Effie's knocking on the door, telling me to wake up and remind me that there was another "big, big, big day!" ahead.
I get up and take a quick shower, then head down to the dining room, where Riley, Effie, and Shawn were in a huddle, talking in hushed voices. While that does seem odd, my hunger got the best of me.
"So, what's going on?" I ask, shoveling a lamb stew into my mouth. It was possibly the best thing I've had at the Capitol, and that's saying something. "You're coaching us on interviews today, right?"
"That's right." Shawn nods.
"You don't have to wait until I'm done. I can listen and eat at the same time." I say.
"Well, there's been a change of plans. About our current approach." Shawn says.
"What's that?" I ask.
"Riley has asked to be coached separately." Shawn says this so casually, as if it didn't matter at all.
Betrayal. That's all I felt. Because, yes, it did matter. The girl who gave me the bread, who gave me hope, who gave me her jacket, who gave me her kindness, who made me fall for her, was now trying to kill me.
But, I couldn't let her win. I promised Prim that I would be the one to come home and I wasn't going to let my feelings get in the way of that.
"O-okay." I say. "So what's the schedule?"
"You'll each have four hours with Effie for presentation and four with me for content." Shawn explains.
After four torturing hours of Effie instructing me on what to do, it was finally time for lunch.
"Well, that's the best I can do." Effie sighs. "Just remember, Maya, you want the audience to like you."
"And you don't think they will?" I ask with a raised eyebrow.
"Not if you glare at them the entire time." Effie remarks. "Why don't you save that for the arena? Instead, think of yourself among friends."
"They've betting on how long I'll live!" I couldn't hold my anger in anymore, not after four hours of it. "They're not my friends!"
"Well try and pretend!" Effie snaps. She takes a deep breath in and smiles at me. "See, like this. I'm smiling at you even though you're aggravating me."
"Yes, it feels very convincing." I scoff. "I'm going to eat."
I stomp off to the dining room, where Riley and Shawn were already sitting, both in good moods. This makes my think that the content session would be an improvement over the morning with Effie, but I couldn't have been more wrong.
After lunch, Shawn and I were in the sitting room, where he just stood there and frowned at me for a while.
"What?" I ask, starting to get annoyed with his stare.
"I'm trying to figure out what to do with you." He finally says. "How we're going to present you. Are you going to be charming? Aloof? Fierce? So far, you're shining like a star. You volunteered to save your sister. Cinna made you look unforgettable. You've got the top training score. People are intrigued, but no one knows who you are. The impression you make tomorrow will decide exactly what I can get you in terms of sponsors."
"What's Riley's approach?" I find myself asking. "Or am I not allowed to ask?"
"Likable." Shawn answers. "She has a sort of self-deprecating humor naturally. Whereas when you open your mouth, you come across more as sullen and hostile."
"I do not!" I shout.
"Please." Shawn scoffs. "I don't know where you pulled that cheery, wavy girl on the chariot from, but I haven't seen her before or since."
"And you've given me so many reasons to be cheery." I snap.
"But you don't have to please me. I'm not going to sponsor you. So pretend I'm the audience." Shawn says. "Delight me."
"Fine!" I snarl.
Shawn pretends to be the interviewer while I try to answer his questions. The key word is try. I'm too angry with Shawn, letting my fury get the best of me.
"Alright, enough." He finally says after I practically spit out the last answer to him. "We've got to find another angle. Not only are you hostile, I don't know anything about you. I've asked you fifty questions and still have no sense of your life, your family, what you care about. They want to know about you, Maya."
"But I don't want them to!" I protest. "They're already taking my future! They can't have the things that mattered to me in the past!"
"Then lie! Make something up!" Shawn exclaims.
"I'm not good at lying." I say.
"Well, you better learn fast. You've got about as much charm as a dead slug." Shawn scoffs. "Here's an idea. Try acting humble."
"Humble?"
