I've never been so relieved, as when I got off that train. In the same moment, my feet touched the ground, I was led into a car (that thankfully had to drive really slow because of the crowd) and straight to what from now on would be my prep team. Even though, the first thing, they said to me, was "take off you cloth", I was considerably more comfortable here than in the train. I'd been to a beauty saloon before, and what was the difference anyway?
"You legs!" one of them said, a man, I think. "They're shaved!"
"Yeah, they are. Does it matter?"
"No, it doesn't," he said, but the rest of the time, they had me, they were smiling like children on Christmas eve, which made even the pain when they plucked my eyebrows funny.
They had to leave me at some point to make room for the stylist. And that basically meant, that they left me completely naked on a stool in front of a mirror. Luckily it was a woman who came in the door, 'cause I might've freaked out if it was a man. No matter how lethal this was, I was not going to sit naked while some random guy checked me out. No. Way.
"Not bad," the woman said while giving me a lift glance. "Not bad at all. I'm Tophia, by the way."
"Not bad, huh? Well, if you've reached your conclusion, would you mind giving me that robe, you're bringing? Here's freezing!" I answered her ironically. She handed it to me with a smile, and I got so busy putting it on, that I didn't realize I was putting it on backwards, till I stood blushing with the back of the robe covering everything from my chest to my knees and the opening of it revealing my bottom to the wall. She laughed at me while I turned it around, which creepily reminded me of my grandma. Grandma. I sighed. Suddenly, there was nothing I wanted more than to sit in my granny's living-room and drink hot coco while she said practicing her non-magical knitting, which she was so proud of. I could feel the sob working it's way up through my throat, and before I could hide it, Tophia held me in her arms and patted my hair softly.
"You carry tears in your heart, youngling. Cry." And I did.
The parade was an awful experience, I wish I could've lived without. Kim and I were dressed a trees, but to make it more believable, they had made two artificial trees with leaves and everything, that fitted us. There was a hole for our brown-painted faces, but none for our arms and legs, which meant they actually had to carry us into the wagon. In the moment, the wagon moved forward, I tilted off it, and they had to delay it all a few seconds to get me up in it again, which all happened to the sound of the other tributes laughing heartily at me. The only good thing was, that they couldn't see my high-red face because of the paint.
Then we finally drove in to show ourselves to the crowd, which was even more humiliating than falling in front of the other tributes. As soon as they showed us on the big screen, the crowd went wild with laughter. The president started talking, but I wasn't really listening. But when he said "And may the odds be ever in your favour", I fell again, and the laughter increased, which for the second time here made me do magic without wanting to. At least, this time I only made the plastic tree blossom, which I guess their technology could've done too. But I still had to explain to those, who knew the suit couldn't blossom. Great. At least I wasn't breaking the Degree for Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery. Or, on the other hand, they'd might be able to follow the Trace here and bring me home. I groaned. Never thought I'd be unhappy about being seventeen.
When the parade was finally over, we were shoved into a lift and taken to fifth floor. Kim's eyes shined like stars, when he saw the place filled with "design" furniture, and he ignored all rules as he jumped straight up in the couch, that almost swallowed him with all the pillows. But, to be quite honest, it did seem a little overkill. I mean, bright yellow chairs, lime green walls, colour-changing floors. Seriously? I missed the Great Hall at Hogwarts, sitting benched between friends, and the dormitories, high up in one of the towers, giving a great view to the moon and the lake. Here, all I could see was high buildings and strangely coloured people wandering around in a far too clean street. At least the bed was exactly as soft as it should be. The last thing I thought before sleeping was, that the costume and the furniture wasn't the only things artificial here.