"Peeta of bread. The boy with bread. Do you accept my humble gift?" Taiya bowed down in front of him.
"What the hell are you doing," Johanna deadpanned as she watched Taiya.
"Shh, you're going to ruin it."
"Ruin what?" Johanna snarked. "You look like a fool."
"I'm presenting my best bread boy with a gift Tanbark! Now hush," Taiya stood up.
"Where's my gift?"
"You said you didn't want a gift!"
"I said I didn't want a tree made out of straw," Johanna pointed out.
"It was meant to be symbolic and amusing," Taiya smirked.
"Again with the tree jokes though? Really? Aren't they getting a little old?" Johanna glared.
"Guys!" Peeta interrupted. It was strange at first, but he was used to their bickering. It took a couple of visits to work out that the two of them were never actually arguing. It was just that they both wanted the last word and they'd just spout nonsense until someone ended it. Sometimes that wouldn't happen until Finnick came to get Taiya. Finnick knew how to handle the two girls like a pro. It was similar to how one would get toddlers to behave, Finnick had whispered to Peeta one time as he left with Taiya.
Peeta had learnt by now that he had the power to end the bickering himself.
And so he did. Both girls turned to him with a smile.
"Do you like the parrot I made?" Taiya waved the straw bird she'd made for him in the air.
"It's so cool," he nodded appreciatively, taking the gift from her. "It can sit on my shoulder," he perched it on his shoulder.
"Lame," Johanna hid her insult behind a cough.
"Do you want a bird too Jo?"
"Yes. Yes, I would," Johanna grumbled begrudgingly.
"Done," Taiya winked, making Johanna regret saying yes.
"Miss Ambersnow," a nurse knocked on the door and stuck her head in.
"Argh!" Taiya loudly groaned as she turned to look at the woman.
She kept her distance. The only ones on the medical staff brave enough to go near Taiya were the Everdeen's.
"It's time for your therapy session."
"Can't you see we're still playing?" Taiya sulked.
"Taiya," Johanna shoved her friend off of Peeta's bed. "Go. If you don't go they won't let you come hang."
Taiya rolled her eyes but began to walk out of the room, dramatically dragging her feet as she left. Everyone just ignored her.
Mrs Everdeen sat opposite Taiya, a warm yet discerning gaze fixed upon her face.
"How have you been this past week, Taiya?" Mrs Everdeen inquired gently.
"Same old, same old," Taiya waved her hand in the air, shooting Mrs Everdeen a wide false grin.
Mrs Everdeen recognised the evasion tactic. Taiya tried it every session.
"I'm here to help you, Taiya. But this only works if you're open with me. I'd really like to understand how you're feeling."
Taiya fidgeted in her seat uncomfortably, tugging on the rope holding her braid in place, Finnick hadn't had a chance to steal it yet that day. "I'm groovy. Your hair looks banging today by the way!" she complimented, hoping to waste as much time as possible.
A faint smile touched Mrs Everdeen's lips. "Thank you Taiya, but I'd much rather talk about you," she redirected. "Why don't you tell me how your last week was?"
Taiya's eyes immediately lit up with excitement. "Oh!" she gasped. "I had the best time! A few days ago, we were in Peeta's room," Taiya's voice immediately brightened. "I wanted to play beach volleyball. Well sort of," she chuckled. "We had to pretend there was a beach, because you know, hospital…" she gestured to their surroundings, there was no sand present. "Johanna doesn't like the beach, so she was calling it 'forest volleyball', which was cool."
Taiya didn't want to talk about Johanna's trauma and why she was so afraid of water, it wasn't her story to tell. Johanna hadn't fully confessed to the doctors what'd happened to her in the Capitol. She was as resistant to actively engaging in therapy as Taiya was and was also skirting around the edge of their questions.
"Anyway," she continued. "Finnick has been desperate to hang out with us for weeks, but like, he's not part of the trauma bros, and when we're having a trauma bros hang session, he usually has weapons training scheduled with Dale. But we needed an extra person to even up the teams, so I said he could hang. But only on the condition he was on my team," Taiya frowned. "He betrayed me. As soon as he got there he said we were playing boys vs girls. Traitor! But, anyway, Jo and I, we smoked their sorry asses," Taiya smiled proudly. "Serves him right. He's banned from the trauma bros club now."
