𝔖𝔱𝔞𝔯 ℭ𝔯𝔬𝔰𝔰𝔢𝔡 - Clove and Cato/Clato

XVII

I took a deep breath before stepping on stage. I needed to look convincing. I needed to believe that Cato was dead. I needed to be the heartbroken victor that the capitol wants. I "Welcome back, Clove!" Cesar smiled dashingly at me. I wasn't sure what was sparkling more, his teeth or my gold dress. He pulled me into a hug and then sat me down.

"I'm glad to be back, Cesar," I lied trying to sound as convincing as possible.

"I think I speak for all of us when I say we grieved with you over the death of Cato." Hearing the mere mention of his name made me want to kill Cesar right then and there in front of everyone. But I couldn't. "We all could feel your pain. You really loved him," he attempted to sound sympathetic.

I played along and nodded. "Yes," I replied. "I'm finding it difficult to truly accept that he's gone," I wiped away a tear. This caused the audience to awe at me. A few even had a few tears of their own.

"Well, he may be gone, but never forgotten," Cesar said, turning to the wide screen behind him. I looked behind me to see that they had created a montage of our best moments, starting with our chariot ride.

I watched as he handed me a white rose and I smiled and took it. I remember feeling flattered but trying to ignore it. Now, though, seeing a white rose made me want to burn everything around me.

The screen then cut to the arena where we first started talking about the kiss that happened before the games. "Here, we see a conversation about a kiss," Cesar paused the video. "Could you tell us a little bit about that?"

I smiled, trying to act like a shy schoolgirl thinking about her crush. "It was magical," I replied. "We knew the consequences, but we couldn't help but do it anyway."

Cesar awed at this comment. "Believe it or not, I was sent some never-before-seen footage of the kiss our golden boy was talking about!" Cesar said excitedly, causing the audience to cheer. My eyes widened. How could they possibly have footage of that?

The screen faded into a scene by the water fountain. They had known this entire time. I should have known better. I should have known that they had cameras scouting everywhere in this entire god forsaken city. They must have used our feelings against us purposely when imposing the first rule change. They wanted to give us hope just so that they could take it away. I watched as Cato and I kissed passionately, but it cut before he mentioned what happened with our siblings.

"The capitol must have known about your love and graciously offered for you guys to have a moment outside of the tribute area, right?" Cesar smiled at me, trying to cover up the fact that we had snuck out. This was an act of defiance against the capitol, and they couldn't have anyone believing that.

"Oh, of course!" I smiled back. "The capitol is very understanding and generous. We were so lucky," I lied.

Cesar smiled, then continued to play the montage. The next scene was when Katniss dropped the tracker jackers onto us. I watched as Cato checked on me while I was hallucinating. He himself was also hallucinating, but he made an effort to check on me.

Cesar paused the video again; the image of Cato and I looking into each other's eyes while we were completely out of it froze on screen. "Now this," he said, gesturing to the screen. "This was very touching. May I ask what you saw when you experienced the sting of the tracker jacker?"

"Well, Cesar," I started, "they say that the tracker jacker depicts some of your worst manifestations." I paused and looked down, drawing the audience in. "I saw myself stabbing him," I replied with a shaky voice, drawing tears to my eyes.

The audience awed again and started to cry with me. Cesar even took out a cloth from his pocket and wiped his own stray tear. "But it was just a vision," he said, playing the clip again. "This is what was going on in reality."