angela lovelace | d8 | done

angela

It had begun one day during her break at around fifteen years old. Sitting in the chair at the long table where she usually would use the sewing machine to stitch together hastily-made fad clothes, she had a sketchbook out and a pen in hand. Chewing on a peanut butter sandwich (without jelly of course), she was lost in thought when the shadow fell over her.

"What are you doing?" The voice is harsh, brisk. It demands answers with no fuss.

Placing a hand over her mouth as she looks up and prepares to speak, her eyes widen at the sight of her boss. Not the floor manager, but like the boss boss. The great designer right from the Capitol herself.

"Oh, uh. It's my lunch break, I was just eating." She says with a quaver in her voice. Had she gone overtime? She'd known people who were kicked out of the factory for less, and she couldn't afford to be fired right now. After rent went up, mom and dad and Christine need her to keep this job.

"No, no. What's that." A finger points down at the sketch, the crude lines from the homemade pencil made from charred ashes smudging when the stylist's digit touches down.

"It's-" she clears her throat of peanut butter with a cup of water, her hand shaking slightly when she raises her water bottle to her lips.

"Spit it out, I don't have all day."

"It's just a few designs I think of in my spare time." Her eyes widen, wondering if this was against the insane set of rules for the factory. She hadn't seen no doodling next to the hundred-item list up on the wall which included restrictions such as No wearing blue on Fridays and Plaid is outlawed on all days except the first Monday of every month.

The Capitolite snatches the book and flips through a few pages. After a few approving nods and sounds, she begins heading towards her office in the back of the warehouse. Not looking back, she calls out, "After your shift, come see me, whatever your name is."

Fearful, Angela had entered that pink and turquoise bespeckled office with complete certainty that she'd have to start job hunting again soon. The promotion had been unexpected. They never let someone as young as her be an assistant designer.

In the three years since, she spent her time trailing behind the Capitolite, taking notes for her. She moved desks into the horrifyingly bright office in the back of the factory to sit next to a few other unassuming designers. They'd nod along to their Capitolite benefactor spout phrases like, "Remember to not be too ambitious," and "This is fast fashion not high fashion".

At night, she stares over a pile of sketchbooks with newly-bought pens. Rent isn't as much of an issue now. Fashion trends are what she worries about now. What will be next and how can her boss make it cheaply and easily before it's discarded for the new season. Of course, her name was not on any of the products she designed. It never would be. It would always have the label of her boss, her mentor who gave her the opportunity to even have her designs placed on Capitolite website for a few weeks before being discarded.

Her sister will often sit over her at night, watching her work under the lamplight. Dressed in clothes that were out of style a few weeks ago and discarded from the factory when the Capitol moves on, they keep each other company while their parents work the night shift at the factory down the road as they always have. Even after Angela's promotion and cash flow coming in, they refuse to change their jobs to anything easier. She thinks it hurts them to watch their daughter bringing more money in than them and being the financial backbone.

She can see it in their eyes. Every time she comes home saying the houndstooth dress or striped hat she'd designed had been a hit in the Capitol and that she'd be getting a small bonus, she could see their bittersweet melancholic happiness. She won't stop though. Her promotion is the reason why they have food on the table and don't get kicked out of her home. More than that, though, she sees the opportunity for more.

Life in district eight has always been rough for her. In the run-down apartment her family's lived in since her childhood, there have been a few solaces. Her sketches had only been one of her escapes from reality. Taking up her father's pastime of smoking just to be able to make an excuse for herself to leave the house and get the factory-tainted "fresh" air had been the other for a few years now.

Now that she's a designer for one of the Capitol's top fast fashion stylists, she's starting to see that there's more to her life than the small apartment in district eight. She hears stories of the Capitol's majesty, and all she wants is to experience that grandeur herself. Especially since her employer mentioned one time that she could use some help in the Capitol itself sometime soon, and cheap labor that can talk is apparently more difficult to come by there.

So she consumes herself in her work each day, every day. She never even actually finished high school, dropping out the second she could to keep on working. And through her art, through her design, she desperately hopes to find some escape from district eight in the future.