Homecoming, a hunger games fanfic

Title: Homecoming

Author: RosesOfTheGarden

Fandom: The Hunger Games

Summary: It isn't home but it's close enough. Johanna-centric. Post-Mockingjay.

Notes: Writing Johanna was harder than I thought it'd be. There's her personality, and the way she talks to others. I tried to keep dialogue to a minimum, so it doesn't seem too unrealistic. Anyways, I hope her actions/dialogue are (somewhat) believable.

I've also changed Plutarch's personality somewhat. I don't think he's this patient and considerate, but I never really got a strong impression on his personality. So if he seems OOC, well...that's why.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own the Hunger Games.

Homecoming

01
After a few weeks in Two, Johanna's hair finally grows to her chin. It is the same length as it were before the war, but somehow, it's different. Maybe it's in the frizziness, like the electricity they had used at the Capitol, or the stray strands that have an unusual tendency to stick out even if she combs it multiple times (rather forcefully, might she add). Or maybe she just forgot what she looked like before all this happened. It was a long time ago.

Either way, she shaves it all off, so now she's back to being bald.

It'd be a bother to wash, anyways.

02
Plutarch Heavensbee is either a liar, or really that much of an idiot. Johanna suspects that it's the latter.

It's unlikely for it to rain, he had assured her. And even if it does, It'll be nothing more than a drizzle. A drizzle. Outside, it is raining so hard she can hear the drops pound the roof and windows, and she can feel it pour on her skin and the shocks that follow just shortly after, even through the closed curtains and locked doors. She doesn't remember Seven having this much rain.

She curses the house Two has provided her with. They think by giving her food and shelter they're so charitable. This is nothing compared to the white stone mansions the residents own. Hell, even her roof is shitty; the raindrops pounding above her are threatening to leak through.

Because she's from Seven, because she's a victor and therefore pitiable, she should be grateful of the hospitality Two is treating her with. Or so she has been told. Grateful? Oh, please. She never asked for any of this. She never even asked to be here. If she had it her way, she would be back at home.

(But back in Seven, she's not the least bit welcome.)

A particularly heavy splatter of rain falls on the roof. She resists the urge to clamp her hands over her ears, like Annie Cresta, the nutcase-she still has some dignity left. Instead, she shoves the covers over her head, and wraps the blanket so tightly around herself she has to open her mouth to breath. Silently, she prays that no one will see her bundled in blankets, like a small, scared child. The 71st Hunger Games victor, Johanna Mason, scared of a thunderstorm? What a joke.

The blanket doesn't completely block out the sound, though, but at least it's muffled. Johanna tries to fall asleep; staying awake listening would only be torture.

But she can't, not in this weather.

If she listens closely enough (which she tries not to, but it's not like she has a choice), the raindrops can almost sound like footsteps-quick and childlike.

So as she squeezes her eyes shut and clenches her teeth, she tries to think of her little cousins bounding up to the wooden porch at her family's shack. Johanna, Johanna, they'd cry. Then when her mother opens the door, she would rise up from her seat near the window. They would present to her whatever they had discovered that day-a robin's nest, a deer from within the forests, an oak, higher than even the Justice Building. And she'd act surprised and all, as if she hadn't just seen any of these things before, and she totally hadn't expected their visit.

It's them. Claire. Anna. Steve.

Not the rain.

She doesn't convince herself.

In her mind's eye, she sees her cousins-all three of them-sprint towards their porch, feet clattering on the rickety planks. Right before they reach the door, they end up a few meters away, back where they started and they run, again, again, again, never reaching it, never coming close to even knock.

She replays the scene in her mind until she finally falls asleep.

For the first time since she came here, Johanna walks outside. Voluntarily, at that.

It comes, with an annoyed (and partly, bitter) realization that her supply of food is rapidly waning, with only a few loaves of bread and some cheese left. It looks like she'll have to be the one to run the errands around here. Death by starvation is not especially favorable.

Johanna makes it to the local market in no time. She knows, the second she comes in front of an intersection of roads, that she picked a horrible time to go grocery shopping. The shops are bustling with customers, and there are so many people bumping into her while chatting happily about their day that she just wants to march back to her sad excuse of a house and curl up into a ball.

She tries to pretend that she is just another citizen of Two. It isn't easy.

