It had become a cycle: Breathe in, breathe out, maybe shed a few tears, repeat. A cycle that I'd been following since I stepped foot in Finnick's shower. With my eyes closed, I would sharply inhale the steam that had clouded around me like a blanket, then let it out at the slowest pace possible, as if I were savoring the moment. In all actuality, I was just giving myself enough time to wake up and realize that this had all been some horrible dream. Of course, I never did, but yet I continued on, waiting for the moment that I would jerk awake back in 12—hell, 13 wouldn't be bad either—and tell myself it wasn't real.
"Katniss?"
So caught up in this cycle, I hadn't been aware of the door creaking open. A voice that would normally be soothing nearly gave me a heart attack. "What?" I lashed out, and through the foggy glass I could see him leaned against the wall. The fact that I was naked in the shower while he stood just a few feet away didn't bother me, mostly because my knees were to my chest as I sat on the floor. But it was also because we had seen each other in an even more vulnerable state: In the face of fear, hopelessness, and, above all, grief. So much grief.
"You've been in here for an hour," he informed me as he approached the sliding door. "Are you hiding from me? I know I'm rather gorgeous, but a girl on fire shouldn't be scared off by just a few winks and dazzling smiles." How he can joke at a time like this, I don't know. But since he's Finnick, I allow myself to smirk, one I'm sure he could see despite the steam and glass.
He did, of course. Since we arrived in District 4, he's been searching for any small sign that I'm coping, while I've been doing the same for him. The problem arises, however, that Finnick Odair is a man that can mask his emotions at any time. He rarely tore down that barricade of flirtatious jokes and whispered teases, maybe for the sake of others, maybe his own. So while he easily detected any sign that maybe, just maybe, I could get through this, I would just stare endlessly at his face and wonder if that snow-white smile was real, or if he were just distracting me from the fact that his will to live had been reduced to practically nothing.
I mumbled an incoherent protest as he shut the water off, hating how my skin instantly reacted to the change in temperature. Luckily, Finnick was always two steps ahead, and handed me a fluffy towel that reminded me of the ones in the Capitol. But the Capitol was the last damn thing I wanted to think about.
With numb fingers I attempted to wrap myself in it, but was instead hoisted up and cocooned in the soft fabric as if I were a child. I didn't complain, though, because I was soon pressed against his chest, and that was the one place I needed to be at the moment. He gently threaded his fingers through my wet hair and stroked my back with his other hand, a gesture that was so simple, yet the most comforting feeling.
"I should have been in there, Finnick," I whispered into the crook of his neck, already feeling the tears come on. Crying was something I had become recently accustomed to, and I no longer felt shame for it. It was a human thing to do, after all.
He abruptly stepped away and cupped my face in his hands, turning my gaze upward to meet those tantalizing eyes that I hadn't yet seen evoke a tear. "Do not. Say that." His voice had turned cold, and for a brief moment I felt as though I were being threatened. "You were not there because you were not meant to be there. The universe decided that you and I were going to live."
"And the universe also decided that everyone else should die!" I shrieked, trying to remove myself from his grip. But Finnick, as always, was too strong to let that happen. "Katniss—"
"What? Are you going to deny it? If fate, or whatever the hell you believe in, kept us alive, did it also not kill everyone I loved? The woman you loved?" Bringing up Annie was something I always avoided, and the look that crossed Finnick's face was the reason why. His arms slowly dropped to his sides, and though I felt it was in order, I didn't apologize, only stared at the wall behind him.
I knew I would dream of it again tonight, the moment when Finnick and I came over the hill and saw the giant crater that had been blown through the earth, the remnants of weaponry, furniture, even people that had been strewn around in the aftermath of the bombing.
Realizing that everyone in there: Peeta, Gale, Prim, my mother, Beetee, Haymitch, the people I had grown to love, trust, yearn to protect, were dead, and I hadn't gone with them, simply because I had decided to give Finnick a taste of hunting in the woods. My own stupid suggestion, that maybe he hunt on dry land for once. Despite all that Finnick had been saying for the past week, it had been my fault.
Grief-stricken, I hadn't initially even thought of the fact that Finnick had been in love with one of the Capitol's unfortunate victims (yet another to add to the long list). It had been after two days of sobbing my eyes out that I stopped and thought of Annie. I was still disgusted with how self-absorbed I had been, and had been trying and failing to make it up to him.
