Haymitch Abernathy, District 12
"Without you, my life has become
a hangover without end."
Pulp, T.V. Movie
There's a girl sleeping in my doorway.
You encounter the homeless a lot in District 12, especially when they can't find work in the mines. Papa thinks that they're a bloody nuisance. I'd woken up to use the restroom earlier only to spot a figure huddled in my doorway. I'd known instantly that I'd have to move her on, otherwise my parents would spot her and call the peacekeepers.
The problem is, she's pretty. Too pretty. She has long, dark waves of hair and delicate features. Her face is covered with dirt but there are tear tracks cutting through it. I'd been expecting a wizened old crone and ended up with a lovely tragic maiden.
So I decide to watch her sleep for a while.
After a few minutes, the girl seems to sense that I'm watching her and she stirs.
"Who are you?" She asks, fixing me with frightened, green eyes. "What do you want?"
"My name is Theodore Petherell," I declare, grandly. "I mean you no harm. I was just going to warn you that my father will report you to the peacekeepers for vagrancy if he spots you. It didn't seem fair to just leave you."
"Okay," The girl said. "I should probably leave. Thanks, Mr Petherell."
"Please, call me Theo," I blurt out, as she's about to get up. "Maybe you can come inside. I can get you something to eat."
"Won't your father see me?" She asks. Nothing gets past her, clearly.
"He's upstairs. I'll be able to hear him coming and sneak you out," I say, thinking back to all the girls I'd snuck out of the house over the last few years. I was a master of stealth.
The girl's brow furrows.
"So you're just giving me food, no strings attached?"
"Yes," I say.
The truth is, I'm only doing this because she's very pretty and I want her to feel grateful.
I lead the girl into my house and let her sit down at the kitchen table while I find her some bread and butter and a glass of water. They're the fanciest things I can manage without waking up the family. The girl seems happy enough. She eats very quickly.
"What's your name?" I ask her, once she's finished.
"Arienette Rose Smith," she says.
"That's a very pretty name," I reply.
"It's Covey," she says, a little defensively.
I've never heard of the word Covey. It must be a poor people thing.
"Do you have any family?" I ask.
She laughs, darkly. "That's a dangerous question. I don't. Haven't had any for a long time. I've got a boyfriend, though."
Of course Arienette Rose has a boyfriend. Of course someone else had found her first.
"He seems like a pretty bad boyfriend if he isn't giving you somewhere to live," I mutter.
"We used to split the rent," Arienette Rose explains. "But he's out of town right now. I don't know if he'll ever come back. He would if he could. He never wanted to leave in the first place.
She looks on the verge of tears. I'm just very confused. How can someone be "out of town"? I focus on the part where he's unlikely to come back.
A girl as pretty as Arienette Rose can't wait for him forever. All I need to do is be as nice as I can to her until she gives up on him and falls into my arms.
"What if I help you pay the rent?" I ask. "I've got plenty of money. You don't need to worry about paying me back."
"You'd really do that?" Arienette Rose's eyes light up. I bask in the warm glow of being a hero.
"Of course," I say. "It's not like there's anything better to spend money on."
I slip away to my room and come back with fifty denarii - my weekly allowance.
"Meet me outside Mellark's bakery at noon tomorrow and I'll give you more." I say.
"Can't we meet up in the town square?" Arienette Rose asks. "I need to see the bloodbath and I don't have a TV."
It's a mystery to me why someone would be so eager to watch the bloodbath, especially since they have no money to make casual wagers, but I agree to it. I feel a little guilty, sending Arienette Rose off into the night but it's probably safer for her than to wait for my family to find her.
The next morning, I put on my best shirt and head to the town square. It's crowded but it's easy for me to find Arienette Rose pacing nervously and wringing her hands.
"Are you alright?" I ask her.
"I'm worried," she says. "The rent's fine and everything... it's just... my Haymitch... I don't want him to die. I love him."
So her boyfriend's name is Haymitch? I wonder. Where have I heard that before?
Suddenly, it all makes sense. Arienette Rose is so desperate to watch the Hunger Games and claims that her boyfriend is out of town. It must mean that her boyfriend is a tribute!
