i’ve been itching to
get my hands on them for days! bows made of wood and plas-
tic and metal and materials i can’t even name. arrows with
feathers cut in flawless uniform lines. i choose a bow, string it,
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and sling the matching quiver of arrows over my shoulder.
there’s a shooting range, but it’s much too limited. standard
bull’s-eyes and human silhouettes. i walk to the center of the
gymnasium and pick my first target. the dummy used for
knife practice. even as i pull back on the bow i know some-
thing is wrong. the string’s tighter than the one i use at home.
the arrow’s more rigid. i miss the dummy by a couple of inch-
es and lose what little attention i had been commanding. for a
moment, i’m humiliated, then i head back to the bull’s-eye. i
shoot again and again until i get the feel of these new wea-
pons.
back in the center of the gymnasium, i take my initial posi-
tion and skewer the dummy right through the heart. then i
sever the rope that holds the sandbag for boxing, and the bag
splits open as it slams to the ground. without pausing, i
shoulder-roll forward, come up on one knee, and send an ar-
row into one of the hanging lights high above the gymnasium
floor. a shower of sparks bursts from the fixture.
it’s excellent shooting. i turn to the gamemakers. a few are
nodding approval, but the majority of them are fixated on a
roast pig that has just arrived at their banquet table.
suddenly i am furious, that with my life on the line, they
don’t even have the decency to pay attention to me. that i’m
being upstaged by a dead pig. my heart starts to pound, i can
feel my face burning. without thinking, i pull an arrow from
my quiver and send it straight at the gamemakers’ table. i
hear shouts of alarm as people stumble back. the arrow
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skewers the apple in the pig’s mouth and pins it to the wall
behind it. everyone stares at me in disbelief.
“thank you for your consideration,” i say. then i give a
slight bow and walk straight toward the exit without being
dismissed.
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as i stride toward the elevator, i fling my bow to one side
and my quiver to the other. i brush past the gaping avoxes
who guard the elevators and hit the number twelve button
with my fist. the doors slide together and i zip upward. i ac-
tually make it back to my floor before the tears start running
down my cheeks. i can hear the others calling me from the sit-
ting room, but i fly down the hall into my room, bolt the door,
and fling myself onto my bed. then i really begin to sob.
now i’ve done it! now i’ve ruined everything! if i’d stood
even a ghost of chance, it vanished when i sent that arrow fly-
ing at the gamemakers. what will they do to me now? arrest
me? execute me? cut my tongue and turn me into an avox so i
can wait on the future tributes of panem? what was i thinking,
shooting at the gamemakers? of course, i wasn’t, i was shoot-
ing at that apple because i was so angry at being ignored. i
wasn’t trying to kill one of them. if i were, they’d be dead!
oh, what does it matter? it’s not like i was going to win the
games anyway. who cares what they do to me? what really
scares me is what they might do to my mother and prim, how
my family might suffer now because of my impulsiveness. will
they take their few belongings, or send my mother to prison
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and prim to the community home, or kill them?
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