87th Games

The Grim Reaping

I turned my gaze as I noticed a commotion at the edge of the town centre. A small boy was being carried away by peacekeepers. Poor kid had fainted at his first reaping. He was lucky. At least he didn’t spray vomit everywhere and onto the podium like I did when I was twelve.

Gasps erupted throughout the crowd and I felt someone squeeze my arm tightly.

I turned my attention back to Magnus standing on the wooden stage with a tiny piece of paper in his hands.

“Let me say again” he cleared his throat loudly “Scarlett Aspen”.

I was frozen. This must be a dream.  No chance in hell was I going to be a tribute!

People were now pushing me to the front and onto the stage. I was in a complete daze, after all I had just found out I was probably going to die in a matter of weeks. I need to run! I turned quickly to see five peace keepers walking towards me. If I ran, my family would take the brunt of the punishment. I couldn’t do that to them.

I walked slowly up the stair way to hell to see Magnus with his hand out stretched. I eyed his hand wearily.

“I see we have a beautiful tribute this year, just beautiful”.

I smiled weakly at him and looked into the crowd. My dad was shaking his head in despair and was trying desperately to hold my mother back so that she wouldn’t volunteer for me. In the last couple of years they began to allow family members of all ages to volunteer for someone. I looked at the projection screens and saw myself standing there, my long red hair flowing down to my waist. I was wearing an old pair of jeans and old boots. We were always encouraged to wear our best to the reapings because we would be on TV but I don’t think any girl in my district even owned a dress.  

“And now, it is time for the male tribute!” Magnus giggled in utter enjoyment.

 “Arrow Arturo” he said clearly.

I heard my entire district gasp. No. Not him. I refuse to be stuck in the hunger games with Arrow. He is good for nothing and had absolutely no skills at all - aside from his rude and snarky attitude. He was useless and annoying and I would rather die than share any sort of alliance with him. It may seem dramatic and rude but I really would rather die. I hated him that much.

I scoffed loudly as I saw him climb up the wooden stage instead of using the stairs. Arrow walked straight up to me and winked. I wrinkled my nose at him. He was disgusting.

“Are we both excited for the 87th annual hunger games?”

Magnus held a microphone to my mouth but I didn’t dare say a word. Meanwhile Arrow grabbed the microphone and said in a rush “I’m just excited to be standing here next to my bestest friend in the whole wide world” he tugged playfully at my hair.

“Like hell you are” I yelled while sending a quick and forceful kick to his foot.

He yelped in pain and grabbed hold of his foot hopping along the stag. He earned a few giggles from the younger children in the crowd and a massive scorn from me. Apparently, he was unable to sense the imminence of his upcoming death.

It was widely known that Arrow and I hated each other. He never pulled his work in the fields and would always leave me to clean up the stables. I hated him more than I hated carrots. I hated him more than I hated the scorching heat around us. I hated him more than a person could ever hate someone. Unfortunately, this only fuelled Arrow more.

Years ago I had only just begun working out on the fields spending my time harvesting the crops that we were to feed the animals with. The sun was about to set and I was nowhere near finishing my daily task. I saw a boy my age sitting underneath an apple tree.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!” I stormed over to him.

“What? I’m eating?” he raised his eyebrow at me and took a huge bite out of an apple.

“You’re supposed to be working out here with me Arrow. You know, I’m going to apply for a different position, you make it impossible for me to get anything done.”

He didn’t reply. I continued my rant “And those apples are for the horses, not for you”

“Yeah” he took another big bite from the apple, apple juice spraying from his mouth. “It’s not like you’re going to tell anyone, Scar.”

“Only my friends call me Scar. You think I’m not going to tell on you? Yeah right, I’m going to go straight to that peace keeper right now!”

In retrospect I should have gone straight to the keeper that was guarding the livestock barn but curiosity got the better of me.

“Oh my god!” he spat out part of his apple onto the ground.

“What now” I said adjusting my hands onto my hips.

“There’s a worm in it!”

“You ungrateful little boy, first you steal an apple and now you’re not even going to finish it”. I scoffed at him. We barely had any food to eat as it was, he infuriated me! Stealing was an offence and if that peace keeper found out the punishment would be huge. Everyone in my town had to steal to survive myself included. We had to do it often to keep our families alive, but the only thing was, the rest of us had common sense and would only take a little each time so that it was never noticed. I never sat out in the field and ate the food we were supposed to harvest, especially in front of a peace keeper!

I looked at the apple in his hands and then back to the peace keeper standing about one hundred meters away.

“No seriously take a look at it, Scar!”

I leant forward to see the supposed worm and then he shoved the apple into my mouth.

He was already on his feet and running away. “You can’t tell on me if you had a bite too!”

And thus began Arrow becoming my enemy.

I was brought back to reality only to hear Magnus laughing ecstatically at us both.

“Oh my” he pulled out his handkerchief pretending to wipe away tears of joy that clearly weren’t there.

 “Beautiful” Magnus chimed looking at us up and down.

 “We have our tributes”