AN: FYI, this story has recently gone through an editing pass. Still the same plot overall, but the first half in particular has been cleaned up a bit to better hold up the rest of it going forward.
Also, just btw, you can find me on tumblr at districtunrest! :)
Haymitch yawns the entire way over to next door. Even with the recent changes he's made to improve his sleeping, he's not any more of a morning person for it.
He adjusts the rucksack over his shoulder, tensing when glass clinks together inside, and pushes through the front door into the - well, the house. It's become both a boarding house and a doctor's office for the time being, and somehow Haymitch is here for both.
Inside, he's met with a warm, heady waft of woodsmoke. He follows the kitchen-shaped sounds and finds Greasy Sae crouched before the large stove with an iron poke, coaxing the fire into something she can make breakfast with.
Now that Katniss and Peeta are trusted to feed themselves without killing each other, and Haymitch is trusted to stay around, Sae has moved on to bigger appetites and opened her kitchen as well as her spare bedrooms to newcomers. It's noble work but Haymitch bets she's glad for the better company, too.
She calls out over her bony shoulder, "Nadine, now that I think about it, fetch another bag of grits." A lanky Seam girl - fourteen, if he had to guess - drops her task of shucking peapods to retrieve a sack from the pantry. When she sets it down on the counter closest to the stove, Sae rises to tell her, "More water, too, dear," before handing her another pot.
Turned away from Sae, Nadine happens to meet his eyes and flashes hers in annoyance as she heads for the sink. It takes Haymitch aback, being let in on the moment. He chuckles in sympathy - empathy, really, though it's long outdated.
With that time of his life in mind, he notices how her dark hair hangs above her shoulders, like Mollie's used to. Instead of wallowing in the same old things that the sight drudges up in him, he tries to remember being fourteen. His grandmother died that year, and he started dating his first real girlfriend, as he'd distinguished to his brother. Haymitch believed he was nearly grown up, then, but of course he wasn't. He can see that same kind of bravado in Nadine, and it's odd to feel only amused by it. He doesn't have to discern whether it'll make her hard to mentor or get her sponsors.
While Nadine runs the faucet, Haymitch joins Greasy Sae at the stove. "You need more firewood," he tells her, having seen the log pile on his way over.
Sae slips a piece of split wood into the fire and shuts the little metal door. "Sounds like I'll have more firewood soon, then. Thanks for volunteering."
Even though he was going to offer, Haymitch still shoots her a flat look as he unslings his bag. From it, he retrieves five glass jars that he sets in a loose row by the grits. They've cooled since he set them out on his own kitchen counter last night. Inside is his attempt at sweet peppers.
When Sae starts tapping the tin lids to check that they're airtight, he assures her scornfully, "You won't get lockjaw."
"Doesn't hurt to check." She nods in approval more than thanks. "These'll do."
Nadine returns with the pot of water. Sae pulls a dishrag from her shoulder and uses it to move an iron skillet out of the way. The rest of the bustling household carries on with its chores, and suddenly Haymitch feels out of place.
"Well, I'm headed downstairs," he says.
"Tell that doctor to stop working through breakfast for me." Sae hands him one of the jars as well as a heel of bread. "Here, save us both the trip up and down those stairs. It's no bacon or grits but I'll send those with the next appointment, maybe."
"You spoil him," Haymitch tells her. He flips a sign on the cellar door from green to red and tramps down the steps into the makeshift office. He finds the doctor writing at his desk.
Doctor Olsen rolls himself to the filing cabinets in his chair - the same kind they had in the Games Headquarters, Haymitch recalls with distaste. From there, he says, "Good morning, Haymitch."
"It's a morning," he allows, resigning himself to the next half hour or so with a sigh. He sets the food down on the desk. "Sae told me to remind you to eat."
"She sounds like my old boss. It's wasted worry, though; here's my big workout for the day." Doctor Olsen rises from his seat by himself - lately he's been going without the cane, only using it for stairs and the like - strides over to the exam area of his office, and sits down in the exam chair. "See? I'm famished."
"Better make this quick, then." Offhand, he says, "Let me know how the peppers turned out."
