In the land of Gods and Monsters
I was an angel
Livin' in the garden of evil
Screwed up, scared, doing anything that I needed
Shinin' like a fiery beacon
Peeta stares at his reflection in the mirrored elevator doors and dry swallows the tiny blue pill that Finnick hands him. His image is shiny and glossed over. A kaleidoscope of colors spark from his fingers as he reaches out to touch the reflection. Somewhere in the furthest parts of his mind, he wonders if he would ever be able to recreate on canvas the way the world looks when he's like this.
"You're high," Finnick says, grasping Peeta's chin and making him meet his eyes. Finnick groans and releases his chin. "You know it only makes it more difficult when you're high."
"It's Claudius," Peeta says in explanation.
Finnick sighs but doesn't say anything more. Claudius Templesmith is a watcher and there's nothing he loves watching more than when Finnick ties Peeta to the specially made wall in his room adorned with hooks, ropes, and straps – that Claudius calls "the rack" – and fucks him. Hard.
Peeta isn't sure what's worse, having to endure being brutally fucked by his best friend or being tied to "the rack." He supposes it doesn't really matter which is worse. They're both equally as bad. He can endure sleeping with men even though he has never had a preference for that. In the past year working as a prostitute, he's found ways around that – like the little blue pill that Finnick gave him – but he still hates being bound or restrained. The only way for him to get through this night without a full-blown panic attack is to be high. The last time he tried ended in disaster. The client was upset. President Snow was upset. Peeta had to pay a price for his failure. A freak explosion occurred in his family's bakery not a month later. His brother lost a hand. His mother lost her life.
There's no way he can do the ropes and leather straps sober. Finnick understands this, but he's still worried. When Peeta is high he has trouble performing and Claudius likes a performance. The blue pill will help him get and maintain an erection, but it does nothing to ensure he has an orgasm. If he doesn't come, that'll be a problem especially if Claudius wants to watch him do it. He'll sometimes ask Finnick and Peeta to spill their seed on him or on each other while he strokes his own cock.
The elevator dings and his reflection vanishes as the doors slide open.
"We'll figure something out," Finnick says.
He braces his hands against the shower wall and lets the water cascade over his head and down his back. His hair hangs heavy in his face making it hard to breathe and he wonders if it's possible to drown in a shower.
"Shower time's over kid," Haymitch grunts from the doorway.
Peeta ignores him. He's scrubbed himself twice, but he still doesn't feel clean. There's probably no number of showers that will ever make him feel truly clean.
Haymitch's head peers around the tiled wall. He reaches past Peeta's body, tapping the screen and cutting off the water. "Get out of the shower Peeta." A towel hits him in the shoulder. "C'mon I have that fancy shit for your arms and legs."
Peeta dries his hair and wraps the towel around his waist inspecting the angry, red welts on his wrists and ankles. Claudius had wanted to use the ropes tonight and kept demanding that Finnick make them tighter. Finnick did his best to help Peeta out, but the night dragged on for what seemed like an eternity. He had to cycle through every sexual fantasy he'd ever had to finally reach a release. And as he spilled himself onto Claudius's naked chest he felt nothing but exhaustion.
"Peeta! I'm too old and too drunk to haul your ass out of there. Let's go," Haymitch gripes.
He joins Haymitch by the bathroom sink and let his mentor apply the healing ointment to his wounds. Then, he holds out a hand and waits for Haymitch to hand over his razor. He is under constant supervision now. Seven months ago, at the end of his first interval as a Capitol commodity, they'd found him unconscious in a pool of his own blood. He'd used a razor blade and cut his wrists.
Now he's rarely left alone for extended amounts of time unless he's with a client. Even when they are home in Twelve, Haymitch is always around. It must be an arduous task, being so vigilant. Why won't they just let him die? If he dies, all this pain, all this loneliness, all this guilt will disappear. If he dies, maybe he will get the chance to see her again. He wonders if she would look like the brave, scrawny ten-year-old he remembers or if she would look like a woman. Would she still braid her hair? Would his mother be there too? He hopes not. He hopes that when he dies, he gets to choose who is around if anyone is around at all.
"Got the president's party tomorrow night. They're dragging my old ass there too," Haymitch says in an attempt to fill the silent room, to get Peeta to talk like he used to.
Peeta nods. All the victors will be there. It's the president's pre-reaping party and Snow loves to show off his victors.
