"Did you love Annie right away?"
"No, she crept up on me."
Strawberries. Despite having washed countless times, my nostrils curl at the overwhelmingly concentrated reek that comes from my hair. I can still feel her bony fingers scratching at my skin, and her hungry eyes in the back of my neck. Shivers. I let my toes graze at the surface of the turquoise emptiness, and little by little, allow my entire to body to slink in to the water once more. I want to be clean of her, want to be rid of her touch, her gaze, her everything.
My recent visit was unusually and painfully long. Whenever I have one of my visits, I count down the days until I'm allowed to board the train and be on my way home once more. Back to the haven of the waves that surround me. But this time, it took her longer to be satisfied, and she secured her knot around me tighter by whispering sins in my ear. Secrets. Forbidden and valuable information – my very trade. She wanted me enough to let go of them; they were simply a price that she had to pay for an even bigger one.
When my entire body is surrounded by the stillness of the water, my mind begins to unwillingly recollect all my previous encounters in flashes. The cold tongues against my neck, leaving a trail of goose bumps, and interpreted as reciprocated pleasure and lust, when in reality they were nothing but disgust. Shivers. My scabs where their eager nails clawed at my forearms, and bruises where their fangs forcefully corroded. Possessive tugs at my arms, and knowing hands leading me to the dreadful darkness that was our privacy. The quiet sounds of zippers being unzipped, buttons being undone, expensive fabrics being ripped, and garments dropping to the floor. The rhythmic bangs of heads against walls, pleased moans that gradually progress into elated squeals. The difficulty in keeping down dinner and the stink of overly sweet perfume. Strawberries.
And with these Strawberries in mind, I allow my head to sink deeper and deeper in to the water, the silent waves kissing my scalp. The deeper I sink, the clearer their faces resurface. Nausea. Why do I do this to myself? I have no reason. Before, I had my mother, I had my father, and I had my little sister. Until that one brief flicker of uncertainty, and I was welcomed home by an unbearably gruesome party. There they sat in pools of their own warm blood, wearing matching holes in their temples, and with their fear eternally frozen on their faces. My little sister's tiny fingers clenched tightly around my mother's – her perpetual youth so unjustly stolen from her. This had been the Capitol's way of keeping me in place. Their way of telling me to never have another brief flicker of uncertainty again. And I never did.
More nausea. . It wasn't enough for the Capitol that I was always going to be haunted by the faces of the lives that they had forced me to take in the Arena, but now I would be forever haunted by the fact that my family was murdered at my expense. More lives to add to my long list of regrets.
As the rhythmic movement of the water cradles me, I fight my natural instincts of swimming back to the surface for air. I don't want to. No more Strawberries. No more Secrets. No more Nausea. No more Pain. I don't want to. I don't want to live at all. Stillness and determination. My lungs begin to protest but I force myself to sink deeper. Deeper in to the dark abyss that was once my Sanctuary, but will now end my very existence. Irony.
As the corners of my world peacefully begin to darken, I suddenly feel my hair being yanked upwards. The anger wells up inside of me, and I want to resist but my corners are still dark. Why wont you just let me die?
My desperate lungs heave in air as I am pulled up on to the dock once more. The salt water itches in my throat, and I feel hands pulsing on my chest, forcing me to cough. I want to swat the hands away, and curse whoever brought me back. Back to misery.
"Finnick!"
The sound of my name coupled with the alarm in the voice makes me freeze. A woman. Suddenly, my stomach wrenches in anxiety, and I realise that maybe I'm not in District 4? Maybe I'm not in my Sanctuary, after all? Maybe this was all a dream? Maybe I'm still in the Capitol, surrounded by Secrets and Strawberries?
"Finnick?"
The voice is velvety soft. I know that voice, but in my frenzied state, I can't place it. Curiosity takes over and carefully; I open my eyes and meet two almond shaped oceans. After a second, I am able to register who she is. I stare at her in amazement. Her sun kissed golden skin, her mahogany locks that caress her face in an incomparable frame, her thin mouth with the same girlish colour of raspberries, and her magnificently blue eyes. Two almond shaped oceans. Annie. And suddenly, I see her.
"Finnick?"
She says my name again, embraces it with the warmth that exudes from her. She says it to check if I'm all right, to check what I'm doing, because she cares. She cares. Say it again, I want to ask her. Please? The two almond shaped oceans send a shiver down my spine. Goose bumps so unlike those that I associate with the putrid fetor of Strawberries. And there, in my Sanctuary, I have suddenly regained a reason to live.
When Katniss asked me if I loved Annie right away, I said I didn't. I said that she crept on me.
But all I wanted to answer was that she brought me back to life.