The Hunger Games Part 1: The Tribute
Chapter 3
The moment the anthem ends, we are taken into custody. I don’t mean we’re
handcuffed or anything, but a group of Peacekeepers marches us through the front
door of the Justice Building. Maybe tributes have tried to escape in the past. I’ve
never seen that happen though.
Once inside, I’m conducted to a room and left alone. It’s the richest place I’ve
ever been in, with thick, deep carpets and a velvet couch and chairs. I know velvet
because my mother has a dress with a collar made of the stuff. When I sit on the
couch, I can’t help running my fingers over the fabric repeatedly. It helps to calm
me as I try to prepare for the next hour. The time allotted for the tributes to say
goodbye to their loved ones. I cannot afford to get upset, to leave this room with
puffy eyes and a red nose. Crying is not an option. There will be more cameras at
the train station.
My sister and my mother come first. I reach out to Prim
and she climbs on my lap, her arms around my neck, head
on my shoulder, just like she did when she was a toddler.
My mother sits beside me and wraps her arms around us.
My mother sits beside me and wraps her arms around us.
For a few minutes, we say nothing. Then I start telling them
all the things they must remember to do, now that I will not be there to do them
for them.
Prim is not to take any tesserae. They can get by, if
they’re careful, on selling Prim’s goat milk and cheese and the small apothecary
business my mother now runs for the people in the Seam. Gale will get her the
herbs she doesn’t grow herself, but she must be very careful to describe them
because he’s not as familiar with them as I am. He’ll also bring them game — he
and I made a pact about this a year or so ago — and will probably not ask for
compensation, but they should thank him with some kind of trade, like milk or
medicine.
I don’t bother suggesting Prim learn to hunt. I tried to teach her a couple of
times and it was disastrous. The woods terrified her, and whenever I shot
something, she’d get teary and talk about how we might be able to heal it if we
got it home soon enough. But she makes out well with her goat, so I concentrate
on that.
When I am done with instructions about fuel, and trading, and staying in
school, I turn to my mother and grip her arm, hard. “Listen to me. Are you
listening to me?” She nods, alarmed by my intensity. She must know what’s
coming. “You can’t leave again,” I say.
My mother’s eyes find the floor. “I know. I won’t. I couldn’t help what—”
“Well, you have to help it this time. You can’t clock out and leave Prim on her
own. There’s no me now to keep you both alive. It doesn’t matter what happens.
Whatever you see on the screen. You have to promise me you’ll fight through it!”
My voice has risen to a shout. In it is all the anger, all the fear I felt at her
abandonment.
She pulls her arm from my grasp, moved to anger herself now. “I was ill. I
could have treated myself if I’d had the medicine I have now.”
That part about her being ill might be true. I’ve seen her bring back people
suffering from immobilizing sadness since. Perhaps it is a sickness, but it’s one we
can’t afford.
“Then take it. And take care of her!” I say.
“I’ll be all right, Katniss,” says Prim, clasping my face in her hands. “But you
have to take care, too. You’re so fast and brave. Maybe you can win.”
I can’t win. Prim must know that in her heart. The competition will be far
beyond my abilities. Kids from wealthier districts, where winning is a huge honor,
who’ve been trained their whole lives for this. Boys who are two to three times my
size. Girls who know twenty different ways to kill you with a knife. Oh, there’ll be
people like me, too. People to weed out before the real fun begins.
“Maybe,” I say, because I can hardly tell my mother to carry on if I’ve already
given up myself. Besides, it isn’t in my nature to go down without a fight, even
when things seem insurmountable. “Then we’d be rich as Haymitch.”
“I don’t care if we’re rich. I just want you to come home. You will try, won’t
you? Really, really try?” asks Prim.
“Really, really try. I swear it,” I say. And I know, because of Prim, I’ll have to.
And then the Peacekeeper is at the door, signaling our time is up, and we’re all
hugging one another so hard it hurts and all I’m saying is “I love you. I love you
both.” And they’re saying it back and then the Peacekeeper orders them out and
the door closes. I bury my head in one of the velvet pillows as if this can block the
whole thing out.
