A/N: This was originally written for Prompts in Panem Round 3, Day 1. Visual prompt: Haymitch's liquor. Enjoy!
It wasn't that Katniss Everdeen couldn't hold down a job. It's just that she hated feeling like her job was holding her down. So when her asshole manager told her not to come back until she learned how to play well with others, she was far from upset—she was relieved. That is, until she got home and found her student loan letters sitting out on the counter where she had left them that morning. One look at all those zeroes and all those due dates and all those percentage signs and the world tilted around her in dramatic fashion.
She breathed a heavy sigh and pursed her lips. "Fuck. Me."
"You're late, Everdeen." Beetee didn't bother to look up from his microscope as she rushed into the lab, so Katniss wasn't too concerned that he was actually upset with her.
"I know, I'm sorry," she said breathlessly as she grabbed her white lab coat from its hanger on the wall and slipped it on, tugging her braid free of the coat's collar.
Her mentor watched her retrieve her text books and research guides from her desk. "I don't know how you do it. Spend your days here and in class and then your nights bartending. When do you sleep?"
She shrugged. "Well, now I only work for you."
Beetee sighed. "What did you do this time? Pour a drink in someone's lap? Punch a sorority girl?"
"No. I might have…" Katniss picked at a hangnail on her left thumb. "Sprayed a customer with the soda gun."
Beetee pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head, chuckling quietly. "Oh, Katniss."
"He pinched my ass! What was I supposed to do?" She settled onto her stool at the lab table and opened her books, spreading all three of them out around her in a lopsided arc.
"So now you'll have time to sleep?"
"Unfortunately not." She sighed. "My first student loan statement came yesterday. And while interning for you is wonderful, it doesn't exactly pay the bills."
Beetee placed a weathered hand onto Katniss's. "You know that as soon as a TA spot opens up, it's yours."
She nodded. "I appreciate that. But my unsubsidized loans have to be paid now. Now stop worrying about me and go back to genetically decoding your fruit flies."
The professor pushed his heavy glasses back up his nose and resumed his stance at the microscope.
Katniss flipped idly through her books, trying to focus on the information in front of her while determining how she was going to make ends meet.
It was a fluke that she even saw the flyer really. She never ate lunch in the student union, never even spent much time on that side of campus. But her 12:30 Principles of Plant Structure class had been cancelled and she found herself with some unexpected free time. She thought she'd grab a coffee and get ahead on her reading for tomorrow afternoon's Dendrology class.
She was standing in line at the coffee shop when a neon green flyer caught her eye. It was an ad for an experienced bartender who was available to work Friday and Saturday nights from eight to four. She'd never heard of the club before but that didn't surprise her. Unless she'd worked there or it neighbored one of the bars she had worked at, she was oblivious to its existence.
Katniss pulled the flyer from the thumbtack that held it to the bulletin board, folded it, and slid it into her back pocket before abandoning the coffee line. She suddenly knew exactly how to fill her free time.
The Captain Cream Club was located on the outskirts of town and honestly wasn't much to look at from the outside. It was a small, dingy looking edifice with a tile roof that reflected the bright afternoon sun.
Katniss parked her car in the spot closest to the door and stared warily up at the building. This could be a very bad idea. But she was desperate when she thought of all those zeroes on the end of her student loan statement. Even what she could make bartending for two nights a week would be better than nothing.
She steeled herself, stepped out of her beat up Chevy, and walked into the club.
She'd always thought seeing fully lit bars was an odd experience. The paint almost always peeled away from the walls and the tile floors were usually covered in stains of questionable origin. This club was no different. There was a large u-shaped bar in the back and the rest of the room was filled with small circular tables surrounded by black chairs. Normal enough for a bar. What confused her the most were the various shades of glitter that seemed to cover every surface in the club.
"Hello?" Her voice echoed through the empty club. "I'm here about the bartending position?"
"Hold your horses, sweetheart, I'm coming." A wizened man stumbled into the room and surveyed her. "Well, ain't you a cutie?"
She narrowed her eyes at him and recoiled when she smelled the cloud of whiskey that surrounded him. "My name is Katniss Everdeen. I'd like to apply for the open bartending position."
The man crossed his arms over his chest and continued to stare at her. "Okay. My application's short and sweet: make me the best drink you know."
Her jaw dropped slightly. "What?"
"You want the job or not? Hop behind the bar and show me you know your stuff."
