I don't own The Hunger Games.

The early morning sunlight streamed in through the windows, bathing the room in a soft golden glow. Melissa stretched out and sighed in content, the bed covers pooling around her.

"Fuck!" A crash sounded from the room next to hers. "Fucking Greg Hardy!"

The serenity of the peaceful Saturday morning was interrupted by the sound of Clove getting sacked on Madden. Melissa laughed to herself quietly- she was fairly used to this.

Life was going great for her at the moment. Cheer practice was tough, but it was more fun than ever. She had great new friends. She was acing her classes. She was dating Cato Stone- one of the kings of West Palms' social scene. He was attractive, funny, a nice guy and he always seemed to listen to her so intently. Her thought process was interrupted by her phone pinging with a new text message. She grabbed it off of her nightstand and swiped a finger across to unlock it.

1 New Message

Marvel Diamond:

Loser

She rolled her eyes, a hint of a smile on the corner of her lips as she texted back.

Takes one to know one x

She laughed as she chucked her cell back onto the nightstand. Marvel was a great guy. She was really happy for Clove, although she felt a small frustration every time she saw them together. She wasn't sure why. Her phone pinged again, but the doorbell sounded before she could answer it.

"Can you get that? I'm a little busy!" Clove called from her room, followed by a whooping and a yell of 'Touchdown baby!'

Melissa pulled on one of her step-father's old hooded sweatshirts on that almost completely covered her t-shirt and shorts.

"Just coming!" She yelled as she clattered down the stairs. She reached the door and pulled it open.

"Oh. Hey."

Johanna Mason and Gale Hawthorne stood on the front porch. Johanna was grinning like a Cheshire cat, but Gale was scowling slightly as he looked down at the floor.

"Hello, Melissa." Johanna greeted her with that unnerving grin.

"Uh, hi. Clove's upstairs, I can call her-"

"No." Johanna cut her off. "We're here for you. Gale needs your help."

Johanna nudged the dark haired captain of the basketball team, whose left wrist was still bound in bandages.

"Yeah, uh, I do. You see, Madge's birthday is coming up and," He eyed Johanna nervously. "I need help getting her the perfect gift. Johanna here is no help to me, she's just along for the ride and to offer criticism. Do you think you could lend a hand?"

"Wow. Um, I'm flattered that you asked me but I'm supposed to be going over to Cato's in an hour with Clove. Besides, wouldn't it be more beneficial to ask Cashmere or Glimmer?"

"Pfft, no." Johanna cut in before Gale could answer her. "They're no help. They just want to run around Forever 21 trying on dresses and shoes. It's got to be you, I'm afraid."

"Alright." Melissa eventually nodded. "I'm sure Cato will understand. Wait here, I'll just go get changed."

Melissa ran back up the stairs. As soon as she was out of sight, Johanna elbowed Gale hard in the ribs.

"Ow!" He hissed, doubling over from the pain. "What the hell was that for?!"

"You're a terrible actor!" She hissed back. "We're trying to convince her to come out the house, not stay in it! We need her away from Cato whilst Clove tutors him! I didn't recommend her to Brutus as a tutor for Cato for you to ruin the plan with your bad acting!"

"I know the plan! Drama was never my forte!" Gale snapped back at her. Melissa appeared at the stop of the staircase and the pair were all smiles again.

"Ready!" Melissa grinned, and the three of them set off.

…

Clove was supposed to be tutoring Cato, but she wasn't entirely sure that she had the right house. She was stood on one side of a huge, wrought iron gate with her schoolbag slung over her shoulder. Beyond the gate, a stone paved driveway lined with bright flowers and trees snaked up a quarter of a mile towards an enormous white brick house. Children's swings and a slide rested in the grass surrounding the long driveway, as well as all sorts of balls, dolls and water pistols. Just beyond the house, Clove could see endless green and, perfectly mowed into lines. To the upper left of the house she was fairly sure she could see a clear pond that was the same size as her house in New Hampshire had been. To the right, a one-story building had its garage style doors open and she could faintly make out gym equipment if she squinted hard enough.

Clove had heard that Cato's family were rich, but she could never had imagined this. She stepped across to the electronic intercom. There were options to call for the main house, security, the groundsmen or the cleaning staff. Frowning, she pressed the touch screen for the main house.

"Hello?" The screen flickered, and a man's face appeared. He looked to be at least fifty, with thinning brown hair and smile lines around his eyes.

"Um, hi." Clove smiled awkwardly.

"I'm the Stone family butler. Who are you here to see?" He asked, peering at Clove through his glasses.

"Cato." She held up her school bag. "I've been assigned as his physics tutor."

"Ah, yes. Clove. I shall buzz you in and page one of the groundsmen." The butler's face disappeared as the camera projection shut off. The iron gate clicked and shuddered open just enough for Clove to slip through. She looked ahead up the long driveway and saw a golf cart trundling towards her, cutting across the grass from the right.

"Hey." A young man chewing on the end of a cigarette stopped the cart in front of her. "You're lucky. Not every visitor gets to hitch a ride, y'know."

Clove got into the golf cart and they drove up to the house in silence.

"Thanks." She said when they reached the house. It looked even bigger up close.

"Anytime." He nodded to her before spinning the wheel and driving off.

The butler was waiting for her at the open door.

"Good morning, Clove." He bowed to her as she made her way up the steps to the wraparound white porch. "My name is Lane. It is so nice to meet the girlfriend of Master Cato at last- he has spoken about you a lot."

