Chapter Thirty Two | The grumbled cries of their own shifted blame.
"'Tis torture, and not mercy. Heaven is here,
Where Juliet lives; and every cat and dog
And little mouse, every unworthy thing,
Live here in heaven and may look on her;
But Romeo may not."
3.3, 29-33 Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
Sometimes, he hates himself. It isn't usually a conscious hatred. It's a growing feeling, like the way a plant springs from the ground. First, the seed germinates in the soil, inhaling nutrients as it opens beneath the ground. It takes days, even weeks, for the first sign of it above the dirt, but when it finally breaches the earth, the roots are already embedded deep below the ground.
Other times, it is more of a conscious feeling than he wants it to be. Those are the times when he does something that he knows he shouldn't do, or even that he doesn't really want to do, but he does it anyway of his own accord because he just can't say no to his many vices.
Cashmere doesn't ask him where he's going when he steps into the kitchen, buttoning up a fresh shirt. They both have their own lives in District 1. At least, as much of a life as they can have, all things considered. She isn't about to cluck at him like a mother hen. She knows full well where he's off to, and trying to stop him would be useless.
Her brother doesn't drink that often. He has a handle on those temptations and she's never concerned herself overmuch with them. Every once in a while though…
"When will you be home?" is all she asks as she sits on the couch and flips a page of the book she's reading. She glances at him from the corner of her eye.
Gloss pauses as he adjusts his collar, and shrugs, "I don't know. Don't bother waiting up."
She hums in response and he leaves, shutting the door calmly behind him before venturing out into the familiar streets of his home. Inside though, he is not nearly as calm.
His mind spins with thoughts of his recent parting with Elara. It's only been a week, but it feels like an age. They're not scheduled to be in the Capitol at the same time for another two months, and the thought makes him strangely depressed. He doesn't want to admit that it's because he misses her, but…
He does.
It aggravates him. He shouldn't miss her. She shouldn't mean anything to him. She is a form of comfort, and nothing more. They had agreed upon it from the very beginning, so why does it feel as if she is so much more than that?
His fist clenches at his side as he ducks down the busy street that runs through the heart of the district. If he's being honest with himself, he isn't angry because of what he feels for Elara Winston. No – he's angry because he can't do anything about it. His hands are tied, and maybe that's just as well because he isn't entirely sure what he would do even if he had the chance.
Love? He hardly knows how to navigate such a thing. But lust – now that is a different story.
He doesn't go to the bar planning on bringing someone home with him. Maybe, if he knew that this would end up happening, he wouldn't have gone at all. He hardly knows his own heart these days, only that it seems to beat out a tune that he is not yet familiar with.
And yet – that is exactly what he does.
It wouldn't be a lie to say that District 1 adores its Victors. They are celebrities here. Their status goes above and beyond even the most well-known socialites and wealthy CEOs, for which District 1 has many. When he is approached by a woman as he hovers over a whiskey at the bar, he isn't surprised. This sort of thing happens often enough. Bringing them home happens often enough, too. But this time it's different. This time, even as he leads the giggling woman past Cashmere's house and goes instead to his own unused home, something feels off.
He isn't able to place it at first. The various drinks he'd had, both before the woman had joined him as well as after, has addled his brain. His thoughts are strung out like faraway stars out of sync with their constellations and adrift in a foreign sky. He doesn't try to put them back into place. It takes far more effort than he has at this moment.
He just wants to feel something, that's all. In a way, that's all he's ever wanted. Is it such a crime to try to remind himself that he is still human? That he isn't the mindless killing machine that he had been during his Games, or the broken shard of a soul he has been since then?
"Is this your house?" the woman whispers at him, drunkenly swaying as he digs around for the key he rarely uses. The fact that he even has it in his pocket is a habit bred from similar nights in the past. He hadn't even given it a second though before leaving for the bar. Slipping it into his pocket had been a natural thing to do. He only uses this house when he needs time away from his sister, and nights like these definitely call for such distance.