Doctor Olsen's brows rise above his glasses with the pleased look on his face. "You made them?"
Haymitch shrugs, not wanting to make much out of his growing array of pastimes. They take his mind off things, that's all. All the better that he can give most of it away; he tends to yield more than he needs.
Doctor Olsen nods, still impressed. "You're all very self-sufficient around here. I know you've had to be," he corrects at Haymitch's look, "but I still find it admirable." Then, he takes his temperature and wraps a blood pressure cuff around his arm; they're on a schedule, after all.
A terse interview and a terser shot later, Doctor Olsen claps his lap and says, "Well, that's all I have for today. Questions, comments, or concerns?"
"No." Haymitch flexes his shoulder. "Actually, I have one question. When can we quit with the needles and switch to pills?"
"When you're trusted to take them responsibly."
He lifts a palm. "See, that's why I don't ask; I just end up offended." Not like he didn't mindlessly take his vitamins with his oatmeal this morning.
Antony smiles, sympathetic yet immovable. "All in good time, my friend. The shot is weekly whereas the pill form is every day. I have to witness that you get the full dose for the first three months, and I doubt either of us wants to see each other that much."
"Yeah, and we're both pretty busy - what with you being the district doctor and me being the district invalid and all. At least you trust me to come to you now." Haymitch slides from the exam table with a metallic squeak. He hates to sit on it, all infirm and stupid with his legs dangling, but it's a more ergonomic level for Antony. "The next step is getting Wendell's personal phone number and address, right?"
Antony only humors him for a moment. "Doctor Templesmith tells me you've been contributing more."
"That's because we're fighting," Haymitch says with a mock wince, as if he's sorry for it.
"About what, if I may ask?"
"Me," he answers. He could leave it at that. But they've probably already consulted each other about it so he might as well say his piece. "We can't seem to agree on what the hell I'm any good for. I used to live to mentor and wage war - and drink. Now that all that's over, I'm just biding my time until I die."
"Or now you're finally free to discover what you want out of life, unbound from crippling addiction and a system that hated you," Antony suggests with a leading, almost impatient quality to his tone that Haymitch appreciates. Wendell would make him spell all of that out himself.
"Figured you'd say that," Haymitch mutters anyway as he absently scratches the stubble on his chin. "You doctors can be predictable."
Antony folds his arms across his chest and shrugs. The stethoscope around his neck shifts with the motion. He's never seen it slip off on accident. "We're consistent. And we tend to be right."
"Well, I'd hate to disappoint. Better go hold some geese captive and burn another casserole." Haymitch rolls his eyes, takes up his rucksack.
"I think you'll find more meaning doing that than the alternative."
"That ain't saying much," counters Haymitch, only halfway flippant. But he's come to understand that he has an ally in this man. Something in him gives way with a sigh, and he admits, "So far, I've only found that it's about all I can do to not be like before." It takes so much out of him - yet amounts to so little when he thinks of it all overhead. Shaking his head, he doesn't bother hiding his frustration about this.
In the same voice that convinced him to do the impossible, Antony tells him, "You need to be patient with yourself, Haymitch. Now is the time you ought to focus on healing and getting through the day in one piece. And then one day you'll be able to do more than that. You'll even want to. But you are right where you need to be." He spreads his hands in a heartening way. "As I said, all in good time."
Of course, Haymitch can't shoulder this counseling without the fingers of shame and doubt trying to pull it away. It would be so easy for him to dismiss these words or pick them apart. But, stubborn and selfish though it may be, Haymitch ignores that temptation and grasps onto the hope in these words, accepts them as truth. There's no other way forward if he doesn't.
His mind goes back to this time two years ago, when his first tributes came home alive. Haymitch promised himself he'd do right by them and try to be better, that things would be different now. They changed history, saved the world as they knew it, and Haymitch made quite the liar out of himself nonetheless. If anything, he got worse, being two for forty-eight in time for the next Quell; somehow it changed everything but also nothing about him.
But then -
But then, something in him did change. And he's still dealing with that. He's terrified of undoing it all, thereby undoing himself. He even has nightmares about it, replacing the blood in his dreams with a different kind of agony. They're slower, almost languid, playing out like a train wreck in slow motion. He wakes up feeling disappointed about something that didn't happen, rather than jolting awake about something that did. At least he sleeps a little longer for it.
