I'm walking along a gray street in hell, trying to figure out why I am here. Just yesterday I was on the beaches of District 4. Now I am back in the place I wish I could burn to the ground.
It's different than it was at the end. The tower is still intact and the dam doesn't have any cracks in it. I don't hear the screams of children dying. Children I killed. It could be peaceful here in hell. But the air is too still.
It's eerily quiet as I trudge along slowly, not bothering to hurry anywhere. Hell goes on and on. I walk back to the tower. I walk to the Cornucopia. I walk to the river where Blake and I swam. I stare at the island where we last made love. That's most of what I do. I stare at it. I don't make a sound.
I think this must be what it feels like to be dead. I look at the place I miss most in the world, the one place I would give anything to go back to. But I am empty. I am cold.
I wonder, in my dead state, if I swam back to the island, would I find Blake there? Would his arms be warm like they were while he was alive? Would his eyes set me on fire again? Would his lips be enough to put blood in my body and make my heart beat again?
I put one of my feet in the water, testing how deep it is. But it's peculiar water, different than it was in the actual arena. I can't put my feet inside the water; I can only walk on top of it. I shrug, although this makes me uneasy.
When I reach the island, I wander around until I find the tent where Blake and I slept. I go into it, hugging my arms to my body. Since I left this arena, I have never missed Blake as much as I do now. Never. It is an excruciating pain that starts in my heart, moving through my veins and infecting my organs and setting my skin on fire. I am dead, I am alive. I am a woman being burned at the stake.
I have never missed him so much. I have never missed anyone so much in my life.
But I cannot cry. I am dead.
I sit in the fetal position, wishing for the pain—so agonizing, so torturous—to just go away so I can be a proper corpse. I sit like this until I hear a rustle at the entrance of the tent. I hope against all hope that it's him—but it isn't. Instead, it's a vaguely familiar girl. She's small and mousy.
"You're from District 5," I whisper. "I killed you." She smiles at me and nods. She doesn't say a word. Blood starts to ooze from the spot where her heart used to be.
The spot where my axe impaled her. My first kill.
"No," I whisper. "No, no, no!" I run over to her and put my hands desperately over her wound, trying to stop the blood, trying to turn back the clock so I can go back and not kill this little girl, wishing that I had just listened to Finnick—and she's gone.
But I'm not alone.
The boy from District 10, the wound in his neck where I slit his throat gushing more blood than ever, looking like a grotesque red smile.
"No," I whisper to myself, over and over again. The visitors keep coming. The little boy whose heart I speared with a knife. The girl who got an axe in her back as she was running away. All of them, all of them just smiling at me like they're in heaven.
Maybe this is heaven for them.
I know who's coming next, and I don't want to see her. Kylie's wide brown eyes stare into mine. She's the first so far who doesn't smile at me. Instead, she looks at me accusingly. Her eyes say, "You didn't have to kill me. I was walking away from you. I wasn't a threat. You didn't have to kill me."
I scream louder now, because everything in hell looks like her eyes, the water in the river running bright brown, the tower turning the color of her eyes.
The boy from 1 shows up, and he's the first to speak. "Thank you, Annie," he says.
"For what?" I killed him. I killed all of them.
"For not letting that boy cut me up and torture me," he smiles at me. His hand falls off as he waves goodbye to me, his blood splattering my face.
The boy from 12 comes next. I close my eyes in anticipation but when I feel his presence, I open my eyes. He looks innocent. Scared. Tired. He doesn't smile at me, just stares at me blankly. He stays for longer than everyone else. He bleeds all over my feet. I cry.
The girl from Two passes through briefly, only to scowl at me.
The one I've been dreading does not come yet.
But one I didn't anticipate shows up.
"Annie Bannannie," I hear a voice whisper. I whip my head up so quickly I think I break my neck. It doesn't matter. We're all dead anyway. But if I'm dead, how do I have a heart that beats so quickly?
"Blake," I whisper almost inaudibly. "You're here."
