Mushroom Hunting

It was fairly early in the morning still and the dew from the previous night hung gently to the leaves on the trees and other plants as Jedidiah carefully stepped his way through the brush. His brow was creased in concentration and was periodically pausing to glare carefully among the fallen leaves, branches, and dirt. He was looking for mushrooms.

A mild breeze fluttered through the trees and ruffled his ginger hair, and he stood still a moment to plant his hands stubbornly on his hips with an impressively childish pout on his face. A moment passed in this manner until he spotted it--there on a branch that looked as if it had long fallen to the ground. The piece of wood was half-buried in the ground now and rotting, but there he could spot hiding among the bark, a small family of chanterelle, and the locust grinned.

He bounced happily over to the woodland treats and plucked one, brushing off any dirt almost lovingly and making sure the fungus wasn't carrying any little insect passengers. Then he tucked it carefully into a small brown satchel hanging off his hip with its long strap draped diagonally across his chest before going about brushing off the others.

Leigha watched the bug boy from her spot in the tree. She remember going mushroom hunting when she was young, her older brother would sniff them out in his dog form and she would pick them up after making sure no fairys lived under them. She jumpped down infront of the boy, "Make sure that's not a Fearie ring first... a few go to this school and you might not want to piss them off."
She moved to sit on the log straightening out her sun dress as she did. She made a show of looking under the rest of the mushrooms to be sure there were no fairys. Leigha smiled up at the boy, "You either scared them away or there were none her to begin with." She made a sweeping motion with her arm, "Continue with your Schroom hunting."

"EH-" Jedidiah reeled backwards a step and a half when the strange girl dropped in from nowhere! Well, obviously, she dropped in from a tree, but still! He glanced quickly between the mushrooms that the girl was diligently inspecting for faeries and the girl herself, looking slightly flabbergasted for a good moment before hastily schooling his features into a more haughty expression, trying to look cool, of course.

"There were none to begin with," he confirmed in his rocky mountain mumble, although he really had no idea. Since when did faeries live under mushrooms? Not that he knew any faeries personally, of course.

He did continue with his 'shroom hunting' if only to act as if he wasn't surprised that a girl had just fallen from the sky. He plucked them roughly and made quick work of shoving the fungi into his satchel with the rest. There was a pause while he regarded the girl again uncertainly, before finally rummaging up some manners and shoving a hand awkwardly in her direction.

"'m Jedidiah."

Leigha smiled and took Jed's hand, "I'm Lee-a. Spelled L.E.I.G.H.A." She laughed and then touched his shoulder with her free hand, "We southerner's gotta stick together righ'?" She used her drawl that she never really used that much when she wasnt at home.

The boy awkwardly shook Leigha's hand, and nodded at hearing her name. It was a nice enough name. His gaze fell quickly to his shoulder when he felt her hand there, and he gave her an odd look at the familiar greeting.

"I 'spose.. Well, it's nice t'meet you, Leigha." His antennae curled thoughtfully. He'd failed to notice her accent earlier. He tilted his head to one side, donning an arrogantly playful smirk. "Southwest myself, actually. So what're y'doing out here anyhow? Forg'in for some eats?" His smirk grew into a lopsided grin. Most girls, he found, turned their noses up at wild mushrooms, but he wasn't sure what to expect from this one. He motioned towards another mushroom clinging to a tree trunk beside the fallen log and popped it from the bark.

Leigha smiled, "Naw I'm jus' out for a stroll is all." She laughed at his anteenea and smile and she poked him on the chest, "Well ain't you just the darndest thing!" She got up from her seat on the log and moved over lean against a tree.

This girl... was pretty cheerful. Jedidiah blinked down at her finger poking his chest and frowned because the action confused him. Why was she poking him?

"Darndest..." He echoed lamely, gaze redirecting back to her face. "Yeah, sure." He smiled widely, which looked almost as awkward as he felt, but brushed it off quickly by adjusting his bag and straightening his shoulders. "Well! Stroll with me then!"

With a curt nod, he stepped around the girl, took a couple steps further into the trees, then paused to glance inconspicuously over his shoulder to see if she would actually follow.

"Eh.. D'you know your way around because I'm definitely gettin myself lost."

Leigha smilled and walked with him, "Yeah, I've been here 'round a week so I could show you the way I guess." She thought to herself for a minute, "Hey, uh, Jedidiah? I was wondering just how old are you?" She blushed a bit so she turned her face away from him hoping beyond hope he didnt see her blush.

The girl needn't have been worried about Jedidiah noticing her blush because, he really didn't. Completely oblivious to any discomfort on her part, the locust-kid propped his elbows up in air on either side of his head with his fingers lacing together comfortably behind his neck. His step fell casually beside Leigha's and he tossed her another odd look at the questions, but then didn't think much on it.

With a small shrug of one shoulder, he answered off-handedly, "Fifteen, whatsit to ya?" But with the dismissive way he looked forwards again, the question was possibly rhetorical. Jedidiah totally dropped all effort on trying to pay attention to where they were. He didn't really know anyway, so he just went along with wherever Leigha went.

As they were passing by some fern clusters, a smallish rock caught Jedidiah's eye and he dropped his hands to scoop it up. He tossed the rock, which was transparent white and a rather cloudy, into the air once and caught it again, then stuffed his free hand into his trouser pocket. "Check it out, quartz." It was a common stone and this one was small and rough and not particularly spectacular, but he seemed kind of impressed anyway.