Disclaimer: I don't own The Hunger Games.

A strangled cry launches itself from my throat. The side of me that responds to situations like this has no time to go on alert. The hot water's already piercing the skin on my face with thousands of miniature knives. I fall, writhing, onto the floor like a shelled insect flipped onto its back. The agony's all-encompassing, and in those few frantic seconds, nothing else exists.

Finally, my senses reemerge, orientation returns, and the part of me that treasures my dignity sets in. I slam one trembling hand on the floor, glancing at it as I do. Some of the skin surrounding my fingers is peeling off. Parts of the scalded flesh appear white, others cherry red.

I don't have to check a mirror to know that my face looks worse. A telltale sign's the severe throbbing in every square inch of skin from my chin to my forehead.

Though the pain's an inconvenient distraction, I'm aware of Rachel looming over me, seeming to stand a hundred feet taller, the dripping, yet now harmless, weapon still in her hand. With it comes the realization that she's about to do what I feared most.

"Wait." The word slips from my smarting mouth just as my wife gets ready to turn around. "Rachel…"

She cannot leave.

Even so, it seems she will, and it'll all be my fault. "No," she almost gasps, her voice laced with bitterness. "Don't." She lets the pot fall with a bang, then starts to make her exit.

I don't care. I can't care anymore. This is the lowest I've sunk since my battle with Demelza, yet I'm willing to be humbled further, if only to ensure my wife won't walk away. I crawl, yes, literally crawl on my knees after her. "Please, Rachel."

She stops walking, yet when she whirls around, her arms are crossed in front of her chest and her unforgiving expression's still the same. "'Please.' Is that what Everdeen said to you, before you did what you did?"

In response to my oblivious silence, she says, "I know everything, by the way. Don't try to deny it."

"I won't." I put up a shaking hand in an attempt to calm her. "Just, please, let me…"

Rachel nearly snarls her response. "Let you do what? Explain? You think you can explain everything that happened with Everdeen?"

Perspiration soaks the back of my neck as I tell her. "Rachel. I know you might not believe me, but…" I struggle to find the words. "After we got married, and you looked at me the day of the parade, when they showed Katniss on screen with me next to her… I realized I'd been right to choose you. And ever since that day, I've had no room in my heart for Katniss."

I wait. What I said was the truth, and nothing but the truth. Yet there's no guarantee my wife will believe it.

She ends up taking me by surprise. "No room," she mutters. "That's the problem, isn't it? You've never had enough room in your heart. Not for the Mockingjay, not for Demelza, certainly not for the thousands upon thousands that you killed!"

At that last word, my heart drops in my chest. My mouth hangs open and my brain whirs, shocked that she's accusing me of worse than an extramarital affair.

There's no need to ask for specifics. Rachel fills in the blanks for me. "You idiot," she hisses, "you think this is about you and your Katniss? This is about what you did!" She does an overly crude impression of my voice. "'Think of it as a wild dog den. You're not going to fight your way in. So you have two choices. Trap the dogs inside or flush them out.'"

I sit on the floor dumbly, unable to argue back. I know those words well. I said them the day the Nut fell. The day I devised the avalanche. She's got me there. Demelza must've been told about it by Marion, then told my wife on the train ride home.

Am I actually that heartless, that I could commit such a crime, then nearly forget about it? And am I that stupid, that I could fail to make the connection between Rachel's having grown up in Two, and her reluctance to speak of the day when all her schoolmates died?

"What did you think?" growls Rachel. "That we were all the same? Just a bunch of filthy animals?" Her fury spills over and she swipes at the plates on the dining table with her hand, sending them all crashing to the floor. "Well, you married one of those animals! So why should I believe you when you say you don't want me to leave?"

Silence. I fight to come up with a coherent answer.

After a few seconds, all I can force out is, "I don't, Rachel. I don't."

Her glare feels like a penetrating laser. "But you wanted me to be hurt, the same way you were. You know what it's like to lose a father in the mines. Did you try to protect other children from feeling that pain?" She shakes her head with vigor. "No, you made sure I felt it. Just because you wanted revenge."

