My breath fogs the dirty glass of the Justice Building, and I mindlessly begin to trace patterns in it, like I did when I was a child. Snowflakes and flowers. I stare out into the district. Although it's almost sunset now, people swarm the street, singing about how their children are spared for one more year. I pull my knees up to the windowsill and press them to my chest. Tears don't come.

I should cry, I really should.

"Thorn!" Cedar grabs me in a crushing embrace, pulling me off the windowsill. We fall to the carpet together and my shirt grows wet from her tears. She's buried her head in my chest, sobbing. How did I think that she was the stronger one. I want my sling now, I want it.

"I'm so sorry, Thorn. I'm just so emotional right now." Seeing my older sister like this should stir something inside me. Some sadness, some fear. But the truth is, I've had a week to come to terms with the fact that I am going to die and the truth is that I'm bitter. Cedar didn't volunteer. The one who vows to strike the Capitol didn't volunteer and protest the Games. The ultimate rebellion.

Loyalties can only go so far on Reaping Day.

"Don't be a pawn, Thorn." Cedar stands up and hauls me to her feet. "And remember, the only thing worse than rebellion is the thing that causes rebellion." It's hollow words but I can't help but be captivated by her words like so many other people.

She cups my chin and raises my head to meet her sparking eyes.

"Who said that?" I choke out.

"Some guy before the Rebellion. Dad always said it to me," Cedar says brazenly. "But that doesn't matter now."

"Any brilliant tips for survival?" I reply wryly. " I could use them."

"How are you so calm?" Her hands shake. "You're about to die."

"Thanks, Cedar."

"Oh no," She stumbles over her words, realizing what she just said. "Thorn... I didn't mean that."

"No, it's fine."

"But try and get a sling or something." She begins to pace and I back away, giving her space. "And hide. Every arena has to have a hiding place. Also, try and hunt. Don't run to the Cornucopia. Get the stuff at the sides."

"Okay," I sigh. "But the Careers."

"Don't be a pawn in the Games. Don't give up, Thorn."

She kisses me on the cheek for the first time I can remember, but it's broken too soon as a Peacekeeper barges into the room.

"Times up, lovers."

"She's my sister, bastard." Cedar spits. The guard cuffs her around the head and she growls.

"Bye, Thorn." She turns to face me, smiling.

"Bye, Cedar."

Thanks for the emotional talk, sis. Something forces its way to the front of my throat and I wail. Help me someone, help me. Tears slip down my face and i can't stem the flow, so I clasp my hands to my face like I can push them back somehow.

My mother enters a minute later. Her worn face is streaked with tears and her black hair is a mess. The Peacekeeper smiles at me and I meet his eyes and raise my chin. I don't give into him until my mother speaks and I want to cry.

"Thorn..." My mother averts her eyes and she sits down. "I don't know what to say."

"That's okay." I lean on a worn desk and trace patterns in the grain. I wipe a tear away and take a deep breath. What do you say to a doomed daughter?

"Thorn, come back to us. Come home."

I rest my hand on hers and she looks at my bracelet.

"I've brought tokens for the last few years, just in case." My mother composes herself, draws herself up. "But they seem so empty now."

I had suspected that she, like the other mothers, did this. She packed a piece of fabric, a dried flower, a pretty stone in an old game bag. But I look at the strap of leather around my wrist and I nod.

"I don't need a token. Just this." I hold up my wrist and my mother smiles. She gave it to Cedar, who palmed it off to me a few days ago with a sad smile. She tied it on my wrist herself.

"Do you know the story behind it?" I shake my head and my mother smiles and leans closer.

"It was your grandmother's. She wore a matching one to my fathers. It was all they could afford for the wedding. But they made it work." It sounds like a fairytale, the way she tells it. "But then, your grandfather died in the mines. She died of sadness, right after I was old enough to move out."

I move to take the bracelet off. My mother, she's never been open about her past. She deserves this more than me, she's not going to ever get it back. I place it in her hand and she doesn't move.

