Closed Do It To Death

[Leo Malstrom]

Kneading dough on a kitchen counter littered with flour that was only interrupted by the cranking of his pasta maker in early hours of the morning was a tide and true routine of Leo's whenever he had something on his mind. It was a cycle he found himself caught in more often recently, given all that had been going on in the band on top of Leo's desire for control and maintaining his many self appointed responsibilities. Indeed, kneading dough and rolling pasta for hours on end and in the middle of the night was the only reverie he could grasp from his everyday life, the lack of sleep when he was already stressed deemed a necessary loss. Especially when the action of making pasta at home was all too comforting and familiar in its simplicity, all too natural a coping mechanism for his emotions and stress, with no other way to express himself due to the stubborn writer's block Leo had been experiencing on top of everything else.

Leo was covered in flour and his hair was a mess, the apron on top of his clothes doing little to keep the black fabrics from being cast in white as he kneaded and rolled yards of spaghetti and linguine he had lost count of. The freezer was full of balls of dough and the pantry with freshly made noodles, and Leo didn't know when he would feel like stopping, whether it would be from sheer exhaustion or from the whisper of a musical idea appearing in his mind and distracting him with creativity. After so many days and hours of being unable to string two words or notes together for the life of him, Leo hoped it was the latter as he wiped his forehead with his arm. He had been in such a musical drought that a lick or motif forming in his mind would be a welcomed sense of productivity he had been missing. He hoped that he could compose something soon as he exhaled heavily, rubbing the tiredness from one of his eyes with his hand. ​

 

[Vera Ito]

Vera had always been a night owl. It was one of the only times it was quiet in her house growing up. She lived for the moments when she could finally think straight without the chaos of her siblings or whatever friend her parents had invited to stay with them indefinitely. Even as she got older and moved out she still found herself preferring the quiet that came with the late hour. It was also a side effect of her profession. Shows sometimes didn't end until after midnight and then it was even later by the time they got home. But now, living with the band, she wasn't usually the only one up at odd hours. She didn't mind it though. It was reassuring hearing the sounds of activity. It reminded her that she wasn't the only person in the world when the night started to feel a little too big.

She had just stepped out of her room when she heard a familiar sound. Vera glanced at the time and she thought it was a bit late for pasta, even for Leo. But she quietly made her way to the kitchen, making sure to walk lightly. She hovered in the shadow of the doorway and watched Leo feed dough through the machine and she nearly laughed when she noticed just how much flour had ended up on his clothes. She frowned slightly when she noticed stress on his face and stepped forward to make herself known. She knocked lightly on the doorframe. "Is all that for me?" she asked with a hint of a smile.

 

[Leo Malstrom]

With tired eyes and tired hands, Leo looked away from his freshly shredded linguine to the doorway. He could hardly say he was surprised by the interruption; given the band's lifestyle that kept them awake at all hours of the night it was inevitable one of them would interrupt sooner or later to see what Leo was doing, and to revel in the mess of flour he had turned himself and the kitchen into. What Leo instead hadn't expected was for the interruption to be by Vera, rather than Delaney or Asher wanting a post-midnight snack. He could admit he was slightly relieved, his demeanor softening slightly as he realised Vera's presence. "It can be." He responded gently, taking Vera's words as an indication to stop what he was doing, to remember to take a break and eat something.

Leo wiped his forehead with his sleeve again, soon retrieving his wand from the pocket of his apron and waving it to clear some of the flour from the kitchen table. He placed his fresh linguine in a jar, returning his pasta maker to its place above the fridge before waving his wand again to summon a different jar of pasta and a jar of pesto sauce in addition to a saucepan to the kitchen counter. He added water to the saucepan and the saucepan to the stove that he switched on, then carelessly untying his apron and throwing it on the back of one of the chairs. He picked up a wooden spoon while waiting for the water to boil. "Can't really sleep." Leo announced softly, both as a complaint to his situation and a reasoning for his behavior, to what he was doing making pasta at such an ungodly hour, as if he would be awake at an hour that was godly. As if the lack of sleep wasn't a choice because he had countless thoughts and emotions to work through instead. "A lot's been happening." Leo added looking over his shoulder slightly to Vera, his exhaustion and their general familiarity not really calling him to make proper conversation. ​

 

[Vera Ito]

