ACT ONE, CHAPTER ONE
Bad Luck Omen

THE SI HOUSEHOLD WAS QUIETER THAN USUAL THE MORNING OF THE REAPING, the family's somber attitude about the day tainting the atmosphere inside their glorified shack of a house. Rhiannon tilted the pot over the stove in an attempt to use the remaining heat radiating from the coals below. The noise from her scraping the bland grits from the sides of the metal cookware were the only sounds echoing around the house, her father, Orville, having already left for his shortened shift at the mines and her grandmother, universally referred to as Wai Po, meditating in their shared room.

The sun had just begun to peek over the windowsill in the kitchen, casting a ray of light over the side of Rhiannon's face. The layer of sweat across her face from the summer heat glistened in the sun, making the sixteen-year-old girl appear almost angelic. She begged to differ, standing atop rotting floorboards in worn clothes two sizes too small, awaiting her fate for the year's reaping.

A few weeks prior, President Snow announced that for the second Quarter Quell - the more glorified version of the Hunger Games that happens every twenty-five years, complete with a twist to make the Games more "exciting" - each district would offer twice the number of tributes for a total of forty-eight versus the traditional twenty-four. Now, every eligible child between the ages of twelve and eighteen had two chances to be chosen - excluding the additional entries given due to receiving tesserae to spare their family from starvation, which nearly every child in 12 has had to sign up for at least once in their short lifetimes.

Rhiannon, for example, has nine additional entries in addition to her government-issued five. The matriarch of the Si household passed away three years ago, and each year Eucommia Si's absence was increasingly felt in every crevice of the home - hence the tesserae. Orville struggled to make enough money to stay afloat even before Eucommia's untimely demise, but what he especially lacked was Eucommia's craftiness. How she'd combine flowers and herbs into their otherwise bland stew in order to give her husband and daughter the illusion of a richer meal, how she'd be able to make clothing last well past their prime with her skills as a former tailor's daughter.

The father and daughter's relationship has never been the same since the woman who held the raggedy shack of a home together took a permanent leave of absence - well, saying "took" sounds like it was by choice. It was not.

Rhiannon doesn't blame her father for her mother's death - not to the regard he does, anyway. She remembers the events leading up to the mine explosion, and her mother's funeral, like it had just occurred yesterday. It was a particularly rough winter for everyone in District 12, but particularly for those in the Seam. In the Si household, specifically, things were worse as ever. A recent injury acquired in the mines rendered Orville useless; Eucommia, notoriously stubborn when it came to her loved ones' well-beings, forced him to lay off work for a few weeks to recover; Eucommia, herself, wasn't working much since even her merchant clientele whom she washed clothes and cleaned houses for were low on funds; and Wai Po had come down with the flu, for whom the Sis had spent most of their money buying herbal concoctions from the apothecary.

Orville had fallen into old habits, relying on alcohol for the feelings of numbness and warmth it provided. His normally cool temper rose several degrees at any inconvenience, no matter how minor. In those trying times, however, every inconvenience was rather significant.

That day, it was among the early hours of the morning and Eucommia hadn't set out to refill the water pails at the stream yet. No one in the house was awake aside from Orville, who hadn't gone to sleep to begin with. From behind the makeshift door into her room (a curtain adorned with mismatched patches covering a rotting wooden archway), Rhiannon could hear her parents' discourse as clear as if they were having their argument beside the bed she and Wai Po shared. The petite elderly woman was thin as a rail, so Rhiannon never felt suffocated on the twin-sized mattress. Eucommia shuffled out of the shack and the door slammed behind her, shaking the entire property. The slam was undoubtedly due to her drunken father's behavior, but it didn't occur to Rhiannon that she would never see her mother again.

In retrospect, she curses herself for not running out after her in her nightclothes, desperate for the touch only belonging to a mother. But if she had, who's to say that Rhiannon wouldn't be six feet under right with her?

That unfateful day, just as Eucommia was passing by the mines on her usual trek towards the stream, the ground began to shake from beneath her feet. She immediately looked towards the mine entrance, and within seconds it was blown open. Any witness to the explosion went down with the mine itself, but from the positioning of the discarded milkmaid's yoke and Eucommia's scorched corpse surrounded by the few miners whose bodies didn't completely become blown to dust, the common consensus was that she had attempted to save the miners who desperately tried to reach above ground.

Eucommia's cause of death was her hamartia; her fatal flaw in every sense of the phrase.

