I AM BACK!
Life is chaos but I can't forget about posting this forever. Give me like, 48 hours and things will be substantially more chill. Enjoy this EXTREMELY DIFFICULT CHAPTER!
Things change immediately after that. The first change is that I cease to see Gale completely. That part doesn't surprise me; he more or less told me that would happen. I ignore the gnawing pit of loneliness that forms within me and do my best to live life as normal. I go to school, to the woods, back home, and I don't think about what's to come.
Until he shows up.
He is Romulus Thread, District Twelve's new head Peacekeeper, who does not actually seem peaceful at all. They haul him in the same day they haul Cray out. Worry tears at me. I have never liked or respected Cray- his taste for desperate young girls made that impossible- but I'm used to him. I know he won't prosecute me for hunting or stop me from exploring beyond the fence. This Thread guy, who steps off the train with a face like a stone, promises to be a harder case.
He's a wiry man of medium height, grizzled, with eyebrows that could pass for squirrel tails. He surveys District Twelve disdainfully. "Meh! Good thing I wasn't expecting a warm welcome."
"For Twelve, this is warm," replies Darius, the best of our Peacekeepers. He's a young guy with a sense of humor, who never snitches and will buy almost anything I bring from the woods.
His joke is not rewarded. Commander Threads sneers at him. "Shut up. Where's your helmet?"
"Uh…in the wash?"
The majority of the Peacekeepers in Twelve don't wear their helmets, and I don't think I've ever seen Darius with one on. Thread is lucky he actually has his chest plate on over his white uniform shirt, which won't stay white for long with all the coal dust in the air.
"Get out of my sight," Thread orders. "I'll show myself around."
"Yes, sir." I've never heard Darius call anyone "sir" before. But I've never seen anyone with the extreme negative energy of Thread before, either.
Darius scuttles away and Thread surveys the curious crowd gathered at the train station. "WHAT ARE YOU ALL LOOKING AT?" he roars. "Return to your homes! NOW!"
No, this is not going to be good.
§
Thread runs the district with an iron fist. He wastes no time, either. The day after he arrives, a whipping post is erected in the square. The day after that, he makes use of it for the first time, on a miner who failed to show up to work. He's terribly sick; I know this because he's one of my mother's patients. Combine the illness with the whipping, and he will most likely die, sooner rather than later.
Curfew is suddenly strictly enforced. The Hob is shut down, forcing many of the regular traders into the mines. Armed Peacekeepers patrol the streets at all hours of the day and night, glaring at any citizens who might pass. This, all of this, I can live with. It's when the electric fence comes on that the terror really sets in.
The fence surrounding the district has always been an empty threat. No more of a danger than the beasts that supposedly fill the forest. I always check it before I duck under it, but it's never actually been on before. District Twelve barely has access to electricity at all, just enough to power the TVs they use to feed us propaganda and maybe a flickering streetlight or two.
The first time I hear the electric fence humming, alive, I am filled with dread. I have a gut feeling it's not a coincidence or a fluke. It's a warning. They know people have been wandering beyond the fence, and they're not going to tolerate it anymore.
Nevertheless, I return several times to see if it's turned off, and several more times to try and find an alternate way through it. No luck. Eventually, I run into a Peacekeeper patrolling the fence line, and I'm forced to take the hint. I can't end up on the whipping post too.
My family is put in an undeniably bad spot. We have some food stored away- leftovers from good summer hunts, Parcel Day treasures- but limited options for acquiring more. We get small portions of grain and oil each month, from the tesserae I've taken out. Mother makes a little money from her healing business- more now that people have their backs shredded by Thread's whip on the regular- and Prim's goat, Lady, provides milk and cheese that we can eat or sell, but that's not much. In the grand scheme of things, really, it's nothing.
I grow more restless with every passing day. I hate feeling so useless. I've been the main provider for my family since I was Prim's age and now there's nothing I can do. We eat as little as we can get by on, let the fire run as low as we dare, but the little food and money we have left won't last much longer. I am terrified, and worse, desperate. I don't want it to get to the point where we have to eat Lady, knowing what it would do to Prim, but we're also dangerously close to starvation and I see few other alternatives. Prim taking out tesserae is not an option. That, I refuse to consider altogether.
