* WINTER LEFT A COVER [josh]

Though he didn't like the cold and he didn't like the snow, Joshua loved the holidays. It was an excuse to give gifts to all of his friends, which he was quite fond of doing. He had money, he had friends, and he liked to show his appreciation for the people that stuck by him. He was a thoughtful gift-giver and thankfully very observant with a good memory to boot. He'd crossed most everyone off his list near the start of the month, having saved up ideas beforehand. Most of the gifts were waiting for the holidays themselves and some were just waiting until he saw the person in question next. "Are you gonna throw a party this year, Josh?" The Fire graduate blinked in surprise at his sister's question, having totally forgotten that their parents wouldn't be around this year in order to throw the usual lavish Christmas celebration. "Uh, maybe, actually," he mused. "I'll have to ask Nell." He would, too, because he asked his fiancée about a lot of things when it came to doing stuff around the house. The way he saw it, his name was on the lease, but she was living here too. It was their house now, no longer his alone, and so while he had the legal authority to make the final decisions he was firm in his belief that Nell should have a say in it. Living with his fiancée was very easy, though, they clicked well together, and so it wasn't like he was worried. "I like parties," Belle mused, grinning. "Know what else I like?" He raised an eyebrow inquiringly. "Presents." The older Fire snorted and ruffled her hair. "Oh, I didn't forget presents, don't worry." Made sense that she'd be worried about that.

Answering the door when it went, Joshua found himself face to face with a familiar figure. He grinned at Skye and immediately stepped aside so that she could come in out of the cold. Hey, it was almost Christmas and she was one of his best friends. Similar to how she'd been ecstatic about his engagement to Nell last year (wow, had it really been that long?) he was happy to see her during the holiday. He wasn't even drunk, what about that! "Skye, hey! I didn't except you! What are you doing here?" It was said in the jovial tone of someone who was curious as to why a friend was so far from home rather than the demanding one of a person who simply did not want company. Joshua was the complete opposite of a grinch on Christmas. It wasn't the holiday yet but it was the season and that was good enough. He was also suffering from post-exam glee, glad to finally have the stressful part of the year over and done with. Next year he'd be looking at medical schools and applying and that would be something to handle. Oh boy. "Not that I mind, no, of course not! You're always welcome here and all." He was grinning, ridiculously happy, there was something about Christmas that worked like crack on his mood. Not a care in the world, a few months of bliss. He had work but he enjoyed work, so it wasn't too bad.

His eyes lit up when she handed him the gift and his grin broadened when he saw what it was. "Holy shit, Skye, this is awesome!" He hugged her to show his thanks, something that couldn't be accurately described in words, or at least not words that weren't punctuated with noises of excitement. Holy shit, the size of the thing! He'd be reading for ages and that was amazing in his book. "I got you something too, of course," he said cheerfully, for what was Christmas without a good ol' gift exchange? He went upstairs and got the bag from amongst the large group of gifts he had get to give, handing it off to Skye with a hum of, "And Merry Christmas to you, too." They'd been hanging out in the fancier district of Maple Hollow during some day or another when he'd been shopping for clothes and Skye had said something about a bag. While some friends would just nod absently and forget the very next day (if not hour) Josh had decided quite simply that this would be Skye's Christmas gift. It was expensive, after all (most things designer were) and he had the cash to deliver.

Having not forgotten the fact that Skye was not native to Maple Hollow, he twitched his lips into a smile of understanding. Most went home for the holidays and so it made sense that she, like so many others, would do the same. "Sounds fun. Do your family have anything planned?" His own were having their usual Christmas party and he was considering attendance if he didn't hold one of his own with Nell. It was strange to realise that he really did have a family of his own now, albeit one that consisted of a little sister and a fiancée. He liked it. He still hung around his parents sometimes on the weekend but it offered a sense of independence. Leaving the nest at last, despite the fact that he'd "left" over a year ago. It was just that he was getting used to the idea. "Was thinking about some sort of party myself but I don't know if Nell's on board or if something else will come up. Hell, I just like parties." And he grinned again, more than usual, his gray eyes sparkling. He really did have the whole Christmas spirit going on. Perhaps it was partially due to the fact that there had been so much drama during this time last year that this Christmas felt like... freedom. He felt light and happy and the stress of exams was off his chest and now all he had to worry about was making sure that all of his friends recieved their gifts before it was too late and they lost their meaning.

