Prompt : oh dear god please do the "soulmate au where you can't lie to your soulmate' for hayffie! It would be hilarious (or possibly horribly painful… depending on when its set ahahah)
So today is the day I reach chapter 400. I'm not sure how long exactly I will be able to keep up with this without people getting bored but as long as we're all having fun… Hey! Let's try to reach 500. That would be a record probably.
I just hope everyone is still enjoying the stories. There is something called quitting while you are ahead or more likely stopping before something becomes crap… I just hope I am not on the "becoming crap" slope. I wrote so many… Am I repeating myself? Is this getting boring? I love hayffie so much it's unhealthy but I would hate to write them badly or to bore you to tears.
Anyway, today is chapter 400 so you get a prompt that isn't the oldest in line but that particularly inspired me and that I enjoyed writing very much.
A Claim & A Promise
Everyone has a soulmate.
That's a given.
However, Panem is a huge country, a huge compartmented country. The odds of finding one's soulmate are never in one's favor and they aren't made any easier by the Hunger Games that kill a bunch of kids every year.
In Twelve, people don't let the soulmate business affect them. If you find them, good for you, if you don't, you can survive just fine.
Haymitch Abernathy hates to the very concept of soulmates. His father and his mother are soulmates. It doesn't help his father to remain faithful to her and even at eight years old he can see it: being soulmates doesn't equal to a fairy tale; if anything, it's a curse.
You can't lie to your soulmate.
Nobody knows why or how. It's just a fact. Sometimes you meet someone and you feel it, the click, and you are never able to tell that person anything but the plain truth. How his mother finds the strength to forgive so many times his good for nothing alcoholic cheater of a father, he doesn't know. Perhaps it's the truth thing, perhaps she forgives because the sins are confessed.
Haymitch is ten when he leaves. His brother is five.
They never see him again.
Some mistakes, even soulmates can't forgive.
When he's fifteen, he falls in love with a girl he has no problem lying to. He likes it better that way, not because he likes lying to her but because it's easier to brag, to impress, to charm. She isn't fooled but he suspects she likes it better that way too. Total honesty at all times isn't romantic, it's taxing, suffocating. Free to lie to each other if they want to, they stumble into love like only two teenagers can fall for each other.
Life is difficult, hard and impossible at times, but for the most part Haymitch is happy.
Until the Reaping of the Second Quarter Quell.
The Games and the years that follow all blur together at some point, rendered fuzzy by the heavy fumes of Ripper's liquor. People are happy to leave him alone for the most part and he is alright with living by himself. Self-isolation suits him. Sometimes, Graesy Sae makes an attempt at coaxing him out of the grave his house has become, with the years those attempts diminish until one day she simply stops trying.
Twelve is the same as it ever was with coal dust dancing in the air, the sharp bite of the winter wind and its exhausted inhabitants exchanging tired nods in the street. Haymitch watches it all from behind his window, nursing a drink, longing for something that would make him feel alive again, longing not to feel anything at all anymore.
The Capitol has its distractions. Chaff knows all the good places, the best bars and clubs, what to do and how to act… Eleven's victor teaches him everything he doesn't already know, the right moves and the wrong ones alike. Sometimes Haymitch even manages to forget they're victors for a short while. Sometimes Chaff drags him in some mischief, to their respective escorts' horror, and they laugh until tears roll down their cheeks. They're young, they're passably attractive and they're invincible. Sometimes, if they try hard enough, they almost manage to believe it.
The first time Chaff drags him to a group of giggling Capitol girls, telling him to take his pick, Haymitch digs his heels in the ground, terrified he will feel the click. It never happens though. Not in Twelve and not in the Capitol. After two years, he forgets to be scared. He follows Chaff, buys one of the girls a drink and takes her home. He doesn't even need to lie to impress the girl, she's already head over heels for him. She takes her dress off before he can even ask her name.
He doesn't enjoy it as much as he feels he should. Sex is just sex. A release of the body, a mean to an end. Once the novelty wears off, he sticks to the occasional one night stand but otherwise makes do with his hand. Capitol girls are too loud, too clingy and too stupid. As for the ones in Twelve, he doesn't dare go near any of them. He doesn't want anyone else getting killed because of him.
A vast majority of people live their whole life without meeting their soulmate. Haymitch is lulled into a false sense of security.
When he drags his sorry ass to the Justice Building on the morning of the Sixty-Second Hunger Games Reaping, he's trying to decide if he can get away with sneaking back some stronger liquors into the District. He's not worrying about the new escort he's supposed to greet – escorts never last long with Twelve and Eleven anyway, he and Chaff have a bet – and he's not impatient to meet her either.
He hears her, first thing. It's hard not to. Sounds echo in the Justice Building corridors and he follows the high-pitched giggles to the Mayor's office, already cringing. He hates women with high-pitched voices. She's in the middle of whatever chit-chat she feels important to impart on Undersee when he steps in without bothering to knock. The Mayor looks relieved to see him for once, the woman looks miffed at the interruption but any annoyance is quickly replaced by a bright – and he thinks genuine – smile.
