Chapter 3

3.

“Rue Jessamine!” Macel Canver reads. He looks up through the crowd in excitement hoping that he’ll get some lumberjack woman or something.

Everyone in the crowd begins murmuring. Who’s Rue Jessamine? Who is she? Where is she standing at? Is she not even here? Did she try to run?

The few kids around me seem to recognize me. One boy starts pointing at me with one of his gaunt trembling fingers. The girl standing next to me, even though I have no idea who she is, begins to bawl her eyes out as if she was trying to prevent a drought. If not for her touch I would have thought I was just standing in a dream.

My chest can’t relax as my breathing becomes rapid. Tears had begun falling down my cheeks but I wasn’t sure when they started. My feet were glued to the spot I was standing in. I find myself struggling to breathe, as if someone had forced a cloth to my mouth.

“Rue Jessamine!” Marcel Canver repeats looking a little bit annoyed that the tribute wasn’t overwhelmed at their picking. What did he expect? That I would scream with joy? That I would run up to the stage and thank him for the opportunity?

I couldn’t run though because my body is figuring out a way to respond yet alone move. I know he said my name, but I can’t move my feet. I stand there unable to move as every wisp of air that escapes my chest comes with a struggle. I prepared myself for the moment, in the off chance that I would have been picked. But still, I find myself in complete shock. I feel a hand grab a hold of my arm. I guess I am able to move because I swayed on spot. People probably thought I was going to throw up or something. I don’t know what I’m doing in all honesty. I could be standing there naked and it still wouldn’t size up to how exposed I feel right now.

Finally a girl that I work with the orchards comes over to me with a teary expression. She can’t be more than a few months older than me. She stares at me as if she’s known me her whole life and I see the pity in her face. She takes my hand and pulls me in the direction of the stage. It’s at this point that everyone in the square knows who I am. The sighs and the exclamations of the families whose children who weren’t picked, silence at once.

I know what they’re all thinking, because it’s what any human being would be thinking at this point. A twelve year old girl had been chosen to compete in the Games. I can hear the murmuring start to begin with the unhappy sentiments that everyone is sharing. Everyone thinks of the Games barbaric to begin with, so seeing a little twelve year old girl fight to her death is appalling.

Somehow I make my feet move. They lead me towards the stage where Marcel has finally recognized that I was the name that he picked. You can see the disappointment on his face. I know he’s not disappointed because I’m so young. He’s disappointed because he doesn’t think I’m going to win, and he wants a winner.

My feet somehow keep moving. I pass the crowd of thirteen year olds.

Stop crying. Stop crying. Stop crying.

I pass the fourteen year olds. Some of them can’t even look at me, and that’s ok because I do not want to look at them right now either.

Stop crying. Stop crying. Stop crying.

I pass the fifteen year olds. I concentrate on taking slow deep breaths. Every breathe is more painful than the last. I feel as if my throat was stung by a tracker jacker. I struggle so much to take in the air that I so desperately crave.

Breathe. Stop crying. Breathe.

I pass the sixteen year olds. I have to stop crying before I get up on that stage. My father will be watching and he would want me to be strong. He would want me to be brave. That’s how he raised me. To view everything in life as an adventure that you’re ready to take on full force. I wasn’t ready for this adventure though. At all.

I pass the seventeen year olds.

Just a few more feet until I’m up on that stage. My breathing begins to cool down, but now I can feel the sweat dripping from my arms. My body did react to the shock before my mind did. My mind is actually still processing it. I was picked. I was picked out of thousands of people. My name was drawn from that stupid bowl with even more thousands pieces of paper.  This can’t be happening, I think. How could this happen? Nine slips held my name out of an easy ten thousand slips. Nine! There were people who had their names in their twenty, thirty times! I can’t believe it. I don’t want to believe it. But I have to.

Stop crying. Stop crying. Stop crying. My breathing has calmed down at least.

