A Story from District 4

Chapter 2

Isla

We remain seated next to each other on the wall in silence, until my Mother calls me inside the house to change for the Reaping.

'See you in the square', I murmur, my voice deflated and lifeless.

He nods once, looking at the floor.

'Wear something pretty' he jokes, before getting up to leave. His laugh didn't reach his eyes. I wave after him. He doesn't turn around.

My family live in the apartment above the shop my parents run for a living, selling fishing supplies. It is a basic, square, wood clad room with nets hanging from the ceiling and fishing rods, tridents and spears lining the walls. There are barrels of bate in the corner, beside the variety of fishhooks next to the window.

I climb the stairs at the back of the store and enter the family room above it. It is empty, so I go into my room to change. Someone had laid out my best dress on my bed, green, knee length, patterned with seashells.

After a while, my Mother enters the room in silence, and starts plaiting my hair, carefully weaving small, white flowers into the braid. Only when I feel the repetitive strokes of my plait did I realise she was crying. I glance up, our eyes meeting momentarily in the dressing table mirror. The same eyes, large and emerald green, although hers were watery and red around the edges.

I smile at her reassuringly. Her answering smile is feeble, and swiftly vanishes.

At one o'clock, my father hangs the 'closed' sign onto the door and locks the shop behind him. We walk to the square in silence.

The streets are sombre and still, and overrun with Peacekeepers, their presence making the sandy track seem small, cramped, unfamiliar. Their footfalls were uniform and rhythmic, in time with the beating of my raging heart.

I swallow the lump in my throat as we enter the square, before turning to hug each of my parents. My father murmurs small words of encouragement in my ear, whilst my mother tried to disguise her anxiety. She had started to cry again, leaving a small wet patch on my shoulder.

'See you after', I say flatly, before joining the line of pale faced children, ready to sign in. I don't let go of Pearl's hand until the woman behind the desk pricks my finger and directs me to the pen where the other sixteen year olds were waiting quietly.

The square was large, cobbled, and lay in the shadow of the Justice building. The finer shops where the wealthy spent their money stood at its perimeter, covered with banners and streamers and balloons. It makes me hate the Capitol more. It is not enough for them to murder our children, they humiliate us by making us celebrate it like a holiday.

A make shift stage had been erected in front of the justice building, and on it sat four identical, wooden chairs. A small, overweight man, who greatly resembled a tomato, sits closest to the podium. Beside him sits a fierce looking woman in her earlier forties, and a heavy set man, who appears to be asleep. Previous Victors, the mentors who help the tributes in the arena. Their names are Judith Irving and Conn Macey. They seemed as repulsed by the festivities as I do .

Beside him sat an eccentric woman dressed entirely in fluorescent pink. Her skirt was large and circular. It looked like one of the gob stoppers I see in the sweet shop on the way to school.

'She looks like she's made of bubblegum, I think sourly, she must be District 4's escort.'

The sun was full and blazing in the sky, and the air smelt of humidity, fear and sweat. The pen was hot and claustrophobic. I squeeze between a blonde girl I recognise from my History class and Hector's younger brother, Nicky. I look down, and I see them holding hands.

I turn and train my gaze toward the back of the square, fixing my eye on the pen at the rear housing the eighteen year olds. The odds were not in their favour, their names added seven times, at least. I knew many of them from poorer families had their names added forty, or even fifty times, in order to gain the precious grain and oil they needed to stay alive.

I spot Hector without difficulty, because he towered over many of his peers, standing tall and proud, appearing bored and nobody but those who know him well would recognise this facade. When he sees me, his face glows with the ghost of a smile and a gives me a reassuring nod.

I can't see Pearl anywhere.

The square had become very crowded now, family members stood nervously at the perimeter. Late arrivers were being directed to side streets by Peacekeepers.

It is then that music started to blare over the speakers and the Mayor stands up to the podium. He is a balding man in his fifties, with beady eyes squinting behind the thick lenses of his glasses. He begins to present his speech, which is as long and droll and as uninteresting as it is every year. He begins reeling off the names of past victors, and the long history of Panem, and how the Districts resisting the Capitol resulted in the Treaty of Treason, and out of the ashes of the rebellion came the Hunger Games, an annual reminder to insure that the acts of rebellion in the Dark Days would never be repeated.

I admit that I zoned out. The only part I care for is the reaping.

A polite applause awakes me from my gormless state, and the woman from the Capitol takes her place on the stage. I note that she is a different woman from last year, slightly smaller, more rounded. Her wig was bright purple and elaborately styled, her teeth gleaming white, her lips large.

I will never understand these Capitol styles, I think.

'Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favour! Thank you all so very much for welcoming me to your District with such warm generosity and kindness', she announces, her Capitol accent ringing through the speakers, 'And now for the moment you have all been waiting for. Who will have the honour of representing District 4 in the 56th annual Hunger Games?'

'As always, ladies first' and she minces in her monstrous shoes toward the glass bowl containing the girls' names. The crowd draws a collective intake of breath, the silence echoing. I feel ill, my stomach contorting, my palms begin to sweat.

After deliberation, she selects a single slip of paper, and crosses back to the podium, and in her high, clear voice reads out the name.

It's not me,

It's Pearl Jackson.