Shame rises inside me, weighing down my heart. There's not a word I could say to refute that, nothing I could do to soften the hard truth. "You're right, I thought like that in the past, but…" My voice almost fails me. "I've changed my mind." I force myself to look at my wife, angry as she is. "You helped me to change it. You helped give me a heart."

"And you broke mine!"

That accusation's true, and that's why it stings worse than the agony in my face.

"I know," I say feebly. "Rachel, I know."

I clasp my hands together in a pleading gesture, then I look down as if submitting to her authority. "I can't ever take back what I did. But please, please believe me when I say that I wish I could. I… I'm doing all that I can to show you I've changed. And it'll never be enough. But I'll still spend the rest of my life trying."

I make eye contact with my wife again. Her stare's icy cold. Not going to stop me from grasping at the smallest straws. "Don't leave, Rachel. Please. Our girls need you."

"Well," she says harshly, "you don't deserve them."

My voice threatens to crack. "Rachel…"

"After you pushed Demelza, I should've left."

"No, you should stay," I beg.

Annoyed, Rachel blows air through her clenched teeth. The resulting hissing sound actually frightens me. "How can you prove you won't do it again?"

"I…" No good answer comes to mind. "I can't." Desperation makes me keep talking, even when I know it's provoking Rachel further. "Just, please, believe me when I say that I hate what I did."

"I don't think you do."

How can she not? Can't she see I've been trying since I moved to Two? She knows I changed careers. Rejected a promotion in the military. Turned the trajectory of my life around. Dedicated it to teaching and nurturing instead of fighting and killing.

I can't be certain if she's just too angry with me, or if she means there's something from my old life I neglected to leave behind. But now's not the occasion to ask.

Now's the occasion to plead. "Rachel." I'm weeping openly, ignoring the sting in my face and hands, wearing my desperation on the surface for her to see. "I'm begging you…"

The sudden slamming of the door to my wife's room answers the question. I now know what's to come. First the dissolution of our marriage, then for me at least, a permanent separation from the ones I love.

My wife didn't keep her word, and for once I'm glad she didn't.

I expected her to promptly serve me with the divorce papers and forbid me from ever seeing our kids. But the days stretched into a week, and neither of those happened. Still, I never once returned to the apartment. I ended up staying with an old friend who's in the Panem Film Institute, a widower in his fifties with a house too big for one man. I took a leave of absence from work, citing stress and health reasons.

Both were true. Ten days later, the skin on my face healed and I went back to teaching, but I didn't see Rachel or the girls while traveling to work. There was no communication on my wife's end. I figured it was the shame that comes with divorce that stopped her from acting.

A few more days went by, and my thoughts began wandering to Marion and Giulia. I've no doubt Demelza will be glad if I stay away, but Marion will wonder what happened. Giulia will, too. I don't want them to get caught in the mess between Rachel and me, but I want them to know I didn't intend to leave.

Now my wishes have been granted. Marion, Giulia, and even Demelza stand on the front stoop of my friend's house. When she recognizes my face, Giulia hops straight into my arms. She wants to know if I'm feeling better after Mama "spilled" hot water on me. Then she asks how my "new job" went. It takes a moment, but then I realize Rachel lied about why I had to leave.

So even in my biggest disgrace, when I was most humbled in my entire life, she was the more charitable of us two. Typical Rachel, skilled at shaming you into submission, but with her good example instead of sharp words.

I don't have time to stew over this. I turn to Marion and accept a hug from her. I know I ought to just be grateful I can have that.

It's past nine o'clock, but I've decided I'll let the girls stay up late. With permission from the owner of the house, of course. Marion says her mama isn't expecting her and her sisters back until Monday morning. It's Saturday night and I'm done grading the projects submitted by my class, so I think I'll relax those rules I usually enforce around bedtime. I'll need more hours to devote to my kids, anyway.

