It was the sunrise that woke her.
Not the gentle hands that dared to soothe her, nor the melody that whispered its longing into the darkness, but the promise of a new day.
Clover's eyes fluttered as long streams of sunlight cut through the darkness and cast a warmth across her skin. Her eyes squeezed shut at its brilliance and the red tint from behind her eyelids was almost comforting enough to lure her back into slumber, but the addition of the soft flipping of pages to the ambient noise of the library caught her attention. Clover stretched with a soft whine, reaching her fingers out above her head until her joints popped before dropping them to rest against the solid form beneath them. Her eyes fought against her will for them to open, scrunching shut as her nose wrinkled, but she pursued, eventually finding the strength to open one eye to peer out into the room around her.
"Good morning."
Alastor sat above her, one arm stretched out along that of a leather sofa holding a book, the other resting lazily against the sofa beside her. Fingers froze against her forehead as her head tilted up to look at him, the bits of her bangs still caught between Alastor's claws falling back into her face as he pulled his hand away quickly. His leg shifted beneath her wrists, and suddenly it was all a little too much for her to take in this close to waking.
An ache was forming in the back of her skull from the metaphorical whiplash Alastor continued to throw at her. He swung between tenderness and detachment, changing the course of his own emotions as rapidly as his radio switched stations, and Clover was beginning to wonder whether it was simply his way of existing or a means to cope with the new-found feelings he'd admitted to the night before.
Clover pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes as she curled into herself once again, allowing another soft, squeaking noise to clear her throat before she replied.
"Mornin'."
"Did you sleep well?"
A thump of a book being tossed against a hollow surface had her peering through her fingers at him, Alastor's attention turning fully towards her. She didn't know why she wasn't fully flustered by the fact that she'd nearly laid herself across his lap in her stretching, or by the obvious missing weight of his hand petting her hair while she had slept, but as she looked up at him in her barely awake state, Clover decided she was just going to commit. Her knees ached from being bent for so long, curled into her stomach and unable to stretch to their normally sprawled sleeping state due to the constrictions of the couch's arm. With a soft huff, she planted her feet against the cushions and pushed, sliding across the leather and smoothly landing at her destination. Her ears flopped across his knees as she adjusted, Alastor going stiff beneath her as the radio began to fizzle.
"Is this okay? My legs were kind of cramped." Clover asked, completely unable to keep her smile out of her voice no matter how hard she fought to remain straight-faced. From beneath her bangs, she could see the nervous flicking of Alastor's ears as he nodded, fully relaxing against him now that she had his approval. "Otherwise, I slept okay, but ask me again once I've actually woken up all the way. What about you? Did you rest at all after your phone call?"
"No, but that's expected. I rarely sleep."
His hands were on her again, gentle claws barely brushing against the tips of her ears before moving to push her bangs out of her eyes so they could properly look at each other. Clover tilted her head into the touch, wishing she could chase it as he moved to drape his arm across the couch above her but settled with the weight of him beneath her as they moved into lazy conversation.
"By choice or circumstance? I think we've had this conversation before, but-"
"But, you are never quite satisfied without a full explanation." Alastor's crooked smile was as endearing upside down as it was normally, the demon propping his chin up against his palm. "Sleep is a complex companion, many of us aren't allowed the luxury due to our damnation, but I do not like wasting time."
"...Do you have nightmares?"
The station changed, the idle static switching into a calm but cheery melody, and Alastor turned to stare out the window. His near-silence was enough of an answer for Clover, but she wasn't done with the topic.
"You have a bedroom hidden in here somewhere, right?"
"I think so."
Her giggling was unstoppable, Clover hiding behind her hands as she laughed. Alastor's radio sputtered at her outburst, the demon turning his eyes downward once again to watch as ears twitched across his lap while she fought to regain her composure. His tone had just been so flat, so genuinely unsure, that she couldn't help herself, Clover fighting for breath to continue the conversation before she offended him.
"I'm sorry, it's just- It's your house, Al."
Sitting up was a challenge, even more so with the sore state of her sides screaming in protest at the movement, but Clover managed with a short huff. The helping hand of Alastor that hovered beside her shoulder went unnoticed, dropped into the warmth she'd left behind where dark claws curled into the cushion.
"Well, recently my time spent here has been solely devoted to my studio, and that occasion in itself has grown exceedingly rare." Alastor stood, trailing after her as Clover wandered into the areas of the library that had been hidden from her in the darkness of the night before.
