Swiftcurrent Creek Look for the girl with the broken smile.

There are a few shoots of vibrant green grass beside the soggy browns, and further along there was a scattered collection of weeds beginning to bud with whites and yellows; she looked at these but did not touch them, did not think to pluck them. In the back of her mind she identified them as nothing important; but her mind was otherwise occupied. She moseyed ahead a few more strides and found a stick lodged in the mud, with river water seeping around it. The stick forked in to thin tines and as she set a paw against one side, the other squelched free, sending a small blob of mud flying. Bits of grit landed on her cheeks and she blinked, recoiling from it.

Around this moment was when the man appeared. He might have been sulking alongside her position for a while - Ibis wouldn't have been aware - but he held a surprised expression on his dark face, and his comment made her forget for a moment about the mud everywhere, and even briefly the argument she'd had with Reiko.

Warm and bright, yes, she muddles, —I suppose. Ibis looked around, first at the water rolling by, then up at the sky, at the overhang of branches lending grey shadow to them both, and then back to him, appraising him carefully. Not wanting to offend him, she did not look for long.

While she was typically quite a social butterfly, there was too much on her mind, and Ibis fell in to her own thoughts again, her brow furrowing softly while she watched the river pulse on by.