Title: we drank all of the holy wine
Summary: If little Prim keeps acting like this, Gale can definitely see it being easy to play make believe. AU!GalePrim
Author's Note: This is what comes out of a four hour delay and a dance competition, bitches. Also, idk if any of you use 8tracks but I posted a playlist with the same name as this because I feel like it.
I left the ending open so if I actually want to come back to dis I can. Woooooooo. Hopefully you guys like this because I'm obsessed with GalePrim yeaaah.
/
They call Katniss' name, that year of the Hunger Games.
It's a hot day, unbearably so. Katniss thinks it's a dream. No – a nightmare. She doesn't even know she screamed, but they tell her that she did when she finally wakes up. She's missing hair at the sides of her face. They tell her that she ripped it straight from her temples.
Prim is gone, they tell her. Prim volunteered. You are a coward, they don't say, but it doesn't mean that it's any less true.
Gale is gone, they tell her. Not a surprise, though. I'm sorry, they say, but it doesn't make the situation any better.
Katniss falls back asleep, and when she finally wakes up, she doesn't feel a thing.
/
Prim raises her hand like the polite little girl she is.
"I volunteer to be tribute," she says, her voice steady and strong.
Her sister is being dragged away by Peacekeepers, and there is Prim, with the duck tail and the odds against her, and she is volunteering to die.
Needless to say, she is a favorite among the sponsors.
When they call Gale Hawthorne, Prim blushes deep red and for once in his life, he notices little things about her. He notices how her hair is almost white, and internally, he smiles when he sees the faint traces of coal at the ends. He notices how she is so tiny, more so than Katniss has ever been.
He takes her hand, and he feels how soft it is, how nice it feels to hold it –
And then, he thinks, we are going to die.
Prim smiles for the crowd and watches all of the pretty faces on the television celebrate.
/
Their mentor is drunk and his belly slightly rolls over his pants. Gale hates him immediately, but Prim loves him, often bringing him his wine and listening to stories about his past. Gale can see that although Haymitch is mean and grumpy, he can't help but like Prim.
Gale can't help but like Prim. There's something about Prim that Katniss lacks – how she can smile about something utterly grim, make situations better by making others happy. Occasionally, he wonders though, if Prim is really happy. There are moments when she'll bring Haymitch another glass of vodka and her smile will falter for just a moment. And then, she'll meet Gale's eyes and smile one of the brightest smiles he's seen.
He likes it when she smiles, because all of the negativity and bad thoughts kind of mute themselves for a little bit when he sees her tiny incisors.
/
Haymitch announces the master plan, and Gale can't help that it's kind of genius.
"Star-crossed lovers," he says with a sweeping motion that makes Prim giggle. "Love defying age and Games and all that shit."
Gale can't picture anyone buying it, but when he turns to Prim, she looks determined.
"Okay," she says, "I can pretend to be in love."
"I'm in," he says then, in a steady voice. "I can do it."
He thinks it's kind of easy to pretend to be in love with Prim.
/
When they come back from the stylists, his head practically spins around. They've removed the coal from Prim's hair and her hair seems more white. She is not just pretty. She is beautiful with lips the color of roses and eyes framed by thick lashes. He feels his palms sweat. He feels like a little kid who's just seen a pretty girl for the first time.
"What do you think?" she asks Haymitch and Gale, tugging on her hair and her tight black flame suit like they're making her itchy.
"You look like you're not a kid," Haymitch says before taking another swig of wine.
Prim chuckles, looks at Gale expectantly with her big, pretty eyes and he chokes out, "You look good."
Haymitch smirks into his wine glass while Gale looks up at the ceiling. From the corner of his eye, he can see Prim's cheeks flush, and she looks even prettier like that.
"Very interesting," Haymitch says, "I think this plan is definitely going to work."
Gale has to fight off the color before it rises to his cheeks.
"I like your suit," Prim says under her breath, so Haymitch can't hear, "It's very form fitting."
She giggles and he snaps the fabric of her matching suit. She sticks her tongue at him and turns away to go talk to Haymitch.
