I think it is evident by now there will be no POV's. So Sorry! I forgot and will put some in the coming chapters.

I wake with a throbbing head ache -I binged on wine last night- that refuses to go away. I have been drinking for about 3 years now, as an escape. I don't get as bad hangovers anymore, though. Just aching heads and foggy minds.

I rip my covers off and go straight to the shower. Before I do, I get a glimpse of outside. It's dawn. The cold water feels amazing -clearing my mind- but I don't bother washing myself. Blurry images of last night come to mind as I take in the smell of vomit. The wild turkey dipped in chocolate which was surprisingly delicious. Glass after glass of wine. Terrorizing Credinsa by eating the meal with my hands and chewing with my mouth open on purpose. And then- what is that?

I see a large patch of blood on my bed sheets -I didn't bother closing the bathroom door. Miscarriage. The word floats into my mind from no where. I had a miscarriage. But I wasn't even sure I was pregnant.

I look at my shaking hands and tell myself it is for the best. But a small voice in the back of my head is nagging at me, It's your fault. You drink too much. Which brings tears to my eyes. I killed my baby. From this experience I know I am definitely not going to have kids if I make it out of the arena alive.

I step out of the shower and am dried by a machine. I wrap a towel around myself, even though I am dry. It is comforting. I leave my hair wet, but put it in a french braid. I walk out of the bathroom to find a wide eyed avox girl with my color of hair starring at the bed.

"Miscarriage.." I say though it is barely audible. The avox looks at me, nods her head once, and then goes to work cleaning the sheets and mattress and replacing everything stained.

When she is done, I dress in the training outfit she leaves for me. Simple tight black pants and a tight blue shirt with quarter-length sleeves. On the way to the breakfast table, I try to forget what happened without success. On this morning, the metal floors and walls feel unforgiving. Like they know what happened.

I'm surprised the avoxes are up this early, I think. Then I remember she initially came to drop off my training clothes. I sit in the living room for a few hours, until I see Credinsa and Cecily come out of their rooms wearing robes -clearly not ready for the day. We sit at the table for a while, not talking. Cecily is the first to speak.

"The training room is in the basement. You and Darious will go together, I already spoke with his mentor." She says after she takes a gulp of coffee.

I am still shaken from the events this morning, so I don't really listen when she tries to explain what to do. Credinsa goes back to her room after she eats. I pick at a roll, not really hungry.

"And remember not to show your skills. What are your skills, anyways?" Cecily asks.

What? "Crossbows. And also, I guess, hand in hand combat." I say starring at the roll.

"Really. Interesting." She says thoughtfully.

My mind flashes back to the reaping. People always think Carra, Primrose, and I are arrogant and stupid. We try to go for nonchalant, but nervousness wins over and makes us act like the whole thing is a joke. It's our way of coping.

"And again, three days of training, then you have a day to prepare for your interview, the interview, and the next day the Games begin." Cecily pauses, as if considering something. "On second thought, I think you already know what you need to do for the interview, so we'll spend the morning working out your strategy for the Games... And also how we want to present you."

I simply nod, not knowing what to say. But that sounds fine with me. I am just going to grab a pack and get out of sight of the cornucopia as fast as I can.

Cecily looks at her watch, and motions to the elevators still looking down. I follow her directions. The whole ride lasts about a minute, with how fast the elevators go. Before I can even try to sort things out in my head, the doors open. But not to the Gymnasium. I look at the floor number, I am stopped at four. I look over just as Finnick steps in.

"Hey ally." He says smiling that seductive smile he always does. My heart melts.

"Hey" I say coolly. He is wearing the same thing I am, and it defines his sleek lean muscles perfectly. Holey shit. He looks amazing. I clear my head of this daze and notice he is looking me up and down.

"Want to train together?" He says hopefully.

Yeah, we could do a whole lot more, too. "Sure" I say suppressing my thoughts. I look down at my feet.

