A/n: This is an alternate ending to my story Where Soul Meets Body. I don't guess you have to have read the other to read this one, but I think the experience would definitely be better if you had :) To those WSMB readers- sorry this took so long! I had a lot of trouble doing it, because I was so attached to the ending of WSMB. It's "canon" in my mind. But here's your happily ever after! It's from Finnick's POV, because that was the only way I could get myself to do it. I felt too much like Annie's POV reached a conclusion and it was impossible for me to retreat back to that.
The first thing I feel is pain, and I immediately think to myself: of course. Of course death is pain. Life is pain, death is pain; why would one side of the glass be any different?
I'd be a liar if I said the degree of pain wasn't surprising, though. I realize by a sharp, metallic taste in my mouth that I've been unknowingly biting down on my lip because of it. I am cloaked in darkness, unable to lift my eyelids for reasons unknown, and I'm unsure for a moment what I could have done to deserve the pain I'm feeling. But then I remember. Not their names, but the strange patterned skin, the multi-colored shower tiles, the teeth sinking into my collarbone. I have done many things to deserve this.
My heart is heavy with that thought, again, like it always is when I begin thinking of that. But I let myself, because I'm dead, and I can't let myself think of the one thing I need to think of most. I can't, because then I have to think about what I have done to her, what I always knew I would end up doing to her. And how she didn't deserve it. And how she deserved so much better than me.
Opening my eyes is difficult until it's not. And then they are rising, and the muscles around my eyes are screaming in protest at the bright lights swimming above me. I take in the whiteness, white as conch shells, white as the fragile insides of her wrists in the winter. But there are no tiny blue rivers. No tiny blue rivers with the comforting beat of a drum that sounds like home. Just brightness everywhere. But after a few moments of blinking rapidly, I begin to notice shapes and they begin to notice me. A warm hand rests on my forearm. Others hover over me. And then, with a shuttering breath, I feel like my entire brain has been soaked with some clarifying agent. Suddenly it is all clear: the doctors hovering over and around me, the bright lights of the hospital room, the machines hooked to my body, the blood-soaked bandages all over my arms. Once I have realized this, and noted the strange truth to myself, I'm trying to sit up. This sudden action makes the tubes attached to my body pull dangerously, and I fall back onto the pillows immediately, briefly intimidated by the idea of how much it would hurt to rip them out. I try to speak, but it feels like sandpaper is rubbing down the inside of my throat. And people won't back off, they won't leave me alone. I have a sudden thought, my eyes wide and panic filling me: is this what she felt like, all those years ago? Chained to the bed, surrounded by doctors, unable or unwilling to speak?
I go limp for a few moments, closing my eyes and swallowing to try and ease the pain in my throat, but it doesn't seem to help. Nothing seems to help until they're moving the machines back and giving the tubes more space. And then I sit up again, ignoring the screaming pain that spurts up all over my body as I do. I allow them to force some water down my throat and almost cry in relief when the pain subsides a bit. And then, and only then, am I able to voice the most important concern now that I know I'm not dead.
"Where is she?"
I don't have to clarify. I stare at them, their heads oddly haloed by the bright lights behind them, and then they glance at each other hesitantly. This causes a shudder of pain to fill me as the worst case scenario hits me. I shake and tense up, gripping the railing of the bed, my eyes burning. No, that can't be it, because she promised me. But I promised her too, didn't I? She could have lied for me like I lie for her. But no, not my girl. Not her. I know when she lies, I can always see it. That wasn't a lie. She couldn't do that to me. She wouldn't. I am the most selfish man who ever lived for even thinking this, but I can't help it.
When I begin to cry, a female nurse is quick to comfort me. She pats my arm and doesn't even seem that offended when I violently jerk out of her grasp, the pain inside of me heavier than ever, my chest heaving, the scratches and slices on my face burning from the salt of my tears.
"She's fine, Finnick. She's okay." She says quickly, and only at those words am I able to calm down. I don't care about what happened or how I ended up here. I don't care about the extent of my injuries. All I care about is getting back to her, because I didn't break this promise after all. I really meant it when I said I would be with her always.
But maybe she didn't mean it when she said she would be with me always. I try not to let the dark voice in my head, the man who started talking the first time I kissed someone I didn't love and hasn't shut up since then, say these things, but I can't stop it. Why isn't she here with me? I need her. I am selfish and I need her. She knows that, right?
I'm left alone before I get the strength to ask this question. I drift in and out of consciousness, probably due to the substances running through one of the many IVs, and in my dream Mags holds my hand and tells me I'm almost home. I wake up wishing she meant I was dying, only to find that I am far from it. I listen to my doctor explain my injuries and the state I was in when I showed up here. He says I wandered in on my own, blood smearing along the white tiles of the emergency room as I walked, one hand holding in my intestines and the other applying pressure to the giant gash across my neck. As he says this, I lift my hand and rest it over my throat and feel the stitches, suddenly understanding why talking is so painful. I become gripped with a fear of her seeing me like this, and it makes me miss a bit of what he's telling me. I catch a few phrases like: mangled right leg, ruptured ear drum, four broken ribs, fractured pelvis.
