the girl who played with knives || clato ✔️

6

Cato

The Maggot tries to make us watch the next showing of the recaps with her, which is at 7:00 PM, but we luckily arrive in the Capitol before then, at around 5:00 PM. It's even more chaotic here than in District 2, with thousands of bazaar Capitol residents swarming the streets and train station. I stare out the window as the Maggot blathers on about sponsors and etiquette and other nonsense. Mortar and Lav sit at the table, sipping coffee and speaking in hushed voices. I stand at the window in awe awhile; the Capitol is huge, with skyscrapers and strange sculptures, and tons and tons of people.

Eventually I wander back to my room to collect my things, before I realize I have nothing worth keeping. The locket is already hanging around my neck, hidden under my navy-blue shirt. I resist the urge to go into Clove's room, and manage to keep away, though it is a struggle.

Clove

I spot the Capitol outside the window and make sure I have my bracelet and my reaping dress and shoes before heading out into the hallway of the train. I keep the reaping outfit because it's from home, and it's beautiful. I keep the bracelet partially for these reasons too, but also because it feels like Aunt Rose, my mother, and the cousins somehow all reside in it. At the last minute I remember the flowers and rush back to my room to retrieve them, but they're already gone, probably collected by one of the Capitol attendants. This makes me more sad than it should. I remember Cato asking me why I was so concerned for them.

"They're just flowers," He'd said.

"They were from you," Was my response. It still is.

Cato

Clove, Lav, Mortar, the Maggot, and I are all sent up to our rooms almost immediately. It's like we somehow have an advantage being here early, though I don't see what advantage we would have except for maybe being able to gain a few pounds for the arena, but with all the rich food we ate on the train, I'm stuffed. Besides, they've only given us rooms for the night in the Remake Center, so it's not like we could sneak into the Training Center or something. It's blocks away from here and we're basically under lockdown.

Several Peacekeepers push us along to the elevators, but I'm not paying attention to them. My head swivels around, my eyes as big as saucers. The Remake Center is one of the many tall skyscrapers in the Capitol, with the ground floor made into basically a huge stable. We just get a glance of the horses and chariots arranged around the room, awaiting tomorrow's Tribute Parade. People with hair died a vast assortment of colors and put up in elaborate ways, wearing clothes that are so bright they hurt your eyes, wander the room, chatting, eating, and gaping at Clove and I, ecstatic that they are able to see us before everyone else does. Several are covered in tattoos, or even have all their skin died unnatural colors. They look like clowns and speak in high-pitched and pompous tones.

Once we're in the elevator, which is just big enough to fit us all, the Maggot presses a button marked with a 2, for District 2 surely. I soon get an answer from the Maggot, who is as bubbly as ever.

"You see, they don't have much coverage of the Tributes' chambers in the broadcasts of the Games, so you wouldn't know much about them. Each District has a whole floor to themselves! On your floor, there's a dining room, several bedrooms, bathrooms, sitting rooms, a screening room..." She keeps listing rooms, but I'm not listening to her. I'm too distracted by the lobby below us, watching it through the glass floor and walls of the high-speed elevator. There's an elevator in the Justice Building at home that's pretty nice, but not nearly as nice as this one. The Capitol elevator is much faster too, and within a few more seconds we're at the District 2 floor.

The Maggot really wasn't lying about the size and splendor of our entire floor that we have to ourselves. There's a tiny lobby with a hallway that leads to our bedrooms (and dining room and sitting room and living room and screening room and any other room ever invented) on the left, and the rooms where our stylists will make us flawless on the right.

We turn off to the left and the Maggot tells us we can do whatever we like, as long as we stay in the "few" rooms we've been assigned, until dinner, which is in an hour. I find my way to my bedroom, which is probably sixteen times as big as my bedroom at home, and sit in the bed, which I basically melt into.

Being alone in this big room allows my mind to wander again, and eventually it wanders to Clove. I can't believe this is when I've started to really show my feelings towards her. Maybe it's because I know now we're running out of time, when before I had forever. I feel the need to be with her, to never leave her side, til death do us part, which won't be long in our case.

Clove

I don't know what Cato is doing, trying to hurry up the process of our relationship before we're torn apart by the Games? In my opinion, this will only make it worse. But another part of me wants to embrace it.

-

It takes me only a moment to decide I need to talk to him. I don't know which bedroom he's in, so I go to ask Madeline Maggot, but she insists it is time for supper and talking will have to wait.

We're not allowed to eat with our Mentors, because it will give us the advantage of planning out our strategies before the other District can. I don't really mind, because it means there won't be much to talk about over dinner and I'll be able to talk to Cato privately sooner.

Boy was I wrong. Madeline Maggot talks and talks about pointless things all through the meal, which is delicious and just as rich as the last, then insists we watch the recaps with her. I finally agree, since she's been bugging us about it all day, and so Cato and I end up watching the recaps again, this time with Madeline Maggot giving what are supposed to be helpful comments on the other tributes, which lasts until almost 9:00PM. And since we have a very big day ahead of us, she makes us go to bed right after. I notice that she stays in the screening room. The recaps will be playing on repeat on the television channel for the Games, and I wonder how many more times she or Lav or Mortar or all of Panem will watch them.

I sigh and trudge to my room. Cato will have to wait until tomorrow. I strip off my clothes and crawl into bed, forcing myself to stop overthinking and fall into a surprisingly dreamless sleep.