I made a small change to this chapter because I just (well, not just, but last week) finished Mockingjay, and I realized that my bread scene, possibly the most important scene in the whole series, didn't exactly fit the book. So I modified this chapter so that it would be more true to the series. And sorry I haven't posted Chapter 4 yet, I haven't had much time to work on my story between school, sports, camping, and writer's block, but it'll be up soon, I promise!
When I wake up, soft, rose-colored early morning light is filtering through the windows onto my bed. The world is silent except for the sound of my family already hard at work in the bakery. I sit up in a panic. I should already be up by now! Why haven't my parents woken me up? Then I remember what day it is and slowly slump back down into my bed. It's the day that everyone in District 12 dreads. The day that we all pray for the same reason, no matter if we're Seam or town. The day that either you celebrate, or you weep bitterly. Today is the reaping.
I slip out of bed, mindlessly, barely noticing what I am doing, and drag myself to the back room, where I find my father already hard at work at the ovens. He pays no attention to my entrance. I have nothing better to do than decorate cakes. And besides, when I'm frosting the cakes, I feel at peace. I am creating a thing of beauty, so rare in District 12. It takes a lot of work, but it's worth it to see the smiles on people's faces when they come by the bakery window and see my cakes. Especially worth it when sweet, little Primrose Everdeen comes. Her blue eyes light up and they are even more beautiful than whatever cake is in the window that day. And normally, her sister is with her. Katniss Everdeen. We are from two different worlds. She is from the Seam, the poorest part of District 12. I am from the nicer part of town. She has been struggling to survive all her life. I- well, we have to eat the stale bread, but food is food. We in District 12 can't afford to be picky. I sigh as I sit down on a stool and start slathering frosting on a cylindrical cake that will make up a layer of my finished product.
My father comes towards me and awkwardly pats my head, putting a very, very, very small loaf of bread down on the table. Fresh bread. He puts a finger to his lips, pointing in the direction of the room I share with my older brothers, Alex and Sterling. His eyes say, Don't tell them. This is for you. Then he returns to his work. I am surprised at this, because normally, our family only eats the stale bread left over from the day. Well, I think bitterly. The reaping is the only day they ever care for me. My parents never do think about me, or my two brothers, Alex and Sterling. I think my dad wishes he had at least one daughter instead of three rowdy boys. But he's gotten over it mostly. I bet my mother still wishes she'd had a sweet little girl with blonde hair and sky blue eyes. I've just been disappointing them ever since birth. Well, at least not with the blue eyes, blonde hair thing. "Peeta, that cake is crooked!" "Peeta, when will you ever learn?" "I feel ashamed to call you my son."
My hand shakes, ruining the intricate frosting design on my cake. I put down the bag of frosting and pick up the loaf of bread, turning it over in my hands. It reminds me of something that happened with Katniss long ago, something she's probably forgotten…
We had both been eleven. The rain pounding the windows matched my mother's mood. At our dinner of stale bread and oil, she shrieked, "Peeta, look what you've done to your shirt!" I looked down. There was the smallest oil stain right below my shirt collar.
"It's a tiny stain!" I said, indignant. My mother knocked me aside the head. We ate the rest of our dinner in fuming silence.
Suddenly I heard a rustling sound outside our open back door. I put down my piece of bread and looked that way, past the glow of the ovens hard at work. My mother got up, still seething mad, and strode to the back door. I heard her yell, "Move on, you little brat! Do you want me to call the Peacekeepers? I am so tired of you Seam rats pawing through my trash!" I stood up and peered at the supposed "Seam rat" from behind my mother.
It was a girl, with olive skin, dark brown hair, and hauntingly clear gray eyes. She trembled at the fury of my mother and the relentless rain, beating down upon her. Even beneath the mud, there was a certain beauty to her. My heart skipped a beat, realizing who it was. Katniss. My father had loved her mother, and I had followed in his footsteps with the next generation of Everdeens. My mother went back inside grumbling, but I remained watching the girl as she made her way exhaustedly over to the pigpen and leaned against our apple tree. Even this action took several labored breaths from her.
I went back into the kitchen, where my mother shoved loaves of bread into my arms. "Go put those in the window display out front, and don't lollygag about it," she said, shaking her finger at me. I took one step and tripped over Sterling's foot. Instinctively, I threw out my hands in front of me, letting the loaves of bread fly into the oven. I heard Sterling snicker, and then I saw my mother's eyes widen and her mouth open. Aw crap. "THAT WAS PERFECTLY GOOD BREAD AND YOU JUST TOSS IT INTO THE OVEN LIKE WE CAN AFFORD TO DO THAT!" She hit me with a rolling pin but I didn't feel anything. I stumbled out the back door as my mother screamed something else. But I couldn't hear her. I just sloshed through the rain blindly, still seeing stars.
