*I forgot to mention that I'm straight up copy/pasting these from wattpad so you get to read my two year old AN's**

this was so hard for me to write for some reason

also I was watching The Umbrella Academy this month for the first time and it's amazing and I love it so much so if anyone ever wants to talk about it with me hit me up

Finnick left me alone at the apartment every day for about a week before I got bored alone enough to actually do something productive with my life. That being cleaning the apartment from top to bottom. Both of them. I had already written five new songs, watched too much Capitol TV, and called Prim every single day, and Peeta twice. In fact, I was bored enough that I actually called Haymitch once.

So I pulled myself out of bed at nine in the morning, which was very late by my standards. Finnick was already up and making breakfast. He had an appointment in a half hour.

"Good morning," he said upon seeing me enter the kitchen. "I wasn't sure you were getting up."

I shrugged. "I was up late last night."

He turned to look at me. "I've been meaning to talk to you about that. You know you don't have to wait up for me, right? Some of these nights could get pretty late."

"I don't mind."

"You should. You need to stay healthy, and waiting for me until one in the morning isn't healthy."

"You honestly think I have a choice? Do you think I could sleep while I know you're somewhere suffering things that I can't even imagine..."

His expression softened as he looked at me. "I understand. But could you at least try?"

I crossed my arms. "Why do you care so much?"

"I care about you, Katniss. What's wrong with that?"

"There's something else going on here." I protested. "And don't lie to me about it. I want to know the truth."

He sighed. "I just... I don't want you to have to see me when I get back. I don't want anyone seeing me like that."

"Oh," I said, dropping the matter.

He gave me a tight smile, then dished out the scrambled eggs. We sat down at the table to eat.

"So what's up today?" He asked me after a few minutes into our silent meal.

"I have plans to clean the entire apartment. Top to bottom."

He groaned. "That reminds me. I need to fold my laundry this afternoon."

"Don't the avoxes do that?"

He shrugged. "I asked them not to. I think it's weird that random people are handling my clothes." He grimaced. "But right about now I'm wishing I let them."

"I get that. I can do it for you if you want." I offered.

"Don't worry about it. I have time this afternoon," he said with another shrug.

"Finnick, I literally have nothing else to do." I rolled my eyes.

"it's totally fine, I promise."

"Okay. If you say so."

Finnick stood up a few minutes later and dumped his empty plate in the sink. I stood up with him. He pulled me in for a deep kiss.

"I love you," I said once he pulled away.

"Love you, too. I'll see you this afternoon." And he was gone.

I sighed and sat down to finish my eggs. I knew he loved me, but he had been so distant lately. Maybe this is how he always acted when he had appointments, but there was something very off about him.

I started by cleaning up the kitchen, then I put on one of my favorite albums to listen to as I worked. Before I won the Hunger Games for the first time, I had very little use for music. In the great grand scheme of things, I placed its relevance and usefulness somewhere after hair ribbons. At least you could use a ribbon to strangle someone. But after I won the Hunger Games, music became my talent. The Hunger Games never end, and singing was my strategy to survive. So I began to finally appreciate music, and it helped to keep my head on straight.

It took me a few hours to finish cleaning. The avoxes lended me some supplies. They were glad to have someone else do their work, and I was sure they had some other apartments to clean. It was their job to clean the entire apartment complex, and I was a welcome hand.

When I finished with my entire apartment, I returned the supplies. I didn't want to clean Finnick's without his permission, even though we shared both of the apartments. It was still his own personal space, and he didn't have much of that left. I thought it better to leave it to him.

But I remembered his laundry that he really didn't want to do, and unlocked his door. He had a small mountain of clean laundry on his bed, so I started folding it and organizing it into piles. After opening a few of his drawers, I finally figured out where everything went, which just left me with a set of sheets, a few towels and washcloths, and one of my sweatshirts, which I must have left in his apartment. I set my sweatshirt aside and picked up the towels and sheets, so I could put them away in the linen closet. I rolled my eyes when I saw that he only had one clean towel left in his closet. He must have pushed the laundry day back for a while.

