The mood is sombre as I return home, as usual we have no formal way of saying goodbye to loosing tributes, they are simply buried and forgotten. One late summers day I go to visit them, it's a warm day but I shiver as I enter the graveyard. Over at the far end is where our tributes lay, individual graves are unmarked but there is a bench overlooking the designated area which is marked by a large stone marker engraved with the capitol seal and the phrase;

"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"

It's written in that ancient language the capitol love so much and as far as I'm aware it enthuses on the properness of dying for ones country, a strange sentiment but the message is the one the capitol want to send to us. That the games are exciting and an honour, no matter what place you come.

I sit on the bench and look at the plaque, it's scratched but its clean the ground around it is weeded and clean. Maybe the people of this district do care, moving closer I see that the scratching aren't random its names. 'Sunny, Vesta, Gold, Num, Lux, Autha, Precious, Eros, Aux, Opal, Clos.' Names I don't remember and one that I do. Someone has carefully and secretly carved these names on this stone, I see near the bottom the letters 'Tig' the beginnings of Tigers name. I reach out and trace them with my fingers and am brought to tears.

I sit there sobbing with a hand lent upon the cold stone for a while before I am disrupted, my survival instincts turn on and I become very aware that there is someone else in this place of death with me.

"Mrs Gardner?" it asks carefully, I gasp, is she here? Why would she be here? My eyes flick to that name again; 'Clos'. Of course, I wonder if her husband knows. I have to get out of here I think, she can't see me.

I keep my head low and stand turning to leave I don't see the silhouette of a woman waiting for me though, it's a man, he seems pretty old and is stopped over, he raises his head though and looks at me.

"I beg your pardon miss" he says "my eye sights not so good, I thought you were someone else"

"It's no worry" I reply "I was just leaving" I hurry past him and towards the gate.

I run from the cemetery and am almost home before I wonder what the old man was doing there, was he the one who carves the names? Does he know my mother? Did he think I was her?

Silk brings the next shock only days later, she meets me away from victors village down by the training centre, there's a little hut there where they keep the broken weapons until they can be shipped to two to be repaired. It's completely out of the way and I can tell what she has to say is going to be important.

"Diamond, we're friends right, I can trust you" she looks much younger than her late twenties, like a scared child being reaped for the games.

"Sure you can, what's wrong?" I ask, something must be very wrong for her to come to me like this can she really not trust anyone else?

"Diamond I'm pregnant" she whispers to me before looking nervously around the room.

"Congra..." I begin before realising this doesn't seem to be good news "I thought us victors are urm..." I remember the shot they gave me years ago, to ensure I didn't have any little surprises.

"Not able to get pregnant until they want us too. Yes but I am"

"Whose is it?" I ask scared of the answer, some nameless capitol client no doubt. Some man with a wife and family who would deny ever being with her.

"It's Roland's" she tells me "I know it is, I haven't been with another since I last saw him. I can't get word to him though and I need your help"

"How can I get word to him" I ask "we can't get messages between the districts."

"In two months time there's going to be a party in Mason's honour, you will be invited but I know I won't. All I need is for you to pass a message to him there"

"I'll do my best" I promise and she passes me a small envelope which I slip into my bra, it fits comfortably. We stand there for a moment as she holds my hands she exhales deeply and smiles at me.

"You're a strange one Diamond" she says "I thought you'd be a handful but you aren't at all. It's like you're not the same girl who was in that arena sometimes"

"Are you?" I ask kindly "Would the Silk who seduced her way to the victors crown risk everything for one man?"

"I don't think she would" she replies with a smile "as the Diamond who took out three tributes in the bloodbath wouldn't be standing here now willing to help me as a friend" She wraps her arms around me "thank you" she whispers.

I return home to find that Jewel and Dad have already eaten dinner, Dad had gone out for a bit so I was left alone with Jewel. She makes me a sandwich as she apologises for not leaving me any food.

"It's no worry" I tell her "I got held up"

I watch her busy around the kitchen and notice how at ease she looks in my house, I still see this place as belonging to the capitol I'm just borrowing it. That little ramshackle hut down by the mines that's been taken over by another family, that's home. Suddenly I'm overcome with jealously, why does she have it so easy when every day for me if filled with confusion and uncertainty? She works a simple job and has few worries as I'm paying for all her food and house. She doesn't even pay me any rent!

"When you moving out then?"

"Urm well there's not that many new homes opening up. But I mean to go ask at the justice building again tomorrow though."

"What about the new apartments by the factory district?" I regret the question immediately for a girl like Jewel who was brought up in a higher class house than mine those apartments are only marginally better than living in a shack by the mines.

"I'll see about it" she tells me giving me a little sweet smile and leaving me and my sandwich alone in the kitchen. I bury my face in my hands and sigh, maybe tomorrow will be easier.

