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31_days2014-01-20 06:51 pm
seta-suzume.livejournal.com) wrote in 31_days2014-01-20 06:51 pm
[Jan. 20] [THG] So Hope Anew, You Who Should Not
Title: So Hope Anew, You Who Should Not
Day/Theme: Jan. 20, 2014 "dreams will only break your heart"
Series: Hunger Games series
Character/Pairing: Mags, OCs
Rating: PG
Author's comment: ...haven't touched Your Own Kind since December...this will be a portion of that, and, as such, it contains spoilers.
There are terrors both public and private in Panem without end for all of us. I don't dress up for the ceremony this year. I mean, I don't dress as casually as I would for a day on the beach, but there's no special outfit. I'm not sure what the point would be. Maybe if I looked really fantastically wonderful or strange it would attract attention that could be applied to sponsorships, but I don't see how I could manage that. Not on my own at least. I just don't have that kind of eye.
In the crowd of girls, Faline shows me an enormous, forced grin and points at it. Okay, okay, I should smile for the cameras. She's right, though how she can manage that when I cannot is a thing of wonder.
I rise for my cue (I will stand for my name on this stage or one that replaces it for the rest of my life), wave (maybe I won't always wave), and sit back down.
I tune out Apple as she says something about 4 taking back their crown and whatever Mayor Current says after that. The mayor and I can't so much as glance at one another. Shaya's shadow lies between us. Sooner or later, will there be an empty gap like that separating me from every person in the district? Because it might not be a child. It might be a friend or a sibling or a lover.
Papa and 'Lito are standing together far toward the edge of things. They get along well, I think.
Apple picks the girl's name and nearly trips on her tongue saying it: "Anemone Monterey."
"I volunteer!" protests a girl, whose voice I recognize. It's Maria Rasif, from my 'club.' She pushes forward past Anemone, a tanned, trembling girl I don't know, maybe about fourteen or fifteen, and takes the stage. She is wearing a faded dress that used to be red and with it the reddest lipstick I have ever seen in my home district. There was always the possibility that she might have feared or faltered, changed her mind, but that lipstick is for the cameras. Maria came to the reaping with this outcome in mind.
"You're, um, Marie?" Apple tries to show off by remembering.
"Maria Rasif," she breathes, feeling the pressure of how real it is now. The dream begins now. A volunteer. A dream that will only break my heart (but if only, if only-).
Apple calls the boy. And of all the possible choices, it is Mayor Current's son. Shaya's brother. What are the odds? Apple's face looks distinctly greener than the makeup should be making it. But Maria's call of "I volunteer," has a partner. "I also volunteer!" Jereck Roy, also from the club, shouts and takes the stage.
Apple doesn't try to guess or remember his name. "Maria Rasif and Jereck Roy!" she applauds them as they shake hands. They look excited, even if they're also afraid. I can see the sweat run down the side of Jereck's face.
I don't have just one volunteer. I have two volunteers. Who know one another. Who will work together. Who will listen to me. Two volunteers, whose presence up here commands real respect and admiration from the crowd. Apple seems buoyed by the cheers that meet them as they make their last gestures to the assembled people before being swept from the stage.
"If I die," Jereck says to me as we sit in the back of the car taking us to the train station, "At least it's going to be as a hero, right?"
"In the Capitol, they'll make me up very pretty, right?" Maria confirms and inquires, "If I die, will you make sure to get my abuela a picture of me for her shrine where I look very pretty?"
"Yes," I tell both of them, "Yes."
Apple gapes that they're both so good, isn't it a bit soon to think that they'll die?
"I never said I thought Jereck and I would both die," Maria laughs at her, "You jump to the strangest conclusions, Ms. Smitt!"
To me it seems as if they've both misunderstood the other. My tributes (students, friends) decided to show me their tokens. Jereck's is a homemade fishing lure of feather and twine. Maria's is a lumpy seed pearl on string around her neck. I daydream of either of them standing, a survivor, beside me. So, what do I do for them? What do I sell? …I have already gone and given them my heart.