Each drop of rain stung my body like tiny daggers digging into my skin. My mother continued to scream at me. Then I heard the bell ring, signaling that a customer had entered the store, and the screaming stopped. I made no eye contact with Katniss, but I felt her eyes on me. I was originally going to feed the bread to the pig, but… Katniss. The pig was probably better fed than Katniss, and did he really need extra food? Maybe the burnt pieces… I glanced towards the open kitchen door one more time, thinking of how my mother would beat me if she found out about this. But she wouldn't. So I tore off the burnt pieces of the bread and threw them into the trough. Then after I'd gotten rid of most of the blackened bread, I tossed the loaves towards Katniss and went back inside.
I rubbed my cheek where my mother had hit me. Searing pain. Not just physically, but also mentally. I felt unloved and bruised, probably because-well, I was.
But it all paid off. The next day, at school, sure, I had a bruise and a black eye, but I caught her staring at me. Our gazes met, and then I looked away. She's stared at me multiple occasions after that too. Now, though, she's probably forgotten all about it, all about me. She still probably doesn't know my name.
I shake my head to clear my thoughts and survey what I have made. Without even noticing, I have created a three-layer cake covered in white frosting, with plants and flowers frosted here and there. I think it's the best one I've ever done. I smile, thinking of how people will enjoy it, and carefully lift the cake. Cautiously, I carry it to the front of the store and place it in the display window.
Now that I am done decorating this cake, I don't know what to do. I turn and see my mother at the register. She supports her worn face in her hand as she stares blankly out the window. I wonder what she is thinking of. We don't really get along well. A perfect example of that is the thing with Katniss. And there have been countless examples before and after that. My mother doesn't even try to hide that she loves my older brothers more than me. No time to think about that now, though. Today is the reaping. There is plenty more to think and worry about.
I return to my room and take out my sketchbook. It's an old battered notebook I got a few years ago for my birthday. I use it to draw what I can't draw on my cakes. It is filled with plenty of embarrassingly terrible drawings, but recently, I've gotten better. I flip to my newest drawing. It's of Katniss, glaring straight at me with her storm cloud gray eyes, her dark brown braid, her olive skin, her arms crossed protectively over her chest, her feet shoulders' width apart.
This happened around last week. I had just finished a new cake, with a picture of our family frosted on the top, and as I was placing it in the display window, Prim and Katniss came walking by. Through the glass, I saw Prim tug her older sister's sleeve, pointing towards the cake with her eyes glowing. I smiled at Prim, who smiled back, and then smiled at Katniss, who glared back with the glare in my picture. It made me feel like I was a tiny little bug, and she was a giant getting ready to squish me. And I admired that. Her fearlessness, her strength, everything about that glare she gave me. Call me crazy, but I admired it.
I study the drawing again and shake my head. It will never do. It will never capture the fearlessness of that moment.
I eat the small loaf of bread. It's still warm, and smells irresistible. In no time at all, it is gone and I am wishing there was more. So I just sit there, doodling in my notebook. I draw Primrose Everdeen, with her wisps of blonde hair, her laughing blue eyes, with a huge smile on her face. I draw Effie Trinket, the insanely upbeat Capitol woman who comes to District 12 each year to read out the names for the Hunger Games. She has an inhumanly stretched smile on her face, and her hair is an unnatural pink, the color of the small flowers that grow along the edge of the fence that "protects" us from wild dogs and such at night. Really, it just adds to the sense of imprisonment and gloom. I draw a speech bubble near her mouth and write her signature catchphrase: "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor!" Every sentence she utters sounds like it has an exclamation point after it.
I doodle and doodle mindlessly until I hear a knock on the door. I hastily shove my sketchbook under my rough covers and say, "Come in."
It's my mother. She peers her head through the door and says, "Lunchtime, Peeta." Her voice has a soft tone to it that is only ever heard on the day of the reaping. I place my sketchbook carefully underneath my pillow, stand up, and follow my mother out the door to the table in the back room where we eat our meals. She places a thin, rough-skinned hand on my shoulder. This is the first time my mother's touch has made me feel this warm, this comfortable.
