Chapter Nineteen: The Contradictions of Life
Congratulations, You've Officially Lost Track of Time!
Odysea Davos, District Eleven Female
In my opinion, the worst part about having to do intense labor all summer is the smell.
Yeah, I get it. The work is impossibly demanding, especially since we don't even grow our own food, instead being provided food by the "generous" Capitol. (Which is stupid, if you ask me- a person who's well-fed is more productive.) Said work is also very boring, and you also have to do it from sunrise until it's too dark to see, with only a break for lunch. Oh, and did I mention that if you're caught doing anything that doesn't benefit the Capitol, you get beaten in public by the Peacekeepers?
All those things are pretty terrible, no doubt about it. But the smell tops it all. It gets everywhere, scrubbing yourself clean isn't an option because drinkable water is such a rare commodity, and it never goes away. Even in winter, the stink that you get during the summer still hangs in the air, which is a cruel reminder of the fact that the entire District has essentially been forced into slavery all summer.
Currently, I'm staggering back and forth among row after row after row of vegetables, pulling up every tiny little weed that I see. Thankfully, we get gloves for this part, so I'm not constantly getting poked by thorns or scratched by sticks.
However, five steps later, I notice a medium-sized weed in the path, which wouldn't be a problem, except I recognize its color: a bright, screaming shade of red, even though fall isn't anywhere near starting yet. Poison ivy. At least I have gloves, so I can pull it up without touching it. Otherwise, I'm going to be scratching like there's no tomorrow all night once I get home. (If I tried scratching it a work without also figuring out how to do my jobs, I might not have a tomorrow.)
I have to be really careful with this stuff- one time, Flora, one of my coworkers, noticed some poison ivy growing and picked it up to try and get rid of it. However, she tripped on the way to the woods and accidentally let the poison ivy hit one of the Peacekeepers in the face.
While I do admit that it was kind of funny that the Peacekeeper went around for a week looking like someone had hung tiny balloons off his face, I'm pretty confident that Flora didn't find it funny when they tied her to a post and whipped her publicly, and for so long that she almost passed out from the pain. Several coworkers had to support her the whole way back to where she lived that day, because the was in so much pain she could barely walk. I never saw her again.
So, I hustle over to the wooded area right outside the patch of crops we attend, ditch the plant like a hot potato, and hurry to get back on task.
Time is money here. I can't afford to waste much of it.
It seems like forever, but eventually, the head watchman calls "Lunch break!"
I don't care that I'm in the middle of trying to pull up a particularly large, stubborn weed in the center of a corn patch. I throw it down and race towards the area where everyone is lining up to receive their lunch rations. Which are too small, by the way, because to quote Peacekeepers, "we don't want any of you getting too fat."
Sure, I think to myself, doing hard physical labor twelve hours a day all day won't help us stay in shape. We need as little food as possible, too.
Once I get to the front of the line, I get my lunch portion, which is in a brown paper sack that makes me feel like a five-year-old. Hell, it even has my name scrawled on it in what appears to be a black marker. (Not that I'm used to seeing one- most of us are worried more about buying food than figuring out where they can go to find black markers.)
I open it up, and find the usual: our tesserae roll that the District is semi-famous for (from the bit of Capitol-oriented TV that I've managed to see, it's one of the tesserae breads they attempt to make for themselves), small bottle of water, and a miniscule box of something that looks like dried fruit. (Thankfully, this Head Peacekeeper learned their lesson about including fresh fruit after it started rotting before they served it to us for the fifth time in a row.)
Looking for a place where I can sit down for a minute (or at least lean over) I notice a familiar face with her back against the fence, digging into her tesserae roll like there's no tomorrow.
"Hello there, Kiki," I say as I keep walking over towards her. "How's your work going?"
I would normally ask how her day is going, but if someone is stuck working here all day, that answer is pretty easy to figure out. I know that because most Capitolites (and probably most of the people from other Districts) wouldn't last more than a day in this line of work, so pretty much everyone here has had a terrible day so far.
"No worse than any other day," she says back in between bites of seed-covered bread. "The days just seem to blend together at this part of the summer."