He doesn't have to keep going. I understand from the pain I'm in that it's bad. But no matter how I try, no matter how often a head doctor speaks with me, I can't remember what happened to me. I can't remember how I got to District 1's hospital. I can't remember anything but her hesitant smile the first time she kissed me.
The cracks are filled slowly, day by day. I begin to remember the mutts in my dreams. I begin to remember pieces of my painful journey up the sewers and back here. I learn that Katniss, Peeta, Beetee, and Johanna are still alive. And her. She's alive, too, but I can't get anyone to tell me how she's doing. I try to call her many times. I grip the phone in my shaking hands, groaning in pain as I twist my torso a bit to reach the buttons with my other hand, but I can't do it. I can't do it because my neck is ripped. It is being held together by stitches. I'm terrified of what this sight would do to her, my wife who witnessed her friend beheaded, who had to sew together a girl's leg, who cried once when she accidentally stepped on a butterfly and broke its wing. Who had to grip me close to her every single night before the Quell, her small body shaking, because she was so afraid that my head would be gone like her district partner's. No, I can't let her see this. And I know that if I called her, she would be here, somehow. She would find a way to be here. Just as I would find a way to be there, too, if the situations were reversed.
The first call I successfully make is to Johanna. She doesn't answer the first time, or the second, or the third. She finally picks up the phone in her hospital room in 13 the sixth time I ring, and she is quiet for a long time after I say hello.
"I've been spending too much time with Crazy, I swear to God. If I've gone mad I'm going to be so pissed." She whispers, after a solid two minutes of silence. I feel a brief flash of anger and worry. Anger at her calling my wife that, worry that she hasn't been good to her. But my common sense breaks in after that. This is Jo. Jo is nothing but good to those she cares about, even if it's in her own way.
I try to consolidate my sentences, so I can use the least amount of words as possible. Talking still hurts. I still haven't been able to eat solid foods, either. And even if there was a reason, I don't think I could laugh. My stomach drops a bit when I think about her laugh. I think I would give anything to hear that again. I think I would volunteer to stay chained to this bed forever, even if only to hear it one more time. I feel so alone, so far from her suddenly, and my chest is aching and my eyes burning and I almost ask Johanna to put her on. I blink and swallow back my tears, using the pain that small action causes to fight against that urge, because I can't do that yet. I can't.
"I'm the ultimate survivor." I say instead, my words thick. When Johanna starts crying, softly, with embarrassment, I really do feel tears fill my eyes.
"Fuck, Finnick. Don't you ever do that again!" She screams a moment later, and I come closer to laughing than I have in a very long time. I know anger is Jo's way of ignoring the shame crying always makes her feel and simultaneously dealing with her emotion, so I wait and let her get it out of her system. "Do you understand what you've done? They're having a memorial for you next week, Finnick. Your wife is loonier than ever. Not to mention the fact that you've—"
She stops abruptly, her voice breaking on that last word. I wait, blinking against tears, fighting against the sudden rush of affection I feel for my friend. Not even bothering to fight against the fear I feel at her words about my wife, because I know I would never win.
"I just missed you, okay? Damn it! You suck." Johanna shrieks, and then I think she might be crying again. But that's okay, because I'm crying too.
"Trust me, not planned." I say. I have to lean over and grab the glass of water off the side table after that. Just that small movement makes my body ache and a gasp of pain escape me. I swallow the water slowly, but it still aches. The water is laced with a tasteless numbing agent that helps with the pain a bit.
I push forward after that, because these next words are the most important.
"How bad is she? Please." I beg.
"Probably not as bad as you. You sound awful. How are you? How did you escape? Peeta told us—about the mutts." Johanna says. I almost drop the glass at that, horror leaking into every pore, but Johanna hurries and adds onto her statement. "But he was careful about how he told Crazy. He told us you were beheaded, though. How are you here?"
I feel a familiar frustration with Johanna, and that would make me smile under any other circumstance.
"Can't talk much. Ripped throat. How bad is she?" I ask again.
Johanna is quiet for a moment, and I tell myself that if she lies to me I'm going to kill her. I think it as hard as I can, hoping she'll get the message. I think she probably does.
"Well…surprisingly not as bad as I thought she would be. I mean, don't get me wrong, she's terrible. She's gone in Crazyland most of the day and sometimes cries for days on end. She won't eat or sleep a lot of the time. But she's still here. She is trying. She's just kind of drowning, if that makes sense. Like when I see her sometimes I feel really claustrophobic because I can sense that feeling of hopelessness. Have they told her yet? Do you want me to go get her? I spend a lot of time with her, by the way. I've been a good friend and you owe me a drink when you're back here."
