Title: you have burst at the seams
Fandom: The Hunger Games
Word Count: 6000 words
Characters/Relationships: Johanna, Johanna+Annie, Johanna+Finnick, Finnick/Annie, Katniss/Peeta
Summary: Each year on the anniversary of the end of the war, they air a patriotic program throughout all of Panem. A (lengthy) look at what goes unsaid about the life of Johanna Mason. Spoilers for the series.
Notes/Disclaimer: Title from Ellie Goulding's "Human." I do not own The Hunger Games and make no profit from this endeavor.


Each year on the anniversary of the end of the war, they air a patriotic program throughout all of Panem. Introduced by none other than leading television personality Gale Hawthorne, it is part documentary, part memorial, and according to some, a master work of cinematography. There is, of course, a touching segment on the participants of the Seventy-Fifth Hunger Games and Johanna Mason is described on different occasions as a tribute, victor, revolutionary, and survivor. The short package devoted to her is slick and sharp - all thanks to Cressida's careful editing, some heartwarming scenes with Katniss she attributes solely to the influence of morphling, and the narration of a man that sounds suspiciously like Finnick Odair. It is, as many would say, quite flattering.

In other words, there is much they forgot (and chose not) to say.


i. She arrives in the world early. Her mother was always considered a slight thing and when she passes from infection, the neighbors predict it likely that the tiny baby girl won't make it past a few more days either. (Such a tragedy, they announce, to add to all their misfortune.) Her father, defiant, spends his days and nights by her crib, calmly telling them not to place their bets so early. (He can afford to, they whisper, with all the favor he receives from the Capitol.) He waits and waits and soon enough, life goes on as usual.

It the last occasion that Johanna Mason is a source of town gossip for quite some time.


Her brother Leon and sister Mathilde are both well-regarded, clever and comely but not extraordinary in any respect. Johanna, however, fails to meet others' expectations. In fact, she seems to want to lower them: small for her age and short-tempered to match. She's unruly and impertinent, though her father calls it "candor". It seems pointless though, keeping her mouth shut when she wants to tell anyone that will listen that the history they learn doesn't make sense. (She says too much once during lunch one day. On the way home, Mathilde scolds her and Leon makes her promise to keep her comments to herself. It's difficult at first; her face will still scrunch in frustration as though she has something to hide and her father will say, "Johanna, the whole point is to avoid revealing your tell.")

Later, after watching a drunk man be beaten for yelling obscenities directed at President Snow, she gets it: standing out and feeling smug isn't worth it when it calls too much attention from the Peacekeepers with weapons at their sides.


Her father, like his father and grandfather before him, has a workshop full of furniture: tables and chairs and sometimes the occasional cabinet or bed. (Once, it would have all been shared with her aunt, but they don't talk about what-might-have-beens in their house, especially not when they concern ghosts taken away by the Reaping years ago.) She never disturbs him while he works (house rules), but when her father announces that he is building a chifforobe for none other than Claudius Templesmith, she finds herself wondering aloud why the famous announcer doesn't just buy it in District 1, like any of the other things the citizens of the Capitol decide they must suddenly need for the season. He just laughs and says, "You'll figure it out, dear. You're smart." (She frowns, because that's not what the teachers say. Or the other children, for that matter. Bully, maybe, but not smart.)

When a man arrives, skin tinted purple and hair bright green, looking of all things uncomfortable in their clean and tidy home, her father leans heavily on his cane and breathes shallowly, as though each and every step is an effort. It is the first time Johanna is home to receive a visitor from the Capitol and all she wants is to run to the doctor, but Mathilde holds puts a firm hand on her shoulder. "Stay away from the buyer," Leon whispers, "Father will be fine."

She'll sit in her father's lap after, waiting for an explanation. "Listen to me, Johanna. I sell antiques, and well, sometimes people need a reason to still want to buy them. It doesn't hurt if you can give them a story of the craftsmanship, however embellished, to brag about to their friends." She doesn't understand, not quite yet, but then her father says, "Sometimes it's best to give them a show."

She nods. "Then it's all just make believe." (She hasn't learned just yet that they're the ones on display - not the furniture - but she'll understand it soon.)


Life hadn't always been this way. Years before, her father had worked at the sawmill like her brother and her cousins and uncles, until an altercation with the other workers left him with a lame leg and the inability to keep up with the pace required of all the men. The Peacekeepers had called it a fit punishment for the possession of contraband books. (One day, though, her brother tells her what really happened: the Peacekeepers had set upon her father on the path to their home on the edge of woods, and no one dared contest the "official version." She considered it cowardice long before she had learned the meaning of the word.) So he had agreed to work alongside Grandfather, catering to the whims of the men and women of the Capitol, the ones that thought it trendy and hip and oh so fashionable to have a custom piece of rustic furniture transported all the way from District 7. It helps bring in much needed money for the family (and at times jealousy from the neighbors, even those that are Capitol Craftsmen themselves), but sometimes –- when the visitors board the train without so much as a second glance behind - Johanna sees a faraway look in her father's eyes.

"He can't decide," Mathilde says, "whether he wants to stay here or leave it all behind."

Johanna hates them for it, for making her father doubt himself. She knows what she would choose. Her district (her family) every single time.


Her first boyfriend is named Cooper. They hold hands sometimes and she even thinks that she might let him kiss her one day if he's brave enough to try it, but knows better than to hope they might grow old, let alone together. He's reaped, of course. She steels herself for the inevitable, but when she sees an eight from the Gamemakers - right up there with some of the Careers - she convinces herself against better reasoning that he has a chance of coming back home alive. He dies anyway, in the middle of grabbing a weapon at the Cornucopia.

She'll swear to herself, in the quiet of the night, when not even the Peacekeepers can hear, that she will always see the games for what they are, what they ask you to become.

Johanna Mason grows that year, in more ways than one.