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frozeninice · 6 months

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Notes upon my re-read of The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins.

Part I: The Hunger Games

November 9, 2023

Warning: Spoilers !!!!

- Madge gave Katniss the mockingjay pin and kissed Katniss on the cheek. Was Madge part of the rebellion???

- Katniss was only 16yo ??

- Peeta telling Katniss and Haymitch that his mom, when she came to say goodbye the day of the reaping, “she’s a survivor, that one. She is” 😭😭

- THE BOY WITH THE BREAD

- Peeta, “I think we have a shadow”, RUE

- Katniss shooting the arrow at the apple in the pigs mouth. “Thank you for your consideration”, bow’s then leaves. SLAY QUEEEEEEN

- Peeta asking to be coached separately. I see what you’re doing boi. You’re trying to save her. I seeeeee youuuu boi.

- Good ol Haymitch. “You’ve got about as much charm as a dead slug.”

- Peeta’s “because she came here with me” AHHHHHHHHHH

Peeta being a boss ass bitch

“My best hope is not to disgrace myself and … I don’t know how to say it exactly. Only … I want to die as myself. Does that make any sense?” he asks. “I don’t want them to change me in there. Turn me into some kind of monster that I’m not.”

I bite my lip, feeling inferior. While I’ve been ruminating on the availability of trees, Peeta has been struggling with how to maintain his identity. His purity of self. “Do you mean you won’t kill anyone?” I ask.

“No, when the time comes, I’m sure I’ll kill just like everybody else. I can’t go down without a fight. Only I keep wishing I could think of a way to … to show the Capitol they don’t own me. That I’m more than just a piece in their Games,” says Peeta.

- “Nervousness seeps into terror as I anticipate what is to come. I could be dead, flat-out dead, in an hour. Not even.”

- Katniss is in the cylinder, with the podium thing she’s standing on rising to bring her to the arena. Random thought. What if one year, they actually launched the tributes into the area? They landed in like idk water or something? What a thought.

- Oh my god. This is bringing back sooooo many memories. Remember the Goodreads groups? Like discussion threads? I was in so many for the hunger games. You’d make up your own character and reenact the HG with other people’s characters. Wild time.

- Ah fuck the game makers for creating a forest fire. Don’t they know about climate change??

- Ohhhhhh shit. Rue pointing to the wasp nests above Katniss in the tree. Shits about to go downnnn

- “Peeta Mellark just saved my life.”

Katniss being dumb ass shit about Peeta

“You know the boy from my district? Peeta? I think he saved my life. But he was with the Careers.”

“He’s not with them now,” she says. “I’ve spied on their base camp by the lake. They made it back before they collapsed from the stingers. But he’s not there. Maybe he did save you and had to run.”

I don’t answer. If, in fact, Peeta did save me, I’m in his debt again. And this can’t be paid back. “If he did, it was all probably just part of his act. You know, to make people think he’s in love with me.”

“Oh,” says Rue thoughtfully. “I didn’t think that was an act.”

- OMG KATNISS YOU ARE SO DUMBBBBB “So Peeta is out there in the woods, wounded badly. But I am still in the dark on what motivated him to betray the Careers.” YOU. YOU ARE WHAT MOTIVATED HIM YOU BIG O DUMBASS

- Not Katniss blowing up the Careers’ supplies with 3 arrows like a mf badass

- “Let the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games begin, Cato, I think. Let them begin for real.”

Katniss not realized Rue has gone missing

- “There’s no sign of Rue, not on the ground or in the trees. This is odd. By now she should have returned, as it’s midday … She’s probably just being cautious about making her way back. I wish she’d hurry, because I don’t want to hand around here too long.”

- “I go ahead and eat the second fish. It isn’t going to last long in this hot sun, but it should be easy enough to spear a few more for Rue. If she would just show up.”

- “Dangling up in the tree, with the sun warming me, a mouthful of mint, my bow and arrows at hand . . . this is the most relaxed I’ve been since I’ve entered the arena. If only Rue would show up, and we could clear out.”

- “In less than an hour, I’m at the place where we agreed to have the third fire and I know something has gone amiss.” Fuckkkkkkkkkk Katniss only now realizing.

