"Ladies first!"
Time comes to a halt. I can hear the waves crashing on the beach, the flapping wings of the hummingbirds. Impossible, of course, but I hear them nonetheless. To my right stands my neighbor, Gia, fidgeting, and to my left, a vaguely familiar girl whose face I recall from the school halls.
Gia has more reason to be nervous than I do. Despite the fact we only have talked once or twice, I know she took tesserae many times, and though I can't be certain of exactly how many, it's rather safe to assume she has at least twenty or so slips with her name written on them, whereas I have ten.
Our district has plenty of Careers to volunteer — as we call those who train for the Games — but there isn't any rules in place to reduce the number of candidates. The Capitol left the matter to our hands, so we came up with an unofficial agreement: in odd years, just before the reaping, the eldest victor alive (until this day still our very first, Margot Seannery) handpicks the most promising boy and girl from the Training Academy to volunteer. In even years, however, volunteering would be forbidden, and oh, may the odds be ever in your favor. Anyone who attempts to take the rightful place of a Career by volunteering too, forcing the Capitol to dust off some protocols, is to be left on their own in the arena, disgraced and with no gifts from sponsors or precious advices, as well as anyone who volunteers in even years. This "arrangement" is working very well so far, bringing some resemblance of order (and fairness, since training isn't what you'd describe as perfectly legal), keeping hundreds of delusional kids from dying and giving them time to prepare properly.
Even years are dreadful to us, the few who don't nurture any desire to die a horrible death and kill innocent children, but also dreadful to Careers, who are obliged to wait, ready or not to dive into the Games. In the course of fifty years, only once since established an arrogant kid decided to defy this agreement: a boy named Dwight, thirsty for blood, refused to wait, and paid the price of his impatience by dying after three days in the arena, abandoned by his district and allies, stripped of honor and then thirsty for nothing but water.
District 4's escort, Lola Lane, puts her hand inside the glass ball, her fingers messing around with some slips, as if she's savoring the moment. I wonder if she interprets that mere gesture as toying with children's lives because the grin on her face is abnormal, sadistic even. Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, The Seventieth Hunger Games has arrived!
Lane grabbed a slip. Her eyes, the color of a deep artificial hue of purple, brightens at the sight of the name, as if she knows whoever is about to be reaped and took great pleasure in it. The audience's breath is hanging in anticipation, and even Seannery and Odair, our district mentors, are leaning in from their seats. "Annie Cresta!" She announces.
I was five years old when I learned how to swim; no one taught me, I had no one to. I managed to learn by mimicking other swimmers who'd come by the beach. It turns out that it was quite a good method, for in less than two weeks I could swim backwards and hold my breath underwater for almost three minutes. I felt unstoppable — but a big wave stopped me a couple of days later, when it washed me down, nearly drowning me. I was so scared I couldn't approach the margin for at least a week. All I kept thinking during my "break" from the water was "What a big wave." I have this weird thing where I cling on to dumb facts when I panic. But to be fair, it's all I can do when I have no one else but fish to support me, and it's all I can do now.
The first thought that crosses my mind is "well, I don't know Lola," because I don't, really, except for her annual appearances for the reaping and the glimpses I've caught of her on television. The second is "and I don't look forward to." It appears I had reason to be nervous, after all.
"Come on up, miss Cresta!" She calls for me, my name, that's my name, tilting her head in an attempt to spot me in the crowd.
Gia let out a sigh of relief, and I can't blame her. She's the only family of a five year old brother. She has to feed him, take care of him. He needed her. No one needed me, and besides, it's not as if we were close friends. We're neighbors. She offers me a sympathetic look, but I find myself being unable to give any gesture in return.
The sea of girls parted so I could make my way to the stage. Careers are known everywhere in the district, and obviously no one recognizes me as one of them; realizing that, pitiful looks pierce through me, a sudden common knowledge that I won't survive hovering over the promenade.
I climb the stairs, welcomed by Lane's scary and broad smile, and I don't want her to touch me. She has this unsettling mean quality about her, as if she's responsible for inventing the Games or, at least, some of the horrors waiting for the tributes in the arena. Her hair is dyed in a soft pink, silky and falling straight on her back, harmonizing with her flamboyant skin-tight magenta dress, adorned with puffy sleeves and shiny gems. I didn't know her, I don't want to know her, and I don't like her. "Alright," she says, touching me regardless as she positions me between the two glass balls. "Any volunteers? No? Let's continue!"
Well, then. This is it. The Seventieth Hunger Games would begin for me soon enough.