With all of this sweeping through his mind, Haymitch remarks, "Two years ago, I would've just laughed in your face." He sighs. "And then I would've punched me in mine."
Antony grins at him. "That's the spirit! Just think of where you'll be two years from now."
Haymitch grunts, noncommittal. It seems too far away to think much of anything about it.
As he's switching the sign on the door from red to green, Sae approaches him with an armful of yarn, wrapped into what he's heard Hazelle call skeins, and in the other hand, stacked egg cartons. "You mind saving me the trip to the Hawthornes' and Grants', too?"
"Do I look like a pack mule more than usual today?" asks Haymitch. Besides, she has plenty of boarders on hand to run errands for her.
Sae ignores him. "I paid for the eggs in advance. Just drop them off on your way back."
He rolls his eyes but leaves with an overstuffed bag all the same, raising up less than a full hand at her parting, "Thanks, neighbor!"
Haymitch curses under his breath when nobody answers right away at the Hawthornes. Off to a great start, he thinks as he knocks again, firmer, just to be sure.
Right then, Hazelle comes to the door, looking harried by her standards. Her hair's piled atop her head instead of tied back, and she stands partway behind the door in a way that makes him want to apologize for something.
She looks at him expectantly, a little winded. "Yes?"
"Got yarn from Greasy Sae," he tells her, like a jackass.
"Oh, good," says Hazelle, more to herself than to him, and steps away from the door to open it wider. She folds her arms over her chest, and he tries not to notice the oversized shirt that's haphazardly tucked into dark - no, damp denim shorts, as if she's just pulled them on from the wash.
It's stupid, how it surprises him that Hazelle can be barefoot and half-dressed. Of course she can be.
"How many?" she asks before he can think any more of it.
"Good question." Haymitch unslings the bag from his shoulder, digs around in it. "Four."
"Here," she says, reaching out. It bares her shirtfront but he only sees the skeins as he passes them over stiffly. Hazelle cradles them to herself and appears to do some calculation in her head. She nods to herself, knitting her brow.
"That enough?" he asks, hanging a thumb off the strap of his rucksack. He's starting to feel like the mail boy.
"Should be for now. Whether it's enough time is another matter."
"I thought you were on schedule?"
She throws him an exasperated look. "I thought so, too. But with all these newcomers… it's throwing the math off."
"That's pretty inconsiderate of them," he agrees, and she breaks into a small smile that fades into concern again.
"Madea and I accounted for some growth," she says, "but nothing like this."
Haymitch nods, thinks of Sae's boarding house. He's heard many didn't want to spend another winter in District Thirteen, opting to join the race against snowfall here instead. So either Thirteen's losing its charm or there really is no place like home. The medicine factory that's in development is a sure pull as well.
"Well, it'd be a rude welcoming to leave them to freeze," he says. "Anything I can do? Or make someone else do?"
"Probably," Hazelle sighs, "but not right now. I won't get to any of it today myself."
He raises a brow. "Slacking off? That doesn't sound like you."
Her mouth spreads into a guilty smile. "I'm learning how to bake and frost a cake with Peeta." She shrugs. "It's my surprise for Rory, for his birthday today. It's the first one since we've been back and, well, the commission ain't going anywhere overnight." The way she says this leads him to suspect somebody else told her that.
Something about all of this makes him smile. "Peeta doesn't trust just anyone with his recipes, you know."
"I think it's a favor more than anything. We'll see how it goes. I'm supposed to meet him in half an hour," she adds with a sheepish look down at herself.
"I'll leave you to it."
The sixth glass jar of sweet peppers presses against the small of his back through the bag's canvas. Earlier, he forgot it was under the cartons. Another time, he decides. Her arms are full.
"Thank you - for these." Hazelle lifts the skeins a little, and it's not lost on him how she's restricting herself. It mortifies him, makes him want to say something to put her at ease. But he also doesn't want to call attention to it, either.
"Thank Sae." He starts to turn away. "Hope everything goes well - with the cake and, you know, the birthday party."
