vera arnolds | seven

vera

She hands over one pencil, a hair clip, and a set of keys to the keepers, her jaw working the gum in her mouth as she stares them down. Her eyes lock on the guns resting opposite of their batons as they shuffle through the items, dissembling them carefully and pulling out the recording devices. They put each one into a small plastic bag, labeling it with an address in district nine--probably where the audio would get analyzed, but she didn't really care enough about the process to investigate further.

The keepers load the items back up with new, unfilled recorders, and push them back across the long table. They're sitting in a dingy basement in an assuming building near the justice building. It's how the peacekeepers preferred these kinds of meetings with traitors like Vera.

"We'd like to thank you again, Vera," the keeper says, clearing her throat before continuing, "For your cooperation, that is."

Cooperation. The word almost made Vera laugh, but she didn't show it. Instead of letting a smile on her face, she continues chewing the gum, its flavor long gone, and locks her eyes on the keeper's. Cooperation made it sound like she had a true choice.

No, she's only helping the peacekeepers because she knew where her home is, and her home is not in a rat-ridden detention center cell.

They had allegedly been trailing her for weeks when she had gotten caught a year or so ago. That's what they told her at least, but she found that hard to believe. To the best of her knowledge, she had been the least assuming member of the small group of rebels, partially because she cared so little about it. She wasn't one of the new generation members who spoke passionately about hating the Capitol or grand plans to disrupt the means of production. Hell- she wasn't even like her parents who preached patience and a slow-burning rebellion through literature.

Instead, all she felt when her parents dragged her to their meetings under the cover of night was overwhelming, unvarnished, and complete apathy.

When the peacekeepers caught her nicking a trinket from a market and used it as an excuse to bring her in she had barely taken a second to blink before agreeing to their deal. It had seemed to surprise them that after barely ten minutes of intimidation tactics, she had shrugged and given them a barely committal "Sure, why not." Agreeing to be a spy seemed a hell of a lot better than a year in the detention center for stealing.

That has led her to know, blowing a dry bubble in the keeper's faces before putting the items away. The keys went back into her pocket, the hair clip went back into her hair, and the pencil went into her backpack sitting at her side-they had grabbed her on the way back from school today.

"Can I go now? I have a paper I need to finish," she says, raising her eyebrows at the keepers. They look at each other and sigh before nodding and leading who is most likely their top asset in a district seven rebellion group.

Vera heads out the door and gives a casual salute goodbye to the peacekeepers before making her way home.

Her parents were out at work, as usual. Paper mills seemed to keep them out late until the night. Then once a week they would drag her to a neighbor's house to talk about how much they hate the Capitol.

When it started, it had been the worst few weeks of Vera's life. Being dragged out of the house at seven for something she barely understood was miserable. Each night, she'd beg her parents to let her stay home. She'd prefer to be sleeping, or reading, or sleeping. Preferably sleeping. Honestly, preferably anything besides those meetings. Don't expect to bring a seven year old to a room full of grown ups talking political theory and expect her to be interested.

It had taken her another year or so to understand why her parents were bringing her there. They were raising her to be the perfect little rebel, to try and instill her with their values. When every conversation with them began to turn into a conversation about what was wrong with the Capitol and when every problem she had somehow had to be linked back to the Capitol, she had come to a realization that her parents didn't truly care about her. It seemed like no matter what she did, they would never truly pay attention to her or her issues.

That's when the stealing had started. It had begun with small things. Coins left around the house would mysteriously disappear, a piece of makeup her mom would use for special occasions, or maybe a pen her dad had left lying around. Then it had grown to something more: an unsuspecting wallet from the back of someone's coat or a pastry that was looking a bit too delectable on the side of a cart.

It didn't matter, though. No matter what she did or what she stole, her parents would never truly see her. But the stealing had never stopped. Even when she had finally come to the realization that no matter how many miscellaneous items her room filled with her parents wouldn't take note of the problem, she hadn't been able to stop.

Her parents had always continued on, bringing her to their meetings and trying to convince her to devote her life to a cause like they were. That's how the anxiety had started too. In the midst of teenage drama and parental problems, she had spent about three years dealing with panic attacks. Again, it seemed like her parents barely noticed.

The only solution she had found at the age of fourteen was to shelter her mind away from her emotions. She began stealing packs of gum from stores where she could and working after-school jobs to afford it when more suspicion was put on her. Keeping her jaw moving and her thoughts off of any semblance of stress is what kept her going.

As the anxiety departed, the deep apathy had moved in.

Her grades had dropped and she had distanced herself further from her parents until the only time she really saw them is when they forced her to join them at a meeting. Whenever she was home, she would hole herself up in her room, sitting at her bed reading. It was the only place she truly felt comfortable. They hadn't seemed to notice, though.

She had cared less if she got caught for her stealing, at least until she was caught. Whatever she had tried to steal was meaningless and she could barely even remember it. It was the perfect excuse for the peacekeepers to scoop her up though at the age of sixteen and turn her into a listening device.

The rebels had been angry when their small-scale plots had started to fail and members started being arrested. They were confused, unsure about what could have been happening. Why their poster printers began getting locked up and worker organizers in the lumber fields began getting rounded up was a mystery to them. At meetings, they would groan about their ongoing issues and their deepening hatred of the Capitol for foiling their plots. All the while, Vera sat in the back, chewing her gum and staring out the window.