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Chapter 59- Terra Coppersmith
The sun shines in my kitchen window, sending streaks of light across the floor. It's beautiful. The light is beautiful, and so is the house I'm now living in, but it's not home. Home is the little house with the two windows my father put in, where I grew up, where I lived my whole life.
This house is probably ten times the size of my childhood home. The kitchen itself is bigger than the whole old house on Engineering Road. There's a library filled with books, Capitol approved of course; a living room, a parlor, six bedrooms, most of which are unused. Iry has one, and I have one, and the others are for nobody really. Three bathrooms, which nobody needs.
There's everything anyone could ever want here, and I hate it.
It's been three weeks since I came back from the Games, and I've been trying to forget it, forget any of it ever happened. I do quite well during the day, when I have Iry to look after and get to school on time. During the day I go to visit Shuttle or Woven, who also don't work. I don't go to school anymore, so I have to figure out what to do with myself.
"Victors are expected to find themselves a hobby, instead of working, you know," Woven had said a few days after we got back, over a cup of tea. "You should think about yours."
"I don't know what I like to do," I said.
"Find something. They'll want to see it by the time the Victory Tour rolls around."
"What's your hobby, then?" I asked.
Woven raised her eyebrow. "They don't care about me anymore," she said, and that's how she left it.
After three weeks, I still haven't gotten a decent conversation in with Deecey. We see each other, but our talks are superficial. Neither of us wants to breach the giant topic lying between us. I miss her so much, but I don't know how to start.
Someone knocks on the door, making me startle. I'm terrified at any sudden movement or noise. I can manage myself alright during the day, but at night it's another matter. I'm plagued all night long by nightmares of the Games, and as a result, I don't sleep much.
I try to walk as quietly as I can to the door, but it's difficult; I haven't mastered my new legs yet. I got a letter yesterday from some doctor in the Capitol saying that they'll send me crutches, so I'm waiting on that. Maybe that will make it easier to get around. I don't leave the house much anymore; mostly just to take Iry to school.
Peering through the peephole, I see that it's just Shuttle, so I open the door quickly.
"Hi," I say, stepping back awkwardly to let her in.
"Good to see you too," Shuttle says, taking off her shoes as I shut the door behind her.
"What's the latest news?" I ask as we walk into the kitchen. I pour Shuttle a cup of coffee and she wraps her fingers around it gratefully.
"The usual. Someone got whipped in the town square because they stole something; the factories are carrying on like normal. Same old District 8," she says.
Either Shuttle or Woven comes by every day to check on me. We never expressly talk about the Games, but we all know it's hanging over us. Mostly we talk about what's happening in District 8 which is, to say the least, not a lot.
"I'm thinking of getting a cat," I say.
"Oh?"
"Iry's been begging for one for years, and now I can actually afford one. Give me something to do during the day."
"Might be good for you. I can see if I can find someone who has kittens if you want," she says, and I nod.
"That would be nice. Getting around still isn't easy."
"We know, you never leave your house."
"Some doctor wrote to me telling me that they'll send crutches. That might help," I say.
"It might. Oh, I got your mail for you," Shuttle says, shoving some letters forward to me. I pick up the top envelope, marked with the Capitol seal.
"What do they want now?" I mutter.
"Something to do with the Games," Shuttle says. I roll my eyes, pulling out the single sheet of paper.
"Government sanctioned hobbies? Really?" I say, looking at the paper front and back.
"Oh, you got yours did you," Shuttle says, taking a sip of her coffee. "Better start choosing."
I look the list over and laugh at the options. "Pottery? Juggling? Birdwatching? The only birds we have here are pigeons, and even those are few and far between."
"I picked cooking as mine, back when they cared what I did," Shuttle says. "Just choose one; in a few years they'll forget about you a little bit more and move onto their next victim."
"I'm not doing juggling," I say.
"So don't. Do… flower arranging or something. Decorate your house; that can be your hobby. Easy and something you can do without too much effort."
"How about sleeping?"
"I can tell by the look of you that it's the wrong hobby. A hobby is something you like to do, Terra."
"I sleep," I say, but not convincingly.
Shuttle's face turns serious. "How are you doing, Terra?"
"Okay."
"I know you're not sleeping, so how are you holding up? The first few months are the roughest."
"I need to talk to Deecey," I say. "I mean really talk."
"So talk to her."
"She's got work right after school."
