Prompt : Haymitch catches Seneca in Effie's bed, and they end up fighting because Haymitch is angry, confused and jealous, and when he confronts a Effie they end up... :3
Not a Couple
The bottle of whiskey was half empty but it wasn't enough to scourge the image out of his brain. He was throttling the neck of the bottle the way he would have throttled Seneca Crane's if he could. The penthouse living-room was dark, night had slammed down the Capitol a few hours ago but he hadn't bothered to switch the lights on. He didn't need the lights. He needed alcohol and bleach to scrape his brain free of the picture of Seneca Crane carrying a giggling Effie to her room, kissing her and laughing with her as if it was a normal recurrent occurrence.
They didn't even see him lurking next to his own room. They didn't even realize they weren't alone in the penthouse. Effie was loud, she always was, and he could still hear her moans through the closed door. Worse, he could imagine what she looked like when Crane touched her or bite on that particular spot on her neck…
Did she beg Crane the same way she begged him for release?
Did she make Crane beg like she liked to make him beg?
He took a swallow of whiskey. It had been a whole year since the last time he had taken her to bed. That was never planned. It always happened by accident. It sure happened a lot but always by accident. She could do whatever she wanted to do with whoever she wanted to do it. He didn't care. He didn't care.
Another swallow and he could almost believe it.
The problem wasn't the fact that she had another lover who wasn't him. They had never exchanged any promises, when they had sex, it was always a one-time thing. Sex was sex, it didn't mean anything. It didn't mean he liked her. She could take as many lovers as she wanted. That wasn't the problem. That wasn't why he wanted to rip Crane's hands off or to beat him to a pulp.
Problem was, Crane was a Gamemaker and on the shortlist to become Head Gamemaker the following year after Radogin finally retired. She was sleeping with a Gamemaker and that, in his book, was treason. It was a fence with two sides and she was on the wrong side of it.
And he hated that. He hated her.
A door shut down the hall and there was some muffled giggling followed by the noise of the elevator opening. Kissing noises, hushed whispers.
Haymitch felt sick.
"Trinket!" he barked without meaning to. He had nothing to say to her. He didn't even want to look at her.
Sudden blessed silence and then the elevator doors chimed. He felt her presence on the threshold but didn't take his eyes off the bay windows showing the nighttime Capitol.
"You shouted?" Her voice was annoyed and a bit sarcastic.
He hated her voice. It was high pitched and always bubbly and such a sham. Effie wasn't happy all the time. Sometimes, her voice cracked and her Capitol accent gave a cruel shape to words. Sometimes, her voice was cutting like shards of glass. Sometimes it was raw and desperate and he knew she was being truthful because nobody could fake pain like that. He hated it when she sounded cheerful and oblivious, it was always an act and he absolutely hated her escort alter ego.
"Haymitch?" she sighed when he stayed silent. She stepped closer without bothering to turn on the lights, he couldn't hear the familiar clicking of heels. She was barefoot. She never went barefoot. A wave of anger swirled in his belly. She went barefoot for Crane when she had never done so for him. That didn't count, of course. What Effie did and with whom wasn't his problem. Except if the person she did it with was a Gamemaker. Then it was a problem. "Are you drunk? Do you want me to help you to your room?" she sounded resigned and that made him even more angry. She was assuming a lot.
She reached for him, he pushed her hand away. "Was it good?" he hissed. Once again, he hadn't meant to. He wanted to tell her that she was free to sleep with whoever but Gamemakers. He wanted to tell her… "Did you enjoy yourself?"
She took a step back. It was too dark for him to detect a blush and he wasn't sure he would have seen it anyway under her heavy make-up – that, at least, she had not taken away for Seneca, her make-up was smudged but still there and her wig was still on her head. She was wearing a dressing gown secured at the waist by a solid double knot and he wondered if she was naked underneath. He wondered what she would do if he tore it off her body. Not that he would. Not now that she had crossed the fence.
"I had no idea you were here." she winced. "My apologies."
"My apologies." he mimicked before taking a gulp of his liquor. She was frowning, unsure of where his hostility was coming from. They had been good earlier. However, earlier she hadn't fucked Seneca Crane yet. Or maybe she had and he hadn't known. He would rather have stayed ignorant of that small detail. The idea of that man touching her…
"You are drunk." She didn't make the mistake of reaching for the bottle.
"Not enough." he laughed bitterly. "Didn't stop me from hearing you moan his name like a whore."
Her mouth pinched in a hard line but she didn't step back. Her voice, when she spoke, was carefully flat. "I will thank you not to call me that kind of names, that's uncalled for. As I said, I had no idea you were here. I apologized, be gracious and pretend nothing happened, that's the polite thing to do."
"Well, I'm not polite, Princess. Isn't that what you always say?" he snorted.
She turned around, obviously intending to go back to her room. He couldn't have said how he ended up standing up, gripping her wrist but he did.
"Haymitch, you're hurting me." She was calm, unfazed by his violent behavior. She wasn't scared. She never was. He always backed down when she asked. That time was no different. He loosened his grip a bit, so he wasn't crushing her wrist. "I am confused as to why you're angry."
