"This" is a stupid school dance, the kind of thing I hate going to, hate the idea of and utterly loathe the reality of. We live in District 12 and there is nothing to celebrate other than making it through another day, and even that is a bitter celebration.
My mother is considering this as an opportunity to "bond" with me, to show me how to "be a girl" but she doesn't understand. I'm not a girl, not really. I'm a hunter. A provider. A son. I don't want to be a girl and I don't know how.
Madge and Delly and all the other girls have been giggling for weeks, talking about dresses and fabric and boys and things I don't care about. I can't afford a dress and no boy interests me. Well, maybe Gale, but he won't be there. I can hear his reaction to that idea in my head, clear as if he was sitting next to me on this uncomfortable puff of a dressing stool. "Catnip, you've been hunting too long. Spent too much time out in the sun. Your brain's cooked."
So I don't even have Gale to make this bearable, and yet I'm going because … I'm not sure why. Maybe because Prim looked so excited about the idea, so pleased that she gave me her ribbon, the ribbon she'd kept since I'd tied it around the neck of her goat. I couldn't disappoint her, so I took the ribbon and put on a fine dress. It doesn't fit, but it's been cleverly altered to look like it does. My mother's skill as a healer sometimes extends to stitching fabric as well.
I refuse to make my hair fancy, so I just tie the ribbon around the end of the braid and leave it there as I go. Prim bounces up and down, pulling the tail of her shirt out in her bouncing like the little duck I always tease her about being, and for once, my mother is truly present, smiling faintly at me as if she's proud of me. She's always proud of me for the wrong things.
The dance is held in town, in one of the buildings where people have parties when they get married, and the room is hot and full of music. There are so many people, all milling around, but they aren't milling together. The girls are on one side, with their fancy dresses and their fancy hair, and the boys are on the other, all looking uncomfortable in their suits.
I glance over at the boys, just in case Gale has been coerced into attending, but I don't see him. I see other boys, like the baker's son, the one who gave me bread, the one who sometimes watches me at school. He's watching me now, and I glare at him just like always. Actually, I glare at everyone, for good measure.
No one wants to talk to someone who's glaring, although Delly and Madge do attempt it. Madge is the mayor's daughter, so she has to be friendly to everyone, but I don't have to be friendly to her and she soon goes away.
After thirty minutes of that and two passes through the meager food table, I've had enough, and I stalk back out of the room. I've done it. I've gone to a school dance to make my mother happy, and now I'm going to go get some food for tomorrow. I'm going to go do what I do best.
Maybe I'll leave the ribbon in, though. Just for Prim.