"Go find her after work. You're not physically fragile, Terra. I've seen you get around."
"It's hard," I say.
"I know it's hard. If it was easy, everyone would be a victor." Shuttle sits back in her chair across from me.
"Go see your friend. Make some sort of arrangement with her. You can drop your sister off on your way there if you need to; you know Iry likes me and Woven."
I smile at that. Iry's been so happy since I came home. She was allowed to paint her room pink, her house is huge, she has new friends in Woven and Shuttle, and I'm home. She doesn't even mind my legs; she finds them fascinating. I probably would have at eight as well.
"Promise me you won't shut yourself off from the world? You worked so hard to get back into it," Shuttle says, then glances over at the clock. "It's almost time for school to let out; I should go so you can pick Iry up."
I get up at the same time Shuttle does, and she gives me a hug on the way out.
"Go do it for Fletcher," she whispers, then she's gone, out the door and on her way home to her own mansion.
My whole body hurts with the weight of her parting words. Fletcher.
It's late summer now, and the heat beats down on my head as I walk slowly into town, towards the school. I don't like the heat; it reminds me too much of the desert. How am I going to handle winter?
There aren't many people in the streets at this hour, but the ones that are look at me suspiciously as I go by. I avoid their eyes and keep walking. It's like I've been branded on my forehead, Victor. All my life I've been ignored when I go in the streets, and this new attention makes me uncomfortable.
The bell rings just as I get to the school, so I wait awkwardly outside for my sister. She's the only one of her class that won't have to go to work after; I pulled some strings being victor and she's free to just be a kid after school now.
I recognize some of the kids from the community home, and I thank my lucky stars that I did come home. Everything might be different now, and I might not be okay, but at least Iry is safe. The kids from the home look sad, defeated; some have bruises on their faces from angry hands. I have kept Iry safe.
"Terra!" she calls over the crowd of kids talking. Her dark face lights up like the sun when she sees me, and I smile back. She means the most to me out of anyone in the world. Iry runs over and gives me a tackle hug, almost knocking me off my feet.
"How was school, munchkin?" I ask, pushing her curls that are so like mine back from her face.
"Good! We learned all about what District 8 does to help the Capitol!"
I hate the Capitol, I really do. It was their Games that took my legs, my fingers, my sanity, and now they're polluting my sister's mind, filling it with their own propaganda. I don't want to make Iry worry, though, so I keep my thoughts to myself and ruffle her hair instead.
"Ready to go home?" I ask, and she nods. We pass by my former classmates as we start to head home; some give friendly waves; others stare straight ahead like I'm not even there. Nobody knows how to treat a victor. I was eleven when Shuttle won, and she was only six years older than me. I don't remember ever saying a word to her until I got reaped, but everyone was careful around her too.
"Terra," someone calls, and I turn to see Deecey smiling nervously at me.
"Deecey," I say.
"How are you doing?" she asks.
"I'm well." This is all too formal, and all wrong for two girls who have been friends their whole lives. "Why don't you come by tonight after your shift is over?" I blurt out. Deecey smiles, the old smile that I know so well.
"Alright, that would be nice. See you after, then?"
"See you."
Iry chatters away about school all the way home, until we get to the gates of Victor's Village. "Why don't we live at home anymore?" she asks.
"This is our home now," I say.
"Why can't we go back to where we lived before?"
"Did you like it better?"
Iry thinks for a minute, her face scrunched up. "This house is nice too, but nobody else lives in here but us and Shuttle and Woven. So why do we have to live here?"
"Because I won," I say, walking up to our front door. Iry is silent for a little while more. We haven't talked about the Games either, mostly because she's eight and doesn't really understand what they mean.
"Was the Capitol pretty?" she asks once we get inside. "Is it like on television?"
"It's prettier in person," I say. I should get supper on so we can have something to give Deecey when she comes over tonight. She only works a four-hour shift for now, but that will change when she leaves school. It would have changed for me too if I hadn't been reaped.
"Maybe I can go there someday," Iry says dreamily.
"I hope you never do," I say.
"Why?"
"Because if you're in the Capitol it means you were reaped. And I never want that to happen to you."
"If I get reaped will I lose my legs too?" she asks quietly.
"Why don't you go play in your room?" I say, probably louder than I need to. Iry opens her mouth to argue, then shuts it and runs out of the kitchen. I sink down, shaking, onto the floor and bury my face in my hands. Iry being reaped is the worst thing I can think of in the whole world.
