Chapter Four

I did eventually awaken, it was however exceptionally late in the morning when I did. The sun had started etch itself up the wall of the room, and the light was warming the room at a considerable rate, almost like it did at home. But not quite. I rolled around on the white sheets lying graciously in the sun for the urge to get up from my haven. But I couldn't imagine anything better than a lazy morning, lying in the warm sun, without a shirt. There is something serene about being alone, yet warm. Something I could enjoy by myself.

I did eventually stir, the scene outside the window changing to a different landscape as I found some clothing, inside a draw that was full of fashion statements I didn't really wish to make. I found clothes that matched my old outfit, dark blue shorts and a plain white formal shirt. Which I did button up. I found no shoes in the draws that I searched, so I found myself waiting cautiously to open the, bare feet, and the same look as yesterday.

I peered out into the hallway, walking cautiously out and closing the door quietly. I found my way back into the dining cart, where I had spent all of yesterday. The bouncy blue man sat next to my mentor Mags, Lamia was nowhere to be seen, and thankfully, the other mentor wasn't here either. The bouncy man smiled broadly, I couldn't help but look slightly confused, I grimaced at his unnatural blue lips as I sat down in my place. The man stopped his smile briefly, "Morning" he sang, I looked at him, wondering why anyone would want to look like that. I swallowed nervously, sitting down, struggling to draw my eyes of the man, but I brought them back to a pair of familiar eyes, Mags. The man bounced up out of his seat as I sat down, I almost caught myself flinching, wondering whether he was going to hit me or not, but he just smiled and bounced out of the room. "Going to see the others!" he called, skipping out of the room. I looked nervously at Mags; she was looking at me comically. Then she started laughing. "You look like you've just been bitten by a fish" she chortled, my face broke into an uneasy smile. I found myself immediately embarrassed. "He is scary" I muttered, reaching across the table to pick up some food onto my plate, realising I didn't have dinner last night.

Mags looked at me, shoving a plate of food over for me to eat. I picked at his cautiously, before relaxing and digging in. "Sponsors." Said Mags, slightly muffled like usual. I looked up, seeing a look in her eye that made me cautious. "I need them" I said clearly, swallowing before continuing. "I already have a slight disadvantage to the others, being younger, I need all the help I can." I said, as if trying to convince myself of this fact. Mags pulled one of her shaky hands off the table, and flicked a hair out of my eye, smiling motherly at me. "I think the capitol might like you too much already" she muttered. I smile, embarrassed. "But continue with what you have already." She said, I knew it meant the charming, happy, gorgeous, godly boy from district four, who might accidently melt your heart, sort of thing.

The breakfast is hearty, and is completely gone when the train pulls to a stop. Mags grabs my hand and pulls me up to be standing beside her as we arrive at the station. I see a smile in her eyes, and a playful look on her lips, and she examines what I'm wearing. She does the old lady, tutting, and I expect her to button up my shirt fully and comb my hair. But instead she laughs with her mouth and opens all of my shirt buttons, exposing my skin. I feel the smile coming off her lips, but a sad trend runs through her eyes, as she turns away, towing me towards the door. The eyes remind me of the ocean, and its solitude of one purpose, never finding happiness in its eternal lapping against the shore. Sadness, Solitude, and then screaming people.

The screaming people come from the outside of the train. Hands waving in the air of capitol fashion, trying to catch a glimpse of me. I try and leave behind the memories of the sad eyes, and draw myself out to be a smiling face for the cameras.

Mags drags me through the crowd, pulling my arm so I have to follow her lead, but I try to catch as many eyes as possible with my stupid grin as I pass the crowds of people. I pull closer to Mags as I get through the bottom doors of the training centre, which will be my home for the next few days, before the arena. The bottom Foyer is massive; I gawk at the ceiling of different decorating as it passes by me.

I catch small glimpses of other tributes as they are pulled into their own styling areas, Mags smiles at me, still holding my hand as I make my way into my own area. I can tell from Mags expression that she doesn't particularly like this stage; she probably has bad memories from her time in the training centre, before going into the arena to murder people. I imagine that it brings back awful memories of the blood, guts and horror of her own childhood. It sends a shiver up my spine and I feel the muscles in my stomach tense slightly.

Mags gently lets go of my hand, saying nothing as she peers at me from under her hair, then leaves the room silently. My stylist walks through the door seconds after Mags has gone away. She is tall, platinum blond hair that falls long around her waist. She wears a dress that is blue and green, painted like the waves. I think it is another imitation that doesn't quite get it right, but she is my stylist, so I am supposed to like her. She walks over to me, a devilish smile falls upon her young face, and I can tell she likes what she sees.