"Haymitch Abernathy!" she exclaims and then abruptly stops for whatever reason, her smile falters and her eyes grow impossibly wide.
Her eyes, he notices despite himself, are a bright sky blue that even the heavy golden eyeliner can't tarnish. He's irritated to think they're pretty. As far as pretty goes, it's the only thing she has for her. The face is caked with make-up, the purple wig is too voluminous, the dress is equally puffy and colorful. He can guess at a nice figure underneath but it's hard to say with that year's fashion. She's attractive probably. Escorts are always attractive.
"That's my name, sweetheart." he snorts, wanting to make everything difficult for her from the start, needing to establish they would be playing by his rules. "You…"
And then he stops.
Because now that he's talking to her, now that's the words tumble out of his mouth, he feels it. To Haymitch, finding his soulmate equals with cold sweat suddenly running down his back and an urge to throw up.
She recovers first, glancing at Undersee and forcing back a bright smile on her lips. He briefly wonders why she is so skilled at smiling on command already but sweeps the question aside immediately. She's Capitol. Capitols always lie.
Although it appears this one would never be able to lie to him.
And as if to illustrate the point, she outstretches a white gloved hand and beams. "I am pleased to…" He watches, fascinated, as she chokes on the words she doesn't mean. She closes and opens her mouth a few times and then settles for : "I was looking forward to working with you."
Fast learner, he thinks despite himself, noticing the tense choice. She had been looking forward to work with him before she had found out and now she isn't so keen on working with him anymore. She isn't so pleased to meet him either.
"I'm not." he says, ignoring the hand that hovers between them like a fragile peace offering. "That dress is very ugly. You're very ugly."
He rejoices in her recoil, in the hurt and pain written plainly on her face if only so briefly.
"Haymitch!" Undersee barks frightfully. "Excuse him, please, Miss Trinket. He's drunk, surely…"
"No matter." she snaps, directing her venom straight at him. "You have no manners, you are rude and unkempt and I am extremely disappointed with you."
"Am I supposed to care?" he sneers.
She refuses to talk to him after that.
He only learns her name when Undersee introduces her during the Reaping ceremony : Effie Trinket. It suits her. She's shiny, fake and replaceable.
They don't talk about the elephant in the room.
In fact, they don't talk at all until they really can't avoid it.
It turns out the not lying isn't exactly a problem because they spend their time together fighting. She screams, calls him lazy and berates him about his behavior. He mocks her, snarls back and when he truly can't take it anymore throws a glass at the wall.
He aims far away from her but the impact of glass on concrete has the same effect as if he hurled it directly at her head.
"Monster." she whispers in utter fright.
She doesn't consult him again after that. She takes over the mentoring and the coaching, and he watches. The kids are not victors material, he knows it and they know it. Sometimes he thinks the only one who doesn't know is her. He watches as she gives advice on advice that are just as stupid as unnecessary. On the fourth day of training, he corrects her during dinner. She glares at first until she realizes he is actually contributing.
She's dedicated, he will grant her that. Stubborn too. Feisty.
It takes only a week for Chaff to start joking about him being smitten.
Haymitch isn't smitten. Any idea he could have conceived of confiding in his best friend flies out the window.
The kids die.
She's shocked.
He laughs.
"You're a hypocrite." he accuses. "You always knew it would end up like this."
"No, I didn't." she retorts and because she can't lie to him, he believes her.
"Then you're stupid." he shrugs.
That's the last conversation they have before he goes back to Twelve. He's sure she won't come back the next year so he does his best to put her out of his mind, to pretend the whole thing was a bad dream. A Capitol, an escort as his soulmate, that's irony at its finest.
She comes back the next year.
She greets him with a smile and a truce offer.
He tells her he will drive her to quit by the end of the season.
It becomes a game. A very twisted, very puzzling game.
He does his best to annoy her but she answers in kind. For every gibe, she has a retort ready. For every provocation, she wields punishment – she goes as far as pouring down the drain all the liquor in the penthouse when he makes a show of belching during a live interview with Caesar. They fight a lot, they toss words at each other that hurt twice as much because they actually mean them – no possible doubts about that – and they push each other's buttons, seek out each other's weaknesses to better exploit them.
It's war, it's relentless, and it's ugly.
Haymitch hasn't felt this alive in years.
The war lasts until the Sixty-Fifth Hunger Games' crowning. Haymitch watches that fourteen years old be crowned victor and he is disgusted by what will soon, too soon, happen to him. He gets drunk, Trinket gets annoyed and before he knows what's happening they're fighting again, screaming at each other in the penthouse living-room.
It's their biggest fight.
She slaps him. Twice.
She would have gone for a third if he hadn't caught her wrist. The urge to slap her back is huge but he swallows it back because he doesn't hit women as a rule and giving in to that part of himself – a part that belongs in an arena and wants to hurt, kill and maim – would be the worst thing he could do. He can't hit her but he can hurt her so he keeps a death-like grip on that wrist and he tells her the truth about her precious little Capitol.
He doesn't stop.
