A Knife in the Dark | ✓

Thirty Five

As I read, another slip of paper fell from between the second and third pages. I ignored it, despite how heavily it fell, until I was finished reading. Saylee had set down the necklace. She and Jake looked shocked at what had been in the letter.

"He wrote that over a year ago? What's the date?" Saylee's questions were more like demands. I passed her the third page, which had the date on it. Her eyes widened. "The day after the Reaping? He wrote this the day after the Reaping for the 73rd Games?"

"I'm more concerned with him knowing that he was going to die a year before he did." Jake said. He looked badly shaken.

But I wasn't really listening. I picked up the little square of paper that had fallen. It was heavier than it should have been, sealed with thin tape. Something slid around inside it. I tore open the tape.

Something silver and shiny fell to the bed. Upon closer examination, I realized it was a ring.

It was anything but simple, all curls and curves, little diamonds and tiny, intricate patterns. The main jewel itself was an average-sized diamond, but was cut in a way that it seemed to glow. It was absolutely stunning.

Inside of the makeshift envelope was another note. The date on this one was very recent--about a month before the Reaping. Though I wasn't positive, I thought that the date might have been the weekend that Cato and his parents and siblings, once again, had to take a trip to the Capitol. It made sense, and it fit with Tiberius's anecdote, the one he told in place of a eulogy.

"What is it?" Saylee leaned over to see the ring and the note. I passed her the ring, and she and Jake admired it with wide eyes.

I cleared my throat once more. "Another note," I said.

"What's it say?" Jake asked.

"Atala," I read. "If I get out of that damn arena alive (which I plan on doing), this is for you. I bought it in the Capitol. And if you're wondering why, it's because I want to marry you. I don't want to be with anyone else, ever. I love you." My throat felt like it was closing up. "It seems as though Tiberius wasn't lying." But of course, I had known that he wasn't even as he told the story. If there was one thing the Marcelluses were not, it was liars.

Saylee took my left hand, resting limply on my knee, and slipped the band onto my ring finger. All I could think was should have been Cato, should have been Cato, should have been Cato. Jake then passed me the necklace.

It, too, was silver. The chain was thin, and resting on it was a tiny silver star. In my mind, I was standing on Cato's porch, the necklace that I had been wearing since he left in his hand. For you, because you're my sun and my moon. Then I was sitting in Cato's kitchen with Bell at three in the morning, a day after Cato had left, and she was saying, you're his sun and his moon and all of his stars, and how can anyone ever hope to compete with that? A tear fell my from my eyes. It splattered against my left wrist. I watched the drop quiver before slipping, sliding down my skin and off. It landed on the bed, darkening the sheets. The necklace was shining in the daylight that was pouring in through the windows.

I pushed my hair out of the way and fastened the necklace. It hung perfectly above the sun and the moon, and I knew that Cato had carefully planned that, had made sure that all of the measurements were perfect specifically for that. Cato was nothing if not calculated and well planned. He would've thought of every little detail.

They should have been enough--the bear, the necklaces, the ring. But the problem was that they were just things and I was just greedy. I didn't want things, I wanted the person that had left me the things, and the girl that had gone far, far away with him. I didn't want memories, I didn't want photographs. I wanted something real and something concrete and someone alive. Was that too much to ask? I would assume that it was. The way their deaths played out had seemed preplanned and fated, and if the way they had died wasn't enough, surely Cato's premature knowledge that he wouldn't leave the arena was. How he had known a year prior--if not, then longer before--that he wouldn't live to see nineteen was a mystery to me.

It occurred to me then that I hadn't really known Cato. Or that I didn't know him as much as I thought I did. Then again, had he really known me? There were so many things I kept secret, so many hidden things that, had he or Saylee or Clove or Jake learned them, would have unearthed another person that was nothing like the Atala they knew. It seems impossible that one could live like that, with two startlingly different versions of themselves trapped inside their head. It seems detrimental. It isn't so bad when you learn to forget the one you don't want around. I wondered if Cato had been trying to forget the other version of himself as well. I wondered if it was the same Cato that had appeared in the arena, the one that was brought out as a result of the Breaking, or if the boy that knew he was going to die was a different version altogether.

That line of thinking made my head hurt, so I shut it down before it could do any further damage. Those were too big of thoughts to have right after a funeral.