Ameline Willow // District 10 // Complete

My small, fragile bones ache for strength. I feel my arms and I feel the way it curves slightly towards my chest when I hold it out straight. My right leg is an entire inch and a half shorter than my left, and both bend awkwardly to the sides. My bones have broken enough times to make any doctor gasp, and ask if I needed a peacekeeper to take my parents away. I would sigh and shake my head. No, my bones break easily. I'm a weak and silly little girl. I have to be careful, because I am my mother's porcelain doll. I shatter too easily.

My name means eager to work, and that does not stray far from the truth. Since I was little I was always trying to help. I wanted to clean the table, I wanted to sweep the living room, I wanted to light the fire when we had enough wood. I wanted to carry my dad's bucket and pull the wagon for my big brother, Abner. Not soon after I was born I got to know the doctor well. I barely survived when I came out of the womb, many of my bones having broken on the way out. During my first month of life I broke three more bones and fractured six. The doctor gave me no more than two months to live, thinking me a defective child and therefore unable to survive. He blamed it on my father being my mother's first cousin and ruined their public image. They lost many friends that year.

My mother wouldn't lose me, she swore. It was born in October, and as November rolled around and as the air began to gain a frosty crisp to it my mother finished a thick, soft blanket. She wrapped me loosely in it and ties me to her chest. I spent my first winter next to my mother's heart. In three months I managed to break my right leg twice, both times while my mother was picking me up in the morning. Even today she blames most of my injuries on herself, even when I am away from home.

In a mirror I can see my shell. The shell not strong enough to protect my glass structure. Thin hair, so blonde it could pass for a shade of off-white. Then the beautiful blue-green eyes that change with the seasons. I am not afraid to recognize where I am beautiful, but I am not afraid of noticing where I am flawed. My mother puts me on a pedestal, never ceasing to tell me I am perfect, or that I have the sweet, gentle face of a porcelain doll. She does this to distract me, and when I was eight, I noticed. She does it to take my mind off what everyone else is noticing.

My bones bend from all the times they have broken, and my hands are knobby and deformed. My growth is severely stunted, and I find myself gasping for inches that aren't there, inches that would call me normal. At twelve years old, I look like a girl half my age and limp away at barely four feet tall. My head is too large for my body, but I would never mention it to my mother. It would break her heart if she though I was unhappy... resulting because of who she decided to marry.

I've always been an overly protected child. Until I was nine my mother kept me inside the house all the time to prevent me from hurting myself. I still managed to, often, but probably less than if I was running around playing with rough children. Running in the house itself caused me to fracture a bone in my foot. I never saw the sun much, unless Abner snuck me outside early in the morning to visit the sheep before he left with them. We stopped when I was nine because I snapped my left pointer finger. I've never been able to properly use that finger since then. After that my mother stopped restraining me. I could go wherever I wanted, but only if I was with my father or my brother.

I've never had a say in what is done or how things are made. I've never even had a decision when it came to my grandfather, who happened to be a doctor. He wanted to heal things his way, which weren't always the way that didn't hurt as much. I never remember how old I was, but I recall, early in my life, times when I would lay in bed for weeks hurting. Every day he would come in and force me to get out of bed and use my muscles. He said I would thank him later, but I never have. Mother says I should thank him before he croaks. I don't know what that means.

I started losing my hearing when I was ten. It took a while to notice but my grandfather did a test on me and said by the time I was an adult I would be deaf. My mother didn't believe him, but I knew he wouldn't lie. That was the same night Abner took me to the river and held me in his arms until early morning. I never knew why he did it, but whenever I bring it up he shuts up and asks me not to mention it.

For the rest of my life, I figure I'll remain shy and insecure. I don't trust anyone, and I know every time someone decides to really look at me all they will notice is my figure, not my lovely face or sweet words. When I speak, I speak through Abner. He is the closest person to my age I trust, and in him I put all my wishes and secrets. I am the girl that begs the tooth fairy to give me height instead of candy. I am the girl that walks on eggshells every time she leaves the house. I am the girl who's greatest fear is that someday I'll trip and fall funny, and break my back, or fracture my skull. I've heard enough spoken fears from my father to know the million ways I could die by walking out the front door.

Ameline Willow

District 10

Age 12

Female