DISCLAIMER: HG CHARACTERS DO NOT BELONG TO ME, BUT OC ONES DO

A/N: I asked this question in my other story, but I am contemplating writing a Galeniss one shot for V-day, let me know if this is something you would like to see, and if you have any ideas for a plot, post in the review section please.

Chapter 160-The Last Goodbye II

March 13 (Saturday)

Gale and Juniper sit in the back of the taxi as they head towards Katniss's Mom's apartment. They arrived in District 4 early this morning, having taken a hovercraft flight. With Juniper off from school for the next week for spring break, Gale was able to convince his youngest daughter to visit her Grandmother for the week. Gale and Juniper were excited that they both would get to see Sienna, for she was still in District 4 until March 31 and got approval to be off Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.

Deciding to stay in District 4 until Tuesday morning to spend as much time as he could with his oldest Daughter and Brother, he booked a hotel room at the same hotel he has gone to since becoming a District official. Having stayed there for business trips and personal trips with Katniss numerous times throughout the years, for it is close to his Mother-in-Law's apartment. He was eager to see his hotel room for the property was recently renovated, the hotel having been closed for almost one year.

Like Juniper, he too was off the entire week, having arranged his vacation week months before. His original plan to try to see Sienna the week he was off before she headed to District 12 to finish her final residency rotation and see Rory as well. He had also hoped the week he was off, to head to District 8 to see Posy, and bring Cassandra with him.

But receiving Katniss's box of letters and videos caused tension between them. Even though Katniss gave her blessing in her video message for him to find love again and in fact encouraged it, he could not help but have a knee jerk reaction to finding Cassandra in their room. The room they had shared together as a couple for over twenty years.

After he had time by himself to come to terms with Katniss's message, and had given Juniper and Avery their letters and message, he had reached out to Cassandra to apologize. He had asked if they could have a virtual call, so he could look at her face as he explained his actions that day at the house. He is relieved when she accepts his apology and while he invited her to District 4 with him and Juniper, she had to decline for she had her first runway show of the year today. And while they had not seen each other, he made sure he found time each day to call her.

After they arrive at the apartment, he is quickly distracted catching up with Mrs. Everdeen and Sienna. The four of them go out to lunch and spend the rest of the afternoon walking along the ocean boardwalk and browsing the nearby shops. While Sienna's apartment in District 4 was small, she had a pull-out bed that was built into the wall of her living room so Juniper could spend the night tonight. Gale goes with his Daughters back to Sienna's apartment after they all have dinner together, and when he leaves at 8 pm, he gives Sienna a small box and tells her to open the box in private either later tonight or tomorrow morning. She gives him a curious look as she takes it, then hugs him and tells him she will see him tomorrow morning.

Once he arrives back at his hotel, he takes a shower and once he is finished, he takes out his phone and calls Cassandra, but she does not answer. Figuring she was still at her modeling event; he decides to send her a message instead:

Thought I would try to catch you before I go to bed, had a long day. Hope your show was good and that we can talk tomorrow. I love you.

The next morning when he awakens, he sees her reply:

The show went well, I wished you could have been there. I do not have any events or photoshoots until Tuesday, so I am free to talk whenever. Love you too.

He then sees she has sent a picture from yesterday; he frowns as he sees her hair is now bright blue, and her hair has been cut to her shoulders. While he liked the length, he did not care for yet another crazy hair color. He sees she is dressed in a long, peacock printed dress, with different shades of blue.

He decides to head over to Sienna's apartment at 11 am, once he arrives, he is met by Sienna at the door who motions for him to be quiet for he sees Juniper is still asleep. Sienna motions for her Father to follow her into her room and she closes the door once he enters.

Gale notices her room is small, but nice, for the apartment was designed to maximize space. He knows she does not mind the small apartment for she was hardly ever there, for she often worked on average 12 hours a day sometimes more at the hospital.

She thanks him for bringing Katniss's letter and video message, but then hands the box back to him.

"You don't want to keep it here?" Gale asks in surprise.

"No, I want to keep it at the house, can you put it in my room?"

"Of course."

"It is too important; I can't risk anything happening to it."