Someone else enters the room, and when I look up, I’m surprised to see it’s the
baker, Peeta Mellark’s father. I can’t believe he’s come to visit me. After all, I’ll be
trying to kill his son soon. But we do know each other a bit, and he knows Prim
even better. When she sells her goat cheeses at the Hob, she puts two of them
aside for him and he gives her a generous amount of bread in return. We always
wait to trade with him when his witch of a wife isn’t around because he’s so much
nicer. I feel certain he would never have hit his son the way she did over the
burned bread. But why has he come to see me?
The baker sits awkwardly on the edge of one of the plush chairs. He’s a big,
broad-shouldered man with burn scars from years at the ovens. He must have just
said goodbye to his son.
He pulls a white paper package from his jacket pocket and holds it out to me. I
open it and find cookies. These are a luxury we can never afford.
“Thank you,” I say. The baker’s not a very talkative man in the best of times,
and today he has no words at all. “I had some of your bread this morning. My
friend Gale gave you a squirrel for it.” He nods, as if remembering the squirrel.
“Not your best trade,” I say. He shrugs as if it couldn’t possibly matter.
Then I can’t think of anything else, so we sit in silence until a Peacemaker
summons him. He rises and coughs to clear his throat. “I’ll keep an eye on the
little girl. Make sure she’s eating.”
I feel some of the pressure in my chest lighten at his words. People deal with
me, but they are genuinely fond of Prim. Maybe there will be enough fondness to
keep her alive.
My next guest is also unexpected. Madge walks straight to me. She is not
weepy or evasive, instead there’s an urgency about her tone that surprises me.
“They let you wear one thing from your district in the arena. One thing to remind
you of home. Will you wear this?” She holds out the circu lar gold pin that was on
her dress earlier. I hadn’t paid much attention to it before, but now I see it’s a
small bird in flight.
“Your pin?” I say. Wearing a token from my district is about the last thing on
my mind.
“Here, I’ll put it on your dress, all right?” Madge doesn’t wait for an answer,
she just leans in and fixes the bird to my dress. “Promise you’ll wear it into the
arena, Katniss?” she asks. “Promise?”
“Yes,” I say. Cookies. A pin. I’m getting all kinds of gifts today. Madge gives me
one more. A kiss on the cheek. Then she’s gone and I’m left thinking that maybe
Madge really has been my friend all along.
Finally, Gale is here and maybe there is nothing romantic between us, but
when he opens his arms I don’t hesitate to go into them. His body is familiar to me
— the way it moves, the smell of wood smoke, even the sound of his heart beating
I know from quiet moments on a hunt — but this is the first time I really feel it,
lean and hard-muscled against my own.
“Listen,” he says. “Getting a knife should be pretty easy, but you’ve got to get
your hands on a bow. That’s your best chance.”
“They don’t always have bows,” I say, thinking of the year there were only
horrible spiked maces that the tributes had to bludgeon one another to death with.
“Then make one,” says Gale. “Even a weak bow is better than no bow at all.”
I have tried copying my father’s bows with poor results. It’s not that easy. Even
he had to scrap his own work sometimes.
“I don’t even know if there’ll be wood,” I say. Another year, they tossed
everybody into a landscape of nothing but boulders and sand and scruffy bushes. I
particularly hated that year. Many contestants were bitten by venomous snakes or
went insane from thirst.
“There’s almost always some wood,” Gale says. “Since that year half of them
died of cold. Not much entertainment in that.”
It’s true. We spent one Hunger Games watching the players freeze to death at
night. You could hardly see them because they were just huddled in balls and had
no wood for fires or torches or anything. It was considered very anti-climactic in
the Capitol, all those quiet, bloodless deaths. Since then, there’s usually been
wood to make fires.
“Yes, there’s usually some,” I say.
“Katniss, it’s just hunting. You’re the best hunter I know,” says Gale.
“It’s not just hunting. They’re armed. They think,” I say.
“So do you. And you’ve had more practice. Real practice,” he says. “You know
how to kill.”
“Not people,” I say.
“How different can it be, really?” says Gale grimly.
The awful thing is that if I can forget they’re people, it will be no different at all.
The Peacekeepers are back too soon and Gale asks for more time, but they’re
taking him away and I start to panic. “Don’t let them starve!” I cry out, clinging to
his hand.
“I won’t! You know I won’t! Katniss, remember I —” he says, and they yank us
apart and slam the door and I’ll never know what it was he wanted me to
remember.
It’s a short ride from the Justice Building to the train station. I’ve never been in
a car before. Rarely even ridden in wagons. In the Seam, we travel on foot.