It takes my racing mind a moment to sort through Johanna's monologue. All I can really register for a moment is overwhelming guilt. I know then that I've done it again. I've made a decision for her without including her, a decision that underestimates her strength and ends up putting her through more misery than before. I chose to let Mags volunteer for her during the Quell, thinking it was better for her even when she told me it wasn't. I chose to go off to war to protect her, thinking it was better for her even when she told me it wasn't. And for once, I can see clearly that what I am doing what isn't best for her. I see it in the mental image I have of her waking up every morning and putting her feet on the floor, despite how much she is hurting. I've known for a while that she's stronger than me, but I know it even more now, because even the thought of her pain has me thinking my feet will never touch the floor again. If she were gone, I wouldn't even hesitate to kill myself. If she can handle this, she can handle anything.
I tell Johanna to not tell a soul. She is angered by this, and tries to guilt me into changing my mind, but I tell her that I'm going to be there by the end of the week. It's better that way. If she tells her that I'm alive, I know she'll worry that she's even madder for a while, and eventually slip away, and then she'll be so impatient to see me that she might do something dangerous. Johanna asks me how I'm going to get there, and I can't give her an answer, because I'm not really sure.
The only thing I do know is that I have never let anything keep me from getting back to my wife, and I never will.
I start to do things that I know would make her very upset. But as long as I never tell her, it can't hurt her.
I begin telling my doctors and nurses that I'm feeling wonderful. It's easy to repress the cries of pain as I move. Easy to force myself to walk in circles around the room and pretend like my eyes are watering from the lights and not because I'm crying. It's easy to learn to laugh and smile when I feel like screaming in agony. It's easy to do all of these things because I had this art perfected years ago. Perhaps (and I think this frequently) my only true talent is pretending to be comfortable and happy when really I'm in extraordinary amounts of pain.
The doctors are skeptical at first, but no one has refused my act before, and it isn't going to start today. They begin lowering my pain medicine dosages bit by bit, and sometimes at night I vomit because I'm in so much pain. But I'm careful to hide it. I force myself to "improve" at astonishing rates. By the end of the week, I'm off the pain medicine and walking up and down the hallways. No one sees that I'm digging my fingernails into my palm. No one notices that I throw up right after I'm alone, my hands gripping the toilet seat and my entire body shaking as I cry. I have never felt physical pain like this ever, not during my Games, not the first time I was forced into bed with someone who gets off at other's pain. This is a new sort, but still it doesn't touch the level of emotional pain inside of me.
They laugh at me first when I demand to be released.
"Are you serious, Odair? You're extremely injured. I don't care how macho you are; you're going to be here for another six months at least."
But I can't be here for six months. Because I remember now, I remember something that I can't believe I forgot, something that fell into the cracks along with a lot of details of the attack. My wife is going to have a baby. I am certain by the end of the week that I have recovered every memory I am going to, because there are no gaps I can see. Everything flows and makes sense. My memories of the attack in the sewers are torn and mangled (a bit like me), but that isn't a memory I want back. I only wanted to remember enough of that to know what happened. I remember the pain of being ripped at, the strength I somehow mustered to force the attacking hound off me, the frantic way I rolled and dragged myself down the sewers. The burning heat and blast as a holo blew up (which is to blame for my mangled leg and ripped stomach). I only remember thinking about her as I dragged myself down the sewers, and then climbed to my good leg, pushed forward by a deep adrenaline and a need to see her again. Up and up, and it took forever, but then I was on streets, dizzy and bleeding, and then I was in whiteness. Nothing is there until I was in whiteness again, and now I'm here, and I'm certain that I can't be gone that long. I didn't force myself through this charade for nothing.
It's easy to find my suave façade.
"Six months? I'm walking up and down the hallways. I'm eating solid foods. I'm off pain medication. I'm fine. I just want to go home. I'll get better that way. I'll still stay in the hospital in 13; I just need to be there." I say, my voice sooth and gentle, which is normally the best way to get what I want.
He frowns at this. He looks over me and my chart, and for a moment I think he's going to call me out, but then he looks up at me.
"Fine. You know what? Fine. If you've made it through all this alive, a transportation to 13 isn't going to kill you. And even if it does, I did my best and it's all on you."
A lot of things are all on me.
I think he's wrong about the transportation not killing me for a few terrible hours.
The hovercraft ride drains me of my carefully crafted carelessness. Even though it's a fairly smooth ride, the seats are incredibly uncomfortable, and I can't seem find a comfortable place to rest my leg. It's still riddled with staples and stitches and heavily bandaged, and if I don't lie it just right, the skin pulls painfully against the sutures. I couldn't be more relieved when the hovercraft lands, because even thinking about my favorite memories with her can't distract me from the pain. I wish they would have just amputated my leg. Peeta gets along just fine. This is causing more pain than it's worth.
