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Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man they say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out for his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

(Excerpt taken from Suzanne Collins' Mockingjay, Chapter 9.)

I.

In my sleep I shuffle and twist. I feel the blankets tangling around my body even as my feet carry me through the jungle. My memory recreates the warmness of the air, the moisture covering my skin and attaching to my clothes. Thick layers of green break as my arms swing at them.

This didn't happen, I think suddenly.

The arena fits. The moment fits. Even Finnick, shouting my name as he pursues me, fits. Flocks of jabberjays fly past me above the trees. "Katniss!" they shout. "Help me!" Is that voice the one that doesn't fit.

Deep inside me I know I shouldn't listen, I hear myself telling Finnick they're just mutts and Peeta telling me they need my family alive so that they can be interviewed. But the desperation in that voice is such that I can't just ignore it. It comes again and again.

In my anxious state I find I can't even place a name and a face to the voice for a moment. A soft voice broken into painful screeches. "Katniss!" they keep shouting. Blue eyes and blonde hair finally click together.

"Madge!" I sound desperate.

This definitely didn't happen, I think.

My legs keep moving. Even conscious that none of this is real I have to get to her. I need to tell her. I need her to understand, to see.

"Madge!"

I feel Peeta's hand circle my forearm and pull me into him. And it feels wrong. His body against mine, his hard arms around my shoulders, his hoarse voice repeating my name. All of it. It's just wrong. "No," I tell him. I have to get to her. "Let me go!" I trash against him and claw his arms off of me. I need her to know.

I keep calling out to her. "Madge, where are you!"

Where are you, Madge. Please. I need you to see. I need you to know.

And I fall down, mumbling to myself. "Please," I say. "Please understand." I embrace my body as my tears start pouring out. Her voice now surrounds me.

I know I should be strong. I know all of this is pointless. She's gone now. That's all there is to it. But there's so much I regret. So much I wish I could change. "Madge," I keep whispering, my voice weak.

I stand up and realize where I am: a clearing back in the woods. Back home. The demonic bird is looking up at me from where it stands near my feet. Its head tips to the right. "Why did you leave me, Katniss?" it spits out through its beak.

More tears spill down my face. I want to take it in my hands and break its neck. I want it to never speak such foul words again while using her voice. I want her voice to never be so shattered again. I want to take it with me to District 13. I want her to speak to me every night even if it's just to throw all that to my face. "Please, Madge." I kneel down. "I'm sorry. Please." And as I embrace it my arms close around empty air.

It's gone. She's gone. It's now over, I think.

Except it's not.

There's still the pressure in my chest and the tears in my eyes. There's still this longing. This excruciating longing.

Emptiness.

I'm really just sorry, Madge. Sorry I never knew. Sorry we never spoke. I'm sorry I never knew how much I'd miss you if you ever were gone. I wish you knew...

I open my eyes and she's standing in front of me. It's as if I was walking under the sun after months of continuous snowstorms. I suddenly realize how much I have missed looking at her elegant face. Her straight nose. The golden hair falling down to her shoulders.

Madge smiles and opens her mouth. However, she doesn't speak. I lean forward to embrace her and, finally, I feel her solid body inside the circle of my arms.

Her singing starts, "Are you, are you

Coming to the tree..."

II.

...Where they strung up a man they say murdered three...

It's not her body, though. It's Prim that's against me when my eyes open. They're wet. My face moist with my tears.

My arms go slack around her. I'm suddenly invaded by the urge to escape her. To run from here. From my own thoughts. This is the only thing with which Prim can't — won't — help me. I'm not even sure, as a matter of fact, if there's a way anyone could help me.

I somehow manage to crawl out of bed without waking her up. In no time I'm hugging my knees on the floor of one of my odd little hiding places. A closet filled with needless school supplies. My breath quickens as I feel my body rock back and forth. I close my eyes.

My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games. I escaped. The Capitol hates me. District 12 was destroyed because of me. Madge didn't survive...

I'd been advised to repeat some of that. As if it would actually help me. My body convulses violently as I feel more tears on my face.

The dream's still too fresh in my mind. I can still see Madge's face in front of mine. The soft curve of her jaw, the smooth surface of her forehead... I wish I had a lantern with me so that its light could burn my retinas and the face they're perceiving with them. For a second I consider looking around the closet to see if there's something I can use. I dismiss it. I'm much too content having that picture burning at the back of my eyelids.

I hate looking at her because she makes me remember. It's me the reason she's dead. The reason so many died. District 12 is gone. Madge with it.

