Multi-pup post!

[precocioustilda]

Matilda has an armchair by the fire, a mug of hot chocolate, and a copy of Beowulf in the original Anglo-Saxon. By her standards this counts as non-academic relaxation. Do say hello.

Jhalak is hanging from the rafters by one arm, surveying the bar with two eyes, the remaining two arms tucked close to its body. It's not sure it likes being away

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[candied_rabbit]

Ooh, fireplace. Warmth. Very nice.

Momiji makes a beeline for it, after he's gotten a drink and a snack - a few cookies and a big cup of coffee, respectively - before slumping down to the side of one of the various pieces of furnitute around the hearth. Actually sitting on chairs and couches is overrated.

As it happens, the furniture in question is Matilda's armchair, and he cranes his head to the side, smiling.

"Hi, 'Tilda!"

[precocioustilda]

"Hi!"

She looks up from the book and grins.

"How're you?"

[candied_rabbit]

"I'm good! School's almost out for the holidays, back home."

Which, given that it's already been Christmas and such here, makes him feel a tad tardy. But it's a very pleasant fact, even if it has been a long time coming.

"What about you? Oh...cookie?"

This latter question presumably refers to the sweet he's holding at her over the arm of her chair, a little round thing with almond and honey, on top.

[precocioustilda]

"Oh! Cookie!"

Yoink.

"Thank you! I'm doing quite well. School's nearly out for the year, for me."

[candied_rabbit]

Cookies are only about nine-tenths as good, when eaten without the aid of someone else. So, it was a necessary exchange, in the process of tastiness maximization.

"Neat - what kind of school do you go to, anyway?"

Matilda is, after all, almost a year or so shy of being a decade younger than him and also reading Beowolf. This would muddle his intuition on the matter, even if schools weren't already weird in other places.

[precocioustilda]

"The university kind. At Cambridge. It's terrific fun."

[candied_rabbit]

"Oh, wow. You're in college, already."

Yeah, Momiji, that's what she just said. But he can't help but be surprised - he has trouble just imagining his older cousins going off to college, and they're only a year or two away from it. Kids attending college is even weirder!

"Do you get breaks a lot? I heard people get more days off of school, when they start college."

[precocioustilda]

"Yes. I'm used to it by now, though; it's my second year."

[candied_rabbit]

"Cool...how many years do you have to go?"

He figures this is probably the same in Japan, but he would have thought that about high schools and things, too, and the years and days are really different between his school and other places. Not to mention that even his brief acquaintances with college students has made him realize that there are all sorts of funny degrees that all take a lot of weird, different things to get.

[precocioustilda]

"Well, it's a little strange for me because I'm so young. I was originally planning at least five years of undergraduate studies, but now I think I'll probably cut that down to three and graduate as soon as I've figured out what I want my first degree in, then stick around accumulating more until I'm old enough to teach."

[candied_rabbit]

It takes a moment for Momiji to process what this means, but, when he does, he blinks quite a lot.

"Won't that mean you'll be in school for, like...forever?"

Okay, maybe they'll let her teach before that, but it still sounds like it would have to be quite a long time! And quite a long time might as well be forever, as far as Momiji's concerned.

[precocioustilda]

Giggle. "Hardly! Just until I'm sixteen or so, probably, which isn't all that long. Besides, the more time I spend at school, the more interesting things I get to learn."

[candied_rabbit]

"How old are you, now?" he inquires, his mildly suspicious expression making it clear that he's pretty sure that there's a forever or two in between how old Matilda is now and sixteen. After all, he's sixteen, and he's pretty sure she's a good bit younger.

"What sort of stuff do you study, anyway? We don't learn anything really neat, in high school. Just English and geometry and algebra and stuff."

He has a very "ick" expression on his face at the last two. A little academe, he is not.

[precocioustilda]

Brightly: "Seven. And I study everything I can get my hands on, of course, especially languages. Maths are fun too."

[candied_rabbit]

"...You're crazy, 'Tilda," Momiji observes, with a good-natured giggle, before popping one of his cookies into his mouth.

"I don't think even any of the really nerdy kids study like that, in my school. There're just math and science people or history people and English people and little groups, like that."

There are almost certainly exceptions to this oversimplified view of things - he's related to one of them - but it's how he sees it, at least.

[precocioustilda]

"Well, I just really like learning new things. It's lots of fun and terrifically useful sometimes."