The first thing I notice when I wake up is that the room is clean – immaculately so. I wonder why my mother goes through the trouble when Peacekeepers aren't looking for dirt, only people in hiding during the day of the reaping. I do not like that the dust is gone from the small table by the wall, and that particles no longer float in the air and catch the sun. I liked the mess – it was a comforting type of familiarity.
Clothes are laid out at the foot of my bed, ones my mother didn't trust me to pick out myself, not when me in anything relatively pretty was nothing short of a miracle. I fight a grimace as my hand skims the faded fabric. At least it seems breathable, and will cover the bruises on my upper arms. I hold off on putting it on, because I know I have woken up early, and it will be many hours before the reaping.
I creep out of the room, trying not to wake my little brother, Lupe, who lies curled up in his own bed across the room, his cheek resting against the belly of a worn teddy bear. He is the only innocent person left in this family.
I walked as silently as I can into the main area of our house, which contains a tiny kitchen, a table, and a television propped on top of a spindly table. The door to my parent's bedroom is ajar, and through it I can see my father, unconscious on the floor with an empty bottle of liquor in his hand.
I turn away from him, my mood sour, and catch my reflection in the only mirror we have in the house. Same reddish-brown hair, same hazel eyes and skin tanned by the sun, but instead of the face I am used to, it is hideously disfigured by a spiteful bruise that covers almost the entire right side. I touch it gently – it doesn't hurt as much as you would think it should, but on the day of the reaping a clearly visible wound could either be terrible or wonderful. And I didn't want to risk looking like a weakling.
Now would be a time for my mother, but if I tried to open the door I know I would wake my father from his drunken stupor, and the less he was in my life the better.
I gave up staying inside my house – it's not particularly small, but the walls still seemed to close in on me. I found myself walking down a random path lined with tree stumps, one that stretched on for miles. Regular types of fields were not found in 7. But I did not plan on following this path. After a while of walking, I recognized the rock in the middle of a clump of tree stumps that was smoothed from age. A left, walk some more. Finally, I reached a hole that was situated in between the roots of a stump, and, looking around quickly to check if anyone could see me, I slipped quietly inside.
From the outside, the hole looked like a den for something no bigger than a fox. But inside was a surprisingly large chamber, surround by smooth stone and sloping downward. It was always damp and a bit too cool, but it was the only place I could truly relax.
"Rylan," said a deep voice from a dark corner of the chamber. Immediately, I knew who it was, and felt my face give into a smile.
"Hey Terrence," I said casually, turning around to face the boy who had been my best friend for years. Skin like mine, minus the bruise on my face, and hair dark enough for me to call it black. The most interesting thing about Terrence, however, when it came to physical traits, were his eyes, which matched the green of fresh pine needles on trees, and were dotted with amber flecks, like sunlight beaming through the treetops.
He was smiling as well, but as soon as he saw my face, he stopped, looking as angry as I knew he would – Terrence knew how I got the bruise, but nonetheless, he asked, "What happened?"
I looked down, putting a hand on my cheek as if to cover it, even though he already knew what was there. "You know what, Terrence." I could honestly say that the only person I truly loved was my brother. I hated my father for coming home from work every night and demanding my mother bring him a drink, I hated that he would storm around the house afterwards, forcing me to shield my brother from his blows… and I hated my mother for letting him do it, just watching.
Terrence regarded me for a moment, before he finally gave in, ending the conversation by reaching into the darkened corner and then holding out something in his hand – something alive. "Look," he urged me, and I looked up again, unable to resist. In his hand, small, squirming, its eyes barely open, was a little dog. Where it came from, I had no idea – I had never seen a dog in 7, much less a pregnant one.
"Where did you get it?" I asked, curiosity creeping into my voice even though my compassion for animals was next to nothing – they were just another mouth to feed, after all. Terrence smiled widely, and stepped forward, nearly shoving the puppy into my hands. It was soft, warm, like something kind of tiny, squishy pillow.
"I was doing a sweep and someone had just left him there… he's barely even started eating actual food, I couldn't just leave him." When Terrence said he was doing a 'sweep', this usually meant dumpster diving in the wealthier part of town. For some reason, Terrence had a need to take care of – no, spoil - any small thing he saw, which did not exclude his two little sisters, Terra and Hollie. I looked at the tiny animal and my hands and couldn't suppress a laugh.
"You are amazingly weird," I said, trying to hand the puppy back to him. He shook his head. "Oh, Terrence, you know I can't-"
"Yes, yes you can!" he encouraged me. I knew Terrence couldn't take care of dog – his family was a lot less wealthy than mine, and we barely scraped up enough to have three meals a day. "Come on, Rylan, you know how happy Lupe would be if you brought him home…"
I sighed, looking at the little bundle in my hands that was now fast asleep. "Fine." I always gave in to Terrence too easily. He was sixteen, a year older than me, but he had some kind of childish quality about him that I couldn't refuse. "Thanks."
