Blood & Roses

Poppy Love

~~ {god I'm so bad at transitions} ~~

It was only a ten minute drive to the park and soon enough, Grian was climbing out of his car, glancing around the area to see if he could see any of his friends. It looked like a decent amount of other people had had the same idea as Etho and though the park wasn't packed, there was a good collection of people milling around the area.

His phone dinged from his pocket.

Etho, again.
"Cleo, Joel, and I are hanging out on benches by the start of the purple trails."

Grian sighed as he started to head towards a large board in the entrance to the park, gazing up at the map to figure out where he was supposed to head. Made no sense trying to walk around blindly in the park.

After grabbing a travel map for his convenience, Grian noted the purple trail on the map and started to head in that direction.

He looked around the area as he walked, trying to spot his friends somewhere. Eventually, he noticed them on a bench right at the start of the trail- just as Etho had said.

Etho and Joel were sitting right next to each other on a bench, Etho's arm resting around Joel's shoulder while their other hand held their phone, most likely scrolling through some social media. Joel was shorter than Etho by a fair bit, leaning his head against Etho's shoulder. He had short, brown hair that fell over his forehead, one stripe down the middle dyed bright green. He was wearing a simple white t-shirt, a brown jacket, blue jeans and tennis shoes.

Cleo sat beside them, though gave them some space, a sketchbook and pencil bag in her lap. She had naturally reddish-orange hair that flowed down past her shoulders. She was wearing Sally's dress from the Nightmare Before Christmas, gray colored leggings and black flats. She also had tattooed stitch lines running around her forearms and hands. Cherry blossoms bloomed on her upper right arm, just below the sleeve of her dress.

"You know, Halloween was last month." Grian spoke up as he approached the three, looking at Cleo specifically.

"It's still fall, it's still Halloween." Cleo retorted as she looked up at Grian.

Grian rolled his eyes, coming to stand right by the bench before speaking again, "Martyn didn't want to come along?"

"He has evening classes this semester." Cleo explained.

Grian nodded, glancing around the area a little. There was still a fair amount of red, orange, and yellow leaves on most trees and it was all around still very pretty. He almost wished he had grabbed his camera before heading out. It would've made for some nice photos.

"Well, with Grian here, we should get hiking before it gets dark." Etho spoke, pulling their arm out from around Joel's neck before standing up and stretching their arms out.

"We've got hours before the sun sets." Joel spoke as he stood up as well.

"And you know I want to hike for hours." Etho retorted, crossing their arms over their chest.

"I do know. And we'll hike for as long as you want tonight." Joel gave in, turning to start to walk down the boardwalk pathway. Cleo stood up and followed after the two, holding her art supplies to her chest. And Grian took up the rear, following after Cleo.

The path lead into the woods, weaving in between thicker patches of trees, but staying relatively flat throughout. It was a nice, smooth, wooden boardwalk, Grian idly thought to himself as they walked.

A couple minutes into the walk, they reached the first semi-clearing in the woods. It was a flat open platform on the edge of a small cliff, overlooking a small waterfall and the river that ran through it. Etho and Joel found a bench along the railing to rest on, Cleo opening up her sketchbook and finding a place along the railing to begin to draw the landscape, and Grian found his own spot along the railing, crossing his arms to lean on it, watching the waterfall.