“Did you sleep well?” he asked drowsily.

“Huh? Oh, no, I didn’t sleep.” He seemed concerned. "Don't worry: I'll have a cat-nap later," I assured with a dry chuckle. He lifted his head to peek at my tablet and asked what I was drawing. "A comic," I answered.

"Can I see?" he asked sweetly. In a sudden panic I put my hand on his face to push him away.

"It's not finished yet!" I spluttered, worried that if he read the comic he would spot any number of inaccuracies in my depiction of the criminal underworld, or tell me that I'd drawn the guns wrong. I actually ended up using the gun in his drawer for reference after that worry.

After a moment I tried to move my hand, but he took hold of it and placed a kiss on my palm. Then, after giving me a lewd look from under his eyelashes, he started licking my fingers before finally putting one in his mouth and sucking it. I could feel his tongue twisting around and no doubt performing a wonderful miniature blow-job, but I just looked at him with my usual cold, expressionless face until he got so embarrassed he had to stop and hide his face. 

"Would you like some coffee?" he asked shakily.

"Okay," I answered, because I had no way of knowing that he meant we would be driving to a coffee shop. I thankfully managed to bring my tablet with me, and avoided sitting on his lap in the car by stretching my legs over him, so I kept working during the ride.

Frank was driving us, as usual, and once we parked the brothers started chatting. Ignoring them completely, I took the opportunity to quickly sketch some of the buildings I could see for backgrounds. One place I saw had a really cute hand-painted sign saying "The Honeypot" and I used my sketch of it for one of the main settings in the comic.

"I'm going to have a quick meeting with someone while we're here. I won't be long, so you two can stay here," Duke told us before exiting the car to go buy the coffee.

"Um, Frank?" I started cautiously when we were alone. He turned around to look at me. "Would it be okay if I drew you real quick?" I was having trouble getting the jawline right for a character that was looking over his shoulder at someone and it seemed like less hassle to ask Frank to model than asking Duke.

"... Sure. Need me to do anything?"

"No, just stay like that, thanks."

I got the sketch done quickly and with ease after that.

"So how're things going with the boss?" he asked me once I'd finished.

"Hm… pretty standard, I guess?" I answered after wondering what he meant for a moment. 

"It can't be that standard: he must be the weirdest person you've ever been with."

"Nah, I've had weirder," I told him honestly.

"I find that hard to believe."

"Well," I chuckled, "the last guy I dated was into cannibalism, so, y'know, compared to that, the cat stuff is fairly tame actually."

"Cannibalism? So, he wanted to eat you?"

"Nah, he wanted me to eat him."

"... Did you?" He seemed genuinely curious, since his tone didn't betray any shock or disgust, but I felt the need to tease him a bit anyway.

"If eating his ass counts." Frank smirked at that. "No, I didn't," I continued, "I always got out of it by saying he was too skinny. Not to mention the fact that I'm vegetarian, so I wouldn't want to eat his meat anyway."

"Maybe you attract that sort," he mused.

"Isn't everyone that sort? Everyone I've met seems to have some sort of kink like that." I thought Frank might share one of his odd kinks with me, but before he had time to, I happened to spot a familiar face on the other side of the road. "Oh!" I exclaimed, my hand reaching for the door handle. "I know that guy! Can I step out for a sec?"

"Suit yourself," he said, turning off the child-locks and watching me excitedly scamper off.

The face I happened to spot was one I hadn't seen in a couple years, but I did recall Maverick mentioning that he also lived in the city. It was Maverick's best friend, and so he hung around my younger sisters a fair amount back in the day.

"Excuse me, young man, could I trouble you for a light?" I asked jokingly as I approached and pulled out a cigarette.

The tall youth was actively smoking and didn't even look my way when he replied, "I don't smoke."

I couldn't help but laugh. "Aw, come on, please?" I asked through giggles. He grumpily cast his eyes down at me and I could see the moment of realisation as he recognized me.

"Wait, Soot?"

"The very same. How you been, Mancock?" I asked with a smile. I only vaguely remembered his real name, since I'd always called him by his nickname, so when Maverick told me about "Manny" the day before, it took me a while to realise, but this was the very same Manuka Babcock from school. He must have been in his early twenties now, though he was still a few years younger than me.

He'd shot up like a beansprout since I'd last seen him, and now he was almost as tall as Duke.

"Light, please," I prompted since he was still apparently shocked to see me.

"Oh, right," he muttered while handing me his lighter. I had my own, of course, but since I'd already asked for his I felt the need to follow through.

We chatted a little, and explained that Maverick had told us both that the other was in the city. "I have a meeting in a few minutes," he said after glancing at his watch. "Since you're here, it's probably fine if you join in. Your name was bound to come up, anyway." It wouldn't have been surprising if I had no idea what he meant, but I actually put the pieces together pretty quickly. Especially when Mancock put his hand in my head and turned me around to see Duke standing behind me with two coffees.

"Your meeting's with him?" I asked, but I don't really know which one I was asking.

"Yes," Duke grumbled angrily, hooking an arm around my shoulders to pull me away from Mancock. "Why were you talking to him?"

"We went to school together," I explained. Duke handed me one of the coffees while staring scrutinising daggers at Mancock.

Standing between those two giants, I found myself feeling smaller than usual. "Are you two about the same height?" I ended up asking, since it was hard to gauge without stepping further away to look.

"I'm taller," Duke quickly boasted.

"Soot, want me to Irish up that coffee for you? I've got whiskey inside," Mancock offered, opening the door that we were standing in front of. 

The fun thing about Mancock was that his expression never changed, so he sometimes seemed to be obliviously unable to read a room when he cut in like that, but I knew he did it on purpose to tease people. This time he was clearly trying to provoke Duke, and it was working since the grip on my shoulders tightened.

I wasn't actually all that curious about how they knew each other or what their meeting was for, but I did want the alcohol, so I accepted and stepped inside. Duke followed closely and Mancock locked the door behind us.

The room we wound up in had a shockingly similar aesthetic to Duke’s living room, since apparently Mancock was also a weird hoarding collector. Rather than cat paraphernalia, his obsession of choice was mugs. In that room alone there were well over several hundred.

For some reason, I wondered if I should pick up a hobby like that. Duke, Maverick and now Mancock were apparently all maximalists with their interior design. The only things I had purchased a lot of were comics and manga, but I just bought online versions since I didn’t own a bookshelf. If I had physical copies of them all then maybe my apartment would look like a library and not a poor-man’s crack-den.