"Are you going with anyone?" Haymitch asks.
No. Thankfully. But that doesn't mean he isn't assigned to meet with a client afterward. It's someone new and he dreads new clients, hates when he doesn't know what to expect. It makes him nervous, shaky, and vulnerable.
He shakes his head at Haymitch's reflection in the mirror and focuses on shaving, trying to ignore the way Haymitch watches every movement of his wrist with the razor or the way the hardness in Haymitch's eyes is replaced with sadness when he thinks Peeta isn't paying attention. One more week. One more week and he'll be home and then he'll figure out a way to do it. Figure out how to do what should've been done in the Games, what should've happened seven months ago. He has to do it. He can't fathom how he'll survive another Reaping or being a Mentor or trying desperately to save two children only to watch them die. He has enough deaths on his hands. Why shouldn't he have his own too?
"That's good enough," Haymitch says, snatching the razor from his grasp and handing him a towel to wipe the shaving cream from his face. "Here, take this." He holds up his palm and in the middle is a little yellow pill. A sleeping pill. Peeta winces. "You need to get some sleep. You look like shit."
"You've looked like shit for years. No one makes you take sleeping pills," Peeta says, plucking the pill from Haymitch's hand and swallowing it with a mouthful of water from the bathroom faucet.
Haymitch laughs, pulling a flask out of his jacket pocket and shaking it. "I'm a lost cause, kid."
Me, too, Peeta thinks.
He follows Haymitch into the bedroom and pulls on underwear and sleep bottoms. The effects of the pill begin to work quickly, and he stumbles as he makes his way to the side of the bed. He hates the sleeping pills. They trap him so deeply in his nightmares with no means of escape. It's just another form of torture that the people around him – the people who care about him – don't understand. Or maybe they do. They must all have nightmares too. They probably use the pills, so they don't have to worry about him in the middle of the night. Don't have to worry that they'll wake up to find him in a pool of blood again.
Haymitch settles into a chair at the far end of the room with a book and his flask. Peeta reaches for the bedside lamp and pulls the string, bathing the room in soft light. He doesn't like to sleep in the dark, not anymore and Haymitch needs the light to read. As his head hits the pillow and the pill pulls him into that deep, tortuous abyss, Peeta wonders if there is a way for him to get his hands on his own supply of sleeping pills. He wouldn't need much. Ten? It might not even take that many to do it. That would be a gentle way to go. No blood. He could close his eyes and that would be it.
That's what he'll do. He'll figure out a way. One more week.
Smile. Nod. Act like you're interested in the absolutely ridiculous things they talk about. Wink. Flirt. But not too much. Play the part. Don't let them see the real you.
He repeats this over and over as he moves through the bodies crowding the ballroom of the presidential palace. On the outside, he's the affable, charming, desirable victor he knows he needs to be. On the inside, he's screaming.
He checks his watch. One more hour until he needs to meet with the new client. He fists his hands and wipes them nervously on the sides of his black tuxedo trousers. What he wouldn't give for a drink or another pill to make the world shiny. But he knows better than that. He needs to meet with a new client sober, needs to learn what they want from him, learn their quirks and kinks before ever attempting to meet with them intoxicated. Some of them always require him to be sober. He hopes this one doesn't.
He doesn't know much about the client other than they're female and seventeen years old, just like him. The name he was given is Ms. Acrum and he is supposed to meet her on the fifth floor of the palace – the floor reserved for Snow's victor prostitutes – at 9 PM.
Prior to his time as a victor, it would've shocked him to learn that people as young as himself bought time and sex with victors. Now, he's learned that it's a rite of passage of sorts for the elite and wealthy young people in the Capitol.
And nothing shocks him anymore.
He checks his watch again. Thirty minutes left. He winds through the crowd passing Finnick whose hand is pressed against the small of a woman's back. She has tinted green skin and vining tattoos. He whispers in her ear and she laughs. He catches Peeta's eyes as he passes.
Peeta moves through long rows of banquet tables piled high with food. One table is laden with desserts and a platter of intricate, tiny cakes. His steps falter. He gazes at the cakes curiously. A wave of longing crashes over him. He remembers when he used to decorate the cakes in the bakery, when he used to wake up early to help his father prep the bread for the day, when he used to bake.
He rushes out a pair of double doors near the back of the room, stepping into the palace's expansive garden. He needs some air and a few minutes to himself.
