Welcome to Hickstead, home to both Seven Oak Stables, and Blue Acre - two rival stables. Both offer opportunities for their clients to reach the highest level of excellence. Each stable differs from the other, so choose wisely and never forget, loyalty is everything... Meanwhile as the stables battle it out, there's trouble brewing at the university. Be careful, if you don't pick a side you may get caught in the cross-fire...
This is an chilled out rpg with a super friendly and relaxed atmosphere! Remember to sign up with your characters full name in all caps and don't forget to do your claims! Thank you and Welcome, we've been established since 10th March 2009 but unfortunately have had to close guest view of our boards due to multiple sites ripping off our hard work, such a shame! Come chat to us in Discord before joining if you like!.
the sky had long since gone dark outside the coffee shop but mav had no intentions of moving from his seat until closing time. if he left he'd feel the need to go home and home wasn't the happiest place right now. he found more comfort being here around the smell of coffee beans, overpriced milk and recyclable straws that melted the second they touched liquid than he did by being at home right now.
he wondered how other families handled grief, the loss of the glue that held them together and kept them all on the straight and narrow. did they fall apart like his was or did they find someway to stick together. so far mav wasn't sure which way his family was going to fall but he knew one thing, it was going to get a lot worse before it got any better than it was. he had just ordered a fresh coffee and the scalding liquid was forcing steam out through the gaps of the lid. he could almost smell the heat as he lifted the cup to his lips and took a long sip. it burned but it was the good sort of burn, almost like the taste of whiskey as it coated the throat.
he was waiting for closing time because it was when his mate knocked off work, he couldn't go home so he figured the next best thing was to bug his friends, at least for a while. plus if there was anyone who knew what it was like to lose someone you loved it was sam. he turned the cup in his hands absently as he sat there, staring at the back of the booth he was sitting in, letting himself get lost in whatever thoughts crossed his mind as he waited for the clock to slowly tick the hands to where he needed them to be.
Sam's shift had been a busy one, he hadn't had much time to think. It was unusual for the day; it was a Thursday, and though they had the usual work crowd early morning and then the university students and the other odds and sods trooping through, it had been non-stop go since he had clocked in late morning. He'd had his English class at 8am, and had only had time to drop his bag at home and make a small start on his weekend homework before he'd had to shower and change for his start at Starbucks. He knew he didn't need to have the job as far as his adopted parents were concerned, they paid for a lot of his things, but he didn't like them paying for everything. He was used to being self sufficient, and in the end it had been a compromise that he had been allowed to have one job whilst he spent his other time in class. That sounded odd given that he was an adult and could do what he wanted, but he wanted to keep Kyle and Marnie happy and disliked upsetting them; they had not liked the idea of him working his butt off with extra shifts or a second job, so compromise it was.
He caught sight of Mav in the corner waiting and when there was a slight lull in the queue, he grabbed a spare pastry that would no doubt be wasted otherwise, and took it over to him. He didn't make friends easily, and he tried hard to keep the one's that he did, so he placed his offering carefully on the table, aware that Mav did not seem 100% present as he approached. "Hey, here, hope you like custard." He gave him a small smile and stepped back. "I'm nearly done, just fifteen more minutes - do you want a top up or anything?" She asked, nodding to his cup. He'd get that for free too; Sam didn't like to take the piss with his job but he'd been there a long time now and was well liked as a hard and honest worker, and the manager never minded the odd extra treat being handed out when it was close to closing time - it would get trashed regardless, as they couldn't carry old pastries over to the next day.
he shook himself out of his own thinking as the plate was placed down on the table and he smiled a little up at sam. he appreciated the gesture, he really did. it wasn't like he needed looking after but even someone like him had to admit that it was nice sometimes, on the rare occasion. "thanks, yeah i'll eat just about anything." growing up in the house he'd grown up in there was no allowances when it came to food unless it was an allergy. if it was served, it had been eaten and there was nothing else coming. he'd also learned to get in quick even if he hated what was being served because if he didn't get his fill the odds would have been his brothers wouldn't have left anything for him. it was a first come first served survival of the fittest style of eating that he'd grown up with, so he'd learned to eat just about anything. he picked at a little of the pastry, his appetite still not back to what it had been pre accident and before his mother had passed but it was slowly getting better.
