"Hi, Wiress!" Julie called. She was buying yarn for her mother at a small arts and crafts store. She was surprised to see Wiress because she knew Wiress had her internship in a few minutes.
"Hi." Wiress said grinning from the end of the aisle. "I can't talk long, Jules, I'm headed to I-Squared."
"Bringing FLOWERS!" Julie squealed. Wiress blushed. She had a bouquet of fabric flowers in her hand. "Aaaaw! That's so sweet and romantic!" Wiress instantly blushed. She had hoped this crush or whatever illogical feelings she had related to Beetee weren't terribly obvious to others.
"JULIE!" She yelped. "I thought they would brighten up the shed and – um – I just – thought – they would be nice." Julie batted her eyes. "Oh come on! Do the words 'internship supervisor' mean anything to you?" Julie eyed the skein of yarn on a shelf before selecting a light blue one.
"Yeah. For one semester." Julie said teasingly. They paid for their purchases and began walking down the street.
"Why are you following me? It's just factories this way." Wiress asked puzzled.
"Oh – just keeping my friend company while she walks to her internship." Julie replied skipping along. Wiress shook her head. Julie was a helpless romantic and somehow managed to keep up with her classes as well as keep tabs on who liked who and who was dating who at the academy. She reached the small shed marked I-Squared. Julie jumped behind a light-post and gave Wiress a thumbs-up.
"You know you don't have to knock, Wiress." Beetee called from inside.
"She has her hands full!" Julie called. Wiress opened her mouth to yell at her friend when Beetee opened the door and smiled.
"Ah – Wiress – you didn't have to buy flowers." he stammered. He blushed as he looked at Wiress. She looked down at the bouquet before looking back up at him shyly.
"I – thought – they would look – nice – here." Wiress stammered feeling disproportionately nervous for the task at hand. Beetee adjusted his glasses and reached for the bouquet of flowers. His hands wrapped around hers.
"Thank you." he said smiling.
"I – um –" Wiress put her other hand on top of their fingers that were entwined. "You're welcome." She looked down and realized what she was doing before pulling away and stammering something at the ground. Beetee laughed and gestured for her to come in. The last thing she saw before closing the door was Julie giggling while running down the street. I'll see her tomorrow – hopefully before she sees the rest of the academy.
"She did what?" Melissa asked giggling. They were in Wiress' apartment on the couch visiting the next day. Wiress' grandmother was away visiting a sick neighbor. Wiress explained Julie's antics at the craft shop and her sneaking around I-Squared. "Oh, Julie!" Melissa giggled. "You know she's the silliest of the juniors."
"Our kid sister!" Wiress quipped as she had turned eighteen two weeks after school began. Melissa turned eighteen around December, but Julie wouldn't turn eighteen until the day before Reaping Day.
"Well, I bet he did something extra-nice to deserve flowers." Melissa said getting back to the subject at hand.
"Well –" Wiress paused. "He bought me a new sweater two weeks ago. I – I guess he didn't want me to have to pay for it with my internship money."
"Aaaw!" Melissa sighed. "No – I'm not turning into Julie – but that's really sweet." Wiress smiled.
"That's why I got him – I mean – the shop flowers." Wiress turned beet red.
"Wiress – if you knew that what you said right here right now would never be spread down the halls of the academy –"
"If I told you, and not Julie then."
"Yes." Melissa said grinning sheepishly. "Um – just between you and I – do you like him?"
"Yeah." Wiress said. She realized she had never verbalized her feelings to anyone even after working more than a month at I-Squared. "Not just because he's smart and he's helping me but because – well – we've talked about – he's lost tributes and I've lost my parents – and we're both working in their memory. It's like we – we understand each other. It's weird. I keep telling myself that I've only worked with him for seven weeks and it's not logical to feel this way, but I do." Melissa nodded. She gave her friend a hug.
"Engineering has to be logical. Feelings don't have to be necessarily." Melissa said. "Between me and you, I think it would be way too cute if you graduated and became his co-inventor and later got married."
"But, Melissa, he's a Victor. I don't even know if Victors can get married." Wiress said worriedly. "And besides they have this whole other world of the Hunger Games to deal with. I can't even begin to understand that."
"Yeah." Melissa said. "Well – I'm sure you could work something out – you know – if you two got hitched." They chatted about school and other things before Melissa headed home.