My father and brothers are already sitting at the table. We nod to each other as my mother and I sit down. On each plate, there is a little loaf of bread, not unlike the one my father gave me this morning, a piece of salted squirrel and a piece of fresh roasted squirrel. Only on a reaping day do we have a lunch like this. Never do we have fresh bread, and we normally save the salted squirrel for winter.
After a while of just picking at my food, everybody gets up in some sort of strange silent agreement and we all leave. I return to my room and just stare out the window, thinking about nothing at all. I hear a knock on the door, and before I can say "enter", my mother comes in, holding a white dress shirt and black dress pants. The clothes look pricey- which is strange, because no one in District 12, save for the Peacekeepers, can afford this kind of finery. Certainly not us.
She sits down on my bed and places the clothing down, smoothing out the creases. Her blue eyes look far, far away. Her blonde hair, with just a few hints of gray, is tousled, so I smooth it down like she smoothed out the creases in the clothes. She looks at me and smiles. Smiles. I think this hasn't happened since I was maybe three. Then she sees my raised eyebrows and explains, "My father's reaping outfit when he was your age." She runs her fingers, so calloused and worn, along the fabric.
I know why she's acting so far away with the clothing. Grandpa used to live with us. My mother was his favorite child, and every day, when the day was over and my mother was fully stressed out, Grandpa would sweep her up in his arms, (he was quite strong for his age) give her a big kiss on her cheek, and boom, "Helloooooooooo beautiful!" I bet he could make even President Snow laugh. My mother loved him a lot.
So you can imagine what it was like for her when he died.
I had been ten. Grandpa had been sick for a while, maybe a few weeks.
My mother had shrugged it off. "Please," she'd said. "It's only a lingering cold. He'll be better in time." I don't think she wanted to believe it, and neither did the rest of us. So we agreed with her.
And then, one day, when I was hauling something- I don't remember what- inside, I heard an agonized wail coming from Grandpa's bedroom. I dropped my something, cried, "Grandpa!" and ran to the room. I remember almost drowning in my own sweat, a combination of nervous sweat and sweat from exhaustion. And then I saw my mom, kneeling beside Grandpa's bed, making choked sobbing noises. And Grandpa looked horribly unmoving, horribly lifeless, horribly… dead.
I still don't know how he died. No one has taken the trouble to tell me. Peeta, the baby of the family. Peeta, the boy who doesn't understand anything.
I shake off this memory and smile up at my mother. I know that this means a lot to her. "Thanks, Mom," I say, wrapping my arms around her. Once I do this, strange noises start coming from her, and she starts shaking. Then I realize she's crying. Awkwardly, I pat her back. This causes her to sob even harder.
"I know, I know," I say. "I miss him too."
She waves this off. "No, no," she says. "You just- you look so much like him."
Well, I suppose that's where I got my looks from. One thing that I haven't disappointed my mother in.
We sit awkwardly side by side for a while, and then my mother clears her throat and says, "Well, put it on for me, then." I pull my gray shirt and pants off, and pull on Grandpa's clothes. They're like a hug from him, assuring me that everything will be all right in his husky, yet soft, tone. I stand up, and my mother beams at me. She grabs me by the shoulders and sighs happily, tilting her head slightly to the side.
"Go look at yourself in the mirror," says she. I obey her, walking to the bathroom, the location of the only mirror in the house. What I see is a town boy staring back at me with surprise in his blue eyes. Blue eyes that are identical to mine. Blond hair exactly like mine. I close my eyes and imagine Grandpa when he was young, wearing this very outfit at the reaping. I smile, imagining the jokes he might have made about the whole Hunger Games, while everyone else was scared out of their skins, living every day in the fear that their loved ones, or themselves if they were young enough, might be picked out of the many slips in the reaping balls.
While I may look like Gramps, I didn't inherit his personality. Sure, I'm a pretty easygoing guy. I guess you could call me funny. But every year, when this day comes, the day of the reaping, I am terrified.
If I could, I would stay at home all day during the day of the reaping and hide under my pillow in the hopes that maybe I won't be found and that I won't get picked. But that cannot be. Everyone is forced to attend the reaping, unless you are about to die. Peacekeepers come around every house, and if they find you inside, you get locked up.
We leave the house around one. I'm not sure exactly when, my nerves are getting to me. The normal incessant flow of chatter in the square is not present today. The bright banners strung from the rooftops do nothing to lift anybody's spirits. Cameras are everywhere, broadcasting our miserable district to the rest of Panem. We sign in and I am immediately separated from my family. As uptight as my mother is, I miss her comforting touch. I miss the sound of my father's slow, heavy footsteps. I miss the sound of my brothers' breathing. Now, I am surrounded by other sixteen-year-olds, familiar and unfamiliar.
