Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.
AN: Some silliness, since the last story/universe, was so brutal. Also, I ignore Posy a lot, so I figured I owed her a moment of her own. And yes, I know she's a bit dramatic, but she's getting a lot of her personality from my ten year old self and my friends at that age. Sorry.
The Joys of Puberty
Gale sits awkwardly, one leg bouncing as he waits on Posy in the dressing room.
He'd never thought he'd have to take his baby sister shopping for a bra, but here he is.
When his mom and dad died nearly five years ago, hit by a lady running a stop light, he'd taken over custody of her and his brothers. It wasn't something he needed to think about. They needed him, and he wasn't going to let them down.
It was hard, but not impossible. Or at least it hadn't been.
Boys were easy. He was a boy, he knew what to do with the little assholes, what they needed.
Posy has been simple until recently.
Unicorns, mermaids, glitter, so much glitter, pink, pink, pink…
Then, she'd brought home a letter from school, informing him they were going to give her year the 'opportunity to learn about their changing bodies'.
Gale hadn't thought much of it, just signed off and sent her to school.
"They told us we could use tampons, but how?" She'd asked over dinner, as if he knew.
Rory actually choked on his mouthful of tuna and noodle surprise.
"Uh, Posy, we're guys," he'd answered, after a massive coughing fit. "We don't have vaginas."
She'd rolled her eyes. "I know that, but Gale's had girlfriends."
"I don't think he puts their tampons in for them," Vick muttered.
Rory snorted. "Yeah, but maybe what he has 'put it' will help him explain."
Gale had given Rory dish duty for a month for that.
"You can't punish me. I'm an adult, remember?" Rory had smugly told him.
An adult making innuendo around a ten year old. So an idiot adult.
"You do the dishes or you stay at Thom's."
So Rory had done the dishes and Vick had gone to the library.
He'd been successful in finding books that helped Posy with the 'mystery of the tampon'. At least what he found got her to quit asking them for advice.
Gale had tried calling his dingbat Aunt Olive, for help, but according to his equally dingbat cousin she was 'somewhere near the equator'.
"We try not to know too much," Hester had added.
"It's called 'plausible deniability' and we want it where her whereabouts are concerned," Birdy had added.
And neither of them were much help either. They were too far away and didn't seem to have a clue how to talk to a kid about all the weird, and quite honestly frightening, changes her body was going to go through in the next few years.
"Can you look it up on the internet?"
They had, and it was a terrible decision. They were not showing any of those videos to Posy.
"Just tell her she's gonna bleed and she'll live. There's directions on the box of tampons," Birdy finally grumbled.
"There are instructions?" Hester asked. "I never noticed."
Gale didn't check. He'd find out soon enough apparently.
Prim had been more helpful, talking to Posy for nearly an hour over the phone and answering a dozen very confusing questions.
"Glad Prim was around," Katniss muttered when the phone was handed back to Gale. "I don't like talking about that."
And Gale doubted she'd have been as informative as her sister.
Once they'd gotten the questions about tampons stopped, Gale hoped they'd move on from the subject of puberty and all the awful things it was going to bring for a while.
He'd expected hormones and talk of boys next. He and his brothers had been ogling girls for as long as he could remember, it was time for him to deal with Posy switching from unicorns to whatever idiot singer the girls were crushing on these days.
That is not what he got.
"I need a bra."
Gale simply stared at her, not really processing what she'd said.
"A what?" He finally asked. There was no way he'd heard her right.
She huffed. "A bra, Gale. For my boobs."
Gale almost laughed. Posy had about as much of a chest as he did.
Posy was, in fact, dead serious.
One of her friends from class had started wearing one, and now, apparently, all the girls needed one.
Which was a little ridiculous in Gale's opinion. She's ten. There's nothing to put in the bra yet.
She'd insisted though, and Gale had given in.
Vick had looked up bra measurements and Posy had excitedly attempted to figure out her size.
"It says round down if it's an odd number," he'd read off. "Then measure your bust and for every inch that's a cup size."
Rory had squinted over his shoulder. "I could size bras."
Gale rolled his eyes. "And get the cops called on you."
Posy had emerged from the bathroom a few minutes after, beaming, her measurements written on a piece of college rule paper.
"Can we go shopping?"
He'd made her wait until Friday. He was off and could mentally prepare himself for the horror of bra shopping with his little sister.
It's every bit as awful as he'd expected.
