Hello! I've been reading your Hayffie prompts in AO3! You're an amazing writer! THANK YOU SO MUCH! I have a request for you: some kind of angst past lives AU where Haymitch meets Effie past time but love between them cannot come true until THG, and Haytmich is like "this is it! I'm gonna go for it and protect her with all I got" and then rebellion occurs and the Capitol takes Effie! That'll be so new and great to do! Thank you!
The Grand Scheme of Things
They are no one in the grand scheme of things. They are never Kings and Queens or Imperators and Impresses or Presidents or something as equally grand. They're always faces in a crowd of ordinary people. They never make history. Sometimes, he's a boy and she's a girl. Sometimes, he's a man and she's a woman. Sometimes, he's old and she's too. Sometimes it's a combination of those.
They are no one in the grand scheme of things but they are everything to each other. Always. They find each other and they lose each other and they find each other again. That's how it has always been and that is how it should always be.
The first time he meets her, he's not Haymitch and she's not Effie, Panem isn't yet called Panem but there are already Games and people dying for the enjoyment of others. The city is called Rome and it stands at the center of the greatest empire ever created. From his perspective, there is nothing great in the empire. He is a gladiator, a former slave, who's too old to fight in the circus and who's supposed to train younger slaves to survive in an arena full of wild beasts and other gladiators who want to slip your throat. He hates his life and he drinks more than he should but he's a former favorite of the crowd so nobody pays him much attention.
Their first meeting is purely accidental.
He stumbles upon her, literally, on his quest for more alcohol. She's veiled as befits a noble woman but still, he glimpses dark blond curls before anything else and blue eyes. That's rare enough in that part of the country that he gapes a little, more taken aback by her unexpected features than her actual presence. No woman is allowed in there. No proper woman in any case. But is she really a proper woman despite her attires? She holds his eyes a fraction of a second too long before avoiding them.
His curiosity is picked.
"Hello." He smirks. She doesn't answer but glances at him in irritation, probably because it's highly inappropriate for a former slave to address a noble woman. He has never really cared about such things. "Are you lost, sweetheart?"
She bristles in annoyance and turns her back to him pointedly. A group of gladiators who are perched on barrels on the other side of the courtyard and very busy watching him making an ass of himself start laughing hysterically. He ignores them and steps around her so they can talk face to face again.
"Friends of mine." he winces. "Never mind them. Where were we?"
She's clearly done with his antics. Her eyes darts left to right in fear of he doesn't know what. "You know I could have you flogged for talking to me?" she whispers furiously, low enough that her voice doesn't ring out in the courtyard.
"Ah, but you won't, sweetheart, or you would have screamed bloody murder already." he winks. "So, did you want to see half-naked men or are you lost?"
"I am waiting for my husband, if you must know." she sighs. "He won't be pleased to see you standing so close to me by the way. You are very much half-naked. Not very impressive, though. I have been told gladiators had body to die for."
He can't help but laugh out loud. "Yeah, I think people means that literally. Who's your husband? He must be a little dim to leave you out there without any form of protection."
"I have his name, this is protection enough." She doesn't seem as thrilled by that as she should be. "Nobody would dare put a finger on me."
"You're sure about that?" He lets his eyes slowly trail up and down her body, appreciatively. "I think I would risk a flogging for a girl like you."
"I am no girl." she huffs. "And you're risking it already. I have half a mind to denounce you."
"Have you, really?" he chuckles. "And here I thought we were having a nice chat."
"A nice inappropriate chat." she points out.
"Those are always the most interesting, don't you think so?" He can feel himself getting smitten with her. Oh, who is he kidding? He is already smitten. He's a goner for beautiful women who can meet him barb for barb.
Her eyes widen suddenly and he spies a flash of fear on her face. "My husband's here. Go away."
He doesn't recognize the patrician at his toga but at his face. He swiftly walks away from her before the man sees him there because there's no point in antagonizing him : he's the emperor's closest friend and advisor.
Still, he doesn't like the way the senator grabs his wife's arm and drags her more than steers her towards the door. It seems the man has taken an interest in the circus because he sees the woman again, the following week, waiting in exactly the same spot.
