Here is the very first chapter. Enjoy!
Even before the whole of Panem knew who he was, the Capitol would have said that they were never supposed to be together.
After all, he was the gorgeous Finnick Odair, heartthrob of every girl his age and under in the Training Center. He was supposed to be cool and have lots of friends and be the instructors' favorite student. And that was what he was.
Until she came along and beat him in Fishing Class.
He vaguely remembered seeing her in the market, trading fish alongside her father. She was one of the kids who didn't Train, so he didn't know her from the Training Center. Not that he would have paid attention to her anyway. He just didn't pay attention to the younger kids. Babies, he called them.
The day he actually sorta-kinda started noticing her, the sun was blazing upon the hot, sandy roads of District 4. The few children who scampered around outside burned their callused feet as they hopped unsteadily from one bare foot to the other. Squeals of relief escaped past their grinning mouths as they dashed into the waves, the cool water sweeping over their scalded feet.
He wanted nothing more than to join his peers in their game, wanted nothing more than to feel the sun shine on his tan, handsome face and the wind blow gently through his bronze hair. But no, the Children's Fishing Class had to be on that day. And so he was stuck inside a dark, stuffy room with twenty other reluctant, restless kids and Mags, the old Victor, as an instructor.
She began the lesson well enough, but soon found that nobody wanted to sit inside a classroom and learn how to fish through old, hand-drawn pictures with yellowed and frayed edges. Children of that age group all thought themselves grown-up enough to go out into the ocean and fish alone. So the old woman nodded in sympathy, told them that they could talk amongst themselves but not leave the room, promptly turned on her heel with surprising dexterity, and exited through the doors.
"Where's she going?" asked Marina Thompson as she scooted her chair closer to Finnick's. He moved away slightly, resisting the urge to squirm.
"She gonna come back?" said Ralph Aquius.
"Well, it doesn't matter, she said we could do whatever we want as long as we don't leave the room," Jack Rodney said.
A slight cheer and then a scratchy noise of chairs scraping the floor echoed around the room as the children rose up from their old, dilapidated chairs and went across the room to talk with friends and arm wrestle. Some of Finnick's "friends" crowded around him, trying to get his attention all at once. He flashed them a smile and pushed himself up from the seat.
That was when he noticed her.
She was sitting alone, slightly hunched over the wooden table. She was drawing something on a notepad, her hand holding her pen gently and at an angle.
Finnick wondered, for a fleeting moment, why this girl was sitting alone and not talking with her friends like everyone else was. But then Marina Thompson sidled up to him and reached for his hand, and he moved away swiftly, all thoughts of the strange girl disappearing from his mind.
It was a while before Mags reentered the stuffy room, holding a large bag made of old, torn sails, like most of the bags they had in District 4. By then the children were a loud, noisy mass, with the girls gossiping and giggling with their friends and the boys shoving each other around roughly and arm wrestling. Finnick drifted between different groups, chatting with them, but he couldn't help but notice the strange girl. She still sat at her desk, drawing, unfazed by the noise and people around her.
He wondered how she could be so focused.
It wasn't until Mags picked up her chair (which was sturdily built, thankfully) and slammed it against the floor that some of the children looked up to see her smiling kindly at them from the front of the room with her bag on her desk. Talk ceased as they nudged one another and pointed out that Mags was back. The Victor waited several moments for all her students to return to their seats before speaking.
"So, kids, since none of you seem to want to learn fishing by looking at these boring pictures," – she held up a diagram that labeled the different parts of a fishing boat – "I'm going to try a different method." She paused as they all looked at her with curiosity.
"Fishing is hard to learn. You have to learn to sail a boat, where there are the most fish, to make fish traps, to weave nets, to fish with a fishing rod, line, and hook, and to prepare the fish, among other things. Today, we're going to start with something that should be simple.
"I'm going to give you a challenge. In this bag, I have a lot of identical plastic bottles." She paused slightly, as if uncertain how to go on. "They may not be very common around District 4, but I'm sure you've all seen them before.
"So this is the challenge. I want you to make a fish trap out of the plastic bottle. Whoever finishes first is going to get a prize. Does that sound more interesting that looking at pictures?"
