Hey, everyone. No, I'm not time jumping. At least, not too much. It would be fun to see Tara and Riegan when they're sixteen, yes? Well, in between thirteen and sixteen, there's enough years to make up some stories. So, here it is.

Also, just to let all of you know - I don't usually start my sentences with conjunctions. :D I know it's wrong, but I let myself break the rules sometimes.

Mia - Yes, I have been updating every day, and I plan to continue like this... but I'll let you know after I get my taste of high school ;) School has never gotten in the way of my writing, but it might dampen my inspiration. I don't know. We'll see, I guess.
luv4jake - I like to think there's a lot of Peeta in her! :P Albeit we have seen more of Katniss, but... whatever. Here's some today for you.

Thanks for the tips, Hurbis! :)

Suzanne Collins has cats. I don't like cats. In fact, I have a dog next to me right now - so I'm not Suzanne Collins!


Horrible as it sounds, the days go by with not a trace of Riegan in my mind, except at certain times. Those certain times are the first moments I sit up in bed to see his painting, and as I go back to sleep. His primroses and dandelions are the first and last things that I see, which is somehow all right with me.

Riegan's first email comes about a week after he leaves. He tells me everything, even "introducing" me to his friends. His email's very long, and was obviously written over a span of a few days. They include funny things people say, weird people he comes across, and the small adventures he has. Those last ones always mention how he wishes that I was there.

The experience would have been much funnier and better if you were there, he writes. He always writes something like that after he tells me one of the stories.

I try to keep enthusiastic when I write back to him, but it's not the same. I can't hear his laugh or see his smirks and his smiles. Sure, there's a trace of his voice in the words, but it's not the same. I can't help but hear Father talking to Gale and Mother whenever I think that. But that's how you know if they care for one another.

Just when the spaces between the letters grow larger, Mother and Father tell Matz and me that we're going to be visiting Grandmother Everdeen, to escape the cold weather. Four is always warmer this time of year than Twelve. Later, when it's just Matz and me, we both know that the two of us want to pass by District Two on the way there, or on the way home, but for some reason, the request seems like a strange idea to fulfill... at least to me.

"You would like to meet all his friends, too, wouldn't you?" Matz asks me, sitting with me in the Meadow as I twirl a dandelion between my fingers.

I nod. "I would." I'm going through his emails in my mind, remembering something he wrote to me...

Do you ever get sick of hearing "you look so much like your mother!"? It's funny, since I look lots more like Mom than I do Dad, and yet everybody seems to think I look more like him. Do you think it's because they just want us to be like them? You to be like your mother, me to be like my dad?

I remember that I thought, as I read that... you have no idea, Riegan.

Matz shakes me out of my reverie.

"So why aren't we asking Mother and Father if we can pass by Two? Four's closer to it than Twelve is, anyway. It's not like it's impossible." Matz frowns at me, because I'm shaking my head with a distant look in my eyes. "Don't you miss Riegan, Tara? Why don't you want to go to Four?"

"Matz!" I drop my flower and look up at him. "Of course I miss Riegan. Of course I want to visit him."

He gives me a disdainful look. "Doesn't seem like it."

Matz recently turned eight, but he's still my little brother, complete with everything that comes with being a little brother. I think he's trying hard to be like Riegan, though, because I have definitely seen a change in him. I sigh. "Just because we're going Four doesn't mean we can just go to Two, Matzo."

"Why not?" he cries. "You don't miss him at all." He stands up and stalks away before I can even argue.

Well, a few weeks later, we head off to Four with no plans of going to Two, anyway. (Matz made good friends with the folks at the station because of how fascinated he was.)

We head straight to the hospital while our stuff are being sent to Grandmother Everdeen's house. She's getting old, but she still works like she did when Mother was my age. It used to confuse me why she didn't just move in with us – she'd be more relaxed that way... but now I know she wouldn't be more relaxed that way.

Mother is at the reception desk, asking for Grandmother, when Matz cries, "Grandmother!"

