beetles and benches. /meeka\

It wasn't that Livvy's day had started horribly. No, in fact, before the disturbance happened she had been having a splendid day. Of course Livvy - or Olivia, Liv, (really whatever you feel like calling her) - is not your average, everyday girl. Maybe if the circumstances had been different, she would have turned out normal. But things happen, stuff goes wrong and in the end, nothing ever turns out the way it should. Maybe her life was an endless riddle of mismatches, as if the heavens above could not decide on what to do with her. Which would have been a comforting epiphany to have, in the case that Livvy was religious. Which she wasn't. So it was pretty much useless and a waste of time to believe in something like that.

On this particular day, late afternoon actually, she was nearing the end of her sleep. She always sleeps in the day as she needs the night to scavenge for food and plunder. Nestled between the thickets of a willow tree, its hanging branches successfully obscuring her from view, she had been peacefully sound asleep for the past five hours. On average she managed to sleep through conversations, even through children laughing or screaming. But it was this noise, so very different from anything she was used to, that startled her wide awake.

Dark brown eyes opened wide and for a second her heart rate staccatoed upon hearing the unknown sound. It was this very fact that caused her to lose her comfortable spot on the willow tree's branch. Her hands slipped across the wood, gripping as a last resort to the first thing she could find. Her satchel. Which promptly gave away also. With a scream of fear, she fell, hands outstretched, and off her branch and right into a bush.

The bush cushioned her fall, the thorns didn't. The sharp claws ripped into her skin and she retreated immediately, though some thorns remained nestled in her skin."Ow. Oh, damn it!" She gave another few profound words from her and then tugged at the strap of her leather stachel, ripping it from the thorned bush and into her arms. Seething, shaking and in an indescribable amount of pain, she moved out of the low hanging branches of the magestic willow and towards the perturbing noise.

She gave a shriek of inexplicable fear when she saw the source of the noise. A man. She managed to calm down somewhat and noticed that this was no man, but merely a boy. He was singing. It was not particularly off-key, but it definitely wasn't what she wanted to hear, not during her much-needed sleep. "You great big oaf!" The insult seemed adequate in her mind. "Can you do this in private and not over here!" So maybe those words coming from a tiny girl was not very intimidating, especially considering that he was four inches taller than her. With a flourish and another huff, she turned on her heel, ready to head back up on her branch and try to catch a remainder of her sleep.

Now, as it is, there are a lot of strange people in District Eleven. The hard, manual labor gradually took care of even the strongest in the district. Livvy naturally shyed away from work of any kind, if it doesn't directly benefit herself. So although her hands tingled with desire to punch this stranger right into the easiest body part to reach, the far-off look in his eyes stopped her. It wasn't even that he looked mad and spoke like a mad person... it was the childish behaviour he was displaying. Just like it would be ethically immoral to hit the elderly, it was wrong to hit someone who appeared a child. True, even though his stature allowed the benefit of the doubt, he could hardly be any older than sixteen.

She was momentarily too dumbfounded to say anything - and chose instead to stare at him blankly. When he turned away, after muttering something about getting something green, she only sighed and chose to occupy the bench he had been using beforehand.

Some of the thick thorns were easy to remove, issuing only a faint whimper of pain and a grotesque grimace everytime she tugged one out of her skin. It was the thorns in her upper arms that seemed impossible to remove. In fact, one of the thorns was almost pushed entirely under the skin and the slightest movement caused her to cry out in pain. Great. Really great. Faint trickles of crimson etched pathways down her arm in angry criss-crossing patterns. She smudged one of the trails, gazing at the spot of blood on her finger with an uncanny amount of fascination.

The sun in the distance was already gradually sinking below the rooftops of the houses, casting the surroundings into a warm, healthy glowing red and orange. She relished feeling the rays of sunlight against her features, knowing quite well that once they disappeared, Earth would begin to plunge in temperature. The prospect of another nights worth of prowling around in the serenity of the night - another few hours plundering from houses and abandoned stands, scavenging from the orchards while outskirting Peacekeepers - just did not sound very appealing given the state she was in.

Then he returned. She had almost forgotten about the strange boy. In fact, she was feeling a little better now, with many of the thorns removed, the blood trails growing less thick by the minute. Then he had to return. To throw leaves in her face. Normally, she would have chosen this moment to retreat, sensing conflict and of course meaning to avoid it at all possible cost.

The fact remained that she could not and would not do anything to harm someone like him. The leaves, the few that were there, hit her in a type of colourful frenzy. She blinked past the various shades of green hitting her square in the face.

Then she turned her face skywards and started to laugh. It wasn't one of those girlish laughs that are mere giggles, the ones that most females tended to relish in; as though to laugh was embarrassing and had to be covered up. No, it was one of those rare, jubilant, full-throated laughs. One that was not accompanied by a string of girlish laughter. She laughed for what seemed a long time, until tears of mirth rolled steadily down her face.

When she was done wiping at them, she smiled happily at him. Maybe this was somebody she would not be afraid of hanging around? He certainly was not as threatening as any other men. He also did not seem quite normal, to put it lightly. But that's what she liked. Being a slight Xenophobic and generally uncomfortable around groups of people, she prefered the not-normal kind. "I like you," she finally stated. "What's your name? My name is Livvy."