A sleepy Giulia pushes her face into my chest. I'm leaning back in a chair with a velvety headrest. Marion and Demelza are bunched together on my friend's old couch, both of them holding a pocket-sized, but thick, book between them. It's read-aloud time, according to Marion, and I'm more than happy to listen. Demelza's behind compared to the rest of her class in Language, but Marion can help her catch up.

Now the latter's propping the book up while the former gets to work pronouncing the archaic words. "Chapter Eight. 'Jo Meets…'" Her voice trails off momentarily. "Apollo?"

Her sister gives her a judgmental look. "'Apollyon', dummy."

"Marion," I admonish her. "Be nice."

She pinches her lips together, but doesn't reply to me. "Just keep reading," she says impatiently to Demelza.

The eight-year-old obeys. "'Girls, where are you going?' asked Amy, coming into their room one Saturday afternoon, and finding them getting ready to go out…"

I sneak a glance at her. She seems completely calm, none of the usual defiance in her eyes. It must be doing her some good, spending her free time with her mama and sisters only.

She goes on reading. "'Never mind; little girls shouldn't ask questions,' returned Jo, sharply."

I suppress a grin. That Jo sounds a lot like Demi herself.

"Now if there is anything…" My daughter's voice trails off again.

"Mortifying," Marion jumps in.

"…mortifying to our feelings, when we are young, it is to be told that; and to be bidden to 'run away, dear,' is still more trying to us." Demelza abruptly stops reading and fixes her sister with a knowing gaze.

"What?" asks Marion.

"Nothing," says Demelza nonchalantly, but I know her too well. I hear that sly note in her voice and realize she just barely stopped herself from insulting her sister.

"Keep reading," Marion nudges her, and she does.

"Amy held her tongue, but used her eyes, and saw Meg slip a fan into her pocket.

'I know! I know! you're going to the theater…'"

Demelza reads, slogging through the longer words with the determination of the racing tortoise. I feel like falling asleep along with Giulia, who's snoring into my shirt fabric, but I have to stay awake to enforce bedtime for the other two.

My middle child continues to read. "'...You shan't stir a step; so you may just stay where you are,' scolded Jo, crosser than ever…"

I allow myself to smile. Wonder if Demelza's aware of her being just like Jo.

"Just as the party were setting out, Amy called over the banisters, in a threatening voice, 'You'll be sorry for this, Jo March! see if you ain't.'"

Marion snickers. She's enjoying the story as well.

"She and Amy had had many lively…" Demelza stops once more.

"Skirmishes," Marion offers.

The eight-year-old goes on without missing a beat. "…skirmishes in the course of their lives, for both had quick tempers, and were apt to be violent when fairly roused."

Violent when roused. That's how Rachel described me once. The mental picture I'm seeing of Demelza quarreling with her sisters becomes one of me battling her. It makes me deeply uncomfortable visualizing myself that way, instead of my child, and it takes all the willpower in me not to get up out of my chair and walk to the other room to put Giulia down.

Am I really violent when roused, like the character in my daughter's book?

Six months earlier

"Stop it, Demi!" I advance toward her while she's still on the couch, clutching the toy she just tried to throw at me. "You want a reason to cry? I'll give you…"

My hand descends on her, completing that sentence. Demelza replies by kicking both of her feet in the direction of my face. What started as a verbal disagreement's about to escalate into a brawl. Then my wife walks into the room and wedges herself between my daughter and me. "Alright, step away from her, Gale."

Small as she is, she's able to act as Demelza's shield. It gets me to stop for a moment, and that's when Rachel chides me. "You can't talk sense into her. You're as angry as she is. Walk away and cool down."

She nudges me in the other direction, then turns toward our child to comfort her. Demelza's already partially subdued. The combative spirit in her fled the instant her mother appeared. Her head's bowed, her posture submissive.

My resolve to beat some sense into her disintegrates. Usually, in spite of the weight of the challenge, I'd never slink away from a fight. This time, though, I do.

