hold your mistakes up {olivia/cody jb, blitz}

She’d taken to wearing the face of a dead girl to the Reapings.

The Capitol dictated that they wear their finest - it was a holiday, after all - so she did, pretending she didn’t notice the way people carefully avoided looking directly at the features that would forever be recognized as her older sister’s, right down to the bruise on her jaw. Dead ringer. It felt strange, not to have to worry about her own name being pulled, but it felt even stranger to stand among parents and worry for her younger siblings. They’d paid their dues, been taxed the blood of their family. What were the odds the Capitol would take from the same source twice?

“Cody Bowers-Fox!”

Apparently, the odds didn’t discriminate.

And then, a few minutes later, she heard the murmurs of the crowd around her. Bad news spread fast. “Hannah O’Leary,” they whispered, and Olivia felt her blood run cold. “They reaped another O’Leary.”

Bubble Boy. Hello, brother.

She had no right to visit the Bowers-Fox brother, but she marched up the stairs of the Justice Building anyway. The Peacekeepers guarding the doors eyed her warily - (she didn’t miss the double-takes, the way they paled when they realized that she looked all too much like another girl they’d kept under lock and key) - but they let her pass. Her fingertips were stained with ink smeared by a letter written too quickly, scrunched up against the false fur of a worn teddy bear that Lucy hadn’t touched since it had been brought back for her.

Her chin rose automatically, lips twisting into a false smile. He’d recognize her. She knew he would. “Sucks, doesn’t it? Being a tribute’s sibling, I mean.” It was as if they were sharing some cruel joke that they’d both missed the punchline to. But she hadn’t come to share laughs, or even to often comfort.

She looked him straight in the eye with a dead girl's face and silently apologized for everything she couldn't fix.