One of those familiar is Katniss Everdeen, looking even more beautiful than normal in a soft, baby blue dress, like the color of her little sister's eyes. I stare at her, drinking in her beauty, until I hear the town clock toll twice. I look up at the temporary stage set up in the square this morning to see Mayor Undersee step up to the podium and read the story of how out of the ashes of the world, plagued by natural disasters, rose the wonderful, fantastical nation of Panem. At the center was a Capitol, surrounded by thirteen outlying districts. At first, all was well. Then a rebellion against the Capitol, called the Dark Days, occurred. Of course, the districts lost, and in the process, the thirteenth district was destroyed. Now all that's left of that is ashes and dirt. The Treaty of Treason gave us new laws, ones that would keep us contained. And the stupid Treaty of Treason also gave us the Hunger Games.
Every year, each district is required to send two tributes to participate in the Hunger Games, a nationally televised fight to the death in some sort of large outdoor arena; the type of landscape changes every year, and no one knows what it will be until the actual Games. The winners of the Hunger Games come back to their districts heroes, and all year, the Capitol rewards that district with special gifts, most of them being food. Oh, and the victors get to move to a place in their district called the Victor's Village, a small-scale model of the houses in the Capitol. And that's saying a lot.
So who wouldn't want to be in the Hunger Games? A lot of people. Because, in the Hunger Games, there are plenty of people bigger and badder than you. And those people are out to kill you. Now, if you are one of those "bigger and badder" people, then you have a pretty good chance. But there's always the cunning people, who twist and manipulate your words and actions. And in the past, those kinds of people have been winners.
Which is why I have no chance in the Hunger Games.
So, right now, while Mayor Undersee is blabbing on and on, I am hoping-praying- that I won't get picked. I'm also praying that Katniss, oh Katniss, the love of my life, will not get picked. Although she would have a much better chance of making it than I would. She and her stupid "friend" Gale Hawthorne hunt, illegally, mind you, together and sell their game to the townsfolk.
Just the thought of Gale makes my face grow warm. I've been jealous of him pretty much ever since I met him.
I was four and infatuated with girls. In fact, I had a girlfriend; my next-door neighbor, the daughter of the owner of the sweet shop, Delly Cartwright. One day, we were chasing each other around in my yard when Gale walked by. Delly stopped running and I tagged her. "I got you!" I yelled triumphantly. But she didn't pay attention. She walked up to Gale and said, "Hi, you're pretty." And Gale just kept on walking. Delly was frustrated. Whenever she wanted something, she normally got it. So, she said, "Bye, Peeta," and ran after Gale. And, ever after, Gale has been the object of many girls' affections. I mean, I stopped caring once I met Katniss, but still. He's always been stronger, better looking, and just in general, more appealing. Not only for his looks, but also because he hunts. Illegally. So he wouldn't even need his looks for all of the girls to be swooning over him. They all love a bad boy.
Another reason why I'm jealous is that he, along with many others, fancies Katniss. The reason he stands out the most is because he also happens to be Katniss's hunting partner.
You might even call them best friends.
My thoughts on Gale Hawthorne are interrupted by the unmistakably peppy voice of Effie Trinket. "Happy Hunger Games!" she says, her annoying voice magnified by the microphone. "And may the odds be ever in your favor!" At this time, I notice that Haymitch Abernathy, the heaviest drinker in the town, the only surviving victor from District 12, is onstage, sitting in a chair between Mayor Undersee and Effie Trinket's currently empty chair.
Effie's constant stream of blab is uninterrupted except for the occasional barely audible yawn from the audience. And then, finally, finally, she says, "Ladies first!" and crosses the stage to put her hand into the glass ball containing thousands of slips with girls' names on them. Some are duplicates. If you are poor and starving, you can sign up for tessera, a supply of grain and oil for one person for a year, if you enter your name additional times in the reaping. A normal sixteen-year-old would only have four entries. Others, such as Katniss Everdeen who has to enter her name three extra times each year because of herself and her family, would have this amount multiplied by ten.
Effie Trinket's hand is still rummaging around in the glass ball, mixing the paper slips up real good. Please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, do not pick Katniss. Please. Her hand has found a slip. She raises it up to her eyes to read the name and her mouth opens. NOT KATNISS!
"Primrose Everdeen."