- “When I break into the clearing, she’s on the ground, hopelessly entangled in a net. She just has time to reach her hand through the mesh and say my name before the spear enters her body”. 🥺😫😭

Rue has rolled to her side, her body curved in and around the spear. I shove the boy away from her and pull out my knife, freeing her from the net. One look at the wound and I know it’s far beyond my capacity to heal. Beyond anyone’s capacity probably. The spearhead is buried up to the shaft in her stomach. I crouch before her, staring helplessly at the embedded weapon. There’s no point in comforting words, in telling her she’ll be all right. She’s no fool. Her hand reaches her it and I clutch it like a lifeline. As if it’s me who’s dying instead of Rue.

“You blew up the food?” she whispers.

“Every last bit,” I say.

“You have to win,” she says.

“I’m going to. Going to win for both of us now,” I promise. I hear a cannon and look up. It must be for the boy from District 1.

“Don’t go.” Rue tightens her grip on my hand.

“Course not. Staying right here,” I say. I move in closer to her, pulling her head onto my lap. I gently brush the dark, thick hair back behind her ear.

“Sing,” she says, but I barely catch the word.

. . .

Sing. My throat is tight with tears, hoarse from smoke and fatigue. But is is Prim’s, I mean, Rue’s last request, I have to at least try. The song that comes to me is a simple lullaby, one we sing fretful, hungry babies to sleep with. It’s old, very old I think. Made up long ago in our hills. What my music teacher calls a mountain air. But the words are easy and soothing, promising tomorrow with be more hopeful than this awful piece of time we call today.

I give a small cough, swallow hard, and begin.

. . .

Rue’s eyes have fluttered shut. Her chest moves but only slightly. My throat releases the tears and they slide down my cheeks. But I have to finish the song for her.

. . .

Everything’s still and quiet. Then, almost eerily, the mockingjays take up my song.

For a moment, I sit there, watching my tears drop down on her face. Rue’s cannon fires. I lean forward and press my lips against her temple. Slowly, as if not to wake her, I lay her head back in the ground and release her hand.

“Rue’s Farewell”

I can’t stop looking at Rue, smaller than ever, a baby animal curled up in a nest of netting. I can’t bring myself to leave her like this. Past harm, but seeming utterly defenceless. To hate the boy from District 1, who also appears so vulnerable in death, seems inadequate. It’s the Capitol I hate, for doing this to all of us.

Gale’s voice is in my head. His ravings against the Capitol no longer pointless, no longer to be ignored. Rue’s death has forced me to confront my own fury against the cruelty, the i justice they inflict upon us. But here, even more strongly than at home, I feel my impotence. There’s no way to take revenge on the Capitol. Is there?

Then I remember Peeta’s words on the roof. “Only I keep wishing I could think of a way to . . . to show the Capitol they don’t own me. That I’m more than just a piece in their Games.” And for the first time, I understand what he means.

I want to do something, right here, right now, to shame them, to make them accountable, to show the Capitol that whatever they do or force us to do there is a part of every tribute they can’t own. That Rue was more than a piece in their Games. And so am I.

A few steps into the woods grows a bank of wildflowers. Perhaps they are really weeds of some sort, but they have blossoms in beautiful shades of violet and yellow and white. I gather up an armful and come back to Rue’s side. Slowly, one stem at a time, I decorate her body in the flowers. Covering the ugly wound. Wreathing her face. Weaving her hair with bright colours.

They’ll have to show it. Or, even if they choose to turn the cameras elsewhere at this moment, they’ll have to bring them back when they collect the bodies and everyone will see her then and know I did it. I step back and take a last look at Rue. She could really be asleep in that meadow after all.

“Bye, Rue,” I whisper. I press the three middle fingers of my liegt hand against my lips and hold them out in her direction. Then I walk away without looking back.

. . .

Another mockingjay, a young one by the look of it, lands on a branch before me and burst out Rue’s melody. My song, the hovercraft, were too unfamiliar for this novice to pick up, but it has mastered her handful of notes. The ones that mean she’s safe.

“Good and safe,” I say as I pass under its branch. “We don’t have to worry about her now.” Good and safe.

- ITS A LIE. DON’T FALL FOR IT. DON’T BELIEVE IT. ITS A TRAP. NOOOOO. “The news sinks in. Two tributes can win this year. If they’re from the same district. Both can live. Both of us can live. Before I can stop myself, I call out Peeta’s name.”

