the sky
is made up
of a trillion stars
so that we feel
a little lonelier

Ferrin Novak (13)

District Three

three months ago

Ferrin calculated every breath as he took it. He had mastered having the most silent inhales and exhales in the world, as any person who got themselves into half as many life-or-death situations as he did would. The footsteps on the bridge he was crouched under weren't going away, and he couldn't run down the stream until they did. He didn't know how many of them were just walking through the scenic area of town and how many of them were Peacekeepers or disgruntled shopkeepers looking to finally catch him in the act.

He cradled the bag of food he had made it out of the grocery store with today in his arms, holding it tightly against his chest. It was only after the footsteps finally went away that he realized he could be crushing the bread.

He didn't come out from under the bridge right away, but when he couldn't hear anything but the distant sounds of the town and the water moving by his feet, he crawled out from where he was wedged between the wooden support of the bridge and the moist earth at his back. He stood up, the water up to his mid-calves here, and looked one last time to make sure no one was around.

And then he was off.

He had caused enough trouble in this town. It was probably time to move on, but he'd have to get money for a train ticket to do that. He didn't think he could walk all the way over to Newton from here, especially not with so many eyes out for him. He'd never managed to get enough food to last him all the way there.

The walls of the stream deepened the further this direction he went, like the water was a living entity that had long ago clawed the dirt out of the way, but got tired the closer it got to town. Ferrin would live in this area forever if he could. He loved swimming down here, and there was a place way farther down, almost back by the factory, where there was a small cave. It was just big enough for Ferrin to sleep in. He wanted to stop back by there before he left to grab the blanket he had stashed, but he didn't know if it would be a good idea. He was sure the Peacekeepers knew that was where lone homeless people slept sometimes, and if they were thinking right, they'd probably make their way there when they realized he lost them.

The stream started to curve, and that was when he finally slowed down, hiking the bag further up on his back to keep it out of the water as it reached his knees. It was pushing him along a little bit, but he was used to walking down it by now.

Once he was around the bend, he saw a person crouched in the water ahead of him and froze on instinct. His first thought was to run away, seeing the flash of white on their clothing and immediately thinking of the Peacekeepers. But then he realized it was someone just as worn down as he was, and tentatively he moved forward. He needed to go this way to find somewhere to stay until later when he could get money for a train, so he couldn't turn back around to avoid them if he didn't have to.

They heard him sloshing around in the water when he got close enough. He was pretty good at staying as quiet as possible, but there wasn't much going on around here, and it was easy to pick up the quiet noises he was still making. Their head snapped around toward him, ready to move, but they relaxed fractionally when they saw he was just a kid.

"Who are you?" the person asked as Ferrin got closer.

"Sorry," he said. He just wanted to get by them without any trouble, or any real conversation. He didn't need anyone remembering him here. "I'm just going through."

"Were the Peacekeepers looking for you?" the person asked.

Ferrin glanced around, worried that they were still hanging nearby if this person had seen them. But he realized that was just paranoia gripping at him and he told himself to relax, looked at them again. "No. Of course not, Mx….?" he trailed off, not knowing their name. But it would make him feel better if he did, both because it felt more polite to address them by name, and because it would make him feel a little less like he was speaking to a ghost.

"Reyna," she said after a moment. "And you?"

"Nobody," he said, shaking his head. He started to walk around them, ignoring whatever they were doing out here, standing in the middle of the stream. He wanted out of the water now that he'd been in it for a while, but it was the safest place in terms of hiding to get where he was going. "I just need to go around you to get to town."

"What did you do?" she asked. He turned back toward her. He wanted to just slip away, but he couldn't ignore her. And he was afraid of what she might do if he did just run from her. She motioned off in the distance, in the direction that the Peacekeepers must have gone looking for him. "Must've been you."

Ferrin got a good look at her now that he didn't think he would be able to go away easily. She wasn't much older than him, now that he really thought about it. She was maybe eighteen or nineteen, and much skinnier than him. "I was… I was just—"

"You stole something," she said, nodding toward the bag on his back. At least he didn't have it in his arms where he could smash the bread further anymore. "Wanna share?"

He shook his head, but he felt a little bit like he didn't have much of a choice. He stepped back away from her. She seemed weaker than him, so there was no chance she would be able to keep up. He could get away if he wanted to. He just didn't know where he'd go.