He shook his head and waved a hand when she apologised, clearly not bothered in the least. He hadn't been doing anything that he was upset to have interrupted. "Hell, not at all. It's my day off so I've just been hanging out with Annabel." Because all cool guys hang out with their kid sisters when they're bored. She was actually pretty cool to talk to when she avoided the things they didn't have in common (like video games, her friends, his friends) and just... talked. It was nice. He liked that they'd built back up the trust he'd shattered. "Really, you came at the perfect time." He wasn't exaggerating because Joshua was glad of the company at this point in time. He was in a good mood and he wanted to share that mood with friends rather than just sitting around and letting it go to waste. Josh was perfectly comfortable in solitude but that didn't mean his friends were ever unwelcome in his presence. "Why were you in town; just hanging out, or?" Some people chose to stay around for a week or two and hang out with friends before they flew or drove back to wherever they came from. The Hollow kids like Josh really had it good. It took roughly ten minutes to get from the Academy to Maple Hollow. Not long at all compared to several-hour flights and lengthy road-trips.

He laughed at her teasing, understanding that she didn't mean anything negative by it. He was flattered, really, because he knew that he probably would be able to understand all the medical jargon and that. "Always a good judge of a book, eh?" He appreciated it, really, and he was incredibly genuine when expressing this. He glowed with a sort of pride and satisfaction when she expressed a love for her own gift as well, relieved that she'd recieved it well. He always got the pre-reaction jitters like anyone would. He was a confident person but not psychic, he couldn't be certain that a person was going to love what he'd got them until he saw the look on their face, heard the glee in their voice. "I remembered you'd said something about it so I figured hey, why not?" It would suit her well and she'd make more use of it than some of the women who had about six billion bags and only used one or two of them on a daily basis. That and shoes. He'd claim to not understand, but Josh and his sunglasses were in the same boat. Over a hundred pairs. "Any time, really." He was glad that she liked it and it was obvious. A chuckle brushed past his lips at her comment. "That makes two of us. You want something to drink, or?" Always a good host, Josh was (or tried to be).

The grin turned to a smirk in response to her question. He didn't mind so much when his friends teased him jokingly like she was now. And hell, Skye was kind of right. Josh really did like parties if only for the fact it meant he could drink and have fun with his friends. He was a little more wary of open-house parties where just about anyone could walk through the door. The Fire graduate didn't like large crowds, even if they were crowds that he knew. He'd usually be the guy at the party who would go over and sit with a couple other dudes to play poker rather than standing and chatting in the thick of things. "You know me well, Skye." Alright, so maybe she didn't know any of his secrets or the things he'd gone through but they'd been friends for many years. They were seniors in college, almost ready to start their post-college lives. (Well, alright, for Josh post-college was just more school, but go figure). "Hey, people can't complain. This place is great for parties." He gestured around the foyer with a smile. He wasn't modest about his house because he was proud of it, even if it hadn't always been his. There were changes since his parents had moved out, though it wasn't as evident in the foyer or kitchen which looked much the same. The living room had changed, the entertainment room had gotten a make-over and he'd added the addition of a bar, the sunroom had been revamped and the attic underwent repairs.

He touched a hand briefly to the side of his hand as if he were in great discomfort, glaring distrustfully at his friend. "Thought I told you not to do that after the last time." He held the glare for several seconds before he broke façade, smiling again. His face was going to start aching from all of the smiling he'd done in the past five minutes if he wasn't careful. He wondered what Skye was thinking of it all. Holidays made him friendly. Well, no. More approachable. He was always friendly to the people he loved but he found it hard to express this. For some reason it was easier during this time of year. There wasn't so much doubt. "Really, though, I don't mind. I'm glad you dropped by. I've been waiting for a good time to give you your gift." He liked giving people things in person but if he hadn't run into her he'd have just called and asked for her address so that he could ship it to Ottawa. First-class, priority mail. Joshua would not allow anything less for one of his best friends and if the package had been lost he'd have flipped his shit. Thankfully all of that had been avoided by this simple visit. Happy day! "Yeah I haven't got all my list done, either. It's tough work!" He wanted to find something that was right for everyone.