"Oh, no. He's dating my sister. He and I are just friends." Clove could feel her cheeks tinging pink slightly.

"Really? He speaks a lot about a 'Clove'. And he's become rather invested in soccer. I thought- oh, never mind. He's waiting for you, I shall take you to him."

Lane led Clove into a large, modern-looking hallway. A spiral staircase twisted upwards, and she could see the two other floors above and the one floor below the ground level. She was taken into a living room that played host to two large, white leather couches and a cushioned arm chair. The carpet was also white, with a large zebra patterned rug in the middle of the room. Three of the walls were white, but one of the longer ones was painted a deep red. A few stuffed animals were scattered across the carpet. The television took up most of the wall opposite the biggest couch, where Cato was leant back with a game controller in his hand and a headset around his neck.

"Master Stone." The butler bowed to Cato before leaving the room.

"Hey." Cato offered Clove a half smile.

"Hey yourself." She sat down next to him. "Madden, huh? Who are you playing against?"

"Finnick." Cato said. "He thinks that just because he has OBJ he's gonna kick my ass."

"He is kicking your ass." Clove pointed at the screen. Cato was only down by six points, but there were only thirty three seconds remaining in the last quarter and he was in his third down.

"You gonna unpause the game or what, Stone?" Finnick's voice sounded through the headset. Clove put her hand out, and Cato handed her the remote. She dropped her bag and sat down next to him.

"Clove's about to kick your ass." Cato spoke into the microphone.

"Pfft." She heard Finnick respond.

"Your offense is shit." Clove said as she unpaused the game and selected a Hail Mary play. "You have, like, no Patriots."

"I have Amendola." Cato pointed him out as the ball was snapped and the figure of Ryan Tannehill looked to make a pass.

"I've got him, Brady and Gronkowski in my offence." Clove said as she selected her receiver and made the long pass. It was complete, and Cato's team entered into a first down just in front of the endzone.

"Rush it. I've got Marshawn Lynch." Cato instructed him. Clove shot him a look.

"Excuse me. I'm the Madden master here. Not you." She smirked, but when the ball snapped she passed it to Lynch. They watched the screen as he ran into the endzone for a touchdown as time ran out. Cato and Clove whooped and high-fived as Finnick cursed through the headset. The kicker took the kick and Cato won the game.

"Yes!" Clove cheered.

"I have to go now, man." Cato said to Finnick. "We have to study."

Clove was surprised at how easy things were between the two of them. Since had been avoiding her all week at school, she figured that her tutoring session with Cato would be at least a little awkward. There didn't, however, seem to be any tension between the two.

"I brought my-"

Clove was cut off by the sound of thundering footsteps. A ball of limbs rolled into the room, and she realised that it was two children. They were laughing hard as they tussled. Cato stood up and plucked a small, skinny blonde girl off of a laughing brown haired, blue eyed boy.

"Put me down! I have to win!" The girl squealed, squirming in Cato's arms.

"Girls suck!" Cato jokingly jeered at her, and began to tickle her. She screeched with laughter and kicked out at him. She caught him in the chest with her bony elbow and managed to wiggle free, dropping to the ground. The boy instantly dived on her again, and they continued to roll around across the floor as they fought.

"Help me beat the boys!"

It took Clove a few seconds to realise that the blonde girl was talking to her.

"Oh, um-"

"Leave Clove out of it, Kayla. She doesn't want to play and she couldn't take me and Toby anyway." Cato grinned as he helped Toby to his feet.

"Oh, is that supposed to be a challenge?" Clove got to her feet and raised an eyebrow at Cato. "Because Kayla and I could take you in our sleep."

Before Cato could react, Clove dived to the floor and grabbed a Nerf gun from next to the rug. She rolled over so that she was on her back and leaned up slightly so that she could shoot at Cato.

"No!" He yelled. He grabbed Toby and they dived behind the second couch. Kayla picked up the other Nerf gun, and she and Clove quietly crept towards the couch. Just as they reached it, the two boys jumped up with their own Nerf guns and unleashed the foamy darts on the girls. They screamed started shooting back as Cato and Toby came around the sides of the couch, still shooting. Cato ran out of darts and knocked Clove's gun out of her hands. He grabbed her wrists and she laughed and fought against him. He dug his foot into the back of her right knee and she went down and took him with her, but Cato twisted at the last minute so that Clove landed on him and he didn't crush her. They lay laughing for a few minutes, before Clove rolled off of him. She grabbed her gun and shot him one last time, right in between the eyes.

"Dead." Clove declared. Kayla had Toby in a headlock, marking her victory against her.

"Alright scrub, let go." Cato said to Kayla as he stood up. "Girls win."

"Woo!" Kayla jumped up and cheered. She hugged Clove tightly before doing a victory lap around the room.

"Not fair!" Toby pouted. "I want a rematch!"

"No can do, kiddo. Clove needs to tutor me if I want to get into college." Cato said, ruffling his brother's hair.

"Aww." Toby sighed. "Fine. Come on Kayla."

He took his sister's hand and pulled her out of the living room. Clove could hear them laughing as they ran off.

"Sorry about them." Cato laughed awkwardly as they sat back down on the couch.

"Don't be. I had fun." She smiled as she pulled a textbook out of her bag. "But now…"

"Physics." Cato dropped his head back and groaned. Clove laughed and rolled her eyes at him.

"Physics."