Flickers of hope still live in me. Her father was mayor. He could've known. They could've run away. Away to the Capitol. She could be there right now, hugging her mother. Afraid. But I know she's not. Gale saw her house fall down as he fled. He said he did. From far away. "No trains had come or gone", he said. I let it live.

She's alive. She's alive, and when I see her I'll tell her. I reassure myself. It's not over, Katniss. For a moment I wonder. What makes me be relieved? Is it the fact that she isn't dead, that her death is not my fault? Is it the fact that somehow she'll know, before she dies?

She's dead, though, and all of that is just futile.

I love looking at her because she makes me remember. The wet fabric covering her shoulder as I cried against it, warm days under the sun, amid the woods, her arms around my body.

She was the first friend I ever had. No, she was not. She was Madge, my Madge. She was no one and everybody. The person whose presence never bothered me. The only person with whom no excess of words was needed. I have tried to demerit her memory in an attempt to make it less painful. That's also been futile.

I want to stop looking at her because I killed her. I want to keep looking at her because I'm dreading the thought that at some point I won't be able to remember what she looked like. She came and is now gone, leaving me regret and sadness. Dead hopes. Doubt. What would it have been like?

When the door opens is Gale the one that pulls me to my feet. "Hey, Catnip," he says. It's obvious how taken aback he is by my state.

I haven't cried for hours now, but I know my eyes must be as red as if I'd rubbed the tears out just minutes ago. "Hey, Gale."

"Thought I'd find you here. Prim's angry... or something. I wouldn't know," he adds, a slight smirk on his lips, "never seen her angry."

He's too close to me. I push him away and fall back on some cardboard box. He crouches.

"Hey." I tip my head away from the hand he's trying to run down my cheek. A sigh escapes his lips. "Is it Peeta?"

Similar enough, I think.

I nod.

It's not enough for him to see me suffering, he has to remind me of Peeta, too.

My head starts hurting as I remember him, the boy with the bread. The baker's son. I feel his lips on mine inside a cave, making him fall on cold snow, his warm body enveloping mine, the burned bread he threw my way all those years ago... And it's still not enough.

Another death. Another one of my killings.

...warm soft lips pressed against my own, the smooth surface of a hand lulling me to sleep...

I wish you'd tell me you know, that you understand. But now you're gone and there's so much I'll have to live with. So much to regret — My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. My home is District 12...

So was hers. It invades my thoughts, her face. Her hands, her body against mine. Her eyes staring at me.

I'm losing it. I think I'm losing it. I voice my thoughts and Gale tries to talk me out of myself. But there's too much keeping me here. Peeta and Madge. Johanna and Annie. The baker and his witch wife. The mayor and her sisterless wife. And so many fatherless kids. Motherless kids.

"It's still likely she'll be disoriented from time to time, but with careful surveillance and compromise from her she should be fine being left alone for periods of time." My mother nodded at that and said she'd take good care of me, not leave me out of her sight, have me next to her all day if needed.

Now I wonder if I wouldn't be better strapped down to a bed.

"...remember?" Gale asks. His face floats in front of mine, but he's careful enough not to touch me. "Remember the song. 'The Hanging Tree'," he tells me. "You taught it to me, remember?" I remember. Silent day under our rock. Back at our rock ledge overlooking the valley. That was a very long time ago. "You told me the man wanted her to come die with him. That dying would be better for her than to live in such an awful world.

"Peeta's better off now. He's home, with his family." He's so wrong. So wrong. He thinks he was just the ally I had to kiss, share the triumph with. But he made me feel alive. Made me feel like something actually mattered. As he does himself.

But she made me be alive. And she was the something, the someone that actually mattered.

And I saw it too late.

We head to the hospital where I'm expecting they'll drug me back to sleep. And I dread and cherish the image of her face plaguing my dreams again. A whirlwind of thoughts starts invading me.

"He's fine, you know?" I'm on a bed now, feeling the heaviness drown my thoughts. Driving me away from the pained expression on his face and the plain tone of his voice. "He's fine now, being where he is."

I make one last attempt. I try to convince myself it doesn't matter. She's death, I'm alive. I try to put a name to what I've lost. Our fingers interlaced on a bed of grass, her soothing words pulling me out of a restless sleep. Secrets built and kept in the woods. But what's the use? Whatever existed between us is gone.

No, it's not, I think. It's not gone and neither is she.

Because what I lost when she died is much more than what I would lose if Gale died, much more than what I lost when Peeta died — if he's dead, that is. What I lost when she died is something neither makes me feel, however close they get. The truth is I can't even name it.