I refuse to let them push me in a wheelchair into 13, because I need to be as fully functioning as possible. The acting president of 13 meets up with me, and then assures me that I can go straight to her. I have to endure excited embraces by my friends and a few select others, and I am glad to see them, but more than anything I'm ready to see my wife. I tell everyone that I don't need help getting to her hospital room, mostly just because I don't want to arrive with a horde of concerned people. That makes it harder to pretend like I'm okay. Not that she'll buy it anyway, because I have never looked worse. Even though I've got fresh bandages around my neck and leg and around my stomach underneath my shirt, I look awful. My skin is a sickly shade from my pain and lack of solid food for so long, my hair has gotten longer than I usually keep it, and there is a darkness underneath my eyes that mirrors the darkness of those damp, blood-smeared sewers. But I am going to try my hardest to act okay anyway, because I am so sorry. Because I love her so much. Because I will truly be okay once I see her again.
I have never forgotten even for a second what she looks like, but I'm having a hard time imagining what I'll see when I finally see her again. I can see the rose of her cheeks, the clear green of her eyes, the soft waves of her hair, but I don't know if I will see a curve where her stomach used to be flat. For all I know, she might not be pregnant anymore. No one said anything about it. I don't know what I would have done if I were her and in that situation.
It takes me a ridiculously long time to get to her room. I have to lean against the wall as I walk, taking shallow breaths and fighting back nausea, telling myself that soon I can get back on pain medication and heal slowly like I'm supposed to. Being here was the goal, and I achieved it.
I don't know why I do it, but I knock when I finally reach the closed door. Two soft raps against the hard surface with shaking knuckles. My heart is pounding away, my legs quaking, my heart already lighter. She's behind the door. Soon she'll be in my arms. Soon everything will be okay. Really, truly okay. Perfectly okay. Good.
When there's no reply, I take a deep breath and rest my palm against the door. I knock again, once, louder. I don't want to just burst into the room, but nothing I could say out here would convince her it was me and not just voices in her mind.
I hear the creak of a mattress and slow, soft footsteps a moment later. My heart picks up pace, and there is a warm climbing up my neck, and I'm smiling. It's ridiculous how much I love even the sound of her walking. It's insane the amount of affection I already feel for her, for the mental image of her bare feet against the tiles, the slight sway of her hips, the curve of her shoulders.
When she pulls open the door, she simply stares at me, her green eyes wide and her cheeks pale. I'm grinning hugely, and I keep trying to say something, but then I end up swallowing dryly instead. Her eyes stayed glued to my face, and she doesn't blink. Just stares, her lips slightly parted, her breath making pieces of stray hair falling out of her bun and into her face float up a bit. I take in her tired eyes, her pale skin, her slight figure, and then the barely noticeable swell of her abdomen. By the time my eyes make it back to her face, she's got her hands over her ears.
"Annie—" I start.
"No, no, no, no," Annie starts whispering, her voice thick with oncoming tears. It shatters my heart, and suddenly I can't recall the pain I was feeling, because the only think I'm aware of is that I have to make her happy again. I step forward and reach out, gently setting my hands on her upper arms. The skin is unbelievably smooth underneath my hands, so soft that I almost cry, convinced that I have never felt anything softer, convinced that I came very close to never feeling it ever again.
"It's me. It's really me. I swear, I promise. This is real, and I'm back." I mutter.
Her hands fall slowly from her ears, her eyelids fluttering open once more. Her eyes examine my face, and then she turns her face away suddenly, her small hand rising to cover her mouth as she gasps. It only takes me a moment to realize why.
"I still have my head. Look, it's here. I'm fine." I soothe carefully. Resisting the urge to pull her into my arms and mold her against me is harder than anything I have ever done. I don't think I will be able to let go once I give into it.
She looks back at me carefully, more pieces of hair slipping from the bun. They frame her face endearingly, and I can't help but smile at it. The moment I reach up to tuck them behind her ears automatically, it's like something breaks inside of her. Her eyes grow clearer somehow and she's grabbing onto me tightly, her face pressed against my neck, her arms tight around my waist. There is pain at first, a lot of it, but then I'm clutching her to me even tighter. I press my face into her hair, inhale the smell that is most familiar of all, mindlessly pull her hair from the bun and let it fall over my hands as I clutch her to me.
She cries with abandon into my neck, and I'm surprised once again at the depth that she can feel, the honesty that she can express those feelings. She pushes against me even more, and I stumble back a bit, leaning against the closed door for purchase. She's seems desperate to hold me as tightly as possible, like she thinks someone will pull me away, and somehow my heart tricks my body into thinking that this makes my injuries feel better instead of worse. It sure as hell makes my heart and head better.
