Interlude; A Merry Dream
It took Katniss another two days before she realized how hungry she was. Hunger had always been a constant and intimate bedfellow, Twelve having rarely seen a boon day in all the years she had been alive and likely for all the time before. She had even gone for long stretches of time with nothing at all after her father had passed. But her body had never been quite this bad off, and extended use of intravenous feeding after a second trip into the Arena didn't quite cut it.
Thankfully it was around that time that some higher power (likely Coin, though Katniss didn't want to entertain anything even tangential to the thought of Thirteen's president) deemed her ready for solid foods. On the first day she devoured the tasteless, strangely textured, unidentifiable products on the plate- too fast for her unadjusted body to keep up, however, resulting in a night crouched over the utilitarian toilet.
That wasn't an experience Katniss wanted to repeat so during the next meal she ate only a quarter of the provided tray and stowed the rest away for later. As much as her stomach lurched and protested for more nourishment the action was familiar and all the more comforting for it. Katniss half expected the various attendants that edged into her room to find her cache, but every time she woke and checked it was still there.
But that was what her entire schedule revolved around and it wasn't nearly enough to do anything but give her a reason to wake up each day (morning felt like a bit of a stretch as she had no way of knowing what her sleep schedule had become). She ate some, squirreled the rest away, pointedly did not make conversation with the nurses, and then whiled away the rest of her waking hours with no company but her thoughts.
They did not make for pleasant companions. Each time her eyelids fell and darkness came, all she could see was Twelve. Twelve as it once was buckling under orange flames that seared her skin and filled her lungs with smoke, smoke that was sickly poisonous to the touch and did not bow to invisible walls and was only penetrated by birds mocking her sister's cry for help as her home collapsed around her under the weight of bombs dropped by Snow-
And every time she opened her eyes to soak in the artificial light of her room she saw Gale. Gale who didn't visit, Gale who sometimes took on Caesar Flickerman's painted hair and unreadable expression. It wasn't worse, but it still caused ice to form down into her intestines. Particularly when she wakes up from a night sitting in an interview chair across from him, the same distance from the seat he used to occupy in her room to her bed. She was never able to answer any of his questions, which might have been the worst part of all.
She couldn't think about those things, so instead she thought about food. Once she tried thinking about Peeta, but he had not sought her out, a fact made particularly glaring by Gale's absence since their fight. Part of her wondered why, but the other part knew that exploring the subject in any depth might end her.
After a week Katniss began to wonder if her store would ever go bad. With no ice or salt to pack her food in, surely it would rot. But Thirteen must have done something to it because not only did it retain its freshness, it kept its shape as well. Particularly the colored, sweet gelatin that she had never had before, not even in the Capitol. That stayed in exactly the same condition in its little plastic packages no matter how long it remained.
Tending to what she'd stolen kept her occupied for some time, but it would not last. After a week of near silence, punctuated by food and showers, there was no way to bear the solitude. Her muscles ached from too much movement and too little all at once, her head swam, her heart pounded. So on the eighth day after the customary (and customarily brief) visit from whatever nurse was working, Katniss set to work. She quickly spread out the thin sheet from her bed and placed in its center the plastic packages she had saved. It was more than she had realized, the contents bulging when she tied the ends of the sheet together.
The weight felt nice when she started to walk. It wasn't enough to throw her overworked muscles off balance but beyond pilfered food the sack felt like purpose. As she slipped out of her room and down the hall it bounced satisfyingly against her back. A better traveling companion than any of the recent others.
Even with the door closed Katniss could tell the larger ward was empty. The sounds of sickness were not quiet, she knew that. So she felt no hesitation when she opened the door and crossed through the rows of beds that looked exactly like hers. The nervousness only flared when she reached the door at the back, momentarily sparking to life then dying away as she entered the room.
Katniss smiled. Finnick looked surprised. And she smiled a little wider for the fact that he looked like anything besides dead.
"I hope this isn't a hallucination," he said, voice almost full.
"Me too," Katniss replied, a little too honestly. She worried at her bottom lip before deciding to forgo the chair altogether and push his legs away so that there was room to sit at the edge of his bed. The bundle of food followed, dropped right between them. "Especially since imaginary food tastes terrible."
"Actually," he countered with a slight groan as he pushed himself up against the pillows, "it might be a step up from this place." He gestured to the uneaten tray on the bedside table and Katniss was struck for a moment with the realization at how long it had been since she'd seen him last. The Finnick from two weeks ago would not have been able to down solid food, but this one had been served. (Though it looked much worse than the fare she herself had been given.)
"Lucky for you, they saved the good stuff for me." She swiftly untied the loose know and let the sheet fall open, revealing packaged breads and gelatin cubes. Finnick arched an eyebrow at her, two parts amused and one wary.
His fingers twitched unintentionally as he regarded the haul. "Lucky. But I thought you were-" The rest of the words sounded more than cut off; more swallowed by the sea than choked off. Katniss paused, pulse thrumming in her throat.