Terrence beamed, and then, suddenly, became more serious. "You know Terra's birthday was a few weeks ago?" he asked, and he did not sound happy. I knew why – Terra had turned twelve, the age that was deemed appropriate for reaping. But no age would ever be appropriate for the Games, not in my eyes. Terrence dropped his head and sighed heavily, not looking at me. "She applied for tesserae."
I knew there was no way to comfort Terrence with this, but I sat next to him, our sides pressed together and my head on his shoulder, perhaps providing a little reassurance. At twelve years old, and with a family of five, Terra's name would be entered into the reaping six times. It is more than it should be, especially since Terrence has already applied for his own tesserae and has his name in the reaping thirty times. If I applied for tesserae for all my family members, I would have my name entered into the reaping twenty times, but my father does not deserve that meager supply of grain and oil. It is selfish of me, but I have been keeping the tesserae from him since I first applied. Because of this, my name is in the reaping only sixteen times.
"She won't be reaped," I promise Terrence, even though I have no way of knowing this. He simply shakes his head, then stands up. He is going to leave now – and I know I won't be able to keep him in our private haven.
"I'm gonna go home," he said quietly, stating the obvious. I stood up next to him.
"Terrence, she won't get reaped. There's more a chance of me—" Immediately, I know that what I am saying is the wrong thing to say, because he looks at me with desperate eyes. I know he is thinking that he lives in a twisted world – one where, if Terra isn't reaped, it will be me. I grab his wrist and looked him in the eyes as intensely as I can. "Terrence," I say forcefully, "you have to get past this. It's just another Hunger Games, one where we don't get reaped and we get to live another year with some semblance of normality." I carefully neglect to mention that someone else will get reaped, and have a one in twenty-four chance of surviving.
Terrence regards me for a moment, and then seems to relax. "Okay," he says lamely, and I let go of him, heading toward the pile of rocks that is our stepladder out.
"Come on," I say, "It's going to be a big, big, big day!" I see Terrence smile as I imitate our escort for the hunger games, Ilona Rinthart (who is annoyingly cheerful, just like the rest of the escorts), and know that I have cheered him up. Terrence climbs out after me, and we take the walk back to town together. The trees inside the actual town are the only ones that are untouched within a mile radius, and I am very grateful. I couldn't live inside Seven if our towering pines were reduced to nothing but stumps.
"I hope you're wearing something nicer the next time I see you," Terrence jokes, and then disappears inside his house, which lies right on the border of the field of stumps and the wooded town. I walk, alone, back to my house, and slip into the yard behind it, heading to the tiny, rundown shed that I have to duck through to get inside. I arrange a few empty burlap sacks into what resembles a nest of some kind, and carefully put the tiny puppy down in the middle. It still has not moved after falling asleep.
"Don't make a sound," I whisper to it, exiting the shack quietly, hoping none of my family looks out the window as I slip out the gate, heading toward the nicer part of town, where everything is sold. Or, everything approved by the Capitol, at least. There is a black market of sorts her, but I have only been to it a couple of times, and it was barely worth it. The Peacekeepers here are not lenient on the rules, so those who are desperate for money have to resort to selling their wares in an old warehouse that was used to store lumber before it was overrun by hives of tracker jackers. Most of the hives are gone now, and for the most part it's okay to go inside, but like I mentioned, I don't. I know that if get hurt in there I would be taking away Lupe's only source of protection against my father, and I would never do that to him..
District Seven is not exactly a poverty-filled district, but in the square you can catch a few beggars hiding out behind buildings, trying to stay hidden from Peacekeepers. They're either executed or beaten if Peacekeepers find out that they're asking for money or food – The Head Peacekeeper, a woman named Silvia Bast, believes in working to get your shares, but sometimes someone looses an arm or a leg or they're blind, something that keeps them from chopping down trees or using machinery, so the rest of Seven usually takes pity on them and drop some coins on the ground for them to pick up or something. I'm guilty as charged, but only when it comes to one man, whom everyone calls Burr.
I'm not sure of Burr's real name, but his wiry, curly beard is covered in, you guessed it, tiny little burrs, so the nickname suits him. I'm not sure where he got the burrs either, because we don't have any plants around here that have them – maybe he came from a place that had lots of burrs and everyone was just too polite to tell him they were all stuck in his beard. I've never asked him, and I don't plan to, but at night when we feel especially terrible, Lupe will crawl into my bed next to me and we'll whisper stories that we make up about Burr to each other until we fall asleep.
"Hello Burr," I say as I creep behind the bookstore. The old man looks up and smiles at a spot somewhere off to my right with the few teeth he has left, and then reaches out his hand in some vague, sightless direction.
"Rylan?" he rasps as I drop a few coins into his hand.
"Yes," I say simply, sitting down in front of him. "How are you?"
Burr shrugs, feeling the coins with long, bony fingers. "Well enough… but tell me about yourself, dear."
I can't help but to smile wryly even though Burr can't see me do it. He knows about my father, but I didn't tell him – he guessed it himself, said my voice was always angry when I talked about my dad and tried to cover up my mistake whenever I talked about Lupe getting hurt. "Bruised," I answered grimly, and Burr reached out a hand to grasp my arm – he was the only one beside Terrence and Lupe I was willing to let touch me.
