Sugar Addicts
The front of the coffee shop was a plate-glass window. A rainbow assortment of flyers had been taped up inside. They advertised indie rock shows, poetry readings, and little theatre performances. The sun had bleached the older ones into paler hues. A small square of unoccupied glass gave Hannah a view inside, but without shielding her face and pressing her nose to it, she couldn't see anything. It was too dark inside. No way would she be the squashed nose against a window!

Getting up the courage to walk into uncharted territory was a challenge, especially when she wasn't sure who she was looking for. In making plans to hang out in a den of fair-trade coffee beans and scenesters, it hadn't occurred to ask 'Java for Life' two critical things. What's your name? What do you look like? So when she took the plunge and went inside, she wound up standing there, the door smacking against her legs, searching for a pair of glasses. She let eyes that were accustomed to fluorescents adjust to wall sconce light. Mood lighting. The lighting of anti-establishment caffeine addicts listening to Leonard Cohen, from the sounds of it.

Wearing jeans, Converse tennis shoes, and a long-sleeved baseball tee, she could've been any blonde-haired, short girl. It was the bejeweled Treasure Troll in her hand that identified her as 'Pixie Strumpet'. Getting up her gumption, Hannah cleared her throat, a soft but insistent little, "Uh...uhh!" and held the pink-haired figurine aloft. "Bueller?"

Toby was flicking through a folder outlining different types of coffee machines he could order in, till systems and back office software and it was making his head hurt. He tugged his glasses off and rubbed at his eyes before he slid them back on, the folder hitting the table with a distinctly unhappy flump. Enough of that.

His coffee cup jumped in surprise at the shudder that ran through the table and he poked at the cold remains of his java with a wooden stirrer before deciding he definitely needed more. He was... apprehensive... about apparently meeting 'Pixie Strumpet'. One could never quite trust the internet, but it was always an adventure meeting new people and Toby just hoped and prayed that the 'pixie' didn't turn out to be something entirely on the polar end of the spectrum.

His eyes lifted when he heard someone speak and saw the pink hair of a Treasure Troll and let out a short laugh. He got to his feet, shrugging out of his jacket and revealing his t-shirt which read 'For instant human, just add coffee' and whistled, waving a hand just in case the whistle hadn't caught her attention.

Hannah's eyes lit up. "Clark Kent!" She smiled and wove through the tables and overstuffed chairs. It was treacherous territory. Here and there, legs with shoes attached to them jutted out, their owners flopped on the comfortable cushions while they read books or napped with earbuds. Scooting past a pair of Doc Martins, she made it to his table.

"Well," she said, unloading a sky blue messenger bag. It had a couple of books in it and her journal, just in case she got stood up and didn't want to look vulnerable across from an empty chair. "You don't look like an axe murderer. Color me relieved! It's a shade of peach." She set the troll down and stuck out her small hand. "Pixie Strumpet, aka Hannah."

Toby grinned and brushed his jeans down before shaking her hand. "Java is Life, aka Toby." he waved a hand, "Take a seat, do you want a coffee? There's a hapless waitress making the rounds, I can pounce on her before she serves someone else?"

He chuckled and settled himself in his seat again, pushing the folder containing all of his coffee-shop related stuff to one side. It had no place now that the person he was supposed to be meeting had actually turned up. It was a fairly epic feat in itself. Never could tell with the internet. "And you're not... well, I'm relieved too." He rubbed the back of his neck and sheepishly pushed his glasses up his nose. "'s a good thing you brought that with you; otherwise we mighta passed like ships in the night. Or something equally cheesy."

"Sure, I'll get something. But you have to recommend it, if it's fancy, because I'm in enemy territory. All we've got where I work is knock-off Maxwell House. It's a generic generic." Hannah craned her neck and looked around for the waitress. Being supremely sensitive to such things, she didn't want to make a nuisance of herself unless blatantly ignored... except, of course, when the waitress was a tip competitor.

Once she had caught the waitress's eye, she settled into her seat, folding her legs up Indian-style. "Don't worry, I won't leave the troll out the whole time. He's got beady eyes." She put two fingers around the plastic body and rotated it. "You think Don King sued for ripping off his hairstyle?"

Toby watched Hannah for a moment before he shrugged, "The coffee here isn't spectacular, but it's better than a couple of the other shops around." He chuckled, "No coffee is as good as my coffee, though. And it's pretty plain, just ask for it with or without milk and add your own sugar." He waved a hand towards the small pot in the middle of the table with various types of sugar (and pretend sugar) sticks jammed into it. "A couple made a bid for freedom when I took some for the slaughter earlier, but their journey fell short when they realised that they had no legs. And therefore couldn't actually walk or run."

