What News? (Open)

[Morgana]

Memory Lane

Try not to peer through plastic eyes.

This is what the Games do. They cause pain and heartbreak and questions. They're supposed to make people shut up and behave, and to some extent, they do. But they also cause rebellion. They make people want to stand up to the injustice of it all and make it stop. The Games have made two extremes out of us. We either believe in the Capitol because we're afraid not to, or we struggle our whole lives to change things. Everyone chooses a side eventually. There's hardly any middle ground. It's coming to the time that I need to decide where I'll stand. With the rebels? Or with the rest of them? Much as I'd like to be with the rebels and make the Capitol hurt for what they've done, I know I can't. The Capitol either avoxes rebels, kills them, or sends them into the Games. Their family would probably get much of the same. I can't do that to Caden. And if the Capitol were ever to connect me to Weaver, and he got hurt because of it, I wouldn't be able to forgive myself. As much as I hate myself for it, I'll stand on the safe side.

The idea of going into the Games on purpose sickens me. Only someone who hasn't lost a person they loved that way could possibly want that. The only way I'd go into the arena on purpose would be to protect someone I care about. Basically, the only reason I'd volunteer is if Caden or Weaver were Reaped. I only have two more years for all of that, though. After that, I just have to cross my fingers. I shake my head, wiping the last few tears from my face. My fingers aren't shaking anymore, and my lungs have loosened up. I feel a lot better now, though there are still many emotions roiling around inside me. It occurs to me that the conversation I'm having with Weaver is dangerous. If a Peacekeeper walked through the door and heard us, he could arrest us in a second, and do whatever he wanted to us. I consider telling Weaver we should leave, but I don't want to stunt the conversation. I'll take the risk.

Bringing my eyes up to meet Weaver's, I say, "I don't know. I don't know much about your brother, but he must have a reason for it. No one does something without any reason." I drop my eyes to my hands, running my fingers over the ridge of knuckles on my left hand. My breath still comes in shakily, recovering from my tears. I try a few slow, deep breaths, but they don't help much. The only thing I can do is wait. "Sometimes the reasons people have aren't very good, but to them, they're good enough." The Reaping is coming soon. Too soon. It scares me, knowing I have one person to worry about. No, two. If Weaver's brother wants to be in the Games, I'll worry over him, too.

[Devin]

WEAVER FORSYTHE

There was something counter-intuitive about the Hunger Games, even to someone who was young enough only to understand the entertainment value for the capitolites. It just didn't make sense to Weaver, and it hadn't for years. This would be his first year for the reaping, and it was coming so soon that he was terrified of hearing his name come out of that shiny glass ball. If it was his brother, he would grieve in private, but know that he had gotten what he wanted, finally. Cotton wouldn't volunteer and Weaver knew it. If there was a way for their father to prevent him from volunteering, he would. So that wasn't a possibility or something that he had to worry about. He should just shut it down and focus on the moment, the warmth that passed so easily between him and Memory, the smell of yeast and rising dough and baking bread. He should revel in the strong aromas, the sight of the bustle behind the counter of the bakery and the way that Memory worked her hands in agitation. But he couldn't keep his mind off of his brother. His stupid, frivolous, unthinking and uncaring brother. If Cotton wanted to go into the games... Weaver didn't now that it was fine with him, but he wanted it to be. He wanted to support his brother, but he wasn't sure that he knew how.

"It's not that bad in district eight," Weaver said suddenly, as everything slid into place. He ran his finger over a knot in the wood of the table and then shrugged his shoulders. "Nobody really wants to die, even if they think they do. It's never real and it doesn't last for very long. But if you... If you go crazy and you stand up and you volunteer or something stupid like that, it's over. That's the end of your life ad you don't have any choice any more. That's what I hate about what he's doing. That's what I think is so stupid. Maybe he thinks it's about glory but they'll just forget about him when the next person comes along to give them what they want. And I don't want to watch him die! Who wants to watch everybody bleeding all in the snow like that!" He couldn't help but think about the last hunger games when there had been all that endless snow and ice, and the blood on the snow, trailing drops as tributes died in the bloodbath, one by one, the games aired on the televisions at school....

It made him sick to his stomach.

"It's stupid. It's really, really stupid."

[Morgana]

Memory Lane

You're still you, remember you.

Glory. It was a useless word, especially when used in the context of the Hunger Games. Definition: High renown or honor won by notable achievements. Only one person that goes into the Games get to have a "notable achievement," at least by the Capitol's standards. The truth is, no one really wants to go into the Games. Deep down, they don't want to fight a group of people and kill them. They don't want the struggle to survive. They just want to win. They just want people to love and worship them for no reason. They want to be seen. That, a million other little things. So it's stupid, really, to wonder why someone would want to volunteer for the Games. Everyone has their own reasons. They make sense in their own minds, but others would have a hard time trying to figure it out. No one wants to go into the Arena. They just want to win. They just want glory, even though the word has lost its true meaning.

Weaver is a smart boy. He understands things. But sometimes, there's things that you can't tell even the smartest person. It doesn't have anything to do with IQ or how quickly you can think up the correct answer. It has to do with how much you love a person. I love Weaver. Time has nothing to do with love. It's just something you know in your heart. You don't even have to really know someone to love them, which is something people in the Capitol don't quite understand. They love tributes based on the short interviews they give and the things they do in the arena. They love based on the ability to entertain. Even though I never knew her, I love Enigma. She was my sister, and though we never exchanged a single word, I still grew to have feelings for her. She's my sister, and she always will be.

I can't talk to Weaver about this. I can't tell him about glory, and winning. People are stupid and selfish and ugly, and by hiding this from him, I am turning myself into all these things. But that's what you do to people you love. You hide the truth from them, even though they'll be hurt when they finally figure it out for themselves. That's why Mom didn't tell me about Enigma until later. She didn't want me to get hurt, didn't want me to see her living a life that was different than mine, and one that I could possibly see as better. It's something I didn't see until now, and it makes me see another truth, as well. It's time for me to let go of Enigma. I can't obsess over her forever. If I let my life be ruled by the desire to know everything about her, I won't have a life at all.

I have to suck it up and pretend I don't have the answers Weaver wants. I am a selfish person. I want a chance at a life. I don't want to throw away any chance I have at being someone. For too much of my life, I've been in the shadows. I refuse to hide anymore, I refuse to lie. From now on, I'm going to be whoever I can be, whoever I want to be. My only hope is that Weaver will be there with me for some of it, at least. "It is stupid, Weaver," say. "It's stupid and horrible, but that's life, okay? Life is ugly and hard, and not everyone comes out as a winner." I lean across the table, locking my eyes with his, making sure he gets what I'm trying to say. "But do you know what matters? What matters is that people try, and that they pursue what's important to them, whether that's money, a family, or becoming a Victor. And if you fail, that's okay. As long as you've put your heart into it."

I lean back into the curve of my chair, crossing my arms over my chest and looking out the window. The words are the truth. They aren't the truth I should have said, but they were still right. Maybe if I had told him that, things would have been different. I wouldn't have listened to myself talk and heard my own advice. If I'd said the first thing I'd thought of, I might not have realized that, even though I'd given up on my dreams of going to college, it was okay. I'd devoted my whole life to that dream, and deciding I wanted another one didn't make all of that worthless. The fact that I'd spent so long chasing a dream meant a lot. It meant I was a person that didn't easily give up. And that was a truth it had taken me far too long to learn.