I pass the eighteen year olds, the last obstacle before I get to the stage. I hear the kids around me talking amongst them. I try not to look at them because I know what they’re talking about. I overhear one of the boys talking to his friend. Bet you she’ll be one of the first people gone, he says. That’s when I realize, I cannot be. I have to view this as a challenge, as an adventure.

I’m coming home alive. I’m coming back from these Hunger Games if it’s the last thing I do. Then I realize, it might be, but I have to make it back home for my family.

Oh. My family. Now I have to stop crying. I don’t want them to see me like this. I’m sure they’re crying and if they are, I don’t want to be. I can’t stand to see them cry, though. No one can see me cry.

I take that moment to wipe the dried tears from under my eyes. I do it with one quick motion of my hand so that I’m sure no one in the crowd will notice. But I’m sure that when the capitol re-airs footage of this reaping ceremony, there will be a close-up of me doing this. I don’t care at the moment though.

Let them see me cry. Let them think of me as a coward, because from this moment on I am not. My parents did not raise me to be a coward. Oh, I think to myself again. I forgot about my parents again. I forgot for a moment that they were watching me more intently than anyone else in the crowd. I’m facing away from them now, but I’m sure they’re looking at me with more intensity than Marcel who waves his golden-lined gloved hand at me, beckoning me to the stage. I step onto the steps to the stage even though my leg weighs a hundred pounds right now. Or is that just my mindset? I can’t really tell at the moment, but I force myself up the stairs.

Marcel says something to me, but I don’t understand him; my head is so full of thoughts I’m surprised I can make clear sentences form in my mind. I only stare back at him. And that’s when I realize how, it’s hard to find the word, perfect he is.

The Capitol’s idea of perfection I guess. His skin is clear of any scars, freckles, or blemishes giving his skin a rather luminous look. But what really makes his skin shine, are the faint golden tattoos spread all over his face. Everyone in the capitol has some variance of these, I don’t understand why though.

His pearly white teeth are so brilliant, I find myself almost repealed by them. His sky blue eyes are looking at me with such disappointment, but I know it’s not the same reason why everyone else is staring at me. He doesn’t feel bad that I’m only twelve years old. He agrees with the eighteen year old I overheard, he doesn’t think I’m going to win and that’s why he’s upset. He wants to be a advisee to a winner, not someone who he thinks will be the first one killed.

He guides me to a spot directly left of the microphone and I realize that I will be able to see my family now. I prepare myself for the worst because I’m sure they’re crestfallen. I turn to face the crowd on Marcel’s demand and that’s when I see them. And I was wrong about preparing myself for the worst. Because if imaginable, it was worse than what I thought.

My mother was openly sobbing into the chest of my father. Wailing at the top of her lungs the only reason why she remained on her feet was that my father was holding her up. Pyrus and Prunus stand on either side of my mother tugging on the hems of her dress trying to understand why mommy is so upset. Prunus is saying to something to my mom, but from this distance I can’t tell what exactly. Lamium stands to the side of my mother rocking baby Lazula in his arms. I’m guessing he took her away from my mother once my name was called in fear that she would drop her. He’s crying as well, even though he is forcing them shut. He does reasonably well at standing his ground. I can see that he’s biting his lip to the point where he’s drawing blood. I force myself to look away at Amaryllis who sits at the feet of my father.

As sick as she looked before, now she looks like the picture of death. She was not crying. She sat there in complete silence as a blank expression covered her face. Her eyes looked almost midnight black as she stared at a spot in front of her. Her arms lay limply at her side and I’m sure if she were touched she would fall over. Her skin, if any color was remaining, was gone. She looked like a corpse. 

And then, I looked at my father. He wasn’t crying either, but I knew what look he had on his face. It was a look that I’ve seen from other tribute’s parents from previous ceremonies. It was the look of a broken man. He held tightly on to my mother, not only so that she wouldn’t fall, but also I believe that he wouldn’t fall either. His eyes were closed but his head was shaking back and forth in disbelief. He was shaking. Even at this far of a distance I could see. It broke my heart, and that is when I compelled myself to look away at Marcel who stood at the microphone beside me.