Orville, instead, argues that it was his fault; his carelessness that caused him an injury, his impatience that heightened his temper, his inadequacy in controlling said emotions that drove his wife off to her own burial. While he, himself, didn't create the explosion, Eucommia was far too nice for her own good. She physically couldn't allow herself not to help when she was able.

This blame game wasn't the reason for Orville and Rhiannon's deteriorating relationship. That was simply the result of the lack of Eucommia, the glue that held their imperfect dynamic together. Besides, the two's paths now infrequently pass with Orville working mine shifts seven days a week and Rhiannon often anywhere but the house. Instead, she's either attending school, working at her friend Ione's family's produce store, or with her (unofficial) boyfriend, Haymitch Abernathy.

Haymitch lived with his mother and younger brother in the Seam, abiding in a house no less similar than the Sis'. His mother and Eucommia frequently crossed paths while picking up odd jobs throughout the district, maintaining their friendliness towards one another from their shared years in school. Mrs. Abernathy's generosity was crucial in the first few months following Eucommia's death regarding keeping the Sis afloat; she kept Orville in check and taught Rhiannon and Wai Po simple recipes that they could make with the tesserae that, while not the tastiest, would keep the three of them nourished.

Noticing how Rhiannon lacked many friends, Mrs. Abernathy took it upon herself to invite the Sis over for weekly dinners in order to kill two birds with one stone: ensure the trio were receiving a well-cooked meal, and introduce Rhiannon to her boys in hopes of them becoming acquaintances, at the very least. Luckily enough, Rhiannon and her oldest, Haymitch, took an unforeseen liking to one other. Over the past three years, their relationship grew from neighbors to friends to beyond.

The only downside with that, though, was that the worry Rhiannon not only held for herself, but for Haymitch as well, was consuming her from the inside out. Her stomach churned from the smell of the meal she was preparing alone, there was no way Rhiannon would be able to stomach it. Wordlessly, she poured the grits into three chipped ceramic bowls and positioned them at the three's respective spots at the dining table.

Rhiannon instinctively glanced at the empty place setting, in front of the chair that's remained vacant for the past three years. She could still envision her youthful mother inhabiting the spot, her demeanor producing enough light to fill the otherwise dreary space.

As Rhiannon turned to summon Wai Po for breakfast, a loud knock resounded through the room, coming from the front door. Eyebrows knit together, Rhiannon walked the few-feet distance towards the door and opened it, a slightly out-of-breath Haymitch on the other side.

Rhiannon shifted on her feet at Haymitch's uneasy expression, "...what's wrong?"

Haymitch didn't wait another second before grabbing onto her forearm, "C'mon. It's your dad."

As Haymitch's pace quickened to a jog, Rhiannon matched hers as panic rose in her voice, "What do you mean? What's wrong with - ?"

Rhiannon's question was interrupted by the crack of a whip against flesh as they neared the square. She skidded to a stop, frozen, as the Head Peacekeeper took a breather. As soon as he snapped the whip against her father's back once more, she flinched back into reality.

Within seconds, Rhiannon sprinted through an opening in the crowd, crying out, "Stop! Stop!" The Head Peacekeeper disregarded her as he lashed again, Orville's groans of pain echoing throughout the square. Men Rhiannon recognized from the mines prevented her from getting too close, holding her tightly as she thrashed around in their arms. "Stop! What are you doing - ?!" Another lash. More groans. Rhiannon looked over to the man on her right, still in his work attire, the coal dust on his hands transferring onto Rhiannon's arm. She shook her head, the side-to-side movement shaking stubborn tears free, "What happened?"

The man glanced down at Rhiannon sympathetically and sighed, "Your father...he was laid off today."

Rhiannon's eyes narrowed in confusion, "What? No one ever gets laid off from the mines."

"Your father's injuries interfere too much," the man explained. "He's not exactly a spring chicken anymore." At the sound of another lash, Rhiannon's attention returned back to her suffering father. The man's explanation still didn't make sense.

"He's getting whipped because he got laid off? I don't..." Rhiannon shook her head, "...I don't understand -"

"Orville didn't take the news well," the man holding her left arm added. He told her bluntly, "He was drunk when he showed up to the mines this morning -" Drunk? Rhiannon asked herself. "- and when the Head Peacekeeper came to inform him..." The man sighed, "...Orville spat in his face." Rhiannon stopped struggling for a moment, in complete disbelief.