Gloss shoves the key into the lock. It takes a few tries to turn it properly, during which the woman hangs off his arm and giggles again. Her voice is loud in the silence of the night, and for some reason the pitch of it makes him a little annoyed.
"Come in," he tells her when he gets the door open, and she stumbles inside. He follows, glancing across the street to his sister's house briefly before shutting the door again. The lights are still on. Cashmere has an annoying tendency of waiting up for him despite the many times he's told her not to. After a while, she'll give up and go to sleep. She's not blind to his habits.
It's been several months since he's stepped into this house last. In his current state, he hardly notices the thin layer of dust on the furniture. He flicks the light on and sends the woman a debonair smile before heading over to the kitchen to riffle through the bottom cabinet. When he straightens out again, he's holding a bottle of hard liquor.
"Another drink?" he asks the woman. He can't recall her name. She doesn't seem to care.
"Of course!" is all she says in response, and falls down on the couch. She doesn't seem to notice the dust, either.
Gloss maneuvers his way through the kitchen to find the glasses, momentarily forgetting where they are. It takes him a few minutes to locate them, during which the woman makes herself comfortable by kicking her heels off and sinking into the pillows of the couch. When he hands her a glass, she purrs out a thank you, but the sound is too slurred to be sensual.
He doesn't care. They only take a few sips of it before he's crawling over her and chuckling as he dips down to press his mouth against hers. The kiss is strange, but he doesn't question it. The woman beneath him is everything he thinks he needs right now. When she arches into him and starts unbuttoning his shirt, he lets her.
"You know…I've had a crush on you for years now," she drunkenly murmurs, and then breaks out into a series of giggles as she pushes his shirt off his shoulders and immediately goes for his belt.
Gloss snorts, sliding a hand over her breast as she grinds her hips up into his. "You don't even know me," he points out. For some reason, it makes the woman giggle even harder.
He's getting a little annoyed at her giggling, but instead of telling her to stop, he just pushes her dress off and slides it down her legs. Then, nestling against her, he starts kissing down her neck and groans at the desire that begins to blossom over his body.
The woman grips his hair and scratches her way down his back and says, "You don't need to know someone to fuck them."
The words have a strange effect on him. He pauses between her breasts and looks up at her with a frown. She doesn't notice at first. She's too busy running her hands down his body, groping at him with singular intent. Normally he wouldn't have a problem with this, but for some reason he can't stop thinking about how her words sound like a client's and how different this touch is compared to Elara's.
Being with Elara is an experience all its own. Her touch spins fire into parts of him that he hadn't known existed. Her kiss makes him forget all the reasons why his life is such a nightmare.
He hovers there above the woman, swallowing tightly when she touches him. Her fingers are not gentle. Whether that's due to her personality or just because she's too drunk to realize, he doesn't know. What he does know is that it's making him feel this ridiculous sense of guilt, and he can't seem to push the feeling aside.
It's not as if he belongs to Elara, or that she belongs to him. They aren't together. Their relationship is static – it comes and goes, vanishes and reappears like a radio transmission. It doesn't mean anything.
So then why does he feel so guilty all of the sudden? He's taken plenty of women to this house. They don't mean anything, either. Just because he enjoys being with Elara doesn't mean that she's his. And yet…the woman's words drift through his head. She had said that you don't need to know someone in order to fuck them, and she's right, but…
God, he knows Elara so well now. His innate understanding of her character makes being with her so incredibly sublime. When he's inside her, he hardly feels like himself. Instead he feels like everything he could be, if he lived in a world where such things were possible. And when she takes him, she doesn't just take him – she breathes life into him at the same time, in such a way that he hardly even realizes she's doing it because he gets so lost within the planes of their bodies and the undercurrent of their souls.
"Touch me," the woman says, taking his hand and laying it against her breast. Such an invitation would make any man eager to fulfill it, but all he can think about now is how this woman's body isn't the one he's craving. Her skin is too tan, her eyes too brown. Her hair doesn't shine with coppery strands, and her form is too curvy. He doesn't know when he had begun to think of Elara as the perfect woman, but for some reason he longs for her fine lines and sharp angles, her arching curves and low voice.