He eyed the troll suspiciously before reaching out to touch its hair. He wrinkled his nose. "Ugh, still as nasty-feeling as I remember it being. I doubt he did, you know, but he should have done. He totally should have done." He nodded seriously, "It does have beady eyes, like it could steal your soul if you stared into them long enough. Maybe that's the price you have to pay for wishing on its belly?"

After the sugar remark, Hannah had stared at Toby with slowly widening eyes. Not because she was weirded out, but because she was kind-of impressed. Unless it was all hyperactive overture, Toby was fluent in the Language of Geek, and she could feel herself leaning a bit forward, getting into his vibe. This often happened when presented by another person as random as herself. She fed off it. Perhaps she had better ask for decaf before she got ridiculous in public.

She picked up the troll and brushed its pink hair back and forth inside her palm. "It is kinda like Brill-o, isn't it? Like, you know... nappy with a side of oil-slick. I bet when you rub its belly, that's when it starts the soul-stealing hypnosis process. First, the little eyeballs turn into swirls, and then the jewel begins to glow and tremble. The power's in the jewel." She set it down and folded her hands. "Hey, did you ever see Village of the Damned, the remake with Superman in it? Christopher Reeve, not Tom Welling."

"Tom Welling wasn't a real Superman." Toby said seriously, "You do not wanna know what I think about that crappy Smallville thing." He shrugged a little and turned his eyes to looking at the jewel, eying it carefully as if he didn't watch it carefully it would come to life, do an evil little gnome-troll dance and then suddenly, BAM, he would be without a soul. "Yeah, I did, the whole cuckoo mentality that was really damn freaky with the little albino kids... Are you drawing comparisons between the soul-stealing trolls and the creepy little children?"

He fell silent when the waitress came over, little notepad in hand and pen clicked out. It was fuzzy and pink. It looked evil to Toby's eyes.

"Can I get you anything?" she asked, false cheer in her voice from working with people for eight hours.

"Uh, I'd like another coffee, black, please, and... Hannah, what would you like?"

She chewed her lip. "Do you have anything in a... minty chocolate? Mayhap a caramel chocolate? But still coffee. If so, that one, a big one. If not, regular." As for the fuzzy pen, she said nothing, just frowned a little and wondered if it was meant to keep customers from stealing it. At the Nugget in Searchlight, they had attached giant, fake flowers to the pens. At the Nugget in Chicago, just a plastic spoon. There was malaise in everything that happened in her current workplace, a sense of 'ah fuckit'.

The waitress put her down for a large caramel-flavored coffee and wandered off with marching orders in hand.

"Back to the freaky kids. When they were hypnotizing people, their eyes would turn into swirlies and glow bright blue," Hannah said, pointing at her eyeballs and twirling her fingers, "And next thing you knew, people were reaching into boiling pots of water and performing autopsies on themselves. That freaked me out for ages! Thank god my eyes aren't blue. I couldn't have stood to look myself in the eye. In the mirror, I mean. Otherwise that'd just be weird."

Toby watched the waitress walk off, still ruminating on her pen before he was dragged back into the conversation. It wasn't unwilling, though, not at all. "After that I don't think I'll ever be able to look anyone in the eye again." He grinned and dropped his gaze to the table, poking a couple of the poor, unfortunate sugar packets that were doomed to a life of table-top misery. He put them back with their covered brothers and sisters, "Just so they're not alone," he explained to Hannah as he slid them back into the pot.

His nose wrinkled again. "See, that's what those things do," he wiggled two fingers towards the troll, "And also that woman's pen. Jesus, things that pink and fluffy have to be part of some kind of evil empire. All novelty pens, in fact, you're not a collector, are you? I knew a girl in school once that collected novelty pens. Then, in senior year, she stabbed one of the other students in the thigh with the giant broccoli pen. I've never been able to look at it the same way..."

Hannah's eyes bulged. "They make broccoli pens?!"

Such unadulterated excitement could only mean one thing. She squeezed her eyes shut. "Guilty. It's not just pens, it's anything novelty. Oh... wait... don't they call sex shops novelty stores? 'Cause that's not what I meant!" Hannah laughed and picked up two elongated sugar packets, careful not to select those Toby had just returned; they'd done their time. "I used to have this trailer I lived in... At first, I thought it was funny to put stuff in the yard. Pinwheels and flamingos and concrete frogs and all? But then I kind-of got into it. I'd go to these flea markets and buy up weird things, like antler coat racks and phones shaped like the Starship Enterprise. I even had a lampshade that doubled as a sombrero. My prized possession was a standing floor lamp shaped like a giraffe."

The sugar packets danced as she talked, a choreographed line-dance routine.