He notices that hers is very form fitting as well.
/
Haymitch and Gale plan for the training sessions. Prim seems to be lacking in fighting skill, so they decide she'll keep behind in the shadows while Gale will attempt to get a high score.
No one thought that Prim would be a fighter at heart, but when she's at the knife throwing station, she lodges the knife in the dummy's heart. And when given a bow and arrow, she can shoot moving targets as well as still ones.
When Gale looks at her with a slackened jaw, she grins madly.
"What?" she asks teasingly, "You thought Katniss was the only one who was good with an arrow?"
She laughs to herself and moves on to the next station, hips swaying back and forth in a tantalizing way. Gale doesn't even remember who she is for a minute, but when he does, he averts his eyes and runs to catch up with her.
If little Prim keeps acting like this, Gale can definitely see it being easy to play make believe.
/
Haymitch claps Prim on the back when she's awarded an eight at the training session. He sloshes a glass of whiskey at her, but she politely declines.
"Congratulations, Prim," he says while smiling, "An eight is awesome."
Her little devil grin creeps onto her face, "Seven is good too. I mean, it's obviously less than an eight... But it's good."
He grins back at her and ruffles her hair, and when she looks up at him, her mouth turned into a pretend scowl before breaking into a smile, he feels something creeping in the pit of his stomach.
"You're such a little jerk," he says, chuckling to himself.
She twines her fingers in his, then and looks up at him, "But you love it, don't you?"
He rolls his eyes, but thinks, yeah, I kind of do.
/
She took one of Haymitch's bottles, he realizes, because Prim would never act like this.
She's on his bed, wearing one of the Capitol nightdresses, and it falls off her shoulder because she's so damn small. She kicks her legs back and forth, staring at the ceiling with a loopy smile on her lips.
"Do you sometimes wonder how you are going to die?"
He nods, and then realizes she isn't looking, "Yeah. A lot, actually."
She looks at him then, her eyes brighter than they've ever been, and he wonders if it's from the liquor or from something else.
"I don't," she says happily, "Isn't that strange?"
"A little."
"I wonder about you, though. Like what you're thinking and what your smiles mean. You never smiled at home, but now, you're smiling. It's also kind of strange."
His head is spinning from the multitude of thoughts, but he realizes, it is true. He smiles around Prim even though their predicament is far from delightful.
"I guess that is strange that I smile here."
She offers him the bottle, and for once, he decides to take a drink. It's bitter and smells awful, but he chugs it. She gestures for him to lay down next to her, and he flops himself on his bed. She smells freshly clean and her hair smells like honey and jasmine and he loses his breath a little.
"Do you think Katniss will mind that we're going to pretend we're in love?"
He looks at her, and sees the slight twinkle of fear in Prim's eyes.
"No," he lies. "I doubt she'll think it means anything, really. Just another tactic to win."
He doesn't know if he's lying to himself or to Prim, but he feels his heart drop a little when she says oh, in the small voice she uses when she doesn't understand something.
He doesn't understand either. Not until she suddenly turns and barely kisses him, and he feels his palms against her skin, and then he kind of gets it.
She pulls away for a second and he sees fire in her eyes, "Do you think she'd mind that?"
He gets a little breathless and kisses her again and wonders if it's her first kiss, because suddenly, he really, really hopes it is. It feels like it's his.
"I think she would mind," he says after a few minutes of kissing.
"Do you care?" Prim asks, and it isn't malicious or cruel, it's an honest question.
"I don't think I do," he says.
She smiles when she kisses him, and he wonders if he's been allowed to touch her like this because he might not be able to soon. He's never had anything special before, but when he touches her veins and feels her lifelines, it feels like it might be pretty easy to lose something special.
/
The next day, they both come out of his room for breakfast and eat ravenously.
"Seems like two people had a really fun night," Haymitch says conversationally.
Prim laughs and Gale traces loops onto her exposed thigh. She blushes so badly that Gale laughs too.
/
They do the interviews perfectly, and Haymitch congratulates them, even though it doesn't seem like it's a tactic anymore.
