- 1 -
Over the next few years I indeed learn a couple of useful things while being busy with the household (My aunt's migraine prevents her from raising a finger and yet miraculously does not interfere with her screaming at me should I leave the oven on or the meat overcooked) and helping Rote around (You'd think after so much time he would learn at least to button up his shirt with his remaining fingers. Fat chance!).
How to duck my uncle's blow - I come to be talented at ducking and generally making myself invisible. This is a hard-won skill, and it costs me a broken nose not to mention occasionally dislocated joints, strained tendons, and bruises.
My uncle has changed after Grita's death. Earlier he just gave me half-hearted slaps whenever in a bad mood but now it is more like dark rage boiling inside him and spilling out each time his eye falls on me. He can neither speak to nor look at me without snarling. I never know for sure what might trigger him, so I try to stay away as I would from a rabid animal.
Grita was his favorite. His little doll. Each year on the day of her death my uncle Rote locks himself in with Grita's photos, and no one is to disturb him - not even my aunt Nola. We tip-toe around the house and listen to him cursing or crying inside their master bedroom. I could even feel sorry for him if it were not for the thrashing that I get first thing he comes out next morning.
No matter how much it hurts, my aunt never takes me to the merchants' doctor. It is always the apothecary, and since lately, I am usually sent to Katniss's mom since she is the apothecary in the Seam. I am not to tell her how I have got my wounds. Not that she asks any questions. Probably takes her guess about our family relations on the clues she sees on my face.
A quiet fair woman she is, so unlike her daughter. Her hands are warm and soft, and her voice is gentle. As Mrs. Everdeen stitches my cuts, I usually close my eyes and savor her care pretending she is my mom, and little Prim who plays with the herbs nearby is my sister. When Mrs. Everdeen sees me doing this, she always says, "I promise it's not going to hurt much". She doesn't know this is not about pain.
For my nose, my aunt did not take me anywhere at all. I spent almost three weeks at home, and the nose gradually healed on its own although it is a bit misshapen now. If I run my finger along the nose bridge, I can feel a small bump.
How to get out of my room in the attic after dark and back in the morning is another important skill to have. The only way is to climb on the roof through the attic window, and slide down or up the downspout, since my aunt usually locks me up for the night.
She starts doing this when she notices me washing my underwear soon after I have my first period at fourteen. At the same time, she also gets a full storage of bitter herbal stuff from the apothecary and makes sure I take some each evening before dinner. Her elegant explanation is, "Making sure you ain't going to shame us one day and get yourself knocked up."
I think though the remedy serves yet another purpose of decreasing their expenses on feeding me. After swallowing the herbs, the inside of my mouth tastes like garbage for an hour or so. No way I could eat my dinner no matter how hungry I am.
And eat my dinner is an absolute must. One might think merchants eat well but in our case, my aunt makes sure our food is just enough and of very low quality. All good products go either to our customers, mostly Peacekeepers, or into my uncle's and Rote's plates. My aunt and me share the scraps. Rote occasionally gives me something off his plate when my uncle is not looking but even with his contributions, I am almost always hungry.
I manage to occasionally steal bits and pieces from my uncle's store but it is extremely difficult since he has taken to locking away everything edible and keeps fuming about the thieves. I have no doubt if he catches me hot on the trail, he is going to hand me in straight to the Peacekeepers just like he would do with any Seam kid.
I sometimes envy the Seam people. For all their misery, at least all family eats the same dish. Then, they have the Hob where I am not really welcome because I am a merchant kid - an outsider. I venture in once or twice but people look at me weirdly, all except the woman they call Greasy Sae. She stares me up, sighs for no reason at all, and pours me a bowl of her soup. For free. When I come for the second time, one of the Peacekeepers shoves me off and threatens to tell my uncle where his niece spends her free time.
On a more positive side, I think my aunt Nola might not be entirely wrong in her suspicions. I go on practicing my dancing whenever I have chance - both Capitol and local styles. Boys line up to be my dance partners at the ever so rare parties we have here at District 12 and make sure I do not leave by myself after school. No more pinching or hair pulling now. Although sometimes when one of them sticks his tongue too far into my mouth, I cannot help but wonder... maybe, hair pulling is more preferable after all.
