Prompt : Pleeeeaaaseeee, write a continuation to "The Road To Hell" I loved it! You're amazing.

The Road To Hell was chapter 83 and dealt with Effie finding out about Haymitch saying yes to a new bunch of Games at the end of MJ. I already explained my interpretation of that scene so I'm standing by it :p Here goes an attempt at reconciliation.

Purgatory

Effie neatly folded the newspaper in four and placed it on the top of the coffee table for safekeeping. She was toying with the idea of having it framed. It was finally over, the 76th Hunger Games were officially cancelled and the idea of new Games had been drowned at the bottom of a well. It hadn't been easy, it had taken months but Effie was proud of herself.

Of course, she hadn't worked alone. Peeta had come back to the Capitol with her as soon as the news had broken out and they had started campaigning against the Games right away. Annie and Beetee had joined them only two days later. Katniss and Haymitch had been longer in publicly rejecting the idea but they had dragged Johanna Mason with them which had given more weight to their claim. Paylor herself had publicly dismissed the need for new Hunger Games which had led her government into a thunderstorm.

The President wasn't all powerful anymore, there was a congress to take into account : each District and the Capitol had their own number of elected representatives. It had been a nightmare for them all to be back under the spotlights but Effie had gladly made the sacrifice of her own privacy for the cause. She had hosted Peeta, Annie and little Finnick in her Capitol apartment, Beetee had refused to impose. As for Katniss and Haymitch, she hadn't offered.

"I think I have everything." Peeta said, rolling his suitcase into the living-room. Her eyes trailed over the case and the two bags at his feet with crushing sadness.

"I will ship anything you might have forgotten behind. Or you can always come back and visit. You're home, here." She tried to sound light and cheerful but the prospect of Peeta's departure was truly devastating. It had been hard enough when Annie and little Finn had packed their bags and gone back to Four, but Peeta… "Are you sure you want to go back to Twelve, dear?"

"I can't wait to get out of this city, to be honest, Effie." Peeta winced. "The episodes are worse here. The memories…" His voice trailed off but she didn't need him to finish the thought.

"Yes, I understand." she sighed. "I am being selfish, don't listen to me." She didn't want to stay alone in the Capitol. The city wasn't the same and what was left of the old Capitol only brought bad memories to mind.

"Are you sure you don't want to come back with me?" Peeta asked tentatively. "Katniss and Haymitch are taking the same hovercraft I am… Maybe you could talk to him on the way to Twelve. He's… not doing so great, you know."

She did but that didn't change anything.

Peeta and Katniss had made peace at some point and Effie had managed more than one civil conversation with the girl herself but Haymitch… The feeling of betrayal was too sharp.

"Are you meeting them at the hovercraft landing field?" She sensed a change of topic was compulsory.

Peeta winced, a guilty expression flashing on his face. "Please, don't hate me too much."

"Hate you?" she frowned. "I don't understand, dear…"

As if on cue, the doorbell rang and something heavy settled on her stomach. "Please, tell me you didn't…"

"I kind of did…" Peeta interrupted her, the guilt obvious now. "Look, he's unhappy, you're unhappy… He just wants to talk to you."

She was so focused on keeping her breathing under control she almost didn't notice when Peeta went to answer the door. She found herself in the corridor behind him, unclear as to how she got there. She hugged the boy goodbye and then, when she had no other choice, she looked up at the man standing awkwardly in front of the now closed door of her apartment.

"You look awful." she told him for lack of a better thing to say.

Haymitch didn't look healthy : his cheeks were hollow, his skin had a yellowish tinge and he had more silver in his hair than the last time she had seen him in person. His clothes were in total disarray but that was to be expected, she supposed.

"I stopped drinking." he replied, swallowing hard. His eyes kept running up and down her body, cataloging and analyzing. That made her ill-at-ease, she knew what he was seeing.

"Good for you." she offered. "I do apologize but I have a lot to do and I don't want to keep you, you have a hovercraft to catch."

She turned on her heels and walked straight into the kitchen because it was the first door she saw. Escaping seemed to be the only logical way to deal with this.

"Effie…" he hesitated on the kitchen threshold but stepped in anyway. "I want you to come back with us."