"Did Finnick's perceived betrayal affect you?" Mrs Everdeen asked, dulling the light-hearted mood Taiya was going for.
Taiya just snorted. "No. Maybe I would've been a bit sour if he and Peeta won. But karma tracked them down," she smiled widely.
"Do you want to tell me about a moment that made you smile last week?" Mrs Everdeen changed the subject, trying to get a read on something deeper in Taiya's emotional state.
"Buck tripped on a table leg, that was pretty funny. And then he yelled at Dale in the middle of the cafeteria. I smiled a lot then."
Mrs Everdeen frowned at her notebook. She was not getting the serious, reflective answers she was after.
"How about something that made you feel a sense of accomplishment?"
"Well I spoke to your daughter without wanting to wring her neck," Taiya smirked. "Bad joke?"
It was a bad joke, but it was one that Mrs Everdeen ignored. Taiya tended to lash out when things started getting a bit too close to comfort for her. Joking about Katniss and wringing necks after what happened with Peeta meant Mrs Everdeen was getting close to something more emotional.
"How did making up with Katniss make you feel?"
"Good, I suppose," Taiya shrugged. "It takes a fair amount of energy being resentful of children. I don't know how Snow does it."
"Did you interact any further with Katniss after you spoke?" she asked, she already knew the answer, but she wanted to hear Taiya's thoughts.
"She sat with us at lunch once."
"And then after that?"
"I sat with Gloss, Finnick and Buck at a different table," Taiya sighed. Gloss wasn't too fond of sitting with Katniss. She had shot him in the chest after all.
Gloss had been bullied into an agreement to sit with her at dinner today though. All it took was Buck making chicken noises at him.
"How have your nightmares been?"
"Off and on."
"How often are they off?"
Taiya sighed. The quicker she answered, the quicker she could leave. "They're off when I'm awake."
"Have you noticed any improvement?"
Taiya stared at Mrs Everdeen. There was an answer, but she didn't want to share. When Finnick held her at night, the nightmares somehow seemed cloudy, less vivid. When he stayed up later reading documents for the rebel cause and she went to bed earlier, they were vivid and horrifying. So now she just refused to go to sleep while he was reading, which meant he'd just drop what he was doing to head to bed at her will rather than finish his task.
"Are you still hearing voices?" she asked, her eyes focused on Taiya. She knew the girl's temperament well enough to know she didn't have long left with her before she cracked it and left. So she had to jump straight into the important questions.
Taiya hesitated, her gaze drifting away momentarily, an obvious sign of discomfort. "Sometimes," she admitted quietly, her fingers tapping nervously on her knee.
Mrs Everdeen's expression softened, a mix of compassion and professional concern on her face. "When do you notice them coming back?" she probed.
Taiya swallowed. "They start creeping in a bit when I've been away from Finnick for too long," she confessed, her eyes reflecting the mental strain the situation impressed on her. "That's why we only separate when I'm visiting Peeta and Johanna now."
This meant Finnick had inadvertently become a part of Taiya and Gloss' prank squad. Their meetings had been less frequent, but Finnick had been sworn to secrecy. To be honest he was just so happy to be included.
"Whose voices do you hear?" Mrs Everdeen inquired softly, trying to keep Taiya in her chair and coax her into discussing the source of the voices troubling her.
Taiya's demeanour shifted suddenly. Her body tensed and her breath caught in her throat. She froze, her eyes wide, as if caught in the grip of an overwhelming fear. For a few moments, she remained silent, her mind racing.
"Buzz, buzz. Time's up," Taiya stood up suddenly. She was overwhelmed, and still struggling to confront the realities of the torture she'd endured.
"Of course, we'll continue next time," Mrs Everdeen rushed to reassure, but Taiya was already out of the room.
