Chapter 9 :

"Thief" he accused, a smirk on his lips. "Give it back."

"I am no thief." Effie denied for the hundredth time since he had met her, but she couldn't help her giggles as she sprinted around the kitchen table, the blue shirt she kept sneaking off his closet clutched to her chest. He didn't care for the shirt, it looked better on her, but that didn't stop him from diving after her. "Haymitch!" she squeaked, half-laughing, when he grasped her around the waist and nearly lifted her off the ground.

He was laughing too.

That happened a lot. He had forgotten how it felt to be so carefree. It wasn't every day, it wasn't every instant, but it happened. And it hadn't happened once since his Reaping before she got there.

"Are you crying Uncle, sweetheart?" he teased, keeping his hold on her loose enough that she could escape if she really wanted to.

"The eleventh thing you should know about me, Haymitch -" she said, very seriously, while turning around in his arms so they were face to face. " - is that I never yield."

"Funny, me neither." He shrugged. "That's eleven for you too, by the way."

She shook her head in amusement, her blond curls flying around her head in a glorious halo. "You are impossible."

"Is that your number twelve?" They were so close… He wanted to kiss her. The impulse was harder and harder to suppress with each new passing day.

"My number twelve is…"

The sharp banging on the back door interrupted her and it was flung opened before either of them could do anything. Haymitch had barely enough time to push her behind him, a hand already on the hint of the knife he always kept close, when Everdeen entered the kitchen, a little breathless.

"There are Peacekeepers everywhere in the Seam." the hunter panted. "Cray said they're from the Capitol. They're looking for Effie. We have to get her out of here and fast."

Time seemed to freeze.

For a terrible endless second, Haymitch actually thought time had frozen and they were stuck in the worst moment imaginable. And then Effie started moving, slipping the blue shirt over the yellow one she was wearing and rushing to the door. Haymitch caught her arm, their eyes met and he wondered if he looked as panicked as she did, as desperate…

"Come back." he heard himself beg. "Go hide in the woods but come back to me." Her face contorted in pain or misery, he wasn't sure, but he knew, he knew without having to ask again, that she was lost to him now. She was going to leave forever and that was it. He was about to lose her. And it wasn't fair to ask her to stay if she didn't want to. It wasn't fair because his house would soon turn into a prison she wouldn't be able to leave as often as she wanted to whereas, by taking off, she had at least a small chance to find the freedom she was craving. He could respect that. He didn't let go of her arm, though, not yet, he couldn't, but he directed his next question to Everdeen. "How long before they're here?"

The man shrugged. "They're busy in the Hob. Half an hour, maybe more, maybe less."

"Haymitch…" His name was a whisper but he didn't let himself get emotional. Not yet. It was neither the time nor the place.

"Go upstairs." he told her. "Put on the warmest clothes you can find." He released her but she stayed there, staring at him with so much anguish… "Go."

She did as he bade and he rushed to the small cupboard under the stairs, rummaging through the clutter he had accumulated through the years. He found a backpack and threw it at Everdeen who had followed him into the house. "Stock it." he commanded. "There's food in the kitchen, you know what to look for."

It took him a few minutes to find what he was searching for. A huge box full of clothes from his Victory Tour he had never bothered to throw away or wear again. He found a heavy black jacket and boots that were made for winter. He pushed them towards her when she hurtled down the stairs. She put them on without a word and accepted the jacket and the hunting knife he took off his belt, equally silent.

"I can take you to the woods through the meadow." Everdeen said, handing her the backpack. "There's a cabin not far away, you could hide there until they're gone."

She was careful not to look at Haymitch when she put the backpack on. "I'm leaving." Her voice was faint, as if she couldn't quite believe what she was saying.

Everdeen stared at him pointedly for a few seconds. What was the man waiting for? Haymitch didn't know. Perhaps he was expecting him to go back on his word and declare he was going with her after all.

"This is suicide, Effie." he said instead. He had told her that before but he had to warn her again. He simply had to.

"Eleven, remember?" She forced a strained smile on her lips. "I am not yielding without a fight." She turned to Everdeen. "There is a hole in the fence behind the village, you don't need to put yourself at risk for me. Thank you for everything you did, thank Aster too, will you?" She hugged him on a whim.

Everdeen looked upset and worried. "Listen to me. Night will be there soon, find the cabin and stay there tonight. There's a crossbow there, I made it for Katniss, for when she's older… Take it with you when you leave. The cold is your first concern, you hear me? Don't forget you're running from Peacekeepers but you're also running from snow. If it starts snowing again… Keep warm at any cost. Find shelter as often as you can, don't hesitate to make a fire if you're getting too cold and drink often. I've put a bottle in your backpack, fill it every time you have a chance. Good luck." He hugged her again and then clasped Haymitch's shoulder before heading back outside. "I'm going to… watch for them."

He was giving them time to say goodbye.

Problem was, Haymitch wasn't sure how to do that and she didn't seem to know either. She was looking at her feet, her blond curls shielding her face from his eyes and Haymitch was left contemplating how people could go from moments of happiness to such moments of anguish in a matter of minutes.

