Prompt: I have an idea for a prompt but it lacks your creativity: Effie is really self-conscious about living in Twelve as a Capitol and she wants to be more District somehow for Haymitch because she thinks that's what he wants. But it's more ridiculous than working and he convinces her that she's perfectly fine for him. Please consider tat least. 🙈 Thank you !

District Fashion

Effie studied the image the mirror gave back, not entirely pleased with the end result.

She blamed the lack of proper salons and beauty parlors in Twelve, the cardboard box of hair dye still open on the sink promised natural results but the color didn't look quite natural to her. She tentatively touched her new raven black locks and swallowed with some difficulties. She had never liked her hair, had barely tolerated it when it had been dyed bright colors, but she wasn't sure what to feel now that her familiar strawberry blond strands were gone. It would take some getting used to.

With a small sigh, she grabbed her hair straightener and went to work. She would pin it up, afterwards, in the fashion the women in town always did.

She wasn't sure what she was trying to achieve with that make-over, truth be told. She had been living in Twelve for six months now and she still stood out like a sore thumb. It annoyed Haymitch, she knew, the attention she attracted everywhere they went.

Most women in this District had hair as black as Katniss and most people wore earth-toned clothes. With her blond hair and her colorful outfits… The whole thing marked her as Capitol and if there was one thing she didn't want to be anymore, it was Capitol. She wanted to be accepted. Loved if possible. Make friends… Make Haymitch start looking at her like she sometimes caught him looking at some of the prettier women in the District. All those women had long dark hair. All the women she had ever seen him pay attention to for the last fourteen years all had dark hair. It was his type. She was only the exception – to a lot of things.

Once she was done with her hair, she took care of the make-up. None of the women wore make-up in Twelve and it wasn't a sacrifice she was ready to make but she was skilled enough to make it look as if she had none. She didn't like that much either. Her features were so plain, without the make-up to make them look sharper, more perfect…

She stopped paying attention to her face once she placed down the last brush and finally turned to the shopping bag she had put aside for last. She discarded the plushy pink bathrobe and carefully hung it behind the door before taking the outfit out of the bag.

The bathroom's door handle turned just as she clasped the lacy black bra on – granted, she doubted the women in Twelve wore lacy lingerie under their awful clothes but, just like the make-up, she just couldn't accept certain things. There was a curse and an impatient knock on the door when Haymitch found it locked.

"The fuck you're doing in there?" he grumbled. "You've been up here for hours."

She clucked her tongue at his attempt to just walk in the bathroom while she was in it. They had had several conversations – that had turned into fights – on the subject because she felt some things should remain mysterious and she didn't particularly enjoy seeing him waltz in when she was using the toilets or having to stand under the shower while he used them himself.

"I was taking a bath." she answered, hoping he wouldn't notice the slight catch in her voice. "What is it?"

There was an irritated scoff. "Maybe I want to use my bathroom, yeah? Thought about that?"

"There is another one down the hall." she pointed out. Never mind the restroom downstairs.

"Why do you lock the door to take a bath now?" he frowned – she could hear the frown in his voice. "Nothing I haven't seen before… Might have joined you too."

A smile stretched her lips and she forgot to be disgusted by the awful brown cotton pants she slipped on. It was long, straight and didn't really flatter her figure but it was preferable to the shapeless long skirts some women wore.

"You could always take a bath later and perhaps I will join you." she teased.

"I don't take baths by myself." he snorted and then hit the door again, a little impatient. "You're gonna open this anytime soon? I feel stupid standing there talking to wood. The fuck are you doing?"

"Getting ready for dinner." she retorted.

She didn't need to see to know he was rolling his eyes.

"You and your pampering." he grumbled. "The kids are downstairs so whatever you're doing, do it faster 'cause food's on the table."

"I will be there in five minutes." she answered, listening to his mutters fade away. Seconds later, the stairs creaked under his weight.

She completed her outfit with a black long-sleeved shirt that she tucked inside the pants before remembering that most women wore it out. But that didn't look very stylish – not that any part of this was stylish – and she eventually concluded that she could give the District look some flair so she left it tucked inside and slipped on the sturdy boots that everyone seemed to be wearing. She walked out of the bathroom to check her reflection on the full-length mirror mounted on the wardrobe door.

Not glamorous.

But there was little she couldn't pull off.