She goes on to tell him that Katniss's letters and message moved her to tears, and that she is so thankful that she has a final goodbye message from her. She also tells him, that she can watch the message and read the letters when she is at the house, and that it is something she can look forward to.

Once they exit her room, they see Juniper begin to wake up, and once Juniper is dressed and ready, the three of them grab lunch to go and head to Katniss's Mom's apartment. After they eat the four of them head to the District's marina, and they are happily greeted by Rory, who will be taking them on a chartered boat ride. Like yesterday, the time flies by for Gale, as he enjoys catching up with his Brother. He learns nothing new is happening in his life, but that his work is going well and that he finally had saved enough money to purchase the boat that they were currently riding around in. Rory explaining to Gale he waited all these years to purchase the boat he always dreamed of having and did not want to settle for a smaller boat and buy something he would not be completely happy with. Rory surprises them by taking the boat out to an area called "Pelican Beach". When they arrive, they see it is an area with a small sandbar, and they see tons of small birds and pelicans resting. They also see, a tall wooden structure that looked like a hut far off to the left-hand side. Rory begins steering the boat over to the hut, explaining that this was a place locals came to. They climb off the boat and head up the hut, Gale and Rory helping Mrs. Everdeen for the ladder like steps were quite far apart. Once they are inside, they see that the hut is a small bar. Gale and Rory grab a drink as Sienna and Juniper take off their shorts and shirt and head into the water, their swimsuits underneath their clothes. After Gale finishes his drink, he heads into the water joining his Daughters as Rory stays in the hut with Mrs. Everdeen. Gale, Sienna, and Juniper are amazed by the amount of fish they see under the hut, with Sienna seeing a large crab climb up one of the hut's large poles.

Once they are done swimming, the three of them sit out in the sun on the hut's deck to dry off. Rory brings to Sienna a beer and hands Gale another one. Juniper, feeling left out that the adults were drinking alcoholic drinks, asks her Father if she can have a sip and once Gale pours her a sip of his and hands it to her, the four of them laugh as she takes a sip and makes a face, saying that the beer tasted terrible.

"Its an acquired taste" Sienna says to her little Sister.

"I don't know how you guys can drink that."

"Maybe you will like wine better, Grandma E has really good wine at her place" Sienna says.

"You can only have a taste and only if your Father is okay with it" Mrs. Everdeen says to Juniper, looking over at Gale making sure it is okay.

Gale nods at her and says, "I think the three of you spending the evening tonight tasting wine sound like fun."

Juniper grins, happy that she can participant in an adult activity, but her Grandmother reminds her that her tastings will be limited.

Once they return to the marina, Gale lets Rory know they will meet him at the restaurant at 7 pm for dinner. Gale then heads back to the hotel to get ready, as Sienna and Juniper go with Mrs. Everdeen back to her apartment. After he is showered and dressed, he sees the time is 6:10 pm, and he has just enough time to try to call Cassandra.

He smiles as he sees her beautiful face answer the virtual call. "Hey" he says cheerily once she tells him hello.

She tells him she in Red Rocks, and that she decided to come early this morning and will be staying until tomorrow night. He can tell by her demeanor that something was wrong.

"What's wrong?" he says frowning.

"Nothing, I just wanted to spend some quiet time here at the cottage by myself."

"I can tell when something is bothering you. Did something happen at the show?"

"The show was fine. Tell me about your day."

"Cassandra talk to me" he says in a stern manner.

"I'm fine Gale" she responds in an annoyed tone.

Knowing he has to try a different approach, he lowers his voice and says in a gentler tone, "Baby, I want to help, please tell me what is bothering you."

He sees her look down and smile, for he knows she likes it when he calls her that. She looks back up at him and says, "I'm fine, can we drop this please?"

He nods his head in defeat and begins telling her about his day. Once he is finished, he sees the time is 6:20, he tells her he needs to get going for he was heading to the apartment first so they could all walk together to the restaurant to meet Rory.

"Before I go, I wanted to tell you, I talked to my Sister this morning, I will be flying out to District 8 to visit her on Wednesday morning and staying till Friday, I know you have work, but I was hoping you would consider joining me. You can always just come for the day."

She pauses, thinking over his proposal before saying, "I'll have to see if another model can take my place, I have three photoshoots scheduled for Thursday and Friday."

