Author's Notes: Hi there! First of all, please know that this story takes place near/after the end of MockingJay, but before the epilogue. As such, there will be spoilers, so I wouldn't recommend reading this story if you haven't read the entire Hunger Games trilogy yet. I'm writing this not as a separate story of its own with a set plot, but rather as if it were part of the third book itself. I found the end of it to be entirely too brief. This story is to help fill in some of those gaps. I'm writing it more for my own closure than anything, but I sincerely hope that you, the reader, will enjoy reading it. I haven't written a fic in a very, very long time, so I'm incredibly rusty! I've also never written in first person, present tense. I'm trying to match the author's general writing style which is different than my own, so it'll take some getting used to! I would love reviews and comments so that I can know if this is something worth pursuing and writing more of, or if I shouldn't bother.

Also, a huge thank you goes out to my beta-reader, April93 for her patience, great suggestions, and for giving this story its title. I can't wait to continue working with you!

Thanks so much, everyone! Enjoy!

*Disclaimer* I am not Suzanne Collins. I am not making any money from this story, nor do I want to. I'm just borrowing her characters and the world in which they live. I don't own anyone or anything; this is a work of fiction and should be regarded as such. Passages from the Hunger Games trilogy are property of Suzanne Collins, not me. They are used for entertainment purposes and to give a time/place/setting to the forthcoming chapter.

-*-*-*-*-*-*Chapter One*-*-*-*-*-*-

As the clinking of his bag of liquor bottles fades away, I whisper, "I doubt it."

I am unable to move from the chair. The rest of the house looms cold and empty and dark. I pull an old shawl over my body and watch the flames. –MJ.

My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am from District 12. District 12 was destroyed, but will be rebuilt. The War is over, the Capitol has fallen. The Districts are free. Panem is free. Coin and Snow are dead. I am a victor of the 74th Hunger Games, and a survivor of the 75th Hunger Games, also known as the third Quarter Quell. I was the Mockingjay.

I stop my redundant inner catalog of facts that I often go through when things become hard to handle, or confusing. It's easy to do these days. Get confused, that is. So much has happened in a small amount of time. How do I sum up, even inside my own head, the most basic of facts about myself when even those feel confusing and muddled? Nothing about my life feels simple or basic. Every piece of information has other things attached to it - memories, experiences, a face, a name. A nightmare waiting to attack me as I sleep.

I am the Mockingjay. I was the Mockingjay. I test both out in my head and frown. Part of me still clings to that identity that was borne out of so many different things. Experiences, beliefs, memories, people. Their hopes, resting on my shoulders. Their deaths, their lives sacrificed to help pave the way for a better future for the rest of us. Well, we won. There's not much else for me to do. I'm glad for that, I think. They obviously don't know what to do with me, now that the war is over. I resent them for using me, for making me into their puppet. But I went along with it, didn't I? And can I really blame them? What would I have done if I'd been in their position? There's no way for me to know.

Now that the war is over and the Mockingjay is no longer needed, I've been cast aside, sent back to District 12 until they can figure out what to do with me. No, not just sent back. Exiled here, ordered back because I killed Coin. Maybe it makes me a monster, but that's one death that I don't regret. I don't feel one bit of remorse for firing the arrow that killed her. We didn't go through this war just to have nothing change. Besides, she was the one who ordered the parachutes be dropped on all those Capitol children. And my sister.

I shake my head almost violently. No, I can't think about her. It hurts too much. Besides, it wasn't just the bombing. She wanted to hold another Hunger Games. Wasn't that the whole point of the war? So that there would be no more Hunger Games? No more oppression, no more rich, over-fed Capitol citizens watching as the Districts starve and send their children off to fight to the death? Nothing would have changed if Coin had become president. At least with Paylor, there's a chance for change.