A flash of ivory caught her eye and Clover dropped her arms from where they had stretched above her head to investigate. The piano was half concealed behind a bookcase, the light of the rising sun just barely reaching the foot pedals and the dark wood of the thing shining with a fresh coat of polish. She experimentally pressed a key, the note resonating above the idle static that followed behind her with full, well-tuned clarity.
"Do you play?"
Clover turned at Alastor's voice in her ear, looking up at the demon who had positioned himself at her hip.
"No, not really. I know a couple of easy songs."
Clover pressed another key, searching for the correct one to prove her point with. Once she'd found it, her fingers fell back into a familiar melody, the remnants of piano lessons' past. A too-fast rendition of "Yankee Doodle" filled the room momentarily, Alastor's soft laughter brushing past the back of her neck as he leaned in to watch. She could feel him behind her, just an inch, maybe two, from contact. Any shift of her weight would press her against him, and for a moment she wondered what he would do with her then. It wasn't an unknown contact between them, they'd been pressed far closer together during their night at Mimzy's, but her worry that something had shifted between them ate away at her slowly waking subconscious.
"I know that one and then-" Clover paused, her fingers freezing above the keys as she pondered her next move. Her limited technical knowledge had offered her an opportunity, and with a slow breath and a soft clearing of her throat, she decided to take it.
"Heart and soul, I fell in love with you,"
It was too slow, too measured, and the melody fell flat without accompaniment; She was sure he was going to see through her. Even so, Clover let herself fall back into him, wavering on her feet as the anxious beating of her heart gifted her with a spell of dizziness. Her voice shook as she half-sang along to her clumsy picking of the melody.
"Lost control, the way a fool would do. Gladly…" She almost missed the next key when the weight of claws appeared around her waist, her voice dying off as she ran out of breath. "Because you held me tight, and stole a kiss in the night…"
Alastor's voice was muffled by where he'd rested his chin atop her head.
"You're more talented than you lead yourself to believe, cher."
His arms trapped her against him as they had the night before and she prayed that she was safely hidden in the shadow of him, for she was sure she was flushing a shade of scarlet bright enough to rival the hair that brushed against her cheek as he leaned around her and lay his own hand beside hers. When her fingers retreated from the piano to give him room to play, he gave a soft "tsk" into her ear, removing his arm from where it had encircled her to take her wrist and gently return her hand to the keys. When he seemed satisfied that she'd given in, he took hold of her once again, his touch carving a burning indent into her waist. He pressed his own set experimentally, pausing to listen to each note before he continued.
"And the next verse?" His voice was so soft against her, a contrast to the unforgiving cage of limbs he'd trapped her in, but with the teasing edge of a smile; He had to know what he was doing at this point, Clover thought. Every move he made was heavy with purpose, perfectly measured to pluck her heartstrings and play her his intoxicating tune. She felt her head beginning to spin at the intimacy of it all, and the only thing keeping her from swooning was the sound of Alastor's voice. "On my count,".
The rhythm of her heartbeat was far faster than the one he drummed against her side, almost causing her to miss the cue he muttered against her temple.
"-and soul, I begged to be adored," Clover could barely hear her own voice over the blood rushing through her ears, unable to tell the quality of it as she fought to catch up. She swallowed hard, trying her best to take in enough breath to sustain their song while she still had the chance. "Lost control, and tumbled overboard, gladly…"
The keys felt like ice beneath her fingertips as she played alongside him, trying her hardest to ignore the graceful movements of black claws contrasting against the ivory. Through the warm fog of desire clouding her mind, she recognized the clicking of radio static, and as she focused on it, found the echoing of her own amplified voice among the feedback.
It almost sounded pretty that way.
"That magic night we kissed…"
Too breathless to continue, Clover finished the last notes of her melody before letting her hands fall to her sides. Alastor's thumb dragged across the knit of her sweater, allowing her a moment of reprieve from his endless onslaught on her fragile emotional state before he undid her once again, this time with just two simple words.
"Very good."
Her teeth ground down on the inside of her lip, and the taste of iron coated her tongue as Clover bit back the whimper his praise had pulled from her. Luckily, he seemed too distracted to notice her blunder, the rapid tuning of his radio giving him away and granting her enough confidence to offer chase. Clover cleared her throat, leaning her head back against his shoulder and turning to whisper daringly against his cheek.
"Your turn."