"There's no point in asking you to come with me, is it?" She attempted to give a playful tone to her voice but he could hear the tears she was trying to keep at bay. "It would be very selfish and probably childish too, yet I'm kind of tempted to do it anyway."

"Thirteen is suicide." he replied, sadly. He was too much a survivor to go and get himself killed in the wild. He was too much of a coward too.

She nodded like she knew that would be his answer all along and lifted her chin. "Well… Thank you for… everything, really." There were tears rolling down her cheeks. "I won't forget you but you should probably forget me as fast as you can."

"Yeah, sure, princess." he snorted with bitterness. "How do I do that precisely?"

"I don't know." Her voice cracked and she threw herself at him, hugging the life out of him. He hugged back as tight as he could, wondering how on earth he could ever find the strength to let go. "Don't drink too much, Haymitch." she mumbled against his neck. "Don't let them destroy you. Don't let them win. Start running again, even if it's harder than standing still." He thought back to that conversation in the kitchen a few weeks ago, their first real conversation if he was honest. He had told her he was waiting for death to reap him and he had meant it too but now… Now that he knew how good it felt to smile, to laugh, to feel again… "If things had been different…"

"Yeah." He closed his eyes. She could have been Twelve's next escort. He doubted he would have managed to hate her forever no matter how much he'd have tried. Or they could have met by chance in the Capitol… Either way, they were doomed from the start but it would have been better than this goodbye. This goodbye had a definitive ring to it. "Be careful, out there, sweetheart. Don't get caught and don't get killed."

She tightened her embrace and then she let go. She started to go toward the kitchen and, presumably, the back door but then she stopped on the threshold and looked back over her shoulder. Her backpack slid to the floor and she walked back to him slowly.

He didn't move.

He didn't move when she stroke his cheek either but when she raised on tip-toe and kissed his lips softly, he wrapped an arm around her waist and locked a hand behind her neck and then, they were too far gone.

The kiss began slow and unhurried but soon turned hungry and frantic, almost desperate, before becoming languid again. It was forever in a kiss. It was their first and their last, the two brackets framing their non-existent future. It was perfect and terrible in its perfection because it was doomed to stay a one-time occurrence. When he let go of her lips to breathe, Haymitch could have sworn he heard his heart shattering open.

He never should have let himself fall so deep. He never should have sought her that first day. He should have let her freeze in the snow. He should have…

"I…" she whimpered, choking on her tears.

"Don't." he begged, pressing his forehead against hers. "Don't, please."

Don't tell me you love me. Don't go. Don't break my heart. Don't leave me alone. Don't. Just don't.

"Goodbye, Haymitch." Her words were slurred and this time when she escaped from his arms, she didn't look back. She grabbed the backpack and she ran away.

He sat on the stairs and waited for her to come back, knowing she wouldn't. He let his head drop in his hands and cursed his leaping heart when he heard footsteps coming to stand in front of him because he knew that when he opened his eyes he wouldn't find her. It was the wrong set of footsteps.

"You should have gone with her." Everdeen sighed. "When you love someone…"

"Spare me the lecture." he snapped. "I know everything there is to know about love." He knew how love killed. It had killed his family, it had killed his girlfriend and, now, it would probably kill him too. "You should go back to your wife. They will think it's weird if they find you here instead of home."

Everdeen face was stern and unforgiving but he still sighed and patted his shoulder again. "Call on us if you need anything."

He needed Effie to stay there with him in open sight, could the Everdeens give him that? He almost asked him but swallowed the words back at the last possible moment. Instead, he stayed where he was while Everdeen left his house and contemplated the deafening sound only silence could produce. He didn't have to wait long before someone came rapping at his front door, though. He was halfway there when it swung open on a sour looking Peacekeeper.

"Why, come in. Make yourself at home." he sneered.

"Search the house." the Peacekeeper said to the small army behind him. There were Peacekeepers everywhere in the village, searching every house. Had Effie been thoughtful enough to erase every trace of her passage ? Had she thought of covering her tracks? No one shouted in victory so she must have. "Abernathy." the man stared at him with obvious contempt.

"Do we know each other?" It was very possible they did. He had lost count of the number of Peacekeepers he had pissed off in the Capitol throughout the years… Or it was also possible that the man simply wasn't a fan of his. He had met some haters too, others loathed him because of his drinking habits.

"Head Peacekeeper Hangston is in charge of finding a renegade." Cray said quickly, squeezing between the stranger and the door. "I told him the whole District would be happy to cooperate."

"I'm sure." Haymitch snorted. "Who are you looking for in my house?"

Hangston studied him attentively. "We're looking for a girl. She's dangerous, quite mad too. She murdered her family in cold blood before running havoc in the Districts. She killed a Peacekeeper in Four." Good thing Effie wasn't there to hear that, it would destroy her. "You wouldn't happen to have seen a stranger around, would you?"