"Jo decided that Amy had forgiven and forgotten her wrongs." Marion turns the page with a lick of her finger, and Demelza keeps reading. "There Jo was mistaken…"

A chill runs through me as I hear my eight-year-old pronounce the words. I'm not really hearing her, only the repeated echo of those sentences said by my wife, "You can't talk sense into her. You're as angry as she is."

I clutch Giulia tight and massage the side of my head with my other hand, but the echo never fades. I hear it again, and again, and just when I refocus my mind for the third time, I hear it. "You can't talk sense into her. You're as angry as she is."

It was one of the times I felt most humiliated in my life. There I was, wielding my innate authority within our household to punish that little rebel, yet the only force strong enough to stop her wasn't me, it was a much smaller, meek-looking woman with the tendency to go about her business quietly. Worse still was her insinuation that my child with anger issues and I are just alike.

If that actually is true, I'd be responsible for finding the remedy, but I wouldn't even know where to begin. It'd be like navigating a particularly volatile section of the Block, back in District Thirteen, but without help from a squadron leader. Y'know what, forget about it. Katniss and I felt fairly confident making plans to desert our squad and strike out on our own within the Capitol. I feel no confidence now, faced with the task of taking the most reactive part of my personality and subduing it for good.

Demelza's voice brings me back to the present. "'Scold as much as you like, you'll never get your silly old story again,' cried Amy, getting excited in her turn."

Marion leans in closer, engrossed by the action. "'Why not?'"

"'I burnt it up.'" Demelza smiles as she says these words, as if she likes that Amy did something so malicious.

Giulia's stirring in my arms. Yet I can no longer move.

A decade earlier

The bombs fall like orange snowflakes in a heavy blizzard. We, the leftover citizens of the former District Twelve, can only stand and watch. Not even a single blade of grass could survive the onslaught.

If pure evil could be drawn in one picture, this would be it.

I'm held prisoner by the mental image. A chance utterance of that confounded five-letter word, and it triggered a series of synaptic impulses that eventually led to the burial site for that memory. The overactive neurons there got to work unearthing it, and, well, you know the rest. The memory has me so distracted, I almost miss what my daughter says next.

She's reading with a passion I only hear from her when she's defying me. "'You wicked, wicked girl! I never can write it again, and I'll never forgive you as long as I live.'"

Two days after the bombing

Unforgivable. I'll never be able to scrub from my mind the image of an old woman holding a slightly stained bag, in which were gathered the remains of her grandchild. In my heart I know it's wrong, but I can only flatten my growing rage by describing vividly the tortures to which I'd subject the Capitol people. Thom listens patiently for a while as he sits next to me in the grassy field, then he interrupts.

"Now that might be going too far. Even the Capitol people have kids." Still, as Thom says this, he looks pensive. He sucks on the end of his cigarette, darkening his already grimy teeth.

Seeing his dead-eyed expression, the spirit of defiance sparks to life inside me. "They took our home away," I point out sharply. "They took the lives of children. I'll never not think their kids should be taken from them." Emotion's about to burst within me like a rupturing sore, so I relieve the pressure by ejecting some spit in a random direction. The glob hits the heel of Thom's boot and stays there.

He startles a bit, then regards me with alertness, even hypervigilance. Acting like I'm no longer sane. Well if I'm not, never mind that. Knowing how the Capitol intends to crush us, at least I'd be ready to do something.

Alright, maybe I did wander too far. Those were disgusting thoughts for me to have. Makes it worse that Thom didn't refute. No, that's not right. I'm the only one who can shoulder the blame. Not my former crewmates, not my former squad members, my former lover, my wife, certainly not my kids.

It's intolerable, knowing I'm in a prison and the walls are my own memories. Even with ten times the brute strength I currently have, I couldn't wrench myself free.

How? How does a man release himself from his own guilt?

It's futile, but I hug Giulia close to try and smother my anxieties. In the background, Demelza keeps reading. "As Jo received her good-night kiss, Mrs. March whispered gently…"

I'm suddenly very close to tears.