“Now is the time in our ceremony, where I will ask the remaining eligible females if there is anyone of you here today who would have to honor of volunteering to take her place as the female tribute in the seventy-fourth annual Hunger Games. Are there any takers?” he asks almost too happily.

He scans the crowd as if there would be hundreds of girls jumping up and down on their feet to get a chance to compete in the Games. The crowd answers back with complete silence, that is, except for my mother’s sobs. I look at some of the girls standing in front of me. Almost all of them are avoiding eye contact with me. Some girls are looking up to the sky, others looking directly at the ground, and others have their eyes closed shut.

But a few girls look directly at me with such a look of despair, as if they’ve known me their whole life. They are trying to tell me that they’re sorry. They would, but they can’t. I understand, because I would never volunteer either.

This wasn’t District 2, where they volunteer at the chance of competing. District 2 detainees fall in line at the chance to compete in the Games. I guess they view it as kind of an honor. It wasn’t viewed as an honor in District 11 though. In fact people probably don’t volunteer because it almost always means certain death, or at least, for our District it did.

District 11 tributes have always had difficulty competing against other Districts in the Games. Mainly because Districts that are closer to the Capitol actually train their children to compete in the Games, although it is highly illegal to do so. It never stopped them before though, and I don’t think it will be stopped anytime soon.

I was never trained though. The only thing that I was trained to do was to climb trees. Climb trees and sing and I’m pretty sure that only one of them would be somewhat helpful to me. Inside my head I can picture the Gaming arena already. Filled with thousands of trees, more than the amount that fills the orchard. I can see myself climbing them already, avoiding the other dangers that fill the place. I can see what kind of sick twisted ideas the Gamemakers will put in it this year.

After Marcel has finally accepted that no one will take my place, he nods quickly and almost dances over to the opposite glass bowl filled to the brim with the eligible male tributes. He quickly slides his gloved hand into the bowl and retrieves a slip from the very bottom of the bowl. The crowd goes silence again.

I can see the eighteen year old who was talking about me to his buddy. He clasps his hands together, and closes his eyes whispering something to himself. I secretly hope he gets picked.

“Thresh Grumly!”Marcel shrills over the crowd. I see the boy take a giant sigh of relief knowing that his last year of eligibility had slid through without problems.

Then I think, Grumly. Grumly…where have I heard that name before?

I scan the crowd of the boys searching for the one who looks as if he had the wind knocked out of him. I look for the one whose life was just yanked away and placed into the manipulating hands of the capitol. The crowds of boys look amongst themselves as well trying to spot the one who was picked. It takes me a while to realize that he was already up on stage. I guess he was standing in the very front row of eighteen year olds. The eighteen year old boy standing on the opposite side of the stage of me did not look eighteen though; he could easily pass for mid twenties.

He stood at least six and a half feet tall so I almost had to crook my neck to see him in full. He wore a white dress shirt that is about to bust by the seams due to the size of his arm muscles. He was built like an ox! It was hard not to be intimidated by him and even Marcel flinches when he goes to shake his hand.

Thresh’s strange golden-brown eyes were intensely staring directly to the front of him. He had short black hair that was matted down on his head. I could tell that he worked in the fields of the orchards, because even though you could tell he tried his best to look proper today, it was clear the amount of dirt smudges he could not remove from his dirt brown skin. Suddenly, he turns to look at me. I’ve seen those eyes before and its then when I remember. I know how I remember Thresh Grumly.

It was two years ago at this precise moment. The reaping for the 72^nd Annual Hunger Games. I remember a girl who worked with me in the orchard, I believe her name was Jasmine, was picked as the tribute for the year. I was standing with my parents, I was still too young for the reaping that year. I barely remember anything about the girl, but I do remember what happened when she was picked. Her older brother forced his way through the crowd to hear wailing at the top of his lungs in despair. Take me! Take me instead of her he yells. He was screaming in hysterics as he pulled his sister into his arms as if he would let go she would die instantly. Please he cries. I volunteer for her! I’ll take her spot!

