Tribute

6.

Amor rushes us out of the train and through the train station, through the crowd that so badly wants to get a look at two of this years career tributes. Thankfully, a wall of peacekeepers keep anyone from getting through to us, and after what feels like a hundred cameras flashing in my face, we enter a big black car. My ears ring as I take a seat in the car, Mags and Finnick sit across from us, while Amor sits in between Roan and I, though after the incident this morning, the man clad in orange seems to lean closer to me rather than get any closer to Roan than he has to. I let him, because despite Amor's astounding ignorance and insensitivity, he really is harmless.

We ride through the bustling streets for twenty minutes, and I take in every detail of the city as we pass building after building and person after person. I am in awe of everything I see, but I can't help but remember that beneath this glittering facade, is the most hideous, and ugly society. These people are going to watch me, and so twenty three other children die in that arena. They are going to laugh, gamble, and cheer for us like they have any idea who we are, like they care at all. The buildings immediately take on a gray shade, and I turn my gaze away to instead look down at my lap until we pull up to a building.

Before I open the door, Finnick stops me and looks at my face, "No matter what they do, don't argue with it. Just take it, and try to be as quiet as possible." I look at him with wide eyes in response, and I can't help but wonder just what is about to happen in this place. I don't have the chance to ask however, because someone opens the door from outside and we are all lead into the building. Everything goes by in a flash the second I walk through the doors, before I know it I am in a large, sterilized room, naked, with three Capitol strangers surrounding me. There's three of them, and each of them looks more strange than the one that came before. One of them is a woman, with a pink, spiky wig, unnaturally pink eyes, and pink skin. She introduces herself as Nivea. The second is a male, he looks to be in his early thirties, he has orange hair, unnaturally pale skin, brown eyes, and lips that are died a blood red color, he is Tanseth. The last one is a younger female, early twenties I think, she has long, straight, purple hair that nearly brushes the floor as she moves, pale purple skin, and she wears black lipstick. She doesn't talk much, but Tanseth and Nivea tell me her name is Ocila. I repeat their names in my head so I remember them. I have never been good with names, and now I am going to have to remember the ridiculous Capitol names that these three were saddled with. 

They put me into a sweet smelling bath with oils in the water, and bubbles floating on the surface, and Ocila washes my hair with careful fingers as Tanseth and Nivea scrub my skin with rough sponges. By the time I get out I feel like a newborn baby, my skin has been scrubbed so much, I'm certain every inch of my skin is brand new. Ocila brushes and rubs some strong smelling cream into my hair and scalp, and she dries it with a loud, strange device that blows out hot hair. The hot air is quite unpleasant, but I remember Finnicks words, and I don't complain, I don't even speak. I just move when they want me to move, and frankly I feel like a doll, being posed and prodded and stripped of anything and everything that even looks like a hair on my body.

As they wax my legs, Nivea pauses for just a brief moment and looks down at me, "I'm glad that you're being so quiet! If there's anything we hate, it's a whiner." I just nod, and she goes back to tearing out my leg hair. I take a moment, and I process her words of praise. Perhaps Finnicks parting words of advice weren't so bad after all.

Three hours must pass before they lead me to a separate room, still naked, and they tell me to wait before they close the door behind them and leave me alone. My whole body feels like it's pulsing, I can still hear the unpleasant tearing sounds, and my scalp is sore from being scrubbed and brushed like that. But I made it through without a single complaint having left me, so perhaps I made a good impression on my prep team.