kill for your love - the hunger games

(039) the seventy-third hunger games

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KILL FOR YOUR LOVE.

act three.

(chapter thirty-nine, the seventy-third hunger games)

the presidential mansion, 73 ADD.

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JUNIPER HALE WANTED TO die. She wanted to jump into the pool beside her and drown. She wanted to smash the glass she was holding and stab herself with the shards. She wanted to go to the roof of Snow's mansion and jump off it. Anything to get out of the party she was forced to attend. 

She had to attend. It was good manners, Nadine had stated. The Capitol people had to see that she was not weak, Yara told her. Maybe next year, Lucy mumbled. All of these things were said to Juniper, but she never took them in. And so, as she stood within the party wearing the tightest dress, she did not think attending was good manners, that her absence would be a sign of weakness, and that there would be no next year. 

But Juniper clenched her jaw as she tried to take in as many breaths as the corset she was wearing would allow her. An hour left, not even, and then she could be on her way home to Ten. She just needed to survive Snow's speech, the scolding coming from Nadine, and the annoyance that is the Capitol citizens and Brent Higgins. 

Juniper, groaning at this, began to move further into the room. The forty-foot ceiling had been transformed into the night sky, twinkling down onto the party goers. Musicians floated on fluffy clouds as they stroked their instruments. Dining tables had disappeared with stuffed sofas and chairs littering the space, being placed near the fireplace where the flames were popping and crackling or next to the pond where odd looking fish swam. And finally, there was a large tiled area in the centre of the room that acted as a dance floor, people dressed in extravagant looks and materials swaying their hips to the upbeat music. 

"Juniper!" The sharp voice of Nadine Groves echoed around the area as the eighteen-year-old from Ten saw her escort hurrying over to her in a pink gown. "Juniper, what are you doing?" 

"Uh — what?" 

"Don't just stand there. It's rude!" Nadine scoffed as she buried her fingertips into Juniper's biceps. "Your tribute may not have won, but you still have to act happy for the Victor." 

The Seventy-Third Hunger Games. A year after the Seventy-Second. Everyone was shocked to hear that the male tribute from Ten managed to make it to the top two because there was simply no possible reality where District Ten won two consecutive years. It seemed so impossible that they loved it. Of course, the boy was overpowered by the Victor, which was deemed to be the boy from Two, and had his skull smashed in by a brick. 

Everyone had told Juniper her first tribute's death would be the worst. That it would make her feel like a failure. But whilst she was filled with dismay that the boy had died, it wasn't him not winning that made her feel so sorrowful. It was the fact that the tribute looked so much like... he was so much like... Juniper couldn't even finish that thought without having her heart cease up. 

The boy reminded Juniper too much of herself and someone at the same time. So much so that she had to temporarily close her eyes. But when she opened them again, she focused them on the newest Victor. He was from Two and he was stocky, burly. The look in his eyes could kill, so much so that it even had a chill going up and down Juniper Hale's spine. And the way he flared his nostrils, he was definitely a Career. But as of right now, he was smiling and laughing away in his blue, silk suit with some of the Capitol citizens that fawned over the now seventeen-year-old. It made Juniper sick, seeing the old women lay soft, lingering hands on his shoulder.