When "Bad" Is The Worst Thing You've Ever Seen (This should be read together with The Star To My Wandering Ship but is not necessary to understand this one-shot)
Written for Prompts in Panem: The Seven Deadly Sins – Wrath
(Good Again universe)
Author's Note at the end.
The walk from our house to Effie's was a somber one. Effie's revelation of the deaths of her sister's family during the assault on the Capitol, her own young nieces annihilated by those deceptive parachutes roiled my feelings until I was nauseous. It explained so much why she had come to visit us in District 12 three months ago and has not given any inclination to go back to the Capitol yet. No one knew of my suspicion that rebel bombs – Gale's bombs – had been dropped on the defenseless children penned before Snow's mansion. To have my horror reflected back in the image of those faceless little girls threatened to push me into my grief over Prim again. It always came back to this – that children were the currency used by those in power to exert their domination over the masses, whether they were the starved slaves of the Districts or the pampered but oblivious citizens of the Capitol. This was not a world where children were loved, protected and kept safe. They were chattel, to be taken, traded, used and slaughtered at the whim of those charged with their welfare.
I gave Effie an awkward kiss as she wished us a good night. Peeta, always the better of us, gave her a powerful hug, whispering something in her ear to which she nodded. It elicited a sad but grateful smile as she patted his cheek then turned to walk quietly home. I looked at him with curiosity.
"I told her that she was probably the best aunt a little girl could have." He whispered morosely.
I was suffocating at this point and could only gasp "Oh, Peeta." I was speechless with the sadness, the utter wastefulness of so much loss.
"It'll be okay." He whispered as he took my hand and led me inside. Neither of us was up to talking, wrapped up as we were with our respective thoughts. I picked at my vegetables, guilty about wasting my meal when vegetables were becoming rarer with the increasingly cold days. I watched Peeta move the contents of his plate around and around until he, too, let his fork drop, giving up the pretense of being interested in his meal.
"I don't feel very well." I whispered to Peeta.
When he brought his eyes to look up at me, they were glassy and dark, the edges curving downward. I put my hand on his, which he turned over to grasp mine in return. "Want to just call it a night?" he asked?
"Yeah, I don't think we are good for anything more." I attempted a smile but felt the grimace overtake my features instead.
XXXXX
Night fell on coldest evening of the year.
When his vision became unfocused, I was hardly surprised. I knew Peeta would fade tonight. There's only so much unhappiness a fragile mind can take before fragmenting and his was opening at the seams. Effie's sad story had been the scissor that snipped at the delicate threads that knitted his sanity in place. Those dark recesses grew and grew until his pupils went dark. I was barely able to undress him when he began to rock back and forth on the edge of the bed. Clad in my thermals and heavy socks, I touched him as I always did. Dr. Aurelius had stressed the importance of human contact when Peeta went into his flashbacks and so I took extra care to wrap myself around him. When he tried to pull his hair, I squeezed his hands, holding them down, murmuring all the while in his ear.
"Peeta, it's not real. Not real. You're at home, with me." I repeated the mantra I taught him, the one that would sometimes keep him from falling apart. "You're Peeta Mellark. You're 19 years old. You're from District 12. The Capitol hijacked you. Sometimes you see bad things. But they're not real. You're safe from them. I'll keep you safe."
He was muttering those things he says only when he's sinking, the tremors taking over his body so bad, I was having a hard time keeping my hold on him. I kissed him and ran my hands over him, at times gripping his hands or pinning his arms to keep him from hurting himself. It was so hard tonight and when he began bucking against me, I was afraid that I would not be able to bring him out. Looking back, that's probably when I should have given up and let him work his way back to the normal world on his own. But when it came to Peeta, I found it difficult to give up on him.
And so I began to sing. A lilting melody of love and longing, so delicate, my voice seemed to cradle itself in the notes. It appeared to calm him so I was completely unprepared when he turned and pushed me so hard, I fell off the other side of the bed. I felt the floor come up and crash into my face, causing little spots of light to explode in my vision. I groaned as I felt the springs of the bed move. I could not see anything but every fiber of my muscles screamed at me to move! so I rolled just in time to miss his foot as it came down on me. I was up and instinctively crouching as he looked at me with those bottomless eyes, the ones that did not really belong to him.