It's unlikely he'll last a day.
What a stroke of luck! All I need is for Haymitch to die and I'll be there for Arienette Rose, a shoulder for her to cry on. It won't take long for her to overcome her grief and fall for me after that. I try to remember the boy named Haymitch from the reaping but can't think of which of the two Seam boys that were reaped was him. If Arienette Rose has only been with Seam boys, she'll probably find me - the son of a respectable merchant - to be a significant improvement.
"Do you want me to watch the games with you?" I ask.
"Yes. That would be nice," Arienette Rose replies.
So I stand beside her as the Second Quarter Quell begins.
A gasp rises across the crowd as the arena - an idyllic meadow filled with flowers - is shown on the screen. The tributes, having just risen into place, look around with wonder bright in their eyes.
All apart from one.
Haymitch - I can match the face to the name almost instantly - is scowling. I study him for the two seconds he has on screen. He's irritatingly handsome, with wild, black curls and intelligent, grey eyes. I can see why a girl would fall for him, the same way I can imagine a girl finding a thunderstorm beautiful. He's dark and incredibly moody.
I remember his interview, the last of the night. All those barbed comments... Clearly there's a mean and narrow mind hiding beneath that mop of dark hair. Arienette Rose deserves so much better.
I hope that Haymitch is the first to die.
The gong sounds. Arienette Rose is standing so close to me, I can feel her tense as her boyfriend runs straight towards the Cornucopia. I'm hopeful that one of the Careers will get him but everyone seems too confused to act. I can only hide my disappointment as Haymitch runs into the woods, well-supplied and unharmed.
Never mind. I think to myself. He's such a loathsome little toad, the gamemakers will probably set mutts on him.
These games go fast. Eighteen tributes die in the bloodbath. They begin dropping like flies to the poisonous hazards of the arena and the deadly Career pack. A volcanic eruption on day four almost halves the remaining tributes.
These games don't go fast enough for my liking. Haymitch is too smart to be poisoned and far out of the volcano's range. On the sixth day, there are ten tributes left and Haymitch is annoyingly, painfully still alive.
Any guilt I'd feel over wishing death upon Twelve's first real shot at a victor in decades is eased by Maysilee Donner still being alive. Half the crowd are rooting for her after she made a few kills with some poisoned blow darts. She'd be a worthy victor. Not like Haymitch, who'd spent the entire games walking in one direction.
A week into the games, I show up in the square with money and a cupcake from Mellark's. The Career pack are on the screen, amicably agreeing to go their separate ways. Ever since the eruption, the Twos had outnumbered everyone else. There were three of them left, while One and Four only had a girl and a boy, respectively.
"For you," I offer Arienette Rose the cupcake. There's a delicate rose on top, made of edible paper.
"Thanks, Theo," she says, as she takes it from my hand. She looks exhausted. I imagine she dreads sleeping, for fear of waking up to the news of her boyfriend's death. "It feels silly, eating this while Haymitch is still in there."
"Don't feel bad," I say. "I think he'd be glad that you're having nice things."
"I guess you're right," Arienette Rose says. Her eyes light up when she takes her first bite of the cake. She'd probably never been able to afford fresh cakes from Mellark's before.
"When Haymitch comes back, he'll be able to buy me cakes all the time," she says, dreamily. "He'll pay you back as well."
I wonder when she became so certain that her boyfriend would win.
Suddenly, the crowd gasp as a fight breaks out between Haymitch and the trio from District 2. The air fills with noise.
"Haymitch! Haymitch! Haymitch!" The people chant.
He's outnumbered and the Careers are all much tougher than him. He ought to die straight away. Perfect. I look over at Arienette Rose. She's shaking and her eyes are shining with tears.
A cannon fires.
"Yes!" I jump with shock as the crowd begins to celebrate. Looking up at the screen, I realise that Haymitch has killed one of the Careers.
A second cannon fires and Haymitch isn't outnumbered anymore.
I can't believe it. I know that he's a smug little know-it-all but does he have to be a smug little know-it-all who knows how to fight?
Thankfully, the third Career manages to knock the weapon from Haymitch's hand. The boy from Two raises his knife to Haymitch's throat...
