Haymitch has a small black notebook in his pocket every day. The only thing in it is names, starting in his clean, sixteen-year-old print and slowly degrading into its current illegible scrawl. First, penned in blue ink, is a list of forty-seven.
Velvetine, 17, who almost won, hit by her own axe
Emerald, 12, who will never have her heart broken, stung by butterflies
Diamond, 18, who should have looked behind him, shot with a dart
Sheen, 17, who thought the water was safe, poisoned
Felicia, 13, who was too young to fight, suffocated
Laura, 14, who was never crowned, stabbed
Honorius, 17, who lived and died in rock, drowned in lava
Caesar, 18, who was the strongest, eaten by squirrels
Copper, 12, who limped, strangled
Wiress, 15, who was the smartest of us all, stabbed in the back
Voltaire, 16, who never made it to the woods, stabbed in the eye
Amper, 17, who had never seen fresh food, poisoned
Mary, 13, who looked so beautiful in that blue dress, snapped neck
Annabeth, 17, who had been bitten by a shark, fell off the mountain
Caspian, 18, who had a cruel mind, burned in lava
Finn, 15, who could swim for hours, burned in lava
Electra, 13, who had bright eyes and a frail body, fell and didn't rise
Hydra, 14, who sang beautifully, beaten with a mace
Sol, 12, who never heard a cannon, choked
Watt, 15, who lost his sister and girlfriend, suicide
Titania, 16, who blew kisses in the chariot parade, sleeping bag flooded in lava
Aurelia, 14, who tried to protect Balbus, stabbed
Balbus, 16, who couldn't protect himself, stabbed
Cassian, 18, who laughed at my outfit, stabbed
Maple, 15, who slept in trees, burned to death in a tree
Willow, 17, who was amazingly flexible, beaten
Blight, 12, who could barely pick up a sword, caved in skull
John, 14, who could climb to heaven, bled to death
Satin, 14, who had red hair, slashed throat
Coco, 15, who had lost her sister in last year's games, burned alive
Lowell, 13, who never really lived, died quick
Lawrence, 16, who was Lowell's brother, stabbed
Jane, 13, who loved flowers, poisoned
Plenti, 14, who could hold her breath the longest, smothered in eruption
Chaff, 16, who never kissed a girl, died in lava
Cornie, 15, who was a fighter, killed by Careers
Joann, 15, who ran fast, burned to death in lava
Bovi, 13, who loved nothing more than cattle, shot through the heart
Dalton, 17, who knew every cut of beef known to man, pushed into volcano
Burke, 18, who could remember anything he heard, strangled
Prim, 13, who was a delicate flower, crushed ribcage
Apple, 12, who was barely old enough to be reaped, drowned in poison
Thresh, 16, who had nothing to live for, an arrow to the heart
Harvest, 17, who knew what berries were safe, starvation
Aster, 13, who was my sister in all but blood, snapped neck
Maysilee, 15, who saved me, speared by a pink bird
Ash, 18, who almost made it, infected burns
All killed by the Capitol as punishment for people who are long dead.
He can add so much more; even now, he can remember the tiniest of details about some of them. He can remember that the Careers had tortured most of their kills, Caspian in particular. He can remember the uneasy whispers about what had happened to Cornie, the one death that he had not seen. He can remember Velvetine in her death throes and in the purple dress at the interviews. He can clearly see Lawrence sobbing over Lowell. He can see Capsian holding tiny Apple in the pond, laughing as she struggled and Thresh tried to save her; he can see Apple's brilliant smile covering panic interview night.
That's why he starts drinking, to take the edge off of the arena. The habit worsens with the next set of four.
Daisy Abernathy, my mother
Marcus Abernathy, my father
Jonathan Abernathy, my baby brother
Margaret Pinewood, my girlfriend
All killed by the Capitol to punish me.
The drinking gets worse with every pair of names he has to add. In the end, he adds forty-six more. Forty-six more children he can't save.
Before the Seventy-Fourth Reaping, he was expecting to add two more.
After the reaping, he expected Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark to be written in his notebook as he rode the train back home alone.
Neither dies, but Haymitch realized that those names were going to end up on another list, the Killed by the Capitol because they were too smart for their own good list.
After writing the list down for twenty-three years, Haymitch knows full well who the enemy is.
More names go down in the next two years than in all the years since he wrote down the first set, ending finally with Alma Coin and Corionalus Snow, killed by the pawn they once controlled.
Directly before that comes Primrose Everdeen, who was a mockingbird in a word needing an angry mockingjay, killed by double-exploding bombs.
Haymitch keeps record for a reason.; the names were once people. Good people, bad people, smart people, strong people, dead people. Lots of dead people. Lots of dead children.
He censors his demons by knowing their names. When you name your demons, they lose power. Haymitch knows about power.