She shook her head in denial, "No...my father - he doesn't drink. He used to, when -"

"When his injuries started to become too much," the man on her left finished. "I'm sorry, girl, but Orville's been self-medicating ever since. Including at work." Rhiannon ceased writhing altogether and slightly slumped, allowing the men to hold her body upright as her father continued getting punished. Haymitch hovered behind her, unsure of what to do or say in this unprecedented moment. Rhiannon tried to remember seeing her father drink liquor other than before Eucommia died, and she couldn't. But at the same time, Rhiannon would be lying if she said she was completely thrown for a loop.

Things began clicking into place: her father's abnormal behavior, such as running into furniture and slurring his words. Orville attested it to growing older, which Rhiannon naively believed since she had no reason not to trust him. Orville frequently drank white liquor, which, when in a glass, looked extremely similar to water. Rhiannon couldn't recall smelling it on him, but at the same time, the Seam had a constant odor to it that seeped into its buildings' walls, taking up residency in the air.

When the Head Peacekeeper completed Orville's allotted lashes, he ran his index finger and thumb along the length of his whip, splattering Orville's own blood onto his raw flesh. The Head Peacekeeper eyed the two men beside Rhiannon and ordered, "Get him." The men released their grips on Rhiannon, which had considerably loosened anyway, and ran over to release Orville from the restraints. The two men grabbed under Orville's arms to lift him off the ground. Haymitch moved forward to help, placing a comforting hand on Rhiannon's arm in passing.

"Go to the apothecary," he instructed as his body's momentum kept him moving forward. "Tell 'em we're coming in!" Rhiannon nodded and turned around, running the short distance into the apothecary store that was facing the square. She went to announce her incoming father, but stopped once she saw the apothecary's daughter, Clara, already clearing off a table central in the room.

At Rhiannon's confusion, Clara explained, "I saw your father in the square. I'm so sorry, Rhiannon." Rhiannon glanced over her shoulder, realizing the windows at the front of the building gave its inhabitants a clear view of the square. The two men and Haymitch soon lugged Orville's barely conscious body inside through the propped-open door.

Clara, usually quite reserved, suddenly took on a commanding presence as she ordered the men, "Put him here." They did as told, laying Orville onto the table on his stomach so his injured back was exposed. Rhiannon kneeled before the edge of the table where his head rested, attempting to be in his field of blurry vision.

"Dad?" She asked. Orville groaned in response. The shock of the situation began to wore off and Rhiannon could feel her tear ducts activate. She reached up to gently touch his cheek, attempting to comfort her father, "I'm right here." If not for his groans every few seconds, Rhiannon would've been convinced Orville was unconscious. She glanced behind his head to see Clara fully in action, removing a variety of herbs and tinctures from the cabinets. Everyone in the room could tell that she was in her element. Rightfully so, with District 12's Head Peacekeeper being unnecessarily strict - abnormally strict - floggings, public executions, and the like weren't uncommon, and Clara was the district's best hope at patching up whatever was left in the aftermath.

Clara instructed the two men and Haymitch to hold Orville down as she uncapped a bottle of clear liquid, and before Rhiannon could ask why, Clara poured the alcohol over Orville's wounds, prompting him to yell out in pain. Clara seemed unfazed as she combined multiple herbs with a mortar and pestle, adding the remaining few drops of the alcohol to create a paste. Using her sterile hands, she applied the paste to Orville's wounds while he groaned at every point of contact.

At Rhiannon's obviously distraught expression, Clara told her, "He'll pass out from the pain soon. We've already used the last of our morphling for the month, or else I would've started with that." Clara continued applying the paste to Orville's back until she used every last bit of the medicinal concoction. By the time she finished, Orville's groans had ceased due to his inevitable slip into unconsciousness. Clara looked over her handiwork, seemingly content for the time being. She informed Rhiannon, "I'll reapply more later. Hopefully he stays asleep long enough for the herbs to absorb." Rhiannon wordlessly nodded as she took her father's limp hand between both of hers.

Alcohol-dependent or not, Orville was still her father. Rhiannon felt foolish for not noticing the root cause of his sudden shift in behavior, but she correlated it with her mother's death, and - as Orville said - his age. He wasn't nearly as old as Wai Po, who was one of, if not the, oldest living person in District 12, but Orville was ten years Eucommia's senior. Compared to other couples in the district, the age difference between Orville and Eucommia was out of the ordinary. Most couples had met while attending school, so were only a few years apart in age. Orville and Eucommia's story was different, one that Rhiannon never had the chance to ask about.

