Chained Hearts

Chapter Five

"What do you believe about the country?"

I sit on the lawn, cross legged, while Peeta digs up some weeds from between the fence and the garden. His back is healing slowly. As soon as Effie discovered it had healed enough for him to work she immediately gave him a million and one tasks to do. He doesn't remember what I said to him in the basement . . . he was too out of it.

I don't know whether this is a good thing or not.

 I lean back on my elbows and squint up at the sun. What does he mean? "What?" I ask.

"You heard me. What do you believe about the country?" Peeta says, pulling up a bunch of dandelions.

A woman walks past the house and eyes us both curiously so I raise my voice and say, "Don't forget that clump of weeds over by the end of the fence there." She nods to herself in satisfaction and walks on. Nosy Cow. "Why would you ask such a random question?" I whisper once she's completely gone.

"Because I want to know," Peeta says.

I watch him as he pulls up more weeds. This boy saved my life and he doesn't even remember it. How could I not have realized it sooner anyway? I'm an idiot. A big idiot. I want to ask him why; why me? Why did he throw me the bread? Why did he get himself hurt just for some scrawny girl sitting under the bakery tree? He saved my life . . . that's twice now. I don't understand it.

Worst of all is he can't remember doing it. He doesn't remember me.

"You know what I wanna know?" I ask. "Why did you leave 5?"

Peeta eyes me curiously over his shoulder. Another hunk of weeds gets ripped from the ground and I catch him wince because of the force of the pull, his back scars still raw. "How about an answer for an answer?" he suggests.

"Who answers first?"

"Well, I asked first." 

I sigh and shake my head. "But your answer would be shorter." Peeta sighs and turns his head away from me, yanking more and more weeds out aggressively.

"I did something," he answers. "Something stupid but also something I don't regret. My," he pauses before sighing, "mother had always been sick of me but I guess doing that one thing finally pushed her over the edge. Shipped me back off to the Capitol Compound . . . it was years before Effie took me."

"I'm sorry," I say. "That's awful."

"To you it's awful. Labour and punishment is as common to a slave as brushing your teeth and combing your hair is to a woman . . . it's life."

My heart aches. How can someone live like this without fighting back? Without doing something about it? Isn't there someone else out there who thinks like this? Someone who could speak out? This country is getting ridiculous. What this country needs . . . is someone to say no.

"It's your turn to answer," Peeta states. "What do you believe about this country?"

I mull the question over for a moment. It's a big question. A big question whose answer I never thought I'd be able to speak out loud because of the consequences of the words. 

"This country is in ruin. It is broken. It is sick. I'am disgusted to have been born here." I speak quietly, so no one else hears it but Peeta. "I don't understand what makes you different. Just because you have a dick doesn't mean you should be tortured and killed." I never normally swear but the word immediately comes to me. "Why can't we share labour? Divide up the work? There is no excuse why not because the reason this country is the way it is because women are sick, demented human beings who take pride and enjoyment out of hurting and beating and raping men just because they're different."