Demelza goes on. "'My dear, don't let the sun go down upon your anger; forgive each other, help each other, and begin again tomorrow.'"

One tear does fall. Unaware, Giulia sleeps on.

"Jo wanted to lay her head down on that motherly…" Another pause from Demelza.

"Bosom," Marion finishes.

"…bosom, and cry her grief and anger all away; but tears were an unmanly weakness, and she felt so deeply injured that she really couldn't quite forgive yet."

I can answer my own question now. How to detach yourself from the burden of what you've done?

Easy. You can't.

Three days after the bombing

I try to dig up the smallest vestige of strength within me. Whatever's there simply falls through, like dirt over my fingers.

Standing in the ruins of what used to be my home, I've no choice but to plant my feet on the crumbling bits of someone's face. The tears attack unexpectedly, choking my throat, clouding my vision and sending me into an unsteady crouch.

"Soldier, that's unacceptable." The woman from District Thirteen walks over to reproach me. Coin, I think her name is. She motions to the nearby refugees. "They're all looking to you for help. You got to put on a brave face and carry on."

I'd normally never say this, but why me in particular? Why not my old crewmates, who helped with the rescue?

The woman provides no useful answer. "C'mon," she coaxes. "Turn those tears into hate. Use it to help us win the war."

It's solid advice. Desperation and despair leave you dry, but wrath, kindled with a need for vengeance, can be the perfect fuel. I breathe evenly in and out, distracting myself from the surrounding carnage by imagining the same devastation in the Capitol. The method works wonders. My ire's soothed in no time. I straighten, pull my shoulders back, and hold my head high before I return to the camp of refugees.

Coin notices this. "Good boy," she says, nodding in approval.

That was a bad day in my life. It was when I first began walking into darkness.

The memory's got me caged, and no amount of verbal consolation could provide a release. I'm hunched over slightly in my chair, Giulia's soft hair tickling the bottom of my chin.

I notice Demelza's no longer reading. Impatience probably got the better of Marion. She's got the book clutched in her hands, and she's holding it in front of her face while she expertly pronounces the words. "'Everybody is so hateful, I'll ask Laurie to go skating. He is always kind and jolly, and will put me to rights, I know,' said Jo to herself, and off she went…"

I hear the words, but I can only make sense of them superficially. "Jo heard Amy panting after her run, stamping her feet, and blowing her fingers, as she tried to put her skates on; but Jo never turned, and went slowly zigzagging down the river, taking a bitter, unhappy sort of satisfaction in her sister's troubles. She had cherished her anger till it grew strong, and took possession of her, as evil thoughts and feelings always do, unless cast out at once."

Something in my heart contracts. How many thoughts did I not cast out at once?

One month after the bombing

The meeting's been going on for more than forty-five minutes. Coin and Heavensbee exchange inflammatory words in rapid succession, while Boggs and I observe in silence. At the end of their search for a solution to the Mockingjay problem, both the president and her right-hand man come up empty-handed.

Then Coin singles me out among the others in Command. Her question throws me off for an instant. "Your heart filled with enough hate yet?"

I quit paying attention when it became obvious Heavensbee wouldn't shut his trap. So I don't know what train of thought Coin's completing. It takes a moment before I recall Coin's stern instructions to me, three days after the Twelve bombing. "Turn those tears into hate. Use it to help us win the war."

I stare into Coin's pale eyes and nod resolutely. "If I could hit a button and kill every living soul working for the Capitol, I would do it. Without hesitation."

A grim smile materializes on the president's lips. I feel a rush of gratification after making those thoughts known, but also a slimy sensation deep within, like an essential part of my soul just rotted away.

I clung to that thought not just during the remainder of that meeting, but up until I said it again, when Katniss was there to hear. Shame overflows in my subconscious, yet if Marion or Demelza were to ask me what's wrong, I couldn't tell them out loud.

