The past haunts us still (April and June)

May was sure her sisters were here. She had not seen any of them because she seemed to be not looking in the right places at the right time. She wasn't even sure either of them would want to see her. After all she was their father in girl form. Least as far as looks went. It wasn't like she didn't know what the man had looked like once. She had managed years ago to sneak a small picture of him and their mother with her. The only reminder she had of their faces. And her mothers all she saw when she looked was blood. Her father all she saw was a sinister look but still she held onto that photo. Bryce had found it once and questioned her about having it. It took him a week to get back into her good graces again. As a matter of fact that was the last week she'd seen Bryce alive before the reaping took him.

She shook her head and then the light in her eyes vanished and became dark. There was no pretending to be kind or too timid. No there was trouble and she felt it like a knife to her heart. She heard the screaming and raced down the hall. There was no mistaking that sound. She knew who it was in her heart of hearts and she had to get there as quickly as possible. By the time she got there she saw a few kids crowded around a body on the floor. Her eyes flashed a deadly flash as she pushed the other kids away from the smaller younger looking one on the ground. Those kids flew back afraid of the sixteen year old that stood shorter than them but they knew better. They just seemed to know it was not a good idea to keep in the same place.

The kids around those kids disappeared slowly and May calmed herself trying not to completely snap. She hated bullying but this was something different. As she looked at the small frame on the floor her heart stopped. It stopped like it had when she heard the scream. The hair and the face so vivid from her dreams. The striking resemblance to a picture she had. She started to shake not knowing what to do. What were these feelings coming through. She couldn't understand. She knelt down to the younger and gently stroked her arms a few times. "June...June wake up please. Oh god please wake up." She said it muffled almost in a terrified voice.

Suddenly that day came flooding into her vision. She closed her eyes trying to will it to go away but it wouldn't. "APRIL!" She was screaming even before she knew what she was doing. A feeling of terror washing through her. The only feeling she knew since the day she was five. Terror utter and complete terror. The only person who could calm it would be her eldest sister. If by chance she was anywhere around. She couldn't calm herself down. Nothing Bryce had told her helped. If this had been someone else anyone else she'd be okay. But it wasn't she again was too late to protect anyone from anything. She shuddered and continued to try to coax June awake.

“I’m April, when you were a little baby we..” I ran out of words. I completely panicked, as I was trying to find the right words, my eyes went straight to lock up with Mays. We were in this together and I couldn’t believe how much I’ve missed them. “.. We knew you” I finished off, shortly. It wasn’t a lie, not the entire truth. I knew she had to know. There was no chance she was going to let us slip out of this one, not if she was as stubborn as before. “I need you to come with me, both of you” I told them, still in my calm and adult voice. “And the woman you been seeing in her dreams, I look like her. Well, I look like her because she’s my mother” I explained. It felt like a bomb had been dropped, and in a few seconds it was about to explode. Maybe it would all come crushing to her, or she would be as clueless as she was right now. I wouldn’t blame her, she couldn’t have remembered it. Maybe some short events. Maybe small parts of the story, but they couldn’t make sense in her head. It was impossible. The story they had left behind them wasn’t some everyday story. It wasn’t something that just happened, no it was a terrible act of pure evil. It was a traumatic, horrifying story that was never meant to be experienced.

I turned to May, she was so beautiful. The perfect combination of our parents, but yet so much alike our father. I couldn’t keep myself from grabbing her hand with tears burning in my eyes. “I can’t believe it. I never stopped looking for you. I missed you, I missed you so much. You have grown so much! You’re an adult now, it’s incredible. You’re so beautiful. You look just like him.” I was talking to both of them, but I couldn’t let June know that. It was to much at once. Somewhere in my mind, I just knew that May remembered it. She hadn’t oppressed it, maybe parts but not the whole picture. A part of me was afraid she was going to be mad, she had all right to be. She should have hated me. I was the oldest, I was supposed to take responsibility. Instead, I managed getting us separated. It didn’t matter if I had spent my whole life looking, not even if I would spend one more life looking because I was too late. I knew it, somehow I could just see it. She was so big, so adult. She didn’t need a bigger sister to take care of her, she was so strong. “I can’t even begin to tell you how sorry I am” I had to tell her, but the words weren’t enough.

May was so vulnerable, so young and so pure. The words that I would have to tell her would break her, crush her innocence into little pieces. Just like it had done to me. She would never be able to forget it, but maybe she had a chance of moving on. She would understand her passed, to close the chapter of an old book. If she wanted to, she could distance herself from it all. She could leave us behind and never look our way again, but at least she would know. Otherwise, her passed would always hunt her. She would never be able to leave those dreams, never live a normal life. I owed this to her for not protecting her. I owed it to her for not being there when she grew up, for not comforting her every time she felt scared and lonely. I owed it to them both to finally be the older sister that they needed, to be their comfort and support. If the best thing I could do was be brutally honest, I would take the risk of them hating me for the rest of my life.