He pondered her words for a moment before nodding his agreement. I guess she's right. There was always the chance that the writing style was bad or the information was inaccurate or it was too long-winded and boring. This was history and medicine combined, though. How could he dislike that? He didn't think it was possible. It meant a lot to him that she'd put such thought into the gift. Joshua smiled when she remarked on his good memory, glad that she'd noticed. He liked the fact that he could retain the little things as well as the important ones. Josh had a brilliant memory, one of his greatest strengths. "Hm. Artificial warmth or actual warmth?" He laughed before explaining, "We have a fully stocked liquor cabinet but maybe that's not the best idea if you need to leave later on. Uh... cider, hot chocolate, coffee, tea?" He tapped the fingers of his right hand with those of his left as he listed off these things. "Any of those sound good?" And they gave you real warmth as opposed to the artificial warmth of all your blood vessels rushing to the surface of the skin.

He made a brief face at the thought of trying to track everyone down during the school year. He was a busy person and even busier when he had classes and exams to worry about so it would have been a nightmare just trying to find the time to go running around the city after his friends. Especially friends like Skye whom he could not simply hand things off to at school. He had a few people that he knew from outside the Academy that were on his Christmas list and so it was good he had the break indeed. "Ugh, exams," he said, shaking his head. "I'm sure as hell glad they're over and done with." He loved learning and he put up with school a lot easier than some but that didn't mean he welcomed the anxiety-inducing last week of school. He wasn't the type of student that would settle for a 'pass'. He had to go above and beyond, get great scores instead of just good ones. That meant a hell of a lot of studying on his part. It wasn't uncommon to see the Fire graduate completely vanish from friendships during the last few weeks of school, only to be found in the library when he didn't have other commitments. Most of his friends had learned in their years of knowing him that they shouldn't be offended by his abrupt absence from their lives—he always came back after the stress was over. Break was a great time to get together with all the friends he'd stopped talking to during exams. "Speaking of, did you do okay on yours?" Ah, Josh and his curiosity.

He nodded his agreement. "Yeah, and then you don't want to just ask them what they'd want because it seems like a cop-out." Joshua always tried to come up with a gift idea on his own before he'd give up and talk to the person about their interests. Gifts on Christmas were supposed to be a surprise. If you knew what you were getting it wouldn't be nearly as fun! That was how he looked at it, anyway. "How are your family, by the way?" Since they lived all the way in Ottawa, Joshua had never gotten a chance to meet the parents of his close friend, but he figured it was only polite to inquire. Skye being a friend of his, he could claim to generally care about her well-being and that of her loved ones. People tended to be unhappy if those they were close to also suffered and so it wasn't too odd a question. His lips twitched in amusement and he nodded. "Sure thing." He gestured toward the kitchen and then led the way into it, the blinding white walls and floors matching the snow outside. The counter and kitchen island were white, too, though they were topped with marble. The stainless steel double door fridge stood out a little. He went into the cupboard to get mugs and the mix for the hot chocolate, putting some water in the kettle to boil. While they waited, Joshua sat down at the island and leaned against it. "So, any luck on the job front?" He resisted the urge to drum his fingers on the counter, knowing how annoying that could be.

