Winds Are Changeling!~ Life of Booker

'cold... why is my apartment always cold?' Booker looked at the ceiling, slowly analyzing the wood boards above his head. Dreams where often, but good dreams?
‘Hmm…’
Slowly sitting on his hunches on the side of the bed, the metal springs groaning almost as loud as him. A shower was definitely in order, a really super-hot shower. Walking himself to the restroom, he took a moment to look around his apartment, surveying his digs. He had an odd sense of achievement every time he saw his apartment.
I mean it was a nice place. The building used to be a factory until the mine collapse. When the Iron stopped flowing into the city, so did the smithing and smelting foundries, and in lieu of its soot covered workers going in and out its doors, it was replaced by a more hipsterish crowd.

The foundry's ground floor became a coffee shop, and the upper floors were turned into rooms for rent. The coffee was completely awful, and he suspected it might be the water they were using to brew the black gold, but it didn't matter to him. The room was a long rectangle, facing long ways to the street. In the back left corner was a small kitchen, squared off by the counters. In the middle of the back long wall was the descent of four cascading stairs that led to a hallway to the street, and on the other side of the main room it had temporary walls put up for a private bedroom and bathroom. The rent was cheap due to the impossible task of heating the place, and its less than clean and homely interior. Only those that had hit hard times, or didn't want to be found would consider it as a living place, and he was just one of those people.
The main room was sparsely furnished, and the wall closest to the street was made entirely of windows, hence the heating issue in the winter. He didn't have any chairs, but he did have one couch. Chairs were the new fad from Canterlot apparently, in case you weren't up to date with the latest gossip magazine. They were terribly uncomfortable for anypony, but image must be upheld and fashion inflicted upon Equestria. But Gods did he love his couch... Side note, moving on!

‘Anyways… bathroom; right.’

Reaching into his medical cabinet, he extracted several bottles of supplements. Due to a money making smile, and a slight of hand a pony from Elite Nutrition had sold him on some supplements to improve his health, which now he had to painfully swallow every morning. Spilling out the various pills and turning on the faucet he swallowed them dutifully. However as he closed the cabinet door, his face in the mirror caught his attention. Maybe it was due to a hard night, but his complexion was less than ideal. The fur around his eyes seemed to take on the appearance of a bandit’s mask over his eyes, giving his reflection a harsh and cruel stare back at him. It was intimidating and discouraging, to receive a resentful look from your mirror image…
‘What am I doing with my life…? What the buck Booker! Common prep talk time you lazy bastard!’
He looked at his complexion from different angles, looking with hawk eyes for any imperfections a little makeup couldn't fix. Sadly you can’t hide weariness in your eyes. The client can always see sadness, no getting around it.

‘Pull yourself togethe-! Eh, together…? Fuck it. Would you do me? Ya I’d do me…’
He smacked his flank to emphasis his point. It is amazing the stuff you do in your house when you are alone.

'You now like that moment you have when you finally get your own house or apartment, and you claim it by walking around naked like you're King of Your Jungle now...? Too off subject?'

However, as he returned his gaze to the mirror, the look in his eyes was still there… glaring back at him, presumably the only remnant of his consciousness left to tell him he was living a destructive lifestyle. And just like that, a vindictive whisper of truth, the kind that cuts through every wall, every mental cushion, every lie…

‘Whore…’

That was it! He was done. He had earned some bits, he could afford a bucking coffee! Leaving the bathroom and grabbing his coat on the way to the stairs, he virtually fled out of his room, from that voice... Gaa man that voice!

'... It sounds sorta like that one guy who tries to be cool in front of his friends by taking the shot full on instead of sipping it, in part because he's too afraid to tell them he has never had hard liquor before, and speaks in the raspy voice after because his throat is on fire! Ahh.... good times... But AHHH that voice!'