He looks at me with concerned eyes. "Something wrong?" He puts his hand on my shoulder as he says this, causing electricity to flow through my body.

I look at him, putting on a mask. Oh, no. I just had a miscarriage and then in four or five days we're going into an arena to fight to the death. I'm just peachy! Of course I don't say this. "I'm fine." I say with a smile. He obviously knows I am lying but doesn't press me anymore.

When the elevator reaches the Gymnasium, I am in awe with how large it is. There's station after station, all of which must be necessary, right?

I am surprised when Finnick grabs my hand and leads me to the semi-circle of tributes. They are surrounding the instructor, a tall man with black tattoos on his bald head. He quickly explains the rules of the Gymnasium -no fighting with other tributes is basically it- and lists off each station.

I am quickly whisked away by Finnick and we are flying across the Gym to the edible plants station.

"Need to brush up on my skills," He says already identifying poisonous berries. I join in and find I rather like this station.

I memorize quite a few of the berries along with the plants. I find out that pine has a softer inner bark that is moist and good to eat because it is high in vitamins A and C. Then we are off to knot tying -mostly snares for humans and animals a like. Next we throw spears. Finnick is actually very good at this, he can hit a dummy square in the heart from almost 30 ft. away.

He insists that we go to the archery station -I prefer crossbows but can manage a bow and arrow. I finally give in and try my best to hit my target. Which I am actually aiming for less vital parts of the anatomy so people will think I am incompetent. It works.

All of us tributes are directed to a room just off the Gym, the cafeteria. Finnick and I sit together in silence for most of it. I am startled when Saphire -District 2- comes and sits down with us. Finnick and I stare at her in silence. She looks at the two of us.

She clears her throat. "I want you guys for allies." she says this not as a question. We continue looking at her. "Look, I am not with the careers. Personally I hate the idea of careers." Something in her voice makes me believe her. "I saw what you guys can do, and I want in with your-" She stops, examining us. "Whatever you have. Alliance. Yeah."

"No." Finnick says sternly.

She looks shocked. "Then you guys are first on my kills list." she says and then stomps away back to the other careers. Not with them my ass.

I look back at Finnick, with his brown hair and sea green eyes. Those mesmerizing eyes. "Well then." I say.

He turns his attention back to me. "You can never trust 1 and 2. I am kind of glad that 7 took 4's place in the career pack. Now I couldn't be with the careers if I wanted." He smiles at me. I know he is telling the truth about them.

I zone out deep in thought. I am glad, too. I am glad I have the chance to know you before I die. I am so deep in thought -what my life would be like right now if I hadn't volunteered. How Carra would be handling it- that I don't notice that they dismissed us for more training until Finnick is shaking my hand in both of his and saying my name repeatedly. I look at him, and he says my name once more.

"Willow, come on. Back to training." I let him pull me back to the Gym.

We spend the next to days going station to station. Finnick tells me about District four and all the reasons his parents named him after Finnick Odair, a victor who was friends with my great-grandma and helped her in the MockingJay rebellion. Something about how his mother had always felt strongly connected to him. I tell him about my life back home, and my friends. I basically tell him my life's story. I even tell him about how I slept with Darious. I do not however tell him about the miscarriage. When Finnick asks at lunch on the final day why I volunteered for Carra, I actually have to confront this reason myself.

"I guess... I know she wouldn't have made it. She actually has a future. Her great-aunt lives in town and is leaving her shoe store to her. All I had was-" Finnick interrupts me. I am kind of glad though because I don't even know where I was going with that.

"What about the Bakery? What happened to that?" He asks. He means the Bakery my great-grandfather Peeta's family owned.

"It burnt down after my mother was born. She was very good at baking. A talent she got from, I guess Peeta. I know how, but I don't care for it much. I more of see myself running an apothecary shop like Katniss' mother did. I am better with medical stuff. Anyways, they lost everything in the shop and my grandma could have bought a new shop, but that one had been in the family for years. So she bought a shop for her little brother's birthday. For a while it was a bakery, but then went south and now is a fabric store." I catch my breath.

