Filed To Story: Sunrise on the Reaping Book PDF Free
“Thanks.” I pocket the nuts and my gumdrops. “You two didn’t have to dress up for me.”
“Well, we wanted your day to be special,” says Blair. “What kind of idiot gets born on reaping day anyway?”
“The kind that likes a challenge,” says Burdock with appreciation.
“Just playing the hand I was dealt. But you know what they say, unlucky at cards, lucky in love.” I arrange my chamomile. “Hey, look what your girlfriend gave me, Burdie.”
Our attention shifts to the girls’ pen, where Asterid stands talking with Merrilee and her identical twin sister, Maysilee, who’s the most stuck-up girl in town.
“Her friends know about you, Everdeen?” asks Blair.
“Nothing to know,” says Burdock with a grin. “Well, not yet anyway.”
The sound system crackles to life, sobering us up. Just then, I see Lenore Dove sidestep a Peacekeeper and squeeze into the pen. She’s looking fine in a ruffly apple-red dress she sometimes performs in, her hair pulled up with metal combs Tam Amber made her. Fine and grim.
A recording of the anthem blares over the square, rattling my teeth.
Gem of Panem,
Mighty city,
We’re supposed to sing along but instead we mumble whatever. Just keep our lips moving at the right time. The screens project images of the Capitol’s power: armies of marching Peacekeepers, airborne fleets of hovercraft, tanks parading through the wide avenues of the Capitol, up to the presidential mansion. Everything is clean and expensive and deadly.
When the anthem ends, Mayor Allister takes the podium and reads the Treaty of Treason, which is basically the surrender terms for the war. Most of the people in District 12 weren’t even alive then, but we’re sure here to pay the price. The mayor tries for a neutral tone, but her voice leaks disapproval in a way that guarantees she’ll be replaced soon. The decent mayors always are.
Next, fresh from the Capitol, comes Drusilla Sickle, a plastic-faced woman who escorts our tributes to the Hunger Games each year. I have no idea how old Drusilla is, but she’s been showing up in District 12 since the first Quarter Quell. Maybe she’s around Hattie’s age? It’s hard to tell because she has a line of what look like fancy thumbtacks encircling her face, pulling her skin back and pinning it in place. Last year, each one was decorated with a tiny buzz saw blade. This year, the number 50 seems to be the theme. As for clothes, she clearly struggled to incorporate two fashion trends, military and sassy, and the result is her current outfit, a lemon-yellow officer’s jacket with matching thigh-high boots and a tall hat with a visor brim. Feathers fan out from the top of the hat, making her look like a deranged daffodil. No one laughs, though, because here she’s the face of evil.
Two Peacekeepers set giant glass balls holding the tribute entries on either side of the podium. “Ladies first,” says Drusilla, dipping her hand into the ball on the right and extracting a single slip of paper. “And the lucky girl is . . .” She pauses for effect, twirling the name in her fingers, smirking before driving in the knife. “Louella McCoy!”
I feel sick. Louella McCoy lives three houses down from me, and a smarter, spunkier thirteen-year-old doesn’t exist. An angry murmur ripples across the crowd, and I can feel Blair and Burdock tensing up beside me as Louella climbs the steps onto the stage, flipping her black pigtails over her shoulders and scowling hard as she tries to look tough.
“And this year, ladies second as well! Joining Louella will be . . .” Drusilla’s hand stirs the slips in the ball and fishes out another name. “Maysilee Donner!”
My eyes find Lenore Dove’s, and all I can think is,
It’s not you. At least, not for another year. You’re safe.
The crowd’s reacting again, but more in surprise than anger, because Maysilee is a purebred town girl and about as highfalutin as they come, what with the Donners being merchants and the general consensus being that her pa will be tapped to succeed Mayor Allister. Town kids are rarely tributes because they don’t generally have tesserae like those in the Seam.
