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 Posted: Sun Mar 23, 2025 11:46 am
Quote: Plot: Ivanna has just turned twenty and she's working as Forest Ranger in her first year; she and Michael have a chance encounter; will they learn to trust each other, or will it fall flat? AU Reason: Modern Day, Aged up.
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Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2025 6:21 pm
  
Ivanna was sat on a bench, her ankles crossed as she leaned her head back against the back of the bench eyes closed. If one didn't know her, she might look innocent, it also didn't help that she had on the partial uniform of the forest rangers who worked nearby. She had shed her coat but kept the undershirt and pants on. Her boots were her personal ones, but she kept those in her car. She had her arms resting on the back of the bench, letting out a long breath as her car keys jingled as metal bumped metal. She opened her eyes and looked directly up at the sky, the sun had passed the halfway point, and it was around one in the afternoon. She had an early morning, so she was able to get off earlier than usual.
The red-haired woman had a long morning. First, she had to rescue a snake from a local home, and then she was sent on a literal wild goose chase, the b*****d almost got her hand too when she was trying to grab him. She had won that battle though, even if she got scraped up in the process. After that was mostly paperwork but that was almost the worst part for her. She honestly liked to be out on the field doing the hands-on things that were needed. It was part of the reason she had gone into the training to become a forest ranger after all. She loved to go camping, and hell, she even had foxes in her backyard that she fed all the time. Between the foxes and the crows, she was more friendly with the animals than her own human neighbors. While she wasn't cruel or mean, she wasn't super outgoing with them either. That was part of the reason she liked this part of the park. She had parked her car and had to walk to get here, but it was quiet, isolated and honestly peaceful compared to her day-to-day life. She got overwhelmed sometimes and she didn't have anyone to talk to about it which was beginning to get old. Her parents insisted on her getting a therapist, but she couldn't trust a stranger with her own information. Could she?
She pulled her phone out of her pocket and began to scroll through her social media as she cocked her head to the side slightly. Now what was she going to do for the afternoon? She didn't have any plans, aside from running to the store to pick up more food for her animal friends who came into the backyard of her home.
WHO WITH: Alone
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FEELING: Relaxed
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WHERE AT: City Park
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WEARING: Casual Ranger Clothes,, green hiking boots, with done up nails.
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OUT of CHARACTER:
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Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2025 6:55 pm
   Being home was... different. Not necessarily bad. Frankly, probably for the better. But it was so hard to reconcile. It almost felt like the world around him was moving, but Michael was left stuck outside of time. Just watching, observing it all as it happened. Experiences were almost no longer his. He had become a careful observer in his own life. Especially now that he had been discharged from military service. His time was up, coming to an end after five years.
Well, sort of. He was still on reserve for another three years. Though he couldn't see the world coming to an actual war that would pull him back into the military. But it also meant that he now had to figure out what to do with himself. In so many ways Mike felt behind in life. Wasn't someone in their mid-twenties supposed to have things more figured out than he did? They would have finished college just a few years ago and now would be in the beginnings of their career. And here he was instead, a man whose wife left him for another woman after having an affair with said woman while he was stationed overseas seeing things that still haunted him at night and made it nearly impossible to sleep. So, like all soldiers who were home, he was attempting to find ways to distract himself while working a minimum wage job and muddling through life.
Which meant he got a dog.
Or, well, more specifically a puppy. Not that it made her any smaller for his trouble. The malamute had been kind of an impulse, but she was definitely helping out in the distraction department. Especially right now. When they were supposed to be on a walk through a local park but the lumbering mess of fur had twisted her leash out of Mike's hand and she was running off toward a poor, unsuspecting redhead sitting over on a bench. "Zoe!" Even as he called her name, he knew it was a wasted effort. Once she had something in her mind, the sled dog was determined to see it through.
Finally his boot stomped down on the end of the leash, stopping the rampaging puppy in her tracks. Well. Rampaging only if it counted to call a puppy trying to find a new friend really aggressively a rampage. But Mike was deciding in this moment as he was pulling in her lead that yes, it did, in fact, count as a rampage if it meant that he had to chase after Zoe through the woods like a jackass. "Jesus Zoe, you're going to give someone a heart attack. Probably me. You're going to give me a heart attack and then who will give you boiled chicken?" She was honestly really lucky that they were in a proper park and not some pretty little manicured park where too many cars were too close.
Once his overactive puppy was safely squirming between his legs where Michael could keep her at bay, he looked up to the young woman who was currently sitting on her phone. "Sorry about that. I swear she'd friendly, she just hasn't figured out not everyone wants to be her friend." His sentence ended with him looking down and giving Zoe a pointed look, as if it would make the dog understand what he was saying and see reason.
