Clato: The forgotten love.

Chapter 6

A/N  Here's the next chapter. This one is all from Cloves POV, hope you enjoy 

Clove's POV:

I'm standing in the A6 gymnasium, wearing my formal jeans and a frilly white blouse my mother had picked out the night before. My hair is washed and curled, hanging loosely by my side. Cato Hadley is standing far too close, his hand inches from mine.

We're waiting patiently for Headmaster Hart to announce the volunteers for the 74th annual Hunger Games. He chose the top 10 pairs in the school to stand on the stage. One of our groups will be chosen to enroll in a special training program and then volunteer for this year's hunger games. All the other groups are 18 year olds. Except for Cato and I. I feel honored to be the youngest person on the stage, but I'm also scared, more than I'd like to admit.

Headmaster Hart comes out onto the stage. "Hello, and thank you for attending this year's volunteer ceremony. I'm very thankful to get to share this amazing news with you all today," Hart says. He talks about the history of the training center and how lucky we are to live in district 2, the favorite district of the capitol. "Now, for the moment you've all been waiting for. I've personally chosen the top 10 tribute pairs from our training facility, and from those 10 groups I've chosen one to represent us in this year's hunger games!" The whole room cheers, and a smile escapes my lips. "The pair that will be representing us in this year's hunger games is..." I hold my breath, terrified but also super excited.

"Cato Hadley and Clove Kentwell!" Headmaster Hart finishes and the whole audience starts clapping and screaming and cheering. I'm stunned. I don't know what to say or do but thankfully Cato does.

He grabs my hand and pumps our fists into the air, cheering. He lets go of my hand and walks up the stairs, I follow him.

Cato Hadley just grabbed my hand and I'm going into the games. I know this isn't what I should be thinking, but it is.

Headmaster Hart shakes Cato's hand, and then mine. Cato and I walk into a room behind the stage. In a few minutes some of the training center employees will come in to talk to us about special game training, which we will have to do until the games.

"Can you believe it?" Cato asks me once we're in the room.

"No," I say truthfully.

"We're going into the games," He states, he's pacing back and forth clearly nervous. "Clove," He says "Your the youngest person to ever be chosen as a volunteer tribute." I look at him, he's right.

"Your right," I respond, sitting down in one of the four chairs in the room.

"Of course I'm right," He snaps, He seems a little off, but maybe thats just because of the news we just heard.

"Of course you are, you're always right," I say this teasingly but Cato doesn't seem to notice that.

"Shut up Clove!" He yells, I turn away from him, annoyed that he yelled at me, when a few minutes ago I had been thinking about his hand touching mine.

"I'm sorry I snapped," He replies his voice much softer than before.

"It's fine," I mumble, it really was fine.

"No it's not, I'm sorry. I just... I'm tired and," He pauses, not wanting to go on "I just... I'm scared."

I know he didn't want to admit this. Cato Hadley is supposed to be some strong, ruthless, mean guy who didn't care about anything but bloodshed and glory. I knew that wasn't true though. I knew Cato had 3 younger siblings that he loved and cared for, also seeing him admit this made me want to admit something too.

"I don't want to volunteer," I say, surprising myself and him.

"What? We have to,"he replies, sitting down next to me.

"Well we don't technically have to," I say.

"But everyone would hate us if we don't," Cato says.

"That's true," I agree. "Forget I said anything."

"No," he says "I understand what you mean, I-" He starts, but gets cut off by the worker walking into the conference room.

"Hi Cato," The woman says in a fake cherry voice, she waves to Cato, not even looking at me. "Hi Clove," She says absentmindedly, still looking at Cato. Cato fakes a smile, he seems uncomfortable. I always thought he liked the attention he got from girls.

"So," She starts. "You two are officially the youngest pair to be deemed top pair in the past 57 years. You will start special training on monday. Instead of group training with your group you will be put in with the 18 year olds group," The girl, who I still don't know the name of, says. She's playing with her hair and nervously keeps tugging on her skirt. This girl was probably in her early 20's and she's swooning over a sixteen year old boy.

I roll my eyes at her and Cato catches it. He quickly looks at me and smiles a little. Trainer girl sees and glares at me for half a second before going back to her fake smile.

"Your schedules will be the same except for the end of the day," She continues. "After your last class you will go to a special gymnasium, designed for the volunteer tributes. You two will train together along with the top trainers in the whole institution. My friend and I will also be supervising your sessions twice a week so we can report back to Headmaster Hart about how you guys are doing."

Great, more of her.  

A/N thank you for reading this chapter, please read the next chapter and maybe even vote.