"Okay, just let me know. I can come to the Capitol on Saturday if you are free. Juniper does not fly home until Sunday afternoon so it would be easy for me to head to District 2's hovercraft port from your place."

"You don't have to be home to take care of the cats?"

"Nope-they are in boarding until Sunday."

She nods and tells him she will talk to him tomorrow then says goodbye. Surprised that she did not say her typical 'love you' or 'I love you, can't wait to see you soon' before she hung up, for in the three months since reuniting, she has told him she loved him every time they ended a conversation when they were not intimate.

He tries not to let what happened bother him as he leaves and finds himself distracted again once he is with his family. After dinner, he heads with Rory to a local bar as Sienna, Juniper, and Katniss's Mom head back to the apartment to begin their night of wine tasting.

While having drinks with Rory he tells his Brother about Katniss's box of letters and messages, and what happened with Cassandra at the house and Cassandra's unusual behavior tonight.

"Something happened at the show, I know it did."

"Maybe she really is fine, you have to trust what she says" Rory says in response.

"You don't understand, the modeling company she works for, the-" but he pauses, unsure if he should say anymore.

"What?" Rory says, encouraging his Brother to continue.

"The owner is not a good person, Rory. His name is Ethan McCalister."

Rory pauses for a second, taking in the name. After a few seconds he says to Gale, "I know that name."

Gale nods and says, "I figured you might. He is the same age as you, he's 49 and originally from District 2, I thought maybe the two of you were in the same class in school. I saw that he was from the downtown area of the District."

"He was hard to forget, he was a jerk in school."

"He lives in the Capitol now, he became a successful businessman, he has a younger brother who is 46 named Kyle."

"Don't know him."

"Ethan owns several companies in the Capitol, Kyle is in charge of one of the companies he owns, but the modeling company Cassandra works at is called MC2 Models."

"How do you know all this?"

Gale pauses and looks straight ahead towards the dark ocean and takes a sip of his drink. They are sitting outside, in an open-air bar facing the water. "I think I mentioned before, Cassandra and I, have had an off and on relationship for a little over a year. When I first met her, I did not want it to be serious, I wasn't ready. Then when I was finally ready for a serious relationship, she ended things because-I wasn't there for her when I should have been. During our time apart, she had gone on a few dates with the younger brother-Kyle. He was abusive towards her, physically and sexually. She managed to get away from him, and Avery found her hiding in a bathroom and brought her back to her apartment and called me. It is how we ended up getting back together. She asked me not to interfere, for she wanted to still keep her job, but I still looked them up in the registry once I learned which company she worked for."

"She just started working for them?"

"Yeah, she used to work for AMB where Avery works, that's how we met."

"Why did she leave?"

"She didn't leave AMB, they terminated her contract."

Rory gives Gale a confused look and Gale sighs and says, "Avery-she couldn't accept our relationship, so she lied to AMB and had Cassandra fired."

Rory looks at Gale in shock and says, "Wow, Gale, I cannot believe Avery would do that."

"She saw the two of us before I could tell her myself, that didn't help the situation and she didn't know it at the time but-"

Rory gives him another confused look and Gale gives him an apologetic look then says, "She didn't know at the time she was pregnant."

"WHAT?" Rory shouts.

Gale then goes into detail explaining to his Brother what happened last fall, how Avery miscarried four weeks later, and how he had to send her to District 12 to pull her out of her depression. He then tells his Brother it was because of what happened between Avery and Cassandra that Cassandra broke up with him last fall. He then apologizes to his Brother for keeping this from him. Rory accepts his apology but does not hold back in letting Gale know that he often feels removed from the family and has for many years.

"I know it is harder now that my Nieces and Nephews are older, but you and Vick used to come visit me more. Mom too, I know she is older now and she cannot travel anymore. But it bothers me to learn you were going to be a Grandfather and you kept that from me."

Gale cringes at hearing his younger Brother refer to him as a Grandfather. While he did not mind getting older when he was still married, he was having a harder time accepting the fact he would be 60 sooner rather than later. And given the fact that he was almost a Grandfather did not give him any sense of comfort. "I really am sorry. The only reason I told Vick was because I was afraid Jack would let it slip to Taran or Taran would overhear a conversation between Jack and Avery. Jack and Avery are talking again, which makes me happy, the two of them grew apart after Katniss died."