- Ooooooh shit i forgot Katniss drugs Peeta with the sleep syrup, so she can run for the feast prize. You sneaky bitch.

- Katniss @ Gale. “I wonder what he makes of all this kissing.” ASHSHSHHS KATNISS YOU FOOL.

- Thresh sparing Katniss after learning she was allies with Rue and protected her before her death. An eye for an eye.

- I wonder what was in District 2’s feast bag that they desperately needed.

- Also, as a nurse. I wonder how one injection is gonna help save Peeta from sepsis. How strong is that one shot?? The fuck is in that thing?

- “It’s him. I do not want to lose the boy with the bread.”

- Mutations time.

- OHHHHH SHIT. THE MUTTATIONS ARE MADE FROM THE DEAD TRIBUTES!!!

The ending

“Greetings to the final contestants of the Seventy-forth Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked. Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed,” he says. “Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favour.”

There’s a small burst of static and then nothing more. I stare at Peeta in disbelief as the truth sinks in. They never intended to let us both live. This has all been devised by the Gamemakers to guarantee the most dramatic showdown in history. And like a fool, I bought into it.

“If you think about it, it’s not that surprising,” he says softly. I watch as he painfully makes it to his feet. Then he’s moving towards me, as if in slow motion, his hand is pulling the knife from his belt—

Before I am even aware of my actions, my bow is loaded with the arrow pointed straight at his heart. Peeta raises his eyebrows and I see his knife has already left his hand on its way to the lake where it splashes in the water. I drop my weapons and take a step back, my face burning in what can only be shame.

“No,” he says. “Do it.” Peeta limps toward me and thrusts the weapons back in my hands.

“I can’t,” I say. “I won’t.”

“Do it. Before they send those mutts back or something. I don’t want to die like Cato,” he says.

“Then you shoot me,” I say furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. “You shoot me and go home and live with it!” And as I say it, I know death right here, right now would be the easier of the two.

. . .

If Peeta and I were both to die, or they thought we were …

My fingers fumble with the pouch on my belt, freeing it. Peeta sees it and his hand clamps on my wrist. “No, I won’t let you.”

“Trust me,” I whisper. He holds my gaze for a long moment then lets me go. I loosen the top of the pouch and pour a few spoonfuls of berries into his palm. Then I fill my own. “On the count of three?”

Peeta leans down and kisses me once, very gently. “The count of three,” he says.

We stand, our backs pressed together, our empty hands locked right.

“Hold them out. I want everyone to see,” he says.

I spread out my fingers, and the dark berries glisten in the sun. I give Peeta’s hand one last squeeze as a signal, as a goodbye, and we begin counting. “One.” Maybe I’m wrong. “Two.” Maybe they don’t care if we both die. “Three!” It’s too late to change my mind. I life my hand to my mouth, taking one last look at the world. The berries have just passed my lips when the trumpets begin to blare.

The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouts above them. “Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentleman, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-forth Hunger Games. Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you — the tributes of District Twelve!”

KATNISS UGH WHY CANT YOU TALK ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS EVER

I want to tell him that he’s not being fair. That we were strangers. That I did what it took to stay alive, to keep us both alive in the arena. that I can’t explain how things are with Gale because I don’t know myself. That its no good loving me because I’m never going to get married anyway and he’s just end up hating me later instead of sooner. That if I do have feelings for him, it doesn’t matter because I’ll never be able to afford the kind of love that leads to a family, to children. And how can he? How can he after work what we’ve just been through?

I also want to tell him how much I already miss him. But that wouldn’t be fair on my part.

So we just stand there silently, watching our grimy little station rise up around us. Through the window, I can see the platform’s thick with cameras. Everyone will be eagerly watching our homecoming.

Listening to the official OST

- the way “The Cave” introduces Katniss and Peeta’s theme so well. Sounds so similar to “I Need You” from CF.

- The second half of “Rue’s Farewell” hits hard. The emotion. The hints of rebellion. Yessss. Also fuck the Capitol for choosing Rue and choosing her death.

- Second half of “Tenuous Winners/Returning Home”, or the “Returning Home” part is interesting. As in CF, “The Tour” has the same theme. It’s a nice play where returning home and returning back to the Capitol has the same theme.

#thg #thg katniss #thg series #thg peeta #thg re-read #the hunger games #the hunger games series #re read #reading

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