-Nat's P.O.V-
Petar, Heather and I take the transparent glass elevator up to the second floor.
As soon as we entered I was amazed. It was beautiful.
There was a gray-ish silver L-shaped couch in the middle of the room. It had a glass coffee table in front of it and a huge flat screen on the wall.
Petar looked uncomfortable. Heather took that as her cue to leave.
"What now?" I ask.
"I think I embarrassed myself in front of Dea when we got here."
No fucking shit.
"How did you embarrass yourself?" I ask pretending I don't know.
"I blatantly stared at her for a couple minutes without blinking. Then she saw me staring and looked at me like I was insane." He says staring at the ground.
"Oh, well what did you expect? You can't just stare at her and think that she'll think you're normal?" I ask.
"I'm sorry, I didn't really like the girls in our district. They're all way too happy for me, so I just stayed away from them throughout my childhood." He says still staring at the ground.
Lord Jesus, that's sad.
"Try and talk to her or at least make conversation before you decide to stare at her senselessly." I say like its the most obvious thing in the world.
Petar nods and walks out of the room.
I lay back on the couch.
-Dea's P.O.V-
Domenic and I sit on the couch watching television.
"Did you see the way that kid was staring at you before the chariot rides? It's like he's never seen a girl before." Domenic says sarcastically.
"Yeah I saw him. He was pretty creepy." I say.
"Do we have a show-mance in the making?" He asks mockingly.
"Fuck you. Maybe a show-mance is forming for you..." I say just as mockingly.
"Oh really? With who?" He ask sarcastically.
"That girl from District 11. Victoria. I saw you checking her out, don't even try to lie." I say knowing it's true.
Domenic turns a light shade of crimson.
"Ha ha ha ha ha, you mad or nah?" I say triumphantly.
I can't wait for this to be over. I don't know if I even have the power to win, let alone survive the blood bath.
Then our mentor walked in with her long sandy blond hair with the tips dyed blue and purple.
"Hey, Jade." I say.
"Hi guys." She says seriously.
"Why so serious?" Domenic asks.
"We need to talk about your strengths and what skills you need to utilize in the arena." She says.
"I'm good with an ax. My parents always made me chop wood for fires so, I'm pretty accurate with swinging and throwing them." I say remembering all those years of manual labor.
"Throwing?" Jade looks at me confused.
"Yeah. I hate my parents. I'd throw axes at skinny trees pretending they were my parents." I say looking back on the good times where I would take all my anger out on trees.
"Ok. How about you Domenic?" She says turning to Domenic.
"I'm not really good at anything." says staring at the ceiling.
Jade looks at me, probably expecting me to tell her he was good at something.
"Don't look at me. I don't fucking know. It's not like I used to have giant crush on him." I say pointing at her.
"Did you guys go to the same school?" She asks me.
"Yes but, that doesn't mean I stalked him or tried to figure out his back story. But he's pretty good with hand to hand combat." I groan. Domenic looks at me with a 'Bish Whet?' Face.
"Ok. Ok, I get it." Jade says to me.
"Can I finally go to bed now?" Domenic asks sounding exasperated.
"No. We still have a meet and greet with all the other tributes and a tour of the training center." Jade answers.
We nod in disappointment before Jade ushers us to the elevator.
We get into the training center and all the other tributes are there except for the twins from District 11, Vince and Victoria.
A couple minutes go by while we wait. They finally come in.
"Fashionably late?" Victoria says jokingly. Vince's face turns a light crimson color.
Domenic starts laughing a little bit over dramatically. I look at him, then to Victoria. She's staring back at him but only for a brief second.
Domenic seems mesmerized.
"Don't drool." I say sarcastically elbowing him lightly in the ribs.
He runs a hand through his dirty blonde hair looking embarrassed. His ears turn red.
"Shut up. Go to your stalker." He retaliates.
"Seriously though, I need to find a way to get him off my back." I say to Domenic. Then I realize he wasn't listening anymore. He wasn't even standing next to me. I scan the room until I see him in the corner shaking Victoria's hand.
"What a hopeless romantic." Jade says.
"Yeah... Do you have any ideas for how to get that kid off my back?" I ask her desperately for a solution.
"Nothing. If anything, I think you should pretend to like him for your image. You have to admit, at first you seem very hostile. He could help." Jade says triumphantly.
"What?!" I ask loudly.
"You'd set a record for the first out of district show-mance. So what I'm saying is go talk to him and be nice." She tells me.
Oh how I wish I could kill everyone now.
