oliver wren . d8. resub. fin

tw: alcoholism, depression, suicide/suicidal thoughts

I was broken when I first came home from that arena. When that ground sloth crushed my knee and my skull, I thought that was the end of my life, and so did almost everyone in Panem who watched it happen. The only ones who knew otherwise were the Gamemakers and probably the now-dead President Snow. When I woke up in that vault, however, I found out the truth, too. They'd saved my life as a part of the quell twist.

It may have seemed kind to spare the tributes' lives like that, but it's been harder than anything else, trying to go on when I thought for sure my life was over. When I first came back to District Eight, it got worse, too. While I was in the arena, my father had died, and he wouldn't be coming back like I did. The guilt surrounded me day in and day out. Why couldn't he have been spared? He'd died before he even knew I was still alive, too. He expected to see my in the land after life, but he wouldn't be seeing me there yet.

At first, being reunited with my remaining family, with my best friend Alice and with the love of my life Jory felt good, at least a little bit. I started to struggle again after a while, though. None of them had been through what I had, so they didn't completely understand, no matter how kind their words were toward me after it all. Eventually, I resorted to alcohol. It was just as much of a crutch to me as the wooden one I used to get around after my knee hadn't healed properly.

I drank far too much for a while, and only recently have I started to get better. Having Jory by my side helped me, for sure. He's stuck with me through it all, and that means the world to me. Things have never stopped being rough, and things get harder some days and easier others. I'm not sure if I'll ever feel back to normal because of all of this.

When news that Maxwell had taken his own life finally reached me, I broke down. I'd never known him well, but I understood why he did what he did. I'd felt the same way all too frequently. I wanted to just give up and die. Honestly, I think one of the very few things that kept me from doing that was the fear of what it would all do to Jory. My depression was constantly eating away from me, and I wasn't sure how to stop it.

Recently, I've tried to refocus from my alcoholism to music. I've spent a lot of time teaching my brother Henry how to play guitar. I've taken the time to write a song for my sisters, too. My brother Reggie seems happy to see me going back to my passion of music that I had for so long before the horror of the eightieth Hunger Games happened to me. It's still terribly difficult, though, despite the things I do here and there to try to make it all better.

Quite recently, Fiona got married. Fiona was one of my best friends in that arena, and I'm very happy for her. I made my way to her wedding with Jory as my plus one. Her husband, Fable, seems like quite the nice guy, and I hope he treats her well. Things truly seemed to be looking up for our little group from the arena. Carmen didn't make it there, but she sent her love and a gift. For some reason, I couldn't recall if I saw Faux there or not, so I just hope he's doing well.

Things took a turn for the worse shortly after the wedding, though. Shy, the tribute who killed Faux in the arena, was reaped for the eighty-sixth Hunger Games. With how much I hated him for the first few years following the Games, one would think I might even be happy about this happening, but how could I be? Fiona and Carmen were close with him, so I had to at least feel worried for their sakes about what may happen to him in an arena where he wouldn't be revived if he died.

The thing is, my worries were unfounded. I suppose Shy knew what he was doing, as he actually managed to make it out as the victor. I'm sure he was traumatized beyond belief now, though. He was the only tribute to ever go through a second Hunger Games, and now he had to live with twice as much trauma as the rest of us. I'll admit, I actually felt bad for him, which I never thought was something I'd feel about him.

Now, as my life progresses further and further from my own time in the Games, I've turned to just focus on myself and those that I love and care for. My only hope now is that I can protect those that I love and care for from going through something even remotely similar to what I did. Although, many of those I care for- Carmen, Faux, Fiona- already have.