With a sigh, Mrs Everdeen closed her notebook. It'd been nearly a month, and she didn't feel like she was any closer to getting Taiya to trust her. She'd been lying to Coin in her reports and saying they'd been making great progress. It was only a matter of time until Coin probed further and realised that Taiya was firmly resisting her therapy, and the only things she'd happily talk about were the nonsense games she played with Johanna and Peeta.
There were deep layers to Taiya's struggles. Struggles that preceded her time in the Games. Struggles the girl hadn't even been able to fully process.
They would need careful and patient exploration if Mrs Everdeen was going to have any chance of being able to help her develop coping mechanisms to come to terms with her past.
"And don't get me started on the collars," Taiya complained for the millionth time about the uniforms they were wearing.
"It's freaking stupid," Gloss agreed, always down for a good rant about how crappy the uniforms in 13 were. "Are you sure you don't want to help him?" he nodded his head in the opposite direction.
"Nah," Taiya shrugged as she turned around and waved at Finnick, who was dutifully waiting in the lunch line to collect food for the both of them. "It makes him feel useful, it's good to give him that now and again," she joked.
"Guys, guys, guys, guys," Tyler ran up to their table, aggressively sliding into the spot beside Taiya, smashing into her in the process.
"Hey!" she protested, lightly shoving him back.
"You'll be so proud of me," Tyler smiled widely, his face lit up with pure excitement.
Taiya and Gloss both studied him in silence for a few minutes. Usually, when he came up to the both of them together it was to lecture them, outside of that he typically tried to avoid Gloss. The one time he had spoken to him since the rescue, Gloss had made a crude joke about Plutarch and Coin, and Tyler had stormed away muttering to himself about how they were all going to get banished at this rate.
"Why?" Gloss asked bluntly.
But Taiya, however, read a little more into his look and eyed him suspiciously. "What did you do?" she asked a hint of caution in her voice.
Tyler's grin widened as he leaned in eagerly. "I pranked Haymitch," he announced proudly, barely able to contain his excitement.
Gloss chuckled, intrigued. "You pranked Haymitch?" he snorted. "You?"
Taiya crossed her arms. She knew Tyler well. He didn't have the pranking touch they did.
"How?" she asked nervously.
"You're going to love this," he smiled at her. "I tripped him."
Gloss' grin immediately fell. "You what?"
"I tripped him," he nodded. "We were walking together and I just thought, hey, let's see what it is about this that Tay loves so much, so I stuck out my leg and just, tripped him."
"Oh Tyler," Taiya sighed in disappointment.
"Good one right?"
"No," she shook her head.
"What?" Tyler's face immediately fell.
"You can't just trip someone man," Gloss shook his head. "That's just mean."
"But it's not mean if it's a prank. It's just a prank. You guys do those all the time."
"Yeah, but they're well-thought-out pranks Tyler. We don't just go around tripping people in hallways. That's called bullying," Taiya rubbed his arm in comfort. "But we'd be happy to train you up in the art of pranking."
Tyler stared down at the table. "Oh god, what was I thinking," he moaned loudly, dropping his head onto the table. He thought; if you can't beat them, join them, and how he regretted that lapse in judgement now.
"Haymitch is coming," Taiya nudged him, and he immediately sprung up.
Haymitch approached their table and stood there watching them before he flicked his hair back with his hands and threw his hands in the air dramatically, wordlessly demanding an explanation from Tyler.
"Coming Buck!" Tyler called out before he quickly exited the cafeteria.
Taiya leaned around Haymitch and looked two tables down and Haymitch turned to follow her glance. Buck was sat there with Annie and Mags.
"Do either of you want to tell me what the hell that was?" Haymitch asked Gloss and Taiya. "Did you put him up to that?" Haymitch turned to Taiya.
"I swear I didn't," Taiya immediately denied. "You're on my never-prank list bestie!"
"It's true," Gloss nodded, continuing to eat his lunch, completely unbothered by the irritated man standing over them.
Finnick had caught the end of the conversation before he took over Tyler's recently vacated seat, lowering Taiya's tray in front of her.
"Thanks," she kissed his cheek.
"Am I on your never-prank list?" Finnick asked, his smile beaming.
