(Untitled)

[makemaps]

I don't know how I'm supposed to feel. 3 North was weird enough but here I am, somewhere even fucking weirder. Apparently, somewhere around here, there's a guy who's, like, my mirror image or something. I've been accidentally hit on by a guy, thrown up on about three people, got a sunburn, got high. So it's a mixed bag

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[burnwithus]

She needs paper for the book that she's writing, the one with all of the memories pressed inside its pages. Peeta's helping, and that, in turn, helps her because she's excluded him for far too long in hopes of somehow saving him. The war was not something they experienced together, but the Games and Panem in its entirety were.

Buttercup isn't around. Katniss figures that he just decided to go find better things to do once he realized that she was done giving him scraps for the day. There's already someone at the tables when she walks in, but that doesn't bother Katniss any. She just goes about business as usual, collecting pencils to tuck behind her ear and paper to write on before settling down at an adjacent table.

Letting the memories come back. Trying not to get lost in them. After a long moment, she begins to write and her pencil makes a scratching sound against the paper.

[makemaps]

I kind of lose myself when I draw. That's kind of the point. Dimly, I'm aware of her being there but, if I'm honest? I don't really give a shit. Because there's a city taking shape in front of me. I make it roughly heart-shaped, two rivers like arteries.

It's coming together well.

[burnwithus]

She can't draw to save her life, and even her handwriting is cramped and spiky, completely unflattering because Katniss doesn't really have an eye for beauty like some other people do. Like Cinna did. And if she's going to be honest, she pretends not to care.

Either way, it's nice not to be disturbed for once. Most people on the island will interrupt no matter what, and people always had this habit of being there at the wrong times around her. Showing up when she wanted to be alone. But after a moment, Katniss' curiosity gets the better of her and she glances at his page. Not even fully aware that she's doing it at the time.

It's a heart? A map? She's not sure, from this distance. No matter how much she squints.

[makemaps]

Rivers. Bridges. A park with a bike-path. It's a little like Manhattan but softer edges, not bounded on all sides by water. I grew up within sight of Manhattan so, I guess, it's in my blood.

I don't really know anything else.

[noonelaughed]

At first he thinks it's Marshall. Chris sees him around the compound often enough, and though most of the time it's in the kitchen, the resemblance is enough that Chris takes a seat next to him at his table without realizing.

It's the clothes and the drawing that give him away, really. Marshall's like... always in a tie. One of these days, Chris will have to ask Maxxie if he leaves it on all the time.

"You look almost exactly like someone I know," Chris says, instead of 'hello.'

[makemaps]

"You'd be totally surprised how often I hear that," I say, glancing up from what I'm drawing (the gates to a great park that I'm shading black). "Marshall, right? I'm not him and...I totally don't want to make out with you. Sorry and everything."

[noonelaughed]

"No, no, that's cool. I don't wanna make out with you either, mate," Chris says, just so they're clear on that bit. Sometimes, it's like nearly everyone on the island's gay- the blokes, anyway- so it'd be an easy mistake for someone new to make.

"I'm Chris."

[makemaps]

"I'm not, like..." This is impossible. "I don't mean that I thought you did. Just, you know, I kind of got a bit felt up? At the bonfire? I was just trying to...you know...head the possibility off at the path."

Smooth. I clear my throat.

"Hey, Chris. Craig? I'm Craig."

[a_swan_diver]

Bella walked through the rec room on her way to the kitchen and something she can use to spice up dinner a little more than just salt and pepper. She wasn't sure why the drawing caught her eye, maybe because it reminded her of the day she and Jake did grid lines for their search through the forest around Forks. But they'd made those lines on an existing map, this guy was drawing from scratch.

"I don't mean to be rude and interrupt or anything, but you're really good at that. Drawing, I mean."

[makemaps]

"Oh," I say, like I'm actually surprised by that and, I mean, maybe I am? I haven't done anything like this in forever, and then I let myself do it and...it's kind of a surprise to actually be good.

"Thanks?"

[a_swan_diver]

"You're welcome," she said, a little confused when he sounded almost like if he was asking if he should say thank you. "I'm kind of envious of anyone who can draw." She looked a little more carefully at the map in front of him. "Is that where you come from?"

[makemaps]

"I didn't really think I could until I started again." It's kind of a ridiculous admission to make, with a drawing in front of me, but it's how I feel. I look at the map for a moment.

"No. I'm from Brooklyn. This...it doesn't exist. It's...a friend of mine called them brain-maps."

I kind of liked it.

[neither_a_nor_b]

Bay had managed to snatch up some pencils and a bit of paper here and there and was wishing she'd paid more attention in 3D arts because how badass would making her own sketchbook have been? As it was, she was just keeping all of her new sketches tucked into a folder made from larger paper.

She couldn't claim that she and Craig had the easiest first meeting, but that was life and that was what second impressions are for. And besides that, she was sort of fascinated by the map he was drawing.

"Where is that?"

[makemaps]

"Uh..." It always takes me a moment to come back from drawing. I was kind of stuck there. I blink at her. Bay, right? Bay.

"Nowhere," I say. "Somewhere. It's made up? It's a brain map."

[neither_a_nor_b]

She hadn't really explored much with maps in her own work, too organic to really find itself in her usual set of references when she liked to focus on the graphic and the hard-edged, but there was something really cool in the way he was assembling his images.

"Like a map of your thoughts or place you made up?"

[makemaps]

"Sort of, like, a mix of both, I guess?" I shrug and roll one shoulder. "I wanted to trace Manhattan but it's really hard to trace free-hand, and you can't really buy a six year old a light-box."

I notice the sketch-pad in her hand and, suddenly, inexplicably, I'm really and completely embarassed.

[quileutejacob]

Jacob had never really needed maps before the island. For some reason, the wolf in him seemed to have an innate sense of direction and no matter how far he got up into Canada, he always seemed to be able to know exactly what direction to go to get back to La Push. It'd been useful, then, but on the island, all bets were off.

"Is it a map from where you're from, then?"

It didn't exactly look like the island.

[makemaps]

"No," I say, shaking my head, still shading in a black area that could be a park or a ventricle or lymph. I lift my pencil and look at him.

"It's a made up place. I never got the hang of drawing Manhattan."

[quileutejacob]

"Ohh. Do you usually draw made up places, then?"

Jacob hadn't ever really been good at drawing, not like building or carving. He could sketch plans a little, though, and maybe that could extend to maps if he really wanted.

[makemaps]

"Yeah. They're easier. A...friend of mine called them brain maps. Which totally works."

This one's...pretty done, so I sign it in the corner.