Disclaimer: The Hunger Games and its characters are all property of Suzanne Collins. No profit is being made from this piece of work. No copyright infringement is intended.
8
When I come to after the punch in the nose, I realize I am sat on a comfortable couch in a warm room. My vision is slightly hazy but I'm aware of a fire crackling and raised voices in another room, perhaps the kitchen. Martox is sat on the carpet, looking up at me with wide grey eyes. I become aware my nose is clogged with tissues.
"Hey," I grumble to him. He still stares at me. I've never been around kids much so I'm not sure how to act. Maybe play hide-and-seek? The thought of getting off the couch makes my head throb even more than before.
"My mommy punched you in the face," he says, giggling. "Why did she do that?"
"Because Finnick Odair Jr. is a traitor who doesn't even deserve to share the name of his father," Katniss answers her son. I jump, having not realized she had walked into the room, and her words sting.
"Katniss," another man walks in, sharing the same blond hair as Martox. He puts an arm around her. "Come on; let's get you out of here for a bit."
"No," Katniss says stubbornly, taking a seat on the couch opposite me. "I want to hear what this scumbag has to say for himself, Peeta."
Peeta.
I watch the man respond to the name. So this is Peeta Mellark, the other half of the star-crossed love story that kicked off the Rebellion which led to the Revolutionary War. Were they…together? All the History classes told us was that Katniss has been banished to District 12 for the assassination of President Coin and that Peeta had returned because it was his home.
"Katniss!" Peeta cries. "Not in front of our son!" He picks Martox up, swinging him in the air before balancing him on his hip. Martox giggles and buries his face in his father's neck.
I am surprised by the surge of jealousy that grips me when I see them together. To take my mind off it, I look at Katniss. Big mistake. She is glaring at me. The burn scars on her face add to the menace of her stare.
As soon as Peeta leaves the room with Martox, she kicks off.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" she screams at me. I sit frozen to the sofa. "Do you have any idea what you have done?"
"That's what Nurse Everdeen said," I mumble. I'd meant for only me to hear it but by the look on Katniss' face it's clear she had heard it too.
"Everdeen?" she mutters. "Do you mean…?" Her trailing off leads me to realize she thinks I'm referring to her mother.
"Your mother," I say, nodding.
Slowly, as if in shock, she sinks back down onto the chair she had just vacated in her anger. "You know my mother?" she asks, as though she is in a trance.
"Yes," I say quickly, glad to have distracted her. She seems so shocked and lost that I almost feel guilty, but for a second there with her standing over me I had actually feared for my life. "She practically raised me."
Katniss looks at me, her eyes hollow of any emotion. She looks so drained, so tired. I can only begin to imagine the hardships she has faced in her life and even then I know I will not come close to the truth.
"What happened to you, Fin?" she asks.
I'm surprised she knows my name but I know right now is not the time to ask her questions. If I want to keep her calm and keep myself alive, I need to answer her and keep her happy.
"My mother committed suicide," I say numbly. I have never said those words aloud in that context before. A part of me crumbles and I feel my shoulders hunch as though I'm trying to hide from the rest of the world. I blink fast, refusing to let the tears get the better of me. I cannot cry now; crying is a weakness.
"Annie…" Katniss whispers in a voice so gentle and melodic it doesn't match with her harrowed face. "I didn't know."
"She couldn't take living without…my father," I say. "I was eight years old."
I look up to find her looking down on me with what looks like sympathy. I tell myself I'm wrong. Just a few minutes ago she had been on the verge of killing me, yet now she looks at me with an almost motherly expression. It's hard to believe this woman led the Rebellion; how time changes people.
"Nurse Everdeen – your mother – brought me up," I finish, explaining why I know her mother.
Katniss cocks her head to one side and smiles. "A boy," she mutters, almost to herself. "That must have been new for her."
"How do you mean?" I ask.
"She only ever had daughters," she pauses; I can hear her talking around a lump in her throat. After swallowing hard, she says, "She must have been at a loss with what to do with you. No hair to braid for a start." I smile with her, feeling ourselves becoming connected.
"How did they get you?" she asks. I don't need to ask to know who she means.
"I was working in the Capitol," I explain, "As an actor."
"I know that much," she interrupts, smiling. "Rosie thinks you're very funny by the way."
I assume by Rosie, she means the brown-haired girl from the front garden – her daughter. I think back to when she had seen us and had run inside to her mother. Was it to tell her about two strangers? Or to tell her the famous Fin Odair had turned up in the neighborhood? I think it might be the latter; she wouldn't have cared about two strangers; she wouldn't have the same sense of wariness and fear that her mother's generation has. Rosie is an Innocent – like me.
