When Primrose Everdeen is called as District 12's female tribute, Katniss is stunned for a moment and then forces her way to the stage, shouting that she volunteers in Prim's place. Because District 12 almost never has volunteers, Effie Trinket is briefly confused, but the mayor allows the substitution. Prim clings to Katniss in panic until Gale pulls Prim away and takes her back to Katniss's mother.

Effie presents Katniss as the new tribute, but the crowd refuses to applaud. Instead, the people of District 12 answer Katniss's sacrifice with silence and then the three-finger gesture of respect, thanks, and farewell, showing rare public dissent against the Capitol. Katniss nearly breaks down, but Haymitch Abernathy stumbles onstage drunk, praises Katniss's spirit, and then falls off the stage, accidentally giving Katniss time to regain control.

After Haymitch is carried away, Effie draws the male tribute: Peeta Mellark. Katniss is shaken because she knows Peeta from a moment years earlier that she has never forgotten. While the mayor reads the Treaty of Treason, Katniss remembers the winter after her father's death, when her mother collapsed into depression and eleven-year-old Katniss had to keep Prim fed and keep the family together to avoid being sent to the community home.

In that memory, the family's money has run out and Katniss is close to starvation. After failing to trade Prim's old clothes and finding nothing in the trash behind the merchants' shops, Katniss is screamed at by the baker's wife for searching near the bakery. Peeta, a baker's son in Katniss's school year, appears after being struck by his mother and deliberately or accidentally burns two loaves of bread. While pretending to feed the burnt bread to the pig, Peeta throws the loaves to Katniss.

Katniss takes the bread home, feeds Prim and her mother, and feels hope return. The next day she notices the first dandelion and realizes she can use what her father taught her about the woods to keep her family alive. Since then, Katniss has linked Peeta with the bread, the dandelion, and the idea that survival was possible, which is why she feels indebted to him and deeply conflicted now that they have both been chosen.

Back in the present, Katniss and Peeta are made to shake hands before the crowd as the anthem of Panem plays. Peeta gives Katniss a steady look and what seems like a reassuring squeeze, but Katniss can think only of the terrible logic of the Games: they may be forced to kill each other. The chapter ends with Katniss recognizing that luck has already failed her once today.