Chapter 5: Prologue 5
[April – December 2371 AD – POV Timotheus Sinterguth – Erlangen, Bavaria]
After the remarkable babysitting experience in April, when Lily had been scared by a thunderstorm and I had been able to comfort and soothe her on the couch, the Madison family and I spent a lot of time together, and it was a relation which provided benefits for both sides. They had found a young man who was accepted and liked by both of their daughters and whom they could trust with babysitting and other tasks, and I had found friends and had realized that spending time with a young family warmed my heart.
Consequently, when Rue had her fourth birthday in May, I was invited, and I gladly came. I felt a little out of place, being the only adult guest next to a group of very young girls, but Rue started to introduce me as her 'boyfriend', which I actually liked, and I did not mind at all playing with the kids, with dolls and such. I called Rue 'my little girlfriend', and she giggled and liked that, too. When Rue's mother saw me fully involved in playing she said:
"Mr. Sinterguth, you are not really an adult, I think. You are a kid with a driver's license."
She had a point, and sometimes I felt like a kid indeed. But that was alright, and I hoped that I'd never grow into a full adult, mentally at least.
Taking advantage of the nice spring and early summer weather, I spent more time in the city park again, and occasionally I met the two Madison girls and her mother there. Sometimes Mrs. Madison asked me if I'd mind to supervise her children for an hour or so while she went shopping, and that was totally fine for me. I'd either sit on a bench close to the playground with the girls having fun there, or we'd sit on a bench close to the lake, with Lily reading a book to her little sister, me reading a book to both of them, or all three of us eating an ice cream.
On one of those sunny and warm days we all had had an ice cream, Lily was right of me and Rue left, and both of them were cuddled cozily into my side and smiling happily after we had enjoyed our snack. Right at that time Norbert, one of my best friends, came along with his girlfriend Anne. Norbert was a couple of years younger than I was and lived not far away; he studied medical sciences at the local university, and both he and Anne were members of the same church community I belonged to as well. When the two of them saw me and the two girls, they started to smile, and Norbert said with a smirk:
"Will you look at that; we thought that you've been single for quite some time, and here we see you with not one, but two girlfriends!"
Lily and Rue started to giggle, and Anne added, chuckling a little bit: "Well, that's Timotheus and his girls, isn't it?"
I introduced everybody, and the two of them stayed and talked with us for a few minutes before they went on.
During summer the Madisons and I had a week of vacation on the beach together. We shared a vacation home, and while I had my own bedroom and bathroom, it happened a few times that Rue, when she woke up in the morning, came over from the room she shared with Lily and hopped into my bed to talk and get some attention. The girls knew that their parents were not morning persons and that I was much more likely to welcome them at this early time. Once we had a thunderstorm during the night, and Lily vanished into her parents' bed to seek comfort. Rue, suddenly left alone in her room and not liking that at all, decided to have me for company and stayed with me in my bed for the entire night, and we got along splendidly. I felt like being her big brother or favorite uncle and was very much proud of that. When her parents looked for her in the next morning, Rue was still at my side and smiling in her sleep.
We spent many hours on the beach, and I was happily playing in the sand with Rue, building roads, towers and sandcastles, and taking her for a swim, allowing her to cling to my neck when she got exhausted. The only little girls I had ever spent much time with were my cousins Ruth in District Twelve and Daniela in District Sixteen. With Rue, I felt like she was a like a cousin or little sister, too, and it was much more fun than I had expected. Rue's parents were delighted to see her that close with me and did not mind at all. In the last years, their vacation time had been mostly dominated by parenting rather than anything else, and they were quite happy to find some time for themselves for a change, specifically as Lily was old enough to not require constant supervision any longer.
In early fall we visited the zoo in Nürnberg together. This was a lot of fun, and some of the animals looked strangely at us. When we got to the brown bear exhibit, we were all looking forward to see the young cubs we had read about in the local newspaper, but one of the employees told us that Mama bear had not shown them outside since giving birth, and we'd probably not be able to see them today. Little Rue looked at Mama bear who was outside on her own at this time, and the bear looked back, and it almost appeared like they were communicating with each other. After five minutes or so, when we were about to leave that place, Rue asked us to wait:
"Wait, please – she is going to bring the cubs out now!"
"How would you know?" Rue's mother wanted to know.
"I just know!" was the answer.
The adult bear went inside, and indeed, after a few minutes it came out again with the two cubs in tow. Everybody around was happy and clapping, and Rue beamed.
"How could you have known, really?" I also asked now.
"I asked her to bring them out for us to see!"
Okay, that was weird, but probably just coincidence.
Later on, when our time in the zoo was almost over, Lily stumbled over a root close to a tree and scratched her left knee, so that some blood showed. I expected some whining or so, but she took it easy, and her parents did not even apply a band-aid or similar. When I asked if something should be done to stop the bleeding, I was told by her mother:
"No reason to do anything; Lily heals very quickly."
And indeed, the bleeding had already stopped, and when we got home, the skin was almost as good as new. That was almost a little bit scary, but kids did heal much more quickly than adults, and I guess that this was a good capability to have.