That line of thinking dies with the last embers. The fire had long since gone out, the wood little more than ashes that still hold the shape of logs. I know from experience that one touch would send them crumbling. Fire can destroy things, but eventually it runs out of fuel. Even the fiercest of flames are extinguished. Sometimes it's the brightest burning blazes that are put out first, either because there's nothing else to burn, or because they're stamped out. I stare hard at the ashes and realize I feel exactly like that. The girl who was on fire has been extinguished. Part of me feels like that flame was put out a long time ago.

I wonder, suddenly, how long I've been sitting in this rocking chair. My body is stiff and aching. I pull the shawl tighter around myself. There isn't much warmth radiating from the fireplace, now that the fire is completely out. I don't know what time it is, but it's dark enough for me to know that the sun has yet to begin its ascent into the sky. Instead, the room around me has been cast into shadow, tinged with blue that tells me the moon must be out and shining. I think winter is beginning to set in, but I'm not sure. Time doesn't seem to have much meaning anymore. Not to me.

I guess I sleep, because the next thing I know, it's morning and Greasy Sae's banging around at the stove. She makes eggs and toast and sits there until I've eaten it all. –MJ

The food has no flavor as I chew and swallow each bite. It might as well be sand, for how hard it is to get down. I do it anyway, because I know she won't stop nagging or go away until I have. I told Haymitch not to tell me who wasn't here, that I wanted it to be a surprise. It becomes obvious as I eat, who one of those people is. Peeta. This isn't his bread. I don't need to be a baker to know what was made by his hand, and this isn't his. So that means he must still be in the Capitol. Maybe he's opened a fancy bakery there. No. That's not Peeta. He's coming home. I cast the thought away as being 'not real'.

How long has it been since I assassinated Coin? How long since any of it? I have no idea. Time has no purpose. There's nothing stopping me from ending my life. I don't move, though. What am I waiting for? Haymitch isn't here. There are no cameras here, no audience, no one from the Capitol to watch my every move. I may not have Nightlock but I can make a fine noose. There are plenty of ways to kill myself. So what's holding me back? What keeps me rooted here, sitting in this rocking chair, clinging to this shawl? What am I waiting for?

The days pass, then weeks, then…time becomes a stranger entirely, only measured in meals that Greasy Sae makes for me. Her granddaughter is here, playing with the bright blue ball of yarn. She's perfectly content, it seems, to roll it around on the floor and chase after it. Sometimes I watch as she unravels a bit of it, only to roll it back up. She grins proudly at her achievement, but I can't force myself to smile back. She doesn't mind, though. She doesn't seem to be any more aware of my presence than I am of hers - which sometimes is fleeting at best. Their visits are only brief reprieves from the tangled mess that has become my mind.

I wonder vaguely what happened at my trial. Did they show footage of me killing Coin? Did they show me cracking and breaking down when I found out how Snow was using Peeta? How many people spoke on my behalf, in my defense? It probably wasn't very hard to convince anyone that I was driven mad. That I'm a complete lunatic. Maybe I am. After all, do sane people really kill someone without feeling at least some sense of remorse? I wouldn't know. I used to hate the thought of ending another person's life. Now, though, so many of those lines have been blurred. The right thing isn't always moral, or ethical. Or even right, really. Just…necessary.

Winter sets in, making itself known with pounding rain, and then with the too-quiet, still nights. A chill settles over the house that the fire, which Greasy Sae builds up every night before leaving, can't thaw. I know that if I looked out the window, all I'd see is white. Snow has probably covered the entire District, or what's left of it. Buried the ashes, the decomposing bodies, the memories.

Cold, hot, it doesn't matter. I feel numb to sensation, to anything really. There are moments of clarity but I don't try to hold onto them. Part of me wants to. Wants to cling to them desperately, beg them not to leave me to the barren place that's inside my own head. But I'm paralyzed and each moment slips from my grasp before I can even close my mind around the thought. Still, through the fog that surrounds me, one thing whispers to me, lingering.

What am I waiting for?