It's a zoo in here!

Birbies and Kitties (GxG)

(I love that inside joke; spelling can be fun. x3)

(Also, be warned. The GxG means this involves a lesbian relationship. I am warning you now so you can skip it if you so please, but I would appreciate you reading the Authors note anyways. Thanks! :3)

Alex groaned, shoving her chair back. It was late, again, and she had to go home now or risk getting locked out of her apartment. She could skip her visit to the coffee shoppe and get another hour of work in, but she had a promise to keep. She glanced to the side, checking Her appearance was normal for her: light brown skin with darker patches here and there where she'd scratched her skin raw- all thanks to mosquito bites- with hair the color of molten chocolate that she'd shaved at the sides and back of her head, and eyes that managed to be a darker brown color that almost glowed in the dark; like a backlit piece of amber covered with a sackcloth. Others described it as beautiful, she called it useful for working late at night. She also blew most people off, preferring work to social interactions; except for her nightly coffee stop. She sighed, standing up out of her chair and shutting off the computer. She could finish re-cataloguing the medicine cabinets later.

She walked to her locker, a small metal cube built into the wall that held her "nessy" clothes, as her colleagues had jokingly called them. She was so rarely seen outside of her work uniform that the clinic had collectively agreed on a day once a month where they locked her out of the clinic, an event she'd avoided by arriving at work before anyone else. She pulled out the clothes- jeans, a t-shirt with the Nike logo, a jacket, and tennis shoes- and quickly changed into them, placing her scrubs in her backpack. She'd wash them at home. She stepped out of her small office, the one she worked in when she didn't have patients, and locked it. The lights were mostly off, she was the last one to leave as usual. It was almost midnight, and even the janitor had left almost four hours ago. He usually stayed till nine or ten, but work had been slower lately and there had been less strain on cleanliness and maintenance as a result. She finished turning out the lights and left the building, locking the doors as a precaution.

She walked to her car, sighing as she did so. She was always exhausted these days, but she was also used to it; she'd been having these days do the past three years. She knew it wasn't healthy, but home just wasn't a place she wanted to be. She'd been dating a human, and she'd felt ready to share the draconian world with him, and then... shot in an alleyway. By a drunken jerk who hadn't been able to tell his friends no. She didn't cry anymore, she had cried herself dry years ago, but she still felt numb. Her family hadn't helped either, insisting she was better off without a human as a mate; like that was any consolation. When you fall in love, you don't care what or who they are, you love them. Screw everything else, they are what matters; everything else is background noise.

As she hopped in the car, starting the thing and backing, and then driving, out of the lot, she gained a slight sense of anticipation. The coffee was good, the shop was homey, and the service was perfect. She had gotten the same waitress every time since her first visit. She'd been working increasingly long shifts for a few months before the rest of the staff managed to figure out what was wrong. They had forced her to take a week off and grieve. She had ended up sitting in a coffee shop for most of the day, not ordering anything, just sitting and staring out the window. After the third day, a waitress came over during her break and had started talking to her. Alex hadn't responded, and had waited for the waitress to leave, but she hadn't. By day four, Alex was talking back to her. By day seven, the waitress had managed to get a promise out of her; that she'd visit the coffee shop at least once a day on the days she worked. It had been almost three years, and she was still keeping her promise.

The waitress had managed to take the night shift, covering the place from ten to six, and had had gotten the place changed into an all night cafe. It had been doing pretty well since then, and had hired more workers, which had helped out a bunch of college kids. Alex had asked the waitress her name after the first month, and had gotten one. Ciara León, a twenty four year old college student who was balancing a night job, insomnia, and school. She was the only close friend Alex had made since his death, and she wasn't going to miss their nightly coffee, not if she could help it. So she drove, arriving at the coffee shoppe in time to see an employee flip the "closed" sign on the door. She walked up the steps and knocked on the door, getting a confused glance from the employee. She pointed at the sign in confusion, and the guy walked over, opening the door and speaking to her. "What's up, lady? Why are you curious about a 'closed' sign?"