I’ve been right not to cry. The station is swarming with reporters with their
insectlike cameras trained directly on my face. But I’ve had a lot of practice at
wiping my face clean of emotions and I do this now. I catch a glimpse of myself on
the television screen on the wall that’s airing my arrival live and feel gratified that
I appear almost bored.
Peeta Mellark, on the other hand, has obviously been crying and interestingly
enough does not seem to be trying to cover it up. I immediately wonder if this will
be his strategy in the Games. To appear weak and frightened, to reassure the
other tributes that he is no competition at all, and then come out fighting. This
worked very well for a girl, Johanna Mason, from District 7 a few years back. She
seemed like such a sniveling, cowardly fool that no one bothered about her until
there were only a handful of contestants left. It turned out she could kill viciously.
Pretty clever, the way she played it. But this seems an odd strategy for Peeta
Mellark because he’s a baker’s son. All those years of having enough to eat and
hauling bread trays around have made him broad-shouldered and strong. It will
take an awful lot of weeping to convince anyone to overlook him.
We have to stand for a few minutes in the doorway of the train while the
cameras gobble up our images, then we’re allowed inside and the doors close
mercifully behind us. The train begins to move at once.
The speed initially takes my breath away. Of course, I’ve never been on a train,
as travel between the districts is for bidden except for officially sanctioned duties.
For us, that’s mainly transporting coal. But this is no ordinary coal train. It’s one of
the high-speed Capitol models that average 250 miles per hour. Our journey to the
Capitol will take less than a day.
In school, they tell us the Capitol was built in a place once called the Rockies.
District 12 was in a region known is Appalachia. Even hundreds of years ago, they
mined coal here. Which is why our miners have to dig so deep.
Somehow it all comes back to coal at school. Besides basic reading and math
most of our instruction is coal-related. Except for the weekly lecture on the history
of Panem. It’s mostly a lot of blather about what we owe the Capitol. I know there
must be more than they’re telling us, an actual account of what happened during
the rebellion. But I don’t spend much time thinking about it. Whatever the truth is,
I don’t see how it will help me get food on the table.
The tribute train is fancier than even the room in the Justice Building. We are
each given our own chambers that have a bedroom, a dressing area, and a private
bathroom with hot and cold running water. We don’t have hot water at home,
unless we boil it.
There are drawers filled with fine clothes, and Effie Trinket tells me to do
anything I want, wear anything I want, everything is at my disposal. Just be ready
for supper in an hour. I peel off my mother’s blue dress and take a hot shower. I’ve
never had a shower before. It’s like being in a summer rain, only warmer. I dress
in a dark green shirt and pants.
At the last minute, I remember Madge’s little gold pin. For the first time, I get a
good look at it. It’s as if someone fashioned a small golden bird and then attached
a ring around it. The bird is connected to the ring only by its wing tips. I suddenly
recognize it. A mockingjay.
They’re funny birds and something of a slap in the face to the Capitol. During
the rebellion, the Capitol bred a series of genetically altered animals as weapons.
The common term for them was muttations, or sometimes mutts for short. One
was a special bird called a jabberjay that had the ability to memorize and repeat
whole human conversations. They were homing birds, exclusively male, that were
released into regions where the Capitol’s enemies were known to be hiding. After
the birds gathered words, they’d fly back to centers to be recorded. It took people
awhile to realize what was going on in the districts, how private conversations
were being transmitted. Then, of course, the rebels fed the Capitol endless lies,
and the joke was on it. So the centers were shut down and the birds were
abandoned to die off in the wild.
Only they didn’t die off. Instead, the jabberjays mated with female
mockingbirds creating a whole new species that could replicate both bird whistles
and human melodies. They had lost the ability to enunciate words but could still
mimic a range of human vocal sounds, from a child’s high-pitched warble to a
man’s deep tones. And they could re-create songs. Not just a few notes, but whole
songs with multiple verses, if you had the patience to sing them and if they liked
your voice.
My father was particularly fond of mockingjays. When we went hunting, he
would whistle or sing complicated songs to them and, after a polite pause, they’d
always sing back. Not everyone is treated with such respect. But whenever my
father sang, all the birds in the area would fall silent and listen. His voice was that
beautiful, high and clear and so filled with life it made you want to laugh and cry at
the same time. I could never bring myself to continue the practice after he was
gone. Still, there’s something comforting about the little bird. It’s like having a
piece of my father with me, protecting me. I fasten the pin onto my shirt, and with
the dark green fabric as a background, I can almost imagine the mockingjay flying
through the trees.