Not when she starts crying.
Not even when she begs him to shut up.
He tells her everything and then some, imparts a little District wisdom on her and is only satisfied once he is done and everything is out. Then, and then only, does he realize just how upset she is and he feels a little sorry.
She tries to call him a liar but she chokes on the words. She can't accuse him of that for the same reason she knows he's telling the truth, his truth. She escapes his hand, flees to her room and locks herself in.
He pretends he doesn't hear her sobs even though he sits in front of her door most of the night. She will never know he was here but he wants to make sure she doesn't do anything stupid. He's afraid he pushed her too far.
He's underestimating her though.
The next morning, Effie Trinket walks out of her room, as cheerful, bubbly and uncaring as ever. He loathes her for it until he glimpses the cracks in her carefully painted face.
Without discussing it, they call an end to the war.
They still fight but they learn how to work around each other. In time, they ever start working with each other.
As far as escorts go, she's the best. He complains, grumbles and drags his feet but secretly he's grateful for her. She's efficient, good with the kids and she's a PR master. Brutus has his eyes on her and he has no doubt she would have been promoted to a better District in no time at all if the Head Gamemaker didn't decide she's the only one who can make him behave. A word from him would probably have been enough to help her get the promotion but she doesn't ask and he doesn't offer. He tells himself he wants to keep her for practical reasons : she gets the job done even if they never win.
After Haymitch's outburst, they stop using truth as a weapon. She truly is a master when it comes down to her image and so she has no problem curbing her sentences around him, curbing everything in a way that isn't as direct. He is blunt because he refuses to make excuses but he likes to think he would have been just as blunt if the situation was different. He tries not to be cruel anymore.
He suspects she's fragile under her fashion armor.
Late one night, during the Sixty-Seventh Hunger Games, in the middle of a fruitless brainstorming session about possible angles for the kids' interviews, he tugs on the strap of her dress. She lets him.
It's different than anything he has ever known.
Suddenly, sex isn't just sex anymore and it scares him.
He doesn't want it to mean anything but when he's buried deep inside her, he feels complete – and given the way she desperately clings to his shoulders, searching his eyes for something, she feels the same way. The feeling that they're reaching to something akin to perfection, that they're touching something greater than them, something that might be fate itself, is terrifying.
He leaves as soon as he's spent, barely pausing long enough to pick up his clothes. He wants to tell her it's nothing, that he just wanted a fuck, but he doesn't dare even try. He's too afraid he will choke on the words. He's too afraid of what it would mean.
They develop a routine.
Arguments end in sex.
Fights end in sex.
Random conversations end in sex.
Elevator trips end in sex.
Everything ends in sex.
He can't get enough of her. He wants her, craves her… Something in her calls to him. He decides it's the bond malfunctioning.
They never talk about it.
Sometimes, he thinks she's waiting for him to say something but she never asks anything and so he is happy to ignore the problem.
Until the Sixty-Eighth Hunger Games and the Vikram problem.
His first clue that something is amiss is that she doesn't let him kiss her after the Reaping. Kisses, wandering hands and attempts at pinning her against a flat surface seem to be off the table. When he asks what her problem is, the only answer he gets is silence. That's his second clue.
The third comes in the shape of a tall lanky man with a crimson wig and a ridiculous golden eye tattooed in the middle of the forehead. That guy makes a beeline for her at the Opening Ceremony, grabs her from Haymitch's side and kisses her in plain sight, apparently not in the slightest bothered by the numerous flashes and cameras directed at them.
Fourth clue : she tolerates it.
Fifth clue : the shiny heavy rock on her finger.
He storms out as soon as the tributes reach the Training Center. He has almost reached the bottom of his first bottle when Chaff finds him in the shadiest bar they know. To his credit, his friend doesn't mock. Instead, he claps him on the back, buys him another bottle and they drink in blissful silence.
The situation festers for two days. They only talk about work related things. He's angry with her and she's walking on eggshells around him.
It doesn't help that he hates her fiancé.
The guy is using her. It is plain to see. He wants the celebrity, he wants the glory of marrying an escort…
"Do you love him?" he asks once.
"Does it matter?" she replies.
She has become too good at deflecting.
There's a party and he watches the man put his dirty paws all over her body like he owns her. She lets him. That's the worst thing. She lets him. That guy kisses her neck and makes a show of holding her hand and whispering in her ear and Haymitch has never wanted to kill anyone this bad.
He drinks.
He drinks until he can't stand the sight anymore and he does what he should have done from the start : he pushes her in the first empty room that turns out to be a library, he pins her to the door and silences her protests with his mouth. She places her hands on his chest but she doesn't seem to be able to decide if she wants to shove him away or not.
His hand sneaks under her dress, finds its way between her legs and she squirms.
"Haymitch." she begs and he doesn't know what it means.
"You want me to stop?" he asks, biting at the delicate skin under her jaw. She doesn't say anything, her fingers clench, creasing his shirt, but she doesn't say anything and he is done with that game. "Answer me."
It's a growl, almost an order.
"No." she breathes out and he's very sure it's because she can't lie and say yes.