"Are we inappropriately chatting today?" he asks. "Because…" The shadow of a bruise he glimpses on her face makes him stop. "What happened?" He's surprised by the anger in his voice, he's surprised to care that much. It's been a few years since he has last taken an interest in something other than his bottle of ale.
"Please." she sighs. "Do not ask any impertinent question. Asking me that isn't polite."
"What's polite then?" he growls. "Ignoring the fact that you've got a bruise on your face?"
"Yes." she hisses.
"Well that just sounds plain stupid to me." He lifts a hand instinctively and she flinches back which is all the explanation he needs really. "Sorry."
"Why do you insist on aggravating me?" she asks in annoyance, adjusting her veil over her hair.
"I don't know, sweetheart." he shrugs. "Nothing better to do."
The senator brings her every week. They have inappropriate chats every week.
The other gladiators, the oldest who like him are there to train the youngest, tell him to stay away. He can't. He's enthralled, he's trapped. He can't stay away from her. Her eyes twinkle with mirth when she laughs at his jokes and it's become his mission to make her laugh as much as he can. She's cleverer than she looks and he loves the way she can hold her own and even leave him gob-smacked sometimes. They bicker each time they talk. They disagree on everything. They have nothing in common. He wants to kiss her, take her away and start again in a place where they can both be free.
And then one day, she's not there. She doesn't come the following week either. Three weeks without news and he's desperate enough to try to find her. Their house isn't hard to locate but he's afraid of what he will find there, he's afraid his husband wou dhave hit her too strongly and… The fact that this man is treating her so badly is making his blood boil but he can't do anything for her. Raising his hand on a patrician would be a death sentence for him and wouldn't accomplish a thing to help her.
Trespassing on the estate isn't harder than sneaking away from the training center. He knows where to look for her, she has spoken enough of her favorite spot in the garden. Stone bench overlooking a small stream under a big olive tree. Except…
"This isn't a stream at all, sweetheart." he snorts. "This is a puddle."
She bolts from the bench and turns around, a hand on her heart, clearly startled. He wavers for a second, perhaps coming here hasn't been the wisest of decision. Who is he to her ? No one but the old gladiator who bothers her when she's waiting for her husband. The attraction he feels is perhaps one-sided or maybe he has dreamt it in an alcohol daze. Perhaps…
Her eyes fill with tears and she launches herself at him in a way that's absolutely not proper for a noble married woman. He catches her, of course – he suspects he will always be there to catch her – and buries his nose in her hair when her veil slips to the ground.
"You shouldn't be here." she whispers against his collar bone. "If they find you…"
"You disappeared." he replies tersely. "I was worried."
She leans back and frames his face in her hands, some tears trailing unchecked down her cheeks. There's a new bruise there, and some on her arms too. It awakes a thirst to kill in him like he hasn't known since his last fight in the arena. "This is neither proper nor clever." she says urgently and with despair. "I can't fall in love with you. I can't. It will end…"
He kisses the end of her sentence away. She's right, obviously, neither proper nor clever. He doesn't care for propriety but clever has always been his game, except with her. With her… The kiss grows heated and when she moans in his mouth he knows he's lost. Love, he has come to think, was a weakness, something unreachable and fragile that left you breathless and hurting. He is breathless and hurting, right then, but he's also very much aware of how good it feels to kiss her, to hold her, to… She's the one who slips off her dress but he's happy to help, he's happy to kiss every mark of abuse, he's happy to cherish and adore her body like it should be. He's never been as careful with a woman as he is with her. He loves her and there is no going back from that.
"Run away with me." he asks, a while later, when the sky is starting to get dark and he's laying on the grass watching her get dressed hastily.
Her whole body seems to freeze and when she looks at him, he can see the temptation in her eyes, the desperate desire to say yes. But she's clever, cleverer than him probably, because she buries that desire deep, deep down and all that's left when she studies him is sadness and regret. "It will be our death."