"Finnick Odair" she murmurs, walking over to me and running her hand gently through my hair as she walks around me "Phillippa" she says, asserting her own name. I nod politely as she sits down in front of me, her hair flicking playfully through her fingers as she looks at me. "What kind of look are you going for, sailor?" she asks playfully, I can tell she is deliberately trying to lay it on thick just to see what kind of person I am. "A natural one." I say, nicely playing along with her game. She looks at me, mocking the seriousness. Then she burst out laughing, I join in lightly. "I take the natural look is just showing off you great abs to get the ladies." She says chortling. "Even if you are like thirteen." She says, coming back to herself. I smile, feeling a little insulted, but overall quite happy that.

She stands up after a moment a goes to rummaging in all of her stuff, the boxes and the bags of stuff become quickly upturned in her attempt to find whatever it is. She finds it after dragging out her search all over the room, making things go everywhere. She surfaces with a small shopping bag, bringing it back over to me. She settles into her seat across from me, and pulls two huge coils of silky rope out of the small bag; I wonder how they even fit in there.

Phillippa hands me a coil of rope as she looks up at me. "You know the netting knot I take it?" she asks stupidly, "Of course I do." I scoff, starting to tie the first knot, my fingers fumbling with the silky twine, which is so dissimilar to what I usually work with. I look up and find the she has also started making knots in her rope, her hands, moving worse than mine. I stop her hands gently with mine. "Why don't we start with something easy like a noose?" I ask in mocking seriousness, but the bubbly, chaotic laughter on her face is a little too much to be just laughing at me, I withdraw my hand, and through her chortling words she says "I don't think the noose would be particularly pleasant for what we are doing." She say, going back to the knotting of her rope. I start mine again, getting frustrated by the slipper knots. I look up at her, working away silently. "Why aren't we using normal rope? It's much easier." I say, stopping my work, her blue eyes find me, "Finnick, if you knew what it was for, you wouldn't be complaining about how smooth it is." And she begins her knotting again.

From then I don't complain, I just make a large net that could almost scale the length of the room, Phillippa's is much shorter, more tightknit. I don't think there is much use for a net that small, or thick, wouldn't really catch much. But I don't comment as I set my knots down on my lap to watch her finish. She does soon after I start watching, and then she looks up at me. "Stand up," she says gently.

I oblige, of course, being probably the most stupid I will ever be in my life. I stood up like a gentleman for the lady. Her next comment could have been suspect, or completely out of the blue, but after what people had been saying to me, I wasn't really surprised. "Take off your clothes, handsome." She says, grabbing the collar of my white shirt and tugging at it gently. I feel my face grow red, my body feel hot, I grab the collar of my shirt as she lets go, and pull it gently off my arms. I feel her eyes on me, it feels strange, and she examines me, gently taking the white shirt from my fingers. I stand there, shirt completely off, exposing my abs, glorious abs the cold air.

Usually its normal for me to wander around without a shirt on, it's like wandering around in your pyjamas at home. Phillippa stops walking around me, and stops, in front of me, looking at me. I smile hesitantly at her, as though unsure of what to do next.

"And the rest." She says impatiently, I feel my face blush even hotter than it was before, I slowly unbutton my shorts, sliding them down my legs slowly, as if questioning whether this was the right thing to do. I look up to Phillippa, and hand her my shorts. I get the best feeling when she turns around and blushes slight, laughing at her own reaction. She drops my short next to my shirt, and looks back at me. Admiring what she sees. I smile broadly, she obviously thinks I have good body, and so do I, so we're even.

I wonder what I'll be wearing, gazing around at the bags and boxes when she places a gentle hand on my shoulder. Looking me straight in the eye, I see how embarrassed she really is. "You're going to have to take your shorts off too Finnick." She says, smiling at me. The blush is back, she drops her hand. "Not unless you want me to do it for you." She says. I could have dropped what I was holding; luckily I wasn't holding anything, so it was just my jaw that fell. A girl, asking to take my underwear off for me. Well I guess we all learn things about ourselves in the games, some more than others. So I slip of the underwear, realising that I was wearing a beautifully new blue pair that accentuate just how tan I am. I hand them to her, and she looks like she's about to drop. I laugh gently at her expression; it is one that I will never forget.

So I am standing naked in a room with a girl, not how I intended this day to go, but I don't really mind. Phillippa turns around and picks up the nets, I think I should have been more concerned earlier, but it is too late for that now. Phillippa smiles, embarrassed, and then kneels down in front of me. Yep, all sanity gone now. I heard stories from my 'friends' about what they get up to with girls, and I really didn't want it to turn into that now. Her hands are soft, but they still send a shiver up my stomach where she touches me. Then I realise that I'll be wearing the rope. She places it around the concerned area, and then leans in closer.

