I'm still asleep when I hear the alarm for the change of shift. I get up quickly, and seeing as I'm already dressed from my last shift, I head straight out my door. The streets are filled with hundreds of the other District two workers, either going out to help the hurt like me, or coming back from their shift at the hospital. I'm quickly assigned someone older to help me out. The guy I'm assigned with is huge. I mean, he's well built. And then I realise that this isn't weird at all seeing as you'd have to be pretty strong to work as a mason. If he is from District two. People have mixed from every district now.
Chaos.
We're put in the kids section, and without a word we begin to attend to the worst looking kid, who has pretty bad wounds from the bombing. Every little kid I see hurt seems to scream "It's all your fault!" at me. I guess I think it is too. I know inside me that I couldn't stop him.
But you could have stood up to him.
I shake my head, take a deep breath, and push the nightmares away.
We get through about three kids with only the occasional remark on the state of the child. Once or twice I catch my partner watching me work. I'm not very good at this healing stuff.
Why would you? You never had reason to be good at it, that's why.
I know he's pretty nice because I see him slowing down a couple of times so I can catch up.
Finally, the awkwardness is broken when we're all shuffled together for a lunch break, and I begin to walk briskly towards the fence. It's broken now, by the rebels defying the Capitol. I usually sit down at the base of a tree where nobody can see me. I'm beginning to sit down when I feel a hand on my shoulder. I freeze.
It's them. They've found you. Now turn around slowly like you're surprised, and then break into a sprint. They'll never suspect a thing.
"Hey. Mind if I join you?" It's the guy I was paired with. I breathe a small sigh of relief, shrug and sit down at the base of the tree instead. "Sure," I say, and I pat the ground beside me. "Feel free."
He watches me eat my food for a minute, and then begins to eat his own. "I'd say this is probably the least affected District. Apart from District one of course."
I look at him, and then continue eating. I'm not really one for making friends. I just stay quiet until they feel awkward enough to go away. He doesn't seem to care though, and he continues.
"I mean, they were basically the Capitols favourites. It took them quite a convincing to join the rebellion."
"Oh," I say. "Right." I roll my eyes when he slides down into his spot, and makes himself comfortable. He won't be leaving me in a hurry.
"So what's your name?"
Crap. Think up a name. NOW.
"Lila."
I see him watching me, and I think, "He's got me. He knows I'm lying. Lila? That's a terrible name!"
"Right. I didn't think you were from District two. If you were, surely you'd be blessed with one of their beautiful names."
He believed you! Quick, do something casual. Ease up the moment. Something one of the rebels would do.
I grin, and pose dramatically. "Well hello there, I'm Cashmere, and I'm delighted to be one of the Capitols puppets."
He smiles. Good. He's at ease.
I don't know what it is, but when he does smile, I feel like laughing. His smile… it's just so radiating, so happy, but when I look into his eyes, it's like his thinking of the hundred reasons he shouldn't be smiling. I quickly look away.
I don't like how I'm overanalyzing everything here. It's like… complicated emotions. I don't like complicated emotions. Especially not toward other people.
Stupid! What are you doing? Falling for him? Not a chance, you're not screwing this up.
"Uh, I'm from District eleven," I say, trying to fill in the awkward moment and give myself a background story when he catches me gazing into his eyes.
No, LILA, do NOT fall for this guy. You can't afford this.
He nods, and goes back to staring at the woods. "Weird accent you have for District eleven."
We fall into a comfortable silence.
Comfortable silence? You don't do comfortable silences with strangers! He could be up to something! You've got to be alert.
I begin to stand. "I uh, should be going now." I say, brushing down the crumbs from my sandwich.
He looks up at me, a puzzled expression on his face. "But we've fifteen minutes left."
I shrug, looking away from those beautiful, sparkly eyes. "The mockingjay is visiting in about half an hour. I want to get a good seat."
His face completely falls this time, and he folds his arms, looks away and scowls, when he hears this. "Alright then. Go on ahead."
I'm pretty sure that wanting to see the mockingjay is a good reason to want to leave, but he looks pretty pissed off at me.
Why would you care if he's pissed at you? All the better! He'll stop this friendly thing. Get away now.
I'm right. I shouldn't care if he's pissed off at me. But I do. I sigh. I don't know where I got this lovey-dovey softy friendly trait, but it wasn't from my father anyway. My mother, well, I wouldn't really know.
"Come on with me. We can… uh… sit together. I guess. I mean, if you want to."
He doesn't say a thing.
What're you DOING? The mockingjay is the LAST person you want to see! She'll recognise you for sure!
"You might not see her again. She rarely does visits anymore. I guess she needs rest… uh…"
I realise I didn't get his name. I'm about to ask him when he shakes his head disgustedly. "I've seen enough of the star-crossed lovers of District Twelve, thank you."
Then I realise I do know his name. The broad build, the distaste for the Capitol, the disgust toward Katniss Everdeen's love. In fact, I know him personally.
"Gale." I whisper.
One of the most known rebels after Katniss. Her cousin. Her supposed secret lover.
And mine.
I turn as he whispers my name back, my real name. I run, I run through the woods, and I don't care that the right thing is to turn myself in, to face the facts. I tear through bushes, branches catching in my hair and pulling it. Tears are streaming down my face because it's unfair, so unfair.
It's unfair that I have to spend my life like this. Running.
It's unfair that I was born to this fate.
That my father will haunt me forever.
My father made it this way.
He didn't protect me.
Me.
President Snow's daughter.
Juniper Snow.
