Forgot to put the disclaimer in the first chapter, so here it goes, I don't own THG, or the perf characters. I do own my ideas though.
Thanks for all the reviews and follows so far guys :) I'm so sorry for the slow update, and I can't promise anything with school starting again, but I'm really trying to take my time with this and make it good.
Gale wakes up to yet another day in district 2. Since his arrival, each day has been so routine and eventless, never having anything special happening that is worth him remembering. His "fancy job" as some people have referred to, was essentially just to train new recruits for the newly established country. He teaches them to put together weapons, helps them improve their aim, and guides them through series of training designed to improve their strength and stamina. They had originally asked him to help them design more weapons, but of course after bombs that killed Primrose, Gale immediately declined the offer, cringing at the thought of it. The job had a decent pay, enough to pay rent and food and a whole lot more; the hours weren't bad either, training usually doesn't go long past early afternoon, and if there weren't an officials meeting or something of the sort, he is usually home by two o'clock or earlier. Things seem ideal, but money and time wasn't exactly what Gale needed; in fact time was exactly what he didn't need.
Having only lived here for only a little more than a month, and not having met many people outside of the military base, any time not spent on work is time spent drowning in the memories. Every day as he sat in his living room, eating a plate of fancy take out or playing with pieces of rope to design snares he no longer need, his mind would always drift back to district 12, to his family, to Katniss, to Prim.
In the first week, Gale found himself resorting to bottle after bottle of alcohol that he bought in a shop just beside the apartment. Gale's never been much of a drinker, but it managed to numb the pain and drive away the images, even if it's just for a while, even if not completely, it was still just what he needed. However after showing up to work with pounding headaches and vague memories for days in a row, and receiving odd looks from his recruits and more importantly the chief commander, Gale decided that he couldn't keep it up, and go down the same road as people like Haymitch Abernathy. He still had a glass every once in a while, but never allowed himself to get drunk.
He's yet to find another way to escape his thoughts completely. He's tried going out for jogs, shooting targets at the military's shooting range, but nothing worked; what he longs for is to be out in his woods again hunting, what he wants is for the people he loves, what he wants is to feel free again. His life has lost many of its important pieces, and Gale has yet to replace them, not to mention find new pieces that weren't even there before.
Slowly though, he got to know a few other commanders at work, at first it surprised him how similar some of their experiences were to his. They have all somehow lost, and still fought through the ashes to get to here. It made Gale think that maybe he's not alone, he's not the only one with a messed up past, if all these people were still fighting, then maybe he can too until the end.
Some of his coworkers have suggested him to start dating, to try and find that special someone that can fill up the empty spots in his heart; some of them have even gone as far as setting him up with dates. He's gone on a few couple of them, had some nice chats with some of the girls, but he never felt any romantic attraction to them. This was unusual for Gale, back when he was still in school, he did have kind of a reputation, he use to go out with different girls almost every week, sure it never really got serious and they never did anything more than just talk or sometimes kiss, he did see them as potential lovers. Now he just sees girls who could be good friends, there isn't that connect, that attraction, not even the slightest urges for a hook up.
Maybe his heart is waiting for the one to come, or maybe the war has numbed his ability to love.
"Hey Undersee, can you give these files to doctor Schylor?" a nurse yells from across the small room. Madge nods, walking over to retrieve the files containing the patient's records in the hospital. In the first couple of weeks upon her arrival, she was put to work delivering supplies to refugees, and the institutions that the government owned. Having been the mayor's daughter all her life, Madge never had to do much work, and as expected the running around and labor work exhausted her.
Luckily though, being a politician's daughter led Madge to have quite a way with people, and it's that way with people that gave her the approval to transfer to the district 2 central hospital. She helps out around the building, mostly visiting patients and making sure that they are well physically and mentally, especially the latter. She was good at talking with people, good at putting a smile on people's faces during their hardest times, good at spreading happiness even though on the inside she feels everything but.
