life's a lullaby

When she takes the glass from him, Saenoo catches himself from actually whining like a child. He groans instead and drags his feet all the way to the bar. 

His head goes immediately back down on a flat surface when he seats himself comfortably on a stool, and he finally manages to say “thanks” to the kind bartender. 

When he finally gets a better glance at her to order the coldest beer the pub has, he realizes a little too late that it’s the barista from Wide Awake. He fights the crushing awkwardness from not recognizing her sooner.

He sits up straight suddenly, embarrassed by his poor manners, heat wave or no heat wave. “Uh shit, sorry… It’s Maude right? I don’t think we’ve ever actually talked beyond my coffee order.” He stops talking abruptly when he realizes she probably knows his name but wonders if he should introduce himself anyways.

SAENOO

Another patron bellows out their guess, and Maude queues up the song with a solemn shake of her head. The other merrymakers groan, some slapping sympathetic pats on the back of the original guesser’s back and shoulder. They hang their head, and the soft, smoky wisp of their elected tune wafts into the air.

Maude refills Saenoo’s drink and slides it over to him, adding it to his tab after transferring his seating place to the stool by the bar’s edge. “Maude,” she mimics, one side of her mouth perking up in amusement. “I like your accent,” she continues, now in her own.

Cal doesn’t know what he was expecting, but it takes considerably less effort than he imagined to make peace with her via a bag of Doritos. Once she sits down, he places it on the towel between the two of them, but not before popping a couple into his mouth. 

It feels bizarre to be asked to introduce himself in his hometown where practically everyone knows him and his family ― well, everyone meaning the longtime Cove residents. “Callum,” he offers, pushing up his sunglasses to balance them on top of his head. “And you? You’re not from around here, are you?”

CALLUM

The bag squeaks and crackles under the pressure of Maude’s fumbling hand, her fingers snatching at a few chips. She cups the small pile in her other hand, lifting the first to her mouth and taking a cautious bite out of one of the corners. A far too chemical taste to be called ‘cheesy’ sticks to her taste buds and dries on the roof of her mouth. Maybe she shouldn’t have grabbed a pile. With the chip held between her teeth, she carefully the rest back into the bag, flashing Callum a quick, apologetic look.

“Maude,” she returns, forcing herself to take another bite. “Nope. Which I s’pose means you are?”

jude-morgan​:

[ closed starter for @adaedwards @ohmaude ]

Her phone buzzes in her pocket. Jude doesn’t need to check it to know it’s either her father or step-mum trying to contact her, their egos surely still smarting after Jude didn’t show up to dinner at Triton with them. Good.

It buzzes again. She turns it off this time, finishes her pint, and contemplates the Knight and Grail’s dessert menu before her. She can’t decide what she wants, but perhaps she doesn’t have to? Impulsively (and perhaps somewhat petulantly), she addresses the two people closest to her.

“I’m going to order every dessert on the menu and I want you both to try them with me.” Jude informs. “It’s my birthday so you can’t say no, or that the sugar will rot my teeth.”

__

Ada’s still nursing her wounds after seeing Freddie again. It had been a successful 5 years since she’d had her last real thought about how much he broke her heart. Seeing him again only reopened the wound like a child tearing through wrapping paper on Christmas morning, haphazard and careless. A night out with friends would be good for her–and celebrating Jude’s birthday would be an excellent reason to think about anything else. She grabbed a light jacket (she did always get cold in pubs) and the wrapped gift she’d made for Jude, a small 15x15cm painting of poppies (August’s birth flower) overlooking the coastline of the Cove and headed down to the Knight and Grail.

“I’d never turn down desert,”Ada grinned. “you know I’d do anything for some sticky toffee pudding right about now–ooh, or banoffee pie with ice cream piled high.”

@jude-morgan​

Rarely does Maude find that life is merciful; later on, she may consider this moment an example of when it actually is. See, as of right now, Maude is pleasantly ignorant of Ada and Freddie’s past. Otherwise, this would have been a very, very awkward celebration. Thankfully, it isn’t, and Maude smiles along with the other two, snorting her amusement when Jude pipes up.

She snaps her fingers in Ada’s direction, pointing at her with her thumb held high, hand in the shape of a gun. “Sticky toffee,” Maude agrees, “love a bit of sticky toffee– is there fudge? The melt-in-the-middle one. I thought we could stick one of these in it.” She produces a brand new pack of birthday candles from the small canvas bag slumped by her side. 