"Humble." Shawn repeats. "That you can't believe a little girl from District 12 has done this well. The whole thing's been more than you ever could have dreamed of. Talk about Cinna's clothes. How nice the people are. How the city amazes you. If you won't talk about yourself, at least compliment the audience. Just keep turning it back around, all right. Gush."
Right after my first sentence, it was clear that I couldn't gush. I couldn't be cocky, witty, funny, sexy, or mysterious either.
"I give up." Shawn scowls. "Just answer the questions and try not to let the audience see how openly you despise them."
In the morning, my prep team gets me ready for the afternoon, working until late afternoon. Then, Cinna enters with my dress. "Close your eyes." He instructs.
The prep team slips the dress over me, as well as having me step into my heels.
"Can I open my eyes?" I ask.
"Yes, open them." Cinna says.
I do a double take when I look at myself in the full-length mirror. I couldn't even recognize myself; this wasn't the hunter girl from District 12, this wasn't me.
"Oh, Cinna." I finally manage to find my voice. "Thank you."
Cinna smiles before dismissing the prep team. "So, all ready for the interviews then?"
"I'm awful. Shawn called me a dead slug." I scowl, still remembering the harsh tone he had used. "No matter what we tried, I couldn't do it. I just can't be one of those people he wants me to be."
"Why don't you just be yourself?" Cinna suggests.
"Myself? That's no good either. Shawn says I'm sullen and hostile." I reject the idea, shaking my head.
"Well, you are...around Shawn." Cinna chuckles. "I don't find you so. The prep team adores you. You even won over the Gamemakers. And as for the citizens of the Capitol, well, they can't stop talking about you. No one can help but admire your spirit."
Cinna takes my hands, trying to reassure me. "Suppose, when you answer the questions, you think you're addressing a friend back home. Who would your best friend be?" He asks.
"Lucas." I say almost instantly. "Only it doesn't make sense, Cinna. I would never be telling Lucas those things about me. He already knows them."
"What about me? Could you think of me as a friend?" Cinna asks.
"I think so, but-" I'm cut off.
"I'll be sitting on the main platform with the other stylists. You'll be able to look right at me. When you're asked a question, find me and answer it as honestly as possible." Cinna says.
"Even if what I think is horrible?" I ask.
"Especially if what you think is horrible." Cinna nods. "You'll try it?"
I agree to it, at least it's something.
We meet up with everyone else at the elevator. Portia and her team have also been hard at work. Riley looks striking in her black dress with flame accents. I force myself to look away, remembering that as soon as we were thrown into that arena, we were going to be enemies.
Throughout the whole elevator ride, I could feel Riley's eyes on me but I turn away from her. When the door opens, Riley and I head to the other tributes who were already sitting in a big arc.
I silently watch each interview, analyzing everyone's angle. The girl from District 1 was going for sexy. The boy from District 2 is a ruthless killing machine, while his district partner was definitely sadistic. The fox-faced girl from District 5 is sly and cunning. The crippled boy from District 10 is aloof.
When it's Auggie's turn for his interview, a hush falls over the crowd at the sight of him. Caesar Flickman, the man who interviews us, is very sweet with him. When he asks what Auggie's greatest strength in the arena will be, he doesn't hesitate.
"I'm very hard to catch." Auggie says. "And if they can't catch me, they can't kill me. So don't count me out."
"I wouldn't in a million years." Caesar says.
When Auggie's district partner comes up to the stage, I couldn't even focus on the interview, too busy panicking. The three minutes go up way too fast and next thing I know, they're calling my name.
I tread up to the stage, shaking Caesar's hand and sitting down on the chair.
"So, Maya, the Capitol must be quite a change from District 12. What's impressed you most since you arrived here?" Caesar asks.
My eyes find Cinna's in the crowd. I imagine the words coming from his lips.
"The lamb stew." I say. Caesar laughs, along with some of the audience.
"The one with the dried plums?" Caesar asks.
I nod.
"Oh, I eat it by the bucketful." He chuckles. He turns sideways to the audience and puts his hand on his stomach in horror. "It doesn't show, does it?" The audience lets out another laugh and shouts reassurances to him.