Bras are simple, or so he'd thought, and he's thought about them a lot.
The bras in the shop are pretty, and Gale almost grinned imaging any number of women wearing them.
His grin slid off when Posy picked up something that would be better suited for a Vegas showgirl than any girl Gale has ever met.
"No," he'd told her, crossing his arms and frowning.
Scowling, she'd picked another, much plainer looking bra.
He'd been happy with the choice, until he saw the price.
For that price that bra needed to give navigation directions and send Gale text messages if a boy got too close to it.
"Excuse me." He'd found a sour faced woman folding thongs. "Do you have anything on sale?"
She had a very obvious spray on tan, and the glitter in her eyeshadow had settled into the creases of her eyelids, but she was pretty enough. Gale probably would've tried flirting with her if they were anywhere else.
If they were anywhere else he probably wouldn't have seen how rude she was.
Her eyes traced over Gale, took in his worn work shirt and dirty ball cap, his own, unglamorous, take on the stubble trend, then rolled. Gale clearly wasn't a big spender, not worth her time to assist.
She let out a little huff at being interrupted before tossing her dry blonde hair over her shoulder and pointing toward the back.
"They should be organized by size."
She didn't offer to help, didn't take the tape measure off her shoulders to measure Posy like he'd seen so many others do, just went back to folding panties.
Hanging Posy's overpriced pick back on the rack, Gale had gently guided her away from the expensive stuff and hopefully to something nice and cheap.
Sale was, apparently, a relative term.
The bras were still more expensive than any underwear Gale owned, most flimsy and frumpy, none seemingly Posy's size.
It should've been easy. Find the correct size and move on, but to choose women's underwear you needed an advanced degree.
Lightly padded? Bralette? Underwire?
Gale's knowledge began and ended with taking bras off, and he was vaguely aware of the term 'push up', which he approved of, but the rest were foreign and frustrating.
They dug for what felt like hours, through the mixed up mess of bras, before finding a few that seemed like they might be the right size and within budget, before Posy went to the dressing room.
The girl guarding the dressing room had left, muttering about dinner, leaving Gale to his wait alone.
Wishing he'd called Prim and asked her to meet them at the mall, she could make sense of the bra mess, Gale lets out a long sigh and rests his arms against his knees, staring at the ground.
"Are you waiting on someone?"
Eyes raising fractionally, Gale finds a pair of Nikes with pink lace where the shoelaces should be, attached to a set of smooth, pale legs.
Sitting back, he forces a smile. "My sister is trying on some-you know-some bras."
The girl's lips quirk up. "You look thrilled."
Smile easing, Gale shrugs.
She's pretty. Not glamorous, no glittery eye shadow or sour expression, but cute.
Gale expects her to ask how he got saddled with bra shopping, but she just laughs. Maybe he's not the first guy to have to bring a female family member to Vicky's overpriced closet of wonders.
"Well, you're a very good big brother."
"Thanks."
She gestures to his shirt.
"Fireman?"
Gale grimaces. "Paramedic."
Her mouth opens, probably to apologize for the mistake, but she gets cut off by Posy's reappearance.
There are tears in her eyes and not a single bra in her hands.
"Let's go," she mumbles, not looking up.
"Not like any of them?" He asks as she starts to walk out.
She stops, turns, then tears start falling, fast and hard.
"They d-d-didn't f-f-fit!" She sobs, flinging herself around Gale, face pressed to his middle, soaking his shirt in dramatic tears.
Gale gives her a squeeze as he forces an apologetic smile for the girl.
She's watching Posy, curious and confused by what she's seeing, before her eyes rise to meet Gale's.
The panic must shine through, because she gives him a sympathetic smile and takes a breath.
"Miss?" She finally says, tapping Posy on the shoulder. "My name is Madge. Do you need some help?"
Sniffling, Posy wipes her eyes on the back of her hand and turns, chin wobbling as she shakes her head.
"I'm a beautiful, c-confident blossoming young lady and I need a bra, but none of th-them fit," she manages to say through sniffles.
Gale's mouth drops open and he almost laughs. What has she been watching? Where did that come from?
To Madge's credit, she doesn't laugh, though she does look uncertain just what to say to such a statement.
"Well...okay," she says, smile a little uncertain. "What's your name, sweetheart?"
Posy's rubs her eyes again. "Posy."
Madge's smile brightens. "It's nice to meet you, Posy. I'm Madge, okay, and I'm going to help you."
