fantasy | johanna mason

chapter four

After my father's story at dinner, I can't sleep. What would my life be like if Uncle Danner was still alive? Or if my mother was? Or Aunt Ellery? What if I had died in the Games?

I have to get out of this house, away from my father and my little sister. The night is cool and dark, but I don't mind it even though I'm only wearing a t-shirt and fleece pants. I don't know what I came out here for, but for some reason, I'm knocking on the neighbour's door.

"Can't sleep, either?" Johanna asks as she opens the door. She looks exhausted, with bags under her eyes and her dark hair messy. "Come in."

"I didn't know who to go to," I say as I step into her home.

"Are you still worried about your redhead sister?"

"Yeah," I answer, then add, "my dad also told me about my uncle who died in the Games, and now I'm questioning... everything."

"So you're like, I don't know, traumatized?" Johanna asks, picking at her fingernails.

I reply, "I guess it's just because my dad looked up to my uncle when he was a child, then he just... died."

Johanna sighs. "You know, it could've been so much worse," she says.

"Like what happened to you?" I whisper.

"Yes. When I won, I wouldn't give into the shit the Capitol wanted me to do, refused to let them sell my body. In response, they killed my parents, my younger brothers and my younger sister."

"I'm so sorry, Johanna."

Johanna finally stops picking at her nails and looks up at me. Her eyes are a gorgeous brown, with both light and dark brown specks in her irises. "You remind me a lot of my sister. Her name was Kayla. You two have similar physical characteristics, and she had a fiery personality, like you."

"Yeah, but I think you know that we don't get along great," I say.

"Kay and I fought a lot, too," she says, shrugging. "You have something else, though. A will to live, to protect people, I guess. Kayla didn't have that."

"I didn't know you thought of me like that," I say softly.

"Just so you know, I don't see you as a sister," Johanna adds. "I could never see anyone else as a sister."

"Yeah, I get that."

"I think you should try to get some sleep, El."

I smile at the nickname. Johanna has only called me El once before, which was before I went into the arena. "You too. Good night, Jo."

I slip back into the night, reality hitting me once more. I've lost whatever concept of time I once had, but I know the 73rd Games are mere days away.

As I'm creeping up the stairs of my own home, Rowan's voice pierces through the silence of both my house and my head. "El?"

I peek my head into Rowan's room. She's awake, the light from her bedside lamp illuminating half of her face.

"You okay, Row?" I ask, sitting on the messy bed beside Rowan.

Rowan shakes her head. "The reaping's too close."

I wrap my arms around my sister. "I know. The good thing is that you're safer than many other fourteen-year-olds, since we don't need tesserae." 

When I first became eligible for the Games when I was twelve, my father, with mine and Rowan's help, could sustain our family properly. When I was around Rowan's age, my father lost his job as a lumberjack. It took a while, but he managed to get a low paying lumberjack job in the deeper, more dangerous part of the woods. Our family was struggling for that amount of time, with my father working an extravagant amount of hours in the woods and for not much money. I had to get Rowan to help me collect food and supplies after school. It was terrible, not knowing if our father was going to make it home alive. On my fourteenth birthday, I took tesserae for myself, my sister and my father. Until I was reaped and became a victor at sixteen, my family was surviving mostly off tessera grain and whatever other scant food Rowan and I managed to purchase with our meager amount of money. When I came back from the Games with way too much money, I was just glad my father no longer had to work.

"I know, Elowen. But you know, if I become a tribute, I'm not getting out of that arena alive."

"Stop, Rowan," I insist, playing with her hair.

"I'm sorry. I just, I hate this. Everything."

"I know, Row. Be quiet, now."

Rowan bites her bottom lip, not speaking. I focus on loosely braiding Rowan's hair, my hands tangling in her loose, red curls.

Once I finish the braid, Rowan smiles and says "thank you, El."

Rowan moves behind me and says, "let me try."

I nod hesitantly. Rowan was truly blessed with great hair. She inherited the red hair gene on my father's side and silky, wavy hair from my mother. My own hair is straight, thick and dull brown.

Rowan hasn't braided much in her life, so I try to guide her clumsy fingers with my voice. After a while, Rowan says, "okay, this isn't for me. You're so much better."

I laugh. "I'll tell you what. How about after school tomorrow, we spend the rest of the day in the woods. I'll make us a nice dinner and everything. Then you can practice with the axe, and when it gets dark, we'll be able to see the stars."

Rowan seems to visualize this, smiling. "Thank you."

"Sleep now, Row. You'll be tired tomorrow if you don't."

Rowan reaches to turn the lamp off, and I fall asleep with a protective arm around Rowan, who I know I cannot protect from the reaping.

-

A/N: I know the beginning of this book is kinda slow and maybe a bit boring, but I want to develop Elowen and Johanna's relationship before the Games start. Next chapter will be the reaping which will be interesting I promise (!!)