_______________Waffles <> It was seven-thirty on a Saturday morning and Nate was awake. He hid under his blankets for a moment of complete confusion. His alarm clock rung incessantly from his bookshelf. Slowly, piece by piece Nate was able to construct what was happening. "Fuck, I left my alarm clock on," he groaned to anyone who cared to listen, who, in his empty house, was nobody. In a swift movement he picked a shoe off the floor and hurled it in the direction of the offending noise. He only succeeded in making things worse; it looked like he was going to have to wake up. Nate pulled himself out of bed and fished his shoe out of a pile of paperbacks. The problem with sleep is that you don't really notice it unless you don't have enough. In that way it's kind of like air. Nate definitely hadn't had enough sleep that night, and he noticed it. However, being up early on weekends has its benefits as well as its minuses. On the plus side, you have more time than you ever imagined. Of course the curse is that you have more time than you ever imagined. Nate had already taken a shower, brushed his teeth, put on some clothes, made himself breakfast and it was only a little after nine o'clock. He should really still be asleep. Nate sat at the table and took a bite of toast. "I wonder what Alice is up to?" he said to himself, and glanced at his phone. <> As Alice always said, "I don't drink for the hangover, that part just ends up happening." This morning it had definitely happened. To put it bluntly, she felt like shit. Alice pulled herself out of bed and decided that waffles were to be the first order of business. Once waffles were attained than the rest of the day could be handled with some sanity; until then, there was no telling what would happen. After a rather extensive search of the kitchen she was disappointed to find not only that she was out of waffle mix but also that her waffle maker was missing. This was definitely a problem, and one that couldn't be easily remedied. In the end, in an emergency nutrition solution, she decided on an orange and a glass of juice, also made out of oranges. The three of them(Alice, the orange, and the juice) headed back to her room. She was midway through peeling the orange when her phone rang. <> It was not until eleven that Nate decided to call Alice. Any time before that would be to early. They had both been out last night, and nobody in their right mind would be awake before eleven o'clock. "Hello?" Alice said as she picked up the phone and fumbled with the orange.	"Hey Alice, what's up?" Nate said into the phone as he drummed his fingers on the table. Nate hoped his eleven o'clock call was not too early after all. "Yeah, oh, I'm OK, a little tired, and out of waffles..." Alice said. "This is Nate by the way," he said, kicking himself for not saying that at the beginning of the conversation. "Yeah, I figured." Alice said, and dropped the orange on the ground. "Shit!" It rolled away. "What?" Nate asked, confused. "Oh, my orange, err, never mind," Alice said as she felt around under the bed for her citrus fruit of choice. "OK, whatever, wanna go get coffee? With me?" Nate asked. Alice stopped and looked at her watch. "Yeah, sure, give me like forty-five minutes or something, to wake up." "OK, forty-five minutes at the coffee shop, I'll see you there." Nate said. "Ciao," Alice said and hung up the phone. "Now, what to wear?" Alice thought as she left the orange for later and went to her closet. <> Coffee is the worlds most popular psychoactive drug - well, the active ingredient of coffee, caffeine. It has surpassed alcohol and nicotine in popularity, but that's really not suprising. Whenever you have nothing else to do, you can get coffee, and in a small town, that can happen two or three times a day. Nate's local coffee shop was just like the local coffee shop in hundreds of other towns. There was a Starbucks, but only a looser or an idiot would ever be caught dead in a Starbucks. There were a couple people scattered around the tables, drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes, reading the paper. Satisfying their various addictions. Nate and Alice fit in seamlessly, sitting across from each other on one of those small coffee shop tables that is too small for any real purpose, but nobody minds. "So, why did you leave so early last night? I wanted to hang out with you." Alice said, sipping her coffee. "Early, it was three in the morning, I was tired," Nate said, defensively. Alice grinned. "Pussy," she teased Nate and they both laughed. "Whatever, whatever," Nate said and grinned. Alice looked at Nate, and Nate looked back at Alice, each of them thinking the same thought. Eventually Nate broke the silence, "So, what do you want to do today?" <> Coffee shops are almost like a trap, a less deadly quicksand if you will. And there is one in every town. When visiting a coffee shop you have to be very careful,