Each time she crosses paths with someone else (which is often), she makes a point to stare straight ahead and avoid eye contact. She can see the double takes people do when they realize just who she is. They, like the people in Seven, seem to have enough sense to avoid initiating a conversation with her. Wouldn't want an axe dug into them, never mind that she doesn't even have one in her hands. At this thought, her lips twist into a bitter smile.

She realizes by the time she reaches the market that she completely forgot to bring a basket. She considers going back to her house to find one, but she doesn't want to come in contact with more citizens than she has to.

Through the throes of shoppers, she finds a familiar face. Of all people, it's the Mockingjay's "cousin".

"Well, what do you know?" she says, her lips forming into a smile. "Look who's here."

His shoulders tense up and he turns around to face her. "Johanna," he says in acknowledgement.

Johanna looks at him. Really looks at him. She supposes that he hasn't changed much from when she last saw him, back in Thirteen. Though from then to now, she sees how much tired he seems to be. His shoulders slump, and although it is not obvious at first, he shows an peculiar interest to the ground. Wars do wonders to one's image, she thinks as she studies him. No, she corrects herself as she thinks of the girl with hair and eyes similar to his own. It's not that.

"Where's your little cousin?" she asks.

He turns away from her, not answering her question. He stares at some unidentifiable object to the left of her. Seconds later, he says, "She's not my cousin."

"Last I heard, the Mockingjay hooked up with Peeta Mellark. Did you know?"

He pretends not to hear her.

They stay like that for a few seconds: her, empty-handed, mockingly staring at him; him, pretending that he is not in the presence of the 71st Hunger Games Victor, that he is not having a conversation with said victor. (This, Johanna thinks, is where he is failing miserably.)

"Well," Johanna says, dragging the word out as long as she can, "I have some errands to run. Grocery shopping and all. Same time next week?" She smiles sweetly like the innocent, flirting girl she is not, and stalks away.

The two of them are not cousins.

This is a fact that she had acknowledged months ago. A man wouldn't look at his "cousin" like that. A man wouldn't look so dejected after his "cousin" moved some hundred miles away.

She can't help but draw similarities. Was it really so long when she was like that?

Except Finnick was no Mockingjay, no real hero, and she is no handsome hunk who could have a boatload of admirers following her if she wanted it. Except Finnick didn't ditch her all of a sudden. Well, she supposes he did, by dying and all, but not because he chose to.

Then again, in order for him to leave her, he would have to have been her's in the first place. And he hadn't been. He was Annie's, even now as his remains lay scattered in some hole near the Capitol. The crazy girl had a ring and a baby to remember him by.

But her? She had nothing.

She takes the long way home, near the woods that no one ever passes through. This is what she should have done earlier. Would have saved a lot of trouble. Technically, it isn't illegal anymore for district citizens to go out into the woods, but no one does anyway. After all, they were on good terms with the Capitol, so nearly everyone obeyed the law. Old habits die hard.

The air here is chillier, and she shivers. A breeze sweeps through, and the oaks sway, casting odd shadows around her.

She realizes smugly that the trees here aren't nearly as tall or strong as the ones back at Seven. Seven was practically a forest; there were that many trees. And they were sturdy, also. When the wind passed through the trees, the branches barely moved. Only the leaves crinkled and fell, already contributing to the pile of autumn leaves that children loved to jump in.

When she was younger, she could climb so high that she could see everything from the Justice Building to her home.

She could climb so high that even Father couldn't follow her up. She was the best tree-climber in her grade, maybe in her entire school.

When her cousins challenged her to a race, which was often, she would climb just a fraction of a second slower, allow her cousins a branch higher than her. Of course, then they would accuse her of going easy on them and demand a rematch. When they raced again, sometimes she would win. Other times, she let them take the victory.

Around dinnertime, they would walk home together: them, chatty; her, irritated but content. Nine times out of ten, they would invite themselves over to dinner, making flattering claims ("No one cooks as good as you do, Auntie!") or find some other way to weasel their way into a bite of her mother's cooking ("We're having vegetable soup today. Ick.")

She is so caught up in this memory that when she nears the house, she half expects a broken-down, wooden shack to be waiting for her. When she opens the door and steps inside, she half expects her mother to greet her, or her three little cousins to appear, having spent hours looking for her.