He doesn't ask again that night. But he comes back the next week and the one after that and the one after that. The secluded garden is the perfect meeting place because no one ever wanders in. They argue and they kiss and they make love and he asks her to run away and she always says no. It goes on for months. Until the time he finds her so badly bruised, shaking like a leaf in a storm, and his sight goes red.
"He knows." she whispers.
The sensation is similar to a bucket of ice thrown at his face. "We're leaving. Tonight. Come." He extends a hand she doesn't take.
"He doesn't know it's you." she shakes her head. "You are safe."
"But you are not and that's all I care about." He kneels besides the bench, clasps her hands in his and kiss the bruised knuckles. She has tried to defend herself. It only makes him angrier. No one should touch her in hate and he should be able to kill whoever did. He had killed plenty of good men over the years, he would take pleasure in killing that one. "Come with me." he pleads again. "We can find a ship. Go across the sea, to Carthage or somewhere else. Somewhere he will never find you. I will keep you safe."
One of her hands wanders to his cheek, her nails rasping in the stubble covering his jaw. "He is my husband."
"I can be your husband." he scowls. "I can be whatever you want me to be. If he knows and you stay here…"
The barking of dogs make him fall silent. They both stand up, worried and alerted.
"Go away." she begs, pushing him a little towards the wall he always climbs to get in and out. "Go away."
He grabs her arms more violently than he ever did, he sees the flicker of fear on her face and gentles his grip but he doesn't relent. "Not without you. I don't care if they tear me apart, I am not leaving without you."
"If you love me, you will go away right now." she whispers. He waits for the tears but there are none. "If you love me… Please, save yourself, there is nothing you can do for me but that." The barking is closer now and she pushes him again. "Go."
"I'm coming back for you." he pledges. "You hear me? By the gods, I'm coming back for you."
He climbs the wall and jumps on the other side just when the dogs arrive. He can hear raised voices and angry shouting but he forces himself to run away. He makes it back to the arena but he avoids the knowing glances of his friends. Nobody ever said a thing, gladiators have honor despite what people seem to think and few of them wanted to be there in the first place: their loyalties aren't to the emperor.
When he lies on his bed, that night, he can't fall asleep. He can only think of her, her blue eyes and her dark blond hair… He's worried sick about her. So when guards come for him in the morning, he's not overly surprised. Gladiators aren't loyal to the emperor but their loyalty goes first and foremost to themselves and a way out of the arena is as good as any. It is a Game day and they fling him with the gladiators who are going in that day. A last fight, they say, but an unfair one, he knows. His sword is as old as he is, his muscles are unresponsive and his reflexes are sluggish. And yet he has something to fight for, a goal. He wants to save her, to fight his way back to her.
He was good in his time. He steps into the arena, amidst the cries of the crowd who chants his name like years have not gone by and he makes a stand. He slays people he has trained and it's not even hard because he knows their flaws. Their faces are a blur, the only one he can think about is hers. The wild beasts are trickier but he's clever, good at tactics, and even though he's badly injured, he's still the one standing when the lion and the panther die. That's when they send the older gladiators in, the ones he had known for years, the ones who are old and crippled like he is. His friends. The crowd goes wild, of course, but he's half-tempted to give up his weapons, to refuse the fight. Would they do the same? They would be punished and probably slaughtered because the spectators require blood but…
That's when the arrival of the senator in the imperial box causes a small disruption in the crowd. There's a black rim on his toga and he knows what it means. He knows. He lets his sword slips from his grip and falls to his knees. It's his friend who's standing in front of him, his oldest friend, and he hesitates for a second before striking but it's a good strike. A merciful death. A few seconds, no more.
He dies with her name on his lips, knowing he will never see her again.
He's wrong. He does see her again.
Are there gods? Has his pledge to come back for her been heard and are they taking him to his word? Or are the two of them destined to find each other over time and space? He has heard of the term soulmates, sometimes he thinks that's what they are. Sometimes he thinks they are cursed. He finds her and he loses her or she finds him and she loses him. It happens time and time again.
Sometimes, he sees her and he remembers.