Taiya didn't know what to say. She just stared at him uncomfortably before giggling. He was not on her never-prank list.
"I'm not even bothered," Finnick sighed in resignation. "Just leave my tridents out of it. That's all I ask of you."
"Oh yeah, Haymitch," Taiya looked up at the man. "Do you know when I'll be cleared for weapons training?"
Haymitch just snorted. "At this rate, you'll be dead before you're cleared."
"Come on man, you've got sway in command, use it," Gloss shovelled food in his mouth. He'd been cleared for weapons training two weeks ago. But Taiya and Gloss both assumed that was more Tyler's doing in an attempt to keep them separated and limit the chaos. To be fair to Tyler, it had been fairly successful. The prank rate had decreased substantially since Gloss had been given something else to occupy his time with.
"I'll train with her," Finnick offered.
"Gale's your training partner," Haymitch shook his head.
"Ew, Dale," Taiya mumbled as she tore off some bread.
"I'd be happy to swap," Finnick pleaded. Weapons training was Finnick's only scheduled activity and he hated being away from Taiya. At least she was happy with Peeta and Johanna while he was training. But now they wanted to increase his training times and he was using the 'recovering from mental instability' card to avoid it. He did not want to spend more time away from Taiya and more time with Gale. "Katniss can take him and I'll train with Tay," Finnick proposed.
"You two make me sick," Gloss grumbled.
"You two are getting married," Katniss declared as she rushed up to their table, a look of urgency on her face.
"Bye," Gloss muttered curtly, immediately picking up his tray and walking away.
"Bye, bestie!" Taiya yelled back at him. She ordinarily would've said a quick hello to Katniss before running after him, but she wanted to hear what Katniss was here for. "You already knew that," Taiya sighed at the younger girl, confused as to why this was groundbreaking news.
"Yeah I knew it," Katniss took Gloss' place at the table, and Haymitch sat with her. "I didn't know that you guys were ok with Plutarch making a whole propo about it though. Are you?" she asked, glancing between Finnick and Taiya. When Plutarch told her his plan, she was concerned about whether the happy couple had agreed to it, from what she knew of Taiya, it didn't seem like something she'd be into.
"It's part of the deal I made with him," Taiya sighed, obviously Katniss didn't know the details of the deal she'd struck to be allowed to see Peeta. "I filmed a propo about some secrets I knew and Plutarch wanted a wedding propo, but I said no to that. We want to get married our way, for us, not for the cameras," she laced her hand into Finnick's, squeezing his hand.
"We want it to be special," Finnick agreed. "We don't want the Capitol having any impact on it."
"But an engagement party…" Katniss sighed.
"I figured it was a sacrifice we could make," Taiya rested her head on Finnick's shoulder. "We had a proper engagement party back home, so this wouldn't really be a proper engagement party... more of a spectacle. And it means I get to see and help pookie bear Peeta. Gets Plutarch off my back as well. I really thought stabbing him would've gotten him to back off a bit, but alas, no such luck," she rolled her eyes.
"What?" Katniss' eyes widened. Taiya stabbing Plutarch was news to her.
"Meh," Taiya shrugged. "Don't worry about it."
"Really," Haymitch emphasised. "Don't. The only one shocked about it was Coin. The kid's got form."
Katniss glanced over at Taiya. Taiya just winked at her.
"MAGS!" Taiya yelled when she saw the older lady take a seat beside Annie. Mags immediately looked over, coming when Taiya beckoned her over. "Sit," Taiya tapped the seat beside her, lifting herself off of Finnick's shoulder as she grasped the woman's shoulder lightly and turned her around. "I made this for you," she lifted the straw necklace she'd made over Mags' head and tied a knot in it to keep it secure.
It was designed to look like a seashell necklace she'd had back home, it'd been given to her by her late husband years before Taiya had even met her. Taiya had spent a week perfecting the necklace for her, getting it to look as close as possible.
Mags glanced down and her whole face lit up. She spun around gleefully to look at Taiya, laying a hand against her cheek as her eyes welled with emotion. She touched the necklace tenderly, as she thought back on her memories.