"Yeah, I get that feeling," I say back. As bad as I have it, Kiki has it even worse. Sure, I have to work twelve-hour-shifts every day in the summer in the fields, since I'm both at the age where I don't need parental consent forms filled out and need money to keep us all from starving in the streets, but she's been working in the fields in the summer (and at a factory in the winter) for up to fifteen-hour-shifts every single day of the year, regardless of the weather. She's also taking care of a sister and a brother single-handedly after her mother passed away in a terrible accident. (She was assigned to pick apples from a tree, fell out fifty feet up, and landed head-first on a rock. The doctors- or at least the imitations of them we have here- tried to help her, but she, unfortunately, was beyond saving.)
"How are your siblings doing?"
"Not great," she says with a disappointed look on her face. "Berry keeps asking Luca where her big sister goes every morning. She goes on and on about how much she want to be with me, from what I've been told. "I know she's only six, but trust me. After one day in the fields-"
She quickly cuts herself off as a Peacekeeper passes by, well too close for comfort. The last thing we need today is to be whipped in public by a middle-aged man on a power trip.
So, we just have a simple, inoffensive conversation for the next five minutes or so while we're gobbling down our food, until the same watchman who announces lunch yells out, "Lunch is over, everyone! Get back to work!"
Considering that getting whipped was not on my list of "things to do" today, I know I have to get back to work. Thus, I scarf down the remainder of my pitiful lunch, wave a hasty goodbye to Kiki, and hustle back into the fields.
An indeterminate amount of time later, it's time to quit.
The only reason I know this is because it's literally too dark to see. The torches we stick into the ground only do so much, and even with one placed about fifty feet in front of me, I can barely see three inches in front of my face. And with my luck, I'm going to wind up stepping on a berry bush or something and getting the crap beaten out of me by a Peacekeeper.
Finally, finally, the horn goes off that means the official time to clock out has hit. (Originally, they used to just use mockingjays to signal that, but that got phased out before I was born due to them becoming a symbol of rebellion, my mother once told me.) Sticking close to the torchlight to make sure I don't accidentally destroy any of the crops, I follow the glowing path back out of the fields and onto the dirt road that connects most of our little town.
At least, it was a dirt road. Because it rains constantly in the summer, the road has essentially become a glorified swamp. Stepping in that is disgusting, but it's better than going through the lush thickets of nasty plants that grow on the side of the road, which includes poison ivy, poison oak, and quite a few more that I don't even want to know about.
It'd drizzly and miserable as I go back to the patchwork hut that houses me and all my family. Once I get there, all I can do is breathe a sigh of relief that there's a lot of water dripping off the corners of the roof. It sounds like a ridiculous and stupid thing to hope for, but if that's happening, it means that the roof isn't leaking. Which is good, because last time the roof sprang a leak, it was during the night so we didn't notice it until my brother, Hercas (who sleeps on the floor) suddenly started choking. After he coughed all the water out of his system, he realized we were flooded with three inches of water. It took forever to get that all out of the hut.
When I step inside the dark room, all I can see is some faint light coming from a lit candle, and all I can hear is the steady drip drip of some water landing in a bucket. Clearly, some of the rain's still slipping through some cracks in our roof. I'll have time to worry about it later.
Mom is sitting against the floor in the corner, trying to avoid the splashing of rain droplets. Hercas is crouched near our imitation of a fireplace, trying to create some sparks. The room isn't very bright, of course, because even if we did have windows, it's way too dark outside to see more than a few inches in front of our faces.
Hercas notices me first. "Hello, Odysea. How was work today?"
I snicker a little. "Less awful than usual. Just kind of monotone, if backbreaking work like this could ever be monotone. How about you?"
"Drills, drills, and more drills," he says dryly. "I don't know why I can't move on to more advanced training, I've been doing this stuff for years." Hercas wants to be a Peacekeeper to try and lower the amount of violence that goes on in this District. Considering we have almost nothing to live for, the amount of senseless suffering caused here is well higher than in the Districts that are better off.
Mom interrupts our conversation and gestures over to the one shelf we have in the house. "I went out today and got a couple of pieces of candy for tomorrow night. Just to celebrate making it for another year." When I shake my head, confused, she clarifies her statement by saying, "Tomorrow's Reaping Day. Hercas is finally out of the bowl, but you still have a shot at being sent in, Odysea."
The Reapings are tomorrow. Joy.
