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Arian had handed over his menu with a murmured thank you when the waitress had reached out to collect them in after jotting down their respective orders. A silence had fallen between him and Nischal after the waitress had departed menus in tow, but it hadn't felt uncomfortable and Arian hadn't minded.

At Nischal's question about school and how his classes were doing, he absently fiddled with a few strands of his hair. "Well I'm not studying Fine Arts" he began, continuing "But it's funny you should mention it as what I'm studying falls under the arts - I'm studying jewellery and silversmithing."

There was no offence in his quiet voice as he spoke, his words matter-of-fact and a slightly amused note slipping into his voice as he added "And I guess it would probably be considered an easy major by some" after all his cousin had pretty much told him as much on more than one occasion. "But it's something I'm really enjoying."

"I think so but..." Arian said. He broke off speaking as the waitress came back with their drinks, murmuring another 'thank you' as she placed his ordered diet coke in front of him. He took a sip and then another of the fizzy drink before continuing "But I know that not everyone gets to study exactly what they want to," there was a wry note in his quiet voice as he added "Especially not when the degree's not considered a particularly useful one."

Arian knew that not everyone had the luxury of being able to study exactly what they wanted, knew there were some people who were studying something that was much more likely to guarantee them a job at the end of everything - after all being student wasn't particularly cheap.

He drank a bit more of the coke as Nischal spoke but only a little, wanting to save the bulk of it to go with his meal, waiting for the other to finish before offering quietly "To be honest I'm not sure that many people know exactly what they want to do with their future." Despite being at DCU, Arian certainly hadn't thought of the future much beyond the fact that he hadn't wanted to do a degree just because it would help him get a safe career in something like teaching. "I can sympathise with the catch up stuff though - I had to do that when I first came here" he smiled, the smile slightly rueful "I was ahead in some things and behind in other stuff so I ended up having to spend most of my first summer break was spent doing school catch up stuff so that I wouldn't be too behind in classes when school started up."

He looked thoughtful "Mayhaps you can see if you can find someone to help tutor you in stuff - it's much easier than having to do the catch up on your own." For a moment Arian contemplated offering to give Nischal a hand - well at least as long as it wasn't for anything Maths related, but in the end held back - after all this was only their second meeting and he didn't want to come across as trying to impose or anything.

He tugged absently at his hair as Nischal thanked him for coming, shaking his head slightly "There's no need to be grateful" his quiet voice was slightly awkward. "In fact I probably should be the one to thank you. If you hadn't texted me then I probably wouldn't have done much with my day." Instead he'd most likely have pottered for a bit once he'd finished running errands and then mayhaps spent what was left of his afternoon either puttering or working on a piece of jewellery.

His burger had been excellent, but there were points during their meal where Nischal had seemed distracted and Arian had found himself hovering between deciding whether he should carry on as if he hadn't noticed or try and push a little.

In the end Arian had decided it wasn't really his place to try pushing given that counting today the two of them had met for all of two meetings. And for all I know, I may be imagining things anyway.

Instead at the other's suggestion of building a snowman he nodded "Sure" he agreed. "Although I have to confess that I haven't seen Frozen yet" at least he thought Frozen was the certain movie that Nischal was referring to, although from what he'd seen of the trailer it certainly fit in with the music aspect and the fun times part too come to think on it.

Having already left down his share of payment for their meal, Arian counted out what he hoped was an adequate tip for the waitress before reaching for his things so that he could bundle up again. "We should probably head back to where we met up" he said as he pulled on his mitten-type gloved and pulled his knitted pumpkin hat on top of his hair. "It seems like a good place for snowman building."

"Well we can meet up next week if you're not too busy" Arian offered. "I've got the bake sale next week over at The Ark but you're welcome to come along, there'll be hot drinks like hot chocolate to go with the baked treats and they're going to be doing carols and stuff..." Arian's voice trailed off for a moment and he added "That is if you'd like to come" not wanting to come across as too pushy - after all for all he knew Nischal had other plans in place.

"And I think that a snowman or snow monster or mayhaps some sort of snow creature would be neat" he offered as he walked next to Nischal, his mittened hands stuck firmly in his coat pocket as an extra layer between them and the frigid winter air. "Snow angels are fun in the making, but not so much fun in the afterwards." Walking in wet clothes wasn't the most fun thing to do and wet clothes - or at least wet back of the clothes was kind of part and parcel of the whole snow angel making experience.

