I brush a sweaty strand of hair out of my eyes with the back of my sweaty hand and pick up another box. Prim's the angriest about our situation.

Since Ethan left, Mom's money has been scarce, which forced us to move from our huge penthouse in New York City to a two bedroom townhouse in Malibu.

There are two bedrooms, with three girls. My mother, who is young, only thirty seven, and my sister, who is fourteen years old, and myself, seventeen years old.

She carelessly tosses a box labeled fragile on the floor and struts out the front door.

It's August and school is starting up soon, and the heat is suffocating outside. I think for a moment about the fact that I am wearing a sports bra.

Malibu is in a drought and it is currently a hundred degrees outside. In New York City, it is normally seventy degrees in the summer.

And I am literally dripping sweat.

I lean over, my hands sliding off my knees. "It's so hot!" I groan, pulling my t-shirt off and leaving myself in a pair of jean shorts and a tank top.

I take my already wet shirt and dry and dry up some of the perspiration all over my body.

I stomp out of the house to the moving van. I hear the clicking of a longboard or a skateboard on the sidewalk and the sound if flip flops slapping against the pavement as a group of three people, one boy, two girls, come rushing past and into the house next door.

I grab another box and trudge towards the house.

I'm not talkative and I don't open up easily. I've had two boyfriends. The first one was Gale, he got pissed because I told him I didn't want sex, and he left me and the next day I caught him making out with Madge Undersee.

Then, after I let my walls down for Cato, he too, got pissed because I didn't want sex, and he left. I caught him grinding against some chick named Glimmer the next day.

Then, the one person aside from my mother and sister that I truly trusted had left. He got angry, my father did, and he left.

I haven't seen him in a year.

Mom lost her job at the hospital because Prim and I kept getting sick during winter and she took too many days off.

We became broke and I heard her crying in her room when she had to dip into my college fund.

So, my trust for everyone but my mother and little sister is nonexistent; because all males are heartless. All males fight. All males only want sex.

I so not trust people. Everyone has loud mouths.

Prim helps me bring in the couch and then I go outside to get another box, and when I hop out if the truck, I see the same people that were just running past are standing at the end if my driveway, with another boy in a muscle shirt and white shorts.

Probably some gang.

"Well damn," the boy that was there first says. He has bronze hair and green eyes. I scowl.

"What?"

"You are sexy." He comments.

I can't fight the look of disgust that crosses my features.

"Not interested." I walk inside and out the box down, and when I come back, they're still there. "Don't you guys have somewhere to be, other than my driveway?" I ask.

"What's your name?" the second boy, the one in the white shorts asks. He has unruly blonde hair and blue eyes, mixed with the color of the sky, and the ocean.

I scoff. "As if I would tell you," I place my hands on my hips.

The white shorts boy scratches the back of his neck. "Okay, well...bye..." He trails off, because three is not proper ending to the sentence without my name, and honestly, I feel like a bitch.

"Katniss," I blurt just as they're turning around to walk away. "My name is Katniss."

The two boys and one of the girls smile.

The girl that smiles, she has black hair that falls to the middle of her back and she is tiny.

I'm tiny, too. I'm seventeen years old and weight a hundred and five pounds, and I'm five five.

I'm underweight for my age, but the thing is, I'm not unhealthy. My metabolism gets rid of everything I eat before it's even hit my stomach. I'm very small because of it.

"Well, Katniss." The blond says. "I'm Peeta."

"I'm Finnick." The other guy says.

"I'm Annie." The girl that smiled says. I nod, not bothered and not caring that the other girl doesn't even look at me.

I grab another box. "Cool."

Prim comes walking back outside when I get back in the truck.

"Hi!" She says. I look at her.

"Prim, why are you all wet? And why do you smell like...fish?"

"I jumped in the lake. You know the one in the back?"

I wrinkle my nose. "You mean the green lake? The one that looks like a forest moved into it?"

"Yes." She says.

"Well go and take a shower, little duck."

She wrinkles her nose. "Katniss, stop calling me that." She whispers.

I pick up another box. "Go take a shower. You're not doing me or anyone else in the United States a favor by smelling like dead fish."