"When I was a teenager, I had a remote control shaped like a lightsaber," Toby admitted after a moment, "Novelty memorabillia I can get behind." He chuckled and then affected a serious look on his face, "But you've never stabbed anyone in the thigh with a novelty pen or novelty coat rack, right?" he asked, looking at her over the rim of his glasses, even though she was little more than a pink and blonde blob in front of him.

When he realised that the English-teacher thing wasn't going to work for him, he just pushed his glasses up a little higher, fascinated by the dance that the sugar packets were doing. It made him want to give them little partners of his own so that they could dance a dosie-do or something like that. His mind ran away with him; they could have a barn dance on the table! The menu could be the barn, the Splenda fake sugar could become the band...

He caught himself getting carried away and blinked back just in time to offer a smile. "Sorry, was imagining a sugar packet barn dance on the table." He figured she wouldn't mind him being a little weird, considering the turns their conversation had taken, it was more than likely that she could keep up.

"Oh my god," she breathed, "With square dancing! In middle school P.E., we had to learn how to do a reel. I remember because it was so embarrassing, holding hands with boys and promenading around." She reached across the table and shoved the sugar packets at Toby. "Hold these! Now dance them back and forth!" On her side of the table, she unfolded one of her legs and tapped her toe lightly on the floor, in time with her clapping hands. "Yee-haa!" As she continued to make an utter idiot of herself in public, Hannah said, "And in answer to your question, no, I never stabbed anybody with a novelty coat rack, although I should note that mounted antlers made a very convenient weapon in Lost Boys."

Behind the counter, a machine whirred to life. Why was revealed fairly quickly, when the waitress came back holding Toby's coffee and Hannah's... monstrocity of whipped cream. "Wow, that's ostentatious!"

"I never did it," Toby admitted as their coffees were bought over, just grinning charmingly at the clear 'what the hell?' look that the waitress was giving their barn-dancing sugar antics. Really, neither of them needed any more coffee, but since when had that stopped anyone? He thanked her and picked up a couple of extra sugar packets (a couple meaning four) and pouring them into the fairly sized cup, grabbing a wooden stirrer to whirl the drink with to get rid of the sugar.

Once the waitress had scurried off again, he eyed Hannah's drink. "That looks like it might topple over if you breathed on it wrong, the Mount Vesuvius of drinks... Creamy death to the saucer below!"

...So, the coffee had clearly had an effect on him, or maybe it was just being around another apparent kindred spirit. Either way, Toby was enjoying himself. There was definitely something to be said for that.

"Noooo, I can't let that happen!" Hannah had not been given a spoon, which left her wearing a somewhat confused look about how to approach her drink. An attempt to sip would end with her nose buried in puffy topping. She leveraged a wooden stirrer and attempted to scrape some off the top, diving in to catch the cloud of whipped cream in her mouth. Some of it oozed down the sides of her cup. "Would you judge me if I licked the saucer?"

Luckily, she was kidding. Once the topping got down to reasonable size, she stirred it and hoped the rest would dissolve. "You know a fun game? You get a piece of sugary bubble gum, set it on a plate, and cover it in whipped cream. Then you challenge somebody to find it using only their mouth, chew it up, and blow a bubble. And they think, you know, easy! But what they don't know is that whipped cream dissolves the bubble gum and you literally can't blow a bubble! It turns into... this pink ectoplasm in your mouth."

"I would judge you, yes," Toby said, somehow managing to keep a deadpan expression on his face that disappeared a couple of moments later. He watched her take the epic mountain of whipped cream down to a manageable level over the rim of his mug, taking a couple of sips of the scalding hot coffee and deciding it needed another sugar.

His eyebrow lifted, the mug being carefully placed back on the table as he added another sugar, stirring it in as he listened. "Pink ectoplasm?" he asked, trying to imagine what that would feel like inside his mouth. The resulting thought made him pull a face. "That sounds like it would be fun if you were the person making people do the thing. Not if you were the poor schmuck getting your face covered in creamy goodness and then trying to chow down on pink ghost gloop."

"Welcome to the world of practical jokes, Toby. I'll be your host, Miss Has-No-Shame." Hannah took her initial sip of the caramel brew, taking tip to let it soak into her tastebuds before forming an opinion. "Hmm! This is good." She licked her lips, afraid there might be whipped cream on her face. The impromptu hootenanny wasn't as embarrassing as white film around her mouth had the potential to be. "By the way... did you just put five packets of sugar in one cup of coffee? That's what I thought I counted."

"That's a smart practical joke. I was always more fond of the whoopee cushion on the seat, superglue on the principle's chair kinda ones," Toby offered with a wink, taking another sip of his coffee, carefully trying to consider whether or not it was finally at a level of taste that he could cope with. He took another mouthful before he decided, yes, that it was just about right and even if it wasn't, Hannah had picked up on his disastrous sugar habit so he supposed he should quite while he was ahead.

