Connect – to join together so as to provide access and communication. Alternately, to form a relationship or feel an affinity.
That button was the one that made the screen blue, and that one was the one he had to push to make the greenlight come on. As far as he was concerned, that's all you really had to know about computers. That and how much space they took up on your dining room table, gathering dust like all the other stupid gadgets Beetee had talked him into buying over the years.
Haymitch waited while the little green light flickered. Was it supposed to do that? He still had the manual somewhere – probably in the boxes of stuff in the bedroom, now that he thought about it - but he didn't want to go hunting for it. Okay, there it went. Yeah, he could handle this.
Turned out that Beetee had set up the passwords and stuff all nice and easy for him. Good man. Didn't mean he had any idea how to use any of it, but that was helpful.
All right, then. That was good enough progress for today. Haymitch didn't really want to power the damn thing off – it'd be a pain in the ass to get it up and running again - so he left it on as he went about his daily routine. Which mostly consisted of putting out some food for the geese and drinking himself into a stupor, but the consistency had to count for something. Why have a clock when you could just judge the time by how you drunk you felt? And really, if you're doing a good enough job of it, eventually, time isn't really a concern.
Haymitch must have been well past that point the night before, if the headache was any indication. Fuck, that blue light wasn't making it any better. The noise he made as he pawed at the screen, trying to get it to turn off without breaking the damn thing – though he wouldn't mind too much about it at this point, not when it might as well be drilling a hole between his eyes – didn't sound human, even to his own ears. "Damn it, Beetee," he swore. "How do I get this fucking –"
Speak of the devil. A gray blip showed up in the corner, and it sure seemed like it was oscillating in size, but he couldn't really trust his senses on that one, because the entire world was tipping back and forth for him right now. He grabbed for the mouse and clicked on it. "This'd better be good," he mumbled to nobody in particular.
"Haymitch? I didn't catch that." He nearly fell out of his chair when a giant face took over the screen, staring out towards him. Shoulda been expecting that one.
"Holding onto my every word again, Latier?"
"I hadn't heard from you in a long time. I'm glad to see you got your computer set up."
"Yeah, some stuff got in the way for a while, but now I've got 'er up and running." Damn, his head hurts. Any water nearby? That usually helped. He did a quick scan of the room. Of course not. That'd be just too much to as this morning, wouldn't it?
"Are you feeling all right, Haymitch?"
"Just peachy," he practically growled back. No reason to take it out on Beetee; just because he wasn't taking care of his problems the way everybody else seemed to be able to take care of theirs was no real excuse.
But Beetee had always been the easy target who never bit back. "Sorry to hear that, Haymitch. Should I get ahold of you some other time? I'd like to hear what you all have been up to."
"If that's what you want." He could sound as put-upon as he pleased, but that didn't mean he wasn't looking forward to it. Now, for some water and some pain relief. Hair of the dog made for the best hangover cure.
Damn, the shit Beetee sent him was weird. Pictures of wiring and tubing and shit he couldn't identify (that the other man probably thought he could understand), little videos of his cat Schrodinger in a box (that Beetee seemed to think were some kind of joke that Haymitch should get), and stories about his work (none of which he could even begin to understand). Somehow, he thought he could see a trend developing. Still, he replied, with pictures of Katniss and Peeta's children and images of pretty flowers he's stumbled (often literally) across on his daily walks. But geese and wires and memories of good things past don't hurt like the deep stuff, and Haymitch can't consider that anything but a positive. And so the computer sees nothing but happiness and the gems of growing old in a world that is only getting brighter, and he wouldn't wish it any other way.