I'm not at all surprised when I begin crying too, because it is only with her that I've ever felt wildly as well. Only with her that I've been able to be myself to the point that I can express my emotions freely, too. I feel like I can breathe for once, like I've been held underwater and I'm just now breaking the surface to gulp for air. She is quiet for a while and simply clings and cries, and I know it's because she's still partly convinced that I'm fake. She is waiting for me to disappear, or for her to disappear into another world. All I can do is kiss her head and rub her back and tell her the same thing over and over: I love you, I love you, I love you.
Eventually I'm in so much pain that I can't endure it any longer. I wrap an arm around her waist and limp over to the bed, ignoring her concerned glances as she takes in the extent of my injuries. When we sit down on the edge, her fingers are cold as they lift up the bottom of my shirt. I wait for questions. I know she has a million burning underneath the surface of her skin. I can practically feel them against mine, too. But she merely swallows her tears, her frown so deep three wrinkles appear on her forehead, and then she leans over and presses a kiss over the bandage. It's such an innocent gesture, one born from a depth of love I understand all too well, and I think I might start crying again. She sits up again and leans forward, resting her cheek over my collarbone, pressing her lips to the bandage on my neck as well. And then she lightly runs her hand over my thigh and kisses there, too. I try to tell her that I'm okay, but the stupidity of that lie is evident to me now, and I have no desire to lie to her anymore. She sees me as I am and that is how I want it, how I have always wanted it.
She helps me lie down, her hands still shaking, and she curls up against my side. It's then that she makes an effort to understand.
"I thought you were dead. They told me you were dead." She whispers, her voice torn and strangled. She hides her face against my shoulder and I can tell she's crying again by the way her back muscles tense a bit underneath my hand and the way her body shakes. I lean down, ignoring the protest from my neck, and press a kiss to her head. I do this a few times, until my heart has been soothed enough to answer.
"I thought I was, too. But I made a beautiful woman a promise that I didn't intent on breaking." I murmur.
She holds me tighter at these words, her arms wrapped tightly around my arm. All I want to do is pull her into my arms so we're entangled, but I am so riddled with pain I think I might black out.
"What did they do to you? Are you okay? Finn, I'm sorry. I missed you so much. Finn, please, don't do that again. I thought…I was going to have to learn how to sleep alone. You were never going to meet our son. Please don't leave me. Oh, God, I love you and it hurts." She murmurs, her words rushed and her sentences choppy and laced with desperation. The back of my throat aches, this time from oncoming tears. I reach over with my other hand, ignoring the pain, and stroke her hair back.
"I'm fine. I'll be okay. Never again, Ann. Never, ever, ever. I'm so sorry. I love you so much." I whisper, and even though I couldn't give her all the words I wanted to, her responding kiss tells me that they were enough. I've never been able to give Annie as much as I wanted to, as much as she deserves, but she's taken what I had the same way she takes my words: lovingly, thankfully, as if I am enough. I had never been enough before I met her. I had never been a lot of things before I met her (like happy, for instance).
I get the story out piece by piece as she holds onto my arm, her body still shaking and mine stinging with pain. I tell her about escaping the mutts, about the explosion that saved my life, about making it to District 1. I confide in her a truth that I think about a lot, but don't ever feel right voicing to anyone else: my love for her is what saved me. I know it must be true, because if I didn't have her, I never would have been able to drag myself out of that sewer. I had to have been driven by something stronger than life itself, something all-consuming and magnificent. The only thing I know that fits that category is our love for one another. And she is so Annie, so wonderful, so perfect, because she doesn't laugh at this at all. She merely kisses my shoulder again and then sits up a bit, her eyes thoughtful and a bit damp. I trace my eyes over her button nose, the delicate bones in her face, and find my heart lighting up at the same time a smile takes hold of me.
"That's real, Finn, because that's what made me hold on, too." She tells me.
And, oh, I love her. I love her more than I can say. I love her enough to sit up and kiss her over and over and over again, even though the pain is beginning to make me cry. She has driven me crazy. It is irony at its best. I made her sane and she made me crazy. I love her all the more for it.
She drifts off to sleep that night for a few moments, but she keeps jerking awake suddenly, hyperventilating and freaking out that I'm gone again. The second time that this happens, I pull her over onto me and cradle her head to my chest, uncaring to my stomach wound, only certain that I need to take care of her. She's still half-asleep, her body hot from being underneath the blanket and pressed to the side of mine, her hair a tangled net of dark curls. Her breath travels out across my chest and hits the side of my arm, her chest rising and falling steadily against me, and her head feels so fragile underneath my large hand. I brush my fingers over her cheekbones; run my fingers through her hair. I pull the blanket up over us when she looks cold, even though I'm sweltering. And, oddly, she makes me feel safer than I've ever felt. She's the most vulnerable person I know, and the kindest, the one least likely to hurt anyone at all, but I don't think I would be afraid if someone were to walk in here right now with a gun. Or a mutt. I'm protecting her and she's protecting me. We've been to hell and back and now we're here to stay.