He pushes her panties aside and touches her the way she likes best, feeling something akin to primitive contentment when her head falls back and her lips part in a breathless gasp.
"Does he make you feel like this?" he hisses.
"No." she admits, a little against her will he thinks.
"Do you love him?" he insists.
"No." she answers and this time it's more assured, firmer. Her blue eyes bear into his. A challenge. "Why do you care?"
He switches angle and she bits her bottom lip but it's not enough to distract her, not enough to deter her from seeking his truth. He had put an end to the silent status quo, he has forced truths out of her and now he must answer in kind.
I don't, he wants to claim but that's a lie and the bond won't allow that.
"'Cause you're mine." he snaps instead, curling his fingers.
She comes with a slow moan she does her best to swallow back.
She recovers faster than he would have liked.
"I'm not…" she starts and then makes a face when the words won't come out. "I don't belong to anyone."
There are half-truths but there are half-lies.
"You're mine." he repeats more firmly. "You're my soulmate. He can go and find his. I swear, Effie, you let him touch you again and he won't have hands by the end of the night."
He's serious, that's the worst thing. He will hurt that man, maim him, possibly kill him. He can't really explain what he feels. She often calls him a caveman and he fears this time she might be right. The possessive urges come from deep within, his very soul laying claim to its counterpart maybe.
"Mine." he growls, sinking his teeth in the flesh of her shoulder, biting hard enough to leave a mark. She gasps either in shock or in pain and he immediately licks the abused patch of skin, sorry for having hurt her.
"Yours." she whispers at last.
They're kissing again.
He thinks they might be going mad because he feels like a man's possessed. He bundles the dress around her waist while she fumbles with his fly and he takes her right there, in a room that probably has more than one entrance and that neither of them bothered to check is empty.
"Say it." he requests as he thrusts into her with something that feels like despair.
"I'm yours." she declares without hesitation. "I'm yours, yours, yours." Her voice breaks with gasps and whines. "And you're mine."
That's a purr, directly in his ear, and it's also his undoing. He comes with a groan and buries his face in her neck. She doesn't climax but she doesn't seem to mind. She carefully places her feet down on the floor and fixes their clothes, her dress first and, when he fails to move, his pants.
"It's the first time you acknowledge it." she observes, too tentative.
"Acknowledge what?" he asks. He wants to step back, to put some distance between them, hoping it would help clear his mind but he can't let go of her, can't bear the thought of being parted from her.
He wonders if that's why his mother always forgave his father, because of that pull he feels, because of the knowledge that being away from your soulmate would have been painful. The thought of anyone else touching what belongs to him is equally painful though. She is his. He is hers. They're one. It's confused and very clear at the same time. He doesn't know how the soulmate bond works, nobody really knows, but he is sure of one thing: soulmates once found aren't meant to be lost.
"That I am your soulmate?" she hesitates. "It's the first time we say it aloud."
"Last one too." he grumbles. "It's not safe." He shudders at the thought of what Snow would do with that knowledge. "Break that engagement up. And for fuck's sake don't let him touch you again in my line of sight."
"Why?" she asks.
Always questions, so many questions…
"Why don't I go making out with another woman and you can tell me what it feels like?" he snarls.
She narrows her eyes at him and there's a dangerous glint dancing in there. Her claws-like nails burry deep into the flesh of his shoulder.
"Mine." she growls and it's equally as raw and primitive as what he feels. It turns him on in ways he couldn't have expressed.
"Yours." he confirms without really meaning to. The word falls out of his mouth, so short but so deadly. He shakes his head because it's too much, entirely too much, and it's also beyond his control. "It shouldn't have happened to us."
"Fate does have a peculiar sense of humor." she comments.
"Fate's a bitch." he retorts. "I'm going back to the penthouse."
It's torture, tearing himself of her. He feels like the first time they had sex, like he's found some missing piece and now can't bear to be away from her. When he leaves her in that room, he feels cold and alone. Empty.
She comes back to the penthouse two hours later, missing the diamond on her finger. She sheds her clothes and climbs into bed with him. The synthetic hair of her wig itches against the skin of his shoulder and he hates the smell of hairspray. He gathers her closer and finally relaxes, a dread he hasn't known he was feeling slowly slipping away.
Being parted from her for more than ten months a year nearly kills him. It's a daily mental and physical strain, it makes him sick to the stomach and liquor barely manages to dull the edge.
It's like acknowledging the bond has only made it stronger and now it's impossible to ignore.
For the first few months, Haymitch feels as if he's dying again. He compares it with holding his guts inside his body with his own bare hands and honestly wonders what's worse.
Humans are adaptive creatures though and eventually they learn how to live with the hole in their lives, they learn how to compose with the absence. They cope. He copes better with that than with the demons in his head anyway.
He never feels as good as when they're pressed tight against each other, skin on skin. Then his head clears and he feels like he can breathe.
"I hate this soulmate thing." he spits out one night.
She shudders. It's a full body shudder, not pleasant, and she curls up a little on herself, the words like a punch to the stomach. His body follows hers instinctively, curling up with her, around her.