She smiles, a hand on the door now. "Me, too."
Haymitch crosses the street to the Grants. Their place has turned into a farm with a house rather than a house with a farm, and he's pettily glad that it's noisier than the geese ever were. He finds Wilbur hammering at a gatepost while Alice looks to be distracting the goats inside with food.
"This a bad time?" Haymitch thinks to ask.
Wilbur shades his eyes against the sun to look up at him. "Almost done. Hold on," he says through the iron nail between his teeth. He nails another part of the fence in place, then tests the frame before getting to his feet. "All right," he calls to Alice, who turns to a bleating, potbellied goat.
"No more sneaking out to the compost pile for you," Haymitch hears her scold before feeding it another treat.
Wilbur looks at him and gestures to his own mustache. "I see you're taking my advice after all."
"No, this is to show you it ain't going to happen." Haymitch rubs at the bristle along his jaw, grown in patchy as aways and, nowadays, very gray. "Now I can shave." He holds up the stupid egg cartons. "Here to refill these for Greasy Sae."
As they head to the chicken coop, Wilbur tells him, "Glad you came by; I've been meaning to find you." Haymitch shoots him a questioning sidelong look but Wilbur doesn't elaborate. He ducks into the coop, leaving Haymitch to watch the hens strut around and bob for stray kernels.
Alice walks by with the hammer in hand. She adjusts her sunhat with her free hand, then works that shoulder in a circle, her face set in a grimace. She notices his raised brow and rolls her eyes. "It's my arm. Still sore from a shot yesterday."
Haymitch huffs a laugh and pats his own tender shoulder. "Join the club." He doesn't know why her eyes widen at this and he doesn't ask. Just then, Wilbur steps out from the coop and hands off the refilled cartons. Haymitch raises a hand in thanks, a goodbye on his lips, but Wilbur stops him.
"Give me a minute while I run inside."
He's left to wait again with an inward sigh. Alice stays beside him - just to mind her manners, probably.
After a moment of human silence, she tries, "Wilbur said you guys had a good time last weekend. What all did you catch?"
"Um, a few trout and bass." He also helped Wilbur wrangle one very pissed off catfish but doesn't share this.
Impressed, Alice downturns the corners of her mouth and nods. "Was that your first time fishing?"
"No. Been a while, though," he replies with a glance at the house. While Haymitch wouldn't say the trip endeared him to anyone, he doesn't think he left worse off, either. That doesn't make him any less reluctant to talk about it, though - as if it will overstep being the pitiful tagalong.
Haymitch still can't believe he was invited. Not only that, but he went. He figured Wilbur must have needed the help to ask him, and it's not as though Haymitch had anything better to do if he was being completely honest with himself. So he woke up at the ass-crack of dawn, only to discover the group was capable enough on their own, with the handful of men from Twelve teaching the others how to fish. Just as well, Wilbur had pushed a homemade fishing pole into his hands, promising, "I'll show you how. Gale Hawthorne taught us all in no time," and Haymitch decided there were worse ways to spend a Saturday.
Alice nods again and then freezes, screws her eyes shut in a wince. "Wait. That's not something you did in the arena, right?"
Haymitch balks at her. When he realizes she's serious, he presses his lips against what wants to be a very mocking laugh. "It wouldn't matter to me if it was," he explains in as measured a tone as he can muster. "That wouldn't have been the worst thing I did."
Her face flushes under her sunhat and she turns away with a frustrated noise. "Haymitch, I don't know. I barely remember."
"Lucky you," he says but he's grinning. Of all the things to worry about around him...
"We don't have the best memories with fishing, either, is all," she mutters, and this snuffs out his conceit like pinching a candle. Now they both look away, toward the house.
Thankfully, this time Wilbur returns. He brings something small and white with him that he hands to Haymitch: a worn deck of cards.
Haymitch laughs in surprise, "What's this?" He steps away, as if putting space between himself and the little cardboard package even though it's in his hand.
"Reimbursement," answers Wilbur. He crosses his arms, looking pleased with himself. "Traded with a train worker for it the other day."
"How is it reimbursement?" Alice asks with the hammer, her other hand on her hip.
