CHAPTER 7

I wake the next morning feeling very strange. I am not stiff as I expected to be. I can move all my limbs normally and my hair is dry. I do not feel cramped and my head does not feel as it is resting on a wet, marble pavement Come to think of it, my whole body feels warm and dry. Then I realise there is something soft on top of me as well. I snuggle down and curl up again, hoping the dream will continue. I fell asleep in the fields last night in District 11, I remember, so it must be a dream. But District 11 has no marble pavements, I remind myself sleepily. So maybe I'm not dreaming? But District 11 doesn't have warm, comfy beds either, I tell myself. I jolt myself awake and sit bolt upright as I remember where I am. In a few seconds, what I thought was a heavenly dream becomes a terrible nightmare; I am in the Capitol. Of course.

I fall back on to the pillow as yesterday comes flooding back to me. I remember now: Reed telling me that he's as good as killing me, that I'm part of somebody else strategy – no I said that. His grey-blue eyes boring into my own. Me stamping out of the room, crying, lying down on the pavement outside, in the rain. Reed must have found me, I realise, and carried me in. In where? I start; this must be the Training Centre. I'm in the Training Centre. I'm in the Training Centre.

'Oh, help,' I murmur. The Training has begun. I'm in the Games now.

I swing my legs out of the bed and I begin to think about what happened the day before. Why was I so angry when Reed told me I wouldn't survive? I was never going to kill anybody anyway, I knew I wouldn't win. And yet, when he told me he wasn't going to help me, I still felt so, so angry, let down. I shrug to myself. Anybody can see why, I tell myself, he must of realised why.

Next to the bed is a small table, holding a plate of food. The bed is even bigger than the one on the train and is so clean and white that I have to squint to look at it. The whole room is white, like the prep room on the train. Except the walls don't seem so blank; they have creamy wallpaper pasted over them with tiny crimson flowers on them. I like the walls; they're pretty.

I draw my attention back to the food. Some sort of fruit, I realise. Grapefruit. Good. I devour it hungrily in less than a minute before exploring the room feeling a lot better than I did. It is a large room, and if I hadn't of had a taste of the Capitol already I would have probably fainted in shock.

It is about the same size as our one-room house in District 11, only its square, not round. It has a large comfy armchair in the corner of the room which is a creamy-white colour and has some sort of lamp over it. It looks a little like the oil-lamp at home, but it's very different too. It is an upside down-cone with a ball stuck inside, attached to a metal stick that goes onto a round, flat stand. Attached to the stand is another pole but this one is very thin and it bends around over to a plug in the wall. I remember Reed pointing a plug out to me on the train, but I don't know what it does. I know it makes electricity but we don't have any electricity in District 11 apart from the town screens and the mayor's home which I have never been in voluntarily.

Interested, I wander over to the lamp and turn on the plug. Instantly, the only thing missing from it before appears, brighter than any oil lamp at home: light. Even in the white room I can see the light and it makes the room even lighter. I push the plug button again, wondering if it will make it even brighter, but when I do, the light disappears. I bite my lip and wonder if I have broken it. Excuses start to form in my head, and in a few moments I am desperately worried. No more trouble! Trouble seems to be pretty attracted to me, I think. Cautiously, I stretch out my finger again and push the button, wincing as I do so, praying I won't make it even worse. The light comes back on, bright as it was before. I push the button again and it goes off. I get the message. It's very clever, I think.

I play with the magic-button-light for a few minutes and then I look around the rest of the room. There is another chair, but not nearly as big and comfy as the other, and it is white instead of cream. In front of it is a small white table which looks like the pavement outside. There is also an enormous wardrobe which nearly covers the whole of one wall and I am pleased to note that it is not white, but red. I realise I am still in my parade outfit. I peel it off eagerly and shove it under the bed, hoping will never have to wear it again. Then I turn to the Big Red Wardrobe and hope that the clothes inside are more ordinary than those on the train.

But they're not; they're even more ridiculous.

There is nothing there half as plain as the fancy yellow dress I found in the train. I am angry now because I know for a fact that not all the girl tributes have wardrobes like this. I've seen them wandering around in ordinary trousers and jumpers, even if they are rich colours and different materials. Why do they give me all these silly clothes? Not more of my strategy, surely?

They are all dresses, again. Silly, fancy little dresses with layers and layers of petticoats and lace under each one of them, frills on top and laced collars. Decorated with tiny flowers or ribbons or something else ridiculous. I roll my eyes at them but I can't help running my fingers along the luxurious fabrics. Velvets and silks of every colour, thickness and texture. I love the textures. It reminds me of the first meal I had on the train with Fesh and Reed (I force my thoughts to steer away from the Fork Incident) and the pot of cream that I poured down my throat. As little as I want to put them on, I can't wait to feel the fabrics against my skin.

I choose a knee-length velvet dress with a silk petticoat. It is dark green and the only decoration is a dark red pin with a flower on it which I take off. I was right; it feels heavenly against my skin. I close the wardrobe door and look into the mirror on the front. I do look pretty in the dress, I realise and it goes well with my dark brown hair and skin. As much as I despise it, I find myself smiling when I look at it.

Just at that moment, I hear a knock on the door and it is pushed open to reveal Fesh standing in a fancy corridor with a thick, red rug on the floor and creamy walls like my own. I surprise her by being dressed and ready for once, when she comes in.

'Well, fancy that,' she mutters as I follow her down the corridor, 'the little animal managed to find her way back after all.'