And it's now, as I'm falling under the weight of whatever drug they gave me, that I realize that what existed between Madge and I was what made me survive for months after my first Games, when Gale had to work at the mines and Peeta wouldn't even look at me. When one day at her home she insisted I took her out to the woods. Where many days later, weeks later, out by the lake...

Gale's drifting away from me, fading behind the fog that fills my head.

My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games. I escaped. The Capitol hates me. Peeta was taken prisoner. He is thought to be dead. Madge died in the bombing that destroyed 12. I realized soon after that I loved her.

III.

...Where the dead man called out for his love to flee...

...Mockingjays answered with the same four notes I'd just whistled. Rue's four notes. Her soft voice filled my ears. "Even whistling you shush them up," Madge told me.

I placed a hand on rough bark as I waited for her to surface into the clearing. When she did her eyes were amused, but earnest. "Can't take responsibility for how they act," I chuckled.

Earnestness gone, she smirked. "They can't wait for you to sing."

It was refreshing hanging out with Madge. After I came back everybody either hated me — Peeta — , were too busy to be with me — Gale, Prim, my mother — , were afraid of me, or were always vigilant in case I had a mental breakdown because of something they said. Madge didn't mind. She spoke as she always did. I guess she expected I could deal with it if she ever said something that affected me.

My head shook. I signaled her to follow. After another fifteen minutes of falling over roots and looking suspiciously over her shoulder at any unknown sound, Madge finally asked for some rest.

"It's nice out here, huh?" she said, looking around her. A convenient clearing.

"Quiet." I nodded. No excess of words was required with her.

I sat against a tree as she gazed around and above us. "Thought you'd like it."

"Oh, I do." Her eyes met mine, wrinkling at the edges as she smiled. "It's somehow better than not being able to listen to you play the piano."

I huffed. "Attempt to play it, more like." She didn't bother denying it. "What's with your mother and her headaches?" It's until I finished that I realized I hadn't been too nice with the question.

Madge didn't seem to mind, though. "It's been a long time since I last asked. It's complicated. That's all I know." She sounded calm but serious. As if she wouldn't appreciate it if I continued down that road.

"It's a shame we couldn't be at you house."

"Well, I don't know." Madge shrugged. Smiled at me. "I finally convinced you to bring me out here."

"You wanted to come out here?" I asked. "To the woods?"

"I want you to sing." She gazed pointedly at me. "But coming out here is nice too."

"I can sing just fine at your house."

Madge came over to sit next to me. She looked at me sideways, and her eyes had that intensity that I'd been noticing since I'd come back. "Not with my mother two floors above... Still not enough to not affect her head."

I was quiet for a time. "I don't particularly want to sing right now."

Madge just nodded. We sat in silence for a very long time. Our shoulders rubbing together. Then she spoke. "I'm really happy you came back, Katniss." Her smile fell a little when I turned to her. Her voice went low. "I don't think I said it before. But I really am."

It's not something I'd been told before. By anyone. I didn't know how to answer, or if I should. So I didn't. Instead, I said, "Thank you for coming to say goodbye, Madge."

"I imagine you thought no one would want to say goodbye, huh?"

"Well..." I hesitated. "The truth is, I never thought you and I were so close. Until you came and gave me the pin..."

"I never told you—" It was as if Madge had caught herself saying something she shouldn't. She started again. "I wanted you to have something to remember me by..."

There she goes again, I thought. Since I came back from the Games I knew there was something Madge wanted to say to me. However, every time she was about to say it she caught herself mid-sentence and started talking about something else.

"I don't need it now, though." I presented to her the mockingjay pin, but she just closed my hand with hers and pushed it away.

"It's yours now, Katniss. I want you to have it."

I couldn't hold back the wide smile that stretched my lips.

After another long silence I stood up. Told her we should be getting back. "You're not that quick and it's getting late." Making small talk, we made our way back to the fence and to her house. The sky was slightly dark by the time we got there. We said our goodbyes. "Maybe we could do this again sometime, Madge," I said.

For some reason she blushed. "I hope so." Then she leaned forward and gave my cheek a soft kiss.

Something happened then, though. Either I moved my face unconsciously and without realizing it, or she did, but the next thing I knew was that her kiss landed halfway on my lips. Just at the edge. They were surprisingly warm, soft. Hotness spread inside my stomach as though I was about to go on stage again for an interview with Caesar Flickerman. She pulled away and didn't mention it. And neither did I.

Just an accident, I dismissed it. Still, I couldn't help remembering the first kiss she'd given me, weeks ago. I'd noticed how warm her lips were then, too. How soft. I distractedly ran my fingers over the place where our lips had touched and continued to do it until I was home.

The time goes on...

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