Things only get better from that point on. I get back on pain medication and stay on it until most of my wounds are healed. I'll forever have ugly scars, but Annie tells me they make me even more handsome.
Time passes and hearts mend and her stomach swells. By the time we're back in our home in District 4, I can kiss over the baby's tiny foot as it kicks. I rest my head on her thighs at night and kiss the underside of her stomach, smiling against her skin as she fights back laughter, my heart too large for my chest.
"He's going to be such a mommy's boy." I tell her.
She reaches down and threads her soft fingers in my hair. When she speaks, I can hear the smile in her voice.
"Oh yeah? How do you know that?" She challenges.
I listen to the faint sound of the ocean outside, and Annie's breathing, and find myself happier than I have ever been.
"Because he's my son, of course. Odairs are naturally inclined to love you to pieces." I explain.
She jokingly lifts her right leg, making my head bounce up a bit, and I grin at that. I reach up and set a hand on her stomach.
"Careful in there! Turbulence out here!" I exclaim.
Her responding laughter is what keeps me going, what has always kept me going.
I almost miss the birth.
I'm on a train back to District 4 after a visit to Katniss when I get the call, her voice laced with pain. I spend the rest of the train ride demanding that it move faster, ignoring them as they tell me that isn't possible.
When I arrive at our house, I run up the stairs quicker than I have since being back here. I have a permanent limp now, and usually it takes me a while to get up the stairs, but now I'm taking them three at a time. When I burst into the bedroom, Annie's propped up against the pillows, her eyes shut in pain and her hair damp with sweat. I rush to her side, ignoring Dr. Everdeen who's got her head right between her legs, and fall to the floor beside the bed. I grasp her hand and feel my heart grow lighter at the smile that immediately graces her face at my touch.
"You're late." She teases, her voice strained a bit. I press kiss after kiss to the back of her hand, my heart pounding away.
"Only because they wouldn't let me conduct the train." I reply.
She laughs at this, her face gaining a little color.
"How dare they!" She jokes. She breathes through what must be another contraction after that, her grip tightening on my hand, and then she opens her eyes, finally. The color shocks me deeply, and I don't know why, because even though it's always beautiful to me, I see it every day. But right now, with her hair in a disarray and her chest heaving, the seaglass makes a shock shoot down to my toes and a warmth spread throughout me.
"You're beautiful." I tell her, and I can't help it, because she is. Even now, especially now. She groans at this.
"I'm supposed to be mad at you right now! Stop being so sweet!"
But a moment later she's leaning over and imploring me to lean over as well with her eyes. I press my lips against hers in a kiss, a giddy happiness engulfing me, and then she leans back against the pillows.
When Paula Everdeen announces that she can see the head, I try to go see it, too, but Annie has the death grip on my hand. I look at her, and her eyes are wide.
"Don't leave me." She begs, fear blatant in her expression. I sit back on the edge of the bed.
"I won't." I promise her. And now I know that this is a promise I can keep.
She tears up then, the green becoming lighter somehow, like her regular hue watered down.
"I'm so glad you're here, Finn." She whispers. I don't have the words to express to her how glad I am, too.
Her agony is my agony, and I think I might even be more relieved than her when it's over. She falls against the pillows, gasping, her eyes shut in pain, and I'm torn for a moment. I can hear the cries of our son, I can see Paula walking a few feet away with him, but Annie is beside me and she's in pain. I decide that she needs me more right now, because Paula is cleaning the baby off anyway. I lean over her and kiss her forehead, her cheeks, her lips.
"He's okay. Are you okay? You are the strongest, Ann. Really." I tell her, because I'm worried that maybe she doesn't know that. She smiles at that.
"Oh, it wasn't too bad." She lies. I help her sit up again, finding any excuse I can to brush my fingers over her shoulders, her arms, her collarbones. She leans into my side, her eyes alight with joy as they fall on the bundled up, clean baby Dr. Everdeen is carrying over to us. I have my eyes on Annie's face as Dr. Everdeen lowers our son into her awaiting arms, and what I see is more beautiful than anything I have ever seen. Her eyes are brighter than ever, and a smile wider than I thought possible graces her face. She stares at him in wonder, her love so strong that I know he must feel it.
"He's perfect." She says, and when I look down at him, I know she's telling the truth. I am overwhelmed by how beautiful he is, how adorable, how utterly wonderful. He has her hair, a facial structure that might end up taking after me, and chubby little hands and tiny little fingers and toes. When he opens his eyes to observe us, I'm hit with a love so powerful that it leaves me speechless for a moment. This is my son, my baby. This is what our love created, one of the many good things it has caused.