"You don't have to," she told him, deflating a little bit. But he didn't trust that response.

He remembered before, when the others who worked for Mr. Braginskaya would point at people like her and say to stay away, that they were usually dangerously hungry, and willing to act on it. She looked dangerously hungry, but even if she was willing, it didn't look like she would do much damage. But then, he understood how people got when they were desperate.

"What do you do out here?" he asked her. Maybe if he trusted her a little bit more, he would be okay with giving away a little. He was planning on leaving here anyway. He needed more grain from his tesserae, but it was difficult to get it when he didn't stay in one place that often. But if he was going to the city for the reaping coming up, he might be able to get things figured out in the Justice Building. He didn't know how they'd take a homeless thirteen-year-old showing up asking to sort their yearly grain ration out, but they hadn't cared when he first signed up last year.

She shrugged a little bit. "I used to find stuff to eat. But shit's poisonous, if you're not careful."

He nodded. He knew that well, which was why he didn't eat anything he found unless he was absolutely certain about it. But he hadn't gotten good at being absolutely certain about some things, enough to get him through when he couldn't steal anything.

He couldn't just not give her anything. So he drew out one of the loaves of bread and an apple, reaching them out to her.

She stepped through the water and took them out of his hands. "Thank you," she said quietly. She walked out of the water onto the sandy area where the water went when it flooded, and hoisted herself up onto the shelf of earth there. Her legs dangled over, dripping from the stream. He took a moment to watch her, and she didn't seem to mind, staring out into the woods. Then he went over to the flood area as well. He was going to get sick if he just sat in the water like this.

He decided to sit up on the ground too, putting his bag down next to him and getting the other loaf of bread out to eat. He hadn't realized how tired he was until now, looking at the way the leaves waved in the breeze, the way the birds sang and hopped from branch to branch.

They didn't say anything for a while, which made Ferrin nervous. He felt like Reyna could turn on him at any moment, but she didn't. She just ate the food he gave her in a daze. Eventually, she left the shelf of ground and started to walk in the direction he was headed before he saw her.

"What are you doing?" he asked her.

She turned back to him. "I guess the same thing you are. Going somewhere," she told him, with half a smile. Her eyes were clearer now, and she didn't seem quite so much like she could fall asleep standing up. But her cheeks were gaunt and her eyes had bags underneath them. He felt like a wind could blow her into the next district, or all the way to the ocean. She was probably nineteen, couldn't even get tessera anymore.

"Can I come too?" he asked before he thought better of it. He didn't want to be wandering around alone anymore. He didn't want to have only himself to talk to. He didn't want to have only his own thoughts when it got quiet. He didn't really like it there.

She shrugged, so he hopped down and slung his bag over his shoulder. He still had half his loaf of bread and two apples. Wherever they were going, that would have to be okay.

a week ago

They had found somewhere to stay until the reaping. In the city, there was a lonely old woman who let kids with nowhere to go stay in her house. He had a feeling that the ones his age usually ended up in orphanages—somewhere he did not want to go—but with Reyna along with him, he was safe from her telling district authorities about him.

For the first couple of days, Ferrin said over and over again that she didn't have to be so kind, but he didn't really mean it. If she wasn't so kind, he wasn't sure what he and Reyna would be doing when they got there.

That night, she brought food into the guest room and set it down on the dresser for them. She turned around to leave, but Reyna stopped her with a question.

"Aren't you worried we're going to do something?" she asked. "Steal something?"

The woman looked at her and her tired eyes crinkled up into a smile. "What could you possibly steal from me?" she asked, and left the room.

Ferrin felt like she either didn't care, or she had been hurt so badly she just wasn't thinking straight enough to care. There was a picture of a man in the living room that he had seen. It didn't take much to guess that he was her husband, and without him she just started bringing people in, helping people in that way. Even if it wasn't the smartest idea. It was a nice idea.

"This is weird," Ferrin said, looking over at Reyna. The two of them had talked a lot in the time that they'd known each other. She left her house when she was fifteen and jumped between family members, hating all of them and isolating herself every time she walked out of one's door, until finally they just didn't let her in anymore. Counted her as a lost cause. He felt like she blamed herself for pushing her family away, but if they weren't willing to help her, even if she was being difficult, Ferrin didn't think they were much of a good family at all.