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Park ☀︎ Ivanna ☀︎ outfit
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Posted: Mon Apr 28, 2025 10:22 pm
Ivanna wasn't expecting a sudden arrival, not that of human or canine. So when she heard a man calling out a name, she lifted her head up only to realize that a dog was running straight towards her. She blinked as the man managed to get the puppy under control and then scold it, as if the dog would understand. She tilted her head slightly as he apologized to her and she cracked a smile, something that she hadn't really had the energy to do all day. Was she still exhausted? Oh, no doubt. But she would have to be heartless to not smile when faced with the fuzzy face that was wagging its tail at her as if seeing her was the best thing in the world. " That's alright, she's just an overexcited baby, that's all." she replied before she shifted and slid her phone into the side pocket on her pants before leaning forward and closing the distance between the overexcited dog and her. She petted her before leaning back and looking up at the man holding the leash. " I bet she keeps you busy. She's an.... Alaskan Malamute, right?" while she didn't currently have a dog, she had animals her whole life and she had been looking to get another one soon but hadn't gone and looked at the shelter. She uncrossed her ankles as she seemed to think of something and straightened out her left leg to fish around in her pocket. She took a moment but pulled out half a dog treat. She didn't know exactly how long it had been there, but it was one of the harder ones, she must have grabbed it to try and bribe that goose.
She didn't let herself laugh even if her lips quirked up slightly into a bit more of a smile. " She on a special diet or anything?" she asked, not wanting to do something that an owner didn't want. She knew first-hand that that could cause some issues, such as allergies or food reactions. The excitable puppy seemed to be looking forward to her treat so once Ivanna got the go ahead she held her hand out flat and a low laugh left her as she watched and felt the dog take the treat. " So cute." she murmured under her breath before she looked back up to Michael. " You must either be a new dog owner, or new here. I haven't met you before, Ivanna." she also kept away from a lot of other people, but he didn't have to know that. Or even if he did know that it was fine, she wasn't going to lie if he asked about it after all.
WHO WITH: A new man and his dog (Zoe)
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FEELING: Amused
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WHERE AT: City Park
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WEARING: Casual Ranger Clothes,, green hiking boots, with done up nails.
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OUT of CHARACTER:
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Posted: Wed May 21, 2025 12:54 pm
Dog owners get to experience a very specific kind of relief. One that comes when your dog is being an absolute menace but the one person that they are trying to terrorize welcomes the terror. And when the red haired woman on the bench said it was no problem, Mike experienced a flood of that very specific kind of relief. Even better, the woman was slipping her phone away and closing the distance between them.
Okay, she was going for the puppy between his legs. Not actually him. But close enough.
A small smile crossed his face as he bent down to offer a scratch behind Zoe’s ears. ”Yeah. She was kind of an impulse buy, but completely worth it.” He couldn’t help but smile down at his dog. She’d been more than worth it. Offering comfort and companionship to him when Mike didn’t really know what to do with his life. The pup had given him a reason to get out of bed in the mornings and that was something he was learning he needed in life.
The treat in the woman’s hand quirked his lips into a smile. Just how many dogs came through here that she kept treats on hand? Still, he found himself shaking his head. ”No, no special diet. You’re more than welcome to give it to her, but she might throw in a free hand washing service while you are at it.” The last part came out in a chuckle. One that was from experience. One that she was now getting first hand as Zoe was determined to lick every last crumb off of the woman’s hand.
”Something like that. I didn’t really get out much.” While it was true that he was a new dog owner, it was also true that he hadn’t been living in the area for very long. And when he had first moved here, Mike hadn’t been all that inclined to go looking for places to hang out. It had been part of his motivation for getting a dog in the first place. His eyes darted down to her hand that had just been slimed and he reached back. Pulling a pack of tissues out of his back pocket he offered them to Ivanna. ”Michael. And please feel free to take a tissue to clean up. I don’t want you to have to walk around with a wet hand.”
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Park ☀︎ Ivanna ☀︎ outfit
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Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2025 7:37 pm
Ivanna didn't mind getting a hand washing and just as she had begun to reach back up to dry her hand off on her shirt she looked up and paused. He was offering something to dry her hand? She breathed out, cracking another smile as she took one of the offered tissues. " Thanks, I have to wash this shirt anyway so I can always wipe it off there too." she was only half joking because she had worked up a sweat when she had worked today but she appreciated not needing to do so quite yet. She did have a tank-top on underneath this too if she needed to pull it off. Leaning back slightly she looked up towards Michael for the first time giving him her full attention for a moment before she re-crossed her ankles and hummed. " Is that so? I'm not surprised. The area has become far more populated as of late and as much as I enjoy more work, it's kind of annoying to have multiple families telling me to 'Get that animal under control' while cowering as if a skunk is a big deal." she rolled her eyes at the thought before she looked up at him. " How do you like it so far? There's plenty of quiet spots like this, but it's usually quite busy." she found herself a little curious about how he would deal with busy crowds, but it was hard not to go wherever one was led especially with a dog as big as the one he had was. In fact, she was still small. She hoped he did the research before he picked her up because she didn't want to have to catch her in the middle of the street down the line. Although at least she'd know who to come for if she did.
