grace kingsely | district 11 | fin

Grace.

The one thing that she never knew that she had.

She didn’t know anything about the world when she was younger, because her parents tried to hide her from it as long as they could.

They locked her in closets that she could leave whenever she wanted, as long as she promised to keep her head down.

Her parents were brewers in the land of eleven, and they always tried to keep to themselves. They sent what they needed to the capitol, and then whatever they kept they sold at a bar that they owned in back home.

Grace was always running around the bar, trying to figure out the calamities and catastrophes of the world.

Cataclysms never felt the same when you had parents that kept you above water of course.

She never felt the harshness of losing a friend to the games because she was never allowed outside of their view.

Her parents didn’t want her seeing reality for what it was worth.

---

Her family grew within time, and before she knew it, she had brothers and sisters one after another.

And each of them were monitored just like the one before.

Her parents were meticulous.

To the point where it became a problem in the district.

When it came to school, her parents didn’t want any of them going because to them, they didn’t need it. What good would an education would do when they would grow up in a profession.

They really didn’t want them to go because they didn’t want them to learn about the harshness of the world.

But they lost that fight, and before they knew it, Grace was off to learn about a world that would send her into free fall, falling back into the earth’s atmosphere bursting into flames of orange and maroon.

However, she would never feel the pain because she never believed it.

And when she sat in that classroom, they tried to tell her about the rebellion, the one that led to the start of the Hunger Games.

But she didn’t listen to them.

Instead, she got lost in the words that she wrote on the page.

Words that never involved the great tradition of Panem, but words that made her think about how beautiful the world could be in her eyes.

How a simple action could cause a ripple effect throughout the nation, but she knew that would never happen.

Instead she would take those pages rip them into pieces and throw them into the fire when she arrived home.

No one had to know what she thought about the world after all.

---

And it wasn’t like she thought anything less of the people that were around her.

Actually, she cared for them. Well, most of them.

Because as poor as eleven was, it was the richest district when it came to the people.

Everyone was kind to another, and as much as people struggled, that did not stop them from making sure that everyone was taken care of.

That included Grace.

She never wanted to do anything more than work on her families farm, because as much as she hated to admit, it was the only thing that she really ever knew growing up.

She didn’t live a sheltered life, but she did see the world in a tinge of rose that no one ever understood.

She was naïve in every sense of the word as she grew up.

And when she tried to tell people her point of view, people would question the type of person that she was, pragmatic or savage, and she would shake her head.

She was not a person who wanted to be defined by a simple label.

She just wanted to be known as herself.

---

And she got that chance.

One day, he father returned home with a large wooden barrel, the liquid in it sloshing around vivaciously.

When he opened it, the color of amber came to mind, ”Liquid Gold” he called it.

When I asked him what he planned on doing with it, he simply told her a story about how he had always wanted to own a bar.

A place where people could go to forget about the tragedies that came with living in a place like eleven.

The concept was foreign to her, but the sound of helping people is what convinced that this was something that she saw value in.

However, she wondered how long he had been wanting to go through with this dream.

And he told her. Since the day she was born.

---

And so he went through with it, because he was a man who did not stop when he set a plan in motion.

And while there was much excitement around the family, they all knew that meant they were going to have to work that much harder in order maintain something that meant the world to her father.

But she was up to the task, because she was always a people person, and as much as she wished she could do what she wanted, she could find happiness in this. Because at the end of the day, everyone was going to benefit.

And a building was found, and at first, his father wanted to open right away.

But he didn’t, because he knew better. To open a bar in plain sight somewhere in eleven would have cost him more than he wanted to spend.

So it started simple. They opened a bakery, a common front that might be able to afford them the privacy that they wanted from the peacekeepers.

---

Her sister hoped on the idea quicker than anyone, feeling like she could finally be useful in a district where most people felt like they were zombies picking nothing that they could gain from.

With the help of her mother, they formed a bakery that became popular in the morning, and behind the scenes, they built a bar in the back that was only open to people who knew the right words to speak.

And before she knew it, she was serving beer to the people that spent their lives trying to find something to live for.

And while Grace never cared for anyone but her family, she learned quickly that people wanted to be heard.

And so with an open ear, she decided to listen.