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Before the reaping, Rue kissed each of her five siblings on the forehead, from oldest to youngest. She smiled, smoothed their clothes, and sneaked them extra bites of breakfast. They didn’t notice that the food came from her portion. Her mother said nothing as she drank her breakfast of stale tea.
She was twelve, it was her first time, her mother heard Rue say. The odds would be in her favour.
No matter that she had signed up for eight portions of tesserae. But still. She would never have better odds than she did this year.
When Rue signed in, and they were notified that she would be standing in the square for the reaping, and not in one of the yards, she did not cry in front of her family. On the way back from the toilet, she overheard her parents whispering; they were frantic, afraid. Rue did not know how to comfort them so she went to sit with her siblings.
Everyone knew that only children from the square were ever chosen. There were too many children in Eleven, so somehow everyone was pre-allocated. Everyone ended up in the square at least once before their final year, and those were the only times they really had to worry.
There were so many people to organise around the district, and all the residents weren’t allowed to know any of the details in advance, so Reaping days were early mornings. Later than normal — in the fields it was common to rise and sleep with the sun — but she had been warned to expect lots of sitting and standing and waiting.
Rue was wearing the nicest clothes she had ever owned. Her parents had warned her to be very careful today so that her younger sisters could wear the dress when she outgrew it. It was pale blue, the colour of the sky on a cloudy day, when the sun wasn’t beating down on your back. She loved it. It was stiff still, but the material was smooth under her fingers. Rue tried not to pick at the seams as she waited for the appointed hour. All she would be doing was going to stand inside roped off pens, with all the other twelve year old girls chosen to go to the square.
But she would be leaving her family.
She held hands with her brother and hummed a tune, encouraging her siblings to sing with her. Quietly, so they wouldn’t draw the attention of harried peacekeepers, but music all the same. Leisure, the chance to sit and wait and dawdle, was so rare that Rue was trying to enjoy it even as something vibrated under her skin, telling her that she should be working.
She liked the work, actually. At least for the first half of the day, before she got tired and the height became dangerous. Climbing up in the sky, singing the working songs; she felt like she could touch the clouds when she was up there. The wind was sweet too, she could nearly soar. It could be much worse.
She could be dead.
Rue knew she would have to reassure her family before she left them. They were going to watch from the edge of the square, behind the ropes for family and friends and gamblers and interested spectators. For her siblings, she would be jovial and sweet; she was letting them know that they didn’t need to worry and that everything would be okay. For her parents, she was more sombre, more measured, but loving all the same. She showed them that she would be all right by squaring her shoulders and standing up straight.
It was a long walk to her group. They went backwards in age, so the youngest were closest to the stage. Even as terror settled itself in the marrow of her bones, Rue was desperately curious. This was her first reaping, and the peacekeepers looked more professional than she had ever seen them, like shining figurines. And the Capitol people — they were obvious as anything. She thought they looked ridiculous, painted in their candy colours and draped in oddly shaped clothes. She did not talk to the other girls near her, did not recognise most of them. She stood quietly under the sun and waited for it to begin.
Rue’s mother held her second and third oldest children close, unable to bear the thought of relinquishing them to this awful place too. But there were so many children in Eleven. So many — and Rue’ mother had never been chosen, and her friends had not been chosen. She would have to trust that they would be fine. She would have regretted having so many children, knowing that she would have to live with this visceral terror for so many years, if she did not love her husband. If she did not love her children. They made her life worth living. So she held them close, and begged for the time she could take Rue back home to come sooner.
When the announcer called her name, Rue nearly passed out. She thought she must have misheard, but everyone was staring at her. They were tightly crammed in amongst the ropes and yet a bubble of space had cleared around her, as though everyone was afraid to be near her. Like being a tribute was catching.
She was a tribute.
Belatedly, Rue realised she had to move. The crowd parted like the clouds on a beautiful day, and she edged closer and closer to the stage. She did not look for her family. She couldn’t imagine what they might look like.
The stairs were so very large, she had to use the banister to lift herself up them. Finally, she made it to the top and saw the sea of faces staring at her. She saw herself on the massive screens — a tiny thing, hair just slightly out of place. Her dress looked nice even next to the garish Capitol woman who prodded her forward. Her hand was slimy on her shoulder as she asked for volunteers. Rue didn’t hold her breath, but she couldn’t help the tiny hope that dawned in her chest. She heard the wind whistling, her friend through so many shifts saying goodbye, but nothing else.