The house is empty when she opens the door. There are no footsteps following the opening of the door; there are no scolding questions of her ever-strict mother waiting for her.

Well. What else did she expect?

She calls Plutarch the very next day, asking—no, demanding—for a trip to Seven. If he's surprised, he doesn't say so.

It doesn't take that much effort to convince him that going back to Seven is not only beneficial, but also that with this last memory of home, she can finally begin a new life in Two.

"A vacation would be good for you," he agrees, and says something to her about a train leaving the next day for Seven.

(What Johanna doesn't tell him is that this trip to Seven is no vacation.)

Besides, it isn't like Two would be missing her, anyways. No one would notice, except maybe Gale, but it isn't like he would actually mind or anything.

It would probably be better if she were halfway across the country. Away from everything.

At evening, Johanna steps off the train. The first thing that greets her is the pine-scented air. She stops and inhales deeply; the air back in Two was never quite so fresh. She steps forward, not looking back once to watch the train speed past, leaving no time for changed decisions. She is finally going back, like she should have when the war ended.

She walks past the houses, relishing the familiar sights. True, they are not even comparable to the spacious and elegant ones at Two, but they're what she grew up in.

They're home.

The citizens of Seven are beginning to notice just who she is. Unlike in Two, she takes no joy in them sparing her wide-eyed glances. Most don't react at all; surely they had seen her before, walking these streets. The younger children, however, bound up and gawk at her in fascination, as if she were a multi-headed animal. They are quickly ushered away by parents. Johanna doesn't quicken her pace. She's going to have to go through this every day for the rest of her life. What would be the point?

Sooner of later, she tells herself, they'll get used to her.

Somehow, she ends up at a particularly rugged shack-of-a-house. No one lives in this house; it's been empty for a good seven years. Like a shell. A corpse.

Just as she reaches for the doorknob, the door opens by itself.

Startled, she retracts her hand. A young woman, no older than she is, stands at the other side of the door.

"Oh! I'm so, so sorry. Were you looking for someone?" she asks, flustered.

Johanna doesn't answer. Her throat is closed up; she can only take in shallow breaths. She feels a familiar bitterness arise from her chest, and all of a sudden, she has the urge to call Plutarch (or anyone, really) and just scream at them.

How could they? This is-was-her house.

Capitol bastards. They're all the same, one after the next...

She doesn't feel herself stomping away from her-someone stranger's-house. She doesn't hear the alarmed and slightly confused voice of the woman, asking her if she is alright.

(Because isn't it obvious? She's not.)

It is only until she reaches the forests of Seven that she realizes she has no other place to go.

This is what is waiting for her at home:

A house that isn't hers. Friends she doesn't have. A nonexistent family. A life she can never bring back.

This is what is waiting for her in Two:

Strangers she barely knows, people she doesn't mind and who don't mind her (that much). A roof above her head, however weak and unstable.

Maybe's there's other things she doesn't know just yet.

It isn't home, but it's close enough. Good enough.

A week later, she boards a train to Two.

She brings nothing with her, just what she wears. This was what she came to Seven with, and this is what she will leave with.

Right before the train speeds past the pine trees and wood-built houses, she gives Seven one final, long look, and closes the shutters.

It is raining again.

Her curtains are drawn, but she can hear the tapping rhythm of raindrops outside.

Just like then, she hides herself beneath a blanket, trying not to listen. Just like then, the roof is a second away from leaking. Or at least sounds like it.

Just like then, she thinks of her three cousins running up to her house, their excitement and anticipation visible even from her place at the window.

Though this time, the three of them don't end up back on the dirt road meters away from the house. They wait, squirming eagerly on the front porch. Her cousins, chatty as always, talk amongst themselves. They don't notice that there is no one at the receiving end of their knocks, that there is no one for them to talk to.

They wait for a long time. Claire, the youngest of them, gets impatient. She starts to head back, but pauses at her brother's voice. She'll be here any second now, he pleads. Just wait, okay?

Claire pouts, but stomps back onto the porch. Fine, she says.

Gradually, their voices die down until they are completely silent, save for the occasional creak of the wooden planks. Then the door opens and they step inside, reaching home at long last.

fin.