𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗼𝗶𝗮 ♛ ꜱᴇᴊᴀɴᴜꜱ ᴘʟɪɴᴛʜ

♛𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲♛

The girl's heart dropped to her stomach.  She knew she resembled her mother, especially in this dress, but being verbally compared to her was a different story.  It hurt more than anything and Aurelia nearly collapsed, but she managed to regain her composure.  "No, Satyria, it's me.  Aurelia," she stated, briefly but firmly.

Realization finally dawned in Satyria's eyes.  "Aurelia, of course dear.  Apologies, you just resemble your mother so much."

Aurelia was about to cry at this point, but this obviously couldn't happen.  She tried to steer the conversation away from this subject. "Thank you.  I wish she could be here with us today.  But is that a new gown? It's lovely."

"Isn't it?" Satyria flipped her tone like a switch, just as Aurelia knew she would. "I had it done especially for today.  Tenth anniversary, you know."

"Of course," the blonde girl smiled politely, thankful for the professor's willingness to swap the topic of conversation.

The small-talk was interrupted by the arrival of two more people.  The first was Professor Sickle, the physical education professor, built like an ox, who could her way through the crowd no problem.  Behind her was a boy, Sejanus Plinth, carrying the professor's shield that she insisted on holding every year in photos.

Sejanus appeared slightly worn out from carrying the massive ornament around the hall, but he was managing it well enough.  He was wearing a gray suit tailored exactly to him, and he'd have to be sweating majorly on a day as sweltering as today.  He basically smelled of money.  Coriolanus could barely stand the boy, as he saw him as a threat.  Sejanus wasn't even Capitol-born, his father had just made enough money in District Two to move his family there.  The fact that he had the same privileges after ten years that the Snows did after generations truly threw Aurelia's twin for a loop. 

Sejanus was the first district-born boy to ever attend the Academy.  His father had donated lots of money to help rebuild the school after the bombings, and instead of having a building named after him, all Strabo Plinth wanted was his son to have an education.

The most irritating bit was that the Snows had plenty of munitions, but theirs were located in District Thirteen.  Which was bombed the heaviest of all.  Nuclear.  That was where the Snows lost most of their fortune, and where the Plinths gained most of theirs.

Even though Coriolanus and many other children disliked the boy, Aurelia had never felt the same.  It wasn't at all his fault that his father had moved him.  He didn't deserve to be treated like an outsider when he didn't have any control over what happened.

♛

There was a strange boy on the playground that morning.  Eight year old Aurelia couldn't help but look at him.  He looked different than everyone else, and she didn't know where he came from.

Someone told her that he was from the districts, and this only increased her curiosity further.  Most of the other kids decided to make the poor boy's life a living hell, others ignored him completely, but Aurelia just couldn't.

She remembered his chocolate brown eyes meeting her sea green ones. 

She remembered smiling at him, and his shy smile coming back to her.

She remembered his hand coming up in a small wave, and just as she raised her hand to wave back, one of the girls dragged her away.

She saw him every day. Every day came the smile, then the wave. It was a pattern, over and over and over. That was all she knew of the boy, the boy with those big brown eyes. Until one day, she learned something else.  How she came to know it, she couldn't say. Maybe someone told her.  It didn't really matter.  It wasn't there, and then one day it was.  And that was when she finally made up her mind.