Hey Guys, I decided to start with this tribute. Thank you Bastetmoon for Citrine and I hope you like how I write her. For the reapings, I will go one tribute at a time and in form of introducing. I will do two phases: A night before the reaping and the morning of the reaping. At the end, in the aspect of the our beloved president or Zena (Head Gamemaker), we will see the reaping caps!

Hope you enjoy this chapter!

Citrine Lauren, District 1, Age 18

Night before the Reaping:

I flop onto the couch in my small relax room upstairs, back from training, happy that I can finally relax and watch some TV when I hear my mother's footsteps on the stairs. She enters the room and calls, "Citrine, darling, " her voice sickly sweet and when I turn around, I see a fake smile plastered on her face, a smile that means there are bad news, not necessarily for her, but certainly for me. I turn around, raise an eyebrow at her and return a fake smile myself, but say almost morbidly, "What are the good news?" My mother starts to take in a breath so she can speak when I interrupt her and say, "Probably a curse in disguise." My mother sighs, her face no longer morphed into fake delight and now into a mask of annoyance, and says, "Your brother and his wife are coming." I huff at her, and fake-cough and with a raspy voice say, "I'm sick." I hear my father's deep, and now stern voice, "No complaining. You are going to treat your brother and sister-in-law with respect and kindness. Any sarcastic comment and I swear you are not going this weekend to the post-reaping party. I restrain myself from muttering, "Who cares, I won't be there anyway."

What my parents still do not know is that I was going to volunteer tomorrow. If the knew, they would panic, they would claw my hands around me, stand next to me in the square, hand firmly over my mouth to prevent me from saying those 'supposedly' dreadful words that would take me to the Games. Too dramatic, you say? Wrong, when it comes to my parents, nothing is dramatic, I mean nothing. I rose up from the couch reluctantly and headed rather sluggishly to the bedroom. I chose some clothes, some jeans and one of my new shirts, purple velvet, slightly off-shoulder. I dragged myself to the living room, expecting it to be empty. Instead, I saw my brother Jacinth placing kisses all over Silk's face. I shut my eyes quickly and screamed, maybe a bit too loudly, "Guys, get a room." Jacinth said annoyingly, "Citrine, mature up." I opened up my eyes hesitant , happy to see that the love fest was over. "Stop being so harsh to her, Jacinth. Such a young age, can be really traumatic to witness such a thing," Silk's overly sweet voice rang out. Silk was so kind, it was annoying. "Thank you, Silk," I said imitating her voice perfectly. Jacinth shot daggers at me with his eyes but chose to say nothing.

I flopped on the couch and Jacinth glared at me. I easily glared back and then did a small fake smile at Silk, saying, "Jacinth can be so annoying." Jacinth didn't seem to pleased by the comment and when Mom came in. I wasn't surprised he rat me off. Dad scolded me with threats of not letting me go to the post-reaping party. "He started, all annoying and glarey for no reason," I justified. Mom's voice rang out, "Honey, you must have upset him somehow." I leapt from the couch, "I get a scolding, Jacinth goes scot-free. You obviously favour Jacinth." Mom sighed, "Honey, no. We do not favour anyone over the other." I rolled my eyes, muttering, "Obviously." Dad yelled, "That's that! You are not going to the post-reaping party." This was a reason I wanted to go. I wasn't sure I was going to win. I had all sort of aspects to improve. My throwing knife skills are weak and maybe improving my endurance would definitely help me. I wasn't pleased with all my skills, but to leave this place, where I was constantly overshadowed, preferred over, would be a great relief.

Morning of the reaping:

I woke up, excited, buzzing. I had to trap all these feelings inside me, appear neutral. They could not smell my plan, sense anything was wrong. If they do, my plan was foiled. They would probably escort me to the Square and tie me down. I needed to look good but not too pretty, Dad would probably sense something. Opening the wardrobe, my hand riffled through my clothes. I was dissatisfied with everything. I either had too fancy clothes saved for special occasions or too casual clothes for school and such. My head thought some more and decided that it would not look strange to quickly pop at Quartz's and borrow a dress. After all, we constantly borrow clothes from each other. Informing Mom quickly, I ran next door to Quartz. I knocked rapidly on the door. I was slightly surprised when Brocade, my best friend, Quartz's crush opened the door. He blushed a bit when it hit me that he was probably here for Quartz. Brocade did look angry, "Citrine. What do you want?" I couldn't help myself but snarkily reply, "Sorry for interrupting your make-out session witn Quartz." Brocade's face turned red as he stuttered, "N-no we weren't." I always suspected that Brocade had a crush on Quartz and I knew for sure Quartz had a crush on Brocade and they way he turned red confirmed my suspicions. I leapt up the stairs to Quartz's room.

Quartz was blushing when she saw me enter and I swung her wardrobe open. "Reaping outfit," I said quickly. Quartz nodded. She leafed through her dresses. She picked out a few dresses. The off-shoulder red dress, the sky blue overalls felt slightly overly fancy. Quartz then took out a knee-length dark green velvet dress. It was perfect. I thanked Auartz and she just seemed eagernfor me to go. Brocade was still in the living room then he jumped up, "Citrine, are you going to volunteer? " I shrugged and then Brocade smiled,"You are the best. You can do it." I grinned, "You going to cheer me on?" Brocade smiled, "You bet!" I grinned as I ran out of the house and headed home...

I ate breakfast tensely, taking deep breaths to calm myself down. I was hardly prepared, as much as Brocade was convinced that there was no way I could succumb there, but I knew the truth, the hard reality. Dad hugged me, a rare form of affection and smiled, "The volunteer, Rubitta, is not any chicken. Do not worry about one thing. I hugged him back, hoping he was fooled that I will not volunteer, but Rubitta was going to be a hard person to beat to stage. There was a huge possibility my attempts would be in vain and I would come back,only to face the punishments of my parents...