A/N
I know you guys are probably very excited to learn more about Joseph, but in order to tell Joseph's story I have to start at the very beginning! ;)
But I promise Joseph will definitely make an appearance in the next chapter. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this one!
I remember the year Gideon got reaped.
It was the first time someone close to me died in the Games.
I spent my entire life watching my cousins get ripped apart on national television, but they were all years older than me, so I wasn't close to any of them.
It wasn't until I was ten that I began worrying that someone from my age group would get reaped, whether it was a cousin or a friend. Gideon was both.
He was only twelve when he was reaped. He died within the very first day of the Games.
The people of twelve were so used to losing their tributes in the Games, that they went along with their business as usual and acted like nothing had changed.
Of course, the grocers cried over their son's death and even closed down their shop for a while. But soon enough they got back to work and the store was reopened. The people of 12 needed to get their fruits and vegetables somehow.
They also needed to get their bread. The bakery stayed open even as the games aired, under a restricted schedule of course. We had to make time to watch the Games everyday.
After the Games had ended in the fall, the bakery resumed operating under its normal hours. I was ten by then, so I had already been working at the bakery for two years.
At first, I only did the small jobs, like sweeping the floors and washing the dishes. My parents wouldn't let me go near the ovens until I was at old enough, so I was excited when I was finally allowed to bake. About a year after Gideon's death, I had finally started baking cookies.
My brother Patrick, who was seventeen at the time, was teaching me how to frost them.
"Peeta this looks terrible," he said honestly "No one's going to buy this. You've got to start over."
He placed the tray on the counter and began emptying the cookies into a bag.
"It looks fine to me," Percy said taking a cookie from the tray and stuffing it in his face.
"That's because you'll eat anything you set your eyes on," Pat said.
"I can't help it, I'm a growing boy," Percy answered sarcastically.
"Doesn't look like it," Pat jibed back.
"Maybe if I bash your head in it'll help you see better."
"No, that won't work. You'll still be an annoying little brat. And a lazy one too. Have you even done any work since you got here?
"Yeah, I made a loaf of bread," he said.
"That's all you've done? You've been in here for an hour!"
"But it's so early in the morning," he whined.
"Well, that's the life of a baker. You wake up early and bake enough bread to feed the entire district."
"That sucks," Percy groaned. "I don't want to spend the rest of my life doing that."
"Too bad. You don't have much of a choice. You can marry a girl when your eighteen and practice her family's trade, but until then, you're stuck here."
"Those are my only two choices? I'd rather be a Victor."
"Fat chance of that happening," Pat scoffed.
"You get to live in a big fancy house, and sleep in all day. You get all the ladies. And all the booze. That's how I want to live."
"Yeah, but first, you've got to win the Games," Pat reminded him.
"So what you're saying I can't win the games?"
"Win?" Pat laughed. "You wouldn't last a day!"
"Yeah, I would! I can fight off all those bastards at the Cornucopia."
"No you can't. You can't even fight me! You wouldn't stand a chance against someone whose been trained all their life."
"Yeah I could. With the proper training."
"And where do you plan on getting this 'proper training'? We don't have training programs here in 12. What do you think, you live in district two now?"
I stifled a laugh.
"What are you laughing at?"
"Nothing. It's just—you wouldn't last at the Cornucopia. No one ever does."
"Oh, what do you know?"
"He's right, pretty much everybody from twelve dies at the Cornucopia." Pat agreed.
"Gideon didn't."
"That's because he ran in the other direction," I pointed out.
"Okay, so, I'll do the same thing."
"He had three other tributes chasing after him," Pat reminded him. "He was lucky the snow held them off. Otherwise he would have never made it to the cave alive."
"Even then the tiger could've easily ripped him apart," I said.
"Yeah, but he didn't."
"Only because there was another tribute behind him," Pat explained. "The tiger must have felt more threatened by the boy with the spear so he attacked him instead."
"If he hadn't been there, Gideon would've been the one getting ripped to shreds," I added grimly.
"But he got away," Percy argued.
"He got lucky," Pat corrected.
"Lucky enough to get to an abandoned cave. After that, he could've survived."
"He froze to death."
Percy took a moment to stuff another cookie in his face, before responding.
"All you need is a coat. It doesn't take a genius to figure that out."
"You're such an idiot!" Percy scolded. "Where are you going to get a coat when you're stuck in the middle of the arena?"
"I'll kill a deer or something."
"And how are you going to do that without any weapons?"
"I'll find someone with a weapon and I'll fight it off them, duh. Then I'll skin the deer."
"You don't even know how to skin a deer," I said.
"Lets pretend that he does," Pat proposed. "How do you know the other tribute won't kill you first?"
"He won't. I'm good with hand to hand combat."
"It doesn't matter how good you are at fighting, the arena will kill you off anyway. You'll freeze to death like Gideon."
"Or you'll get sucked into quicksand like Bobby," I added. "Or get trapped in a bed of ivy like Vanessa. Remember that? That looked pretty awful. She was screaming for hours."
"Any idiot can get past that if they just learn some basic survival skills. That's what training's for."
"Again with the training? You're not going to get trained! This isn't District one or two," Pat sighed. "You know what? Get back to work. You're doing way too much talking and not enough baking."
"Baking is a complete waste of my time! How is learning how to bake cookies going to help me survive in the arena?"
"Maybe you'll get hungry," I joked.
I automatically felt his hand swipe the back of my head.
"Ow," I cried in response.
"That's what you get for trying to be smart, pinhead."
"Hey, don't get distracted," Pat warned. "Mom will be here any minute. Percy you finish up with the bread, and then start on the cookies. Peeta try not to mess up the frosting this time. I can't keep hiding all the bad batches you've made. Mom will find out soon enough."
I nodded. Every time I made a bad batch of cookies, my mom would hit me. Patrick tried to protect me by hiding the cookies from mom, but when she found out she'd just hit the both of us. I knew this routine well enough to know that this time, I had to make the cookies perfect.
"Just try to get everything done before mom comes, alright? I'm going to go help dad out in the front."
With that, Patrick left the room, leaving us to finish our work on our own.
Percy finally finished his second loaf of bread just as soon as I began working on my last tray of cookies. He brought three trays of cookies to where I was standing, and placed them all on the counter beside me.
"I bet I could finish all these trays before you do that one," he challenged.
"But I've already started."
"So? I can still beat you," he smirked.
"Alright, you're on," I said, convinced I would surely be the one to win.
Check out the next chapter to see what Peeta and Percy bet on! ;)
