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He stares at her, holding the flint striker from his neck.
“Please, May, take it. Finish this.” He gasped, his hand shaking as he thrust the thin, golden chain into her palm.
“Haymitch, please, don’t do this to me!” She cried, throwing the pendant down as she applied pressure to the seeping slit in his chest.
“Please, May. I need you to do this.”
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Maysilee shot up in bed, panting, her fringe damp with sweat and sticking to her forehead. Not that nightmare, that same nightmare, again and again. Her eyes frantically scanned the dark room, searching for something, anything, in the dim, early sunlight. But he was gone. Haymitch, her once mortal enemy, then beloved brother, was gone. And had been for a long time.
She glanced at the clock quietly ticking on the nightstand. 6am. Not a bad time for her, all things considered. She was used to being woken from sleep, shaken awake by awful nightmares at all hours of the night. To make it five hours before her past woke her, she considered a small victory. Still, though, that was one of the worst nightmares she faced, Haymitch’s bright blue eyes boring into hers on his deathbed. He was the one cut out to be the winner, she thought, but the gamemakers couldn’t let him get away with the stunt he pulled with hijacking the arena. She used to think doves were beautiful. Then the giant, grotesque mutts came down and sliced through Haymitch’s chest like a slice of paper. She didn’t believe them to be birds of peace after that.
She swung her legs over the side of the bed, dangling her feet, then padded gently to the bathroom. Washing her face helped, not that she could see it. Her house, her prize, came with so. many. mirrors. And she couldn’t stand that, to see those awful welts and blights still standing out on her once pale, perfect, untarnished skin. Smashing the mirrors had led to more cuts and scars, but she didn’t care. She could barely feel it when she drank anyway. It wasn’t just the scars she couldn’t stand to see. It was her face. It was Merrilee’s face too. Yes, her eyebrows were thinner and Merrilee’s lips fuller, but it was her sister’s face through and through, and she couldn’t stand to see it. Looking in the mirror, all she could see was Merrilee’s face, burning and blistering and turning to ash. So, she didn’t like them. Washing her face was usually all she used the bathroom for. She couldn’t use the shower, or the bathtub, and if she did, she had to wear clothes. Wearing nothing reminded her of hands on her, the slimy, groping hands she hadn’t been able to escape. Fuck you, Drusilla. She hated that she had been right.
The soft sunlight peering through the slit in the curtain in the living room illuminated the thick layer of dust lying atop her mantle. She rarely cleaned, disliking looking after the house she had bought in blood. She kept her house dark and empty, with half-finished bottles making up almost the entirety of her decorations. She had framed one thing, a photograph that Asterid had sent of her and Burdock at their wedding. She didn’t know why she had framed it, honestly. She knew that photographs were expensive, especially in Twelve, and she had pushed Asterid away. The least she could do was appreciate the gesture. It gave her a connection, to something at least. The barren landscape of her house in Victor’s Village could never be furnished with her belongings, because she didn’t have any. Her belongings were a pile of rubble and ash, sat forlornly near the square, which she would avoid looking at every time she went to pick up more rum, the only time she would ever go to that damn square. Her baby blanket, her collection of jewels and pins and trinkets, her one family photo that had been framed in the kitchen. Her mother had always wanted a mantle to frame it above, but not even her home, one of the fanciest houses in district Twelve, had a mantle. She looked at the dusty mantle in disgust. She had one now, but no picture to hang above it, and no home either. This dark, disgusting hole could never be her home. It was her prison. Her Capitol-mandated, complete with all mod-cons prison, and she hated every moment she spent in it. When she first arrived, after that awful, awful victory tour, she had smashed a lot more than mirrors. The beautiful, snow-white piano made an amazing crescendo as she drove her fists into it. The intricate carvings of the grandfather clock in her hallway became piles and piles of wood shavings as she whittled away. Her despair did not break as easily as her fists, however, and when all she could do was sink to her knees and sob, smashing up the only possessions she had left didn’t help her.
She opened up a bottle of white rum as she sunk into the sofa, drinking straight from the neck as if it was water. She threw her head back, staring glumly at the ceiling, until there was a knock on the door. Maysilee was confused. She rarely had visitors. At first, of course, Asterid had tried. She’d knock, calling through the door, every day without fail. Then, one day, Maysilee had thrown a loose brick through the window, and she got the message. Other than that, no one ever knocked. Being the only Victor in the damn Village, she had no neighbours to call for a cup of sugar, and her contact with the rest of Twelve was severely limited. She had lived as a hermit for the past eleven months, leaving her house only to collect more liquor, or on occasion, to visit their graves.
“Maysilee! Open the door, darling!” A voice called from outside. She recognised that voice.
Pulling herself up from the sofa, open rum still in hand, she staggered to the door. Throwing it open, she was met with that awful, straw-like orange bob.
“Drusilla?” She exclaimed, wondering if her nightmare was still ongoing.
“Hello, Maysilee dear.” Drusilla crooned through gritted teeth. Drusilla eyed her up and down. “You don’t look washed.”
“I wasn’t expecting visitors. Or for you to still be in a job.” Maysilee retorted, but she shifted uneasily. Of course, they would send Drusilla, not only the person she despised most in the Capitol, but the one who had beat her for her scathing (and true) comments on her appearance, to her door when she looked as if she hadn’t taken a bath since the victory tour.
Drusilla inhaled sharply. “I’m told I am to be replaced soon. My retirement is already in the works. But today, I am to collect you.”
“Why?” Maysilee asked, her hand on the door handle to steady herself. Maybe drinking spirits on an empty stomach before 7am was a mistake.
“For the reaping, dear. To meet your tributes.”
Then, it hit her. Eleven months. Fuck.
As the morning light rose and the prep team on the porch tittered excitedly, Maysilee vomited profusely over Drusilla’s bright purple heels.