Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Haymitch returned to Twelve with Katniss Everdeen.

Mentor. Jailor. Friend.

He wasn’t sure in what capacity, all that he knew is that he’d finally made good on his promise to Lenore Dove and the only thing still tying him to this mortal coil, was the girl. So he followed her home.

At first, he figured that returning to Victors Village together was enough. He was doing his duty as sworn in his contract with the court simply by living next to her. Neither of them were terribly social people, so he gave her space as she mourned and healed.

‘Mourned and healed.’ What bullshit. Maybe her body was healing, the burns he could see were mostly scars now. But the whole reason for her existence for the last 18 months was gone. Maybe the last 6 years. All Haymitch knew was that she walked into that Arena to save Prim’s life. And she was the face of the rebellion to keep Prim safe. And now Prim was gone.

And the boy was gone too. Boys. The one who she also protected by being the Mockingjay and the one who used his connection to the Mockingjay to propel his military career upward. One was too broken to be near her. The other, well, Haymitch wasn’t sure Katniss would piss on him if he was on fire these days.

Haymitch knew a thing or two about losing your reason for living.

Which is why he found himself knocking on her front door. Because the court might only care about her staying put in Twelve. But Haymitch cared about her staying put on this earth, too. And the sounds of despair coming through her windows were too much to bear.

She came to the door. Her eyes were red and swollen. Her hair a greasy mess of what was probably once a braid. Clothing wrinkled and stained. And honestly, she smelled terrible.

“Hey sweetheart,” he greeted her. She blinked at him. He waited and it seemed like she was waiting, too. Well, fuck, this was as bad as he’d worried it might be. “Can I come in for a bit?”

It took a long moment for Haymitch’s words to register. Her face remained blank. Eventually, she stepped back and let him into the house.

He found the front room in much the same shape as the girl. No lights. Piles of dust. Ashes spilling out of the fireplace grate. Dead inside. After the initial sweep of the room, he brought his focus back to the girl. There was nothing to do for it but to say, “Get a bath. You’re coming to mine for lunch.”

“I’m not hungry.” Even her words were sluggish. And a Seam kid, a Hunger Games survivor, did not turn down food.

“You can go get a bath and come eat lunch with me, or I’m throwing you in the stream.” He didn’t have the energy for this kind of parenting. He was doing his own wound licking, too. She looked at him with such a petulant, teenage expression, he was forced to crack into a smile. More kindly, he pressed, “Go on, sweetheart. Take a bath. Put on something clean. I’ll be here waiting.”

He watched her trundle up the stairs, complying only because it was the path of least resistance, before settling himself onto her couch.

It was a long wait. He passed the time coming up with a mental list of things they needed to do to get her house back into habitable shape. Mostly cleaning, but it looked like she’d broken a few kitchen essentials that might need replacing. Then he sheepishly acknowledged to himself that the list for his house would be awfully similar, maybe longer.

She came back down the stairs, shoulders slumped and better smelling. Her clothes were wrinkled but didn’t seem as downright rank as the ones she wore before her bath. Her hair was loose and dripping.

“Go get me a towel, a hair brush, and a hair tie,” he told her. She turned back around to climb the stairs again. No hint of an opinion, no backtalk. Fuck.

When she returned, he told her to sit on the ottoman in front of him and she did. He told her to turn her back to him and she did. He told her to hold still while he dried her hair, then brushed it, then braided it, and she did.

“Come on, let’s get some lunch,” he said and they walked to his house next door. Her compliance was exhausting.

Katniss sat at his table and might have been watching him as he assembled lunch. Sandwiches made with ham and butter. Canned pears. Apple cider. When he placed the plate in front of her, she dutifully ate.

When they were both nearly through with their meal, Katniss finally spoke. “You’re drinking cider, too.” Her voice lacked emotion, but her observation carried weight.

“Yeah. I figured after all the bother I went through to get clean with you and Peeta, then District Thirteen’s dry laws, I figured it might not be a bad thing to stay off of anything harder than juice.” He didn’t say that each day was a constant struggle. That he could count how long it had been since his last drink in days, hours. That he feared slipping up once would land him back in a place he wouldn’t be able to climb out of again.

“How do you bear it?” she asked. In her question, he heard the unspoken, How am I supposed to bear it?

He gave her question the consideration it deserved. Then he told her a story, edited but true. “I don’t remember much of the first few years after my Games. I was too drunk. But the next time Beetee was back in the Capitol to mentor, maybe three, four years later, he pulled me aside. Said that having nothing left was a gift because it meant I could help the rebellion and not risk anything more than my life. And what was I doing with that anyway. I told him to fuck off.”

It had been a long time since Haymitch had spoken aloud and he wasn’t one for telling stories. He took a long drink to wet his throat. “Eventually I told him I wanted in and he put me in touch with Plutarch. He told me I had to get at least sober enough that I wasn’t going to go spilling secrets over a bottle. That was the better part of two years. It’s a balance: drunk enough to be numb but not so much I’d be a liability. Since then, I did what I could and that kept me alive.”

Her eyes gained a bit of focus over this course of her telling, and he got the sense she genuinely listened, even if she looked at the wall and not at him. “But why? Why not just drink until you didn’t wake up? Or eat a bullet?”

Haymitch did not like this one bit. He needed to get her away from this kind of thinking. “I made a promise to my girl. Last thing before she died. I promised to try to end the Hunger Games. I had no way of making good on that, couldn’t imagine a world without the Games. But I couldn’t die until I’d done it. I think that’s why she made me promise.”