[Sorry it's a bit shorter xD]

One could make a pretty fair assumption in asking Joshua how he did on exams that they were going to get a similar response each time. The boy's work ethic really was nothing short of phenomenal and it really showed when it came time to showcase all that he'd learned over the months in one huge test. He had good study habits and good memorization skills. Really, it was like the Fire graduate was built for learning. He knew it, too, and while he tried to avoid bragging too much he certainly wasn't going to be modest about his accomplishments. Why should he? It was something to be proud of. "Aced them all," he said confidently, grinning. "I was a bit worried about the elemental exams since I was so focused on my majors but I did good on those too. Thankfully there weren't too many since I didn't take Elemental Studies as a major or minor." Quite a lot of students chose to minor in Elemental Studies if they were interested in picking up some extra tips and knowledge about their element but he did not care enough about his powers to do that. He loved his elemental abilities, wouldn't trade them for the world, but he was not interested in pursuing a career in them and so he didn't care for studying them that much in school. Only as much as was necessary to pass. Joshua was absolutely fine with his element taking a few extra years to master since he hadn't studied it in college. He was willing to wait another nine years to become a doctor and he'd have mastered his element far before then. It was nothing.

He laughed at Skye's direct tone, amused that she found him easy to shop for. That was a good thing, he supposed, it meant that in her many years of knowing him she'd realised what sorts of things he was most prone to enjoy. A lot of people found him difficult to shop for given the fact that he was rich and could really buy himself a lot of things but as Skye had learned, books were a safe bet the majority of the time. He'd be completely happy to be locked up in a library. All books, all the time. Until he got hungry or something. That would be a problem. "Ah, that sucks," he said, a bit disappointed that he hadn't gotten the chance to meet Skye's parents. They sounded like decent people. He was a bit biased and all but your friends parents were usually pretty chill so long as they didn't have an issue with their kid hanging around you. As Skye was twenty they didn't have a say in who she hung around but hell, age didn't stop some parents. He thought about the way Donovan had kicked him out for dating Nell and quickly brushed the thought aside. The Fire graduate retrieved their hot chocolate and set down the mugs, warning, "They're probably really hot but I can't tell, so." He figured a word of warning was nice and all. He couldn't tell because he was immune, Fire elemental and all. "Want marshmallows? I'm pretty sure we have the mini ones." They had a lot of stuff in their house. It was like an adventure every time you opened a fridge, a cupboard, a closet.

He grinned earnestly when Skye said that she had gotten a job, so glad to hear that his mother had been able to pull through. He had been hopeful that Patricia might be able to use her influence to hook Skye up but the fact that the woman had managed to hire her herself was even better. It was almost amusing to think of one of his best friends working for his mother but it was kind of cool at the same time. Trish was a nice, sociable person. He was sure she'd be pleasant to Skye. "Oh, Skye, that's wicked cool. I'm glad you got a job!" It had been a long time coming, really. Joshua had been 'working' since he was fourteen, albeit only volunteer work, but his first job had been at the age of eighteen. The tattoo parlour and all. Then he'd quit that when it was no longer necessary to pay the bills and he'd finally gotten another job at twenty years old working in the retirement home. It was nice. "Hey, no problem," he said easily, still grinning. "I'm happy for you, glad I could help." It was always nice to have money of your own. A paycheck was an amazing thing, money that was yours and yours alone. Not a gift, not a loan, but yours to do with as you pleased. He did feel that every time he got his at the end of the week, even though he was rich. Earning his own money was... special, an acknowledgement of his hard work.

[Holy shit muse, hello o.o]

fElemental exams were definitely a lot less of a breeze when it came to studying. It was frustrating to someone like Joshua who liked to come as best-prepared as he could. It was much more difficult to ensure that his power would work right under all conditions during the exams when he couldn't predict what kind of conditions those would be. Like how he hadn't gotten a good sleep and so he'd been paranoid about his performance. Joshua was resilient, though, and it was probably the fact that he was used to running on little to no sleep that had saved him. It was always nice when little things like that could come through and save the day. "Knocked myself out a lot when I was studying. I push limits a bit too far sometimes, it's why I used to study before I fall asleep." That was a little harder now that he had Nell living in the house (and sharing said bed) so he would usually only do that sort of practice when she was on suicide watch at the group home or when he crashed before she did. Either that or he'd simply practice until he felt close to passing out and then go to sleep. "Great cure for insomnia, too," he joked. He was glad his insomnia had been transient and not a recurring thing. It would be difficult with a job. There were people who did handle it in their day to day lives, though, so it wasn't impossible. "For this semester I just had a class on Fire in general. It kind of went over a lot about the element, tips and tricks, the works. Thank god it wasn't the weakness-based class I had the last time. I'd have failed for sure." He was exaggerating of course. Joshua didn't think it was possible for him to fail an exam, he was smart and gave himself credit for that, but he'd have done a lot more poorly for sure.