"I am, Ann. I am here," he smiles at me. He squats down so he's on my level. I sit up and push the hair out of my eyes.
"Are you going to bleed all over the place like the rest of them?" I ask, because I don't want to see him bleed anymore. I've seen enough of his blood to last a lifetime. He laughs.
"No, Annie, I'm not. I just wanted to stop by and visit you, since you're here," he says, smile still lighting up his perfect, beautiful face.
"Am I dead?" I ask, because I think maybe I am. Blake chuckles at me again. His smile doesn't reach his eyes. I sound like a child.
"No, Annie. You're not dead yet." I ignore the word 'yet.' I want to pretend this is real.
"Then why am I here?" I ask, because I am so confused. It's traumatizing for me to be here, staring at every person I've killed. Staring at Blake, who is dead. But his hand on my face feels so, so real.
"Because you're not living your life the right way," Blake frowns at me. My eyes don't move an inch in either direction. I need to soak him in. "I've been gone for three months, and you still aren't moving forward. You still think about me night and day. I didn't let myself get killed just so you could die, too."
"But you said I wasn't dead," I point out.
"Not now. But if you keep going like this, you will die. Annie, don't you see?" Blake raises his voice, and I flinch away from him. I don't want him to yell at me, when his touch feels so real and his eyes look so real. But he yells anyway. "I died. I was always going to die. You were meant to win, you were always meant to win. But now that I'm gone, it's like you died in the arena. That's not what I wanted! None of this is working out like I wanted! Don't let the Annie I loved die, don't let her place be taken by a corpse, a zombie!"
"You should've won, Blake, you should've won," I sob, clutching his hands tightly, never wanting to let go. "I hate this life without you. I wish I would've died and you would've won, that's all I want every waking hour of my life!"
"I didn't win, Annie," he hangs his head so low I have to force his chin up so I can look at him. "You won. I died. Please, don't let my life go to waste. Don't let any one of those tributes' lives go to waste. Remember me, remember how I loved you, remember…" he's fading away now, and I hold onto him more tightly.
"WAIT!" I scream at him, pulling desperately on his arm.
"What?" Blake asks, pausing.
"Is this real? Or is this just a dream?" He smiles at me when I ask the question, like it's so obvious. I feel how rough his skin is under my hand, see how brightly his eyes shine, how his teeth are so white they look like the moon lit up at midnight. This feels so real.
"Do you want me to show you?" He asks, and I nod. He leans his head into mine, and does something that makes me want to rip my heart out of my chest. His forehead touches my forehead and his hand reaches to grab my face roughly. "I love you, Annie. Remember me," he growls before he kisses me, his lips rough and gentle and sweet and stormy all at the same time. The same way they were in life. I know I can't be dreaming this, I can't. His skin smells sweet like it did and life and I hold him tighter and think maybe it's better for me to die so I can be with him again.
When he pulls away from me, I notice that he's crying. "I miss you, Annie, I miss you so much."
"Not half as much as I miss you," I whisper back. There are tears of my own dripping down my cheeks.
"I have to go, Annie," he says to me, and I cry out, digging my nails into his arm to hold him there. "Annie, baby, let go. It's time for you to go back," he says, and his voice is so gentle, so sweet, so kind.
"No," I sob, "No, I don't want to."
"Annie," he sobs unashamedly. "Annie, please, please, please. I have to tell you something before you go, please listen, baby." His tears are coming faster now.
"No, no, no, I won't leave," I cry.
"Please, just let me tell you what I came here to say," he begs.
"Fine," I scream at him. "Fine!" I collapse on the floor of the tent and he bends over me to brush his fingers over my face. When I look at him, he looks like he's memorizing my face. Maybe he is. Maybe he won't come see me anymore, in my dreams, in my episodes.
"Annie," he whispers, his lips brushing my cheek. "It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live. You loved me. I loved you. But now, you have to go on. Move forward. Live. Please. I would rather you live a hundred more years with Finnick than have to see you here again. It doesn't do to dwell on dreams."