She passes him to me carefully a few moments later, and after a few seconds of uncertainty of how to hold him, I realize that this is all I ever wanted. This moment is an accumulation of years and years of empty yearning. I wrap my arm around Annie, comforted by the surety of her body against mine, and look at the child in my arms who is more hope than anything I have ever known. Family. That's what I've always wanted, what I never believed I would have. Maybe I'm not as bad as I've always felt. Maybe I do deserve this, after all.
Annie wants me to name him, so I name him Manning, a name I stumbled upon in one of Dr. Malone's baby name books.
"It means son of the hero." I tell Annie, pressing a kiss to her nose and stroking the skin of her back. "Because you are a hero."
These words make her confused. I lean back so I can watch her eyebrows furrow and her nose wrinkle, because I find it more adorable than almost anything. I glance over her shoulder at the bassinet beside the bed, checking for the millionth time that our baby is sleeping soundly.
"I'm not a hero. You're the hero." She refutes, and she almost sounds upset that I would even consider that.
But she's wrong. Because she endured mental turmoil, the death of her entire family, the death of Mags, abuse in the Capitol, losing me, and is still here today. She is here, and she gave birth to our baby, and our life is going to be so beautiful. It's going to be beautiful because of her. Because once upon a time, I was miserable. I thought I was in my own personal hell, and life was a punishment. Death was what I wanted, what I wished for all the time, but I couldn't make it happen without hurting Mags, who was the only family I had. I had no purpose, no reason, no joy. But then there was Annie, and she made me feel things. She made me care. She made me love again, and I can never express to her what that means to me, or how much she saved my life. But maybe by this I can. Maybe this will show her, once and for all, that she is a hero to me even if she isn't to herself. And she will be to our son as well.
"No, you're my hero." I tell her honestly. She scrunches up her nose skeptically and laughs, and I laugh back, but then I kiss her so she knows I'm serious. She smiles softly against my lips.
"Well, I want his middle name to be Finnick after you." She whispers after that.
I grimace. "Manning Finnick? It sounds awful." I argue.
She traces her fingers over the long, jagged scar on my stomach, her touch light as her hair trailing over my skin when she leans over me. She presses her face against my neck, pressing a kiss to that scar as well.
"Seadon, then." She tries.
I touch her spine and focus on the faint pulse I can feel. I will give her this, I will give her anything. I know that. I have always known that.
"Manning Seadon. I like it." I murmur.
She's smiling into my skin when she replies after that.
"I like you." She jokes.
This makes my heart soar and a smile grace my face as well.
"I like like you." I tease back.
This makes her face grow warm against my neck, and that forces me to grip her closer to me, my affection making me want to scream. The fact that she blushes at something like that, after all the times we've made love, after all we've been through, makes me fall in love with her even more.
"I feel the same way." She tells me, her voice muffled, and I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing outloud.
"Oh goody." I say.
Allowing myself to love her was the best decision I ever made.
I'm torn from sleep by a small voice.
I register the darkness and the echoing sound of rain, first. Then I hear Annie's soft, untroubled breathing and register the curve of her body against mine. I blink against the darkness for a moment, and then I see a small figure in the doorway, illuminated by the yellow light coming in behind him from the hallway. He's clutching his blue blanket, the one that was mine, then Annie's, and now his, and he looks upset. I unwrap my arms from around Annie and open them, a silent invitation to my small son.
He hurries over to my side of the bed, his socked feet sliding a bit. He climbs clumsily up onto the bed, his rush almost making him fall. He throws his arms around me and presses his face against my side when he's finally on the bed.
"What's wrong, Manny? Did you have a bad dream?" I whisper. I feel Annie stir a bit, but she doesn't wake up.
He shakes his head against my chest, his arms tightening. I listen to the sound of the rain and thunder and take another guess.
"Did the storm wake you up?" I try.
He nods at this. I think about carrying him back to bed and explaining to him that the storm is really just a way for the Earth to get a shower, that it can't hurt him, but I'm abruptly afraid of the storm, too. A peal of thunder shakes the foundation of the house and I know then that I want Manny here with me. The thought of him alone in his room makes me feel awful. I rub his back and hug him.
"Do you want to sleep here tonight?" I ask.
His responding nod is instantaneous.
Once he knows he isn't going to be carried back to bed, he sits up and starts to climb over me. I stop him.
"Mommy's sleeping, why don't you sleep over here on my other side?" I say quietly. Annie has had a bad couple of nights and I don't want her sleep to be interrupted. She's been having nightmares about Manny drowning, because we're starting to teach him how to swim. Terrible nightmares are things leftover from her mental illness. She's so much better now, so much better that I swear she's the girl I met on the train all those years ago. She doesn't drift away much at all, maybe once a month if anything. She can handle water fine and doesn't need reassurance that I still have my head anymore. She is stronger than I ever imagined and, true to Manny's name, the real hero of this rebellion.
