A daunting shiver runs through my spine as I stand shakily at the very back edge of the district eleven over-stuffed plaza, waiting for the dreadful, yearly reaping to start. Young, scared eyes are frantically looking around, trying to find the comforting gaze of their loved ones for what may be the last time. Everybody is shifting nervously around as if we are all standing on uneven, moving land. Every year, the same woman, with the name of Harper Hayes, goes to every district to announce two names of opposite genders to attend the murderous Hunger Games. The people owning those names get a look of shock, fear and dread written all over their faces, so easily displayed that they don’t even try to hide it. This year, Harper looks around the crowd with a long, slow 180 degree gaze before putting her delicate hand in the jar full of so many innocent names and slowly pulls out one small, folded, two by two slip of parchment. The silence in the air was like someone turned the humidity up to a thousand percent, chocking us all into a dreadful silence. The one name that I thought would never have been called, not in the jar of so many names, got called out clean and crisp, slicing through the air.

“Juniper Stowe!”

My legs feel like jelly, the shock overwhelming me, as I try to stand up. The relieved faces that surround me give me sorrowful stares as I finally get my energy to shakily rise to my full height. My emotions are whirring inside of me like a hurricane, but they are all being hidden away as realization starts to hit me as I slowly sit back down with a feeling that no other person can understand.