DOUBLE UPDATE!

Chapter One-Hundred-and-Sixty-Three; Resolution

"Well, you did say Ellen shoved her help down your throat whether you liked it or not," Stephanie said weakly into the painfully stretching silence, trying to feebly rent the suffocating air.

She cringed as she heard her own pitiful words.

I really don't know when it's better to just shut up, do I? Stephanie thought drolly.

She laced her fidgeting fingers together, feeling utterly sick down to her stomach.

But she had to say it. She had to ask it. She had to know…

"Do you hate me Haymitch…Do you hate me now you know I have feelings for Seneca Crane?"

The silence that followed her words was one of the most nerve-wrecking and heart-wrenching Stephanie had had to endure her entire life. Wild fear spiralled through her entire body until she was almost shuddering. The only other similar feeling to this mounting, strangling terror was the seconds after her name had been called at the Reaping; when it felt like her entire world had fallen apart.

She knew she wouldn't be able to hold it together if Haymitch replied yes. And yet, what could she really expect, Stephanie berated herself.

She had just damn well admitted to having feelings for Seneca friggin Crane!

A man who spent his days designing more harrowing ways for terrified children essentially, to die. A man who had single-handedly made it his goal to completely ruin Haymitch's life. A man who was a monster. Stephanie had told herself it over and over again. Had screamed it at herself in silent desperation as she had begun to recognise that her heart rate inevitably picked up when she came face to face with the familiar, blue-eyed Gamemaker.

What kind of human being was she, if she couldn't help but be attracted to a monster?

Stephanie turned resolutely, despite the crippling fear. It hurt to move, it hurt to face Haymitch, it hurt to damn well breath, but Stephanie forced herself to. No matter how unintentionally, she had created this mess and it was her responsibility to face whatever repercussions came of it.

…

Initially Haymitch didn't even hear her question. Not properly.

There was only one fragment of her words that had hit him, winding him far more effectively than the pipe Seneca's guard had used to batter him with. And also incidentally, hurting far more.

"…I have feelings for Seneca Crane…"

For a blazing few moments, Haymitch was angrier at Stephanie than he had ever been before. It would be a lie to say otherwise. It was a knee-jerk reaction, something he couldn't stop even if he wanted to.

He had just heard the woman he loved admit she had feelings for the man he hated above everyone else.

In a way Haymitch was almost angry at Stephanie for even telling him. But then he knew Stephanie abhorred pretences of any sort, knew that for Stephanie to continue on faking being indifferent to Seneca was as good as lying in Stephanie's mind. And that was something she hated about the Capitol; the lies and the deceit that was so widely practiced.

It didn't make the brutal truth any easier to hear or hurt any damn less than it currently was though.

Haymitch shifted his anger very easily onto a new source in the next moment. A familiar source that was easier to deal with.

Seneca Crane.

It hurt far less to be angry with someone you hated, rather than someone you loved.

For years the blue-eyed Gamemaker had been taking everything from Haymitch; snuffing out lives as though they were meaningless. How could Stephanie, his Stephanie…the Stephanie that Haymitch had fallen in love with, who had more compassion than every damn Capitolite in this cesspool…have any feelings for a man like Seneca Crane?

His blaze of blistering anger flared again for a split second. He wanted to ask, to demand, to shout and beg at Stephanie to explain it to him. How she could possibly feel anything for a man such as Seneca Crane? Seneca Crane was everything Stephanie should have hated; the Gamemaker that had envisioned and created the harrowing Games that would kill Frenkin, the boy she loved like a brother.

Haymitch could still see her face in his mind. See the hatred blazing like some fantastic golden flames in her eyes when Haymitch had first told her about what Seneca had done at the welcoming party, what felt a lifetime ago. The tears had swam in her eyes, spilling helplessly over as Haymitch had listed the people Seneca had killed, including his own family. And then when Stephanie had looked back from the balcony at the party, tears still wet on her cheeks, her gaze had sought out the Gamemaker and there had been only hate, burning hatred in her eyes that made the tears sparkle as hard as diamonds.