A sharp laugh blew across her neck, and Clover could have screamed at how tightly he'd wound her. He moved away quickly enough to not notice the shiver that ran down her spine, Alastor stepping around her to take a seat at the piano. She moved out of his way, leaning into the heavy wooden instrument to maintain her balance as Alastor cracked his knuckles and set to playing an oddly familiar tune.
Clover's heart leapt in the hopes that she'd hear him sing again when he took a sudden breath, but Alastor fell silent, ears lying flat atop his head. If she listened closely, she could hear him faintly humming along among his static, the vibrational duet between man and melody sinking into her spine between each rapid patter of her heartbeat.
The light of Hell's red sun now drifted across the piano in its entirety, casting shadows beneath the fingers that danced across the keys. She could have watched him play forever, completely enraptured by the graceful movements of his claws, but Clover's attention was called upward as Alastor's radio began to interfere.
"If this isn't love then why do I thrill?
And what makes my head go round and round while my heart stands still?"
It flickered into accompaniment before the station shifted into a swelling static that his frantic tuning attempted to control. Alastor's ears lay flat against his head as he played, anxiously flicking now and then despite the mask of calm he wore, and her heart began to ache
It was moments like these where Clover longed for that damned camera, the cause of all her troubles, just so she could savor him forever. She wondered if Alastor knew how beautiful he truly was. The Radio Demon was vain, there was absolutely no doubt about that, and surely he had endless knowledge of how handsomeness aided him in alluring other demons. But did Alastor, the man she'd grown so fond of, truly understand how he took her breath away? Was his dancing around whatever had developed between them due to misunderstanding, or was it just disinterest? Alastor's natural ability to lock into her every desire was dangerous, he played with her as if he'd practiced it, but even then he seemed to surprise himself. Sometimes, it felt like he was testing her, touching just enough to figure out if it was to his liking, but then there were moments like these, where he'd fall head first into seduction with a smile. Alastor was not naive, perhaps just inexperienced, but even then it was hard to tell. Was Alastor as out of his depth in their budding relationship as she was? It felt like every time Clover found the right steps to take, he changed direction, pulling her off balance in this endless twisting tango of temptation that neither of them had decided to lead.
A shaking breath layered with static broke through the overlapping melody that had begun to accompany him.
"If I didn't care, would it be the same?
Would my every prayer begin and end with just your name?"
The longer she looked at him, the more she wanted to understand. Her fingers longed to reach out and smooth the lines in his forehead, to pull him out of his thoughts and soothe him with gentle affirmation. Very little about Alastor bothered her, at most his quirks got on her nerves now and again, but none of it was enough to turn her away from putting together this sharp-edged puzzle.
"And would I be sure that this is love beyond compare?
Would all this be true, if I didn't care for you?"
Not even the pain of uncertainty.
Her head rested against her arm as she watched him, admiring the effortless romance of him. Alastor's smile meshed together in that confusing manner as he chanced a glance up at her from between lowered lids, casting that warm, sentimental glow of a radio lit from within across his skin. Crimson eyes flickering over the small smile she gave him in return, Clover lifting the back of her hand to nudge her glasses back into their proper place and his eyes followed the motion momentarily before falling closed as Alastor's fingers found the final keys. He leaned into the motion, his brow unfurrowing with a soft sigh as a broken silence fell over them again.
All was still as they breathed together, not even the rising sun daring to move in case it disturbed them. Clover knew she could never truly tell him the ridiculous measures her mind took to make sense of him, she wasn't sure she had the strength to explain. But now, in the quiet of the early morning, she wanted to try. Dark eyes turned to her as she whispered into the space between them.
"Alastor, I-"
What? What could she say to him?
I adore you, I want you, I need you, I'm obsessed with you, I love-
No, it was still too soon for all of that. That depth of truth before they'd learned to tread water may be enough to drown them both. As much as she wished to continue to be honest with him, he'd already voiced his want for time, and her respect for him far outweighed her own selfish desires. She wouldn't overstep with him again, not unless she was sure the delicate bond they'd forged together wouldn't shatter under the weight of her admiration.
Or until the way he looked at her drove her mad.
"...You really know how to make a girl feel like an amateur, is there anything you aren't good at?"
