Chapter 9 – Forget-Me-Not
Vanye Taller, 15
"Don't be too soft; people will crush you."
Two Years Before the Reapings
"Come on!" I yell up the stairs. "Mutton—no, stop that!" I race up the steps, quickly extricating Mutton's arms from Fale's armpits. "Mutton, we all know you're taller than Fale. That doesn't give you a reason to try and lift him in the air."
"But it's fun!" the eight-year-old exclaims, jumping in the air. "Vanye, Vanye, are we going to go to the market yet?"
"Yes," I say. "As soon as Valentine stops trying to pull Jake's hair out."
Mutton snorts out a laugh and watches his two friends attack each other. I run over and break up their fight, pushing them apart. "Aw, come on, Dynamite!" Valentine whines, slumping forward dramatically. "We were just playing." She whirls around to face Jake. "Right, Jake?"
"No," Jake replies. "You were pulling my hair. I don't like having my hair pulled."
"No one does," I agree, grabbing Valentine's hand. "Come on. We're going to the market today."
"Ooh, ooh, can Gracie come?" Valentine begs, pulling on my hand. She's surprisingly strong. Gracie is another girl around Valentine's age who lives in the Taller Orphanage too. She and Valentine have been best friends since Gracie started living here a couple years back.
"No, I'm taking you, Mutton, Fale and Jake," I reply, shaking my head.
"You're no fun!" Valentine exclaims sadly. I take a deep breath through my nose and remind myself that she's just a kid. She doesn't mean it. She's just unhappy that Gracie can't come with us. Not a real insult. Nothing to be mad about. Right.
Valentine and I start down the stairs, where the three boys wait at the bottom. Luckily, no one is lifting anyone into the air or pulling anyone's hair out. Good. Crisis averted.
The orphanage, which is run by my parents, has about twenty or so kids in, ranging from three months to fifteen-years-old. My parents always offer the fifteen-year-olds a place here if they want to stay, since we technically have no reason to evict them until they turn eighteen, but all six of them turned us down and left. I can never understand why. Sure, this place comes with a bit of responsibility and a lot of yelling, but hey, you get to live with me. Who wouldn't want that?
I take Jake and Valentine's hands, telling Mutton and Fale to join hands as well, and we head out onto the street.
Trees surround us as we walk, hand-in-hand, and in the distance I can hear birds singing. Two identical looking boys run past us, shouting their names at each other. They're being really loud.
Mutton whispers something to Fale, pointing to someone coming down the road toward us. I tug on Mutton's hand, looking at him oddly. "Mutton, come on," I say, getting annoyed. I pull harder on his hand, but his feet are planted firmly in the ground.
"Vanye…that's Anamos Forrester," he whispers breathlessly, his eyes wide.
I furrow my brow, and he says, "What, you don't—you don't know who Anamos Forrester is?"
"No," I say impatiently. "Come on, Mutton. We have to be back home soon."
I pull on his hand again. By now, Valentine, Fale and Jake are looking at us, wondering why we've stopped. "Anamos is mean," Mutton mumbles. "He calls us names."
Sure enough, this so-called 'Anamos Forrester' starts to approach us. "Well, well, well, if it isn't the orphans and the orphan wrangler." His voice is full of malice, and all I can think is that this has happened before. Mutton draws back, hiding behind my back, and Anamos laughs. "Aww, look at the little orphan, too scared to face me. How adorable."
"Leave him alone," I snap, feeling my anger rise. This kid can't be more than ten. He can't be much older than Mutton, or Fale, or Valentine, or Jake. But he's taller than I am. He's broader too. But size has never kept me away from justice.
"Don't think I will," Anamos says in a low voice as he steps closer to us.
I can't help it; I snap.