"No," I cry, my sobs shaking my entire body. "No, don't make me leave."
He kisses me again, his lips rough against mine. "I love you, Annie," he whispers before everything fades to black.
I manage to choke out a small "I love you more" before my world fades away to dust.
PB
But I don't go back to life, not at first. I go to a dense woods. It looks eerily familiar. I wander around again, until I realize where I am.
Finnick's arena. I flash back to when I was twelve years old, watching Finnick kill everyone in his sight. My Finnick, the youngest victor ever to win the Games. My Finnick, so beautiful, so perfect. Where is he?
There's no one in this arena, I notice. Just me.
So when I hear him screaming, I panic more than I thought possible. Where is he? I thought I was alone! Where is he?
Finnick. I have to get to Finnick.
He isn't just screaming; he's screaming my name just like Blake did before he died. I run frantically around the arena, banging on the force field, feeling an electric shock go through my body, hitting it again and feeling the shock again.
"Finnick!" Finnick is dying and I'm dying and Blake is dead and I have to get to Finnick before everyone is dead so I can tell him how sorry I am, and much I love him.
This is like sprinting down the roads of hell looking for Blake. But it's worse. It's worse, so much worse.
"Finnick!" I scream, but I don't have enough energy to yell for him again. I lay down on the ground, because I feel the life leaving me and if I had one wish it would be to see Finnick's face one more time.
I reach out to the force field again and brush it with my fingers.
"Live, Annie," I hear Blake call to me.
Finnick's voice whispering that he loves me is the last thing I hear before an electrical impulse shakes me to my core.
PB
When I wake up, I'm in an unfamiliar setting. I want to look around, but there's a haze of drugs in my system. I can tell because everything has a cloudy shade of green to it. I'm so comfortable, so warm—but unhappy. Where's Finnick, my dying wish? Is this heaven?
I'm not sure it is. If it were, Blake would be waiting to welcome me. I push the thought of him out of my mind, because he isn't who I need to see desperately now. Finnick is.
I have just enough energy to force two words out of my mouth, before settling into a comfortable stupor. "Where's Finnick?" I hear the shuffling of clipboards and the clicking of shoes, but I don't care about them. I just want Finnick to step in front of me so I know he's okay, so I know he's not dead, so I know that his screams weren't real. I don't even need to say anything to him, although I want to. I just want to see the slope of his nose, the rose color of his lips, the sharp angle of his cheekbones. The dark eyelashes that surround the most beautiful pair of eyes I've ever seen. The light in his eyes.
It's in this drug-induced stupor that I realize that Blake was right. What was it that he said? 'It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.' That was it. I miss him. But he's not coming back. I loved Finnick a long time ago. Maybe if Blake had lived, I would've chosen him. Maybe I would've chosen Finnick. But it doesn't matter now. Finnick is the only one left on Earth I would give my life for. He is my sanity. I can't waste the life I have left dwelling on something that can never be. I can only move forward, and the only way to do that is Finnick.
I think again of the panic I felt in my chest when I heard Finnick screaming in his arena. I wonder why I was there. I wonder why I went back to hell just to see Blake, to see the children I killed. I wonder why the beast from District 2 didn't show up. I wish more than ever that Finnick were here, so he could make sense of what's going on. So I could know he's alright.
I hear a loud shuffling of feet, and feel a pinch in my arm and the flow of liquids into my veins. I don't have the time to wonder what they're doing, because after thirty seconds, the room around me begins to come into focus. It's vaguely familiar.
Oh. I'm at the Academy. In the small medical center they have. The best medical center in District 4. Where victors go to receive treatment.
Another oh. I'm a victor. I'm here because I needed treatment for something. But what?
As the room comes further into focus, I see a few people crowded around my bedside. One is unfamiliar, and she's the first one I look at.
"Who are you?" I ask, my voice wary with suspicion. The woman smiles at me. It does not reach her eyes.