And drops dead.
There's more cheering as Maysilee Donner emerges from the trees. For a second, I hope, foolishly, that she'll kill Haymitch like she killed that Career. No such luck. She offers him an alliance and he takes it.
Well, that's annoying.
I watch as tears of relief start streaming down Arienette Rose's face. It's clear that she's pretty attached to Haymitch. The longer he survives, the harder it'll be for her to let go of him. Maybe she'll need a bit of help.
"What do you think of Haymitch allying with Maysilee?" I ask, as I walk her home.
"It's good. They can work together." She replies, brightly.
"You don't have any issues about him allying with a girl?" I ask. "Especially a pretty one like Maysilee?"
"No," Arienette Rose says, evenly. "They're not in love. They're just allies."
"How do you know?" I push further.
"Because boys can be friends with girls without it being love," she sighs, sounding exasperated. "Aren't we friends?"
I hesitate. It's only for a second but Arienette Rose picks up on it.
"Do you love me?" She asks.
"Yes," I say. "I did all these nice things for you because I thought you'd love me back."
"That's not how it works, Theo," Arienette Rose shakes her head. "It's a good place to start but money isn't enough to make a girl love you and kindness isn't enough to make her forget about her boyfriend. I love Haymitch. He can be a little grouchy sometimes, especially when he's scared, but once you get to know him, he's really-"
"Maybe you'll change your mind when you run out of money," I snap. "I won't give you another coin until you tell me that you love me back."
"I thought you said there were no strings attached," she says, a little sadly. "I can manage without the money if there are."
Arienette Rose walks away. I imagine that she'll come crawling back to me the moment that her beloved Haymitch dies. I'll turn her down at first, make her really desperate. Then I'll let her in and she'll be so grateful, she'll agree with everything I say. It's how my father won my mother over. It's how my older brother, Thaddeus, won his wife over. I know it works.
Now all I need is for Haymitch to die.
I wake up to a pounding headache. Last night was a wild night of drinking and partying. Everyone in the household is probably hungover apart from my pregnant sister-in-law, Phillipa.
I stumble down the stairs, hungry for breakfast and desperately trying to remember details from the night before. I can't help but groan when I remember why my family had been celebrating. District 12 had won the Hunger Games.
Haymitch Abernathy had won the Hunger Games.
I imagine him coming home to a hero's welcome. I imagine him letting Arienette Rose Smith move into his house in Victor's Village. I imagine him giving her everything I could've given her.
And a few things I couldn't have.
Suddenly, there's a knocking on my door. I open it to find Arienette Rose on my doorstep, looking rattled.
"There are peacekeepers," she says, breathlessly. "They're after me. I don't know why. I didn't do anything, I swear. Please, help me."
"Why should I do that?" I ask, coldly.
"Haymitch is still in the Capitol. I've got nobody else. Please. They're going to kill me!"
"I don't want anyone else to have you," I say. "Leave your boyfriend. Be mine. If you don't, I'll leave you to the peacekeepers."
Arienette Rose opens her mouth to say something but, before she can speak, I see a peacekeeper approaching from behind. I know that if I let Arienette Rose inside, I'll be punished.
So I slam the door in her face.
"Theo!" Arienette Rose starts screaming. "Theo! Help!"
I block out the sound of her screams as they drag her away. She deserves this. She turned me down. Even if she hadn't, it's not worth risking my life to save her.
It doesn't matter that Haymitch Abernathy is coming back because, when he does, his girlfriend will be long gone.
You all probably know about Haymitch and how he won his games, since he's a pretty major character in the series, so I decided to zoom in on one of his loved-ones, who's killed because of his rebellious actions. There are a few parallels between the love triangle here and the one in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Theo's based a little on eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow (and a little on Gerald Croft from 'An Inspector Calls'). He's a possessive and elitist snob. Arienette Rose probably would've been able to manage without his help if the peacekeepers hadn't been sent after her.
I also tried to squeeze as many references into Arienette Rose Smith as possible. I think she beats Fawkes Chau's record of how many references I can fit into one name, which is quite a feat. I love Covey names. They're easy to fit references into.