And that's when I noticed the small cardboard box hiding behind the towel. I didn't think much of it at first, until I noticed the label had been torn off, leaving just a small corner, with the letter M on it.

I knew I was being paranoid. I really should have more faith in Finnick, but I was instantly reminded of his morphling addiction, and all sense of trust left me instantly. I lifted the box from the shelf and opened it, sinking to the floor when I saw what was in it.

And that's where Finnick found me two hours later.

How? How could he do this to himself? Is this why he was off the past few days? Was he hooked again?

Did he even stop to begin with?

I felt tears stream down my cheeks, felt my breath pick up until I was breathing in short, uneven gasps. "Oh-" I started to say, but couldn't get another sound out, except for the loud sob that escaped me.

"Katniss?" I heard someone call my name, but I couldn't find my voice in order to respond. I wasn't sure how much time had passed while I sat there. "Katniss, where are you?"

The bathroom door was slammed open, and that's when he found me. "Katniss are you-" His eyes locked on the open box in my lap. "Oh."

I stared up at him, still crying freely. I opened my mouth to speak, but no sound came out. "I-" was all I could manage.

"Katniss-"

I held up my hand to silence him. Was I angry? Maybe. I'm not sure. I don't think I could ever actually be angry at Finnick. I had too much of a soft spot for him. But this is the closest I would ever get. "How long?" I finally managed.

"Not long. Just a week or so. I started around the time that happened," he gestured to my injured arm, now secure in a brace.

"Where did you get it?" I asked. My tongue still felt too thick in my mouth.

"I never threw them all out."

"Oh," was all I could manage.

"Katniss I-" He started again, but I silenced him once more.

My hands were shaking hard as I closed the box and set it on the counter, standing up. Slowly, Finnick reached for the box, removed the bottle. I thought he was going to inject it right before my eyes. He unscrewed the lid and poured the contents down the drain.

I stared at him confused. "That was too easy," I said, my voice hoarse. "Are you not addicted?"

"I want to stop," he said simply. "I think you yelling at me was enough for me to sum up the courage to do that."

"Why didn't you just do it before?"

"Because I was too scared. I still am. But your trust is more important to me." He swallowed. "I want you to trust me."

I turned to watch the last of the liquid wash down the sink. "I used to. But after this... I mean, what else are you hiding from me?"

He lightly tugged my chin so I could look at him. "I'm not hiding anything else from you. There's nothing else. You aren't easy to lie to."

"It's not just what you've been lying to me about, it's what you refuse to tell me about. I've known you since I was twelve. You're my best friend... you're my boyfriend... I just feel like I really don't know you that well."

"I could say the same thing about you," He pointed out, tossing the box and its remaining contents in the trash.

"That's not healthy."

"So ask me something about myself. Anything you want to know. I promise I'll tell you the truth."

I stared at him through the mirror, trying to think of a good question to ask him. Something I really wanted to know. "Where are your parents?" I finally asked.

He frowned, contemplating the question. "You know what happened to my dad, right?" I shook my head slowly. "He died. I thought I told you that?"

I shrugged. "I guess that does sound familiar. You mentioned it once, briefly. I don't think you ever explained anything besides just saying that."

Finnick led me back into his bedroom, and bit his lip, mulling over his response, but didn't say anything right away.

"If you don't want to..." I started to say.

Finnick didn't answer me, but instead just started talking. "When I was twelve, we were out in our boat when I saw a giant fish jump over the water. I got pretty excited. We were heading in the direction of a small island where there were always easy pickings, so I had my trident with me. I was holding it in my hand, swinging it around, fighting invisible bad guys or something. My dad told me not to, but I did it anyway. So when I saw the fish, I accidentally dropped the trident mid-swing and it slipped out of my grasp and it fell pretty hard, point first, into our boat, and it shattered the wood. So we went down."

"Finnick-" I started,but he kept talking. It was as if he couldn't stop, now that he started.

