(no subject)

[everyone_takes]

The bookshelf keeps giving her books on drawing. It's sort of annoying, because the very last thing in the world Kate is interested in is drawing. Well, that's sort of an exaggeration. There are probably a few things she's less interested in, like walking on hot coals and shit like that, but if she's going to do anything artistic, it's going to be dancing.

Or makeup. Which she supposes is just drawing on her own face, but it's totally different.

So she's collected the books -- six in all, though the bookshelf tries to give her more -- and she's walking to Harley's place carrying all of them in a pink bag. Which, now that she's almost entirely there, she's realizing probably wasn't the best idea. They're fucking heavy and Chang isn't much of a help, trotting along beside her, occasionally sniffing himself. When she reaches Harley's hut, she's sweaty and she all but throws the bag on the ground.

"Oh, my god, I hope you're home," she groans, loud enough to be heard if he's inside. "I'm just gonna leave this shit here even if you're not."

Comments

[bloodycrescents]

I jump at the sound of something thudding outside my door, pencil scratching across my homework. It's pretty quiet here most days and there's only a few people who ever come to see me, so it's not like I'm expecting anyone, and until Kate starts talking, I figure it's an animal or something and I'm just being a dumbass, getting spooked like that. I nearly rip the page out of the sketchbook, a half-filled one I dragged off the bookshelf a couple months ago, so I can tear it up and throw it out before I remind myself I have a fucking eraser for a reason. It's getting pretty worn, though.

Heading across the room, I think about grabbing my shirt on the way over, but it's hot as fuck so I don't bother. It's just Kate. I might if it were Carla Jean, but it's not like it really matters. "What the fuck?" I ask, pulling the door open. "What's wrong?"

[everyone_takes]

"What's the matter is that these books are fucking heavy," Kate answers, swinging the bag up again and holding it out to Harley. It's a bright pink bag and there are purple kittens on it, but whatever. If he wants the books, she figures he can take the bag for at least a minute to fish them out. Not that he's asked for the books, exactly, but she's pretty sure he'll want them.

"And they're for you," she adds, in case he doesn't know what she's doing. "I brought them for you. The bookshelf kept giving them to me, so I figured it wanted me to like, bestow them on you or whatever."

[bloodycrescents]

It looks like something Jody would drag home if given half a chance. I eye the bag warily, then crouch down to pick it up, turning to head back inside. "What the fuck is all this?" I ask, though I'm less annoyed now that I've settled down. It's just Kate. Mostly I feel like a dumbass for being thrown by something so small anyway

Lifting a book from the bag, I frown at it. "What, trying to get me to draw you another dinosaur?" I glance over at her, brow raised. I'm taking the class. I'm not sure what else she wants. Most of what I try to draw still looks like total shit and there was a while there I didn't want to try at all. I'm not sure the books will be much help when I still feel so fucking clumsy with the pencil, though.

[everyone_takes]

"No. I don't know. It's from the bookshelf," Kate answers, following him inside. Chang looks like he's trying to decide what to do before he flops down in the dirt -- of course -- and starts to roll around on his back. Kate just rolls her eyes, because that's what this fucking dog does all the time, just to drive her nuts, she thinks. It ate Jeff's clothes and now it makes all her shit dirty.

"I thought it might be better than a teacher," she says. "I mean, maybe the teachers here are awesome, but I never liked teachers much. I always liked doing shit on my own way better." Maybe it's stupid of her to think Harley might like to do the same, but it's too late now. He has the books.

[bloodycrescents]

Carrying them over to the desk, I nudge my sketchbook aside so I can pile the books next to it, looking over the titles. I'm not sure if they'll be useful or not. There's one for figure drawing, and I kind of feel like it wouldn't matter to the Impressionists because it's not so much about getting everything right as getting the right feeling. I like that about them a lot. It would probably be a lot easier to evoke the intended emotions if the people in the pictures didn't just look like disproportionate blobs drawn by a kid, though.

"Thanks," I says, a little grudging as I turn to look at her. "That shelf will do anything not to help you out, huh?" Including help me instead.

[everyone_takes]

"Yeah, I think it's because I tried to burn it down that one time," she admits, lips pursed as she thinks about it. "I mean, I tried to light it on fire, so I guess it has a pretty good reason to not like me much, right?" If someone had tried to light her on fire one time, she'd probably do everything in her power to piss that person off all the time.

"I had to spend the night in jail when I did that," she says, then laughs. "Jeff caught me, but he took the lighter and hid it so that the cop didn't know exactly what I was trying to do."

[bloodycrescents]

I don't know Jeff, never met him, but I've heard about him. Another one of us vanished. Seems like the number of people here is never enough to eclipse the number of those who've left us behind.

"Were you fucking high?" I snort, brow raising. "Or did it just piss you off?"

I'd understand if she said it was the latter. I've been avoiding it since the day I found that paper. I wanted to burn it down then, too. I wanted to burn down everything.

[everyone_takes]

"Well... both," she says, trying not to smile even though it's pretty much impossible. Looking back at it, the whole situation is pretty hilarious, even if no one seemed to think so at the time. She'd ended up having to apologize to about a billion people, which had been super awkward, but at least no one had gotten hurt. And it was a pretty funny story.