Katniss said, “I didn’t make any promises to Prim.”

“Then you’re going to make one to me,” he said, his voice insistent. Her eyes finally swung his way. He met them and held them. “Promise me.”

She sucked in a ragged breath but didn’t speak. He stayed silent, too. Kept looking at her. I’m right here, sweetheart. I’m not leaving you. Eventually, in a quiet voice, like it cost her something, she said, “I won’t.”

Chapter Text

Haymitch could say things had improved since that first day. He made a point of seeing Katniss at least daily to check in on her. She slowly began to bathe and eat without reminders, and even to clean up her house. He did the same, it was only fair. That all of this constituted improvement was no less sad for being true.

“Tell me about your girl,” Katniss asked over dinner. Potato soup with croutons made out of old bread. She didn’t talk much still, but usually asked Haymitch questions that led to him telling her stories. About failed attempts to take down Snow and the Capitol. About her dad. About her mom. About Sid. None of it was easy. None of it things he would choose to talk about. But he did. For her. And he found himself feeling lighter with each story shared.

And so he told her about Lenore Dove. About her music and about the way sunlight landed on her hair. About how she got in trouble for playing forbidden songs and other mischief. About how Maysilee figured out she was spray painting rebel slogans before he did. He told her about Lenore Dove’s uncles and her geese. He didn’t tell her how she died. He didn’t tell her he still killed her in his dreams, over and over.

“I think I would have liked her,” Katniss said at the end of his telling.

“I think she would have liked you, too.” And he meant it.

It was a few days later that Haymitch went to Katniss’ door and didn’t get an answer when he knocked. The knocking became pounding. And after pounding he opened the door, too scared to give a fuck about invading her privacy. He raced through the house, terrified he’d find her and then terrified again when he didn’t. His breaths came in rough pants, loud in his ears. His heart was pounding against his ribs.

He’d lost her. He lost her.

Haymitch sat heavily on the floor.

He lost her. He failed. Why did everyone he tried to protect die? Why couldn’t he?

In time, his breathing slowed and his heart slowed and his thoughts slowed. Haymitch wound down like a clock, like a broken toy. Just a body slumped against a wall.

That’s how Katniss found him.

“Haymitch? Haymitch! Are you ok? What are you doing?” Katniss dropped to the floor beside him, looking for wounds, looking for what had hurt him. In her haste, she dropped the basket in from the crook of her elbow as she ran assessing hands over him.

“You’re alive,” he croaked. Afraid it was a dream, the kind that taunted him. Afraid his mind couldn’t be trusted.

“Of course I’m alive. You’re the one who – Are you sick?” It was the most vivacious Haymitch had seen her in the weeks since Prim died and she murdered a president and then she was locked up where something inside her died. That spark was back. Katniss, the protector, protecting him.

“I’m not sick,” he sat up, fussed that she assumed he was the one in need and reassured that she was worried. There you are, girl on fire. “You weren’t here.” I was scared. “I assumed. I assumed the worst.”

He watched Katniss' face go soft. “No. I walked to town. They’re rebuilding, you know.” Of course he knew. He was the one who fetched provisions for them every week. But she probably never wondered where the food was coming from. Another sign of concern for a girl once so wholly preoccupied by that question. “Anyway, I went to get you a present. I got you these.”

At this, she turned her attention to the basket next to her knees on the floor. “Oh shit. One broke,” she tutted. She put the basket in his lap.

In a nest made out of one of her towels lay one broken and six perfect eggs. “They’re goose eggs,” she said. He knew. “The McCoys have started up a shop. Mostly produce. Some butter and eggs.” He knew this too but he let her keep talking. “Angus McCoy said these are fertilized and should hatch soon enough.”

Geese. She got him geese to raise.

Haymitch looked from the eggs to the girl. Her face was hopeful, nervous like he might not like the gift. But he was too overcome to speak. The whiplash from his fear to his grief to this gift and all it signified. His eyes jumped between the basket and her face. He hoped that his expression reassured her. It must have, because she smiled. Maybe her first since the end of the war.

That night, they celebrated. A roast chicken with root vegetables. Katniss even said she would hunt the following day, the first time she’d touch a bow since her arrest. They imagined rabbit stew and wild turkey and squirrel soaked in buttermilk. Haymitch didn’t know which filled him with more excitement, the prospect of the food or Katniss feeling like she could hunt. Why choose? It was a good night.

The eggs hatched nearly a week later. (A week of good hunting and good eating.) Haymitch kept watch over them like a hen, wanting to make sure that when his babies first emerged into the world, his would be the first face they’d see. He knew from Lenore Dove how important this was. Imprinting, it was called.

The first one hatched. Mottled gray with a white belly. Two more, both yellow. He knew they’d grow out of those colors. He yelled out his window for Katniss to come. She was there for the last three. Gray, gray, and then the last was all white.

His babies.

He spoiled them.

Once old enough, they had the run of his yard and slept on clean straw in a coop he built behind his house. He kept their water fresh. And when they were older still, they followed him in a waddling line to the meadow.

He loved all of them. But from the first, one stood one. Completely white except for his orange bill, there was no getting around it, this one was an asshole.

He honked and flapped his wings at Haymitch and the man would swear the bird was cussing at him. The thing got into his house and made a menace of itself. It shit in one of his shoes. He half considered just killing the thing but then he would think of Lenore Dove and what she’d say.

