"Uh, I really don't have anything in particular in mind but figured we could find something to do. Though if you need to get some sleep, I'll find something or someone else to keep me occupied. Hell, I could even go back home and wake Samantha up. Make her occupy me today..."

Talia made her way over to the empty bar and took a seat on one of the stools, spinning herself around to face him. 

"You know, this place looks so much different without people in it. It's rather big in here."

She could see Johnny looking over his shoulder, giving the place a bit of a scan. 

"Yeah, I guess it is. Not sure I've really taken a look at it like that."

Making his way over to where she was seated, he leaned up against the bar. Didn't take a seat just stood there in front of her. He gave the cup of coffee in her hands a look. 

"Oh, my coffee. I'll be right back."

"Ok.." Talia said as just watched him walk off to the back, giving he a moment to take another sip from her cup. 

Johnny scurried back to the office and spotted his coffee right away as he entered the room. Scooping it off of the corner of the desk he took a large sip before spinning around and heading back out to the bar. He was behind the bar this time and Talia was still facing away starring at the empty pool hall.

Reaching across the bar he grabbed her by the shoulder and spun her around to face him.

"Who needs sleep. Sleep is overrated anyhow. You think of something for us to do and I am down."

The coffee in his hand was starting to get a bit cold for his liking so he popped off the lid and quickly chugged the rest of the cup. 

"I might need a refill on this before we get into anything too crazy though." He said motioning to his now empty cup. 

"Good thing the coffee shop is just around the corner, we could run over there really quick and grab a couple more. You know I won't say no to another cup, hell might even be fancy and get one of those cappuccinos this time around. I hear they are the newest craze."

"Uh... they aren't really new but sure lets go with that."

Talia shrugged. "Hey, I've always just gone the coffee route. Simple and easy!"

Johnny laughed abruptly then immediately cut himself off. 

"What?"

"You, simple and easy. HA!"

"What's that supposed to mean?" She gave him a glare, waiting to see what he had to say. 

"I just mean, you are not simple or easy. Complex and difficult would be a better description actually. Don't get me wrong I like it... but there is nothing simple about you."

As he was talking Johnny spotted Todd walk back in through the front door. He headed over to the office once more and locked the door before returning back out to the bar.

"Hey Todd, we are out of here. If Luke shows up for his shift tell him to get lost I already covered it. If anyone shows up with a resume just toss it in the office for me." 

He then headed back over to Talia and pulled her up off of the stool by the arm.

"Come on, you have a cappuccino waiting for you miss simple, and I need more coffee!" 

"Okay.. I guess we are off to get more caffeine." She said while standing there in front of him, just after he pulled her up off the stool. He began walking towards the door, in which she followed but abruptly stopped just before he was about to reach for the handle. 

"Oh shit..."

Johnny spun his head around. "What? What is it now?"

"My bag, I think it is still in your office. Actually I know it is."

"Well the office is all the way in the back and it's locked."

"Okay, and?"

Johnny took in a deep breath and let out a sigh. 

"And.... I  will be right back."

Johnny spun around and headed back to the office. Fiddling with his keys for a few moments to unlock the door he finally swung it open. There it was, a big ol' feminine-looking bag sitting right on his desk.

"Not sure how I missed that..." He muttered to himself.

Swinging the bag over his shoulder and headed back out he locked up the office once again before making his way back over to Talia with the purse still hanging from his shoulder. 

"Alright got the purse. Are we ready to head out now?"

She motioned for him to hand it over, a motion that he disregarded. 

"Alight got the purse. Are we ready to head out now?"

"Yeah but I will take that."

He glanced over and down at the bad over his should then directed his attention back onto her. 

"Oh, you want this big ole thing. I mean I was thinking about keeping it, it was in my office and you know what they say. Possession is nine tenths the law."

"Oh... okay... so you wanna walk around the streets with that thing on your shoulder? By all mean be my guest. Not like you aren't used to the funny looks already."

Talia chuckled and walked right by him out the door.   

Johnny had been busy lately, so busy that he hadn't had time to stop by and check on the pool hall in quite some time. The staff was pretty self-sufficient at this point so he wasn't overly worried about it, but at the same time, he would hate to have to deal with the wrath of Ood if something bad were to happen to his business on Johnny's watch. With that in mind, and now that he was finally back in Detroit he decided he should probably go check on things.

On his way down to No Foul Play, Johnny swung by Talia's apartment. He figured she could help him make sure everything was running smoothly, and besides, maybe they could even make a night of it. If Johnny was going to a bar you could almost always bet Talia was there as well these days. He pounded on her door for a few minutes before she finally swung it open.

"Hey fancy running into you here..."

"Huh? At my apartment?" She responded a bit confused.

"Yeah so anyways, convenient you live so close to the pool hall. Wanna come give me a hand? Of course you do, come on lets go."

Talia had just kicked her shoes off and sat down on her couch when a loud pounding went upon her door. It was so loud that it scared the hell out of her. Her heart immediately went from zero to one hundred. “Who in the hell...” she said within her head as she stood up from her seated position.