He sighs and leans back, pulling himself away from her to instead sit down on the other end of the couch. After a moment, he reaches for his glass and takes a large sip. He figures he isn't quite drunk enough to handle this complicated layer of guilt that he feels breaching up inside his chest. It doesn't make sense to him, but then again, nothing about Elara Winston has ever made much sense.
With a frown, the woman sits up too. "Why did you stop?" she asks, and reaches for her dress. Even in her drunken state, she seems to realize that the atmosphere has inexplicably changed.
Gloss just grips his glass harder and says, "I just…I think you should leave." He glances over at her and sighs, "I'm sorry."
There is something strangely sincere in his voice, and it rather blunts the woman's indecency about the whole situation in a way she can't understand – only it shows in the crease of his eyes and the stiff set of his shoulders.
"…Alright," she responds, frowning in confusion. She hesitates for a moment before pulling her dress back on. She pauses again and then reaches out to scribble her number on a bit of paper that's strewn over the coffee table. Gloss doesn't outwardly react to this, even when she turns to him and shrugs, "Just in case you're in the mood some other night."
Apparently, when you're a Victor from District 1, you can do no wrong. The woman looks disappointed, but there's a hopeful gleam in her eyes that makes him frown even after she takes her leave. He doesn't try to help her even as she stumbles off, and just scoffs when he lifts the number and studies the looping writing.
He doesn't know how long he sits there before he's reaching for the phone and pushing a different number into the dial pad.
It rings five times before a groggy voice picks it up and asks, "Hello?"
Gloss closes his eyes as a strange sense of peace washes over him.
"…Did I wake you up?" he asks, and Elara snorts.
"Gloss?" she asks, sounding surprised to hear his voice, and then wryly says, "It's past midnight. Of course you woke me up."
He bites back a smile and chuckles, "Sorry." Then he frowns, wondering why he keeps apologizing to people tonight. This particular apology goes a little deeper than merely waking her up, though he's still not entirely sure he understands it himself.
Elara yawns and murmurs, "Are you alright? You sound a little off."
He pauses, leans back, and haltingly says, "I…miss you, I guess. Is that weird?"
She laughs. "Completely," she tells him, and he laughs too.
Why does he feel so much better now that he's talking to her?
"I miss you too," she quietly tells him after a moment, and even though he doesn't see, she clenches her hands into fists at the late night confession.
He smiles tightly and murmurs, "I think there's something wrong with us, Winston." But inside, he doesn't have to guess at what, exactly, it is. He doesn't want anyone but her. The realization is like a bucket of cold water, and yet…
"There's a lot of things wrong with us, but I don't think missing each other is one of them," she tells him then, and the warmth that he feels spread through his chest completely counteracts the chill of his realization.
"Mmm…maybe you're right," he concedes, tilting his head back against the couch and sighing.
Missing Elara Winston is, after all, just another hollow piece of his heart.
Later that night, the solemnity is broken.
"This plan isn't going to work if I join Katniss's group," Gloss murmurs through the silence. The lamp on the bedside table is on, bathing the room in dim light. Gloss and Elara are tangled together with a familiarity that only two such souls have. He's got her pulled close to him, side by side, foreheads pressed together. Though their breathing is slow and steady, neither of them are asleep. Perhaps it is fear that keeps them awake – fear of the Games, fear of the unknown, fear of what might happen to them in the coming future. It doesn't matter, really, what thoughts pluck at their minds. The only thing that truly matters is the way they fit so perfectly together, even in the face of all this uncertainty.
Elara reaches up to palm the side of his face. Her fingers idle over his skin, her touch so light that he barely feels her caress. In a very soft voice, so quiet that even he is hard pressed to hear her, she breathes, "What are you saying?"
