lifeline | finnick odair

scene 2; the reaping

Every second blurred into a minute, and every minute seemed to feel like an hour- I couldn't tell how long I'd been standing there, waiting for some kind of movement amongst the crowds of nervous teenagers and mumbling coming from the parents. None of the girls near me spoke, and I thought saying 'good luck' might come off as sadistic.

We all seemed to stare at the young woman who climbed onto stage, one of the pampered women who lived in the Capitol. Though I knew she'd be calling us for the reaping, I couldn't help but envy her. Those in the Capitol lived a life of luxury and often didn't have to do hard work aside for designing and game making. Their society thrived off of our demise. Their gain was our loss and so on, so forth. 

I allowed my thoughts to slip into silence as the video produced by the Capitol played on one of our large projectors. I'm certain that nearly everyone in District Four could quote the video word by word, since we all watched it once a year, every year, especially since everyone came to watch the reapings.

"As usual," My thoughts were interrupted by the woman speaking once again, I honestly wasn't sure of her name, I always seemed to tune it out, "Ladies first."

I felt a sense of dread fill me, starting from the pit of my stomach and raising like a wildfire. It spread fast and I felt my head spinning as I stared at her approaching the glass bowl containing all of our names. I would be fine, this year was Amelia's turn to volunteer, a girl I briefly met in the academy.

I turned my head to try and find Alexander once again, or find one of my parents but they seemed long lost in the crowd, and my patience was wearing thin as I glanced back at the reaper who was now lifting the paper to her vision to read it into the microphone.

"Allison Davis." The crowd seemed to go silent, and I felt a selfish wave of relief crash onto me. "Have we got an Allison Davis?" As the young girl with platinum blonde hair quivered from only a couple spaces in front of me, it soon dawned on me. Allie. Alexanders's younger sister.

I heard a choked sob from the other side of the crowd, one I recognised to be my mothers, and I felt my eyes well up with tears. She was only thirteen.

I couldn't think, my head was dizzy as I pushed through the crowd. I couldn't breathe properly and I felt anxiety crash over me in replacement of the now long-gone relief. Amelia wasn't going to volunteer. Amelia wasn't even here.

"I volunteer as tribute." My voice was loud and I started off confident, but my voice broke at the last second. It was easy to tell I was scared, and I could hear yelling from behind me. My feet involuntarily dragged me towards the podium where the young woman beckoned me up.

Facing the crowd, my face was stone cold and my mouth was set into a line as I stared over to my parents, the crowd looking horrified at me. I hadn't meant to do this, this wasn't the way I planned to do this, but Allie was thirteen, and I had seen her run off to our parents.

It wasn't the kind of terror that makes you scared of the dark or of bugs, it's the kind of terror where you realise the inevitable is finally coming true, and you can't wrap your head around the fact that your fate is impending doom. Or at least it feels that way.

My breath seemed to hitch in my throat when I crashed back into reality, realising the reaper was talking to me. "What a brave thing you did back there! Was that your sister?" We didn't really look alike, aside from the platinum blonde hair that we shared, so I couldn't blame her for coming to that conclusion.

I didn't know why I had volunteered, if anything it's better her to die out there than me. "She's thirteen years old." My voice came out harsh, and I stopped staring at the crowd to glare at the woman who seemed slightly taken aback.