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Treech Koa knew all there was to know in the world.
He knew that he was from district 7, he knew that he was reaped for the tenth hunger games and he knew that he was currently playing a card game with the people he would be forced to kill. If he wasn't at the center of this thought, he would have laughed at it.
He turned to look at Lamina. Her quiet sobs had halted and, just for a moment, he felt as though things were okay or at least that they would be okay.
Treech knew he wanted to survive the impending games, he just didn't know whether he could.
Treech did, however, know that he was smart.
He didn't go to school in district seven but every other day he would visit Mrs Mason, an old woman who lived at the top of the tallest hill in the district.
Some of the earliest memories Treech had included running up to Mrs Mason's house, knocking on the door and running away in fits of giggles.
The town thought she was mad.
Her son left her to move right next to Treech as he was married to his sister.
Treech knew that he despised that asshole.
Either way, Mrs Mason was kind enough to offer Treech basic scholarly lessons. So much of Treech's life revolved around those lessons, he almost didn't want to graduate from their makeshift school.
Every evening, after his work as a lumberjack and his shifts at the saloon, he would climb all the way to the top of Barkley Hill and to Mrs Mason's house where he'd spent an hour on Math, an hour on English and reading and -although this was not a part of the deal- an hour where they talked.
Treech's mother died when he was young. He remembered the day so clearly, as much as he wished he didn't.
Therefore, he lacked a motherly figure growing up.
Sure, there was his boss Miss Woodard or his friend Ash's mother or even his own sister, Maeve but none of them filled that hole in his heart, that massive, bleeding, mother-shaped, bullet hole in his heart.
Not like Mrs Mason.
He was scared of the woman at first, attempting to skip his lessons but even at her old age, her eyes were keen as a hawk and he soon gave up in his exploits to escape.
Quicker than expected, he began warming up to his teacher just as she began warming up to him.