Never once did he let on the fact that he was suffering, too. I knew it, of course, but he had been the strong one this whole time. Making all the decisions: We were to sneak into 4 and secretly live in his old home, which is what he decided merely minutes after the discovery of an obliterated 13.
He had been making sure I was eating, checking to see if I was really asleep or just rocking back and forth in bed. It could almost be seen as him parenting me, and in most cases I would have been agitated, but I had actually never been so grateful for what he had done.
Now, here I stood, reminding the one person I had left in this damned world of who he had lost. I hated myself for that, not that I didn't have other reasons to. And it made me angry how he wasn't mad at me. It was a strange feeling, but I wanted him so badly to yell at me and tell me how horrible I was, how I should have been down there in 13 while he and Annie went out for a walk. But Finnick Odair would never breathe such words, at least not to me.
"Katniss," he finally said, in a tone that had most definitely softened, "I've never met a person as deserving of life as you." While I sensed he was lying—Annie had most likely been the one that bore that title in his mind—I didn't speak in opposition. "And the same goes for you," I whispered back. I wasn't lying in the slightest.
His arms surrounded me again, leaving me astounded once again at his effortless ability to forgive. I often wondered what it had took to get to that point, where someone's wrongdoings could just be forgotten with a wave of the hand. Later, I came to the conclusion that that was just who he was. Yet something told me not everyone would be spared from his anger, and there were times when he didn't forgive. President Snow, for example.
Neither him nor I would ever forgive that monstrosity of a person.
He had brought home fresh fish for dinner, like he always did since we arrived here. Even if I didn't feel hungry at first, just the sight of one of his catches would suddenly leave me famished, and I would eat all of my share, even some of Finnick's when he forced it onto my plate, insisting that he would feed me everything if it meant I would eat.
That's when I had realized that he was afraid I would kill myself. Maybe through starvation, maybe through drowning myself in the nearby ocean, I didn't know what ideas he had running through his mind. He wouldn't be entirely wrong, since there had certainly been a few instances where I felt ready to take some course of action that would result in my death. What stopped me, I wasn't sure, though it could possibly be the fact that I was all Finnick had left. I was only living for someone else.
Dinner, as usual, was quiet. It wasn't an awkward silence, like one you would encounter while being forced to converse with an enemy, just a soundless period of time that felt right. The fish, as always, was terrific, and a part of me felt like if it had been caught by anyone else, it wouldn't taste as good. Finnick had that special touch on everything in life: Why wouldn't it apply to fishing?
After we ate, Finnick lit a fire and we sat in front of it side by side like the two loyal companions we had become. We often found ourselves holding hands. Not as a romantic touch, but as a comforting gesture that communicated to the other that we were still there and always would be.
"Tell me a story," I said to him, suddenly unable to bear the silence. Raising an eyebrow and giving me a crooked smile, he asked what I was hoping to hear about. I paused briefly before suggesting he share a childhood memory.
Nodding, he took a moment to think of one in particular before grinning as it came to him. I couldn't help but reflect his expression back at him—any positive emotion we got from each other made us ridiculously giddy.
"My father," he began, "taught me how to fish when I was five years old. I remember my mother was all worried about me drowning or something irrational like that. We went out to the beach with all of our gear, and I sat and watched him cast the line." He chuckled. "It seemed like a magic trick to me back then, something that only certain people could do, you know?"
Our hands were still linked together, and I absent-mindedly ran a thumb over his knuckles. We both seemed to acknowledge what I did at the same time, although Finnick continued on with his story a second later. "While I'm sitting there with him, waiting for something to bite, he turns to me and says, 'Finn, I'm going to teach you a very important lesson today.' Of course I thought he meant fishing."
"Finally, something bites, and my dad reels in a fish almost as big as I was back then." He grinned and nodded at my doubtful expression. "I'm not exaggerating here! So I'm watching him just reel in this fish and as he starts to gut it, he looks up at me and asks if I want to learn this very important lesson. I nod, and he says with a dead serious expression, 'These fish are a hell of a lot easier to catch than a sane woman.'"
Despite the blatant sexism, I laughed whole-heartedly, which earned me yet another award-winning smile from Finnick. When he looked at me like that, his eyes shining, it made sense to me why all of Panem was in love with him. I felt guilty after such a thought, since it had been these infatuations that landed him in the bind he had longed to evade for years. When he finally did, however, he was met only with tragedy.