This time I arranged a phone call between my twin brother and me, in the evening my time which was early afternoon his time. I mentioned the event with the bear cubs, and he mused:
"Maybe your Rue is something like a horse whisperer?"
"People like that really exist?
"I think so, yes. We have a few people in the ranger teams who can make their search dogs do practically anything. Once I was on a tour with one of them, and we encountered a black bear with cubs. I knew exactly that this was dangerous and got my tranquilizer gun ready, but he just pushed me back behind him, held up his hands horizontally and started to hum something. The bear calmed down, and after a few minutes one of the cubs came closer. My friend gently touched it at the side of the head a few times, the cub sat down and purred, and I could have sworn that the bear mother even smiled at us. I still find it hard to believe that this actually happened, but it did. Yet another few minutes later the bear and cubs slowly went away from us, and they had never shown any sign of aggression. I almost expected the bear to shake hands; it was totally incredible and kind of surreal, but it looked liked my fellow ranger had actually somehow communicated with the bears, on an empathic level."
"Okay, if you say so. I am still not convinced, but it seems indeed that she has a way with animals."
"So, you plan to wait until she is an adult and you can marry her?"
We both laughed, and I replied: "Come on, she's four; I am not that patient. What about yourself?"
I heard a sigh and the response: "The girl I like best by far is still little Ruthie. I fear that I measure all girls I meet by her, and all of them fall short. None of them have passed the playground test yet."
Yep, I knew about his playground test with Ruth pretending to be his daughter. Ruth was the best little sister somebody could have, and I thought that one day she would be a wonderful woman and wife to somebody. Both my cousin and I were going to make sure, of course, that she only got the best husband ever, and we were fully prepared to apply various torture levels to any boy or man who'd ever hurt her.
Just a few weeks after school had started again in early September, the Madison family and I went to visit a large adventure playground on a weekend. After we had had quite some fun together with the two girls, we three adults took a break while Rue and Lily continued to run around, and together with some other young children they had met, they apparently enjoyed climbing, sliding, and just being kids.
We adults used the opportunity to talk about various topics not so much suited for young kids, and eventually I asked about more details related to their heritage. Mr. Madison told me:
"Yes, indeed, Mr. Sinterguth, we are quite proud to be related to young Rue who was a tribute in the 74th Hunger Games. Her parents had six children in total, and Rue had been the eldest, getting reaped shortly after the 12th birthday. One of her brothers, Liam, five years younger than her, founded a family of his own as an adult, and he and his wife also had several children. Liam was my great-grandfather, and our family has always lived in District Eleven."
"And why did you actually decide to come over to Europe?"
Mrs. Madison smiled and took that one: "My own ancestors are from Europe, from an area close to Linz in Oberösterreich (Upper Austria). My parents moved to Panem՚s District Eleven just after getting married, as they had married against their parents' wishes and were not welcome there any longer. They had both grown up on big farms, and Eleven welcomed them with open arms. Thus, I grew up on a farm in District Eleven, and my future husband happened to be on the next farm, so that we met from time to time."
"When I grew up, though" Mr. Madison added, "I wanted to do something else but farming. I have always been interested in the orchards in other areas of Eleven, and me moved there after getting married. We started to get involved with variants of trees, adapted to different climate zones, and when our two girls were born and we had already seen agricultural areas in a few other districts, we gladly accepted an opportunity to travel to Europe for a few years and learn more about orchards and trees around here. The local university sponsors an exchange program, and they help to coordinate the information exchange, and that's why we are here in Erlangen."
"Wow, that's quite interesting. We sure have a lot of orchards in Central Europe as well, and I have seen some of them."
Mr. Madison now wanted to know: "You said that you also have ancestors over in Panem, right?"
"Yes, I do" I nodded. "As I had mentioned earlier, my family goes back to the Mellark bakery in old District Twelve, and I still have relatives over there. Two of my uncles and a cousin run the Mellark baking company in Appacolia, and once or twice as year I still see them. I am very close to another one of my cousins, who was born on the same day as me, and we consider ourselves twin cousins."
"Really?" Mrs. Madison asked.
"Well, our mothers are identical twins, and I guess that this shows. There is the other part of the family, too, the Sinterguth clan. They started in former Germany, not far from here, and now we have our major sites in the 'Fränkische Schweiz' region not far from here and in 'Rainbow Valley' in District Sixteen. I am lucky and privileged to have such interesting families, and I am proud to know that our wealth is not used to support a lazy and spoiled life for ourselves, but that we give a lot. We have the Sinterguth foundation, spending significant effort to help poorer regions in the world, for instance, and the Mellark bakery runs a few soup kitchens, proving food for free for the poor in the area."
We continued to talk about this and that, and we also got a little bit sentimental, thinking back to the violent deaths of tributes in the Hunger Games.
"The scene when Rue was about to die and Katniss held her hand and sang that special song is something we will never forget" Mrs. Madison told me.
"Yes, I can understand this. We almost always watch this, too, when we celebrate Christmas."
About a year after I had first met them, the Madisons told me that it was time for them to move back to Panem, to their home area in district Eleven, and I was not happy to hear that at all. Both Rue and Lily had tears in their eyes when they learned about that, and when they had to take their leave from me, they jumped into my arms and I got a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek from each girl and a very warm handshake from their parents.
