The Little Mockingjay

Eet

Song- Eet by Regina Spektor

I wake up to my school alarm the next morning, which surprises me for some reason. I don’t know why I thought my life would change after the events of last night. Of course, the assassination of the President would affect the government, but not my family. So I go about my day as always, unable to tell if I am overjoyed or melancholy about the fact that nothing in my life has changed. I take a pair of light jeans from my closet and pull them on. Then, I grab randomly around in a drawer and come up with a black tank top, which I put on with a sweater over it. After lacing up my black converse, I braid my hair, wash my face, brush my teeth, and head downstairs. Everything is as it should be. Dad passes Flint a bowl of cereal, so I grab two slices of bread and pop them in the toaster. No one mentions the events of last night until I sit down next to Mom and bite into my buttered toast.

“So, you both understood what was happening last night in the news?” She asks, addressing Flint and me.

We both nod.

“Good. It’s a very serious situation. No one really knows how it will be handled, considering our government is very new still. Just…” She trails off before adding,

“Be careful today.”

We nod again, but her words echo in my head as Dad sits down across from Mom and me and takes her hand in his, one arm casually thrown around Flint. Be careful? What does that mean? She sounded scared. Should I be scared? I conclude that the answer is no as Flint and I finish breakfast. Everyone in the country is on edge, considering there is no leader. So Flint and I head off to school, but just before the door closes, I hear a sound escape from Mom. I stop momentarily and turn my head, just long enough to hear Dad say,

“Don’t worry, babe. They’re gonna be fine. Nothing is going to happen to them, or to us. We’re okay. We’re okay.”

I pull Flint away from our house before I can hear anything else.

What does this have to do with my family?

As we walk, I look down at Flint and notice that he’s looking up at me with furrowed eyebrows.

“I want to know what’s going on, Nadia.”

I suck in a deep breath of air.

“You know as much about this as I do.”

“No. Not just about the assassination, about everything. I want to know why it’s such a big deal to Mom and Dad. I want to know everything that they’re not telling me because if this is somehow related to us I deserve to know.”

“They don’t tell me either.”

He scoffs and says, “Aren’t you curious? Do you even care? Or do you just want to put those stupid headphones in and forget about the world?”

I’m furious at this comment. Of course I care. I’ve spent my whole life digging for information about my family history that my parents won’t provide me. What has he done? I try to stay calm, as to avoid a fight, but I fail miserably.

“I’ve been curious for sixteen years, Flint! I’ve been trying to understand for sixteen years, constantly asking everyone who I think will have an answer. No one will tell me! I don’t know, and I hate it! We’ll never know!”

I slowly let out a breath.

“It’s like the whole country has just deleted that part of history…”

We approach the school and Flint, being my fourteen year old little brother, just says,

“Yeah, whatever.” And stomps off.