Part One of Three


The morning of the Reaping – my first – I wake before dawn in a cold sweat, despite the heat from the summer air and my sister's sleeping form beside me. My lips tremble as I struggle to contain the terror I feel, but I will not wake Katniss or my mother from their last hour of sleep before this awful, awful day begins.

I struggled with sleep all of last night and early this morning, only dropping off into darkness when my eyes began to cross with exhaustion. But in the depths of unconsciousness, I saw what surely awaited me, should my name be drawn today – a black nothingness. The emptiness of it all jolted me awake, and if my name is pulled from the glass orb today, at least I know what will become of me in the Capitol.

The inevitability of it all is crushing – perhaps I will not die today, perhaps not in this Hunger Games. But one day, my life will end, and instead of warm meadows and my father's embrace after I die, I know I will be met with only darkness.

We live our lives in the dark in Twelve, and not even death can bring us light.

Some nights, when I know Katniss and Mother have both fallen asleep, I sit awake and wonder about our Dad's last moments. I wonder if he was afraid – did he cry out like I so want to when I think of my own impending death? Did he think, until the last second before his body was blown to pieces, that someone would save him? That he would be okay?

In the daylight, I pretend to be content, given our circumstances. I see Katniss go into the woods day after day, risking her life to bring fresh meat and bread to our family. On the days she catches several rabbits or a gets a squirrel through the eye the way the baker likes them, we eat well. In the waning light of the evening, as our kitchen is filled with the sound of simmering meat and our cups are filled with hot tea, it is easy to forget that we are starving. A well-stoked fire and reading by the hearth lets me forget that with winter, we will struggle for both sustenance and firewood. It is easy to pretend that the three of us are just fine; it is easy to pretend that we will be stronger and live full and happy lives.

But the food always runs out, and the coldness always creeps in.

Dad used to say that no amount of money or material possessions could ever buy happiness; I'm not sure I believe him, especially now. I've become more and more bitter with each passing year; I feel my chest tighten and my heart harden with each slip reading Katniss Everdeen that falls into the Reaping ball. My sister is sacrificing her life, and for what? A bit of grain? Oil to keep us warm?

The first light of morning reaches into our room, but the long, yellow rays bring a feeling of desperation rather than warmth or comfort. Katniss Everdeen is written on twenty-four slips of paper, and even out of thousands the chance of her name being picked is so, so high. If her name is chosen – and something horrible about this morning tells me my heightened worries are founded – I will have mere minutes to say goodbye, and then she will be gone from me forever.

It is impossible to tell Katniss how much I love her in just a few minutes; I doubt I could properly express myself if I had years to tell her –

That she is my best friend, that she is the only one who brings me hope, that I want nothing more than her happiness and health, that without her I would have nothing.

She would be hopelessly out of place in the Capitol, among fancy clothing and strong, healthy children more suited than her for a fight. She would push through it, though. Learn everything she could during training, try her best to be appealing during the interviews. Katniss can kill animals and bring home food for us, but I'm not sure that she could kill another person. I hope she could – I want her to come back to me more than anything – but when it comes right down to it I'm just not certain.

Katniss doesn't believe it, but she is quiet, sensitive, and above all she is good. She is motivated by love for her family and an incredible will to survive, but would that be enough in the Capitol? What chance do either of us stand at the end of a Career's knife or spear? I imagine myself nose to nose with a Career – imagine the blade of his knife as it enters my chest – and I gasp. But the picture shifts and suddenly it is a pair of familiar, grey eyes rolling back in pain, and I watch as my sister crumples to the ground in a pool of thick, red blood.

I can't help it – I cry out and wake Katniss, and it is with almost mechanical motions that she collects me into her arms and rocks me gently back and forth, whispering comforting words to me as she does. She tells me to calm down, tells me my name is only in the bowl one time and I have no reason to be afraid.

She tells me they aren't going to pick me, which confirms my biggest fear.

They won't pick me, but they will pick her. When Katniss tries to slip away, presumably to hunt in the woods with Gale, I hold her tighter and try to think of anything that will keep her by my side a little longer.

"Will you sing?" I ask, tears rolling down my face. There are few things more comforting than my sister's voice, and I realize the time I left to hear it is dwindling.

Her voice is soft and lifting, and through the fog of fear, I can't help but think of what a wonderful mother Katniss could be one day. She has always said that she has no interest in marriage or children, but I know otherwise. In a different world – one where there were no Hunger Games and no danger for her family – she would allow herself that happiness.

