Four years it's been. Four years from now I was just a happy child. Four years from now I thought the future was clear: One day I'll fall for a girl and we'll get married in our own sea cabin and we'll have kids.. until it was decided that I change my plans a bit.
I've killed 5 children and mentored 6 to their death. Now I have this ugly scar on every year: I have to go to the capitol for two or three weeks to mentor 2 kids who will die, most of them are not even much older than me if they were older at all (The 1st year I mentored, I mentored a 17 year old boy and an 18 year old girl, they were both younger than me, it was awkward when I tried to order them or advise them they'd be like, who the hell are you?) But this year I'm turning 18, which means no tributes will be older than me anymore. A part of me that is still childish cheered for that, but the other parts were wondering if it makes any difference.
But anyway, Mags goes with me to those visits, and this makes them easier.
In those four years, my feelings for Annie have changed. She's no longer my shy and kind friend, she's everything in my life now that Mags is not. We spent a lot of times by the shore together, and they were when I realized how I feel about her. I can remember our first kiss, two years ago. Ever since, we've been together in every way, yet our maximum physical acts were hugs and kisses.
It's my birthday.. Mags has bought a beautiful cake from town and Annie and her father are here.
Mags seems somewhat nervous. I'm trying to know what is wrong with her, but she won't say. But because I know her, I know she'll tell me sooner rather than later, so I decide to leave her alone.
We eat the cake and I crack a lot of jokes which Annie and her father laugh to, yet Mags seems uncomfortable.
"You know, I got this movie from the capitol last year and never watched it before. Let's watch it on the TV."
I take her upstairs to my room. We do this a lot, just sit on the floor watching a movie on the TV. But for some reason.. I had a feeling tonight would be different. I turn the TV on and start the tape.. and we start watching a usual stupid action movie where the capitol is just trying to show more and more luxury. I watch the tape and have some thoughts that the capitol would definitely censor of they could. I start thinking about how all of this comes from us, district people who give them their power and suffer from it. The cars the hero and the villain race in.. they're made in district 6. The clothes they're wearing are made in district 8. The heroin's jewelry is made in district 1. The food they're eating.. comes from my district, and districts 10 and 11.
Without us, the capitol is nothing.. they have nothing. If one day we won't give them all that.. they'll die from hunger and poverty too. Maybe we can? Maybe one day we will? Maybe..
"I think he's cute." Annie says about the main guy, interrupting my thoughts.
-"Ah.. you like him?" I say.. kind of irritated.
-"You didn't let me finish. I think he's cute.. but really do you think I might prefer a capitol boy over you? Or could a capitol boy be half as good looking as you anyway?"
I smile.. a little cautious. Are we only going to talk about my appearance?
As if she's reading my mind, she goes.."And you're also kind and you have a great sense of humor.. you're everything I could dream of. But I sometimes think if I would have loved you even without all those things.." She was whispering in my ears..
-"..And?"
-"And, I don't think there would have been a substitute. You're the one and only person I would have loved, Finn. You're my whole life."
I don't know when I started that.. was it subconscious? But I caught Annie's chin with a hand a started messing with her hair with the other hand, while kissing her. I was unconsciously whispering "I love you" in her ear before she mentions something about her father and Mags being downstairs.. but I wouldn't let anything interrupt.
We went on and on.
-"Finn.. Finnick.. wake up, sweetie.."
I wake up to those words and Annie's face. Is that.. the most beautiful morning in my life? Possibly.
-"I slept over."
-"And.. your father was downstairs last night? Oh God.."
She laughs.
-"Relax, Finn. Last night I was the worried one and you're the one who wanted to do this. My father loves you, and he knows we both belong with each other. He knew this would happen sooner or later."
I start to relax. Still.. how am I going to meet the man when I take his daughter home? "Hi sir, sorry for not sending your daughter home yesterday, we were getting intimate." Oh well, he sure would understand.
Still speechless, she was the one who said," Let's go downstairs and have breakfast."
-"I didn't even invite you to breakfast? Oh Annie I'm so sorry, I'm still.. kind of thinking how to meet your father and all.."
-"It's okay, let's put something on first."
We put our clothes on, when she suddenly goes.. "Worried about my father? How are you feeling about meeting Mags now?"
-"That's a nice thought to give me, sweetheart, thank you very much." I retort and she laughs. That's a good question.. what to say and react to Mags?
We go downstairs and there she is. "Good morning, Finn, Annie. I already made you breakfast."
"Thanks, Mags." For both making us breakfast and acting like nothing is up.
We eat our tuna sandwiches and Mags brings a tray with pot full of coffee and of course some cream and sugar cubes. I add the cream to Annie's coffee and ask her," Want a sugar cube?" and she smiles and asks for two.
