As promised, here is Part II in Haymitch's POV. :)


Chapter 3

Haymitch: Part II

Effie was deadweight in his arms as he ran, ducked and weaved amongst the panicking people running in all directions. His hands were numb, he was exhausted and severely out of breath.

Haymitch's knees gave way and he collapsed in an empty alley way with half-destroyed buildings. The place was once crawling with Capitol citizens and it was lit up brightly with neon lights – the Capitol's pubs were located in this area.

He cradled Effie's head and patted her cheeks. "Effie, Effie, please. Please, sweetheart, wake up. You gotta to – please don't do this."

Her head lolled to the side and Haymitch looked around helplessly, looking for help. Rebel soldiers ran past the alley before he could even shout for their help.

Snow's mansion. That was where he had to bring her. That had been the plan told to him by Plutarch before he deviated and went in search of Effie.

The woman in his arms was slowly dying. She was rasping and wheezing for breath. Haymitch feared that each breath she drew would be her last and that debilitating thought spurred him towards Snow's mansion.

If anyone were to ask him how he managed to get to the mansion, he wouldn't have been able to answer. He had no idea how he got there except that he knew he needed to get there fast.

She was taken away from him to be medically treated. He fought to be by her side before he felt the prick of a needle and the world darkened around him.

XxX

Haymitch thought that years of watching his Tributes die had desensitized him to any news of death, but when he was informed of Finnick's and Prim's death, he had nodded his head in silent acknowledgement and sat by Effie's bedside, his heart hurting and growing numb by the hour.

His only consolation was that Effie was alive. She was conscious and lucid, although she had to take long naps to regain her energy. She was sleeping now.

When the door opened and footsteps approached him, he didn't react until he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Haymitch," Plutarch called him out.

He sat up straight in the chair immediately, steeling himself. Plutarch's voice sounded grave - he had more bad news to deliver.

"There is something you need to see," he informed Haymitch before handing over a worn out file with a Capitol seal on its front cover. He nodded absent-mindedly and listened to Plutarch's retreating footsteps.

Glancing down on the file in his hands, he noted Effie's name and without thinking much, he flipped it open and his world split.

Bound within the file were pages upon pages of unimaginable horror and still he forced himself to read through it. His answers, the ones he was looking for. The answers to all the questions he had about Effie all these years.

He had wondered about the chink in her armour, the vulnerability on her face when her mask slipped, and the reason why she changed. This was the reason right here in his hand – he was the reason. Forced prostitution.Snow had put her on the market just like Finnick and the other desirable Victors.

He had asked himself where the light in her eyes disappeared to and he realised now that she should have been dead a long time ago. Yet here she was still fighting for her life. Effie was far stronger than he gave her credit for.

As he stared at the file in his hand, he finally broke down and cried after so many years. The words printed on paper swam before his eyes, burnt and etched in his mind. Misconduct by mentor of District 12. Haymitch Abernathy.

He remembered the words he spat at her that day in the Penthouse. "You smell of cigarette and sex." He buried his face in his hand, the tears seeping through his fingers.

The rage bubbling inside of him magnified and a huge weight of guilt settled on his chest. Another name added to the list of people he felt guilty about.

XxX

Haymitch sat slumped in the crammed arm chair by Effie's bed side staring blankly at her unconscious form when she began to stir, her file still gripped tightly in his hand. He started and considered leaving the room. How was he supposed to face her when he had been the reason she was auctioned off, the reason why she had to grit her teeth and swallow her scream as a man lie on top of her all these years?

He stayed his feet and remained her room. The least he could do was face her and let her hate him and scream at him. She did neither. She merely looked at him, a small sad smile on her face. It would have been less painful if someone were to drive a knife in his heart and twist it. How could she still look at him?

She had been awake for less than three days before they started fighting, before he confronted her about the contents of the file.

"You could have told me, Effie! I would have –"

"You would have what? What would you have done, Haymitch?"

As fair as the question was, it didn't make him any less angry that she kept it from him. He had never once shown that he cared, Effie had no reason to tell him and expect any less. What would he have done if Effie had told him the moment it started?

"I don't know. But I would have done something, anything. Wouldn't drink so much, I would have kept my mouth shut. I wouldn't have taunted them. I would..."

He trailed off and sank into the armchair next to her bed. He hung his head, defeated. What could he have done? What could he say to her?

Haymitch sat on the edge of his seat and took her hands between his. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, Effie."

"You saved me. It's enough, we're even."

He stared at her in disbelief. It couldn't be that simple. His mistakes could not be atoned for in such a manner. He shook his head but she was quick to wrap her arms around his shoulders and press his cheeks to her breast, patting his head awkwardly.

