It's a beautiful clear day when we arrive at the Capitol. Effie wakes everyone up at the crack of dawn to get dressed before Twelve makes their first impression on the Capitol citizens. I take a shower and choose my clothing carefully. Something shapeless. I don't want to appear particularly attractive to the public. Besides, I'm not the one on display so what I wear isn't that important.
I select a black floor-length dress that's much larger than my slight frame, grinning at my triumph as I make my way down to the car with the TV, where Effie is waiting. Peeta and Haymitch burst out laughing when they see my outfit. Effie grimaces.
I have a response prepared: "I'm representing the district," I tell Effie, smiling broadly.
"How so?" She wrinkles her nose.
"We mine coal. Coal is black." I gesture toward my outfit with numerous flourishes.
"There are plenty of other black things in your room if that's really what you want to wear," Effie fires back. "Change, and if you come back looking like that again, then I will have to help you pick something out."
Oh no, I definitely don't want Effie picking my clothes. I'm going to end up looking like…
Well, like her.
Today, Effie is dressed in a hideous yellow atrocity. The entire outfit is so bright I can't look at her clothes for more than five seconds without risking a headache. Maybe my strategy to be unnoticed should be to stand next to her for the rest of the day.
When I reach my room again, there's an Avox tidying up. She's making the bed, and as I look at the rumpled sheets, I can't help but think about the previous night.
I'd spent the greater part of the day coaching Lucy on the Capitol and what to expect from other district representatives. I'd told her about my experience in the Games, specifically the interactions I'd had with the other tributes. I knew that my extensive reminiscing meant the nightmares would be worse than normal.
I was brushing my hair before bed when the door opened tentatively.
Peeta.
"Are you busy?" he asked.
"You can come in," I said, hoping my voice wouldn't betray how badly I wanted him to stay. Selfish.
"Haymitch told me to come here," he said, avoiding eye contact.
"He wants you to sleep here," I concluded.
"Yes," Peeta said, wringing his hands. "I can tell him that's not possible. I won't stay unless you want me to."
"Have you been having nightmares too?" I asked, turning the brush over in my hands. "The past couple of nights I mean?"
Peeta nodded. "Worse than normal. I didn't realize mentoring would be this hard."
I sighed. "I just spent six hours reliving it for Lucy. The nightmares will be bad tonight."
"Does that mean you don't want me to stay?" Peeta asked. I peeked at his expression but couldn't tell what response he was hoping for.
"Peeta, you've been avoiding me," I said, sidestepping his question entirely.
"Well, of course I have," he said. "Did you really expect anything different after you spent the last six months ignoring me? After the things you said in the Justice Building on the day of the reaping?" I didn't say anything and Peeta continued. "You have no idea how much it hurts me when I see you walking around Twelve with your boyfriend."
"This has nothing to do with Gale," I said.
Peeta scoffed. "It has everything to do with Gale."
"Gale is the natural path my life would have taken if Prim hadn't been reaped!" I argued.
"You sound like Rose when she talks to Ash," Peeta said, shrugging. "And you're right. If Prim hadn't been reaped, you wouldn't have volunteered, and then I would have died in the Games, and we wouldn't be sitting here right now talking to each other. But that's not what happened. Prim was reaped, and you took her place, and you saved my life, and now in the eyes of the Capitol we're linked together." He laughed, mirthless. "Unless you want to be their whore."
I started at his language, something I'd never expected to hear coming from his lips.
"Live in reality, sweetheart," he said dryly, patting me on the back.
"You sound like Haymitch," I accused.
"Good," Peeta said. "You listen to him."
"Stay, or don't. It doesn't matter to me," I said, curling up on the bed and turning away from him.
The creak of the room door opening made me turn back over. Peeta had one foot out the door when I got up and called out for him.
I still had the nightmares, but Peeta's presence was enough to keep them bearable.
He snuck out of the room early this morning, so that Effie wouldn't find him when she came to wake us up. In his hurry, he forgot his socks—they're on the floor by the window, blending in with the dark blue carpet. I don't think the Avox has noticed them.
I choose a blue tunic and pants, inspired by Peeta's socks. These clothes are still loose by Capitol standards, but hopefully fitted enough to satisfy Effie. When I return to the TV car, everyone else is there waiting for me. Effie nods at me once, and I take this to mean she won't make me change clothes again.
I peek out the window and see the crowds waiting to greet us. Peeta winks at me and opens one, reaching out a hand to wave at those assembled at the station. "It starts now," he says to the tributes. "Make them love you. Be unforgettable."
Lucy looks at me, questioning. Trying to please everybody won't come easily to her—it didn't for me either. "Do your best," I tell her. "We can figure the rest out later."
Effie leads the way out the train. Haymitch is next, followed by Lucy, then Rose, then Ash. Peeta and I bring up the rear, and I notice that the cheers for us are significantly louder than those for our tributes. My stomach twists into uncomfortable knots that only go away when Peeta squeezes my hand reassuringly. A giant monitor mounted in the square shows a close-up of our entwined fingers. Is Gale seeing this right now?
We are loaded into a car and taken to the Training Center. The tributes are taken to meet their prep teams while Haymitch, Peeta, Effie, and I are taken to a large room in the basement of the Training Center for breakfast. The room is decorated beautifully with flowers and colored lights, and tables overflowing with food—with a shock, I realize that this is the same room where the tributes receive training prior to the Games. I wonder where the weapons are stored during this event.
