Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine.

Veni, Vidi, Reliquit

Madge didn't like parties. Not for her parents, not for school, and definitely not keggers on Thursdays at some idiots house just off campus. This was going to get her killed, she was going to end up as an episode of Dateline, as a warning to young girls about the dangers of college parties.

The little rental house looked like something straight out of Animal House. There were people in bedsheets running around, slinging cheap beer from their red plastic cups everywhere, some moron was trying to start the charcoal grill using what appeared to be a rub on shoe polish sponge and a clear substance of unknown flammability. Madge guessed the answer was 'highly'.

"Ish no w-workin'," he complained to his friend.

"You neeta light it, bro."

Madge began praying she was gone before they found anything, even a spare bit of flint and steel, to try out their innovation with.

She was going to kill Katniss and Peeta. They owed her big time for coming for their dumb butts.

They'd gone to the party, thrown by one of Katniss' fellow engineering students, just for a few drinks, then they'd said they were going to bow out and head home.

It hadn't quite gone that way.

Katniss had apparently gotten in a drinking game of some sort with one of the grad students. If being one drink from passing out meant you won, then Katniss had beaten the girl into the ground. Madge was fairly certain, though, that wasn't the case.

Peeta had called around the middle of the game, asking Madge to 'Please,please, come get us'. Katniss was a notoriously mean drunk and Peeta had sounded a little tipsy too, though at least he still had enough sense at the time to call for help.

So Madge had rolled out of bed, thrown on some jeans and a hoodie, then drove, slowly, across town, to what looked to be a less than reputable neighborhood, to rescue her idiot friends.

She looked up at the house, her bubble of personal space was about to be painfully popped.

The house wasn't big, but it was packed with people, smelled of alcohol and too much body spray trying to mask the horrible odor. Taking a deep breath, Madge pushed through the sweaty, stinky, incredibly inebriated crowd, hoping it would be easy to find her missing friends.

Someone caught her by the elbow, let out a shrill squeal. Madge feels her heart stop in her chest.

"Oh my god! You came!" The platinum blonde pulled Madge into a hug, overwhelming her with the scent of expensive perfume and the liquor from the drink in her hand.

Oh, god, my bubble!

Madge recognized the girl from her statistics class. She'd made an unbearable class even more intolerable with her pointless questions and constant need to text during discussions. Even her name was annoying, Glory or Glamour or Glitter, something that belonged on some poor celebrity child. They'd never even spoken, clearly she had Madge mixed up with someone else.

The girl released her, smiling drunkenly, then squinting, "You were supposed to pledge our house, what happened?"

Madge nearly corrects her, tells her she had never rushed and she was mixing her up with someone else, but instead shrugs. She just can't help herself.

"Oh, uh, I went with Omega Beta Zeta."

The girl squints, racks her lone brain cell, she doesn't recognize the name, but she's too drunk to put that together into words. She nods, makes a vague noise.

"I gotta go," Madge makes a face, gestures to the hallway leading away from the kitchen and the Ralph Lauren sheet wearing girl, and hopefully, to Katniss and Peeta.

Before Glimmer, that was her name, can stop her she pushes off, toward the exit.

She gets stuck behind a couple messily making out, annoyingly blocking the hall entrance, when someone comes up behind her, blows hot air into her ear and whispers hoarsely, "What's your favorite scary movie?"

Not him.

That would be her luck.

She turns and finds her nose nearly bumping into the voice's cheek.

Gale Hawthorne, Katniss' long time neighbor and friend, and normally a complete jerk. While he and Madge had gone to school together, K-12 though he'd been a couple of years ahead, he'd basically pretended she didn't exist or was the most unappealing human he'd ever had to share oxygen with. He'd spent years mostly communicating with her through elaborate grunts, using full sentences only when necessary. It had stung a little, a lot if she was honest, he was possibly one of the cutest boys at their school and he looked at her like she was barely human.

Katniss still hung out with him, but Madge avoided him. It wasn't worth the effort and the damage to her ego.

Now, though, he's grinning at her as he straightens up.

"Scary movie? Really, Madge? You couldn't have gone with Pi Delta Pi or Zeta Beta Zeta?"