She adjusted the pants and decided that, maybe, she could buy some tighter ones. It wouldn't be too terrible if they were a touch tighter. Her face still looked too natural for her taste and the hair… She could learn to like the hair in time.

She didn't look Capitol anymore and that was the most important thing.

She wasn't sure she had managed to look entirely like someone from Twelve though.

She could hear voices drifting from the kitchen and she was nervous when she finally walked down the stairs. They were already all sitting at their usual seats around the table when she made her grand entrance.

Katniss was the first to look up and she gaped.

Peeta was next and his eyes grew wide.

Haymitch had his back to her and he didn't move at all, simply stopped talking and stared at the kids.

"She was up to something in that bathroom, yeah?" he said, his tone wary. " I knew it. Tell me she didn't shave her head."

"I did not shave my head." she scoffed. "How preposterous."

"Did you chop all your hair off?" he asked.

The length of her hair was often a subject of debate. He liked it long, she found it unmanageable. And yet she consented to keeping it shoulder-length because she loved it too much when he reverently combed the curls with his fingers every night. Sometimes, he even took the hairbrush from her to do it himself. That was probably their best kept secret.

She pursed her lips. "My hair is safe."

"Well…" Peeta winced and then immediately backtracked when Katniss not so discreetly kicked him under the table. "No, I mean… You look lovely, Effie."

"Thank you, dear." she smiled, now really nervous because the boy didn't seem to mean a word of it and Katniss was still staring like she had grown a second head.

"Oh fuck…" Haymitch whined, still making no move to look. "It's pink, yeah? You went and dyed it pink again."

She cleared her throat, annoyed. "Are you going to turn around any time soon?"

"Not if I can help it." he retorted.

She rolled her eyes and entered the kitchen, moving into his line of sight. He had been expecting it naturally and had probably simply been teasing her but, clearly, whatever he had thought he would see, it wasn't… this.

He looked her up and down three times before he frowned. "The fuck is this? Is this a joke?"

There was another kick under the table. This time, it was Haymitch who startled and glared at Katniss. The girl lifted pointed eyebrows.

"Fashion." Katniss declared as if it explained everything. "District fashion."

He made a face. "Yeah, I ain't blind, sweetheart, I see she's going native, I'm just wondering what the fuck she was thinking."

"You do not like it." Effie deduced, not even bothering to hide her disappointment.

She knew her Capitolness had always bothered him. She had hoped…

"Cause I was supposed to?" he scowled.

She gritted her teeth and blinked back the tears of humiliation that burned her eyes. Not in front of the children. Certainly not in front of the children.

"It's not very you, Effie, that's all." Peeta pointed diplomatically.

"That was rather the point." she huffed. "If you would excuse me, I am not very hungry tonight."

She fled upstairs before any of them had time to comment again, pushing the bedroom door close behind her but not quite naïve enough to think it would remain shut for very long. She went to stand in front of the mirror again, almost tearing the hair tie off her head.

"Idiot." she accused her reflection. It was blurry, mostly because of the tears. She wiped the few that slipped through before the door opened and Haymitch stepped in but she didn't really have time to compose herself. And without the heavy make-up she used to wear, it was hard to immediately school her expression into detachment. "Go back downstairs, Haymitch. We have guests. It is rude to abandon them."

"The kids ain't guests and now you're upset." he grumbled awkwardly.

He didn't say that bad things happened when she was upset. He didn't say that she tended to have panic attacks or curl up in a corner for hours at a time or start scrubbing the whole house from floors to ceilings. He didn't say it. But he thought it and she knew it.

"I am fine." she lied.

He scoffed. "Like hell you are." He shook his head and sighed. "Look… I'm sorry, alright, sweetheart? I thought… It looked like you were making fun of us."

She turned around, a scowl on her face. "I would never."

"I know. That's why I said sorry." he deadpanned but then waved away the sarcasm with a slightly shaky hand. "The boy's right. It ain't you. What's gone through that pretty head of yours?"

He came closer and she let him. When she didn't protest his proximity, he wrapped his arms around her waist and she leaned against his chest, propping her head on his shoulder.

"I simply did not want you and the children to be ashamed of me anymore." she confessed in a whisper.

"What?" It came out almost as a growl. "The fuck you're talking about, Effie?"

