AN: Primrose's POV
The next morning after breakfast Dr. Gunian leads me and the guys up to the roof where a hovercraft is waiting for me. "This will take you to the New Capitol and then to District Twelve," He explains, "We'll be expecting you back in three days.
Three days. That should be enough time for everything.
I kiss Merlin then address both of them in jest, "You two keep out of trouble while I'm gone, okay?"
"Okay," Merlin grins, "You do the same."
"When do I ever get into trouble?" I laugh, walking towards the hovercraft. I get in and the driver takes off.
It's a thirty minute flight to New Capitol, then the driver lets me out on a hover pad and waits for me there. I walk on the sidewalk, looking around at all the tall shiny buildings. I've never actually been to the New Capitol before, only seen pictures, but I still know the way to Monroe's apparent building.
I walk up to it in there's a door man at the front revolving door. "Excuse me," I say, "I'm looking for my brother, Monroe Everdeen-Melark, he lives here."
"Wait out here," The door man says, walking inside. It's a good minute before he comes out again and he says, "Come with me."
He leads me to the far wall and pushes a button on the side. Doors open revealing a dark wood-paneled elevator cab decorated with mother-of-pearl.
"He's on floor five," The doorman says as I walk in.
The door shuts and hit the button labeled "5". I almost lose my balance as the elevator starts to moves, and again when it stops. It opens up reliving a young man in his early twenties in a dark business suit. He has neatly styled blonde hair and deep gray eyes, and smiles slightly when he sees me.
"Hello, Prim," Monroe says.
"Hey, Monroe," I say, actually moving in for a hug and wrapping may arms around his neck.
"Wow, what's all this about?" Monroe says in surprise as I let go, "First a surprise visit, an now hug? Are you dying?"
"No," I reply, "But something has happened, and I really need to talk to you about it."
"Sure," He says, "Just let me call in to tell them I won't be coming."
We walk into his apartment and I sat down on his couch while he calls in. I settle into the cool gray, square cussons and examine my surroundings. The apartment is large, all glass and metal. Actually, quite nice, I have to admit. I almost can see why Monroe doesn't seem to want to leave. Then my mind drifts to the matter at hand. What do I say to him? I mean, getting Dr, Gunian's permission was one thing, but I'm telling my brother that this is the last time we'll ever see each other. Since our relationship has been strained since we reached adulthood, maybe even a little before, I didn't think it would be that hard, but then he appeared so happy that I was here. Well, maybe he isn't all that happy about it; he's been in the other room for a while now.
Then he comes out with a tea tray. Crap.
"You like mint, right?" He asks, pouring two cups, "I mean, I remember you liked it when we were kids."
"It's been a while, but yeah," I say, taking the cup and inhaling the minty scent.
"I figured you might appreciate after the long trip here," Monroe says, pouring milk and sugar into his own cup.
"It wasn't actually that long," I say, blowing on my tea, "I was already at the border so it already took about half an hour."
Monroe's raises his eyes in surprise. "What were you doing there?"
I put my cup on the coffee table and looked him in the eye. "That's actually what I came to talk to you about."
Just like the night before, I explain everything to him. Except this time I put empathies about how much I love Merlin, how much he loves me, how much thought we put into this.
When I finish, Monroe leans back thoughtfully for moment, then says, "This Merlin-is he good to you?"
It's not bad question to ask about the guy your sister just told you she's running off to another century with, I'll admit. "Yeah," I say, "He is. Really good."
"And you're happy with him," That's one half-question, half-statement, like somehow he already knows the answer.
"Yes," I reply, "Happier than I've been in a while."
He's silent for a moment, like he doesn't want to say what's he's about to. "Well then," He says at last, his voice shaking, "Who am I to stand in your way?"
Suddenly I feel like a great weight has been lifted off my shoulders. "Thank you for understanding," I say gratefully.
"Thank you for coming to tell me in person," Monroe replies, "All things considered."
"All things considered," I laugh. He has a point. "But really, you don't hate me for doing this to you?"
"Doing what?" Monroe responds, "Prim, if you haven't noticed we've been practically strangers for years, and yes, I know that's my fault-"
"Not all of it," I admit, "I didn't suddenly lose the ability to write a letter."
"Prim, we could debate to Kingdom Come whose fault it was," Monroe cuts me off, "The point is, you're still my sister, so yes, I am going to miss you, but I also want you to be happy, and if this is what makes you happy then-how can I be mad about that?"
I stay for a little bit longer, and when I leave Monroe walks me all the way to the elevator. When we get to it we share a long, warm embrace. "Goodbye, big sister." Monroe whispers in my ear," I love you."
