what it means to be strong.— [six/bubby]

It was surprisingly easy to sleep. I guess I assumed it would be nearly impossible, considering the circumstances. But I spent my days exhausting myself with training. And by that, of course I meant the panic attacks I had doing it.

But as I layed down for bed, thinking the evening might be over, there’s a knock on the door.

Could it be Beck or Annie? 

Areto? Late night conversations don’t seem like her forte.

It was a stranger. Well, kind of. I opened the door to see a tribute from another district. What was he doing on this floor? It was the freckled red head boy from Six. No, Eleven, his name was Six. I cocked my head, confused and cornered. He called me Bubba. That’s what my sister used to say before she could enunciate it correctly. I’m urged to correct him, but of course I don’t. It actually felt kind of nice. For someone who’d never seen District Four, he reminded me of home in a weird way. Speaking like my sister. But mostly his hair. Most of us from four were light blonde or bright red. Areto was an anomaly in the hair department. Not a lot of dark colors back home. But she felt out of place anyways. But this boy from Eleven, he looked like he was plucked right out of sand and dropped in the cornfields of Eleven. I knew boys in school who looked just like him.

“Um, uh yeah. Come one in, I guess. I’m Bubby-uh Bub. You can call me whatever you want um.. Sit down?” 


I pat the bed next to where I sat down. 

“What can I do for you?”

You said there was nothing in the world that could stop it
I had a bad feeling

I didn’t know what I was expecting from Six, but it certainly wasn’t kindness. But here he was, telling a stranger that he empathized with me.

“At least you made it until the cameras were gone,” I laughed, “The whole country thinks I’m the litter of District Four.”

It was a slippery slope, this connection. Moments before, Six O’Malley was a stranger, and with each word we are forming a bond. Whether we know it or not. But here in the Capitol, that’s a direct pipeline to heartbreak.

Outcome number one: one of us looks up into the night sky and see the stars morph into the face of the other, knowing the last friend we ever were allowed to make had slipped through the cracks of life and left marinating in our memories until the same omen of death reaps us in the coming days. This is the best case scenario.

Outcome number two: The stars learn twenty-two faces, none of which are ours. We’d lost our friends and allies, and now there’s just the two of us left. But only one gets to go home. And we find what is supposed to be our friend, and we rip each other to shreds. And we live the rest of our lives burdened by villains that look like ourselves. 

If we were smart, this conversation would live only in our heads, and never spoken allowed. We shouldn’t make room for friendship. But that’s the game. That must be why the game makers keep us in the same building. Why they let us mingle with each other. Why they encourage us to make friends and allies. So even the victor dies a little bit before going home. So they can hurt us just a little bit more.

It’s the Capitol’s game, and I played. 

“Thank you for saying that, Six,” I smile, “But you’re wrong. I know myself enough to know I’m not strong. But there’s no strength greater than being true to yourself. So I’m not weak either. I’m just alive.”

I matched his eyes and took a breath. And with a half-cracked smile I’d seen from Alistair so many times, I said, “For now.”

You said there was nothing in the world that could stop it
I had a bad feeling