He put the cup down on the table and started putting the sugar packets into the bowl again. "Uh... would you judge me if I said I had a problem with sugar?" he asked after a moment, not entirely kidding. He did when it came to things like coffee and tea, and most other things that it was possible to add sugar to (except baking, he was very good at not screwing up the baking of things).

"On a scale of white powdery things you could be addicted to, I'd say sugar's pretty tame. I won't turn you in." Hannah wrapped both hands around her cup. The dishes here were real, white porcelain mugs in saucers that matched, accompanied by silver spoons. Just like at a diner or someplace. She had always rebelled against how Starbucks automatically put stuff in paper, even if you were gonna sit in the shop and drink it.

"I used to be addicted to COPS. You know, the tv show?" Hannah pushed her blue sleeves up her arms. They gathered around her elbows. Underneath, her arms were small and pale; once it was warm, she wanted a real tan, even if it took her hours and hours in the sunshine, even if she had to load up in baby oil and scorch herself to accomplish it. It was the opposite of ghostly, of 'cadaver white', as she had come to think of herself while she was a goner.

Toby grinned and briefly eyed the sugar before he thought better of it. It was definitely sweet enough. He wet his lower lip and lifted the mug to his lip, figuring maybe he shouldn't put it down, even if it was going to give him bulging muscles (eventually, after a lot of coffee). Even so, he'd still not be able to beat Alec even in a playful fight. The man would paste him against the wall. Or the floor. Or something.

"Yeah?" he chuckled, "Definitely something to be proud of," he mused, "At least it wasn't something awful. Like a trashy reality show. American Idol or something like that. My sister loved America's Next Top Model when we were younger." He felt a brief stab of pain thinking about all the times he spent watching that show with his sister and pretending he wasn't invested in it when actually he was very invested in it, he always ended up getting very involved.

Hannah's mouth fell open. "You don't think COPS is trashy?!" Her expression was pure bewilderment. "It's a documentary about arresting hookers and crackheads! Hmph. Just like you to sympathize with another substance abuser." Now she shook her head, as solemn as she could pretend to be. "Perhaps I've jumped to premature conclusions about your judgment." As for the model show, Hannah had never seen it. Most of what she watched on television in earlier years had been on basic channels.

Her hand sneaked across the table, latched onto the sugar holder, and scraped it ever closer, out of Toby's reach. Just in case he couldn't help himself.

Toby's hand shot out rather quickly, catching the opposite end of the sugar holder, eyebrow lifting in challenge, lips quirked into that irrepressible smile. "Don't you be stealing my white powdery stuff now, Miss Strumpet," he warned teasingly. He rolled his eyes and shrugged, "Compared to some of the stuff that used to be on the TV at my house when I was a kid, COPS was prime viewing. Television gold."

He picked up a couple of sugar packets, since Hannah seemed determined to pull the sugar container away from him, though it was mainly for show as he was done polluting his coffee with sweetener. Besides, he grabbed artificial and brown sugar. He eyed them with disdain and put them on the table. "Be free, little sugar packets, be free."

"Bad!" Hannah smacked his knuckles. "It's classical conditioning. Bad behavior gets a hand slap. Good behavior gets a reward."

She took up the rejected sugar substitutes and filed them in the container, color-coded by package. Each day at the pancake house, she found herself doing little organizational things like that, which got undone within an hour of opening. It seemed it was her lot in life to fight chaos. Though not in her apartment, which was starting to look like a garage sale. The things she had bought for herself were piling up on Carrie's old things, which she hadn't yet put into storage. She couldn't bring herself to sell them; what if Carrie ever came back and wanted them?

Toby watched her organise for a second, having made a rather pathetic whimpering noise when she slapped his hand. "I call abuse, conditioning is totally cruel." He pouted at her, eyes big behind the thin wire frames of his glasses. He shook his hand, like that would make it all better. "Besides, sometimes there are creatures just too stubborn for conditioning. Like the rat that pushes the pleasure button rather than the one that gets food." He shrugged, "I'm like that, except sugar's my pleasure and I can totally handle getting smacked every time I reach for it."

He paused, "As long as it isn't my housemate doing the smacking. 'Cause, you know, he smacks hard. And doesn't play fair."

Hannah crinkled her nose. "The rat thing sounds kinky." She ran her fingertip over the top edge of all the packets, like a paper xylophone without notes. It sounded more like a zipper. "You have giant puppy eyes when you're pouting. I'm trying to figure out which kind of puppy. Maybe a beagle." The housemate thing struck a chord. Maybe if she found a roommate, she could afford to move out of Carrie's apartment sooner than anticipated. It was a two-bedroom. "Where'd you find your housemate?"