"You too," I whisper back, "I'll remember this when it's time to name the children."
"You better," He says as I step into the elevator and the doors close.
The last thing I see is him grinning like an idiot.
I fall asleep on the ride to District Twelve. Rather soundly apparently, because the next thing I know I'm being shaken awake by the driver. "We're here," He tells me.
"Thanks," I say getting up.
I take the scenic route to the cemetery, taking everything in. The shops on the streets, the felids where I use to play as a child, ignorant of the bodies beneath, the farms in the countryside, I have to stop when people I know from my work with the colonist, come up to me and chat me up, not letting on this is the last time they will do that. The last stop I make is the old victors village, more specifically my childhood home. While no one has lived there since Mom passed, both me and Monroe have been paying for its up keep, so when I walk in, its exactly the way I left it. There's the pale blue-grey couch and matching armchairs, a stand with a small TV on it that hardly ever got used even when the place was in habited, I'm not even sure it works anymore, a table made of dark wood, atop which sat a blue mosaic vase, which someone has put fresh flowers in from the garden. I half expect my parents to come in, Mom demanding where the Hell I've been.
I walk through the rest of the house, the kitchen, the second floor, until I finally come to my old room. It was pretty plain by the end, a tan wooden bureau by the wall, a metal frame bed topped with a green bedspread, and an scuffed leather trunk at the foot of it. I open it up, revealing the memories of my childhood I chose to keep: pictures, both photographs and drawings tied neatly together with string, a glass bottle in the shape of a swan, long empty of the perfume it held when I was a teenager, and Florence, my best friend from childhood, a porcelain doll with light brown hair and green eyes, wearing a calico dress with seven flounces. I hadn't planned on taking her with me, but that thing I said about children...maybe I'll have some to pass her onto one day. I grab the pictures and drawings, put them in the bag, and walk outside, still holding on to Florence.
I walk around outside of the house, which is still lined with the same plants that have surrounded it since as long as I can remember. Bushes of little yellow flowers, the color of sunshine. Evening Primrose. The flower from which my name comes. Or rather flower from which the name of the person I'm named for comes from. I remember when I was little I use to make crowns out of them, one for myself and one for Florence. When Monroe was out there with me I would make one from him. He use to love when he was little but when he got older and more into boy stuff, he'd protest and wine, saying he didn't want to look like a girl. I even made flower crowns for our parents when they played out there with us. I remember how the bright yellow looked in contrast with Mom's black hair. She was the beautiful of all. I told her so once and why I thought that, and she replied that I had the same hair, so it was more of a tie. '
I pick several flowers in my hand and start weaving them together. As I weave I start to sing. "Beneath the meadow, under the willow, a bed of grass, a soft green pillow..." I haven't sung it since I was kids, but I can still remember the words by heart. Soon I have two crowns, just like when I little, one in my hair and one in Florence's, just like when I was kid. When I finish, I put Florence in my bag, the grab gather three bouquets of Evening Primrose, and leave the house for a finial time.
At last I make it to the graveyard where Mom and Dad are buried. The graves are hard to miss marked with giant headstones made of gorgeous blue-gray marble. I walk over to them and lay a bouquet on each on each grave. "Hey, Mom," I say, "Hey Dad. It's been a while."
And so I tell them the story of me and Merlin, the story we told together, the one I told to Monroe on my own. The one I'm getting very good at telling.
"I know this sounds crazy," I say, when I finish the tale, "Even more so since I'm talking to a couple of pieces of rock, but ...deep down in my heart I know I'm doing the right thing. Actually, it's kind of like you two in a way. Remember how told me about how you first meant, the real first time you first meant, with the bread and the dandelion? Merlin-he's my dandelion. He's my hope."
I'm surrounded by complete silence. But something inside me feels-strange. I don't know if I believe in an afterlife, I somehow, I know, that if there is, my parents are smiling down on me right now, and they're happy.
"I knew you understand," I say, getting up. I don't say goodbye this time because I've already said goodbye to them a long time ago. I continue down the rows.
There's still one more grave to visit.
This one's much more modest. The gravestone's average-sized, craved from an ordinary gray-brown rock. I lay the last bouquet down in front of it.
"Hi, Gale," I say.
Gale Hawthorn was the man I met two weeks after Mom passed, the one who thought I was her. "I'm so sorry, Catnip!" He exclaimed, as he hug me, "I'm so, so, sorry!"
"Sir," I say, trying to get out of the vice-like embrace , "I'm not who you think I am." Honestly, I didn't know who he thought I was. Who would name their kid Catnip?