Katniss shrugged out of her jacket and slung it across the back of a barstool. She stepped behind the circular bar and rubbed her hands together while she surveyed the ingredients at her disposal. The man took a seat on one of the barstools and clasped his hands in front of her.
"Okay." She brushed the loose tendrils of hair that had fallen out of her braid behind her ear. "What's your poison?"
The man sat up a little straighter. "Whiskey."
She nodded and began gathering ingredients. "You got a preference?"
He cocked his head. "Crown."
"Yeah, I had you pegged for a Crown kind of guy." She measured a two-ounce shot of whiskey, a teaspoon of simple syrup, a squeeze of half a lime, and a dash of tabasco sauce in a shaker glass. She stirred the concoction together and poured it into a highball glass over ice. She set it in front of the man and waited for his response.
He studied it for a moment before raising it to his lips and taking a deep drink.
"You'll probably think it's missing something."
He smacked his lips. "And why's that?"
"I usually rim the glasses with steak seasoning."
The man choked on his second sip. "Well, hot damn, sweetheart. You know your way around some Crown. I'm impressed. Haymitch Abernathy." He held out his hand and she shook it firmly. "Where'd you bartend before and why haven't I ever heard of you?"
"Most recently I was at Louie's, but that didn't turn out so well." She blushed furiously.
"How so?" He tilted the glass up and drained the rest of his drink.
"Look, I'm gonna level with you. I got fired because I wouldn't let some asshole grab my ass whenever he felt like it. So if you've got a problem with me standing up for myself, I don't think this is going to work out."
The man threw back his head and laughed uproariously.
"Sweetheart, you've never even heard of my bar before have you?"
She shook her head and blushed ashamedly. "I don't get out much unless I'm going to work or school."
He continued to laugh for a solid minute. His eyes were bloodshot and his cheeks streaked with tears when he finally looked back up at her.
"All right." He sat back in the barstool and smiled. "I'll give you a shot. Any girl who can mix her whiskey like this is welcome in my bar. I'll pay you ten an hour plus the tips you make, plus I'll have the guys tip you five percent each at the end of the night. Sound all right?"
She nodded, too dumbstruck to speak. Ten an hour was way more than she'd expected to make. Plus her tips? Plus a tip out? What kind of club was this guy running to afford to pay his employees so well?
"Stay here." He slapped his palm on top of the bar as he stood. "I want you to meet the guys."
Haymitch disappeared into the back of the club and Katniss leaned on the bar waiting for his return. When he finally reemerged through the door, two very young, very attractive men followed him.
"Katniss, this is Finnick and Gale. Guys, this is Miss Everdeen, she's our new bartender."
She nodded a greeting to both of them. "So, what you guys are the bouncers or something?"
The shorter one, Finnick, she thought, laughed. "Not exactly."
"Yeah," Gale replied. "We're the main attractions."
She looked at Haymitch, the question she couldn't ask written in her expression.
"Oh." He stifled a laugh. "Right. You wouldn't know, seeing as how you don't get out much." He held his arms out as if displaying the club, in all its glitter-covered glory to her. "Captain Cream is the home of Xquisite, the city's premiere all-male review."
Finnick winked at her. "That's just a really nice way of saying that we're strippers."
Her heart leapt into her throat and it felt like her face had actually caught on fire. She looked at the two men standing behind Haymitch and she blushed even harder. But the potential to make enough money to get way ahead on her student loans was enough to make her swallow her pride and the heat of her embarrassment.
She forced a tight smile and promised Haymitch she'd be back at eight o'clock that evening to prepare for the night's show.
As soon as she climbed back into the safety of her car, she rested her head on the steering wheel and sighed. "Fuck. Me."
A strip club. She couldn't believe she worked at a goddamn fucking strip club. Katniss sighed heavily as she parked her car in the designated employee parking lot. She was already ten minutes late because she couldn't decide what to wear. Because, really, what does one wear to bartend in a male strip club?
She had eventually settled on a fitted black scoop neck top and her favorite pair of jeans. They made her ass look wonderful, which really helped when it came to making tips in a normal bar. Although, she was pretty sure she would be the very last thing that interested this club's clientele, which meant that her tips would be low if they even existed.
She took a few deep breaths and squeezed her eyes tight in a desperate attempt to calm her nerves. She had just gotten her heartbeat settled back into a normal rhythm when someone tapped lightly on her window.
