Chapter 9

'There are so many places I want to take you," Jen says. "There's this lounge here you like and we used to go all the time when we were filming—even though this old lady there assaulted me…."

"I thought we were going to try to contact Suzanne Collins again," I interrupt. In the light of sunrise, I watch the scenery go by as the driver takes us away from the tall steel structures of the city, to an area with long stretches of trees and wide grassy fields.

Jen frowns, a little crease settling between her eyebrows. "I tried calling yesterday after the read-through, Josh. We don't need to drive the woman crazy."

"Yeah, I'm sure you're right," I say, giving her a smile. Jen had been great over the last two days, manic, but great and I know she's trying to help. She doesn't fully believe me, doesn't wants to believe me, but she's still trying and that's more than pretty much anyone's ever done from me—well, except Katniss.

And in less than an hour, Jen will be Katniss, transformed into my future wife, our future children playing around the meadow. It's weird trying to wrap my mind around that. Jen will pretend to be Katniss and I will pretend to be Josh pretending to be me.

Jen snakes her hand out, capturing mine. "I'm always right. That's something else you have to learn about me," she says teasingly. Her thumb slips up my wrist in a caress, but then stops dead.

"Josh," Jen says, her voice strained. "Where's you Libra tattoo?"

"I don't have any tattoos," I say. Most people see tattoos as a Capitol thing. People in the districts who get tattoos are harassed, called out for wanting to look Capitol.

"You have, like a ton of tattoos!" Jen says, reaching out and pulling on my shirt.

"Hey!" I say, trying to wrestle the fabric out of her hands.

"How could you have…I mean…I would have noticed earlier…"she says, before her eyes meet mine.

She clicks something and a light springs on above our heads. She searches my wrist again. She licks a finger and starts rubbing the skin.

"What are you doing?" I ask.

"You covered it, didn't you?" Jen asks.

"No, Jen." I cup her hand in mine. "We can't keep pretending that nothing's happened. You know I'm not Josh."

"Then what's that?" she asks stubbornly. She jabs her finger at my wrist. In the yellow light, I see the blueish-gray mark on my skin.

"Probably a bruise," I say, rubbing my now sore hand.

"In the shape of a star?"

I look at my wrist again and I see it, a mark shaped like a star. And then I see a second and then another pair of stars on the other side. The marks are faded and gray like print on old newspaper.

And I've never seen them before in my life.

"What are those?"

"Your Libra tattoo," Jen says triumphantly. "Because. You. Are. Josh."

"That doesn't mean I'm Josh!"

Jen leans forward and kisses me, a quick brush of our lips. "Yes, you are."

The truck pulls off onto a grovel road and parks.. Before I can do more than blink, Jen is already opening the door. I stare after her, my mind a muddle of confused thoughts. I don't know what to make of that kiss, whether it was a friendly sort of kiss between friends, whether I should feel guilty for liking it.

Is there such a thing as a friendly kiss?

I shake my head and follow Jen into a meadow busy with workers setting up equipment.

I guess it doesn't matter because I'm going to have kiss her again, anyway. In front of all these people. In front of a camera.

Maybe it was an icebreaker kiss.

"Bear," Jen calls out. She launches herself up, and he catches her, swinging her around, a wide smile on his face. That's when I remember him from the movie. This is fake Gale Hawthorne. I don't know if Bear is his real name or a nickname, but it suits him. He's tall and burly with shaggy dark hair.

And I know it's stupid, but I have to fight down a prickle of jealousy. What makes it even worse is I don't know if I'm jealous of him because of Gale and Katniss or because of the way he's holding Jen. I let out a slow breath and walk over to them.

The guy lets Jen go and grabs my shoulder, giving it a friendly shake. "Josh, what are you doing here," he asks. "And blond again." His accent is strange, like nothing I've heard before, nothing like the real Gale at all.

"What do you mean what's he doing here," Jen says. "What are you doing here? I didn't know you were coming down."

"I'm here for the epilogue shoot," fake Gale says. "You know, you and me riding off into the sunset together."

Jen laughs. "Did somebody send you another gag script? Damn, Bear, I told you to read the books."

"Why read the books, when you have the script," he says, waving a leaflet of papers. The cover looks the same as the one I have, but it seems a little thicker.

Jen jumps, snagging the script from him and flips through it. "What is this?"

"The script," fake Gale says, snatching the papers back. "Might remember it from the read-through yesterday?"

"You weren't there," Jen says.

"Yeah, I was. I remember it like it was yesterday," he crosses his arms over his chest. "You two been taking mind-altering substances?"

"Oh, you know we would've invited you if we were," she says, patting his arm and he snorts. "But, really, Bear, what's going on?"

Just then, the gray man from the hospital comes up to us, giving Jen a squeeze. "Ready to be Katniss one last time?"

"Don't say that Francis, you're going to make me cry, again," Jen says, swatting at him.

The man turns to me, "Hey, Josh what are you doing here?"

"He's here for the epilogue," Jen says. "For Peeta's part."

Francis looks from her to me, his eyebrows raised in confusion. "Well, it's nice to see you, Josh, and you're always welcome on my set," he says, slowly. "But… you know your character's been dead for three movies now."