clove is made of ice. it is why cato loves her.
he is not ever going to say that to her face. it is a sin even to think of loving someone, but clove's eyes are a steely shade of gray and sometimes looking at her is like looking in the mirror.
they both sleep with weapons under their pillows, clove says she's done it since she was five and cato jokes that he probably had a sword in his crib and when she laughs, it's something wild and manic and beautiful but if he says that out loud she'll slit his throat.
there are a million things that they are not allowed to say aloud, but when they fight, it's like words couldn't matter less. they don't go easy on each other. clove is bruised from head to toe one day, and cato takes a knife in the side of his thigh. this is how they speak to each other when words won't suffice. their "i love you's" are written in scars and burst blood vessels, and that's the only language they know, but it's the only one they need. some days, he catches her looking at him like he's breath itself and she's choking, and he wonders if maybe she loves him back.
half the fun of loving ice, he reasons, is never knowing what to expect. some days, she is beautiful like snowflakes settling in the grooves of the mountains. some days, she is frostbite claiming hands and feet and heartbeats from her victims. he thinks she's gorgeous either way, but he doesn't dare tell her that. the second she finds out she has a claim to his heart, she's bound to freeze the blood in his veins.
their first night in the Capitol, she orders a glass of cherry wine with ice. the sight of her with bloodstained lips is almost too much for Cato to handle, he wants to kiss her right then. he knows better until he doesn't. she tastes like alcohol and he's an open flame, but when they collide, he doesn't freeze and she doesn't melt. they reach homeostasis in the only way they know, fragile balance and rough hands and no apologies given. he is still fire and she is still ice refusing to admit that she's cold.
even as she's dying, she's all ice, but she's ice with frantic eyes and hands that reach out for cato or maybe for a knife, it doesn't matter anymore because he's holding her hand anyways and she is powerless to stop him.
"i love you." he says, and she replies "i'm sorry," as her hands claw into his wrist and leave one last scar, one last reminder, one last "i love you" to make up for the one she could never bring herself to speak.
when he wins, the Capitol erases all of his scars, and he decides to set the world on fire.