Nodding, Posy watches as Madge takes the measuring tape from around her neck and holds it out.
"I need to measure you to see what size bra you need, is that okay?"
"I measured myself," Posy tells her.
Madge nods in approval. "Very good. All by yourself?"
Posy smiles. "Yeah, my brother told me how."
Great, they sound like perverts, which in Rory's case is true, but still...
"Our brother looked it up," Gale interrupts. "He's-he looked it up to help her. Trying to make things easier when we got to the store."
For all the good that had done.
Madge chuckles. "You have very good brothers. It's really nice they tried to help you, but sometimes it's hard to measure all by yourself, so would it be okay for me to check your measurements?"
Looking at Gale, Posy shrugs. "I guess."
Wrapping the tape measure around Posy, Madge gets the first measurement, and the second, then loops it back over her own shoulders.
"Posy, how old are you?"
Frowning, Posy looks at Gale again before answering. "Ten."
"Ten." Madge smiles. "Sweetie, I think this store is a little more than you need right now."
Posy's gloomy expression drops more.
"Have you had a training bra yet?"
Frowning, Posy shakes her head, looking once again at Gale.
Gale shrugs.
What the hell is a training bra? What are they training them to do? He didn't even know they needed training.
Madge gestures to the seat Gale had been sitting in, and once they're both seated, she begins explaining what exactly a training bra is.
"...and some girls grow really fast, and some go slow, but that's normal. You'll be able to buy a bra here someday, but for now, you should buy something a little smaller, and a little cheaper, because you'll probably outgrow it pretty quick, okay?"
Cheaper Gale likes.
Smoothing out her pink running shorts, Posy nods as she stands. "Yeah." Her head tilts. "We're yours fast or slow?"
Gale runs a hand through his hair. Why can't his siblings keep their thoughts to themselves?
Making a face, Madge laughs, a little uncomfortable.
"Fast, unfortunately."
Looking from Madge's much more impressive bust to her own, Posy glares at her boobs, mentally willing them to grow.
Giving them a list of places they can find an appropriate bra, Madge guides them from the back of the store, past the sour faced woman still folding panties.
Posy thanks Madge before hurrying off, to the shop stacked with perfumed lotions and candles across from them, leaving Gale standing in the painfully pink entrance, rubbing the back of his neck, unsure what to say.
"Uh, thanks," he mumbles, tugging at the shaggy hair at the nap of his neck. "I don't actually know much about bras."
Or at least nothing useful. Nothing he wants to tell his little sister.
Laughing, Madge nods. "I suspected as much." She shrugs. "You didn't do too badly though."
"I brought her to a store she's at least six years too young for." He'd kinda failed.
"I have some bad news. It's not going to be six years," she warns him.
"Don't tell me that," he groans, closing his eyes, pretending he hadn't heard her.
Madge grimaces. "Sorry."
He almost asks why, but he doesn't have to. He'd been a teenager once. The thought of Posy being around horny teenage boys like he'd been, and buying one of the wonderful and awful bras inside to entice them with, is more than he's ready to deal with.
Stepping back, Madge smiles. "It was nice to meet you, 'Posy's brother'. Good luck with everything."
She starts to retreat into the store, but Gale stops her with his name.
"Gale," he tells her. "Name's Gale."
Her smile tugs up. "Gale."
He stuffs his hands in his pockets and glances over his shoulder, makes sure Posy isn't heading back, before looking back at Madge.
"Maybe sometime we can meet up-not bra shopping-"
"I get off at seven," she says before he even forms the question. "You and Posy can meet me at the taco truck in the northwest parking lot. We can see what kind of training bra you guys pick out."
Chuckling, Gale nods.
"We'll be there."
Taking a step back, Madge grins before running into a mannequin, nearly knocking it over.
She straightens it, putting the bag back on its nub shoulder before turning back and giving Gale a sheepish smile.
Gale watches her vanish into the store, wondering vaguely which of the bras she's wearing, then Posy reappears and grabs his hand.
"Come on, Gale. We gotta find the training bra."
Letting her lead him down the mall, Gale takes a breath, preparing himself for more embarrassment.
At least he's got a date-sort of-to look forward to.
Bra shopping for Posy is definitely not a favorite task, but it had turned out well enough.
When he tells Posy about their dinner date, she smiles.
"Great! I can show her my new bras," she tells him, holding the bag up. "I wonder if Madge knows much about tampons…"
Gale groans.