She was a tribute now. She had to do this. So she could see the wind again.
When the announcer called Rue’s name, her mother gasped, horrified. Her father fell to his knees. Her siblings held each other and cried, or stood there so shocked they were a statue, or cried because they didn’t understand. They watched their sister on the big screen and knew it could mean nothing good.
They got to say their goodbyes, at least. In a tiny room in the Justice Building they had never visited before. Rue stayed strong for them, she promised that she would do her best.
They held each other close as they watched Rue board the train.
The two weeks pass slowly, honey dripping from a beehive. They can only imagine what is happening to their daughter, in circumstances so unlikely they had thought their fretting irrational, in places they cannot fathom. Work continues, but they are so distracted that if not for the generosity of their neighbours they both would have been whipped at least. And how would that look to their other children?
Other children
. What a heinous idea. They have always known how important Rue was to their family’s world, but now they really wish they had done more, been able to give her more.
They hope Rue can learn to survive in the little time she has left.
At the interview, Rue looks mystical, magical, but she does not look like their daughter. There is shiny stuff on her face, and her dress looks like wisps of cloud, like Rue is not truly there. They have given her wings. They remember her climbing in the orchard, as fearless as if she could fly, but she was so successful because she knew she could not let herself fall. Those with wings think it is okay for them to fall.
Don’t count me out, she says. The interviewer painted in garish colours says something kind back, but Rue’s mother knows the odds. The youngest victor ever was fourteen, and Rue is nothing like him. She is a kind, gentle girl. She has a will as strong as any oak, but she is so small.
The despair waits inside her every shadow, dogging her footsteps, waiting for her to succumb. But she has her family to think about.
On the morning of the Hunger Games, they all rise early. That is, if they slept at all — night sky and flickering candles and desperate dreams blurred together to the point that sleeping and waking were the same torment. Finally, finally, it was early enough to go to the square.
As other families trickled in, they found themselves the object of charity: a bit of spare food, a toy for one of the children, a ribbon, a snack. They were not too proud to turn down things they always needed, but Rue’s parents did not think the consolation was soothing at all.
Some of Rue’s siblings had seen Hunger Games before, others were young enough that they had been shielded from the killing. Yet none of them were excited. They all loved the sister who doted on them, who loved them back.
The chatter of the Capitol commentators was like a ringing bell, the buzzing of a gnat. Every so often they would try to listen, but it was not a comfort. Still, they could not ignore all of it. They were enamoured with the girl on fire from Twelve, and the boy who was in love with her. They talked about the careers — the hulking boys, the girls with murder in their eyes. They mentioned Rue only twice, noting that she was the youngest tribute. She was one of two twelve year olds, but apparently she was the younger. Thresh was mentioned a few more times than Rue — none of them had known him personally, but they hoped he was a nice boy. His grandmother had promised as much. She had told them that he would not be able to save her, but he would not harm her. He would not help others harm her. They tried to be grateful for it.
Just when they were certain that it had always been that day, that there had been no before and would be no after, the alarm sounded that the games were about to begin. Rue’s mother and father held hands.
The sixty seconds lasted a lifetime. Each time they were shown a glimpse of their daughter, their hearts stopped. She looked more like herself now, all of the paint and glimmer washed away, but she should never have been dressed up as a tribute.
The klaxon sounded, and she ran forwards. They held their breaths.
The camera would not stay with Rue — they watch other people's children die, other people’s children hack them to death, they saw a girl sprinting away, hair a molten banner behind her. They saw the girl on fire catch a knife in her backpack, and the disappointment of the dark-haired career who had thrown it.
Next the cannons sounded: they showed the collection of the dead bodies and a replay of their deaths. The recap was slower than the cannons; the children managed to count it under their breaths. Eleven, already gone.
They showed the dead dying in ascending order by district. They waited with bated breath, but the count stopped at district ten.
She was alive. Not long after — the Capitol had mercy after all — they were shown Rue perched in a tree, inspecting the contents of her backpack. She had managed to get away with a backpack. It was a good start, they had to admit that it was.