Alastor stared at her for a long moment before breaking out into one of the wide, smug smiles that seemed to always quirk one brow upward without him even trying. The room once again filled with noise as he sharply set his fingers to the keys, seeming to test the strength of the instrument itself with how passionately he played. He banged out a quick ragtime tune, the end of a song that Clover thought sounded familiar despite obviously being played up-tempo, before dragging his hands along the length of the thing and plucking the highest key for emphasis.
The beat of self-satisfied silence that followed combined with his theatrics was too much, Alastor looked far too proud of himself, and Clover fell into another fit of giggling, but this spout of laughter seemed far more infectious than the last. She sadly didn't get to see Alastor fall to pieces; Her face had long been hidden in the creases of her arms on top of the piano by the time his roaring laugh perked up her ears, and she didn't dare look up, no matter how much the sound made her heart soar. It wasn't until both of their fits had subsided into a dusting of giggling that filled the quiet morning, Clover breathing out slowly in an attempt to calm herself before looking at him again.
The radio flickered as he caught her eye, the red demon's ears flicking back and forth as that last of his laughter died off. He was breathless, and it was beautiful. Sunlight bounced off the ivory, casting a soft light across his skin that almost brought his ashen shade back to the warm tones she'd captured and kept hidden away in her bedside table.
"Well!" Alastor sat forward suddenly, sliding the piano's cover closed in one fluid motion before his palms met his knees, and the force of the movement pulled him to his feet. "Now that it's a more reasonable waking hour, what shall you like to do on this fine Saturday morning, my dear?"
Blinking up at him as he yet again swiftly steered them back into more casual conversation, Clover thought of what they could do at a time like this. There were a million options to entertain with their minds combined, but currently all but one escaped her as the early hour of her awakening began to weigh heavily on her eyelids.
"Want to get some coffee? I'll buy."
Alastor left her alone briefly to change into clothes that "better suited an outing", which Clover came to learn upon his return, to her almost-dismay, just meant his normal red suit and tails. She was sad to see her small glimpse of the more casual, homebound Alastor disappear behind the "Radio Demon" theatrics once again, but after further pondering during their trip down his intricate iron elevator to the bottom floor, she decided that she'd much rather keep that intimate image to herself.
Their walk to the cafe was calm, quiet, the Cannibal Colony still waking up as the sun stretched down cobbled streets. A few stragglers loitered outside Mimzy's as they passed, and Clover wondered what their flirtatious flapper friend had been doing since she'd seen her last. Alastor paused to peer into darkened windows when they reached Rosie's emporium, his radio flickering momentarily before it landed on a peppy piano tune that set the pace for their promenade.
As their normal entry into the Colony grew closer, the air began to change. The normal static she associated with Alastor grew heavy, the demon's steps growing quicker as the staircase came into view. Clover struggled slightly to keep up with him, still a little weak on her feet after the events of the night before, but her grip on his arm stood steadfast. It wasn't until she'd set foot on the staircase itself that she caught on to what exactly had altered his mood until her own anxiety hit her full force.
It would be impossible to avoid the carnage of last night if they continued on this path.
"Alastor-"
He stopped on a dime, turning quickly on his heel and stepping down beside her. The tightness of his smile settled slightly, and the radio fell quiet as he began to speak.
"Perhaps I have overestimated, that was my mistake. We shall go another way."
He was already moving back down the staircase, holding out a hand to help her, but Clover couldn't make herself move. The cold grip of trauma was already creeping back up her throat, but behind the suffocating memory was another. Now that she thought about it, Alastor seemed very keen on returning to the scene of his crimes once again before she'd spoken up and as morbid as the habit was, Clover could understand why in this instance;
She herself wanted to be absolutely sure there was nothing left.
Ignoring what that thought could have possibly said for the decline of her morality, Clover decided to press forward.
"No, it's just- I needed a moment," Clover took the hand Alastor offered to her, intertwining her fingers with his and giving them a soft squeeze to punctuate her point. "And I need this."
"I see."
Alastor stepped up beside her again, shifting her hand into the one closest to her so they could walk properly. She was almost surprised by the soft smile he gave her when she attempted to drop the embrace as they entered the more public streets outside of the Colony, but the feeling was quickly overwhelmed by the warm fluttering the expression sparked beneath her skin.
Maybe her patience with him was going to pay off sooner rather than later if they continued on this path together.