Smile. Flirt. Play the part. Don't cry. Six more days.
The doors open behind him and Johanna's petite frame steps into the fading sunlight.
"On babysitting duty?" he asks dryly, his eyes on the sinking sun.
She shrugs beside him, her eyes following his gaze. They stand in silence for a few seconds before she speaks. "I know why you did it. I guess I've never been brave enough to try it myself, but I've thought about it. I don't blame you."
He doesn't know what to say to that, so he watches her profile as she watches the sky. She's beautiful and would've brought in a lot of money for Snow. She's also stubborn and opinionated. She refused Snow's request and everyone she loved was killed because of it. He wonders if there's a freedom in that, in not having anyone to protect. A part of him feels jealous. But then he thinks of his father and his brothers and his nephew. The jealousy gives way to overwhelming guilt.
"You've got to get upstairs," Johanna says, touching his arm and meeting his eyes. Her stare is fierce and angry. He looks away.
"I know. I'm going," he says. With a sigh, he leaves her standing in the garden.
The fifth floor is nothing more than a series of long halls with thick, red carpet and doors with golden number plates. He strides down the hall, exuding confidence he doesn't feel, and stops at the door adorned with a "4." He knocks and waits. He hears a muffled reply telling him to enter. He turns the handle and steps through the threshold.
He suppresses a shudder. He's been in this room before. He keeps his eyes off the dandelion chair in the corner. The client sits on the end of the bed. Her wide, anxious eyes take him in. Her fingers nervously pick at the embroidery on the duvet. Her bare feet dangle over the edge of the mattress, the left one unconsciously jiggles shaking the thin gold chain around her ankle. Her shoes lay haphazardly on the floor beneath her feet.
Only one type of client is this nervous: a virgin.
Fuck.
He's only had to do this one other time. It was excruciating. Too intimate, too much like what he imagines it might be like if it were real, only to be dismissed and thrown aside when it was over. That night made him feel more like a whore than any of the others.
He really wishes he weren't sober.
Play the part. Let your mind go somewhere else.
A pair of gray eyes flash in his mind. He pushes the thought aside.
"Ms. Acrum," he says. His voice a mixture of shyness and charisma with a slightly flirtatious lilt, just like Finnick taught him. He smiles brightly and moves towards her.
"Oh! Um...it's Amethyst or – or Amy. My friends call me Amy," she says scooting further on the bed, keeping a distance between them.
It's an endearing move, but he knows how this goes. She'll act shy, chaste. She'll want him to make the first move, instigate the contact, control what happens between them. Or, at least pretend that he has any control over this. But he can play the game too. He's been taught well.
"Are we friends, Amy," he says in his smoothest, sexiest voice. The voice that Finnick had him practice to an embarrassing degree. But if he wants to keep his family safe he needs to be good at this. As good as Finnick is. That voice is usually all it takes to get these things going. The faster this starts, the faster he can get out of this nightmare of a room.
Her head tilts and he sees confusion and surprise cloud her features for an instant before she's put on the mask of indifference she's trying to wear. He can see through it though. Her pulse hammers erratically on the side of her throat. He can count the beats. Maybe he'll focus on that. He'll watch her pulse race and then decrease when she's done with him.
She clears her throat. "Perhaps we could be. You can never have enough friends…right?"
He doesn't know about that. He's not sure he has any friends anymore. He has Haymitch and Finnick, who he considers is as close to a best friend as he can get, and he has people that take care of him out of obligation. But are they really his friends? He's not sure. The friends he used to have back home can no longer look him in the eye, not after what he did to win the Games. He bets someone like Amethyst Acrum has a lot of friends. Prissy, spoiled, entitled, pretty little things. He bets she'll boast about her night with him to them. How she lost her virginity to a victor. And no one will mention that she had paid for the use of his body.
He removes his jacket and belt. Her throat pumps as she swallows.
She's pretty enough with the potential to be beautiful, or at least he thinks she could be without her unnatural purple hair and matching eyes. He tries to imagine what she would look like in plainclothes without the heavy makeup, her olive complexion free from the layers.
He wishes he could stop doing this, stop humanizing them especially when he knows they don't think of him as human. Finnick says it will get easier with time, that he'll be able to separate himself from what he's made to do. He doesn't think he'll ever be able to do that. It doesn't matter anyway. He won't need to do this for much longer.
