love in the arena, but not the same story that you're used to.


Huddled beneath the cornucopia on the first night, when everyone else has fallen into a restless sleep, Clove curls in tighter on herself. Cato reaches across the gap between them to touch her hand, but she draws away from him.

"It doesn't make any difference now," she whispers harshly, "It won't get us anywhere."

Cato takes his hand back, turns over on his side so he doesn't have to face her.


Underneath the tree, she watches Lover Boy watch the Girl on Fire.

Love, she thinks, what is the point? In the end, one of them is going to die and there is nothing the other can do about it.

Cato gives her the last of the water left in his canteen. She refuses until he says, "Please, Clove. Please."

If it gives him peace of mind, then why not?


Tracker Jackers.

Cato's scream jolts her awake. She has a knife drawn and ready to throw before she realizes what is really going on. Glimmer is already down, wounded beyond repair and Cato is swatting at his face. She grabs his hand, pulls on it fiercely until he follows her. She barely feels the stings to her own body. She runs and does not look back.

Deeper in the forest, when the tracker jackers are behind them and she's feeling woozy, like she can't move another step, Cato slips an arm around her waist to hold her up. He carries her like that until they find a suitable place to hide. Beside a stream, she falls asleep with her head in his lap. She wakes up to him stroking her hair.


Lover Boy is gone.

She wonders how the girl feels. She wonders if she knows he did it all for her survival. She wonders if it even matters. She sharpens her knives until nightfall, and when the cannons ring out, there is no Lover Boy in the sky.

Cato says, "Well, maybe they've found each other, after all."

Clove won't look at him.


When the announcement rings out, she allows herself to hope for a moment.

"Clove," Cato whispers, "Clove, we can... We can do it."

He clutches her hand in his, so tight that she can feel it bruising, and she squeezes back.


Another announcement.

The capitol is trying to tie up the loose ends and lure them all to the cornucopia.

"This is our chance," Cato says, huddled around a small fire that Clove constructed. They plan how they're going to do it. Clove will take the girl, and Cato will hide at the edge of the forest to catch Lover Boy, or the other remaining girl tribute. They don't think Thresh will make an appearance.

"We're so close, Clove," he tells her.

Clove closes her eyes, touches the tip of a knife to her index finger. She kisses him harder than she ever has before.


So close, and her hands are shaking on her set of knives.

If she can just get this over with, then they can kill off the rest and finish this thing. They can leave this arena together.

The Girl on Fire emerges from the forest.


It doesn't work out.

Cato watches from the distance as Clove gets carried away with her kill. He catches sight of the girl that stays hidden and chases her deeper into the forest. He turns around when he hears his name. By the time he's back, district 12 is running away and Thresh is walking off in the other direction, one broken body littering the ground.

He holds her hand, though it won't make a difference, now.