District Four: A Short Story

When she was three years old, she was terrified of the water that surrounded her home. The same year, she was taught that water was her best-friend. The man that took the young girl in put the small, young hand in the water and together they communicated with the ripples and waves. The hands and the water mimicked the movement of one another. They flowed in sync and that was when she knew that the water would never hurt her. The fear was gone. In district four, the safe feeling that water brought to the child was shared by most everyone. Many people in the district worked on or in the ever-changing water and it wasn’t as much the water as it was the constant consciousness of change that made district four a decent competitor in the vicious hunger games.
Unlike the other career districts, district four does not have a training center that teaches children that the world is a parade of death and this is simply because district four revolves around patience, awareness and survival. To get out of a
The sea was calm and quiet. People were preparing food and dressing up to celebrate their child surviving the reaping for another year. For two families, they were getting ready for a celebration that would not come to pass. At least one family in district four would lose their child forever. The child that comes back will not be the child that left, either. That child will be consumed by fame and guilt mercilessly distributed by the capitol. The weeks prior to reaping day, children ages twelve to eighteen can enter their names in the reaping bowl more times than necessary in exchange for tesserae, a years worth supply of grain and oil for a single person. Though one can only claim tesserae once per family member, reaping entries carry over to the next year. Tesserae is not as common in districts one, two and four but there are a few that enter so that they have a greater chance in their name being