"You killed them all." he hissed. "Mutt!"
"Peeta, it's not real." I say to him, straightening out of my defense position. "Sweetheart, please. You're at home in District 12. The war is over. Just sit down." I made to move towards him but his body became rigid with tension and I began to feel real fear. He was strong, my Peeta, and could snap me in half if he got it in his head to do so. I surveyed the room – there was no way for it. He was between the door and me.
"My family's dead. You killed them." He accused with a dead monotony that contrasted eerily with the clear rage on his face and caused shivers to radiate over my skin. His voice then dropped to a hissing whisper. "You killed those babies too, didn't you?"
I took a deep breath, a voice in the sick part of my heart agreeing with all the horrible things he said, taunting me to get it over with, to let him punish me. "No, I did not. The Capitol killed them, like they killed Prim."
"LIAR!" he screamed, his hands bent and claw-like as he went for me. It mortified me to think this way but I was never as grateful for his prosthetic as at that moment. His claws became fists which he managed to connect with my shoulder as I spun just out of his reach. However, even that glancing impact made me stagger and I knew I needed to get away from here as soon as possible.
"They were burned alive! All of them!" he roared, his face completely lost to his anger.
He began to swear, a seething string of hatred like I'd never heard falling from his lips. I almost preferred the glancing blow to the horrible insults. He was so busy cursing me that he became distracted by the vitriol the tracker jacker venom caused him to spew. Before my terror rooted me to the spot, I sprang like a cornered cat, leaping onto the bed and springing out the door, leaving him howling in rage, the sound of shattering glass following me out into the frigid night.
My legs would not stop moving until I was before Haymitch's door, shivering in the freezing night. I banged noisily, feeling as if I would collapse in a pile at his threshold from the numbing fear and cold. He opened the door and taking one look at me, pulled me inside.
"What happened? Why are you in my house in your johns?" he said as he pulled a musky blanket from a closet in the hallway and wrapped me in it.
"Lock the door, Haymitch." I said through trembling lips.
Not sparing a moment to shock, he did as he was told. For good measure, he propped a chair under the door knob and turned back to me, leading me to the sofa. Once I was seated, he stoked the fireplace so that its soothing heat began to relax my clenched muscles. The shock of the evening was beginning to wear off and I felt myself teetering on the edge of tears.
After several minutes, Haymitch had magically produced a cup of hot chocolate. I normally never ate from his house as a rule – hygiene had never been a real concern for him. However, I was touched by his consideration and could not resist the warm drink. As I set the mug down, I heard a thump outside which made me jump on my feet, driving my heart rate through the roof but Haymitch coaxed me down onto the sofa again.
"It's just the geese. They're inside the shed. It's okay, kid."
I nodded quickly and sank into a desperate silence, my face already wet with tears.
Haymitch let me have my moment, moving off to the kitchen to rummage about for something. When he came back, he had a small bag of ice wrapped in a cloth. "Here, hold this on your cheek." He put the bag in my hand. It was then that I acknowledged the glancing pain radiating over my face. I moaned as I put the ice on it, letting the cold slowly numb the ache away.
"You want to tell me how you got that?" he asked as he sat in the chair directly across from me, studying me from behind steepled fingers.
I sighed. "He had an episode. It was rough and he pushed me off of the bed. I landed on my face." I chuckled darkly, wiping my face dry. "He tried to stomp me so I figured it was time for me to get out of there as quickly as I could."
"You did the right thing." Said Haymitch gently. He'd been on the receiving end of Peeta's madness before.
"Can I stay here tonight?" I whispered miserably.
"Yeah, of course. Take the sofa. I'll go over and check on him in a little bit."
I nodded heavily as I leaned on the pillows of his sofa. I kept seeing Peeta's pitch-black eyes, the curve of his gnarled hands and the vision ripped more tears from me. I sank into a fitful sleep, wrapped in Haymitch's thick blanket and my misery.
XXXXX
I felt rather than saw his strong arms around me in the early glow of twilight. I woke to thick hands caressing me, running along the length of me. He peppered my face with kisses so wet, I knew he'd been crying.
"Katniss." He moaned into my neck.
I was so relieved that Peeta had come back to me that the memory of last night was bleached out, leaving just him as I brought my arms up and pulled him to me.
"It's okay, Peeta. It was just a nasty episode."
