Katniss Everdeen
A surge of energy infected Katniss when she returned to the show's rehearsals. She called up the tailor and promptly unlocked Cinna's old orange gown - one she wore for her first games. Tried it on. Flickering flames still spitting along its hem like it were sewn yesterday.
"I want this," Katniss took in the fall of orange fabric upon her hips. Vibrant like the brightest sunrise. A new hope.
"It's a little old, don't you think?" the tailor observed, "I saw you wear this nearly two years ago, but if you-"
Two years ago I stood on the same stage - looking into the cameras and saw only one girl behind the lens. A girl who knew me. I want to find her again.
"Good enough for the show," Katniss spoke over her question, "alter the seams and take out the waist and we're good to go."
The tailor looked over her shoulder at Plutarch leaning in the doorway, and quickly nodded. She took a few more measurements and left Katniss to make the harrowing attempt at a soundcheck one more time. A dozen crewmembers eyed her warily when she showed up onstage. Standing in a circle like she were a deadly animal. Only Plutarch dared saunter close, albeit still at an arms' length.
"Katniss-"
"I can do it," she bit down on her tongue, "just give me the microphone and I'll do it."
"Alright then," Plutarched turned to the Crew, "let's get it on!"
Freed from the gown's constraints, Katniss walked straight to the centre as the music played. Nausea roared in her belly. Lights flashed. She shut her eyes against the cacophony of noises in her head and belted out the notes in time with the chorus. Hands clasped around the microphone, Katniss crooned and sang and threw her voice at the high notes like she were performing a power ballad and not a patriotic song. The last note left her throat stinging raw. Not as alarming as the single tear which stained her made-up face. A stunned silence had befallen the crew, hands still frozen on the uncalibrated audio. It hadn't been necessary.
It was in this moment, Katniss looked upon the empty auditorium, misty-eyed and hands shaking. Instead of seeing the ghosts which haunted her in times like these - saw only a single girl on the front row. Eyes bright with joy.
Hope.
"Knocked it out of the park," Plutarch's voice echoed from backstage, "I knew you could-"
"I don't want to sing that song," Katniss interrupted, turning to a swathe of empty seats, "I'm only singing Silver Blue."
"Silver Blue?" Plutarch folded his hands, "It's a love song."
"Yes," Katniss's heart swelled as she imagined Madge's face as she sang the words right to her, "and-and I want-"
I want her to know how much I loved her.
"Very well then, Mockingjay gets what she wants," Plutarch clapped his hands together, "let's make it happen!"
Katniss looked back at the seat as the crew cued Silver Blue. The ghost of Madge was gone. She's alive. Reality hadn't fully sank in. Madge Undersee was alive and well and wore demure-looking glasses and ran a bookstore in the Capitol. Madge Undersee - the love of her life. Not buried in a grave with her name on it. Still the same white cotton dress and gentle touch and a voice that set her heart ablaze.
Alive.
And she was coming to see her sing tomorrow.
Her soul welled with hope. The music pitched to a crescendo and Katniss sang like she was singing for the only girl that mattered.
Despite riding on that wave of optimism right until the next day - Katniss's heart still shrank at the crowds streaming into the venue. Bright lights lit up her name on billboards. Seated in the limousine, she could taste the hum of excitement in the air. The arena already boomed with music from the opening acts. It's happening. Kayla greeted her in the dressing room. Light, subdued makeup applied with a steady hand amidst the background hum of rock music. A producer entered and announced thirty minutes to stage.
The tailor had altered her gown perfectly, removing the hem's flares and allowing its pleats to fall naturally upon her hips. Katniss looked at her reflection. The same dress from two years ago, shrouding an entirely different woman. Light of hope shone through her eyes instead of the vacant hollowness she'd grown so used to avoiding. And when she touched her cheekbones, she felt a fullness behind them instead of the gaunt touch of despair.
She might not come. The harrowing thought bit at her as she marched through crowded corridors of crewmembers and stylists. Madge might think this harmful to her memories, that the sight of my dress might hurt her brain. What if she's just not -
The doubts fizzled out as a singer left through the curtains. Sweat glistened on her dark skin and eyes shone like lightbulbs. She passed Katniss a microphone, nearly dropped it from how hot it was. Heartbeat started pounding in her jaw.
"Good luck, darling," the singer planted a wet, sopping kiss on Katniss's jaw, "crowd's warm - you're the star for tonight."
Two minor stage appearances with Caesar Flickerman hadn't prepared her for the crowd's roar. The ovation. Bright lights that seared her eyeballs and burned her skin. Katniss shielded her eyes against the wash of white and strained to hear the music. This was the Capitol. The spectacle of its grandeur and the madness of the crowds. For once cheering over something that wasn't about sending children to their deaths.
No, this wasn't the Capitol anymore - this was Panem.
Katniss lifted the microphone to her lips.