Joshua fetched two large bags of mini marshmallows out of the cupboard—one plain, one coloured. He didn't really get the point of the coloured ones but Annabel liked them and he liked anything sweet so they made do with having both. "Take your pick," he said, dropping a number of the white ones into his own drink and then popping some coloured ones into his mouth. They were gooey and delicious as marshmallows should be. He made sure that he'd finished chewing and swallowing before he answered her words with, "It was weird for me too at first. I mean, I started the job over the summer, but once we went back to school I realised how difficult it actually was. I managed, though, so you probably can, too." He shrugged and smiled very briefly. He believed in Skye since they were such good friends and so the encouragement was genuine. She only had one major and didn't have to volunteer in hospitals in order to get into graduate school so she'd probably be able to at least cope, if not do well. Maybe not, though. Everyone was different. Just because Josh was doing well did not mean that everyone else would. "Pff, I will so disapprove." His scoff was jokingly severe because he didn't think it would actually happen. Skye didn't seem the type to drop out, especially not when they'd made it as far as senior year. Senior year. The end of the road at last. Ah, he was still getting over it. "That's great," he said, smiling. It was good to see everything work out for a friend. That was how his life was going at the moment. Things were good. There were minor ups and downs but everything seemed at least... okay.

Noticing the way that Skye raised her eyebrows at him, Joshua stared back with an almost contemplative expression for a moment. He didn't do good with people telling him what to do and all and he wondered what his friend would do. He was thankful for the fact that she didn't try to give him a long lesson on how irresponsible he was or anything like that. The last person who'd tried was no longer a friend of his. They'd ended up arguing and arguing with someone that had anger issues didn't tend to go well. "Don't worry, I never do anything too dangerous. It's not like I try to erupt volcanoes before bed or anything. Just sort of practice until I fall asleep from the exhaustion." As stubborn and determined as he was to test the limits of stamina and strength he was not foolish enough to attempt something incredibly dangerous. Then again, Skye was probably right to disapprove in a way. He did a lot of things that were not good for him for the sake of education. He was responsible in different ways. Not these ones, clearly. He chuckled at her opinion. "You think so? I liked them a lot." He liked to feel that he had some sort of a weapon against his foes that were stronger than him, even if that weapon was simply a bit more endurance than usual. It had been a really difficult course, though, she was right about that. "Then again, I like a challenge." He didn't like things to be easy. It was why he took harder courses and more of them at that, studying a double major while working a job. He was a bit obsessed with keeping busy. It wasn't always a good thing. It wore him down some days.

He considered the bags before shrugging. "Pretty much, I think. Shouldn't matter." One bag was full of the coloured minis and the other were just the regular old white marshmallows. He still wasn't sure about how serious the difference so it didn't matter which ones she ate or put into her drink. The coloured ones looked fancier, though. Pastel pinks, blues, greens, yellows. Orange and purple, too. "Nah, I wouldn't imagine so, especially not if you want to get your own place eventually. Do you?" He knew a lot of people liked to get their own apartments after college and break away from the nest for good. They got used to living away from their parents and all so it wasn't too hard to go from living at school to living in a place of their own. Joshua's 'breaking in' period had come when necessity forced him into an apartment with Nell. "And if she works you too hard, call me and I'll tell her to get off her high horse." He winked and laughed, obviously kidding. He was pretty fond of his mother and trusted her not to be a total bitch to one of his best friends. The woman had a temper like all Fires and a short patience but she was nice enough, friendly. Annabel had inherited that friendliness and increased it tenfold. "Sentimental isn't necessarily a bad thing. We're awesome and shit. We're allowed." He shrugged as if this explained everything. Being 'awesome and shit' was clearly enough to justify being sentimental about a few things. Besides, they were best friends. It counted.