He stares at her. That he is here, now, in her bed and pressed to her body, says all that needs to be said regarding his desires to survive these Games. Yet he knows that if they are going to do this, they will need to tweak the plan in order to accommodate them into it.
"…Cashmere and I will join up with the other Careers. People expect us to," he whispers, smoothing his hand up her spine. "But…I want you to get in with the others. It's safer, and I know Finnick and Johanna will look out for you."
It's not easy for him to say that, to entrust her life to other people. To willingly separate himself from her in the arena, of all places, where death could take any of them at any moment. Every piece of him wants to have her near him, to protect her, to keep her safe, but one of them needs to be a part of Katniss's group, and it can't be him. Katniss Everdeen wouldn't trust him with a ten foot pole, but she might just trust Elara.
She frowns at him. Lifting herself up on her elbow, Elara mutters, "No. I'm staying with you. Gloss – "
"If you stay with me, Brutus will kill you off the first chance he gets," he cuts in, swiftly sitting up. He turns to her, grasps her shoulders, and says, "You're safer with them. Look, Elara, I swear I'll do everything in my power to join up with you before the end. I promise you."
She slowly sits up too, studying his expression as she carefully responds, "Something will go wrong, Gloss. It always does."
He swallows. He knows she's right. This is the Hunger Games, and nothing ever goes right when it comes to this bloody tradition. But she had to realize that this is the only way. Two Careers wouldn't be able to just waltz into Katniss Everdeen's group and just be accepted as allies, right then and there. The Girl on Fire would sooner stick them with arrows than trust them that much.
She edges closer to him, reaching out to slide her hands over his brawny shoulders. He brings her to his body, heaving her into his lap and breathing out against her hair. The safety of his arms seems lessened suddenly, as if they are already in danger.
"How will you know when to meet up with us?" she asks, clutching him tightly, like she's afraid he might disappear on the wisp of a breeze.
He sighs out and murmurs, "I'll find a way to keep track of you. You have to trust me, Elara. This is for the best and you know it. It's the only way."
She immediately shakes her head, but doesn't reply. Though she physically denies his words, inside she knows that he's right. It is the only way.
Gloss seems to understand her silence in a way that only he can, for he brings her closer and whispers, "I don't want to be parted from you, but you won't be safe around Brutus and Enobaria. They might have accepted you as a friend before, but now that we're tributes again…"
Elara sighs, "I know." Then, lifting her face, she catches his eye and thickly says, "But how will I know you'll be safe? There's no point in surviving this if I lose you."
His eyes darken immediately upon her words. He purses his mouth and says, "Cash will look out for me." He pauses, studies her face closely, then murmurs, "Elara…promise me you'll…move on, if something happens – no, don't talk," he says, swiftly cutting her off when she starts to speak. He swallows and grasps her tightly, "There are other people who could make you happy. If I don't make it…promise me you'll at least try." She stares at him as if he's just betrayed her, and he sighs. In a quiet voice, he shakily adds, "You know it's not easy for me to say that. You're mine. You belong with me. But I need to know that you'll try to live if I don't make it out of this alive."
She frowns and moves closer to him, burying her face against his shoulder as she struggles to find words. It takes her a few lengthy minutes to ensure that her voice won't shake and that the tears filling her eyes won't overflow. When she does, Elara whispers, "I can promise you that I'll try to live, Gloss, but…I can't promise that I'll find someone else. I'll never find anyone like you."
He buries his face against her too and hoarsely says, "There's no one like you either, Winston."
They don't say anything more for a long time, but their silence cannot last forever. Their plans need to be hammered out further, extrapolated to an extent where they both understand what they need to do, and when, and how.
"We need to keep pretending," he whispers later. "We need to make it seem like we don't care about each other at all, at least for the start of the Games. If we play it that way, no one will question why we're splitting up in the arena."
Elara chuckles bitterly and drawls, "Well that's not hard. We're already used to pretending all of that."
