The rise of Panem

Chapter 38

In my dream, Liam was sitting on the couch with his eyes glued to the tv. It wasn't like watching your favorite tv show, where your face is filled with excitement. It was more like a feeling of sadness, like reading The Fault in Our stars. "LIAM," I call out, but nothing. I then feel a sharp pain in my backbone. At first, I think it is swelling again, but it hurts worse than that. Almost like... A knife! I turn around and someone has a knife blade in my back. He releases it as I start to sink to my knees. Liam's face is filled with shock, sadness, and horror. He falls of the couch with tears raining on the floor. "IM HERE LIAM," I say banging on the thick glass. A cannon booms and I black out.

If only if someone were here to fight away the nightmares. Niall is just my friend, we don't have that kind of relationship. I could tell his dreams were bad because he was crying already. "Bad dream," I ask. He looks at me like I could read his mind, then nods like nothing happened. "Me too," I say. "The games," I ask. "Samantha got killed, and I couldn't save her because we were in the games. I knew it. Ever since he got reaped, he wasn't crying about the scary time that is waiting. He cried about leaving Samantha and the boys. I have been crying about both. We both try to sleep, but nothing, so we just talked all night.

When pink and yellow leaked through our windows and shone on us, we knew we needed to get up. I put one foot on the floor first, lean, and put the other down. I slump to the closet for some clothes. I pass up tons of dresses, jeans, skirts, and blouses until I find a plain pair of jeans with a plaid tank top. It was so simple compared to the other million dollar clothing in the closet, but it was so me.

Breakfast is a serving of toast, eggs, pancakes, bacon, and fruit. I wasn't hungry because I usually never eat breakfast, but I knew the arena would have no food except the ones in our backpacks, if we make it to them. Niall, however, was eating it like it was nothing compared to the food he probably gets every day. "We are going to go though how to win, you want to make a good impression at the opening ceremonies, so you need to look your best, or else people won't sponsor you," he said. Seemed easy. I always perform plays back at home, like I was Toto in The Wizard of Oz. I barely had lines, but the director said to make a good impression on the audience. This time, our audience will be the entire Panem. When the thought finally got out of my mind, it came back in because we were here.