”Who is it?” Talia overheard the voice coming from down the hallway, causing her to turn her head in that direction. It was Samantha, she had heard the pounding at the door from all the way in back of the apartment, which says a lot. Normally the girl kept her door closed, had her record player going and was usually absent from the world. Not this time though... 

“Someone who is pounding on the wrong door and whom better have a good reason, that’s who.” 

She took one step towards the door, one step and already Samantha was on her heels. “Who do you think it is?” Samantha muttered, was a comment Talia completely ignored. She said nothing but made her way to the door, stood on her tip toes and looked through the peephole. 

”Pft, I should have known...”

”Who is it?”

”Who do you think?”

Samantha took a quick moment to give it some thought, in that same moment Talia opened the door. Samantha didn’t see the person right away as she was standing behind Talia, still in thought. Once she heard the voice and brief conversation, she ducked under Talias arm and leaned towards him. 

”Johnny!” She embraced him tightly. 

”Pool hall you say? Okay I’m down, lemme put my shoes back on.”

Samantha slowly let go of him but made sure to keep her focus on him. “Can I come too?”

Johnny looked to Talia, hoping for some kind of subtle yes or no facial expression to let him know how he was meant to answer Samantha's question, she was basically the kids' mother at this point after all. She had her back turned to him though putting on her shoes, and Samantha was still just staring at him, looking so damn hopeful.

"Oh yeah of course you can come, throw on some shoes. I'll be down there." He said pointing outside towards the front of the building.

He headed down the stairs and out the door right away, partially because he was worried he answered Samantha's question wrong. He took a seat on the bench just outside the front door of the building and waited for Talia and Samantha to get down there. The pool hall was only a few blocks away and once they joined him they were there in no time. 

"Feels like forever since we've been here. Doesn't it?" Johnny said as he stared up at the sign above the front door. 

Samantha kind of led the way, she was a couple steps ahead of Talia and Johnny the entire was to the pool hall. 

”It’s ok she’s coming right?” Johnny subtly asked during the walk, Talia simply nodded. The pool hall was no concern for Talia, besides the headquarters this place was next safest in line. Plus it gave the kid a chance to continue honing her pool shark skills. 

They got up to the door, Samantha walked herself right in as Talia and Johnny stopped just prior to going in. 

”Feels like forever since we’ve been here. Doesn’t it?” 

Talia looked at him and nodded, it had felt like it was forever ago that they had been there. In the past it was common that the pair of them were there every night but anymore those nights were a distant memory. Life had gotten busy for the both of them and making time just wasn’t as easy anymore.

”Yeah, it has been a while. Too long of you ask me, we should make more of a habit of doing this. Maybe weekly?”

"Weekly eh. Hmmm, sounds like a plan! After you..."

Johnny swung the door open as he talked and motioned for Talia to go first. He followed her inside and then headed back towards the office, motioning once again for her to follow him. He fiddled with the key for a moment or two before managing to get the door open. 

"Damn lock..." He muttered as it finally opened.

He flopped down in the desk chair and started reading through the finances. After several minutes of reading through he looked over his shoulder to Talia.

"You wanna do me a favor?" He asked, accompanied by the biggest smile he could muster.

"Depends..." She said, sounding unsure.

"If this is all right, and going off what the bank balance was earlier... there should be ummm... $263 dollars in there." He said nodding to the safe. 

"and you want me to count the safe?" She stated, more than asked.

"Pleaseeee?"

Talia swiveled her head around as she followed Johnny into the back, she had an idea where Samantha was at but needed to make sure. She directed her gaze towards the pool tables and sure enough that’s where she was. She was chalking up a pool stick as so random dude was racking up balls. 

”Sucker!” Talia muttered in her head. That guy had no idea what he was in for, his night was gonna turn bad for sure. 

Feeling content where Samantha was, Talia followed Johnny into the office and plopped herself down in the chair across from Johnnys big boss chair. Talia day there quietly, giving Johnny ample time to go through the books. Normally this is where she’d yammer on about something but not tonight, tonight she kept quiet. 

That was until Johnny hinted at counting the safe. 

”and you want me to count the safe?”

”Pleaseeee????”

”Sure, gimme the bag with the cash in it.” Talia said while extending her hand towards him, a hand that was met with the bag of money. It wasn’t a heavy bag. Was actually rather light. Opening it up, Talia dumped the content on the desk in front of her. It was light for a reason, the cash was broken down in the biggest bills possible. There were two, one hundreds a fifty, a ten and a couple singles. It all totaled up to $263 just like it should have. 

She put the money in order, put it back in the bag and handed it back to Johnny.

”I need you to count that.”

”Yeah and I did, it’s all there. Large bills but it’s all there.”

"How the hell did a pool hall safe end up with only large bills?" Johnny wondered out loud as he opened the bag up and looked inside.

"Oh well fuck it, as long as it's all there I guess..." He shrugged as he tossed the bag back into the safe and closed it up. 

"Seems like everything is pretty well under control here, drinks?" 