This time, they're standing in a forest. He's English and he has come to the New World to stay, she's a local, dressed in furs, all dark skin and dark braided hair. She's beautiful. Their eyes meet and they click. He remembers, he loves her and, of course, he loses her in a pity war that doesn't concern either of them.
Sometimes, he remembers when they kiss.
They're both studying music. He plays the piano and she sings. They hate each other, they bicker all day long and they argue on everything. She criticizes his skills and he says she sings like a cat with its tail stuck in a closed door. They're actually both very good at what they do and for all the distaste they show each other, he likes to think they're kind of friends.
Except, they're not in the right country at the right time and he's Jewish when her parents are both members of the Nazis party. She doesn't know about him but he does know she dabbles in some underground movement of resistance, so one day, when their argument grows too intense and he becomes meaner than usual he throws her parent's political beliefs at her head and then, for good measure, he throws the yellow star he has never sewn on too. She scoops it up instinctively and stands there with the frayed piece of fabric in her hand, a sad look on her face. The heated argument is replaced by a silence he doesn't like.
"Nothing to say to that, sweetheart?" he sneers. "So unlike you. I'm disappointed. You have a new range of insults to chose from, now."
She doesn't insult him. She thrusts the fabric deep in her own pocket and steps closer, until she's invading his personal space. Later he will wonder if she already remembered at that point and was just waiting for him to catch up. But later would be too late.
The moment their lips touch, he remembers.
They don't discuss this. They never do. But they know.
They love each other in their own way which involves a lot of arguing and they make good use of the time they have left because they know it will be short. It always is. That time isn't different.
He dies far from her, in the cold, starved and beaten, her name on her lips. It's a different name yet it is the same. Names don't matter. She dies a few years later, whispering his name like a prayer.
Sometimes, he remembers when they make love.
They're always on opposite sides of a war it seems. They're star-crossed in every way they can be. And yet he always falls for her and she always falls for him. He's a white planter's son in Virginia and she's one of their slaves. Their story is slow and complicated because he loves her but she can't really say no to him and he doesn't want to force her. He courts her like he has never courted any woman before, he makes sure she doesn't feel pressured, he makes sure she understands she can refuse him. It's her who kisses him in the end, because she's fed up with his antics when she has told him a million times she understands.
The first time they sleep together, everything comes back to him at once. All the lives, all the pain, all the heartbreak but then it washes away and recedes in the back of his skull like it always does. It's here and he knows it but it's neither overwhelming nor disturbing. It just is.
For a while, everything is perfect. They argue and kiss and make up. They hide, of course, and, for once, he begins to think they finally broke the odd curse that follow them in every of their lives. Except they haven't. Someone finds out and his father laughs at him until he makes it clear that he actually loves her and wishes to marry her – he would run away to the north with her if it were what it takes, he should have done it already – then all hell breaks loose. He doesn't know what happens actually but, afterwards, he can remembers a lot of arguing and shouting and then he's on the floor, his head slipped opened. His mother's scream, a doctor, days waking and falling asleep, in and out, life looks like a daze.
When he finally wakes up for good, he doesn't need his mother to tell him. She's dead, he knows. He feels it. Her absence is a hole in his soul. It always is.
He runs away a week later and joins General Washington's troops who are fighting to free the South of slavery. It's a desperate quest to avenge her. It's stupid probably. But it's also a way to kill time until he can find her again. Because he will. He has pledged it. That once, he doesn't have time to say her name before death takes him.
Sometimes, he remembers when it's too late.
Paris is ablaze with resentment and the city is thirsty for blood. He's wearing a three-colored cockade on his breast and contemplates the revolution he helped create with proud and a tinge of worry. Things could get out of hands really quickly, he thinks, as he watches the trail of prisoners waiting to get their head chopped off by the guillotine. Aristocrats mostly, but it won't stop at that, he senses.
He's not particularly searching for anyone but his eyes still catch one of the ladies. He recognizes her because she's famous enough, one of the Queen's closest friend, even though she looks different without her white wig and her extravagant dresses. Her blond hair is loose on her neck, her blue eyes are terrified and when they meet his…
His breath catches and he lets out a gasps. Her face twists from terror to despair and then to something more peaceful. She smiles at him, a little sadly, and then she's gone. He tries to get to her but she's the next on the line and he's slowed by the crowd. She's dead when he reaches her. She doesn't have a name to whisper as a prayer this time around.
