Chapter 7 :
Effie was in an excellent mood as she entered the Game Headquarters on Hayden's arm that morning. She nodded to people on her left, smiled to people on her right… She was happy and bubbly and she could tell Hayden was both amused and annoyed at the same time but she didn't really care.
She felt like a Queen.
It was her hour of glory.
She had bottled up her mixed feelings from the night before and had buried them deep under a newfound layer of optimism. Their tributes had the same chances as anyone else after all, and she trusted them completely. This year, she vowed, Twelve would win.
They found a place near a pillar with a good view of the giant screen occupying an entire wall. She thought it was almost as big as the ones in the Square but she wasn't sure.
When the Capitol's seal appeared, quickly followed by the anthem, there was a general excited chorus of exclamations and then a hush. When Caesar showed up, his bright purple hair rolled in a quiff – the latest fashionable hairstyle for men but Hayden had outright refused to take the hint when she had brushed the subject – everyone was bristling with impatience : sponsors, mentors or escorts, they were all awaiting the beginning of the Games.
"We are going to win, Hayden." she said, squeezing his arm in unchecked anticipation.
When he looked at her, Hayden's face was guarded but she could read the sadness in his eyes very clearly. She decided he was simply being pessimistic.
It wasn't long before Caesar left his place to the very first images of the arena. There were collective oooh and aaah when the glimmering lake appeared, surrounding what appeared to be an island. The camera panned on the Cornucopia which was situated at the center of the arena, surrounded by the twenty-four tributes.
She didn't think anyone was listening to Caesar's chatter anymore, people were too busy talking – she heard a victor from Five let out an aggravated comment about how unfair the arena was for people from his District but the man was quickly shushed by his fellow mentor – Effie, for her part, was focused on the screen. As was customary, the camera did a circle sweep, showing the face of each of the twenty-four tributes with their name and District.
"Oh, that's Stella!" she squealed, digging her nails in Hayden's arm.
The girl, for the first time since the Reaping, looked good. The stylists had pinned her hair in a high ponytail that freed her face and the cargo pants and tank top provided this year suited her figure or, at least, didn't make her look as unbecoming as the pink dress from the interviews.
"Don't get your hopes up, Effie." Hayden warned, shifting until he could free his arm from her grip and lean against the pillar. It wasn't suitable at all for a mentor to be slouched in that fashion but Effie couldn't bring herself to care or to let him damper her enthusiasm.
When the camera showed Finnick Odair, most of the sponsors clapped and cheered in delight. The boy clearly was a favorite but it meant nothing, she knew, favorites had lost before. Mags looked pleased though. The woman stood a little apart from the main crowd, arms folded, and a smug smile on her lips.
When Sage appeared on screen, Effie made a point to clap very loudly – it didn't matter if she was alone or if people glanced at her in surprise or mockery. Her tributes were every bit as good as Four's.
"Ladies and Gentlemen…" boomed Claudius Templesmith's voice. "Let the sixty-fifth Hunger Games begin! And may the odds be ever in your favor !"
The crowd fell silent and Effie held her breath.
At the sound of the gong, every tributes started moving as one. It was difficult to glimpse anything in the general confusion. The screen divided into several squares, showing different angles of the Cornucopia. On one of them, she spied Stella starting to run in the direction of the Cornucopia, the girl stopped mid-way, probably afraid by the first bodies dropping dead to the ground, and doubled back the way she had come. She disappeared in the heavy foliage.
"Good." Hayden breathed out behind her.
Effie looked for Sage, her eyes darting left and right but never finding the boy until the camera zoomed on Finnick who was fighting the female tribute from Two for a knife. Sage was behind him, slumped over, blood still flowing from his open throat.
Her gasp was sharp and several heads turned in her direction but she couldn't care less. She couldn't look away either, her eyes burned, her breathing quickened.
"Keep it together." Hayden ordered firmly, taking hold of her elbow. "Effie, keep it together. You can't cry in here."
She couldn't.
She knew that.
It didn't stop the tears from escaping and rolling down her cheeks. She batted her fake eyelashes quickly but it didn't help, not enough. The cosmetic products made her eyes burn harder in reaction to the tears. It was all a mess.
Hayden's grip on her elbow was firm and he steered her toward the closest exit door, as discreetly as he could. People were too busy staring at the screen to pay them any attention. She caught Livia's eyes in the crowd, District Six's escort sent her a sympathetic smile.
Eleven's victor was leaning next to the door and Hayden couldn't hide a groan of annoyance.
"What's up with her?" Chaff asked in a snort.
"None of your business." Hayden spat.
"Sorry, boy…" Eleven's victor mocked. "Didn't mean to insult your girlfriend."