"Panem," she whispered. Shaky voice lit the crowd on fire. Her eyes slowly adjusted to the light, but the orchestra had already started playing. Music jumbled in her ears. She tried to peer past the rays of gold and silver. A kaleidoscope of shifting colours that made her head spin. The moment arrived all too soon, and Katniss threw out her first few croaky notes to an audience. It took a few lines to hit her stride. Eyes screwed shut as the chorus approached, and right when she opened them again - there Madge was. Seated at the front. Concealed by the shadow yet with her hair braided into a crown. Light and blonde and cheery like that beaming grin of hers.
Katniss sucked in a deep breath, an evident smile spreading across her face.
In skies of silver blue,
And every dawn that breaks anew,
In quiet winds and morning dew,
This is where I love you.
Katniss's lungs strained after the highnotes, but euphoria overtook her ache. She was giddy. Floating on a cloud she never felt the last time here. Looking back at Madge's eyes, the thrumming heartbeat in her chest verged close to exploding when she visibly saw the girl blow a kiss at her. Without thinking, Katniss stood on her tiptoes in sky-high heels and blew a kiss back. The crowd roared its approval and Katniss didn't think her megawatt smile could spread any wider.
Until the brown-haired woman seated beside Madge leant over and planted a kiss on her cheeks.
And sent the world crashing down around herself.
Katnisss had nearly drowned once. It was a summer afternoon and she'd taken the canoe out into the lake having caught nothing onshore. The festering wound of Father's death was still raw on her soul and the empty spot behind the canoe only inflamed it further. She'd been out of it. Hands had barely connected to her mind as she wound bait on the string. Flop of dead fish on a hook scarcely making sense to her bewildered eyes. Father had always taken in the catch. The unsettling sensation of his ghost behind her had led to the boat capsizing and Katniss. For the first time in her life, had forgotten how to swim. Limbs trashing against the currents as a phantom swell dragged her under. Her head thudded the canoe's bottom. Hands grabbed foamy spray. Mouthfuls of water swallowed before she finally latched onto the hull.
She'd never felt that way again - not in her solitary swims in the lake. Not when she's flung into the Quarter Quell's rough surfs or fighting for her life in the Capitol's sewers.
Until now. A bubbling dread that clamped her throat tight. Straining to breathe above the harrowing sight of what she's witnessed. Gasping for a breath of air that never came. That kiss. Madge brought a date. Katniss stared at her own reflection in the dressing room mirror afterwards - feeling like a piece of trash. She scarcely budged as Kayla removed her makeup. Couldn't make out the thumping congratulations from producers about how good she sounded. Lifted a finger only to sign conciliatory autographs from private well-wishers. Her gut twisted further when she looked into her own eyes and saw, once again, the reflection of that brown-haired woman. Lips smacked upon Madge's cheek. The blush and coy smile she gave back.
She gripped the table and tried to stave off that drowning in her chest. Eyes fluttered shut. She forgot you. Madge had every right to date another woman. And who wouldn't want to date her? Pretty and kind and brave. Exactly the type of girl anyone would like. A shard stabbed her chest as she contemplated, for the first time - whether Madge had simply thought to let her go after all this while. That nothing could've stopped this from happening and she's left with the amputated stumps of her hands still reaching out for a ghost which had forgotten her.
The world spun. Katniss wobbled to her feet and left the dressing room in a daze. More autographs. Handshakes which passed right through her fingers. Photographs without a smile. Plutarch's cigar breath hit her face before she shook out of her stupor. Something about the ratings through the roof and wanting her to stay on as a guest judge at a talent show and more guest appearances.
"No," Katniss brushed past him, barely looking back, "I don't think I want to come back to the Capitol anymore."
"Look-"
She left him hanging there, desperately seeking out the rush of cold air. Open space. Anything besides cramped corridors and wistful eyes glaring at her from every corner. Katniss huffed and pushed and ended up half-staggering and falling from the entrance steps. Scarf already round her neck. She sucked in a lungful of crisp spring air right before she caught sight of Madge by the promenade. Eyes drawn to her like a magnet. It felt like drowning again. The same girl who put her underwater now represented the surface breach she so hopelessly longed for.
That same woman kissing Madge's hands and bidding her farewell still put a dead-knot in her chest.
A familiar instinct crept onto Katniss. Hide. From the streaming crowds around her, who'd inevitably recognise her braid. From the rapid thumping in her chest. From the Capitol and all the deaths and broken memories. From that single, gleaming point of light before her - the last ghost she could let go and wish a happy life. Katniss's jaw clenched. Stop hiding. She waded through the surf, pushing through every instinct of hers until Madge noticed. The girl had worn a blazer over her white cotton dress. Bare-faced with loose-flowing blonde hair that gleamed beneath the streetlights. It made her look a decade older.
"Hey," Madge stood with hands behind her back, "you sang beautifully tonight."
"Thank you, my father taught me that song. A-and…"
It was meant for you.
"I was hoping to run into you, actually," Madge fished around her leather satchel, "I wanted to give you this."
Madge handed her a bound manuscript. The title on the cover read: Wings of Fire. Pages upon pages of neatly-typed single-spaced font. Barely two fingers thick, yet Katniss felt its weight in her soul.
