Ok don't get excited because it's not anything really special but this one is my favorite from the one shots in the calendar I think. There's potential there for a bigger story maybe. I don't know. I just like this universe so I might revisit it.

Prompt : "Your gingerbread house looks more like a… gingerbread pile."

The Mystery Of Her

Haymitch loved his kids – even if they weren't, technically, his kids and if they were now in their twenties. He didn't, however, always love how much they meddled, particularly during those periods when he tried to make sobriety stick and they were eager to help distract him from the cravings and the side-effect of cutting off from alcohol.

Once a week, Peeta opened his bakery for free baking classes for what Haymitch had dubbed the old and lonely. He had been gently mocking him regularly for months because that was just how good the boy was. He had stopped laughing when Peeta had forced him to start attending, claiming it would distract him from the withdrawals effects and that it would do him good to socialize.

At forty, he had honestly expected to be the youngest one there. He had been surprised. Sure, the old crones of every small town could boost were all there: Sae, Ripper and her missing arm – that did not stop her from using a whisk like an expert – ancient Mrs Lamb… But there were people around his age too. Hazelle Hawthorne, Thom… Delly, Madge and Katniss often attended too but, he figured, that since they were all former school friends it didn't really count. And then there was the newcomer…

The first time Peeta had dragged him to the bakery for a class, Haymitch had been determined for it to be the first and the last time he would ever show up. He liked cooking well enough but baking wasn't his thing. And he didn't want to be around people anyway, never mind people who gossiped about him when there was nothing else to talk about because he was kind of a local celebrity. Every town had their old drunk vet who was rumored to be crazy and he was The Seam's.

So, yeah, the first time he had showed up, he hadn't planned on sticking around. But then Peeta had paired him with the stranger who was attending for the first time too. Effie Trinket. New to town, classy to the point she looked utterly out of place with her Chanel bag and her ruby red fake nails, a pole the size of Texas stuck in her ass… Drop dead gorgeous, which was a shame. Haymitch had decided he would hate her on sight, that she was probably dumb and as unbearable as she looked.

The first sarcastic comment he had tossed her way, she had replied in kind. The second one, she had lashed out without raising her voice. By the third, she had reduced him to shreds without even batting a fake spider eyelash.

It had surprised a laugh out of him.

He had decided that maybe she wasn't that bad after all.

And then he had kept coming to the classes after all. Because bickering with her for two hours and a half was the highlight of his week and the prospect of their words spars was usually enough to keep him away from a bottle when the temptation grew too strong. He called her pet names just to irritate her, mocked her relentlessly for the way she dressed, poked at her every chance he got…

She never backed down, never failed to retort with the perfect amount of whit to keep him entertained and interested, baited him when he didn't pay her enough attention…

He honestly believed she enjoyed their bickering as much as he did for reasons that were her own. He had tried to learn more about her – usually not that hard in a town so small everyone gossiped about everyone else – but she was a mystery. Nobody knew why she had moved to the middle of nowhere and the theories were going rampant from extravagant – she had killed someone and was on the run – to simply sad – she was fleeing an abusive husband. Haymitch had tried to ask her a few times with covert questions but she had deflected every time. He had never insisted. Her smile had dimmed in those occasions and he didn't like that. He didn't like the scar he had accidentally spotted on her shoulder either.

Five weeks into the baking class, it turned out, however, that while they were perfectly happy to fully enjoy their two hours of criticizing each other and blaming each other for failing to follow Peeta's instructions, everyone else didn't fully enjoy their arguing.

"What do you mean I've got to partner with Hazelle?" Haymitch frowned, half-glaring at the boy.

"I mean you should partner with Hazelle." Peeta repeated plainly. "Delly can't come today so she will be alone."

"But my partner's here." he argued – a bit petulantly, maybe – pointing with his thumb over his shoulder in the vague direction of Effie.

"Effie will work with me." the boy stated flatly as if it had all been decided already.

"Don't see why Hazelle can't work with you." he scoffed.

"Because it's almost Christmas and we want some fucking peace and quiet!" Katniss snapped, rolling her eyes. "Now put on your apron and shut up, Haymitch, I swear!"

Peeta cleared his throat and winced a little but shrugged, not disagreeing.

Nobody disagreed in fact.

Effie looked embarrassed, she was blushing – and he was annoyed to think even her blushing was pretty – but with a sort of commiserating look for him, she took the spot next to Peeta, leaving him no choice but to join Hazelle at her usual station.

Hazelle was an old school friend he had lost touch with for a while but with whom he usually got along with quite well. That day, however, she didn't seem too pleased with him. A bit vexed by all his protesting, probably.

