He's got the next day off. He goes out with Chaff with the intention of finding sponsors for their kids. Maybe they do, but the details are pretty fuzzy by the time he returns to the Training Center for the interviews.
His kids look great. He makes sure Cinna knows he thinks so, and Effie glows at this display of good manners.
Katniss actually does okay in her interview, although Cinna's dress does most of the heavy lifting. Caesar makes her look good.
Peeta's great. Funny, charming, just like in practice. Then he makes them all remember him by admitting his feelings for Katniss. Haymitch watches Katniss and sees she's blushing. Could be with anger, but then she hides her face in her skirt to hide her expression. Good girl.
He tries to talk to Finnick as they're all leaving, but gets caught up with reporters asking him to talk about Peeta and Katniss. It's his turn now.
"Were Peeta and Katniss dating back in 12?"
"Does Katniss have a boyfriend back home?"
Haymitch waves his hands for quiet.
"This is the first we're all hearing of it. Should be an interesting Games, though, eh? We never had two tributes in love."
Then he starts pushing through the crowd, Effie staying close and following in his wake.
She squeals and jumps up and down in the elevator. "Finally!" she says. "Some tributes with something to say!"
Haymitch can't tell if the urge to grab her and pin her to the wall is lustful or violent, so contents himself with biting his tongue and not looking at her.
They reach the apartment and see Peeta on the floor, amidst broken shards of pottery. His hands are bleeding.
Haymitch thinks he might be about to hit Katniss, who confesses to pushing Peeta, and then gets angry about Peeta helping her at the cost of his own life. Christ, he'd like to hit something!
They get Katniss calmed down, the girl is stubborn as a donkey, and they all settle down to eat dinner and watch the interviews again. Haymitch watches Peeta. Did he hope Katniss would react favorably to him? Well, what 16-year-old boy wouldn't?
It's like the sofa he's sitting on, the screen he's watching, and the people around him disappear.
He's 14. He sees Terra walking home. He crawls through the fence separating the Meadow from the rest of the Seam and calls out to her.
She turns around. Her hair is a big, red, curly mass around her round face. Her nose tilts up at the end. Her pale, ivory skin is beset with a million, million freckles. She's the most beautiful girl in District 12, maybe all of Panem.
"Hey, Terra," he says, and puts a flower behind her ear.
She touches the flower, and smiles. Her teeth are crooked. He's filled with love.
He's already tall, the tallest in his tall family. Terra is tall too, but he has to lean down to kiss her. It's just a quick brushing of lips together, not his first, and he can tell it's not hers either. When he opens his eyes, she throws her arms around him, her hair obscuring his vision. He puts his hands on her waist. A certain low warmth and rising sensation causes him to break the embrace before he embarrasses both of them.
"Let's go for a walk," she says, and takes his hand.
He doesn't remember where they walked. Just that they held hands until he walked her home.
Someone's hand brushes his now, where it's dangling behind the sofa. Cinna is looking at him strangely. He fidgets, brings his attention back to the screen, where Peeta is again declaring his love for Katniss. A thousand ideas about which sponsors to approach and what to say to each of them enters his mind. He's thankful to Cinna for bringing him back to the here and now. Terra hasn't needed him in a long, long time. The dead ones, Peeta and Katniss, he corrects himself, do need him, now. And he plans to help them until they're beyond his help.
After the interviews, Portia and Cinna make their departure. Effie says something clueless yet again. He'd like to get a hold on this ridiculous attraction to her. She'd probably react the way Katniss reacted to Peeta, and push him out of a window. Well, that's one way to go, he thinks.
Effie leaves, and now it's just the three of them. He won't see them tomorrow before they go into the arena. It's the stupidest tradition, but it's also a relief.
"Any final words of advice?" Peeta asks. He looks nervous. Haymitch is overwhelmed by the desire to bundle them into a Capitol car and see how far they can get. Probably wouldn't even make it to the car.
"When the gong sounds, get the hell out of there. You're neither of you up to the bloodbath at the Cornucopia. Just clear out, put as much distance between yourselves and the others, and find a source of water. Got it?"
They nod.
Katniss asks, "And after that?"
After that? He can count on one hand the number of his dead ones that made it through the first day and night. A million pieces of advice strike him. Don't eat anything you don't recognize, find a place in the foliage to survive and hide, no fires unless you're ready for a fight, careful with your water source, no direct sunlight to avoid burns and stiffness when fighting.
"Stay alive," he says, and he means it. Please, please, please, one of you, stay alive.
He goes straight to Effie's room and knocks. She always stays in the apartment until the tributes are in the arena, then goes back to spending her nights in her apartment.
She opens the door, still in full regalia. At least he won't have to wait for her to get ready.
"Let's go get some sponsors," he says.
She beams at him. "So," she says, slipping her high heels on her feet, "You're finally taking an interest." Her wig is as high as his chin with her heels on. "What do you think of their chances?"
"I don't want to speculate. But if you could make some introductions for me, I think their chances will improve."
Effie looks surprised.
"What? Are we going or not?"
"Yes," she says, blinking quickly and grabbing her jacket. The nights get cold here, even in summer. She's quiet all the way to the elevator.
"You've never said I could improve the tributes' chances before."
Haymitch clears his throat. "We've never had kids like these ones before."
She smiles sadly. "No, I guess we haven't."
They leave the Training Center and Effie hails a cab. She takes them to a lounge with quiet music, pulsing neon lights, and little, tiny, cloth-covered tables. The interviews are playing on big screens on each wall of the room, and official betting tables are set up in a corner, and a lot of unofficial bookies are scuttling through the crowd.
Haymitch tries to squash the feeling of loathing making the bile rise in his throat. He remembers his advice to Katniss and tries to be charming when Effie introduces him to an extremely corpulent woman wearing a purple fur coat and dripping in jewels. She's had two diamond inserts in her cheeks. He wonders where else she might have diamonds inserted, and tries hard not to think about it while he talks about his tributes.
The woman loves the soap operas the Capitol produces in between Games. She married rich, and has taken a lot of young, unattainable lovers since her husband died. She's almost dying herself, waiting for someone to love her the way Peeta loves Katniss. He makes allusions that she's a lot like Katniss, and walks away knowing Effie helped him land a rich sponsor before the Games have even started.
It's getting late, but Effie takes him to two more places, making quick introductions, and stilling him with a hand on his arm when she thinks they have a sure thing.
They get back to the Training Center as dawn is breaking.
"Effie! You were great! We might get some help this year."
He hugs her. He's had a lot to drink, but it's made him happy for once. Or maybe the woman in his arms has made him happy.
She hugs him back and then they just stand there, holding each other.
She says into his jacket, "Wouldn't it be amazing to have another victor from 12? You would finally have a partner, Haymitch."
He tightens his arms around her, his face buried in her hair, her pink curls obscuring his vision.
"I already have a partner," he says. "I'm sorry I never realized it before."
Effie, incredibly, giggles. "Well, I've never seen you this sober before a Game. I'm sure you've realized a lot this year."
Haymitch smiles. "Yeah, I think so."
They release each other.
"I'll see you in the Viewing Room in an hour."
"You got it. Sweetheart."
She blushes, and walks away. Haymitch watches her go, before going to his room for a shower. A cold one.