She asked about what happened to him. How he got there. He gave her the short version, the easy version. When he said he'd worked for the tech producer, Andrei Braginskaya, she hadn't believed him at first, rolling her eyes like it was a lie. But the more he told his story, the more she realized that he wasn't that good of a liar and couldn't possibly fabricate this.

"How'd you end up losing all that, kid?" she had asked him, propped up by her elbow on the floor. They were taking turns with the bed every night.

"He didn't like me," Ferrin had told her. "He cuts off rations of the people he doesn't like. I stole food, and he…" He didn't know how to lie here. Didn't know how to fill the gaps of the story he didn't want to tell. "Well, he kicked me out."

"But your dad's still there?"

Ferrin had nodded and turned over to go to sleep.

He didn't blame his dad for not looking for Ferrin. There was no way he could find where he'd run off to, and just trying to would leave him jobless and homeless. He wouldn't make it as well as Ferrin would. Or maybe he would, if he did jobs for people, but it was easier to think that there was no way the absence in his life could be fixed.

Now, Reyna didn't seem so talkative. She just grabbed their plates from the dresser and handed his over, and they ate in silence.

A week and a half of good eating wasn't going to fix everything in their lives, but this was the most luxurious accommodations he had had in years. He didn't care much if it was strange, but it was still worth acknowledging.

When Reyna was done eating, she came to the bed and sat down on the foot of it, pulling her legs underneath her and looking at Ferrin wordlessly. He glanced at her, hating this game she played sometimes. When there was something on her mind, she just let him figure it out, or at least start the conversation.

"What?" he finally said, giving in.

She clasped her hands in her lap and let out a breath. So this was pretty serious. "Ferrin, I want you to go to the orphanage after the reaping," she said. "I'm an adult. I need to get a job, and then— then I'll adopt you or some shit. Like as a big sister. Well, as a guardian legally, but that's weird. A big sister." She spoke rapidly, not letting him get a word in until she stopped, but he was shaking his head as she spoke.

"No. Nope. I won't. If you two send me there, I'll just leave," he said.

"Ferrin, he's not going to find you," she said gently. She had asked before why he didn't want the roof over his head and the food in his mouth that he'd have there, and he had made it pretty damn clear that he wasn't going to risk Mr. Braginskaya finding him if he was living in the system. He wasn't going back there. "It won't be long anyway. Just til I have a job and an apartment. I already talked to Mrs. Riel and she said she'd help me out."

"No!" he snapped at her, standing up from the bed. "No, I'm not going back there. I'm not fucking going back there."

He walked out of the room, his feet carrying him quicker than his mind was actually moving. He was out of the house and walking down the street before he calmed down enough to think about where he was going. He would go back later, but he couldn't be in there knowing that they wanted him to be exposed like that. He had managed just fine up until now, so if Reyna wanted to get a job and shit, he would just wait until she did. Or Mrs. Riel could let him stay there like he was already. There was no reason to send him there.

He found his way to an empty street full of mostly abandoned, run-down old houses, and he sat down next to a street light, leaning up against it and pulling his knees against his chest. If they understood him at all, if they understood—

"Kid."

Why had she followed him? He didn't even need to stay with her, really. They had only known each other a few months. It was ridiculous to think she could just demand he go to an orphanage and that she adopt him. He would be fine on his own.

She sat down next to him. He wanted to get up and run away from her. But he couldn't not give her a chance. Maybe she'd seen reason.

"Kid," she said again, this time quieter. "You're like a little brother to me, Ferrin. I just wish you'd realize you don't have to do all this shit on your own. You're only thirteen."

He refused to say anything if she wasn't going to listen to what he was saying. He really would run away if she made him go there, and then they'd never see each other again. That wasn't what he wanted, as angry with her as he was. But he couldn't risk anything, and he didn't want them to think that he was incapable of taking care of himself. He was aware of how young he was, but he was also aware of how young he was when he first left home, when the world really began to crash around him. He could handle things on his own.

"I don't want him to find me," he said finally. He rested his forehead on his knees, shutting his eyes and blocking most of the world out.

