.:These Will All Be Stories:. [D2 Train Thread]

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Heathcliff Travers

Heathcliff stared into his reflection, and the reflection stared back. Tired eyes—not red, and not ready—watched his lithe form. Flecks of green stood out amongst the brown, and his nose was still a little too big for his face. His hair was buzzed short, and skin a paler shade of white than even when he’d been sick in the winter. Was this the face of District two, what the boys and girls of his district would compare themselves against? And the thought flitted, and fluttered until he was thinking how just moments ago he’d been risking his life for a boy he’d never so much as know. It could’ve been for a taste of glory, but Heathcliff wasn’t that stupid. Nor was it to prove anything to his mother—she already knew his potential, she had molded enough of it with her hands.  

Magdalene and his mother had left not four minutes ago. He’d listened to their footsteps at the door, until they faded down the hallway. Small talk had never been a strength of the Travers. They were dancers through and through—touch was far better a reveal than words spoken. His sister had said only to remember, to remember what they had learned. That he could stop dreaming for a moment, he might just live to come back to them. Her voice broke, like a string plucked too tightly around a violin. Thin, piercing. They embraced, one becoming two again, for the first time in so many years. She would go home to an empty room full of shadows. She would shape them into all the happiness she could muster, just as when they had been children, until she learned that there were new shadows to be seen. 

His mother had tapped her foot on the floor and leaned in close. He would remember this smell—ash mixed with wood—until he closed his eyes. This was the woman whose voice could make the hair on the back of his neck stand, the same that had him leap higher in the air, over and over again, until his feet were covered in blisters and his ankles swollen. She paused for no one, accepted no substitutions. Hard work could defeat talent; it was the furnace that smelted the worthy into talent. She would never delude her son into thinking he was one of the greats. Rather, neither Magdalene nor Heathcliff proved to be much more than average. And yet here he was, tremendous if nothing else. Enough, she whispered before breaking the embrace. The rail thin woman looked back over her shoulder as she moved to close the door. She would say it was the last time she saw her son, whether he returned or no. What remained would become a man, or shatter to a thousand pieces. 

Pity that he had such little idea of who really stared back at him in the mirror. He itched beneath his skin, fingers ready to become anything but the thin boned digits they were now. That had been the real meaning of the moment of indecision, had it not? To discover what stared back at him, whether the boy whose untrained fists were strong enough to carry him through hell and back. And then he thought how rubbish philosophy was, how tainted his words would run on the page. For seventy-three years, piss poor philosophers have stood in this very room thinking about the meaning of their lives. There were better minds with cleaner words that told better truths. And yet this was his truth; his time to discover that he was—not who, but what.  

Heathcliff remembered—that this journey was to start, just as soon as the knock on the door came. He would be lead down the steps of the justice building, past the remaining crowd, guarded by white armored men. He would have to start thinking of more than just himself—that’s how he would win, was it not? And yet he thought it better to think for himself, at least for now. He watched the faces of the boys that longed to be in his place, of those that were pretending. That was the best lie of all. Perhaps he could still think for himself, but pretend, too. There would be such expectations for a career (did such an agile dancer count?). Who was the girl that was his district partner? Was it time to fear her, or to puff up his chest and make like he was just like everyone else? The games were played as much in the head as they were in the heart. No victor won on brute strength or attitude alone. Those bodies all lined the graveyards, they didn’t wear crowns.

Heathcliff found the dining car first. The long expanse of the hardwood table was decked out in various cakes and cookies. He munched on a single vanilla wafer before trailing along the carpeted floor and settling on a vase of roses. He took in a deep breath, and then another. He watched his face in the mirror, holding up a single yellow rose and twirling the stem between his fingers. His sister had once made them both crowns of daisies, and they pretended to be princesses riding horses through the mountains. He gripped the edge of the stem in his palm and snapped off the flower before placing the thing over his right ear. He stared at the yellow petals trailing over his face with a smile. He turned at the sight of the doorknob turning, his heartbeat quickened.  

The boy stood, hands clasped together and face empty. He said nothing staring back at the one in the doorway, fading once again into the blank slate he’d seen in the mirror.