The smile he sends her then is tight with a similar bitterness, borne from all the years of sneaking around. He exhales slowly and leans in to kiss her, lips moving over hers with a gentleness that is part sorrow, part hope. She responds to him, mirroring the emotions that he expresses with his kiss. She feels them too, rising up beneath her skin like a plague. Nothing is ever easy for them, and that is the worst curse of all.
"Everything will work out," she whispers against his lips. She has to believe that. If she doesn't, the walls she has built over the last eight years – the fortifications against the Capitol and her own grief – will come tumbling down.
Gloss hums, though he isn't sure if the noise is one of agreement or not. In truth, he does not know if their plan will work. He isn't sure if he should even dare to hope, when it could so easily be torn asunder.
But, for her sake, he doesn't refute her words. Instead he just presses her into the mattress and hikes her leg around his waist, nestling his body over hers once more. It is very late by now, but sleep will not come to them tonight. The Games are only a few days away, and there is only one cure for the insomnia that its arrival brings.
"Let me love you," he whispers, kissing her deeper, as if he's trying to take all of her into all of him.
Elara's only response is to drag her touch over his body, pulling his length inside of her and sighing out as he begins to move. She cannot help but let him love her. That, she thinks, is also a plague, for being in love is not the perfect state of existence that the poets like to claim. In her experience, it is a painful, thorny thing that makes her bleed just as much as it heals her. It is a tempest, a monster, a nightmare, and yet…
Perhaps her heart is just dark and hollow, but she cannot help but throw herself into the eye of this storm again and again. Some lessons are meant to be repeated, and this is not one that she wishes to ever learn.
The next day, a different sort of tempest tears into her world. It is one that she expects. One that she knows she can't ignore.
She's with Finnick at the trident station, letting him laughingly show her how to throw a trident. Laughingly, because she clearly lacks the necessary skill and strength to heft the weapon through the air and into one of the targets on the other end of the station. Still, Finnick isn't a bad teacher. He shows her how to stand and how to hold the trident, even as he jokes about her lack of arm strength.
His jokes come to a roiling halt when Cashmere storms over, snatches Elara by the elbow, and angrily twists her around. Her expression is tight and barely calm when she stares at Elara, and Elara isn't foolish enough to question the reasons for it. Gloss must have spoken to her.
"Are you insane?" Cashmere immediately hisses, throwing Finnick a glare as she pulls Elara off to the side. Finnick does a decent job pretending not to eavesdrop, but all three of them know that he is. He idly turns a trident around his hands and eyes one of the targets, but his head is tilted towards them and his eyes are flashing with a seriousness that he rarely allows them to possess.
Elara isn't particularly worried about Finnick overhearing them. She's already spoken to him about everything. It had been her priority that morning, making sure that he was aware of her new part in the plans. His acceptance of her is important. Without him and Johanna, she might not be able to convince Katniss to allow her to ally with them. Finnick had told her that if Katniss had her way, none of them would ally with her, and that she shouldn't worry about it too much. He told her he'd look out for her. After years of their similar sufferings, he said it was only right.
If only Cashmere would agree.
"Gloss told you, then?" she murmurs, drawing her arm from Cashmere's tight grip. The Victor from 1, and one of her closest friends, crosses her arms and glowers at her. Her eyes are angry, but they're also fearful. It is a combination of emotion that Elara understands, for it is perfectly mirrored in her own eyes.
Cashmere frowns and quietly seethes, "It's bound to fail, Elara. You know it is. We can't beat the Capitol at its own game. Look what happened the last time people tried. An entire district was wiped out."
Elara opens her mouth to calm her friend, but Cashmere just glowers at her and swiftly says, "But the worst thing about this whole mess is that you've dragged my brother into it. You of all people should know how dangerous it is to hope for something that is never going to happen."
The words sting, just a little. Elara clamps her mouth shut and shoves her hands into her pockets, turning her gaze to the opposite wall as Cashmere's words drift through her. She's right, in a way. Elara does know the dangers that hope brings. Hope is a creature all its own, and it has brimmed up within her many times over the last few years only to come crashing down.
