The night before the interviews, Haymitch asks how it's going, to tell him what they've learned.
Trudie tells him about the edible plants and fungi, and how to collect rainwater and purify river water. It sounds like there will be some freshwater sources, at least.
Bennet tells him about learning how to use a sword, a mace, and a trident.
"And?" Haymitch asks.
Bennet stops eating his food, and looks at Haymitch, his face blank.
"Have you been to the plant station? Learned to make a fire?"
Bennet shakes his head. He looks apprehensive, and Haymitch realizes he was waving his knife around while he spoke. He sets it down, tries to fight panic.
He had specifically told this idiot not to mess around with swords until he had learned something useful. The dolt had watched as many Games as Haymitch had, and he thought he stood a chance with Career weapons?
"Bennet, those Career tributes have been training since birth with those weapons. A weapon is always handy, but three days of sword training is not going to help you survive!"
Bennet looks hurriedly down at his plate. His face is beet red. Trudie has stopped eating, and is also watching her plate. She looks a little green.
Haymitch is furious with himself. Why did he wait three days to check in with them? He should have asked the first day. It's not like they get another shot at the training room.
"Never mind," he says, sighing. He sees a tear fall down Bennet's cheek, into his food, and feels sick with himself. "Who knows what might be useful when it comes down to it. Don't worry about it. Finish your dinner, and we'll watch your scores."
They finish their meal in silence, and head over to the sitting area. Haymitch turns on the television, and they wait for the scores. They're replaying the chariot ride for anyone who might have missed it. Just like every year, the tributes from 12 are dressed as scantily clad coal miners. Trudie's tits and ass had been hanging out, and Bennet hadn't been much better off. It had been miserable to watch, and Haymitch doesn't appreciate having to reassure them they look good enough to bag a sponsor or two because of this rerun.
Caesar Flickerman appears, talking about his favorite costumes and stylists. Then he says, "And now, what you've all been waiting for, the tribute scores!"
The Careers all pull 9's and 10's, of course. The girl from 5 pulls an 8. Haymitch tells Trudie and Bennet to watch out for her, that's not to be ignored. The rest are all low ranking. Bennet gets a four, and storms out of the room. Trudie gets a six.
"A six isn't bad," says Haymitch, getting up, and turning off the television. He's finding it difficult to turn around and look at her. He sighs, and does turn around. Trudie is crying into her hands.
Haymitch feels his face get hot. He's never been good at cheering people up. He sits next to her, and pats her awkwardly on the back.
"I don't want to die," says Trudie in a thick voice. She wipes snot from her nose with the back of a hand, and doesn't seem to know what to do next. He hands her a tissue. He had never seen one before his trips to the Capitol. They're like paper handkerchiefs, and you're supposed to throw them away after one use.
"Thanks," Trudie says, wiping off her hand. "S-sorry, I'm crying."
Haymitch is surprised. Does he seem angry? Why is she apologizing? He should be apologizing. She has every right to cry and be scared.
"Just don't cry during your interview," he says, and she giggles weakly.
"Get some sleep. We'll talk about interview strategy in the morning."
She takes another pass with the tissue under her eyes and nose, and leaves. Haymitch looks out the window. He wonders what Bennet is doing in his room. He thinks of Bennet crying after Haymitch got irritated over him not listening about the swords. Why was he such an ass? The kid fucked up, but now they think he's angry with them.
Suddenly, it feels like all the air has left the room. He remembers the garden on the roof, and leaves their apartment and goes up the stairs.
Haymitch reaches the garden and takes a step back. The District 11 mentors are here, Seeder and Chaff.
They see him, and call him over. They're smiling and passing a bottle back and forth.
"What's good, District 12?" asks Seeder, passing him the bottle.
"Very little," he says, and takes a drink of white liquor, like his dad always had around. Seeder and Chaff are laughing. It feels good, somehow, to sit above the Training Center and all it contains, and drink and laugh like he's back home with his friends. Until he remembers Bennet slamming his door after his score, and Trudie saying, "I don't want to die."
There's a slight breeze, and it's rattling the leaves in the trees of the garden. It sounds nice, a little like he's in the Meadow.