"It's okay, Haymitch. It's okay, I'm not... I don't hate you. I've never hated you. I was angry with you, sometimes I wished you could just shut up but it's not you, is it? They've never owned you - you had no one left they could threaten. How were you supposed to know that they would use me?"

"You could have told me," he repeated himself.

"I never meant for you to know. They were going to kill you. I ... I did it to keep you alive. If they had gone straight to you and threaten you, there's nothing to hold you back – you would have retaliated and... They would have killed you, Haymitch."

"Why? You hated me," he pushed himself back to a sitting position but maintained his hold on her hand.

"Pay attention, Haymitch. I said I never hated you."

He was confused. Was Effie always this arcane and unfathomable? She had never hated him? She should hate him now more than ever for all that had happened to her.

"I just wanted to see you safe."

That sentence sounded odd in Haymitch's ear. His safety had not been anyone's concern since the only people he cared about were murdered long ago. Over the years, he had learned to live with the knowledge that nobody would bat an eyelash if he was one day found dead in his house from alcohol intoxication. He had accepted the bitter truth that he was alone.

Haymitch wanted nothing more than to clarify the confusion surrounding him but Effie looked exhausted. Shooting her a dubious look, he rose from the chair.

"You're a good actor, Trinket – you're good at hiding things. I won't press it. Rest now."

He kissed her forehead and left the room. He needed to think and come to terms with what just happened.

XxX

A full year went by without any contact with Effie. It was unusual. When Reaping Day came around, there was no knock on his door, no meddlesome woman dragging him out of his bed by the collar demanding he clean himself up for the Reaping.

People gathered at the town square on Reaping Day not because they had to watch two District Twelve children be called on stage but because for the first time, they were free. They were remembering all the tributes that had died, the sacrifices and the victims claimed by the Capitol. Haymitch watched from a distance and if he squinted, he could almost pretend that Effie was walking down the dirt pathway in her high heels looking terribly out of place in District Twelve for the Reaping. He blinked. The image disappeared.

Peeta had taken Katniss to the meadow that day. The girl Haymitch knew had slowly started to return although there were still days when she stopped responding to anyone and sat in a corner, rocking back and forth muttering Primrose's name. They had each other, and Haymitch was confident that both Katniss and Peeta would make it through and heal with the other's support.

It was clear to him that day that everyone around him was slowly but surely picking up the pieces of their lives and building new ones for themselves. He was the only one still left behind. Nothing had changed for him.

He was still a reclusive drunk who could barely function. He was dead, he wasn't living his life. He had fought against the Capitol since he was sixteen and now that there was nothing to fight, he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do with himself. He had too much guilt to allow himself to live properly.

To say that he envied these people would be an understatement. He wondered what it was like to be content. Was that too much to ask for? He wasn't even asking for happiness. He just wanted to be content with his life.

He needed forgiveness and he needed to be absolved of his guilt. The only one left alive that he could seek any form of atonement for his mistakes was Effie. She was it. She held it all in the palm of her hands.

Effie had the ability to fix things when they inevitably fell apart. It was part of her job as an Escort. When things did not follow the schedule given, she would have a panic attack, get herself together and fix the situation.

I need to go to her. She could fix me.

XxX

Wiping his hands on his pants, Haymitch knocked on the door and waited for her invitation nervously. He glanced around the corridor where the walls were painted sky blue with motivational posters pasted on them. The whole floor was for patients receiving long term psychiatric treatment.

"Come in," he heard her voice through the door.

"Oh, it's – Hello, Haymitch. It's been awhile."

There had been a speech he had prepared in his head as he sat in the train on the way to the Capitol. The plan had been simple – visit her, extend the invitation to live with him in District Twelve and wait for her reply. She could either reject his invitation or accept it.

Truth be told, he had spent days debating if it was a wise move to even ask her to move to Twelve with him. He had been worried about her reaction and her answer that he had not given it a moment's thought at the possibility of what came after. Well, if she rejected it then there was nothing to think about. If she said yes, however, then Haymitch decided he would cross the bridge when he came to it.

The speech he had mentally prepared in his head dissipated now that she was in front of him. He settled for the next best thing, "How are you?"

They were not very good with small talk but this time, it was Effie who went straight to the point.

"Are you really here to visit me?"

He looked at her like a deer caught in headlights. How does one do this – invite someone he could barely tolerate for years to stay with him?

"No – Yes, I mean no," He was doing it all wrong and Effie was giving him an amused look. "No, I'm actually – Will you come with me, please?" he blurted out. Still, the question didn't come out quite right. He had not exactly specifically told her to come with him back to Twelve.