Haymitch was sweeping up the broken crockery from his floor. The asshole had gotten in again and threw a tantrum that ended with two broken mugs and a bowl in pieces. Katniss came in with the asshole hot on her heels, nipping at the backs of her legs until she slammed the front door on it.

“What an asshole!” she exclaimed. And then, “Have you seen Dinner? I can’t find her.”

“Dinner?” Haymitch echoed in confusion.

“Gray goose with a white belly. Penchant for wandering off,” she said this as though he was an idiot, like she was reminding him of something for the seventh time.

And then it clicked. “You named one of the geese Dinner?”

“Yeah,” she said. Like this was known. “Dinner, Sandwich, Dark Meat, Drum Stick, Stuffing, and Asshole.” She pointed over her shoulder at Asshole, who was currently doing his best impression of a perfect child in the window ledge.

Haymitch burst into laughter. “You named them!” Asshole was one thing, there was no other name for the beast, but he hadn’t bothered to name the others.

“Yes! And Dinner is missing. We need to go find her.” Katniss turned on her heel with full knowledge that Haymitch would follow. Asshole joined them in their search as well.

After a few minutes wandering around both of their properties as well as the neighboring ones, including calling, “Dinner!” like the bird would know her name, they found her. She was sleeping under the front step of one of the vacant houses in Victors Village. (And it said something about the superstition and fault lines that no one else moved into the empty houses in the Village, even as they rebuilt the leveled Twelve.)

Dinner was chided appropriately. Asshole followed along, seeming to enjoy his sister getting in trouble. When they returned to Haymitch’s yard, he asked Katniss, “Now, who is who?”

She pointed to the remaining four – Sandwich, Drum Stick, Stuffing, and Dark Meat. Haymitch committed the names to memory as he returned Dinner and Asshole to the flock. But of course, as soon as they closed his front door behind them, Asshole decided to be, well, an asshole.

It was fully within the geese’s rights to shit up his yard and make a racket. It was what geese did. But Asshole hopped through the open window in Haymitch’s living room, where he and Katniss sat on the couch, deciding what to make for dinner. Asshole flutter-jumped onto the arm of the couch before flapping his wings in anger and hissing at Katniss.

Knowing full well he was a biter, Katniss rolled away from Asshole, landing herself nearly in Haymitch’s lap. He caught her, their faces close, before Katniss used the hand currently resting on his chest to push herself off. Asshole settled on the couch where Katniss had previously been sitting – pleasant as you please – and the girl ended up remaining close enough to Haymitch that their knees touched.

The conversation interrupted by the goose did not easily continue. The problem was that recently, Haymitch had started thinking of the girl as beautiful. Now, he’d known she was a looker; it was part of how she and Peeta won their games together. Girl on fire and all. But sometime in the last few weeks, he’d stopped seeing her as a girl, and instead as the woman she’d grown into.

Which meant that Katniss falling into his lap, her lips kissing distance away, left Haymitch feeling the kinds of things he hadn’t felt in a long time. He was no monk. He’d had his nights seeking comfort, whether in another Victor’s bed or rented by the hour, but that had been purely biological. Like eating and having to trim your nails. But attraction to Katniss would never be that simple.

After a long moment, during which Haymitch could not guess what was on Katniss’ mind, the woman in question said, “I’m going to skin a squirrel,” before only doing what could be described as fleeing through his back door.

Asshole hissed at him, so he shot the little monster a dirty look before making his way to the kitchen. He got out the buttermilk and breadcrumbs. Peanut oil for frying. And sweet potatoes to boil and mash with butter.

He heard the flappy patter of webbed feet on the hardwood floor as Asshole made his way back outside. Not long later, he heard Katniss yelp, “Ow! You little shit!” Haymitch chuckled to himself.

The birds in Haymitch’s little flock each had their own little personalities. Dinner was always running away, always finding trouble that she needed saving from. Like a game, to see how long it took Haymitch or Katniss to find her.

Sandwich was the clear leader of the pack, barring Haymitch. When they traveled to the meadow, Sandwich walked first behind him. And if Sandwich wanted access to the water trough, the others moved out of the way. He wasn’t the biggest, just the leader.

Stuffing was a lazy boy. Left to his own, he was always drowsing somewhere warm. And if you wanted him to go anywhere with haste, the only choice was to carry him.

Dark Meat was shy, the loner. Katniss worried about whether she was sad or not. The bird was clearly her favorite even if, when asked, she rolled her eyes and said, “They’re all future meals, Haymitch. Why would I have a favorite?” This was particularly adorable since not only was she currently carrying Stuffing, but she was also the one who named them.

Drum Stick might have been Haymitch’s favorite, though he promised them that he loved each of his babies equally. Drum Stick was a preener, always showing off. And he loved nothing more than a little scritch of Haymitch’s blunt fingernails in line with the direction of his feathers.

Then there was Asshole. A disturbing pattern became clear in his behavior. He hissed, bit, hit, and shit on both Haymitch and Katniss when he went near either of them alone. The only time Asshole settled down was when Katniss and Haymitch were together. Insane, maybe Haymitch was finally losing it. But it seemed to be the strange truth.

Chapter Text

As he knew it would be, Prim’s birthday was a difficult day.

By the time Haymitch rose and walked out his front door to check on Katniss, she was lying in her front yard. Her back in the shit-less grass, her eyes staring up at the cloudy sky, she was singing Deep in the Meadow.

Haymitch made his way beside her and sat down in the grass, too. Katniss had a good singing voice. Like Burdock. Not just that she could carry a tune in key, but that her voice was rich and she could make you feel things with it. When the song ended, she said, “It was Prim’s favorite.”