"Do you hate me?" she asks and it's a frightened whisper.
It exists, he figures. People who hate their soulmate. It's a bond not a guarantee of love.
He doesn't answer her.
He wants to say yes, I hate you, you disgust me, you're Capitol, you're an escort and I hate to the very idea of you. He knows the words wouldn't come out not because it's a lie but because truth is simple and his feelings are not.
She mistakes his silence for an answer.
He pretends he doesn't understand her sniffing means she's crying.
He never asks her if she hates him. He already knows she doesn't and he's not ready to open that can of worms.
During the Seventieth Hunger Games, he watches Finnick send his brand new found soulmate to the arena.
He can't imagine what the boy feels. The thought of kissing Effie goodbye and sending her to a certain death is too terrible to be contemplated. He doesn't know what he feels for her, what is due to the bond and what his due to his own feelings. He only knows he can't lose her. Can't, can't, won't.
"Why did you become an escort?" he asks Effie late one night.
"I don't…" she starts answering only to choke on the lie. She wants to say she doesn't know, give a generic answer, but he suspects she does know and thus the bond won't let her off so easily. He waits. If she doesn't want him to know she simply won't answer. That's how they work around the no-lie things. Eventually, she shrugs and confesses in a voice that is entirely too fragile. "I wanted to be loved."
He laughs.
It's cruel perhaps but that makes the whole thing even more ironic. The victor who finds himself with an escort as a soulmate and the woman who wanted to be loved and finds herself shackled to a man whose heart is too broken to function properly.
He hopes the adoring crowds of fans are enough for her, because it's probably the only sort of love she will ever get.
She gives him the cold shoulder for a while after that. Up until Annie Cresta wins the Hunger Games and Finnick stumbles in their living-room in the middle of the night, drunk as a skunk, confessing to rigging the Games and begging for forgiveness because his hands are covered in blood, his soulmate is now broken beyond repairs and he has no clue what to do or how to fix anything.
Effie is only too used at dealing with drunk people. She rubs the boy's back while he throws up, helps him clean up, guides him to a tribute's room and tucks him in.
"Should have been someone like you." Finnick slurs, clumsily reaching for her cheek. "Someone strong, someone they can't hurt. You've got one, Effie?"
"Yes." she answers, brushing golden hair from his forehead.
"You love him?" he presses.
She hesitates, in part, maybe, because Haymitch is leaning against the doorframe, listening.
"Is it important?" she deflects.
It's an answer in itself and Haymitch's heart starts pounding in his chest with something akin to panic.
"I don't know if I love her…" Finnick answers. "I don't know her… I just know… I know we belong together… I know… How do I tell her the truth about everything, Effie? How do I… Truth is ugly."
"Don't tell me, darling." she laughs, it's bitter and all kinds of wrong. "Truth hurts but there comes a point where you have to stop living a lie."
He doesn't know if she's talking about the soulmate bonds, herself or the Capitol. He's too scared to ask.
Later, he pushes her on the bed, covers her body with his and tries to show her what he can't say. He's not sure he succeeds.
"Some people run away from their soulmates." she muses. It doesn't happen often but it does happen. "Why didn't you?"
They had too many uncomfortable conversations while naked in bed. It's natural, he guesses, pillow talk. He told her things he hasn't told anyone else and she confessed to some things he supposes only he has been privy to. It still feels odd. Out of place.
"You're Capitol." he snorts. "There's no running from the Capitol."
There's loathing in his voice.
But it's just a half-truth, it doesn't answer her question.
"I tried to leave. I tried to find a life elsewhere. You didn't let me." she remarks.
He's silent for long enough that she thinks he's avoiding answering. It's some time before his hand curls over her hipbone possessively. "I can't."
She rolls on her side, places a hand on his chest, right over his heart, and he waits for the next question, the one he knows he will have to answer even though he truly doesn't want to.
She doesn't ask why though or if he still hates her. She studies him instead, her blue eyes retracing every line on his face, every scar on his body. He wishes he could do the same but she still wears her make-up and wigs to bed and she flinches every time he tries to take it away from her.
It's her last line of defense and she's not ready to give it up.
"Would you pick me to be your soulmate?" she asks. "If you could choose between everyone you know, would you choose me?"
He wants to answer no but knows the word that will pass his lips is yes so he falls back on their favorite game of deflection. "Would you?"
"I'm not answering if you're not." she protests.
"Then we'll have to live in doubt, right?" he snorts. "It's not like we have a choice anyway."
During the Seventy-third Hunger Games, she and Johanna have a drinking contest. He tries to stop her but she's already tipsy and she insists on doing it, she even insists on a bet. She wins, he reduces his drinking. He wins, he gets to take that wig of her.
It comes to exactly no one's surprise when Jo drinks her under the table.
Because he's a nice guy, he helps her into bed.
Because he's not so much a nice guy, he refuses to let her forget about their bet once she wakes up sober.
