President Snow: From Pain to Power

Chapter 7: It Was All Worth It

I slowly open my eyes to sight of Hadley knelling on the end of my bed. She's crouched over me. I look around and see that I'm in one of the Capitol's hospital wings. She looks up and see's I'm awake. She gives me that look again; pity. She makes me feel weak, but i'm not, I hate that about her. Her teary eyes send a chill down my spine. She stands up and walks to the head of the bed. "How are you feeling?" she asks me.

"Fine," I say hostilely. I actually do feel fine. The capitols amazing technology healed me quickly. But I don't care about how I feel; I'm focused on what happened after I passed out.

"Good. Now I really need you to tell me what happened." she whispers to me. "Everything."

What do I tell her? I can't tell her I killed the president. I find myself in the same position as when she took me in. To lie or not lie about my childhood. I lied. And that went well so I might as well just lie again. But why is she so interested in what happened? I turn my head from her and roll my eyes.

"Why do you care? Why do you want to know so badly? It's really non of your business." I utter.

I see hurt in her eyes, but she keeps going, "Cornelius, this is no time for questions. I need to know." She says softly.

"Why!?" I scream at her, "Why do you need to know!"

"I just do!" she screams back. "I care about you...your like my child. I want to know what happened...the person...or...thing that almost killed you!" Tears roll down her face as she breaths heavily.

It's silent. I glare at her wondering why she's so upset. It's really not that big of a deal. You know what? She should know the truth...she should know the real me. Since she "loves me so much" I stare straight into her eyes and say slowly, "I killed the president."

Her face goes blank except for a tear falling from her eye down her cheek. She stands up and walks over to a chair on the opposite side of the room and sits down. She breathes heavily like she trying to hold in all her anger in.

"Why do you care?"I ask nastily. "He makes the capitol feel like a living hell, he pretty much publicizes that he tortures people. What the heck is so important about him? He's a bloody nightmare! And if you tell me he's not then you're wrong! You didn't spend years working for him and getting put down everyday!" I scream. My hands are tightened into fists, my face feels hot, and shaking. What the heck is wrong with me?

"Snow...you need to listen..." she trails off.

"No I will not listen..." I rip the tubes out of my arm and climb out of bed. I run toward her. "I will not listen...my life has been a discrace...my freakin' mother was killed, my father is who knows where and on top of that I have to live this stupid perfect life with you!" I'm in her face, screaming, spitting. She's curled in the chair covering her face, probably crying. I don't care, I keep going. "I'm not your kid, I never was. This whole thing is stupid. My life is stupid! I hate eveyrone in it...including you!"

Finally she gets out of her chair , we're face-to-face. "He was my grandfather..." she yells."He was... my grandfather..." she trails off as she sits back down.

What??? Grandfather?

Before I can say anything, a tall man with a suit and tie walks in. I quickly fumble back into my bed and pull the covers over my legs. "Are you feeling better sir?" the man asks in a deep monotone voice.

I take one lat look at Hadley before I answer.
"Yeah. I feel fine. What do you want?" I grumble at him as I take another quickly peek at Hadley who weirdly looks like she never was even crying. She gets up and walks out of the room without looking at me.

"Sir, I need you to tell me what happened." he says seriously.

I already told Hadley the truth, but she wouldn't tell anyone would she? I think of a quick story and blab out, "He tried to kill me, and I tried to fight him to survive. He went berserk. After he cut me he said, "It will look as if you did this to me. If I can't kill you, then they will kill you when they find out what you I've done to me" and he just killed himself. I bled and bled until I passed out. Then I guess you guys found me" I say quickly with a look of fear in my eyes.

"Thank you sir, it was hard to tell what happened because at some point before we got the call all he cameras in h mansion cut out. So we couldn't see what happened during this...event." He keeps talking but never stops writing on his notepad. "Now, obviously the president is dead, and we need a president."

"Oh yes." I say with a small smirk.

"So, I have one question for you. The government thinks since you were the president's assistant, you should be our next president. Would you like to be the next president of Panem?"

I smile. "Why yes... I would love to be the president." I've been waiting a long time to say those words for a long time.