His mustache twitches, sheepish. "I dropped all his cards in the mud."
"Your husband can't shuffle for shit," supplies Haymitch. "But it made us take up the lines again and, sure enough, there was the catfish." He shares a knowing chuckle with Wilbur, and it's absurdly normal - like that fishing trip.
While Haymitch hadn't cared about the loss of his card-deck, he genuinely appreciates its replacement as he thanks Wilbur and tucks it away. It's a simple debt paid, he knows. Pretty much all of his interactions with Wilbur Grant center on this. But it's a thoughtful gesture nonetheless.
Alice shakes her head as well as the hammer at Wilbur. "You're lucky you're handsome." That he's balding and sporting an outdated mustache has no bearing on her. Wilbur takes the hammer from her with a fond, playful smile, and when she walks away, he acts like he's going to tap her bottom with it but refrains.
It reminds Haymitch of how his parents were with each other. He'd found it mortifying, then, and he still kind of does now. But he also admires it in a way.
Turning back to him, Wilbur says they should play again sometime. Haymitch is about to agree until he adds, "We'll invite the other guys, make a game night out of it."
Haymitch compares a group of strangers fishing to a group of strangers sitting around playing cards, and his interest just about dies. He gives some casual response and mentions how Wilbur's welcome to borrow the cards anytime.
It's later than intended when Haymitch finally gets home, and he feels more drained than accomplished. He tosses his emptied rucksack in the coat closet, then checks on the geese.
Somehow the thought of hosting dinner doesn't seem tiresome. He starts to prepare it by four o'clock; it'll take around two hours, start to finish, and the kids are coming over at six. He's making chicken bog for them tonight. It took a while to get chicken since the Grants don't routinely butcher theirs. But there's been a fairly steady supply of sausage from District Ten, and the rest of it calls for pantry staples.
Haymitch is checking the rice when the phone rings in the study. He considers letting it go to voicemail until he sees it's nearing six o'clock with no sign of the kids.
"Hey, we're going to be late," Peeta tells him right off, inflecting an apology. Then, he brightens with, "You'll never guess - Delly's back! She came in today and surprised us."
"Oh," is all he says, matching the boy's surprise.
"Yeah, so we'll be a minute. She and her brother need some help settling in. They got in later than they expected. But we're still coming," he assures him.
"No, no," says Haymitch, sliding into his gruffer form of persuasion, like Peeta would be a fool to do otherwise. "Go spend time with your friend. You haven't seen her in a while, and we do this enough as it is."
"Are you sure?" the boy presses, and he can hear his worry.
"When am I not? It works out this way anyway; I haven't even started dinner yet."
"Well... we'll come over for a fire later, then? And make popcorn?"
"Nah, I've been up for a while. I'm old, remember? Another time."
"All right. If you say so." Peeta still sounds uncertain on the other end of the line. There's a pause that makes him chuckle. "Katniss says you sound like you're trying to get rid of us."
"Takes one to know one," Haymitch reminds them, all good-natured and play-acted. He might as well have a camera in his face. "Talk to you soon." He's sure to hang up completely before heaving a sigh with a reluctant look toward the kitchen. He could just call it leftovers... but he'd really wanted to share it.
Before he can talk himself out of it, he calls Hazelle. He's startled when she answers on the first ring.
"Ready?" she says, all giddy and expectant.
"Uh," he says, not ready at all apparently. "What?"
"Oh. Haymitch? I'm sorry, I thought this was Gale." There's a lot more commotion in the background on her end. "We're getting ready to sing the birthday song, and he was going to call."
"Oh, shit, I-" Haymitch screws his eyes shut and fists his other hand, chastising himself. "I completely forgot. Here, let me hang up."
"Well, hold on. Is everything all right?"
"Yeah. Perfectly fine," he answers in a casual, near dismissive drawl. "I'm fine. Bye!" He slams the phone back into the receiver, then rubs at his burning face with a groan.
Haymitch trudges back into the kitchen and uncovers the chicken bog. It looks and smells ready. He doles out a bowl for himself but ends up just pushing it around with a fork. He leaves it to go into the study again, for what he decides is the last time tonight. He estimates the phone number based on its location in comparison to the other three phone numbers he knows in the Village.