"I get it, and I know you are all busy."

"I'll talk to Vick and Posy about the three of us coming to visit. We will plan for this summer I promise."

Rory gives an appreciative smile and says, "What are you going to do about Avery and Cassandra?"

"I don't know, Avery is trying, but…she still keeps her distance, and I don't know why."

"I don't envy you, sounds like too much drama to deal with."

"You have no idea" then Gale quickly changes the subject to talk about something more pleasant. When he lived in District 12 and then in 13 during the war, he thought being in Katniss's life and dealing with the drama of the Capitol and her and Peeta's relationship was too much drama. But dealing with the dramatics of his Daughter and girlfriend along with the dramatics of his teenage Daughter's fears regarding his relationship takes things to a whole new level.

They stay at the bar for another two hours talking and ordering more drinks. When they leave, they share a taxi, with Gale getting dropped off to his hotel first. He sleeps in the next morning and arrives at Katniss's Mom's apartment shortly before noon just in time for lunch. When he arrives, he learns that Sienna spent the night, for she drank quite a bit of wine while snacking on cheese and crackers. Mrs. Everdeen informs him that Juniper had four small tastings, and that she learned she does not like red wine and prefers white. Mrs. Everdeen prepares a chicken salad for lunch, and once they have finished eating the four of them relax at the apartment for the rest of the day, watching TV and playing board games. For dinner they decide to order in, with Gale ordering seafood delivered to the apartment from a nearby restaurant. They tear into their food once it comes, for the place he ordered from was one of the best seafood restaurants in the District.

Once they are finished eating, they decide to go on a walk. Once the sun goes down the temperature drops and Gale's glad he brought his jacket and puts it on as they head out, Sienna, Juniper and Katniss's Mom all wearing jackets as well. After walking for a few blocks Mrs. Everdeen says she is heading back, and Gale tells her he will walk back with her and tells Juniper and Sienna he will see them back at the apartment later.

Once they arrive back to the apartment, Gale leaves his coat on as he tells her about Katniss's box of messages and letters. He explains to her the call he got from his lawyer last week, how the box should have been delivered in August, and explained that he did not want to risk mailing her letter and having it get lost. He then reaches into the inside of his coat pocket and pulls out the sealed letter and hands it to her.

Unable to hide the emotion on her face, she inhales sharply as she takes the letter and holds it close to her chest. She closes her eyes, forcing herself to hold back her tears. She then opens her eyes and says, "Thank you. I'm going to head into my room."

"Sure, if you don't mind, I'll take the keys and head downstairs and wait in the lobby for Sienna and Juniper."

She nods and says, "The three of you should go do something fun, I think they both would like that, Juniper especially." She then reaches up and hugs him, showing him her appreciation.

Once he is downstairs waiting in the lobby for Sienna and Juniper, he has an uneasy feeling that he cannot explain. Once Sienna and Juniper walk into the lobby, the three of them decide to see a movie, and take a taxi to the District's multiplex movie theatre. Once the movie is over, he takes a taxi back to the hotel and hands Sienna the keys and she takes Juniper back to Mrs. Everdeen's apartment.

The next day, he receives a message from Sienna letting him know she and Juniper will meet him at the meeting location they agreed on yesterday. The three of them spend the day relaxing at the beach, and later meet Mrs. Everdeen and Rory for dinner at a restaurant near the marina. Gale notices Katniss's Mom is quieter than usual, and he tells himself most likely it is due to giving her Katniss's letter yesterday. She stays the entire time however, the five of them continuing to talk long after they have finished eating.

As they exit the restaurant, they say their goodbyes to each other, Juniper hugging Gale and letting him know she will message him. He hugs Sienna and Rory before saying his final goodbye to Katniss's Mom. He notices the hug she gives him lasts slightly longer than usual and he watches as she and Juniper get into a taxi to head back to her apartment.

Later, he would look back on this long weekend and be thankful for the time he spent with Katniss's Mom, for it was the last time he would ever see her again.