It didn't get better once Peeta announced they would be doing gingerbread houses that day. It was complicated and, while ruining pastries with Effie was fun, Hazelle was far too invested in getting everything right. Haymitch found the recipe too difficult to follow, Hazelle's snappish remarks annoyed him – and not in a good way – and he was too busy sneaking glances across the room at his usual partner. Peeta had orchestrated it so that she was too far away to talk to without shouting.

Not fair.

Not fair at all.

"Why don't you invite her out for a drink if you're so desperate to get into her pants?" Hazelle asked eventually, frustrated by his lack of attention. Small mercy, she kept her voice low. Of course, she realized what she had said and immediately made that face Haymitch hated. He loved the Seam. He hated that everyone knew his business and pitied him for it. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean…" Hazelle softened a little, clearly realizing she had been going bakezilla over nothing and remembering they were supposed to be friends. "You should ask her out. I can tell you like her. For some reason."

The other women hadn't taken to Effie kindly. She tried to make friends, he had noticed, but she was simply too different. And probably too gorgeous. You didn't trust anything that beautiful in a place like the Seam.

"Mind your own business." he grumbled ."You're ruining the gingerbread."

Actually building the house was the worst part and Haymitch was ready for this week's class to be over. Everyone was cheerfully discussing Christmas like it was some magical thing… Even Hazelle had deserted him, clearly giving up on their project as a lost cause. Peeta was walking around the kitchen, offering advices and gentle criticism…

Haymitch was so busy trying to get the roof to stick on top – and sneering as the whole thing collapsed for the third time – that he completely missed Effie sneaking around the room and to his side.

"Your gingerbread house looks more like a… gingerbread pile." she commented, pausing for maximum effect.

He glanced at the gingerbread house Peeta had abandoned on his part of the counter. It looked beautiful and would probably end up in the display window. "Noticed you haven't done much all day… Afraid to break a nail, princess?"

She pursed her lips into a displeased pout, narrowed her eyes and tilted her head to the side in a pissed-off attitude that made him want to kiss her. And push her against the kitchen counter. And maybe have his way with her on top of it.

It might or might not have been one of his new recurring wet dreams and his go-to fantasy when he slipped his hand into his boxers late at night.

"I have a name." she pointed out.

"Good for you." he deadpanned.

She let out a long irritated sigh. "You are impossible."

He let the other conversations fade to the background and turned to face her, giving up on the gingerbread. Baking wasn't why he came to those things anyway. "If I'm so impossible how come you're so unhappy to have gotten rid of me?"

"I am pretty sure I was not the one who caused a scene because we were not paired up today…" she shot back flatly with a perfectly polite smile.

"Yeah, but you're the one who crossed the room to talk to me." he retorted, wriggling his eyebrows. "Missed me?"

Her lips twitched and he knew she was fighting a more genuine smile. He had managed that once or twice: turn her fake polite smile into an actual grin that had made her blue eyes sparkle…

"Not even for one second." she lied. It had to be a lie. "How was your partnering with Hazelle?"

Hazelle was far enough away chatting with Katniss that he didn't feel bad answering honestly. "Dull."

A chuckle escaped her but she quickly swallowed the laugh back, clearing her throat and jutting her chin up a little. "I am surprised. She is quite beautiful. And single as I understand it."

"Widowed." he corrected automatically and then frowned because it had been close to seven years now and… "Yeah, I guess maybe she's looking…" He put a hand on his chest with far too much theatrics. "Shit, you think I missed my chance? Maybe it ain't too late…" He dramatically turned in Hazelle's direction, raising his voice. "Hey, Hazelle, you wanna be my girlfriend?"

A hush fell on the kitchen. The kids, in particular, looked entirely flabbergasted. Sae was shaking her head with fondness but, then again, she had known him since he was born so…

Hazelle studied him, studied Effie, and then snorted. "Told you the day you failed to ask me to the back-to-school senior dance, Haymitch Abernathy, that ship has sailed and it's never coming back."

Everyone laughed and, understanding at last it was all a joke, went back to their own conversation. He still felt Sae's, Katniss' and Peeta's eyes linger on him but he ignored them to turn back to the woman next to him. "Seems like you've got nothing to be jealous about, sweetheart. You heard. Won't be boarding that ship any time soon."

"Jealous?" Effie repeated, lifting her perfect eyebrows. "Do not flatter yourself, Haymitch."

His smirk deepened. "In my experience, when a woman tells a guy another woman's pretty, it means she wants the guy to say she's prettier."

"I did not say pretty, I said beautiful." she remarked. But she only met his eyes for a second before looking away and that might as well have been a signed confession.

He frowned a little. "Fishing for compliments… Doesn't seem like your style."

"And what do you think my style is exactly?" she scoffed.

"Confident to the point of arrogance." he replied without a moment of hesitation. She didn't seem to know what to answer to that so he took the opportunity to look her up and down, letting his eyes linger in places that could have warranted a slap if she had been so inclined. "And, for the record, if it needs saying, you ain't beautiful you're fucking gorgeous."