I look around to see her. She was once a beauty, they tell me. She still is, if I look carefully. For an aged woman, she still is a beauty... but, I think with a flash of hatred, the Hunger Games made her wither.

She smiles at the sight of Matz. "Well, well... !" Her arms open as Matz runs toward her. She holds Matz at shoulder's length, as if sizing him up. He was so little when she last saw him, but Matz knows her because of the gifts she sends us. Mostly cookies, even though Father makes the best that we know. Still: anyone who gives my little brother cookies has been granted his love.

Grandmother gives Matz a lollipop, and then she hugs Mother, murmuring something to her that I can't hear. Then, Father, who I'm hiding behind. She smiles at him. "Taking good care of our Katniss?" Mother tells me that she was never usually this happy. Judging from what I know about Grandmother, it helps that she's saving people's lives here.

Father nods and smiles. "As expected, Mrs. Everdeen." He sounds like a schoolboy, worried of pleasing his girlfriend's parents.

Then, she looks to me. "What happened to little Tara?" She smiles wistfully, and I know she wishes she had seen me grow up. But she can't, and I finally understand why.

I throw my arms around her. "I'm still quite little, Grandmother."

"Not as little as I wish you would stay." She ruffles my hair, which I ruefully fix. "Ah! Already at that stage where you care for the hair. Oh, no. Not breaking any hearts, I hope?"

I catch my father's amused glance and shake my head much too hastily. "I don't think so."

Grandmother may have been fairly enthusiastic at the hospital, but when we're at her house, it's different. She and I are in her study, both quiet. Matz, I find, is the only person in my family who I can't sit silently in a room with. Grandmother, however, is best at it. I'm typing out an email to Riegan, while Grandmother sits, just thinking.

"Who are you writing to, Tara?" she asks me, breaking the silence.

My fingers stop. "Riegan Hawthorne."

"Riegan Hawthorne?" she repeats, raising a brow.

"Yes, they came to visit..." I turn around to her, surprised that she doesn't know. "Did Mother not tell you that they did?"

"She did." Right. Gale Hawthorne visiting Katniss Everdeen-Mellark is worth news, especially after all this time. "I just wasn't sure how close you were."

I say quickly, "Not that close. But he's nice."

What I like about Grandmother is that she doesn't waste her breath. Sure enough, she just nods slowly and goes back into her own little world. She can do that very well. Still, I find myself typing with more of a bad mood. I'm sure, wherever Grandmother is in that "own little world", she is remembering Mother and Gale, and how "alike we must be". I'm scowling, rereading:

Do you think it's because they just want us to be like them? You to be like your mother, me to be like my dad?

I sigh to myself. You have no idea, Riegan.

On the second day of our stay in District Four, we go to see Annie Cresta-Odair and her son, "Finn" Odair, who's sixteen-almost-seventeen. I've seen the pictures, during the span of time that I did not really know them. The Odairs are easily among the best-looking family I know. They have the prettiest eyes. I remember the last time I was in Four, when I first met Finn, he was about... eleven, so I was about eight. Even then, I thought he was the most handsome boy I knew – I told this to Mother shamelessly that time, and she told me that Finn got his good looks from his father. I look at Finnick Odair's photos in "the book" and I can tell.

"Hey, Tara," Finn greets me as our parents hug and say how long its been. Father tells me he's not as … well, he's not exactly the same as Finnick, who was... well, "seductive". Finn, I found, was a bit quieter. But I don't know. It's been a while.

I give him a little wave and say timidly, "Hi." Finn knows that I used to (used to?) think he was the prettiest boy I knew, or know. Not that it means anything. I like pretty things; it doesn't necessarily mean I like him.

Matz, who was three when we first met Finn, so he doesn't know him, really. My brother looks up at Finn blankly. The older boy clears his throat. "Erm. Nice to 'meet' you, Matzo."