"Kinda the same place I found you." Toby said, "On the internet. I was terrified he was gonna be a Jason Voorhies kinda crazy hockey mask killer type, but he isn't. He's a doctor who, fortunately, likes animals and has totally stolen my kitten's affections from me." He grinned. "Then again, I'm kind of lu- Hey, a beagle?!" His previous train of thought was completely derailed with the belated comment about him looking like a beagle when pouting. He would have at least thought something a little less... tiny. But then, beagle puppies were adorable... He could probably live with that. At least she hadn't called him a Basset hound or something like that.

Hannah cocked her head to the side. "C'mon, everybody loves beagles! Think of Snoopy." The cavity-causing sweetness of her caramel coffee was beginning to give the blonde ants-in-the-pants. She switched positions and twirled one of her shoelaces around a finger. They were the same pair of Converse shoes she purchased at the mall when meeting Gavin. They were day-glo orange, the color of Tang, beverage of the astronauts. "I bet your place is just a one-bedroom, and your housemate sleeps in the bed while you sleep on the roof... with your little... puppy nose pointed in the air."

She sipped more.

Toby's eyebrow lifted. "You think I'm the one that needs to have their sugar intake monitored?" he asked looking carefully at her as she fidgeted. He shifted, as if by osmosis his own innate fidget was awakened, feeling inherently jealous that Hannah didn't keep hers contained. He wet his lower lip and took another couple of mouthfuls of his coffee, thankfully it wasn't so scorchingly hot now.

"Well, if I did, then my housemate would be that little yellow bird... what's his name? He's totally like my sidekick." Except he wasn't. If their lives were a movie, Toby would definitely have the sidekick role, and probably get killed off towards the end. He blew out a sigh into his coffee. "You definitely coulda picked a worse dog, I suppose I can handle a beagle."

"Woodchuck?" Hannah's face faltered. "No, Woodstock!" It had been a couple of years since she saw a Peanuts special on television. "In real life, the beagle would eat the bird. I never had a beagle, but my neighbors did when I was a kid. It used to hunt rabbits and squirrels and leave them on the front porch as presents." Her mouth turned down at the corners in an 'eww' expression. "I had a chihuahua once. His name was PePe."

Hannah drummed her fingernails on the table while mulling an idea. "Maybe I should get a pet. Like a St. Bernard. I could pretend it was a pony and ride it to work." Jokes aside, having a barking protector for her apartment might be a smart idea, considering Carrie's old clientele still stopped by. Even the computer-printed sign announcing 'No Nookie for Sale!' hadn't dissuaded a few persistent ones.

Toby rather intensely disliked the idea of either of his pets leaving presents for him. He didn't think either of them would. Well, maybe Spacey when she got a little older and spent more time out of the house than in it. He thought for a moment before nodding, "Maybe, pets are pretty awesome."

He broke the invisible grip that was chaining him to his coffee cup and replaced it on the table, tapping his fingers against the tabletop before he plucked at the denim of his jeans. "I've got two."

Hannah's eyebrows went up. "A roommate and two pets? What kind are they? You said you had a kitten, right?" Maybe listening to him regale her with pet stories would help her decide if she should ignore the whim of adopting a furry creature. Reptiles were definitely not her style. Well... maybe a turtle. Back in Searchlight, Mallory had a fun dog. The narrow bridge of her eyebrows furrowed as she tried to recall the animal's name. Toughie? Was that it? Whistler had a pet, too, an enchanted garden gnome named Gerald, but watching its eyes go back and forth was creepy. And a little pervy. Sometimes he rotated and tried to look in the trailer windows.

"Yeah, I've got a kitten and a Siberian Husky. He's like a really big teddy bear. All he wants is love. No good as a guard dog, unless- do you think it's possible for a dog to love and lick someone to death?" Toby tipped his head in thought, pushing his glasses up his nose again. He really needed to get them fixed. Or a new pair. One of the two. Either way, new glasses that didn't slip were needed. "Wolf's a handful, needs a lot of exercise, but he loves Spacey - that's my kitten - and Alec, the housemate - so that's what's important. He hasn't tried to eat her, in fact, he played a lot with her when she was really small." He smiled, "Wolf saw some bad stuff when he was a little younger, I think that's why he's so much with the loving of everyone."