She gives him an uncertain look, "It's from Scream two, learn your movie references."

He smirks, puts his arm over the top of her, palm against the wall, and leans in. Madge leans back. He's in her bubble.

"Why don't you teach me some then?"

She makes a face. Why is he being nice to her? Almost flirting with her? Normally he treats her as if she ranks with jock itch in the list of things that annoy him.

Then his breath hits her. A little pungent, heavy with alcohol. She rolls her eyes, of course he's drunk, that would be the only way he would be nice to her.

She takes a step back, bumps into the wall and crosses her arms.

"Gale, I'm looking for Katniss and Peeta, have you seen them?"

Surely he had, he was probably the one that had goaded Katniss into coming to the party in the first place. She wouldn't be surprised if this was his house, actually.

He nods, but doesn't say anything, just continues to grin drunkenly at her.

She huffs, "Well?"

Gale scratches his cheek, covered in a dark stubble, looks around, ignoring her question. "You want something?" He points to the fridge, "Uh, Thom brought some wine coolers and some hard lemonade, you like those?"

"I don't drink." She's going to strangle him if he doesn't focus. Her voice raises an octave, there's too many people crushing in on her and she just wants to leave. "I'm not here for the party. Listen, I'm here for Katniss and Peeta. They need a ride home. Please tell me where they are."

He squints, processing her words, her tone, then points down the still blocked hallway.

Madge forces a smile, "Thank you."

Now she can collect her friends and get out of this hell hole.

If she can get the gross couple to move.

She ducks under Gale's arm, goes back to the couple, tries poking each of them on the shoulder, but they're too absorbed with each other to notice. A deep, authoritative voice booms out behind her.

"The lady needs through."

Gale pushes them aside, not that they notice, then waves Madge through.

"Thank you."

He follows her down the tiny dark hall. She looks back at him and frowns.

"I'm pretty sure I can find them from here." She doesn't need an escort.

He shrugs, continues to breathe down her neck. It's unnerving, how close he is, dressed only in a sheet. She eyes the pattern in confusion.

"Are you-are those your sheets?"

He grins again, looks down at his toga. "The Avengers? Yep."

Her eyebrows arch up. Of course. Why not?

"I've got Iron Man on my boxers. Wanna see?"

Madge closes her eyes. She's glad there's more between them than just his children's section sheet, but she doesn't need visual confirmation. With a little grimace, she shakes her head.

Gale snorts, "Prude."

Ignoring him, she continues down the hall, until Gale stops and puts his hand on the handle of the only door on the right. When he swings it open, they get an eyeful.

"Oh god!"

"Shut the door!"

"Oh god!"

It was too late though, they'd seen too much. Arms, legs, and a whole lot of naked.

Madge covered her face and turned to the opposite wall. She needed to bleach her eyes, her brain, burn the image of Katniss and Peeta impersonating an octopus out of her memory.

Gale clears his throat, "I, uh, guess we should've knocked."

Yes, yes we should have.

The door creaks open, just enough for Peeta's blonde head to poke out.

"Hi, Madge."

She doesn't turn from the wall. She can't look at him.

"Uh, well, she woke up, and, uh, well-"

"Peeta, please just get dressed," she gently bangs her forehead into the wall.

He makes an affirmative noise and she hears the door gently shut.

The hall is quiet, only the muffled noise of the music from the front of the house keeps it from complete silence.

"Party in the USA?" Gale groans.

Madge keeps her face in the wall, "You're at a college party, what do you expect? Indie rock hits?"

He flops onto the wall next to her, shrugging. "I requested Seether."

"Good luck with that." She doubts he's getting anything but top 40 hits while he's here. "Just enjoy what you get."

He chuckles, nudges her with his shoulder, "Are you going to turn around?"

She isn't sure. Seeing Katniss and Peeta like that might be the end of their friendship with Madge. There are some things you just can't come back from.

"Gotta hand it to Mellark, that was a pretty creative-"

Madge covers her ears. She does not need a reminder.

She feels his breath come down on her in a hot puff, he's laughing at her.