Gale watches them in his bedroom the same night, and looks at how his face changed when he started talking about Prim. He thinks about the words he chose to describe how he felt, and then curses himself for not saying more, like how she makes things lovely with her smile and how her blush felt against his skin when he kissed her.
He wonders what Katniss is thinking, right at that exact moment. He doesn't know if she really believes he loves Prim or if she's wondering if he's thinking about her. He shakes his head to himself, because girls like Katniss are not the same as girls like Prim, because Katniss doesn't think the same pretty thoughts that Prim does. That's why he liked Katniss so much, initially.
He doesn't realize he thinks about Katniss in the past tense.
/
The sponsors go even crazier over them, because they're not just the girl and boy on fire, they're star-crossed lovers, Lolita and Humbert Humbert (Gale doesn't get the reference, but Prim laughs so hard she folds into herself) – Gale and Prim from District Twelve.
They lay on her bed, side by side, and Gale feels like they are in another place completely.
"One more day," Prim says, breaking the silence.
He whispers, "Do you sometimes wonder how you are going to die?"
She looks at him tiredly, "Yeah, sometimes I do."
He kisses her lips and tastes all of those star-crossed tales that they are compared to.
"There's a chance we'll come out to be a tragedy, you know," she says, leaning her forehead against his. "All the best stories are."
"If you die, I'll die too," he fiercely says, because he is many things, but he is always loyal.
She kisses his knuckles and wonders when they grew up so fast.
/
They run to the woods. He feels her heartbeat in his ears. Her tiny hand in his feels like a lifeline. He thinks, in the minutes that they're just running, that in Prim, there is home. So when she lags behind, he grabs her and swings her on his back, because Prim is home and smiles and Haymitch must've known, behind all of those secret smirks, that this would happen.
Prim laughs in his ears out of nervousness, and he runs faster just listening to the sound.
She speaks into his hair, "I think I really love you, Gale."
He knows then, by her wavering tone and accelerated heartbeat against his back, that she means it this time. He pulls her closer and keeps running, because he has to keep her. He really needs to keep this one special thing in his life.
/
A lone Career wanders into their campsite when Gale is out scavenging for food. When Gale hears the cannon, he runs as fast as he can, dropping berries in a trail like they did in his favorite fairytale.
He's so glad to see the dead Career instead of a dead Prim. He drops the food to the floor and picks up a sobbing Prim and kisses her furiously. She cries into his lips but kisses him back, her bloody fingers roaming in his hair and legs wrapped around his waist.
"I was so worried. So goddamn worried," he says, crying now too.
She hiccups and leans her forehead against his, "I'm twelve. I'm fucking twelve."
He understands the double meaning behind her words, but kisses her anyway, because in this world of Games and violence, there is no age limit on murder.
And apparently, as a parachute falls from the sky filled with food to make up for all that Gale dropped, the Capitol found that there was no age limit on love either.
/
The trail of berries leads someone to their campsite. Gale wakes up as soon as he hears the footsteps, and untangles himself from Prim. He grabs the bow and arrow a sponsor sent them and stands up.
"Gale," Prim says, suddenly wide awake, "What's wrong?"
"I think there's someone here," he replies, face deathly white.
It's a surprise to them when they see a tiny girl standing outside their campsite. She must only be Prim's age, but yet, she's frighteningly skinny and Gale can see her ribs through her shirt.
Prim takes her hand before Gale can stop her, and says, "We won't hurt you. I promise."
Seeing the look of joy spread across this little girl's face is enough for Gale to trust her.
"I'm Rue," the girl says, her voice melodic and warm. "I hate to ask this, but do you have any more of those berries?"
Prim giggles and Gale joins in before offering her some food. It's strange for him to trust another person like this, but he can't help but feel like Rue is family when he sees her laughing along with Prim.
/
Prim wakes up and smells fire. She knows the smell too well, and wakes up Gale and Rue with terror in her eyes.
"Run," she says, and that's enough to send them all out of their campsite.
