Re: Hylla Mason (D1)

I dreamed a dream where my life was easy. That's how I knew it was a dream. I hate my parents for not loving me for who I am. I love my brother for not hating me for what I am. You wouldn't guess I was a thief. You wouldn't guess I was empty on the inside. My smile heals others while I rob them blind and burn inside. I am a dream.

I smile excessively and people just melt. Which is why I only smile when I'm conning people. I look younger then I am. I'm fourteen, but I look twelve or thirteen. My long, thin straggly dirty blonde hair hangs past my shoulders and poofs out in the District 1 humidity. My freckles and my acne spread across my nose. My small mouth is usually set in a decided frown. My river-colored muddy green eyes burn with a mixture of anger, jealousy, and regret. Short for my age, I could pass as a child. Bone-thin, ragged from hunger.

Look down and see the beggars at your feet
Look down and show some mercy if you can
Look down and see the sweepings of the street
Look down, look down,
Upon your fellow man

Oh, that's right. District 1 is supposed to be this promised land. Flowing with milk and honey. It is; for the over-stuffed, over-privileged, over-indulged things that call themselves human beings.
For the scum of the street, us, the lower class, it's quite different. The clothes on your back and the dirt under your fingernails is all you own. It's no wonder I resorted to stealing. Not just stealing. Pickpocketing, conning, scamming, blackmailing. They're all the same you say? No, each is it's own lowly art. Each it's own sin in turn.

I'm ashamed of myself. I'm so much more than this, I know. It's not the way I was raised. What choice do I have? It's either immorality or hunger. People who knew me before say they can scarcely believe I'd do such a thing. These are the same people who turn up their noses at me as they smile patronizingly while I rob them broke. Don't they know I hear them? Don't they know I hate them? No, because I'm just that little girl off the streets.
What made me this monster? My parents. I blame my parents for everything. They were my everything. When they left, they left me with nothing. They left me with Isaiah.

Isaiah is another nothing, like me. Another scumbag, another kickass, another sob story. He's my seventeen-year-old brother. Being raised by one's stubborn headed rebellious older brother is not fun. You're not allowed to do anything. Our parents left us, abandoned us. We fend for ourselves. I hope they miss us. Because, secretly, I miss them.
I'm pretty intelligent, it's my one vanity. They call me ''The Sneak" back in the slums. I'd snap back at the dogs at my heels if I didn't know their bitterness wasn't from the same hunger I was enduring. It's horrible, being so alike to a street dog.

These are my people. Here's my patch.
Not much to look at, nothing posh
Nothing that you'd call up to scratch.
This is my school, my high society
Here in the slums of Saint Michele
We live on crumbs of humble piety
Tough on the teeth, but what the hell!
Think you're poor?
Think you're free?
Follow me! Follow me!

Recently, Isaiah and I moved in with my mother's sister and her crowd of annoying but endearing children, our cousins. We insisted on keeping our last name. Their last name, Cole, well, it just doesn't suit me. Or Isaiah. Really, were still loyal to our parents. Even if we won't admit it. Especially Isaiah. Funny, since they were exceptionally disloyal to us. Disloyalty is the one trait I cannot tolerate. Isaiah is the most loyal person I know. That's why I love him. He has the proper sense of family, unlike our parents. I don't think Angela--our aunt--minded, about us keeping our last name.Then again, maybe she feels hurt. Part of me doesn't care, because she pities us. That's a word and an action I can't stand "pity". Then again, part of me does care, for the same reasons.

Angela wants me to stop stealing. She thinks it's a disgrace. Well, this nation's a disgrace. Besides, I've got to hold my own, and someone has to cut the fat ones down to size.
I hate this District, I hate Panem, I hate myself, I hate Snow. Not actual snow, which I adore, but our idiot president. Show some mercy.

Mercy. That's what people won't have, what they don't get. Mercy is different than pity. Mercy is love, pity is pride. Pity is looking down, mercy is looking up. I wish they'd show those poor souls in the Games some mercy. I hate the Games. They're horrible, even if they're entertaining. I thought this country was supposed to be modernistic, and the Games are plain barbaric. I'd love to be in the Games. To compete, to sweat and cry and feel something for a change. To die. To die fighting for this God-awful District. Then again, the glory, the rewards, the pride, the riches. It would definitely be worth it. Even killing others, it would be worth it. I'm in two minds about the Games, obviously.

I want a normal life. I don't want to starve, my new family has fixed that. But as welcome as I feel I still know I'm alone. Alone in a room full of people. People who don't believe in passion for a change in our society. For an uprising.For the judgment day.

With all the anger in the land
How long before the judgement day?
Before we cut the fat ones down to size?
Before the barricades arise?

Lyrics: Look Down, The Cast of Les Miserable
Face Claim: Emilie Ellenhauge 
Colors: 3d3532,526061,6e645f
Family Thread: We Are The Coals of District One