"This is Wilbur," he hears and almost huffs in relief. He got the household right, and the right person answered, too.
"Hey, it's Haymitch. So, um-" He lifts a hand listlessly, searching for an excuse that doesn't completely out him as a lonely sod. "My math was off and I made way too much for dinner. Any chance you all like chicken bog?"
"We sure do! But we're good for tonight. I'll come by tomorrow and take some off your hands? Let me know what I can bring."
"You don't have to bring anything," he says.
"Well, it's only right," Wilbur says back, sounding confused. That's how they've operated so far, after all.
"Okay, yeah, whatever. Thanks." He compares this to the other man's invitations to fish and play cards, and wonders what he's doing wrong. He's done harder things than this. He's said harder things than this - in covert networking, tense negotiations, troubled teenager management, war strategy with opportunists and idiots alike...
Sullen, Haymitch works down his dinner and then stores away the rest. He makes himself wash, dry, and put away the dishes; he has a feeling they'll remain in the sink indefinitely if he doesn't do it all tonight.
After that, he takes up the fiddle until he reaches his threshold for mistakes. Then, he showers and plays solitaire with re-runs of Plutarch's show on in the background. He might as well be pacing around. He knows he should reopen the book Wendell sent, should finish it tonight in time for their appointment tomorrow. But he's not in the headspace to read, let alone something so inherently uncomfortable and unpleasant.
Last night, Haymitch skipped ahead to thumb through all the personal stories that begin each chapter while the jars boiled. He found himself sympathizing with them and then realizing it was supposed to be empathy. And then he remembered how often he felt like that with his friends, and that was when he'd put the book down for the night.
He just can't read it without thinking of how much Chaff needed to hear those things and wishing he had. He wishes that for all of his friends. But they were made senseless tinder while Haymitch remains, a reminder that could tempt him to spike his coffee with the rubbing alcohol stowed away in the girl's house that he's not supposed to know about. He has to make it count for something instead… he just hasn't figured out how yet.
And the thing is, Haymitch understands what the book is about, what he's meant to glean from it. He can answer Wendell's cursory questions about it just fine. But it doesn't make the small, relentless tasks to keep functional any less straining, or tell him how to connect with people when they've all spent years watching him deteriorate like it was the morning weather report.
It doesn't help that Haymitch doesn't know what to do with himself, either. For all he tells other people what to do, he doesn't know how to go forward from here. And he learned a long time ago that there's danger in standing still.
Haymitch abandons his game to stalk outside onto the porch, hoping for cool nighttime air to shock him out of this downward spiral of a mood. Instead, the air is hot and stale, and he feels himself sag in disappointment. He needs to stop getting his hopes up.
But, damn it all, he wants more - wants to do more, be more. For years, he never entertained such things, not for himself. But that was when he drank the days away, when there wasn't much else he could do without hurting somebody. And now that there is, he's told that's getting ahead of himself. What's worse is it feels like that, too.
"All in good time," he says under his breath but it comes out irreverent, lifeless. What an empty promise. It might as well be a lie.
Not like he deserves anything else.
The dry, hard lump in his throat takes him by surprise, and it's only then he realizes his eyes are stinging. He has to consciously slow his breathing, even it out.
If Haymitch could slap himself out of it, he would - but he knows better. It's annoying and pathetic but he's so discontent and inept and broken and lost, now more than ever. And he hates that all the while, he's been left with the shame and hurt that he hid from for years like a coward. He knows why he did but regrets it all the same, useless as that is, if only so the burden could be lighter now.
He's ruminating on this when the wind turns - and suddenly, he smells smoke. Not woodsmoke… but the kind that means something is burning that's not supposed to.
He looks out and realizes it's not fog that hangs in the air or catches the moonlight in a rolling gray haze. Self-pity dissipates without another thought, and the restlessness crackling within him tightens into a single cord of purpose. He bounds down the porch steps, tracing the Village for a source.
It's easy enough to find: a glowing house next door. The very one he yawned at, crossing over to this morning.
Haymitch runs right for it.