Prompt : if you're still taking prompts, could you write a story where Haymitch gets tortured alongside Effie and they recover together, and Haymitch, even though he's hurt really badly, like almost died, is really stubborn about making sure he comes to see her all the time.

Not Quick Enough

1.

"I'm sorry."

Her words are a mere whisper and he holds her tighter, trying and failing to shield her from the cold and the pain and the cruelty of their life right now.

Her prison jumpsuit is torn in places, damp with blood in others. There isn't an inch of her skin that isn't bruised, cut or sore.

He hates that she's the only one who is hurt.

Haymitch is fit as a fiddle except for the deep hunger, the unrelenting thirst and the waves of hatred.

They never raise a hand on him. The worst they did was rough him up a bit but they never hurt him in anyway. They take it all on Effie.

For every I don't know, they punch her.

For every I don't care, they cut.

He said so many I don't know and I don't care in the last few weeks – months? – he lost count. He can't tell them anything, mostly because he doesn't know anything.

At that point, he would have spilled everything to protect Effie.

They saw through his lies about not caring about her ages ago, since the beginning probably. They brought Peeta once and it was almost worse, making the boy watch while they tortured her and Haymitch remained there, unresponsive, helpless, hopeless. He can't stop their fists, their knives, their bats or their whips. He never can.

Even Effie stopped struggling.

It's worse now because she doesn't even scream. She's beyond that. The pain is omnipresent, endless.

And he can't do anything.

He supposes it's already a small mercy that they leave them in the same cell. All he can do is cradle her abused body against his and offer a meager form of comfort.

Everything is his fault.

If he had been quicker…

Katniss took him by surprise with her stunt in the arena, he didn't have enough time to run away. He went back for Effie. He can't quite regret it even now. If he hadn't, he would be free but she would be alone.

"Don't give up on me now." he croaks, his voice hoarse from thirst and emotions he can't truly suppress anymore. "Hang on, sweetheart."

She shifts in his arms and he pretends he doesn't hear the quickening of her breathing as she fights through the pain, or the little whine before she finally settles with her head against his shoulder.

"They will come." he lies. It's the same lie he has been telling her since the very first night. "They will come for us."

And nobody would hurt her ever again. Nobody.

"I hate you." she murmurs but it lacks the strength it used to have when they were fighting over a trivial thing like how much he had drunk the night before.

"I hate you too." he replies. "Don't die on me. You're not allowed to die on me."

It would be better if she did but he wouldn't be able to bear it. He can't lose her. He can't.

She is all he has now.

Even the nightmares desert him nowadays.

Sometimes he thinks it's because he is having the most realistic nightmare and none of this is real.

Sometimes he just knows that's his lot in life : watching the ones he loves being destroyed because of him.

It doesn't matter.

She is everything.

"Hang on." he repeats, like a prayer.

2.

On retrospect, throwing himself at a Peacekeeper wasn't the best idea he ever had.

Some nights he can still hear the gunshot ringing clearly in his ears.

The rescue was a mess from start to finish and the moment Gale Hawthorne appeared in the doorframe of the newly exploded door of his cell, Haymitch started doubting the rebels. It only grew worse when they were adamant Effie wasn't on their list and should be left behind. She was – is – on his list, though, he fought them to bring her along. And then the Peacekeeper showed up, his gun aimed at her head and he lost it.

Later, Katniss told him he almost died.

Still, he drags his sorry ass to Effie's room every day.

He never goes inside. He leans against the wall, just next to the door, and he listens. He knows she will recover because Plutarch told him so. He knows she will be scarred for life, physically and mentally – he has figured that out a long time ago without the rebels' information. He knows she doesn't eat as much as she should, doesn't talk unless she truly has to and outright laughed into the face of the President when she threatened her with various unpleasant outcomes if she didn't cooperate with them and tell them everything she knows.

He doesn't think anything Coin can muster would frighten Effie now.

It's days after their rescue when Plutarch pushes a wheelchair into his room.

"You're not supposed to be up." Haymitch says at once.

If she hears him at all she doesn't let on. She thanks Plutarch politely and the Gamemaker doesn't linger, he flees the room as fast as he can.

"Plutarch says you can't leave your bed yet." Effie declares, not looking at him in the eye. "Now, I will pretend to believe it and that I haven't seen you lurking in front of my door if you tell me why you are avoiding me."

"Didn't think you would want to see me, sweetheart, that's all." he scowls, turning his head away from her. He wishes there was a window in there, something on which to focus other than her piercing blue eyes.

The creaking of wheels startles him and he looks in time to see her standing up on shaky legs. The five steps that separate her from the bed seem to take out all her energy and she collapses without any of her former elegance or poise.

"Make some space for me, would you?" she asks, out of breath.

He scoots to the edge of the bed, leaving plenty of space for her to lie next to him. For a second, their surroundings blur and he is back in that cell.

"I'm sorry."

In all that time, he has never said it.

She was always the one to whisper it in the darkness.

But he is.

He is.

"It wasn't your fault." she replies, carefully resting her head on his shoulder. It strains the wound but he keeps silent. He will take the discomfort and the slight tinge of pain if that means she would stay there.

"Yes, it is." he argues.

She doesn't protest further, probably because it was in a way, but she nuzzles her nose against the side of his neck.

"Don't give up on me now, Haymitch." she begs. "Hang on."

How many times has he said those exact words to her in that cell? How many times?

He understands why pulling away would hurt her.

She is everything.

Maybe he is her everything too.

"I hate you." he murmurs tentatively, pressing his cheek against her forehead.

"I hate you too." she breathes out.

It's enough, he thinks.

More than enough, even.