Saying 'Good Bye' was sad, indeed, but I promised to write when I got their new address. A few weeks later, I got a letter indeed and wrote back a few days later, and this worked well for a few months; most of the time either Lily or Mrs. Madison wrote letters, and a few times simple drawings from Rue were attached. I always replied promptly.
Meanwhile I focused on my work once more. Since I had completed my diploma, I had been working for my professor, and I had never regretted the decision to accept his offer. The focus of my scientific investigations was on storage options for electrical energy. While we had made a lot of progress on generation of electricity mostly based on solar power and wind power, complemented by hydro power, bio gas and a few others, means to store energy were still limited. On a smaller scale, we now had very efficient batteries for vehicles and such, but they were too expensive and required too may raw materials for large scale use. So, what to do with the excess energy on a sunny and windy day, and what to do about the lack of energy on a calm and cloudy day? Both my twin cousin and I had a favorite for that – pumped storage hydro power. My cousin did research in this direction as well, but while I focused more on the technical aspects, his emphasis was on the compatibility with nature, optimizing efficiency by best use of geological formations and minimal impact on rare species of fauna and flora. For ecological engineering, the two universities – the University of Erlangen I worked at and the University of Appacolia he worked at – had a close cooperation, and our respective professors encouraged us to work together and exchange information. As languages were different, though, all documents needed to be available in both languages – German and English – which created some additional effort, but that was required and worthwhile to do.
In addition to work, there was also my church community. A few years ago, after some dark events which had happened to me at that time here in Erlangen, I had started to attend a home bible study group, and once a week, in early evening, we usually met at a friend's place. Markus and Ulrike had a large apartment and a baby already, and it was easier for them if we all met there rather than somewhere else. Ulrike always served some drinks and a few snacks, and I was happy that I was not the only one around who abstained from drinking anything with alcohol in it. A few friends sometimes consumed a small glass of wine, but most of the time we were all happy with water and fruit juices.
Sometimes I would miss a meeting because I was either busy or was traveling, but I went there whenever I could, and it was actually more interesting than I had originally imagines. Before I had joined, I had imagined bible study groups to be boring and dull, only focused on reading, but in reality the focus was on discussing above and beyond the reading. For many verses and sections in the scriptures, we tried to find analogies in real life, and almost always somebody came up with a useful example, which was sometimes even quite entertaining, and many times this provided something to think about. We always also had a fun part where we just talked or somebody showed photos or videos or so, and I had once or twice already provided some insight into life in Panem, specifically where my twin cousin lived.
Going to church on Sunday mornings was also something I tried to do every other week or so. Luckily our pastor was a young man dedicated to his profession, and he always managed to illustrate his sermons with nice and fitting examples, to make the message easier to understand.
Thus, although I tended to have a lack of social life in general, growing into the church community by attending services, meeting people with similar believes and interests and specifically going to the weekly home bible study group changed my life for the better. Outside of that community I was still shy, but at least inside I started to warm up to the concept of having friends outside of family, and I started to enjoy that. Spending time with the Madisons had also helped to overcome my shyness with people a little bit better, and I got more contacts now in my church community. I was looking forward to where this might lead me.
A few months later I received another letter from the Madison family in Panem, telling me that they were about to move once again. A special job was offered to both of them, and it was too good to ignore, they wrote. They were not able or willing to tell more details yet, but they promised to send mail again once they were settled in their new home.
However, that was the end of the conversation – no more letters arrived, although they had told me before that they'd write again from the new address. I was concerned, disappointed and sad, but maybe they were getting too busy. Anyway, I needed to focus on my work and could not afford to reflect on them too much.
When I traveled to the yearly family Christmas celebration in Rainbow Valley in Panem this year, I shared my room and bed with my cousin Daniela, as we had done so many times before; she was like my little sister, and we had no secrets from each other. I told her about the latest events and that I missed the letters, and she tried to comfort me:
"Oh yes, Tim, I can understand so well how one can get attached to some people emotionally. It's like with you and me, I guess. You have been there for me since I can remember, and you have always been my closest friend. Tim, I am sure that eventually you will find the love of your life, too!"
Yes, so I hoped as well. Meanwhile, the one year I had spent with the Madison family would never be forgotten, and in particular the two girls would stay in my memory forever. During the time with all four of the family, I had been integrated into their family life almost like a big brother to their girls at times; they had trusted me with babysitting, spending extended periods of time with Rue, helping Lily with her homework, and much more. The one year we had had together was an important part of my life, and it was something I valued and cherished a lot; I missed them, but nevertheless life went on. Maybe I'd get a chance to meet them again later on in my life?
[Author's Notes: This chapter ends the prologue part, and we will get into the main story next, with chapter 6, skipping more than one year. I hope that you enjoyed the prologue chapters; at least now we know why the story is titled 'Timotheus and his girls'. Please let me know what you think.
BTW, I don't think that there are a lot of FF stories showing the Hunger Games world many years after the events in the books, right? If you are aware of some, please let me know for comparison.]
- END OF PROLOGUE -