These things are just another way for the Capitol to essentially spit in our faces. It isn't enough for them to force us to do a million and one things just to satisfy their absurdly gluttonous "needs," they also have to outright commit murder for their own enjoyment while they're at it. And then they're surprised as to why ninety percent of the District population hates them.
Including us. Unsurprisingly, we don't enjoy being forced to do twelve hours of hard labor every single day. Especially since we see almost zero of the benefits of doing such labor. All the food we get it sent to us from the Capitol. We survive off whatever's left over after they're done with it. Which is never much.
I hear a knock on the door, or at least the pale imitation of it that we make do with. When I manage to force the thing open- causing enough creaking in the process that the birds that have landed in the yard all fly away in a storm of wings- it reveals Jason, another friend of mine. However, the expression on his face wouldn't look out of place at a public execution. (And I should know. I've been forced to attend a couple in my lifetime.)
"Odysea- Hercas- I need you outside for a second," he says. "This is important."
"Sure thing," I say quickly, making sure that Mom gives her nod of approval before we step outside into the steaming air.
Jason looks at me, then Hercas, then me again, and gives another somber nod.
"Guys, let's go for a walk."
A short time later, we're out in the countryside, taking in the scenery that we never have the time to enjoy while we're working.
Hercas opens his mouth to say something. "What's this-"
"Be quiet," Jason says. "You know what'll happen if a Peacekeeper hears us, right? So zip it!"
Hercas stays quiet. Soon, we diverge off the muddy road through a field of ripening corn, being careful not to break any of the stalks as to alert anything nearby of our presence. Two fields of corn, one field of beets, and one out-of-the-way trail later, we come across a clearing. Or at least, what used to be a clearing. Now, it looks more like a mass grave.
Hercas heaves next to me, but luckily doesn't throw up. There wasn't enough actual food in tonight's dinner for that to be feasible.
There are bodies everywhere. And I do mean everywhere. The flies have started on some of them, leaving a grotesque imitation of what once was a human being. One poor guy clearly made it partway up a nearby tree before dying, as parts of the truck are sticky with dried blood. When I see some of them are children, some clearly younger than I am, I go stiff and my stomach ties itself in a firm knot.
"There was a demonstration against the Capitol this afternoon," Jason whispers, "and the Peacekeepers were either informed of it or walked in on it by accident. They just started shooting. No words, only death."
Tears start to spill out of my eyes. Hercas tries really hard to hold them back. It's not just the death and carnage that makes us feel like we've just fallen off the edge of the earth.
This is the same way that Achillos died, Hercas and I think at the same time. He'd gone to a demonstration just like this one (despite our mother's protests) and been killed in the process. We managed to get the body returned to us so we could bury him. However, that convinced me, and everyone else, that no amount of peaceful protest was going to help us better our position.
We don't actively rebel, and none of us are part of the really out there sects who do things like assassinate Peacekeepers. For the most part, it's little things: stealing crops that we spread out to the rest of the District, destroying the whips that the Peacekeepers always carry, and things like that. But we never caused any actual harm. This way, we could help everyone without being executed for "inciting rebellion" (which is ridiculously vague, by the way).
"This is why we need to stop Peacekeepers from doing this," Hercas whispers in my ear. "This is what I want to stop. All this senseless, meaningless violence."
I completely agree with him, but I don't think he can really do much. As well-intentioned as he is, he's just one guy. One in about three hundred won't make a big enough ripple to create any meaningful change.
"Let's go home before we get caught," I whisper back to Hercas. He gestures at Jason, who nods and waves goodbye and he hurries off in a different direction.
As we retrace our steps home, making sure to avoid detection, I remember all the screwed-up things we've come to see as normal in the District. Public whippings, backbreaking work every day, and the Hunger Games.
Tomorrow, they start. And for the two people they choose, life will never be normal again.
But for everyone else, life will go on. We've adapted way too well.
Hopefully, one day, everyone here will be able to fix that.
Author's Notes:
-Finally, FINALLY had the time to finish this. Sorry it took forever, that's why I tried to make it a little longer than usual.
-Thanks to DMonkey1607 for Odysea.
-Next up is Tiger Outsider's first tribute, the D7F.
-After that, only three POVs left. We're almost there, folks!
-See you next chapter!