73rd Hunger Games

Chapter 3

I grabbed the towel I'd bought in exchange for four fish a few years ago, a scrubber I found near the beach, and some soap. Scooping everything up, I headed for the beach. Nobody was up at this time so I felt safe washing myself in the ocean. As I walked, I tried not to think about the reaping or about my multiple nightmares last night, but to think about Henry. The guy I was now officially dating.

Wow that felt weird.

His gentle hands slipping into mine, made me blush just thinking about it.

I had now made my way to the ocean. The sun hadn't risen yet as I stripped myself and dived straight in to the water with my scrubber and bar of soap. I quickly washed myself, making sure there wasn't any dirt left. I rinsed myself using the water from the tank when I got back to make sure I don't have any sand left on me.

I'd finished and gotten out of the water just as the sun was rising. I wrapped myself in a towel and made my way into my home.

I rinsed myself near the tank using the short old hose that had been attached to it since I'd found this place. Once I was happy with my appearance of looking clean I made my way inside.

I quickly dressed myself in the dress Henry had given me a few months ago for the reaping. It was a simple dress. Black with a few berries that I'm pretty sure were cherries and a white collar. He'd also had given me a thin, cloudy white belt and cute rosy coloured shoes to go with it. I recently found a bracket at the markets that would go perfectly with the dress. It was two birds connecting at their beaks and a band stretching the length from tail to tail.

My hair was a mess from last nights struggle. I braced myself as I tore through my hair with my brush. Forcing it through, to attempt to make my appearance better than a terrifying scarecrow dressed as a girl in disguise. As a did this, my long brown hair naturally dried fast, as usual, making it wavy and pretty for once. I grabbed my only hair-tie that tremendously matched my hair colour and pulled the top half of my hair back out of my face. I think the middle class called it a half-up half-down, but I wouldn't know.

The reaping wasn't due to start for another two hours. So I decided to take the three-quarter of an hour's journey and walk to the Weather-Knots house. It wasn't far from the Justice Building which has always been situated in the middle of the district. Actually, you had to walk past it to get there.

It was a grand building standing wise and tall. You'd never see it on camera, but it had a slight blue-green tint to it. The architect must of had a thing for district 4, as we were the only district that had this slight change to it. But other than that, all of the justice buildings looked the same.

Henry showed me a picture of all of them once, explaining the slight colour change in the white rock. Like our district was special in a way, more important than the others. It had a stage like figure to the front of it where all the important people sat at the reaping. That was all it was ever used for, the reaping. Broadcasting the horror of the chosen children that would need to represent our district for the hunger games.

"Happy Hunger Games and may the odds be ever in your favour" I remember last years escort's funny accent, the capitols accent. Her quirky outfit and make up seemed to make her look like a zombie-barbie in a way. Our escort for district 4 was Flora Greens-Vale. Don't ask me how her parents came up with that name. I guess you could ask her, but I'd rather spend my hours with Henry fishing then talking to her.

I thought about my possibility to being picked at the reaping. Four little pieces of paper in among hundreds of other names of girls between the ages of 12 to 18. The possibility of one of my little pieces of paper to be picked out by Flora, well, it didn't seem like much at all. Still, I had the nightmares like any other child would have, with no-one there to comfort me when I woke up.