We race up the stairs, and thankfully there's no more guards on the top floor. In fact the door opens to the outside, and both me and Myles freeze for a second as the warm sun washes over our pale faces. 

Then I close my eyes, inhaling the fresh smell in the air. It's ambrosial, and pleasant, and so many more things I couldn't even begin to describe. I guess--it smells like Spring. Like blooming flowers and fresh berries from the bushes out in the woods, like the trees that drop their leaves in the Fall and appear dead in the Winter returning to say hello. It's a wonderful scent. I've always like Spring, when the trees come back and the flowers bloom and the weather starts to get warmer. Chopping down trees all day in the freezing cold is not fun, especially the hypothermia that comes with it. 

I take a careful step forward. What if the ground is mined, like the ones around the platforms in the arena?

I shudder at the memory. The arena. It seems so long ago, yet also like just yesterday. And I'll never, never, be able to erase it from my memory. It will always haunt me, just like the souls of those I've killed. 

(omfg I def didn't forget their names ahhhh)

Adair. Victor. Lee, Lea. Aegis. My dad, my sister. Rylie. My mother, probably. Oceania. Autumn. And probably even more than that, that I just forgot. 

That's way too many. Too many people I've killed--and three of them are my family. My dad, my mother, and my sister. 

I've killed my whole family. 

How could I even deserve to live? How could I deserve to enjoy this moment of sunshine, this moment of freedom, when I'm basically a serial killer? When I should be killed, right now, because of what I've done?

But I take a step forward, because I know I shouldn't be thinking those thoughts. I should be walking forward, into my future. 

Maybe I can forget the past.

A smile crosses my face, and when I look over at Myles I see he's doing the same.

"Should we go to thirteen now?" I ask Myles. I have no idea where we are--we could be in District 1, which would be such a long journey to Thirteen. That wouldn't be fun--but it would be worth it. 

"Yeah--if that's what you want," he says, and I nod. 

And so we do. 

I smile at Myles, his face barely visible through the flickering flames of our campfire. Smoke travels up high into the air, like smoggy clouds, but we're far enough out into the wilderness that I don't think anyone will notice. 

Trees make odd shadows around me, that dance around the fire while the wind whistles through the branches. It's almost summertime now, and the nights are getting warmer. I hope that's because we're getting closer to District 12, where the summer is warmer (around 90 degrees Fahrenheit, I've heard). 

But everywhere is warm. They say it used to be colder, hundreds of years ago when there wasn't so much smog and smoke fogging up the atmosphere, but those seem like legends to me. Sure, the planet isn't still warming, but it's not cooling down, either. 

"It's almost July 4th," Myles says, voicing my thoughts. I frown. That's the day of the reaping--I know it all too well. The day my name was called from that glass ball by Gloriana--I wonder where she is now. 

"Are they still doing the games this year?" I ask, but I know it's a stupid question. Of course they are. They wouldn't stop them just because a victor disappeared. 

"I think so," Myles answers, and I nod. 

"It's sort of... terrifying that other kids have to go through what I did. That they have to watch others die, to kill them themselves." I stare down at the ground, watching a beetle crawl over my shoe. Myles scoots over closer to me, and I lean on his shoulder. 

"I never forgave myself," I whisper quietly, my voice raspy. A tear rolls down my cheek, wetting a dead leaf. I'm fiddling with my hands, somehow expecting Myles to agree that I was right to not forgive myself. That I'm a murderer, and I should be captured and executed, and--

He takes my hand in his, surprising me out of my thoughts. But I just look at him. 

This is fine. He isn't Adair. 

(ahh short chapter but whatever)