“That’s a Covey song,” he noted. It was a day for missing folks lost, he supposed.

She kept staring at the sky as she said, “My dad told me he was part Covey but he never explained what that meant. Only that it was dangerous and not something to talk about.”

As so often happened, it felt like Haymitch was at once losing something and lighter when he said, “Lenore Dove was Covey. Your Dad’s ma was, too. But Covey wasn’t just about blood. It was a way of life. A community. And music was the most important part of that.”

Katniss hummed, which he’d learned meant she wanted him to keep talking, so he did. “A lot of Covey songs had two meanings. There was the part anyone listening could appreciate, but there was always a meaning that only Covey knew. That song you were singing was a map. It’s directions to the place where they buried their dead.”

Perhaps realizing that it was an especially difficult song to hear on a difficult day, she took his hand. It wasn’t something they really did, hold hands. But at the moment, Haymitch was grateful. “That song you sang for the propo, The Hanging Tree, couldn’t have been better chosen if you tried. It was outlawed to sing in public, so your dad took a real risk teaching it to you. Lenore Dove got in trouble for playing it, got arrested once.”

He sat quietly for a time. Thinking of Prim. And Lenore Dove. Burdock, Sid, his ma. Mags, Wiress, Finnick, Chaff. So many people lost. He wondered if, beside him, Katniss’ own thoughts wandered from Prim to Finnick to folks not dead but lost to her all the same, like Peeta and Gale. Or maybe the whole of her grief for Prim was still too fresh, too large, to leave any room for the others on a morning like this.

“Did your dad ever teach you The Old Therebefore?” he asked her after a long time of companionable sadness.

She shook her head no and he watched her bread snake through the grass. “It was what the Covey sang at funerals. Last time I heard it, your dad sang it for my ma and Sid and the kids who died in the Arena with me.”

“Will you sing it for me?” she asked in a quiet voice.

“I’m no singer like you,” he demurred. But at a squeeze of her hand, he cleared his throat. The words flew easily into his mind even with the decades since hearing it.

You're headed for heaven,
The sweet old hereafter,
And I've got one foot in the door.
But before I can fly up,
I've loose ends to tie up,
Right here in
The old therebefore.

I'll be along
When I've finished my song,
When I've shut down the band,
When I've played out my hand,
When I've paid all my debts,
When I have no regrets,
Right here in
The old therebefore,
When nothing
Is left anymore.

I'll catch you up
When I've emptied my cup,
When I've worn out my friends,
When I've burned out both ends,
When I've cried all my tears,
When I've conquered my fears,
Right here in
The old therebefore,
When nothing
Is left anymore.

I'll bring the news
When I've danced off my shoes,
When my body's closed down,
When my boat's run aground,
When I've tallied the score,
And I'm flat on the floor,
Right here in
The old therebefore,
When nothing
Is left anymore

When I'm pure like a dove,
When I've learned how to love,
Right here in
The old therebefore,
When nothing
Is left anymore.

By the time he finished the song and was quiet again, tears were flowing freely from the corners of her eyes down to soak the hair at her temples and pool in her ears. Katniss isn’t a pretty crier, all blotchy and pouty, but even still, she was beautiful.

She took a deep, wet sounding breath and said, “The song is like a promise.” Like her promise to him. “Like your promise to Lenore Dove.”

“I’ll see you. But not yet.” he said in a quiet voice.

“Yeah. Not yet,” she exhaled.

He blew out a breath, not a little worried that he was about to make her angry. “They’re dead, Katniss. Gone. And it’s right to mourn them. But it’s also right that we’re still alive.”

She finally looked at him, her brow creased. Before she had a chance to blow up at him or to have any other reaction, the heavy moment was broken by the screaming honk of Asshole as the bird divebombed Haymitch. Using both his powerful wings and webbed feet, the aptly named menace attacked his face and head.

Haymitch let go of Katniss’ hand as he curled up in a ball, bringing his knees up to his chest, tucking his face, and using his arms to protect his head. Above him and around him, he felt Katniss. She’d gotten off the ground to cover him bodily against Asshole’s assault. The crown of his head and the backs of his hands were now nestled against her stomach. Her cheek rested against his back and her arms wrapped around to his front.

All at once, Asshole subsided in his attack, making himself comfortable on Katniss’ grass. Both Katniss and Haymitch were breathing hard, adrenaline coursing through their blood. With Haymitch’s panting breaths, he could smell her. The soap of the laundry they washed together as well as something warm and human.

She unfolded gracelessly, landing on her ass with her legs willy-nilly on either side of him as she sat back down. She huffed a laugh which made Haymitch laugh in turn. Their eyes met and they fell into peals of laughter. Katniss cackled and every so often sorted, which made them both laugh harder. Then their watery eyes would meet and they’d laugh again.

It was good to laugh.

As they came back to themselves, Haymitch noticed bits of grass stuck in Katniss’ hair, on her shoulders. Her back was probably littered with bits of her lawn. He plucked a strand from her hair just to the side of her face and her breath caught. Their eyes met.

They were so close, well within each other’s personal space. He had hardly needed to extend his arm to reach into her hair. At the thought, his hand reached again, this time tucking an errant strand behind her ear. She hadn’t breathed, eyes on his face. What did she see there?

He wanted to kiss her. The thought inappropriate and true. His eyes traveled to her lips, which dropped open. If he kissed her, she would run away. Quite possibly, she would punch him first. And the way he was staring at her mouth, she must know what he was thinking. So why wasn’t she running away?

