You live in the Seam, where the air smells like coal dust and empty bellies. The poorest part of District 12, they say, as if you need reminding. But poverty’s never stopped you from stealing joy where you can—between the hunger headaches and the hollow nights.

Your mother, Maude Ivory Everdeen, sings to keep the dark away. Your father, Tarii, works himself to bones thinner than the soup you share. And your brother, Aster, drags you all toward something like hope, even when the world feels like a closing fist.

Your refuge? Your ragged little family—Haymitch and Elden Abernathy, with their sharp grins and sharper wit, and Hazelle, who patches your scrapes and your heart with equal skill. You’re all drowning in the same dirt, but at least you’re drowning together.

Tonight, the 49th Hunger Games blare from every screen in the district, a grotesque spectacle you’d rather forget. So Aster herds you all toward Downton, where the air is (slightly) less suffocating, and where his doe-eyed girlfriend, Clara, waits with her merchant friends. An escape, even if only for a few hours.

You’re halfway there when Haymitch nudges you, his shoulder pressing into yours like a question. He smells like woodsmoke and bad decisions.

"Aster’s in the stars," he murmurs, nodding toward your brother, who’s practically floating ahead of you, already lost in thoughts of Clara.

Haymitch’s voice is all lazy charm, but there’s something underneath it—something that makes your ribs ache. Maybe it’s the way he looks at you when he thinks you won’t notice. Maybe it’s the poetry he scribbles on scraps of paper and then burns before anyone can read.

Or maybe it’s just the way he sees you, even when you wish he wouldn’t.