"Shit!" Katniss jumped and her heart raced once again. When she had gathered herself enough to look up, her gaze met the bluest eyes she'd ever seen. She smoothed the hair on the crown of her head and opened her door.
The stranger stepped back and held his hands out apologetically. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to make sure you were all right. You just looked kind of freaked."
She laughed nervously. "Oh, yeah, I'm fine. Just late for my first night of work, which is just awesome." She fiddled with her keys just to have something to do with her hands. "I'm the new bartender."
"Oh!" He shook her hand. "Well, I'm Peeta. I'm a performer."
"So that's what they're calling it these days?" She couldn't suppress a chuckle as he led her toward the back door of the club.
He shrugged good-naturedly. "I know what you're thinking, but this is only a temporary gig for me." Peeta held the door open for her and she stepped over the threshold.
"Look, I'm not judging you. Trust me, I'm in no position to judge anyone."
He nodded. "Good. You'll get along fine here then. Nice to meet you, Katniss. Good luck tonight."
"Thanks, you too." She gave him a small wave as they parted ways, she to the back of the club to the bar and he to the dressing rooms behind the stage. Her cheeks flushed. Was it considered bad manners to wish a stripper good luck?
Haymitch was perched on a barstool waiting for her. "Sweetheart! You excited?"
She shrugged. "I don't know how I'm gonna make any money working at a bar that I'm guessing is patronized mostly by women and gay men."
He laughed. "Well, at least you won't get your ass pinched and have to soak some poor bastard down with the soda gun."
"How did you..." She widened her eyes at him. "Where did you hear that?"
"Word travels fast in this circuit. Just remember that. You'll make good money when the boys tip you out. They make a couple hundred a night easy." He winked at her as he headed toward the back of the club.
The doors opened at ten o'clock on the dot and she was surprised to see Haymitch take a post at the door, checking IDs and collecting the cover fee. The show didn't start until eleven, so Katniss stayed busy mixing more fruity drinks in the hour than she ever had before. She was grateful for the work though, and she was so wrapped up in margaritas and gin and tonics and screwdrivers that she almost didn't notice the dimming lights and rapidly waning crowd at the bar until a room full of piercing screams jolted her back into reality.
Some cheesy eighties song that her mother used to listen to played at full volume and colored lights danced across the long black curtains that hung in front of the stage.
"And now," an amplified voice Katniss recognized as Gale's echoed through the club over the dull roar of the women seated at the tables. "Please welcome to the stage your Able Bodied Seaman, Mr. Finn-tastic and his long, hard trident!"
The room erupted in fits of giggles and screams as tall, tanned Finnick burst through the curtain, dressed only in a strategically placed piece of fisherman's netting. He did, indeed, clasp a long shiny trident in his left hand. His chest sparkled and the club's ubiquitous glitter suddenly made sense.
Katniss watched as he rolled his hips to the beat of the song, but she turned away when he started stroking the trident in an incredibly suggestive manner.
She felt the heat creeping up her neck as she turned to the sink under the bar. She wasn't exactly a prude, but this just wasn't her kind of thing. She was generally opposed to exploitation of any kind and this was the epitome of it. Katniss rolled her eyes and set about washing what glasses she'd had returned to the bar so far this evening.
She paid little attention to Gale's and Finnick's next two routines and she found herself desperate for intermission so she would have another rush at the bar. There were only so many times she could dust the bottles of liquor without looking stupid. If she were a normal girl, she supposed she'd be enthralled by the dancers on the stage. As it was, she propped herself against the bar and picked at her fingernails, refusing to look up, even when the crowd's screams grew obnoxiously loud.
Finally the house lights clicked back on and hordes of women flocked their way to every open inch of the bar. Katniss handled them the best she could, sliding pint glasses of beer down the polished wooden surface with her right hand while shooting soda water into a mojito with her left. She honestly loved the rush of bartending, even if she did hate being constantly yelled at.
"Hey, Katniss!"
She turned over her left shoulder as she filled a pitcher of Bud Light for the bachelorette in front of her.
Peeta leaned over the edge of the bar, dressed in a simple gray sweat suit. She tried really hard to ignore the piercing blue of his eyes and the delicate way his hair curled against his forehead.
"Hey, when's your break?"
She shrugged, handed the pitcher to the woman in front of her (who had actually had the gall to wear one of those stupid pink veils out), and began pouring a round of tequila shots for the woman to her left.
