When we press p-a-u-s-e [JasonxHelen]

H e l e n S u m m i t

Retreating away from everything, every small step I take, I’m heading towards the unknown. Do I fear the unknown? Of course I do, everyone does. At home, in my bedroom, there is nothing that is unknown to me. Everything is familiar, everything has a place and a name, and it has a story to tell a story I have heard a thousand times. But today, today in the past ten minutes I have been venturing in unfamiliar territory and there is nothing I can do about it. I am being forced. My body is taking me away from the land of comfort and I have no idea how to feel about that…

There are emotions swirling inside of me, rotating and mixing together like the wild winds that slalom in out of the trees that surround me and Jason. It’s hard to control my emotions due to the fact that I have no say on them. It’s my writer that puts them there; they conjure up all these different emotions, mix them together and hope for the best. Right now I think they’ve mixed emotions together that do no match. This is why I feel so weird, this is why I am not acting myself…

Nerves take the lead of the emotions that are marching across me. Nerves because I don’t know this boy that is leading me to the unknown. He could be taking me anywhere, he could put me in danger but I cannot resist following…Curiosity is trying its best to take the lead but nerves is pushing it back. My curiosity is wondering, wondering where this location is. And excitement, my old friend…or enemy, lurking at the back, a few casts off emotions filling in the ranks that should not be there. Why am I excited? I have never been excited…not for a long time…

The last time I was excited…was on that day. For years I had climbed trees as a child…a juvenile reckless child. I had always clung onto the branches somehow; it’s as if the trees cared for me. Many times the tops of the great big wooden fortresses were my safe haven. I’d go there when the house didn’t feel safe. Somehow the leaves were capable of washing my mind of any troubles that had swarmed my head. I thought I was a natural climber…obviously not. I was so excited for the morning to come where I would go to work. The night before was sleepless but I was ready and eager. I climbed the first tree and cut the branches with ease…but the second tree betrayed me. It let me fall, it didn’t protect me and that’s how it happened. SMASH both my wrists shattered into millions of pieces, one worse than the other. Never again was I to climb a tree. Never again would I feel excitement…until today…

"Not far, I think." Jason said after I asked him when curiosity took over about the place not too long ago. Keeping my eyes on the ground, every time I place the sole of my foot to the earth, a tree branch shatters beneath my foot. I’m taking revenge, shattering the loose branches like they did to my own. Battling its way through my clothing, the cold breeze stabs a sharp freezing sensation onto my skin. My only hope is that it is a warm place, away from the elements that are trying to take me down.

For minutes we have walked in silence and I praise that. Small talk and long talk is not my thing. Within all this silence I can think, I can clear my mind and ask myself questions. I can also ask them questions…but they never reply. Why did you make me like this? Why can you make my story better? They’re either deaf or ignoring me…I just want my answers.

"This is it." He announces as the trees slowly begin to disappear behind us. This is not a warm place. Y'see, I sometimes come here cos barely anyone else ever comes here, kinda like my own alone place." All I hear is rambles as I step into the clearing and observe the surroundings.

Glancing around, my eyes fall onto the main feature of this area graves. Has he really brought me to a graveyard? Is he one of these disturbing sorts that I have heard terrible tales about? Does he want to add me to the collection of dead that lay close by to us? My writer could have come up with a much more elaborate death than this. No, he can’t be one of those types…surely not.

Looking down to the rows of tombstones, the forgotten fallen tributes, I try to locate Stella’s. Soon Stella will be forgotten tomb, my family will no longer whisper her name and we will all soon move on from her…to another one. We’re one of the, if not the biggest family in the District. Even though not many of us take out tesserae, there are that many of us with the surname in those glass bowls, the only thing we have to predict is the name that is in front of it.

Thinking about all the rotting bodies that are beneath the ground, it doesn’t put fear into me, the dead can’t harm anyone…

”I have a cousin under the dirt in there.” I say as I turn and look at Jason. ”It doesn’t matter though, she’s dead.”

H e l e n S u m m i t

Eyes fixated on the gravestones of the many fallen, vertical rows after rows of all the failed tributes. Every year, two more are added to the hoard of dead and I doubt that pattern will end any time soon. There was an anomaly in it however, Stella’s games. Not two but four bodies were added alongside the forgotten skeletons. I’ve only been down there once and that was the day of the burial. I pledged never to go there again, what is the point? My family plea next to her gave but she can’t hear their words. She is dead and dead she will remain.

Why did he even bring me here? A viewing spot of the dead. Is this what he is interested in? Is he one of these many unusual wild boys with peculiar fetishes? What is my writer thinking, pairing him up with me? I do hope they’re just experimenting, trialling with my social traits. That is if I even still possess the ability to socialise. I just have to wing it, tolerate whatever is to come in the next couple of minutes for I have no choice too anyway.

