Chapter Fifteen
Mags snickers as Annie squeals and ducks away from the worm I'm holding out. There's Mandatory Viewing tonight so we're sitting on the end of the Victor's Village docks with fishing poles. The viewing is probably just Katniss and Peeta's wedding coverage but I think we all know it could be more. So we're fishing. Maybe we'll have an appetite for what we catch and maybe we won't. Either way, with sailing banned it's all we can do to kill time.
"Just a worm, girl," Mags teases Annie. "How'd you grow up here and not like worms?"
She thrusts her pole at me, demanding that I put the worm on the hook. "In school, when I was seven, a boy put a handful of worms in the sandwich I had for lunch. I ate half of it before I realized."
I motion for her to cast her line. "If it took you that long to realize, maybe you really like worm sandwiches. Want me to make you one?"
In answer, she shoves me off the dock and into the warm, clear water. I scare all the fish away but that's not my problem because Mags will be more annoyed than me – she takes her fishing very seriously. I corkscrew through the water a few times before I pull myself back up on to the dock and get Annie as wet as I possibly can.
"What an ugly fish," Mags laughs, poking me with the handle of her pole before I can get close enough to get her wet. "Throw him back."
I wrap myself around one of the posts before Annie can do just that. "You two are very rude, teaming up against the only man here."
"Boy," the old woman corrects me. "The only boy here."
Annie giggles behind her hand. "We're not catching anything, you know."
"Well now it's probably because someone threw me in the water and scared the fish away," I point out dryly. "Do you want to try the other dock?"
"No, the fish will come back. Probably just in time for us to have to go in for the Mandatory Viewing, but they'll come back." She's quiet for a long minute before she glances at us from behind a fringe of red hair. "Do you think it's just about Katniss and Peeta's wedding?"
Mags shakes her head before I can answer – not that I could do more than offer empty speculation. "No," she says confidently. "It'll be that but it'll be more. It's the Third Quarter Quell. Snow will read the card. It's time for that."
"Does anyone know what the card will say?"
"I don't," I say, and I'm telling the absolute truth as much as I would like to know what it will say.
"I don't," Mags says with much less conviction – and I know she at least has a guess. "Stop it, both of you. Enjoy these hours in case the next ones are dark and dangerous. Please. For an old lady who wants to see you smile, smile."
It's hard to smile after she begins what I am terrified is the beginning of goodbye. But we smile. We force ourselves to laugh and smile again. I am alive because Mags made me smile on the train to my Games and because she kept making me smile every day after that. I owe her so much more than this.
By the time we're required to be inside, we've got exactly three scrawny fish. They're all still alive in the bucket of water so we throw them back. If we're about to hear about more people dying, there's no reason the fish shouldn't get a second chance at life.
We go into the dark house and don't turn on any lights before arranging ourselves on the sofa. Mags tries to sit on one end but we put her in between us without speaking. Annie and I can reach each other around her just fine. I just can't shake the feeling that I need to hold to what I've got and that Mags is the first thing I'm likely to lose.
When the program starts Caesar Flickerman is beside himself with joy over the selections for Katniss Everdeen's wedding dress. I don't know Katniss but I know she hates every one of these creations because of what they represent. Her actions in the arena and the things Haymitch told me make me sure of that. Cinna designed them all, of course, and I can see things I imagine Venia helped sew but Katniss will still hate them.
No one moves to turn off the television.
We know something more is coming.
And then President Snow is at a podium.
He announces that the Quarter Quell will prove that the best among us are not invincible. He announces that the tributes will be drawn from the pool of existing victors.
It's like he's talking directly to me, telling me that I am going back into the arena.
My brain starts working like it's underwater. The sounds I hear are muffled and echo painfully in my ears. It's hard to breathe. I feel like I'm drowning.
Time passes but I don't acknowledge it until Mags is shaking my shoulder and I see the sun appearing on the horizon over her shoulder. I didn't move all night. It's horrifying for so very, very many reasons. She's shaking Annie too, pulling her out of the shell she escaped into.
"Enough," Mags snaps. "Enough. We are not dead yet. We are not reaped yet. We will live until time is up. Pull yourselves together. Go wash up. I'll make breakfast."
Annie moves first, going up to the bedroom we share. I go to the bathroom on the first floor and wash my face and hands. But Annie still gets to the kitchen before me.
"We decided what will happen," she announces when I walk in.
I worry briefly about exactly how long I was in the bathroom.
"We decided what will happen," she repeats, even as tears fill her eyes and she struggles to square her shoulders. "My name will be drawn because you love me and your name will be drawn because you're dangerous."
I nod, because that's all I can bring myself to do. And I don't want to hear what's coming next.
"I'm going to volunteer," Mags says, making me really not want to hear it all. "Annie's not going in."
"You can't survive the arena," I say with a sudden burst of passion.
"Rude," she says, smiling sadly and telling us she knows that. "You two are young. You deserve a chance to live. You'll fight harder, boy, if you have Annie to come home to. Don't argue. Be like her and don't argue. Living is the greatest gift either of you can ever me. Understand?"
I understand all too well. Mags is signing her death warrant because not all of us can live. I understand too that Annie will be terrified without either Mags or I. And I understand that no one will volunteer for me. I have to go into the arena again. But I understand that Annie will be safe, mostly, so long as she's not in the arena.
"Finnick?" Mags says with a soft firmness I'm going to miss. "Do you understand?"
I swallow a lump in my throat and tell her that I understand.
"Good." She comes around the table and squeezes my hand. "It's decided then. Now go get some oranges and make us juice for breakfast."
She's giving me time alone, as if I need more, and maybe I do. Either way, I escape the house before she can change her mind. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Annie start to come after me but Mags stops her with a shake of her head. I don't want to see Muscida or Librae or Ron – especially him because he would be the only one who could take my place – so I go to the orange trees as far from the houses as possible.
It's odd, though, that when I get there I don't break down. The fresh air feels good and I simply collect the oranges. The look more appealing if for no other reason than I don't know how many more oranges I will ever pick, eat, or even smell. Cherishing organs seems silly but I do.
Annie greets me on the steps with a hesitant smile.
Knowing full well that nothing is more sacred than life and there's no reason to hide anything anymore, I drop the oranges into the sand and pull her into my arms. I kiss her like I've never kissed her outside of our bedroom.
And she responds in kind, molding her body to mine and losing track of the moment entirely.
When we finally break apart, we go to Mags and sandwich her between us in a hug of living, not of dying.