They had been making their way in the general direction of the part of the park where they had initially met up and as they walked Arian slipped a hand free from his pocket so that he could point to the relatively clear expanse of snow that he'd spotted "Think that might work for snow building purposes?"

"Neat" Arian said. "The bake sale starts at half ten, but it'll probably be relatively quiet until round about eleven or so." It felt like the snow had managed to get even higher whilst he and Nischal had been eating and part of Arian wished that he'd thought to grab boots rather than shoes as he trudged through the white stuff alongside the other teen.

"I quite like cats" he admitted at Nischal's question about liking animals as he followed the other over to the expanse of snow that he'd pointed out. "But I also like labradors" his experience of Labs being of dogs that were both sappy and friendly.

The clear stretch that he'd pointed out to Nischal had turned out to be deeper than Arian had realised and made him wish that he'd grabbed those boots even more, although at least the plastic bags that he'd slipped over the two bottom-most pairs of socks out of the four that he was wearing prevented his feet from getting wet.

"A snow pet works for me" he continued as he glanced down at the snow, before scooping some up and started to pat some together so that the two of them could mound it up. "Did you have any particular animal that want us to try?"

"Godzilla?" Arian asked as he continued to pat snow onto the snow that he'd managed to mound up. There was a bit of amusement in his quiet voice as he added. "I'm not sure that he'd make a good pet. - wasn't he supposed to be a giant lizard or something?" Not that he could really say as he hadn't seen the films or anything, but some of his classmates had and from the snippets that he'd heard the Godzilla they'd described had certainly sounded like a giant lizard and a rather destructive one at that.

"And I'm pretty sure we could make a snow one if you want," he pointed towards the snow around them as he continued with a small smile. "There certainly seems to be the snow for it." As Nischal pushed his own mound of snow in his direction, Arian did his best to try and combine their two efforts together as he added. "Although you'll have to take a lead on it since I'm not sure how Godzilla-ly it would look if I do it." Another of his slight smiles "Although I could probably do something like a cat or dog," nothing artistic, but Arian acknowledged ruefully to himself that would definitely look more convincing than any attempt to try and make a snow Godzilla thing.

Nischal's description of a peace-keeping giant lizard was different to how Arian had heard his classmates describe it, but it wasn't as if he'd actually seen the movie himself. "A giant fire-breathing lizard keeping its eye on everyone does sound like it would be an effective peace-keeper" he agreed as he continued to mound snow, "Although eating all the wrongdoers kind of sounds counter-productive to me."

He nodded at Nischal's suggestion that they make a snow dog and started to try and shape the base of the snow mound into something that looked like paws "That sounds good to me" he said. "Mayhaps we can try find some sticks or something once we're done, make it look like the dog was trying to chase it or something." After all most dogs liked playing catch and there were trees nearby which meant that branches should hopefully not be too hard to find.

Shaping the snow was cold work, despite his gloved hands and Arian made a mental note to suggest that they go get themselves something hot once they finished making the snow puppy. After all there was bound to be places selling hot chocolate or something.

After a bit of working Arian finally managed to shape what he thought looked almost like passable front paws and after carefully drawing some lines in the snow with a gloved hand to try and indicate toes he waved Nischal over "So what do you think? Do these look paw-ish enough do you think?"

Nischal had a nice laugh, kind of infectious too and Arian couldn't help but quirk another smile at the other. "I'll take that as a yes then" he said, his quiet voice amused.

With him not currently working with the snow, the chill was more apparent and Arian tucked his gloved hands into his coat pockets, ignoring the snow-damped outer layer in favour of attempting to add more warmth to his material-encased hands.

"Shall I do the back ones or do you want a hand with the top half?" Arian asked as he finally slipped his hands back out from the pockets and as he asked the question a part of him couldn't help but wonder if Nischal was cold - after all wasn't India supposed to be warmer than the UK? Which reminded him...

"By the way, would you like to grab a hot drink when we're done?" Arian continued, absently picking up some more of the snow as he asked the question, although not immediately doing anything with it, his attention on Nischal as he added. "I'll treat."

Cooro Cooro

again I'm really sorry for taking so long Cooro