Did she lean in slightly? Had he? Could he kiss her? And risk everything?

Their faces were so close they were breathing each other’s breath. Neither leaning in to close the space, neither running. Was it possible to be so torn as to become literally paralyzed?

Just when Haymitch was going to say fuck it and press his lips against hers, Katniss scooted back. Then she stood. But she didn’t run. He had to crane his neck back to look up at her as she fidgeted and plucked grass from herself.

“I’m a mess,” she said. She wasn’t. He cocked his head to one side, trying to understand where her thoughts had lead so he could follow. “You know, there’s parts of me where the skin was so burned it's all waxy now. Pink. I look like a fire mutt.” She was speaking quickly. Nervously.

“And even where I’m finally growing hair again, on the side of my head, it’s all the wrong length.” She gestured to the side of her head, burned badly enough that it took months for her skin to recover, but not so badly she couldn’t regrow her hair in time.

Still trying to catch up,Haymitch made a joke with a nonchalant shrug, “You look a bit like Cressida now.”

Katniss whined, tugged at her scalp. “But that was intentional. And she’s hot. And badass.”

“You’re hot and badass, too.” The words fell out of his mouth before he could censor himself.

Above him, Katniss covered her face with her hands. “Nope. Never said that again,” she protested.

“Badass. Hot.” He said just to needle her. Because he was a little offended on her behalf now. “Are you worried you aren’t pretty anymore?”

The idea was so ludicrous as to be laughable. But Katniss didn’t laugh. Instead she huffed, “I know I’m not.”

Haymitch stood up and took her hands from her face, wanted to make sure he was looking right at her and she was looking back when he said, “Katniss, you’re beautiful.”

She looked away. A flush rose on her cheeks. “Sweetheart, there are about a hundred more important and more interesting things about you, but you’re the most gorgeous woman I’ve ever seen.”

Her hands went back to cover her face. Having none of that, Haymitch pulled her toward him. He wrapped his arms around her. And while at first, her hands were trapped between them, pressed to her face, she eventually tugged them out from between their bodies to wrap her arms back around him. He stood holding her, wishing she could see herself the way he saw her. Her looks, but also her bravery getting out of bed each day, the way she took care of him, the way the world should have ground her down to nothing but survival but she still had so much compassion.

With her face pressed up against his chest hard enough to make her words come out funny and smushed, she said, “You know you’re handsome, too, right?”

She was poking fun and he said as much. “Oh come on, Haymitch. You have to know. You’ve got that rugged thing going for you. And I like the way your eyes crinkle when you smile. You have to know Effie was in love with you . And it’s not like Johanna slept with you out of pity.”

He winced at that even as his cheek pressed into the top of her head. “She told you about that?”

In his arms, Katniss snorted. “I heard all about her sexual exploits. She felt it was her duty as my worldly roommate to teach me.”

“Oh for the love of mercy,” he chuckled.

“She had very complimentary things to say about you.” Haymitch couldn’t tell if Katniss was back to teasing him now. “She said you were a beast in bed.”

“And that’s a good thing?” Was it?

Katniss’ face nodded against his chest. “She was impressed with your stamina.” She drew out that last word and now Haymitch knew Katniss was messing with him. “She also really liked your tongue on her um.”

She stopped speaking awkwardly and Haymitch saw a moment of payback. “On her what?” he teased. “On her what?” He pinched her side and she squealed.

Instead of pulling away, she stood on her toes and arched her back. A stupid way to keep him from pinching her. But it pressed them chest to chest with their faces once more close. The laughter in her eyes was enough to light up a District. Just seeing the happiness on her face drew a smile across his. He was dazzled by her.

“Pussy,” she whispered.

“What?” What?

“That’s what Johanna said. That she liked your tongue in her pussy.”

The filthy words coming from Katniss’ mouth short circuited his brain. With a laugh that couldn’t hide her furious blush, Katniss pulled him into her house for breakfast.

Chapter Text

If Katniss realized Haymitch had a hard-on, he was going to die of embarrassment and it was going to be all Asshole’s fault.

Haymitch had just come inside after chopping firewood for both their houses and his back hurt enough that he wanted to ask Katniss about spending more time together in one house or the other, just to save on wood. She was in his kitchen, taking herbs down from the drying line to stock away for the colder weather.

Seeing him sit at the table, Katniss asked to borrow a quilt from in his linen closet. She liked the pattern and wanted to see if it was something Greasy Sae’s granddaughter Joni could replicate. The girl wasn’t quite right – couldn’t speak and seemed to be in her own mind most of the time – but if you put a needle and thread in her hand, her stitches were perfect. Katniss thought it would be fun to let the girl tear apart some of the threadbare shirts and sun bleached curtains that she collected to make a blanket that Greasy Sae would then be able to sell.

Haymitch gestured toward his hallway, giving Katniss permission to get the quilt. As though she needed any. They both lived in and out of each other’s houses and pockets.

He heard her pad down the hallway, heard the closet door swing open, but then slam shut quickly thereafter. He waited a moment and thought he might have heard a muffled thump. “Katniss?” he called.

When she didn’t answer, he got up to see what happened. The hall was empty. No Katniss. The linen closet door firmly shut. Haymitch opened the door, uncertain how she could have gotten stuck inside but before he had the chance to pull her out, he felt – somehow – a shove that landed him pressed against Katniss who was, in turn, pressed against the closet shelves.