"It's just Matz," he corrects mildly. Matz doesn't look totally impressed. I suppress a smile; anybody who's the least bit timid doesn't have the total adoration of my brother. I know that's why Matz worships Riegan, who's immature in his own little way.

"You know how to swim, Matz?" Finn asks. I can't help but compare Finn's conversation skills with Riegan, who jumps right into everything. Finn is shy. I might get along with him.

Matz looks faintly interested. "No... can you teach me?"

Finn nods. He looks as eager as Matz is interested. "Sure. Mother -"

Annie Odair, Mother told me, was once referred to as "mental". Even though I've read and seen "the book", I still can't imagine that serene woman to be quite... "mental". She's a lot like Grandmother, at least to me. She has her own little world, and she can escape to it better than others can. That's all, really. What I'm sure hasn't changed is her loveliness. "Yeah?"

"Can Matz and Tara and I go down to the water?" he asks. "Matz wants to learn how to swim."

"To swim!" repeats Mother. Matz gasps and sees that Mother is rapidly considering it in her mind if she wants little Matzo to learn how to swim. It's not something we do often. In my mind, swimming ranks somewhere with "hunting". We don't need to learn how to do it, so we don't. It's different with Matz, though – he's reckless. He doesn't understand the concept of "drowning".

"Yes, Mother! You can't stop me, I need to learn how to swim!"

I cover my mouth. The giggles are threatening to come out. Once you bar Matz from something, all the more he wants it. Finn glances at me and looks confused. Again, I think of Riegan, who definitely would have burst out laughing. He would have known the funny part about it. But I just shake my head at Finn, and he gives me an unsure smile. All right. I guess that's good enough.

I add, to back up my brother, "I did think we were going to swim in the fishing district."

Father laughs. "I think you're outnumbered, Katniss."

"I wasn't going to stop you," she says, and I can tell it's a half-lie. I smirk. "Go on, I guess... and Finn, you will take care of them, right?"

"Of course, Mrs. Mellark," Finn says easily. "And if I can't, I'm sure Tara can."

I look at him in surprise, but I nod slowly. "Mhm." I guess I'm just surprised of his judgment of me. We don't even really know each other.

So, we head off to get some swimming clothes and then to the water. I remember Annie telling me that people from Four weren't just allowed to go swimming for fun. If they were swimming, it was for work. I sit on the sand while Finn ventures out into the water with Matz, instructing him with the patience that I only see rarely in Riegan.

When he asked me what my favorite district was aside from Twelve, it was Four. The reason is the water. Once, when Mother and Father were teasing one another, she told me that Father had a weakness for beauty. Father had replied, "Like I told you before, Katniss, having an eye for beauty isn't the same thing as weakness."

I may not quite have Father's eye for beauty. I'm not good at painting, and I think that painting is really just seeing things and being able to reproduce it. I can't see as well as he can. Although I do appreciate it just as much as he does, and that's why Four is my favorite district. Well, yes, it's one of the few I've ever visited, but out of that few, it's the prettiest.

"Aren't you coming, Tara?" Matz calls out to me.

I smile and get up, going into the water slowly. The sea is different from the lake. I'm not used to the waves, or the saltwater. It's still swimming, though, so I make my way out to Matz and Finn.

"Your brother's a natural," Finn tells me in his nonchalant tone. "He's a fast learner."

"Really?" I say in surprise. Matz sticks his tongue out at me, knowing that I'm poking fun at his restlessness.

"Really," says Finn, with a smile. That smile reminds me of Finnick's picture in the book. He's smirking almost just like him. I wonder if that ever hurts Annie. I know that I don't look like Prim, because of my hair, and Matz doesn't look like her, because he's a boy. Mother doesn't have to feel that kind of pain that Annie might feel from the resemblance her son has to her dead husband. Or is it a pain?

Too many thoughts! I dive down, wetting my hair and my face, and then rise up again. Need to stop thinking, need to stop thinking...

Finn looks to me now, as Matz doggy paddles a fair distance away. "So, is it just me you've met, who's a kid of..."