Cashmere sighs, glancing around as she murmurs, "This plan is going to get us all killed. Are you really that selfish? Would you really send Gloss to his death like this?"
Immediately, Elara's gaze snaps up to Cashmere. Her blue eyes are sharp and strong, and when she next speaks, her voice comes out in a hiss of sound. "That's not fair, Cashmere."
Cashmere's eyebrows turn down even further. She stares at Elara for a long moment, then mutters, "I'm not under any illusions that any of us will survive these Games. If the plan does succeed for the others, great, but what about the rest of us? If the Capitol gets their hands on us, we're dead. We're worse than dead. And if you think Snow will stop with us, you're wrong. Think about your sister, Elara."
Something dark and uneasy churls through Elara at this reminder. She has considered this too, of course. She'd be stupid not to think about Amelia and the consequences that might come upon her should they fail. She's already experienced the taste of Snow's vengeance upon her family once before, and she isn't naïve enough to think that Amelia would be safe. But – it's for her that Elara wants to do this. Amelia's tearful words have been ringing through her mind for days now. The way she had begged her not to leave, pleaded her to try to win so that she could come home again…
Either way, they are walking on thin ice. One misstep and they will falter, spinning into the darkness that they try so hard to stay above. There are no right choices this time around. There are only in-betweens.
Elara opens her mouth to respond to her friend, but Finnick's voice smoothly cuts in to say, "I think you should both keep your voices down."
They both turn to look at him, only to find that he has abandoned the trident station and is stepping over to them. His expression is wary and hard, his eyes determined. His usual laid-back nature has been shrouded over by a severity that Elara rarely bears witness to.
Cashmere turns her frown on him, and Finnick raises his eyebrows at her. Him and Cashmere have never gotten along all that well, but neither has their relationship been negative. They have always kept out of each other's way, ignoring the other for the most part. They doubtlessly would have continued to do so had this new plan not drawn them together in ways that only a rebellion can.
Granted, Cashmere hasn't quite come to terms with the possibility of said plan, but Finnick is nothing if not convincing. He idles beside them and quietly says, "You should be thankful that Johanna wanted Elara to be a part of this at all, otherwise you would have gone into that arena blind. You can't possibly say that you don't want your freedom. That you don't want to be rid of the life that Snow has forced you to live. All those hotels rooms – they have a way of ruining you. Do you really want to live out the rest of your life like that?"
Cashmere stares at him in stony silence. The Victor from 1 has a way of inflicting fear into anyone with just one cutting look, but Finnick just stands there and casually tilts his head at her, clearly unimpressed with her glower. He isn't the type to bow in the face of such things.
With an aggravated snort, Cashmere scoffs, "I'd rather be alive than dead."
Finnick just gives her a careful look. It's an expression that's partially understanding, partially pitying, and it seems to rankle her. He slowly murmurs, "It's true that this plan might fail. But I'm going to fight for my freedom. I'm not going to sit back and do nothing when there's a chance for a better life."
With that, Finnick nods to Elara and strides away, leaving the pair to themselves as he heads over to where Mags is sitting on the far side of the training room. He seems to take the anger and the fear away with him, for when Cashmere turns to Elara next, she appears far more resigned and far less aggravated.
"…He looked so hopeful, Elara," she whispers after a long minute of utter silence, broken only by the sounds of the other Victors at various stations. Cashmere stares at her friend with frustrated eyes and breathes, "My brother deserves to be happy. He's been through so much…I don't want him to suffer. You understand that."
It isn't a question. Cashmere knows that Elara understands it. She knows that she agrees with it. Gloss has already suffered enough. They all have, in their own ways.
Elara swallows thickly and grasps Cashmere's arm. She breathes out and tells her, "I love him, Cashmere. I love him."
She's never said the words aloud. It's funny, in a way, that when she finally does, it is not to Gloss but to his sister. And yet, in another way, it all makes sense. Cashmere gives her a painful smile and pats her hand. She sighs out heavily.
