Chapter 1

When Katniss Everdeen stepped out of her car in Boston for the first time her senses were going berserk. The smell of a nearby restaurant on Newbury Street had made her stomach growl from the long ride and her mother's determination to get there without stopping. When Katniss asked if they could stop for food on the two hour drive from Springfield, her mother yelled at her in the unnecessary volume that it always seemed to take on. Thank goodness her mother was at too much of an awkward angle for her to strike her, but she knew her mother would find a reason later on anyway. She always did. Being six years old and that smell being an amazingly strong scent of cheeseburgers and fried food, she wanted to see where the smell was coming from. She would have to wait, because there was no way her mother would let her roam around the city like she did the trees at home.

She heard her four year old brother, Rory, struggling to get one year old, Vick, out of the car. When my father saw how difficult of a time Rory was having, he helped him with the fantastic smile on his face that he always did. Her father was the jolliest man that Katniss had ever encountered even if she hadn't encountered a lot. Finally, when our driver finished putting all of our belongings that hadn't been sent here on the curb, we went into our new home. Father had gotten a really good job at John Hancock and they were now able to afford much more than they could in their three bedroom in Springfield.

As a family, they walked through the apartment gasping at every new room. All of the children were able to have their own room, which wasn't new for Katniss; however, Rory was ecstatic. Father said that Katniss was going to be able to paint her room whichever color she wanted to. Before he even finished the sentence she knew what color she had decided on: green. Forest green was her favorite color, because it reminded her of the trees that were more back home than they were here. Katniss did not know what she was going to do when her mother decided to finally punish her from wanting to delay their trip. Kat had always just gone and sat in the woods behind their house and thought about how a great person like her father would ever marry the evil witch that was her mother. Surely there was something he must have seen in her then that had to have changed drastically since the day they had gotten married, but Katniss couldn't picture it. She couldn't picture her mother being nice to anyone.

When Katniss had gone to her room to take in where she would be living for the foreseeable future, she couldn't believe it. Her room alone was bigger than her and her brothers' rooms back home. She had her own closet and everything. She didn't even know what to do with that much space, because she only had a few things to put in there. Even after she unpacked, the room looked relatively empty.

"Don't worry," father said. He must have seen the look on her face. "We'll get you some nice things to decorate it with."

"Daddy, it's okay. This home is going to be so much better than the last one already! I don't need anything else in the whole world as long as you're here with me."

She sat down on her unmade bed. The sheets she had from Springfield were for a twin sized bed and this was a full. They were going to have to go buy her new covers anyway. She saw the blue and white soccer ball in the corner of her room and she felt something, something she had never had to feel before. She missed her friends from home.

"Daddy?"

"Yes, Catnip?"

"Do they have a soccer team here like they did at home?"

"Of course. I already signed you up. There will be new teammates that, I bet, can't wait to be your friend," he said, obviously with a large smile.

Katniss believed anything her father said, because of that smile. Since she had always wanted to ask and she knew her father wouldn't lie:

"Daddy, why did you marry mom? She's mean."

He didn't even hesitate to answer although he didn't really answer at all, "You'll understand soon enough, Catnip."

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Review please! This is my first story and I would really like to know what you guys think.