He almost relents when she's lying on the bed, naked and pressing her hands against her bare face, trembling as he takes pin after pin from the wig. He even tells her he will stop if she wants him to but she takes her hands away and snarls. "You want to see so badly, take a good look so you can tell me just how ugly I am and we can go back to normal."
It occurs to him he has never bothered correcting his initial declaration that she was ugly and that maybe all this time she has been thinking he is disappointed by the package fate gave him.
Her face is different without the make-up. Her lips aren't as full, there are tiny lines at the corners of her eyes and bags under them. She looks older. More real. He takes the wig off and tosses it on the nightstand before removing the nylon net. Eventually, her hair tumbles on her shoulders in glorious untamed golden curls and she buries her face in her hands again out of shame. He doesn't get what she's ashamed of. He runs his fingers through her hair and finds a brand new object of fascination right then and there. It's soft, glossy and when he tugs on the curls they bounce back in place.
"You're beautiful." he says, almost in awe that she managed to hide this from him all this time. "You're fucking beautiful."
It doesn't make much of a difference to him at this point. Looking like a clown or not, she ruined him for other women. It's a nice plus, though, something unexpected.
Her hands drop in her lap with something akin to shock. She stares at him, her lips slightly parted, and doesn't say anything.
"What?" he scoffs, ill-at-ease. "Please, like no one told you before."
"Never when I look like this…" she whispers. "I'm hideous."
"Gorgeous." he corrects automatically. "Much better than with all that crap." And then he frowns because if she has managed to tell him she's hideous… "You really believe that? You really think you're not beautiful? 'Cause you are, sweetheart. You fucking are."
"Mother said…" she argues and he starts piecing things together. The odd comment about her family, her desperate quest for love and approbation from a million of anonymous faces…
"Your mother is stupid then." he cuts her off, not interested in whatever words of wisdom the Capitol chose to impart on her daughter. "Probably a bitch too. I'm telling you. You're beautiful. You've got to trust my word since I can't lie."
She pushes him on his back and straddles his hips and he thinks it might be the best sex they ever had.
He's not sure he's entirely alright with the way she looks at him afterwards. It's like she gave up on putting barriers. There was a line in the sand and they crossed it.
Somehow, he always knew that when she would love, she would love fully and with everything she has. It scares him. He will hurt her. He's not sure he's not too broken to reciprocate and he's very sure it would be beyond dangerous to do so. You love him, you die, that's how it works. It almost killed him the first time and it would only be worse now because she's more, she's part of him in a way nobody else will ever be. He hates this soulmate thing.
When Katniss Everdeen volunteers, Haymitch feels the shift.
The kids win and they embark on a journey that leaves Haymitch terrified even though he has no choice but to soldier on, for the children's sakes as much as for hers. The rebellion, Victory Tour… He feels as if he can't breathe.
Effie picks up on it, of course she does. And she asks. And he doesn't answer. And that's how she knows whatever is happening is huge and dangerous and she begs him not to do anything stupid but what else can he do?
"Everything I do, I do for the kids." he whispers in her neck one night.
She never talks about it again.
They play pretend for most of the Quell.
He doesn't know if it's a good or a bad thing that Katniss and Peeta have no problems lying to each other. Katniss doesn't care, doesn't even think twice about it. Peeta cares too much.
"This soulmates thing doesn't mean anything." he tells the boy one morning, when they're alone in the penthouse living-room. "It's random."
"It's fate." Peeta retorts bitterly.
"Random." he insists with a shrug. "Better to choose who you spend the rest of your life with than getting shackled to someone you wouldn't have looked at twice. You're not missing out, boy."
"How would you know?" the kid shoots back.
"Educated guess." he deadpans.
As luck would have it, he only notices the puffy pink edge of a dress in the corridor too late. She's gone before he can try to salvage it and she stubbornly refuses to meet his eyes after that.
Hours pass before he manages to corner her in her room. He reaches for her face but she avoids his touch and turns her back on him.
"You are wrong, you know." she hisses. "It does mean something. It means someone out there is meant for you, that someone out there will love you no matter what you do. It's a promise, a promise of unconditional love and acceptance. It is not the bond that makes no sense, it's us." She retches the words as if she has been holding them for too long before turning around to stare at him. Her blue eyes are bright with tears she won't shed but that glisten in the harsh light of the neon lamps. "You're supposed to love me. You're my soulmate. Why won't you love me? What is so wrong with me that even my soulmate doesn't want me?"
"It's not that I don't…" he starts only to stop. Not because it's a lie but because he can't say what he wants to say. He opens his mouth and closes it again. Anything he could say is too linked with the rebellion by now. Too dangerous, too soon, too late… He doesn't know.
She clearly mistakes his botched attempt at denying for an aborted lie.
"I want to say it doesn't matter." she says flatly. "But I can't lie to you. Please, stay away from me."
He does.
Because he thinks it's safer this way.
He has a plan in place, arrangements with Plutarch, and when the Quell starts and the moment grows near he gets in that hovercraft without a second of hesitation because the Gamemaker promised he would get her out and she would reach Thirteen way before them. She will be safe, if anything, and maybe once they're there they can truly talk.