Sometimes, it all feels pointless but he never ever gives up.
The sensation of urgency is crushing and with every day that passes, Haymitch finds it harder and harder to breathe. In this lifetime, he remembered early. The first time she replied to his gibe with one of her own, he knew. They fall into each other like they always did, claws and teeth out. Haymitch and Effie never really fall in love, they collapse in love, they crash and burn and ask for more.
He tries his best to protect her all those years by keeping their relationship a secret and mostly letting her think he doesn't care as much as he does. She does keep their affair secret but she has other way of trying to protect him: she takes care of him, she comforts him, she soothes the nightmares away. She also annoys him to death but that's why he loves her.
It works well enough until Katniss and Peeta come along because the kids change everything. For once, Twelve has a chance to actually win and Haymitch and Effie are thrust into the spotlights while their tributes fight for their lives in the arena. They're careful not to make mistakes, not to give anything away, until Katniss takes out those berries and Haymitch finds himself with a whole new set of worries.
Rebels contact him and he cannot let this chance pass. He doesn't say anything to Effie but he has a feeling she knows anyway because she always does. She's a very good actress and can seem clueless and stupid when he knows for a fact she's neither of those. Victory Tour only confirms that a war is inevitable and, of course, they're once again on opposite sides.
They don't discuss this. They never do. But they know.
"I'm with you." she whispers against the back of his neck, in the dead of night, the last night of the Tour. "Whatever happens, I'm on your side." He thinks she believes him to be asleep or she doesn't and she's just pretending to. It's hard to say with her sometimes.
He vows again to protect her but he fears it's pointless.
The Quarter Quell announcement only enhances that sensation. His world is a world of shadows. In Twelve, despair is everywhere. He lets Katniss and Peeta sever him from alcohol because he knows that, ultimately, his addiction will be a problem. He needs to be sharp and liquor doesn't help him much anymore anyway. He lets the kids train him for a Game he has no intention to play. The urgency only increase because he was out and they're threatening to throw him back in and it remind him of another life.
This one is too similar to their first and it terrifies him.
When Plutarch tells him what the plan is, he makes arrangement so that Effie can be evacuated too before Snow gets it into his mind to arrest her. Thirteen isn't particularly pleased but Haymitch controls Katniss to a point and they need it. Plutarch isn't fooled by his excuses that Katniss will be more comfortable with Effie around but he has the good grace to not saying anything. Everything would go fine.
"I'm leaving with you." she states, arms folded.
They're in the middle of her apartment because it was the easiest place the rebel team could access to get her out of the Capitol. He has insisted they went there without much explanations but she never asks for much anyway. She knows how to read him, she knows more than she lets on.
"Nobody's leaving." he mumbles, leaning in for a kiss. He needs to meet Plutarch in half an hour and he's late already.
She avoids his kiss and put a hand on his chest. "Haymitch, don't. I'm going with you, we stay together."
He sighs and prays to god her flat isn't bugged. "You will be safer here, sweetheart. I will see you again in a few hours. Everything will be fine."
He had expressly said his cooperation depends on her presence in Thirteen. He won't stop at anything to protect her. The feeling of urgency is too strong to be ignored and it's beginning to lace with something like dread.
This life is too similar to the first one. He can't get it out of his head that it's their last chance.
"When we're not together, one of us always ends up dead." Her eyes are glued to the ground and there is a small frown on her face like she isn't sure this is the cleverest thing to say.
They don't discuss this. They never do. But they know.
"Sweetheart…" he tries again.
"Don't sweetheart me." she hisses. "You know I am right."
"I know you will be safer here so you're staying here." he growls. "A few hours away from each others aren't going to kill one of us." Well, it might kill him. Rescuing tributes in a hovercraft isn't Haymitch's idea of safety. "We'll be fine."