"You remind me so much of Alice," he says, the pain easily evident in his voice – Alice is his granddaughter, or, she might as well be, and he tells me that she hasn't spoken to him since the day of the reaping six years ago, the Quarter Quell. Districts had to vote for their tributes and Alice was chosen, but she was only angry at Burr for voting for her. I didn't blame him, though. Even though I was only nine at the time I can remember that Alice was probably the toughest girl in District Seven – Burr had voted for her because he believed she would win. And she did, but ever since then she seemed a little off. I guess Alice was kind of right to be angry too, though – for some reason she had taken a liking to Burr when he first appeared in District 7, and they grew so close they started calling each other grandpa and granddaughter. She must have felt a little betrayed and unappreciated by him, I guess.
Burr comparing me to his granddaughter was a very deep, sincere compliment, so I leaned over to kiss him on the cheek, and then stood up, readying to leave so I could get some shopping done for that ridiculous little dog. "Cross your fingers for me," I said, and I saw Burr raise two fingers on his right hand to touch his forehead, a little like he was praying, then moved them down to his lips. It was an old-fashioned gesture, one that meant great respect or admiration, and as far as I knew only District Seven used it.
The shops in District Seven were far and few between, scattered between pine trees, little houses, or abandoned warehouses. In the part of Seven I come from we all grow fruit of some sort in our backyards and have a goat for milk and cheese (maybe a cow if you once had a lot more money), and we get the tesserae bread every month, but you have to go to the butcher's to buy meat usually, which is quite expensive if the butcher, a man named Chet, isn't willing to bargain – his mood changes a lot so you never know until you get there.
I don't just want to go to the butcher's today, though – I want to get something for Lupe, maybe something for our whole family tonight, after the reaping, something for a feast. I glance at the brightly-colored sweet shop, something that looks almost glowing in the soft, warm colors of seven. The windows are decorated with a rainbow assortment of candies. The sweet shop doesn't get much business, except perhaps on a birthday. On the day of the reaping, however, there are a few people I can see milling about, and the owner, Agatha, talking animatedly as somebody checks out. I go inside, avoiding the bright, cheerful gaze that Agatha gives me – she is nice enough, but almost as annoying as an escort when it comes to staying cheerful.
I bought something in a silvery-blue wrapper and stuff it in my pocket, trying not to notice how the coins inside didn't have a lot to jingle with anymore. Candy was expensive, even if it was only one piece. I go to the butchers, get the cheapest meat there without bothering to ask what it is, and then stop in the bakery. By far, it is my favorite place to go. It is colorful like the sweet shop but humble and warm and homely. The smell of fresh-baked bread lingers in the air today, and I knew that the owner is probably working to keep his mind off the reaping. I remember I saw his son once, one fragile, bony hand clutching onto the arm of an equally frail-looking mother. It must be killing him to think his son might have to go into the Hunger Games.
I go to the big glass case that holds mostly cakes and pastries, but off at one end there are various types of bread that have always fascinated me. The baker tells me that each twelve of the baskets holds the bread of a different District. We aren't actually allowed to order any of the bread except for ours, but it's interesting to look at. It's funny how each Distract has bread that looks like what they harvest – District Four has green, fish-shaped loaves, District Twelve has some rather unpleasant-looking dark brown biscuits that look a bit like lumps of coal, and District Six's long, grayish-brown loaves have always resembled a trains to me. Our bread, of course, doesn't look like a tree, but something about the way it's cooked leaves some parts more baked than others, almost mimicking the patterns of sunlight filtering through the trees.
"Here to buy, Rylan? Or just looking?" says a plump, tired-looking man who appears from the back, his hands stained with flour – he has a basket of freshly-baked bread in his hand. His name is Mr. Sarvis – he knows my name only because I am a regular here, looking, taking in the calming scent. I give a half-smile that is vaguely in his direction.
I buy one of his fresh loaves and leave to go back to my house, where I slip in quietly through the door. My father is awake, sitting at the table with a fresh bottle of beer and my mother. He looks up at me and my arms full of food.
"What's all this?" he asks, his voice rough – on the verge of angry. I ignore him. "Rylan?"
Nothing, I remind myself as I set everything down on the table. Just keeping looking down and say nothing. I see my mother reach for his hand, but he shakes her away, repeats my name. I see him standing up, walking toward me.
I break into a run, up the stairs, closely followed by breath that smells that alcohol and angry yelling. I squeeze my eyes shut, just for a second, to drive the tears away, but blinding myself for even a second gives him enough time to grab me, to drag me down. My knees hit the stairs, hard. I'm screaming, he's swearing and I'm hurling things back just as nasty. I see a movement out of the corner of my eye.
"Lupe!" I scream at my brother, who drags his teddy bear across the ground and looks down the stairway with dreary, sleep-filled eyes. "Get in our room!" I break away from my father and scramble upstairs, chased by a stream of curses, thundering footsteps. I pick Lupe up and run, slam the door shut, lock it. He starts pounding on the door.
"Are you okay?" says Lupe quietly, touching my face with his short little fingers. I don't answer, but grasp his hand in mine and let the tears flow.