He saw white feathers and webbed feet, heard an angry honk, before the door slammed shut. “Ow,” he complained as he awkwardly reached behind himself to twist the doorknob.

It wouldn’t turn. And no matter how hard he shoved his back against it, the door wouldn’t budge.

“What in the world…?” he wondered.

“I think it was Asshole,” she said, all matter of fact. Resigned. Like it wasn’t crazy to suggest that a goose locked them in a closet together.

A goose had locked them in a closet together.

“Well, fuck,” he said, unsure what else there was to it.

The closet was dark, no light inside it and only a crack of illumination coming through at the top and bottom of the door from the hallway. The door was right up against Haymitch’s back and his front was, well, right up against Katniss. He could feel that her back was pressed into his shelves and he winced. He definitely had the more comfortable spot.

“I’m not really sure what to do about this,” he admitted.

Katniss huffed out a laugh, her breath on his skin. “Well, there’s nothing for me to shoot in here, so I’m not much help.”

“I don’t like when you do that, put yourself down like that,” he said. “You’ve got a good mind in that head of yours. And there’s a lot you’re good at.”

He didn’t need to see to know she blushed at the compliment. But she didn’t respond and he couldn’t think of anything else to say. The truth was, he was growing more and more aware of their predicament. Or really, his.

With Katniss’s front plastered to his, every breath each of them took created a back and forth kind of friction. Haymitch was in trouble. He was only a man, after all. And if he’d taken more notice of the way Katniss’ body was shaped on the occasion of a recent hug, well, he was human.

She smelled good. Laundry soap and the rosemary and thyme she’d been working with. Which made Haymitch grimace with the realization of just what he must smell like. “Sorry I’m sweaty,” he said. All awkwardly.

“No, it’s um. It’s nice,” Katniss said, her voice strained. She never was a good liar.

They continued to breathe, they continued to rub against each other. Her breath puffed against his neck. Haymitch noticed just how awkward it was to have arms hanging from his shoulders and hands hanging at the ends of those arms. They just dangled at his sides. How had he never noticed how awkward arms were before?

With a self conscious laugh, he lifted his arms and rested his hands on the shelf to either side of Katniss’ head. Her breath caught. Her breasts pressed against his chest. He had to figure out a way to angle his hips back. Because he was getting hard. And he would die of embarrassment if Katniss knew that her smell and the feel of her did this to him.

He’d bet good money that he just heard Katniss lick her lips and he was ready to whimper. She said, “So, when we get out of here, how are we cooking Asshole?”

Haymitch laughed and then she laughed and fuck, that brought their bodies against each other in new, bouncing ways. “Um,” she said. Her hands came to his waist. Tentative, light, but they stayed there.

He tried to calm himself, distract them. “Roasting is the obvious answer,” he said.

“Sure, if you want to be obvious,” she joked. “But we can always pan sear the breasts, slow cook the legs…”

“Please stop talking about breasts and legs,” his voice was strangled but there was nothing to do for it. He threw his head back, arching his aching neck, in a desperate attempt to breathe air that didn’t feel like drowning in her.

“What? Oh!” Well fuck, even if he’d succeeded in tilting his hips away from her, she knew now. “Does the idea of slow cooked goose really do it for you, Haymitch?”

There was no mercy in this world. He at once heard how she tried to tease him and how uncomfortable the attempt at flirting made her. He squeezed his eyes shut in the dark, trying to determine which way to go with this. Earnest? Apologetic? Playful? Self-depricating?

Her hands on his flanks scalded him.

She spoke again before he could, her tone earnest once again. “Do you remember how before the Quarter Quell, everyone tried to use sex to unnerve me? Finnick and his flirting? Chaff kissing me? Johanna stripping?”

“Yeah. You made it easy for them to fuck with you,” he noted.

“Because I’m such a prude,” she assumed.

“Because you’re so innocent,” he corrected.

She grew quiet again. A part of Haymitch that had lost his mind wanted to move his hands from the shelves to her hair. It was soft and thick, he knew from the handful of times she had been too despondent to brush it in the early days of their return. Now, he could imagine being able to wrap her braid around his fist.

“I need to talk to you,” she said quietly. And fuck, she was going to tell him that his inappropriate feelings were making her uncomfortable. He was going to lose her. She continued after a pause, “And I need you to pretend you aren’t Haymitch.”

“That makes no sense,” he said. He was trying so hard to behave.

“I need you to be my mentor. My friend. Not you.” She sounded so unsure, he wanted to do what she needed but he still didn’t understand.

“Ok,” he said, though. Of course he would try to be what she needed.

She took a deep breath, bracing herself and, in the process, rubbing herself up and down him. Then she asked, “How do you know if the way you feel about someone is real?”

His hands tightened on the shelf. “I don’t understand,” he admitted.

He could practically hear her think. His hand came to the side of her head without his consent. He held it gently and said, “Just tell me what you’re thinking.”

Katniss leaned minutely into that hand before righting her posture. She spoke slowly, as though placing each word down with care. “I think I’ve developed feelings. But I know from Johanna and Madge and just hearing people talk that sometimes you can feel a thing and then it will go away. Or it will be put on someone you didn’t mean it to.”

If Katniss had spoken to a single soul other than Haymitch in the months since they came home, he thought he might throw up. As it was, something small and frail and flickering lit in his chest.

“You mean romantic feelings?” He was trying so fucking hard to do what she asked and just listen and be present for her.

“Romantic,” she admitted. “Sexual,” she said more quietly. He could feel the brush of her hair against his collar as she tilted her head down.