I throw myself at Anamos in a blaze of fists. I punch him directly in the nose, hearing a satisfying crack as blood trickles from his left nostril. I drive my shoulder into his chest, sending the boy crashing to the ground, where I continue to kick and punch him until he lays bloody on the ground.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spot Valentine, Jake and Fale, cowering behind Mutton who looks like he would like to cower behind someone to. Shakily, I get to my feet, reaching out toward Mutton, but he draws away from my hand, which I only now realize is slightly bloody. "Mutton—" I begin to say, feeling the anger swiftly drain from my veins. But I don't get to finish my sentence. As I take a step toward the four orphans, they scatter, each other running in a different direction.
I look around at the crowd of bystanders, all looking at this thirteen-year-old girl who just beat a boy bloody. Feeling tears suddenly well in my eyes, I push through the crowd and run off into the woods, holding my left wrist over my eyes to shield my tears from sight.
Finally I collapse against the trunk of a tree, glancing around and wondering where I've landed myself. Tears still silently leaking from my eyes, I look around at the tall trees, the canopy of leaves blocking out the sunlight and leaving me in the dark.
Good. If it's dark, no one can see me cry.
Vanye Taller doesn't just… cry! I'm not a crybaby. I'm not weak. I'm thirteen-years-old! I shouldn't be… be… breaking down and sobbing! I'm stronger than this.
All my thoughts do is make me sob harder.
"Are you alright?"
The voice startles me out of my sob-induced reverie. I look up and make out a boy, probably about my age, looking at me with concern evident on his face. He kneels down beside me as I sniffle, wiping my face on my sleeve. "Yes. I'm fine."
"Why are you crying?" he asks in a soft, sympathetic voice. He's… really pretty. Now that I can see his face up close… he's hot. "I promise I won't judge."
"It's… it's nothing," I say in the firmest voice that I can. "I'm fine. Really. I am."
His handsome features contort with confliction for a moment before he says, "I'm Ardan, by the way." He extends his hand, and I almost take it, but I pause with my hand inches away from his fingers.
"Ardan… Ardan Carvas?"
"Yes," he says, confused. He's pretty when he's confused. "Why? Do you know me? Do I know you?"
For a moment, my silence in the only thing to be heard. Finally I gain the courage to say, "I'm Vanye Taller."
"Oh," he whispers breathlessly. "Of course."
It happened years ago. Thirteen, to be exact. See, the Taller and Carvas families had been at each other's throats for years now, and this was the final straw. Their twelve-year-old daughters disappeared at the same time, and both families were absolutely certain the other's daughter had killed theirs. And then, two weeks later, little Vanye Taller comes into the world, right in the midst of all the chaos.
I'm not supposed to associate with the Carvas family. But… I suppose this will be one secret I'll manage to keep. I slowly get to my feet and take his hand. "Doesn't matter to me, though." I smile, letting go of his hand and wiping my tears a second time as Ardan smiles as well. What's the fun of having friends if everyone knows about it?
Monk Redwood, 15
"I have no past, so what's my future?"
Two Weeks Before the Reapings
A loud thunk sounds through the room as my body hits the floor, but I don't bother to get up. I will just end up back on the ground. Wallowing in a pool of my own blood as… the man, whose name I can never remember, kicks me and hits me whenever he gets bored. I'm sure he has a name, but my memory has never been the best…
Suddenly the picture of me lying on the floor, surrounded by red morphs into something else. Everything is mostly black, things flinging in and out of focus as I turn my head side to side, trying to see what's going on and figure out where I am and why I am and who I am. Answers should be there! Answers are… answers are always there…
Another loud noise. Another scream of pain. More red. More cuts. More bruises. More of the same old routine…
Black finally wafts into my vision, but once it overtakes my view of the old house, another scene takes it place, the only sound filling my ears is my screams of utter agony as something hits my head once, twice, three times before finally, thankfully, everything goes black.