Despite never being taught much about it when she was young, Madge was smart and a quick learner nonetheless. She was able to pick up some medical knowledge, at least enough for her to qualify as a nurse. Now her work expands to preparing and distributing medicine, and occasionally giving a couple shots. It wasn't particularly difficult, and Madge was content that at least she's being useful for what seemed like the first time in her life, and actually making differences in people's lives. Even though her job involved so much communication, outside of it Madge still kept to herself. She sometimes engaged in the small talks with the other girls in the hospital, but she never accepted their invitations to hang out, choosing instead to shut herself in her studio apartment, often lost in a book or a movie, any kind of portal that can magically transfer her to another world away from her problems.
"Madgey!" calls a voice behind her, and she finds herself rolling her eyes before even turning to face the boy following closely behind her with a bright smile on his face. "Hey, I've been looking for you all morning where have you been?" He says once he reached her. It was Toni, a doctor in training that she met during the first week here. He had been following around for days, trying to get her to go out with him; he was a nice guy with a good heart, but Madge just wasn't interested, especially not at a time like this. She was willing to be friends, just not his girlfriend. Madge has dated guys before in district 12, but they always ended badly, many of them ending up to have just dated her because she was the mayor's daughter. Even though Toni doesn't know about her past, past of the reason for her disinterest is still the fact that she's scared to get hurt, because that might just finally cut it and make her really hit rock bottom.
As a reply Madge gives him a weak smile, and that leads him to continue talking, "So I was thinking, how about we go to dinner after work today? I know-"
"Toni, I told you already, I don't want to be in any sorts of relationship right now and I'm not interested, do you not understand that?" I say, having already said the same things to him at least twice. I never use to be this cold but I've learned that it's necessarily.
"Okay, fine. Then how about we just go out as friends then? Come'on, I just wanna hang out with you, nothing else."
She sighs, she's always had trouble saying no, but she really didn't feel up to a "hang out" with a boy she just met for a couple of weeks. "Okay fine, but not today. Maybe another time alright? And don't have any expectations." And with that she turns away, while Toni rushes away quickly yelling something to her about next weekend.
Madge continues down the hospital halls towards the doctor's office, absent-mindedly flipping through the files, glancing over the words. Suddenly a name catches her eyes, one that she had to read again to make sure she read it right, one that makes her heart almost skip a beat.
Gale Hawthorne
Gale storms into the hospital, clutching his bleeding arm with his hand. No big deal, he thought to himself, just some minor accident. The idiot had apparently not listened to any of the instructions, and flung the knife so far from the target that it went straight towards Gale. Luckily Gale saw if coming and dodged it. It did still scrape his arm and leave a fairly deep cut, but it was better than what could have happened. It wasn't a big deal to Gale, not a big deal for a soldier who's been through war. But everyone kept insisting, and so after giving the person behind all this a punishment of some extra laps and aiming practice, as well as a deduction in rank, Gale got dragged to the hospital to get the cut stitched.
He sat outside the doctor's operating room, his eyes scanning the hallway in front of him, trying to catch anything interesting to kill his time with as he waits to be called inside. Doctors and nurses scurried through the hallways, busy getting to patients in need. The hallways were painted with white paint, and grey tiles, it was plain but still better than Mrs Everdeen's kitchen which had practically been the district 12 hospital. Great, now he was thinking about the Everdeens again.
But then all of his thoughts are interrupted when he sees it, the familiar flash of gold that triggered so many memories and took his breath away. And with out a second of hesitation, Gale gets up and runs to chase down the girl with the golden hair, his arm and his appointment well out of his head.
I was going to include the next chapter with this one, but it seemed like the right place to end it, so sorry if its a bit short. Plus I thought this chapter wasn't that good so I thought I'd just leave it be. I do have the whole next chapter planned and it should be up later this week. It'll address the pre-story of Gale and Madge.
Oh and about this chapter, I was trying to just fill in on their daily lives in district 2, so it's a bit choppy and not much happened, but I promise the next one will have more interactions.
I decided to leave Madge kind of cold-hearted in this story at first, because she's scared of getting hurt again and such... anyhow
Review and tell me what you think.