Author's note: Just posting this short one before I go to school. I'll probably post another one tonight (if I'm not too stressed out, about the convention being tomorrow *panic mode activated*) because this is short and kinda bad.

This story may be seen as triggering to people dealing or having dealt with self injury, suicide or depression. Rated M for descriptive violence and very dark themes.


"There's nothing more we can do now," Haymitch said to calm her down as they sat together, him with a glass in his hand and eyes loosely locked on the screen in front of them, where the tributes rose in their tubes and into the arena.

"Cinna did an amazing job on her and Peeta didn't even need styling for his charm. They both got good scores, maybe…" she trailed off looking not at the screen, but not quite at him. There seemed to be something way more interesting over his left shoulder. A pressure laid on him. Here he was, alone, with Effie Trinket again. Last time he'd made her cry, then kissed her, and then proceeded to make sure she came unharmed to bed and tuck her in. This time he had to limit emotions to a pang of sadness if one of their tributes died at the Cornucopia. She didn't seem to like that plan, because she nervously moved closer to him, when the countdown began. Had she done the same the other years? He didn't remember, but soon he found himself taking her hand as the countdown reached 10 seconds. Outside they heard all the people standing on the large square, watching the start of the games on a giant screen, join in the counting of the last 5 seconds. Effie hid her face in his shoulder when the timer reached zero and the start canon sounded. She hadn't done that the other years, he was sure. He laid an awkward hand around her shoulder and let his fingers slip under her wig, feeling the net holding her own hair in place, but also the softness of the real, human Effie Trinket, whom she kept under there along with her tears and laughter, she'd never let anyone hear except on accident.

Haymitch found himself torn between his former oath to not feeling any emotions for her today and the urge to calm her down with a kiss. To calm himself down with a kiss.

"Effie listen…" Why did he feel so guilty? The woman did this to herself, she wanted it.

"No Haymitch," she said and peeked out from the soft fabric of his shirt, he could feel every bit of her warmth trough it. She didn't look at the screen.

"You could do better," he said and gently tugged of her wig, trying not to get the many pins she fastened it with to rip out her hair. She didn't seem to mind at all, in fact she took the wig cap of herself letting her hair fall down. It looked like a severely bad hair day after being stuck under the cap all day, but to Haymitch it was enough to just see her as a real, flawed person.

"You could do better," she responded and propped herself further up against him.

"Me? Have you met me?" Haymitch laughed. This situation was so surreal he didn't even want to process it right now.

"Yeah, I met you. I met you in a lot of ways Haymitch," The way she pronounced his name made him think of a child who'd not quite caught the pronunciation of its first word, but still insisted on using it all the time. It might just be her accent, trying to make his name exotic. She didn't say anything more, leaving him to his thoughts – which was way enough for him right now. He knew she thought about the time he lost his mind and hit her. Talked about the times he'd nearly popped her eardrums yelling at her, that she was just another worthless Capitol-girl. He felt somebody had sucked his body clean of air. Why the hell did she insist to still even talk to him? Why didn't she just get the police to take care of him? The Capitol didn't like him in the first place and Effie seemed to be their darling, so what would the problem be? She could probably have him executed without even lying.

"Look, Trinks, I didn't … I haven't exactly treated you…"

"It's okay,"

"No. No, it's not,"
"It was an accident,"

Haymitch never replied. Hitting her hadn't been an accident, far from it. She knew that. Yelling at her had sometimes been accidents, because when he was that drunk he'd yell at pretty much anybody for anything.

"I read your file," she said watching Katniss fight her way through the woods, just running.

"How did you get that?" Even Haymitch knew she didn't have access to those. Especially in his case, where his files was probably protected to not put the Capitol in a bad light.

"I have connections,"

"Sure," He said with a suspicious voice. He didn't want to talk about his own life, just as much as she didn't want to talk about hers.

"I know what we… They did to your family," He closed his eyes. The 'we' she changed to a 'they' sparked his attention again, though he'd started closing her out, like he always did when people mentioned subjects that were too sensitive.

"It's a long time ago, Trinks,"

"But you still have nightmares, I can hear you yelling from my room," She was getting to one of those lines again. He didn't like it. He didn't want to cry in front of her.

"Oh, I'm so sorry. That breaks the rules too, doesn't it?" she said noticing his shut-down. She directed her attention back to the TV now showing the deaths from the initial bloodbath. Haymitch let out a sigh and took a few moments to swallow his tears, before they came out. God, he was pathetic.