Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games not anything by Dr. Mehta
A/n: As you have undoubtedly guessed, I lied about there being a 12th chapter - this is the epilogue. The chapter title will be changed to reflect this in a few days (it is a legal maxim and completely irrelevant to the chapter). Because in the oneshot this whole fic is based on, there was one more scene in Gloss' life in which Anfisa was brought up and I thought it would only be fitting that what happened there was also fleshed out. Thanks for reading and reviewing and favouriting and alerting if you have been (well, I assume you've at least been reading if you got to this point) and I hope you enjoy!
Epilogue
"Remembering the past is one thing but living on with it is another." – Dr Mehta.
Gloss stands up and stretches. Opposite him, his sister does the same. Then she looks around. Her eyes catch on a photo. She walks over to it and picks it up.
"Isn't this Theodore Hart?" she asks him. "From your Games?"
He nods, coming to stand beside her. "I couldn't just forget him, Cashmere. Not Teo."
She nods as though she understands. He knows she doesn't. It's been four years since his Games and he still regrets killing Teo. But Cashmere didn't have Games like his. She didn't really know anyone in her Games, not even her allies. Her deaths are all equally regrettable.
"He meant a lot to you, Gloss, I know," she says, seeing his look. "We might not have been close for these last four years but I did mentor your Games."
"Sorry," he says. "It's just ... he was such a great friend, even in the arena. And his death..." Gloss shakes his head. "If only he hadn't eaten those stupid berries."
Cashmere nods and then looks thoughtful. "You know, you never really said why you didn't eat them either," she says. "You saw him eat them and you were going to ... but you suddenly stopped."
"I recognised them. They look like a bitter type but there's a mark on the side."
"You really knew your survival stuff," Cashmere says wonderingly. "I'm surprised – you didn't mention you were going to at Training."
Gloss scowls. "Cashmere, can we get off the subject of how I won my Games, please?"
"Sorry," she says. She looks again at the smiling photo of the once-tribute of District 4. "I guess he was the death you regretted the most."
"No ... second most."
"Huh?"
Gloss opens his mouth and then closes it. Finally, he just says. "There was a girl ... from District 5 ... I ... it doesn't matter really. I owed her nothing. You're right, it was Teo's."
She gives him a strange look but says nothing. She probably doesn't even remember that tribute. The TV screens barely showed her. Her death ignored his presence completely. And their meetings had been heavily edited, so much so that her parents didn't even know they'd known each other.
He hasn't spoken of her since that day. Even in the Victory Tour, he did no more than a scripted mention. The Capitol expected nothing else and no one knew he owed more.
He scowls again and then, brightly, changes the topic.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
When Cashmere has left, he walks upstairs and looks out of the window at the moon, shining down. Not an artificial moon but the real one. An inanimate object.
Not for the first time, he hears a blunt voice telling him how much she likes the moon. As he does every time, he tries to force it away. But the longer he stares, the more memories hit him. A girl crouching behind a tree. Running from the Cornucopia. Telling him not to be so fricking rude. Leaning forward and kissing him...
He clenches his fist until the tears refuse to fall.
For four years, he's tried to forget the girl he barely knew. A crush, that's all it was, he thinks. But he doesn't know because it couldn't have gone further. And when he sleeps, he sees her broken body with her battered lips in a torn smile. A girl who chose to die, alone and tortured, so he could live. One of the bravest people he's ever met.
His nails draw blood from his palm. He shakes his head and looks at the moon. One last time.
"I'm sorry, Anfisa," he whispers as he turns away. "I should have looked where I was going."
Fin