No prompt, just some fluff ;)
An Impossible Dream
One second Haymitch was asleep, the next he was wide awake, breath caught in his throat.
Bad dream.
Not a nightmare. Or at least not the kind of nightmares that plagued most of his nights. He couldn't have tossed and turned or even made a single noise because Effie hadn't stirred at all. Her warm naked body was still tucked against his, partially covered with his because he had half-rolled on his stomach in his sleep and taken her with him…
He forced his body to relax, took a long deep breath and let it out… The train was rushing through the wilderness, tossing strange changing shadows on the walls and on the floor…
He drew away from her a little, enough that he wasn't crushing her, let his leg slip off hers… He had a bad tendency to wrap himself around her like an octopus during the night, as if he wanted to protect her in his sleep… It wasn't actually helpful though. Because if she needed to get out of bed fast…
He shouldn't be sleeping in her room.
He knew that.
He knew that so well he was always angry with himself in the morning.
It was an indulgence to let her soft breaths lull him to sleep after sex. An indulgence that could end up costing them a lot. He trusted her to be clever about his night terrors and he made sure the knife was never in easy reach when he took her to bed but the truth was he didn't need a knife to hurt someone.
And he shouldn't have been indulging because there were other things at play here than his personal demons… And because he was an addict. Indulge too much in something and soon enough you couldn't get enough of it.
But this Tour…
Fuck, he needed to take comfort where he could find it and so did she. Liquor and cigarettes weren't exactly taking the edge off when people were being executed left and right and Peacekeepers were breathing down their neck every second of the day.
He wasn't even sure how he had ended up in her bed the previous night. They hadn't had sex even if they were naked.
It had been late, they had been in her room going over everything they would need to do in Eight – speeches, meetings, people they would need to greet by names as if they were old friends; everything the children didn't even know was necessary to make this Tour go smoothly – and then… Then they had taken one look at the clock, realized it would mean five hours of sleep and had decided to call it a night. He had shed his clothes and climbed between her sheets because he was too exhausted to face the trek back to his own room and she had briefly disappeared in the bathroom only to come back wig and make-up free, not bothering with a nightgown before joining him.
It wasn't the first time they shared a bed. Hell, since this Tour had started Haymitch had spent more nights in her room than in his own. But it was the first time they shared a bed without any funny business beforehand and that he wasn't sure was…
It wasn't particularly smart.
And it was bad timing.
And he really needed to get a grip.
She curled up a little on herself, probably chilly now that he had drawn away from her.
It would have been a good time for him to slip out of bed, gather his clothes, and do the walk of shame to his own compartment. There were a book and a bottle with his name on it waiting there.
And yet what he did was prop his head on his hand and watch her in the semi-darkness.
She was drooling on her pillow.
He found that adorable.
Maybe because it was another rare reminder that she was human. She played the doll too well sometimes.
And she would deny it if he brought it up the next morning, like she always did, because fuck forbids he ever mentioned her farting, pooping or drooling… It made him snort only thinking about it.
She was a light sleeper though and the soft noise was enough to prompt a sleepy hum of protest out of her.
She stretched her whole body like a cat and then relaxed it again, her hand blindly feeling the space in front of her looking for…
He pressed a kiss on her shoulder.
She let out another hum, a pleased one this time, and rolled back a little, eyes still closed. She was on the threshold between sleep and awake, he figured, and it wouldn't take much to wake her up completely. He was tempted to do just that. Push her on her back, settled between her thighs, take her all lazy and slow like only middle of the night sex could be… But she was tired and he knew she needed her rest so he refrained.
"Haymitch?"
He barely made out his name because her face was pressed into the pillow beneath her cheek.
"Shhh, sweetheart." he whispered, coupling that with another soft lingering kiss on her skin. He could afford to be soft. She wouldn't remember this in the morning. "Go back to sleep."
"Cold." she muttered, her hand now searching behind her for his body…
He gave her his arm and didn't protest when she hugged it to her chest. He followed her lead and spooned her again, his arm curling around her head in a position that he would regret before long because it would grow numb. He didn't really care right then though since it meant he could play with her hair…
This, right there, was dangerous…
His instinct screamed at him to run while it was still time, to do whatever was necessary to survive…
But that was the trick, wasn't it?
If this whole rebellion thing Cinna had sold him worked out… It wouldn't be about surviving anymore in the long run… It would be about living…
And living…
Well… The only moments he had felt anywhere near alive in the last few years had been when he was with her so it stood to reason that…
Surviving was easy.
Living… That was harder.
And he would need her for that.
And…
And he really didn't want to leave her to go sleep in a cold lonely bed.
It would be easy, he mused, easier, to go to sleep like this every night, her warm body tucked against his, her soft breathing for a familiar lullaby, safe in the lavender smell of her sheets…
It was an impossible dream but…
Fuck, did he yearn for it…
I hope you liked this. I'm thinking movie verse because book!Haymitch is a little more in denial in my head but movie!Haymitch is a little more astute XD So... yeah... Tell me your thoughts!