Main Campfire [Monday evening]

[justwantsquiet]

Sookie loved summer. And while it wasn't really summer yet, it was close enough

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[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri was finally un-grounded, which was a relief, except for the part where the cabins meant it was about that time of year.

It had her slightly preoccupied, but at least she wasn't a walking ball of soul-crushing emo, right? "Hey, Sookie," she greeted as she approached the campfire and poked a few marshmallows onto a stick to roast. "How's cabin life treating you so far?"

[justwantsquiet]

"Headacheishly," she said, figuring Tahiri would understand. "But otherwise, it's nice out, and school isn't really school. Can't complain. How're you?"

[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri gave her a sympathetic look. "That bad? I've spent the past two weeks stuck in my room when I haven't had classes or somewhere I absolutely had to be, and I don't even know why."

[justwantsquiet]

"...wait, how? Like, literally stuck?" she asked, staring. "Could your feet move?"

[weetuskenraider]

"No, I just couldn't leave," Tahiri grumbled. "I couldn't even open my own door, and the latch was working just fine. If I was on my way back from class, and tried to go anywhere else, I'd hit invisible walls . . . I feel like I was being punished for something, but I don't know what."

[justwantsquiet]

"Were you under a spell?" Sookie asked, wide-eyed.

What? It made as much sense as anything else here.

[weetuskenraider]

Tahiri dropped onto a log near the fire and held her stick of marshmallows out. "I'm blaming the island," she decided. "Jaina had the same problem for a while, but she got out earlier."

And that was enough grumbling about that, so Tahiri looked up toward the sky and smiled. "It's a nice night. I sometimes think I like it better out here than I do in the dorms."

[justwantsquiet]

"I'd live out here year round," Sookie admitted softly, looking up as well. "The close quarters leave something to be desired, but it's warm and lovely outside and I like being kinda removed from everything, you know?"

[weetuskenraider]

"I definitely know," Tahiri assured her. "There's so many people all crammed together in the dorms, and sometimes I just get a little . . . itchy, I suppose. It's calmer out here. More what I'm used to, and --" She gestured toward the treetops. "How can you not appreciate all of this?"

[justwantsquiet]

Sookie nodded vehemently. "The weather, too -- it's more like home, for me. I don't feel right in the winter. Being outside is almost kind of...comforting. Weird as that might sound to most people, I guess."

[weetuskenraider]

"Not to me," Tahiri said with a laugh. "It's alive out here. Feeling that makes me feel like I'm more in touch with everything."

[justwantsquiet]

"Easier to breathe, too," she admitted, smiling. "I feel more alive outside, honestly. I don't feel right without a tan."

[weetuskenraider]

"Definitely." Tahiri nodded, and flicked her fingers out to idly shape a wisp of smoke from the fire into a spiral. "Though I can do without the tan, myself. I had all the sun exposure I ever wanted when I was little. This is what the weather's like at home for you most of the time?"

[justwantsquiet]

"More humid," she said, considering. "We're near swamps, so it's not just hot, it's sticky, too. Truth be told I might like it here, more. For lots of reasons, the summer weather just being a small one."

[weetuskenraider]

"Sounds a bit like Yavin," Tahiri observed. "Though it wasn't that sticky there, either. There was more plant life there, but . . ."

Depressing subject, so she shrugged it off. "There's lots of reasons to like it here. We could be here all night naming them."

[justwantsquiet]

"Where's Yavin?" she asked, hoping that wasn't too sensitive -- she figured Tahiri had broken off for a reason, though she wasn't pressing -- but she was curious about whatever this place with the weird name was.