The stairs to the first floor exited out in an employee’s only hallway behind the café. Walking down the hallway and turning the corner into the café’s storefront, he glanced toward the barista behind the counter as he made his way over.
She was brown coated mare with a personality as colorful as the aromas of the numerous coffees she boasted on her shelves; very bouncy and energetic too. Maybe it was because she worked in caffeine infested environments all day long? Her eye’s where the only thing a different color than her coat and mane, a translucent emerald. For some reason people never really noticed her eyes. Regardless though, with a reduced waist line and a dynamite ass, she still caught every eye in the room. When someone tells you about beauty in simplicity, she fit the bill, and her flank could cash the check. What! Hey I’m still a colt? Common, admit it, we all look, and that all studs agree on the 1-10 scale.
“Morning Hazel… how’s the daily grind going? Any takers?”
She turned to him while steaming some milk for the only customer in the store, who was currently looking at some of the coffee bags for sale.
“Oh, hey Booker! Ya not so much; surprising for a Monday. The office guys usually poor in this place like locusts. Morning to you too handsome by the way…” she said with a smirk. Although nobody would admit it out loud, he knew a few of the older regulars sat at the bar stools just to ogle.
As she handed the gent his drink, Booker made his way over the coffee bar. Hazel had a bar counter and some stools put in despite it being a coffee shop. It was an odd choice, but for those who wanted a good chat and some toast with their coffee, it was a great innovation.
“I know, I know, I look like crap… I’m gonna need something really strong this morning. Got any creative mixes in mind?” An unsettling smirk crept on her face that seemed to shatter his steel resolve.
“Oh sure, you mean like you want it even darker than you usually take it? I got just the thing for you, guaranteed to make an earth pony fly or your money back!”
Trudging over to a stool and draping himself over the counter, the reviving smell of freshly brewed espresso shots from the previous drink quelled all his fears.
“Now you’re either talking my language or scaring me. I am frankly too out of it to tell which. But for the record, I trust you… implicitly!”
“Trust me? You don’t want to test my skill, trust that! I've been running this café for three years now, almost four. I know just how to cure your “disease”.”
With a speed only obtained through the fluid motions of repetition, she steamed up a concoction of ingredients into an artisan drink worthy of only the most seasoned coffee goer.
“Here we are my dear, my herbal remedy just for you. I call it Indian Spice Market.”
Booker gave it a pensive look before raising it too his lips. Instead of taking a sip however, he conducted reconnaissance with the smooth streams of vapor rising from the wasn’t surface. He wasn't quite sure if he trusted it yet. As much as he wished he could say, Hazel had never steered him wrong.

‘But, victory does favor the prepared…’
Living above her café had taught him many things about coffee, but she still was able to create strange and bazaar elixirs of youth and energy from her grinder and syrup bottles.
The excitement on her face now peeling away to anticipation, she decided he needed a push.
“Well? Aren’t you going to try it? It’s getting cold numb nuts!”
His eyebrows furled in reprisal to her verbal assault, yet gave no further argument or hesitation.

‘Calling a courtesan, ‘numb nuts’? Girl if only you knew what I did most nights, you have no idea…’

Head back, bottoms up, he took a sip.
“Holy beans Hazel! What did you put in my cup?”

She shrugged her shoulders with a smirk, “Oh just a little cinnamon, espresso, vanilla, black magic, things like that.”

Booker raised his eyebrow quizzically and glanced back at his amber cream colored drink. “Well I’d believe the magic part. It’s so balanced. The roast flavor just carries strait to my heart.”

She stretched her back and cracked her hooves “Well I’m glad I could be of assistance. All in a day’s work! On a different note, because I’m so awesome and you owe me $4.32 for the latte, I get to ask a question and you get to answer it without skimping on the details…?”
Being a tenant meant he was subject to her experiments and imagination, and he had to accept that. Though he did kind of find her mannerism’s cute.
When you are lonely, the need for companionship usually overpowers the barriers of friend zones. Its both annoying and fascinating, because you look in placed you never should have looked, but you also gain a new perspective. Eh, there where worst things to be subjected too. “You get one question…” he said with a smile.
Her giddy smile was worth a thousand words. Bouncing in place, she practically jumping into a leaning position on the counter
“How did… that date I set you up with go?”
Hazel’s anxious smile was so hopeful, how could he disappoint a face like that? Alas the truth was truth.
“You mean the date your mystery friendidn’tme up on? Ya didn't go so well. I think she was more in for the free dinner and an excuse to dress up than it was didn’t.”
Her smile didn't go away, but the bright hope faded a bit from her enthusiasm, replaced by sympathy, “Free loafer than?”

“It would appear so.” Booker rubbed his face, still trying to kneed the morning from his eyes.

“Well they can’t all be winners I guess. Tell you what, coffee’s on me this morning, you deserve it.”

The ears on his head flattened in shock, “Nah Hazel you don’t have to do tha-“

“Hey Booker, where’s your manners? Didn't your mother teach you not to argue with a lady?”

“True, but you’re not much of the “lady” type, more the “steam-some-more-milk-for-another-sea-salt-caramel-latte” type…”

A small chuckle escaped her lips as a blush rushed into her now rosy cheeks, “Alright! You have lived here, about my café… how many years? I may not put on a dress, but how do you know whether or not I don a mask in the cover of night and gallivant around subduing crime?” She tilted her head and put her hand over her face, then slit her fingers in half to reveal one of her eyes.

Booker collapsed his head on the counter laughing as a retort came into mind, “Hazel, the only thing you have ever subdued is my desire for coffee!”

She gave him a queer look slightly off put by the teasing, and rebutted in a more serious tone, no longer in the mood to play, “Well just you wait FIVE minutes, and you’ll be jumping up and down like a jack rabbit and pissing like a rabid dog because of the fucker in your hands…”
Booker abruptly raised his head and looked at the mostly empty experiment with a fearful grimace.