A/N: So I decided to write a story about the Second Quarter Quell. It's kind of overused, but I hope you like mine.
ONE
"Haymitch, are you listening?"
I look up as if I am thinking, then look down at the girl beside who is attempting to make doe eyes at me. "Um, try no," I say rudely. She sticks her lower lip out in a pathetic pout and walks ahead of me, entering the store she was headed to.
I shake my head. Another stupid girl trying to flirt with me. It's always that way. If they aren't throwing themselves at the Seam heartthrob Roger Everdeen, they're coming after me. I look at my reflection in a store window, an ever-present scowl on my face, and wonder what they see. True, I'm not as ugly as some of the people in the District, but I'm no Everdeen.
Another pair of grey Seam eyes from the other side of the window obscures my view. I smile slightly as the person comes out of the store and meets me in an embrace. I kiss the top of my girlfriend Annalee Robert's head. "Everyone knows you're handsome, Haymitch, but that doesn't mean you can stare at yourself in everything reflective you come by," she says teasingly, poking me in a tender spot on my stomach.
I roll my eyes and guide her along, keeping one arm around her shoulders. "I just felt that I needed to make it more obvious," I say sarcastically.
Annalee snorts at this. "What? That you're the most arrogant person on the face of the world?"
I chuckle softly as I look around at the people in the Hob. There is an ominous vibe in the air. Some of the people seem as if they have aged many years over the past few weeks. It is always this way as the Hunger Games get closer and closer. However, this year is the Second Quarter Quell which means there's going to be some sort of terrible twist in the rules, which is supposed to be annoucned tonight. Out all of the people here, only one seems to still be in a good mood.
As we reach the edge of the busy trading place and go into the richer part of town (which really isn't much better than the Seam), who else but Roger Everdeen is standing on a makeshift podium which is nothing but a wooden box with a bag on the ground for money. He is singing the mountain song in his smooth voice. I swear even the mockingjays are silent for him. There are lots of people, girls especially, gathered around seeming mesmerized by the low notes and eerie harmonies his vocal chords are producing. I know he probably brings in game from hunting as he is one of the best shots in the Seam, District Twelve, and maybe even Panem. If he ever has a son - or even a daughter - I can imagine the talent the child will have. However, we all need to make a bit of extra money.
As he begins singing The Hanging Tree, his eye catches mine. I nod to him as Annalee and I keep on walking. She keeps watching him as we walk away, wanting to savor his voice since I can't sing at all and wouldn't be able to provide such entertainment for her. I nudge her slightly, and she turns back around just in time to see Naomi Hollis walk by who - though I would never tell Annalee this - is the most beautiful girl in District Twelve.
Annalee sighs. "Wouldn't it be a shame if Roger and Naomi got Reaped?" she says quietly. "Great people like them wouldn't deserve it."
I look at her, raising my eyebrows. "No one deserves to get Reaped, good person or not," I say emotionlessly. "The Hunger Games shouldn't have happened in the first place. Someone has to stop it. I mean, it can't go on forever, right?"
This time she rolls her eyes. "There you go again. Haymitch Abernathy, Civil Rights leader," she says jokingly. However, her tone has a touch of seriousness to it. She pushes the door open to a store where we both know we can't afford anything with money but can hopefully get something valuable by trading.
I am lying on my bed, caught up in a book that I am reading when my door swings open and someone jumps onto my back. "Haymitch!" my younger brother, Jacks yells though his mouth is right by my ear. "Mom said to come to the living room! They are about to show the announcement for the Quarter Quell!"
Breathe in, breathe out, Haymitch, I think as I slowly close my book and turn to look at the fifteen-year-old. "You know," I say calmly, "I would get up and go in there, but it's kind of hard to when there's a kid on my back."
He turns bright red and stands up on my back, popping some of the bones I didn't even know needed it. "Right," he says. With that, he jumps off my back, knocking the wind out of me, onto his own bed beside me, then off of that bed, and runs into the living room, slamming the already worn down door behind him.
I walk into the living room which triples as our kitchen and a bedroom to find him and our mother sitting on her beat down bed. My father isn't present in the family at the time. It's not really a subject I want to go into at the moment. I sit on the floor next to my mother. Her hand lightly strokes my curls as the Capitol seal appears on the television. We are all quiet as the cameras pan to our young President Snow. He smiles eagerly as he says a greeting and a few more words. I do not listen to most of it, but pay the most attention I can as he pulls out an envelope and pulls out a card. My mother's stroking stops, Jacks starts tapping his foot nervously, and I lean forward expectantly.
Snow reads the card more than once to make sure that he does not say the wrong thing. He then looks directly into the camera and speaks. "This year's Hunger Games, the Second Quarter Quell, will have one hundred percent more players!" he says estatically. "Four tributes from each district will be Reaped instead of two! Good luck to all our future tributes! Happy Hunger Games and may the odds be ever in your favor!"
I sit back as Jacks turns the television off. There are going to be forty-eight children going to the arena instead of twenty-four. Forty-seven innocent lives lost instead of just twenty-three. I wonder how these people live with themselves. Jacks and I meet eyes, and I know he is thinking the same thing I am. My name is probably in the bowl thirty-seven times, his possibly twenty as I usually don't allow him to sign for tesserae. And with there being twice as many tributes, we both have twice the chance of being reaped. I just hoped that the both of us won't get reaped. I have no idea what that do Mom.
However, whenever Jacks asks me what I think of this, I do not let my fears show. I shrug. "I just thought they couldn't get any stupider," I say snarkily. I put my books back on their makeshift shelves as we prepare for bed. I pull the scratchy sheets back and climb in my bed, trying to get comfortable though I know that this is not possible.
Jacks rolls his eyes. "Seriously, Haymitch," he says clambering onto his own crappy mattress. "This doesn't worry you the slightest bit?"
I roll over on my back, staring at the water-stained ceiling. "I think worry is one of the weaknesses most of the tributes have when they go into the arena. Might as well lose it while you can in case you get reaped."
I hear him sigh as he blows out the candle we lit since we usually don't get electricity here in the Seam. "Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be in the Hunger Games. Then, I remember that I probably wouldn't win," he says quietly so Mom won't hear. "You, though - you're a different story. I think you would at least stand a chance."
I look in his general direction though I cannot see him in the darkness. "Well, neither of us are going any time soon so we don't have to find out." I turn onto my side facing the wall and close my eyes, hoping sleep would rid the knot in my stomach.
A/N: The first chapter is short. Yikes. I hope the rest of the story isn't like this. I wasn't exactly sure how to do this. But usually, the first chapter always seems to be the roughest. I honestly hope some of you agree with me...
Review please. And also, check out my other stories.
-AGEless
