𝐂𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐅𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐬 [𝐅𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐤 - 𝐇𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐆𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐬]

9 | 𝐋𝐚𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐥

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F I N N I C K

            — MY GAMES HAD BEEN MUCH KINDER TO ME, I realised quite quickly after my victory. Or, at least, it felt like that for the first few months afterwards, before the Victory Tour.

            Once I'd returned home, free at last to enjoy the final few dredges of August heat, it had been easy, perhaps too easy, to slip back into routine. Fishing with my father, gutting our catch on the docks, spearing little creatures in the shallow waters with my brother-in-laws, carrying heavy baskets through the market and greeting the people that finally valued me. I think it frightened everyone a little, how undeterred, how lively, I'd become. But it felt like, after all those years, I had finally turned into someone that meant something. Even if that something wasn't always good. And I was home, and I could finally provide, do something good for my family.

            I'd stopped being a disappointment, I suppose.

            But they helped — the night terrors. They came as a great comfort to my mother, who would leave blankets at the end of our private dock for when I inevitably came to sit and hang my feet in the gentle, dark sea. The fact that I needed to escape my mind; it made me seem softer, more human, more like the stupid son my parents had raised. They begin to try with me again. And in turn I tried, too, at least for a while, to make words not my enemy but my friend. I spoke more, I had my school-aged cousins read aloud from their textbooks. I could finally feed the academic hunger that had waited so impatiently all these years. I found new ways to apply the tactical skills I'd absently curated throughout my life. I was happy, intelligent, productive. Welcomed, at last, a burden no longer.

            August to December had been a time of peace for me.

            I only worry now, watching the boy from 1 as he runs, tirelessly, through the desolate lands, how he will fare once this is all over. Because I'm certain that he'll win. There's a feeling that creeps in on you when observing the Games — a sense of who truly has it in them. Of course, the crowds love him, love the chivalrous, subdued character they'd met in the interviews, love the stern, determined leader of the arena, and love that soft kindness that came out around the girl from 10. I understand the appeal, too, in this tribute. Young, stony-faced, charming. He would be good to sell in the same way I am, would appeal to the same crowds. If, dare I say, when, he wins, we'll be in the same circles.

            A part of me is a little elated at that. Finally, a friend. Someone to sympathise with, find kinship in. I dread it, too, having to explain the horrible truth of his new life to him when the time comes. Maybe he'll be lucky — maybe infection will take him — but otherwise, I know where he's headed.