"Oh. Interesting." Finnick says as they start calling people for their private session.

We keep talking, the conversation have turned down another road. Mainly nonsense. Then Finnick is called and I am left alone with my thoughts. What is he showing them? Probably throwing his spears. What am I going to show them? I am going to show them what I can do with a crossbow. Maybe even a bow and arrow since there are almost never crossbows. I wonder what score I'll get. Then I start thinking about Finnick again and what will happen in the arena. What if we are the last two? The odds are against that. I know I will probably die before the final four, if that. But if I don't win I want Finnick to. He is so sweet. And he deserves to, having lost all his siblings to the Games. I wish we knew each other before the reaping. I know we would have been friends. Or would we? What if he is just pretending- I stop myself there because I hear my name being called.

I calmly walk into the Gym, and go to the bow and arrows. There is no crossbow, of course. I pick a target, and shoot it right in the heart. I do this over and over all the while trying not to show how nervous I am. I do this until they tell me I can go.

As I am leaving, I hear one of them say, "Just like Katniss." This really rubs me the wrong way, that they even have the guts to say her name. I have Katniss' temper. But I also have more control. So I decide not to shoot an arrow at them.

I walk to the elevator and press twelve. They are the ones who killed her. I hate them. I hate the Capital.

When the door opens to my chrome colored home/cell, I walk straight to my room. I am still enraged, but over a new thought.. I am not just like Katniss! I am not going to start some stupid rebellion and get everyone I love killed. I do not run like my grandmother told me she did at the sight of blood. And I am certainly not going to have kids and put them through this hell. It's her fault I am here. Victor's children are always chosen. If she didn't volunteer for her little sister, she wouldn't have gone and then my grandma wouldn't have gone, and my mom wouldn't have gone. Even though I wasn't chosen this year, I would've been next year for sure.

In all this rage, I begin to understand why she volunteered for Primrose; it's the same reason I volunteered for Carra. It's because you rather die than watch them be brutally murdered.

Credinsa comes to my door, telling me it's time for dinner. I am thankful that Darious decided to even eat separately. I can't stand the sight of him. I saw him a few times during training. Finnick had noticed, but didn't comment. Thank you Finnick.

The meal consists of fish soup, oysters on crackers, orange flavored chicken, and for desert a cake in the shape of a heart. Typical. Cecily and Credinsa chatter on and on about who knows what. Cecily finally asks me what I did in the private session.

"I shot dummies with a bow and arrow." I say plainly starring at a mountain of cake on my plate.

"That's good. What did they say?" She asks taking down another oyster.

"They said I was dismissed." I take a bite of cake. I decide it is dry and tear off pieces of it and dip it in hot chocolate. This makes Credinsa frown.

Cecily just nods and takes a sip of wine. We are quiet for a while until Credinsa announces tea-time and we go to see the training scores. Darious and his mentor join us. I cringe.

All the careers are in the 8-10 range. Finnick comes up with a nine, which makes me smile. That little ally of mine. The images and scores blur together until Nightlock's face appears with the number 6 underneath it. Darious receives a 7, then when my own face apears my palms start sweating like crazy. I see the number 9 flash under my name. A nine! That was more than I hoped for.

I go to bed, and wake to Cecily hanging over my bed starring at me.

"What?" I say annoyed.

"I know how you're going to present yourself. You will be sexy." She says this as if it is the last number in the square root of pi.

"Okay. I can manage that." I say thoughtfully. She pulls me out of bed and waits for me to get dressed. We spend the day planning my strategy for the arena. I practice walking in heels a bit. I tell her about my alliance with Finnick. She acts approvingly. Then we eat dinner and go to sleep for the next day. It is going to be my big chance to get sponsors. And in the Games, sponsors are your savior.