I miss Haymitch a whole lot, and I had this sudden thought for this one-shot, so here it is :) There's hayffie if you squint.

One Step Forward
(43 years old)

The entire district was a mass graveyard, one that was being built upon, slowly and a little each day.

People were moving back to Twelve. Shops had begun to sparsely spring up selling the basic necessities and there was already some semblance of life to a district that only half a year ago had been razed to the ground, leaving it an empty desolate land.

Haymitch let his feet guide him, one step at a time until he came upon a stretch of road. The road itself was no longer familiar. The place had been dug, paved and then cemented following the bombings that had left a huge crater in the middle of it.

The cemetery at the end of the road was destroyed and there was not even an indication that it used to be a place where the dead were buried. Except for the broken tombstones, it was an empty land as far as they eye could see; a clean slate.

It was probably a sign, if Haymitch believed in things like that.

There was nothing to see and yet, he ventured in to stand upon familiar grounds. It might not look the same but it did not mean that Haymitch did not know the place.

The markers that marked his parents' grave and his brother's were gone but they had been buried at this exact spot he was standing so he stayed.

For a long time, all he did was to stare at the patch of earth.

There were plans to turn the cemetery into something but there was nothing concrete yet. To the people in Twelve, this place was not a priority and people were not too comfortable about disturbing the place, even if it resembled nothing of what it used to be.

"The Games are over - "

The words tumbled out of his lips, unbidden. The dead wouldn't care about what was happening in their world but he felt that he needed to share, that he owed it to them that something good came out of all these deaths and pain and destruction.

"- and I'm still standing."

The place was eerily quiet except for the occasional chirping of the birds that had made a nest in one of the only remaining trees in the cemetery that still stood despite the devastation. The cold draft of wind blew in the air and Haymitch pulled on his collars.

"Don't know how I made it, truthfully. Some days, I wake up and still have a hard time believin' that I'm alive. I think - "

He rubbed the back of his neck and retrieved the flask from his pocket. The sip that brought a little burn to his throat and gave him some warmth in the cold provided him some comfort.

"I think I'm being given a second shot at – I don't know - at living."

He tried to picture his mother but it had been so long he was beginning to forget her face and it made his blood ran cold. There was a photograph of when he was ten years of age and Lief was still a tiny toddler with his parents. It was faded with age but Effie had taken it and had sent it to photographer with the hopes having it restored or preserved. He wasn't sure if it would work but he let her.

"I don't know why I'm here. Goodbye, maybe," he shrugged without a thought even if there was no one to see him do it and especially not the dead. "I had to come for one last time. Stupid, yeah, but … Your graves are gone and this whole place might not be around much longer," he exhaled shakily. "Before they built something on this ground and I thought it was good to … I've never said goodbye. I've never let go; never let myself heal properly over any of your deaths.

"The guilt, it's… I'm never gonna forget you even if your graves aren't here no more but I need to – I need to move on. I need to live. The boy – Peeta – thinks it's an insult to those who died and to those who sacrificed their lives for us if we don't live our lives. Could be some bullshit his therapist fed him but he's got a point. I need to forgive myself – that's the only way forward. I couldn't do that over the past twenty odd years and truth is, I don't think I can do it now but I gotta try and this time I'm willing to try. I made it, Ma, and I don't wanna waste it."

He fell silent when he heard voices but his presence went unnoticed.

"The kids… They need me. Not for long, I think, but right now, they need me and Effie, too," he muttered and chuckled. "You'll like those kids. They're good kids – mine, only have each other now. Hell, you might even like Effie. She's a handful, snobbish too but she's got good heart. You'll like her. Lief might like her, too."

He wished there was a way that he could really know that but he would never know the answer and suddenly, it felt useless being here.

"This is fuckin' stupid," he muttered, rubbing his face in frustration.

There was nothing to find here. The graves it once held was gone. Everything from his past was gone. It was time to go.

Haymitch turned away and walked the same path the came from. He gave one last look over his shoulder and he knew then that he would not return. Whatever plans the post-war committee had for this place for a better future, it was better than the acres of land filled with their dead who lost their lives to the game and Snow's regime. It would be filled with hope and life, and it would be better.

Forward.

There would undoubtedly be some form of memorial in this district but to Haymitch, there would be other ways for him to remember the tributes he lost and the family that was taken from him. He did not need three grave markers to remember his family. He could honour them by giving his own life a shot – a life that they never had – and by protecting the family he now had, dysfunctional as they may be.

His mother would have wanted that for him, he supposed.