it's better when we pretend [ines / maggie day 5]

[marguerite harvard d2a (zori)]

m a r g u e r i t e

It comes apart
The way it does in bad films
Except the part
Where the moral kicks in

"What do you become when you get out of here?”

Maggie’s voice came out over the wind’s whisper.

She sat crossed legged on the ground, hands on her knees. Afternoon had faded to dusk. She counted the cannons and waited on the anthem to show the faces of who wouldn’t see sunrise.

Most of her life had been spent discussing the before and the during. To become a good soldier meant to live in the moment and to anticipate but never assume. She’d fight until her bloodied body couldn’t stand; she couldn’t get held down by the existential. Not when that had the potential of never materializing.

Perhaps she did have her parents to thank for that, after all. Her mother’s disappearance had helped her understand at an early age what daydreams could do. Her father’s death after a life of hard work a treatise on what it meant to live your life as best you could, only to be gone in an instant.

Life was the same as the fold. Dizzying in shadow, hard to see through, and at any moment, lightning could strike you dead.

“I know some people have gone crazy. A lot of them seem like wind-up toys when I see them on television.” She knew that was the legacy of any victor, to be used by the capitol until you weren’t useful anymore. And somehow that seemed fine to her. Even if she had to dance for them, to read some lines off of a page, she could spend the rest of her days discovering what came after, rather than having to anticipate what might’ve been.

“Are you OK?” Marguerite shifted back against her parka, now turned into a makeshift blanket.

Ines hadn’t been molded by violence – at least, not the same sort of hands that Maggie had seen. She still had an air of innocence about her, even if she’d killed Harley. That had been less an act of malice and more of mercy anyway.

“It’s going to get harder from here.” Maggie said with her eyes drawn to the flashes of light in the distance. There’d come a day, maybe tomorrow, when they’d have to double back against one another.

She hadn’t thought she’d miss Ines, especially not before they left one another. Maybe it was that time worked differently here. Ines was as close as anyone she had back home. The thought of saying goodbye drove a small twist of pain down toward the back of her throat, right above her ribcage.

Friendship was irrational like that.

You couldn’t rightly explain that love. A chosen family of sorts, it had to be built. Trust sown from the walk of life until it was ripe enough to flourish. Often you lived in constant worry that you’d say or do something to cause it to rot. And sometimes, even with the best of intentions, it all went the way of ruin and turned to dust anyway.

“I think I’m OK.”

[maggie collects items/does actions]

ELEGANT

[Cait]

ines izar

I’ve always been an accomplice of storms. Grey skies and rainclouds have always been a comfort. The world seems softer in that dreary afterglow. I become softer.

Rita is – was – a sunshower, amplified by glowing blonde hair and a double-edged smile. She exists – existed – on a plane so far removed from myself, unattainable. Fire streaks the ground in my mind’s eye. It was never coming for me. If it’s true that lightning strikes the tallest objects, it’s no surprise that it found her.

I think the numbness is starting to wear off, because I don’t feel sad like I think I should.

I am feeling differently, but I don’t feel different. My lungs still ache and my limbs still shake and my skin is still peppered with goosebumps, my body not yet ready to let go of the perpetual winter despite the droplets of condensation now coating my boots. But there’s new emotion within me when Maggie asks if I’m okay. Something different than grief; I feel vexed by her question. Maybe she thinks after yet another person dying three feet away from me, I’ll start to harden. I’ll be shaken from my suspended state of fear like there’s some kind of trip switch to turn you into a merciless, murderous zombie. But I know I won’t be okay until I’m out of the Arena.

Deep down, I think she knows it too. We are not the same, haven’t been on the same page for days despite our best efforts to align ourselves to each other’s moon paths. She might be able to see and reason with the necessary evil we’re charging towards, but she’s also grown up in it. She runs through the formalities of checking in with me like any good ally would, but I don’t feel understood, and she doesn’t feel satisfied.

“I think I’m okay.”

That’s good, I think. Better one of us than neither of us.

I reach over to her, grab her free hand. Cold touch to cold touch, I will the dregs of her strength she has to spare into my tired bones.

attempts to break the bone pit generator:

vvubLuCjwi1-5

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