"My name is Dr. Eddleman, Ms. Cresta," she responds. Her voice is smooth. I don't like it.
"Where's Finnick?" I ask aggressively, eyeing her down. I don't know what it is about this woman that makes me feel like curling up into a ball and shrinking against the wall. I cover up my fear with hostility. A classic Career tribute characteristic.
"Here, Annie," I hear his voice say. I turn my head to the doorway and see him slumped against it, relief emanating from every pore of his body. There are purple shadows under his eyes. He is wearing clothes that have stains on the front. They look like blood. I shiver.
But he's here. He's alive. His eyes are the same unclouded, pristine blue-green. His lips are full and pink. His cheekbones cut across his face in strong lines. His jaw is strong. There's a muscle jumping at the edge of it. I reach my hand out to him.
He comes closer to me, and while he does, I look at the other people in the room. My brothers. My dad. Mags. Mags nods at me and pulls my family out of the room with surprising strength. The creepy doctor follows.
Finnick sits on the bed next to me. His eyes are glued to my face. I reach my hand out to touch his face and I realize my hands are chalk-white. I wrinkle my brow in bewilderment. I'm a naturally tan person. Why am I so pale?
"Baby," Finnick whispers when the door finally clicks shut. "Annie," he whispers my name with that familiar tone of a person prostrated in prayer.
"Why am I here?" I ask. I run my fingers over every inch of his face. I thank whatever God there is for him. He's okay.
"Do you want some water?" he asks. I narrow my eyes at him.
"No. Tell me what's going on." Finnick sighs and pulls me to him, enveloping me in a bone-crushing hug. I feel the wetness of tears dropping onto my hospital gown. "Please, Finnick. I'm starting to panic. What happened?" Only my tone of desperation makes him pull away. He holds my hands tightly in his.
"Do you remember anything from last night?" I furrow my eyebrows, trying to think. I had a dream about the beast. He was stabbing me in the stomach with a body part of his that transformed into a giant knife. I remember the pain feeling real. Then I had the nightmare about the arena.
"I had a dream about the beast," I tell him. "He was stabbing me. It hurt. Then I had another nightmare about hell. Then another one. That's all."
"Okay," Finnick begins. His hands are gripping mine like a vice. I want to tell him to loosen up, but I have a feeling he's doing this more for himself than for me. "I woke up to you screaming in pain. There was blood soaking through the bedsheets. I didn't know where it was coming from until I picked you up and it was dripping from between your legs. I ran as fast as I can with you to get you here. You were losing so much blood, Annie. You were turning white and you were getting colder and I was screaming and I thought I was going to lose you."
"Why was I bleeding from there?" I ask. He grips my hands more tightly and adopts a soft voice, the one you would use with a child who was dying.
"Annie," he begins. Tears threaten to spill over from his eyes. I find myself squeezing his hand back because I'm not sure if I want to hear this. "You were pregnant. When you started bleeding, it was—" he chokes on the words. "The baby died. You were—the doctor said it was called miscarrying."
I feel a choking sensation in my throat, blocking the air from reaching my lungs, strangling me. I need to ask—I have to ask—or it's going to kill me. I blink away the tears in my eyes and choke out one word: "Whose?" I can't say anymore because I think I'm going to die from the effort it's taking to breathe. Was it Finnick's? Was it Blake's? Was it the beast's? I think of a baby with black hair and blue eyes that looks just like Blake's and I think that maybe the baby could've saved me from going insane. Something of his to hold onto forever.
Then I think of a baby with wild blue-green eyes, growing up with a mischievous smile and maybe dark hair like mine, but everything else like Finnick—and I start to sob. Did my body kill Finnick's child? Was I not good enough to carry him? Did he despise me as much as I despise myself?
The sobs come harder now, and I know that Finnick's child hated me. He didn't want me as a mother.
I don't consider that it was the beast's, or Blake's. It was Finnick's. I know it was Finnick's.
