Our Love Could Be Lethal Act I Re-Write

Act I: Pains, Both Shoulder and Societal

The small hospital in 2 is nothing like the ones in the Capitol. They apparently wanted to airlift me to Capitol, but I was bleeding too quickly to make it, and they immediately rushed me into the small dingy operating room in the hospital here—the only one we have—that they mostly use for Peacekeepers injured during training. Part way through, the team from the Capitol arrived and took over the surgery to stabilize me, and then I was apparently flown to the Capitol for another set of surgeries.

I spend my days in the Tribute Tower medical facilities being visited by therapists, aids, nurses, and doctors constantly. I have nightmares nearly every night. They alternate between me being too slow to run away from my mother chasing me with a knife, and replaying the day I woke up after my Games. The latter of the two is a little harder to shake off considering I'm pretty sure it's the same room I was in back then.

I have to come up with a mantra in my head so they don't start to think I'm crazy and stick me on a mountain of sedative medications. My name is Octavia. I'm nineteen years old. My Games ended a year and a half ago. Sometimes my brain likes to play tricks on me as I repeat, adding in phrases like I killed my mother or obsessing over whether or not I could get enough medication from the vial the nurse is holding to kill me without it hurting.

I find out through the television set they have in my room that by the time I've come to, the entire story has been crafted without asking me a single question. So it's no surprise that my first real visitor is Plutarch, who comes as soon as I'm coherent enough to tell me the 'facts' of my case.

He makes it clear to me that the man who 'robbed' me was found on the streets the same night; he bled out and died as a result of the 'self-defence' wound I gave him. I guess they had to make it look like I fought back against my attacker—which I technically did—so I shudder to think of the Peacekeepers stabbing the man and leaving him to die. I don't know who the poor shmuck was, probably a petty thief they decided to pin everything on, but whatever he did or didn't do, he's taken the fall for me.

The basic facts are right: I was stabbed in my home and survived and my mother was stabbed and didn't survive. But everything in between has been carefully woven into a tapestry of falsities and lies, probably by an entire team here in the Capitol to ensure everything, and I am now tangled up in the middle, trapped and unable to move. I suppose I should be thankful that they've decided to cover for me and not throw me into the court of public opinion for killing my own mother, but I know better than that. Plutarch makes it extremely clear to me that I now owe him another favour, which makes me eye the nurse's vials even more intently for the next few days.

I never asked for this. I never wanted to be attacked, or covered up for, but Plutarch and the Capitol own me and therefore get to make every decision for me before I even have time to think about it.

They finally let me go home after three months as long as I promise to keep doing my exercises to help my shoulder. I'm not sure how necessary it is, given the fact that I've felt fine for weeks now thanks to their incredible medical technology, but I simply tell them that I'll do them so they let me go home.

Although it's not quite home since they've moved my things from Gran's house to 'my' house down the row at the very end of the occupied houses in Victor's Village. It's cold and emotionless, even though they've clearly done their best to decorate it with my things. I don't think I ever stopped to think about how creepy it is that each of the houses are a carbon copy of one another. The walls and furniture are all still the standard make, a far cry from the vibrant colours and comfy fabrics of Gran's house. It's a soulless copy of what once felt like the only safe place in the world.

For some reason, Enobaria and Mr. Hackett visit me multiple times a week. The irony is not lost on me that Enobaria is the one who likely saved my life. At least with Mr. Hackett, I know it's because he said he'd watch Gran's house while I was gone. But with Enobaria? I have no idea. But I'm bored out of my mind so I don't question it. It's nice to at least be around someone I don't have to pretend with. She knows what really happened, unlike the recovery team from the Capitol. One day she even makes a joke over tea that, "it's a good thing she's still got terrible aim. If she'd hit your heart, you'd be dead by now."