He pulled back to give me one of his joint-melting kisses when I felt his fingers push my hair aside. Staring at the bruise in horror, he seemed to lose his ability to speak. "I did this?"
I shook my head. "Not directly. I fell down." I whispered.
He looked sternly at me "Tell me the truth, Katniss. How did it happen?"
I sighed and tried to give him a sanitized account of that evening but each word I uttered seem to horrify him further. Abruptly, he stood up.
"I can't live with this. I'm sorry."
Soon, he was out the door.
XXXXX
When I entered our bedroom, he was standing near the bed, placing clothes in a square suitcase. His face was resolute as he packed his things.
"What are you doing?" I asked as I stared at his hands moved from his clothes to his bag, methodically, inexorably.
"I hurt you, Katniss. There is no way I can stay here anymore." He said grimly.
I was stunned. "Are you out of your mind? Where would you go?"
He shook his head. "I'm not sure. I'll stay at the apartment over the bakery for now. I'll think about the rest later."
I felt like I had lost all ability to comprehend, such was my shock. He folded his clothes and neatly placed each piece in place. I looked from the bag to him and back again, trying to keep the significance of his actions from overtaking my mind for fear something would fragment and fall apart.
"You're not serious, Peeta. This is crazy. How do you think this will make anything better?" I pointed at his bag, a hysteria beginning to well up inside of me.
"There is no way you are safe around me." He began to choke on his words as the tears fell openly over his face. "I told you I would never be able to live with myself if I hurt you.."
"You didn't hurt me! It was the flashback! I was stupid – I should have left you alone…"
"Katniss, stop trying to make excuses for me!" he fairly screamed at me.
"I'm not making excuses for you. I knew you were in bad shape. I could have just left you alone and I chose not to!" All I could see was him leaving, a panic seizing me so strongly in my chest, I was sure I would double over in pain.
"It doesn't matter. I can't stay here knowing what I did."
"You didn't do anything. It's just a bruise…"
He wheeled around, his hands in two fists. "Look at your face, Katniss! I could have killed you! If I did that, I would follow right behind you, do you understand? I would rather die than see something else happen to you." He packed as he sobbed his grief.
"You're over-reacting, Peeta." I begged. "Don't do this!"
"I have to." He said simply.
"You're breaking my heart! Doesn't that mean anything to you?" I moaned in desperation, stepping near the bed, trying to still his arms.
"Looking at you in this way, with that bruise breaks my heart." He whispered. He pushed my hands gently away as he continued to pack.
"Don't leave." I begged him. "Please."
"I have to." He repeated.
"I'll follow you." I said stubbornly.
"Then I'll hide."
"I'll find you!" I screamed. This was getting us nowhere. The more things went into his luggage bag, the more inevitable his decision became. My hysteria grew to such proportions, all I could hear was blood rushing in my ears. My vision was no longer clear - what I saw before me was a shriveled person, a girl like a flower that could no longer catch the sun. I glimpsed myself in the mirror, eyes wide, my slender frame vibrating from terror. Without thinking, I lunged towards Peeta, knocking him onto the bed, taking him by surprise.
"Katniss!"
He would never be quicker or more cunning than me. I disrupted piles of clothes as I deftly pressed the buttons on the side of his prosthetic, the tell-tale hiss announcing its detachment. Never had I been more grateful for an inanimate object as I was now for cooperating so flawlessly with me. He realized too late what my intentions were and made to catch me but his efforts at resisting me came to nothing as I yanked the prosthesis out from his pants leg.
"See how far you can get with one leg!" I seethed as I ran out of the room with it.
I caught his expression of pure shock as I rounded the corner towards the stairs. "Katniss!" his voice boomed but I continued to run until I was out the door and half-way across the frozen lawn. I heard another door open as Haymitch stepped outside.
"What the…" he froze as he saw me wielding Peeta's leg like a club. I was a fury, promising pain and retribution to anyone who approached me.
"Katniss, what the hell do you have in your arms?" He squinted, not believing what his eyes told him.
My breath came in spurts, my mind overrun with adrenaline and madness. I had never felt myself so transported. Before I could answer, I heard Peeta at the door of our house. He had limped his way down the stairs and made it to the door but without support, he could go no further.