Effie Trinket comes to collect me for supper. I follow her through the narrow,
rocking corridor into a dining room with polished paneled walls. There’s a table
where all the dishes are highly breakable. Peeta Mellark sits waiting for us, the
chair next to him empty.
“Where’s Haymitch?” asks Effie Trinket brightly.
“Last time I saw him, he said he was going to take a nap,” says Peeta.
“Well, it’s been an exhausting day,” says Effie Trinket. I think she’s relieved by
Haymitch’s absence, and who can blame her?
The supper comes in courses. A thick carrot soup, green salad, lamb chops and
mashed potatoes, cheese and fruit, a chocolate cake. Throughout the meal, Effie
Trinket keeps reminding us to save space because there’s more to come. But I’m
stuffing myself because I’ve never had food like this, so good and so much, and
because probably the best thing I can do between now and the Games is put on a
few pounds.
“At least, you two have decent manners,” says Effie as we’re finishing the main
course. “The pair last year ate everything with their hands like a couple of
savages. It completely upset my digestion.”
The pair last year were two kids from the Seam who’d never, not one day of
their lives, had enough to eat. And when they did have food, table manners were
surely the last thing on their minds. Peeta’s a baker’s son. My mother taught Prim
and I to eat properly, so yes, I can handle a fork and knife. But I hate Effie Trinket’s
comment so much I make a point of eating the rest of my meal with my fin gers.
Then I wipe my hands on the tablecloth. This makes her purse her lips tightly
together.
Now that the meal’s over, I’m fighting to keep the food down. I can see Peeta’s
looking a little green, too. Neither of our stomachs is used to such rich fare. But if I
can hold down Greasy Sae’s concoction of mice meat, pig entrails, and tree bark
— a winter specialty — I’m determined to hang on to this.
We go to another compartment to watch the recap of the reapings across
Panem. They try to stagger them throughout the day so a person could
conceivably watch the whole thing live, but only people in the Capitol could really
do that, since none of them have to attend reapings themselves.
One by one, we see the other reapings, the names called, (the volunteers
stepping forward or, more often, not. We examine the faces of the kids who will be
our competition. A few stand out in my mind. A monstrous boy who lunges forward
to volunteer from District 2. A fox-faced girl with sleek red hair from District 5. A
boy with a crippled foot from District 10. And most hauntingly, a twelve-year-old
girl from District 11. She has dark brown skin and eyes, but other than that, she’s
very like Prim in size and demeanor. Only when she mounts the stage and they
ask for volunteers, all you can hear is the wind whistling through the decrepit
buildings around her. There’s no one willing to take her place.
Last of all, they show District 12. Prim being called, me running forward to
volunteer. You can’t miss the desperation in my voice as I shove Prim behind me,
as if I’m afraid no one will hear and they’ll take Prim away. But, of course, they do
hear. I see Gale pulling her off me and watch myself mount the stage. The
commentators are not sure what to say about the crowd’s refusal to applaud. The
silent salute. One says that District 12 has always been a bit backward but that
local customs can be charming. As if on cue, Haymitch falls off the stage, and they
groan comically. Peeta’s name is drawn, and he quietly takes his place. We shake
hands. They cut to the anthem again, and the pro-gram ends.
Effie Trinket is disgruntled about the state her wig was in. “Your mentor has a
lot to learn about presentation. A lot about televised behavior.”
Peeta unexpectedly laughs. “He was drunk,” says Peeta. “He’s drunk every
year.”
“Every day,” I add. I can’t help smirking a little. Effie Trinket makes it sound
like Haymitch just has somewhat rough manners that could be corrected with a
few tips from her.
“Yes,” hisses Effie Trinket. “How odd you two find it amusing. You know your
mentor is your lifeline to the world in these Games. The one who advises you, lines
up your sponsors, and dictates the presentation of any gifts. Haymitch can well be
the difference between your life and your death!”
Just then, Haymitch staggers into the compartment. “I miss supper?” he says in
a slurred voice. Then he vomits all over the expensive carpet and falls in the mess.
“So laugh away!” says Effie Trinket. She hops in her pointy shoes around the
pool of vomit and flees the room.