The hate in her eyes had waned since then. Haymitch had noticed, had watched it happening, not able to bear seeing it. Stephanie had thought it was her own ineptitude that had driven Haymitch to the edge to break things off with her. But it hadn't been, it had been that. Having to watch Stephanie be drawn to Seneca, like a moth to a flame and she hadn't even realised it. Haymitch had convinced himself for a while that the reason he had stormed from the racetracks that day had been to protect Stephanie. Haymitch wasn't so sure anymore if it was just Stephanie he was trying to protect, but himself as well. Electra had picked up on it. Ellen picked up on damn near everything, Haymitch thought sourly. The blue-haired woman was forever telling him that it was people's voices; she just had to listen to them and she knew everything. Haymitch didn't know much faith he would place in Electra's seeming ability to detect everything from a person's voice. What Haymitch did know for sure though, was that when Seneca's name passed Stephanie's lips now, it was no longer with the mixture of absolute loathing and begrudging fear it had been once before.

Haymitch finally looked up at Stephanie. At the golden eyes that were always filled with her emotions that she could never learn to conceal and her question slowly registered with him.

Did he hate her? Haymitch almost laughed bitterly. It would certainly make things a lot easier and a lot less damn hurtful, if he did.

But hate her…No. Never. He loved her.

Haymitch told Stephanie as much. And he watched as the relief and the guilt and the pain crashed over her face, and the tears she had desperately been holding back were finally released. Tears in her eyes, that no longer held any hate for Seneca Crane.

Haymitch wasn't sure if he pulled her to him or she collapsed against him first, but suddenly she was in his arms, a litany of heart-breaking apologies falling from her lips. Haymitch never knew such a small thing could make him feel so much. But he never felt such a potent mixture of hatred for the Capitol and anger and sadness, than when he felt the hot press of Stephanie's salt tears against his throat.

"You don't half make things difficult, do you sweetheart?" Haymitch murmured against her temple, as Stephanie continued to cry against him. Stephanie's shoulders jerked shakily, with watery laughter or harder sobs or a mixture of both, Haymitch wasn't sure.

…

Stephanie continued to cry on Haymitch's shoulder, as he held her tighter, his fingers entangled in her once more wild hair. So much for Silver ensuring my hair wouldn't fall down, no matter what happened, Stephanie thought fleetingly. But then she supposed her stylist hadn't expected her to be apologising to her mentor and ex-fiancé, for the developing feelings she was beginning to have, for a Gamemaker that had ruined his life and also happened to be the President's son…

Stephanie hadn't realised until Haymitch had said he didn't hate her, how much she was expecting him to say that he did. The warring feelings of trembling relief and deepening guilt had threatened to tear her apart for a few moments. She couldn't bear the thought of Haymitch hating her but she felt that it was no less than what she deserved after her confession.

As soon as Haymitch had told her he didn't hate her…"the opposite in fact sweetheart, if you can believe it? I love you…" Despite her best attempts and stern internal admonishments, the pitiful apologies she had warned herself not to spew out had come tumbling out of mouth anyway. She wasn't sure she could ever apologise to Haymitch enough. But Stephanie leaned back once her sobs subsided enough to let her. She determinedly sniffed back her tears as she realised there was something else very important she had to say to Haymitch.

She looked into his storm grey gaze, blinking away her tears.

"I love you Haymitch," she said clearly, holding his eyes meaningfully. "No matter wh…no matter what I….feel for Seneca, it isn't love. I don't love him. I love you Haymitch, you know that don't you?"

Haymitch smoothed Stephanie's hair back from her earnest face, as he offered her a weak smirk, nodding once.

Her words lessened the hurt he felt, a little.

"I know, sweetheart," he added.

Stephanie once more placed her heavy head on Haymitch's shoulder, gratefully nestling closer into his warmth.