I haven't updated this one for ages! I wasn't going to but I was sorting files on my laptop and found four more oneshots that were supposed to be for Gethsemane's challenge. Originally they weren't going anywhere because for one reason or another, I didn't like them, but I guess they might as well go somewhere. Geth, if you're reading, I said I would do twenty-four but I don't think I will get that far. Will four more do?

My first attempt at (relatively) meaningless fluff. Anyone who recognises my user name on here will know who this is... ;)

Bracelet

When she lines the knives up along the table in front of her, everyone in the massive gymnasium stops to watch. The Gamemakers, the trainers, the assistants and especially the other tributes all fall silent and still, as if they sense that she isn't just playing. I am no different. I watch with the rest as my beautiful, lethal girl hits the tiny, distant target with every weapon that leaves her hand, feeling a strange mixture of pride and grief, seeing the fear she is inducing in their eyes and yet knowing that we will be parted from each other in a very short time because they will only let one of us live. It will be her who does.

As she throws the last knife she is already looking around at her audience, her face a picture of satisfaction and arrogance. That is until her eyes meet mine. To any of the others watching, I am sure that her expression doesn't change, but I know her better than I know myself. I see the subtle lowering of her silver eyes and the way she lifts her right hand to rub her left wrist, the only visible sign of unease that she makes, a subconscious gesture I have known since childhood.

She pushes her shirt sleeve back when she realises she's doing it, covering up what she sees as a sign of weakness by hurriedly rolling the other sleeve back too. My eyes are drawn immediately to the ring of bruises that encircles her wrist, bruises that I had unintentionally put there only yesterday, demonstrating my disapproval of her suggestion that she should try allying with the man from District Eleven. Not that she would ever consider it really. I know that, but even after all the years she has been mine, I still can't bear the thought of her looking at another the way she looks at me.

As she has told me so many times, I simply don't know my own strength, reacting to the emotions I feel without considering how fragile she is compared to me. That might be a truth I would never dare mention in front of my lover, for the only thing I would get in return would probably be her knife at my throat, but it has nevertheless given her more than her fair share of bruises over the years.

When we were younger, I used to tell her that when I won the Games I would shower her in jewels and riches and give her everything she could ever dream of. She used to tell me as she lay in my arms that she already had everything she could ever dream of and that she didn't need jewels or riches. Then she would give me her famous death stare and tell me not to be so sentimental. I had just laughed, my laughter getting even louder as she hit me when I whispered the word 'hypocrisy' under my breath.

When we grew older and were punished by chance and fate when her name was drawn on reaping day, I soon realised that I will never be able to shower her in jewels. I watch the Capitol people, with their earrings and bracelets and diamond encrusted coat buttons, and realise that I won't live to see her dressed as their equal. Not that she would ever be their equal. She has always been a million times better than any of them. The only bracelet I will ever give her is the circle of bruises she wears now, which cause me more pain than they will ever cause her.

'I don't care,' she had said when I tried to apologise. 'I wouldn't care if you scarred me for life because it would be the only scar on my body that was put there in love and not in hate.' She must have seen the scepticism in my face, for her response was to push against my chest with all her strength, sending us both crashing back onto a huge armchair when I had the sense to pretend her tiny weight was enough to knock me off my feet.

'See,' she had said triumphantly. 'You didn't hurt me.' I had smiled then, holding her in place when she had tried to get up, and the look she had in her eyes then was the same look she is giving me now as she stares at me across the vast expanse of the gymnasium.

Maybe she really doesn't need jewels and riches. Maybe I have always known that for the truth. Maybe that is one of the many reasons why I could never want another. Maybe I know it is one of the many reasons why I have never loved her more, and why I know that I will die for her without question.