LUCY PEVERELL ♥ D12

( N A M E ) Lucy Sage Peverell
( N I C K N A M E S ) Lou
( A G E ) Thirteen
( G E N D E R ) Female
( D I S T R I C T / A R E A ) District Twelve

( C H I L D L I K E )

0.

You're a tiny baby with bright blue eyes and a plentiful smile; the kind of child who rarely cries and lights the house District world with her laugh. (Daddy's glad, because when he gets home the last thing he wants is yet another difficult baby.) Edmund doesn't care for you, but Susan clings to your fingers with her tiny hands and Peter pushes his toys very gently into your flailing legs. You giggle. (Mama wants to play with you but she's too busy clawing at the mattress trying to find the last few coins your family owned.) Your father picks you up and spins you around and you clap your chubby fists in ecstasy and delight.

1.

You're one year old and the slightest trace of golden curls has bloomed atop your head. You crawled for a long time before you finally found your feet - (Daddy says it's because Susan insisted on carrying you about and Peter would fetch for you what you wanted.) Now you toddle about contently. They lose you, sometimes - you'll sit for hours on end simply hiding and waiting to be found. (Usually it's Edmund who tugs you out from inside the kitchen cabinet or crawls behind the curtains to sit with you.) Still, you are rarely seen without a grin on your face. Perfect white teeth form a toddler's smile that still never fails to melt the heart of your father.

2.

At two, you discrover the difference between a truth and a lie. (Susan learns about what is real and Mama scolds Edmund for pretending he never touched her ring. You saw him, but you don't speak up.) After much deliberation in your mind you decide that it's best to answer everything with complete honesty. (Peter works out this is why you're now refusing to play pretend with your toys.) You grow ever so afraid of doing wrong, and it takes your parents a long while to convince you that your teddy bear is still a valid playmate, even if he doesn't really talk.

3.

After your third birthday, Daddy's eyes grow dark and tired. He still hitches you up on his shoulders and listens to you cry out in delight, but he can't play for long. (He's never around anymore, but Peter's starting to grow up and he says Daddy needs to work to get money.) You believe and accept what you are told easily - adapting to situations without questioning. The fear of playing pretend is long forgotten as you pour cup after cup of tea for your bear. Mama says you could only afford to have one bear. (It's actually Susan's, but she's too old for it now and you don't mind a bit.) One day at dinner, you give your bread to Peter even though you are hungry, and he hugs you extra hard that night.

4.

When you are four, Peter begins to grow up. (He's only seven, but Daddy is never around.) He grows serious and stern, and watches our for you when you need him. When Edmund begs for a wind-up soldier at the market, he says no. (Later, you go to Edmund as he sulks and offer him your bear to play with, but he says bears are for little children.) You look around at your mother, worn and busy and stressed, and at the absent place at the table your father neglects to fill, and decide that being a child is perhaps not so bad.

5.

The summer you are five, you start school. (Susan and Peter and Edmund are there, but they are big and you are small.) On the first day, they teach you about colours, and you decide that your favourite one is purple like the sky at night. They also show you flashcards decorated with animals - cats and dogs and ants and bees and horses. (You like them very much, so that night you ask Susan about them.) She tells you that you're not allowed a dog or a cat or a bee or a horse, but if you want you can go and have a look at the ants in your small garden. You do - patient and filled with joy as you watch ant after ant make it's trek across the grass. (Daddy doesn't come home at all, but Peter and Susan both tuck you in. Edmund has nightmares.)

6.

When you are six, your father takes you on a picnic in the meadow. (Mama doesn't come because she's sick in bed.) You and Susan catch butterflies and bend down to pick flowers while Edmund and Peter explore, kicking at the fence and laughing at their own daring. (Your mouth aches from beaming so brightly.) When you are done playing, you sit down on the blanket you brought and eat the biggest meal any of you have had in years - sandwiches and fruit. Susan disapproves of the mould that has begun to blossom on the crusts, but you pick it off and eat hungrily. (You don't mind at all.)

7.

