For the Starvation prompt "Fallen and Forgotten."
Disclaimer: I do not own the Hunger Games.
Four of us went to the games that year, but you only remember two of our names-mine, Haymitch Abernathy, and Maysilee Donner. It was a Quarter Quell, a games with a twist, a punishment for the districts with an extra bit of cruelty thrown in. 25 years ago, during the First Quarter Quell the Districts had to vote on who their tributes would be. For the second Quarter Quell, the 50th anniversary of the games, twice the normal number of tributes were sent to the capitol. You know how the story ends; I allied with Maysilee after she saved my life during a fight with the Careers, we split up, she got attacked by mutts and died in my arms. I fought the girl from District 1; I won because I knew about the force field, and came out of the arena a Victor. What people don't remember is what happened to the other two District 12 tributes that went into the games that year. I remember though, I remember every hellish second I spent in that arena, the rest I saw in the recaps during my post games interview. Everything in that arena was absolutely beautiful and designed to lure tributes in and then kill them. The game makers worked hard on the arenas for the Quarter Quells, they were after all the most celebrated of events in the Capitol, and designed to deliver an extra slap in the face to the Districts whose children would be dying on live television.
The two children sent to the Capitol that year with Maysilee and me were named Keyser and Violet. They were both town kids which was unusual but especially so since Maysilee was also one which meant that I was the only one from the Seam going into that games that year. Most of the time our District 12 tributes were Seam kids, there were simply just more of them than the wealthier kids who lived in town. As everyone knows Maysilee's parent's owned the sweet shop in town and my father was a miner, what they don't remember is that Keyser's parents raised livestock and ran a dairy and Violet's mother ran a small restaurant. Violet was an only child, Keyser had a younger sister and brother. She was 12, he was 15. Instead of watching the games quietly in their homes that year the people of District 12 gathered in the square every night to watch on the large screen provided by the Capitol. People say that because most of the tributes were from town that the merchant class finally felt the pain that so many Seam families had felt over the years and that this brought people together and that most of the town came to the square every night until I won.
Funny, I won but instead of celebrating my family was killed by the Capitol because of how I used their force field to win the games. Instead of dying the other three families were forced to live with their grief and it destroyed them. Being a Victor destroyed me. Even though District 12 had a Victor for the first time in over 20 years there was no joy to be found there, only grief, anger, and insanity. Keyser's whole family was in the town square when he died in the bloodbath. He tried to make a run for the cornucopia, to grab something, anything, a backpack or a knife, but he got too close to a Career with a weapon and his life was over in a matter of seconds. He met death on the point of a spear that was driven into his stomach repeatedly.
While her son was screaming on the ground in the arena Keyser's mother was screaming in the town square. She screamed and kept screaming; a high pitched keening sound that people say was painful to hear because there was so much loss in it. She died about a year later from pneumonia. She had stopped eating and getting out of bed long before that, really she stopped living the same instant that her son did. Keyser's brother and father still sell goats, cheese, and milk near one of the mine entrances where the livestock market is set up. They don't come into town much anymore and will cheat you if you're not careful, their morals died along with Keyser and his mother.
After watching her older brother die on a jumbo-tron and losing her mother in the same year Keyser's little sister Sarah was never right. Sometimes she would just drift away, humming to herself and wouldn't speak to anyone for days on end. She grew close to Violet's mother after the games. Since her own mother was lost to her and Violet's mother was grieving for a dead little girl it made sense. They only lived a few houses apart and Violet had been friends with Sarah. Because everyone at home was busy missing Keyser they didn't have time to miss Sarah and she became like a second child to Violet's mother, or a replacement for the child she lost, it was hard to say which.
Violet lasted two days in the games. She fled from the bloodbath with a small pack that contained a full water canteen and some dried fruit. After she ate what was in the pack she found a peach tree weighted down with fruit. Now, in the Hunger Games you have to assume that everything is a trap, especially a tree full of food, but Violet was only 12 and being a town kid she had never gone to bed hungry. She filled her backpack up with peaches and walked away from the tree eating one. Within seconds she was convulsing on the ground, blood oozing out of her mouth and eyes. Everything in that arena was poisonous, the food, the water, everything. Violet's mother watched her child die in shocked silence, then ran into her house, only coming out when it was time to bury her daughter. She closed her restaurant after that, drifting in and out of madness and trying to care for a half crazed little girl didn't lend itself to running a business.
Violet's Mother and Sarah leaned on each other over the years and survived, if you could call what they do living, which I don't; to me it's just existing, sometimes here, sometimes lost in their memories. Now Violet's mother sells soup in the Hob and people call her Greasy Sae. Sometimes there's dog meat in the stew, sometimes it's something worse. People in District 12 aren't that picky, they eat what they can get their hands on and if it happens to be dog or rat so be it. Sarah is with her most days, humming to herself and whispering . I asked her once who she was talking to and she looked at me and said "Violet and Keyser of course!" She meant it too. Looking at her now, old, stoop shouldered, and filthy you would never know that 22 years ago Greasy Sae was called Sally Reeves and that she was pretty and always looked neat and well put together. No one who didn't know their story would guess that the strange girl who serves Greasy Sae's soup and talks to herself was once a sweet 12 year old who laughed easily and made straight A's in school.
Maysilee's twin sister Molly became quiet and reclusive after her death. Her father ran the sweet shop until he died a few years ago and then Molly sold it. She no longer needed the money as she was married to the mayor. She's been addicted to morphling for over 20 years and rarely comes out of her house. Her daughter Madge is now the same age that Maysilee was when she died. I wonder if Molly has noticed how much Madge looks like her dead aunt? Maybe through Madge I'll get to see what Maysilee would look like as an adult. Molly no longer looks anything like her dead twin; her skin is yellowish and her eyes are surrounded by huge black circles. She looks like a living skeleton, death walking. Everytime I see her in town I have nightmares about Maysilee's dead body following me around the District.
I never saw my family after I left for the games. They never got to share my prize money or live in my house in Victor's Village. They all died in a house fire before I made it home. President Snow doesn't like for his Victors to look too smart and apparently my using the force field to win made me appear too clever for his liking. My parents and little brother paid the price. That was my prize for winning the games, a dead family. My district? They won too; they got a train full of food for free every month for the next year to celebrate my victory. They also got three decimated families, one dead family, three dead tributes, two of them fallen and forgotten, and me, the drunken Victor and the biggest joke in Panem. Congratulations District 12 on winning the 50th annual Hunger Games!