Haymitch rested his hands on Rhiannon's shoulders, "Rhi..." As if she could hear the words arranging themselves inside his head, she glanced up at the analog clock hanging above the front door. The reaping was only an hour away, and neither Rhiannon or Haymitch were dressed. Rhiannon internally wondered what harm would be done if she had shown up to the reaping in her nightclothes, but analyzing her father's current state, she ultimately decided against it.

Since dawn that morning, Wai Po had been up, performing her daily devotional meditation. Today's, however, differed from the usual chant she repeated. Wai Po, raised on their ancestral culture's superstitious beliefs, had warned her daughter of marrying Orville Si all those years ago. It wasn't that she disliked the man, but it was the surname he harbored that frightened her.

In their native tongue, "sì" translates to the number four, which sounds eerily similar to their language's term for "death." Four holds a negative energy according to Wai Po's ideology, and her concerns were brushed off as senility until Eucommia's unexpected death.

Not only did Eucommia have incredibly ill luck that day, but it happened on this very same day, three years ago.

Reaping day. July fourth.

When the news reached the rest of the district in the early morning, Wai Po was convinced this was just the continuation of the family's predetermined destiny. Beginning with Orville's injury, then Eucommia's trouble with securing stable job opportunities, then Wai Po falling ill. Although she didn't dare speak it into existence, Wai Po worried for her granddaughter's safety. In fact, she was convinced that the slip that would be pulled from the wretched glass bowl would read "Rhiannon Si."

That day, Wai Po spent all of the time leading up the reaping meditating, replacing her traditional chants with pleas for her granddaughter's protection. Rhiannon's name has been spared every reaping since, and per her superstitious nature, Wai Po continues the tradition, even as her remaining days dwindle down.

An uneasy feeling erupted in Rhiannon's stomach as she thought about the day's reaping. While it wasn't unusual for her anxiety to worsen on the forsaken day of the year, there was something else brewing within her. As if her body was trying to tell her that more bad luck was on the horizon.

Rhiannon sighed as she attempted to swallow the lump in her throat, pressing a quick kiss to Orville's cheek before telling his unconscious self, "I'll be back. After the reaping." He, obviously, didn't react, and Rhiannon stood up from her squatted position.

After sparing Clara a thankful glance, Rhiannon and Haymitch exited the store and began their trek back to the Seam. A comfortable silence stood between them, with Rhiannon wishing she had a sense of precognition and Haymitch repeatedly glancing her way, trying to find a gap in her train of thought to spark a conversation.

Upon noticing a subtle movement of her head, Haymitch took the opportunity to reassure her, "He'll pull through. He always does." Rhiannon silently nodded, sight unwavering from the path before them. Haymitch nervously swallowed, unsure of how to proceed since Rhiannon led most of their conversations. He sighed, resorting to the one action he knew would pull Rhiannon out of her racing thoughts.

He suddenly stopped walking, latching onto the crook of Rhiannon's arm to bring her to a similar halt. Rhiannon's body naturally brought itself around to face Haymitch, whose facial expression read concern all over. Haymitch wrapped his free hand around Rhiannon's other arm, pulling her body close enough for their chests to graze one another, giving Rhiannon no other choice but to listen.

"Rhi." Her eyes slowly moved away from their position stuck on smoke departing from a chimney in the distance to Haymitch's face. He gently shook her arms in reassurance, "Clara treats all the flogging victims and once she's through with them, they forget that it even happened to begin with. She patches them up, good as new. Orville won't be any different."

Rhiannon half-heartedly shrugged, "I know. It's not him I'm worried about."

As she began getting lost in the distance, Haymitch shook her arms again to regain her attention, "You're going to be okay too. Wai Po's streak is going on three years, right? I don't think the universe wants to mess with that woman. I sure as hell wouldn't."

This garnered a soft chuckle out of Rhiannon, the sound of which forced the corners of Haymitch's mouth upwards. The grin cast across Rhiannon's face went as soon as it came.

She flexed her wrists upward to grab onto the underside of Haymitch's forearms, resting her thumbs on either one of his wrists to feel their constant pulse, "I'm worried about you." Haymitch's smile dropped slightly, his own fears that he's been attempting to ward off all week resurfacing.

Just as quickly, he scoffed, "Please. When have I ever not been able to handle something?" He jokingly asked, "Remember that history test? Whew, that was a doozy, but I still passed, sweetheart." Rhiannon rolled her eyes at the nickname Haymitch used during his frequent bouts of sarcasm. He used it to tease his younger brother, he used it when talking back to their teachers - which resulted in a hearty slap of a ruler on his knuckles. He hardly used it with Rhiannon, only when he tried to lighten the mood since she knew the term of endearment was only ever used in an ironic manner.