"They trapped me," I continue, feeling ashamed. "They've got me at gunpoint twenty four hours a day." I look pointedly to the door which leads to the hallway and through to the kitchen. Katniss looks with me and I can see it all come together in her head.
"Gale is your guard," she realizes. "Oh, Fin, what have you done?" This time her voice is full of despair, and I feel terrible for being the one to make her sound so hopeless.
"I'm sorry, Miss. Everdeen," I say.
"Mellark," she corrects me. "It's Mrs. Mellark."
"You married?" I ask, surprised. None of the textbooks say she married Peeta but, then again, the textbooks only went up to when she was banished. Nobody wants to hear about the broken Mockingjay serving her sentence for murdering the President.
"He finally wore me down," she says, her District accent thick. I smile with her again.
"Do you think there's any hope?" I ask her. "Will there always be a government like this?"
"Probably," she says it like she's given up, as though she accepted such a fact a long time ago. "Though Plutarch surprised me," she goes on, before catching me eye and saying, "As did you."
My heart sinks as I realize I have not earned her friendship. What I am seeing is a fragile woman going through so many emotions she can't be bothered keeping her guard up. She hates me. I don't think I will ever be able to change that nor do I think I deserve to.
"You deserve this," she says before getting up and punching me to the floor.
I'm not knocked out this time but instead pain flares up legs and in my head. She starts pounding me with her fists. My vision becomes red and blurry. My eyelids are heavy. As she starts to kick me in the gut, I begin to fear for my life. I wonder where Gale is. The Capitol needs me alive don't they?
Unless it was all part of Gale's plan. Maybe he'd suggested District 12 because he knew this would be Katniss' reaction. He hates me for signing the contract and bringing him into this for my protection. He wants me dead.
With that being my final thought, I black out.
(*)
It hurts more to come round this time, and it takes me longer to work out my surroundings. The room is brown; I'm lying in a bed; the bed is comfortable; my head hurts. Little tidbits of information come to me one by one until, after a few minutes, I'm left with the full picture of what is going on.
I guess I am in a guestroom in Katniss' home. The light brown walls match what little I saw of the hallway. They have the same rich and polished look as the rest of the house too. Upon the walls, hang paintings of the countryside. The green hues match well with the walls. I feel as though I'm lying in a forest. It's peaceful but I don't like it for a number of reasons.
One, I'm from District 4, I want to be in a room painted blue with paintings of colorful fish and deep green reeds. Two, my whole body hurts and I'm dreading the fact I will most likely need to move soon. And three, I'm still alive. Clearly Katniss didn't do a thorough job and, being in her house, I'm scared she will come back and finish what she's started.
For a split second, as I lay being beaten on the floor, I thought of how nice death sounded. I wouldn't have to deal with the Games, the Capitol, the responsibility. I could close my eyes and not come back. Maybe I'd see my mother again, meet my father. Who knows?
That last bit pulls me up short. I don't want them to see what I've done. I can't die yet. I need to make this right.
The door opens and I flinch, crying out as pain erupts throughout my body like flame licking my veins. Gale stands there, looking guilty. He's not alone. A small woman with long red hair rushes through the doorway behind him and over to me. She's a nurse and I want to kiss her when she adds more morphling to my system.
"Just you rest now," she tells me, patting my arm. She knows how gentle she has to be so she comforts me without hurting. Forget it, I want to marry her. But there are more important matters to attend to now.
Suddenly I'm aware I'm half-blind. Surprised I didn't notice this before, I blink a dozen times just to check. Sure enough, a bandage covers my left eye. Still, I won't let it distract me from what I need to do.
"What the hell was that about?" I scream at him. "I thought you were supposed to protect me you bastard!"
He doesn't even flinch but tells me threateningly, "Shut up. There are children in this house and a lady beside you."
"It's alright with me," the red-head drawls. "He's got every right to shout as far as I'm concerned. What those people in the Capitol made him do, and now Mrs. Mellark beating him to a pulp." She's going to have my babies.
"Stop trying to score points, Hanya," Gale tells her. "Remove his pain and get out."
"There's a lady beside me," I mock him, reminding him he's being rude.
Hanya takes it all in her stride, checks my drips which I'm suddenly aware of beside my bed, and leaves the room in silence.
"Explain," I demand. The morphling is making me a bit woozy but I need to know what the hell is going on. If he and Katniss want me dead then why am I still here?
"Katniss did you a favor," he tells me.
There's a pause before a burst out laughing. "Yeah, thanks," I say. "Now I'm in a good mood, tell me what really happened."
Ignoring me, Gale takes a seat on a chair beside my bed. I've just noticed that's there too. God, what is wrong with my head?