“Because you’re afraid you might just be feeling these things because there is no one else around to feel them about,” he said. He had to say it, even as that light thing in his chest guttered.

He would not abuse her loneliness.

She sucked in a breath. “How do you know what’s real and what’s not?”

The back of his head thunked against the door. “You know I would never take advantage of you,” he had to say it. She had to know.

“But you’d be tempted?” she asked.

“I’m a man, Katniss,” he admitted.

“And the reason you’d be tempted is because you are a man and I’m the only woman around,” she nodded her head, confirming something stupid to herself.

“Don’t be an idiot. You might consider me because I am literally the only human you have contact with but, sweetheart, you’re–” How could he finish that sentence? Beautiful? Perfect? Everything good left in this world? “You’re my girl.”

Now that he admitted it, something in him shattered. He’d lost the one girl he thought he’d ever love and he’d thought any chance at love was lost with her. And now the world and his cruel life had given him another precious girl. He was so lost in his unraveling, that he was surprised by the quick touch of her lips against his. Before he could respond she had pulled away again.

But she said in a rush of distressed words, “I think about you at night and it makes me ache. And I picture kissing you and touching you. And sometimes you look at me with so much tenderness I thought that maybe you also…” And there she lost her nerve.

After so much courage, the girl who was the embodiment of bravery on behalf of those she loved, she deserved some, too, didn’t she? His words were barely audible. “I think about touching you, kissing you. I imagine making love to you but I also picture something harder and darker. But I think that might be making love with you, too.”

He leaned down to kiss her then. Just a press of his lips against hers. But she leaned into kissing him, too. And for a moment, his hands tangled into her hair and her hands on his hip squeezed.

The lock clicked. The door fell open.

Haymitch and Katniss stared at each other in the light now shining into the closet. He didn’t know what he saw in her face, didn’t know what she would see on his. But with a clearing of his throat, he stepped back so she could come out of the closet.

He took a moment to close the door, noticing the lack of any lock on the handle. He took a deep breath and then another before turning around to face the girl and the consequences of what they’d just said and done.

Katniss was gone.

And Asshole was nowhere to be found.

Chapter Text

The foul was wise enough to hide himself for days afterward. Unfortunately, Katniss hid, too. Or maybe he was the one hiding. He spent the next three days in solitude.

He’d forgotten how to cook for one, so he kept making too much and then eating the leftovers cold for the next meal. Nothing tasted as good without her company. He caught himself looking over his shoulder to say something only to remember the girl wasn’t there.

Because he had scared her away. Because a girl thinking she might have a crush was not the same as a grown man talking about fucking her. Because she trusted him and he’d failed that trust.

Haymitch was laid out on the rug in his living room. He hadn’t wanted a drink this badly in a long time. But the mug by his head held coffee, just coffee. He stared up at the crown molding around the room’s ceiling and the ornate lighting fixture and he wondered how much their homes might have looked like the make-shift suite-turned-jail cell they’d kept Katniss in when in the Capitol. He’d left her alone there, too.

He really should check in, make sure she was alright.

Asshole finally showed his assholey face. It flapped gracelessly onto his window sill and then into the room, waddling too close to wear Haymitch sprawled. He sat up and pointed a finger threateningly at the bird. “You!” he hissed.

The goose hissed back. Then shat on his foot.

“This is all your fault!” he said, talking about the girl, not the shoe.

Asshole honked and flapped his wings.

“I’d have been fine with what we had. I wouldn’t have pushed for anything more. But then you had to go and ruin it!” he accused.

The bird honked again and the part of Haymitch that had never been right since his Games would swear the thing was answering him.

“How’d you get that closet door stuck anyway?” he asked.

The bird didn’t answer. But he did ruffle and settle himself, looking inordinately pleased with himself.

“Anyway, I lost her now,” he told the bird.

This got a reaction. It lifted its wings intimidatingly. Haymitch thought for certain he was about to be swatted at again, so he lifted his forearms to protect his face. But the bird only honked vehemently at him. He’d swear the thing was yelling at him.

“You know, I used to date a girl who raised geese, too,” he said to the bird. Because with Katniss not talking to him, he had no one else now.

Asshole shifted and honked restlessly, which Haymitch decided meant the bird wanted to hear more.

“I learned a lot about geese from her. But I also learned a lot about how to live. And if she could talk to me now, I know she’d tell me to stop feeling sorry for myself, to get off my ass and go win her back.” He knew it in his blood, with every memory of her he had, Lenore Dove would want him to be happy. “It’s like in the song. When nothing is left anymore. But I’ve still got someone here.”

Asshole was spurring him on, little yips of honking, urging him in this direction.

But his spirits fell when he remembered, “I’ve still got someone tying me to this therebefore, I’m going to stay put and do whatever she needs, even if I’ve lost her as a friend or anything else.”

The bird did not like this. The racket started up again. He got off his plump white body, stomping his webbed feet – if you could call it stomping – flapping his wings, and honking. He also shat on Haymitch’s rug.

Haymitch glared at the fresh shit and at the bird, but kept the thread of his thoughts going. “I need a sign, Lenore Dove,” he begged. “If I had any courage whatsoever, I’d march up to that girl and say, ‘Even if you aren’t sure of me, I’m sure of you. I’m in love with you in ways I didn’t know were possible before.’”

Asshole calmed down and from over Haymitch’s shoulder, he heard, “I’d tell you I love you, too.”