Day/Theme: Jan. 20, 2014 "dreams will only break your heart"
Series: Hunger Games series
Character/Pairing: Mags, OCs
Rating: PG
Author's comment: ...haven't touched Your Own Kind since December...this will be a portion of that, and, as such, it contains spoilers.
There are terrors both public and private in Panem without end for all of us. I don't dress up for the ceremony this year. I mean, I don't dress as casually as I would for a day on the beach, but there's no special outfit. I'm not sure what the point would be. Maybe if I looked really fantastically wonderful or strange it would attract attention that could be applied to sponsorships, but I don't see how I could manage that. Not on my own at least. I just don't have that kind of eye.
In the crowd of girls, Faline shows me an enormous, forced grin and points at it. Okay, okay, I should smile for the cameras. She's right, though how she can manage that when I cannot is a thing of wonder.
I rise for my cue (I will stand for my name on this stage or one that replaces it for the rest of my life), wave (maybe I won't always wave), and sit back down.
I tune out Apple as she says something about 4 taking back their crown and whatever Mayor Current says after that. The mayor and I can't so much as glance at one another. Shaya's shadow lies between us. Sooner or later, will there be an empty gap like that separating me from every person in the district? Because it might not be a child. It might be a friend or a sibling or a lover.
Papa and 'Lito are standing together far toward the edge of things. They get along well, I think.
Apple picks the girl's name and nearly trips on her tongue saying it: "Anemone Monterey."
"I volunteer!" protests a girl, whose voice I recognize. It's Maria Rasif, from my 'club.' She pushes forward past Anemone, a tanned, trembling girl I don't know, maybe about fourteen or fifteen, and takes the stage. She is wearing a faded dress that used to be red and with it the reddest lipstick I have ever seen in my home district. There was always the possibility that she might have feared or faltered, changed her mind, but that lipstick is for the cameras. Maria came to the reaping with this outcome in mind.
"You're, um, Marie?" Apple tries to show off by remembering.
"Maria Rasif," she breathes, feeling the pressure of how real it is now. The dream begins now. A volunteer. A dream that will only break my heart (but if only, if only-).
Apple calls the boy. And of all the possible choices, it is Mayor Current's son. Shaya's brother. What are the odds? Apple's face looks distinctly greener than the makeup should be making it. But Maria's call of "I volunteer," has a partner. "I also volunteer!" Jereck Roy, also from the club, shouts and takes the stage.
Apple doesn't try to guess or remember his name. "Maria Rasif and Jereck Roy!" she applauds them as they shake hands. They look excited, even if they're also afraid. I can see the sweat run down the side of Jereck's face.
I don't have just one volunteer. I have two volunteers. Who know one another. Who will work together. Who will listen to me. Two volunteers, whose presence up here commands real respect and admiration from the crowd. Apple seems buoyed by the cheers that meet them as they make their last gestures to the assembled people before being swept from the stage.
"If I die," Jereck says to me as we sit in the back of the car taking us to the train station, "At least it's going to be as a hero, right?"
"In the Capitol, they'll make me up very pretty, right?" Maria confirms and inquires, "If I die, will you make sure to get my abuela a picture of me for her shrine where I look very pretty?"
"Yes," I tell both of them, "Yes."
Apple gapes that they're both so good, isn't it a bit soon to think that they'll die?
"I never said I thought Jereck and I would both die," Maria laughs at her, "You jump to the strangest conclusions, Ms. Smitt!"
To me it seems as if they've both misunderstood the other. My tributes (students, friends) decided to show me their tokens. Jereck's is a homemade fishing lure of feather and twine. Maria's is a lumpy seed pearl on string around her neck. I daydream of either of them standing, a survivor, beside me. So, what do I do for them? What do I sell? …I have already gone and given them my heart.