"I know you do," she whispers. "You'll look after him, if I'm not there to do it myself. Promise me."
Elara frowns. "Cash – "
"Just say it," Cashmere glares, and Elara sighs.
"…I promise," she tells her, though inside she wonders if she'll be able to keep that promise. She isn't a fighter. She doubts she'd even be able to look after herself, let alone Gloss. But inside, Elara knows that that isn't the sort of protection Cashmere is asking for. The protection she is speaking of goes far deeper than physical wounds.
"I'm glad that we're friends, Cash," Elara tells her after a moment. The two of them are standing side by side now, looking out over the sea of stations and Victors who, in a few days' time, will turn from friends to enemies. She hopes that their friendship will remain intact.
Cashmere just chuckles and murmurs, "If our lives weren't as shitty as they are, we'd be sisters by now."
And, with one last knowing look, Cashmere heads off down the line of stations, leaving Elara standing behind her with eyes that feel just a little more watery than they ought to.
"Are you ready for the private sessions?" Gloss asks her later on, when he comes over to where she's standing by the snare station. Elara jerks in surprise, clearly not expecting his sudden appearance, and he smirks and crouches down beside her in the tall grasses. The training station is a large oval of grass and saplings, just big enough to give one the illusion that they are in a forest and not in the training center.
"…I'm ready," Elara tells him once the surprise dies down. She turns her attention back to the snare she's trying to set. While she's hardly a hunter, the mechanical aspects of the contraption appeal to her mindset, and her fingers move quickly over it as she drags one of the wires into place. She moves too fast though, and ends up sliding her forefinger over the sharp edge of the wire. When she cuts herself, she jerks her hand away with a glower, and petulantly sighs down at the droplets of blood.
Gloss doesn't say a word. Instead he just gives the rest of the room a quick glance before reaching for her hand and lifting it to his mouth. He presses a kiss to her palm first, then drops her hand into his lap and firmly presses the edge of his shirt against the cut to stop the bleeding.
Elara looks strangely bashful in lieu of his actions, especially when he continues their conversation as if nothing had happened.
"What are you going to do for your session?" he asks.
She glances up at him and tries to wrangle her hand back, but he's got it in a tight grip. With an exasperated sigh, she grumbles, "I don't fucking know, Gloss. Maybe I'll just make small talk with the Gamemakers."
He purses his lips at her tone and looks down at her finger, focusing for now on seeing if the bleeding has stopped yet. As he does, Elara frowns and mutters, "Sorry. I…didn't mean to say that."
He swallows and says, "I just want to make sure you'll be okay." He says the words as if they are stilted, shadowed with more than just a blaze of fear. She rarely hears his voice take on such a sound, and it makes her feel all the worse for having been so sarcastic with him.
With a sigh, she twists her hand in his, fingers tangling. Her finger isn't bleeding anymore, and he doesn't do anything to stop her when she sidles closer and murmurs, "You know I'm not weak, Gloss. I can take care of myself. You don't have to worry so much about me."
True, she isn't as strong as he is. Not physically, anyway. But – there are other forms of strength that she possesses, and he knows that by now. God, does he know. It takes a very strong person to deal with the manipulation Elara Winston has dealt with over the past eight years. A life of forced prostitution is not for the weak-hearted.
He grips her hand tighter and hoarsely murmurs, "I just…I wish things were different. I want to protect you."
To be her shield, in times of trouble. To be her rock, when she needs to break down. To be whatever she needs him to be, at whatever moment, in whatever universe. He wants her to need him, because he needs her just as much, though he dares not say the words aloud. When he glances up at her face, he knows that he doesn't have to, though. Elara sees those words as clear as day as if they are written across the very planes of his face.
"I want to protect you," she responds, and he lets out a strangled laugh full of emotions he does not want to acknowledge.