"Haymitch is going to come cover you in about..." He tilted his head back and forth while he counted. "Fifteen minutes or so."
"Why? What's happening in fifteen minutes?"
He shrugged. "Nothing you should worry about. Just a little something we like to show all our new employees. Initiation, if you will."
Thoroughly confused, and if she really cared to admit it, still a little entranced by his eyes, Katniss brushed off his comments and focused on counting out the amount of gin she was adding to the Long Island iced tea she was mixing.
Haymitch did relieve her fifteen minutes later and she had the sinking suspicion that Peeta had had something to do with the timing of it.
She couldn't say she minded though. Haymitch seemed perfectly content behind the bar with nothing to do and she was parched after the intermission rush. She filled a glass with Coke for herself and found an empty stool in the back corner of the club. She settled into the shadows and watched the stage for the next act.
"Ladies, please put your hands together for our next performer. He's a real special one to us here at Captain Cream's. Please welcome Provocative Peeta to the stage!"
Throbbing bass music boomed under Katniss's seat and the screams that she thought couldn't get any louder increased by what must have been a decibel when the spotlight landed on Peeta in his gray sweat suit, his head bowed as he waited for his cue to head across the stage.
She watched his routine, mesmerized by the way he had complete control over parts of his body that she thought were only used for one activity. He ripped the sweatshirt from his chest, revealing sculpted abs.
She bit her lip as a bead of sweat rolled across the ripples of his muscles and disappeared into the waistband of his sweat pants.
He dropped his body to the floor and thrust his hips up and down in time to the music. As he rolled himself slowly on the floor, Katniss felt the tingling of want alight between her legs so she squeezed her knees tightly together and sipped her Coke. But she still couldn't turn away from the man on the stage.
The pants came off next and his ass was perfect in the boxer briefs he wore. The red material hugged every curve, every dimple, and the heat in her core grew hotter. She downed the rest of the Coke quickly.
He leaped from the stage and made his way through the crowd, occasionally stopping to grind against a flailing woman for a few bars of the song. But he had purpose in his eyes and his path was clear. He was heading straight toward her.
She didn't know how he'd done it, how he'd managed to find her in the shadowy back corner of the club, but suddenly his strong arms were wrapped around her waist and he hoisted her up to his chest. He carried her up to the stage and laid her on her back at the edge. He moved above her, pushing his pelvis against hers in perfect synchronization with the thudding bass of the music.
Her cheeks were red hot and the knot between her legs was so tight she thought she might explode just from mere proximity to him. He was sweating and he smelled so wonderful—like shaving cream and body spray and something musky that she thought must just be him. She could hardly hear the roar of the crowd around her because she was so wrapped up in watching his facial expressions as he danced on top of her.
The song ended far too quickly and Katniss slumped against the stage. He grabbed her hand and helped her to her feet.
"Ladies, this is our new bartender. Be nice! We want to keep this one around for a while!"
All Katniss could think was that if she was getting that kind of treatment every night, this might turn out to be the best job she'd ever had.
After almost two weeks at Captain Cream, Katniss had grown accustomed to seeing the men walk around in their boxers or, in Finnick's case, his blue sequined thong, but Peeta never exposed himself when he wasn't performing. That endeared him to her more than the fact that he always showed up early to help her set up the bar and stayed late to help her clean everything. And she wasn't positive, but she was fairly certain that he was giving her way more than the required five percent tip out. That, or he made an absolutely ungodly amount of money.
Still, she wasn't complaining. She'd made almost a thousand dollars in the two weekends she'd worked so far and that was a hefty payment on her student loan interest. She would probably even be able to afford to buy real groceries this week. No more Ramen and Easy Mac for this girl.
Haymitch handed her a thick wad of bills as she wiped down the shiny wood bartop.
"Thank you!" She shoved the money into her back pocket and continued her cleaning.
Haymitch surveyed the area behind the bar. "Peeta didn't stay to help you tonight?"
She shrugged. "I dunno. I haven't seen him since the show."
"All right." He stifled a yawn. "Well, he has keys. Let him lock up after you, okay?"
She nodded and waved goodnight to him. Her cleaning duties were relatively light since she had developed a system of going about her chores during the dead times when the show was going full force. She'd actually made herself watch the entire thing on her second night, but blushed furiously when Peeta took the stage in that gray sweat suit, remembering the way he felt pressed against the inside of her thigh and how wet she'd been when she finally gotten home and relieved the ache that consumed her very core that night.
