Garden of Eden

Chapter 15

I wake to my body shaking. This time, though, it's not shaking because someone is waking me up. It's shaking because I'm really cold. The coldness in the ground seeps right into my body. My jacket has shifted while I've been asleep, also exposing my upper body to the extreme cold.

I'm just about to pull up my jacket when it shifts itself. Well, by it-self, I mean by someone. And by someone, I mean Haymitch.

Not entirely sure what to do, I go on pretending that I'm asleep, keeping my eyes shut. I do allow a sigh of contentment as my body instantly becomes warmer.

Lying there for another ten minutes or so, I slowly get up. I make a show of waking and sitting up.

"It's not your shift yet," Haymitch says. "Sleep some more."

"That's okay. I'm not sleepy," I reply.

"So try."

These two simple words rub me the wrong way. I've been letting Haymitch get away with telling me what to do too often that he thinks he has more power over me than he does. Well that's about to change.

"I'm not going back to sleep. So either you can stay up with me, or you can take this chance to get some much needed rest." I emphasise the word much.

Haymitch's reply is most definitely one that I expected. "Nightmares?"

"No," I answer truthfully. Come to think about it, this talk of nightmares has me thinking of Konrad. He once mentioned recurring nightmares and plaguing feelings of guilt. But at its worst, my dreams since coming here has been bad – never nightmares, though.

Maybe there's something wrong with me.

"Look," I begin. "You-"

Turning towards Haymitch, I see that he's already lying down and breathing heavily. He must have been so tired and is already sleeping.

Amused, I turn to the sky and see whether I can make out any stars through this canopy of black trees. From this angle, many of the trees look like spidery hands reaching out to grab their next victims. I pop another mint into my mouth and allow my thoughts to keep me company as I keep watch for the rest of the night.

The sun has risen for several hours now before Haymitch finally gets up. I smile broadly. Not going to lie; sentry duty is boring.

"Morning," I say.

Haymitch merely grunts.

For breakfast, we go through two more ham sandwiches. Afterwards, we break a chocolate bar in half and try one each. It's really quite nice.

Then is our usual custom, each either holding a can or bottle, we resume our journey. Picking up where we left off yesterday, Haymitch leads the way.

Given how much distance we covered yesterday, I'm amazed my legs haven't given up on me yet. I suppose it's only a matter of time though.

As we trek along, we pass by a dazzling little pond, with stunning mayflies and graceful water striders in abundance all around. In silent agreement, we pass on, not so much as considering testing the water out somehow. After all, this arena truly is a poison paradise as Haymitch said.

One time during a break I remember something I've been meaning to ask Haymitch, not that I ever imagined I'd actually get the chance.

"What exactly did you do for the Gamemakers that would result in you getting such a high score?" I ask.

Haymitch recounts this amazing tale.

"As Evelyn and Adam said, the Gamemakers had the attention span of a five year old by the time I got to see them. Before I could do anything else, I first had to somehow get their attention. I did that by throwing a small axe at one of the lights hanging above the ceiling. The explosion of noise and sparks did the job nicely. Then I started throwing knives at target practice. Only, instead of aiming to get as many knives in the centre as possible, I used them to spell out the word DIE. Savouring their reaction, I then turned and left without being excused."