He finally put me down and on closer inspection starting murmuring, "No, no."
"Mister," I say calmly, "Why don't you just take a deep breath, and calm down? Look, my name's Primrose, what's yours?"
I didn't realize at the time, but that was possibly the worst thing I could've said. His eyes got a glazed over look and he doesn't say anything.
"Mister," I say, gently shaking him a little, "Mister!"
As he snaps out of it I realize that people are starting to stare.
"Hey, maybe we should take this conversation in private," I suggested.
He nodded. "Yes, maybe that's-for the best." As we walked away from town he added, "Gale."
"Hun?" I replied.
"You asked what my name was," He said, "My name is Gale."
When we get home, I set him down with cup of tea and we eventually get everything sorted. He explains to me the his name Gale Hawthorn and that he and my mother use to be best friends, but something happened during the war that put a permanent wedge between them. When he heard Mom died, he came hoping to make it for the funeral.
I remember my mother mentioning a Gale once or twice, but I never got the whole story. As Gale goes into more detail, he admits that he's not long for this world himself, and he made the trip against doctors orders.
"Couldn't any family come with you?" I asked.
Gale shook his head. "My parents are dead and I haven't had contact with my siblings, other than my sister, for years, and I never married, never had children-that I know of at least," He chuckled, "I was quite the ladies man once upon of time."
"I have an idea," I said, "Why don't stay here for a while?"
"I wouldn't want to be a bother," Gale replied.
"You wouldn't," I insisted, "Trust me."
"I suppose a few days wouldn't hurt," Gale gave in, "As long as you're sure, Prim."
A few days turned out to be the rest of Gale's life, which was about the year and a half. If I'm completely honest, I'm not sure how he lasted that long. He was very frail and weak, which a heart condition, and he tended to fade in and out of reality. That day was not the last time he mistook me for my mother. But it felt good, having someone to take care of again.
I took care of him to the point of sitting by his bedside as he died. "Where's you jacket?" He asked.
"What?" I replied, confused.
"You were wearing an old leather jacket earlier," He elaborated.
I start to say I wasn't then I realized what he was talking about. The day we meant I was wearing my mother's jacket.
It's then I know how much he's fading, and he's only hanging on for me. "It's okay," I say, getting on the bed with him, tainting and taking his hand, "You can let go, I'll be fine."
"Oh, Prim," He says in a horse whisper, "I'm so sorry."
"It's alright, Gale," I say, not really sure what he's got to be sorry about, or if it's even me he's saying sorry to, just wanting to help him the best I can, "I forgive you."
It's only then that he closes his eyes, and his breathing starts to get weaker and weaker until it's finally stops. It's also then I lose it again, and start sobbing .I managed to locate his sister Posy, and the younger of his two brothers for the funeral. I've even seen them again a couple of times when I come to visit my friend's grave.
Back in the here and now, I start talking to him. "I hope you heard what I told my parents 'cause I'm really tired of repeating myself." It's the kind of joke I know he would appreciate. "But that also means, I won't be coming back here. Don't worry, you'll still have Posy. But what I really wanted to say was...you showed up right when I needed you and you gave me a reason to keep going when I wasn't sure I could. So, since I'm not sure if I've ever said it before...thank you."
Having said that, I pull myself together and stand up, willing myself to leave for the final time.
By the time I get back to the hover craft the sun's gone down, and the driver thinks we should stay the night, so that's what we do, sleeping in the hovercraft. Apparently he wakes up before me because when I wake we're in the sky, right in-between District 12 and our final destination. I look down and see trees and villages fly buy, looking so, so tiny. It then occurs to me that this is the first and last time I will see this particular area. "No," I tell myself ''That's dangerous territory you're getting into and you know it." But I can't help it. In a few hours I'll be in a completely alien place, in another century and I'll only know two people there. And that scares me. It utterly terrifies me. I have half of mind to tell the driver to turn this thing around and drop me back off at District Twelve, but he can't hear me back here and even if he could, I don't think hover crafts work that way. So I try to calm myself. "You'll be fine," I tell myself, "Everything will be find." I tell myself that the rest of the way.
Finally we land, and I see two people waiting for me. One of them is Dr, Guinn, and the other us Merlin.
As I step out of the hover craft by legs wobble a bit. Probably because I've been sitting too long. Instantly Merlin's at my side, helping me stand. "So," He said, as we walk together, "How was the trip?"
"As good as could be expected," I say, "Monroe took it well, he says he's glad I'm happy."
"We'll have to remember that when we name the children," Merlin jokes.
"I told him we would," I laugh.
Suddenly I forget all about being scared.