"Thank you," she whispers, fastening it around her wrist. "It's all I have left of her, please understand. I had no idea Cedar gave it to you."

Then she does something I wouldn't expect. She takes the bracelet and tears it half. The worn leather snaps easily. Too easily.

"Wear this." She smiles wearily at me.

"You'll need it."

I do.

The silence stretches between us. We never talked much, but we have this indescribable bond. My mother's crying and I'm weeping silently. I'm so sorry I'm so sorry I have to go now. I look out at the night. I feel like Death himself has swept his cloak over the District and ice slithers down my spine.

"Times up!" A younger Peacekeeper smiles as my mother embraces me one me and whispers a goodbye, drained and hollow.

"Bye."

"I love you!" My mother yells and tears burn my eyes. I don't know what to think, what to feel.

"Your father." The same Peacekeeper sneers at my sorry, sniveling form and I look at him blearily.

"Okay," I rasp. My father steps into the room and embrace me. I cling to his neck, just like when I was a little girl who didn't even know what death was.

"Daddy." I murmur. I'm a weak little kitten as my father embraces me in his arms. I'm sobbing and weeping and sniffling. All our walls crash to the ground. Pity it took this to break them.

"I love you," he whispers, over and over. My great, heaving sobs become little mews. I just wanted to cry. I can weep in my father's arms over my death and everything that's going to happen. Enemies I don't know exist right now. But they're there, volunteering and sent off by parents who told them to do this.

"I'm... gonna... die," I wrap my arms around his for support and he kisses me on the lips. His stubble presses against my skin.

"I'm so sorry, Thorny." He used the nickname he gave me when I was four because I thought Thorn was too 'boyish' of a time.

"I'm not." I lay my head on the curve of his chest, inhaling his scent of smoke and mint tea. I don't want to let it go, it's unique. In the thousands that live in the Seam, most look exactly like him, with rainy eyes and dark complexions but his smoky, minty scent belongs to him and him alone.

"I'm going to die as well. I don't want to lose either of you." He's crying now and holds me closer until I can hear his heart, the blood roaring through him.

"Never forget me." I look in his shining grey eyes with seriousness. My heart thrums in my chest because this needs to be said. I forgot to ask Mama and Cedar and someone needs to know this fear in my chest. Something to tie the two of us together even after I've crossed over because really, what's a twiggy, weak fourteen year old going to do against a Career?

"I could never forget you, Thorn." My father runs his hands through my hair and I smile, despite the darkness outside the window. "You're my daughter."

"No." I'm stumbling through this speech. "As a person. As who I really was... my flaws and all. I just want someone to know me for who I was, even when I pass away because I don't want to be forgotten like the other tributes. Please, Papa remember me as a person. Please."

One day, my name will be on a long list of the people who've died in the most dangerous game a person could ever play. I don't want to be something someone in the Capitolite will see and smile because the rebel has been put in her place. This is the end, isn't it? This is the end and I want to live on because I'm only human and we don't want to be forgotten.

"Thorny, we've been through so much." He holds me close, and I want to sink into the embrace and freeze time, but the moments over too soon. "I'll remember you. But you are going to make it." He grabs my wrists and kisses me on the cheek.

Maybe I'll fight.

"You will, Thorn."

"I will, Papa."

"Alright, times up." My father nods stiffly to the Peacekeeper and slowly backs out of the room. He doesn't look back.

That's it. There are no other visitors. I don't have friends. Neither does Cedar, now that I think about it. Raven and Archer are just lackeys. They would follow her to the end of the earth if she asked. But she wouldn't do that for them. I press my elbows into my stomach as I lean forward. My lungs burn and my muscles ache with emotion. This was supposed to have closure. This was supposed to sever me from my family. I should have been able to find out what my father really is like, why Cedar is the way she is, and learn what my mother really thinks of me, learn about her past. Learn my standing in this circus of a family.

Life isn't a story where all the loose ends are tied up in bows. I'm leaving forever with lots of baggage and unanswered questions.

Let me return home. Miracles are real, right?