Mercy {Rosemary Oneshot}

Sage Scarborough has been gone for over three years now, and there's no bringing him back. Rosemary has now come to terms with this fact after years of wishing he'd show up back at her door again one day, alive and well. Unfortunately, it's never happened and never will. The boy is gone forever, killed with little to no mercy. As the projectile pelted the boy one last time, he finally collapsed to the ground, lifeless, and nothing could be done to turn back time and bring him home to safety. For years after Sage's death, while Rosemary was still eligible for the reaping, she just hoped that if she were unlucky enough to be selected, she'd be shown at least a little bit of mercy by her killer and that they wouldn't be too brutal.

Luckily for gentle Miss Scarborough, she didn't have to face the reaping anymore, and she was forever safe from the Hunger Games, as long as the insane people of the Capitol didn't decide to throw adults into a quell or something of the sort. The young woman had always been all about being positive. She insisted that things would turn out right, as long as you had confidence that they would. One just had to be prepared for whatever may come at them, and tell themselves that it would all turn out just fine.

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This was yet another year of safety for the Scarboroughs. Now, the only Scarborough left in the reaping was Thyme Scarborough who was Rosemary's younger sister. She wouldn't have to face the reaping for much longer, but as she grew older, it became more and more likely for her to be reaped. Rosemary just had to tell herself that her sister was safe and that nothing bad, such as being chosen for the hell of the Hunger Games, would happen. They just had to pray that Sage's bad luck he'd had while living back home didn't rub off on them. After all, it seemed as if the only luck the boy ever had in his entire life was while he was in the arena, yet it still wasn't enough.

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Now, as the days moved forward, Rosemary started to live her life in a bit of a different way. She was free of the reaping and now spent most of her days working in a small shop in the District Square, selling little bits and bobs that people might need for various things in their everyday lives. Ever since Sage died, she'd started growing out her hair and hasn't cut it since then. It's grown out to be quite long and quite beautiful now, which Rosemary has started to enjoy. Never someone who used to be overly concerned about her appearance, the young woman has recently begun to put in a bit more effort wherever she could. Being a rather impoverished family, however, there's not much that Rosemary can do to clean up her appearance.

Sage's bracelet that his boyfriend and District Partner, Affron Williams had gifted to him shortly before the Seventy-Fifth Annual Hunger Games now rests on Rosemary's wrist every day. Sage's sister, Parsley, had given it to her as a way of remembering him. Parsley had the rest of his possessions, after all, as they had lived together in the same home. Now, Parsley was living alone. Many times, Rosemary and Thyme offered for her to move in with them, but she turned down the offer. Although Rosemary was unsure as to why this was the case, she'd decided not to push it all too much.

Rosemary has started to feel that, at this point in her life, she needs to shift her focus away from the past. She wants to settle down. She wants to find someone who loves her, and, perhaps one day, start her own family. Her most prominent fear, however, is that her own children would be selected for the Hunger Games one day. It scares her more than she'd like to admit, as she's usually a rather calm, confident and positive person. Now, that seemed like it was gradually starting to fade. Rosemary Scarborough was turning into a bit of a different person, nowadays, and she didn't particularly like that fact.

703 words - Oneshot