Like moments ago when we first met, the strands of grass have taken a sharp hold of my feet, securing me to the location where I stand. There is no escape now and no matter how hard my body is currently trying to fight for my freedom, my mind is assuring me to stay put. But it doesn’t feel like before, my heart isn’t trying to barge through the bony cage, my breathing is at a slow rhythmic pace. I like it here. The eerie atmosphere that surrounds me, even the cold spring breeze that is marching up my spine is somewhat comforting me. It reminds me of something, of my room back home. For it is as dead as the mass bodies that lay beneath the ground, not too far away from where I stand.

Even though she is rotten flesh, it’s hard to dust away Stella’s name from the house. As soon as her name was pulled from that glass bowl, the house went into a ruckus state. One of our own dragged away by the Capitol, the inevitable happened and it is likely to happen again (sooner, rather than later). Slain on day four by her ally, mistaking her for one of the mechanical beasts that took shape of the tributes. It’s quite a typical way for one of the Summits to go, an accidental death with no glory. If another one of us steps into that arena, they’ll likely have pride less death like Stella did. We don’t deserve any better. We’re cursed by the number that follows our District name. We’re cursed by the six letter surname that follows our own name. There is no escaping it and it is entirely the fault of my writer. They want me to lead a sorrowful life so to make sure that happens, they make the world around me as dull as my own existence.

"What?" Jason says, his eyes wider than the hole they dug for Stella’s coffin. Oh. I forgot to tell him my surname, I think. Shit. I didn’t want him to know that I was a Summit and now I’ve just lead him down the track of that knowledge. I can’t lie now, I must tell him. I have no choice but to tell him of the doomed family that I have to share a house with.

"Who?"Firing one worded questions at me, I decide to explain it with as little detail as possible. Words aren’t my friend and I’d rather not play with a lot of them. ”Oh my cousin was in the 70th.” Taking a breather from the rather long sentence, I’d conjure up energy to finish off the explanation. ”Stella Summit, she died in the quell.” My face as blank as my words, there is no emotion entwined in them. I want him to know that I don’t care. I want him to know that I’d rather not bring up that name again. The bane of my existence. One day, that six letter name will be a forgotten memory in my house. And may my life be restored on that day.

H e l e n S u m m i t

Setting myself on the ground, the dry strands of turf would attack my backside, sending a ticklish sensation up my body. Digging my fingers into the soil, I’d tear a handful of the grass from its roots, picking at it as a sudden silence pierces the air after I speak. I’ve been running away from socialising all my life. The events that have happened today should feel like a nightmare but it feels far from it. However the sudden silence sends a soothing reminder that conversations are not for my liking. Maybe the writer is trying to figure out the next dialogue that is to be spoken although it’s Jason’s turn to speak up. I think I’ve outputted enough words today to last me a lifetime.

Everything that happened during her games were a blur, I can’t even remember what the arena looked like. A memory of two trains only comes to mind but I may be mistaking it for the train she left on. Stella was a part of my family but it doesn’t mean I loved her. She didn’t love me. The memory of me probably never crossed her mind while she was in those games. She was from a large branch of the family anyway, she had enough siblings to love and worry about. My family is a great mess; sometimes I can’t even remember the names of a few of them. There are just too many. My writer’s fault, they kept reproducing so many.

I don’t even remember what killed her. Could’ve been a beast, another tribute or a disease. I’m happy I don’t remember for I do not care.

Nobody would care if a canon sounded after my death. Nobody would care if my name lit up the night sky for the living to witness. Nobody would care if I returned home inside a wooden case. Nobody would care if my body was dumped six feet beneath the earth. There would be no mourners at my funeral. Even my writer would be pleased of my passing. Alas, they can close the book with a fin at the end and finally allow the ink of their pen to dry.

Piercing through the silence, a soft breeze greets me as I remain seated on the earth. Not far beneath me, mass graves a lay parallel to each other, ones fresher than others. It’s quite ridiculous that we have a cemetery dedicated to dead tributes. There’s too many. If I was to pass, I’d rather not be buried; it’ll be too much effort for my family anyway. I’d rather flames engulf my body as the fiery inferno will take me from this planet quicker than the worms that feed from the dying flesh. But one can only wish.

"Hope you don't think this place is weird then," Not weird at all, it’s not like there are hundreds of corpses not too far from us. He really picked the most picture perfect view and I thought I was morbid…” I usually come here to run away from stuff, it's quiet and all, get to take a break from looking at trees all day as well," Because graves are better to look at then trees… "I just don't focus on the graves; just look at everythin' else." Because that makes it better.

Looking up as he moves towards me, looking defenceless as his hands are hidden away in his pockets, it quickly reminds me to hide the thing. Looking down at my lap, it’s been out on view for so long. Pulling it up my sleeve, I pray to ripred that his eyes hadn’t fallen onto it. "Just wanted a quiet place, where we're alone. Where it's just the two of us." He picked a great quiet place. Although he’s likely to get a better conversation out of the dead bodies than he is me.

”What do you mean, the two of us?” Without thought, I question his intentions. I’ve known him for what…at least half an hour? Maybe a full hour? What is this boy trying to imply?

This isn’t the time to find boyfriends Helen. If only my writer agreed.