¹ THRONE ─ the hunger games

[ 005 ] empires fall in just one day

WALKING INTO THE IVANOVICH HOUSEHOLD felt like walking through a rip in the universe to an alternate reality. It was disorienting as it was unfathomable. In stark contrast to her own house, made of cold walls and cold air and the bitter taste in the back of her mouth, Alex's home was exactly as she believed a home should be. A fireplace in the harsh winter, a roof that didn't leak in the thunderstorms, lush colour in the walls and cheeks, and people who were warm to the touch. They were a rowdy bunch, the Ivanovich's, filled with mutual adoration and bursting with colour. They were all kind to each other. Some part of her didn't want to believe such a family existed so tangibly, but they did. This was a real family, close-knit, respected, and dysfunctional in the best way. Battered, but unbreakable.

Another part of her wished she was a part of this family instead of her own. Fractured, irreparable.

But then she realised that she was. You're Alex's best friend, Alex's father had said to her, once, someone who matters just as much to us as one of our own.

What do you mean? She had asked, completely baffled. Strangers didn't do nice things unless they wanted something out of it. Something to benefit both parties. That was the human condition. People were kind so the world knew how to be kind to them. Karma had no deadline, but it's memory was as sharp as it was long.

It means welcome to the family, kid, the man had said, laughing. So perhaps they did have something to gain from it. Perhaps the benefit, on their end, was Alex's happiness. But she was a part of their family, not bound by flesh, but by sworn protection. In the end, it had nothing to do with the blood of the womb. Family ain't who you're born with, Alex's mother had said, years ago, while she was pushing Iko on the swings, it's who you'd die for.

From then on, she was an honorary Ivanovich. Loved, fed, and welcome.

Seven in the morning, seven hours to the Reaping and the living room was ablaze with a bustling routine. A chaotic symphony of pots and pans clashing, plates slicking across the wooden table, the synchronised scrape of a chair against the floor and a toothbrush against pearly teeth, a woman shouting for her children from the bottom of the stairs, a father shouting at the waffle iron in the kitchen. At the dining table, sat two teenage girls, two out of the five Ivanovich children. One with her head bowed into her plate with early morning exhaustion, half-asleep in her waffles and chocolate syrup, and the other glaring with questionable contempt into her glass of orange juice.

Neither remarked on her unannounced presence when Alex and Iko raced down the stairs, shoving and hissing at each other, fumbling to reach the dining area first. It wasn't until the aroma of eggs and waffles perfuming the alcove had stained her senses and her stomach gave a wistful tug that Iko realised she was starving.

     "Morning, sunshine," Alex chirped, conveniently ruffling the aforementioned Sunshine's already artlessly messy hair as he strolled past the kitchen island stockpiled with an assortment of pancakes and other foods of the breakfast variety. Cassandra Ivanovich batted her brother's hand away tiredly, pouting through a mouthful of waffles. And then Alex's intrigued eyes fell upon Vesta, who sat directly opposite Cassandra across the island on another fancy barstool, all pale skin pockmarked with paint stains and incendiary scowl and silken hair sifting like flaxen sand against the sharp edge of her jaw. She looked like a porcelain figurine, something cut from tempered glass. She was as beautiful as she was perpetually moody.

"Vesta," Alex nodded, wide beam undiminished despite her demeaning sneer, only withering sardonically at the edges, "made anybody cry yet?"

"Oh, I don't know," Vesta shrugged, casting her brother a lazy, cat-like grin. Briefly, her uninterested gaze flickered over the rim of her glass of orange juice to Iko, who was already eyeing the other girl's expression in mild amusement. Vesta's eyes glistered with that very same unbridled malice she'd witnessed when they'd first met. There was no such humour behind it, but Iko knew Vesta thought Alex was being stupid. Vesta thought everybody was stupid. "It's only seven-thirty."