"You fucked a Gamemaker." he growled.
She was small without her heels, he was towering over her. That didn't suit well with him. He liked it when they were roughly the same height. He liked it when she could look at him straight in the eyes and tell him he was being an idiot.
"Language." She clucked her tongue disapprovingly. "And I fail to see how what I do is any of your business."
His instinctive response was to pull on her arm until the very notion of space was obliterated between them. Her breathing quickened and he couldn't tell if she was scared or aroused. She turned her face away from him. "You. Fucked. A. Gamemaker." he spat.
She was neither scared nor aroused, he realized when she tore her wrist away from his grasp and stepped back. She was furious. "I have sex with whoever I want. You are neither my keeper nor my boyfriend. I do what I please."
"He's a Gamemaker!" he roared.
"Is that your sole argument?" She shook her head. "This is ridiculous." She tried to leave again but he was quicker. He stepped on her path and blocked her way to the door.
"Is he your boyfriend?" he asked, taking two mouthfuls of whiskey for good measure. He didn't see how that was relevant to his point but his mouth was obviously not on the same brainwave as his head. "Is the Gamemaker your boyfriend?" It didn't sound better that way. It sounded sad and pathetic and he was making himself sick.
She stood there, watching him in the dark with a look of understanding on her face he didn't like one bit. "I don't have a boyfriend." she answered slowly. "He's a friend. Sometimes he's more than a friend for a night. It's nothing important." She tilted her head. "Please, let me pass now. You're drunk and I have a feeling you will be glad we didn't finish this conversation in the morning."
"We're not finished." He argued, stepping closer to her. "I'm not that drunk." He was coherent enough. He had been drunker in any case.
"You're drunk enough." she snapped. "If you were sober you would stay as far away from this can of worms as you could."
"What can of worms?" he chuckled bitterly. "You being all friendly with Gamemakers to get a promotion?"
"Stop insulting me." she demanded, folding her arms on her chest. "I don't deserve to be insulted because you're too emotionally constipated to see the real problem here."
"I see the real problem." He pointed a finger at her chest and she slapped it away from her.
"I sleep with Seneca sometimes just like I sleep with you now and then." she hissed. "How is that different?"
"I'm not a Gamemaker." he replied.
"But I am an escort." She made a face. "That makes me the pot and you the kettle calling me black, by the way."
"It's different." he immediately protested. He wasn't prepared for her sneering.
"How?" she challenged, inviting him to expand with her hand.
"It's different because he doesn't get to touch you!" he shouted, advancing on her. She stepped back but soon enough, she was trapped between him and the back of the couch. He placed his hands on each side of her and gripped the leather of the couch tight. "He doesn't get to touch you." he repeated in a low dangerous voice.
He was breathing so hard on her face that some loose strands of hair of her wig rose up and down and up and down… He was fascinated by the pink hair that looked like cotton candy and he watched it float in the air until he wasn't panting anymore and it fell back on her forehead. He brushed it away softly, feeling like he had lost his mind.
"He doesn't get to touch me…" she mused. "But you do, I presume?"
Perhaps he was drunker than he had thought. Perhaps…
"Yeah." he answered, relieved she was finally getting his point. He leaned in to kiss her but she put her hands on his chest and pushed – not hard enough he would step away but just so he didn't close the distance between them.
"Why?" she asked.
"Because he's a Gamemaker." he mumbled stubbornly, he tugged on her wig a little, testing its resistance. Sometimes it came off easy, other times there were pins to take care of first. It didn't look like one of those times. She gripped his wrist before he could so much as think about removing the pink thing on her head.
"Why?" she insisted.
"Well, you will have to ask him that." he replied. "He's your friend, not mine. What do I know why he chose to be a Gamemaker? Maybe there wasn't any job left at the local butcher's shop."
"Why shouldn't I have sex with him if I want to?" she clarified, refusing to let go of his wrist. The hand on his chest was still pushing him away.
He couldn't help his growl or his step forward, really. Her wording had been deliberate and it made him want to chop off Crane's hands and other parts of his body. "He doesn't get to touch you."
"Why, Haymitch?" She was grasping his wrist so tight her nails were digging into his skin. It was painful. Sort of. He'd rather have her nails stabbing his arm than Crane's.
"Because you're mine." he snarled, it was the alcohol talking surely. That time, she didn't stop him when he slip her wig off. She didn't like it when he did that, she'd rather keep wig and make-up at all time even in bed. She didn't get what pleasure he could find in running his fingers through her reddish blond hair, it was a dull color according to her. He liked it though so she let him do as he wanted, he was glad Crane didn't have the same privileges. Although, Crane took probably no interest whatsoever in her hair. "Mine." he sighed against her cheek, his fingers clumsily trying to remove the pins keeping her hair in a tight bun at the back of her head. She stopped him once more. She could see her eyes shining with irritation even in the darkness.
