SILVER • THE HUNGER GAMES ¹

01. | HEARTBEAT

     "Here," he declares as the girl begins to lower her head. Carter leans forward, placing the chain to rest on soft skin. "Some silver, for Silver."

     It is not long until a man head-to-toe in artificial white orders him away as a stream of people makes their way past. Carter offers his daughter one last squeeze of her shoulder and takes a step back, watching as her frame is absorbed by a line of children — all dressed in their own best clothes, all tugging at the fabric against them in a snug fit. When he blinks, he tries to find her again, but she is lost to the swarm.

    The girl makes her own way through the District square from here. Though full of life, the bleak cream stones and the banners hanging from the higher floors draw a hollow rigour upon its citizens. She can imagine how it must feel in the other eleven Districts at a time like this, the ones she can recall from the television reaching out to her mind eagerly. They are bright and colourful in the richer Districts, nearly filled with an awful dash of hope — false and overbearing. She's grateful for that, maybe. If the District Ten square is the worst of her home, she hates to think that those places may be the best of theirs.

    There's a small tussle between a Peacekeeper and a child older than her as she waits in line. He's stocky but paler than her — a child of the northern border, perhaps — and he's put down like a limp draught horse before he can lay a real hit on any Capitol official. The others move along the line as if nothing has happened, just as he is pricked, stamped off and carried to the front of the group of children arranged before the Mayor's house. She's seen it happen every year, of course. It always happens; a child of the poultry farms, too bullish for their own good. She remembers her father telling her that when they get reaped for the games, District Ten is the first to lose both Tributes.

    The girl is stamped soon after, a second blood prick on her forefinger. There will be more, no doubt, and they will hurt the same every year. As she is filed towards the back of the crowd of children, this time a little further forward, she licks away the red stain that has begun to trickle down her skin. 

    District Ten's Mayor begins her usual speech about the Dark Days and the Treaty of Treason and all the gruesome history of rebellion that every child is taught in their schools as soon as they are able to write out the alphabet. Behind him, three of the District's still surviving Victors sit rigidly on wooden stools. The youngest one looks ill — his cheeks near blue with a fever, youth fading from his eyes — forced to watch and attend his duty; another is an older woman, hair white and hands shaking; the last Victor wears a tight frown, his hands holding so firmly against his knees that she can see the whites of his knuckles from the very back of the crowd.

    The District Escort, Atlanta, follows — a woman teetering on heels and attempting to balance a towering teal wig atop her head. As she steps forward, the wig sways. In front of the girl in the crowd, a boy chuckles and his friend as to push their boot into his toes to shut him up.

     "I say every year that District Ten is my favourite District," she begins, her voice shrill and laced with a sweetness everyone around her is foreign to. She flounces her arms around until they land before her, clasped, and lets long acrylic nails click together for a second.  "So charming... So eager to send two lucky souls to this year's Seventy-Third Annual Hunger Games."

    What seems to be a sigh transforms into a childish squeal as she trots over — albeit a slight bit prematurely — over towards the first bowl of reaped names. She stumbles over words of endearment towards the happiness of the Games as she does, singing out praises for the Victors sat along the back wall of the building, listing them all by name and complimenting them all one by one. 

     From this point, what occurs is simply routine. Atlanta makes a joke, it batters against the cold silent wall of the audience in front of her, and she swiftly declares that the Ladies have the honour of being chosen first.