The broadcast settled into tedium, though their dread and fear did not leave them. They watched various tributes walk and stumble. They watched the careers guard their hoard, watched a crippled boy try to dig. The careers were getting ready to hunt.
Rue would be too clever to be caught, surely — she would be too small, too quick, too high up in the air. It was like she had said. She only had to avoid being caught.
They had allowed the tinge of relief to creep in too soon. It was summer, but apparently it was not so in the arena at night. They watched Rue shiver, arms hugging herself. She made herself gloves from a spare pair of socks in her hard-won backpack, her hands shaking, but it was not enough. Other tributes suffered in the cold too. One was killed by the careers because she lit herself a fire. Some suffered less — girl on fire had a sleeping bag. Why couldn’t Rue have gotten that bag?
They had to trust that she could manage.
The days passed in this way. Rue froze every night, but she revived herself every morning.
She passed her days in the air, in the trees. She foraged and hid.
But the rest of the time, she spied. She watched the other tributes, learnt their names and their hiding places. She knew nearly everything all the time.
This terrified them, seeing her so close to those who could kill her, but they knew she was doing the right thing. And she was not waiting to die.
They were so proud, even as they wanted to smother the hope blooming in their chests.
When Rue’s mother and father are asked to the Justice Building, they think they are going to be punished. They tell the five children at home to stay quiet and be good, thinking there are only five ways they can be punished more.
It turns out to be almost as bad. There are only ten tributes left now — they know this, though Rue’s father does not think about it, Rue’s mother obsessively counts the tributes left, names them by district on her fingers to stem the flow of panic. Rue helped saved the girl on fire from the careers, and now she is nursing her back to health. They hope it is the right move.
The game makers are preparing little clips on the tributes’ families, in preparation for the final eight, assuming their daughter survives that long. One of them actually starts to say that to them, before someone who knows what tact is kicks them.
It feels false to talk about her as part of eight when two more need to die for that to be true. They talk stiltedly in an old room on the ground floor, the walls so dusty that Rue’s mother’s fingers look ashen when she steps away. When they have asked them for secrets about Rue, and they have made them cry, they ask to see the house, to see if Rue’s siblings have anything to say.
Their children are just as bad at the charade. The youngest two think they are being allowed to send a message to Rue, and keep telling her to hold on, stay alive, they love her so much. They want to see her. One of the producers says it’s cute, they might keep it in anyway. Rue’s parents say nothing in response.
When the camera crew leave, and their home is quiet again, they can feel the intrusion of the Capitol. Something in the air, in the disrupted dust, and suddenly it’s tough to imagine Rue here anymore. They can’t see her walking through the door, asleep draped over a chair like she had so many times before, keeping watch over her siblings. Rue’s younger brother won’t stop crying after they leave, and he can’t articulate why the tears keep coming, a boiled pot overflowing. For once, it does not result in their entire brood crying together. Some of them are too forlorn for tears.
Their daughter laughed, in that god-awful place. They had been worried when she saved the girl on fire but she had been a gift after all. She made sure Rue got to eat a proper meal, the kind she had never had in her life, and Rue got to sing. They wished they could be shown more of them just talking to each other, more of Rue being a little girl and making a friend, but the cameras wanted to show them the careers out hunting. When they settled in to sleep together, Rue finally warm, they worried that Katniss would turn on her. But she only slept.
When Katniss and Rue hatch the plan together over breakfast, Rue’s mother thinks it is a good idea. Rue’s father cannot get over his fear, but she thinks that Rue can only sit and wait in there for so long. There are not very many tributes left. She notices that Katniss takes the more dangerous part of the plan for herself, and she is grateful for older sisters.
It goes well, but not without a hitch. Rue never manages to light the third fire — Rue forgot to be careful as she ran to it, and nearly collides with a girl stooping to inspect the green leaves. She has fiery hair and is holding a knife. Five, her mother says, but all her father can do is watch. His daughter is standing on the ground, her slingshot in her backpack, smaller and younger than her opponent.
All her advantages are lost to the trees, and they see on her face that she knows it. Rue begins to back away, arms at her sides.
Just as the girl looks like she will pursue, Rue sprints away. She heads into the trees, headlong, as fast as her legs can carry her. She does not look back.