"Annie," Finnick whispers. "Annie, it's okay. It wasn't District 2's."
"But whose?" I cry, because I need to hear him say it was his, I need him to share this grief with me. I never thought I wanted children, but when I think of this child that would've looked just like Finnick, who I could've taught to swim, who Finnick could've taught to fish—I've never wanted anything more in my life.
"Baby," he coos, holding onto me tightly. "Baby, they did a test. Annie, he was ours. Ours." So much relief floods into me. If it were Blake's—well I killed Blake, and I would've killed his child, too. And if Blake's child lived, I would have to stare at it every day, a living reminder of its father's absence.
"The baby—the baby—" I sob, feeling like my heart is going to stop. "It was a boy? Why didn't he want me? How big was he? Did he feel any pain?"
"Annie, no, no, no," he cries, rocking me against him. He sobs, too. He would've made the best father. "You didn't do anything wrong, you did nothing wrong. It just happened, we don't know why, Annie, it's okay. Baby, please calm down, please." He begs. I summon every tiny bit of will left in my body, shudder a little bit, and let the tears subside.
"Okay," I whisper. "Okay."
"Okay," he repeats. He's struggling to hold it together, too. But he's managing. For my sake, probably. "He wasn't old enough to feel any pain, Annie. That's what they told me. His nervous system probably wasn't developed enough to feel anything. You got pregnant maybe three weeks before the Games. The last time we slept together before Blake, probably. Seventeen weeks, eighteen, maybe. They had to take him out of you surgically. You didn't do anything wrong, Annie, I promise," he says.
"In my dream, Blake told me I wasn't dead yet. Yet. Then I saw everyone I killed and Blake sat with me and told me that I needed to change my path. He told me to live," I whisper. "He told me to go to you."
"Did he?" Finnick asks sharply, pulling back from me.
"Yes," I whisper back. "I thought I was dead in the dream. Felt weak. Then when he left, I thought I was coming back to you, but I went into your arena."
"Mine?" Finnick sounds surprised. Shocked. "What happened then, Annie?"
"Wandered around," I murmur. "Then I heard you screaming for me, screaming my name. I thought I was having a heart attack, but then you kept screaming and I had to lay down on the ground. I touched the wall around the arena. It shocked me. Then came here," I mumble.
"Well, you must be a psychic or something, Ann," Finnick gives a watery, shaky laugh. "I was screaming your name, over and over again, when they took you away from me. Into an operating room or something. The doctor told me she had to shock you to start your heart again, because you died on the table," he bows his head down and kisses my knuckles, one by one. "That must've been the force field."
"I died?" I whisper.
"For a minute. You lost too much blood, baby," he murmurs against my hand.
"I remember wishing that I could just see you again, so I could see that you were okay. So I could tell you how sorry I am, how much I love you, how much I need you. Because I haven't since the Games, too much," I say.
"Not your fault," he says, still kissing my hand.
"I should never have fallen in love with him, Finnick," I reply. "I miss him, I do, so much."
"But?"
"But we belong together," I whisper back. "We made a baby together, Finnick. His death made me insane, but you make me sane. You heal what's broken in me. Please, please, please love me like you did. Blake told me to move on. He told me not to dwell on dreams. I'm going to listen to him, for once," I say with a dry chuckle. "Please don't leave me, please stay with me for always, please give me another baby that will live, please promise me that will have a long life together," I beg him, grabbing his face roughly between my hands. He kisses the palm of my left hand and breathes deeply.
"I promise I'll never leave you. I promise I'll stay with you for always. I promise I'll give you ten babies that we'll give the best life imaginable. I promise that we'll live a hundred more years and die the oldest, happiest people in Panem. I promise you that I'll love you until the universe explodes and kills us all. Probably longer."
"Okay," I whisper. I kiss him, and behind it is all of the things I want to say to him, all of the apologies he won't listen to verbally. I pull away after a while, tears falling down my face, just to whisper, "I love you, Finn."