Four months had gone by. Four painfully slow months.
All he did was attend pointless interviews, listen to pointless people talk about pointless fame, and watch pointless lips move pointlessly as pointless words left their pointless body.
Everything to him in that time was just that: pointless.
He went mute toward his mother; hardly poked his head out of his new house, and when he did, it was to walk with a Capitolite and camera crew to talk about his 'new and improved' lifestyle. He would put on a smile, pretended the whole threat toward Caesar was nothing but an accident. He acted like his mother was the best thing ever, one of the influences toward his victory along with his Peacekeeper father who had died a year prior to his Games; Stephen and Andie had been another drive - and all of this was offered as excuses to make it look like him killing his foster sister had been a purposeful mistake.
That the whole sibling-love charade had been nothing more but, ultimately, an act. That pissed off many sponsors who had been rooting for them, but in the end, only one could win. And no one would dare argue with his reasons . . . Not after he proved how lethal he could be with an axe in his possession, then again during the interviews when he nearly tore the host's head off with only two fingers.
Don't dare question or challenge him.
The wound was still open, and the more you prodded, the more his insides would pool out. Gryffon learned that first hand. Apparently watching it happen hadn't been enough for the Capitolites, though. They continuously poked him with a hot-iron-spear, in the same place, twenty-three-seven, which gave him just enough time to drop his guard before being jabbed again.
And dare he admit, it hurt like nothing else.
Gryffon looked down at the lighter in his hands, blinking away the burning sensation that pricked at him behind his eyes. The white stick in his mouth had been balanced there for at least five minutes by then, but all he could do was stare at the chemicals in his hand and pretend to click the flame on. He couldn't do it . . . Couldn't use the same vice his father had . . .
But his dad looked less stressed. Looked like he didn't mind this. It made him happier, in a sense. Maybe it'd help. Maybe, eventually, it would lead to him forgetting. Once . . . Just once . . . he sighed. He pressed his thumb against the metal igniter and after a couple of tries, watched as the orange flickered to life and appeared over the dark little tube, dancing there for a moment. Slowly with a hand cupped around it, Gryffon lifted the flame to the roll of poison at his lips and watched the tip of it as the white became grey and flashed with little embers. He breathed in a bit, coughing in reaction before quickly removing the thing from his mouth. Hold it, don't breathe it, the Victor reminded himself, recovering from the small fit of coughing. He tried again, simply pulling in the smoke and blowing it back out, watching the thick, grey ash billow out into the foggy air. It smelled just as disgusting as it always had, and tasted just as bad. But maybe it was an acquired taste? If so he'd get used to it with time, just like he would have to get used to the scent of blood that seemed to have seeped into his skin.
Gryffon lifted it back to his lips, took another drag, and slowly blew it out, trying to ignore the water that sprung to his eyes. At least they weren't the tears. At least it was just the reaction one would usually get from any sort of smoke. His lips were tugged into a smirk, reflecting the angry flash of the embers. If nothing else, Gryffon could laugh in his dad's face. If everything else turned to misery, he'd always have that bitter amusement.
He was told to step forward only to be told to step down . . . He listened to the former, got screwed over, but proved the man's doubts wrong . . . "One good thing," he choked, closing his eyes as the warmth of the cigarette rested on his lips.
Forget the damage he was doing to his brother, to his mother. Forget the hate Andie would grow up with. Forget the fear everyone looked at him with. Forget he killed his best friend . . . Forget that he was convinced it had been on purpose. Forget he just didn't know anything anymore.
All he had to know was the laughter he'd throw at his father when they next met. Just throw how right he was into the man's face, then admit the man had "told Gryffon so" since the beginning! And because of that, it was all the man's fault . . . It was all Alick's fault . . .
But it wasn't. Gryffon knew there wasn't anyone he could blame, though he'd try. And oh, how he would try. He pushed himself up, turning back to the door of the overly spacious house. Its polished bronze knob was still so foreign, still so wrong under his palm; it still made his skin prick, still made him so unbearably uncomfortable.
If that knob was never turned . . . If I had never gone through . . . Gryffon stopped himself there and bit his lip to stop the scene of the arena returned as his hand gripped the knob. His other hand still followed the motion of removing the stick from his mouth just as the knob was turned. It clicked open slowly, quite unlike the silence from the arena, and clicked back into place when he closed it behind him. One difference. It wasn't the same house. It wasn't quiet and distorted. Not when the lights were on, not when he was awake, not when he had something filling his lungs and forcing him to breathe. Denim would have won . . . One would have won . . . he finished slowly, puffing out the grey smoke from his mouth.
I wouldn't have pushed him away . . . I wouldn't be slowly buried alive. The 'I wouldn't's' kept going through his head. Kept on listing themselves with scenes playing behind his eyes. Stephen wouldn't be scared of me. He wouldn't hate me. Andie wouldn't hide, wouldn't shake . . . Mother wouldn't have sunken more into her shell . . . Jay would still be here. If I hadn't volunteered . . . Gryffon let out a shaky sigh and returned the stick to his mouth, taking in a deep drag. Another cough hit him as he inhaled some of it, quickly having to grab onto the counter to keep himself from bumping into it. I wouldn't have to keep wishing Dad back. Wouldn't have to keep hating him for it. If a heaven existed, and he believed it didn't, he wouldn't be able to wait to see his dad again. To give him was he deserved. To shove it all back down his throat - to make him see what Gryffon truly went through all those times he was targeted, pressured, and loathed. To show that what Alick believed to be drunken support had actually just confused him. Had just made Gryffon see everything in two ways - changed his point of view.