"Go. Hide. And win, Terra. Win for me. Okay? I love you."
Fletcher's words flash inside my head, as if he was speaking them to me now. I start to cry, rocking back and forth by the stove. Then the kitchen melts away and all I can see is the arena, the mountain and the sand, and Fletcher holding me by my shoulders telling me to run.
"I don't want you to fight them."
"Why not? Because I'm a girl?"
"Because I love you, that's why!"
And now he's dead and it's just me, alone in the arena, and the wind is blowing, and my hands, my hands are so cold.
"Terra! Terra!" Iry's frantic sobbing brings me back out of the arena, back into the kitchen where I'm curled up, still by the stove. Iry's face is streaked with tears and she's terrified. My fault, my fault.
"It's okay, it's okay," I say, pulling my sister in for a hug. She sobs against me, hiccupping every once in a while.
"You scared me," she says.
"I know, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to," I whisper, rocking her back and forth like I did when she was a baby. "Just some bad memories, that's all."
"Don't do it again," she says.
"I'll try not to, I promise. I'll do my best. You know I keep my promises," I say. "Why don't you go over to Shuttle's house while I pull myself together here?" I say, brushing the tears from her face. Iry nods. "You go ahead and I'll watch you from the window."
Iry runs across the street and knocks on the heavy door at Shuttle's mansion. The house is so eerily quiet now that it gives me the creeps; I feel like I'm being watched constantly. Shuttle opens her door and lets Iry in without hesitation. I feel secure knowing that my mentor is still looking out for me. She's still my mentor.
Instead of putting supper on, I slump at the kitchen table instead. I get those flashbacks sometimes, but they're getting more frequent as the weeks go by. Usually it's Fletcher telling me to run, or the snowstorm, or the morning of the last day, when I killed Calypso. My memories are haunting me and crippling me, and all I want to do is cry.
I sit like this for a long time, watching the sun go down a little through my window. It's summer; the sun doesn't go down until late. I'm grateful for that, because I can't stand the dark anymore. A lot of my demons come in the dark, preventing me from sleeping.
After a while, someone knocks at my door. My automatic thought is always that someone is outside waiting to kill me, but so far I've been wrong. Peering through the peephole I see that it's Deecey, not a murderer.
"Hey," she says. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," I say, pushing my hair back. It's particularly wild today. "Come on in."
"Where's Iry?" Deecey asks, looking around.
"She went over to Shuttle's."
"Ah."
The silence is deafening as both of us stand in the doorway too awkward to say anything else.
"I think we need to talk about everything," I finally say. Deecey nods, and we both go into the living room. I carefully perch myself on a couch, Deecey curls up in a chair across from me.
"So," she says.
"So." I have no idea where to start.
"I've missed you," Deecey says.
"Everything is so different," I agree.
"What's it like, you know, with your legs?" she asks, gesturing.
"Rough. Someone from the Capitol is going to send me crutches so I can get around easier."
Silence. I need to break the most delicate subject, but how? I finally just blurt it out.
"Fletcher," I say. Deecey jerks her head up to look at me full in the face.
"Fletcher," she says. She's waiting.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry I kissed him and everything when I know that you liked him, and it's just so messed up in my head. I didn't think either of us was going to come out alive."
"It doesn't really matter now, does it? He's dead," Deecey says, but there's a hint of bitterness in her voice.
"I worried about what you would think the whole time I was in the arena."
"So why did you do it then?"
"I don't know. I guess I just fell for him." What a terrible excuse, Terra.
"And he died for you," Deecey said. "Don't get me wrong, I'd rather have you than him back, but it's still a sucky thing to do, Terra."
"I know! I know it was, but we both knew that we were so close to death the whole time in the arena. He told me that he wanted to ask me out before all of this happened."
"And what did you say to that?"
"I told him that I would have said no if he had asked, because of you."
"Oh, so you're blaming me for it," Deecey says.
"No! I told him that I would have said no because you liked him first, and I wouldn't do that to a friend. I thought about you the whole time, but the odds of Fletcher or me getting out of the arena were so slim, I let myself love him for those few days. And now he's dead, Deecey, so it doesn't matter anymore."
There's tension between Deecey and me, and I hate it, I hate it so much. "You don't know what it was like in the arena," I start, but she interrupts me.
