chapter 1:
She sighed internally once upon the train that would take her and the two district 12 tributes to the place she called home. It was the same old process. She had long gotten over the feelings of disgust, anger and helplessness she felt when the responsibility of reaping the chosen ones names came about once a year ultimately, she, issuing them with a death sentence. Effie Trinket had learnt the hard way as to how cruel the Hunger Games actually were when you knew and got attached to the youngsters involved. It was always an unspoken rule in the Capitol: don't discuss how unfair and unjust the games actually are but, by all means, talk about the clothes the tributes don, place bets on which one will triumph, discuss their gruesome deaths in minute detail and celebrate the 23 deaths lavishly. Yes, after her very first year as escort in the games, Effie had felt very sick and ashamed of her former self. She could argue that she was brought up on watching the games and that she didn't know better: that it was all anybody could ever talk about, and still is, but deep in her heart she knows she's never quite agreed with them but kept her mouth shut regardless and joined in the festivities with everyone else. And now, she thinks, she's definitely going to hell for she literally chooses them. Effie Trinket chooses who dies.
It wasn't always her plan to be an escort in the games, it just sort of happened. A job in the government was really what she had aimed for, but if she was being brutally honest with herself she thought fashion editor might be a bit more of a realistic goal. Nevertheless, she had gotten an interview for a job described to her by a green haired woman with heavily blushed cheeks at the Job Identification Center as needing someone with exceptional organizational and communication skills, brilliant punctuality and a sense of great responsibility. It sounded perfect to Effie at the time. She met all the requirements- heck it fitted her flawlessly! She attended the interview dressed to the nines in her Capitol attire, telling herself to remain calm and pleasant and then etched her face with the very same smile she uses presently to talk to her audience in district 12: how that audience must hate her and associate her with nothing other than taking their children to the slaughter-capitol.
She sat down at one side of the expensive wooden desk and was greeted by a man named Elite Remderton (Chief gamekeeper at the time). He was pleasant enough, talking up the job at hand, making her envision herself on stage, on TV. He spoke about how promotions would come with time; better districts and eventually maybe even a bigger and better job outside the games. She couldn't wait to get started even if it was district 12 she'd be travelling to and decided to see it as a challenge from that point on. She was going to do her damndest to make district 12 more appealing and, moreover, try to do the unimaginable- try to give 12 a winner. Not since the 50th Hunger Games had that happened. Not since Haymitch Abernathy had won the 2nd Quarter Quell. If only she had had the slightest idea of whom she'd be working with when she agreed to the job then and there. If only she'd known she'd get dealt Haymitch the disagreeable, unrestrained, unclean, bad mannered mentor who knows exactly how to push her buttons. She lets a real sigh escape her lips as she walks down the narrow passageway towards the trains' lounge. At first she was shocked and disgusted with him and how he behaved, but now that she knows what it's like to be on the receiving end of having to watch annually kids you know die, she ultimately sympathizes. She knows he must feel so much pain at reliving his own Hunger Games in his head; revisiting all the people he knew and killed. How their faces must haunt him. And to top it off the capitol forcing him to mentor each year- it most definitely will bring those memories flooding back. That doesn't stop her from trying to change his ways though. He's a smart, witty and, dare she think it, attractive man give him half a chance. If only he would put the bloody bottle down for 5 minutes and take a shower now and again. In truth she knows his problems lay deeper than this though and that it would take a lot for him to be truly happy again, but she hoped to God that day would come for him; he deserves it after all he'd been through. Unbeknownst to Effie at that point she was Haymitch Abernathy's best shot at feeling alive again…
