第44章
no. no, not all of you. but maybe cinna. i don’t think i’m
imagining the sadness on his face. “her name’s prim. she’s just
twelve. and i love her more than anything.”
you could hear a pin drop in the city circle now.
“what did she say to you? after the reaping?” caesar asks.
be honest. be honest. i swallow hard. “she asked me to try
really hard to win.” the audience is frozen, hanging on my
every word.
“and what did you say?” prompts caesar gently.
but instead of warmth, i feel an icy rigidity take over my
body. my muscles tense as they do before a kill. when i speak,
my voice seems to have dropped an octave. “i swore i would.”
“i bet you did,” says caesar, giving me a squeeze. the buzz-
er goes off. “sorry we’re out of time. best of luck, katniss
everdeen, tribute from district twelve.”
the applause continues long after i’m seated. i look to cin-
na for reassurance. he gives me a subtle thumbs-up.
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i’m still in a daze for the first part of peeta’s interview. he
has the audience from the get-go, though; i can hear them
laughing, shouting out. he plays up the baker’s son thing,
comparing the tributes to the breads from their districts. then
has a funny anecdote about the perils of the capitol showers.
“tell me, do i still smell like roses?” he asks caesar, and then
there’s a whole run where they take turns sniffing each other
that brings down the house. i’m coming back into focus when
caesar asks him if he has a girlfriend back home.
peeta hesitates, then gives an unconvincing shake of his
head.
“handsome lad like you. there must be some special girl.
come on, what’s her name?” says caesar.
peeta 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.”
sounds of sympathy from the crowd. unrequited love they
can relate to.
“she have another fellow?” asks caesar.
“i don’t know, but a lot of boys like her,” says peeta.
“so, here’s what you do. you win, you go home. she can’t
turn you down then, eh?” says caesar encouragingly.
“i don’t think it’s going to work out. winning . . . won’t help
in my case,” says peeta.
“why ever not?” says caesar, mystified.
peeta blushes beet red and stammers out. “because . . . be-
cause . . . she came here with me.”
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part ii
"the games"
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for a moment, the cameras hold on peeta’s downcast eyes
as what he says sinks in. then i can see my face, mouth half
open in a mix of surprise and protest, magnified on every
screen as i realize, me! he means me! i press my lips together
and stare at the floor, hoping this will conceal the emotions
starting to boil up inside of me.
“oh, that is a piece of bad luck,” says caesar, and there’s a
real edge of pain in his voice. the crowd is murmuring in
agreement, a few have even given agonized cries.
“it’s not good,” agrees peeta.
“well, i don’t think any of us can blame you. it’d be hard not
to fall for that young lady,” says caesar. “she didn’t know?”
peeta shakes his head. “not until now.”
i allow my eyes to flicker up to the screen long enough to
see that the blush on my cheeks is unmistakable.
“wouldn’t you love to pull her back out here and get a re-
sponse?” caesar asks the audience. the crowd screams assent.
“sadly, rules are rules, and katniss everdeen’s time has been
spent. well, best of luck to you, peeta mellark, and i think i
speak for all of panem when i say our hearts go with yours.”
the roar of the crowd is deafening. peeta has absolutely
wiped the rest of us off the map with his declaration of love
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for me. when the audience finally settles down, he chokes out
a quiet “thank you” and returns to his seat. we stand for the
anthem. i have to raise my head out of the required respect
and cannot avoid seeing that every screen is now dominated
by a shot of peeta and me, separated by a few feet that in the
viewers’ heads can never be breached. poor tragic us.
but i know better.
after the anthem, the tributes file back into the training
center lobby and onto the elevators. i make sure to veer into a
car that does not contain peeta. the crowd slows our entou-
rages of stylists and mentors and chaperones, so we have only
each other for company. no one speaks. my elevator stops to
deposit four tributes before i am alone and then find the doors
opening on the twelfth floor. peeta has only just stepped from
his car when i slam my palms into his chest. he loses his bal-
ance and crashes into an ugly urn filled with fake flowers. the
urn tips and shatters into hundreds of tiny pieces. peeta lands
in the shards, and blood immediately flows from his hands.
“what was that for?”