Chapter 3
The moment the anthem ends, we are taken into custody. I don’t mean we’re
handcuffed or anything, but a group of Peacekeepers marches us through the front
door of the Justice Building. Maybe tributes have tried to escape in the past. I’ve
never seen that happen though.
Once inside, I’m conducted to a room and left alone. It’s the richest place I’ve
ever been in, with thick, deep carpets and a velvet couch and chairs. I know velvet
because my mother has a dress with a collar made of the stuff. When I sit on the
couch, I can’t help running my fingers over the fabric repeatedly. It helps to calm
me as I try to prepare for the next hour. The time allotted for the tributes to say
goodbye to their loved ones. I cannot afford to get upset, to leave this room with
puffy eyes and a red nose. Crying is not an option. There will be more cameras at
the train station.
My sister and my mother come first. I reach out to Prim
and she climbs on my lap, her arms around my neck, head
on my shoulder, just like she did when she was a toddler.
My mother sits beside me and wraps her arms around us.
My mother sits beside me and wraps her arms around us.
For a few minutes, we say nothing. Then I start telling them
all the things they must remember to do, now that I will not be there to do them
for them.
Prim is not to take any tesserae. They can get by, if
they’re careful, on selling Prim’s goat milk and cheese and the small apothecary
business my mother now runs for the people in the Seam. Gale will get her the
herbs she doesn’t grow herself, but she must be very careful to describe them
because he’s not as familiar with them as I am. He’ll also bring them game — he
and I made a pact about this a year or so ago — and will probably not ask for
compensation, but they should thank him with some kind of trade, like milk or
medicine.
I don’t bother suggesting Prim learn to hunt. I tried to teach her a couple of
times and it was disastrous. The woods terrified her, and whenever I shot
something, she’d get teary and talk about how we might be able to heal it if we
got it home soon enough. But she makes out well with her goat, so I concentrate
on that.
When I am done with instructions about fuel, and trading, and staying in
school, I turn to my mother and grip her arm, hard. “Listen to me. Are you
listening to me?” She nods, alarmed by my intensity. She must know what’s
coming. “You can’t leave again,” I say.
My mother’s eyes find the floor. “I know. I won’t. I couldn’t help what—”
“Well, you have to help it this time. You can’t clock out and leave Prim on her
own. There’s no me now to keep you both alive. It doesn’t matter what happens.
Whatever you see on the screen. You have to promise me you’ll fight through it!”
My voice has risen to a shout. In it is all the anger, all the fear I felt at her
abandonment.
She pulls her arm from my grasp, moved to anger herself now. “I was ill. I
could have treated myself if I’d had the medicine I have now.”
That part about her being ill might be true. I’ve seen her bring back people
suffering from immobilizing sadness since. Perhaps it is a sickness, but it’s one we
can’t afford.
“Then take it. And take care of her!” I say.
“I’ll be all right, Katniss,” says Prim, clasping my face in her hands. “But you
have to take care, too. You’re so fast and brave. Maybe you can win.”
I can’t win. Prim must know that in her heart. The competition will be far
beyond my abilities. Kids from wealthier districts, where winning is a huge honor,
who’ve been trained their whole lives for this. Boys who are two to three times my
size. Girls who know twenty different ways to kill you with a knife. Oh, there’ll be
people like me, too. People to weed out before the real fun begins.
“Maybe,” I say, because I can hardly tell my mother to carry on if I’ve already
given up myself. Besides, it isn’t in my nature to go down without a fight, even
when things seem insurmountable. “Then we’d be rich as Haymitch.”
“I don’t care if we’re rich. I just want you to come home. You will try, won’t
you? Really, really try?” asks Prim.
“Really, really try. I swear it,” I say. And I know, because of Prim, I’ll have to.
And then the Peacekeeper is at the door, signaling our time is up, and we’re all
hugging one another so hard it hurts and all I’m saying is “I love you. I love you
both.” And they’re saying it back and then the Peacekeeper orders them out and
the door closes. I bury my head in one of the velvet pillows as if this can block the
whole thing out.
Someone else enters the room, and when I look up, I’m surprised to see it’s the
baker, Peeta Mellark’s father. I can’t believe he’s come to visit me. After all, I’ll be
trying to kill his son soon. But we do know each other a bit, and he knows Prim
even better. When she sells her goat cheeses at the Hob, she puts two of them
aside for him and he gives her a generous amount of bread in return. We always
wait to trade with him when his witch of a wife isn’t around because he’s so much
nicer. I feel certain he would never have hit his son the way she did over the
burned bread. But why has he come to see me?