"How's it going sweetheart?" Haymitch smiled at the older lady, not understanding the emotional connection she had to this necklace.
Mags answered him with a thumbs up.
"She says she's doing good," Finnick translated for Haymitch and Katniss.
Haymitch and Katniss exchanged a bemused glance before they both tilted their heads as they looked over at Finnick.
"I don't think they needed that translated, hon," Taiya teased, lightly tapping his thigh in consolation.
Finnick's cheeks flushed slightly, realising the unnecessary translation. "Right," he admitted. "Good point."
Buck's voice prevented Finnick from being subjected to more teasing. "Mags, Annie's asking for you!"
Mags smiled warmly at Taiya and briefly touched her cheek again in affection before making her way back over to Buck's table.
Taiya playfully glanced over at Finnick, raising an eyebrow in mock jealousy. "When did Mags get so popular?" she quipped, feigning being insulted at their being ditched.
Finnick chuckled, throwing an arm over her shoulder. "She's the second coolest cat in District 4, remember?" he teased, referring to the joke she'd made in her propo.
"This is very true," Taiya smiled up at him.
Haymitch couldn't resist chiming in with his own banter. "I don't think there's anyone cool in District 4," he quipped with a smirk. He leaned over to Katniss conspiratorially and loudly whispered. "If you hadn't noticed, the District 4 tributes have a few screws loose," he joked, gesturing to Finnick and Taiya. "It's the seawater," he winked at them. "It kills brain cells."
Taiya smirked as she raised her cup of water at him. "I'm pretty sure the alcohol you've consumed over the years has lost you more brain cells than the seawater has for us," she winked. "We should get a cat when we get out of here," Taiya smiled at Finnick, getting sidetracked by the thought of their future.
"I reckon a dog would be cooler," he bargained.
"But if we got a cat it'd find all the warm spots at home and let me know the best places to nap!" Taiya countered, nudging Finnick teasingly.
Haymitch snorted. "Are you 24 or 84?" he interjected with a smirk.
Taiya shot Haymitch a mock glare. "Well, actually, I was held captive for a while, so I'm not exactly sure what month we're in, but I'll probably be 25 soon," she retorted, poking her tongue out at him in playful defiance.
Haymitch just chuckled, shaking his head. 'Yeah, real mature," he teased back, winking at Taiya.
Finnick squeezed her shoulder, bringing her attention back to the conversation at hand. "How about a compromise? Cat and a dog?" he suggested, extending his hand towards Taiya. "We've got the room at home."
Taiya grinned, accepting the handshake. "Agreed," she nodded in mock seriousness.
Katniss just sat and observed the playful exchange between Taiya and Finnick with a small smile. She couldn't help but admire their easy banter and the obvious connection between them. She'd only seen the two of them together within the context of the Capitol. The one small interaction she'd seen between them in District 4, on her victory tour, came to the forefront of her mind. A small squeeze Taiya had given Finnick's shoulder when she'd re-entered the dining room. An act that was not meant to have been spotted by Katniss based on the glare Taiya had sent her that night when she'd noticed the girl's gaze.
They were just so naturally at ease with each other. So in sync. There was always some form of physical contact between them, whether that was their interlaced hands or their touching arms. Their bodies just seemed to move in sync with each other, even when they weren't looking at each other.
Watching this gave Katniss a sense of warmth. True love did exist out there. She knew it had been difficult for them both, but if this was the result of the hardship, anything would be worth it to get your hands on that once-in-a-lifetime connection with someone else.
It was evident their relationship was built on a deep understanding, one forged between them since they were children They weren't just a couple in love, they were genuinely best friends as well.
She would never have guessed that Finnick had 'snuck up' on Taiya like he'd told her. She would've thought they'd always fit so perfectly together. And it warmed her heart to think that this sort of bond was something you could build over time and not something that came immediately. Peeta flashed through her mind, and she banished the thought as quickly as it had occurred. That was gone now. It was gone because of Snow.
ShiaraS46: Tyler's gonna get burnout at this rate ahaha! He's gonna be working overtime to keep her out of Coin's path haha!