Oh, Rose. You're so immature. Let's go.

I waited seconds, minutes, hours, days for a chance to see him again. However, as time progressed, I realized that maybe I was wanting too much...from Gale Hawthorne's SON? Let's make that GALE HAWTHORNE'S son?

I knew I should be more careful...not that I had given away much truth about myself. Ryan seemed sweet, maybe as a friend. I could tell from the outside that he was an extremely likable person, and that he had lots and lots of friends even though he had a quiet personality. I bet girls fell in love with him at first sight; I really wouldn't be surprised if they did - it had almost happened to me.

Almost.

And I was also confused about his father, Gale. How come my mother had felt so awkward and had changed the subject whenever Gale was mentioned - who was he? How had he known my mother? Why did she not want to EVER talk about him? Maybe he had broken her heart, and she just didn't want a reminder of that in her life anymore. If Gale was a heart-breaker, would Ryan be one, too? I knew that I could not be so foolish and carefree as I was being, especially if Gale was some kind of a heart-breaker. I realized that I was genuinely curious about this man, and what had been going on between him and my mother. And why...Dad got that kind of annoyed look on his face if his name was ever mentioned.

Being the nosy one as I was, I didn't wait a minute to rush over to Mom to ask her about Gale. Mom was chopping onions and wiping her eyes with her sleeve; I gave her a tissue, which put her into a good mood. For the time being.

"Mom," I said, pulling up a chair and sitting next to her, "Who's Gale Hawthorne?"

I got the reaction from her that I had expected; she immediately became rigid and started chopping onions at high speed.

"Why do you want to know, honey? Does it concern you?" she shot back, somewhat stiffly.

Kinda...I wanted to say, but I knew better. "No, but I notice how you...uh...react if his name is mentioned. Tell me the truth," I said intensely. "Who is he?"

Unfortunately, I'd said something wrong. My mother's face changed from uncomfortable to angry. "Look," she stormed. "He was nothing, and he never will be anything. Just forget I ever said anything, ever, okay? Just forget it. NOTHING HAPPENED, at least that you need to know of." She said this last part in a whisper that I wasn't supposed to hear, but I'd heard it anyway.

"What do I need to know of, Mom? You can tell me, you know I'll keep it a secret," I insisted. Again, it was the wrong thing to do.

Mom was silently fuming. "Rose. Get. Out. Of. The. Room. Right. NOW." Then I had to leave, because she could shoot me with a bow and arrow if I didn't exit the kitchen at that instant. Literally.

But I was still stubborn. I needed to know who this Gale was, and what he had done that Mom felt so terrible about.

And right now, all I wanted was Ryan Hawthorne as a friend so that I could squeeze more information out of him to get to Gale. I felt really bad as I thought of this, because I felt I was just using him, but I was greedy for information about Gale Hawthorne.

So to execute my plan, I sat all day in the lobby of the hotel, reading a stack of Harry Potters. Unfortunately for me, all the names of the guys seemed to change and float around as I was reading. Harry...Ryan. Malfoy...Ryan. Voldemort...Ryan. Angrily, I shook my head to get rid of these stupid thoughts. All Ryan would be needed for was collecting information about Gale.

The bell on the doorknob rang, and guess who walked in through that door.

"HI, Ryan!" I said, falsely surprised, as he smiled and came over to me.

"What's up, Rose?" he asked. "Oh, you like Harry Potter? Same here, I - "

"Hey, uh, Ryan? I think your dad...on TV...is really cool. Where does he live again? Sorry, I don't watch much TV." I felt bad about interrupting him, but I really needed to dissect his brain.

Ryan gave me a half-confused look that I nearly laughed out loud at. "District 2? I think the reporters say it all the time. You should be paying more attention," he teased.

I grinned. "Well, I don't have much time to watch TV. And I thought you lived in District 7?"

"Yeah," he sighed, "I go to a boarding school there. You know Panem Academy? It's the best school in all of Panem, and my parents wanted me to go there so badly, I just had to apply. And...I passed," he added, blushing.

I wasn't completely oblivious to my surroundings, however. I knew that you had to be a brilliant, completely perfect combo to get into that school. They only accepted five thousand of the millions of applications turned in. "Wow, you must be really smart!" I said in admiration. "So, uh...what does your dad do? I mean, I haven't watched TV for a while, so..."

Ryan gave me a half-smile. "Well, he's an accountant. He sits behind a desk all day and does pretty much nothing else. Sometimes he goes hunting in the tiny woods outside our house, he says that it's his 'home away from home'. I never actually figured out why he says that."

At that moment, I knew I was getting somewhere. Katniss Everdeen-Mellark always went to the woods. And she always told us that it was her second home.

Reviews? Me will love you. Gale