The cameras linger just long enough to show the reaction of the girl from Five — she does not throw the knife, and does not follow, instead turning to skirt the treeline in the opposite direction. But there is a cruel tilt to her lips as she watches the horizon that chills Rue’s father to the bone.
Rue runs so far and so fast she leaves the treeline. She isn’t being pursued, but her head whips back and forth as though she hears something just behind her. Then they hear the laughter.
It is not the joyful camaraderie they heard before, it is the jeering of killers. Rue realises her mistake at the same time they do. The killers are between her and the trees.
The trees, the dizzying heights, her safe place — they were even how Katniss survived them days before, when their alliance began.
Rue slows to a loping pace, ducking down towards the ground, and her father’s heart contracts before he realises. Now, her footsteps are silent. She heads further through the undergrowth, past boulders that become tiny mountains next to Rue’s hunched form. She continues her escape.
The careers are clumsy, and evidently trained to kill those at their feet or fight for their lives rather than the delicate game of chase Rue is leading them on. They grow more frustrated, but do not give up.
Rue decides to hide, biting her thumb to keep quiet, as the careers clumsily search and kick undergrowth. The cameras do not make clear how far away Rue is.
Before they can try to study Rue’s position, the cameras move to Katniss. They want to scream. Katniss is watching Five sprint towards the careers’ supplies, past their sleepy guard. The commentators explain that the boy from Three rigged up some explosives, that Five’s spying has taught her where it is safe to step, and they wonder whether Katniss will be able to work it out. All they want to see is Rue.
They stay on Katniss’ puzzlement for far too long, as she crawls around behind her bush. Clearly, something clicks, her mouth parting, and Katniss draws an arrow.
Finally, they see Rue; she is crawling slowly. The careers have taken to calling out for her, mocking her. They say awful things — what they will do to her, how they will make her pay. Their Rue is terrified, they can see that. But she does not give herself up.
The screen is split now. Katniss fires an arrow. It misses, but she doesn’t look disappointed. It hit a burlap sack of something, but barely tears a whole in the bottom. She sets up to shoot again.
Rue is still again. Her father remembers teaching her about animals, about watching, about how movement and colour will give you away faster than anything else. Most of the careers are debating giving up, but one of them is still looking. It’s the girl with the knives — Two, his wife supplies — and she is close. They think that Rue must have been safe before because they can see that the girl will catch Rue now.
Katniss has shot again, torn another small hole in the burlap. They can see it is full of apples, but why that is helpful he cannot say. Until Katniss stands to line up the next shot. And he remembers the explosives, that pressure will set them off. That sack full of apples…
Katniss lets the arrow fly.
The force blows her backwards.
Rue flinches, as far as she must be, but she does not make a sound. Two sprints back to the other careers and they watch the smoke together. They are frantic.
They run back to their camp, away from Rue…
Katniss is on the ground. She’s clearly hurt, blood on her face, and she can’t get up. It’s all she can do to crawl into the cover of a bush and watch.
The boy from Two kills the one from Three. His rage is ridiculous and terrifying as he storms the camp. The boy from One doesn’t take him seriously and nearly gets a sword in the chest for his trouble.
The calmer ones leave him to his psychosis and pick through the wreckage but they don’t find anything they want. His district partner seemed to know how to manage him as his furor finally abates. She has a plan.
The girl from Two has them gather the ropes and wooden planks and sharp things they had set aside earlier and build traps in the woods. Some of the other tributes are clearly working together to hurt them, so she wants them to play the same game.
The cameras show them just enough so that they understand the careers are building something, but they don’t let them really understand what.
They aren’t worried about that. Rue’s siblings are scared for her, really scared for her — that was the first time since the bloodbath where she nearly died. They huddle close on the ground, a little circle that somehow preserves space for their missing sister. For the first time in a while, Rue’s parents need to take care of their other children. They eat together, feasting on the pity and generosity of their neighbours. They find out there is a collection going around to send Rue some bread — she has done so well, and people are rooting for her.
Perhaps there’s a little less pity involved than they thought.
Before they go to bed, they see Rue asleep too, warm finally in the sleeping bag she borrowed from Katniss. She’s on the ground for once, which worries them, but they tell the children she is so well hidden no one will find her.