I glare at Jade and then obey her instructions by reluctantly walk over to that kid.
"Hi." I say forcing a smile.
He looks up from talking to the other girl from his district. It looks like he's about to faint.
I wait for an answer and when none comes the girl steps in.
"Hey. I'm Natalie and this is Petar who has all if a sudden become mute." She says while reaching out to shake my hand.
She pulls away and looks at Petar expectantly. Apparently whatever she was trying to accomplish wasn't working so she slapped him in the back of the head. Petar snaps out of his trance and starts rubbing the back of his head while looking at Natalie. Natalie almost indiscreetly points to me. Almost.
"Oh, hi." He says noticing what she said.
I extend my hand so he could shake it. He holds onto my hand uncomfortably long. At some point he realizes this and hastily let's go.
"Wow, what riveting conversation. I'll just leave you two besties to continue chatting." Natalie says sarcastically before leaving in the direction of the snack table.
Petar gives me a 'Sorry about her' look and an awkward and dorky smile.
"Ok we'll, I think I'll go too now." I say starting to turn around when he stops me.
"Wait! Why did you come over here?" He asks quietly.
"I-" I start stuttering.
Be nice. Be flirty, Dea.
"I was just trying to meet my fellow tributes. I came up to you first because you looked like the most interesting." I finish.
Nice.
"Really?" He asks in bewilderment. I nod. Apparently this was some sort of confirmation that I still want to talk to him. He then launched into a random topic.
I actually am getting pretty into this conversation.
~Nat's P.O.V~
I feel so forever alone. Everybody is talking to someone except me. At the snack table.
Then out of no where someone taps me on the shoulder.
It's that scary looking Jenelle chick from district 6.
"Hi." My voice comes out high-pitched and squeaky,
"Hello. Anything good?" She asks, referring to the snack tables.
"The cake. That's it." I say wanting to be done with this conversation.
"Cool. So how come you're on the side. You seem like a very talkative person." She says.
"Ha. Guess again. I'm on the side because there's nobody to talk to." I say sighing.
"Am I nobody?" Jenelle asks raising one eyebrow.
"I-um-well. N-no." I stutter not knowing if she's being sarcastic or not.
"I'm just kidding. Its this thing called a joke." She says happily.
"Is that supposed to be— Oh! Right that's another joke." I forcefully laugh.
"Yeah... Hey look we're allowed to leave if we want to. I'm going to go to bed, I'm super tired." She says before departing.
Friends. What is this "Friends" that people speak of?
~Dea's P.O.V~
"Oh my god really?" I ask.
"Yeah. It was so crazy." Petar answers as we enter the elevator. We go up two floors.
"Well this is my stop. I'll just get off now." He says heading for the glass elevator door.
I put my hand on his shoulder.
"You don't have to go." I suggested.
What. Did. I. Just. Say? I shouldn't have had anything to drink. Fuck it. I'll have time for regret in the morning.
"Well, Ok." He says barely giving himself anytime to contemplate his decision. He probably shouldn't have drunk either.
We went one floor up to mine.
Once we got inside we raced to the couch and turned on the TV.
"Can we watch a movie?" I ask him.
"Sure whatever you want. How about a scary movie." He said while smiling. This is disturbing.
Why can I see lust in his eyes???
"Sure we can." I say disregarding my thoughts that were most likely incorrect.
We watch the movie woman in black. Its not that scary. What is scary is that Petar just kept scooting closer and closer to me on the couch.
Once the movie is done Petar and I are sitting side by side.
"Should we watch another one?" He asks.
"Yeah Ok." I say quietly. The next movie we pick is Insidious. About halfway through the movie I shiver because its very cold in here.
Petar notices this.
"Are you Ok?" He asks.
"Yeah I'm fine just cold." I say.
Out of nowhere Petar puts his arm around me and pulls me closer.
A couple minutes later I'm not prepared for what I hear next.
"Dea! Go out with me?" He blurts hopefully before putting his hand over his mouth.
"Petar? We just met." I answer calmly.
"I know. But we're both probably going to die in the arena without knowing what being in a relationship feels like." He pleas.
"Petar I—" But that's all I manage to say before he forcefully kisses me. I want to slap him and kiss him back at the same time. I finally come to a compromise. I'll do nothing. Even though I really badly want to do something.
Petar was getting nervous I could hear his breathing getting slightly heavier.
He finally broke the one way kiss.
"Dea. I'm sorry I—" This time he's caught off guard when I put my arms around his neck and pull him into a kiss.
Don't Drink, Kids.