Prompt: throwing this at you as a totally random prompt: cinna and portia trying to make a gentleman out of haymitch in order to set up a romantic date for him and effie, .
Prepping Time
"Oh, come on, Haymitch." Portia complained, tugging on his arm so he'd stop fidgeting. "Can't you just keep still for one second?"
"I hate this." he grumbled, stretching his neck to get a glimpse of himself in the floor-to-ceiling mirror behind Portia. "Can't fucking breathe."
The stylist wasn't impressed and she let him know by glaring daggers at him. It would have been scarier if she hadn't been wearing a pink and purple wig done in a puffy bun at the very top of her head. It was all he could do to resist the urge to pinch it every time it bobbled in his line of sight.
"You are the worst celebrity I had to take care of and I will have you know Peeta is not my most famous client." she hissed.
From the bed where he was elegantly sprawled, Cinna laughed. "I have to admit even Katniss is less difficult."
"Why are you here?" Haymitch shot back while Portia tugged on his arm again so he would face her and let her do the delicate and complicated rows of tiny gold buttons that lined the waistcoat. The suit she had brought him was far too complicated and uncomfortable, too… Capitol. He was half-sure that was why Cinna had sneaked into his room right behind her when she had arrived to get him ready for the party.
He should have been more suspicious when she had told him she would be helping since he categorically refused to use Peeta's prep team. Prep teams, in his experience, were the worst of the worst and he had been doing alright with only Effie all those years. The problem was: Effie was currently getting pampered by her own personal prep team.
"To enjoy the show." the other stylist deadpanned. "And to remind you we have done worse on this Tour than this."
"And…" Portia added "…it buys the children a night off."
Haymitch sighed, knowing they were right. All the public wanted was to see the kids but tonight would be an off night for them. He and Effie were to be received by the new Head Gamemaker for a private dinner – which meant there would be at least fifty people there but that would also give him time to get acquainted with Heavensbee as Cinna had instructed – that would be followed by a bigger reception. From what he'd had been told by his very excited escort people had been fighting to get invited to both the dinner and the party. Meanwhile, Katniss would be free to scowl all night and Peeta would be able to sulk all he wanted about the upcoming 'surprise' proposal scheduled for the next day.
"Fine." he granted. "But does this fucking outfit have to be so fucking tight?"
"Fashion, darling." Portia dismissed. "Stop insulting my work. You look perfectly gentlemanly. I designed it with you in mind specifically. It suits your style."
It did vaguely look like what Effie usually ordered for him. Vaguely. It was a three-pieces suit with a black shirt embroidered with golden threads, a matching waistcoat with far too many tiny buttons and a jacket that, he could tell from here, had golden embroideries on the lapels and the wrists. And he hadn't yet seen what she planned to do with the tie. Because there would be a tie. There always was with outfits like this one.
"It does suit you." Cinna hummed, his eyes lingering too long on his ass for comfort.
"Stop teasing him." Portia chuckled. "He's all red."
Flushed and annoyed to be, Haymitch muttered a string of obscenities under his breath, cursing his meddlesome new friends. They had been a unit after the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games but going through the Tour together had made him appreciate the two stylists even more. The fact that he and Effie had finally found people they could work with easily was never to be taken for granted. He was difficult on a good day and she was a control freak diva…
"Sorry, Haymitch. It is bad taste to ogle you on your date night with another woman." Cinna teased.
"You're lucky I am not the jealous sort." Portia retorted. "Now, I would not try that again in front of Effie though… She can be quite possessive."
"It's not a date and there's nothing between Effie and me." he lied through clenched teeth. Why did all his friends always ended up bringing that up?
"You are dressed to the nines and going to a fancy soirée with a beautiful woman…" Cinna remarked. "It sounds like a date to me."
"Well, it's not." he growled.
Portia finally finished doing the buttons but before he could escape, she tossed something around his neck that felt more like a silk scarf than a tie… He wasn't sure where she had been keeping it. "If it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck…"
"What the fuck are you doing?" he protested when he realized she was knotting the scarf in a very puffy and complicated knot.
"Trust me a little." Portia demanded, tossing him a look. "Effie is right. You are awfully vulgar." There was a twinkle in her dark eyes that he had come to know meant troubles. "Although, as I understand it, she appreciates it in certain… circumstances."
He opened and closed his mouth like a goldfish without managing to think of a single good reply to that. In the end, he studied the stylist, cautious. "I don't know what she's been telling you…"
"She has not named you." Portia hummed, her fingers flying over that scarf, twisting it this way and that, almost strangling him – not that he cared because now he was more focused on the fact that Effie had been telling tales. "But she did mention a particular lover who was generous with profanities during the act and you seemed to fit the bill so I connected the dots." She gave a last tug to the tie and lifted her eyebrows. "Was I wrong?"
He glared at her. "There's nothing going on between me and Effie."
"My mistake, then." she answered, clearly absolutely not convinced. She took the jacket Cinna handed her. "Thank you, honey. Put it on."
With a long suffering sigh, he slipped the jacket on and was finally allowed to properly look at himself in the mirror.
"No fucking way." he said immediately, trying to get rid of the tie/scarf hybrid. "I look like one of those Capitol fops."
"And Effie will love it." Portia purred behind him.
"Effie won't even see it." he vowed, fighting with the knot.
"What is it I won't see?" his escort asked from the threshold, as if on cue. "Oh my, Portia! You went all out. I am surprised you managed to get him into the outfit at all."
Haymitch whirled around to argue but whatever it was he was angry about, it fled from his mind when he saw her. She was all gold and red. Red velvet fabric was wrapped tight around her chest in two crisscrossing bands that merged into a big bow on her left shoulder, a large golden belt held the lower part of the outfit, some kind of semi-see-through fabric that clung to her legs every time she moved, outlining their shapes even though it fell to her ankles. The top and the skirt, he saw, weren't connected because he could see a flash of skin between the bands that hid her breasts and the belt.
"Distraction is key to dressing him." Portia grinned. "He is all yours now."
There was something he wanted to protest, Haymitch remembered, something important. But fuck if he could think when Effie looked like that. Her necklace was a thick rigid golden circlet, she was wearing matching armbands and her wig was a champagne color that wasn't too awful for once and…
She looked like some sort of fucking foreign warrior princess.
"I take it you like my outfit?" Cinna asked innocently.
"It is a masterpiece!" Effie beamed, twirling on herself. "Isn't it wonderful, Haymitch?"
He couldn't answer because when she twirled the skirt wrapped around her legs and it caught his attention. Badly. Hell, he didn't know what it was about that woman. It wasn't like he hadn't spend the last ten years or so caressing every inch of those legs. He knew them by heart. He knew them almost better than he did his own. He shouldn't have still been so fascinated by their outlines under a stupid dress.
"Yes, Haymitch…" Cinna mocked. "Isn't it wonderful?"
He glared at him. "You are a very mean man."
The stylist laughed. "Guilty as charged. Try to have some fun."
Before he could reply anything, Effie had taken hold of his arm like she was prone to do when they were going out.
"Remember to pull out her chair so she can sit at dinner." Portia murmured when he passed her by.
Haymitch rolled his eyes.
But if he did remember and if he resisted the temptation of pulling it all the way out so she would fall, she would be none the wiser.
And if Effie appreciated the surprising show of manners enough to let him unwrap the bow on her shoulder later on well… He wasn't going to tell her that either.