The baker sits awkwardly on the edge of one of the plush chairs. He’s a big,
broad-shouldered man with burn scars from years at the ovens. He must have just
said goodbye to his son.
He pulls a white paper package from his jacket pocket and holds it out to me. I
open it and find cookies. These are a luxury we can never afford.
“Thank you,” I say. The baker’s not a very talkative man in the best of times,
and today he has no words at all. “I had some of your bread this morning. My
friend Gale gave you a squirrel for it.” He nods, as if remembering the squirrel.
“Not your best trade,” I say. He shrugs as if it couldn’t possibly matter.
Then I can’t think of anything else, so we sit in silence until a Peacemaker
summons him. He rises and coughs to clear his throat. “I’ll keep an eye on the
little girl. Make sure she’s eating.”
I feel some of the pressure in my chest lighten at his words. People deal with
me, but they are genuinely fond of Prim. Maybe there will be enough fondness to
keep her alive.
My next guest is also unexpected. Madge walks straight to me. She is not
weepy or evasive, instead there’s an urgency about her tone that surprises me.
“They let you wear one thing from your district in the arena. One thing to remind
you of home. Will you wear this?” She holds out the circu lar gold pin that was on
her dress earlier. I hadn’t paid much attention to it before, but now I see it’s a
small bird in flight.
“Your pin?” I say. Wearing a token from my district is about the last thing on
my mind.
“Here, I’ll put it on your dress, all right?” Madge doesn’t wait for an answer,
she just leans in and fixes the bird to my dress. “Promise you’ll wear it into the
arena, Katniss?” she asks. “Promise?”
“Yes,” I say. Cookies. A pin. I’m getting all kinds of gifts today. Madge gives me
one more. A kiss on the cheek. Then she’s gone and I’m left thinking that maybe
Madge really has been my friend all along.
Finally, Gale is here and maybe there is nothing romantic between us, but
when he opens his arms I don’t hesitate to go into them. His body is familiar to me
— the way it moves, the smell of wood smoke, even the sound of his heart beating
I know from quiet moments on a hunt — but this is the first time I really feel it,
lean and hard-muscled against my own.
“Listen,” he says. “Getting a knife should be pretty easy, but you’ve got to get
your hands on a bow. That’s your best chance.”
“They don’t always have bows,” I say, thinking of the year there were only
horrible spiked maces that the tributes had to bludgeon one another to death with.
“Then make one,” says Gale. “Even a weak bow is better than no bow at all.”
I have tried copying my father’s bows with poor results. It’s not that easy. Even
he had to scrap his own work sometimes.
“I don’t even know if there’ll be wood,” I say. Another year, they tossed
everybody into a landscape of nothing but boulders and sand and scruffy bushes. I
particularly hated that year. Many contestants were bitten by venomous snakes or
went insane from thirst.
“There’s almost always some wood,” Gale says. “Since that year half of them
died of cold. Not much entertainment in that.”
It’s true. We spent one Hunger Games watching the players freeze to death at
night. You could hardly see them because they were just huddled in balls and had
no wood for fires or torches or anything. It was considered very anti-climactic in
the Capitol, all those quiet, bloodless deaths. Since then, there’s usually been
wood to make fires.
“Yes, there’s usually some,” I say.
“Katniss, it’s just hunting. You’re the best hunter I know,” says Gale.
“It’s not just hunting. They’re armed. They think,” I say.
“So do you. And you’ve had more practice. Real practice,” he says. “You know
how to kill.”
“Not people,” I say.
“How different can it be, really?” says Gale grimly.
The awful thing is that if I can forget they’re people, it will be no different at all.
The Peacekeepers are back too soon and Gale asks for more time, but they’re
taking him away and I start to panic. “Don’t let them starve!” I cry out, clinging to
his hand.
“I won’t! You know I won’t! Katniss, remember I —” he says, and they yank us
apart and slam the door and I’ll never know what it was he wanted me to
remember.
It’s a short ride from the Justice Building to the train station. I’ve never been in
a car before. Rarely even ridden in wagons. In the Seam, we travel on foot.
