Lavinia....the drowning silence.
chapter one, looking back
I dream of forests. I rarely dream but when I do it's always the same. A dream bordering on nightmare. Nightmare because of what it brings back to me every night. Dream because I yearn for what I see. I am walking through an orchard carrying a woven basket, the splinters cut into my hands but I walk on against the afternoon heat, dragging my feet. Suddenly the basket is whisked from my grasp, I turn to see who has taken it...and the scene changes. A bird singing in the voice of a child. A sack of apples falling to my feet. A large screen with sobbing families gathered around, holding onto one another as if they were afraid they might be carried away by the light breeze that whips my hair in front of my face. A truck. The forest flying past me in a green leafy blur...
I am jerked awake by the all to familiar metallic voice echoing around my room.
"All staff report to the kitchens in five. All staff report to the kitchens in five. All-"
I swing my feet off the bed and let my self fall. It's the only way to get safely out of bed, the walls of my room are so sharp and slanting, the cool metal floor reflects my face as I land in a crouched position. I straighten up, then almost immediately slump and have to catch myself from falling. I can't describe how much I want to return to the dream, even though I know how it ends. But I can't, I can't face it. Sometimes I'm not sure what kills me more. How torn I am between nightmare life and equally terrifying dreams. How my life is now a continuous circle of nothing. Meaningless.
I'm just living the Capitol dream.
I walk over to the only chairs on the room. Two slabs of finely polished metal attached to the wall, side be side. Not any decent furniture for slaves, no decent furniture for avox's. I pick up the neatly folded clothes and pace over to the sink and toilet, it's still the same room, they tell us that save is limited and no one is brave enough to say otherwise.
I pull on a stiff shirt that I button up to my neck and tie a red bow around my neck. Next is my skirt, a simple black scratchy material that comes down to my knee, almost to my ankle. I push my feet into red knee socks and black leather shoes with the Capitol seal on the buckle. Facing the glass placed roughly into the wall I take a red and black striped ribbon from the dip cut into the wall and tie my red hair off my face. I place a Capitol pin into the middle of my bow and walk from the room.
There's a long metal corridor if you leave my room, each side is peppered with the doors of other avox's. Over ten thousand slaves serving in the Capitol. One of Panems best kept secrets I suppose. The part of the building we are housed in may be small, but it reaches up to the clouds and it's set up like a big silver prison. Of course that's what it is...
People are coming out from their rooms too. Male and female but all the same height. The Capitol think that it makes us look more like a workforce if we were all the same height. Tall people have barely any soles to their shoes. The short have extra heels. We all file through the reflective corridors the sound of our shoes making a continuous clacking echo but apart from that...it's completely silent. The heels on my shoes are so tall that I almost trip and fall a few times. I'm short so the heels on my shoes are particularly tall and even after a year I still find them difficult. I catch sight of myself in the wall, hair as red as flames still threatens to escape my rough attempt at tying it back my eyes are a deep brown framed with long lashes. My lips are light and pursed. A boy cuts in front of me and when I look back at myself I am no longer in the avox building but I am home...
The sun is just rising as I climb down the stairs yawning. My mother is standing by our ancient rust covered cooker. I'm fairly sure that there's nothing good for us that could be cooked in that but it's the best we have. I can only dream of the alternative. I drag my feet to the kitchen tables as my mother turns to face me.
"seep well?" and I can't help noticing how shaky her voice sounds today.
"mother..." I begin cautiously but she cuts me off as her kind face crumples and she breaks down in tears. I instantly feel my face crumple too, I can't help it though. No one should have to see their mother cry, not ever.
"please....don't just....we've been over this...mother-" but I'm cut off by my father coming out of the garden and through the door.
And I instantly take a sharp step back from them. My father puts his arms around my mother and I wipe every trace of emotion from my just concerned face as he turns to face me. Upon seeing me his old face crumples with sadness and anger. I don't care, if anyone deserves the worst it was him.
We both know why my mother cries now. Reaping day is one week from now and her nerves are pulled taught. I have taken so much tesserae that my name is already in forty eight times. Needles to say I won't be chosen.Or- NO! I refuse to even think about it. I cross to the bathroom and put both hands either side of our cracked mirror and stare hard at myself. My red hair flies out at all angles like fire itself. My eyes are the deep brown of a birds wing and my face has the kindness of my mother. No, nothing will happen to me. Not ever. I will not be in the hunger games. I will not die so far away from home.
I will not go to the Capitol........
...
...
...
But I did. I went to the Capitol and I'm never going to leave. I will never see my family again and nothing will change that.
My name is Lavinia Lupin and I was turned into an avox. I did not go into the hunger games. I left before the reaping. I left because I fell in love.
A girl bumps past me and I realise that I've been standing frozen still. I see the girl take the hand of a taller boy who matches her hair colour. And just for a second time seems to freeze but then she pushes on and I see the boy slump with the hopelessness that follows us all. Love, like our voices...is meant to be extinguished. I feel that if love survives here, so can our voices, in a different kind of way.
End of chapter one. X