he glanced at the cup as sam offered a top up and he shook his head a little. "if i have any more coffee i might bounce out of the booth." he said with a bit of a laugh as he looked back up at him. he didn't mind waiting the fifteen minutes for sam to finish either, it was sort of nice to just sit and think, even though sometimes it drove him crazy but tonight it didn't seem to be. maybe it's because he wasn't sitting in a quiet house, he was sitting in a quiet coffee shop, where life was still happening and the world was still turning where his house felt like it was standing still. "fifteen minute's, it'll fly by." he said as he leaned back into the seat and glanced around to see just how busy it was. it amazed him that people got coffee this late at night still. he didn't really get it, but then he hadn't gotten a lot of things until now so who was he to judge.
Sam caught the smile and returned it almost without thinking. He liked Mav, He seemed like a decent guy and though Sam had taken his usual time to relax around him, the guy seemed pretty harmless and he'd found him easy to talk to - he hadn't seemed to mind Sam's shyness at the beginning either and anyone that was kind and stuck it out whilst Sam sounded a person out and started opening up was worth their weight in gold to him. Having never had friends as a teenager he was a guy that appreciated the heck out of them as an adult. "thanks, yeah i'll eat just about anything." Sam gave another warm smile at that. "Perhaps I should test that by bringing out one or the older pastries we have to throw." he joked, though he wouldn't really do that - and they had to throw everything daily if it didn't go to keep things fresh.
"if i have any more coffee i might bounce out of the booth." Sam nodded, understanding that feeling. "Best not then, can't have you bouncing around and making a mess of the shop, I'll never finish if I'm cleaning up after you." He glanced at the patrons left he needed to finish up with. "fifteen minute's, it'll fly by." Sam smiled again, relaxing a little now Mav didn't mind. "okay cool I'll be right back!" he promised and he hurried off. It ended up only taking ten minutes for him to fix up everything he needed to and then he grabbed himself a quick coffee and his stuff and headed back over to Mav. "Right, I am here. How are you?"
he slid the pastry closer to him and he chuckled a little as sam joked about testing out the theory. he would eat just about anything, normally, his appetite was nothing like it had been before his accident now though. "how about next time, bring me random food until you find something i don't eat." he said as he picked some of the pastry off and put it into his mouth. "one's enough for now." he said with a smile though. he almost laughed a little as sam agreed with him not bouncing around the shop with any more coffee, though he knew he wouldn't be anywhere near as bad as his little brother, crev, would be. as much as he was a good kid, he could be like a bull in a china shop and well-meaning as he could be, he wasn't known for being careful. the joys of being the baby of the family he guessed.
"and i'd like to get out of here before midnight." he agreed with a smile as he pulled another piece of the pastry off. he watched as sam moved off to finish cleaning up and he was left there to kill the last few minutes of his mate's work shift on his own. he didn't mind, it gave him the chance to finish off the pastry he'd been given. well, that was dinner sorted at least, he wouldn't need to go home later and try and find whatever his brother's hadn't left him. he stood up from the booth as sam grabbed his stuff and headed over to him, ready to leave if he wanted or he'd sit back down if sam wanted to sit for a few moments after his shift. he didn't know how he did it, he could never work on his feet all day. "another pound earned." he said as he stuck his hands into his pockets as sam asked the question mav knew he would. he didn't mind it from sam though, the guy was genuine and he knew that he was asking because he would care if something was wrong, not out of obligation. "still kicking, that's a good thing so i've been told." he said with a smile. so it might have been deflecting a little, but he could never come out and say anything but he was fine, it wasn't possible for him. he'd tried once and it had felt so wrong he'd never tried it again.
