It was very probably a cliché, but Mitchell liked his coffee black as night and bitter as death. It wasn't what he really wanted, but it was the only substitute he had, even thought too much caffeine made him almost as jittery as George.
But on some nights, the worst nights, when nothing could stop him leaving the house and prowling the streets, when he returned shaking with the effort of hanging on to his self-control by only a slender thread, Annie would make him tea, hot and sweet and milky white.
And he would know that he was home.