I am about to scowl at her when I remember that I am going to be all smiley and nice today in this funny green dress. A small voice in my head asks me 'since when?'

'Since now,' I whisper. 'No more trouble.'

I follow Fesh to the end of the corridor by which time Thresh has come out of his room to join us. Fesh tells us that Reed and our stylists are waiting for us on the ground floor, in District 11's Dining Hall for breakfast. Something about the word 'Breakfast' makes my stomach rumble.

Fesh escorts us into a small, glass box and I run over to the edge to look out. We are very high up in the building and I can see miles of luxurious carpets with other tributes and stylists wandering around on them. I can see the floor at the bottom as well. I wonder what we are doing in this odd glass box.

Fesh pushes a button on the wall and to my surprise the doors close. I let out a scream and point to the doors, telling Fesh we have been locked in. She laughs scornfully and pushes another button, marked G. I can see lots of buttons on the wall, numbered from 1-12, with G at the very bottom. She tells me they are District numbers and that we are on 11 at the moment. I ask her what G means but before she can answer, the lift starts plummeting downwards. I scream and rush over to the edge so I can see what's going on. The feeling is wonderful; I have never been so exited in my life! I can see all the floors rush past me and I wave to the people standing on them. As we go down, the numbers on the wall light up. After a few seconds, '10' lights up, then '9' and so on. Just as the '5' turns yellow, the box stops and Fesh grumbles as the door slides open.

I am still recovering form the shock of moving so suddenly and I ask if we have to get out. Fesh says we don't and I grin at her and rush back over to the edge. We are half way down now. The tributes from District 5 enter the box but they do not look exited or nervous like I do. I wonder if they are just hiding it and I tell them eagerly what is about to happen so they won't be too scared. The boy snorts and the girl gives me a sickly smile and explains in a patronizing voice that they know what it is; they have lots of them in District 5. This never occurred to me so I ask Thresh if he's been on one before and he tells me he rode it the night before. Then I feel really stupid and I keep my mouth shut for the rest of the journey (which I am still thrilled by.)

When the box reaches the floor, everybody gets out and Fesh tells me to follow her to the Dining Hall. I don't want to go though; I want to ride in the box again. I make a quick decision between breakfast and the box before telling her that I forgot my shoes and I need to go back and get them. She rolls her eyes but shows me the door I will need to go to when I return and then marches off towards it leaving me in the box on my own. I run to the open doors to wave goodbye to her but just as I stick my arm out, the doors slide shut.

I scream loudly and tug at my arm, biting my lip in agony as the doors continue to press on my arms. Fesh does not turn back and I frantically try to pull my arm back in. Realising I will never make it, I stretch my other arm to the numbers on the wall and push all the buttons hysterically, praying that the lift won't start moving again, leaving my arm behind. The heavy doors are still crushing my arm when I push the last button and a voice tells me that the doors are opening, stand clear. Sure enough, the doors slide open and I rush out of the box, frightened to go anywhere near it and I watch it travelling upwards, stopping every now and then to pick up passengers. However, it doesn't travel in a straight line like when I rode it; it goes up and down and then up twice as much and down three floors. I can see the passengers inside getting frustrated. I realise it must be my fault so I hurriedly trot off towards the door Fesh showed me, looking as innocent as possible.

The Dining Hall is similar to the one at the train and when I walk in to take my place in the enormous chair, the first thing Fesh says to me is 'I thought you were getting your shoes?' which makes everybody look at me.

'I didn't,' I say, 'My arm got stuck in the door and I decided to come out,' and to prove it I use my right arm to lift up my left, which was the one that got stuck. It is horribly twisted and red and the part where the doors crushed it is missing a lot of skin. I wince when I look at it and try to ignore the pain.

'Stupid girl,' says Had and I take my place at the table, using my right hand to eat eggs with my fork as I find I can no longer use my left.

When everybody has finished the meal, Reed stands up and clears his throat. 'It is only three weeks until the Games,' he says solemnly. Everybody but Thresh and me cheer. 'And I have decided to give our brave tributes a little gist to show we appreciate their efforts made.'

'But we haven't even started training yet!' I protest. Fesh gives me a look which clearly says 'Shut up.'

'So here's to Thresh,' Reed continues, lifting his glass, 'And Rue,' he adds quickly when I glare at him.

'Thresh and Rue,' chant all the Capitol people. I smile at them. Thresh nods at them. Then Reed hands us each a parcel. Thresh's big and looks heavy. He turns red and quickly puts it under the table. He looks as if he knows what it is. Mine is flat. I tear off the paper, curiously.

It's a thin book. On the front are three photo's: one of District 11 and one of the Capitol. The third is of the 73rd Hunger games. I open it quickly and see lots of little boxes with numbers inside and a few lines below. Some of them have labels on them. I look at it, puzzled.

'It's a calendar,' Thresh explains, 'It has all the coming events on it so you can remember what's coming up. And you can write your own things on the little lines.'

I nod. 'Thanks,' I murmur, reading the labels. I read 'First Parade,' which has already happened. The box below reads 'First Interviews.' I flick to the next page and see more little boxes with similar labels. I turn the page again. The third page has ten boxes. The first says '10 days to go' the second '9 days to go' and so on. On 'One day to go' there are also interviews, it tells me. The last box reads 'Let the Hunger Games Begin.' I turn the page to look at the paper underneath.

There are no little boxes after the Hunger Games.