After that, with Mags still not bringing the awkward things up, and me grateful for that, I take Annie home. As we stand at her porch I feel like running away.. but no. I'm a hunger games victor. I've seen death. I'm not scared of the father of my girl who knows we just.. Slept over. Or am I?
He opens the door.. and I'm there with his daughter. My face goes hotter.. how long has it been since I last blushed?
"Hello, kids.. had fun?"
Whoa.. what should I say?
-"K.. uh.. yes.." I go.. and I don't see Annie's face because I'm standing behind her.
-"Great! Come to dinner tonight Finn if you'll be available, I caught some sea bass earlier today, it will be great when I'm done grilling it."
-"I would be delighted." I say, smiling cautiously. He doesn't seem angry.. but who knows?
-"Then come and get Mags with you."
-"Thank you, sir."
-"Finnick, the last time you called me sir was 5 years ago. Just relax, kid, will you?"
-"Uh.. sure." I smile, still cautious.
-"Come in, young lady." He says to Annie. "See you at dinner tonight, Finn."
-"Have a great day, s.. dad." I call him with the word I've been calling him with for years. Yes, considering him my father made my relationship with Annie sort of awkward, but the four of us have no other choice: Ever since we knew each other Annie's mine and I'm hers, and Mags is Annie's mother she never got to know and her father is the father I never got to know. This is my family and I've always loved them like that.
Before I walk and after Annie has just been in, he smiles at me.. a very normal, very pure smile that I know to hide nothing. I smile back similarly, this time without caution, and walk after he closes his door.
Now I have to face Mags. Yes she didn't mention it in front of Annie but she's my mother, a conservative 74 year old woman who's more like my granny, and she knows before I loved Annie there's been no one else (And I was a child, really) and after I loved her I've kept myself exclusive for her. And she knows about last night and she definitely knows it was.. the first time.
I walk into the door of my victory village house.. she's usually here or I'm at hers, it's very rare for us to be separate.. and I blush again. Seriously?
I look at her waiting for her to say something.. she looks just as nervous and uncomfortable as last night, and she looks at me in my obvious "How much trouble" attitude.. I wait for her to start a long conversation about it and maybe blame me for embarrassing her and Annie's father but.. she smiles and says "Just tell me you were good, kid."
On our train to the capitol Mags looks more and more nervous. It's been a week since my birthday and she's still as confusing and she won't say a thing. I start to worry about her.
Wrong it might be, but really I could care less about my two tributes: The usual big boy and big girl who volunteer every year thinking the odds may be ever in their favor. Why does nobody understand that there is no winner in those games? Even those lucky enough to make it out with their lives.. even I.. we've lost our humanity. We've killed children so that we can live and we justified it. But not only criminals we are, we're also victims. We were not forced to kill those children, but we were forced to go to those games and either die or become murderers. We wake up every night screaming ourselves out of a nightmare... one with dying children or with our own beloved ones dying. The only people who won are those who watch us kill or get killed and cheer. Those who maybe don't see us as equal humans because if they did, I'm sure they'd consider that they wouldn't want that to happen to their own kids.
Then if those two teenagers are going to lose anyway... why should I care? Getting one of them our of there alive wouldn't mean he lost much less that he would've if he or she had died in there.
Teenagers.. why do I always forget that I'm one? Maybe because I've seen so much death I feel like I'm older than Mags?
We arrive to the capitol and as we're out of the train, I see the real winners of the hunger games wave to us and scream... maybe more for me than for the tributes... as shallow and superficial as always.
We arrive to the remake center first and I watch some shallow stylist put those kids in the usual outfits of mermaids and fishermen and cover them with nets... everything just like every other game. Mags and I sit in their chariot and watch the capitol people scream and cheer for them. In a few days those very people will be extremely enjoying their time watching them die.
After the parade we arrive to the training center. As I enter, three men in formal suits stop me.
-"Mr. Odair, will you come with us, please?"
-"Is there something wrong?"
-"It is a very important matter." I see with the corner of my eye Mags looking at us.. and I don't need to turn my head to see that she's terrified. "We are told to take you to the president's mansion as he would like to see you."
-"The president"?
-"President Coriolanus Snow."
-"Drink, Mr. Odair?"
-"No alcohol for me, thanks."
-"Ah.. what a healthy young man. No morphling.. athlete.. no alcohol.. and enjoying life as a young man ought to be."
A guard with a formal suit hands him a golden trey with porcelain pot with floral shapes on it, and a small sugar pot with the same shape, and a small plate of cream, then leaves us alone in the fancy office. Snow pours hot coffee out of the pot into his cup and adds nothing to it then pours coffee in my cup and adds two tea spoons of cream and two sugar cubes in it. Exactly how I take my coffee. I take this not as a nice and warm gesture, I take it as an obvious "I watch every step that you take". But even if you do.. great President Coriolanus Snow.. what is it that you have against me?