They even think they aren’t lying, with the careers so far off in the woods. For once she might be safe out of them.
In the morning, Katniss begins to move, but it’s clear she’s injured. Rue is fine, thankfully, but she takes a while to get moving. She looks strange walking on the ground instead of flying through the trees. Her mother does not say anything, but she thinks Rue is lost. They haven’t seen her scouting here, but she might be being overcautious after her blunder yesterday.
The day passes slowly. Katniss spends most of the day sitting at their meeting point, slowly eating what seems to be all the food in her pack. Rue finally finds the edge of the trees again by midday.
The cameras are lethargic, jumping from tribute to tribute, everyone in between tasks or lying in wait. It doesn’t quite feel ominous.
Rue spends a little time in the air, apparently trying to figure out where she is and how to find Katniss, then returns to the ground. Katniss is walking around by this point too. She seems to be following something on the ground, but Rue’s mother has no idea what.
Then they hear the screaming.
Rue’s mother feels something inside her snap, feels her physical body fall away as she lives in that scream. The game makers show a recap, Rue climbed over a root and set off some kind of trap. She’s suspended in a net, desperately tugging at it but she can’t get free. She screams again, this time forming a name — Katniss!
God, she must be desperate and afraid. Now Katniss is calling for her too, just as loud, daring anyone to come for her. She sees Katniss sprinting through the undergrowth, but all she wants is to be shown her daughter.
She is still pulling at the ropes, still frantic, still hasn’t given up when Katniss arrives in the clearing. Rue reaches for her.
And then they see the spear.
Katniss fires an arrow, and they see him on the ground and bleeding out, before they get to see their daughter.
Before they get to see the blood.
Katniss pulls her free, lays her out on the grass. A cannon sounds for the boy from One who threw the spear, but Katniss does not look up. Rue is gasping, tiny hiccupping breaths, her hands reaching for something. They settle on Katniss’ arm. Katniss takes her hand.
Rue asks about the food, as if that matters at all.
You have to win, she says. Katniss promises. She hates the tiny things her daughter is dying for.
Then Rue asks her to sing. Music, for their little girl who thrived on it, who used it to sustain her when they had no more food.
Katniss’ voice is thick with tears, cracking and uncertain. She sings of a meadow, of softness and love and peace.
Then the cannon fires. Their silent family makes a bubble even in the crowded square. Everyone gives them space as though their grief might be catching. Rue’s mother is shocked that Katniss has stayed. That she continues to sing, even though their little girl is gone.
The song ends, and Katniss is still crying. She makes no move to stand, just holding on to Rue even though she is beyond protection.
The camera cuts away. Rue’s father is on his knees. Two of their daughters are clinging to him. The rest of them are listless.
Rue’s mother needs to see her body be carried away. After someone dies, the helicarrier comes for them. The camera watches them be carried away, and then they are gone. They have watched it happen so many times, in these games and in previous ones. She needs to see it now. She can’t articulate it but she needs it, she needs it desperately.
Yet all the cameras will show them is the careers from Two. They have decided not to pursue the cannons — they would rather the boy from One go alone and die, they think that two cannons is enough bloodshed and they don’t have to exert themselves yet. They have a meaningless conversation about which two could be dead, sitting and sharpening their weapons, as they say performatively cruel things about killing.
Rue’s mother feels like she is dying. Her son took her hand at some point. His face is so painted in tears it is shiny. She touches her own face and notices the dripping. She squeezes his hand but she cannot leave yet. She needs to see.
They have been watching the girl from Five sitting against a tree for what feels like forever when the camera finally cuts away.
Katniss is walking away. She wears three backpacks now, and she raises three fingers to the sky. Some kind of salute, like the people from her district did for her, Rue’s mother remembers — then her head empties.
The boy who killed Rue lies where he fell, his head in a pool of his own blood. But Rue has been transformed. She lies surrounded by wildflowers. They have been woven into her hair, her clothes. They cover her wounds. She looks like their daughter, and she looks like she has been loved.
As the claw comes from the sky to take her away, Rue’s mother finally falls to the ground. Her husband knows her, and knows that she is ready. Together, they go to suffer and grieve at home.
The rest of the games are meaningless to them.
The girl on fire keeps her promise, but not in remembrance of Rue.
