The rest of the way, we don't really talk, normally we talk all the time but today and every other reaping day we don't, at least not until after the reapings. We arrive at the registration shack to sign in, we then pick up a basket and start the harvesting. Because I am really small and short I climb the trees to get the fruits, most others harvest bushes and roots instead. While I am there I wave and smile at a few of my others friends, it's not as if I'm popular but I know a lot of people and they know me. We get a ten-minute break every two hours, I sit with Anisha, my other best friend as well as Katherine but none of us really feel like talking.
After working we walk out together and give each other hugs, mostly out of fear, everyone is more of a family today. We go our different ways back home.
I get home and give myself a quick rinse, the one day we have water I intend to take as many baths as possible. I change into my reaping outfit, a light yellow dress with dark blue ballerina shoes; I put my hair into a neat up-do and then help my sister do her hair.
I walk hand in hand with my two siblings while my other trails behind giving the occasional whimper. We reach the square and I walk to my section just after giving them all one last hug. It's like this every year, and even though I act as if I'm fed up with it, I actually really like it because it reminds me how much they care.
I walk into my section and squeeze in-between my friends, Katherine and Anisha. They give a small sigh of relief, I barely made it in time. Last year, a boy in our class overslept and the peacemakers dragged him here. After the reaping was over, and he wasn't chosen, he was punched and kicked several times before they let him go.
The district's escort Selane Tarasa gets up onstage along with the victor of the fifty-seventh games Desllow Badams. He hasn't taken up drinking or drugs yet, but he will, eventually they all do. I know him quite well, in a way I grew up with him and the other victors. My mother cleans their house, so when I was a child she would take me along and I would stay with them while mother swept the floor and dusted the shelves. That's how I know that eventually they all fall in to bad habits. It's to forget the games, most of them still have flashbacks and all of them have nightmares.
"Welcome all, today one lucky boy are and girl will get chosen to enter the sixty-fifth annual hunger games, representing district 10" You can hear everyone, even Desllow snort in disgust when she says lucky. "Ladies first hmm?" As if it's a question! "This year's tribute will be … Vilila Dezan"