She looked all over for Peeta when she was ready to leave and finally found him in his dressing room in the back.
He was on the phone, speaking quietly and gesturing wildly with his hands.
Katniss barely stuck her head in and pointed out to her car. "Lock up?" she mouthed and when he nodded, she turned and headed to the parking lot.
After climbing into her car and trying desperately for ten minutes, Katniss concluded that her engine definitely would not turn over. She turned her key one more time hoping that by some miracle, her car would be fixed. But it just clicked and clicked and she finally admitted defeat. She took out her cell phone to call for a cab when Peeta rapped softly on her window.
She rolled down the window. "It's dead."
"I can hear that." He leaned into the doorframe. "Can I give you a ride?"
"Oh, no." She shook her head furiously. "No, I couldn't impose on you like that."
"Come on. It's really late. Just let me drive you home and you can come back and get it towed tomorrow." He shifted the duffle bag on his shoulder and jerked his head toward his truck. "Please? You'll make me nervous unless I know you get home all right."
She pursed her lips together tightly, considering her options. It was awfully late. And Peeta was trustworthy. If she could get into a cab with a complete stranger, why was she hesitating being alone with the star of a few of her more erotic dreams lately?
She nodded in acquiescence and collected her purse from the passenger seat before following him to his black truck.
The drive was silent for a while, she merely telling him the direction in which to head, but then he turned to her.
"How do you like it so far?"
Simple enough. She fiddled with the end of her braid. "It's fine, I guess. Different from any other job I've ever had."
He chuckled. "Yeah, I can definitely relate to that one."
Katniss took in a deep breath. "Can I ask you something?" He nodded. "Why do you do it?"
Peeta sighed and tousled his hair as he pulled up to a stop sign. "Honestly?"
He reached into his duffle bag that rested in the center of the bench seat. He took his wallet out and handed her a faded picture.
"That's me." He pointed to the smallest of three boys standing in front of a brick building with a sign that proclaimed that Mellark's Bakery was officially reopened for business. "My parents owned a bakery when I was growing up. But my dad died right after I graduated from high school and then my mom not long after. My brothers inherited it but they never cared like I did. It's just sitting there empty and sad now. And I hate that. My father never would have stood for it. He might not be proud of the way I'm earning the money to buy back the bakery, but I'll do what I have to do. And this is the easiest way. I'm good at it. I enjoy it." He shrugged. "So that's why."
Katniss studied the picture by the orange glow of the streetlights as they drove through the dark streets. Other than for height and the obvious changes that occurred with aging, Peeta looked relatively the same. His blond hair still curled uncontrollably and his eyes were still that perfect cerulean blue. She smiled and tucked the picture back into his wallet.
"That's so sweet."
"What about you? I mean, I just bared my soul to you and I don't even know your favorite color."
She laughed. "Fair enough. I'm in school studying to be a botanist. I'm focusing my research on endangered plant species. I want to save them before they're gone forever."
"Oh, so you're a hippie!"
"Hardly." She pointed to the curb in front of her house. "Oh, this is me."
He steered the truck over to the side of the road and shifted into park. He turned to her.
"Well." She cleared her throat. "Thanks for the ride home." Katniss moved to open the door, but stopped when she heard him say her name.
He was inches away from her when she turned back around. Her breath hitched in her throat at the nearness of him and she licked her lips unconsciously, desperately wanting to taste his mouth as it worked against hers.
He stroked her cheek. She anchored her hands on his neck and tilted her head toward his.
On her cue, Peeta captured her lips with his greedily and drank her in. His tongue moved rapidly against hers and she moaned and relaxed into him when his hands trailed over her waist and down to the hem of her shirt.
She pulled gently at the short fine hairs at the base of his neck and goose bumps arose on her skin as he dipped his tongue into the hollow just behind her earlobe.
"Oh, god, Katniss," he breathed into her neck. "I want you so damn bad."
She pulled away from him and looked directly into those deep blue eyes she'd so quickly grown accustomed to seeing.
"Fuck me." And for the first time in weeks, she meant it in its truest sense. "Oh, and for the record," she gasped as he nipped at the delicate skin of her throat, "my favorite color is green."
Thanks for reading! I'm on Tumblr as meggiemellark if you wanna come say hi or ask any questions. I'm really nice, I promise! :)