"I can't leave this room unescorted by a nurse. If you could just call her, we can go where... where are we going?"

He sighed. He had never been articulate with words.

"I should be clearer. Plutarch says that you'll be living in a public apartment build by the government? When you're released from here, I mean."

"Yes. It's a temporary arrangement until I can get my footing again. Get a job, you know?"

"I have plenty of room in Victors' Village... You know, if you don't mind. I spoke to Plutarch and he said it's fine if you would like to ... stay with me."

He observed her for any reaction. She was looking down on her hands and he watched, mesmerised by the tear drop on her palm.

It must have been a bad move on his part if she was sitting beside him crying so he felt the need to explain himself.

"It's okay if you don't want, though. I understand – I won't take it personally." When she didn't respond, he continued, "I supposed it would be difficult to stay with me after what you had to go through because of me. Katniss said I shouldn't ask but I... gotta try, you know?"

"How are the kids?" she asked instead.

A change of topic. That was it then, the rejection. He took a deep breath to try and get rid of the strange aching in his chest.

"Good. They're okay, they have each other. They'll make it."

"And you?" she asked him softly.

He lifted a shoulder in response.

"Drunk," he smiled at her, amused at how she was trying to make small talk now. It was a good thing, he supposed. At least she hadn't screamed at him for his audacity to waltz in after a year and ask her to return with him to Twelve.

"You're not taking care of yourself," she noted her eyes sweep over his haphazard appearance.

"Nobody around to care about how I look," he answered truthfully.

She looked at him and after a moment, her lips quivered in a smile. That was the moment Haymitch decided that he could not leave Capitol without her. He hadn't even tried hard enough. He straightened and squared his shoulders.

"I need you. That's why I came. I need you, Effie. I don't know what I'm doing. Everything and everyone is changing around me. We've won and I'm still the same. I still wake up drunk, my house is a mess and I'm wasted half the time. My life is still..."

He paused and exhaled.

"I think you might need me, too," he said softly, "What you did for me, I –"

"Yes. I'll come with you. I'll stay with you."

What? He did a double take to look at her. The next thing he knew, she had thrown herself at him and was sobbing on his chest. Haymitch did the only thing he knew in that situation. He wrapped his hands around her and held her as she cried.

Haymitch kept quiet, unsure as to the real reason behind her tears. He stroked her soft blonde hair, trying his best to soothe her. Without her heels, she fit perfectly under his chin.

When she finally step back and entangle herself from him, she smiled shyly up at him. "I can leave this place at any time."

"Good. Our train leaves in an hour," he patted his breast pocket and showed her the train tickets.

She laughed lightly and shook her head. "You were confident that I was coming?"

"No, bought it just in case," he replied and moved to get her duffel bag.

XxX

They skirted around each other, tip toed in each other's presence for months. Effie had been living with him in Twelve for nearly four months and he still felt odd to have a woman in his house.

When the Games were in session, he only had to tolerate her presence for a few weeks before going back to his life of solitude. But now, this arrangement was more long-term in nature and Haymitch had no idea what he was doing.

Effie still flinched out of shock at times when he unexpectedly and accidentally brushed against her. She still stiffened when he stood too close to her. It made Haymitch uncomfortable. He was unsure on how he was supposed to behave with and around her.

There had been occasions when he had considered treating her the way he had always treated her during the Games but that was the past. He had risked his life to rescue her and one did not simply go back to how things were after such drastic events.

The whiskey felt good as he took a sip of it and sank into the chair at the kitchen island, exhausted from fixing the pen for his geese. Effie had been complaining about how his geese should be kept in a pen instead of being allowed to roam about freely in his back yard.

The chair beside him scraped against the floor and Effie sat quietly beside him with a plate of freshly cut fruits in front of her. She pushed the plate over to Haymitch for them to share and without looking at her, took a slice of orange from the plate.

"Haymitch?" her voice was soft.

"Yeah?"

"I ... Uh, do you want... I don't know how to say this," Effie gave a nervous laugh. Haymitch glanced briefly towards her before focusing his attention back to the whiskey bottle in his hand in front of him.

"What is it, sweetheart? Just say it."

"Okay," she replied him. He heard her inhale.

"Do you want me to leave, Haymitch?"

He froze. Slowly, he turned to face her. His gaze bore holes into her and she fidgeted in her seat, biting her lips nervously.

"What?"

"I said, do –"

"I know what you said. What do you mean?"

"I mean, do you want me to go? I could go back –"

"Do you want to?" he snapped at her. He was irritated and confused. All these while, he was under the impression that she wanted to stay with him. She was supposed to... What was she supposed to do? Oh, fix him. But how could she when she was as tragically broken as he was?