"Will we?" Her eyes are sad, knowing in a way. Does she feel the same he does? Does she, too, think it's their last chance?
He has to be right. For once, in all those lives, he has to be right. "We will."
She nods but she's tensed, frightened. When she wraps her arms around his torso, he hugs back for dear life. "I love you." she whispers against his neck. "I love you."
"I know." He presses kisses against her forehead, her cheek, her shoulder… He never says it back in this life. He can't. Love has burned him before she came in and made him remember. Love isn't something he can't think about even if he does love her. "We always find each other. It will be okay, Effie. You wait for a few hours and then they will come and bring you back to me."
It's a promise he intends to keep and she must know it because this time her nod is more confident. "Until next time, then." She kisses him and it feels like goodbye, but then she steps back and he has no choice but to rush to his and Plutarch's meeting place.
Once again, it's Katniss who's responsible for everything. He doesn't actually blame her but he sometimes wonders why she cannot stay put and do as she's told. She force them to go quicker than they planned. They lose the boy and Johanna – Enobaria, he never cared much for. He's so engrossed in worrying about Peeta and Katniss' reaction to his loss, that he almost forgets to worry about Effie until Finnick wakes up and starts asking about Annie.
Haymitch doesn't offer any word of comfort for which Finnick seems to be grateful. He doesn't know if there are others like them or if it's just Effie and him who seem to remember lives they never really lived, he never had the nerves to ask. Effie is safe and it is all that matters to him.
Until they finally arrive in Thirteen and he's told Katniss' prep team had been retrieved but not Effie. Peacekeepers got there first, they tell him. Do they expect the explosion of rage? They should have. He breaks things and shouts abuse at anyone who comes near him for two days, until Finnick simply grabs his shoulders and forces him under the cold spray of his shower. The cold is like an electroshock.
"You find her and you bring her back." Finnick says again and again, and Haymitch is not sure who he's speaking to or whom he's speaking about. Effie or Annie? "You save her. You save her."
It's not a bad plan so Haymitch does. Or he tries to at least. It hurts to know she was right all along and they could have avoided that if only he had listened to her. Bad things happen when they're not together. He should have stayed with her or took her with him. He vows that if they ever make it out of this unscathed – and they better be this time, because he's tired of dying with her name on his lips, he's tired of doing all this over again, he's tired of watching her die because of him – they will never part from each other ever again.
When they're not working with Katniss on their Mockingjay act, Haymitch and Plutarch do their best to locate Effie, Annie, Peeta and Johanna. They find out where they keep the victors and they figure Effie must be there too. She's on the list of people to bring back, he makes sure she is, but when the rebels come back victorious, Effie is not with them. Johanna is in a sorry state, Peeta is broken beyond repair, Annie is even more withdrawn than she ever was and Effie is still missing.
Haymitch collapses on his bed and doesn't get up for three days. He waits for someone to come and grate his nerves about it but no one comes because, he thinks, no one cares. He craves alcohol but he craves her skin more, she's as much an addiction as booze is by this point. He wants to die without her, just like his hopeless yearning for liquor makes him want to die. Still nobody comes for him and he wonders if he should just give up and die. Would she feel the hollowness like he always did when she died? Would she give up too? Would they find each other again and try somewhere else?
But he can't, in the end, because there's still this awful nagging in the back of his head that tells him this is now or never. Time is running out.
"I'm coming back for you." he whispers those words that aren't really his to the empty bedroom and he hopes she can hear somehow wherever she is. "You hear me? By the gods, I'm coming back for you."
He doesn't feel better afterwards but gets up, takes a shower and goes find something to eat. Giving up on each other never was their style.
Months pass before they're ready to take on the Capitol and the battle is so chaotic that even if he's only working strategies with Plutarch, he's exhausted by the end of it. After it's all finally over, Thirteen is more alive and joyful than it ever was but he doesn't stay to celebrate with the others, he goes back to his room to drown in his misery. He's barely laid down when an unexpected knock at the door makes him stand up once again.