Her sour mood slowly had begun to lighten, reaching out to pet the dog again as she spoke again almost directly to the oversized puppy. " I'll have to make sure to have some more treats on me next time. That was one left over from trying to catch that goose that was running around the residential community, silly thing, wasn't supposed to be there." she knew that the dog likely didn't understand a single word she said except for maybe "treats" and that was okay. At least if animals talked down to her, she wouldn't be able to understand them. She knew that she was probably being cursed at by the feathered runaway this morning, but she just got him back to his pond like she was supposed to do. Did she flip him off before she left? Oh yeah, but she still had a smile on her face as he seemed to reunite with his mate.
WHO WITH: Michael and Zoe
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FEELING: Amused
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WHERE AT: City Park
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WEARING: Casual Ranger Clothes,, green hiking boots, with done up nails.
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OUT of CHARACTER:
　
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Posted: Mon Jul 07, 2025 5:07 pm
For a moment he didn't think she would take the tissues. Finally, after a moment of stalemate, she took one. At her comment he shrugged, a smile making the corner of his mouth twitch up in half of a smile. "Fair enough. The shirt is honestly probably more useful anyway. The tissues they make for travel dissolve too easily." As he spoke, Mike started moving to tuck the rest of the pack back into his pocket next to his keys. How was he supposed to respond to the rest of her comment? He didn't know. Mike was one of those new people in the area, though he wasn't exactly trying to pour out his life story to a woman he had just met all of five minutes ago. Maybe he should. God knew his mother would love for him to get out there more. When he'd come home with a scar running down half of his face, she'd been more than a little uncomfortable. Not that he could blame her. He was struggling to cope, how was the mother who raised him supposed to watch him become a shell of himself? Hence the dog. It seemed like a good compromise at the time.
The mention of people cowering at a skunk had him laughing as it pulled him out of his mind. "Not that a skunk is the scariest thing I've ever seen, but in their defense I don't want to be sprayed by one either." A grin spread across his features as he leaned down, his hand curling into the fur at Zoe's neck to ground him. Almost as if reading his mood, the puppy looked up before leaning into his leg. Like she was saying she would support him. Yeah, Zoe really had been a good idea. "If you're that unafraid of skunks you haven't had to spend a week smelling like one."
"I'm still new, but the area is nice." Read: I don't get out enough to have any complaints.
"I'm hoping to get to see more around town." Read: I spent the first three weeks laying face down on my couch trying to figure out what to do now that I'm a civilian again.
He watched her reach out to Zoe, offering promises of more treats the next time. Next time. Jesus that sounded so nice. So normal. How could he make sure there was a next time? "I wouldn't have thought to use a dog treat for a goose." That probably wasn't it, but it was what had tumbled out of his mouth with a laugh anyway. "Do you think there will be a repeat showing? I would hate to miss it if there is." There we go, that felt more on track.
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Park ☀︎ Ivanna ☀︎ outfit
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Posted: Sun Jul 13, 2025 7:00 pm
Ivanna couldn't help but find his nervousness a little endearing. Usually, people were scared of her or worse, demanding that she take care of some helpless animal that was trapped in the wrong place. Now, while that was her job, she did have some people who acted all high and mighty because they thought her job was for those below them. That just showed that they didn't have any idea what her job consisted of, she had to take courses for this! It wasn't an easy thing to do, and she couldn't back down from an animal that was cornered even if she was scared. " My shirt is all sweaty from earlier, so probably not very useful right now." she sat back onto the bench and tilted her head slightly as he found entertainment in her story about skunks and how people would react. She couldn't help but laugh louder than before for a brief moment at his final comment before she waved her hand in front of her face in an attempt to pull herself together. " I'll let you in on a secret, it's actually because I've had that happen that I'm not that scared." she hummed, considering his answers before she leaned one arm across the back of the bench.
She hadn't outright told him what she did and considering that he had a dog this might be a good time. " Well good. I hope you enjoy the area as much as I do, it's nice and most of the people aren't too full of themselves, although as a park ranger I get to see the worst sides of people sometimes." the puppy leaned against his legs was a huge reason she was humoring him but there was also something about him that made her think that he needed this, and part of her did too. He wasn't overwhelming and she appreciated that about him. " As for a repeat showing.... unfortunately, probably." she rubbed the back of her neck and laughed quietly. " The goose in particular is an a*****e, he leaves his pond, terrorizes people and then gets all freaked out and cornered. They always say to be careful with a cornered animal, and I can confirm it can get dangerous sometimes. Hence, the dog treats." she came full circle, looking up at him with a pleased look in her eyes. " It's better the dog treat than my hand. Distracts him enough for me to get him."
She wasn't sure what other people thought of her, but she was happy that he didn't seem too put off by her as others were. So far, his company was nice, and she didn't feel like it was too forced. " I'll have to keep an ear out if I hear the call, let you know where it's happening." while she was half joking, it made a thought pop into her head, and she did something she hadn't done in a long time. " We could even meet up for walks and stories if you wanted, I'm sure there's plenty about the area I could tell you about." she didn't want to outright ask to spend more time with him, so she floated the idea, and hoped he'd bite.
WHO WITH: Michael and Zoe
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FEELING: Amused
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WHERE AT: City Park
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WEARING: Casual Ranger Clothes,, green hiking boots, with done up nails.
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OUT of CHARACTER:
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