October 30th, 1894 - MoM Breakroom

Noah had been so lost in a long list of investigations (and their unfortunate paperwork) that it had taken a colleague's mention of his rumbling stomach for him to realize he should probably take a break. He put his glasses to the top of his head as he rubbed his eyes. They were a little blurry from translating his own sloppy notes into what he hoped were somewhat coherent files for the cases he was working on. He was sure he'd messed something up, but hopefully it would be minimal.

After traipsing to the break room with his lunch, Noah settled into a table with a book on the muggle traditions of Samhain. With the celebrations tomorrow, he figured it was an appropriate topic to read about while he stuffed his face. He probably should have a shown a little more decorum, considering he was still at work, but Noah sat with both elbows on the table, glasses slipping down his nose, one hand holding up the book before his face and the other occasionally bringing an apple up for a bit and back down again.

As per usual, he was oblivious to much going on around him, too absorbed by his reading to pay much attention to the rest of the room's occupants. It wasn't until somebody sat down next to him that he glanced over. Ah. Fortitude. Noah still wasn't sure how he felt about his newest brother-in-law, mostly because they didn't talk much, but Jemima seemed happy after all was said and done, so he supposed that was all he needed. Nodding in the other man's direction, he went back to the line about carving turnips for the nighttime of All Hallows Eve.

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Fortitude Greengrass

  

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Ford had been distracted today. There was a party tomorrow that he'd been invited to, along with Jemima, and they were not socially recovered enough from the circumstances of their engagement that they could afford to be picky about invitations. Ford wouldn't have minded staying home, generally, except that he still needed to drag Clementine out in front of Philomen Huxley at every available opportunity in the hopes that he would get on with a proposal... and he suspected that Jemima liked attending events, at least when she wasn't hanging on the edge of the room as a social pariah. So he was happy enough to attend anything they were invited to — but this one was a bit difficult, because he knew without even having to ask that Tycho would be there too. The last (and only) time Jemima and Tycho had been at an event since Ford's wedding hadn't gone exceptionally well. So he was spending most of his free energy today thinking about how he could prevent another Coming Out Ball, and subsequently not getting much of his work done, and his coworker at the next desk was beginning to take notice of the fact that he'd had the same case file out for the past two hours.

Time for a cup of tea.

The break room had a handful of people in it when he arrived, one of whom he recognized right away — Jemima's younger brother. Ford had been walking on eggshells around the Farleys since the engagement, convinced they all hated him and would forever (and not entirely blaming them for it, either). But of the whole Farley clan he found Noah least anxiety-inducing; it was difficult to feel intimidated by someone so much younger. Ford put the water on and prepared the tea, then went to sit while he waited for the water to boil. He approached the table with a small but friendly smile, which Noah seemed not to even notice since he didn't bother looking up until Ford had already sat down. Barely a glance, and he was back to his book.

This felt very deliberate to Ford. He'd come in and looked around the room and then started making tea; surely Noah Farley had glanced up and taken notice of him at some point prior to this. He had intentionally not looked up while Ford approached the table, and intentionally cut back to his book so quickly. An extreme cold shoulder. Well. So much for Noah Farley being his de-facto favorite of Jemima's siblings.

Ford turned his attention to his fingernails and made a very slight hmmm noise, pondering whether and how to try and initiate a conversation when his efforts at being friendly had already been fairly solidly rebuffed. It was too late to change tables, at least without someone else in the breakroom taking notice. He glanced towards the tea kettle, still nowhere near boiling.

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Set by Lady!

Oblivious as ever, both in manners and attention, Noah was far too engrossed in his book to notice any sort of awkwardness between himself and his brother-in-law. Noah had always been of the opinion that people did not him their attention, and so he had always been able to occupy himself rather well. Plus he often found books to be better company than most people.

Still, it was hard to miss the noise that Fortitude made and so therefore Noah glanced up again. "Sorry, am I taking up too much space?" He had a bad habit of spreading out, which wasn't so bad at the moment, but possibly more than one person ought to on the break room tables. Noah started to pull some things closer to his space, the spare books he'd brought, the canteen of pumpkin juice he'd packed along with the rest of his lunch. "Bad habit, sorry." His desk in his office was a veritable mess, papers, ink, quills, folders, everything scattered without so much as a rhyme or reason to the organization. It was probably the single most vexing thing about him.

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