It's Johanna and he's tempted to slam the door in her face because she has been nagging him non-stop about not being allowed to go and fight with Katniss and Finnick. Something on her face stops him. She's serious and distressed in a way she never is.
"They found your escort." she says before he can ask what she wants. "Plutarch thought you would want to know. The hovercraft is on its way."
He has never run as fast in his life, even in the arena. It's pointless, of course, because it's two hours before the hovercraft appears in the sky and he spends every minutes of them watching and praying. She's among a mass of prisoners but he finds her immediately even in the chaos that takes place on the lading-ground. She's unconscious and her grey prison suit is bloody in some place but otherwise she seems fine. Starved, dehydrated and a bit bruised, but fine.
She isn't a medical priority compared to some others, he tries to pull rank but nothing does the trick and, in the end, he had to wait with her unconscious self in a crowded corridor for a free medic to come and help. They're short of doctors, most of them have been sent to the Capitol.
It's hours before they put her in a bed and finally see to her wounds. They assure him she's not too badly injured. There are traces of torture but they're old. She's lucky, the doctors tell him, because they seem to have get bored with her months ago. She needs food, water and rest but she should be physically alright. Her mental state, however, is another matter entirely but they can't say anything until she wakes up. Haymitch isn't too worried about that. She's strong, whatever happened to her, she can get past it.
She hasn't opened her eyes yet when Plutarch comes in with less thrilling news. Primrose and Finnick are dead, Katniss is badly burned and Peeta is in a sorry state. They're both required in the Capitol.
"No." he refuses. "I've done my part." He's staying with Effie. She's right, when they're apart, one of them always ends up dead. He can't wait for her to wake up and utter her favorite 'I told you so'. She enjoys telling that particular sentence very much.
"You will want to speak to Coin." Plutarch sighs. "She had a bunch of people involved in the Games rounded up and ready to be executed. You need to come with me to the Capitol."
Coin. He has always known Coin would be a problem. "And leaving Effie here so she can have her killed?" he snorts. "Over my dead body and literally at that." But not this time. Not this time. They can't go through that. Not again.
"Effie is safe, here. Johanna can keep an eye on her." Plutarch argues. "I can't convince Coin for you, Haymitch. And if you can't convince her you will need Katniss to do it for you. Either way, if you want to protect her, you need to come to the Capitol."
Plutarch, as often, is right. He hates it. He hates the fact that he has to leave when she looks so frail and lonely in her bed. He hates that he has to go before she wakes up. He leaves her under Johanna's vigilance, warning her that if Effie is not unscathed when he comes back, there would be hell to pay. He doesn't leave a message for when she wakes up. There's no point, she knows everything. At least, he hopes she does.
He thought convincing Coin wouldn't be as difficult as it proves itself to be. The woman is dead set on obliterating everyone who has ever had anything to do with the Hunger Games – Plutarch is even questioned at some point which is utterly ridiculous for everyone involved in the rebellion – and Katniss is in no condition to help. As more and more people are getting executed, Haymitch starts making escape plans. He doesn't know where they could go because the Earth doesn't seem wide enough for them to be able to finally live in peace but he's growing desperate.
When Coin tells him, the morning of Snow's execution, that she has decided Effie is to be executed last of the list – to give her time to get her affairs straight, which is more than others have had – Haymitch almost loses it. The war is over, they won, they had never ever survived a war before, but it's not enough, it's never enough. They're doomed, it seems.
He's angry at Plutarch when he learns he had her transferred from Thirteen to the Capitol so she could play the escort one last time with Katniss before Snow's execution. He finally manages to find her in Katniss's suit while the girl herself is god knows where, Katniss isn't totally right in her head anymore. Effie is remarkably unchanged: same dress, same shoes, same ugly wig… And yet, he sees the difference right away. Something gave in her, something died. Her eyes, her beautiful, bright and twinkling eyes, are empty.
"Sweetheart." It's a plea for forgiveness and a desperate wish for her to be whole once again all rolled into one.
She smiles but it doesn't reach her eyes. "Hello, Haymitch."