No, rules must be rules Marcel exclaimed. Male tributes cannot volunteer for female tributes or vice versa, but the brother would not take that for an answer. He pleaded to be heard. He begged for her to be spared in some possible way. He eventually had to be torn away from her by the Peacekeepers, but his cries were not silenced until she was shipped off to the Capitol and even then I swear I could hear his whimpering from my house, still begging for her to be spared. She wasn’t though.

And if I can remember correctly, she actually died very gruesomely. If I can recall it correctly, it’s been two years since I watched those particular games; she was pinned down to the ground by a fellow tribute. He taunted her gently tracing the knife over her skin before he finally slit both her cheeks open. Her tears mixed with blood as he cut the bottom half of her eyelids as well. He then proceeded to cut off her ears so ‘she couldn’t hear herself scream.’ He continued by putting small gashes all the way down her arms and then finally ended his enjoyment by stabbing her repeatedly in the chest.

He stood up and left her for dead, but she was far from it. She laid there for three hours before the cannon shot signifying that her heart had stopped. I could only imagine watching that if I knew her. It was bad enough watching her death as an acquaintance. I try to imagine the thought of myself watching Amaryllis being tortured to death. I can’t even stand the thought of it.

The boy standing across from me looked nothing like the boy from two years ago though. He was a good two feet taller. He gained about one hundred pounds of muscle, but those strange eyes that were glancing at me were definitely the same. I’m surprised he is holding his composure as well as he is, considering it’s his own life on the line now, but maybe he valued his sister’s life more than his own.

Thresh then stretches out his hand towards me and it brings me back to reality. I assume the mayor had just finished reading the Treaty of Treason, as per tradition it is to be read every year after both tributes were picked. I missed when Marcel asked for volunteers for Thresh, but of course I’m sure that no one would volunteer for him either.

The mayor stands at the microphone besides Marcel both looking at us waiting for us to shake hands. Although both showing different expressions. While Marcel looks like he’s holding back so much excitement he’s about to burst, the mayor looks rather sullen. He was in our shoes once. He was chosen as tribute and forced to compete. He knows what obstacles we face now and I’m sure if he could say something to us without the whole crowd overhearing he would, but all he does is just stare at us with those defeated eyes.

I reach out for Thresh’s hand, and with someone of such great strength, he shakes my hand with such gentleness. All of a sudden I start crying again. I don’t know exactly why. Maybe it’s because I keep looking at my family who are all sobbing uncontrollably. Maybe it’s because I’m realizing this may be the last day in District 11. Everything that I’ve grown up with might vanish before my very eyes.

The trees vast as a jungle full of the mockingjays singing their perfect melodies to their viewers, I may never climb them again. The bushes full of berries that I may never have the chance to taste the succulent juices again. The small field in the back of my house may never feel my footsteps chasing around my siblings with some crazy game that they made up.

I close my eyes and try to focus on emptying my thoughts. All this does though, is make me more upset. I clench my teeth in the sad attempt at stopping the tears flowing from my eyes. I feel a small pressure on my shoulder and realize that Thresh has placed his opposite hand on my shoulder. As quickly as I felt his small attempt at comforting me, the feeling of his hand against my chilled skin had vanished.

“Don’t let them see you cry,” Thresh whispers to me through closed teeth. I assume he means the Capitol viewers watching this from their televisions right now. I nod quickly and we release each other’s hands. We turn to face the crowd and Marcel steps in between us one more time. He grabs both of our hands and pulls them into the air as if we just won a boxing match.

“Ladies and Gentleman! May I present to you,” he yells ecstatically, “the male and female tributes for District 12 for the seventy-fourth Hunger Games! Rue Jessamine! And Thresh Grumly!”

Then Thresh looks at me, and I’m scared. The look in his eyes is pure determination.  And then it dawns on me. He has to die for me to win. And without a doubt in my mind, I know he's thinking the same.