"Language." she chided, pursing her lips again. She tossed him a slightly irritated look but there was also a spark of amusement dancing in her eyes. "And it always needs saying."

She broke a piece of his gingerbread collapsed house and gracefully plopped it into her mouth. She chewed on it too long.

He snorted. "That bad?"

She made a face. "How much spice did you add exactly? The whole bottle?"

"Enough to give it some kick." He shrugged.

She rolled her eyes. "Why can't you ever follow the recipe?"

"Cause then you wouldn't be ranting at me and it would be a lot less fun." he answered, more honestly than he meant to.

They stared at each other a bit too intensely. He was suddenly very aware of just how close to each other they were standing. His grey eyes darted to her mouth. There was a crumb left there and he wanted… Her tongue poked out and she licked her lips before he could follow through on the thought. And yet it only made him want to…

"You have weird ideas of what fun is supposed to look like."

They both startled and bolted apart with matching expressions of guilt. Neither of them had noticed Peeta creeping up on them.

Well, Haymitch figured the boy hadn't been creeping, they had just been… distracted.

Peeta was tactful enough to pretend he hadn't interrupted anything weird and surveyed the disaster that was his gingerbread house. "Hazelle usually gets good results with Delly and Effie did well today… I'm starting to think you're not much of a baker, Haymitch…"

The kid was joking and, for that reason alone, Haymitch didn't remind him that he was the one who had forced him to attend those classes in the first place. Kicking and screaming, as he recalled.

"Of course she did well…" he scoffed. "You did all the hard work and she just kicked the fuck back and relaxed."

"You are so rude." Effie lamented.

"And doesn't that turn you on, sweetheart…" he challenged.

Peeta choked on the piece of gingerbread he had just put in his mouth. Might have been the comment, might have been the spices… The boy mumbled something under his breath and scampered to Katniss.

"Keep saying those things and people will start to talk." Effie retorted.

"Don't care much about that." he dismissed.

"Obviously." she huffed.

"Ain't a bad attitude, you know." he teased. "You've only got one life, sweetheart. It's too short to obsess about what everyone think of what you're doing with it."

A rare flash of vulnerability passed on her face, making him wonder, once again, how a woman like her came to be in a town like this. "It is not a bad attitude at all. I am just unfamiliar with it."

He wanted to dig more, to peel off her layers, to figure out who she was underneath the expensive brands…

But Peeta annoyed him for the second time that day by calling the class to an end. There was no time to talk after that. Everyone gathered their stuff, cheerfully talking about their plans for Christmas as they headed outside… He realized abruptly that the classes would stop for the holidays and that meant he wouldn't get to see her for two weeks.

That seemed liked too long.

Everyone lingered outside the bakery in small groups. Katniss grabbed his arm to ask him something, pulling him into her conversation with Madge and Peeta… By the time he looked up, he saw Effie slipped away from the group, still too much of a stranger to be invited to join in the groups… She met his eyes and flashed him a small goodbye smile that looked a little sad…

"I didn't realize you liked her." Peeta whispered to him as an aside. "I really thought you weren't clicking with each other. Sorry. You can partner back with her next time."

He barely nodded in thanks because his feet were moving. And it wasn't until he was more or less jogging after Effie that he realized what he was doing. She was fast for someone on such high heels but he managed to catch up with her and grab her arm.

She stopped and looked at him in surprise, waiting for him to say whatever he wanted to say…

Except Haymitch wasn't sure what exactly he wanted to say. Just that he couldn't wait two more weeks to see her.

"What are you doing for Christmas?" he asked.

She frowned a little but it was quickly covered with a blank expression. "Oh, I am not sure yet… I might go to my parents'…"

The reluctance in her voice was so plain he wondered what was the deal there. He didn't pry though. Not all families were good.

"The kids are coming to my place." he said quickly, before he could regret it.

"That's nice." she offered uncertainly. "I did not think you were the sort to throw Christmas parties…"

"I ain't." He snorted right back. "My house's just the biggest. They invade me every year, whether I want it or not. It's just the kids and a few friends, mostly. You can come… You know… If you want to."

She hesitated. "I wouldn't want to impose…"

"Ain't imposing if I'm offering." he grumbled with an awkward shrug. He buried his hands in his pockets. "Maybe you could even come over sometimes… We could try to bake some dessert for Christmas…"

She laughed at that. "Perhaps we should leave that to Peeta if we want to have an edible dessert…" She looked at him eagerly, though, and grinned. "But I suppose I could come over. We could have dinner."

Dinner sounded too much like a date.

But having her over also meant a chance to possibly finally have his way with her in a kitchen…

It was too good an opportunity to pass.

And, who knew, maybe by Christmas, he would have solved the mystery of her…

I hope you enjoyed this! Please do let me know!