May couldn't keep herself from shaking. No matter how hard she tried and then the voices came. First it was the voice or her father telling her that everything happened for a reason. Saying it just like she remembered him telling her that many years ago. Then came the cooing soft voice of her mother, of their mother. Always barely just a whisper trying to coax her to calm down. Then came Bryce telling her everything was going to be alright. She had wanted this she would be okay. The voices threatened to shatter the only calm that she had left. She had to focus on June and on April she couldn't let them see her in the mess that she was. She didn't care that April was older. She had always wanted to protect them both but she had been so young. She had been unable to fight the seperation because even at that time she wan't talking. She couldn't she had still been in shock. If they had let them stay together. They wold have seen. They would have healed. No they had spererated them and caused them to be haunted by the past.

May took a deep breath and let it out. She willed the voices to go away except for Bryce's. He had told her, had promised her he'd be here for this and it just seemed wrong for her to shut out his voice because of that promise. A promise that this was the only way he could keep it. She held back the tears there were still too many people around them. April started to talk in almost the exact same soothing voice that their mother used to use. In the same voice that April always seemed to have when she and June woke up from a nightmare. It was rare but May remembered all of them curling up on April's bed at least once. All May could do at that moment was listen. She wasn't sure what to say to help April at the moment. Not when her insides were a jumbled mess and she wasn't feeling numb. She didn't know what she was feeling but she knew she was feeling.

She'd been numb for so long. April looked up to May and all May could say was "we knew you June." The words came out a bit rushed and April said them again. May still kept her eyes locked on April's. That was until April turned and the crowd around them seemed to be dispursing to let them through. They needed to get somewhere else before the bomb shell completely dropped. Then April said it. Said the lady in the dreams she knew she and June were having was their mother. The blood came swimming back into her eyes and May had to stop. The typically strong willed, even as a small child, couldn't move from the spot. She bit her lower lip and willed herself to only hear Bryce's voice. It took her a couple of seconds or so to start moving again and focus back on the converstation at hand. April was talking to her directly. Saying she looked so much like their father. "I'm sorry." May said and her voice faltered as if there were tears in it.

May hadn't even realized the fact that April had taken her hand. When she did and she saw the tears in her big sister's eyes. May wrapped her arms around the older girl and hugged. For the first time in eleven years May Rhodes cried. The tears just wouldn't stop coming. She didn't cry much as a kid but she had stopped completely the day her world had fallen apart. Now that she had pieces of her life back she had the feelings back. She didn't have to pretend she didn't have to fake it. She was overjoyed and sad all at the same time. She didn't let go of April until April was saying she was sorry. "You don't have to be sorry. It wasn't your fault. You did nothing wrong." She said it while catching her breath and trying to dry her eyes so that no one else would see. She wanted to hug June tightly too but that would just make things worse. She hoped June would be okay with all of this.

Soon enough June was telling them that she was fine with going somewhere else to talk. All May could do was watch as June fell over but finally got up and brushed herself off. She looked to April to lead the way. She wasn't sure where they were going to go but as long as they were away from the prying eyes of people she would be okay. She had chocked down the tears that had come before. One could tell that something wasn't right though. That there were more thoughts in her head then she choose to let out. She was breaking slowly inside and all the pain from years pasts threatened to shatter her into pieces. She would have to cope. She would be alright.

    I ask no questions as April leads both May and I away from the school in which we should be in class right now. However, the further we get from the school the safer and happier I feel even if I am with complete strangers. However, they aren't strangers and I know that for sure. Not just my mind but my heart feels as though I have some sort of deep connection with them both and I am on my way now to find out just what that is. My heart begins to race not from nerves but from anticipation of the thought that I will finally know my past. I will finally be able to learn what my dream means and maybe this whole intervention will make the dream stop once and for all.

    My curiosity begins to grow larger as April leads me to a part of the district I have never been before. Yet then again I hardly ever leave my house so there are plenty of places I have never been. However, this is still very exciting of course even if its just because I don't get around much. When April finally stops it is at an old bench surrounded by a small forest grove that seems to hide the nearby factory. I let out a long sigh at the beauty of the place and I walk over to a nearby tree which I then softly slide my hand across. This little area is so different from the rest of the industrialized and polluted district.