It was apparent before they'd even gotten to the scene of the crime that Rosie had indeed done her work by the lack of bystanders crowding the city streets; Nothing drew a crowd quite like a disaster. Clover led their pace as they passed through the intersection that had housed her latest tragedy, her head turning to peer down the alleyway where she'd been assaulted for the third time since arriving in hell and finding little more than the remaining shards of broken bottles that hadn't pierced her skin scattered across the concrete. The rest of the street looked inconspicuous, perhaps tinted the slightest bit rosier than usual, save from the demon wiping blood from his store windows across the street with a squeegee.
"A fine morning, isn't it?" Alastor chirped from above her, his head turning to watch the final drops of his handiwork disappear into an iron bucket.
"It is. We could sit outside, at the cafe?"
He pondered her offer, humming softly before his gaze dropped to the hands she'd begun to absentmindedly swing between them as they walked. The motion stilled immediately with a sharp tensing of Clover's muscles at the realization, her fingers beginning to slip out from between his, but he held them steadfast until they reached their destination. He released her briefly then, stepping around her to open the door and motioning her inside with a wide sweeping of his arm and the slightest bow at the waist. Clover covered her face as she snorted, skipping up the small step into the cafe with a smile.
"Greetings and s-s-salutations, what the fuck are you doin' here on ya' day off?"
"Good morning to you too, Cyrus," Clover called back, relinking her arm with Alastor's as the door closed behind them.
It was when her voice echoed back to her, too loud in the nearly full cafe, that she noticed the glaring change in atmosphere. The normal hustle and bustle she would have expected from the morning rush fell silent as she peered around the room and found every demon staring as she and Alastor stepped inside, save for one of the two imps standing at the end of the pick-up counter, who continued to babble on while scrolling through a cell phone. Alastor didn't seem to notice as he continued to hum along to his radio and stepped into the line that had formed in front of the register, pulling Clover along for the ride as the Radio Demon took his natural place in society. She'd barely realized that they'd been offered to skip to the front until Alastor was turning to the spot on the floor she was stuck to in search of her opinion on the matter.
"Uh- No, thank you. I don't even know what I want yet."
The small, shaking sheep demon that had made the offer turned to Alastor for confirmation.
"As the lady said!"
Clover's ears nearly popped with the rush of sound that started up again as everyone went back to pretending to mind their own business. The weight of Alastor against her soothed the anxious buzzing of her nerves as eyes continued to bore into her back, giving her enough clarity to pretend to gaze at Cyrus's updated menu board and decide what she was craving this morning.
It wasn't until Cyrus himself moved to grab a pastry from the slowly emptying display case that she broke the facade, leaning around the hulking form of a skull-headed demon at the front of the line to watch as he took a cinnamon roll from its plastic platter. Her eyes darted quickly across the rest of the display to find what she was looking for, spying the sole hazelnut roll sitting sadly between two empty plates. Tapping her fingers against Alastor's arm as she counted the number of people in front of them, she almost regretted not taking the offer to skip as she tried, and failed, to catch Cyrus's eye.
"What are you wanting for, my dear?" Alastor's voice in her ear turned her attention away momentarily, looking up at him to find a smile twisted with amusement.
What a loaded question that was, in retrospect.
"It's- Silly." Clover whispered back. They moved together as the line shifted forward, a quartet of shiny black shoes shuffling across the tile.
"Nonsense." Alastor scoffed, dropping his hold on her and leaving her in their place in line to look over the pastry case himself.
The curiosity of what he was doing exactly was enough to keep her from questioning him, and as the line moved further ahead, it all became clearer. The next patron gestured to one of the many leftover Devil's Food Cake slices without issue, but as the demon moved on to order the last of the lemon-poppyseed muffins, a rise in radio static stalled them. This repeated itself with the next demon who dared to order the last of their brownies, and then again when the sheep demon in front of them shakily pointed to the carrot cake bars Clover had added to the menu. It was then that she couldn't stand it any longer, as amusing as Alastor's little plan to get her what she wanted was.
"Go ahead, you can have the last one. They're really good."
It was their turn then, Alastor stepping back beside her with a proud grin as he tilted his head down at her while they waited on Cyrus to return to the register.
"All of that trouble could have been avoided had you just told me what you wanted, cher."
Clover waved his teasing away with frantic fingers, her cheeks beginning to match the color of Alastor's suit, and was thankful when Cyrus rejoined them.
"You get home okay last night? Heard there was-s-s an… accident, down the block." He hissed, narrowing his eyes as he looked up at the Radio Demon beside her. "Heard it was brutal, nothin' was left of the guy 'cept some fur."
