Passenger | Unedited Version

chapter three | a place in this world

chapter three | a place in this world 

There's something extremely relaxing about drawing. 

        Mama says that I was born drawing, no exaggerating necessary. With a healthy cry loud enough to wake up the whole town, I came out of the womb with my fingers inching to make my extravagant mark on the world. I was painting sunsets in the delivery room, sketching figures out in the air with something like wild fire in my veins and stars in my eyes.  

        My father taught me the difference between primary and secondary colors before I could correctly spell my full name, which came in handy when we practiced mix media together. He'd stare at me in the dim light of the basement and tell me that I had enough potential to be the modern day Vincent van Gogh, but without all of the sadness.  

        I don't know how honest a dead man's words are, but I carried them around on my sleeves and started putting my soul down via pencil and paper. My old spiral bound notebook with the frayed edges from constantly falling into the lake is full with doodles of faces, my deepest darkest secrets hidden among the irises. The portraits of unknown people slowly died down to nothing, as time ticked by and puberty struck. 

        I can't be too sure how piercing eyes turned into roads, but somehow I ended up with a love for creating maps to places I've never been. Mama says that it's quite the odd hobby to be wasting all my free time to, as they're all fictional and probably never function on this world. I can't say that I particularly disagree with Mama because it is pretty pointless.  

        But I like doing it. 

        Something about creating the world from absolute scratch appeals so strongly to me, constantly leaving me baffled that I could even do such a monumental task. It's insane, isn't it, that simple human being are the ones that made most of the world around us? If it weren't for us having a burning passion to shape the world we live in, the Great Pyramids, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, or the ancient cities that we've all grown to love and cherish wouldn't even exists.  

        We really are amazing, each and everyone one of us are - I can only hope that before I take my last breath in this world, I can make an imprint on the world. No something gigantic and horribly unreasonable, but something that will be apart of Earth forever. Considering everyone at this Godforsaken town seems to believe that I'll never set a foot away from it for too long, it's unlikely my dream will ever happen. Spending all my free time doing the maps is my only ticket out of here, when you stop and think about it. If I ever even get the heck out of Franklin, that is. If I can't actually go to any of the world's most extraordinary places, I might as well be the one designing them.  

        "Nellie," a voice booms from somewhere behind my back. "Hey." 

        Pulling a one eighty and looking at the portion of the woods that illustrate the land, a figure waves frantically in my direction. Indie is basically acting like a cute five year old girl, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she acts like an idiot. Her head bobs up and down, a smile reaching to both ears and twin ponytails bouncing to the nonexistent beat.  

        She reaches me before I can hardly blink, plotting herself down next to me on the dull beach towel. After thinking about the action for a few quiet moments, I can physically see the gears in her head turning.  The cute little beam of happiness that is her smile slowly vanishes, as she starts to second guess herself and the confidence she had a few heartbeats ago is long gone. It seems to me that the poor girl is never really too sure of what she does. A frown doesn't suit her very well.