Gale puts Rue on his back and grabs Prim's hand and they take off, trying to escape the smoke invading their lungs. Rue starts hacking and has to spit over Gale's shoulder. They try not to notice that eventually, blood and ash is mixed in with her saliva.
They know then, that the Capitol didn't like them playing happy family. Only people from District Twelve could handle this much ash in their lungs. Eventually, Rue coughed up more and more blood.
She whispers into Gale's ear as they continued to run, "You need to let me go."
Gale stopped in his tracks and let Rue down. Her eyes were closing, and her little ribcage was barely rising. They must have put more ash in the smoke. Prim started to cry, and squeezed Rue's hand tightly.
"I'm sorry," Prim said with a slight cough and tears trailing through ashy cheeks.
"I love you two," Rue said, with a tiny smile. "I love you both so much, so you have to leave me."
Gale kissed Rue's cheek, and gave Rue the customary Twelve goodbye of kissing your fingers. He took Prim's hand and slung her over his back. She cried against his back, dampening his ash covered shirt.
When Rue's cannon finally sounded, Gale felt tears fall down his own cheeks. Prim whispered in his ear, just like Rue had done and broke his heart in a million ways.
"I don't think I can watch another person die, Gale."
He kept running. He didn't want her to be in pain, but she would have to see more deaths if she wanted to stay alive.
Her tears kept falling on his back, and he thought of his promise.
/
Only four other tributes are left when they announce the rule change. They are the only two tributes left from the same District.
That is the same night that Prim asks Gale to have sex with her.
While he's holding her that night, he thinks he doesn't even know the difference between reality and make believe.
/
Prim looks at him differently after the rule change is announced. All of her kisses taste sweeter but her eyes are filled with such sorrow and joy that Gale wonders if she even remembers what it's like to laugh anymore. She hasn't laughed since Rue died.
She kills the boy Career, Marvel, the second he approaches them, and then holds out her hand. A package falls in it and she smirks. Gale kisses her to get Prim back. She smiles against his lips.
He tickles her and while she's laughing, she tells him that he's the reason she stays alive.
He kisses her nose, "You're the only reason I'm afraid to die."
Her smile still plays on her lips, but he sees the fear in her eyes.
/
He wakes up and she's not there. His breath accelerates and he can't feel her heartbeat against his palms and this makes him weak.
He runs out of the cave they've occupied for the past couple of days and searches for Prim. She's nowhere to be found and he only gets more desperate to find her. Suddenly, he hears her laugh and looks up to see her in a tree.
She kicks her legs back and forth, while grinning, "Scared you, didn't I?"
He's about to yell at her before an arrow pierces her chest, right in the heart, and her eyes grow wide before they go cold.
He wakes up from his hallucination, and even though she's alive, he sees that there's blood dripping from her temple.
"I think I did something really bad," she whispers quietly, before she passes out.
In the distance, three cannons sound, but the Games do not end.
He kisses her forehead and tastes blood on his tongue.
/
The Games have not ended and there have been no things set to end it. There are no explosions or natural disasters. There is just Gale and Prim and the blood of tributes on her hands.
Gale wonders if this is a Capitol tactic or a gift.
/
"You have to kill me," she whispers into his ear, so soft that the cameras can't catch the sound.
"I promised," he replies back, in a normal tone. "I love you, so I promised."
She nods and turns her back to him. He presses his fingers against her collarbone and faintly, he feels her heartbeat trapeze against them. He puts his lips on the back of her neck and she sighs.
"I'm sorry."
He doesn't know what she's apologizing for – but then, the trumpets sound.
She clutches his hand in hers and squeezes it.
"We're going back home," he whispers happily. "We're safe, Prim."
She nods absentmindedly and then says in a dreamy voice, "I don't think we'll ever be safe again, Gale."
He smiles, "Do you ever think about the way you are going to die?"
She puts her cheeks against his, and he feels her smile creep up on her face.
"Yes," she answers, after a moment's thought. "But in every scenario, you're right there with me."
He takes her hand, and together, uncertain of the future, they walk into the shining lights.