-"Now you know, Mr. Odair, that our country needs money to survive. Feed the districts and the capitol citizens, and keep humanity alive." Yes I know Mr. President.. I know our district is one of the wealthiest and yet we suffer when the temperature isn't good enough for fishing.. I know if I and Mags hadn't been giving out a lot of livestock and money we don't need a lot of men, women and children would have been dead by now. If this is how we are.. how about ten and eleven and twelve? How about the least fortunate districts? I'm sure they can starve in safety.
"..And, as a president of Panem, the money I get goes straightly to Panem." I bet it does.
"So, what would be your position on keeping this country's heartbeat going?"
-"My position, Sir?"
-"Would you do a little.. self sacrifice? And I mean of course more than donating your wealth to your district's citizens."
-"That.. Depends. Excuse me, Mr. President, it seems to me quite unclear.. what you are trying to say."
-"You're very popular, Mr. Odair, you can gain prophet out of it and raise money for this country."
I shut my mouth because if I open it now it might shoot out sarcasm.. like.. "How, by raising a kissing booth?"
-"You're here because I'd like to offer you a deal, Mr. Odair." I start to get nervous.. Nobody calls me Mr. Odair. Not normally. For everybody in my district I'm Finnick.. just Finnick.
-"I could guarantee the safety of everybody you love…" As he says that my body goes stiff and my nerves reach their limit. "Including your kind granny, and your sweet girl, Annie Cresta, and her father. But of course, those happy things don't come without a price."
This is not "I will guarantee their safety".. this is in fact "I won't kill them".
-"What is the price?" I say flatly, almost whispering, unable to move.
-"You'll have to let me use you... sell you."
-"Sell me…."
-"Your body. Can you imagine how much a wealthy capitol girl would pay to spend one sweet night with the stunning district 4 victor? Or how much a middle aged woman who loved you for years would?"
Is he… serious? I look at his face and there is nothing implying that what he just said is an overrated joke.
-"You want to... sell me as a prostitute." I say... as calm as I could. On the inside parts of me were vomiting and the others were just screaming.
-"For the interest of the poor districts."
-"Let's not lie to each other for a minute." My disgust screams out of me and I start to put my own conditions for the discussion with the president of Panem. "You are telling me that you want to sell my body to your people or you'll slaughter my family. How come you find a reason for telling me the money you'll get by selling me will go to the interest of the poor kids in the districts when in fact every penny of it will go to your own pocket? Because I don't. This conversation or deal or whatever you're calling it… is already scandalous enough that we should be crystal clear honest by now."
He just glares at me.. and smiles.
-"Fine, Finnick. You're a smart young man like I was one day. This money will go to me, of course. You're simply another chance for me to raise more money and power over everyone in Panem. But this is just a deal and you've got a total freedom of choice. You either do it or your dear old Mags, your little lover and her father will die. So.. do I get a yes or a no?"
I think for a few seconds.. not about my choice because it's done.. but about how to speak. I can't, so, still stunned, I nod.
-"Great." He says with a cunning smile. "Your first client awaits you in her home tomorrow, she'll send a car to take you from the training center. Oh and by the way, I can't convince my citizens you're theirs while I see you on my cameras having a little romance with miss Cresta. You made the deal and now you're an exclusive property of the capitol, so you need to stop giving that property out to... anybody else. Otherwise would be a deal breaker, and your family will really suffer." He says it and clicks a button on his desk.. the guy with the formal suit enters the room and Snow tells him to drive me back to the training center.. I stand up and accompany the guy to the door, then out of the building.
"Finn. Finnick. I'm sorry." Says Mags as I lie on my bed hiding my face with a pillow. How much of a child am I to do this again? I used to do this when I was 12 when angry at something. After I went to the hunger games, I stopped doing that because I was no longer a child. But now it seems to me like I can't stand things.
"I know what happened. I knew it was going to happen to you. I tried to lie to myself... I tried to convince myself Snow won't.. I'm sorry, my son. I... know because... it happened to me too."
It happened to Mags? He prostituted her? He sold her? One day she suffered from what I am suffering from now?
"It happened until I was 40. People then got bored of me and of course there were the younger and more attractive substitutes, like Cashmere and Enobaria. And now there you are… young and incomparably sensuous. I saw you grow day by day a better man, but also a better chance for Snow, and I knew your 18th birthday was his time to claim it. I'm sorry I never told you, my boy, you were too innocent and happy.. I hated to ruin it."
She started crying.
"Look, son.. if he threatened you my life, I'm seventy four. My life on earth is coming to an end anyway, and if I can choose to live and see you living this hell or die and set you free.. I'll definitely welcome death."
I take the pillow away from my face and glare at her.
"Not in a thousand years."
For a few seconds wee look at each other... and I finally stop resisting and burst into tears. She hugs me... crying too... and I sleep in her arms all night. Only this time I'm not ashamed.