"You are such a prude."

"Whatever." She finally turns, crosses her arms and stares at the door, waiting for the other two to hurry up and get out so she can go home and begin purging her mind with Disney movies.

Gale reaches over and begins toying with a strand of her hair that's escaped her ponytail. He twirls it around his finger idly.

Madge gives him a scrutinizing look. His hair is mussed, not that it's ever all that tidy. He could use a shave, he has what she suspects is a two or three day grown coming on across his cheeks, chin, jaw, and down his neck. There's a smudge of what looks suspiciously like lipgloss, smeared on the side of his mouth. His gait was steady and his eyes aren't unfocused, in fact, they look amazingly clear in the dull light from the naked hallway bulb. He isn't as drunk as she'd originally thought, which baffles her to no end.

She tugs the strand from his fingers. She needs him out of her bubble.

His mouth turns down, a little crease forms between his eyes.

Her attention goes back to the door across from her.

"Why don't you drink?"

What? She frowns as she turns to him.

"You said you don't drink. Why not?"

It really annoys her when people ask her that, as if not wanting to drink makes her some kind of circus freak. She doesn't like the taste or the smell or what it does to people. Everyone has preferences, and hers happened to not include alcohol.

"I just don't."

Gale watches her for a moment, tugs at Captain America's face to loosen the knot keeping his toga up. "Okay."

The door finally opens and a sheepish looking Peeta followed by a glowering Katniss emerge.

"Pervert," Katniss hisses at Gale before she stumbles into Peeta. She may be standing, doing other things, but she's still pretty drunk. She glares at Peeta, as though he's the one that fell into her, grabs him around the neck to keep herself upright, then commands him to walk.

Grinning, Peeta helps his very unsteady girlfriend down the hall.

Gale takes the tail of his toga and makes a whipping noise. Madge rolls her eyes.

"What? He is."

"He's a good boyfriend." Madge gives him a sharp look, "You'd probably encourage whatever girl you were with to get on a table and strip."

Though from what she remembers of Gale's 'girlfriends' they wouldn't have needed neither the encouragement nor the drinks to do that.

He actually looks a little offended, gives her a glare, "Have a real high opinion of me don't you?"

Madge stops and gives him a faint smile, "Like my opinion matters."

They follow Peeta and Katniss, clad in pink and yellow togas, out the sliding glass door, into the backyard, strewn with cups and empty bottles. Madge feel relief wash over her as she steps out of the stuffy house. The grillmaster from earlier and his friend are there, Madge notices they're both missing their eyebrows, the must've found a lighter or matches. They have several very large fireworks set up, on the grass, a little too close to the house. Their failure to burn the neighborhood down with their deadly concoction at the grill apparently disappointed them, they were upgrading to gunpowder.

Those two are about to win a couple of Darwin Awards.

"It does," Gale says suddenly, as they pass the last of the fireworks.

Madge frowns.

"Your opinion, it matters."

She wrinkles her nose, "Why?"

He didn't even like her. Why would he care what she thought of him or his flings?

Gale shrugs, "It just does."

Right as she starts to counter him, tell him to stop being so cryptic, she spots where her car should be. It's not though.

"I left it right here." She locked it. She had her keys in her hand. Where was it?

Gale grimaces, "This isn't a great neighborhood."

Great, now she had to file a police report and then explain to her parents why she was in a shady part of town and had her car stolen. Fantastic.

The joke was on whoever stole it, though. That car was one missed oil change away from biting the dust. She isn't sure what an alternator is, but it sounded pretty damn important, and the guy that worked on her family's cars told her it was about to go out.

Peeta looks around, "Uh, mines gone too."

This night just kept getting better and better.

Madge presses her fingers to her eyes until she sees stars.

"Come on, we can take my truck," Gale gestures down the road.

She starts to ask what they'll do if Gale's truck is gone, but the moment they cross the street, spot the sandblasted single cab that looks like it might collapse under its own rusted weight, she lets the question die.

Katniss attempts to crawl in the bed, but her foot slips off the tire and she bangs her chin against the side.

"Just get in the front," Madge grumbles. She just wants to get home and plan what she's going to tell her parents.