"And it always comes back to what you want in the end, doesn't it?" she scowled angrily. There was a mountain of dishes to clean, she started to scrub, happy for the distraction. For once, she even forgot to regret the time where she had servants to do it for her.

"Don't be like that." he snapped. "I've apologized. I've explained. You forgave Katniss, why not me? I stopped drinking. I made sure someone would take care of your bloody garden while you were here. I… I sent flowers. Peeta said you got them. I'm trying. What else do you want?"

"You will pardon me if a dozen flowers doesn't exactly excuse you saying yes to another bunch of Hunger Games." she replied, scrubbing harder an already spotless plate. "And keeping such a thing from me on top of it."

"Sweetheart…" he sighed.

"Don't call me sweetheart." she hissed. "You lost that right. My nephews could have been killed because of you."

"I told you…" he replied but she was having none of it.

Did the plate escape her fingers or did she throw it purposefully? She wasn't sure. But the sound of shattering china as it hit the floor was deafening.

"It doesn't matter." she spat, grabbing another plate. That one ended up on the floor too. As did the next one. He looked at her with bulging eyes. Perhaps she was crazy, she thought, perhaps she had finally snapped… Because it was deeply relieving to smash all of her plates on the ground like that. "I. Can't. Trust. You. Now." Each word was punctuated by the smashing of a plate and when there was nothing left to destroy, she opened her cupboard and grabbed a glass.

He clasped his hands over it before she could drop it. It was odd to feel his skin against hers after all that time. Weird and still good in a bad way – she didn't want to enjoy the touch, she didn't want to feel that familiar spark. And yet she yearned to lean against his chest, melt in his arms and finally cry her heart out. She could feel the burning tears in her eyes already.

"Please, go away." she whispered.

"I can't go away and you can't stay in the Capitol, it's killing you." he retorted harshly. "If you really don't want me, I will keep my distance but come back to Twelve. You were doing better there."

"Who says I'm not doing better here?" She tried to sound sure of herself and strong but her voice broke.

"You're not sleeping, you have bags under your eyes and even your clownish make-up can't hide them. I'm pretty sure you haven't been sleeping since you've come back here." he snorted, like it was obvious. "Your hands are shaking all the times, even when you're interviewed which isn't like you. How many flashbacks a day, sweetheart?" He removed the glass from her hands and placed it on the counter. "You can't stay here on your own."

"I am staying." It was a challenge.

A flicker of annoyance flashed in his eyes. "Then I'm staying too."

"I don't want you." she growled. She placed her hands on his chest and pushed him away. Or tried to anyway. He didn't move.

"You drew my name at the Quell Reaping." he said out of the blue and that made her freeze. "I forgave you. Why can't you forgive me this?"

"First, it wasn't the same." She gritted her teeth, feeling sick to her stomach. "Second, I can't believe you would try to blackmail forgiveness out of me."

He rolled his eyes. "I'm not blackmailing, I'm stating a fact." He lifted his arms and dropped them in uncharacteristic helplessness. "Tell me what to do then. You used to love doing that."

His eyes were pleading and she turned her head away. "I don't think there is anything you can do. This is too… This is too big, Haymitch."

The hand he placed on her shoulder was tentative but she didn't find the strength to shrug it away. Despite everything, she still craved his touch. She was a coward.

"Bigger than you being an escort and me being a victor?" he mocked gently. "Bigger than you being abitch every day and my drinking? There were enough reasons to stop throughout the years and we never did. Never."

She shook her head. "The odds of coming back from something like that…"

"Fuck the odds." he growled. "I'm here, I'm sober and I'm apologizing. What are the odds of that?"

"Not high." she granted.

His shaking fingers brushed her chin. It was a ghost of a touch really. "I can live without you, sweetheart, but it's… it's boring and… dull."

"Is that your way of saying you miss me?" she asked uncertainly.

His face softened slightly. "Yeah. Come home. Please."

She took a deep breath and let it out just as slowly. Her heart was racing in her chest. "If I do come home, it doesn't mean we will pick up where we left off." she warned him. "I… I need time. I need to learn how to trust you again."

He nodded quickly. "Okay."

She searched his eyes one last time and then it was her turn to nod. "Okay."