Pretend Happiness

"I don't want to be the mockingjay."

She was frightened more than anything in her life as she whispered those words, so powerful that she couldn't quite recognize their meaning until she said them out loud. Fidgeting, her nerves tingled as she awaited the response of the boy next to her.

"I don't blame you," he admitted finally, and she was even more surprised to hear this coming from the boy who seemed ready to take the Capitol to its knees single-handedly. But when she stole a glance at him, she knew he was telling the truth. He also had another look in his eye, the same look that Haymitch and even Peeta sometimes got when they looked at her. She reacted to that look with eyes like daggers and turned her head.

"No, no, no," he protested, getting up and reaching for her hands. She flinched at this, unaccustomed still to being touched in such a comforting way by someone. Nevertheless, she didn't move her hands away from his calloused ones. For a split second she felt shame to have her dainty hands brushing his, looking how hers once looked. "Hey, Katniss, look at me. Sometimes you don't get to choose how life goes, and it sucks. But think about it like this; you have the potential to make it so others don't have to be forced into a miserable life like us – so people of the Capitol don't get it so good while we suffer and – "

"You know what, though? I didn't sign up to be some savior of Panem!" she shouted at him, pulling back from his touch. Her eyes were accusing, but he refused to back away. "Let somebody else do it, let Peeta, let somebody who cares."

"Don't you see?" Gale moved towards her, and this time she didn't back away. "Peeta can't. Nobody else can, nobody else fits the role. It's you, defiant and imperfect and relatable. You might not see it, but you were the right person in the right place at the right time. And chance sucks, yeah, but look at this opportunity for everyone else to be finally free –"

"So you're saying its coincidence?" she flashed back, challenge alighting in her eyes. "Well guess what? You don't know anything about what I want. What if I want to try and be happy for once in my life?"

But even as she said it, the ridiculousness of that statement slammed into her full force. Her eyes dropped, and her mouth formed an "o"; she sharply took in a breath.

"But why don't I get to be happy?" she breathed, eyes shining as she stared still at the ground.

"After this is all over, you can be, Katniss," Gale told her, his voice so full of assurance that it could only be a lie. "I'll be here when you come back. And things will be the same but better – for everybody."

"That's easy for you to say…" You're not the mockingjay.

But she allowed him to put his arm around her, and they sat and watched the wind in the trees and pretended that there was a place for happiness in the future.

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xx Again with the morbid. Sheesh, you'd think I could do better. (; Maybe some pre-Games scenes and that'll do it.