Effie nudged Hayden forward before he could answer. They didn't need a strife in the middle of the viewing room.
"I need to go back in there and see what can be done for Stella." he told her. "Go back to the penthouse."
"I want to help." Effie protested, trying to keep her tears under control. She didn't know what was happening to her. She had watched countless Games, why would those ones be any different? Sage was just another tribute. He was just…
"You're in no state to help." Hayden replied harshly. "Go back to the penthouse, cry for awhile if it helps, and come back when you're sure you won't lose it again. That's dangerous, Effie."
Dangerous…
She didn't understand.
She didn't understand but her hands were shaking and she didn't think it would make a lot of difference if she disappeared to the penthouse for a few minutes. Just to take a breath, she told herself, just a minute alone to collect herself.
She gave him a brisk nod and walked along the deserted corridors to the elevator. She willed her fingers to stop shaking during the ride but it didn't work. No matter how deep she breathed or how much she tried to relax, the tremors didn't disappear, they spread to her whole body until she was shivering from head to toes without any good reason.
She stumbled to the penthouse's living-room more than she walked.
The TV was on, of course. The Games were mandatory, the TV was programmed to switch on automatically. She was more surprised by the presence of the man sitting on the couch in front of it, nursing a glass of whiskey.
"What's up with you?" Haymitch asked her when he glimpsed her hovering near the door hesitantly. "Shouldn't you be busy partying downstairs?"
The TV was on mute but it was perhaps worse. The bloodbath was still in full swing, teenagers were dropping dead all around the Cornucopia, trying to get their hands on weapons, food or bags… And all in silence. Haymitch was watching her, twirling his whiskey in his glass absent-mindedly, but he didn't say another word.
Silence, she thought, could be deafening.
"Sage is dead." she said through the chattering of her teeth.
"Yeah, I saw." Haymitch shrugged. There was something too meticulously detached around that shrug though. It was studied, made careless on purpose.
"I can't stop shaking." she whispered at last, her eyes darting from him to the screen and back on him again. "Why can't I stop shaking? I don't understand… I…"
"Come here, sweetheart." He patted the couch next to him.
Her feet took her there mechanically. She dropped more than she sat, barely remembering to cross her legs at the ankles. She took the glass she was handed and didn't pause to consider that she wasn't fond of whiskey or that she didn't drink from other people's glasses as a rule. She gulped it down and he poured her another one.
It burned and the taste was atrocious but by the second one, the chills faded away.
She reached for the bottle but he snatched it and placed it out of her reach before taking the glass back.
"If I get you drunk, Hayden will have my balls on a plate." he chuckled. "I like them where they are."
"Language." she whispered by reflex. Her eyes went back to the screen.
"The bloodbath is almost over." he stated, as if reading her mind. "I would say it's the worst part but I try not to lie when I don't have to."
She didn't understand.
"Why is it so different?" she asked, her voice so low it was a miracle he could hear her.
"You're on the other side now, Princess." he shrugged. "Better get used to it 'cause that…" he waved at her. "… it's never going away. It will only get worse."
"The first day on the train… You said the job would break me." she recalled. Her mind wasn't clear. She didn't know if it was the alcohol or the image of Sage that was seared into her brain but she couldn't quite make sense of her own reactions. She had always loved the Games but this year… She couldn't for the love of her understand why it was so different.
She felt disgusted, grossed out by the blood and, overall, so crushingly sad.
Sage was dead.
He would never annoy her again with his sulking, he would never learn to bake, he would never…
"It breaks everyone." Haymitch laughed in his glass. "Some are just better at hiding it than others."
"Are you broken?" she asked.
He stared at her a few seconds and raised his glass in a toast. "Wouldn't you like to know…" His eyes turned serious. "Learn to hide it, Trinket. You won't like the outcome if they think you're questioning their little Games. Be a puppet."
She didn't think she could.
It was a frightening thought.
Effie's only goal had only been to stand out… Belong to the elite yes, but rise above it at the same time… She wanted to be at the top of the pyramid. She wanted to be…
"Here's your girl." he nodded to the screen. They were apparently doing a quick survey of who was still alive and who was where in the arena. Stella was lost in the jungle-like forest, looking around her, clearly lost. "She ran away from the Cornucopia. Maybe she will last a few hours."
It was so careless, so…
"She will win." Effie hissed with a newfound energy. Never mind the brothers' defeatist attitude, she didn't care for it, Effie knew what she had to do. First stop would be her room, a change of clothes and a make-up check and then she would head down and she would dazzle every sponsor into helping Twelve. "Stella will win."
It was a promise she intended to keep.
What do you think? :p
