decisions (n.)
a conclusion or resolution reached after consideration.
CHECKMATE #4
"world-changing decisions are hard to make, but learning you have to sacrifice is even harder."
Life has gone back to normal in the Adelaide Woods five years after t...
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track #01 in eunice raina seyfield
twice // queen of hearts
NOSTALGIA WAS something we didn't even want to think about following the Hunger Games. It never actually existed – apart from the bittersweet feeling that came with looking back at our childhood memories. Although the New Regime was gone for good this time; life in the Adelaide Woods would never be the same.
Five years after – we had all fully moved on from all the torture the Games brought us, resuming our lives, but I still couldn't prevent the times when I laid in bed just thinking about Byrok.
***
My parentsnamed me Eunice Raina for 'the queen of victory', but I just kept thinking about how I had pathetically became a puppet in Byrok's games, even when things were long past over. Even before I ever knew of Byrok's existence – growing up, things were never easy, and in contrast to giving me luck to win all my competitions, my name became the laughingstock of the class. I was ashamed of my name and what it brought for me.
I always avoided writing my full name on tests or worksheets – but it was too late. My classmates already knew what my middle name was, and what it meant. In the first year of primary school, it was as if the world was against me because our teacher had told us to research the meanings of our full names.
They taunted me for being the supposed 'queen of victory', saying my parents only named me that because they knew I wouldn't be able to win for real. My name was only a placebo to reassure me; that I never had real potential.
Whenever I'd get second place in an archery competition or not do as well on a test, they'd make fun of me and say my parents' desperate wish for me to win just once had given up on me because I was an epic failure.
And that's what I told myself most of the time during my middle school years with Gwyneth in the class next door. I am a failure. I can't even do simple things right.
I hated myself; for failing to do what I thought I was 'supposed' to do. It meant academic excellence, being the best at everything I wanted to be. It meant that I had to win every competition; ace every test; never flunk one assessment. To me, it was pretty much impossible; but I believed I could do it – I just didn't manage to. What meant to serve as a helpful push – had now become nothing but a burden.
Gwyneth had such a cool middle name – Thalia. It meant 'in bloom'. And during her Percy Jackson phase in primary school, she was convinced it meant 'daughter of Zeus', too. Altogether, the name Gwyneth Thalia meant happiness was in bloom, or that she was a gift sent from the heavens.