He loosens his tie, popping the buttons on his shirt, untucking the fabric from the waist of his trousers, and letting it fall down his arms. His chest is bare. Her mouth parts and her eyes scan his body. He grasps the button on the front of his trousers.
"Wait!" she says, moving even further away from him on the mattress. "Can't – Can't we talk a little first? Get to know each other better…before – before anything else happens?"
He freezes, tilting his head in confusion. He suddenly feels self-conscious and shy. He hasn't felt shy in one of these rooms in a long time. "Talk?" he questions, his eyes darting to the ceiling.
She follows his gaze and a look of understanding washes over her. She knows the rooms are bugged and everything that happens between them in this room is being recorded. He often wonders what Snow does with those recordings. Does he keep them for himself? Does he sell them?
She nods. "You're such an interesting victor and from an outlying district, too. I'd love to get to know you better," she says with what he thinks is her best effort at a shy, playful smile.
She's terrible at this. But there's something familiar about her, something he can't quite place, like a long-forgotten memory or a hazy dream. Inexplicably, he finds that he wants to talk to her, that he misses talking to people. That desire brings up past feelings of confusing pleasure and twisted emotions in this room. He hates this fucking room.
If he can steer the conversation in a way that he doesn't have to give too much personal information, too much of himself to her then it might work. At least he might get to avoid fucking her.
"Okay," he says, moving to sit on the end of the bed making sure to keep his back to the chair in the corner.
They talk about simple things at first: Capitol gossip, the latest fashion trends that he has no interest in, and the latest movies that he hasn't seen. He starts to relax, just a little. He starts to think that this won't be as bad of a night as he thought it would. He sees her relax, too. She laughs at something he says, a real genuine laugh that makes her eyes crinkle in the corners. He finds that he likes talking to her. And then she asks him what it's like to be a victor.
He gives the polite answer, the expected answer, the lie. He tells her that he's proud and honored to represent his district, to be a victor and a new mentor, to do it all for the power and glory of the Capitol. And that's when he sees it: pity. It shines and dies so quickly in her violet eyes, but he's sure of what he's seen. She looks away, tucking her legs under herself and brushing her hands across the sequins of her gown. Her eyes fall on the chair in the corner and he watches her bite her bottom lip as she studies it. It confuses her in the same way it confused him the first time he saw it.
He glances at the clock on the wall. He's been in the room with her for nearly two hours and he knows from the information he was given beforehand that she only paid for two hours.
"Time's almost up," he says rising to his knees on the mattress. "Is there anything you'd like me to do for you, Amy?" He moves closer to her on the bed.
"No – No, that's not – " she scrambles off the bed, standing tall, holding her head high, like the good Capitol citizen that she is "– I just required conversation from you this evening." She moves to the end of the bed and pulls on her heels. "You may go now."
Something changes in her then. The relaxed ease of their earlier conversation is gone. She squares her shoulders. A wall goes up emphasizing the divide between them. The mask of indifference is so clearly worn now that he isn't sure if he really saw the look of pity in her eyes at all. He might have imagined it, imagined that someone like her would care enough to feel sorry for him in this situation, to think of him as anything more than entertainment for her. A toy. An ornament. Something to be thrown away once she's bored or once he's too broken to be of any use.
He nods, climbing off the bed bewildered and unsure. He's never been told to leave before. Never left without being asked to perform some sexual act. They've always left him once they were through with him. A pang of jealousy strikes. How nice it must be that she gets to dismiss him, gets to choose that she isn't ready to have sex yet. Not with him. Not now.
He was never given that choice.
He gathers his shirt, jacket, and belt from the floor. He glances back at her as he opens the door and he sees it again. Pity flashes beneath the mask. He quickly shuts the door. His heart is pounding. He doesn't understand what just happened, but he's sure of what he's seen. She felt sorry for him. Why?
He throws on his shirt and jacket, dressing quickly as he steps onto the elevator. He smashes the button on the lighted panel. He's angry and confused. He's sure he just fucked up somehow. He'll have another meeting with Snow in the morning. There will be another price that needs to be paid. He slumps into the corner of the elevator car. Everyone will be so much safer once he's gone.
That night he dreams of home and mutts and roses and Rue's small hands reaching out, begging him to save her and purple eyes and dark braided hair.
A/N: I'd love to hear your thoughts!
Lyrics at the top of the chapter are from the song Gods and Monsters by Lana Del Rey.
You can find me on IG: isarnicole_everlark_fanfics
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