Clato: Fire Meets Gasoline {A Hunger Games Story}

chapter twenty four

"Excited?" Candela asks as she applies eyeshadow to my face.
"I guess," I reply with a shrug. She frowns at my underwhelming response.

"Well, you may not be excited, but I certainly am. This time of year is my favourite".
"Summer?" I ask. She laughs at me.
"No, silly. Hunger Games season. It's super entertaining!" She exclaims, closing her eyeshadow palette.

Something about her saying that makes my stomach flip, but i'm not sure why. A huge part of why I volunteered myself to be here is because I loved watching the Games as well, especially when District Two wins. But Candela saying that makes me uneasy.

"There, you're all set". She exclaims, pulling me out of my thoughts, "Now all we need to do is get you into your dress. Close your eyes".
I hear her walk across the room and open the closet. Suddenly, she's right next to me and I feel material being fitted around me.

"Open your eyes".
I look in the mirror and see myself in a dress so beautiful that it couldn't possibly be mine. The strapless top half of the dress is orange/pink, the waist is tied tight with an orange bow then it falls out into a floor length orange colour floating around my legs.

Half of my hair is tied up into a fancy bun on the top of my head and the rest is curled down to my waist. My makeup is done to perfection.
I turn around to face Candela, the ends of my dress floating with my every movement.
"Thank you". I say, a small smile on my face. She grins back at me. "I'm so glad you like it!"

A knock comes from outside, making me jump.
"All tributes must be downstairs in 5 minutes". A man yells from outside the room. A few seconds later we hear him yell the same thing from further away.

I walk over to the door and pull it open.
"Clove?" Candela asks. I turn back to look at her. "Yeah?"
"Go show them what their future victor is made of".

A grin flashes across my face before I let the door shut behind me. I lean against the door and take a deep breath, before I begin my descent down the long hallway that would lead backstage.

Other tributes beginleaving their assigned rooms but I walk past them all, not glancing in their directions. They are all beneath me.
They all watch as I walk, my heels the only sound in the hallway. I am radiating confidence.

Eventually I make it to the end of the hallway where there is a small staircase down to the backstage area. I lightly place a carefully manicured hand on the fancy banister and descend down the stairs.

As soon as I reach the bottom, the mutters of tributes is audible. I put a determined look on my face and cross my arms as I look through the tributes. The girl from Eleven is sitting alone on a bench and, by the looks of it, her district partner isn't here yet. Twelve are sitting on another bench talking quietly to eachother.

Looking at Katniss, there is no other term to describe her look other than 'basic'. A simple red dress. Nothing more.

I glance to my right and see Marvel and Glimmer in the corner talking. Glimmer looks beautiful of course, in a short pink number and Marvel looks good in his suit.

In the farthest corner away from where I'm standing, I see Cato and my heart momentarily
stops. To say he looks good would be an understatement. He's dressed in an all blue suit and his hair is messy in a nice way.

Shut up, Clove. You have Adler.

Cato turns his head in my direction and meets my eyes. His 'sure of himself' expression quickly diminishes and is replaced with wide eyes as he looks at me. Correction - stares at me.

I smile and roll my eyes, before gliding the length of the room towards him. The whole time he keeps his eyes on me. As I get within earshot, I swear I hear him draw in a sharp breath.

"Wow, Clove, you look..." He begins before trailing off. I cross my arms and tilt my head, a small smirk on my face. "I look..."
"Beautiful. Really beautiful".

I smile at him, a genuine smile. I allow myself a second to look down at the floor before meeting his eyes again.
"You look...handsome. Really handsome". I reply, mocking him slightly but telling nothing but the truth.

He grins and opens his mouth to say something when a Capitol man runs past us, yelling at us all to get into our places. Cato closes his mouth and holds his arm out to me instead so we can go and sit down. I smile slightly before taking it, allowing him to lead me to the other end of the room where the other tributes are standing in order. Glimmer is up first and Peeta is set to go last.

This should be interesting.