"I was at the rave, so Harry and I got pretty stoned, totally had sex for the first time while stoned and then I got up and tried to burn down the bookshelf because it kept giving me books on DID, which, hello, I'm like, the last person in the world who needs books on that shit."

[bloodycrescents]

I glance briefly up at the ceiling, fruitlessly hoping to block out part of that. I'm not a prude or anything like that, and I'm not an idiot. I know Kate and Harry fuck around and that's their business. I just don't really want to hear about it. She's too much like a sister, even barring the ways she reminds me of Amber, and it makes me uncomfortable to think about.

"How the fuck did you manage to start a fire in the rec room?"

[everyone_takes]

"I had a lighter, obviously," she says, then frowns, because that's not right. "Or maybe matches. I don't really remember, I was super stoned."

Since then, she's been to a few of the raves, she's even gotten drunk, but she hasn't gotten high. Smoked pot a few times, here and there, but nothing hard and she isn't sure why. It's not like she has a problem with it now or anything, but she really doesn't want a repeat of that night.

"Danny Williams, the guy who's training me? Totally found me and Jeff screaming at each other. Actually, I was probably doing most of the screaming."

[bloodycrescents]

"Somehow not surprised," I say on an exhale. For the most part, Kate's pretty sane, all things considered, but she's still a girl, still not much older than Amber. Screaming's like an Olympic sport for them. After a moment, I sit heavily back down in my chair, reaching for another of the books.

"You ever think maybe it just wants you to learn to draw instead of me?"

[everyone_takes]

"What? No," Kate answered, her nose wrinkling at the thought of her drawing. "I can barely manage stick people." But she was thinking about Lynda now and the things she'd drawn. Those posters had been cheesy as all fuck, but they'd actually been kind of good, too, and that'd been what had drawn her to the whole thing initially.

"I was a model for someone who painted back home," she said. "But that's not even close to the same thing. All I did was hold a sword for like, an hour."

[bloodycrescents]

I snort. "I'd get fucking sick of it in two minutes." That's kind of an exaggeration, though. It probably wouldn't take even that long.

I take a long look at her, wondering if I could even begin to get her right on the page. This newest notebook is filled with sketches of Effy, but they're all fucked up, rushed. It's not like I could ask her to pose. I'd be embarrassed, just sitting there, watching her, like that.

"What was it for?"

[everyone_takes]

"This stupid comic thing," Kate answers, shaking her head. She hasn't put the Princess Valhalla costume on in a long time and she knows why. She knows she isn't looking for that kind of attention anymore, latching onto anything that looked for just a second like it might be able to take her away from her crazy family.

"I was trying to collect this woman's debt and when I finally found her, she'd done all these drawings of this superhero princess and I kind of looked exactly like her," she says. "So she got me to do this stupid fucking music video and paintings and like, go to comic book stores so nerds could pay to have their picture taken with me. It was so much fun at the time."

[bloodycrescents]

I bark out a laugh, brow raising at her. "Shit," I say, "seriously?" It sounds pretty fucking stupid, but then, I was never into that shit. Deep down, even if it seems lame, I like the idea of anything that makes her look as cheerful as all that. She smiles more easily than anyone else I know, but it isn't the same as being happy.

I don't do too much of either, but things are different now than they used to be. These days, they aren't half bad.

"What, like with a crown and shit?"

[everyone_takes]

"Uh, no. Princess Valhalla Hawkwind wore a Viking hat, okay?" Kate asks, then laughs. "I even have the costume here. I sort of showed up in it. It's totally ridiculous, these stupid red vinyl boots and shorts and plastic armor and a super long blonde and pink wig. I used to wear it to the parties sometimes, but I haven't taken it out in a long time."

The Princess seems to have been retired ever since that video of her sitting on a cake showed up on the island.

"I may have... tried to make my own business out of it," she admits. "Getting dudes to buy me stuff. So, I don't know, I'm not exactly excited about the idea of taking her back out again."

[bloodycrescents]

At first, it's funny. The idea of it is pretty fucking hilarious, Kate all done up like some kind of Viking superhero with some bigass wig. By the time she's done, though, I've gone tense, looking over at her and trying not to let the rage burn me up under my skin.

She made her own fucking choices and I shouldn't be pissed off, but I can't help imagining what that would entail. How easy it would be for guys to try and take advantage of her. It isn't the same thing at all, but I still think about Amber and the guys who followed her around, interchangeable assholes. I think about the couch I set on fire.

"What do you mean, business?" I ask tightly. "None of them hurt you, did they?"

[everyone_takes]

"What? No. I never even met any of them," Kate said. "It was strictly an online business." That had been her intention, anyway, she hadn't actually gotten very far with it before she'd ended up on the island. "Besides," she added, "It's not like it even went beyond collecting e-mail addresses. It was still mostly in the initial planning stages and then suddenly I was here, so it's not even a thing."

And she was pretty glad that she'd come here instead. That was the sort of thing that would probably end up all over the internet and then she'd regret it, like she did with most of her weird, spontaneous ideas, and it would cause some kind of ridiculous drama.