it takes courage (and love) // zori {blitz}

[Meghan]

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I found him on the rooftops on the very first night, just staring into the garden. It was a very peculiar sight and I would've laughed if I wasn't so afraid of what he might do. How do you approach somebody like this, so alone, so poised that they seem almost untouchable?

No, that wasn't it. Despite his cool exterior Iago still seemed a little rough around the edges. He had to be, to pull such a crazy stunt.

"You must really love him," I whisper and take a step into the light to gaze clearly at his stock-still back. Not unlike the wheat-and-corn so loved by his district. A pause in time and I find myself wondering what it's like growing up surrounded by hay and apples instead of mountains and forests. It probably felt like home for him.

Home. I missed home. Or what used to be home, a long time ago.

I guess this was my home now, wasn't it?

"I would have done it too, you know."

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Word Count: 167

Thanks to Onyx for help with the header and dreams for fixing the table!

[Deleted]

I a g o
I z a r – M c C l a i n e

•••

{ I feel numb most of the time }
{ The lower I get the higher I'll climb }
{ And I will wonder why }
{ I get dark only to shine }

•••

I stand now, further gone that I have been, or forever since. The whole world watches with eyes, wondering what I have to prove. Volunteers tend to have something to prove—love, life, etcetera, etcetera—that gives them a story behind their words. I have a cousin, unluckiest at the worst of times, whose shoes I have filled. That he even knows how lucky he is, I won’t ever rightly know. Instead, I’m left to contend with the voices of the games, the boys and girls that either see me as a threat or as another to be taken down. I never knew how much politics went into the whole thing until I set foot here—that Benat got sponsors and survived so long was enough to convince me that I had more to learn.

The rooftop is my refuge. Lined with trees and dotted with fresh greens, I can’t think of a more serene place. The other tributes seem to stay away, as though stepping out of their apartments would lead to certain death before the games. If anything, I think we’re supposed to live before the games begin. These two weeks are a chance to give us something different, something we’ve never known. Though the danger is getting wrapped up in what 23 of us can never have, those solitary hours spent eating ice cream or watching the city lights are to give more life than we’ve ever known. I don’t know, maybe I’m exaggerating.

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She comes to see me, words kinder and braver than the rest. It’s easier brushing away tributes I don’t know, the ones that are smaller and stupider than me, than giving the time of day. She’s the Birch girl—much like me, she’s know what loss is and has lived it. You must really love him[/color]. She says as though she knows Sampson. I blink, thinking whether or not Sampson was so worthy. I see his smiling face now, and give a grin. He knew more than the lot of these tributes put together. I would have done it too, you know.[/color] I want to recoil. What does she know about such things? Most of them were picked, not given the chance to step in.

“It wasn’t his time,” I say. I bring my arms around knees. “He loved District Eleven more than I ever did. No reason for him to get taken away from what he loved.” I look up at the sky. It still burns, thinking that she thought she knew what I did. “I don’t know,” I whisper. “You say you would’ve given up everything just to be here? You stupid or something??”[/justify][/blockquote][/size]

[Meghan]

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He is kind of a mysterious fellow (I guess we all are, but him most of all, stepping in like that) and for a juncture in our present point I gawk at him through green-glaze eyes. What made a man boy like Iago Izar-McClaine truly tick? What sort of things ran his gears, what motives, what intentions, what thoughts, feelings, desires, hopes, fears, colors, etc. really ran this boy? The list goes on and on.

He must be a deep thinker, as well, because he takes a breath of time as well before he can answer my thoughts with arms folded around his knees and a head turned towards the sky. I take this as an invitation to take my perch, like an innocent dove though not as innocent as I would like them to think. I let mother earth rotate for just a cycle, and sat guiltlessly beside this boy. Even though his cousin had fired that dart towards my brother. Even though, perhaps given time, I would do the same. For now, we were declared naive, and that was all I needed for just a second of infinity.

I think about the implications of his words. They were part of the reason I decided to sit down instead of respond right away. Especially because of the significance of his tone. "You stupid or something?" If he were anyone else, I would have socked him right then and there and have been done with it. But he wasn't anyone. I had not worked my way up to this moment for nothing. I was not able to waste a sleepless night for a wasteful word, and a shameless mouth is what got him into this mess in the first place. That was nothing to be afraid of.

I decided to laugh instead, a little chortle really, and wrung my hands in my lap as if they were water needing to be squeezed out. "It's not like I had anything left, you know. Back home. And if it was my brother up there, and I could step in. Well, let me tell you, I would have in a second." I bite my lip hard enough to taste charcoal-blood, but I can't really complain. Blood would be all too familiar in just two short weeks. Good thing I wrung my hands out, I suppose. I try to press my forefinger to the bleeding without my companion associate noticing, but I am not sure of my success. Perhaps his mind is too rattled with thoughts of his distant cousin and the alluring garden to notice my self-inflicted troubles tonight?

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Word Count: 435

Thanks to Onyx for help with the header and dreams for fixing the table!

[Deleted]

I a g o
I z a r – M c C l a i n e

•••

{ I feel numb most of the time }
{ The lower I get the higher I'll climb }
{ And I will wonder why }
{ I get dark only to shine }

•••

Her words circle around and through me. It’s not like I have anything left, you know. Back home.

[/color] It’s pathetic and a sob story, but all the same a part of me can’t ignore it. I still imagine standing in the Justice Building alone. I had waited as long as I could for my mother and father to come through the door but—only the peacekeepers to lead me to the train. A whole fourteen years wiped clean like the refuse I was. Their golden boy, the good McClaine, turned away for doing what he’d thought was right. Everything about them had been a lie. It only served to remind me how easily I could be fooled.[/color] And unlike so many here, I learned from my mistakes.

“Yeah,” I say, my twang suddenly showing. “I know what you mean. Nothing to go back to at this point,” Which causes me to stop short. I can think of Deval, and his promise. I can picture Sampson, and the second chance that I’ve given him. They’re small but they’re ripples across the District. I clear my throat and shake my head. “Well, I mean, almost. I don’t know.” I let out a sigh. “District Eleven is full of idiots, but there are a couple that I don’t mind.” I wonder now how she’d felt about her brother, and how he’d come and gone for the games. Had she no one to step into her place, with her family already losing so much? Or is this—like a fool—what she wanted?

“You okay?” I say, looking at her finger and lips. I look away fast. It’s a force of habit, having been taught not to stare. Instead I decide to change the subject completely. “You think you’ll do better than your brother?” It might have been rude for some people but then, from what I’d heard about Beatrice she was anything but soft. Enough like me to know who was a target and who wasn’t. While she would have to prove her status as an equal, for now we could swap stories. It was much better than being alone. [/color]“I don’t know about me. Benat got through five days, and he was a total idiot. I can’t figure it out.” With this I relax onto my palms and place them behind me. “Then again, he couldn’t fire a blow dart to save his life, so I guess there wasn’t a reason to take him out.”[/justify][/blockquote][/size]