In the girls’ pen, Maysilee’s gripping Asterid’s hand while a weeping Merrilee embraces her, their three blond heads pressed in a tight knot. Then Maysilee carefully disengages herself and smooths her dress, which is identical to her twin’s pink one, only a shade of lavender. She pretty much always has her nose in the air, but she holds it extra high as she walks to the stage.
Now it’s the boys’ turn. I brace myself, preparing for the worst, as Drusilla plucks a paper from the ball on the left. “And the first gentleman who gets to accompany the ladies is . . . Wyatt Callow!”
I haven’t seen Wyatt Callow around school for a while, which probably means he hit eighteen and started in the mines. I don’t really know him. He lives on the other side of the Seam and keeps his head down. I hate myself for the relief I feel watching him approach the stage, his measured steps and vacant expression revealing nothing. I feel bad for him, too. Wyatt has to be closing in on his nineteenth birthday, a big deal in the districts because that’s when you age out of the reaping.
As Drusilla’s hand dives back into the ball, it seems too much to hope that both Lenore Dove and I will escape this terror. That in a few hours, we’ll be far away from the square, locked in each other’s arms in the cool shade of the woods. I suck in my breath, preparing for my death sentence.
Drusilla peers at the final name. “And boy number two is . . . Woodbine Chance!”
An involuntary huff escapes my lips, echoed by several boys around me. Lenore Dove looks over, tries to smile, but can’t help shifting her attention to the latest victim.
Woodbine’s the youngest and handsomest of those crazy Chance boys. They all get so wild when they drink that Hattie won’t sell them white liquor for fear it will bring down the Peacekeepers, so they have to buy it from old Bascom Pie, who has no scruples and sells rotgut to anyone with enough coin. If the Abernathys give off a whiff of sedition, the Chances reek of it, and they’ve lost more family members to the rope than I can keep track of. Rumor has it, Lenore Dove might be related to them on her pa’s side. They seem awfully fond of her, even if it’s not official. One way or another, there’s a connection there that Clerk Carmine discourages.
I can see Woodbine, who’s a few rows ahead of me, projected up on the screen. He makes as if to follow Wyatt, but then his gray eyes flash defiantly and he whips around and sprints for an alley. His kinfolk shout encouragement and bodies instinctively block the Peacekeepers. Just when I’m thinking he might make it – all those Chance kids run like greased lightning – a shot rings out from the Justice Building rooftop, and the back of Woodbine’s head explodes.
The screens go dark for a second and then the flag reappears. Obviously, they don’t want the rest of the country to witness the disorder here in District 12.
The square erupts as some people make for the side streets and some rush to help Woodbine, even though he’s long past helping. The Peacekeepers keep firing, mostly as a warning but hitting a few unfortunates at the edge of the crowd. I don’t know which way to go. Do I find Sid and Ma? Get Lenore Dove off the square? Just run for cover?
“Who did this? Who did this?” demands Drusilla.
A bewildered young Peacekeeper gets pushed to the edge of the roof of the Justice Building.
“You imbecile!” Drusilla berates him from below. “You couldn’t wait until he was in the alley? Look at this mess!”
It’s a mess all right. I catch sight of Ma and Sid at the edge of the crowd and take a step their way when a rough male voice booms over the sound system.
“On the ground! On the ground, everybody! Now!” Automatically, I fall on my knees and assume the position – hands linked behind my neck, forehead pressed to the sooty bricks of the square. Out of the corner of my eye, I see almost everybody around me follow suit, but Otho Mellark, a big lug of a guy whose folks own the bakery, seems bewildered. His meaty hands dangle loosely at his sides and his feet shuffle back and forth, and then I notice his blond hair’s splattered with someone’s blood. Burdock punches him hard in the back of his knee and it’s enough to get him down on the ground and out of the line of fire.
Drusilla’s hot mic bounces her voice around the square as she screams at her team, “We’ve got five minutes! A five-minute delay and then we’ll have to finish this live! Get rid of the bloody ones!”
For the first time, I understand that when they show the reaping live, it isn’t really live. There must be a five-minute hold on the broadcast in case something like this happens.
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