Disclaimer: I don't own The Hunger Games.

Summary: She's dying - right here, right now. This isn't what was supposed to happen. Haymitch wasn't supposed to develop any sort of feelings for the tributes, especially not like this. Especially not for her. HaymitchMaysilee, oneshot

My first Hunger Games fic! I'm really excited about this. I've shipped HaymitchMaysilee for the longest time, it seems. I just wish Suzanne Collins would have told us more about them. But hey, that's what fanfiction is for. Just all the much more incentive to write! I know this kind of fic has been done a lot, but I just wanted to try my hand at it. Anyway, I would love to hear your thoughts and opinions on this! Thanks for reading!

What a Shameful Thing

Her hand feels so cold and still in his own.

Haymitch Abernathy has never felt like this.

Sure, he has taken out his share of tributes in the Quarter Quell - more than he should have, if the rules had remained the same - and he tried to put all of that toward the back of his mind, thinking only of getting home. Thinking only of seeing his parents and friends again. Trying to push back the horror for now at least.

He can't pretend to do that anymore.

She went off, dismissing their partnership for good reason, by herself. It was with a good thought. Haymitch had hated contemplating the thought that one of them would have to die, and it might become the two of them in the last moments of the Games.

But now it was something completely different.

He had heard her scream. Without hesitation, he had rushed after her. It was completely subconscious on his part. He recognized that scream of pain as hers, and he was powerless to stop himself from rushing in to help her.

Utterly, completely useless.

He found this.

Maysilee Donner, having just been skewered through the throat with one of those awful candy-colored pink birds' beaks, was lying in a pool of her own blood. Gasping, twitching, clawing at the dirt around her as if to find a hold onto this life.

Haymitch didn't think he'd ever felt so destroyed in his life.

Sure, he could say all the tough guy things he wanted. He could be glad that the birds had taken her out and he didn't have to. He could be glad that another crueler, harder tribute hadn't had the change to get to her and she was dying relatively peacefully - peacefully compared to anything else in the Games - but he couldn't.

He couldn't find any reason to be glad that she was dying.

He was rendered immobile for just a few simple seconds, just staring at the kind blonde girl that doesn't deserve to be here. Frankly, none of them deserve to be here, but if anyone didn't deserve to die here, it was her.

The spell of shock worn off, he darted toward her, trying what he could to help her. Pressing his fingers to the wound on her throat. She looked at him as if he were being silly. This wound wasn't anything that she could come back for - the amount of blood made sure of that.

So here he is.

She had told him to stop. Weakly, softly, kindly. She told him to stop trying to save her. It wouldn't work. She even echoed this as being a kinder death than anything else in this damned arena.

So, instead, he folds his hand into hers.

She looks comforted by the gesture. And that's all he wants, really. For her death to be as peaceful as he can make it. He's sure that she isn't long for this world, and that pains him more than he likes to admit.

He watches her, though. Haymitch can't bring himself to look away. It is too hard to tear his eyes from her body, thin and weak and frail and covered in blood. He figures he can give her the decency of her dying with someone looking at her. To know that she isn't so hideous that she can still stir some sympathy in people.

There's a thin line of blood trickling out the corner of her mouth. Her skin is pale, ashen in color. Red coats her skin and mats her hair and for the first time, Haymitch thinks that he might be sick.

"Hay…mitch…"

He looks at her expectantly, Seam gray meeting brightest blue. "What is it?"

His fingers twist tightly around her hand. He can imagine feeling the life drain from her, receding almost like the waves of an ocean from the shore - not that he's ever seen an ocean, but he can imagine.

"Thank…you…"

What was left of his heart clenches as her eyes continue to stare at him. He can pinpoint the exact moment when the life leeches from them, leaving them glassy and open, staring but not seeing. The cannon booms. Haymitch doesn't let go of her hand. It feels cold, like ice. And that frigidity of her hand seems to be the only thing keeping him from losing it.

He's not sure what to say, what to do, so he reaches out his free hand and closes her eyes. There is just enough warmth left on her that he can pretend she's still alive, but her breath no longer comes. Her chest no longer rises and falls.

Still, he sits there by her side. He doesn't want to leave her. He just wants to stay with her and not have to be in these stupid Games…

But he knows that the hovercraft will be waiting for him to move so they can pick up her body. He knows that he'll have to move sooner or later. And, out in the arena, sooner is better.

Reluctantly, he pries his fingers from around her hand. Stands up. Moves the minimal amount of distance so that the hovercraft would come. It does, and Haymitch can do nothing. The feeling of being useless almost smothers him.

Haymitch stares at the spot of drying blood where she had lain before he walks back to his cliff with the image of Maysilee Donner, dancing and happy, playing through his mind.

End.