Frog BachelorWelcome to the pond.
A small, soggy community of locals who run the place - and a rotating cast of suitors who keep wandering in. Mind the lily pads. Someone's watching them.
Fourteen-and-counting residents keep the pond running - they don't date you, they process you. Grouped by what they're here to do.
The professionals
The Frog Court
Convenes to try you for crimes against your own heart. All three take it very seriously, which is the problem.
Family & friends
The ones who love you through it - your bestie comes in a few different flavors of supportive. You pick who's in your corner.
And then there's the Heron.
He is not a local, exactly. He does not run a booth or hold a gavel. He stands at the water's edge, very still, and he writes. Letters arrive in wax - describing the message you didn't send, the hour you left, the thing you only thought. He insists this is care. The unsettling part is that he might be right.
- he signs them only "H."
Thirteen kinds of frog. None of them okay.
The locals run the pond; these are who you actually date. Every suitor you meet is a riff on one of these - and yes, you can tell within one pickup line. Skim them. Find your type. Regret it later.
"You have met everyone who is here. That is not the same as everyone. I keep the ledger, and the ledger has blank pages - I have learned not to assume they stay blank. Frogs wander in. Types I had not catalogued reveal themselves. I add a line; I never draw the final one. Come back and count again. The number will have moved, quietly, the way the water does. - H."