"Don't judge everyday by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant." - Robert Louis Stevenson
~
The Reaping is today.
I force myself not to vomit, as I stare down at my plate of food, both of my hands balled up into tight fists. It's like this every year. Another year, another set of tributes, and another breakfast I can barely get down, without it wanting to come right back up again.
My older brother sets his mug down on the table, and looks at me with a concerned frown. "Poppy, eat." He nods towards my barely touched bowl of cornflakes.
I shake my head stubbornly. "Don't want to."
He grabbed my now, shaking hands and gently pulled them out of the fist I had them in, immediately releasing the tension. My hands had gone bright pink, and my knuckles white. "Come on, it's going to be a long day today. You'll need your energy." He urges me gently.
I shake my head, and push my bowl of what was once cornflakes, now a bowl of brown mush away from me. "I can't anyway, they've gone all soggy." I murmur, looking at the steam rising out of my brother's mug. He's probably drinking coffee - A beverage I can never bring myself to enjoy.
"Aw, come on Pops. Don't be this way." My brother complains, frowning at me in confusion. Bringing out the old nicknames, was just one of the things my brother did, to try sway my opionion. "You're not going to get chosen! You've never ever had to once get the tesserea, other kids, their survival depends on it. They have a higher chance than you do. I really don't get what you're so worried about!"
Yes, I know, my brother is right. Kind of. But I wasn't going to let him have that satisfaction. Not this year, not this time. "There's still a chance I might get picked..." I point out, being as calm as possible. I wasn't going to loose my temper with him. Not yet anyway. "You can't really dismiss the matter, just yet. You're just going to put a jynx on it. And how many times do I have to tell you to not call me Pops!"
"You're not going to die, just please calm down-" My brother starts, avoiding my line of sight. There he goes again. Just the same crap he says every single year to get me off his back about this whole thing. And with two years after this to go, I've had enough of it!
"That's easy for you to say, Eaton!" I yell furiously, interrupting him mid-sentence. "You won your games! At least you had a chance! I mean, look at me! A scrawny midget like me wouldn't last a few days in the arena, let alone a few seconds!"
Did I mention that my brother won his games? Because, yeah, he did. He won it ten years ago, when he was 15, and I was six. He was won of the youngest winners ever. Not the youngest, but one of them. It brought a lot of pride to our household, though it did change some things in my brother. He initially stopped playing with me, and eventually went on to not talking to me either. He became very, distant. Guess he felt guilty for all the tributes he killed or something. Things are better now between us though, we've become a lot closer again. Even though it's not really the same as how things were. Our parents aren't here anymore, and the both of us are all we both have left.
"Poppy, I-" He sounds defeated, upset almost.
I stand up out of my chair, and turn to storm off out of our kitchen, but I find myself stumbling over the chair as I'm doing so. It kind of ruined the effect I was going for. The chair falls over, onto the tiled floor with a loud, and satisfying bang. I hope it puts cracks on the tiles, I never really quite liked them.
"Poppy!" Eaton repeats, raising his voice this time. Sometime's he's like a broken record.
I ignore him, and storm up the stairs to go to my room, or my bear cave, as my father once put it. As I get up to the top of the stairs, I pause, and I hear my brother heave a forlorned sigh. I consider going back down there to apologise, but discard the thought almost immediately. I don't usually loose my temper like this, it's just that this whole thing, with the reaping and the games, it's kind of a sensitive topic for me. It's what tore our family apart. Sometimes I feel like I've been living in my brother's shadow.
