JANUARY - JULY 106
One month. Kya lifts her head during the strange ritual called tummy time. She likes to stare at her parents' faces. Her eyes are big and when she cries it's also big and very loud. She smiles once and it maybe is because she has pooped but he and Cress both cry.
The days pass in an exhausted blur. He doesn't accomplish much by way of revolution because he is busy accomplishing the smaller, more granular parts of life: cleaning blowouts, figuring out how to warm up the bottle just so, endlessly supporting Kya's little head, himself panicked and careful, not a natural at this at all. But Enna has agreed to let him help. Nano might be moved. He wants back in.
Two months. She coos and gurgles a lot. She is less jerky, she picks her head up more consistently when they do the tummy time. Slate reads to her several times a day, in part to pass the time, breaking it into chunks of one book to the next. She reaches for the pages with splayed fingers.
Spring coming to the Capitol. They go on walks with her, strapped to one of their chests. In Eleven things intensify. In every District, they intensify. Slate longs for the drugs that numbed him. He has nightmares almost every night now. He wakes to Kya screaming as if she too has seen Mercuria's death again in her mind's eye. He goes to her and finds comfort in her little body and her small, human needs.
Three months. She laughs now and smiles when they make silly faces. He is better at being silly than he'd thought he would be, better at making her laugh than he'd feared. At tummy time she tries to push herself up. It's like she, too, wants in on the action.
Free Eleven. It exists. It's out there. He keeps himself from whooping with joy when he hears. The neighbors, the walls, the light fixtures all have eyes, all have ears. And then shortly after, the Victor's Ball. An announcement. The age limit is gone. No one is safe. Cress isn't safe.
Four months. She grabs things. She still babbles: babababa, dadadada. When she says this, dadadada, he cries again and is surprised at himself for the outpouring of all this emotion, all this water. Maybe it's the water he soaked up in the Arena, finally draining out.
Free Eleven is a mess but it's free. Difficult to get reports. He wants to go, itches to go, but he won't leave. He can't leave. He's being watched. He and Cress fight off cameras, the press; they all want a piece of Kya but if they each take something she'll have nothing left. Instead they offer themselves up. Smiling and patriotic. At night he helps Enna sometimes. He does what he can.
Five months. She plays with her hands and feet and thinks these limbs of hers are a miracle. She rolls from her tummy to her back. She can sit up for a moment, sometimes two, all on her on.
The 136th Reaping draws closer. Tensions rise. He and Cress get word from friends, other sympathizers, about advances and defeats in Two. The news talks about how exciting this next Games will be, how great for everyone to be able to be involved.
Six months. She is ready for solid food and Slate samples some of it and nearly retches. Cress laughs at him. Kya jabbers and seems to recognize her own name. She puts lots of things in her mouth.
The Games draw closer, closer. The fever pitch the country is at; deafening noise from everywhere. Pressure and fear. He sometimes feels like he can't stop screaming, though he's making no noise at all, no noise ever. He's being perfectly silent. Perfectly good.