"Give me back my leg, Katniss!" he called. He was angry but I didn't care. He wasn't going anywhere without it.
Haymitch stood in shock, looking from me to Peeta and back again. "You've got to be kidding me. Katniss, what the hell are you doing with Peeta's leg, for fuck's sake? Have you lost your mind?"
I was sobbing now, struck with the picture I must have presented to Haymitch and now Effie who, upon hearing the tumult crossed the lawn, bearing a look as if she had seen death itself.
"Well, that's not something you see every day." He muttered to himself.
I could not register his sarcasm in the state I was in. The words tumbled out of me between breathless gasps, the tremor in my body so pronounced, my voice shook with it.
"Haymitch, he wants to leave me because of this…" I pointed at my bruised face, my hysteria causing my words to tumble together. "And I said he couldn't but he insisted and he wouldn't stop packing so I took his leg because he can't leave, he can't leave." I shook my head, all sense of where I was completely gone. Instead I was in a strange, savage forest, alone with no compass, no way to sustain myself, no way to stay alive. "I'll die without him Haymitch, I'll die if he goes. I'll be nothing, there'll be nothing left of me and I'll just disappear. Please…" Here I grabbed his jacket lapel, oblivious to the look of pain and incredulity that he cast towards me. I implored Haymitch wordlessly as if he were the one leaving. I sunk to down to the winter-dried grass, hugging the prosthetic to my chest, something beyond grief having seized me, taking me with it. "Don't go. I'll do anything." I whispered. I had nothing left but my sobs and this extension of him and I clung to it as every tear I possessed bled out onto my face. Effie was overcome and sat next to me, holding me to her, murmuring into my ear.
I don't know how he did it but suddenly Peeta was next to me, speaking to me in a voice thick with his own tears. "No, Katniss, don't do this." I became more undone, hiccupping and nearly hyperventilating. Haymitch tried to remove the leg from my grasp but I yanked it back to my chest in an iron grip. There was no way to pry it from me.
"Katniss, calm down. Breathe, dear. You're going to faint if you don't take a deep breath." She looked up at Haymitch helplessly. He in turn fixed a murderous stare on Peeta.
"Leaving? Is that the bright idea you were proposing?" hissed Haymitch.
Peeta was beside himself, his head hanging, sobs wracking his body as he yanked the dried grass miserably out of the freezing ground. He could only nod in response.
Kneeling next to me, Haymitch gently took hold of the prosthetic. I resisted but he just ran his hand over my hair, whispering soothing things in my ear, which had the effect of calming me infinitely. "Come on, sweetheart. Give me the device. He isn't going anywhere." I relented before his kindness, letting him pull it out of my arms.
Peeta's held his head in his hands as Haymitch addressed him. "Right, boy? Tell her you're not going anywhere. Tell her that you are going to stay because otherwise you'll need to order another one of these nice things from the Capitol." Peeta put his head up, his eyes red from crying. "Why?"
"Because this one here will be so far up your ass…"
"Haymitch, that can't possibly help!" squealed Effie.
He just looked at Peeta for a long moment before flinging the leg at him. "Put that thing on and take her inside. Be very nice to her and make sure you are never responsible for letting me see her like this again. It's one thing to have a flashback. It's another to be an asshole with your wits about you."
"Haymitch…" began Peeta.
"I don't' want to hear it!" he roared. "Act like you deserve her. You are supposed to be engaged, for crying out loud. That means you take the good with the bad, even if the bad is the worst thing you've ever seen. Take her inside. Right. Now." He took a deep breath and turned towards Effie. "Let's leave them alone. I got some of that whiskey you like over at my place."
Effie looked at all of us, not sure where she should put her eyes. Slowly, she let herself be led away. As they walked, I could hear her whisper, "Is it like this all the time?"
"No, they actually take turns being assholes." He muttered.
XXXXX
I originally intended this outtake to come after Chapter 32 in Good Again but then I wrote a second part and for the sake of pacing, I've decided to just go ahead and post it here as an outtake. I will post the second part on January 4, 2014 (there's a story behind that but I'll tell it hen). Anyway, I appreciate everyone's patience with me. I'll be working on another piece for S2SL and so I may not be posting again until the end of January.
I'm also organizing the first annual Hunger Games Fanfic Jam. Check out the Forum of the same name for more details about participating.