The Hunger Games - Peeta Mellark (1)

}8{ - Friends & Enemies

As she strode toward the elevator, she flung her discs to the side.

She brushed past the gaping Avoxes who guarded the elevators and hit the number two button with her fist.

The doors slid together and she zipped upward.

She actually made it back to her floor before the tears started running down her cheeks.

She could hear the others calling her from the sitting room, but she flew down the hall into her room, bolted the door, and flung herself  onto her bed.

Then she really began to sob.

Now she had done it.

Now she had ruined everything.

If she had stood even a ghost of chance, it vanished when she sent that disc flying at the Gamemakers.

What would they do to her now?

Arrest her?

Execute her?

Cut her tongue and turn her into an Avox so she could wait on the future tributes of Panem?

What was she thinking, shooting at the Gamemakers?

Of course, she wasn't, she was shooting at that apple because she was so angry at being ignored.

She wasn't trying to kill one of them.

If she were, they would be dead.

Oh, what did it matter?

It wasn't like she was going to win the Games anyway.

Who cares what they did to her?

What really scared her is what they might do to her brothers, how her family might suffer now because of her impulsiveness.

Would they take their few belongings, or send her parents to prison and brothers to the community home, or kill them?

They wouldn't kill them, would they?

Why not?

What do they care?

Livia should have stayed and apologized.

Or laughed, like it was a big joke.

Then maybe she would have found some leniency.

But instead she stalked out of the place in the most disrespectful manner possible.

It took at least an hour for her to cry herself out.

Then she just laid curled up on the bed, stroking the silken sheets, watching the sun set over the artificial candy Capitol.

At first, she expected guards to come for her. But as time passed, it seemed less likely.

She calmed down.

They still needed a girl tribute from District 2, didn't they?