“Alternatively,” Maude starts, stretching her arms out across the table to drum her knuckles on the somewhat sticky surface, “we stick a candle in every pud we order. How old are you again, Jude?”

“Hi,” Nadia echoes, biting back a laugh. She’s tempted to ask if there’s something on her face–doesn’t quite want to be that cliche. Decides if there is fuck it, it’s three am, she can style it out. It’d be a shame to ditch now, just as things are getting interesting. 

She turns her attention briefly to the litter of lads, hiking a thumb in their direction. “You think? I’d love to join, been working on my apathy for just such an occasion.” 

Nadia

In the background, drunken roars of appreciation erupt from every corner of the pub; for a moment, Maude watches arms fly into the air, flushed faces stretch wide with euphoric grins. Such simple joys.

She laughs a little, arms folding on the bar to lean on them. Her eyes are reluctant to blink, lest they waste a mere moment not admiring the patron’s sharp, wise-looking features.

Tom isn’t paying attention to the crowd, more watching the way his watch ticks the seconds painfully slowly. Once three rolls around, he figures he can make it home without stumbling across his sister. He sighs, shaking his rest until his jacket covers his sleeve. Later he can feel guilty. The heat makes his hair impossible to tame and a drink already emptied of ice as he downs it in a single go. It’s the laughter that reminds him others are around and he looks up in time to catch a familiar set of eyes. “Hm,” he says, trying to place her a moment. Too many familiar places, too poor of a memory. “We’re guessing your favorite song. What about a hint for the decade? Help us narrow down the options.”

The answer doesn’t really matter to him. Between his brother and his parents, he’s got more money than someone like him has ever held. Tom studies her, thinking over possibilities. “Can’t say I’m the best at guessing, trivia has never been my strong suit.” Not his priority either, though he shrugs rather than say this. “Pete seems pretty adamant about his answer, he a regular?” Tom eyes him, taking in his red face and general air of drunkenness. “He looks like he needs water. Might be luck he can’t think of another answer, wouldn’t envy the person who has to take him home.”

Tom

She hasn’t exactly spoken to him, given that there’d been no need, up until now, but she knows him from the neighbourhood. He stands out, given his height. Then again, tall people have always stood out to Maude. She doesn’t trust them. The air must be thinner up there, it makes them think in funny ways. Hence, perhaps, why this patron asks for a clue, something that Maude has always insisted takes the fun out of the occasion. Especially given that, really, the game’s only there to explore everybody else’s musical tastes, and to craft a unique cocktail of sounds that’ll only last the night.

Even after asking for help, the lad doesn’t seem all that engaged. Maude stares at him, her blank expression impregnable. Customer service has given her plenty of time to practice wiping her features clean of emotion. They’re impervious, by now.

“He’s... come by ever now and then, yeah.” Maude glances over at the unsuspecting subject of conversation, who’s desperately trying to roll a cigarette. He seems to have crumpled up the rizla, and there’s tobacco spilling all over the high table. Maude makes a note of cleaning that later.

“I’m sure they’ll be fine.”

Saenoo receives a text from his friend, who was going to have some beer and hang out with him, that he can’t make it. He slumps down in his booth in disappointment while his hand still clutches the only remotely cool thing in the entire pub, his empty glass.

At this stage, he would really like to melt into his seat. So much so, that he has stripped off his cardigan which is his standard uniform around the Cove. It lays lifeless next to him while he stretches as much of himself across the booth’s table as he can. The cool surface immediately turns just as hot as the rest of the room, and he groans inwardly in disgust of the never ending heat.

 “What?” he replies while he lazily turns his head to the sound of the voice. “Oh actually, I never know the name of songs or even the artist,” he chuckles weakly.

He barely lifts his glass of the table and asks, “Can I please get another one? I’ll come get it as soon as I can peel myself off of this table.”

She knows that cardigan. It’s odd to see the guy without it; had she not spotted it after a quick and curious scan, she probably wouldn’t have recognised him, yet the glint of such a realisation brightens the brown of her eyes. His accent gives him away, too. Probably what prompted Maude to search for the item of clothing in the first place. He’s a regular at Wide Awake; while Maude is yet to spark a proper conversation with him, she’s seen him around, served him, appreciated some of his more generous tips.