"No." he lied bluntly. He kept it at that. The shortest the lie, the likeliest it was to be believed. "But I'm sure you will catch her quickly."

"Yes, of course they will." Cray agreed with entirely too much enthusiasm. "Nobody can escape the Capitol."

Hangston shot him a look of contempt. "The Capitol won't be mocked by a mere girl. We won't show any leniency to anyone who has helped her. Even victors."

Haymitch lifted his eyebrows. "Am I being accused of something?"

"Word on the street is that you've been visited quite frequently by the local healer." Hangston replied. "You don't seem very ill to me."

"But he was." Cray said quickly. "I can vouch for it."

He was quite moved by that spontaneous show of friendship. Perhaps he had misjudged Cray.

"Yes." Hangston snorted. "As, I am sure, you can vouch for the black market running right under your nose and the defective electric fence."

Or maybe Cray was just thinking that if Effie had been hiding in his District all along, it would sign the end of his career.

Cray winced and Haymitch folded his arms. "I had a bad cold and then I befriended the healer and her husband. Is that a crime?"

Hangston probably would have loved it if it were but as a matter of fact, he had no choice but to retreat when one of his men confirmed there was nothing to be found in the house. Haymitch watched them search the rest of the village from his kitchen window. They had ransacked the house, everything was turned upside down but he couldn't bring himself to care.

When they left, night had fallen and there was nothing else to see outside so he grabbed a bottle from the cupboard, straightened a fallen chair and sat at the kitchen table. He put the bottle on the table but didn't immediately drink himself into a stupor.

He didn't want to.

For the first time in too long, he wasn't longing for alcohol to fill his belly. Alcohol never made the memories go away, it blurred them for a short while. Effie didn't like it when he drank and, when she had been there to distract him, he hadn't felt the urge as much. He had cut down on his consumption in the last weeks, the tremors in his hands had even died down.

But Effie wasn't there anymore and what was there left to fill his days between now and the next Reaping but nightmares? The silence was too loud. It was absolute. It was the silence you heard in your coffin. It was death. It was standing still when you should have been running.

He found himself picking up the phone he had so often contemplated tearing off the wall and scavenged through the pile of papers on the dresser. He found the number after a few minutes and dialed it with a slight apprehension that only deepened when he heard Chaff's voice in the receiver. They never called each other when the Games weren't in session, they both belonged to this dreadful period of the year.

"Chaff." he said, feeling stupid and not exactly knowing why.

"Haymitch?" Chaff sounded more surprised than annoyed by his phone call. "What's wrong, buddy?"

Because for him to call another victor when the next Reaping was still three months away, something must most surely have been wrong…

He wondered what Chaff would say if he told him the whole story, how easily – stupidly – he had fallen in love for a girl he barely knew, how empty he was feeling now that he was alone again. But he couldn't say any of that. Phones weren't safe.

"Do you ever feel dead inside?" he asked instead.

There was a short silence at the other end of the line and then a clanging as if Chaff had dragged a chair. "Okay. Are you drunk?"

"No." Haymitch sighed, before closing his eyes and leaning his back against the wall.

"Then that's the problem, buddy." Chaff joked. "Go get yourself a drink."

"I don't drink as much anymore." He slid to the floor slowly.

"What can you tell me, Haymitch?" Chaff sounded serious, now, worried even. "What happened?"

"Nothing." he lied, knowing his friend would see right through it. "I'm just tired of all this."

"You're twenty-four. You're too young to be tired." Chaff pointed out, without thinking any of it. All victors were tired. All victors were wishing for an exit door. And maybe he had found his. Maybe… "Haymitch, you aren't thinking about doing something stupid, are you?"

There was fear in his friend's voice. Fear and dread and maybe a little envy because… "What if I am?"

"Don't take the coward's way out." Chaff warned. "Don't you dare make me come all the way to Twelve to kick your butt, man."

Haymitch surveyed the kitchen with weariness. It was empty, as was the house and as was his life. "I need to get out of the arena." he heard himself say, echoing words he had thrown at Maysilee years ago. That was the only way. As long as he was alive, he was still part of the Games. He had to get out. He had to start running again and the only way to do that…

"Haymitch." Chaff was pained but his friend didn't dare tell him he was already out. Chaff knew as well as he did how untrue that was. "Think about this."

"There's freedom in death." He had told that to Everdeen and he had been right. That was the third option he hadn't managed to find before Effie left. He had to die.

"Haymitch." Chaff's voice was urgent now but Haymitch didn't let himself be moved.

"Goodbye, Chaff, and good luck." he said before hanging up.

The phone started ringing soon after but he didn't pick it up. It was still ringing when he sat at the kitchen table, a stack of paper in front of him and started writing his last note.

If he took off through the woods, they would come after him, there was no winning against that. Now, if he was dead…

I'm publishing early because I have to leave for a dance competition. Lot of things happen in this chapter and there is a mean cliffy so I would love a feedback =) Go crazy with the theories! Lots of love from me and thank you for reviewing!