His sentence trails off, but I know what he means. "Kids of the victors?" I raise a brow.

He nods. "Yeah." So he, unlike Riegan, has a respect for the fact that Matz doesn't – and still shouldn't – know about the Games.

I give him a nod right back. "I think so. You?"

"I met Johanna Mason's daughter," he replies with a small smile. "You know Johanna?"

I laugh and nod. "Yes. Mother likes her, so yes. But I've never met her... at least, I can never remember meeting her. Or her daughter. What are they like?"

"Johanna? Well, Johanna's... Johanna's scary. Rysnna's the exact opposite. Mother thinks that Johanna might be disappointed Rysnna didn't turn out to be quiet the – er – quite as wild as she was herself," says Finn with a smile. "She's adopted."

"Ris-na?" I ask. Strange name.

Finn nods. "Yes. She probably just wanted a protegee of sorts. Johanna's not married."

I grin, thinking of my own parents' stories about the frightening Johanna Mason. "I can imagine." I stroke backwards. "Who else have you met?"

"Well, Cecelia – she was from District 8, not sure which year she was from – had three kids. I've met her oldest son's kids," says Finn, looking up to the right. That's his thinking face.

I smile. "That doesn't count. Those are grandchildren of victors. And you haven't met Cecelia, so." Well, she's dead.

He laughs. "Well, that's all I know, or have met. Unless you want to count Riegan."

"You've met Riegan?" Why does this surprise me?

"Yes... your mother and father weren't Gale's only acquaintances, you know," he says, giving me a sidelong glance.

I shrug, then say, "I think he should count."

"In that case, I've met you, Matz, Rysnna, and Riegan."

Hearing all the names together makes me a bit irritated. I'm thinking grimly: Gosh. We should form a club. Children of Warriors. My scowl morphs into a small smile, thinking of a slogan for the imaginary club. We are not the killing machines our parents were.

That would be fun.

"What is it?" asks Finn, seeing my face.

Again with my comparisons: I would have told Riegan immediately about the idea, and he would have burst out laughing. Is Finn supposed to be my "Peeta"? The idea disgusts me, mean as that sounds. I remember that I'm not Mother, so I say, "I was just thinking how … because Riegan and I were talking once, about how everyone thinks we're going to be just like our parents." I'm not Mother.

He gives me a genuine grin. "Yes, I think I know what you're talking about, in your case. Mother was talking with your grandmother, and she said that Riegan and you were probably going to be like Gale and Katniss." He's just stating facts, so I don't mind. I do mind, however, that Grandmother was kind of lying to me yesterday. Well, no, she said she wasn't sure how close we were... but still.

I groan. "Yes!" Then, changing my tone to a bit joking, so he knows I'm not serious, "And I was thinking that we should have our own little club. So we can 'protest'."

Finn actually laughs a little, and I'm pleased. "Well, I don't have much to live up to, I guess. Not as much as you do." I frown, and realize he's thinking of his mother. But I have someone else in mind.

"What are you talking about?" I ask, swimming towards him. "You do have a father, even if he is..." My sentence trails off, thinking it's tactless to talk about a dead father. I continue: "You look almost exactly like him."

He laughs again, only this time it's humorlessly. "Good point. That'sall I have to live up to." He mutters something, and I think it's, "... 'almost exactly' ..."

I'm confused, and he sees it.

Finn looks a bit exasperatedly at me, like an adult talking impatiently to a child. "Tara, my father was -" He flexes his fairly nonexistent muscles, and I realize what he's talking about. "And I'm, well, not. I can't use the trident like he can. Believe me, I've tried I can't look at people and consider how I can kill them. I can't use whatever pretty face I have on people. I'm not... not him. Whoever he was."

I feel a rush of empathy for him and smile. All right; I officially have Finn Odair listed as a friend in my book.

"I know exactly how you feel."


Methinks she's getting sick of being treated like she's Katniss reincarnated, oui? For good reason.

Review review reviewww.

Lots of fun in this fic tomorrow.