Mink Abbey- District Nine (18)

Volunteering was the biggest regret of my life. I learned that too late and I would always condemn myself for it.

I hadn't wanted to ally with Demetria. Who would want to ally with a thirteen-year-old girl who'd never hurt anyone in her life? I wish I could say I did it to be noble or heroic. I just did it because I felt obligated. It doesn't matter, I'd told myself. She'll die in the Bloodbath anyway. What a thing to think about a human being. What a realization to see firsthand how many other people felt the same way.

Demetria didn't die in the Bloodbath and neither did I. Once we saw the Arena we knew it would be stupid to run toward the Cornucopia. We ran down a corridor of stores and didn't stop until the Careers were out of sight. We got lucky- none of them came after us. Later I would reflect that it was because of Demetria. They thought anyone who would ally with Demetria wasn't worth wasting their time. In a moment out of some feel-good book cliche Demetria saved my life.

We set up shop in a beauty store. It was Demetria's idea, naturally. It did make some sense. The Careers would look for Tributes in a food store or a hardware store. They wouldn't look in a store that had nothing but jar after jar of lotion and face cream and therapeutic sand. We were lucky they didn't look anyway, since we found a few rows of mineral water bottles tucked in with the beauty sand. Demetria made herself a little nest behind the register and I tomcatted around looking for interesting stuff. Pretty quick I found a toy store and made myself a spear out of one of those horse sticks you pretend to ride on. I practiced aiming at wads of paper towels while Demetria opened all the scented jars and smelled them.

It turned out Demetria was a pretty cool kid. She told me about her friends back home and how she wanted to be a florist or maybe a baker when she grew up. One time I came back and she was wearing a ghastly face mask that made her look like she'd ripped off a rabbit's face and put it on over hers. Then she insisted I try one on and wouldn't take no for an answer. The sound of her laughing as she applied mine was the brightest memory I had of the Games. Afterward my skin did feel a lot better. I never would have believed it.

I would never know how the Careers found us. I never watched the tapes after I won. One minute we were eating some candies I'd found at the cash register of a nearby greeting card store and the next there were three Careers coming at us. I'd joined the Games for a thrill and in a single instant I learned there was no thrill for me here. There was only terror. I'd spent days practicing with my spear and fantasizing about sniping some brainless Career. I looked at the hardened athletes running toward us and the gleaming weapons they held and knew just how stupid I was.

I ran. I couldn't fight them. I couldn't even help Demetria. I couldn't pick her up and run faster than she could by herself. If she was going to live she would have to be fast enough on her own. She wasn't.

Some Victors have inspiring stories about beating the odds and triumphing over the evil Careers. I never killed a single person in my Games. I didn't even fight any. I won because Avariella Hanson had a relapse and died of a heart attack before she found me. I won the Games knowing that not only did I not deserve it, but that there were other people who had.

Only one person lives in the Nine Victor's Village. I spent a lot of time there alone in my house. No one else knew what I had gone through. Sometimes I stared at the empty rooms and wondered how Demetria would have decorated them. It was hard to celebrate when just remembering I existed meant remembering my life meant Demetria's death. I was a Victor but I wasn't sure what I was supposed to be celebrating. I had money and fame and no idea what to do with any of it. I knew one thing for sure: I didn't want any more thrills.