"You never wanted me to win, you wanted me to die so you could continue to be their favourite, you whore!" Sapphire taunts me that night, she's barely human her skin decaying from her body giving me glimpses of bone. It's a strange dream in that I'm fully aware that I'm dreaming but I can't force myself to wake up and escape the horror.

When I do awake I'm sweating and shivering, I've not had a nightmare that bad for almost a year now as my pills usually take care of them. I realise I never took one the night before so swallow two now feeling the calm rush though my body I float downstairs.

"Why did you tell Jewel to leave?" Dad demands as I stroll into the kitchen, he's usually at work by now but instead he sits cross armed at the table glaring at me, Jewel is nowhere to be seen.

"I .. I.. I want my house back to myself" I stutter why is he mad at me for this, "we always said it'd be a temporary thing, it's been over a year now"

"What about me?"

"What about you?"

"Maybe I need someone her Diamond, when you're out of your mind on those drugs or off gallivanting with strange men in the capitol. I know you don't act. Well unless the act you're doing here counts"

"She's leaving dad" I tell him ignoring his comment that now made it very clear that he knew exactly what I was doing in the capitol. Then again was I ever so naive to assume that he didn't know the truth.

"I always thought you'd amount to so much more Diamond" he tells me standing up and leaving the room, I stare after him in silence scowling slightly, so much more, more! I'm a hunger games victor, one of the most loved people in the country what more did he want of me.

Throwing myself on the couch I scream in frustration, I try so hard, I just want to please everybody, I want the capitol to love me, the men I fuck to love me, my family, dad. Why is it so hard to make people like me? Am I such a horrible person?

Of course I am.

As Silk had predicted an invite came for me for Masons party a week before it was due to happen, she didn't get one but Hale, Calix and Shimma did. We meet at the station on the morning of the party.

"Just the four of us then" Hale notes as he climbs onto the train, I notice he looks as me as he says this, I've replaced Silk in the capitols eyes and everyone knows it. Silk seems to be the only one who doesn't care.

I start off my trip with a visit to a regular client; Walton Snow is yet another distant cousin to the president he's a small and weedy man with a strange obsession with my feet. It takes all my energy to not snap him in half but one of my pills sees me through. After leaving Walton in the soiled sheets I shower and take myself back to my hotel. My dress is laid out on my bed so I change and sit on the bed to wait for the car to take me to this party. This was due to happen in half an hour; deciding to kill the time I turn on the large television screen.

Its typically a victor news show, shouting about who's got the capitols attentions most this week, there's a little bit about Ula's baby they've named her Coral and plan on telling her how brave her brother was in the arena. Poor child, she'll either grow up feeling the need to either win the games or kill me, I hope it's the second, at least that way she'll live. The hosts then move on to talking about Mason, the birthday boy himself. I was too mixed up in a world of excitement and new things to pay any notice to what they were saying about me at my first big post games appearance but I'm fixed to the screen as they talk about Mason.

Apparently he's been hailed in his district which isn't unusual, he's been showered with praise and gifts and women. He waves and he smiles and he flexes his abs, I scowl and turn off the screen.

I can't be doing with this I want it all to end.

But first I have to deliver Silks message.

I throw three pills down my throat to numb my brain and then a fourth to secure the numbness. I am not me anymore I am their pawn, their piece to mold and play with as they wish. It's easier to exist like this than to fight it.

I check my face for one last time before I leave the room and deciding I look to pale add a third layer of makeup. I plaster on a smile and head for the car.

There's no one to greet me at the venue I'm just left to my own devices expected to know what to do after all this time. I do know what to do of course, how to play the part dance the dance, I get a drink, something fizzy or colourful I'm not sure and I sip it and I dance and I smile. At some point Mason enters and I greet him politely,

"Well, if it isn't Miss Diamond Hart, It's a pleasure to meet another glamorous Victor who's under twenty five" he smile

I nod "thank you Mason, you won your games well"

It's stilted and it's overly formal and it tells Mason all I want him to know. I don't like him and don't have to talk to him.

At some point in the evening I slipped Silks note into Rock's hand as I congratulated him on Masons win, he slips it into his pocket and nods politely too me.

At another point I slip out onto the balcony for some fresh air when I hear the breathing of a horny man coming my way. I steady myself as I feel strong arms around my waist.

"I'd like to skewer you with my spear sometime Diamond" He drools

"You couldn't afford me Mason" I retort

"So the rumours are true then. You are for sale"

I turn around and Mason lets go "I don't have to explain myself to you" I tell him.

"But you do Diamond, Please" for a moment I see something in his eyes a hint of myself two years ago looking up into Silks eyes and asking for the truth.

No he's just playing with me, playing with his food like he did with ... with ... I can't even remember my own dead tributes name.

I sway on my feet for a moment, "Mason understand this" I say eventually before everything goes black.