Chapter Text
I awake early on reaping day, even though last night's dreams kept me up for hours. I can't be the only one though because even now I can see my older brother Thom in the opposite bed, tossing and turning, muttering in his sleep. The nightmares always come before the reaping, because even though my family doesn't have to take any tesserae, there is always the shadow of fear, that maybe the name that is pulled out of the reaping ball, will be yours.
Shaking the dreadful thought out of my mind, I push off my thin covers and drag myself out of bed. Thom is still sleeping, so I got to our small grimy window that overlooks the town square, where later today, I will be forced to stand in a crowd full of terrified 12-16 year olds, while Effie Trinket, our eccentric representative from the capitol, picks out the names of which boy and girl are going to go to the Hunger Games to die. Die, because basically everyone from district 12 who goes to the Hunger Games dies. We have only had two victors, one of them long dead, there have been 74 Hunger Games so far, and she won near the start, and our only alive victor is addicted to alcohol and never really comes out of his home in the victor's village, except to buy more alcohol and for the dreaded reapings.
Suddenly, a movement in the square distracts me from my thoughts. It's Gale Hawthorne, a bag of berries and roots slung over his shoulder and 5 rabbits dangling from his belt. And next to him is... Katniss Everdeen. My heart skips a beat as I see her walk beside Gale, her shiny dark hair done in an elegant braid down her back, her gray eyes like a storm cloud, beautiful, yet deadly. She wears and old jacket, covered in stains, mud and a little bit of animal blood, but it still looks great on her. Her posture is strong and steady, her arms full of muscles. I know where they have been, in the woods, hunting.
What they don't know is that they are respected by everyone at school. Both of their fathers killed in the mine explosion, both of them still going strong. They both live in the Seam, and to keep their family alive, they have to venture in to the woods, and hunt. They have weapons out there, some say, hidden in logs and under rocks. I know that they are archers, because every time she brings my father game, it's always a clean shot, not a cut throat, just a hole through its head. No one but them goes in there, its too dangerous. But they always bring back game and trade well at the hob, our local black market. At school she is always left alone. Not because no one likes her, but because of her air of and superiority and the way that she seems to want to be alone, they are a little scared of her. The only one who confronts her is Madge. What an unlikely pair, the brave, poor hunter and the most well of girl in district twelve her father is mayor.
I watch them knock on the Mayor's house's door. Madge opens the door. She wears a very expensive with dress and a pink satin ribbon in her hair. On her dress there is pinned a gold pin. Real gold. I can't see the shape from my window, but I think it's a bird of some sort. They talk for some time. I see Gale's handsome face begin to mold into a frown. He begins to argue with Madge. Katniss separates them then hands Madge a small bag of strawberries. Madge in return hands Katniss a handful of coins. Madge closes the door and they leave. Gales expression is still stony, but Katniss says some words and he begins to smile. I turn away from the window and i go to sit on my bed. I can't help but have a crush on Katniss. I have since the very first day I saw her, her long hair in two braids, and a red checked dress on. She is so beautiful, her voice so phenomenal, her willing to survive so strong and admirable. But there is Gale.
He is quite popular at school, and he has had a few girlfriends, but everyone thinks that Katniss and he are going to get married. They are best friends after all, even though he is 2 years older than she is. He is handsome and strong, with gray eyes and dark hair just like Katniss, and everybody else from the Seam. Whereas I am blonde with blue eyes, and the most dangerous thing I do is get bread out of the oven at the bakery where we live. I do have a little muscle, but that's only from throwing big bags of flour around. I hate having this huge bonfire of jealousy inside of me, but I can't help it.
I look across at the opposite bed, where Thom is snoring away. I think about confiding in him, but I won't. Even though Thom is my brother, he is 18 while I am 16, and we have never been that close. My other brother, Jacob, is 21 and he's always down in the bakery, we've never really been that close either. If I told them they'd probably laugh at me.
Suddenly, Mother strides into the room. I instantly straiten my back. If mother saw me with any sign of weakness she'd yell. "The reaping is today" she says going through my drawers and pulling out my reaping outfit, my cleanest white shirt, black pants and some old brown leather shoes. "Get ready, we will not be late!" and with that she shakes up my brother Thom, throws him his clothes, and slams the door as she exits the room. Thom sits up and begins to groggily put on his clothes. He looks pretty much the same as me, except he inherited dad's warm brown eyes. I sigh, sit up and began to get dressed for the reaping.