"You're suffering from concussion," Gale says as though he is reading my mind. "You've been signed off sick for five months."
I wait for this news to make sense. It doesn't so I wait for him to go on.
"Katniss has just given you an excuse to have five months away from work," Gale tells me. "Five months away from the Capitol on condition that you stay in District 12."
"Great," I say, sarcastic. "I'm sure I'm welcome here."
"You are," Gale tells me nonchalantly. "You'll be out of bed within a week, and off crutches in two months. That gives you three months of total relaxation."
"And forgetting who I am and where I'm supposed to piss," I remind him.
Gale gives me a small smile. "Hanya may have over-exaggerated your injuries to Plutarch a little bit."
I blink at him, surprised. He places an almost fatherly hand on my shoulder. It hurts a little but I don't complain – I wouldn't want to marry him anyway.
"We're all on your side," he says.
Gale is right. In two months I'm as good as new and enjoying life with the Mellark family. Rosie and Martox take me to the meadow everyday where – as soon as I was off crutches – they forced me into playing tag.
Okay, 'forced' is a strong word. I enjoyed playing with them. It felt good to let my guard down and act like I was innocent again. People stared. I let them. I didn't care.
"We named him after Peeta's father you know," Katniss tells me conversationally as she holds a sleeping Martox in her arms. Rosie is curled up next to her. It's been three months since she hit me and the pair of us are sat in the living room. The television is off because we don't want to wake the children. The silence is soothing to my still-sore head.
"I didn't know," I say, unsure what to add.
"He was killed in the bombing," she explains, stroking a curl of blond hair away from her son's face. "He was a good man."
"What about Rosie?" I ask.
Katniss freezes and looks down at the sleeping girl. I know straight away I shouldn't have asked; that I've struck a nerve.
"My sister," she says numbly. I know she means she named her daughter after her sister but the meaning I get from her chills me to the bone. She uses the voice I use whenever somebody asks me about my mother.
"What happened?" I ask.
"She died." The words catch in Katniss' throat and I know I'm seeing something very rare. After living with Katniss for weeks now, I know she's not an easy person to break. Yet mentioning her sister is enough to make me realize I have to be gentle with her.
"What was her name?"
"Primrose." I can tell it's been a while since she's said her name out loud. I think if she talks about it, it might make her feel better. I start off small.
"Why don't you just call her Rose then?"
Katniss almost throws Martox down onto the sofa as she flees the room. I'm left sitting there, as stunned as Martox who begins to stare as soon as he leaves his mother's arms. Rosie wakes too.
I snap out of my shock quickly to soothe the pair of them. I like being round the children. It's nice to be around other Innocents.
As I stroke Rosie's hair to put her back to sleep, her name suddenly hits me. But it's not just her name, it's part of a memory; a memory that seems hundreds of years away now.
"We'll just have to find somebody else won't we? I'm sure we can hold out long enough until Rosie is ready."
Plutarch's voice rings loud and clear as I stare down at Rosie. With her closed eyes and button nose, she is the face of innocence. And the child of two victors. I kiss her forehead. At least she is one life I save whilst doing this. I'll keep that in mind when I watch the twenty teenagers fighting to death because of me. Two months to go.
Despite me being in the house for five months, I discovered next to nothing about Katniss' life before the war. I never found out about her relationship with her mother either – she seemed as reluctant to talk about her as she did her sister.
And I still wasn't so sure she had beaten me up for my own good.
Peeta opened up about life in the bakery and his paintings, but he was adamant about not discussing Katniss' life. Gale even kept his distance too. Peeta told me he and Katniss were catching up on things but I was surprised to find myself hurt that Gale wasn't checking up on me.
The fact that he'd opened up to me on the train here combined with the way he'd put his hand on my shoulder when he declared they were on my side had made me think our relationship would be different. I want Gale to help me out of this situation. I want him to be my friend when Britney betrayed me and Juppy disowned me.
The only time he truly speaks to me is the night before we're due back to travel to the Capitol. He's going over what will happen when I arrive back. We leave early in the morning so I've already said goodbye to Peeta, Katniss and the children. They're sleeping now as we sit at the kitchen table.
I'm trying to listen to Gale but my mind is still replaying Rosie's goodbye.
"Fin," she had said to me after giving me a hug. "When you get back to the Capitol are you going to make me laugh again?" I hadn't wanted to lie to her and I knew she was talking about the show; my acting. Something I know I will never get the chance to do again.
Still, I didn't want to upset her either. I promised her I would try.
"Fin?" Gale's voice brings me back to the present. "Are you listening?"
"What?" I ask.
He sighs, exasperated. "I said when we get back to the Capitol," he smiles, "There's somebody I want you to meet."