Law Finals and break are over. I am working to finish this story.
The world around me is bright metals and neutrals. Some archaic crest is singed into every open table top. I am placed on a thread-bare console and immediately forgotten. People scramble around the cabin, smiling speaking amongst each other. I am a statute in the chaos, stuck to the seat as if roots have grown beneath me. Someone sits across from me followed by two more. I fight to ignore their gazes.
Dax is the one across from me. He cleers his throat. "How are you feeling, then?"
Numb. "Fine."
He begins to talk with a compassionate expression. I stop listening to anything but the words burned into my mind.
"if you love me." "Meet me at the peace rally,"... "If you love me."
My mind twists and tumbles over the words. They are sludge and I am too thick to squeeze any meaning from them. Does Gale love me? He want's me to run away.
Where would we go? Did he say something about the woods? Nothing makes sense and yet, a hope burns through me. I can be free of this. I can spend my days away from a loveless marriage, under trees in Gale's arms. We can survive with eachother. Of course, survival is why I am here. If I turn down this marriage another poor girl will be forced to do the same. Running away from Gale puts both our lives at risk. The marraige is the only way to stay safe and keep another from taking this black-fate.
It is then that I remember the rest of his words; "I cannot do this again." Katniss. This is not about me. Katniss was once forced away from him; forced to marry another. Gale is trying to protect me. As my mood blackens I remember everything he has spoke of her. The way his face would recede into shadows when her name was brought up. And again, in that alley of 12, I remember their hushes whispers; how desperate he looked.
Katniss will always be Gale's great love, just as Annie was Finnick's. Fear slides through me as a voice whispers I may still be able to have him. These thoughts are the same which kept me a broken woman each time Finnick left my bed for Annie's. I push them away. I will never again be second to another. I have already torn myself apart once for such a hopeless cause.
"- worked out."
The man I will marry is starring toward me. His face is patient and his voice is smooth. His teeth are brighter than the white's of his eyes and I cant help but wonder if they're artificial. I banish any thoughts of other men and focus on this man. He smiles politely toward me and a piece of blonde hair falls into his eyes.
The boy who sits next to me, Hollis, starts gesturing toward his friend.
"-lucky woman. Daxie, here, was named Panem's most elligible bachelor."
Paylor's other friend sits on his right. I watch his eyes darken.
Paylor flushes. "It was a ridiculous award. I'm sure father put them up to it."
"Dont sell yourself short, D-man, the ladies love you, don't they Jack?"
Jack sighs. "Of course." His eyes flit to me and I am sure he is not fond of what he sees.
"News of the engagement will break soon, it should take care of their obsession."
Jack stands. "Excuse me," he says before storming out the cabin door.
"Don't mind him," Hollis smiles. "He's strung tighter than the mockingjay's bow."
I dont laugh. Neither does Dax though I fear it's because he is incapable.
"I know you've been through quite a bit the past few years. Father has told me about your relation to Snow. I assure you it won't affect the way any of us treat you."
He seems to be quite proud of the fact, as if he is saving me and I owe thanks. I say nothing.
"...Our marriage will be for the good of the country. And I think," he smiles, "at least, I hope, that we'll get along."
Get along? I decide that I have never heard a worse sort of marraige. I nod, unsure what else to do and turn my attention toward the landscape streaming outside. Running away sounds better with each passing tree.
The next few days I am prodded and poked and styled within an inch of my life. My hair is cut, fluffed and burned. I am stuffed and sown and measured for more clothes than I have worn in the past year. With each thing they change on me, I feel a peice of myself dissapearing. When the Frido, the plainest stylist I have ever met, demands I remove the hoops in my ear, I twist his arm behind his back. He quickly lets the subject drop. It is decided that the blue ink on my skin, the matching symbol which Seta once wore, must be removed. "It makes you entirely too Capitol-born." I let them laser it off and make no other objections as they debate whether to remove the one on my hips. The rest of the hours I spend receding into myself. I am no longer in a cold brick building outside of 5. I am under an oak tree. Strong arms are wrapped around me as a voice whispers an old song into my ear. I am at peace in these moments.
