Welcome to Hickstead, home to both Seven Oak Stables, and Blue Acre - two rival stables. Both offer opportunities for their clients to reach the highest level of excellence. Each stable differs from the other, so choose wisely and never forget, loyalty is everything... Meanwhile as the stables battle it out, there's trouble brewing at the university. Be careful, if you don't pick a side you may get caught in the cross-fire...
This is an chilled out rpg with a super friendly and relaxed atmosphere! Remember to sign up with your characters full name in all caps and don't forget to do your claims! Thank you and Welcome, we've been established since 10th March 2009 but unfortunately have had to close guest view of our boards due to multiple sites ripping off our hard work, such a shame! Come chat to us in Discord before joining if you like!.
He didn’t know why the weather had been making Dublin feel a bit more tired than usual. There was something about the change, or maybe it was because he knew the work at the barn was going to get busier. Summer was busy, but fall felt more insane with the leaves, and prepping all the bushes that needed to be moved in or protected from the colder elements.
Dublin found himself at the small bulk grocery in town on a Saturday, earlier than he expected to be. But he knew High Street would get busier as the time got older. At least, it wasn’t Sunday post-church. Dublin learned that the hard way. It was something his cousin had warned him about multiple times, but it was an experience – that’s for sure.
As he made his way to the coffee aisle, Dublin caught a glimpse of a familiar figure. Almost struggled to reach something, but he didn’t know if it was his tired eyes playing tricks on him. Dublin made his way over with his cart in tow. “You need help there, Sofia?” he inquired, not wanting to come across as some weird knight. But there were times when mornings just made things difficult.
Sofia hadn't been prepared for parenthood when it happened, but that was nothing compared to being ready to being a mother of a school girl. They'd been out shopping and had got Cat everything she had needed for school, and now she'd managed to get some time to herself to do some grocery shopping, thankful to the kind police officer who lived down the hall who had offered to watch her daughter.
Walking around the grocery store, she kept checking the list she had as she put things into the cart, making sure that what she picked up was either the best value, or the brand that her daughter would eat - she had been under the false pretenses that the girl would grow out of being fussy.
She had never seen herself as a short person, though petite was a word often used to describe her back at school, in the grocery store, however, it always seemed that there was always that something that was always just out of reach. She stood on her tip-toes as she reached for the box of crackers she wanted, her fingers grazing the corner of the box, as she managed to slightly move it. She was so focused on what she was doing that she hadn't heard anyone approach and she released a started squeak at the sound of a voice behind her, leading her to laugh at herself. "Hi Dublin." She said. "Yeah, someone rudley put that box of crackers just out of my reach."
Dublin couldn’t help but smirk a bit at the small sound that escaped Sofia. It was funny and cute. He wondered how long she had been struggling to get it. There were some people that easily gave up on it and just moved along. But there were people who were determined to get it. Sofia appeared to be the latter.
“What? You don’t want to practice some climbing skills?” he joked, easily reaching up to grab the box of crackers she was after. “Huh, never had this brand,” Dublin commented, looking at the packaging. He handed the box off to her, noticing she was kid-free for the moment.
“Managed to get some alone time? I guess kids can be a bit of a handful while shopping.”
Sofia gave a silent huff, annoyed that she was caught unawares, but there was nothing she could do about it right now, as it had happened, and, from the look on Dublin's face, no chance of pretending it didn't happen.
She quirked an eyebrow as she glanced around, disappointed not to see one of those 'do not climb on the shelves' that seemed to be littered all over the place, but not here. "I would, but then I might find myself not allowed to return." She said with a shrug. "Plus, I don't always have the best balance, and I don't plan to be 'clean up on aisle three'." Finger quotes and all. Now, if that happened, she wouldn't be able to return to the market, for fear of people always watching her afterward to see if it would happen again.
She smiled as she accepted the proffered box of crackers and shrugged, nose slightly curled as she looked at the box. "Personally, I think they taste like cardboard, but Cat likes them. And right now, if she'll eat them, without starting world war three to get her to do so, I'll get them." She grinned at his mention of her lack of a limpet. "Cat has taken a liking to a woman who lives down the hall from us, and said woman has the morning off work and offered to watch her while I ran some errands." There was a box of chocolates in her cart for Serenity. "It's not so much that she can be a handful, it's the things that appear in the cart on the way to the check-out." She glanced down at the cart and the shopping list that she was holding, her cheeks heating a little as she had a number of things in there that weren't on the list she was holding. "And then there are the things that fall in there by themselves."
“I guess we’ll just have to shop together more than,” he teased, not quite registering the words that were coming from his mouth. When he was more carefree, Dublin often liked to be more brazen. While he was still carefree, he seemed to be more closed-legged than he was. He didn’t know if that was good or not, yet – but Dublin was busier with work now anyway. Work meant standards had to be a bit more structured.
His mouth made a small “O” shape. There were still good parents out there. It made him grimace slightly, as he remembered how his own needs weren’t met. Food was always eaten or hungry. One of the reasons why was he was quite avoidant of certain things, like canned chicken.
“Ah, that’s great you have some lovely people in your village! Nice to have people outside of Cara to watch Cat. Not that Cara would say no, or anything.” Dublin hadn’t talked too much to Cara, even though he had been with Blue Acres for a bit now. He honestly didn’t talk too much of the Thorn family in general. Dublin knew how they were, but they never seemed to have a minute to chat – other than commenting about his hedge work, or if gravel needed to be replaced.
“Maybe you need a drink and snack?” He offered. “I know shopping on an empty stomach is never easy,” he laughed, grabbing a box of his favorite crackers. Nothing fancy, just something that held up to his favorite spread of chive cream cheese with some sausage on top.
Sofia laughed at Dublin's words. "You could be my knight in shining armour, for every time something is just out of reach." She said as she batted her eyelashes, trying her best damsel in distress look.
She'd always thought that age old saying about it taking a village to raise a child was a myth, as she'd never really had a village before, but since she had arrived here, there were always people that were happy to help out. Her job had even come with a babysitter. She smiled at the mention of Cara. "That woman doesn't know how to say no." She laughed.
At the mention of a snack, her stomach chose that moment to growl, and Sofia wanted the floor to open up and swallow her. "Technically, you aren't supposed to shop on an empty stomach." Another of those old adages, except in her case, she hadn't thought about feeding herself when she got Cat's last meal together. She frowned as she looked from her cart to her list and realised that she would need to put a few of the extras she'd picked up back so that she could get what she actually needed. She laughed as her stomach made itself known again. "I think a snack would be a good idea."
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