She stomps towards the house. "And take your shoes off!" I walk after her. "If mom sees you tracking up mud in her house she'll whip your damn ass!"

I'm used to being the mother to my little sister. It's not that Mom doesn't care, because she does, it's just that she's at work all the time and Prim's got nobody but me.

She feels terrible, of course.

She told me that since I am a teenager, when I want to go do teenage things, I am to dump Prim at my Uncle Haymitch's house.

I haven't seen him since I was twelve.

He's an alcoholic, as far as I know. His wife died and took his took and put her up for adoption.

I never met the kid, but I know she was put up for adoption. He wasn't too happy and he drank all the time.

"Bye Katniss." Annie says. Then they walk away.

Thank god.

I grab the last box, slam the door to the moving truck and trek inside. Mom is gathering her purse. "I'm going grocery shopping. Later, you're coming with me to renew your license."

She kisses my cheek and looks around for Prim. "She went and jumped in the shower." I apprise her.

"Oh. Okay." She walks out the door. I begin separating the boxes to their appropriate room, leaving the miscellaneous.

I push the last box to Mom's pile and yawn. We've been driving for a week or two and I'm tired, add that to the heat.

I blast the air conditioner and rush a bead of sweat off of my forehead. Prim comes downstairs. "Our room is too small."

Prim and I, we are complete polar opposites. She hangs with a huge group of people, she is perfect in the looks, she's chatty and everyone likes her, she gets whatever she wants because she's the baby, and everyone loves her. Her music is loud and crazy and she plays it a lot.

Me, I'm not. I'm quiet and I like to keep to myself. I had one friend, actually…well, kind of. Megan wasn't really my friend. We sat together at lunch and read books. We didn't talk, but we had each other's backs. I don't have any admirers and everyone that does like me thinks I'm perfect because I'm skinny. I write my feelings in a notebook and I write stories. I listen to soft music and I like to be alone to keep to myself.

But everyone thinks I'm depressed, but I'm actually happy in my life.

I like sweatshirts because they're comfortable. "Oh, it can't be that bad." I insist.

She groans loudly. "Come look." I sigh and follow my bitter sister up the stairs.

Honestly, it could be worse. I lean against the doorframe and cross my arms.

It's a pretty big room and we have our own bathroom, but she continues to moan and groan about how she can't do what she pleases in her own room, and how she can't change her clothes without feeling uncomfortable in her room.

How she can't listen to music or have sleepovers and so on.

I sigh. "Well, you're just going to have to deal."

To be honestones, I don't want to share a room with her. I do love her, but she is too immature and she annoys the shit out of me, and in my head, when I'm annoyed, I call her the 'Little Shit'.

But, she's my 'Little Shit' so I tough it out.

I wander around until I find a door in the laundry room. Frowning, I open it and see a staircase. It leads down into a basement, which is completely bare, but luckily, it's finished, just the walls aren't painted. The floor is wood. I look around and eye the small window that lets in the small amount of sunlight that comes in.

I her Prim complaining on the phone to one of her many friends about how she has to share a room with, and I quote 'her bitchy older, depressed sister'

Now this, this is much better than sharing a room with Little Bitch.

I pull my phone out of my pocket and slam the door to the basement, walking all the way down. There's a closet in the corner, and when I rip it open, I see it's a supply closet, and I could easily turn this into a closet for my clothing.

I call my Mom.

"Hi honey." She says.

"Mom?" I ask.

"Yes?"

"Do you think I could um…make the basement my room?" I ask.

She's silent for a while. "Katniss…" she doesn't want me to. "You don't really want to do that."

"No mom, I do. Prim is on the phone with one of her friends and complaining about, and I quote 'sharing a room with her bitchy and depressed sister.'"

She's quiet. "Your fourteen year old sister said the word bitchy?" she asks.

"Yes." I say. "Please? It's nice down here."

"Is that what you want, Katniss?" she asks.

"Yes Mom."

She sighs. "Alright, fine, you may have the basement. Now I have to go, some cop is staring at me for driving with my cell phone."

"Right, sorry, bye, I love you."

"I love you too, honey."