People talk about Katniss’ trick with some berries for weeks afterwards, tracing the same words as though there is comfort or awe in them. When too many people are listening, it is phrased differently: she tried to commit suicide with the boy she loved.
At first all Rue’s father can think is that their daughter and her promise clearly mattered so little to that Katniss. Then he begins to think some more.
People are angry. It is a thrumming undercurrent, a haze in the air. No one quite knows what to do, but everyone’s thoughts seem to be screaming, not this .
Rue’s father oscillates between powerfully indignant and afraid, he vacillates between thoughts of action and thoughts of evasion, always thinking of his children. Rue’s mother is more decided; she thinks that her children will never be safe unless something changes. Rue’s memory proves that. She begins to involve herself with certain people.
When Peeta and Katniss come on the victory tour, they do not look like the people who won the games. They are pretty and smiling, with expensive clothes and shiny hair, and they do not look like people they could know. It is hard to see the girl who sang their daughter gently into her death in the young woman who stands, wringing her hands, pretending she isn’t looking at them.
Her lover is impossibly generous — and impossibly foolish, Rue’s mother thinks, to offer all that money. Giving away your victor’s winnings? She has never heard of such a thing.
Their time is up, their slot finished, when Katniss flails, grabbing for the microphone. She says lovely, heartbreaking things but all Rue’s mother can think is — she remembers. More people than their faltering family miss Rue.
When the man is shot, they hurry away with the rest of the crowd but Rue’s mother’s thoughts are spinning. She thinks that maybe, just maybe, the Capitol is afraid of them.
They do not pay attention to the rest of the tour. After each district there is a carefully curated Capitol clip — mostly of Katniss and Peeta and their clothes — but it’s all so shallow and similar that they can get away with ignoring it. When Peeta proposes, they think that Katniss’ joy looks as hollow as a rotting tree. Rue’s sister asks, Aren’t they a bit young? To which her father replies, Yes. Yes, they are.
They cannot say for sure why they would do this, or why they would be allowed to.
When the Quarter Quell is announced, their first thought is that they are relieved. Zinnia will not have to be a part of a reaping this year. She will not be at risk. The risk would have been slight, someone says to her, forgetting that she is Rue’s mother. The risk was only one round of tesserae higher for Rue.
Then Rue’s parents begin to hear the whispers. Among several of the higher numbered districts, they already know who some of the victor tributes will be this year. One of them is Katniss Everdeen.
No one thinks this is a coincidence.
Rue’s parents argue about what it means, about what they are going to do next. They remember that their anger is rooted in love, and they do not push each other away.
Rue’s oldest sister, now the oldest in the family, tries to take over what Rue used to do to look after their siblings. She never realised how hard it was.
Their son gets beaten one day during class. He said that the Hunger Games were unfair, and that the Capitol were cruel. Mild sentiments, but shocking to say in public.
They leave his body, bloody and unconscious, in the square. No one helps them carry him home.
He is alive. They do their best to set his knee. Their home is quiet, but supplies appear on their doorstep and through the window — bandages, a poultice, a bit of bread. Their son cries, but he is not sorry.
None of them are sorry for the truth.
The Quarter Quell is a miserable affair. People are refusing to watch, or when they do they notice how thin the charade has become. The victors are angry and rebellious in themselves. They use rage and sweet simpering and calculated logic to cause chaos in the Capitol before they are sent to the arena.
The feed is cut before the interviews can finish, but there is a moment — the image is burned onto their eyelids. Twenty-four tributes from twelve districts, all hand in hand, staring the Capitol in the eye.
They go quietly home that night.
The games are sluggish, uninteresting. People die, people become allies. Mostly people are killed by the arena itself. The commentators are gleeful as they explain the clock mechanism, but all they can see is the Capitol’s callousness.
Rue’s father is grateful his daughter’s arena was kinder, that it might have reminded her of home.
They go to the meetings for those who want to do something now. Mostly his wife goes since it’s too suspicious for both of them to be out and away from the children.
Their son is healing, but there is a jagged edge in him that worries them. His father takes time to caution him. He is so young. He should not have to play pretend with stakes this high.
The games end quickly, but explosively. When the feed cuts, when Katniss fires the arrow and everything explodes, there is silence in the square. Rue’s parents hurry their children home.