"Weren't expecting this, were you sweetheart?" Haymitch chuckles, nudging me in the side. "The Capitol always has this nice little mentor reunion every year while the tributes are getting ready for the opening ceremonies. This is also where the mentors do their work during the Games. Here, let me introduce you both to some of my friends."
Peeta and I head wearily to a table in the corner of the room, clutching plates of food.
"That was exhausting for me, and I actually like talking to new people," he says. "How was it for you?"
"It was interesting to meet all these people we've only seen on TV before," I reply. "I really liked Wiress and Beetee from Three."
Peeta laughs. "Johanna from Seven called them Nuts and Volts," he says. "I'm not sure which is which."
I frown. "Well that's not very nice. They're both brilliantly smart. I mean, remember how Beetee won his Games by building a trap with electrical wire?"
"Nice doesn't win you the Games," Peeta says. "No one here is particularly nice."
"Except you."
Peeta shrugs. "Well, I kind of won by accident. Of the two of us, you're the victor."
"We're both victors or we wouldn't be in this room," I say.
"Well put." We both turn our heads and see Finnick Odair approaching our table. "I was wondering where the two of you had gone."
"I was hungry," I say defensively. "No one else seems to be eating."
Finnick grins widely and pulls up a chair to our table. "Astute observation." He grabs a piece of fruit off my plate and pops it in his mouth. "We have more important things to be getting on with."
"Like what?" Peeta asks, curious.
"Alliances, strategy, making friends. It's especially important for you two since you're new. There's no time for it once the Games actually start."
"You make it sound like it's as important as what the tributes are dealing with," I retort, quoting Haymitch. "We're not the ones that matter here."
"I respectfully disagree," Finnick says, now twirling a breadstick between his fingers. "We are the Capitol's darlings, celebrities of the highest status. Those tributes will all be dead soon, except for the one who will join us here. We are the ones that matter, not them."
Finnick sees the outrage on my face and smiles lazily. "Katniss, darling, you need to learn some distance. It's the only way to do this every year and not lose your mind."
"Don't call me that," I mutter as Finnick turns to Peeta.
"So is it true you've got yourself another pair of star-crossed lovers?" he asks. "Do you really think the Capitol will go for that two years in a row?"
"I didn't choose them as tributes," Peeta says. "Rose and Ash are doing their best."
Finnick nods. "At least you're not Chaff," he says, pointing to the other side of the room where the grizzled man is standing next to his mentor partner, Willow, and Haymitch. "I counted more than twenty tributes. That's basically half the pool."
"Are we talking about Eleven?" Johanna Mason says, loping over from her perch next to the champagne. "I saw you pointing at Chaff."
"How is he going to handle it with just Willow and Seeder to help?" Finnick wonders. "The three of them are very capable, but there's no way they can manage that many people."
"Hopefully most of them die off in the beginning," Johanna says. "Then they can focus on the ones with an actual chance." She looks around for another chair, but ultimately decides to sit on the table so she doesn't have to drag one over. "My tributes are useless," she adds. "Neither of them wants to take either of us seriously because they're 'volunteers' and they've 'had time to practice'." She rolls her eyes. "As if any amount of practice gets you ready for what's waiting in there. In any case, it makes my job easier, so what do I care?"
"Twelve is going to have a rough time in interviews and training scores this year with all of Eleven's tributes," Finnick comments. "You guys always go last, and I don't know if anyone will have the energy to pay attention through all of it."
"I hadn't thought of that," Peeta says, frowning. "But I'm sure if we put together a good angle, the three of them should be able to snap anyone out of a stupor."
"They made it work in the second Quell," I add. "That one had forty-eight tributes."
Finnick nods appreciatively. "True, and Haymitch did manage to win that one, so Twelve must have made a decent impression."
"That may have had more to do with Haymitch himself than anything," I mutter, and I'm surprised to hear Finnick's and Johanna's appreciative laughter.
"Making friends, sweetheart?" Haymitch says, coming over to clap me on the back. "Well done!" He turns to Chaff, who is standing right behind him. "You wouldn't believe it, but this is probably the first time she's listened to me about anything!"
I scowl as Finnick, Johanna, and Peeta laugh loudly.
"That's more like it," Haymitch says, guffawing now as well.
"Any chance for an alliance?" Chaff says, nodding at Peeta and me. "Haymitch suggested your tributes might be open to one."
"With which tributes?" Johanna asks, raising an eyebrow.
"Any of them!" Chaff says. "They can have their pick, as far as I'm concerned. And I'd appreciate the extra pair of eyes. Twenty-three tributes is no joke."
"Twenty-three tributes?" Finnick furrows his brow. "Hey, so what happened when the Capitol broadcast of the reaping cut out?"
Chaff leans in. "Officially, it was an issue with the electricity in Eleven."
"And unofficially?" Finnick prods, dropping his voice so low I have to strain to listen.
"No volunteers," Chaff says, looking around the room furtively.
"Shame the issue with the electricity had to happen on reaping day!" Finnick says brightly to cover the hush falling over the rest of the group.
"Shame indeed," Peeta echoes, catching on quickly, adding, "So twenty-three tributes? If you tell me some more about them, I can talk to Ash and see what he thinks."
I don't listen to Chaff. My mind is still reeling at the news about Eleven. For a minute, my mind drifts back to Rue, the twelve-year-old girl from Eleven who participated in my Games, who died in my arms after being speared by the boy from One. I imagine Chaff having to take care of twenty-three girls just like her and tears prick at my eyes. Rue was more than an ally—she was a dear friend. District Eleven may have sent a strong message to the Capitol, but was that message worth the lives of all those kids who didn't need to die this year?