"I see how people look at me." she insisted. "You do not say it but you are embarrassed because I am too Capitol sometimes and the children do too. I simply wanted…" She let out a long breath and shook her head. "I thought you would like it. You like brunettes. Granted, it is a shade darker than I thought it would be and the clothes are terrible but all the women you eye when you think I am not looking are wearing this sort of things and…"

"Okay, stop." he ordered, drawing her a little away from him. Not far enough that she wasn't still in his arms but just enough that he could sneak his hand under her chin and tilt her head up. He looked confused and a bit anxious. "Princess… I've never been ashamed of you. Fuck, if anything I expect you to be ashamed of me. The other way around… That's not even a question. And the kids… Effie, the kids love you."

She had to make an effort to keep her breathing even and she averted her eyes. "But I am not your ideal and I want to be your…"

"Sweetheart." he cut her off again, letting his hand trail from under her chin up to her cheek. "I don't care what you look like. You're beautiful. Whatever your hair color, the scars, how much you weight… I always find you beautiful."

"That's only words." she whispered, hastily blinking now because there was a lump in her throat and her eyes were badly burning. "They are nice words but you do not mean them. Men never mean them. You will see someone younger, more your type, and…"

"I've seen younger. I've seen more my type." He shrugged. "None of them are you and I'm not interested. I don't fucking care what everyone else thinks, you're beautiful to me. Maybe that's only words but that's also the truth." He sighed and drew her in his arms again, cradling the back of her head in his hand, his voice rough. "I like you best when you look like yourself. I don't need you dying your hair or stuff like that. I like the real you. You're beautiful. I don't know how many times I've got to tell you that for you to start believing it."

She buried her face in his shoulder and bit down on her bottom lip because she didn't want to fall apart about that. Being seen without wig or make-up… He had requested it at a time when it wasn't fashionable and she had never really understood his fascination for her plain bare self.

When she was dressed in silk, her hair done and her face painted, she knew she was beautiful.

When she was exposed, raw and without artifices… She didn't understand how someone could look at her and see anything worth their time.

She had been raised to believe a woman ought to work to keep a man interested and Haymitch… Well, Haymitch kept proving her mother wrong.

He let out a long sigh again and petted her hair.

She knew without having to ask that he was disappointed by the lack of wild curls – she also knew he would never admit to it.

"Do you hate the color?" she enquired, already trying to figure out how she would get rid of it and back to her blond hair without a decent hair salon. Perhaps she could go to Eleven or Ten. Surely either of those District had a competent hairdresser. "You always liked me with a dark wig…"

"It's different." he said carefully. "It's not forever, yeah? It's gonna go back to red eventually."

She rolled her eyes. "I do not have red hair and now you are just trying to infuriate me." There might be reddish hues to her blond hair but she did not have red hair no matter how much he teased her about it. She waited a second and then licked her lips. "I hate the outfit."

"Then, take it off." he snorted, letting go of her to sit on the bed, clearly intending to wait for her to switch clothes.

She figured he wasn't about to let her off the hook about dinner. Not when she was still underweight from her stay in Capitol cells and struggling to keep on the right side of that problem.

She didn't waste more time, aware that the children were waiting downstairs, probably hungry, and that their supper was cooling down. She slipped the long sleeve shirt over her head and kicked the boots and the pants in the corner where she would dispose of them later.

"There you are." Haymitch smirked, his grey eyes slowly studying her lacy underwear. The lingerie was really her, truth be told: her favorite mix of sexy and comfort. "Always hiding under ridiculous layers."

The last part was added with a hint of sadness that she preferred not to address. It might be complicated for someone from a District to understand but Capitol people with the right breeding were taught how to hide their true self behind smoke screens from infancy. It was a difficult thing to unlearn.

She slipped on colorful striped woolen tights and a pink little woolen dress she particularly liked. She checked her reflection again, quite liking the contrast between the dark strands and the pale pink.

"Better." he commented, coming to stand behind her to press a kiss on her neck. "You're made for colors, sweetheart. Leave brown to boring people." He pressed another one higher, closer to her ear. "No more thinking we're ashamed of you, alright? 'Cause… I swear that's bullshit."

"Do not tell the children." she begged. It would only hurt them and the last thing she wanted to do was let her silliness hurt their feelings.

"Your secrets are always safe with me." he promised.

She turned her head and kissed him properly, humming against his lips when his hand wandered south.

There was no time for that now but later maybe… Later she would let him tell her she was beautiful again.