𝐝𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 · 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐈

𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐢𝐱

~"are you okay?"~

Andi has me go get dressed in this super long dress that hits the floor and keeps going. Why would anyone even wear this in the first place? Then he has me put on shoes with heels that are like 10 inches. This isn't what I'll actually be wearing for my interview, but this is what I'll be practicing in.

Andi works with me for a little while on walking in high heels, but I get it pretty quickly. We move on to posture, which although I don't necessarily have bad posture, when you basically have no parents beginning age 6 and have 3 older brothers, nobody's going to tell you to sit up straight.

Except Mags. But she doesn't live with us.

"I don't understand why I have to do this but Finnick didn't," I grumble to Andi. "He slouches all the time."

"Yes, but he has a very hot way of doing it," Andi says.

I almost choke. 

Andi has a lot of trouble with getting me to maintain eye contact, because eye contact makes me uncomfortable. Apparently it's respectful. We work on hand gestures for a while before moving on to smiling.

We're done after two hours, and I am very relieved to stop getting yelled at every time I relax my shoulders or don't smile enough. I change out of that dumb dress and dumb heels before going down to lunch.

After lunch, Finnick and I go down to the sitting room. Once we sit down, Finnick sort of rubs his face. He looks tired.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

Finnick snaps out of his daze. "What? Oh. Yeah. I'm...it's just...nevermind."

"No, tell me," I say.

"I'm getting a lot of pressure to present you a certain way that I'm not going to. That's all," Finnick says.

"What way?" I ask, a sick feeling in my stomach, pretending like I don't already know.

"Same way I'm currently being presented. Doesn't matter. I'm not doing that to my little sister," Finnick says, only confirming what I thought.

I'm quiet for a second. "Would it give me a better chance at winning?"

Finnick doesn't even have to think about it. "Yes. Makes you a more appealing outcome, gets you sponsors. But you already have a lot of sponsors."

"Enough to get me a trident?" I ask.

The hesitation on Finnick's face says it for him.

"How would I even portray myself like that?" I ask.

"Well, the thing is, they're already doing it for you. Honestly, no matter what you do, you'll be viewed the same as me. But if we were to really play into it, you'd have to dress a certain way. Twirl your hair. Bite your lip. That sort of thing. You'd have to copy what that girl from One is doing," Finnick says.

The vast majority of all the girls from One have all been presented the same way.

"Velvet," I say.

Finnick cringes. "Yeah. Her."

Then we sit quietly for a long time.

"Do you really want to do this?" Finnick asks.

"Not really. But I do want to live, and I'm going to do everything I can to survive."

Finnick swallows. "Okay."

"Is it going to upset you?" I ask, feeling a little guilty. 

"Honestly? Yeah. But it's not about how I feel, it's about what you want."