Breakfast is a silent affair. We eat stale bread like we always do. Some people in the district are under the impression that since we own the bakery, we must be well fed on fresh warm bread, a delicacy in the districts. But no, we cannot afford to eat the fresh stuff, we can only eat the stuff that has gone stale, that no one will buy. We are well feed, but it can be depressing eating the same stale bread every day. Mother leaves early to go catch up with some other mothers from the town. When she has left, father hands out some pieces of roast squirrel, something that we are never allowed to eat when Mother is around. She considers it vermin. As soon as I see the squirrel, I know that father had been trading with Katniss and Gale. They're basically the only way any of us can get fresh meat. I chew mine slowly, letting the rare taste of juicy meat seep over my taste buds.
2 hours later I stand in the area marked “16 years male” like we are a type of animals that need marked cages, though that is pretty much the way the capitol thinks of us, though the real cages are labeled “districts”. I still feel a little ache of pain from where they took my blood. I stand next to my friends from school, Connor and Mavis. I look across to the opposite area, marked “16 years females”. Katniss stands at the front, her brown hair in her traditional braid, but wrapped around her head somehow, wearing a sky blue satin dress and her brown hunting boots. She looks gorgeous.
I turn my attention back to Connor and Mavis, who both look scared about the coming reaping. I try to lighten the mood. “I wonder what Effie will wear this year” I joke. That’s me, the jokester, the one that makes people smile. I actually do have quite a lot of friends at school because of this. Connor turns to me, a smile returning to his face. “Remember last year” he smiles. “Oh yes” says Mavis, joining the conversation “it was a bright green wig with a fake lizard in it!” I laugh, something I rarely do on reaping day. “That was ridiculous!” I agree.
Suddenly, Mayor Undersee, the Mayor of district 12, walks onto the stage and sits on 1 of the 3 chairs that stand at back of the stage. We fell into silence and the smiles soon left our faces. He is soon followed by Effie Trinket, who is this year wearing and oversize bubblegum pink wig, a spring green jumpsuit and her skin so powdered with white that she looks like a ghost, but she wouldn’t stand out in a capitol crowd, they all wear clothes that are seem absolutely mental to us. The third seat is still empty. That’s Haymitch’s spot. He must be in a drunken haze and asleep in an alleyway or something. Effie and Mayor Undersee look in concern at the empty seat. When the clock strikes 2, they seem to give up waiting and Mayor Undersee goes to the podium to make his speech, without Haymitch’s presence on the stage. The cameras that sit like dark vultures on the roofs of the square all turn to follow him
His speech is the exact boring story that we have to listen to every year. About the rebellion that the districts had against the capitol, because everyone was starving, overworked and dying. The rebels (the districts) lost and the Capitol won the war, so as punishment the districts have to compete in the Hunger Games every year. One boy and one girl from each district have to go to the capitol and fight to the death. The only rules are, kill or be killed. What they don’t include in the speech is that the days leading up to the Hunger Games are like a pageant. You dress up and are shown off in chariots, then you show off to other districts in training, then you have to show your special talent for killing or survival to the Gamemakers and they grade you on it, then you are dressed up and shown off at an interview, then they send you off into the arena for your probable death.
I zoned out from the monotonous speech, I had heard it many times before. Instead I watched Katniss. Her face was creased with worry. I wondered why, until I saw that her gaze lay on her younger sister Primrose, also known as Prim. Of course, this is Prim’s first year in the reaping, she must be worried. I know how much she loves Prim, sometimes you see her at the window of the bakery with Prim, looking at all of the decorated cakes. I had decorated them myself.
Suddenly, while Mayor Undersee was droning on about how if you win the games you get to live in the Victor’s Village and be showered with gifts, Haymitch stumbled onto the stage, yelling something that no one can decipher. He is drunk. Very drunk. The crowd responds with its token applause, but he is confused so he tries to give Effie a hug, and she only just manages to dodge it. The mayor looks distressed. Since every reaping is televised for all of Panem to see, district 12 is becoming even more of a joke.