Inserting a dramatic flair into her voice, Marion keeps reading. "'Keep near the shore, it isn't safe in the middle.'" She adjusts her position on the couch before continuing.

"Jo heard, but Amy was just struggling to her feet, and did not catch a word. Jo glanced over her shoulder, and the little demon she was harboring said in her ear…"

I feel like flinching.

"'No matter whether she heard or not, let her take care of herself.'"

Two months after the bombing

Beetee Latier's one of the most intelligent men I know. He's the brain where I'm the brawn, and I know he's indispensable to the war effort, despite not being physically fit for combat. Here we are in Special Defense, dreaming up new ideas for war-winning weapons.

I point to the intricately drawn design on the sheet of paper. I'm feverish, all too eager to explain my brilliant plan. "A bomb explodes. Time is allowed for people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second, more powerful bomb kills them as well."

For a minute or two, Beetee contemplates the drawing. He does this so often, I no longer get impatient with him. "That's what we'll use?" he inquires. I don't know if it's just me, but he sounds a little unwilling. Perhaps he senses what's boiling inside me. It's my passion for the Capitol's total annihilation.

I shrug. "Just an idea." I'm careful to remove the enthusiasm from my voice.

Beetee's still brooding. "If we were to submit this to Coin, and she suggested using it on, I don't know, children…" He kneads his head, as if the mere suggestion's giving him a migraine.

Before he can cave, I push him in the other direction. "Well," I say steadily, "whether she does or not, the Capitol made it clear what they're willing to accept when they bombed our children." My voice wobbles the tiniest bit, but I allow it. "Let 'em deal with the consequences, huh?"

The thickest tension occupies the pause. Beetee fixes me with a hard stare.

In the end, he doesn't demonize me. Nor does he scrutinize my tactics. I think he recalls seeing the footage of the corpses in Twelve. "Yes," is all he says. "Let them."

I blink in surprise. Then I let the grin creep onto my face.

This is the beginning of someone's end.

It wasn't the Capitol's.

Remembering what I said on that day, my shame lets itself show in tears that fall down my face. I hasten to wipe them off, but more drip down just as quickly. Lucky for me, my two older daughters are glued to the book.

"For a minute Jo stood still, with a strange feeling at her heart; then she resolved to go on, but something held and turned her round, just in time to see Amy throw up her hands and go down, with a sudden crash of rotten ice, the splash of water, and a cry that made Jo's heart stand still with fear."

The day the Capitol fell

"He's getting away!" The Peacekeeper to my right lets off three shots. Two of them hit their mark. To be specific, my back, right below my shoulder blades. Right where I was whipped by that walking piece of dung, Thread. I fall to my knees, then land facedown in the slush covering the street.

My nose and mouth fill with the stuff, and I begin to choke. I turn my head slightly to the side, allowing the mess to dribble out. "Argh…"

The Peacekeepers are on me in seconds. Their hands clamp down on my arms, my legs, my shredded back. I groan in pain and hate myself for it. I can't let these subhumans see me in my weakness.

A commotion in the Circle distracts me. People, kids from the sound of it, are yelling about something. I squint and see many pointed fingers. The kids are gesticulating toward the sky.

In a few seconds, they're deluged in what looks like a snowfall. But there's no mistaking the silver shapes in the sky for snow. No, those are parachutes. The same contraptions they deploy in the Games. The kids aren't clueless, they know what parachutes usually hold. They begin scooping the containers up. Unwrapping their gifts.

These are Capitol kids, and I swore I'd hate them along with their parents, but seeing them now, I'm glad they're getting aid.

The relieved feeling expires as quickly as the containers in the kids' hands explode.

A wave of pressure sweeps over my body, leaving a residual ache in my ears. That's just one second before it crystallizes in my mind that I caused this. The Peacekeeper holding me up lets his grip slacken. I see why a second later.

The snow's the reddest it's ever been since the invasion began. I must not be as courageous as I thought, because I can't bring myself to look closely at what I brought on. I try to shut my eyes against the stinging flurries of snow, so I won't have to see the extent of the damage done.

