billie. d6.

Suppose I shoulda seen it coming. It's not like I don't know the warning signs that flare up just before someone breaks my heart. Empty conversation and promises and grand dreams spun up to keep me happy until my grief is too much for them to handle and they just


leave.

Like it's easy. Maybe I'm easy to forget but I've been trying my hardest to distance myself from them yet all I can remember is like before he, she, they both left me, rip-fucking-red. I think it woulda been worse if my brother had been reaped, at least then it wouldn't have been his choice to abandon me. Everyone in this District has lost someone to drugs and I'm no different, I'm not special, but he made me think that we were.

And now he's dead. 

You know how weird it is going from being a sister to an only child? Except I'm not an only child, I never was. But now I am. But I'm also not. 

I hate people calling me Billie. He used to call me that, ruffle my short yellow hair and laugh my nick-name. I'd go by Will now if I could but it's too late, I've got a name that a dead boy gave me spoken by people who probably wouldn't give two shits if I dropped dead myself. Maybe Mom and Dad would but they're still quietly grieving. They're passed the stage I'm in, white-hot and furious, to them he died long ago. 

Fuck I sound miserable. I probably look like shit too, raggedy blonde hair tied up in a sloppy ponytail that hasn't been washed in a few days. It gets greasy easily, like my skin - I should probably fix that, but who am I trying to impress? Not her.

Not her.

When I told my brother I liked girls he just grinned through his cigarette and said, "Well at least you won't get pregnant." Which roughly translated to you're not going to be a worthless teen mom. I told him to speak for himself, that he probably had a few kids running around the district by now - he laughed, told me I was talking shit. In hindsight I kinda wish that it were true, but how the fuck would I find out now he's dead?

God, I can't stop focusing on it. Him. That's why she left. Told me I was all grief and sadness and after the aftermath of my brothers death had consumed me and spat me out it started eating at her, too. But her breaking up with me made it worse, she made it fucking worse so I fucked her ex just to spite her and cried in the bath twenty minutes later.

My parents thought it'd be a wise idea for me to get a job. It's a lot easier for me to transition from eighteen to nineteen, they said, avoid being caught in the currents of dozens of kids suddenly realising they had a whole life ahead of them now reapings were out of the question. Something for me to do, something to take my mind off of things. They didn't say that part, but I heard it loud and clear. Being a pharmacist assistant wasn't exactly in the plan but I kind of like the irony of it. Handing out pills to patients, measuring out the exact number needed to cure common colds and ailments, I had control over the shit that spun my life out of whack. I hand them over with a smile, fuck drugs. They can't hold any power over me. Not like they did with-

The money's nice, I suppose. The job itself forces me to look and speak and smile at strangers - which doesn't sound like much work but to me it is. A few hours a day is manageable. Afterwards I can walk home in silence and go back to the comfort of bedroom walls and the quiet around me. Lie down and close my eyes and get lost in my thoughts, sinking into sleep, numb...

"Wilhemina?"

I blink away sleep, crane my neck to look at the clock and think oh fuck-

I'm late for work, no I'm not, it's Saturday. Tuesday?

"Time for school, c'mon, wake up."

Monday.

I've got a few more months left of learning and then after the last reaping we're left to our own devices. Even as I walk down the same old cracked concrete path and count my steps and feel the cool morning wind tickle my cheeks I still think I'm dreaming. Dysphoric, my limbs feel heavy. Like when you have the flu and something as simple as putting a shirt on makes you feel like you've run a mile. Pop a thermometer in my mouth and it'll tell you I'm fit as a fiddle, sit me down in front of a stranger and ask me to talk about my feelings and you might as well admit me to the hospital right then and there. 

They had the nerve to try and prescribe me something once. I knocked the pills out of the doctor's hands and screamed, my parents didn't bother bringing me back after that. Fucking morons. Think that did more damage than most things that year, how ironic, taking me to get fixed and picking me up more broken than ever before. It just made me so angry. How dare they give me what killed him. How dare they tell me to take one before bed with water. Medicine is easy when you're in control, when it's not your prescription, when you're the one handing it out and checking doses. But when it's yours, you need it. You're dependent. And then you're too dependent, and then you're

dead.

I'm not sure what I'm scared of more: my addiction to being miserable, my addiction to every pretty girl that walks in front of me, or my addiction sealed in those little pill bottles. I'd rather not see the aftermath of the third so I keep those bottles shut tight and consume thoughts rattling around my brain. Besides, broken hearts and grief are easier to swallow than your worst fears coming true. 

Looking at the girl who left me sometimes makes my fingers twitch, but I keep that lid shut tight. In those moments, the hard ones, I kinda get why he did it. It'd be easier. Awful, still, but easier. I get that. I just don't get why he didn't think of me before he reached for the medicine one last time. Because when I do the same, he's all I think about.

And then I put the bottle down, still sealed, shut the pantry door, and walk away.