"No way." Gale shakes his head. "She's gonna hurl any minute now. I know this girl. The moment this thing starts moving she's going to lose it and I don't want to be in a closed space with her when she does."

Katniss glares at him and mumbles some very unflattering things, but loses some of her bravado when she starts to gag.

Peeta nods, "I'm with Gale. The back seems like a wiser choice."

Gale drops the tailgate and he and Peeta push an increasingly sluggish Katniss up. Peeta crawls in after her, helping her shuffle to the front.

Madge eyes her warily, "Put her on her side. That way if she throws up she won't choke."

Gale pulls out his keys and opens the door, but Madge snatches them away.

"Hey!" He makes to grab them back. "What are you doing?"

"You've been drinking. I'm driving."

He scoffs, "I just had a few cups. I'm fine now."

She shakes her head and hides the keys behind her back. He reaches around her, trapping her between him and the hood of his truck. He lets out a little growl of frustration, "Give them back."

He's too close, she can feel her heart pounding. She isn't sure what he'll do, and that terrifies her, but he can't have the keys.

"Gale, please," she uses her softest voice, the one she uses with her mother when she's in a state.

Gale frowns and backs away, raising his hands in surrender.

He opens the door for her and she crawls in, noticing, to her horror, it's a standard.

Shit.

Gale slides in the passenger door, across the seat, stretching his arm behind her. She shoots him a look, does he not understand the concept of personal space?

"There's a whole side. Do you have to sit on me?"

"My truck." He narrows his eyes, "Do you know how to drive stick?"

She'd done it exactly once. It had ended in tears.

He doesn't need t know that though.

After several false starts, several kills, they finally get to the main road, settle into a slow pace.

Gale, still leaning on her, watching the speedometer, gives her a smirk, "You can kick it up, go a littlefaster you know? I'd like to make it back home before dinner."

"Ha, ha." She rolls her eyes.

If he would scoot away, stop staring her down, she could do this. He was too close, she could smell the last traces of his cologne and the detergent from his toga mixing with the musty smell of his sweat. He was making her sweat. His breath kept skipping across her neck and hair, the alcohol was almost gone, but it was still a little stale.

"I wasn't going to hurt you."

She stops herself from looking at him, her eyes need to stay on the road, even if they're barely going.

"I know." She didn't. Not really.

"Someone hit you?"

Her head snaps over. Where had that come from?

"What? No! Why would you think that?"

Gale stares at her for a minute, thinking over his words carefully, like she's made of glass. He shrugs, "You looked like you were waiting for me to snap." He reaches up and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "Madge, if someone hurt you…"

Madge bites her lip, looks back and forth from him and the road. He's being very nice, a little too nice, but it's pleasant. She wishes he talked to her like this all the time instead of waiting until he's had a few drinks.

"No one has hurt me." He's taking the superheroes on his sheet a little too close to heart. "My-my aunt was killed by a drunk driver."

Before she was even born, but she was still being haunted by the accident that killed her mother's twin. Her mother, who'd been in the car as well, had healed from her physical injuries, but her emotional damages were never quite mended. She'd become addicted to pills, narcotics, something she was able to hide for years before anyone even noticed. Their family was in constant flux, trying to get her mother the help she needed.

Madge spent most of her childhood watching her mother battle with her demons, in and out of facilities, missing birthdays and school functions, even Madge's high school graduation.

That's nothing Gale needs to know, though, not at the moment.

"I'm sorry."

She shrugs, "I just don't want to put another family through a death if I can keep it from happening."

Even if it makes everyone think she's a circus freak.

He stays quiet for the rest of the ride. A few times she thinks he might've passed out, but he's just sitting, his arm across her back, watching the road slowly move ahead of them.

When they finally pull up to she and Katniss' apartment, Madge lets out a sigh of relief. She almost gets out and kisses the ground, she's that happy.

Gale and Peeta heave the now loudly snoring Katniss from the bed of the truck and carry her up the steep steps to the apartment.

When they get inside, Peeta carries his girlfriend into her room and kicks the door shut.

Gale flops into the sofa and stretches out.