She tells me to finish on my own, and then she is gone.

I slip into bed with Mother once Katniss disappears into the woods, and I cry into her nightshirt until my tears have run dry. Mother doesn't cry; she doesn't do much of anything. She stares at the wall for a little while, and when I've finished crying, her eyes fall on me where I am snuggled against her chest.

I tell her I'm afraid, and I ask her why this has to happen to us. She doesn't answer; she stares back at the wall instead.

Katniss doesn't return until I am fully dressed in my nicest skirt and collared shirt. I'm folding my socks over my ankles when she sweeps into our room, and when Mother produces a dress in the softest shade of robin egg blue, I can almost see softness in Katniss's eyes. But the look is gone just as quickly as it comes, and I'm left to wonder if Katniss will ever love Mother like she used to.

Katniss dresses quickly, and when she is done Mother braids her hair and pins it back. I can't remember a time Katniss has ever looked more beautiful, though I still believe she is beautiful when she is caked in mud and has dried animal blood under her fingernails. This is a different kind of beautiful – graceful and dignified – the kind of beautiful a woman is on her wedding day. Will Katniss ever have that privilege?

Before we leave the house to walk into town, Katniss crouches down and tucks in the back of my shirt. She calls me the nickname she bestowed on me at some young age, before our father died, and takes my hand in hers. My feet drag in the dirt, sending little brown flecks of mud onto my once white socks. I can't be bothered to care about a little thing like that, not when we are stepping closer to fate with each footfall.

All too soon, we are at the entrance to the town square. I see children ahead of us being poked and prodded already by Capitol officials, and that is when the reality of the whole thing hits. Two of us are going to die. Two families will lose a child today, and the only evidence of the young lives will be their meager possessions and two wooden coffins. I imagine staring up at a wooden lid for the rest of time and panic. I can't do this. They can't pick me!

I scream again and Katniss is at my side immediately, shushing me and telling me to calm down – the Capitol will not tolerate outbursts. She says it is just a little blood, that I will be fine; but it isn't the needles that bother me! Doesn't she realize how close we are now to losing each other forever? How quickly this could all be over? I try to focus on her hands, rough from years of providing for me, as she rubs them over my cheeks and across my forehead. I have to calm down. I have to do this.

I feel utterly trapped in time itself as the seconds tick by. I zone out while they draw blood and confirm my identity. It is easier this way; it is easier to focus on the numbness of it all rather than the horror. It is only when Katniss and I separate that I realize how important it is that I stay strong for her. I set my attention to putting one foot in front of another, and I hold my head as high as I can as I walk toward the other girls from my class. They all look just as scared as I feel, but I won't allow anyone to see that now. A strange sense of empowerment comes over me, that if no one else can see my fear, it doesn't exist.

I wonder if this is how Katniss makes it through each day.

Effie Trinket takes the stage and the readings and videos begin. I zone out during the speeches and instead take the last few moments of stillness before the chaos begins to remember the good days we used to have. Though I was small, I take solace in memories of Dad coming home each night. Katniss and I would run to meet him at the end of the dirt road to our house each day, and I recall with fondness and longing the way he dropped his lunch pail and hat to scoop both of us into his arms. Katniss and I never ran down the road again after he died, but instead walked solemnly, as if out of respect for his memory.

I think of the days Katniss and I spent in the meadow together the spring before Katniss's first Reaping. On the last day, we laid together in the grass, my head resting across her knees, and I linked together wildflowers to make a purple and gold crown for her. When I presented it to her, she playfully asked me what use a girl like her had with a crown. I couldn't find the right words to tell her why, but something in the way I gazed up at her brought tears to her eyes, and she spent the rest of the day braiding and rebraiding my hair in the sunshine.

A single tear slips from my eye when I decide what I will tell Katniss if she is taken away from me today. Remember that day in the Meadow, Katniss? I couldn't tell you then, but it's because you're my best friend and I love you. Try to win, just try to win.

It is in slow motion that Effie Trinket announces that the time has come to choose District Twelve's tributes, and though her mouth continues to move I cannot hear what she is saying. Each clack of her high-heeled boot against the stage coincides with the pounding beat of my heart, and when she reaches a long, bejeweled hand into the glass orb filled with girls' names, only one thought is looping in my mind. A single thought that I feel with such hopeless desperation that it could drive me mad.

Not Katniss Everdeen. Not Katniss Everdeen. Not Katniss Everdeen.

And it's not Katniss Everdeen.

It's me.


A very big thank you to my beta, Everlark Pearl.