I’ve been right not to cry. The station is swarming with reporters with their
insectlike cameras trained directly on my face. But I’ve had a lot of practice at
wiping my face clean of emotions and I do this now. I catch a glimpse of myself on
the television screen on the wall that’s airing my arrival live and feel gratified that
I appear almost bored.
Peeta Mellark, on the other hand, has obviously been crying and interestingly
enough does not seem to be trying to cover it up. I immediately wonder if this will
be his strategy in the Games. To appear weak and frightened, to reassure the
other tributes that he is no competition at all, and then come out fighting. This
worked very well for a girl, Johanna Mason, from District 7 a few years back. She
seemed like such a sniveling, cowardly fool that no one bothered about her until
there were only a handful of contestants left. It turned out she could kill viciously.
Pretty clever, the way she played it. But this seems an odd strategy for Peeta
Mellark because he’s a baker’s son. All those years of having enough to eat and
hauling bread trays around have made him broad-shouldered and strong. It will
take an awful lot of weeping to convince anyone to overlook him.
We have to stand for a few minutes in the doorway of the train while the
cameras gobble up our images, then we’re allowed inside and the doors close
mercifully behind us. The train begins to move at once.
The speed initially takes my breath away. Of course, I’ve never been on a train,
as travel between the districts is for bidden except for officially sanctioned duties.
For us, that’s mainly transporting coal. But this is no ordinary coal train. It’s one of
the high-speed Capitol models that average 250 miles per hour. Our journey to the
Capitol will take less than a day.
In school, they tell us the Capitol was built in a place once called the Rockies.
District 12 was in a region known is Appalachia. Even hundreds of years ago, they
mined coal here. Which is why our miners have to dig so deep.
Somehow it all comes back to coal at school. Besides basic reading and math
most of our instruction is coal-related. Except for the weekly lecture on the history
of Panem. It’s mostly a lot of blather about what we owe the Capitol. I know there
must be more than they’re telling us, an actual account of what happened during
the rebellion. But I don’t spend much time thinking about it. Whatever the truth is,
I don’t see how it will help me get food on the table.
The tribute train is fancier than even the room in the Justice Building. We are
each given our own chambers that have a bedroom, a dressing area, and a private
bathroom with hot and cold running water. We don’t have hot water at home,
unless we boil it.
There are drawers filled with fine clothes, and Effie Trinket tells me to do
anything I want, wear anything I want, everything is at my disposal. Just be ready
for supper in an hour. I peel off my mother’s blue dress and take a hot shower. I’ve
never had a shower before. It’s like being in a summer rain, only warmer. I dress
in a dark green shirt and pants.
At the last minute, I remember Madge’s little gold pin. For the first time, I get a
good look at it. It’s as if someone fashioned a small golden bird and then attached
a ring around it. The bird is connected to the ring only by its wing tips. I suddenly
recognize it. A mockingjay.
They’re funny birds and something of a slap in the face to the Capitol. During
the rebellion, the Capitol bred a series of genetically altered animals as weapons.
The common term for them was muttations, or sometimes mutts for short. One
was a special bird called a jabberjay that had the ability to memorize and repeat
whole human conversations. They were homing birds, exclusively male, that were
released into regions where the Capitol’s enemies were known to be hiding. After
the birds gathered words, they’d fly back to centers to be recorded. It took people
awhile to realize what was going on in the districts, how private conversations
were being transmitted. Then, of course, the rebels fed the Capitol endless lies,
and the joke was on it. So the centers were shut down and the birds were
abandoned to die off in the wild.
Only they didn’t die off. Instead, the jabberjays mated with female
mockingbirds creating a whole new species that could replicate both bird whistles
and human melodies. They had lost the ability to enunciate words but could still
mimic a range of human vocal sounds, from a child’s high-pitched warble to a
man’s deep tones. And they could re-create songs. Not just a few notes, but whole
songs with multiple verses, if you had the patience to sing them and if they liked
your voice.
My father was particularly fond of mockingjays. When we went hunting, he
would whistle or sing complicated songs to them and, after a polite pause, they’d
always sing back. Not everyone is treated with such respect. But whenever my
father sang, all the birds in the area would fall silent and listen. His voice was that
beautiful, high and clear and so filled with life it made you want to laugh and cry at
the same time. I could never bring myself to continue the practice after he was
gone. Still, there’s something comforting about the little bird. It’s like having a
piece of my father with me, protecting me. I fasten the pin onto my shirt, and with
the dark green fabric as a background, I can almost imagine the mockingjay flying
through the trees.
