17
Secrets and a Resolution
"I have to go in for a visit to the Capitol tomorrow," I told my mother while hanging up the phone. "What are you doing?"
She hadn't cried since the funeral, but I couldn't help but feel like I had to walk on glass around her. She and my father had been together for twenty years, so this was not an easy adjustment. Now she was standing in her room, staring at a pile of clothes she made on the bed.
"I'm packing."
I walked in and leaned against the doorway. I could see a suitcase left open at her feet and raised my eyebrows. "Why?"
She picked a few dresses out of the mess and tossed them in the case. "I'm moving to a new house."
"Where?"
"Oh you know, the village you're aunt used to live in...the one where they hold that festival every two years."
"The one that's two hours away?"
She nodded and continued to toss clothes into the suitcase. I was a little confused, she never talked about moving before. "But..."
"I need to get out of here for a while, Finnick. That's all. I can't stand being here with everyone giving me sympathy and staring and whispering. And now his name is everywhere, I can't do it anymore. So I'm leaving."
I crossed my arms, "You think that this is a good idea?"
She sighed and kicked the suitcase shut with her foot, "Better than staying here."
I nodded but then caught her arm, "You know I can't go with you, right?"
She smiled and patted my cheek with her hand, "I know Sweetie. I'll see you soon, I promise."
My mother departed the next day, before I left for the Capitol again.
"Finnick, it's good to see you again. What's it been, like a month since our last visit?"
"Hello, Ivan."
"Oh tut, tut. Such a bitter tone. Sorry to hear about your father by the way. Stomach bug, was it?"
I looked at him coldly, "He was attacked by a shark."
Ivan pulled a few papers off his clipboard and started reading off of them, "Phillip Odair, forty-five. It says here he was sick before the attack, and according to a crewmate he went swimming to 'work out a cramp'. The autopsy seemed to show that your father started drowning before his injuries were inflicted, so I'm guessing he was pretty sick. All that extra thrashing probably brought that shark around."
I stared at the paper in his hands, "You know all that?"
He waved it with a smug grin, "That's what it says. Oh and I thought I should tell you your mother has arrived at her destination safely."
I blinked and then decided to ignore him. "Assignment?"
"Coca Templesmith. Here's her picture. You only have to spend one night with her, then you'll be spending two more with Estelle again. She liked you."
My insides shuddered, but I look the picture anyway and started for my room to be alone. Not that I was actually alone, apparently I never was.
"Ivan..." I froze at the door, "just how much do you know about me?"
He laughed his oily little laugh and flashed me one of his wry grins. "We know you've never kissed a girl outside those in the Capitol. We know you broke your ankle when you were four and we know you paid for some old woman's visit to the health center before your father died. We know who's names you say in your sleep...We know everything about you, Finnickboy."
