heather hall | district eleven | fin

H E A T H E R
i'll use you
as a warning sign

I am not Jasmine.

I am not Jasmine.

I
Am
Not
Jasmine.

But oh, do I wish I was.

She succeeds me by only a year and still she holds no fears and no nonsense. One year separates us and I will spend a lifetime trying to catch up to her. And I am almost okay with it. I watch how she grows and blossoms and is not afraid of the world and I am envious of her talents: envious because I can never have them.

I am too weak.

And I am not Jasmine.

I am just Heather.

We look the same with our dark hair and bug eyes. But we are not the same. She is her, and I am me.

I think Momma would have liked to have another Jasmine, because two Jasmines will always be better than any amount of cowardly little Heathers. She is graceful and elegant and lovely and I am awkward and leave a mess in my wake. (Just ask the boy from that one games who was dyed purple because of heather.)

While she goes out and lives, I stay in with Momma. Daddy is never home, and I think that's why Jasmine isn't. She takes after him, you see. But does that mean I take after Momma? No. I don't take after anyone. I'm just Heather.

But I try my best to keep the house clean. The windows stay open in the summer time and in the spring, which has always been my favorite. Flowers blossom in the spring time, after all. The death goes away and rebirth is formed and it is all just a spectacular thing I have enjoyed watching time and time again. But heather doesn't blossom in the spring. It waits until late summer, when death is already so close and the sun is scorching down everything I love. (But I love spring time anyway.) A tricky friend, the sun is. It's always wonderful to bathe in his presence, but too much exposure and petals fall and green fades to brown and we are all left hopeless.

I know everything about heather. I know everything about most plants, in fact. I don't ever get to keep the books-- Momma says there is too much work to be done around the house to worry about such nonsense, and certainly not enough room to store them, but I do read them. Panem Flora, Flowers of the Wild, Top Fifty Edible Roots, Poisons of Panem, I have read almost every plant book in my school's library cover-to-cover, and the only thing I can ever find about heather is that it is something of a pest if left to grow on it's own. It needs to be well-tended and kept in line, and I guess there are no exceptions.

I am Heather, not Jasmine after all.

I cannot grow tall and beautiful like a queen. I am forever a princess who does not know what she is doing, causing more harm than good for my small kingdom of followers. But I have not yet let go of hope. It is sort of what keeps us all alive, isn't it? The promise of a better tomorrow? The feeling we get in our gut that some day, this will all become worth while and the reasons for our existence will reveal themselves. Until that fleeting moment when the light appears, we are left in the dark to fend for ourselves, though. And part of me worried that even when I can see again I won't like what is around me.

Or, rather, I worry that there won't be anything for me to see. I cannot live alone. I am too weak for it and I wish I weren't because what noble person willingly admits they are afraid of solitude? Of growing old alone? Still, I don't want to be alone. The dark frightens me. And I can't depend on Jasmine to be there for me forever.

I remember being a little girl, my big brown eyes staring enchantingly at my parents. Seeing how in love they were with each other, how one person's life depended on the other's well-being -- it was beautiful to me, and I knew then I wanted it. But it has not yet come my way. Jasmine of course, has boys lining up to win her hand. She doesn't seem to care, though. She apparently does not share my fascination, yet has a very good talent as far as making them fall to their knees at her request, and she could even have them thinking it was their idea to do so.

Hope, I remind myself. I hope it will be my turn some day.
Hope. It's all I can do.

Because I have nothing else left.