Slowly, fearing this was just the conjuring of a sad mind, Haymitch turned to look behind him. Katniss stood in the open front door. He turned slowly back to see Asshole settle himself back down with such self-satisfaction there was no denying the goose did it on purpose.

Haymitch got to his feet and walked toward Katniss. She stayed in the door and he feared that at any moment, she might spook and run again. When he stood within arm’s reach, she said, “That bird has been harassing me nonstop for days.”

He laughed and said, “I think he’s been trying to get us together.” He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling sheepish for admitting it aloud.

“I think he’s right that Lenore Dove would want you happy. And here,” she said. He could hear in her voice how nervous she was at invoking his old love’s name.

“That asshole is probably her doing,” he half-joked. When the bird honked in agreement, the both looked at it, nestled into a plush chair like a little prince, and then back at each other.

The moment of lightness made bringing their attention back to each other somehow weightier. Like this wasn’t already the most important moment in the last twenty-five years of his life. Haymitch stared into her eyes and hoped he saw what he believed – light and trust and love. He had to take her at her word, even if he wasn’t sure what a crusty old former-drunk, former-rebel had to offer her.

He touched the side of her face gently, just his fingertips and the heel of his hands skimming her cheek. “If I kiss you, are you going to run away?” he asked.

“I don’t think so,” she answered. Her honesty gave him more courage than a flat refusal might have.

Haymitch tilted her face up to meet his as he leaned down to her. He waited until the last moment to close his eyes.

At first, he simply skimmed her lips with his. Felt her breath on his lips and in his mouth. Just a gentle brush back and forth, mouths open but tentative. He darted his tongue forward, the tip spearing into her mouth, licking her tongue and then retreating. It earned him a little noise of surprise but then Katniss’ tongue ventured toward his. He greeted it with a flat stroke of his tongue and a swirl. Their lips had still barely touched but their tongues were moving in an intimate, instinctive dance.

The corners of her mouth drew up in a smile even as she continued to explore his tongue with hers. Unable to hold back any longer, Haymitch tightened his hand at the back of her head and pressed forward. He sucked on her upper lip before tilting her head to where he wanted it.

Katniss might have let him use the grip at the base of her hair and another on the small of her back to maneuver her, but she wasn’t content to be passive. Her arms snaked around Haymitch’s neck to pull him closer as she rose up on her toes to reach him.

Haymitch taught Katniss everything he knew about kissing. Deep kisses and slow kisses and kisses that were questions and kisses that were promises. He didn’t let go once and only moved them enough to press Katniss’ back against the door jam. He fucked her mouth with his tongue and suckled her lower lip. He nipped at her and explored her and gave her free reign to kiss him in every way she wanted to try.

He lifted her with two hands on her waist and then used his weight against her body to hold her up higher on the door frame. Her legs wrapped around his waist and this time he let her feel just what she did to him. With the first press of his hard-on against her core, a little ‘oh’ sound punched out of her chest. So he ground against her and redoubled the fervor in his kiss.

They kissed for hours, for years. It didn’t matter. Time held still and let them be for a while.

When minutes and ages had passed, Katniss pressed her forehead into his shoulder. He gave her the space to calm down or order her thoughts but in doing so, he looked over into the living room. “We have quite an audience,” Haymitch’s voice rumbled quietly.

“What?!” She jerked her head up to see that Asshole was joined by Dinner, Sandwich, Dark Meat, Drum Stick and even Stuffing. The flock all sat passively staring at them from various perches around the room.

Her cackle called forth his own chuckle, and they held each other as they shook. The movement of their bodies as he pressed her into the wall and they laughed brought ideas to mind. Ideas he looked forward to sharing with her. But for now, he stepped back enough to let her slowly slide down the door frame until her feet touched the floor.

Katniss’ mouth was all bruised and swollen, the skin around her lips pinked up from his stubble. Her hair was mussed by his hands. He’d never seen her look more beautiful.

He turned to the geese and fussed, “Ok, ok, show’s over. Go back outside before you ruin the room completely with all your shit.”

Sandwich led the line of waddling birds out past them. Asshole brought up the rear with a last little, ‘I told you so,’ of a honk.

Days passed and then seasons and then years.

Katniss moved into Haymitch’s house. They shared their meals and their bed and their life. Occasionally, they engaged with other folks, hearing from Annie and Johanna, talking to the families in town. But they mostly stayed to themselves. The reclusive strange Victors.

Haymitch grew older and neither of them ever fully rid themselves of their nightmares. They didn’t bother with official paperwork or even a toasting – they shared enough meals to have toasted loaves of bread. They didn’t need ritual or paperwork to tell them who they were to each other.

Asshole’s personality had changed so wholly ever since they got together – so smugly satisfied and well behaved – that they each took to calling him Lenore Dove. They didn’t kill any of the geese no matter how much Katniss teased that it was a waste to raise a good meal and call it a pet.

Sandwich went first. A leader to the end. Then Stuffing, who just didn’t wake up one morning, as lazy in death as in life. They had a few more good years with Dinner, Drum Stick, and Dark Meat before they inevitably died, too.

Haymitch died an old man by Twelve’s standards. He was 63. He passed quietly in his bed, Katniss’ hand in his. It was the sweetest death a Victor could hope for.

After a long many years, it was just the girl and the goose. She was an old woman by then, herself. Haymitch might worry that she’d be lonely, looking at her from the after. But she had town children who called her Auntie. And the goose Lenore Dove to keep her company.

She’d see Haymitch again. But not yet.