- F A L L E N -

1

"Our tribute for the 75th quarter quell hunger games".... She un crinkles the small piece of paper and takes a deeply sad and striding breath, "Y/n L/n".

I stare blankly ahead, motionless. The woman calls for me to come and join her by her side, and I oblige like a skittish dog. I walk slowly to her as she wraps her right hand around my left shoulder. Her rings are digging into the light layer of skin that covers my shoulder bones, and her hands feel cold.

I look to Finnick, who's eyes are glossy and teary with sorrow. I can't stand to look any longer at him so I move my eyes to meet the ground.

The woman lifts her other hand to comfort me awkwardly, like I am a pet she is afraid to touch. "Congratulations", she breathes warmly into the mic,
I am the only one that can really hear her, but I know that she is not saying this for me.
Suddenly I see a water droplet fall of my face, it splashes on the cement like a tear drop and I realize I am crying.

She walks over to the the next big fishbowl full of names and twists her wrist like a witch casting a spell, "now for the lucky boy", she says cheerfully.

She grins towards the crowd. Her hand reaches into the pile of names, and I watch her slim fingers graciously fish around as they select just one. In this moment I am hoping to hear any name besides Finnicks, then get worried that by thinking this I have made a mistake, I have jinxed it, and fated him to be chosen.

She unravels the name tag like before, and maybe it is by the way she looks at me immediately, with a pitiful face I've never seen her wear before, or the way her eyebrows furrow into something vulnerable and true.

Mostly it is the way she sighs so helplessly that I know whose name she has chosen.

She says his name slowly, it lingers in the air like smoke, and Finnick stares robotically ahead. I can practically feel him as he detaches from the world, this reaping, and even me.

The woman grabs his hand and places it on top of mine before raising both ours together. Finnicks touch does not feel like it has before, and I feel like I am touching a ghost.

I am plowed back into reality with the lewd noise of peacekeepers trotting heavily on their boots towards us, and in a matter of moments I can sense their presence behind me.

The cement starts to fall under my feet, my head feels heavy and my body feels weak. They grab me with so much shock I almost collapse fully onto the ground.

I try and glance for comfort at Finnick, but he is pushing a peacekeeper away from him. It seems like it takes hours of Finnick and I being berated by men in white army get up before we both realize we have no control. I'm getting dragged like a dog by a short, fat peacekeeper, the man is pulling my dresses neckline too tight and I start to feel a small burn along my collarbone. My mother is screaming and calling out for me but I cannot answer, I try and I can't.

My eyes plead with dread and fear as I watch Finn silently mouth, "I'm so sorry", as he gets shoved and pushed farther and farther away from me.

The next thing I know I am standing in a room with walls so dark it feels like they are slowly closing in on me, there is one lamp and one desk. There is no chair, and the only light in the room comes from an artificial buzz that makes it sound like I'm standing in a shady convenience store.

Internally, I scan around to find a window, I just want to look outside, but all there is-is a murky brown wall and a door so large it reminds me of how small I am.

———-

The first person to open the door is my mother, her pale neck is wet with sweat, and I can see that she has been crying. I stand still, not sure whether to hug her or sob, because I suddenly cannot remember how I did it the last time.

I feel her frail hands wrap around me, and her disproportionately flabby arms squeeze me until there is little air left in my lungs. I am forced to yell "mom!", but it comes out in a more sweet and gentle "mom" tone. Regardless, she releases her arms from around me, and I suddenly feel empty.

She whimpers for minutes on end that she is so sorry this has happened to me again, I tell her I will try to win for her again (this I do remember saying last time).

Even as I say it I know it's a lie, but I can't admit to my mother the truth; that I was dead the moment I got reaped, so I squeeze her tightly and repeat it: "I'll try".

Because there besides my mother, I cannot tell her that her only daughter is going to die, and the only boy the daughters ever loved is also probably going to die. Finnick could die.

With my inability to fill the silence, I can feel my mother crawling deeper into her own thoughts. I feel my heart drop in an anxious fear that runs away after a deep breath.

My mother finally leaves me to wallow alone, and as the doors close on her way out I get the sudden urge to cry. I try to be a strong woman and swallow my sorrow, but selfishly, I can't stop thinking about how much all of this sucks for me.

And then I think about Finnick, what he must be feeling right now, and I do begin to cry.

I haven't cried in years.

Ever since I'd won the 70th annual hunger games, ever since I'd felt my knife pass through the last tributes stomach, till I'd watched him bleed out and whimper in pain, I had been stripped of the ability to display my sadness.

That was the last time I cried. And I had let the world believe I was crying out of joy. As I had dropped to my knees, sobbed and faintly heard the drummed out, monotonous, "Congratulations to the winner of the 70th annual hunger games", I had only wished to be dead. I had felt no joy, or relief or even pain. Only shame.

Because I was a stone-cold, Capitol created killer.
It disgusted me; I had disgusted me.

And I had to do it all over again.

Finnick had to do it too.

Under the malevolent face of the Capitol, I now had to be stronger than I was.

———-

And suddenly I felt myself being thrown into a memory, my heart thumping out of my chest and my mind racing and I feel
that same woman placing my hands together with another little boy. She looks a little bit fresher. Younger. She has different rings on, these ones have butterfly outlines, and they're less sharp. There is a different boy standing next to me, he's blonde and small and he will not meet my gaze.
He looks scared and brave at the same time.
The woman starts tilting the microphone graciously back towards her mouth, it accidentally hits her pink lipstick and she smears color onto the speaker,

"And may the odds be ever in your favor".