"What a mess we're in," he murmurs to her, but thinks to himself that he wouldn't have it any other way. This thing between them has grown wild. It had been left untended for years, allowed to take root in places he had not anticipated. Like weeds, his feelings for Elara – and her feelings for him – have shot up out of the dark earth and into a world that should, by all accounts, have suffocated them long ago. Yet the weeds are still there, the roots still tangled together, and even if this rebellious plan does not go the way they intend it to, he knows without a doubt that it will not be easy to cut away those feelings.
She just gives him a stilted smile that looks more like a grimace than anything else, and flips his hand over to trace the lines of his palm. She turns her eyes down, studying the familiar callouses. If she were artistically inclined, she could probably draw his hand from memory. The thought saddens her as much as it breathes life through her. She wonders if it will always be this way – this mixture of pain and pleasure, of hope and tragedy.
With a soft sigh, she brings his hand to her lips and kisses it. When she pulls back, she whispers, "The interviews are tonight. Do you know what angle you're playing?"
He shrugs, thumbing over the back of her hand as he murmurs, "Cash and I have always been the Capitol's children, even back during our first Games. It's the best angle we've got."
She hums in agreement. It is. The Capitol adores the District 1 Victors. They love every Victor from District 1, but they probably love Gloss and Cashmere the most. They see the pair as an extension of themselves. In a way, calling them the Capitol's children is a phrase that makes plenty of sense. She wonders what they would think if they knew what sorts of people the siblings really are. Any favor they had felt towards the Capitol had quickly drained away after their Games, once the veil that had kept the silent horrors at bay was lifted. Cashmere was forced to visit a multitude of hotel rooms when she won, and Gloss…
Gloss has his fair share of horrors too. He tiptoes the line between prostitution and photoshoots, venturing into both worlds equally. He's never had nearly as many clients as Finnick, but he's been to plenty of hotel rooms all the same, and a person does not forget an experience like that. Not easily, anyway.
Gloss squeezes her hand and asks, "What about you? Are you going to be the sarcastic Elara Winston that the Capitol loves, or somebody else?"
She gives him a wry expression that's tinted with amusement, and he smiles crookedly at her. With a chuckle, she says, "…I think this time around I'm just going to be myself."
At this, his eyebrows raise, eyes flashing into hers as his crooked smile turns into a smirk. "Oh? I'm not sure the Capitol could take that."
She laughs at him and releases his hand to swat at his shoulder playfully. He darts back with a chuckle.
"You can take it. I'm sure other people can too," is all she says, and his smirk turns downright sinful.
He leans forward and murmurs lowly, "Yes, but I've taken pretty much all of you by now, so I'm used to how aggravating you are."
She gives him a look, eyes roving his face as she mutters, "Aggravating?" She raises a challenging eyebrow at him and he purses his lips to keep his smile at bay.
"Mmhmm," he drawls, and then playfully adds, "You're a fucking wildcat, Winston. Half the time I don't even know what to do with you."
Her eyes flash with mirth. She smiles and shrugs, "I think you know exactly what to do with me, Gloss."
He doesn't answer with words, but the way his eyes gleam at her with the dark traces of desire tells her everything she needs to know and more. He hums and gives her one last smirk before standing up and straightening out his shirt. As he glances around the room, he says, "I'll see you at the private sessions later. I'm going to go take a shower and try to get Cashmere to talk to me."
At this, Elara rocks back on her heels and carefully wonders, "She won't talk to you? Is she still angry?"
He rolls his eyes and gruffly responds, "You know how she is. She'll come around before we enter the arena, but until then, she's giving me the cold silent treatment."
It isn't very surprising to Elara that Cashmere is against the plan that Haymitch had told her about. The blonde Victor isn't loyal to the Capitol – far from it, really – but she's also very careful about not inciting the wrath of their president. She's always been like that, for as long as Elara has known her. And, having been on the receiving end of Cashmere's 'cold silent treatment' herself many times, she can't help but feel a little bad for Gloss.
With a wince, she says, "Good luck."
He just gives her an exasperated look that silently says 'yeah right' and lopes away, smiling slightly when he hears Elara's amused snort as he goes.