"What's this?"
Madge sighed, "I've been writing a book, but it's just a bunch of nonsensical ramblings. Most of them are disjointed memories of my past life."
A shudder coursed through Katniss's spine. Her mouth dried.
"I don't think the Capitol has much taste for stuff like this - since I'm from District 12 after all," Madge continued, "so it shouldn't belong here. Would you help me take this back home? Or what's left of it anyway. I'm sure some reconstructed library will one day be glad to have this."
Home. The word thudded in her chest like an arrow. Katniss wanted to scream - District 12 is your home! Not this fake place.
"I will," Katniss mouthed, words barely audible as she turned away, "w-who was that woman with you? Your date?"
Madge visibly tensed, "Crescentia? She's a date, well, I mean, a not-date."
"Not-date?" Katniss folded her arms.
"Look - I've been having some problems with Capitol authorities over the bookstore, they want the land for some development," Madge looked over her shoulder, "Crescentia works at the Interior Ministry and I asked her out hoping she could help me with it."
"And?" Katniss's voice sharpened to a knife's edge, "Did she?"
Madge shook her head, "It's not resolved yet."
"Right."
"Believe me," Madge levelled her gaze at Katniss, "I would've asked Cassia but she had another date tonight."
"So you asked this woman - Crescentia."
"Katniss, it's not what it seems."
"What does it seem, then?" Katniss asked, glowering stare like a dagger in the dark, "Because to me, it appears you two have something going on."
"We did alright?" Madge's voice pitched, "Only for a night or two at most. What does it matter to you anyway?"
Her gut twisted. A night or two. She'd thrown away what they had together for the comfort of a Capitolite woman. And for what?
"It-it matters," Katniss stammered. Before she caught herself. It didn't make a difference whether it mattered or not. Madge had forgotten her. The reality hadn't yet fully sunk in that she meant less to Madge than a leaf in the breeze.
"I don't see why this should matter, least of all to you," Madge countered, venom in her voice, "since according to TV, you're married to Peeta Mellark. The baker's son who lived across the street and went to the games with you. I bet you've spent a night or two at his place."
"Well-"
Katniss's face burned with shame. She had slept with Peeta. The blatant hypocrisy of her anger laid bare before the night sky and her body tremored with want to hide from Madge's unrelenting stare. She met her eyes head-on. Expecting to see the same charcoal greys that used to set her heart ablaze. Instead, Katniss saw nothing but cold steel. Hardened by years in purgatory.
"Well - it means there's nothing to it, then - is there?" Madge shot back, "You have your life, and I have mine."
"You had a life before this, Madge-"
"Maybe I did - but it's all buried beneath the pile of ruin I woke in-"
"It's not," Katniss pleaded, "they're rebuilding it. District 12 is still there. Please, Madge - don't you remember anything about the District, about…us?"
"I don't!" Madge yelled, drawing a few curious glances, "it's locked behind this prison of pain that hurts me and…and….you know what? Maybe none of it ever happened!"
"What? H-how," Katniss's eyes welled with tears, "How could you say that?"
"Real or not - I wouldn't have the faintest clue if it was," Madge wiped her eyes, "I'd bore a hole through my skull trying to remember and probably end up like my mother. Paralyzed with headaches and-"
"So you do remember then," Katniss's eyes lit up, "your mother?"
"From a freaking hospital application!" Madge broke, jabbing her finger at the air, "All I have of my past life are documents and records and not one of them ever mentioned you!"
Two pairs of grey eyes widened with hurt. Madge covered her mouth with both hands; eyes squeezed shut as she choked out a sob. Katniss turned away, shallow breaths leached into the cold night air.
"I don't remember anything!" Madge sputtered between sobs, "I don't remember their eyes. The touch of their hands. What they said to me. Nothing. I couldn't even remember my name!"
Katniss's fists balled into shaking lumps, a thousand angry words on the tip of her tongue and not one of them she saw fit to loose at Madge.
"Maybe you-" Katniss breathed a sigh, "maybe you're the lucky one. Having nothing to remember - while the rest of us have to make do with broken memories."
"You don't get it do you? This is all I have left, the Capitol. There's nothing left for me back in 12. No memories. No family. Nothing. Not even-"
You.
The word hung off the tip of Madge's cherry pink lips. Katniss could hear it on the shape of her mouth.
"Fine!" Katniss seethed, "Stay here with all these fake people - since they're your family now!"
Without another word, Katniss turned and stomped off. Not even realising her own tears had dampened the cover page of Madge's manuscript. Foggy-eyed and disoriented, she walked straight into Plutarch. The paunchy man had been smoking a cigar on the steps and watching the entire episode play out.
"Katniss - look-"
She glared straight into his eyes and shot the first words that came to mind.
"Sign me up," Katniss stammered, "as many damn episodes as you want. I'll do it for Panem."
A strangled sob filtered over the evening crowd's murmuring. She turned in time to see Madge running into the night, not knowing if that's who she's really doing it for.