Tetra Warden

''“I’m going to sail the sea, my sister. Come with me and we shall travel together.”''

''“I can’t. I have to stay here.”''

''“Why? There’s an entire world out there! A free world!”''

''“I. . . My training.”''

''“Everyone is so wrapped up with training and producing and fishing—no one takes the time to see the little things in life. The trees, the salt air, the morning sunlight.”''

“I’ve worked my whole life—”

''“You’ve worked your whole life to be a slave. If you get chosen for the Games, you’re going to die!”''

“. . . You’re really going then.”

I watched my older sister sail away on a boat one spring afternoon. I thought I would be sad to see her leave with no human companionship and a limited supply of food. But as her boat disappeared on the horizon, I felt an overwhelming sense of hope. I couldn’t say why the hope swelled inside me as the sails vanished for I knew what she did was wrong, but I can say now that I have had years to think about her actions, I admire her bravery and I am proud she is my sister. Is. Because somewhere out there she is alive and thriving.

And she is a promise of a new world, somewhere without the Hunger Games.

But I was a naïve ten year old who didn’t understand what she was talking about. The Games were a staple in my life. As a child raised in a upper middle class household, all my time went into training to enter the Games. I started with wooden weapons and then moved to real weapons. But my grandmother was a wise woman, and she taught me things my parents and grandfather overlooked: she taught me which herbs were the best to use for medication or food or poison, and how to wrap a wound. My sister spent hours with her each day while I trained my physical skills.

It came to me in my thirteenth year that everything my sister said was true. My sister and I were destined to become Tributes and bring wealth and fame to our family. In my sister’s seventeenth year, her name was called—I held my breath as she broke away from the crowd of girls in order to ascend the stage, but not a moment later, someone else took her place. My sister was spared from death.

But her brush with death had inspired her with this newfound hope that somewhere out there was a world that was free from Panem and free from the Hunger Games. A world where she could ride a horse and I could sit and paint for hours each day. There would be no more training for Hunger Games, no more bloodied noses and throbbing knees.

Of course, I didn’t believe her. Or rather, I was afraid to believe her. Believing her would mean that everything I knew was a lie, and our family was only perpetuating this lie. At the time of her departure, I was only ten, and though I was capable of making my own choices, I wish she had forced me to go with her.

“You’re deluding yourself—there is no need for this violence.”

“What is there if there is no Panem?”

''“That’s what I’m going to find out. I have my supplies ready and my ship prepared.”''

“Won’t they see you when you leave?”

“Tetra, you make it sound like this is an ill-prepared departure.”

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I don’t want you to stay.”

To fill the empty void, I fight, I train, I work to become the best so that if I am chosen to go to the Games, I will be prepared. I will bring back a victory, and I will make my family proud. It was hard to lose a sibling, and even harder in the way I did. They searched the bay for her body for days under the belief that she had drowned, but they found nothing. My parents lamented their loss of a daughter and a bringer of great fortune, but my grandmother just sat in a chair on the porch with a smile on her face.

When I am not fighting, I am painting. Sometimes I am paid to paint pictures of the ocean for merchants to sell to those who do not see the rippling waves as I do. My hands are scarred from training, but I can still hold the paint brush between my fingers and gently stroke the canvas. Colors burst across the fabric and delight the eyes of observers.

And I think about Hope.

Everyone looks at my pictures, and they see the sea. But I see Hope in every brush stroke. I see a world out there that is not like a world in here, and I see my sister standing on the far banks, calling for me to join her.