She never reaches Thirteen. She's arrested before the arena even explodes.
He's furious when he finds out but there's no time to go mad with grief. Not when they toss him in a rehab room that is little more than a cell. Are they torturing her for information she doesn't have? Between hallucinations, delusions and nightmares, he dreams they are.
They've never been careful enough. They must know who she is. They must know.
Plutarch has no news about her, he barely manages to find out the victors are detained in the depth of the Training Center.
Weeks pass and, one day, his communicuff demands his presence in Command as a matter of emergency. There's a tension in the room and less people than usual: Coin, Beetee, Plutarch and Boggs.
"The Capitol offered to negotiate." Beetee tells him. "They requested you act as our representative. They want to talk to you and only to you."
"Why me?" he frowns. "Why not Katniss?"
Coin waves that off. "It's of no consequences, we are not negotiating."
"We want to know what they want from us, that's all." Boggs declares. "Make them talk."
It reeks of a trap and he silently prays it doesn't mean Peeta is in more danger than he was a few hours ago. Of course when the screen flares to life with the sigil of the Capitol and Effie Trinket appears, he starts to get a clear idea of what Snow is actually playing at.
His breath catches in his throat when he sees her. They didn't bother with make-up or appearances like they do with Johanna and Peeta for propos. The close-up doesn't allow him to see beyond her chest, his best bet is that she's sitting in front of a camera, but what he sees is enough. Her face is black and blue, her bottom lip is split, her beautiful hair has been cropped close to her skull…
"Effie…" he breathes out, a brand new kind of terror settling in his stomach.
"Good afternoon, Haymitch." she answers. Her voice is rough as if she has a cold. It takes him a few seconds to understand she probably screamed herself raw. "I trust you are well?"
She barely puts any inflection in her question. Her tone is flat. Her eyes are vacant, full of tears, and she's not looking at the screen in front of her, not looking at him.
"What have they done to you?" he growls.
She licks her lips and winces because of the cut but keeps that same flat tone. "I suppose it is as good a time as any to clarify she is just a mouthpiece. I'm typing, she is reading."
"Snow." Haymitch spits out with furor.
"Why her?" Plutarch asks, confused.
"Oh, excellent question, Mr Heavensbee." Effie answers, briefly closing her eyes. "Do you care to explain to your rebel friends, Haymitch?"
He passes a quivering hand over his face, feeling as if he has just aged twenty years in the span of twenty seconds. "Effie…"
"I'm sorry…" she whispers, her eyes finally finding his. The response is immediate, some sort of shock runs through her body and rips a scream from her throat.
"Effie!" he shouts, stepping closer to the screen as if he could help, as if…
He feels Boggs' hand settling on his shoulder but shrugs it off.
"That's what happens when she goes off script." she eventually pants. "That's what happens if you don't answer my questions to my satisfaction."
"Cut the feed off." Coin orders, nodding at Beetee.
"No." Haymitch counters, lifting a hand to stop his friend.
"She's right, Haymitch." Plutarch cuts in, muting the mic. "We won't get anything out of this. He's going to make you watch while they torture her. That's all. That's why they picked her, isn't it? That's what you're supposed to explain. Because you are somehow involved with her and…"
"They chose her because I can't lie to her." he hisses through clenched teeth.
Silence follows that declaration.
"Which means she can't lie to you." Coin says.
He doesn't like what that hints at. "I won't put her at risk."
"She's already lost." the President argues. "You are not giving them information, Haymitch. They're going to kill her. We might get something useful out of this after all. Make her talk. Find out what she knows. Make her death count."
She slams the button again before he can tell her to go fuck herself.
"Are you done whispering behind our backs then?" Effie asks in that dispassionate voice he starts to hate. "Why don't we start with an easy question… Approximate number of your soldiers?"
His breathing is fast as he tries to think, tries to find a way out of this. He can't tell her anything. He can't save her. And he hates that Coin is right.
"I'm sorry." he says. Her blue eyes fall on him again and her lips twitch as if she wants to smile but can't find the strength. "Is Peeta alright?"
The shock is immediate and he watches with clenched fists as her body convulses.
"They've done something to him." she says as soon as the pain stops. "They've…" They send a shock again but she grits her teeth as soon as it's over, her eyes falling behind the screen again. "President Snow says he is going to kill me if I don't start reading again." she informs him. "What do you want me to do?"
"Stay alive." he says without any hesitation.
"How many soldiers?" she asks.
"Enough to win." he snaps.
"Haymitch." Plutarch warns.
"Fuck off." he growls.
Effie closes her eyes. "What is the rebels' plans?"
"Come on!" he shouts. "He knows I can't answer that."
"Of course he does." she comments. "He thinks torturing me in front of you will undermine your moral, possibly convince you to make a deal in exchange for me. I told him it was an idiotic plan but what do you know? Our President is a romantic. He seems to think soulmates would do anything for each other."
He waits for the electric shock and, clearly, so does she but it doesn't come. Snow is waiting for his answer, he figures. They're at a dead end, then.
