The Hunger Games

stung, too, when they drew the tracker jackers in by the lake,” says Rue. “I guess they agreed to let him live if he acted as their guard. But he’s not very big.”
    “What weapons does he have?” I ask.
    “Not much that I could see. A spear. He might be able to hold a few of us off with that, but Thresh could kill him easily,” says Rue.
    “And the food’s just out in the open?” I say. She nods. “Something’s not quite right about that whole setup.”
    “I know. But I couldn’t tell what exactly,” says Rue. “Katniss, even if you could get to the food, how would you get rid of it?”
    “Burn it. Dump it in the lake. Soak it in fuel.” I poke Rue in the belly, just like I would Prim. “Eat it!” She giggles. “Don’t worry, I’ll think of something. Destroying things is much easier than making them.”
    For a while, we dig roots, we gather berries and greens, we devise a strategy in hushed voices. And I come to know Rue, the oldest of six kids, fiercely protective of her siblings, who gives her rations to the younger ones, who forages in the meadows in a district where the Peacekeepers are far less obliging than ours. Rue, who when you ask her what she loves most in the world, replies, of all things, “Music.”
    “Music?” I say. In our world, I rank music somewhere between hair ribbons and rainbows in terms of usefulness. At least a rainbow gives you a tip about the weather. “You have a lot of time for that?”
    “We sing at home. At work, too. That’s why I love your pin,” she says, pointing to the mockingjay that I’ve again forgotten about.
    “You have mockingjays?” I ask.
    “Oh, yes. I have a few that are my special friends. We can sing back and forth for hours. They carry messages for me,” she says.
    “What do you mean?” I say.
    “I’m usually up highest, so I’m the first to see the flag that signals quitting time. There’s a special little song I do,” says Rue. She opens her mouth and sings a little four-note run in a sweet, clear voice. “And the mockingjays spread it around the orchard. That’s how everyone knows to knock off,” she continues. “They can be dangerous though, if you get too near their nests. But you can’t blame them for that.”
    I unclasp the pin and hold it out to her. “Here, you take it. It has more meaning for you than me.”
    “Oh, no,” says Rue, closing my fingers back over the pin. “I like to see it on you. That’s how I decided I could trust you. Besides, I have this.” She pulls a necklace woven out of some kind of grass from her shirt. On it, hangs a roughly carved wooden star. Or maybe it’s a flower. “It’s a good luck charm.”
    “Well, it’s worked so far,” I say, pinning the mockingjay back on my shirt. “Maybe you should just stick with that.”
    By lunch, we have a plan. By early afternoon, we are poised to carry it out. I help Rue collect and place the wood for the first two campfires, the third she’ll have time for on her own. We decide to meet afterward at the site where we ate our first meal together. The stream should help guide me back to it. Before I leave, I make sure Rue’s well stocked with food and matches. I even insist she take my sleeping bag, in case it’s not possible to rendezvous by nightfall.
    “What about you? Won’t you be cold?” she asks.
    “Not if I pick up another bag down by the lake,” I say. “You know, stealing isn’t illegal here,” I say with a grin.
    At the last minute, Rue decides to teach me her mockingjay signal, the one she gives to indicate the day’s work is done. “It might not work. But if you hear the mockingjays singing it, you’ll know I’m okay, only I can’t get back right away.”
    “Are there many mockingjays here?” I ask.
    “Haven’t you seen them? They’ve got nests everywhere,” she says. I have to admit I haven’t noticed.
    “Okay, then. If all goes according to plan, I’ll see you for dinner,” I say.
    Unexpectedly, Rue throws her arms around me. I only hesitate a moment before I hug her back.
    “You be careful,” she says to me.
    “You, too,” I say. I turn and head back to the stream, feeling somehow worried. About Rue being killed, about Rue not being killed and the two of us being left for last, about leaving Rue alone, about leaving Prim alone back home. No, Prim has my mother and Gale and a baker who has promised she won’t go hungry. Rue has only me.
    Once I reach the stream, I have only to follow it