Effie Trinket comes to collect me for supper. I follow her through the narrow,
rocking corridor into a dining room with polished paneled walls. There’s a table
where all the dishes are highly breakable. Peeta Mellark sits waiting for us, the
chair next to him empty.
“Where’s Haymitch?” asks Effie Trinket brightly.
“Last time I saw him, he said he was going to take a nap,” says Peeta.
“Well, it’s been an exhausting day,” says Effie Trinket. I think she’s relieved by
Haymitch’s absence, and who can blame her?
The supper comes in courses. A thick carrot soup, green salad, lamb chops and
mashed potatoes, cheese and fruit, a chocolate cake. Throughout the meal, Effie
Trinket keeps reminding us to save space because there’s more to come. But I’m
stuffing myself because I’ve never had food like this, so good and so much, and
because probably the best thing I can do between now and the Games is put on a
few pounds.
“At least, you two have decent manners,” says Effie as we’re finishing the main
course. “The pair last year ate everything with their hands like a couple of
savages. It completely upset my digestion.”
The pair last year were two kids from the Seam who’d never, not one day of
their lives, had enough to eat. And when they did have food, table manners were
surely the last thing on their minds. Peeta’s a baker’s son. My mother taught Prim
and I to eat properly, so yes, I can handle a fork and knife. But I hate Effie Trinket’s
comment so much I make a point of eating the rest of my meal with my fin gers.
Then I wipe my hands on the tablecloth. This makes her purse her lips tightly
together.
Now that the meal’s over, I’m fighting to keep the food down. I can see Peeta’s
looking a little green, too. Neither of our stomachs is used to such rich fare. But if I
can hold down Greasy Sae’s concoction of mice meat, pig entrails, and tree bark
— a winter specialty — I’m determined to hang on to this.
We go to another compartment to watch the recap of the reapings across
Panem. They try to stagger them throughout the day so a person could
conceivably watch the whole thing live, but only people in the Capitol could really
do that, since none of them have to attend reapings themselves.
One by one, we see the other reapings, the names called, (the volunteers
stepping forward or, more often, not. We examine the faces of the kids who will be
our competition. A few stand out in my mind. A monstrous boy who lunges forward
to volunteer from District 2. A fox-faced girl with sleek red hair from District 5. A
boy with a crippled foot from District 10. And most hauntingly, a twelve-year-old
girl from District 11. She has dark brown skin and eyes, but other than that, she’s
very like Prim in size and demeanor. Only when she mounts the stage and they
ask for volunteers, all you can hear is the wind whistling through the decrepit
buildings around her. There’s no one willing to take her place.
Last of all, they show District 12. Prim being called, me running forward to
volunteer. You can’t miss the desperation in my voice as I shove Prim behind me,
as if I’m afraid no one will hear and they’ll take Prim away. But, of course, they do
hear. I see Gale pulling her off me and watch myself mount the stage. The
commentators are not sure what to say about the crowd’s refusal to applaud. The
silent salute. One says that District 12 has always been a bit backward but that
local customs can be charming. As if on cue, Haymitch falls off the stage, and they
groan comically. Peeta’s name is drawn, and he quietly takes his place. We shake
hands. They cut to the anthem again, and the pro-gram ends.
Effie Trinket is disgruntled about the state her wig was in. “Your mentor has a
lot to learn about presentation. A lot about televised behavior.”
Peeta unexpectedly laughs. “He was drunk,” says Peeta. “He’s drunk every
year.”
“Every day,” I add. I can’t help smirking a little. Effie Trinket makes it sound
like Haymitch just has somewhat rough manners that could be corrected with a
few tips from her.
“Yes,” hisses Effie Trinket. “How odd you two find it amusing. You know your
mentor is your lifeline to the world in these Games. The one who advises you, lines
up your sponsors, and dictates the presentation of any gifts. Haymitch can well be
the difference between your life and your death!”
Just then, Haymitch staggers into the compartment. “I miss supper?” he says in
a slurred voice. Then he vomits all over the expensive carpet and falls in the mess.
“So laugh away!” says Effie Trinket. She hops in her pointy shoes around the
pool of vomit and flees the room.
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