"C'mon," Haymitch said, simultaneously pulling Rhiannon underneath his arm as he turned their bodies back towards their houses in the Seam. Rhiannon's arm instinctively wrapped around Haymitch's middle, fingers clutching onto the hem of his tattered shirt. Without a distraction from the anxieties surrounding the events occurring within the hour, Rhiannon subconsciously tightened her grip on the fabric. He glanced down at her once he felt her fabric-covered nails graze his side, "Killer grip you got there, sweetheart."

The nickname interrupted the spiral of the worst case scenarios playing inside of Rhiannon's head, she barely loosening her grip in response, "Sorry." With her other hand, Rhiannon was repeating the familiar hand motion she did whenever she felt her emotions begin to eat their way through her stomach. She touched her thumb to each one of her fingers - index, middle, ring, pinky - before doing the same in reverse. With every touch of the thumb against a finger, she would internally count to four, and when reversed, backwards to one.

As they made their final turn onto the dirt path that their homes sat along, Rhiannon's fingers moved swifter as the time ticked down until this year's tributes' fates were sealed.

One, two, three, four - four, three, two, one - one, two, three, four - four, three, two, one.

Haymitch could feel the additional momentum crawling up Rhiannon's arm from his own position around her shoulders. He glanced down and noticed the familiar hand motion, immediately aware of what ill ideas plagued her mind. Haymitch slowed down their pace, convinced that they could afford one final stop before they would have to race against the clock to get ready.

He turned her body towards him like before, gripping onto both of Rhiannon's hands. Learning from prior experience, Haymitch knew that the shift in posture would leave her no choice but to escape her raging train of thought; its cants were already wearing thin, about to throw the locomotive off the rails.

"Rhiannon." Haymitch slightly raised his eyebrows, prompting Rhiannon to ask him the question on her mind to put herself at ease. He found that his words of reassurance had a hit or miss effect; sometimes they would help, but other times they only put Rhiannon further on edge. He felt confident in his earlier words of consolation regarding Orville, but now, he felt that Rhiannon best knew what she needed to hear most in that moment.

"Promise you'll be okay," Rhiannon spoke without hesitation, the words already prepared to leave her tongue. Orville's and Wai Po's health and safety weren't her topmost concern - Haymitch, whose name adorned so many slips that Rhiannon lost count of just how many, was. She wasn't exactly outpouring optimism; Rhiannon understood what was at stake. She gently shook her head, "Whatever happens...promise me you'll be okay."

Haymitch felt the urge to break their eye contact, feeling unwanted emotions of his own well up within him. As flawed as he was, Haymitch Abernathy was not a liar. In reality, he had no say over whose names were drawn from those forsaken glass bowls. It could very well be his own name, or Rhiannon's name, or their friends' names ...Haymitch didn't have the enhanced intuition he wished he did in order to know.

But in this instant, it appeared that Rhiannon just needed something to cling onto, even if it was a doomed promise. Haymitch squeezed her hands and nodded.

"I promise."

ah first chapter!! i hope you all are as excited for this as i am. the og version of this chapter was SUPER long so i had to halve it + keep you on the edge of your seats for the reaping 😈

quick explanation: clara is katniss' mom. mrs. everdeen is never given an official name, but paula malcolmson (who played mrs. everdeen) said she referred to her own character as clara so i just rolled with it. it's obvi not directly related to plants/flowers/occupations like most d12 names are, but it does mean "bright, clear" or "famous" so do with that what you will. since merchant kids' names apparently relate to their occupations (e.g. peeta as in pita bread, baker family) maybe clara goes with needing to be bright/intelligent + clear-headed to be an apothecary/healer?? it's really not that deep idk why i'm making such a big deal out of it

moving on - if rhi + haymitch's relationship seems a little...lacking? (idk if that's exactly the right term for it but) that's on purpose! their dynamic will be shown more as we get further in the book, but they're the kind of ppl who appreciate just physically being there for one another and having someone who knows you so well that you don't even need to speak aloud vs pulling a kourtney + travis softcore scene every five mins.

even before his games, i don't think haymitch was ever a super happy-go-lucky kinda guy and rhi's also already had her fair share of bad luck, so neither of them are exactly the poster children for lovestruck teenagers. and, as was introduced in this chapter, rhi faces her own internal battles which essentially make up a third person in their relationship

anyway i wish i could say happier times are on the horizon but...tbh things are gonna get worse before they get better! buckle ur seatbelts 🚗💨