Catching Fire

However, Haymitch’s house, despite the care taken by the grounds-keeper, exudes an air of abandonment and neglect.

Lit windows, smoke from the chimneys, bunches of brightly colored corn affixed to the front doors as decoration for the upcoming Harvest Festival.

They can afford to buy butcher meat in town, although none of us likes it any better than fresh game.

Cutting down alleys and through backyards gets me to Gale’s house in minutes.

I don’t do well with ambiguous threats.

Twice I made myself so sick in anticipation of it that my mother kept me home because she thought I had contracted the flu.

The annual trip became an enormous source of anxiety.

A prep team to beautify me for public appearances.

I’m sure plenty of people assumed that we’d eventually get married even if I never gave it any thought.

But when the Capitol decrees that only one tribute can live and you have the audacity to challenge it, I guess that’s a rebellion in itself.

“Only you’ll have to do even better if the uprisings are to be averted,” he says.

My next stop is the Hob, where I’ve traditionally done the bulk of my trading.

The claustrophobic tunnels, foul air, suffocating darkness on all sides.

The stove isn’t completely out and I manage to coax the few live coals into a flame.

Any act of rebellion was purely coincidental.

Still would if it wasn’t for a salve my mother concocted.

I get a good haul from the traps—eight rabbits, two squirrels, and a beaver that swam into a wire contraption Gale designed himself.

In several of them, however, people viewed your little trick with the berries as an act of defiance, not an act of love.

Peeta smiles and douses Haymitch’s knife in white liquor from a bottle on the floor.

“I’m only interested in how it affects your dynamic with Peeta, thereby affecting the mood in the districts,” he says.

I ask, both chilled and somewhat elated by the possibility.

I don’t know exactly how much it was, and the price of any gift in the arena was exorbitant.

However, Haymitch’s house, despite the care taken by the grounds-keeper, exudes an air of abandonment and neglect.

We’ve never been particularly fond of each other, but now we have this new bond.

“It must be very fragile, if a handful of berries can bring it down.”

I keep hoping that as time passes we’ll regain the ease between us, but part of me knows it’s futile.

Just the sound of his voice twists my stomach into a knot of unpleasant emotions like guilt, sadness, and fear.

A guttural animal sound comes from his throat.

But not two people in love, which seems to be President Snow’s implication.

Or how those hands, which could set the most intricate of snares, could as easily entrap me.

They’ve been sending me all kinds of stuff about my itinerary and what protocol will be observed in each district.

I will have to travel from district to district, to stand before the cheering crowds who secretly loathe me, to look down into the faces of the families whose children I have killed… The sun persists in rising, so I make myself stand.

It’s for Haymitch, who acted as mentor for Peeta and me in the Games.

He shakes his head at Greasy Sae in mock disapproval and walks off to join his friends.

First there were the obligatory celebrations.

He wipes his face on his shirtsleeve and turns to the windowsill where I perch, just in case I need to make a quick exit.

So between the ceremonies and events and the reporters documenting my every move as I presided and thanked and kissed Peeta for the audience, I had no privacy at all.

Your stylist turned out to be prophetic in his wardrobe choice.

They’ve been sending me all kinds of stuff about my itinerary and what protocol will be observed in each district.

In winter her hands got so red and cracked, they bled at the slightest provocation.

A shiver goes through me when I think of the proximity of my mother and sister to this man who despises me.

I wish I could go back to it because, in retrospect, it seems so secure compared with now, when I am so rich and so famous and so hated by the authorities in the Capitol.

Because I outsmarted his sadistic Hunger Games, made the Capitol look foolish, and consequently undermined his control.

“After that, there was nothing to do but let you play out your little scenario.

I’m taken aback by the directness and even the sincerity of this speech.

“I’ll want that bowl back,” Greasy Sae calls after him, but since she’s laughing, she doesn’t sound particularly stern.

I say loudly, because I’ve learned there’s no subtle way to wake him.

He’s surly, violent, and drunk most of the time.

As always, I listen a moment, but there’s no telltale hum of electrical current running through the chain link.

I start the hour-and-a-half trek it will take to cover our snare line.

He’s something of a whiz with snares, rigging them to bent saplings so they pull the kill out of the reach of predators, balancing logs on delicate stick triggers, weaving inescapable baskets to capture fish.

Maybe I didn’t know about the potential uprisings.

A small, white-haired man who seems vaguely familiar is reading a book.

In fact, I treat him as if he’s a real snake, the venomous kind.

Him being your cousin and all,” she says wryly.