[A/n: Thanks for the reviews! I wrote this when there were only two, but the motivations spurred me on to continue. Lol I know it's pathetic but I did a victory dance for each lol - you know the type where you thrust your furry rainbow pompoms in the air and just hysterically whip them back and forth shouting AYO? #happygal]
Rue.
It was the name the Capitol voters had agreed upon, before interference by an egoistic, self-worshiping sadist. The three choices put up for Voting were: Rue, Primrose, and Mockingjay (which is total cliché, I know).
But the following morning, President Snow had cleverly come up with this brilliant idea and had everyone awake at 3am in the night to witness his live broadcast on national television.
"She shall be called…." The drum rolls kicked in. The high-resolution cameras zoomed in on the weary Capitol faces that had sleepwalked zombie-style all the way to the rally to hear the fat snake holler for attention. I suppose he thought himself very creative and original.
"Hope!" Unless you were blind, you should have caught the clear confusion on their faces, each ridiculously agape mouth outdoing their neighbor's.
"Thank you," he retreated back to his nest for bedtime. When the realization that that was all began to sink in, the citizens disbanded, irked and stamping their feet like spoiled little children, their expressions leaving the district residents sniggering for the rest of the night. It's not every day that they come across such nuggets of entertainment. I'm sure that if they hadn't been so afraid of Snow, they would have probably burned off his eyebrows with rainbow light-sticks, or smother his nose slits with one of those fluffy cat-eared accessories you can get at the night markets in the Capitol.
Except that everyone is – afraid of Snow, that is.
That's the main problem, really.
My hand flies to the handle of the door that reads "Haymitch bernathy." The missing "A" had been blanked out with musty tape. I know who did it, why they did it, and I'm not going to report him. Haymitch isn't even half of the Haymitch I'd heard from the stories the older Rebels have told me. His eyes are dead, and it's not his fault. I guess that that somebody just wanted to make a point – maybe sober him up. But then again, he's so broken and dead, after Peeta's death, they have since left him alone.
It's hard to sympathize nowadays, considering that we are all going to die.
I throw the door open anyway – Not forfeiting the chance to take a deep breath before I do.
I don't have an idea what I was expecting, but him threadbare and sitting in a chair facing the cracks in the dirty white wall, doing absolutely nothing, was really the most mundane thing you could do on your last day of freedom – which we actually don't have, to begin with. Is he crazy? No, I cannot associate crazy with Haymitch.
Crazy refers to our eccentric ex-kitchen server, who was a really refreshing woman with emerald eyes. I think her name was Annie. They shifted her to clean the cells deep in a part of Rebel Camp I've never been allowed into, after she stood on a gray tabletop in our canteen one day, talking about a man named Finnick Odair and moving us all into tears. After that, I've seen her only once, on all fours, polishing the boots of a Peacekeeper. The man had been insulting Finnick, taunting her, but she did not rebut. It was only the silent tears falling down her cheeks, the animal-like, wordless whimpers that emerged from her throat, which let me know, Annie Cresta had become an Avox.
I know Finnick Odair. According to the seminars, he had been one of the lead rebels. He had been my mother's friend.
"Aren't you getting changed?" I said quietly.
The only response I got was the silence emitting from the walls.
Heaving a sigh, I pick up the plastic comb and drag it through his ragged hair, peeled off his rag of a top, and draped the only presentable cloth I could find over him, my fingers quick in buttoning. I know he'd hate it if the Peacekeepers do it for him.
Hell, I know he'd hate anything to do with the Capitol.
I've never exactly had a conversation with Haymitch; his upper lip and bottom lip, I swear, are permanently glued together, but we've shared a couple of comfortable silences. Usually, the Peacekeepers take him out when I practice. I always shoot straight during target practice, attempting more elaborate stunts each day and finally perfecting them, always hoping he'd nod in approval, encourage me, maybe even offer a few words of advice.
Yet when I whip my head around to check, he's never watching - Just staring at thin air.
Everyone can die and leave me dangling solo, but I want this man, who I feel understands me because he's in the same predicament, to support me. How come Katniss gets everyone without asking, while I have close to zero aid? Sixteen years I've been fending for myself, but I am going to die now, how come the only person in this cursed world, whom I feel affiliated to, is not even going to say a word to me?
I turn to leave the room, my anger refreshed.
I feel a cold, sweaty palm lock my hand in a desperate grasp. For a moment, our eyes meet, and they say everything he is unable to voice out loud.
"Tell me," I whisper, "Tell me about my mother, please." For the first time, my forced resolve to keep strong is broken, as I hear my voice quake.
He shakes his head, the beads of saltwater welling up in his eyes. I look away, embarrassed, and pull from his grip. Fresh anger from my show of weakness blinds me as I flee from the room, and fall into his arms.
"Woah, huffy princess," Jed has me awkwardly cradled in his arms, but still manages to make the situation less gawky. His natural talent for easing things is the reason why I talk to him. I steady myself and push him away.
"I would apologize now, but I'm not in the mood so you'd have to live without it," I smoothed out my shirt, and stalked off, tripping over a large open sketchbook filled with hand drawn fashion designs and ideas.
I feel the oncoming blush. I'd made him drop his sketchbook.
"Your thing is on the floor," I state, before stepping over it and walking away. Halfway down the corridor, I turn back to say sorry, because I know how much that book means to him. It had been his father's.
"It's okay," He smiles, tossing his natural brown hair. "Twirl for me? Maybe I'd forgive you." Smirking, he ruffles my hair, to my irritation, and heads to the pavilion where we are supposed to assemble.
I frown and follow in his footsteps, though careful to keep my distance. Jed's my friend though, I'm certain of that. He has been here four years longer than I have, because his dad designed the outfit which is now taboo in the Capitol. In fact, anyone seen now with a Mockingjay tattoo, costume, or accessory will be shot – after torture. Fireballs will start to fly in my direction if I enter the Capitol with the rubberized pin on. All the chariots will be roasted, since everyone in all the chariots will be wearing the Mocking pin. Hopefully Snow has planned to murder us that way. Death bathed in swiftness is always better than a slow, torturous death which will be accompanied by the cheers of the Capitol…
Life sucks, but what doesn't?
I sit cross-legged in the crowded pavilion with the rows of disordered rebels. People stare and try to convey encouragements and sympathy with their eyes. I'm past caring and focus on the loose skin hanging from my nail. The silence is so intense, and I am almost ashamed of the anxiety that floods my stomach as more people stare.
Then one voice breaks across the pavilion. It sounds like shattered glass, but nonetheless crystal clear.
"Katniss Everdeen lives!" The outrageousness of the outcry overwhelms and stuns everyone for a few seconds.
"She's over there!" Suddenly everyone's eyes are trained on me, and I freeze.
Then I see it. Haymitch Abernathy's bony finger in the distance, stabbed at me.
[ End/ It's still in editing so sorry for the errors. Review please. It only takes the same amount of time you would take to reblog a unicorn on tumblr :D]