twentyfourseven
The place is open 24/7, which is just as well, because she can never manage to get there until at least 1am, and sometimes not before 5am. No matter which shift she works, she just can't seem to get her shit sufficiently together to arrive before midnight.
So she'll get there, savour the anticipation as she approaches the entrance, stand for a moment with her hand on the frosted glass door (pause, pause), then push with just enough force to open it a crack. There'll be a slight pop and a sliver of climate-controlled air will feather out, then sigh away into the night. She'll slip inside, hang her coat on the usual hook (it might as well have her name engraved underneath), and enter the lounge.
The same people are here all the time. She recognises some more easily than others. A nod here, a smile there. Very rarely there are new faces. If she manages to arrive a little earlier or a lot later than usual, there might be a handful of unknowns. She finds herself anticipating these more and more eagerly, and can barely contain her enthusiasm when they appear. She knows she shouldn't, knows it's frowned upon, but she has this compulsion to greet every new (new-to-her) face with a smile and an outstretched hand, introduce herself, show a little of her work (always keeping a fragment or two on her person for just this reason). She tries to be cool, to remain aloof, but the temptation is just too great.
And afterwards, when she has done the meet-and-greet, when she collapses slightly dizzily into her regular chair to assess the worth of the tentative new connections forged, she takes a deep breath and tips her head back to rest against the shabby wallpaper, lets the breath out, blinks some, and admits to herself she's out of her depth, and considers, for the umpteenth time, how she might extricate herself (stand up, make an announcement, very carefully remove herself from the premises and never return). But they're looking at her now, so she smiles, glances at one or two or three of them, then bends to her notebook and begins to write.