"So tell me! You've been back three weeks and you don't tell me anything! You came home and you're obviously broken, and you don't leave the house except for Iry, and I don't know if I can talk to you like I used to anymore."
"It hurts, Deecey! The arena messed me up, it's messed everyone who's ever won up, and I don't know how to handle it. I don't talk about it because it's too painful to remember, but I remember it every night, every single night!"
Deecey has frozen, looking at me with a mixture of anger and pity, which I hate. "Listen, Terra. You've come home and you're not my friend who left. You're someone different, you've changed a heck of a lot, but you're still my friend. And I want to help you! Please, let me help you! I've missed you so much and I prayed for you every night when you were in the Capitol, for you to come home. And now you're back and nothing's as it was. God, I miss you," she says.
"I'm sorry about Fletcher," I whisper.
"I never talked to the boy in my life. I liked him, but I never knew him. Stop beating yourself up about it now; it doesn't matter. He's dead, it doesn't matter at all now. You're home, that's all that matters. And please, please Terra! Don't cut yourself off because of him."
"Everyone looks at me like I'm diseased or something when I walk down the street," I say, running my hands up and down my arms, searching for something to hold onto.
"You're a victor. We've had so few victors, Terra; in the history of the Games we've had four."
"We're doing better than 12; they've only had one," I point out.
"Yes, and the Careers districts have at least a half dozen each. The point is, you won. You're automatically different from everyone else in the districts. I hear the talking in the factories, in school. Everyone is proud of you; is happy for the food parcels we're going to get for the next year. But it's so rare to have a tribute come home."
"I'm glad I came home," I say, and I mean it this time.
"I am too. You have no idea how terrified I was at the fact you might not ever get back to District 8. Iry was scared too, but we distracted her from the Games a lot. We didn't make her watch a lot of it."
"Thanks. She's too young to really understand," I say.
Another pause.
"I want to understand, Terra. What it was like in the arena," Deecey says. I shake my head.
"I'm not ready to talk about it yet. I don't know if I'll ever be able to."
"That bad?" Deecey asks.
"It was a living nightmare," is all I'll say.
Deecey leaves her chair to come sit next to me. She laces her fingers in with mine, like we used to as kids. "You're my best friend; don't distance yourself from me. Makes me think you hate me or something."
"I could never hate you," I say. "Everything's just been confusing and awful lately."
"Yeah."
More silence.
"I don't care what you did in there, you'll always be my friend. I forgive you everything," she says, and I hug her tightly.
"I wish things had worked out differently," I whisper.
"Me too. But life carries on, doesn't it?"
"I suppose it does."
Another knock at the door makes us both jump. "I hate it when people come to the door," I say. Deecey helps me up then we both go to open the door; standing outside is Shuttle with Iry.
"Can she come home now? She's tired," Shuttle says. "Hello, Deecey."
"Hi Shuttle," Deecey says. They don't know each other at all really, but they respect each other. "Iry, come on. Want me to put you to bed?"
Iry nods and takes Deecey's hand, and together they go upstairs. Shuttle looks at me concernedly.
"Are you okay, Terra? Iry said that you were on the ground and crying."
"Had a flashback," I say.
"You're too tired. You need to get more sleep," Shuttle says.
"I don't like being alone at night," I admit.
"You need sleep; want me to stay the night? Might help with the nightmares."
I nod. "Okay."
"Right, I'll go make a bed up for myself," Shuttle says, locking the door behind her, taking off her boots, and heading upstairs.
"Shuttle?" I call after her.
"Yes?"
"Who stayed with you when you were a victor?"
"My mother," she says, then she's gone. It really strikes home that I'm an orphan. I miss my father so much, and I wonder what he'd think of who I've become. I wish he hadn't died. Both him and my mother. I was Iry's age when she died, but I remember her singing and her beautiful face waking me up each morning. I touch her ring that I have hanging around my neck, still. Iry hasn't asked for it back, and I'm reluctant to hand it over again. This necklace has gone to hell and back with me.
"I should get going; my mother will worry if I'm out too late," Deecey says coming back down. "Iry's in bed and wants you. I promise I'll come by again."
"I'm always free," I say smiling. Deecey hugs me tight.
"Don't be a stranger, Terra."
"I won't."
Then Deecey is gone, and I'm staring at the back of the door. I lock it, pause, then I turn off the lights downstairs and slowly make my way up the stairs to my room, where, even though Shuttle is staying, I know I will get no sleep tonight.