I am surprised to find my dislike toward Dax Paylor thinning with each day. He is a kind man with an easy smile and a dreadful sense of humor. On my second day he finds me wandering in the gardens and lectures me on the uses of each plant. I find the lesson dull, but let him talk. We attend countless functions together, though our engagement has not yet been announced. Mostly, we talk about his father's policies and my time spent learning politics many years ago. Nothing of significance is exchanged about our shared future together. In fact, Dax seems to pay little attention to me in such a capacity. It seems I am not the only one who has noticed, as with each passing day, my stylists stuff me into a more revealing dress. To their dismay, Dax's behavior has not changed. He smiles toward me and we dance when his father glares toward us but otherwise I find no sexual-interest in his gaze. The lack of attraction doesn't much bother me. In truth, I am so confused of my feelings toward Gale, I'm sure that I am projecting the same. With each passing day, I find the space in my life grow wider. The day does not feel the same without my dark-boy.
I shake away the thoughts as I walk down the path from the ugly brick fortress. At one point, It had been some type of compound for the resistance, but I find it the most hideouts structure I've seen. Flags project from every open window on the place, flying the Resistance Red beneath the symbol of a mockingjay.
I walk further, ignoring the immature jealously I feel. There is no way to compete with a girl who has flags erected after her. I walk further down a newly cleaned path. In a day's time, thousands will line these streets for the Peae Rally. The Grinds and Gale will be among them. I am so uneasy by the thought I decided to sit next to a rotted shed. I have mere hours to decide what I want. My eyes close and I picture the planes of Gale's face. If you love me, Meet me At the Peace Rally. He will be waiting for my answer and though I cannot go, for both fear of our safety and of the girl who'd be replacement, I find myself needing to answer a different question.
Do I love Gale?
Cori once told me that time is the true measure of power. At the time, I thought he had meant mechanics of the hour but perhaps he meant something else. In the time I have spent away from Gale, housed in a fortress of strangers, forced into clothes I no longer enjoy and fed with food I no longer taste, something has changed. A part of myself has been missing since leaving him in 12. Throughout the days, each time something occurs, I find myself wanting to tell him. Three nights ago, a general snorted soup through his nose and I had been gleeful at relaying the sight to Gale. It had taken only a moment to remember he was not there. I find myself occasionally thinking of his hands, or the way his hair stands in disarray. Gale is a mentor, a friend and something else. Is that something love?
The only way I feel I could know for sure is by comparison. I have been in love. With Finnick, it had been an all-consuming thing. My entire life had shifted, it's focus had become him and us. He occupied my body and mind for a short time before I had started to apply the sentiment. I had first known the night he'd left my bed for another. In those aganizing moments, my heart had been ripped apart. It had been one of the worst nights of my life, more painful than when Cori had me burned and beaten.
With Gale, it was different. His presence has become a cherished fixture in my life. When we're apart I think of his features, the way I feel with him, the tone of his laugh. Unlike before, I have not lost myself in what we have. Our intertwining hasn't been instant or effortless. Gale has gradually slipped into my life, as if he had belonged there all along. Is that love?
Finnick and I had been an inferno, raging up and going out with any shift of the wind. Each of us had been scorched by our relationship and until now, I had always equated that with love. Was that wrong?
he jealousy I felt toward them both seemed the same, like a beast clawing through my chest and lungs. Though, it had always held more of an edge of panic with Finnick .
"If you love me,"
Did I?
Are there shades of love? Why is it that what I feel for Gale is so different from how I felt with finnick? I cannot help but wonder if it is them. They are both so different from one another. The question trudges up more doubt and then it hits me, as if a bucket of cold water has been poured over my head. It is not their differences which makes this all so different, it is mine.
I am a different. I am the change. I am no longer foolish. I was a girl when I loved Finnick. I offered my whole heart to a man who did not love me and was surprised as he tore it apart. I have grown. I will never again let love consume me, take over who I am to better suit another. I am no one's consolation.
The way I have love has changed, but it does not make that love any less. It is in these moments beside a dilapidated shed, that I decide that I do love Gale Hawthorne. Just as quickly, I decide I cannot have him. I will not do this again. Because I am no longer foolish, I am brave.