He had his hand out to her. Phyri deliberated for a moment and then took it, pulling herself up with gusto, feeling her bare feet squish - deliciously - into the muddy grass bank. (Shoes probably ought to be her next priority, but...)

There was something in his tone of voice, or the line of his smile, that made Porphyria think he might be laughing at her. “Well, what’s a day without a near-drowning?” She quipped back breezily, not opposed to the odd near-disastrous experience, though she wouldn’t agree that she had been responsible for this. It wasn’t her fault the park and its environs clearly had it out for her. Mistletoe kisses, stolen bags, a sinking boat now: what was bloody next?

“Porphyria Dempsey,” she added, taking advantage of still grasping at the man’s hand to shake it in the most manly fashion she could muster. He mustn’t think himself her saviour, after all. Though she supposed she did want to learn his name, at least, if only because he seemed the sort of acquaintance worth collecting, whoever he was. He looked almost as windswept as she imagined she must, only his seemed to be an aura consolidated over time: it was too thorough for a single lakeside walk to have fashioned. “But I’ll admit that that sort of floating was much better fun.”

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