Madge frowns, "What are you doing?"

He gives her an incredibly serious stare, "I've been drinking. I can't drive."

So he's staying here.

Damn him, using her issues against her.

"Fine." She reaches into the closet, pulls down the most horrible, pinkest, fuzziest blanket they own, and tosses it to him. "I'm giving you a wake-up call with 'Wrecking Ball', though, just so you know."

His eyes narrow, "Don't you dare."

Madge smirks. She would dare. All she had to do was download it.

Gale unties the knot on his toga, pulls it off and tosses it at her. She ducks it and just catches a glimpse of his Iron Man boxers before he covers himself with the too short blanket. Great, now the only thing between her microfiber sofa and his nakedness was Tony Stark.

She makes a face at that thought and starts to walk away.

"Hey Madge?"

Turning, she finds him leaning over the back of the sofa, watching her, his expression is a little guarded.

"Yeah?" Make it quick, she nearly says, it's almost two in the morning. She wants to go to bed.

"What is your favorite scary movie?"

Her nose wrinkles. Why does he want to know? Telling him is definitely a bad idea. "Why?"

He shrugs, "I dunno, I thought, maybe, you know, we could pull it up sometime. Watch it together…"

She still doesn't quite understand, "Why?"

Gale lets out a groan, "As a date."

It takes a second for her to process what he's saying. He wants a date, with her, watching a scary movie. She's having some weird dream. That's the only explanation for what she's hearing.

"You don't even like me."

"Of course I do! Why would I want to go on a date with you if I didn't like you?"

"Because you're drunk." He wasn't falling down drunk, but he was still clearly inebriated. He wouldn't be asking her on a date otherwise. In the morning he'd be back to grunting at her.

Gale throws himself back in the sofa in frustration, making a strangled noise and covering his face. His voice comes out muffled, "I'm not drunk!"

He rolls off the sofa, stomps over to her. She backs up, uncertain what he's going to do. Then his hands are cupping her face, much more gently than she expects, and he kisses her.

The beer is still there, stale, but weaker, his lips are chapped, a little eager, and the scruff of his stubble is irritating against her skin. He eases her back until she bumps into the wall, then his body, tall and lean and in nothing but boxers is against hers. Rough hands ghost up her waist, just under her hoodie. He makes a needful noise in the back of his throat, groans, before finally breaking the kiss, resting his forehead against hers.

"I'm not drunk. I like you. Do you want to go on a date?"

She's still trying to catch her breath, but manages to get a question out, "Why do you like me all of a sudden?"

He sighs, "I've always like you." She rolls her eyes, he had a funny way of showing it. "I just, back in school you were you and so perfect and I was me, and kind of a loser, no one even thought I'd get into college…" He traces her cheeks with his thumbs. "What's it that Mellark calls it, a defense mechanism? I knew I couldn't have you, I wasn't good enough, so I just kinda…"

"Treated me like dog food?"

He makes a face, "It wasn't that bad, was it?"

Maybe not, but it felt like it when she was younger.

"What's different now?"

A little smile sneaks onto his face, "I just got an internship. They called me today, told me I was in." His smile bursts full force, "I'm not a loser after all."

Madge's cheeks hurt and she realizes she's smiling, beaming at him. "Gale, you were never a loser." How could he ever have thought that? "That's great though!"

He pulls her into a hug, buries his face in her hair. Her bubble is nonexistent at this point. Still, it's a little awkward, he's practically naked and her arms are pinned to her sides. She supposes it could be worse, her hands could be trapped in front of her.

She feels his hot breath on her scalp, hears him swallow thickly, "So…how about it?" He pulls back, "Date?"

Madge makes a thoughtful face, "How about 'The Exorcist'?"

He makes a face.

"Does my choice scareyou?"

Gale chuckles, "Your driving scaresme. Your movie choice makes me a little concerned."

Madge snorts, "Too late to back out now."

He leans in, kisses her again, more gently, "Wouldn't dream of it."

Maybe she wouldn't kill Katniss and Peeta after all.

They still owed her one, though, maybe she'd make them explain to her parents what happened to her car.