Coffee. Coffee was a thing she needed. It would make the throbbing in her brain stop right? Right. Not that Nola didn't often resemble a walking corpse but today, in particular, Zombie chic was the closest to some sort of style she came. Eyes heavy with bags hid out behind dark sunglasses as she shuffled up the sidewalk toward Alohomocha and the only person who knew how to make coffee black like her soul. The thought caused a small uptick in her lips but even that hurt and quickly settled back into a stony line. She would have just stayed in bed, but she'd actually crashed at the studio the night before and had to clear out early because there were bagpipes and bagpipes could not be a thing today.

The hangover wasn't even really a hangover. It was a I-worked-all-night-fine-tuning-songs-and-experimenting-with-new-sounds lack of sleep-itis. They were so close to releasing their second album she could taste it. Of course there were still a lot of details to hammer out, like a title they could all agree on, but mostly everything was coming together and they were in the final stages of production. Of course Nola was the kind of person that thought of twenty things that could be changed to make a song better after she had agreed to stop fussing. So she'd spent the night working out her anxiety on other collaborations she had agreed to. She'd never complain about the money, but she really was just in it for the music. The fans, the fame, the gigs, it all came second to being able to afford to just create.

That was what had originally drawn her to Leon. He was so talented, she loved watching him work when he'd let her - not at the coffee shop (though she'd done a fair bit of that too) but his real passion, his art. It made her feel centered and at home in her skin watching someone else work so hard on something so beautiful. In her current state she couldn't be as appreciative, but she still meant to ask after his projects as she pulled open the coffee shop door and slithered inside, not bothering to remove her sunglasses as she collapsed in a heap against the counter, "Must have coffee. It feels like my hair has grown nerve ends and they're poking my brain LeLe. I might die," drama queen rock star.

One of Leon’s favourite things about working at Alohomocha, other than the smell and the easy availability of coffee, was that he could usually find some time to sketch instead of doing work. What he was sketching at the moment was technically work, but it was other-work, so it didn’t feel like proper work. Frowning, he flipped the page, making a second attempt at drawing it. He could make the body easily enough, the draped clothes made it easier to keep proportionate, but the face, or more specifically the nose, was giving him difficulty. To hook or not to hook, that was the question. Whether t’was nobler in the mind to suffer the effects of dithering like an indecisive Danish prince.

His thoughts, and attempts at drawing a reasonably angelic face that could still contort into something more vicious, were cut short by the ring of the bell, and Leon’s head jerked upwards almost guiltily, aware that he wasn’t supposed to be sketching, even if there was nothing else for him to do. Fortunately, it wasn’t Clementine, the owner, and even better, it was a friend rather than a regular customer.

“Nola!” he exclaimed, sliding the notebook quickly out of the way – with luck, she wouldn’t notice it. Staring at her in surprise, he reached out a hand, patting her hair gently to reassure her. A little sympathy went a long way when you were in severe need of coffee, but, of course, someone getting on with it and making the coffee for you was much better. Smiling a little at the use of the nickname, which he’d always associate with Irina, he nodded, hastily removing his hand lest the supposed sensitivity of her hair meant that it was paining her.

“Wild night?” he asked over his shoulder, already beginning to make her a coffee – a double espresso, judging from the way she had slumped across the counter. Definitely something with a kick, but no milk, because that would dilute the awakening properties – that was a fact, and anyway, Nola liked her coffee black. “Here,” he said, sliding the cup forward, “I can make another, if you’d like.” It felt a little like being a salesman, but honestly, Leon was just trying to make sure that Nola felt properly able to face the harshness of reality.

The blonde made a small pained mew as Leon patted her hair. It didn't actually hurt she just felt pathetic. Of course being the generous soul he was her friend quickly set about fixing the elixir of life known as espresso. Her sunglasses slid down her nose a bit and she peered over the rims as he worked, clammy skin pressed against the cool counter top. She'd known this was the best possible idea she could have had this morning, and not just because the shop was within walking distance of the studio either (she was in no shape to try to apparate anywhere). "You're so good to me, I could kiss your face," she inhaled deeply as Leon pushed the cup of coffee toward her, already feeling more alert as her slender fingers wrapped around the mug.

"I would ask you to marry me but I should probably not be wearing yesterday's makeup if I'm going to purpose," for a moment she regarded the dark liquid with reverence, then took a large sip lips forming a blissful smile as she swallowed, "I wish it had been a wild night. I'm working on a new arrangement for Sid and the Giant Squid. It lets me stretch my creative legs but Post-Pop-Punk is a really different sound," she wasn't complaining of course. She liked the challenge, even if it wrought havoc on her sleeping schedule. In three more gulps her cup was empty and she slid it back toward Leon, already looking more alert, "Of course it was really just me trying not to think about the boys and the lable," she sighed standing more erect now as she leaned her hip against the counter.

It seemed within the few moments she'd been there she was already feeling more herself as she launched into an explanation for her most recent bout of anxiety, "We've had to push the release date back because there is so much going on in February, but even with the extra month we still can't agree on a title and I'm pretty sure Iggy wants to disown me for pushing a March 11th drop date," she looked a little guilty as she sighed, finally resting her sunglasses atop her head and eyeing Lenon carefully. She could see a little tiny corner of sketch book from behind the counter, and though she had been a walking corpse moments before she hadn't missed how hurriedly he'd hid it. Now that her face didn't feel as though it would break apart, her lips twitched with a curious grin, "What are you working on da Vinci?

“Any time,” Leon promised, laughing at the expression of satisfaction on her face. It wasn’t like he could talk – if anything, he was worse, completely incapable of doing anything until he’d had his morning fix, including asking people to make him coffee, which seemed unfair to him. He nodded as he listened to the rest of her story,  “Way less fun,” he sympathised, glad that the coffee had proved beneficial if the way she was standing straighter was anything to go on. “That sounds frustrating, but I’m sure that what you did will sound incredible, it always does and you work so hard.” A little too hard, sometimes, but he wasn’t about to say as much now, instead repeating his offer of a second coffee, since a hard night working was in some ways even worse than a hard night partying, “Another coffee, to make sure you’re ready to face the day?”

Wrinkling his nose at the use of Da Vinci (which was completely wrong, Da Vinci was… Da Vinci, even if Nola did mean well) Leon put a nervous hand on the sketchbook, sliding it fully out of view. It wasn’t that he minded being caught out, but he didn’t want to show Nola the contents of the book because they weren’t good enough. That was what the sketchbook was for, a way of getting down his rough ideas and gradually working them into something that was worthy of being viewed, so while he was happy to talk about it (at least with Nola) he was considerably less enthusiastic about showing her the contents.

“A commission,” he said cheerfully, “the money is less than great, but it’s enough and the job itself is fun to work on. It’s just, faces.” Because they were the point of focus, faces were almost always what ended up troubling Leon most about statues. It meant that making animals was always initially a blessed relief, before he was confronted with problems of dimension and texture, but having just finished a peacock even the difficulties off the face seemed blissfully simple. “They always end up looking lopsided, or just wrong,” he lamented, rubbing his own face with a tired hand as if for emphasis. Fortunately, repeatedly sketching whatever he was doing, slowly adding details as he went, usually meant that when he started working on stone the end product could be deemed acceptable, sometimes even good.

“But anyway,” he continued, knowing that he could, and would, talk about his work at great length if given the opportunity, “what’s the problem with the eleventh?” It seemed like an okay day to him, but maybe there was something about seasons that meant it wasn’t a good idea. Maybe it was the proximity of the deadline more than anything, because even deadlines that seemed far away had an unpleasant habit of sneaking up and then suddenly looming out of nowhere.