Chapter Two:

I walked downstairs quietly, an anxiety filling me as if something was eating me from the inside out. Hearth was asleep. Effie Trinket, Haymitch Abernathy, and my parents pulled me out of the house, leaving Hearth in Darius's care. I didn't even get to say goodbye to my little brother.

I felt my eyes start to fill with tears at this thought, but when I caught vague sight of a young man that was no doubt Cedric Hawthorne, I forced my eyes clear. I would not...repeat, would not show weakness in front of him.

We stood there, half-glaring and half-staring again, and the adults watched our expressions with curiosity. With what I hoped was a strong voice I sneered, "Should we get on the train?"

The adults nodded, obviously uncomfortable at our animosity towards each other. I sat at a window, watching District 12 slowly disappear in to the horizon. Slowly and surely, my District, the last I would ever see of it, disappeared behind trees.

"Miss Mellark." A deep voice. Not my dad's or Haymitch's, but like the one that had asked for my attention in the square. I turned to see Cedric. "We were going to watch the reapings of the other Districts. Your mother wanted to know if you'd like to join us."

"Oh, um...Sure," I said. I stood up, stretching my left leg which had fallen asleep. I stepped aside to let him walk out the door first, and he stepped aside at the same time. Both of us blushing a little, we both stepped in to the doorway. Surprisingly, we were able to fit, but my arm brushed against his. I jumped away, shocked at the feeling of his warm skin. Sure, we had shaken hands at the stage. I could not deny that I had liked the feeling of his hand. I jumped away so quickly that I hit the wall and felt my weaker shoulder make a strange noise.

I made a squeaky noise of pain and put my opposite hand up to my shoulder.

"You alright?" he asked quickly, having the decency to look worried. "I'm really sorry."

"I'm fine," I replied coolly. We walked in to the other room, being sure to allow at least a foot and half away from each other.

I didn't bother to sit far away. We had been saved a couch, so I sat down, and he sat down next to me. I, like my brother, have a habit of hugging pillows. I pulling the blue pillow on to my lap and put my arms around it. The video started.

I can't say I noticed much, other than the fact the Careers were frighteningly large, one of the Districts looked like they were starving, and all of them looked exactly like Cedric and I had; absolutely expressionless.

When the video ended, Haymitch muttered something and disappeared, looking troubled. My parents exchanged glances, and followed closely by Effie, rushed after Haymitch.

"Where's Haymitch going?" asked Cedric.

I shrugged. "He didn't react well to his Games. He's probably really upset or something. He hasn't mentored since my parents were in the Games, and trust me, that was like, centuries ago."

Cedric gave a short laugh, and I managed a weary smile.

After a short minute of silence, Cedric asked, "So...what did you notice about those tributes?"

"I like the look of District 8's tributes," I said honestly. "They look trustworthy. The girl looks strong and smart."

Cedric looked slightly impressed. "Really? All I saw was who I didn't want to trust. You saw who you wanted to trust."

"Who don't you want to trust?"

He furrowed his eyebrows, and then said, "The District 10 boy, both of District 11, 9, 4, 3, 2, and 1."

"So you want to trust the District 10 girl and the District 8 people." That sounded good with me. Of course, I wanted to meet them first. This was first impressions. "I think that sounds good. I really don't like the looks of that District 4 boy. He looks like a killing machine."

Cedric nodded his agreement. Then, he started to smile slightly. "Are we agreeing and becoming allies?"

I allowed a slight smile to slip through my defenses. "Most definitely." We went to shake hands again, and he kissed my hand gently. Before I could allow myself to grin or blush, I said, "Well, let's see if we got there yet. These train rides take WAY too long."

"Yeah, no kidding."

So we both sprinted out of the room, as if the room was what we were running away from and not shyness.

"Good timing," my dad said, trying to wonder about the blushes on our faces. "We are coming to a stop."

Haymitch gave us curious looks, as if he was in deep thought about something.

We finally stepped out. It was as if we had jumped out of a bowl of honey and got attacked by a million insects. Okay, so maybe that's mean, calling the reporters insects. It certainly seemed like it though.

My parents pushed their way through, both of them all fake smiles as if they had been through this millions of times. My dad, with his more agreeable attitude, answered a few questions. My mom pushed her way through, pulling me and Cedric with her. We ended up in the fancy black limo, and we pulled far, far away from those reporters.

"Wow," I said in awe.

"You won't like what the prep team does to you," growled my mother. "But I think you might grow to like them."

"As they are preparing you for your death," muttered my dad, earning an elbow in the ribs from my mom.

"And you will love the chariot ride," my mom said, starting to smile grimly.

Don't ask me what happened the second we stepped out of the limo; I'm not quite sure. What I do know is that my mom and dad disappeared behind me, Haymitch and Effie encouraged me to go to a stunningly large building and go inside to a huge salon room. I cautiously walked over to a chair and sat down. They(the several squeaky people who I had no idea what or who they were) pulled Cedric in to another room.

"May I just ask one question?" I asked timidly.

"Mmhmm?"

"Yes?"

"Yeah?"

Squeaky accents, Capitol accents. I said carefully, "Where am I? Who are you?"

A tall woman, looking a lot older than she probably was, with dark eyes, lots of make up, and flower tatoos going up her arms, smiled at me in a friendly way. "You are in the Capitol, at the hotel that is saved specially for the Games tributes. And we are your prep team!"

I could say not to ask me what happened next, because it all came down to one thing: A million things. The first woman, who I found out was named Alamea, worked on my hair. Like, all of my hair. They were determined to render me hairless except the hair on my head, which for now was pulled up in to a messy, out of the way bun.

The other woman, Kalea, had high arched eyebrows, short, spiky hair, an hourglass figure, and lots of makeup. They did have one thing in common: the bounties of makeup. Kalea worked on my fingernails and toenails, filing them in to a rounded shape and applying something shiny to 'make them prettier.'

The last woman, Dara, also had a job. Applying my makeup after I was cleaned. Plucking my eyebrows, which hurt, trust me. Putting on something called eyeliner which I found I did not like at all. I did not mind the lipstick nor the mascara too much though.

Alamea, Kalea, and Dara finally left, speaking in their silly accents that a stylist would be with me soon. After all this, this exhausting, miserable day, I wasn't sure I wanted to meet any more people.