My face is probably redder than fish blood, as she ties the rope together behind my back. I am actually certain she could have tied the rope a different way, like, by standing up, or even asking me to. But no, she had to do it herself. She stands; her face is really red as she brings herself to full height. I can see just how embarrassed she is, red faced, biting her lip, and averting her eyes from mine. When I finally catch her eyes, I smile smugly at her. It feels so tense for a moment. Then I am laughing ridiculously at her, her expression, her stance, and how embarrassed she now feels.

She flicks her blond hair over her shoulder, bending down to pick up the next line of netting. Her hand grasps it, holding it awkwardly at her side as she stands up. I find her eyes and she smiles awkwardly at me again. I almost get the feeling from her eyes that she wants to punch me, but won't because she afraid I might tickle her to death or something ridiculous like that. She flutters her eyelashes nervously, I often notice when people are nervous. She holds her arm out from her boy, offering me the rope. "Do you want to do it this time?" she asks, looking down at the floor occasionally. I can tell the bravado of her trying to intimidate me has worn off, and now she is so embarrassed by how good looking I am that she wants the ground to come up and eat her.

I take the rope from her, catching her icy eyes and fluttering my lashes at her. "You can if you want." I say, weighing the netting in my hands for a moment, then realising I have no idea how I am meant to put on a piece of rope. She blushes, obviously, not even trying to hide it under her hair like some girls, but letting the redness of her cheeks come on full view for me. She flustered umming the word no for a second before composing herself back into relative human conversation. "Just take the loop, third from the end in your left leg" she instructed, I looked down, the newest game of how to tie yourself in a knot, is now in session. I lifted my leg up, accidently flashing in her direction from underneath the skirt of rope, and then putting my leg through as instructed.

The smile from her face was a bit weird as she told me the next instruction. "Take the rope, yes that piece, five knots down and then know the entire rope there." She said, as I fiddled around with the slightly uncomfortable rope. I did what I was told, knotting it correctly. I suddenly realised why she had said what she had earlier, about the smoothness of the rope, and how uncomfortable a noose would be. I take back everything I said earlier; her way is probably a lot more comfy. And possibly safer.

"And now that the other end, three from the bottom loop, and put your right leg through." She said, pointing out the pieces of rope I needed to be dealing with, and I got into those loops acceptably before she continued. "Take the netting at the back now, and tie it at your left hip." Her voice getting a little calmer now than it was when she was fiddling with the netting. I think I am a bit calmer too, back in my own habitat, away from girl prying eyes, just fixing netting and being gorgeous.

She stepped back for a moment, looking at the mess of a net I was now wearing, and wondering, with a look in her eyes, that there was something she wanted to change. Her voice was small again, embarrassed, weak. "Can you take off the original net Finnick?" she asked, her face starting to turn a different colour once again. I did as I was told though, that's what you have to do, so I untied it from the back, and pulled the first net out from under the new one. That made the new netting to large and baggy in all the wrong places. I could see Phillippa gulp as I handed her the first net again, but she took it.

"You should probably tighten it Finnick." She said, voice sounding slightly strained, so strained even that it made me smile. I fiddled around with the side of the netting, making sure everything in the make shift undergarments were in the correct place. I turned back to see Phillippa with a pair scissors, cutting the first net into a much smaller net. I wondered just what she had in mind with it, as I gazing over her work, watched her finish it.

She wondered over to be a little closer to me, placing the scissors down on her way and holding the much smaller piece of net in her hand. I could see a glimmer in her eye that this was the last piece of the costume, but I could tell it may be even worse to attach than the first. She gulped, placing the net into my hands. "Tie it under the knot and the front, and then make sure that it ties on at the back." She said. I looked at her, raising my eyebrows at her expression. She gave me an exceptionally sarcastic smile and turned around to be facing the wall. Yeah, wimp. Of course then I started rummaging. It was difficult to make the net, let alone attach it, but then turn it into a garment. I fiddled around with the loose ends of the rope for ages, making sure that they all tied on secure.

I think nothing was showing when she turned around, at least Phillippa looked a bit happier, seeing her piece finally together on such a beautiful beast as me. I felt her eyes catch mine and then her lips formed sad words that made me really confused, more confused that everything else that had happened to me. "So like your mother." She muttered as she turned around, rummaging in her boxes of goodies. "Lay down Finnick" she called over her shoulder, and she found watch she was looking for.

I lay down, staring intently at the ceiling as she opened a tub of powder, and got a large brush. She walked over to me, placing a gentle, cold hand on my stomach, making me feel a little tingly. I could see she was going to accentuate my muscles with the makeup, because she was peering all over my chest in the way only a girl could do. She looked a little further down, and then did something that surprised me. She put the lid back on the powder, and put it down on the bench. "I think we're bulging quite enough actually." She said. And I burst out laughing. Yeah, she should think that they are quite big enough, thanks. And then she laughed with me until I was dragged away with her, to go and meet my new fate.