I have my first kiss on the night preceding my second reaping. I am only thirteen, and the boy, Erwin, is already fifteen, so he seems to me very mature and self-confident. That is until our somewhat desperate wet munching on one another's lips, and him snuffling, and his hands getting very hot.
I go out with Erwin mostly because I am so scared. I am scared out of my wits. Because of Grita, who should not have been reaped, I feel like I am to be revenged on. I kiss the boy and hope that would make me feel safe. It does help for some time.
Until he wants to unbutton my dress, and when I try to wriggle out, he blurts out that he has taken fifteen tesserae, that he has never tried this out with a girl, and the day after tomorrow he might not have another chance. If he says all this to make me feel sorry for him, he is terribly wrong. If anything, I feel betrayed and strangely vulnerable. So, I smirk and say that there are girls out there even in the arena, so he can still try his luck, and then, he can kill her right after.
He slaps me across the face, and I spit blood. This almost does not hurt. I am used to my uncle's heavy hand. When the boy starts his "So sorry... I didn't mean to... Don't know what's wrong with me... Must be the reaping", I only smile back.
Erwin is not reaped this year though. He is reaped a year after. I hope he used that extra year and did manage to make it out with a girl. I really do. Even so, I feel guilty as if now I am to blame for two deaths - Grita's and Erwin's.
That is why when another boy takes me out to the Meadow in the evening and pulls up my dress a week after Erwin is dead, I do not refuse him. They talk about pain but all I feel is slight discomfort and burning down there, and I desperately want to pee all the time he moves in me.
After I am back home though, I sit awake all through the night in my attic room. I cannot believe I did this, and what for? I cannot believe I am still me. One part of me even wants to come down, wake my aunt and cry on her lap even though she would probably just swear and stuff in me another portion of her herbs.
I end up crawling into Rote's bed and manage to fall asleep whimpering and gulping. The first thing he does when he wakes up early in the morning and finds me curled by his side is to yell and take away his blanket but at least he does not shove me out of his room. He never does.
I promise to myself that never ever again... but a few days later, one of my classmates sees me off after school, and we somehow end up at the back of the school barn. My second time is no better than the first. Yet, after we break up in a month or so, it seems to be no other choice but to make it out with a boy from the Seam. And then, there is another boy...
As time goes on, I find that I prefer dark grey-eyed guys from the Seam to fair-haired merchant boys. They are not so high brow and they never sneer at me after we fall apart. That is why at some point I hook up with Gale; although each time Gale pulls my dress off my shoulders, I keep looking out for Katniss with her hunting knife.
I think they might have a crush on one another. Otherwise, why would they disappear in the woods every now and then? Hunting? Well, I am not a hunter of course, but tell me one thing... Does it really take both people a whole day to shoot one skinny squirrel? I would guess no, otherwise Greasy Sae would have run out of her meat supplies for the soup. After two weeks of worrying that Katniss will find out about me and Gale, it simply becomes too much, and we quietly split up. No regrets from either side.
I do not even know how it happens, and why I cannot stop... Sometimes I think there must be something terribly wrong with me. I am barely fifteen but my dubious fame is spreading out fast like the choky smog from the Seam.
When I first hear my classmates tittering behind my back, I turn bright red and run out right in the middle of the lecture notwithstanding the teacher yelling at me. I cry in the dark and smelly washroom and do not get out until all students have left.
After a while though, I get used to this. I am okay with the fact that I will likely not have any girl friends at school, and I almost do not care what they all whisper about me keeping no boy longer than a week. When one of the teachers wrinkles her nose as if I stink and mutters something about nowadays teens being fast, I just give her a shrug and respond that people are all different. Some might be fast but others are absolutely retarded.
The only one who tries to defend me is Delly but somehow her plaintive, "Look, girls, Lia is not like that at all. I know her. She's so good and kind" stings more than their sniggering. That is why at Madge's birthday party I dance with Jero Freies who has been sweet on Delly. When I see the look in Delly's eyes which has more disbelief and apprehension than hurt, I know I have just lost it.
