"You know you don't have to eat dinner with me," Haymitch grumbles as I set the basket down on the table and unfold the towel which has been keeping the pie warm so I can take it out and put it on the table.
"What's the sense in us both eating the same thing alone in separate houses?" I ask him.
He grunts assent, "Fine. Fine," he shoves papers and things aside and offers a plate to me. I take it and put it's crusty covered self in the sink with the stack already there that need to be washed.
"I have clean ones from my house," I tell him.
"You'll make someone a good wife some day," he muses, peering at me through the amber liquid in his glass.
I take out the rest of the contents of the basket: two plates, a pie cutter, a knife and fork for each of us given I knew there was no guarantee of any of these things being present or clean, "Who knows?" I decide is the safest answer.
"I hope you're not holding out for Katniss," he says, "There are plenty of other young women around here, and I know you have to be getting messages from the Capitol. I know I did," he snorts, "believe it or not," he takes another drink.
"You were the one who told me it wasn't over," I remind him as I cut the pie.
He sniffs deeply as the steam comes out along with more of the scent, "Did I say that?"
"Yes, and then you took half a bag of pastries."
"I don't know if I'm holding out for anything. Nothing is up to me, but I can't just turn things off. I wish I could. Let's...just talk about something else."
"Fair enough," Haymitch raises his glass, as he pulls his piece of pie towards him, "Have you seen your family recently?"
I close my eyes, really, Haymitch?
"I made the pie at home if that's what you mean."
"Kid, they're the only family you've got."
"They're really not," I take my own piece and sit down, "Come on eat. The dough will help soak up some of this," I wave at all the bottles around the room with my fork, "stuff you put in your system, and the vegetables will do you good."
"Are you my mother now?"
"Apparently I'm your wife, so I guess that makes Katniss your husband. We've got to keep you alive at least long enough to mentor us through mentoring someone else through the games..." I shudder at the thought as it fully sinks in. We have to send two more unfortunates off to possibly die.
What was it he said on the train? Embrace the probability of your imminent demise? Before us District 12 hadn't had a victor since his games, the 50th games, that's 46 kids he's watched die his first two he was maybe a year or so older than, like we will be. How are we going to do this?
"Realizing why I said it's never over now, aren't we?" Haymitch remarks. He pushes the bottle across the table towards me but I don't touch it.
"Your games were a Quarter Quell too, weren't they?"
"Oh, no! We are not doing that tonight," he says, or maybe ever his face continues without him having to, "I think you can head home. Leave the pie. You can collect everything tomorrow. I'll probably have finished it by then. Maybe the husband and I will have a piece when she brings me more booze."
"When she checks to make sure you're alive you mean."
"Same old. Same old."
"We are going to talk about this," I tell Haymitch as I leave the house.
He waves a hand dismissively and shuts the door.
I make my slippery, sliding way down the street to my house, muttering about having left the cane in Haymitch's hallway and reminding myself that I need the practice walking on the snow and ice without it even if I have already fairly well mastered regular terrain. At least I'm not trying to sneak through woods interrupting Katniss trying to hunt things I can just imagine how well that would go with the new leg it was bad enough when I had two. Neither of us has to worry about that any more though, thankfully.
It's a sleepless night. Faceless children dying on screen no matter how many parachutes we're able to send. One freaks out too much and steps off the platform before time is called and blows up before things even start and after that I give up on sleep and paint.
Dark shapes swirl and bleed across the canvas but at least they leave my head for a while. I bet the Capitol's check-up cameras would love this type of Mellark original.
"Two weeks and counting!" Effie's reminder of the Victory tour and the newly amended itinerary part five is in my messages. I read it but don't retain any of the information. It's never over. Haymitch reminds me toasting amber liquid. I lean my head down on the cool surface of the kitchen table for a while.
What did happen in the 2nd Quarter Quell? And for that matter where are Haymitch's family? That must be why he was on at me...maybe he has a point. Well, of course he has a point, Peeta, don't be an idiot. I sit up and massage my temples. I just don't know if they'll agree. They're the ones who wrote me off, after all. I wasn't supposed to come back. Sure they were all smiles and happy at the station while the cameras were still here, but it's been upset and annoyance that I'm still around, unless they want something, and Mom won't even come then.
Still...
I find myself filling a bag with trade gifts, dates, goat cheese, figs, oranges, chocolate and slowly picking my way down the path from Victor's Village towards the town itself. The additional snow and ice make it difficult with the new leg but I'm not going to stop at Haymitch's for the cane and I'm not going to focus too much on the fact that "snow" is what is making it difficult for me to walk because then I might either laugh or cry too much and really fall down. No, practice without the cane is good. I need to stop relying on it. I need to walk normally. It'll stop me getting those looks or I'll get less of them, at least, anyway.
As I pass the turn to The Hob I try to add up how many bottles of liquor there are. Much as I don't like what Haymitch does to himself the weeks he was without were so much worse—we thought he would die, trying to ration him is better it was decided between Katniss, her mother, Prim and I. So, we keep watch on him, making sure there his diet isn't solely liquid. Katniss brings meat from the butcher and the occasional turkey or squirrel and I bring baked goods designed to last a while. We make sure he has fruit. We've tried to work other drinks in but that hasn't worked so far. His color is better though. Katniss' mother maintains we're doing some good, but for how long are we delaying the inevitable? And today I find myself wondering how long will it be before Capitol life and mentoring take it's toll on us and we stop trying to do anything but drown our own pain the way he has his or worse?