"He doesn't know us very well, does he?" he snorts.
Something that would have been amusement if it hadn't been so wary and defeated flashes on her face.
"To be fair…" she says. "Soulmates usually love each other. You always have to do everything differently."
"I'm not that different." he confesses, ignoring Coin's impatient looks and the pity he can read in the others' eyes. "Remember what you asked me? If I could choose? I wouldn't choose you."
"I know." she sighs, levering a dark look at someone behind the camera. "I told them and they didn't believe me."
"The nerves." he mocks.
"Quite." she smiles. It's a small smile but it's soft.
"I wouldn't choose you because if you belonged to anyone else you would be safer, happier." he clarifies. "I'm not different. We're not different, princess."
"You have the worst timing ever." she breathes out. The shock that runs through her body took her by surprise and makes her scream in agony. He wants to break something. It never stops. It goes on and on… "Cut the feed!" she sobs between two shocks. "Cut the feed! I don't want you to see!"
"I'm sorry!" he pleads. "Effie, I'm sorry!"
Beetee cuts the feed before he can be sure she heard. He can still hear the echoes of her screams in the silence.
"Well, that was a waste of time." Coin declares.
The urge to break something – or someone – is so strong he takes a threatening step towards her and finds his path blocked by Boggs.
"That won't help." the soldier mutters under his breath. "I can't imagine what you're feeling, I get you're angry but that won't help anyone and certainly not Everdeen."
He holes himself up in Beetee's workshop and waits for the Capitol's broadcast that a new rebel has been executed. It never comes. He waits for days.
"If she was dead, you would know." Beetee says quietly, after a week.
It's the first time they actually discuss the reason he hides in here and tinkers with his equipment. Haymitch doesn't want to talk about it but he's desperate. Being apart never became easier they just became more skilled at ignoring the problem but now… Now he feels like something is calling to a lost part of him and her absence from his side is a constant ache.
"Not if Snow wants to torture me." he grumbles. "Once I know for sure there's no more hoping… False hope… False hope is the worst thing."
"No." Beetee sighs. "Listen to what I'm saying, Haymitch. If she was dead, you would know."
He tilts his head and studies his friend but doesn't dare ask the obvious.
"It hurts." he confesses. "All the time."
"Good." Three's victor shrugs. "When the pain stops, when the craving for her presence stops, that's when you know she's dead. It's dark and cold and empty. You're adrift. If she dies, you will know. Stop wallowing in here and go take care of Katniss."
He trusts Beetee's word.
They rescue the victors but Effie is not with them.
He watches Finnick and Annie being reunited and he tries not to resent it, not to envy them but he fails. He's jealous of the fact Johanna can afford to get high on morphling when he has to stay sober.
Eventually they win the war.
But at what price?
When he finally sees Annie, he understands what Beetee meant. Annie's gaze is hollow, the spark gone.
So he keeps looking. He directs troops to every known detaining center, punches as many high ranked Peacekeepers as necessary until she's found and transferred to the Mansion's hospital. She's covered in bruises, shaking like a leaf and too thin but she's breathing and Haymitch counts his blessings.
It takes days for her to wake up.
When she does wake up, the first thing she does is latch on his hand and hold on for dear life before falling back asleep. He supposes she craved him as much as he did. Being with her soothes him and his frayed nerves. It's not a magic remedy to his wounds but it's a shield against the pain.
"Still alive." she whispers when she finally stays awake long enough for him to help her sip from a cup of water.
"Yeah." he smirks. "Good job, sweetheart." He reaches for her face but she instantly recoils. His hand hovers over her forehead for a second and then he gently makes contact, running his fingers through the short locks. "I'm sorry."
He must have said it a thousand times by this point.
At least she knows he means it.
"I want to forgive you." she rasps out. "But I can't yet."
"Yeah." he shrugs. "I figured. Do you hate me?"
It's really a stupid question because how can she not?
"I…" she hesitates and he doesn't know if it's because she has to tell the truth or because she's confused. "I don't think I could ever completely hate you." she answers carefully.
"But you hate me a little." he snorts. "Come on, you can say it."
"I hate you a little." she admits. "But I also still love you a lot. Is that how you feel about me?"
"For a long time." he offers. "Then I just didn't hate you at all."
Blue eyes bear into his, searching… "Is that a convoluted way to say you love me without actually saying it?"
He licks his lips, wants to downplay it with a maybe but he knows that's a half-truth that won't be allowed this time. "Yes."
She nods slowly, still staring at him. "I want to call you an idiot but I can't because I actually think you are clever. This is very frustrating."
His mouth twitches in amusement. "You just did, princess. It's fine, I understand the idea. I'm an idiot."
She hums. "I need you. I hate that I need you."
"Suck it up, sweetheart, 'cause I need you too." he shrugs. "You're still…" He can't finish the sentence. Is she still his? He doesn't know anymore. It's not for him to decide. "I'm still yours."
"Yes, you are." she growls. "And I am yours."
Something settles in him and he presses a kiss to her lips. It's chaste and sweet.
Not a claim but a promise.