He doesn't know exactly how they get from him standing by the door and her clutching her clipboard in the middle of the room to them kissing with passion and despair but they do. They always do anyway. "How are you?" he asks, between two kisses and it's three more before she answers.
"I don't know." she offers, truthfully. "I think I will be better once I know if they intend to kill me or not."
He strokes her cheek then and presses his mouth against hers softly. "Nobody is killing you again. Not now, not ever, not if I can help it. You're stuck with me, now."
Her smile is sad and telling. "You don't know how to lie to me." She shakes her head a little. "Would you do something for me?"
He can't help but chuckle bitterly. "Is there something I haven't done yet?"
"Try to live this time, would you?" she murmurs. "Don't… forget me but… find someone else. Be happy."
"Without you?" he shrugs. "Not a chance." It's simple really. Child play. He's not whole without her and she's not whole without him.
She looks even sadder then. "Try." she begs against his lips.
He doesn't. When Coin calls a meeting for the remaining victors just before Snow's execution, he sees his chance and he takes it. He knows Katniss like he knows himself. They're the same. She understood that Coin or Snow, nothing will change. When she votes yes to new Hunger Games, he follows her because he trusts her and the way she's looking at the white rose on the table makes him think she's going to do something rash like she always does.
When she kills Coin instead of Snow, he experiences a second of blatant relief because everything goes to hell around them and he has to take care of everything once more. Relief, however, is short lived. He's shipped back to Twelve with Katniss, while Effie has to stay in the Capitol on probation. He leaves Katniss with a promise to come and take care of her the next day but he never shows up. He falls back into alcohol and he tries to forget but he fails. He does lose any sense of time.
So one day when he wakes up to see a blond woman standing in front of his couch, hands on her hips, and a scowl on her face, he doesn't immediately react. He thinks he's dreaming at first. He dreams of her a lot in the midst of nightmares.
"I will not live in a pigsty, Haymitch." she says while he sits slowly, waiting for the hallucination to go away. "Start sobering up because we're cleaning."
She picks up a cushion that had rolled off the couch long ago and that he had never bothered to put back in place and throws it at his head. That's when he realizes she's real. She's real and she's there and suddenly he can't breathe. He gets up unsteadily and tries to go in for a kiss but she avoids his attempts.
"This is not happening until you have a shower." She wrinkles her nose. "Or two."
Of course, that leads to an argument. He manages to learn that she brought Peeta back home but he still loses the argument and ends up on the lukewarm water of the shower while she tuts and tsss at the state of his house.
It's so easy to find a rhythm between them. She nags and he snaps and they bicker all day long but he relents and she thanks him softly and they always make up. It's not perfect because nothing ever is but it comes very close in Haymitch's mind.
It's years before he's brave enough to ask her. They're older than he can remember them ever being, they don't have children of their own but they have the children's kids to spoil and look after – Haymitch has long ago stopped mumbling in protest every time Katniss' girl and boy call him grandpa – and they have the geese, or rather Haymitch takes care of the geese and Effie hates the geese but while she's busy complaining about his pets they don't argue over something more serious so it suits everyone in the end. They've been together longer than in any of their past lives and those memories are starting to fade so that Haymitch is even starting to wonder if he didn't dream the whole thing.
"Did we make it, sweetheart?" he asks, late one night. They're laying in their bed, he's spooning her like he always does and she's holding his hand like she always does and it's peaceful like it always is. "Finally?"
She hums softly but doesn't answer properly. She's half-asleep already, he guesses. He kisses her neck but doesn't ask again. It doesn't matter really. What matter is that he would trade all the lives for this moment because this moment is bliss. They're together, at last, and together is all there ever should be.
They are no one in the grand scheme of things. They are never Kings and Queens or Imperators and Impresses or Presidents or something as equally grand. They're always faces in a crowd of ordinary people. They never make history. Sometimes, he's a boy and she's a girl. Sometimes, he's a man and she's a woman. Sometimes, he's old and she's too. Sometimes it's a combination of those.
They are no one in the grand scheme of things but they are everything to each other. Always. They find each other and they lose each other and they find each other again. That's how it has always been and that is how it always will be.