He just needed someone. It was enough - spending two decades alone had taken its toll on him. He needed companionship and she wanted to leave?

"N-no," she stuttered. "Please, don't take this wrongly, Haymitch."

How was he supposed to take it? Women were complicated creatures and there was always some other meaning behind the words they said. Was he supposed to figure that all on his own?

His fingers scratched and peeled off the label of the whiskey bottle. He couldn't look at her right and he needed something to distract him.

"Haymitch," she called out his name softly and laid her hand on his arm before hastily retracting it again. Effie didn't like to be touched and she hardly initiated contact. "Please, it's just, you haven't been yourself. You treat me like I'm something fragile, I don't need that. I need you to be you. You act like you're in someone else's skin."

He paused in his actions. His fingers halted the mutilation he was doing to the whiskey label. Haymitch cocked his head to the side and considered what she said, but he avoided looking at her.

There was truth in what she said. When was the last time he had made a joke about her or teased her about something? He couldn't remember. His recent memories were of him carefully avoiding any mention of her time in Capitol prison or anything that would remind her of the times she had been sold off. All of these were new territory for him.

He held her when she had her nightmares but avoided any contact with her the next day when she was awake. He spoke to her as civilly as he could manage although there were days when he snapped at her.

Every weekend, an errand boy would stop by the house to deliver him his supply of alcohol when the shipment came in from the Capitol and each month, household supplies were delivered. He had no reason to leave his house and he had arranged it that way so that he would always be able to keep an eye on Effie.

She had suffered because of him on many occasions before and he wasn't about to let it happen again while under his watch. Apparently, try as he might to be discreet, Effie wasn't exactly stupid. He bet she could see right through his act.

"I don't want to make you uncomfortable in your own house. I don't. Please, please look at me," she pleaded.

He sighed and turned his body towards her so that their knees were touching, forcing himself to look at her.

"If you're doing all this –" she gestured aimlessly towards herself and the general direction of the kitchen, "because you still feel guilty, then don't, Haymitch. I told you in the hospital that I've forgiven you and I don't bear any ill will towards you. Please believe me when I said that."

She was crying and his heart clenched painfully in his chest. Wiping the tears away with the pad of his thumb, he finally allowed himself to speak.

"Shh, don't cry. I don't know what to do with crying women."

She smiled slightly. "None of it was your fault, you know? Your family and your girlfriend were killed, all because the Capitol didn't like defiance. It wasn't your fault, you were only a boy trying to survive. My imprisonment wasn't your fault either. I made the choice to stay behind, you didn't make me."

Her breath hitched and she sniffed. "I was sold off because ... Because I realised the Games were cruel and I said some terrible things about the Capitol. That was my mistake, not yours."

"But –" He tried to make his opinion known before he was cut off.

"No, I know what you're going to say. You misbehaved and I had to take the fall. Yes, I did but I've already told you that I've forgiven you. I did it because I wanted to see you safe and you're safe now, you're here in front of me."

"Why?" he asked. The same question he had asked her in the hospital room nearly a year ago. A question she had avoided answering.

"Because I ... I care about you."

She was looking at him now with a fierce determination in her eyes as though challenging him to disagree with her. The only sign that showed she was nervous was the fact that she was biting her lips.

"Don't go," he whispered, finally. "Stay. Stay here with me. I'll insult you every day, if you want. Make fun of you and argue with you. I'll disagree with you on almost everything."

Effie nodded, her eyes growing softer.

"Don't be so harsh on the insults," she replied.

"I'll try," he chuckled.

He turned his palm so that it faced upwards and waited for her to make the next move. If this was going to work, she would have to learn to trust him and that he wouldn't hurt her the way all those other men had.

Effie looked at him and down to his hand again. Slowly, she placed her hand in his where it closed around hers. Haymitch tugged her forward so that her head rested against his shoulder, their knees still touching in the position they were in.

"There some things you can't go back on and we can't go back on this, Effie," he told her, kissing her temple. He felt her nodding in agreement, felt the tears soaking through the fabric of his shirt.

She turned her head so that her mouth was near his ear, her warm breath tickling his neck.

"We'll be okay, Haymitch."

Maybe they would be, maybe they wouldn't but he wasn't alone now and it was easier to face the world when one didn't have to do it alone.


A/N: Oh wow, Haymitch POV alone nearly reached 10,000 words.

Anyway, that's it, everyone. The end of Darkest Before Dawn. I hope you like the last bit of scene with Haymitch & Effie and I really do hope, you enjoyed the entire story!

Please leave a review & thanks for reading!