Chapter 2
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
That's all I can hear, echoing throughout the cold empty halls of my room.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
And suddenly I'm back in the arena. With Wiress. "Tick tock- yeah we know." I was harsh. I shouldn't have been harsh. She's dead. They're dead. He's dead. He can't be dead. He is dead, Johanna. You weren't even there to save him. And then the tears begin again, a stream of brokenness, not being able to breathe properly or see straight. My head hurts, after bashing it against the wall for so long.
It's my fault Finnick is dead.
I'll never be able to see Annie again. Look her in the eye. Not that I could anyway. A few months ago I would have broken them up in a heartbeat. Happy to be a home wrecker if it meant I could wake up next to him every morning. He loved me. He told me once. He wouldn't leave her though. I regret it. I regret every single little thing. If I'd never known him this might never have happened. Maybe If I'd have walked away that night in the Capitol, he'd still be alive. We wouldn't have been allys… comrades…friends… in the arena. More people would have died. I might have died. He might have died. Less painful than this life of emptiness I'm leading. Empty because he isn't here. Empty because I can see no tomorrow. Empty because my dreams were about him. About us. Now he's gone, I can dream no more only fantasise that he is still alive with me.
They'll come to find me sooner or later. Probably stick me back in the hospital when they find out I haven't been eating. I don't feel hungry. I don't feel anything. I just feel like I'm standing on the edge of a precipice contemplating whether to jump. I won't jump. He wouldn't want that. He made me promise once.
I'm here in District 13, broken and tattered, thinking about whether or not to get up off the floor. It's quieter now the rebellion is just about over. Less soldiers here, some people from twelve are even venturing home to rebuild their lives. It's quiet. I'm not sure if I like quiet.
It's been a couple of months since Snow's death… Coin's death too. Brainless shot her. I don't blame her for doing so. Had it coming.
I'm working through distractions. Finnick told me to tie knots once- but I didn't have the knack, it just made me angry, so instead I chose to take out my aggression with an axe in my hand. That or another form of stress relief, the emotions involved in both activities were very similar. However there's nobody even remotely interested in me now I'm a train-wreck of a human being. They liked vicious Johanna Mason, not Johanna who doesn't have the strength to feed herself. Pathetic. There was one person who liked me… He called me Jo, and on stormy nights in the capitol, when he wasn't with a client, he'd lay with me and hold me softly. He'd press soft kisses along my neck and tell me that we would see a brighter day. A better day. Finnick again. Every one of my goddamn memories leads back to Finnick. It's not fair. None of it is fair!
And then I'm crying again. And there I cry until somebody comes and picks me up. I stopped bothering with names. They wear the mindless grey of District 13 and talk to me like I'm a baby or toddler. "C'mon Johanna, you can make it. Nearly there." Soft voices until I'm back in the hospital again. Paralysed for another day. I think Annie visits me at one point, but I can't even look at her. Her soft loving eyes that could do no wrong, and saw such purity everywhere.
I know they've plugged the morphling back into me, when I start feeling happy again, and I know they've drugged my food when I start feeling the pull of tiredness which I have no choice but to submit to. This sleep will be a dreamless one. I like the dreamless ones.
