Disclaimer: I'm pretty sure I'm not Suzanne Collins. Wait let me check…. nope.
Spoilers for Catching Fire and Mockingjay, you have been warned.
The screams had started long before the roar of the planes had thundered above your house. It was almost like someone had warned all those people. Someone smart, someone dependable and strong. Your first guest would have been Katniss, but she is gone away you had just seen her, she had shot an arrow seemingly at nothing, then your television had gone dark.
The ground shook again and the picture of your aunt fell off the fire mantel, the glass shattering into a thousand pieces.
You wonder why you're not worried. Why aren't you running to help your mother or just trying to escape yourself. Then you remember, your father isn't home yet, he is still at the courthouse doing whatever one does while running a district.
So you stay seated, because your father had always promised you that as long as he was with you, you would be okay. You continue staring at the window and watch as smoke takes over your district.
You should be angry and scared and trying to fight for your life, and yet you sit in the fluffy pink chair that has always been your favorite.
That was one of your best characteristics, the ability to hide your emotions. You hadn't cried since you were six years old, you only smiled when you meant to and even then it was rare. The last time you had shown worry was when you had run into the courthouse, searching for Katniss and had pinned the mockingjay on her dress. You don't count the tears you shed that day because they weren't from sadness, but from anxiety. The last time you had felt fear was the day you had watched Gale Hawthorne publicly whipped. The first and only time you had felt true anger was the day you saw Gale kiss Katniss. None of that really mattered though, because now these memories brought no feeling to you at all. You wonder when you stopped hiding your emotions and simply started having none.
Another rumble, and now there were flames outside the window.
You were just like your aunt. That's what they used to tell you, that's why your mother would call you May instead of Madge. Did Maysilee lose all her emotions in the games? Did she fall for the seam boy with pretty eyes? Did her father promise her safety?
No of course not. If her father had promised her she wouldn't have died, that was difference between them.
Her father had promised.
There was another scream outside your house, it sounds closer than the others, more desperate.
You take your hair out of the ribbon holding it back and let it fall in waves to your shoulders. The ribbon is a deep orange and red and you marvel at the fact that it matches the flames now consuming your town.
Another bomb, this to seems closer.
There is a bowl of strawberries to your left, sitting on the table with the pretty designs. You reach over and take one remembering when he had last brought them here.
He had looked tired and overworked, the mines and Katniss were wearing down on him. You had taken the strawberries and given him money without even speaking hoping he would leave so you could pretend that he was till the old Gale, the boy in class that all the other girls liked too, not this new, tired, and mature Gale.
But before you had been able to close the door he had stopped you.
"Do you miss her?" He had asked you in a deep strangled voice. You may have been surprised at one time; he was talking to you, and in a civil manner. But you weren't, you had simply cocked your head to the side and gave the honest answer.
"You don't really care." He looked surprised at what you had said and then he had walked away, quickly. When he made it out of your yard Gale started sprinting.
You are snapped out of your reverie by another scream. This one you know. You stand and walk over to your window. There is your father, running up the road towards your house, he is carrying a little body in his arms, and it has dark brown hair.
You try to make your self smile, try to feel relieved but you don't. Besides you knew he would come. Then there is a rumbling one that shakes your house and makes your teeth chatter. In seconds your father is gone, engulfed in flames and the little brown head disappears too.
You are confused. You walk back to your puffy pink chair and sit down. Even as you hear you mother calling out to you trying to make her way out of bed you don't move.
It's all going to be okay anyways. Your father will be here soon.
He promised.
AN: A kind of twisted view into Madge Undersee's mind. Not really sure why I wrote it though, I hope it didn't suck too much. Review