Disclaimer: The Hunger Games belongs to Suzanne Collins. If you recognize it, probably not mine.

They call him Nick, and he grows up in the waters. He can swim before he can walk, fish before he can speak in full sentences, and weave nets before he can write. He has eyes as green as the sea, bronze hair, and skin kissed tan by the sun. He is the recipient of many, many kisses, mostly from his mother, for whom it is practically a physical pain to let go of his chubby little hand, who refuses to let him out of her sight, even for a moment. He takes that for granted; it is the way things have always been, after all, for all his five years of existence. His life has always consisted of his smothering mother, who is always there yet not always there, and his father, who is never there at all, except when Mama weaves images of him out of her voice, which falters and trails off halfway.

Papa was kind. And brave. And good. And strong. Nick looks just like him, with his brilliant smile and green, green eyes. Yes, Mama has green eyes too, but yours are darker, just like your father's. No, no, sweetie, Papa won't be coming home soon. Why not? Well, because Papa lives far, far away now, not next to the blue water like we do, dear, but next to the blue sky. Well, because he had to move there, darling, he didn't want to, but he had to. We had to do a lot of things we didn't want to, when we were younger, both Papa and Mama did, because we wanted you to be never have to do any of those things. No, he loves you very, very much, with his whole heart, Nicky. He always said …

When she trails off and her eyes – green, but just a shade lighter than his own – lose focus and cloud up with tears she never lets fall, he knows that it is time to stop asking questions about Papa.

Other people don't know that though. Chattery people, with too-big lips and too-small eyes and prying voices, ask Mama about Papa all the time and think that it is okay to stare at him and exclaim how he is the spitting image of his father and don't you just know he'll grow up to be a little heartbreaker one day? Mama purses her lips at that description; sometimes, when she is enough there, she will sweep out regally, arm protective around his shoulders, head held high with disdain. Mostly, though, in her varying stages of not-there, you can see her own broken heart peeking through the pieces of this once beautiful woman. Those are the times when he takes her hand protectively, and scowls up at the nosy people, and tells them as fiercely as he can to leave. Them. Alone.

They do. They always listen to him.

He doesn't like those times. The times he likes best are when he and Mama sit on the beach, half in the water, half out, cool and hot and sleepy and awake all at the same time, and they make silly little rhymes and poems. Nick has a knack for it, which makes Mama smile this strange half-smile that lets him know she's thinking of Papa again, Papa who wrote silly soppy love poems to her; only she never fades off when they're making poems on the beach, like she usually does when she remembers Papa. Instead, her smile only grows wider—there's bittersweetness there, but there's pride too, and so much love that Annie Odair can practically feel it leaking out of her broken heart, though little Nick doesn't know that.

Sometimes she recites some of Papa's poems to him, and they are soft and sweet and gentle, like the steady rocking of the waves that can lull you into sleep on a summer day, but they are also strong and fierce, like the sea right after a storm. Those poems, Mama confides in her son, are things Papa never shared with anyone, except her. He told others that his main talent was being gorgeous and charming, and he was, but his secret talent was with weaving words so vivid and bright you could practically taste their sweetness, practically feel their weight in your palms and on your skin. These were his Papa's closest thoughts, which captured, as much as anything could, the essence of the man she still loves, and who loved her, and who loved their son.

When he is old enough to read, and to understand, Mama shows him an old, tattered notebook, full of Papa's poems. They're written in a half-illegible scrawl which Mama says is Papa's own handwriting, which makes it even more precious to Nick. She says it belongs to him now, if he wants it.

He wants it. He is all of twelve years old, and he is finally meeting his father.

For the first time in a long time, in just about forever, Mama lets Finn leave the house without giving her precise details about where and how long and why and with whom he is going. She understands. She is wracked with anxiety and terror, which she tries to soothe by knotting and unknotting, knotting and unknotting, but she understands. More than anyone else ever could.

He goes to the beach. Dusk is falling, misty over the waves, but Nick sits, half in and half out of the water, with a flashlight in one hand and his father's thoughts in the other.

Most of them, so many of them, are the same poems Nick heard his mother croon out to him on those beach days. Some, he realizes with a start, he recalls hearing his mother murmuring in her sleep, or to lull him to rest when he was young, very young. These are the gentle poems, soft and warm as fresh bread, sweet as the candy his mother buys for him at the market. Poems about love, and hope, and dreams and forever.

But there are some that are harsh, too, tortured, with images surreal and disturbing as a nightmare, written with a frenzy that reminds Nick of an unrelenting storm. Hurricanes of blood and the crunch of bones splintering like driftwood and green eyes, sea eyes, haunted by ghosts and goblins and – what's worse – living, breathing, broken people. These poems are entrancing in their own way, so much so that little Nick – who despite his own self-perception, despite the fact that he has aged beyond his years, more than he has a right to be, is still young, so very, very young—cannot draw his eyes away from the frantic scrawl. He is horrified, terrified, mesmerized, hypnotized.

These are his father's thoughts too. These are poems about fear, and vengeance, and hatred, mixed in with the sonnets about love and tenderness.

This is his father's voice.

Nick is breathing hard as he comes to the final poem. He turns the last page.

It is titled "To my son."

He stops breathing altogether, for a moment.

He has to squint to make out the words, it's so dark, and there is a pounding of urgency surging through him. Beneath his breath, he curses (he has the vocabulary of a sailor, after all) the illegible chicken scrawl, but he blesses it with the same breath.

His hands are trembling as he deciphers the poem, syllable by syllable.

To my son

If I should die before I wake,

I have just one last wish to make:

To hold my son within my arms

And know that he is safe from harm.

To see him smile his mother's smile

And know this fight has been worthwhile.

To know his dreams are free to grow,

And watch his tiny face aglow.

To whisper in his ear so dear

That he will never have to fear.

And to ask that he takes care of her,

The woman who was my whole world.

I hope he dreams the dreams I never could,

And chases all the things he should:

Poems, magic, childhood love,

Wishes made on stars above.

I hope he's free to be a child,

Free to roam and to run wild,

To swim the oceans as he dares,

To give his heart to one who cares,

To never give, to never yield,

To know that hope is his best shield,

Above the rest, I hope he knows

The reasons for the path I chose.

And that if I should die before he wakes,

With the final breath I take,

I will

It ends there. Nick feels a coldness, a numbness descending upon him. It ends there, as if the poet was distracted in his final lines, wandered away and never returned. Never returned, because he will never return.

Now Nicky will never know his father's final – and first – words to him.

He is crying, and he is not sure why. No. He knows exactly why. He is crying, because he will never know the man with this awful, awful excuse for handwriting. He is crying, because he will never, ever, be able to put a voice to these poems on the page. He is crying, because he wishes his father had lived long enough, even for just long enough to finish that final poem.

But he is smiling too, through his tears, because at least his father began that one last poem to his someday son, and at least Nick knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the kind of man his father was. And that even if he doesn't have the voice ringing in his ears and memory, he has the words, clear and true in his heart. And that is more than he ever dreamed to have of his father. And for now, for him, that is enough.

A/N please forgive my lame attempt at poetry. I'm sure Finnick was a much better poet than I. Reviews are lovely