It wasn't the Games that messed him up . . . No . . . He wouldn't even have gone in if it hadn't been for Alick. Gryffon wouldn't be making the only ones he cared about suffer now. He wouldn't be the cause of their pain. He'd be helping them. He'd have helped Andie get through her grief, because surely Jay wouldn't have gotten through the Games without Gryffon as an obstacle.
But sure as hell, if Sapphire had killed him that time . . . Jay would have beat Denim. She was smarter, faster, than the One boy. She knew his blind side, knew how to maneuver toward it. Just like she had with Gryffon.
But if Gryffon hadn't been there, if he wasn't there to pose as a threat, as competition . . . They would have laughed at Jay and her charming facade and they would have killed her at the Cornucopia like they were supposed to . . .
Gryffon let out something between a growl and a shout, slamming his fist against the wood to push himself away and toward the drawers. I wouldn't be caring for this shit now . . . he mumbled inwardly, his hands fumbling slowly through the papers and pencils and pens. I wouldn't be wanting this . . . Wouldn't be doing this . . . He slammed the thing shut and pulled another drawer out of the jutting wall more hastily, letting the cigarette to rest in his mouth again to allow him two hands to search. Nothing. Nothing there, either!
The boy sank to his knees and flung the bottom cabinet's doors open only to find his father's collection of drinks had made it over to the Victor's Village house. Gryffon didn't know what he wanted to find, or what he expected to find, all he knew was that there was something he was looking for. Something he wanted to have. But what? What was it? Why couldn't he remember it? Gryffon's hand flashed into the gap, pulling one of the bottles out and setting it beside him; his second hand did the same. A few bottles were carefully pulled out before his movements grew more desperate, more needy, as if he was running out of time, and he might as well have been with his lungs filling up with smoke and him holding his breath.
Though, time, he knew, had never really been on his side. The ticking was always there, in the back of his head, counting down the seconds of his too-long life. There were too many ticks to go, too many tocks following.
8,166,240 minutes . . .
Oh shit . . . Shit! He couldn't breathe!
Gryffon gasped, but that only choked him further and drove his hands faster. In that mere moment, the neat collection of wines and beers at his side became a stinking pool of alcohol at his feet, legs, across the floor, beside the counter, under the chairs and table. Broken glass was embedded in his palm, but he didn't feel them, didn't see the chips and pieces scattered and shattered around him. He couldn't see or feel anything. Just like that entire time. He was, once again, faceless, hateful, and desperate.
Desperate for something he couldn't find. Yearning for something he wouldn't get.
Unless . . .
Unless . . .
Tick tock tick tock
There it was. Driving him nuts. That's what it was. It was the clock . . . The stupid time bomb his dad set in his mind like he had set in his own. It was what would cause his death, that time bomb, like it had Alick. It was going to set him aflame, and down the rest of his family would go, just like it had tried to do before.
But Gryffon's bomb would actually blow up..
There would be no more suffering after it.
And they could all prove the hate and misery to the man that had been his father.
Would finally show him! Or at least Gryffon would . . .
Not fair . . . It's not - not fair! Gryffon wailed mentally, not being able to suck in a morsel of air. He staggered up to his feet, his bleeding fingers reaching up to tear the burning thing from his mouth, making a stinging indent on his palm that he didn't feel.
With both hands, both which smeared a warm and trickling crimson paint over the originally clean sink, he tore another drawer from the countertop, this time letting it clatter against the wall on the opposite side of the room. He heard the forks, spoons, and knives hit the wall and floor in different places, creating a symphony of sounds that rang loudly in his ears as he searched for another little knob, another drawer.
It was here . . . I saw her put it here! he claimed, watching as his vision blurred and made everything in front of him swerve and swirl, creating a kaleidoscope-like effect. No, not again, not again, stop it, stop! Gryffon coughed, his lungs begging for more air, but he refused to open his mouth to breathe. He was convinced he was suffocating, and so he'd let it happen. His eyes would let the tears flow, he'd let his lungs burn, he wouldn't give into their pleas to live. It wasn't his problem. They weren't his problem.
Gryffon's hands hit their target, and upon doing so, he let his fingers automatically close around the metal, setting themselves in a horizontal 'L' over the thing. Finally. His sigh of relief was instantly followed by a choking cough, one he couldn't identify as a sob or a growl behind his wheezing breath. The boy's thumb rolled down with his body, setting the dull click in place at the same time his knees hit the glass and liquid on the floor. Finally . . .
"Thank you . . . " Gryffon whispered, closing his eyes when the metal touched against his temple. He didn't want to get buried beneath it all . . . He didn't want to cause more damage to everyone and everything . . . He didn't want to destroy himself more than he had . . . He wanted to be free of it all, and with one press of a button he could do it . . . He could finally . . .
Click.
It was hollow. The pressing of the trigger produced nothing but a hollow sound from the barrel and nothing more but a strangled sob from the Victor. He felt himself slump forward, then heard another thmmp as his head hit against the wood with the cold of the gun still pressed to his head. The bitter weapon slowly vanished from his skull, slinked down his side, and hit the floor, splashing into a pool of rum with the unsatisfactory sound and reminder that he was still alive.