"Annie" I hear Finnick's voice trying to pull me back, "Annie, please. I need you." Slowly I slip away from my mind and come back to the real world where Finnick is holding me while he shakes with sobs. "Finnick… is it real?"
"Yes, Anne. I'm so sorry." he cries.
"You know that we're are both going to be reaped, don't you?"
"You don't know that Annie. We're both going to be fine." We both know he's lying, but he is also hysterical right now. He is holding me so hard that I'm sure it would be uncomfortable if I could really feel my body.
"Yes, we do Finnick. My sister and mother were just telling me about it" in my head. "They said that they were sorry. I'm sorry too." I tell him, though I'm still not crying. The idea of dying is oddly comforting. Besides now Finnick and I have a few months of having nothing to lose. Snow has just given up all of his cards. Finnick, if you don't come to the Capitol and sleep with woman then I'm going to kill Annie! Well, you're already going to kill her anyway, so, I think I'll pass. Just thinking about this conversation makes me smile and hold back a laugh.
Feeling me shake makes Finnick pull back to look at me, "What has got you smiling at a time like this?" he asks, incredulously.
"Finnick, we're free. We get to kiss in public, and hold hands on the beach. We can have a wedding on the docks at sunset. We can have sex. We get to taste real freedom. The Games are going to be hell, and losing you is my definition of pain. But, we get to live, really live, together, and then die together. We can finally do everything we always dreamed of doing. I won't ever apologize for loving you even though I'm mad, and I won't apologize for being happy that I am getting everything I have ever dreamed of for you and I, even if it only lasts for a little while." As I speak my smile grows bigger and bigger, as does Finnicks.
"Snow really should have thought this through better." Finnick smirks. Then he leans in and kisses me with a passion he has never expressed but I have always felt. As much as I want to tear through his layers of cloths and laugh at every Capitol girl that ever thought he was theirs, I don't want to let Finnick act too rash. "Finnick" I sigh, "we should stop…" My words do not add up with my actions as I continue to kiss him fervently. Finnick chuckles against my lips, "No, we shouldn't. Because, you are the last woman I will ever sleep with and that is exactly what I have always needed." Hearing him say this removes all of my prior hesitation. And I let myself get lost with the man who I will be my husband in a few short days.
I love him so much. I whisper this to Finnick every few minutes and he smiles uncontrollably every time I say it as if he has forgotten in the past few minutes that it is the truth. It has always been this way, since the day I confessed my love for him he has never been able to believe it unless I was saying it to him. But here with both of us tangled together I don't know how he could ever question it again. And he doesn't because, afterwards, when I tell him that I love him in a tired sigh he responds, "I know, Anne. I love you too."