He takes a second drink and passes the bottle to Chaff. He's never been this close to him. He won his Games the year before he was eligible himself, and he had paid extra attention that year, trying to feel even kind of prepared for the worst thing that could happen to a kid from the districts.
Chaff had fought hard. He had never stopped, never gave up. When a pack of vicious mutts came pouring out of a mountain cave, Chaff had run along with everyone else in the vicinity, but he had fallen and shattered his arm on a boulder, and he had degloved his hand. Chaff had just held the bleeding, gruesome appendage to his chest with his other hand, and kept running, while the mutt pack took apart the last three tributes. When the hovercraft had picked him up, he had been gray from blood loss and shock.
Haymitch had admired his dogged resolve to just keep going. He had tried to remember that in his Games when…
He stops that thought in its tracks. After his victory interview with Flickerman, he had never once thought about his Games.
"Where'd you go, 12?" asks Chaff.
Haymitch blinks, and realizes Chaff and Seeder are both looking at him.
"Far away," he says, and Chaff laughs again.
Seeder smiles kindly. "A man of few words. You could learn a thing or two, Chaff." Chaff just shakes his head in mock dismay, and hands her the bottle. She takes a drink and says, "How are your kids?"
"My… Oh, they're okay. Well, no they're not."
Chaff looks at Seeder before saying, "We saw their scores."
"So did they."
That gets a big guffaw from Chaff. He sure laughs a lot.
"You're all right, 12," he says. "Listen, your kids, they're gonna die. Our kids -" he looks at Seeder, who nods for him to continue. "They're gonna die. A Career from 1, or 2, or 4, is going to kill our kids while we sit in the Viewing Room and watch, not able to do a thing about it."
"So what's the point?" he asks, and is embarrassed to realize he shouted it. "Sorry." Seeder passes him the bottle, and he takes a bigger drink than before. "I just mean, we bring them here, dress them up, tell them they're going to be 'trained', but it's all just so kids from the same three districts can kill kids from the other nine. Why not just toss them in the arena? Why have mentors at all?"
Haymitch realizes he's ranting, waving the bottle around. It's a bad look. He passes the bottle back to Chaff.
Neither of them say anything for a minute or more, and Haymitch has time to wonder what fresh hell the Capitol is cooking up for him after that little outburst.
When one of them does speak, it's Chaff, looking at the ground.
"We're not here to give these kids hope. We can try. And hope can be a powerful thing." He sighs, sits back on his bench, and takes a long pull from the bottle. "But all this?" He gestures around, encompassing the Training Center and the stupidity of the week preceding the Games. "It's not for them. It's not for hope. It's to remind us, the victors, who's really in control."
"Mm-hmm," says Seeder.
They're quiet, passing the bottle around, all of them thinking about the Capitol, the Games, the inescapable futility of their lives.
"Well, I'm for bed," says Seeder, taking one last drink. "You should go to sleep, too, District 12."
But Haymitch is feeling good for the first time in over a year.
Chaff tells him funny stories about District 11, times he and Seeder have got in trouble for drinking, and a little about the other victors.
Haymitch is laughing and egging him on.
Chaff checks his watch.
"Oh, shit, 12. We better get some sleep. Interviews tomorrow." He stands up, stretches, and offers his good hand to Haymitch.
He almost doesn't take it, but quickly realizes it will be harder than he thought to get off his bench. Once he's on his feet, he stumbles, and Chaff catches him, a little awkwardly, with his other arm. Then he starts singing a song at the top of his lungs.
"BLOW, BLOW, BLOW THE MAN DOWN!"
Haymitch recoils, scared of the boom of sound, until he realizes it's Chaff singing a song he's never heard before.
He's giggling when Chaff drops him off at his apartment door.
"Sleep, go to sleep," says Chaff, when Haymitch puts his arm around Chaff's shoulders and cries, "Another verse!"
Haymitch swings around toward the door.
"Sleep," someone says, and immediately, he feels very sleepy. Walking to the bedroom seems too hard. He'll just lie right here on the floor, and get up later.