Closed A Friendly Walk with a Friendly Frog

[Ivara Caldwell]

Ivara was taking a stroll outdoors with her frog, Roger. He was croaking happily as Ivara took him for a stroll. It was an important part of her daily routine, and Ivara was plodding away in a merry sort of mood. She lived a carefree sort of life, focussing her attentions on frogs rather than schoolwork. Her break had gone well - more time to spend with her dads and the frogs in the room she had at home. SHe was musing slightly on the subject, on how she'd miss both Da and Pa soon enough, as well as her other frog friends. A cool, wintery breeze blew through, boughs on an oak tree bending a little at its force. Ivara stopped to look at the bare branches, her attention grabbed. Something about it, despite seeing it the past few days (it was a few days into the new school year by this point), took her fancy. "Pretty neat, isn't it, Roger?" Ivara asked her frog, saying it loud enough for any passerbys to hear. "I like the way the branches look when they don't have leaves."

 

[Juniper Veritas]

Juniper was taking a little walk outside with her cat Pumpkin. She'd lost her jar of sand recently which was quite unsettling start for the new year so now her cat had to endure the responsibility of being her emotional support link to home. She saw a girl in her year walking a... what was that? As she got closer she noticed it was a frog, that was very cute. Walking a bit closer she heard the girl call the frog friend Roger, or at least Juni assumed she called the frog that. The Hufflepuff was about to agree on the girl's words about the tree when her cat got there first, scaling up to the very branch the girl had been looking at. "I was going to say that tree's have such beautiful looks no matter what season, but I think Pumpkin thought it lacked colour." She said softly, blushing a little at the fact that she was daring enough to initiate conversation.

"I think it's beautiful that hey drop their leaves, only to let them grow again. As though they live a thousand lives. I suppose they do, given how old they can be." Juniper mused looking at the tree that now had her orange cat on its branch, much like herself her cat had grown since the small kitten she'd had last year. The Maine Coon was only a year and a half old and already almost 8 kilograms. Though the Hufflepuff supposed her tendency to feed her cat home baked cat treats had a little something to do with it.

 

[Ivara Caldwell]

Ivara gasped lightly at the sudden appearance of the cat, a little surprised. That didn't usually happen on her walks with Roger. She looked over to spot another student, someone she thought she recognised from a class or two. Ivara smiled at the remark about the colour the cat was giving to the tree. She listened to the other girl, nodding and quite impressed. "Many lives..." Ivara repeated, looking back to the tree thoughtfully. "I think that's very deep. Are you quite a thoughtful person?" Ivara asked, neglecting to introduce herself.

 

[Juniper Veritas]

As the girl said she thought what Juniper had just said was very deep the Hufflepuffs cheeks gained even more colour and she gave a sheepish smile. Considering the question she gave a slight shrug looking at the tree. "I guess so? I just like to think that plants, especially trees, have souls of their owns and that they see, feel and hear everything around them." Juniper explained. "It sounds a bit silly, I know, but it's a nice thought." She added quickly in case the girl found her answer stupid. She'd always seen the world around her as something that was fully alive, but she knew others might not see it the same way.

 

[Ivara Caldwell]

Ivara was fascinated by this girl. She turned fully to face her. "That's very interesting," Ivara said in response, then appeared to be deep in thought. "I don't really know what I think, but you could be right. Nature is very important, either way. We need to respect nature." Ivara said this with some authority, despite her small stature. "What's your cat's name?" Ivara asked, then gestured to the frog. "This is Roger, and I'm Ivara."

 

[Juniper Veritas]

Juniper gave a small nervous smile as the girl said her thought was interesting. She then nodded in agreeance to the statement that nature was important. "I think so too, we humans tend to take the world around us for granted and treat it as we please forgetting that most of it is much older than us." She said nodding a few times while talking. "Oh his name is Pumpkin, I wanted to name him after something that was relevant to autumn, like me, and well his coulour made Pumpkin quite the perfect name." She explained awkwardly, looking from her cat back to the girl. "It's nice to meet you Ivara and Roger," she said with a small smile and nod to the girl and her frog. "I'm Juniper," she told her, trying to get over the nerves little by little.

 

[Ivara Caldwell]

Ivara nodded. "It's kind of impressive how old things are. Like Roger. He's not very old, but frogs have existed for approximately 250 million years. Humans, on the other hand, have only existed for 300,000 years." Ivara couldn't remember her point exactly with bringing that up, but she liked to share frog facts so she wasn't too bothered. "Pumpkin's a great name," Ivara said. She tilted her head slightly when Juniper mentioned autumn. "Were you born in autumn or something?" Ivara asked. "I was born in the winter. And it's nice to meet you two too." Ivara was trying to be polite, but her tone was sometimes a bit indecipherable.

 

[Juniper Veritas]

Juniper smiled and felt herself relax a little bit further as Ivara went on to explain about a frog fact she knew and seemed to have somewhat of a similar outlook on thing. In the way that it was amazing how old some animal species were or the world around them was. "I didn't know that, that's impressive." Juni said with a nod, fully agreeing to it. "Yes, I was born in October and my mum and mama wanted to name kids after the season they were born, but like not directly so they went with Juniper." She explained with a nod.

(OOC: Writing this I have noted my FATAL mistake, October on that side of the globe ain't autumn and she was supposedly born on that side of the globe so like she might get an existential crisis out of this fact but its ok)