They hear the news that Twelve is burning in a mandatory announcement before dawn. Their televisions show burning buildings, the dead bodies covered in ash in the street, the craters in the ground. Whenever they think the footage is looping, they are shown some new atrocity. They don’t try too hard to shield the children from it. Eleven is the last district now.
There will be a raid on the peacekeepers today. Both parents sign up to help.
Barely a day passes without a skirmish now. The people are angry and they are not willing to stand down anymore. They are both helping to steal food, to hide it in stores for the rebels. They know that food production will be essential to the rebellion, and that lack of access will kill the movement as quickly as any bomb.
Some people turn away, refusing to see the change that they are clawing within reach. But District Eleven is large. They can tear this down even if some people turn away.
The world is a mess. The fighting lasts for months. They build barricades and tear down the Capitol buildings and try to sow and reap food without getting shot. War wages.
They learn that District Thirteen is still alive, and assaulting the Capitol. The flow of information is spotty and reckless.
People rally around Katniss Everdeen. Rue’s father looks at the footage of her and sees a courageous child. But he cannot deny that they need her.
Their children are confused by the rebellion and their parents cannot pretend they understand more about it. But the children have an excitement that has been damped in their parents. They all try to have faith. They will not go backwards. It is all or nothing.
Rue’s mother dies in the final push to take District Eleven back. It is theirs, as no one alive remembers, but Rue’s father is hollow. Thanks to Rue, his children understand what it means that their mother is gone. They are comatose, catatonic, inconsolable. Rue’s father feels dead inside. He loved her so much. He is alone now.
He focuses on keeping his family together. Love is a tangible thing, this he knows now. He feels the places in his chest love has carved out of him, and the chains of love that tie him to his children. His family will not grow any smaller.
They take the instructions of rebels and stay in abandoned homes, cobbled-together tents, beneath trees, anything they can find. He keeps them together. In the dark hours, his children turn to music. Simple tunes, lilting songs.
At first he worries about the noise but the soldiers tell him they appreciate it. It reminds them what they are fighting for. And they have always been a musical people.
He cannot bring himself to join in but he hears the ghost of his daughter in their symphony. He feels his wife next to him in the children they cherished together.
The days pass on, grey and listless and awful. They are together, at least.
They are in a makeshift shelter when they hear the Capitol has fallen. The assault was always in fits and starts, and the footage from Thirteen was always heavily edited, not that Rue’s father could often bring himself to watch.
People force themselves to celebrate. But the feeling that is real is the blossoming hope, the idea that this could be the beginning of something real.
They are in the house of some dead neighbours when they hear that their daughter’s ally killed the new president instead of the old. They are not sure they care.
They just want it all to stop. Those are the words his children used. He knows they do not miss the lives they had before, they simply do not want this any longer — he does not blame them. Too much has already been taken from them.
He determines that he will make this new world better for them. He is not worried that he doesn’t know what that will look like.
They now have to vote. It is complicated, and flawed, and strange to be asked for his opinion. He does not dislike it.
They reopen the district — people will always need food, after all — but the hours are leisurely now. The children have to go to school all year round now, and they do not work in the fields.
New people come. It is an adjustment, but what is the world if not changed?
Eventually, they get food, technology, and medicine. He forgets what it was to always be hungry.
There is disquiet and unrest but Rue’s father holds on to the peace fluttering in his chest.
People travel now, to other districts and even to the Capitol. He does not wish to go. His son is fourteen now, and wants to go on a trip to Four. It takes everything in him to let him go, and he does not feel comfortable again until he is back, aglow and smiling.
He gets to watch his children flourish and he lets the memories of those he has lost become transcendent along with them.
When he passes away, a long, long time later, he thinks that he has so many stories to tell those he loved of what the world has become.
Now, Rue’s siblings grow up. None of them ever have to stand in a reaping, or sign up for another round of tesserae. None of them ever have to watch another Hunger Games, or worry whether their children will be reaped that year.
The world is difficult, and complicated, and unfair.
The world is theirs. They let themselves fill it up.
The memory of their sister fades, like a rock worn smooth by the sea. But sometimes, they will see a tree tall enough to prick the clouds, a flower threaded through hair, a mockingjay, and they remember. They rue what should never have been, but they find time in the day to be happy.