"He won't," Reyna promised, with the most conviction he had ever heard in her voice. "You're safe, Ferrin."

present day

Ferrin and Reyna had walked together to the square for the reaping. She said she'd see him afterwards, and then they'd get things figured out.

Mrs. Riel had said that he could stay with her so long as it wasn't for too long. Reyna already had a job, had looked almost nonstop from the moment that was her goal. And now she was saving up every cent she didn't give to Mrs. Riel for food. They had learned together she didn't really have a lot of money after her husband died, although the husband's death was still speculation. So that was why she hadn't originally wanted Ferrin to hang around while Reyna got their lives figured out.

But now everything was going their way. As long as Reyna worked hard in the factory, she would have an apartment soon. Then they'd have a roof over their heads that was their own. She could put food on the table for them without either of them having to steal and put themselves in danger. It would be almost normal.

Ferrin was floating through the reaping. He wasn't really there for the Treaty of Treason, instead wanting to get back to Reyna. Something told him that they might be looking for apartments. He knew she wouldn't have enough saved up already for a deposit, and she'd struggle for first month's rent if they didn't have more saved up, but it wouldn't hurt to start looking.

Imelda Detann never did much to keep attention on her. It was a wonder she managed to stay in District Three and not get pushed down to a district like Twelve or Thirteen, but Ferrin didn't care enough to keep up with escorts and which ones were on his stage.

She called up one Audrey Simmons, who seemed more concerned with something out in the crowd than where they were in the moment. Ferrin was paying attention now. It was hard not to when the tributes were up on the stage. There was a district-wide ache to see the faces of those who would probably not return to them. Everyone's eyes were trapped on the stage as if there had been an accident and people had come out of their homes to see what was going on, hungry for the tragedy that twisted their hearts.

No one clapped for Audrey when Imelda asked for them to. There was only one victor for District Three, and that wasn't much to clap for every year. Ferrin glanced back at where Decima Reede was sitting, having refused to make a speech as she did every year. Her face was perpetually grimacing, but never more so than during the reaping.

"Ferrin Novak!" Imelda called out clearly into the microphone while he was still dazing away. His eyes snapped to her but he didn't move. He didn't even think he breathed. It could have been another twenty-five years before he took another step toward the stage, away from the square, away from apartments, away from a life with a big sister.

Imelda's composed face wrinkled after a moment when there was nothing going on. There weren't a lot of people who knew him, and perhaps none in his age group, so everyone was looking around for a Ferrin Novak that they couldn't find. He watched her eyebrows raise as she stepped closer to the microphone again, considering repeating his name in hopes of drawing him out. But he was stubborn, and no one was figuring out who he was yet. Maybe if he just looked around like everyone else, they wouldn't find him.

The worst of it all was that he wasn't surprised. He had skirted through life, avoiding one thing to the next, and scraping past rules and laws to get by. Eventually he was bound to fall victim to the worst possible punishment.

"Mr. Novak," Imelda said again with an awkward smile, and Peacekeepers were beginning to inch toward the boys' section to find out who he was. He would be yanked onto the stage unceremoniously, made to stand in front of the crowd of pitying faces, made to stand in front of Reyna out there somewhere. "Mr. Novak, are you out there?"

He squeezed his eyes shut and felt himself begin to move. When he opened his eyes again, people were moving out of his way, a thousand young eyes staring at him. A thousand young eyes who'd never known the hardships he had, who would never know them, who would never be forced into the Games over them. A thousand eyes, a million eyes, and he was on stage in front of them all, he was shaking hands with Audrey in front of them all, he was presented to the Capitol by Imelda Detann in front of them all. A thousand, million eyes and only one pair had ever bothered to care.

yeehaw... took a few days break and now i'm ready to fuckin get some intros OUT... i WANT to get both d4s out when i wake up but lmao we'll see

i wasn't going to do ferrin at the reaping either but i thought just showing his thought process would be really sad considering he and reyna just got close to each other

ferrin is from mysteriousStarlight!

i got all the capitol chapters & partnerships planned and i'm super excited! i think y'all are gonna enjoy some of the things i have planned, it's going to be very relationship-centric (not all romance relationships) and i'm excited to have those relationships start to play out

question for the chapter: which of the minor characters here (decima, imelda, mrs riel, mr braginskaya, etc) seem the most interesting from the very little they're shown/talked about?