Sam smiled at the laugh, pleased that Mav found the joke funny - he had gotten better at cracking jokes. It sounded stupid to learn so late in life that he had a sense of humour, but it wasn't until you made friends and then made them laugh that people told you you were funny, before that, his social interactions had never been nice enough to learn those kinds of things about his personality - or he thought people were making fun of him. "how about next time, bring me random food until you find something i don't eat....one's enough for now." Sam pretended to think about it for a moment and then grinned, "that could go horribly wrong for you - are you sure you don't want to back out now?" He joked, though he wasn't mean enough like some people to cross a line; not like he knew some of the people Heather called friends would do.
"another pound earned." Sam chuckled at that and gave a nod, "It's not much, but I'll take it." He said with a modest shrug. It was honest money at least, and he found the work good - he'd had much worse jobs over the years, so much so that after everything he'd been through from it, he'd take any good, honest hard work. He knew Kyle wasn't always a fan, but he didn't know how to live without working, it had been his life for too long a time. "still kicking, that's a good thing so i've been told." He nodded in response and gave a small smile at that. "It's better than not, for sure. Did you want to stay here or go elsewhere? They don't mind if we use the space as long as we tidy up after." He shrugged, not minding either way - it was warm and comfortable enough and there weren't too many distractions.
mav laughed when sam mentioned that telling him to bring him random things wouldn't go well and he just shrugged a shoulder slightly. "i grew up in a zoo, i'm pretty sure i could terrify most people with what i've eaten because someone told me i couldn't." there had been a time when he and his brothers had been just brothers, young and without a care in the world, well other than making each other as miserable as they could for no reason. dares, jokes and fights had been a dime a dozen between them all, though some of them had been worse than others.
"yeah i know that feeling." his job didn't pay brilliant either and some of it went to housing his horse at blue acres but it was enough for him to live off, usually. it hadn't been since his dad had fallen off the wagon and him, derek and stephen were covering the expenses of the house, it felt like it was a pittance. "some days i doubt it." he said, almost quieter than normal. he couldn't deny it, there were days when he woke up disappointed that he had, because it was another day in a world that didn't seem worth it anymore. "here's fine." he said as he looked around. "i mean any other place is just going to be filled with other people and that sounds .. awful." he said with a grin. he wasn't the biggest people person, in fact he downright hated being crowded, which had made growing up in a house with no personal space hard but he'd had to suck that up, it wasn't like he could ask his parents to get rid of his brothers.
"i grew up in a zoo, i'm pretty sure i could terrify most people with what i've eaten because someone told me i couldn't." Sam raised a brow and smiled slightly, the corners of his lips tilting up. "Ah I see, one of age old sibling razing things huh?" Not that he'd had much knowledge of that growing up, but Jack was doing pretty good at getting some of it in now. He imagined it wasn't too dissimilar from some of the things he'd experienced and seen in juvenile detention. He would have assumed siblings were slightly more pleasant and not as cruel or mean but he'd been told otherwise by people enough to know otherwise. "We'll see if you still agree in a few weeks time," He joked, after he'd found some of the weirdest things on offer.
Sam took a swig from his drink, getting more comfortable in his chair. "yeah i know that feeling." Sam glanced at Mav, seeing a look come across his face that made Sam think there were more things going on in Mav's life than he probably knew about. "some days i doubt it." Yes, clearly there were. Sam's expression softened. He knew how it felt to feel like you have nothing at all. "I promise it is, and as long as there's a roof over your head and some kind of food in your mouth, you're richer than you think." Having had neither, he knew both ends of the spectrum - now he felt like he had too much and it was hard to feel deserving of it.
"here's fine. i mean any other place is just going to be filled with other people and that sounds .. awful." Sam nodding in agreement. "Yeah good point, at least this place will quieten down a little now." Which would make studying easier. He began pulling out his books, notes and pens. "Okay, what do we do first?"