Vera's smile turned genuine when Leo said that the pasta could be for her. They had known each other so long she didn't have to say another word before he started to make her favorite. She hovered in the doorway for a moment more, until the kitchen table was clean and she took a seat. Seconds later the smell of basil and garlic filled the kitchen as Leo bent over the stove. His movements were smooth and practiced after countless nights of this exact same ritual. Vera waited patiently and didn't have much to say when her friend admitted he couldn't sleep. That was obvious considering the time and just how much pasta he had managed to make tonight. But when he turned to glance at her and added that a lot had been happening she felt her eyebrows furrow. She stared at him for a long moment as if the simple act of looking at him would let her read his mind. Usually that would work but not now. As far as she knew everything was going fine with them and the band. Maybe they would actually have to use their words this time. "Oh?" she asked questioningly. She was tempted to leave it at that but that wouldn't get them anywhere fast, and the bags under Leo's eyes did concern her. "Like what?" she asked and waited for his response. There had never been secrets between them. They had too much history for that.

 

[Leo Malstrom]

Leo both didn't understand how to elaborate, nor why he needed to when Vera asked it of him. What really, was he was supposed to say when she too knew the band's schedule, and likely knew how much he had been struggling over the last few weeks to piece a song together? That his usually short fuse had burned out, causing him to snap at nothing at a moment's notice? As much as Vera seemed so in tune and in step with him enough to read him like a book, he knew it would be unrealistic of him to assume she could read his mind. But from a lack of knowing how to form his feelings into words and complex sentences he almost wished she could, wished she just knew what he was thinking at any given moment, even if he realised it would lead to more vulnerability that he was comfortable with.

He sighed at first, focusing on the task at hand as the water in the saucepan began to boil. Only after adding the noodles and lowering the temperature of the stove to a simmer did he decide to turn and lean back on the counter. Brought back into the conversation, Leo crossed his arms over his torso in frustration towards himself over his inability to answer Vera's question with the detail she likely wanted. "You know." He waved a hand slightly, soon bringing it to pinch the bridge of his nose in a state of tension. "Just everything, dealing with the other two-" He nodded to the hallway in reference to Delaney and Asher. "- dealing with trying to be successful. I feel like the work we've put in and the time we've spent is all for nothing." It had always been fear of Leo's, a mix of rational and irrational that his lifetime trying to be successful in the music business was all for nothing, that what he had achieved could be taken away at a moments notice. As much as he knew so many years of hard work couldn't result in nothing, it was a fact of reality that fame and success in music was fleeting. Performers could make it big in one breath and be forgotten by the next if they didn't innovate, didn't repeatedly out do themselves and continue to reach milestones of unrealistic proportions. Leo felt pressured to constantly out do himself, and if he couldn't it would lead him to hit brick wall and realise his life goal was entirely unreachable.​

 

[Vera Ito]

Vera watched Leo closely and she could see him struggling to find the words he wanted. She had noticed that he seemed to be in a bit of a writing slump lately but that was nothing new. Thankfully it didn't happen often, but it wasn't the first time. And if their career lasted as long as they hoped, it wasn't likely to be the last either. At the same time she hated seeing him like this. For as long as she could remember he had been the confident one, or at the very least the more charismatic one compared to her. Seeing him waver even slightly didn't sit well with her. She sat up a bit straighter as Leo finally found whatever words he had been searching for. Vera's lips twitched into a hint of a smile when he implied Asher and Delaney were the culprits of his stress. She knew those two could drive even the most level headed saints crazy. But everyone in this house was a little crazy. They had to be to choose the life they were living.

Her faint smile faltered when Leo continued and expressed his concern about the band and it's success. Vera knew the responsibility weighed on him but usually it was an unspoken fear, avoided just in case acknowledging it would make it real. Now it was her turn to make him sit in silence and she chose her words wisely. She stared at him and for a moment she saw him as the boy he had been in his old apartment with her brother. They had already come so far form where they stared and achieved more success than she had ever thought possible. Without thinking about it she stood up and crossed the kitchen and took his face in her hands. She tried not to think about how her pulse quickened at the contact and instead stared directly in his eyes. "Well...I think you'd make a really good chef." she said with a grin pulling at the corner of her mouth. Deep down she knew none of them were cut out for day jobs but she hoped her joke would lighten his mood. "You're being ridiculous." she said more seriously this time. "This house is bigger than the one I grew up in. I mean just think about it. We've made it." Vera said genuinely. She rarely bothered with unfiltered sincerity but she hated seeing Leo like this. "Just relax."