"Now, Maya." Caesar continues after the laughter dies down. "When you came out in the opening ceremonies, my heart actually stopped. What did you think of that costume?"
"You mean after I got over my fear of being burned alive?" I ask back and more laughter is heard.
"Yes. Start then." Caesar says, looking at me with amusement on his face.
"I thought Cinna was brilliant and it was the most gorgeous costume I'd ever seen and I couldn't believe I was wearing it." In my head, I couldn't help but adding 'but Riley looked even better in it'. I shake my head, snapping out of it. We were enemies.
"I mean, look at it!" I lift up my skirt and spread it out. I spin in a circle once and the audience gasps and cheers.
"Oh, do that again!" Caesar encourages me and I obey, spinning around and letting the skirt fly out. When I stop, I clutch his arm.
"Don't stop!" He says.
"I have to, I'm dizzy!" I say.
"Don't worry, I've got you." Caesar says, gently sitting me back down. "Can't have you following in your mentor's footsteps."
The crowd hoots as the cameras shift to Shawn, who waves them away with a roll of his eyes.
"So, how about that training score. Eleven. Give us a hint about what happened in there." Caesar says.
I glance at the Gamemakers on the balcony and a sheepish smile appears on my face. "All I can say is that I think it was a first."
The Gamemakers chuckle and nod.
"You're killing us." Caesar groans. "Details, details!"
"I'm not supposed to talk about it, right?" I say, looking back at the Gamemakers.
"She's not!" The Gamemaker who fell in the punch bowl shouts.
"Sorry, my lips are sealed." I say back to Caesar.
"Let's go back then, to the moment they called your sister's name at the reaping." Caesar says and the audience automatically hush, the mood turning serious. "And you volunteered. Can you tell us about her?"
"Her name's Prim. She's just twelve. And I love her more than anything." I say, glancing back at all the tributes sitting in the arc. My eyes flicker past most of them, momentarily stopping on Auggie before continuing to where Riley was.
"What did she say to you? After the reaping?" Caesar asks, directing my attention back to him.
"She asked me to try really hard to win." I say.
"And what did you say?" Caesar asks gently.
"I swore I would." I say quietly, my voice barely heard.
"I bet you did." Caesar says and the buzzer goes off. "Sorry, we're out of time. Best of luck, Maya Hart, tribute form District 12!"
The applause continues even after I walk off stage and back to my seat with the rest of the tribute.
They call Riley up and I'm in a daze for the first part of her interview. She has the audience laughing off their seats. She plays up the baker's daughter thing, comparing the tributes to the breads from their districts. Then she starts talking about the Capitol showers.
"Tell me, do I still smell like roses?" She asks Caesar, a grin on her face. The two of them have this whole thing where they take turns sniffing each other, which causes the audience to roar in laughter. A particular laugh stands out, sounding like a dying donkey.
When Caesar asks her if she has a boyfriend back home, I snap my focus back to Riley, giving her my full attention. Did she?
Riley shakes her head.
"Beautiful girl like you. There must be some special boy. Come on, what's his name?" Caesar presses on.
"No, there's no boy." Riley says. "There's no BOY." She puts an emphasis on the last word.
"Oh!" Caesar's eyes widen in recognition. "Well, are there any girls you like?"
Riley sighs. "Well, there is this one girl. I've had a crush on her ever since I can remember. But I'm pretty sure she didn't know I was alive until the reaping."
My face burns with jealousy but I quickly shake it off. It doesn't matter, not when only one of us was going to make it back out alive from the arena. That is, if we make it out. The chances were unlikely.
"She have another fellow or lady?" Caesar asks.
"I don't know, but a lot of boys like her." Riley shrugs.
"So, here's what you do. You win, you go home. She can't turn you down then, eh?" Caesar says encouragingly.
"I don't think it's going to work out. Winning...won't help in my case." Riley says, leaving everyone else confused.
"Why not?" Caesar asks.
Riley flushes red. Her next sentence sends everyone into a uproar. "Because...b-because...she came here with me."