"Ah, yes! The Colony was abuzz with talk of it! But, it seems your business is bustling as usual, my friend! You must see so many demons daily in such a lucrative location. May I ask, if you've had any interesting customers this morning?"
The silence that followed was so stiff it felt manufactured. Clover's neck began to ache as she turned between the two men, watching as Cyrus's tongue flicked out between his teeth and Alastor's smile twisted ever so slightly at the corners in response. That tingling that she was being watched began to raise the hairs on the back of her neck again, but before she could turn to try and find which of the many demons dotting the cafe was to blame, the conversation continued.
"A couple." Cyrus hissed, the thud of his boot against the mat behind the counter audible as he turned towards Clover. "What can I get ya'?"
"Uh- Cold brew, half vanilla, and half hazelnut, with nutmeg and cream." She rattled off one of her favorites without thinking, still caught up in the vaguely threatening exchange that had just happened in front of her, and ignored Alastor's knowing smile as she gestured toward the pastry case. "A hazelnut roll, please, and- Al?"
"Coffee, black."
"...With a teaspoon of the spices we use to top the chai, stirred in at the bottom."
Clover ignored the quirk of Cyrus's brow at her addition and instead turned to fetch her wallet out of her bag as he read back her total, the price notably reduced once he'd punched it into their register. By the time she'd turned back again, the register's drawer was sliding closed, and Alastor was depositing the remaining coins into the chipped mug that served as their tip jar.
"I told you I was buying."
"It's adorable that you thought I would let you." Alastor sounded utterly pleased with himself, sending her a smug glance out of the corner of his eye before moving on to take a seat by the window and wait patiently for their drinks, her coveted pastry safely in hand.
Standing on her toes, Clover shuffled along the length of the bar to follow Cyrus as he returned to making the line of drinks that had formed across the countertop. When he looked up at her peering at him from between the syrup bottles, she noticed the lack of messy strands getting stuck against the slightly raised ridges of his cheekbones and took the time to pay closer attention to the not-so-friendly owner of the neighborhood coffee shop. Sandy blonde was slicked back away from his face today, shining slightly with some sort of substance that kept it in place as Cyrus bent down to fetch milk from the cooler below the bar and popped back up with a small hop. Clover had never really looked at him that closely before, their relationship didn't call for it, but now it was safe to decide that Cyrus was one of the least offensive-looking demons she'd encountered, when he wasn't busy scowling at the world around him, of course.
Waiting until he'd called out one of the many drinks he'd completed, Clover moved into the now-empty space at the end of the bar so she could talk to her friend.
"I like your hair like that, you should push it back more often."
"Thanks-s-s, Cloves." Cyrus raised a brow as he poured nearly half of their containers of sugar into the next beverage, setting it under the espresso machine before moving on to what she recognized as her drink. "You okay? Ya' don't gotta talk about it but, like, it's obvious what happened."
"I don't know what you're talking-"
His steely glance from over the top of the bean hopper was enough for her to realize exactly what he was referring to, and the chill it sent through her had her pulling her sweater sleeves down over her knuckles, worried he could see the bandages beneath.
"I can s-s-smell the blood, most people in here probably think it's just the big man over there rubbin' off on ya', but I know it's yours. It's the s-s-same as the first time I met ya'."
She took the moment she was given while he filled her cup with ice and topped it with cream to try and figure out her answer, watching as Cyrus swirled the liquids together until it formed a familiar caramel before placing it in front of her.
"...I'm fine, Alastor was there."
"Figured." Cyrus's sigh was almost drowned out by the grinding of ceramic against marble as he pushed Alastor's coffee toward her. Yellow eyes flickered over her momentarily, lingering on her extremities before he pushed back from the hand-off and stepped back behind the espresso machine. "Get some rest doll, I'll s-s-see ya' on Monday."
Alastor stood as she moved towards him, taking his coffee from her with a smile.
"Shall we take the morning air, as you said before? It is a bit crowded here."
The door was already open before she finished her humming agreement, Alastor juggling both his own coffee mug and her pastry as he held the door open for her. Clover barely dodged the two imps that rushed forward towards the handoff, the jingling of the door closing behind her echoing out into the otherwise quiet street alongside the announcement of the next order's completion, the outburst that followed, and Cyrus's wheezing laughter.
"I've got a cavity in a cup for- Uh, Bingo!"
"Goddammit, you son of a fucking bi-"