I hated to bring an abrupt end to a rare moment of genuine amusement, but with the idea of Snow's prostitution ring fresh on my mind, I couldn't resist the urge to blurt out what was brewing on my lips. Would I regret it afterwards? If my past conversations with almost anyone were any indication, then most likely, yes. But I've never been one for holding my tongue, especially when something is bothering me.
"I realize, now," I said quietly, my heart sinking as I watched Finnick's breath-taking smile disappear, "that I could have very easily been roped into the same…business as you." He said nothing, just stared at the crackling flames that briefly reminded me of the attire I had worn in the opening ceremonies of the Games. Cinna…
"Why didn't Snow do the same to me as he did to you?"
His averted his eyes from the fire and bore them into mine, making me want to turn away. But I didn't. I had brought this up, after all. "You expect me to know the answer to that, Katniss?" I honestly hadn't, and had just been speculating aloud, but now that I saw the position I had just put him in, I didn't hesitate to look away from him this time, angling myself to the left. "I'm sorry."
Much to my surprise, I felt arms encircling my waist from behind, drawing me up against him. It seemed like we were always touching, whether it be our feet when sitting at the dinner table, or gently bumping shoulders while walking across the beach at dawn. "Don't be sorry," he whispered into my ear. The warmth from his breath seemed to transfer over to me, and I felt my face flush.
"Why is it always everyone else but me?"
"Hm?" His chin was resting on my shoulder.
"You're forced into prostitution. Peeta gets hijacked by the Capitol. Cinna is beaten then killed protecting me. My father dies in the mines. Why doesn't this happen to me?" The words sounded foolish coming out of my mouth, especially since it was the mouth of a person who has been in the Hunger Games.
Finnick hugged me tighter, and I closed my eyes, repeating the cycle I had done in the shower, with the exception of crying. I was done with that, at least for today. I liked how he didn't just deny whatever I said, because he knew that would do nothing. Instead, he does a very Finnick-esque thing: He just stays there, and heals you with his mere presence. How he does that will always be a mystery to me.
It was just his touch that did all the comforting, what told me that everything was going to be okay, and that it wasn't my fault. That was what I would always love about Finnick Odair—he could say so much without speaking a word.
"You need to rest," he finally mumbled into my shoulder, planting a small kiss on my cheek as he pulled away. It made me a little embarrassed how badly I wanted him to come back and hold me again, to silence the demons that brutally screamed in every nook of my brain, never letting me stop and breathe.
"So do you," I pointed out, trying to be the caretaker for once. "When was the last time you even took a nap?" Shrugging with a mischievous smile, he comfortingly wrapped his arm around me as we headed upstairs. "Let me guess, sleep is for the weak?" I tried. He shook his head. "I'm afraid not, Miss Everdeen. Sleep is for the privileged, the ones who can close their eyes without being afraid of not waking up."
We've been sharing a bed, ignoring the fact that there is another one right down the hall I could use. But the thought of waking up from a recollection of charred corpses and acrid smoke without Finnick there to stop me from screaming keeps me from moving to the other room.
I'd be lying if I said I didn't sometimes awake with the wrong idea, finding myself in the arms of Panem's sex symbol. But it takes less than a heartbeat for me to remember that this is my best friend—my only friend left, really—who keeps me from going insane.
The sun was barely up when we heard knocking.
Almost simultaneously, we bolted upright and looked at each other frantically, fearing this it was the end. It could be ten Peacekeepers standing outside, or maybe, if we were to ever be that unlucky, President Snow himself, holding a white rose as we waved our white flag.
"Stay here," Finnick orders me, and he doesn't seem the least bit taken aback when I follow him down the stairs. If he's being arrested, killed, or worse, kept alive for Snow's enjoyment, I'm going with him. All of District 13 has already suffered without me, and I refused to let the same thing happen with us.
We were nearing the door when the knocks sounded again, causing a wave of nausea to envelope me. Finnick, his hand on the doorknob, casted an uneasy glance over his shoulder at me, as if asking if he were making the right choice. I just hold up in defeat—there is no right choice at this point.
As it turns out, however, I was wrong, because who else would be standing in front of the house than Effie Trinket.
Hm…not too sure how I feel about this. It's definitely not as awful as I thought it would be, but it's definitely not something I'll be boasting about. :D I know that HG fics are often pushed off the pages pretty quick, so I hope someone is managing to read this! I'll be posting more soon.