You're seven year old, watching the faces of the tributes on the television screen. Your expression is raw and filled with emotion - eyes tearing up as another innocent mutt hits the dirt. (Susan says the chances of being reaped are small, ever.) You burst into tears, your cheeks rosy and your face screwed up. Peter holds you, stroking your hair and covering your eyes. Still, the sound of people dying is loud and clear. (Nobody thinks to turn the television off, despite your almost unintelligible cries of 'It's not fair!') This year, you learn that no matter how afraid you are, everybody grows up. Everybody dies.

8.

When you are eight, you watch your eldest brother stand with all the other boys on reaping day. He's twelve and that morning he squeezes your and Susan's hands and promises everything will be okay. (Daddy sighs at this, as though Peter is making false promises.) Everything is not okay for Jaimie Maccon or Dustin Summerfeild, nor is it okay for Lethe Turner, who you watch win later that year. (Peter tucks you in and you smile.) You are very afraid, and before your elder brother leaves you tuck your teddy into his hand, still battered and quite alive.

9.

At nine, you are a quiet child who still lights up the world when you laugh. You don't notice Daddy failing to return more often than not of a night, or the times he slips away during dinner. (Not because you don't care - you care an awful lot.) It's because although you've barely spoken a single lie since the time you could first talk, you are awfully accomplished at lying to yourself. (You're happy!) The butterflies are still in the field, but Susan doesn't come with you to catch them anymore. Edmund came once, but he wanted to shut the beautiful creatures in jars rather than letting them go. He calls you a baby, and you cry. (The next morning you find a bottle of pills in your fathers draw but you do not take one.)

10.

By the time you are ten you have grown used to your poverty. You have seen photos of a time before Peter was born when your father was well-dressed and well-fed, but these days your arms are looking awfully frail and your spine protrudes through your clothing. You're not vain, you don't mind much. (Besides, Daddy says you're his pretty little girl.) One day, you find a mirror and gaze into it, noting the way you keep your clothes quite clean even though you love exploring. Hair too blonde, skin too pale, blue eyes too large and wide. (You look like a doll, and you always did prefer teddies.)

11.

When you are eleven, your Mama finally asks you to grow up. ("We can't really afford to do without your hands helping out, Lucy. You'll have to help Susan with her chores.") You already do help Susan with her chores, though, willingly - you wonder what it means if even this isn't enough. And then the thought is gone from your optimistic mind as you walk with your sister to the bakery and purchase a loaf of yesterday's bread to last you the week. (You want to ask Susan about everything, but she doesn't want to talk.) You worry about next year, when there is a chance you will have to be very grown up all of a sudden. (That is not what you are worrying about.)

12.

Susan wakes and dresses you on the morning of your first reaping. It's one of her old dresses, but you're smaller than she ever was at twelve and it sags. (You tell her not to bother with stitching and that it's fine, but she pins it anyway.) You clutch her hand. Killian and Abri are reaped, and they don't come home. (You quite like Klaus, because his face when his name is called reminds you of yourself.) The pills in your fathers dresser are gone when you go to show Peter, and he rolls his eyes at your games.

13.

A week after you turn thirteen, the Peacekeepers arrive on your doorstep and demand to see your father. (He obliges happily, but when they start talking his face falls.) Your Mama ushers you and your siblings from the room, and you wait with bated breath to be allowed back in. You and Edmund slip away and press your ears to the door - within moments you feel awful and dishonest, and you run away to hide. (They find you four hours later, but Daddy is gone by then.) For a long while nobody tells you what happened, because you do not ask and they assume you already know. It is only when Mama bursts into tears one day and begins to clear out his things that Susan holds you close and explains. (But how will he speak to the other miners without a tongue, Susan?)

14.

You still have the teddy bear, and reaping day always leaves a terrible knot in your stomach that can't be undone. You miss your father tucking you into bed at night - but Peter and Susan do it now. (Mama is oh so very quiet, always.) They don't ask you to help anymore - as though your innocence is something precious and fragile and in need of preservation. You still smile at the slightest of jokes and do everything you can to spread joy among you family. (It seems to you that they need it, because they are not so great at pretending.)


( C O D E W O R D ) Odair.
( F A C E C L A I M ) Elle Fanning.

( C O M M E N T S / O T H E R )

Lucy in the Narnia plot.
Sister to Peter, Susan and Edmund.
Template by Lalia.

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