"But Mommy is alone. I wanna be with her too!" He whines. He's just turned four and hasn't quite mastered the art of whispering. Annie rolls over in her sleep so her back's towards us.
"Mommy isn't alone. I'm with her." I whisper back to him. But he sniffles and I can see it on his face, shadowy in the dim light, that he's going to cry. His green eyes get wide and his lower lip puckers out. It's a heartbreaking expression for not only me as his father, but pretty much everyone. He's a charismatic little guy, adorable, sweet, and intelligent. He is very quiet and shy, and very attached to us. Especially Annie, who he can't stand to be away from for more than a few hours before he starts getting anxious. Annie says he does the same when he's with her and away from me, but I sometimes have my doubts about that. The difference is that he's more used to being away from me. I'm the District's head fisherman now, and so I'm gone during the day most of the time. Sometimes Annie and Manny come with me, and sometimes not. It normally depends on how Annie is feeling. Sometimes she wakes up gasping, worried that I'm gone forever. She always runs down the stairs on mornings like this, her face white as a bone and her fists clenched. The relief that floods her face when she sees me in the kitchen, eating breakfast before leaving for work, is enough to make me want to cry. Those are the days she wakes Manny up and bundles him up and takes to the sea with me, bravely pushing away her own discomfort at being on a boat again. I like those days the best, and I'm hoping one day they will become the norm without Annie having to do it out of panic. Once Manny starts school she'll most likely come with me, anyway.
I give up and release Manny, deciding that waking up to a crying child is worse for my wife than waking up to a sleeping one. He wedges himself between Annie and I and I pull the blankets up so they're to his chest. He turns on his side and rests his forehead against Annie's back, a small smile on his face.
"I love you, Daddy." He whispers.
I kiss the top of his dark head, smiling into the dark.
"I love you too, Manny." I tell him.
The storm rages on for the rest of the night, but I'm not worried at all, because the two treasures of my life are safe beside me.
I wake in the morning to Manny and Annie's voices. Annie's whispering and Manny's talking in a normal tone, his voice a bit sleepy and happy.
"Really? A big storm?" Annie asks in disbelief. I smile sleepily and wonder how she can sound so excited so early in the morning. "How big?"
Manny must get that from his mother, because his voice is excited, too.
"Huge!" He exclaims. Annie stifles laughter and then shushes him.
"Daddy's asleep." She reminds him quietly.
Manny gives whispering an attempt, but he only manages to stage whisper.
"It shook the whole house! The whole thing!"
"Wow! That's quite a storm. I'm glad you came in here." She says in exaggerated relief.
Manny sounds serious when he replies.
"Me too." He says. The bed shifts as he moves around a bit impatiently. "Can I go play?"
I hear the sound of Annie kissing his forehead and then her agreement.
"Okay, but just in your room. I'll come get you for breakfast in just a few minutes. Okie dokie?"
Manny practically bounces off the bed.
"Okie dokie!" He yells.
I listen to his footsteps as he hurries from the room, and a minute later I'm smiling because I can hear the sheets rustling as Annie moves towards me. She curls her knees behind mine and kisses my back, her lips warm and soft. I scoot over and then roll over onto my other side, so I can see her. I can't help but grin so hugely my face aches. I always love her in the morning best, when her hair is wild and her eyes sleepy and her cheeks flushed. The t-shirt she's wearing is slipping off her shoulder a bit, and I find it so lovely that I can't help but press a couple kisses to the skin there. I slid a hand over her flannel-covered hip and smile against her skin.
"Morning." I say.
She smiles.
"Good morning! Thanks for handling that last night." She says. I lift my head and rest it back on the pillow across from hers. Her eyes study mine as I study hers and we both smile at each other at the same time.
"I didn't really have to handle much. I just asked him if he wanted to sleep in here and that was that." I explain.
"Well, I still thank you for it, Mr. Modest." She teases.
I flash her my most seductive grin. After four years of freedom from Snow and the Capitol, I'm glad to say that she's the only one who has been on the receiving end of it.
"I can't help it I'm so perfect." I murmur.
This makes her laugh for a few moments and curl into my arms. Her skin is still warm from being underneath the blankets, and I wish I could hold her like this for the entire day. But there is work to be done, and Manny won't stay entertained safely on his own for long.
I kiss the fragile skin underneath her ear and hug her briefly.
"Let's go make breakfast." I suggest.
She sighs, and for a moment I think she's going to ask for a few more minutes, but then she's up and jumping off the bed.
"Race you!" She calls behind her. I watch her hair swing as she runs from the room, her laughter echoing through the house, and I can't do much but smile for a moment.
Life is joy.