    As I turn back to April and May I say softly, "It's beautiful here, so different from the rest of district nine." I walk over to the bench then carefully test its strength before sitting down on it. My heart is almost ready to leap out of my chest as I wait for April to reveal my past to me. Finally I can't wait any longer so I pipe up to them, "Okay I'm ready to know." My eyes lock on April's as I wait like a little puppy wanting a treat. My whole body quivers as I wait for the answer I have been wanting so long and am finally getting it from two girls I never thought existed.

In my head, I tried it out a couple of times. Saying it. It would be the first time I ever really said it, I suddenly realized. My past was something I kept to myself, since I am a very secretive person. I feel like if I share to much, I expose my weaknesses. I wouldn't do that to anyone I didn't trust, and I didn't trust anyone but them, my sister. Even if we haven't seen eachother in more then ten years, I just knew that they wouldn't want to hurt me. They shared my past, as much as it pained me. I couldn't come up with any nice way to put it. There was no possible way to let this down easily.

"Well. As I am sure you know of, you are adopted." That she already must know, but starting out easily may be the best way. I gave May a insecure gaze, I didn't know how to say it. I just didn't. I almost choked on my own words. "Well.. " I had to try again, but the rest of the sentence got stuck in my throat. As I was feeling rather uncomfortable, I started moving around. Switching positions to sit in and fingering on my hands. "You come from a dark past my dear June.. This is not easy for you to hear, neither is it easy for me to say." She explained herself. Come on now April, you're almost a grown woman and you still can't speak of your past, grow up, I had to tell myself. "June. We are your sisters. We grew up together, you were three years old when it happened, thats why you don't remember. We do, and it was terrifying, it was horrifying and evil, pure evil thats what happened to us" I still couldn't force myself to say it.

She deserved to know. She did, so I had to grow up and tell her. It hurt me, her whole innocence. How crushed she would be, I thought. Maybe she didn't care. Maybe she wouldn't even waste a thought about it. I didn't believe that myself, but she had a new family now. Maybe even new sister, a new mother and a father that wasn't a murderer and an avox. That is better for her, and suddenly I felt ashamed of myself. How could I be this selfish? I wanted her to know because I wanted her back in my life. She didn't need to know. She would actually profit from not knowing, still I was crushing her, just for me. I wanted my sisters, but it wasn't my decision to make. "June.. Our.. Our.. F-f-father" I had a hard time even saying it. The rage was bubbling inside me. I wanted to throw something, break something, hit somebody, hurt them badly. I wanted to hurt him, hurt him badly just like he hurt mother and me. Like he hurt my sister. I wanted to destroy him, like he destroyed me. I wanted to tear him apart, pschologically. Torture him, like he had tortured us.

"You see a dead woman lying on the floor, with her back stabbed open and blood in her blonde hair. She had blue eyes and they were so friendly, so warm and beautiful. That woman loved you once, more than anything. I wish you could remember her, because she adored you. You were just a little baby, barely out of diapers when it happened. She was your mother, and ours too." I had to grab her hand, I just couldnt help myself. I grabbed Mays to, and stroke it slowly with my finger. "He killed her" I had to force it out, almost like a hiss. "He slaughtered her" I wanted the tears to come, to come pouring down my face. I wanted her to see how much it pained me, but they never came. Instead, I found myself in a new state of grief. After 11 years, I finally let go of my guilt, of the pain I was feeling. In that moment, I entered the next state of grief - anger.

"Thats when they separated us. That lady in the blue dress, she teared us apart. I still remembered how we sat in our window, holding eachothers hands. I fell silent when they told me, and you were so young. I was as young, but I was meant to be your rolemodel. So you both mimicked me. You fell silent as well, and we didn't speak. We didn't speak for days, weeks, months before they took you away. They brought you to new families, and I was left in the window. I thought about you every day. I still do. They wouldn't let me see you, not even a minute. No, they had to take you as far away as possible. This is the first time we meet ever since." I hugged her hand in mine, and felt a sudden need to tell her that her past didn't have to hunt her. She could leave now if she wanted. She could, I would never blame her.

"I'm sorry you had to hear this June, and if you want to you can shut it all out. Just leave it here and don't think about it ever again. I'm so sorry if you didn't want to hear this. I want you to know that.." I fell silent. I had to think of it for a moment. "That our mother loved you dearly. And we do to. I know that seems scary because you didn't know us but.." My voice cracked again. I could feel the tears now, they were burning. "I still remember how you used to crawl up in my bed after having a nightmare. I used to sing for you, and you called me 'Appi' because you couldn't pronounce my name properly.. I truely am sorry June"