"War wounds," she said solemnly and nodded. She imagined a Siberian Husky laying nose-to-nose with a tiny kitten, which was cute. Those kinds of pictures wound up on calendars. Despite her love of oddball furnishings, she wasn't an adorable calendar person. She preferred pictures of places she'd like to travel. After the months ran, out, she often cut the scenic pictures out and hung them on her refrigerator as inspiration. That kind of thing kept her from calling in sick for work. If she saved up enough money, maybe she could afford a trip to Glacier National Park.

"What kind of work do you do?" she asked, realizing she knew very little about Practical Toby, just Random Toby Musings. In the glasses, he looked like an editor or a journalist or something.

"He's very cuddly." Toby said, thinking about his dog for a moment. He was very attached to his pets, even if Wolf reminded him of his parents at times. He remembered getting the dog afterwards, how clingy Wolf was and, to an extent, still was.

He lifted an eyebrow, "Work? Oh- I- uh, I'm currently in the process of opening up my own coffee shop." He rubbed the back of his neck, "I'm not sure what to call it yet, been tossing some ideas around, but I don't need to worry about that just yet; just gotta get it all built and fixed up and stuff. What about you?"

She was impressed. "Wow! You're an entrepreneur!" Hannah drank a little more coffee, draining it to three-fourths finished. "Make sure you put a minty-chocolate coffee on the menu. I had one at Starbucks during Christmastime once. It was amazing." She rubbed her thumb across the lid opening, where some froth had settled. "I'm just a waitress. Not that it's bad to be a waitress! I'm a good waitress. I just..."

Trailing off, Hannah had internally struck upon one sore point, when it came to giving up the Agent role with the Powers That Be. What she did was no longer significant. It was no good for the self-esteem, being mid-twenties and unsure of a career choice. Would she always float about, serving late-nite food to people? Even when she was old and less kind on the eyes, and couldn't bring in the tips anymore? "I just don't want to be fifty and working at a truck stop, getting my droopy ass pinched by guys named Big Bob."

"Minty chocolate coffee." Toby opened his folder and made a note on the inside of his folder, writing that he needed a 'minty chocolate coffee' on his menu. He glanced up. "Check." He grinned at her and then listened, spotting the change in her demeanour.

"Then don't do that for the rest of your life, what else are you good at?" he asked, already wondering if he could pinch her from whatever place she was working at to get her to work for him, after all, she was bubbly and a good conversationalist, there was totally a chance for someone who knew what they were doing to climb up the ladder of positions. If there was a ladder. "How long've you been waitressing?"

She expelled a breath and tipped her head back, thinking. While deep in reflection, Hanna's mouth pursed into a tiny, pink bow. "In Nevada, I was a waitress for three years. Then I took two years off and did..." Oh geez, how did you explain something like that?! "Community service! I started again this January."

Lord, she needed to work on that. Also, to look over Carrie's employment history; she often forgot that legally, she wasn't herself anymore.

"I didn't go to college, just high school, but I bet I'd be a good salesperson. Or nurse. Especially with kids and old folks. That's kind-of a weird range, but they kinda use the same communication skills. Lots of patience, a sense of humor, and not minding crap-filled pants." Hannah shrugged.

Toby listened for a moment before he nodded, obviously thinking. "Do you like where you're working at the moment?" he asked after a couple more seconds of silence. He was seriously thinking about pilfering her for his own business. After all, he had experience working in a coffee shop for about six months, even if he and his then future wife had turned the place around. And that was it. He had little other relevant experience. He wet his lower lip.

"It's not a weird range at all, versatility and all that, always an admirable quality." He shrugged, "And I think college is over-rated. I dropped out after a year."

"You did?" Hannah's eyes brightened. "Not that I have anything against college graduates! It's just nice when people can be successful without it. It costs so much, and I don't wanna be in debt up to my eyeballs." She had inherited a bit of debt from Carrie, mostly in credit card bills, but had made a budget to get those paid off.

She remembered his other question. "Oh! The place where I work? It's okay..." She wrinkled her nose; there were definitely worse places, and unemployment was even worse than that. "It's a pancake house. Sorry, 'family restaurant'. Have you ever eaten at the Golden Nugget? If you stay more than an hour, you smell like maple syrup."

Toby smiled, "You don't have to have gone to college to be successful, that's for sure." He saw how her eyes brightened and it made him smile that little bit wider. She should definitely be smiling all the time (well, not all the time because that would make her face hurt), she looked like the kind of person that a frown or an expression of sadness would look painfully out of place on.

He chuckled, "Mm maple syrup. Not so sure I'd wanna work there though... What're your job prospects? This interrogation totally has a point... Promise. I'm not just being nosey..."

"My prospects..." Hannah liked the sound of that. It reminded her of hopeful people who'd panned for gold and struck it rich in California. All they needed was location, good eyes, patience, and the right equipment. Maybe if she stuck her pan out there, a piece of precious metal would get caught. "Well, once I was at the mall, and a guy named Gavin said I could interview for his restaurant, but we're like... what was that saying you used? Two ships passing in the night."

