Isolated Together | Panem's Past Hunger Games

Chapter 4

Esmẽ

A/N - "Esmẽ" is pronounced Ez-may.

I've only just turned around to see what is taking so long when Hazel falls forward and the doors close with a resounding click behind her. They locked them. Hazel stands up, her hands shaking as she balls them into fists and crosses her stiff arms tightly against her abdomen.

"Hey, don't be like that. It'll get better, I'm sure!" I say to Hazel, who manages a weak smile before her eyes fall to the floor.

It's going to get better? Yeah, totally. Just look at how well things turned out for my sister.

If she couldn't win, we don't stand a chance.

And there's no way in hell that I'm telling them that. I'm using this... facade... to it's full extent.

I face "them" and showcase my signature smile, trying to radiate my usual sense of energy. Everyone is clustered together in the small living room, and the air is heavy with grief.

Grief.

Because they've lost their homes? Their families? Their life? My life hasn't ended yet, unfortunately. Wouldn't want to waste what my sister loved so dearly. Out of the other two, I've already lost one and I sure as hell don't want the other.

I wonder how much is true for the rest of my friends. If I can call them that. I grin and it almost hurts, but I'm used to putting up walls. It comes pretty easily now. Everyone disperses to find their rooms at the command of Penelope, who was somehow in the train before we even arrived at the station. She must have taken the only car in the district - the one owned by the mayor.

I make my way to the corridor which supposedly holds my living quarters for the journey to our death site. I study the extravagant patterns on the walls and the watch in amazement as the soft purple carpet under my sandals swallows all of the sounds my feet would usually produce.

I get so distracted that I almost collide with the painting mounted on the wall that makes the end of the corridor. It's a portrait of Panem's 57 year old president and her son. Khione and Coriolanus Snow. No one knows what happened to the father of the family, but most suspect that Khione "disposed" of him, so that she could rule over Panem. I wouldn't be surprised if her son, now 27 years old, does the same when he wishes to have control.

Murder, trickery, manipulation, and secrets run in the family.

I shiver and quickly run into the door to the left of the solemn painting. My room, apparently. I stop in my tracks when I see it.

The room is the same one Emily described in her interview. Lavished curtains and crimson walls. Polished wood flooring and gleaming windowsills.

One of the last beds my sister slept in before she died.

I imagine her small, frail outline tightly woven in the plump blankets draped over the bed, trying to compress her nightmares. My fault.

My fault.

My fault.

I close my eyes and my world is swallowed by darkness.

Is this the darkness Emily saw before her consciousness was stolen by death? Or did she picture me, standing there, finally telling her that I act happy when I'm not? Did she picture herself saying she would sign up for tesserae instead? Because she felt sorry for me?

I was just standing there, silent.

Standing there, watching.

Standing there, in shock.