Then the money starts showing up. A few coins slipped under our doorstep every night. I don't waste much time wondering: I know exactly where the money is coming from. My suspicions are confirmed when I wait up one night- well, until the early hours of the morning, really- and spot Rory Hawthorne sneaking back towards the Victor's Village at dawn. Gale.
'Annoyed' is an understatement. How many times have I told him that we won't accept his charity? But at the same time, the need is there. We've all been going to bed hungry and it's only going to get worse. Even if we make it to the next Parcel Day, that won't buy us much time. Parcel Day won't last forever, either- that will stop altogether in July.
So we accept the money. I'm not happy about it- actually, I'm ashamed of it- but I swallow my pride and keep my family fed. We survive on tesserae bread, goat's milk, and the cheapest food available for purchase. It's just that: surviving. Not living. Not in the authentic sense of the word.
I count the coins and survey the food we have available. We made it to February first, Parcel Day, and the package we snagged included a can of pear slices. Prim insists we need to eat them with goat cheese and slices of white bread, and I'm trying to see if we can swing it. Obviously, Prim can make the cheese, and we already have the pears, so the problem is the bread. We have enough to buy a decent-sized loaf, but can we justify it?
I eventually decide that we can. We have more than enough coins to buy a loaf, and there's been so little joy in Prim's life lately. She deserves something special, as small as it might be.
I tuck the coins in my pocket and put my jacket on. I don't tell Prim where I'm going- I think I'll surprise her. She loves surprises, and I so rarely have the resources to do anything for her. Imagining her glee at something as simple as a loaf of bread is what gets me through the walk to the bakery.
I haven't been there for a while. There hasn't been a reason to go. No hunting means to squirrels to trade, and no hunting also means no money with which to buy baked goods. The "avoiding Peeta" factor has played a slight role as well.
I'm undeniably relieved when it's not him working the counter, but the eldest Mellark brother, Nicky. Tall and skinny with a friendly face, I don't know him very well, but I know I like him. I grab a loaf of white bread (the day-old stuff, obviously) and take it to the counter to be rung up.
"No squirrels today?" Nicky comments, fingers flying over the cash registers.
I shake my head, not wanting to reveal too much. "Haven't been out lately."
"Ah." He hands me back my change. "Well, nice to see you anyway."
Before I can reply, the door behind the counter swings open and someone else walks in. Peeta. He's carrying a tray of cheese buns- my favorite- but that's not what stands out the most. It's the swollen purple-black eye he's toting, a bruise that screams "somebody hit me".
It's not the first time I've seen him with a black eye. At this point, it's his mother's calling card. Anger wells up in my stomach and I wonder what he did to "deserve" it this time. Last time, he earned it by breaking curfew to see me. Obviously that's not the case now.
Just thinking about last time burns. I had been furious then too, all but dragging him to my mother to get the offensive wound looked at. But I can't help him now. Not anymore.
Whatever I was going to say dies in my throat. I avert my eyes and grab my loaf of bread, ignoring Nicky's polite, "Goodbye, come again!"
I can't see anything except Peeta, his eye. I can't think of anything but how bad it was before, and I wonder if there are belt marks beneath his shirt this time, too.
My breathing grows ragged when I get outside the shop, and I clutch the bread I just bought like it's a weapon. Bread for Prim, bought with Gale's money. More proof of how useless I am. I can't help Peeta. I can't feed my sister.
Is this what the rest of my life will look like?
Also, kind of off-topic, but I've never understood why so many people write Peeta's brothers as complete degenerates. I just think they should be nice.
Yes, Nicky is short for Pumpernickel. I also have a horse named Nicky, so that's fun too.
Sorry to disappoint with another short and relatively boring chapter- NEXT ONE IS THE REAPING WHOOP WHOOP! That's when things get REALLY exciting again- I assume you already know who's going into the Quarter Quell…