The mayor tries to pull the attention away from the slumped form of Haymitch by introducing Effie Trinket, and with his queue, she jumps strait out of her chair and walks, as bubbly and eccentric as ever, to the podium to pick the names of the next tributes from district 12. I notice that her pink wig has shifted off center since her encounter with Haymitch. “Happy Hunger Games!” she says brightly “And may the odds be ever in your favor”. She says that every year, it’s her signature welcoming to the reaping. She goes on about how much she is delighted to be here, but everyone knows that she longs to be in a higher up district, like district 1 or 2, a career district, where a tribute from there wins almost every year. But now it’s time for the real reaping to begin.
“Ladies first!” says Effie, and she trots over to the reaping ball that holds the name of the girl tribute from district 12. She swirls her hand around in the ball for a while, leaving everyone in total suspense. Then she finally pulls out a paper slip and walks slowly back to the podium, where she opens up the piece of paper slowly and reads the name inside. “Primrose Everdeen” she says, her voice echoing across the square, loud and clear.
I can barely hold back the gasp of surprise that threatens to escape from my mouth. I quickly look at Katniss. Her gray eyes are wide in what is clearly shock, and she seems too stunned to even administer what is happening. I see Prim, her face as white as Effie’s, her hands clenched into tight fists, walk slowly through the crowd of 12 year old girls, who all part to let her pass. Suddenly Katniss catches sight of her, and as if she was jolted out of a daydream, she gasps and begins to shout out Prim’s name. “Prim, Prim” her voice full of strangled emotion. She runs to the stage, where Prim is just about to reach the stairs. “I volunteer” she yells desperately as she pushes Prim aside, “I volunteer as tribute”
Effie is muttering something about how she must ask for volunteers first but no one is listening to her, they are listening to the way that Prim is screaming hysterically, her arms wrapped tightly around Katniss. “No, Katniss! No! You can’t go!” I’m thinking the same thing as I see Gale rip Prim off Katniss and she heads up the stair, her posture even more stiff than usual.
Then Katniss walks slowly onto the stage, her face betraying no emotion. “Well bravo!” exclaims Effie, who is obviously pleased to a volunteer probably the first that district 12 has ever had. “That’s the spirit of the Games!” she gushes on. “What is your name?”
“Katniss Everdeen” Katniss says, still betraying no emotion. “Well, I bet my buttons that was your sister!” exclaims Effie, as bubbly as ever, “wouldn’t want her stealing all the glory, would we? Come on everybody; let’s give Katniss Everdeen a big round of applause!”
But no one does. The silence hangs in the air like fog. Then, slowly, everyone in the crowd, including me, slowly lifts their three middle fingers to their mouths and raises them at Katniss. Effie looks confused; she has no idea what it means. But I do. It means thanks, it means admiration, It means goodbye to someone you love. It is mainly used at funerals. I can see that Katniss is truly on the verge of crying, but then something happens that distracts her and everyone else in the square.
Haymitch seems to pick up on the sudden change in the crowd, and chooses this time to stagger across the stage, as if to congratulate Katniss. He throws his arms around her neck and her nose wrinkles in disgust. He must smell terrible. Then he shouts, his voice strong for someone who is so drunk, “look at her, look at this one!” All the cameras on the roofs turn on him. “Lots of…” he pauses, as if wondering what word would describe Katniss the best. “Spunk!” he says finally. “More than you!” he shouts at the crowd as he lets go of Katniss and starts toward the center of the stage. “More than you!” he repeats, and then points his finger towards the cameras that are perched on top of the roofs, which still have their lenses trained directly on his face. Is he so deep in his drunk haze that he might actually be addressing the Capitol? To taunt the Capitol is something that no one in any district dare do, because it is almost a direct ticket to becoming an Avox. An Avox is what all prisoners of the Capitol become, slaves with their tongues amputated, so that they can never speak, taste or swallow properly ever again.
Fortunately, before Haymitch can get himself into any more trouble, he loses his footing and falls of the stage, headfirst, to the ground, knocking himself unconscious. He is carried off on a stretcher. Mayor Undersee shakes his head sadly on the stage. Yet another reason why district 12 is the laughing stock of Panem.
I draw my thoughts back to the main issue that is troubling me. Katniss Everdeen, the girl I have been in love with since I was young, going to a place where she may die, and will definitely suffer! I was so shocked that I didn’t even realize Effie was doing the boys until I heard the sound of paper crinkling across the loud speaker as she unfolded the name of the boy tribute for the 75th annual Hunger Games. Then she said, her voice loud and clear, “Peeta Mellark”