She smiled, and the kids grinned back. They nodded and glanced across the room at each other, excitement plainly gleaming in their eyes. Nobody had ever taught them hands-on anything. They were always "too young" and would be taught the skill "when you're older.
Finnick looked with interest at the bag in his teacher's hand; like she had said, the inside of it was filled with empty plastic bottles. Since District 4 was a more well-to-do district than many of the others, some people there could afford to buy Capitol things, such as disposable plastic bottles. Most people regarded the plastic bottles as a sign of arrogance and disdain from the wealthier 4 citizens. (Though that didn't stop them from picking them up when they drifted by on the street and using them as an alternative to glass while making bottles of sand art. The smooth cylinders did look like a clear glass bottle from afar.)
Now the question was: How could he make a fish trap out of one? After all, everyone expected Finnick, the smart, gorgeous boy, to finish first and have the best fish trap in class.
Mags began to walk around, passing out bottles. When she finished, she opened one of her desk drawers, took out a basket of scissors, and passed those around, too. Then she said, "Okay, kids, you can start. Remember, the first to finish gets a prize." She sat back down at her desk.
Finnick glanced around at his classmates; most of them had looks of puzzlement on their faces. Some had taken off the top of it, figuring that the fish would swim in that way. He was briefly glad that they didn't have ideas for the fish traps, either. He turned his attention to his own bottle and unscrewed the top. The boy figured that the fish would swim in from the bottle neck, but how would the fishermen get the fish out without breaking the bottle?
As he pondered the question, turning the bottle in his hand to look at it from all different angles, Mags cleared her throat.
No, he thought. No one can have finished already. I have to finish first. He forced himself to raise his head to see why Mags was clearing her throat.
The small girl who was drawing was standing up there with Mags.
He felt his heart stop. She had finished before him.
Mags smiled genially at the class. "Okay, the first person to finish is Anemone Cresta. She's done making her fish trap. It's really an ingenious design. Anemone, why don't you show it to us?"
The girl – Anemone, Finnick thought darkly – lowered her head shyly and muttered, "You can call me Annie."
Well. Annie, then, he thought.
"Okay, Annie," said Mags. "Can you show it to us, and teach us how to make it?"
Annie nodded, her eyes lowered at the sandy floor. She held up her fish trap. The bottle was cut in two parts, a little bit below where the plastic narrowed from its cylindrical shape. The cap was taken off, and the curved part was fitted inside the bottle. Finnick could see exactly how it would work. The fish would be able to swim in easily, but would not be able to get out.
He ran a hand through his bronze hair, marveling at his own stupidity. How could he not have thought of a trap like that? It was so obvious and so easy to make. And he was supposed to be the smartest.
Not anymore, you idiot, he reprimanded himself. He groaned lightly.
Since he was positive that he could recreate that fish trap in less than a minute, he stopped listening to her quiet voice and slight stutters and studied the girl. She was about nine, he decided. A good two years younger than himself. She was small, with an oval face, slightly pink cheeks, and blue-green eyes with a bit of gray. Her blue tank top hung off her loosely, covering the top of her knee-length shorts. Her straight brown hair was tied at the nape of her neck, but a few pieces fell out in front, which the girl brushed back behind her ears repeatedly.
He couldn't help but wonder, How could such a slight girl be so smart at something like this?
And he continued to watch as the girl finished speaking, the class half-clapped, and Mags presented her with a small, tinfoil-wrapped bar of what she called "chocolate." (None of the "regular" District 4 kids had ever seen one before; it was one of the Capitol delicacies most of the District 4 citizens would never be able to afford.) He kept watching as the girl's cheeks reddened slightly as she lowered her head even more and muttered a barely intelligible "Thank you," and Mags smiled warmly at her before dismissing the class. And he kept watching her as she exited the classroom, the precious chocolate held tightly in her hand.
And that was how Annie Cresta unknowingly entered Finnick Odair's life. The Capitol never meant for it to happen, but it did. And nobody can change that.
Review? The next one isn't all the way written yet, but if I get enough feedback I'll be sure to write faster. :)