Peeta is often my only solace and the reason why the school does not become completely unbearable. We do not talk as much as we used to though. No time for that. Him toiling in the bakery right after school, me swamped by the household and store duties. Yet, it helps simply to have him there in the class. Knowing that his mom is no better than my uncle, and in some ways, he is even worse off than me because he loves her in spite of everything. He'd never raise his hand against her even though he can. He prefers to endure some of his fellow classmates' smirks "Hey, how does your mom feel today?" whenever he comes to class with a bruise.
Eventually though I quit stopping by Peeta's bakery. Peeta never mocks me behind my back, and he is such a goody-goody. That is the whole point of why I do not want to be friends with him anymore. Because I know my damned self only too well. If we go on chatting after school, I won't be able to help it but make a pass on him. Then, I will ruin everything. And I want at least one person in the district to remember me as something else but an easy-going never-to-refuse girl.
At first, Peeta acts as if nothing is happening, and we are still the same old friends even though all that I say now is "Hi, how are you?". Then, he gets the clue but still smiles at me sweetly and a bit sadly at the same time, and always allows me to copy his answers on the quizzes. Sometimes when I am late for the class and run in all flustered - with a dark spot showing somewhere on my neck - and kids upfront start sniggering, Peeta is the only one not laughing. The only one watching me as if he understands something about me that I myself do not even know. As if he guesses an answer to the question I keep asking myself.
Why do I keep doing this? What do I want after all these years? As I am fourteen, and fifteen, and sixteen? Oh, it is so simple, and yet so immensely complex and unattainable. I want for someone to need me.
I want to be safe so badly that during the week that precedes the reaping I am ready to make it out with just anyone - anyone no matter how ugly or old. Only not to stay alone. Not to think of Grita's crusty lips and blood dripping from her fair ringlets, or Erwin's shaking hands, or Daffo's slit throat, or any other of these familiar faces. Not to think that this year, it is going to be me - for sure!
Once I have someone holding me, it is not so bad. I almost believe it is going to be fine. I almost feel needed. That is why deep inside me I know I cannot quit. I cannot help but date these boys. Watching them kiss me with their eyes closed tightly. Never closing my eyes. Drinking in their hunger and need. The more of them want me the better. One boyfriend is not enough. He might die in the Games like Erwin, or be buried in the mines like Mr. Everdeen, or see me - like they all do - for what I am - a freak! - and leave me for a girl like Delly or Katniss.
- 2 -
I do not see much of Haymitch Abernathy these years, and each time I meet him near the Hob, he looks more and more scruffy, paunchy and grey-haired. Strange as it might seem sometimes I almost envy him. I wish I could do the same. Not to care about what people say or think about me and send anyone who bothers me straight to the devil. Most importantly, to be able to punch my uncle in the face instead of ducking.
I do not try to talk to Haymitch on the street but for a few months after my first reaping I keep on visiting his place. Sometimes I even bring something with me and leave at his porch. It is not much but for a 12-year old me it seems like a decent deal. A piece of a stale lemon pie or a funny drawing made at school. First time Haymitch has a bad hangover and looks as if he might puke all over me and my pie. After that, he does not even bother to open the door anymore, and I know better than to knock.
I sit on his porch having no idea whatsoever why I am even doing this. It is not like he is even remotely friendly or sympathetic towards me. It is just that... He is the only one in the district who has noticed that what my uncle does is wrong. Other adults - teachers at school, the store customers, even the Mayor and Peeta's father - pretend they do not see or know. They either look away or keep smiling at me and telling me to be a good girl.
Then, there is something else. Nobody ever goes that way but me and the grounds-keeper. Even on holidays. Does Haymitch have no family or friends at all? Somehow I do not think anymore that large house of his is such a blast.
By the time I am fourteen, I quit coming to the Victors' Village though. As my memories of my first reaping grow dim, I go on dating my boys, sweating at the reapings, having wild dreams, and dancing in the Meadow when nobody is around. A simple girl with simple wishes. All that till the 74th Hunger Games...