Where there other prospects? Hannah considered her situation. Other than an inherited pool of sex partners who paid cash, not really. "I think that's it."

"Well, I was gonna ask if I could make like a pirate and pillage you from that place to come work with me when I opened it. Or even before. I mean, I've got no experience with this kind of thing. Except, y'know, an unholy love of coffee and I don't figure you'd be someone who's gonna steal from the cash register, we'll just have to try that whole smacking hand conditioning thing if I caught you doing it," but clearly Toby was teasing; he was fairly good at reading people (psychotic vampire ex-fling aside). He didn't picture Hannah as someone who would steal from the till.

He gave the tiniest nervous laugh and then looked down at the table, picking up his coffee mug again, fiddling with it. It was mostly empty now. "I mean, you don't have to, it's just something to consider, but I need someone who kind of knows what they're doing, you like coffee too, so you'd get as much free as you wanted and you haven't lived till you've tasted my coffee and I mean, it's just an offer, and y'know, good job prospects, you'd kinda be like, assuming a managerial role anyway if you did come work with me and- Yeah, I'm babbling, I know. 'm sorry." He shifted awkwardly and rubbed the back of his neck, taking his glasses off to clean them on the hem of his shirt.

"Are you serious?!" Hannah's voice climbed to a shriek. She gripped the table on either side and leaned closer, enormous brown eyes blinking, searching Toby for any hint of a joke. The chance to work in a real coffee shop, with customers who read books or the newspaper? To have a cool boss who, unlike Mickey, wouldn't make her wear a sausage link costume? Free mint-chocolate coffee? "I would love that!" Just as soon as she spoke, she covered her mouth, realizing he would probably ask her for a resume and references. At the very list, there would be employment paperwork for taxes. A driver's license or copy of her social security card, maybe. Her excitement deflated like a balloon, but only half-way.

"Um." She rubbed her lips together. "What kind of documentation would you need? I mean, I'm a U.S. citizen, don't worry about that! I just would have to rummage through some...yanno, boxes." She flipped her hand around, like it was no big deal. The caffeine made it difficult to sit still and wait for Toby's answer.

Toby watched her blurry enthusiasm, waiting for the clarity to come when he returned his glasses to his poor, abused eyes. He didn't think squinting across the table at her would be very helpful. He kind of wished he had put his contacts in. But he hadn't, no use crying about it now. He thought about documentation and then realised that he would actually need to know that she was a real person.

At least he could rule out vampire, since the sun was up. So that was an automatic plus in his mind. Not a vampire. He should have a checklist of things he wanted in an employee. At the top of his list - when he wrote it - it would say "#1 - must not be a member of the legions of the undead, vampire, zombie or otherwise".

"Uh, I guess... driver's license and social security?" He lifted his shoulders helplessly, "See? This is why I need someone to help me!"

It was a good thing Hannah couldn't hear the undead legions part. She would've found it necessary to defend wandering, occasionally-corporeal spirits.

"I've got those," she said. Part of her 'release into the wild' had included phony documentation; basically, they'd stuck her face in Carrie's passport and license. It was the reference check where things got fuzzy for Hannah, and he hadn't asked for one of those. "Um... you'll notice my real name's not Hannah," she confessed, becoming a bit hesitant. "It's a nickname. My real name's Carrie." Yuck, it even tasted like a lie. Before this whole 'swapping places' episode, Hannah almost never told lies, and she found she wasn't particularly good at or fond of it.

"Carrie, huh?" Toby nodded and shrugged, "So's Toby." He smiled, trying to reassure her. "It's a nickname, I mean. Though... if it's okay, I'll call you Hannah? You totally don't strike me as a Carrie."

Besides, Carrie sounded a little too close to Cassie. And he didn't need any more things reminding him of that crazy ass bitch. He rubbed at the scar on his neck self-consciously as he thought about it.

Oblivious, Hannah watched his hand and wondered if his neck itched. "I prefer Hannah," she said. "I've gone by it pretty much always. If I was walking down the street, and somebody yelled out, 'Carrie!' I might not even look up." She shrugged. It was totally true. The way it worked, she was in her old body and looked the same, except to people who knew the real Carrie; there was a glamor in place to fool them into seeing a girl with slightly darker hair, who was an inch or so taller. "I might have to keep a part-time job on the side, I'm not sure yet. I'm saving up money. If it didn't get in the way of your work at all, would that be okay?"