"I'm not yours." she denied and when he opened his mouth, she kicked him softly in the shin. It wasn't mean or a sign he should step back, he thought, she just wanted him to listen. "I'm not Seneca's either. I don't belong to anybody but myself."
She was proud so, so proud. He had never thought he would ever find someone as stubborn as he was and yet, there she was, chin high and sparkling eyes.
"I want you." he said and he blamed the liquor for all those things that were coming out of his mouth unchecked. This wasn't supposed to be about her, he wasn't suppose to care about her. It was supposed to be about betraying him with Gamemakers. Except it wasn't. It was about his blood boiling with jealousy when he saw her in Crane's arms. It was about being truly afraid of doing something he would regret like using that knife he always kept close to hurt one of them. It was about feeling like he'd rather die than being aware another man was touching her and seeing her the way only he was allowed to. He didn't care if it was casual, he didn't care if they were dating, not dating, friends or fuck buddies… He couldn't bear the idea of another man putting his paws on her. "I want you to be mine."
She let go of his wrist but she didn't say anything more. He didn't know if it was good or bad so he focused on removing each pin without hurting her, satisfied only when her hair fell freely on her shoulders. It was crumpled from having been under her wig all day but it was still soft and he brushed it back into place. It was curly, he liked to coil strands of it around his fingers. "You're angry." he said, at last. He felt strangely calmer now. Jealousy had run its course it seemed. "I should be the one being angry, sweetheart. You didn't have to sit hereand try not to hear while he…" He stopped right there. He didn't want to picture what Crane had been doing to make her moan so loud.
"If you had told me you wanted to be exclusive, I wouldn't have gone to Seneca." Her hand trailed down his chest and stopped at his waist, crumpled his shirt and tugged. It was an odd sort of hug but he complied readily enough when her arms sneaked around him.
"I don't want to be exclusive." He made a face. "We're not a couple, sweetheart."
"You're drunk." Her voice was both affectionate and exasperated which was good. It wasn't high pitched or seemingly cheerful for the sake of pretence anymore. "So…" she sighed, propping her chin on his shoulder. She had to go on the tip of her toes to do that without her heels. "If I follow your perfectly flawless reasoning…" He was sure there was sarcasm somewhere in there. "I can't see anybody else but you."
"You can see as many people as you bloody like." he grumbled against her hair. "Just don't sleep with them."
"Alright." Her arm coiled around his shoulder bringing him even closer. "What about you? Can you sleep with other people?"
He could certainly sleep with other women. Did he want to ? That was another question entirely. A question his drunk brain wanted to answer with a 'no' but he knew, even as far gone as he was, that it was a dangerous statement to make.
"I sleep with women. You're a woman." He shrugged. "I don't need another one."
She rolled her eyes. He didn't need to see her face to know that.
"You're such a romantic, Haymitch." she scoffed. "You sure know how to make a girl wanted."
"Would you like it if I told you I thought about thirty-six different ways to kill Crane?" he asked darkly. "Is that romantic enough for you? Because I could, you know. Is that what you want? Some stupid proof I care about you?"
She shuddered but he couldn't tell if it was a bad or a good shiver. He had a dark side, she knew that better than most. She usually was the one trying to cool his temper or witnessing the worst of his nightmares, that was never a pretty sight and neither were his lunatic rumblings about what he would like to do to the people who had hurt him and his family.
"Don't talk like that, Haymitch." she whispered. "He's not your enemy. Seneca is not… He is not as bad as some of them."
He held her tighter. "He took what's mine." And he didn't allow people to steal from him.
"I am not yours, you silly man." she sighed. "I am no one's property, thank you very much."
"You make me crazy." he accused her, his mouth finding the crook of her neck and pressing hot kisses there.
She pushed him back gently. "No." she said. "Not tonight."
It was definitive too. Haymitch's mood darkened again and now that his arms were empty he looked around for the bottle of whiskey. It had slid from his hand and on the couch. It was standing upright fortunately, no liquor spilled. Good. He wouldn't have to suffer a lecture about proper care for leather and there was no alcohol wasted.
"You drank enough for tonight, I think." she tried to ease the bottle from his grasp but he held on.
"You sleep with a man who dyes his beard blue and say no to me, sweetheart." he snorted. "I didn't drink enough."
"You don't sleep with two different men on the same night, Haymitch." She pinched her lips. "That's just not done."
"Says who?" he grumbled, allowing her to take the bottle away.
"Says me." She put the bottle down on the liquor cart and eyed him from head to toe. "Don't come complaining to me tomorrow and you better remember this." She came back to him and pressed her lips against his softly. "I won't sleep with anyone else anymore. You don't sleep with another woman."
His hands found her waist and tugged on her dressing gown belt. She whacked them away with a smile. "But we're not a couple." he insisted.
"No, we're not a couple." She rolled her eyes and, even in his inebriated state, he couldn't help but think she was indulging him. "We're just two people who only sleep with each other, care about each other and dislike it very much when others hit on them."
"As long as we're clear on that." he grumbled.
He didn't get why she was laughing and he was too drunk to care. She was his, Crane would never put his hands on her again and that was what mattered.