I wrote the first version of this story for a school competition. The character depicted was based on Thresh, although I never named him. The only difference in this version from the original is anything specific to the Hunger Games (the Games themselves).
We all owe Thresh. He saved Katniss's life the one time she had no chance of saving herself.
He was always there, but no one ever noticed him. Given his tall, muscular build, one would've thought he was hard to miss, and yet most people didn't even know his name despite sharing so many years of work together.
In the cold winter months, he would sit in a fire-lit room with other people as they sang and told stories to one another, but no one knew he was there unless he said something. On the rare occasion that he did, everyone would startle at his low, quiet voice and turn to him as if he'd been invisible up until that moment.
During the harvest season, he was under the gnarled trees, gathering the apples that had fallen in the night or were dropped by the pickers, hidden high up in the branches. He would listen to the banter and songs that spread from tree to tree until the whole orchard was alive with noise. The bird calls mingled with the human voices to create a choir of harmony. He never joined in, but he always listened. Letting the thick texture of voices wash over him.
When dusk fell and the call went out that working hours were over, he lugged the full baskets onto his strong shoulders and carried them alone back up to the storehouse. Chatter didn't cease with work and the mix of voices surrounded him as everyone carried their laboured fruits and helped those struggling under the weight.
Sometimes the weight would win over and apples or grain would spill out of the fallen basket. He would always set down his own load and make sure that every golden grain and rich fruit that was salvageable was saved. If the carrier thanked him, he would smile back at them before retrieving his own baskets and continuing on the long haul up the path. Those he helped had always forgotten his face by the time they reached home.
Other days, he would be in the fields, carefully turning over the earth again to make sure the harvesters hadn't missed anything. The empty pack on his back was always at least three quarters full by the end of the day because he knew that even the smallest of the crop can make a difference between food and starvation during the harsh winter that was soon to arrive.
Not once did he complain, nor raise his seldom used voice. Even when his muscles protested against the hard labour or his own legs gave way under the weight of his load, leaving him to gather the spilt crop alone. Or when a false move or word landed the bitter whip's bite against his dark skin. He just went on, day after day, working hard and helping those who needed it. Always there, but never noticed. It seems unfair. Unfair that he should try so hard and yet be so alone. Fate, it appeared, had it in for him. But then everything changed.
One dreaded day. A sole name called.
His.
He was finally noticed.
It seems wrong that he should try so hard to please those who had ignored him for so long, but all he cared about was the girl. Luck seemed to hate them both, but as always, he ignored himself to help her. And the people back in the trees and fields he had worked for so long watched him for the first time.
They saw him run and escape into the deadly copy of their own pastures. They watched him survive, they watched his pain when the girl was killed and shared his grief that followed. The girl who, unlike him, was noticed and loved by everyone. Many of them had worked beside him for years, yet they grew to know him more over those few, short days when he wasn't even among them than in the whole time they had shared labour space.
Then they witnessed the raw anger and watched him kill. His normally passive expression twisted into rage. A few of them began to wonder why he had never snapped at them, but when they witnessed him sparing the life of the girl from twelve, those thoughts vanished. Once again, he was doing something for another who had done nothing to deserve it…except try to save that young girl they had loved so much.
Many of them turned their faces away when the man from two caught up with him. Mothers covered the eyes of their children, fellow workers clenched their fists and whispered words of encouragement as though they could be carried on the wind to him. When the killing blow was finally delivered and the life light faded from his golden-brown eyes, they were silent. They had cried for the little girl, but for him there was only respectful silence.
Because they owed him that.
That harvest, the apple pickers came down their trees to find fallen apples littering the ground, many of them already rotting or half eaten by other animals. The potato yield seemed smaller than previous years and many grains of corn were lost to the rocky ground.
He was always there, but no one ever noticed him. Then he was gone, and everyone knew.
For those who read Crash Landing; chapter 15 will be up once Fang stops being stubborn and lets me hear him.
Thank you
~EndlessMidnightSky~