The Peacekeeper holding me won't let me get away with it. After uttering a cry of horror, he lets his shock harden into rage. His thick fingers squish the skin on the sides of my face, forcing me to open my eyes and sob in pain, despite my best efforts.

Yet a part of me feels like laughing, since I understand perfectly how my enemy feels.

"Prim?" The syllable catches in my mouth, before wresting itself free. I don't know why I said it at first, then my brain fully registers what my eyes are seeing. The medics from Thirteen with their familiar coats are pouring into the Circle. Of course, one of them's got a yellow braid hanging down her back.

I see the medics running forward, their thoughts only on how to save the children, none of them wary of what I know will come next. I should shout out a warning. No, it's already too late. There's no way for me to not see what's about to unfold, so in the final instant before the world explodes, all I can manage is a scream.

I wish that in this moment, I could show my grief through a howl or bellow. It'd feel more cathartic than trying to hold in these wracking sobs. They slip out one by one, concealed only by Marion's voice reading at a too-loud volume. "Shivering, dripping, and crying, they got Amy home…"

I'm not thinking of Amy, but of the other young girl with golden hair. She was just one year older than the littlest March sister when I killed her.

I killed her. The admission sends a visible shudder through me. Now I'm crying the way Posy did when she begged me to come home.

"…Jo dropped down beside the bed, in a passion of penitent tears, telling all that had happened, bitterly condemning her hardness of heart, and sobbing out her gratitude for being spared the heavy punishment which might have come upon her."

I wasn't spared. Makes sense, actually. Jo's wrath targeted a single girl, mine expanded over time like a tumor, until it was able to grind thousands to a pulp.

Marion reads, unaware of my thoughts. "'It's my dreadful temper! I try to cure it; I think I have, and then it breaks out worse than ever. Oh, mother! what shall I do! what shall I do?' cried poor Jo, in despair."

One week after the Capitol fell

All my movements resemble a robot's. Guilt and grief have stiffened my joints and made it near impossible for me to function normally, yet it's equally impossible for me to confess to my colleagues why I'm grieved. I lean on a completely random wall in a completely random room in the president's mansion. I can't recall how I got here.

"Come now, Soldier." Coin's voice is surprisingly maternal, for a hard-as-steel president in charge of the bleakest district. She pats me lightly on the shoulder. "You're not at fault. You were a victim. You were enraged at the Capitol, and that's understandable."

She jerks her finger in the direction of Snow's former cronies, who stand in handcuffs, their wrists shackled to the opposite wall. "Any of these people ever seen a genocide up close? Bet you they haven't."

I just nod without speaking. The tears dry up in my eyes, yet Coin's statement feels ineffective. Like holding a pillow in front of your chest, when there's a gun barrel against it and the trigger's about to be pulled.

Marion's almost finished with the chapter. "'Watch and pray, dear; never get tired of trying; and never think it is impossible to conquer your fault,' said Mrs. March, drawing the blowzy head to her shoulder, and kissing the wet cheek so tenderly, that Jo cried harder than ever."

And with that, I start sobbing harder than I ever have this whole time.

At last, my kids take notice. Giulia wakes with a start and stares wide-eyed at me. "Papa?" Her tiny hands grasp at me worriedly. "What's wrong?"

My only reply's to shed more tears.

Marion briefly looks away from the page she's on. She seems only curious, not a bit sympathetic. "It's a sad chapter, isn't it?" she asks me.

Demelza's mouth curls in utter disgust. "You like this book? It's for girls!"

"Shh!" Before I can pull myself together and scold Demelza, Marion breaks in. "I'm reading."

The little rebel goes quiet. So do I, thankfully. Giulia tries to reassure me by silently stroking the side of my face. Bless her. She's the closest thing to an angel in this hellish world.

"'...It was easier to try for your sakes than for my own; a startled or surprised look from one of you, when I spoke sharply, rebuked me more than any words could have done; and the love, respect, and confidence of my children was the sweetest reward I could receive for my efforts to be the woman I would have them copy.'"

