wanderer | fin

[attr="class","TheoTableInterior"]Sometimes, you realize that you've been running away all your life.

And sometimes, you realize there isn't anywhere else left to run.

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Father left me his business when he died. I was eighteen. Newly an adult. That should have set me up for life, shouldn't it?

It didn't.

Three years later, the savings were gone, and the doors of that building shut for the final time.

It's not that I spent the money on alcohol and girls, though some people might jump to that sort of conclusion. Never been one for such things. Or maybe that's just the sour grapes talking.

I cared about running that business well, I really did. Maybe it was the last thing I ever cared about.

I got a job in the factories after that. That didn't last, either.

A grocery store, a cleaner's, an apothecary. All in different sections of town, as if moving somewhere new every year would hide from others how I inevitably fucked things up whereever I went.

I could never concentrate right, could never listen right, couldn't even remember what time it was unless there was a clock right in front of me. The devil's in the details, so they say, the details I always seem to miss. Perhaps this is what they mean when they say my father possessed 'business sense'.

I guess I still could have done something with my life. Couple of years ago, one of Father's friends called me up and offered me a spot at his place. Out of pity, certainly; good things always happened to me only because my father knew the right people. I suppose I was lucky, at least in that regard.

Yeah, I probably should have responded to that guy. He was respectable and everything, honest day's work for an honest day's wages. Probably would even have put up with me for more than a few months before firing me.

I was supposed to. I should've.

Instead, I ran.

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Time stops mattering so much, out here. There are no clocks but the sun that rises every day, and sets every night. And when the days get shorter and the nights colder, and the rabbits' brown fur starts turning white, I know it will soon be winter. I think I remember learning about that in class, once. It was one of the few classes I didn't do too badly in.

Little boys in upper districts aren't supposed to take an interest in wilderness survival, especially not a place like Three with its electronics and technology and industry. Father must have realized it when he saw how I liked watching the Games; he warned that I mustn't let anyone else find out about such interests. It was not an illegal thing to seek information on, strictly speaking, but it was suspicious, and attracting suspicion is never good.

For weeks after I left, I was terrified that the Capitol would come looking for me. That they'd use scent tracking or heat tracking or whatever they had to find me and kill me, or make me an Avox. Not that I would have made much of an Avox, with my track record at shutting up, sitting still, and following orders.

But winter came and went, and there was no sign of muttations or hovercrafts, or much of anything, really. Probably decided I wasn't worth spending their budget over. I wonder if anyone even reported me as missing, given that my family's gone and I don't have any close friends to speak of.

I guess it gets lonely here sometimes. It's a different sort of lonely than in the buildings and streets of Three, though.

I think I like this kind better.

⚜️

I estimate that I've been wandering for about a year and a half. It's the second winter since I left now, and that's good enough for me. Never been much good at keeping track of this sort of stuff, anyway. I stick to the southern reaches of Panem, where even the concept of winter can be vague and fuzzy sometimes. It's easier to find food, and less risk of freezing to death.

Often, I wonder if I should be disappointed in myself. I think I used up all of my disappointment the day I turned in the final backruptcy paperwork, after weeks of delaying and of creditors knocking on my door. I'm just glad Father wasn't there to see; he always maintained that he had faith in me. I proved him wrong.

I think I lost myself in these woods. I think I found myself in these woods. I think those two things are not so different after all.

I know I have forfeited the chance for the dream life my father promised me. I still wonder whether District Three remembers me, if I will become the inevitable cautionary tale parents tell children who dare to play games and hang out before they have finished all their schoolwork for the week. I wonder if my acquaintances in the district will even recognize me now under all the scraggly hair, wearing furs and soft leathers instead of scratchy suits and stiff ties.

But I also wonder, deep down, if I have been freed.