"Yeah?"
"-Nothing. Sorry."
He looked more colorful, skin nearly its rightful dark gold tint but all Katniss could feel was him pulling away from her, mumbling a string of apologies under his breath, awakening in the pale yellow of their version of morning. Anger. Her own: familiar.
She pressed through the wall of memory, choosing instead to focus on grabbing one of the cartons and some utensils. Her hopes were fulfilled when he followed suit, only lagging a little. When she snuck a glance, she noted that while his hands shook he was still able to hold onto the package. For now, it was enough.
It was almost surprising how quickly and easily they fell into the task of claiming food and setting up little eating areas. The scene reminded Katniss of another, one of her and Gale eating away at stolen bread after a long day of hunting. But that was too painful so she reached back further, until it was her father's steady weight at her side as they stared across the lake, glittering under the noon sun. That one she held for a little while, letting the tenderness of it burn in her chest until it, too, died away.
Then she was left with only this one. This new one, this weight that was novel but felt so strikingly familiar. When Finnick shifted forward she didn't know how much he'd displace the bed, not like she would with Gale, but somehow she didn't mind learning. That usual rush of anxiety at the unfamiliar wasn't there, and instead of jerking backwards when he went for one of the blue-colored gelatins, she smacked him with the back of her spoon.
He laughed, and she felt light fill up her every atom at the way it reached his eyes. "Harsh, Everdeen."
"I've trained," she told him, voice strung together like so many loops on a loom, "I'm deadly."
"Don't I know it."
That's when he started humming. Katniss lifted an eyebrow, but only enough to reflect her own confusion. She remembered his ticks, the way his fingers moved or how his eyes looked walled away sometimes. But this was new. At the same time she glanced up at him, he did the same and spared her the question by asking a question himself.
"Doesn't this remind you of winter?"
"What?" There was nothing there that remotely resembled the bitter, winter months. "I'm pretty sure we haven't been out that long- it's likely still fall."
"No no, I mean-" His lips came together, pressed into a thoughtful line. "The celebrations at yuletime. It's- I don't know how it was for you but," he took a moment to laugh but it wasn't exactly happy. Not quite upset either, just a remnant left over from some ghostly memory. "My little sister and I, we used to have a little tradition kind of like this. Holidays weren't much but we'd steal some sugared things from the table and make a tent in my room from blankets. We'd talk into the night- the year before-" There his voice caught and he skipped over the next word, "-we were old enough to go out by the jetty. The rocks by the ocean. It was still warm." His smile looked right for his face, as broken-in as it looked. "It was nice."
Katniss ducked her head, finding that she was mimicking that same grin. "It sounds nice. Maybe you'll get to do that again with her this year. If Coin can get her here."
Finnick cleared his throat and took a large bite of the gelatin. "... I don't think so."
"I'm sure that-"
"-Katniss."
The way he said her name slammed into her like a metal pipe. Oh. They were both tangled up in the silence, awkward angles and limbs askew. So Katniss plucked the last napkin and tore it into pieces, smaller then smaller still until they were shredded, fine and white in her palm.
"... What?" Finnick half-asked.
Katniss ventured a tentative smile. "It's not winter without-" She had nearly said snow but even the inoculations use of the word had no place here. So she substituted, "Flurries."
"Flurries?"
"Yeah- you haven't heard of them?"
Finnick shook his head. Maybe Four wasn't accustomed to flurries- she really had no idea what it was like outside of Finnick's eyes and the presence of his little sister and the glimpse she'd received on her tour.
"You have waves and rocks and sugar. We have flurries. Sometimes great big storms that cover the whole district in this white, wet stuff."
He shivered playfully, "Sounds intense."
"It's fun," she insisted. "Kids pack it into balls and throw them at each other. It's cold but it's soft. My mother uses it for healing too."
"Intense. But magical."
And at that, she had to smile. "It kind of is." She didn't wait any longer to throw the handful of torn up napkin and they both watched as it gently floated down, covering the bedspread and clinging to the plastic packages. Their own, personal flurry.
"Merry yuletide, Everdeen."
"Merry yuletide, Odair."
A/N: And she sneaks it in at the eleventh hour! I realized that we haven't had an interlude in a while, nor have we had too much shmoops. So I decided to fix that with a Christmas/Holiday/Winter Solstice update depending on what you celebrate. Obviously this is more like a little side-story than the next step in the plot, as the interludes generally are. I had wanted to make it longer, but between wrapping and cooking and generally getting ready for holiday things I haven't had much time.
I hope you're enjoying! I'm so happy that you guys seem happy with it so far. Next update will be happening in January, and we'll be moving forward by leaps and bounds with the plot. For now, enjoy Katniss and Finnick's forged Christmas. It's unedited so forgive any mistakes- I'll likely put up a corrected and fully edited chapter at some point.
Reviews are the best Christmas present any author could ask for, especially from the best audience on earth! But either way have a warm, happy, and bright holiday and new year!