Safe and Sound || Hunger Games

Chapter One - Dead and Gone ||PART ONE||

NOTE: I know it annoys you guys when I post a picture of 'what characters look like', but this is kind of how I imagine Grayson. You can picture him completely differently, whether if it is the length of his hair or the shape of his nose. I don't mind. It's your imagination and it's just my words. Use that imagination of yours :)

PART ONE - THE FLAME

Chapter One -  Dead and Gone [UNDER EDITING]

I stood over the small, cheap gravestone that stood in memory of my eight year old sister, Rose. She was dead and I didn't want her to be. She had been one of the only people who loved me and I had loved her dearly. A tear trickled down my cheek as I laid down a small, slightly withered Katniss flower in front of the grave, giving  the dull grey a small bit of colour. Katniss Everdeen had been my sister's hero, so I wanted her to have Katniss in her heart, even now. I always kept her memory alive by mimicking Katniss slightly, and it had turned into my way of life. My mother had gone home before me, because she needed to go and 'look after my father' while I went out to get him food. I was hoping I could snatch a rabbit today, my dad had always liked rabbit.

I reached out and touched the gravestone of my younger sister. I stroked the rather choppy, carved letters in the grey stone and more tears slipped down my cheeks. I couldn't help it. I hadn't cried in a while, but now the pain was just unbearable, hacking away at me as if it held a blunt and rusty sword. My sister was dead, my father was seriously ill, very close to death. My mother couldn't seem to bear it and I was breaking slowly inside and out, crumbling as each second ticked by, counting down the days until my death.

Soon, meaning in two days, the Hunger Games were going to begin and the two tributes from each District were going to be chosen. My name was going into the bowl twenty-five times. I had had my name put in five times per reaping and so it had added up. It probably wasn't the most times someone has ever had their name put in, but it still seemed like quite a lot to me.

I found this event sick and disgusting. It was practically manslaughter. What made it worse was the fact that it was all for entertainment and as some form of sick punishment, reminding us of the rebellion all those years ago. My father's aunt, my great aunt, got picked one year. Sadly, she died on the second day because she got a knife to the heart. My family was known throughout District 12 for being really unlucky, as proved by almost all of the family before me. Most of them died young, either out of hunger, disease or mining disasters. Some of them even killed themselves, which made me shudder at the thought. My little sister was the most recent and my father seemed to have accidently inhaled fumes from the mine that he shouldn't have, resulting in his weakness and almost certain death. I knew he was being slowly poisoned, every breath he took was slowly eating him away.

Taking one last look at the gravestone and withered katniss flower, I turned on my heel and walked away, wiping the tears from my face as I made my way through District 12. I finally found the weak spot in the fence and, with a quick glance about, snuck underneath the weak, wire mesh. I instantly felt free. I was free. Well, for a little while at least.

I made my way towards the forest and found my wooden bow that I had stashed up a tree. I climbed up it and took it out of the small hole in the trunk of the tree, also throwing my quiver over my back. I undid my high ponytail and braided my hair into a side plait, so there were no stray hairs in my face. However, this didn't work. I always had stray bits of hair everywhere, no matter how much I brushed it. I left my hair in its messy side plait and adjusted myself in the tree. With a deep sigh and one last, swift tear wipe-away, I jumped down form the tree and nocked an arrow into the bowstring and started walking, slowly and carefully, as to not scare game.