"That's fine, don't worry," Toby said with a smile, "We can work out hours when it's all opened and stuff, but if you wanna have a hand in the hiring practices and stuff? I really don't know what I'm doing other than wanting to share my love of coffee with people." He looked a little sheepish. "But yeah, I'll keep calling you Hannah and stuff, 'cause yeah, you look more like a Hannah."

He chuckled, "Though, that's the last of my worries at the moment since, you know, I gotta get it all put together and stuff. I got a carpenter in to start building my stuff... And I need to get a name and stuff."

Hannah nodded. "I'd like to help, when you're ready for me. Plus, it means I won't leave the Nugget in the lurch. I try not to burn my bridges of employment." Suddenly, she was relieved to have dropped those community college courses her namesake had enrolled in. Pure intimidation factor inspired the dropping, but pretty soon, she wouldn't have time. "I know some stuff about employment law. Once, I worked for this place that... well, the owner Verlie kinda pushed our buttons. I read up on it so I'd know my rights. I'm not troublesome or anything!" she rushed to add. "But she was a lunatic."

"Might run stuff past you whilst I'm getting it all set up, since you probably know a little more about it whilst I, y'know, really don't." He chuckled and then lifted an eyebrow at Hannah's rushed reassurance that she wasn't a trouble-maker.

Something told him she had the ability to cause a lot of trouble if she so wished; her practical joke - the pink ectoplasmic gum - coming to mind. He nodded, "And that's good. I've got some stuff in here," he waved at the big folder, "about employment law and all kinds of other nasty law stuff that I need to know if I wanna start hiring people."

Hannah folded her forearms and eyed the folder. "Yup. Lawsuits can be an ugly thing. I've never been in one, but I've seen them on Judge Joe Brown." Those people were crazy. She had never figured out if the court cases were staged or not, but if they were, a few of the plaintiffs and defendants should've received academy awards for their performances. She tipped her cup up for one last sip, finding herself relieved to reach the bottom of it. As it was, she'd be peeing all day long. "I actually have to leave pretty soon. I'm supposed to work. I have to change first."

Toby nodded, "Yeah, my dad was a lawyer," he shook his head, "Spent too much time at the office and not enough time at home, or so my mom used to say. When she wasn't trying to drink herself out of whatever existential crisis she had gotten herself into." Pain flashed across his eyes again and he found himself wondering why he was talking about his parents. He hadn't talked about them to anyone, really, except Nathan (and then he'd been under some kind of hypnosis, so it totally didn't count). Even then, though, it had just been about how they died.

When she said she had to work, he felt a little disappointed but he understood. He was actually really enjoying their conversation - random as it was - and the fact that he was sure he had just gotten himself a new employee. His first employee, in fact. "Guess if you're gonna be heading off, I oughta get some way of contacting you?"

Hannah was actually crestfallen now; she wanted to stay and offer to listen, if he wanted to vent some about his parents. She checked her swatch-watch, but the time was encroaching on work, and now she really couldn't afford to be late, since he'd know it, and if he was gonna be her future boss, she didn't want to send a lazy message. "Oh. Um... yeah, can I see that?" She picked up his pen and wrote information on a napkin, in case he didn't have clean paper in his folder. She included her phone number and email address. "Maybe next time we talk, you can tell me more about you, and that way we'll have a good working relationship. You're really nice!"

"You're pretty awesome yourself," Toby offered, looking at the napkin and making sure he could read it. "And if these don't work, I guess I'll just be PM-ing Pixie Strumpet." He winked. "We'll do a getting to know you session," he nodded; it sounded like a good plan to him. He glanced at the time behind the counter and carefully placed the napkin into one of the plastic wallets inside the big folder itself. "I'll be sure to contact you. We can do lunch or something? Maybe I'll even stop by the Golden Nugget, see you in action."

"Okay!" Hannah watched the napkin disappear inside his folder, confident that he'd follow up with a call or visit. She picked up her messenger bag, belatedly realizing she'd left the Treasure Troll on the table, after all. "Don't worry, I won't leave Leroy behind." She tucked it into a blue pocket and fished out some money for her drink and tip. Those, she weighed down under the sugar dispenser. Hannah stuck out a hand to shake with Toby. "See you around!"

Toby got to his feet and shook her hand. "See you soon." He glanced at the money on the table and figured maybe next time he could insist on paying for their lunch or coffee or whatever they were having. "It was great to meet you, Hannah, I'll speak to you soon, I'm sure."

Once he had let go of her hand, he sat down again, wondering if he should go back to his folder or just go home. He kind of needed to talk to Alec anyway. Hopefully his housemate would be in. "Have fun at work!"

"Bleh!" Hannah made a face and fake-shivered. Then she was off, just barely keeping a skip out of her step. If she timed it right, she'd get home in time to write in her journal before leaving for work.