“Right.”

As soon as the question falls from his lips, Callum realizes how pointless it is. There is literally nothing he can do about it. What’s he going to do? Help the other person get undressed and dust off the sand?

“Right, uh—” He looks up at her behind his sunglasses, face scrunched up in a grimace under the piercing rays that warm his bare skin. She doesn’t seem mad, just… mildly irritated, maybe. Oh, and an unfamiliar face, Cal notices absent-mindedly. (Just how many people have moved to the Cove while he was away?) 

A long pause follows as he scrambles to think of a solution. In the end, he ends up offering: “D'you like crisps?”

Callum

Crisps. She does like crisps, but as with many things she is awfully particular about which ones she’ll eat. Maude tilts her head, nodding once only to better emphasise her curiosity. “What kind?” she asks.

When the answer turns out to be Doritos, Maude almost sticks her tongue out to fake a gag. After a particularly horrifying incident revolving around too much rum and two whole bags of said savoury snack, she’d sworn those traitorous little triangles off for good. Then again, she’s peckish, and it’s free food.

__

You know, just calling me an author doesn’t finish conversations, neighbor-lady; it doesn’t mean anything, it’s not like I did something ground-breaking or anything. I just stuck some words together–I was more useful working for the Port Authority.

Oh, it’s nothing terrible–he just loved people and loved to dance and sometimes he came off a little amorous to people who didn’t know him, and some other fellas didn’t take it too well. He wasn’t trying to cause trouble, it was just a little bit in his nature.

–

Sorry, just... You don’t think writing really means... anything...?

Nadia’s quest to scope out all the local hotspots was bound to lead her here eventually. Not that she’d been avoiding it, per se, just wasn’t quite sure what to expect after a long line of questionable experiences in pubs and clubs in the past. Mostly, she was hoping not to walk into some sort of secret, fish-worshipping cult meeting without at least knowing the dress code. Fortunately she found nothing of the sort, just an ordinary pub which seemed to swallow her time like a sinkhole.

She starts, surprised by the sudden question after having enjoyed watching others guess. Nadia clears her throat. “Well if you’re sure it’s not Wonderwall…Must be ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’. Those are the only two options.”

—

Oh, shit. When she’d turned around, caught the other’s attention, she hadn’t expected her to be so pretty. There’s something in her eyes that leaves Maude a little starstruck, as if she’d been granted a peek into a whole other universe, vastly different to this grey, dismal one they all populate. At least, their small little corner feels pretty grey and dismal, anyway. Or it did. Not anymore.

“Hi,” Maude says, dumbly. She snaps out of it when the song title registers properly in her head. “Ahh, afraid not, actually. But I’ll play it anyway, I’m sure Pete and his gaggle will appreciate the chance for a sing-along.”

__

Well, first of all, I would never insult a person’s mum. Second of all, I feel like sometimes that just happens in Scotland? But thirdly, my boyfriend at the time got a little overenthusiastic with someone who turned out to be someone else’s girlfriend–it was a misunderstanding, but a bit of an experience nevertheless.

—

Hyperbole, mister published author, sir. I’m using hyperbole. You’re not the only one with some creative writing experience under their belt.

It’s that time of the night when inhibitions are low and morale is high, elevated by glistening bubbles fizzing to the surface of many a pint and G&T. The pub’s swollen with heat and hubbub, forced to host more than it can actually accommodate by this nasty case of the summertime sweats. Usually, she’s more than ready to exit, pursued by stress, an hour and a half before her shift ends. By that point, time slows to a sluggish pace, purposefully mocking her. Maybe it’s because of how busy it’s gotten, but tonight’s an exception in this painfully ordinary pattern in Maude Hardgrave’s life.

People are drunk enough to play games, and the one Maude’s brought to the table involves taking over the tinny background music of this month’s Top Ten Charts! She’s plugged her phone in, loaded up Spotify and invited the patrons to guess her favourite song of the week. Whoever does gets a free (cheap) drink.

"Nope, once again: Wonderwall is incorrect. Please stop picking it, Pete,” Maude begs a flushed rugby lad, his meaty head lolling from side to side as he blinks, heavy-lidded, at her, seemingly dumbfounded to learn that he’s chosen the song before. His surrounding team guffaw at him, slap him on the back, and Maude leaves them to it, turning back to the bar only to make eye contact with another patron.