I wake up a pool of cold sweat, it feeling far too much like the blood that surrounded me in my dream. No, memory. It's always a memory. A memory of time before the Community Home, before the silent wails of starving children, before Monk Redwood even had a name, when I was just a silent boy who lived in my memories, never truly existing…
That's a question I've asked myself many times. Did I exist before I woke up in 7's hospital with no recollection of my past life? Or did I simply pop into existence one day on the side of the road, as a ten-year-old boy covered in scars and cuts and bruises? Why did no one ever come for me? Who is the man in my memories?
No one here has as many questions to ask as I do. Many of them wonder where their parents went, maybe if their siblings as okay. All of them are someone. Because even if I have a name, and a face, that's a lot different from having an identity. I'm just the kid who sits in the back of the room, never noticed unless he's trying to sleep and starts screaming.
"Matron Bellamy!" one my roommates yells. "Monk's having a freak out again!"
I sigh, wondering what time of night it is. Judging by the moonlight just barely visible through our tiny window, it has to be late. And nighttime is the only time the Community Home is ever quiet. There's always someone screaming, crying, and/or vomiting. Sometimes a combination of all three. But when everyone goes to sleep, things calm down a lot. Until, of course, I came waltzing in with no memory and nightly freak outs, waking everybody from their peaceful, nice, relaxing slumber with ramblings of memories no one can confirm ever happened.
Matron Bellamy, the head matron of the Community Home, bangs open our door, probably waking up everyone in the Home who somehow managed to sleep through my terrified howling, and instead of offering kind words like a nice person might, she simply glares at my roommate. "Amir," she snaps. "It's 1:47 a.m. Someone here needs to get sleep."
"Yeah, but Monk was—"
"I don't care what Monk was doing," Bellamy says sharply, staring Amir down. "We have established that he can survive this without someone patting his back and telling him it will be alright. Now, I better not hear a peep from any of you for the rest of night, or else there'll be hell to pay." She scowls at each other us individually, pausing for a few moments longer on my face. "Monk. I will speak to you in the morning."
With that, she slams the door shut. Her angry stomps are audible from even in here.
Sometimes, I wonder if living here is worse than living wherever I used to.
At least back then I lived in such a haze of pain that nothing ever phased me. Now? Now, I have to be aware of everything that happens around me. No drifting off into the peacefulness of sleep whenever something I don't care about happens. Sleep is only allowed at night. The Community Home needs all hands on deck, blah blah blah. Everybody has to work in order for this place to be a well-oiled machine.
No one ever accused it of being that way, and I'm certainly not going to be the first.
I lay back against my pillows and catch Amir staring at me in the dim light. Quickly, I roll over so he can stare at my back. I don't want to look at him, knowing I woke him up and drew all this unwanted attention to myself and that everything is my fault and I can never escape my past and it will haunt me wherever I go and it's all my fault because I'm such a failure that not even the Community Home wants me—
After nightmare-memories like tonight, I don't even bother going back to sleep. It's not like I'm going to manage to anyway. I never sleep for longer than a few hours anymore. Everyone else basically sees my nightmares as akin to a baby's cries. It happens, without fail, every night. But instead of being comforted, people just glare at me the next morning. But I deserve it. I don't deserve to be comforted. I deserve to be brushed under the rug and ignored. I don't matter, in the grand scheme of things. I never have, and I never will.
Sometimes, I almost wish I could go back. I wish I could back to when I never had to do anything. Where I just laid on the floor in a pool of my own blood, listening as the man rages in the background and beats me when he's bored. Is that really too much to ask?
A/N: Anyway catch a reference to a (now deceased) tribute from TYAU in Vanye's part? It's hardly in there, but I just kind of felt like adding it in for no reason. Who doesn't want more heartache?
What do you think of Vanye? Of Monk? Who do you prefer? Who do you think will last longer? If you submitted either, how'd I do?
Random Question of the Day: what is the most useless sponsor gift you could be given in the Games?
My answer: a nerf gun, maybe. At least it would be funny.
Please review,
Amanda