"We grabbed onto some driftwood and swam in the direction of the island. We slept there that night, then the next morning we swam back home. The swim home was five miles, with two small islands in between. Dad was fifty-eight, and unhealthy from a life of starvation. He didn't make it, and drowned in the middle of the ocean. I tried to save him, but I was twelve. I couldn't... I couldn't..."

I exhaled, listening to his story. "Finnick..." Knowing him, he probably took blame for the entire incident.

"So I unintentionally killed my father because I couldn't take life seriously for ten more minutes before we reached land." He spat out.

"Finnick..." He wouldn't look at me, and his breathing had picked up. I noticed he started rubbing the skin on the inside of his left elbow, like he was wishing he could shoot up his systems again. I slowly brought my hands up and covered his ears with them, my fingers rubbing the back of his neck. His breathing gradually slowed down. "There you go," I said.

He finally looked at me. "You want to know about my mom, too?"

"Only if you want to tell me," I told him. He was having a panic attack not thirty seconds ago and was already trucking on to tell me about the trauma that his other parent delivered to him.

"You deserve to know. I'm in this for the long run, Katniss, and you should know these things about me."

I pulled my hands off his ears, and instead laced our fingers together. "Okay."

"My mom got in a huge fight with my grandmother, Dell, when she married my dad. So Dell refused to see us. But once Dad died, Dell was suddenly okay with seeing us. So my mom moved us all in with her, because Dell is a Victor, and had plenty of space and money for all of us. It was around this time that I met Mags, since she was our neighbor across the street. My mom decided to pretend my dad never existed. She never spoke about him, and she didn't bring any of his stuff from our old house to Dell's house.

"My younger brothers, Sol and Killian, thought this was fine and normal. They was so young and probably didn't understand what was happening. Vann and Killian probably didn't even remember Dad. But I did and I was so mad at her for trying to wipe him out. She never even asked me how he really died, I just told her he drowned. She never asked for the full story. No one cared that I had to watch him die. Except for Caspian, who didn't quite understand the situation, like the others, until he started talking to me more. I took him a few years before he totally understood the gravity of our situation.

"Once I won the Hunger Games, I still lived with my family for a year, then I got in a huge fight with my mom and moved out. She didn't speak to me unless I came to visit, then she would put on this whole big show, pretending that she loved me or whatever. But around the time I turned eighteen she just stopped altogether, and made it very clear I wasn't welcome in her house. Caspian still visited, of course, and he would bring Solomon and Killian with him from time to time, but my mom started telling them that I was dangerous. I won the Hunger Games by killing more children than any other Victor, and she didn't want them visiting me. So Caspian started sneaking them out at night. I see Solomon much more regularly than Killian. I think my mom got to him more, since he was so much younger. He's a little scared of me."

"But you were so close," I said, heartbroken.

Finnick smiled sadly. "And that's why you never see my family, even though you've been to District 4 several times."

"You didn't need to tell me all that. I would have understood."

"Yes I did," He argues. "You deserve to know these things. You've stuck around long enough."

I didn't respond to that, but instead leaned into him, resting my head on his shoulder. He pressed his lips into my hair.

"What about your parents?" He asked quietly.

"Well you know my father died when I was eleven... about the same age as you were. My mom kind of shut down after that, even though we needed her. That's when I started hunting, and then soon after I was reaped. She finally got better, but then cut me off when I was sixteen... I was struggling with our breakup, and I was really emotional, and she decided it was a good time to get married to Peeta's father, who I already made it clear I hated, because of how he manipulated me after I volunteered for Prim. I wanted to talk to her and figure things out with her, but she chose the baker over me, and moved in with her and I haven't spoken to her since. And Peeta hasn't spoken to his dad, either. The only connection we have to either of them is through Prim, who splits her time between us both."

Finnick gasped out a small laugh. "Look at us, with our matching traumatic backstories. Our fathers died when we were eleven, leaving us with an absolute wreck of a mother who eventually decided to leave us for dead."

I smiled. "Look at us," I repeated.