Johnny got up from the seat and headed out of the office as he asked the question, and Talia quickly got up herself and followed him out to the bar. The bartender that was working was serving a customer when they got up there so he just headed behind the counter himself and grabbed a mug, filling it nice and high with beer. Talia propped herself up on a stool on the other side, snapping her fingers in his direction a few times.

"Ohhh bartender!" She said looking directly at Johnny.

Johnny drank about half of his mug of beer before placing it down and turning towards Talia.

"What would you like?" He said with a chuckle.

Talia hmmed for a moment then acted like she had a brilliant idea. 

”Do you all have wine here? Like good wine, not that cheap shit they serve most everywhere.” 

”Wine... wine.. hmm, we might just have some of that.” 

Johnny pretended to look about but didn’t move from where he was standing. 

”Nope, no wine sorry. Looks like you’ll need to drink a beer.” 

”Beer... fuck that I’m outta here.” 

Talia grabbed her bag and acted like she was getting up to leave.

"Alright alright hold up..." 

Talia paused and slowly turned back around to face him. 

"I'll have a look... but I am really not sure if we do..."

He turned and flipped through a couple of cabinets behind the bar quickly, managing to find more or less every type of alcohol on the planet other than wine. Determined to find it if it was there though he headed out back to the storage area in the kitchen and searched through a few shelves.

"Damn I really don't think there is any..." He muttered to himself.

As Johnny was heading back to deliver the bad news he spotted a bottle under one of the counters in the kitchen. It was shaped like a wine bottle, he rushed over to it but as he picked it up and gave it a read he noticed it was all Japanese writing on the bottle.  

"Saké? What the hell is a saké?... Oh well, it looks like wine to me."

Proud of himself for actually managing to find Talia some wine Johnny marched triumphantly back up to the bar and placed the bottle down in front of her. 

"HA! Wine. Now you must stay and drink with me."

Here she thought this whole time it was a joke, she had been here many of times and each time she had gotten wine. Now all of a sudden it didn’t exist? Did they stop receiving shipments? Something wasn’t right and this was an issue, momentarily Talias fears diminished as Johnny walked back towards her with what looked like a wine bottle. 

”HA! Wine. Now you must stay and drink with me.” He stayed as he pulled out a wine glass and began pouring. The liquid coming out of the bottle wasn’t red, it wasn’t amber like, it was clear....

”What kind of wine is this?” She gave it a glare then darted her eyes towards Johnny. “Wine isn’t clear, this shit is clear.” 

Johnny stopped pouring, placed the bottle down then leaned down to give it a look. 

”Hmm, it’s a new kind of wine... sake wine.” 

”Sake? Like that liquor from Japan?” 

”Dunno where it’s from but it came in a wine bottle that means it is wine or at least wine like. Right?”

Talia placed her head in the palm of her hand and sighed. “This is not wine, not even close.” She picked her head up out of the palm of her hand and pushed the glass towards him.

”Go ahead try it, tell me it’s wine.

Johnny took a sip of his beer and looked at Talia after she requested he tried her funny wine.

"Yup that's beer." He said followed by a smile.

"Yes. This though. This is not wine!" She held her cup out once more.

Johnny leaned in and took a sniff before responding.

"I don't know, it looks winey too me. Weird Asian wine? If you can find a bottle of wine you actually like your welcome to it..." He said motioning to the cabinets behind the bar. 

Talia stood up from her seat and leaned herself over the bar. If he said there was no wine then there was no wine, behind the bar at least. This wasn’t the first time this place ran out of wine, the first time was an utter disaster. There was literally no wine, she had to resort to drinking beer and if anyone knew Talia, knew that beer was a last resort type of thing.

Luckily for her sake her learned from that experience.

”See, no wine. Sorry... guess you’ll have a beer?” Johnny asked. 

”Nah, I’ll still have wine.”

”Uh, there is none...”

Talia leaned off the bar and smiled. “Yes there is!” Without saying anything else Talia walked off into the back, she could feel Johnnys eyes starring her down as she walked away but she didn’t look back. A couple moments later, Talia came waltzing out from the back. A bottle of red wine in her hand. She walked up to the bar and set it in front of him. 

”I’ll have wine!” She said while giving him a smile. “Now all you’ve got to do is get me an opener and a glass, glass optional of course.”

Johnny looked at Talia with a slight head tilt, looked back to the direction she had just returned from, then back to her once more... trying to figure out where the hell she had pulled the wine from.

"Ummmm?"

"Opener? Glass?" She said with a grin, intentionally not mentioning his confusion.

"Yeah, we will get to that... but where the hell did you pull that outta?" 

"You get me that glass and that opener and maybe I'll tell you..." SHe said still grinning.

Johnny sighed and headed over to the far end of the bar where the wine glasses were kept and grabbed one from the rack..On the way back he scooped up a corkscrew off the countertop, handing both to Talia as he returned to where she was sitting. 

"Who would have thought, no wine but there was still a corkscrew thingy sitting like four feet away... so anyways, where'd you get that?" He asked pointing at the bottle.