Marion raises her voice, conveying the character's zeal. "'Oh mother! if I'm ever half as good as you, I shall be satisfied,' cried Jo, much touched."

Ten years after the war

"Behavior issue after behavior issue. That's Demi," I tell Mother through the phone in the kitchen. I have to pause to rub the back of my neck, I'm so tired from dealing with the two older ones. "Then there's Mar. Smart mouth, constantly talking back. Why're my girls like this? I keep telling them, treat others like you want to be treated."

I listen as Mother offers some words of advice. I don't take them to heart. She doesn't really know what I'm up against. When she's done, I go on with my complaints. "I wanted one daughter like Primrose." Another pause, and Mother says something about a family I hate and the bakery they're running in Twelve.

Wish she wouldn't remind me. "I'm sure Mellark's laughing right now," I monotone, straining not to think of that man and the woman he's with. "What I wouldn't give to be able to break his neck," I finish, nearly snarling as I do.

"Ooh!" It's Demelza and Marion. They're listening intently from the dining table. Their exclamation's followed by hushed laughter. Why do those two brats think it's funny to listen in on talk between grown-ups? Now they'll repeat what I said about wringing a person's neck to everyone at school.

Little girls shouldn't love violence. That much, I know.

I knew nothing at the time. I was a bigger idiot than half the drunkards and fools in the Capitol.

The chapter's winding down. Marion's lowering her voice. "Amy stirred, and sighed in her sleep; and, as if eager to begin at once to mend her fault, Jo looked up with an expression on her face which it had never worn before."

One hour later

"I let the sun go down on my anger," I admit to my eight-year-old, as I get ready to tuck her into bed. "I… I will never lose control in front of you again."

She hits me with a quizzical, even incredulous, expression. Of course, I never blew up at her during the course of this evening. But I'm not talking about what happened today. This is how I'll try removing every wedge I've driven into our relationship since it first started, since the day she was born, when I almost threw her facedown into the floorboards because she wouldn't stop wailing.

Her lips part slightly, and I think in that moment she understands what I'm attempting to say.

"I'm sorry, Demi," I get out, and the back of my throat's assaulted by another rising tide of tears.

Both my daughter and I cry this time, and we both bear the burden of comforting each other.

One hour ago

The chapter's nearing its bittersweet ending. Marion secures the book where it sits, propped up on her lap. Demelza alternates between watching me and looking at the page.

"As if she heard, Amy opened her eyes, and held out her arms, with a smile that went straight to Jo's heart. Neither said a word, but they hugged one another close, in spite of the blankets, and everything was forgiven and forgotten in one hearty kiss."

I hope someday, somehow, I can be forgiven.

This entire time, I was a fool. How could I have ever hoped to get three Primroses? More like three roses with thorns, considering my girls each took one half from me. Now my responsibility's to love them as they are, flaws and all, even if it means getting my fingers pricked. I'll just have to learn to smile through the pain.

When I made the promise to never blow up at my kids again, I meant it one thousand percent. I'll say this, I didn't always make good on that promise. There were days much later when I'd slip, having forgotten what I said, while plummeting back into the depths of my anger, momentarily.

Momentarily was the key word. I've absorbed many hard lessons through years of being a teacher, and one of them was a phrase I'd reiterate to my students. "If you fall seven times, you get back up eight." It was unbearably difficult at first, but with each and every slip, I learned to move on, to stagger back up again, apologize to my kids, and renew my promise to not let my temper get a hold on me.

Nor can I hold fast to those grievances that excite it in the first place. I suppose that's the ingredient I missed all along. It sounds so stupidly simple, too easy to be true, but maybe that's why I overlooked it. I've been a fighter all my life, in the physical, emotional, and mental battlefields, and in all three, I'd rather be slaughtered than have to surrender.

Yet now I know the surest way to win's to simply let go.

AN: Beta'd by Nicholas Wilde.