Chapter Text
The careful hand of Peeta is shading something on the drawing he’s made of Finnick.
Katniss is sitting on the rug in front of the hearth, sorting photographs.
The memorial book wasn’t something I’d wanted to partake in. There were too many memories soaked in grief. I didn’t want to have to relieve them. Peeta didn’t press when I’d refused, but Katniss seemed like she’d wanted to.
Most of the photographs Katniss sorts are worn, old things. Frayed edges. Yellowing. She’s frowning at one of them.
“Peeta,” she says, looking up from her work, “I’d like to make a page for my father.”
“Okay,” he replies. “What was his name?”
Burdock, I think. He was great with a bow and had a voice that made all the birds stop to listen.
Katniss is staring at me in disbelief.
I raise an eyebrow. “What, sweetheart?”
“You knew my father?” she asks, almost angrily. “And you never told me?”
Shit, had I said that out loud?
I blink. “Yes, Katniss. We were…friends, once.”
“Why wouldn’t you tell me that?” Katniss says, now definitely angry.
I sigh. “It’s hard for me to talk about.”
Peeta cuts in before Katniss can really go off on me, and says, “We’re here to listen, if you do want to talk about it. You don’t have to, of course, but we’re here for you.”
“But I–” Katniss begins, and then pauses. She holds up a picture that sends a jolt through me.
It’s Burdock, of course. And me. And Blair. We’re all in the woods, arms slung around each other. Laughing like we didn't have a care in the world. We must’ve been twelve or so. I think, maybe, Lenore Dove had taken the picture.
“Can you tell me who’s in this photograph?” she asks. “I mean, I know which one is my father, but….”
I point to the boy in the middle of the photograph. “That’s Blair. He was one of our friends. Used to come into the woods with us, even though he wasn’t great at hunting or anything. He was loud.”
“Like me,” Peeta chuckles.
I give a small grin. “Yeah, very much so.”
“And this boy?” Katniss asks, pointing at my image.
I close my eyes for a moment, because I’m really not sure how she’s going to react.
“Well,” I say, softly, “that’s me.”
Katniss blinks. “What? Haymitch, are you joking?”
I shake my head. “No, sweetheart. We were inseparable, the three of us. Up until…until after my Games, anyway. Until I drove them away.”
Peeta looks at me with gentle eyes. “We don’t have to keep talking about this, Haymitch.”
The problem is, now that I’ve started to talk, I can’t stop.
“It’s alright, Peeta,” I say, softly. “I just– well. The Capitol killed my family and anyone I loved because of what I did during the Games.”
“Because you used the forcefield in the arena against them?” Katniss asks.
I sigh. “I know that the two of you watched my Games, but what you saw wasn’t really what happened.”
Peeta frowns. “How so?”
“The Capitol edited the footage so that it hardly resembled what actually happened. For one, my reaping was rigged.”
“Oh, Haymitch….”
“A boy named Woodbine Chance was actually picked, but he ran for it and– and the Peacekeepers blew his head off. My girl was trying to intervene, to stop them from dragging away his body before his Ma could say goodbye, and she almost got killed too. I stepped in so she wouldn’t get hurt. As punishment for that, they reaped me instead.”
“I’m sorry,” Peeta says softly.
“While I was in the arena, we hatched a plan to blow it up. Well, we’d hatched the plan before going into the arena, with Beetee’s help.”
Katniss stares. “With– with Beetee?”
“His punishment that year was that his son, Ampert, got reaped. I couldn’t save that poor kid.”
“I didn’t realize Beetee ever had children,” Katniss whispers.
“He did,” I say, softly. I pause for a moment to collect myself, and then continue, “Ampert and I had a mission to destroy the generator of the arena. Of course, he got killed. And when I tried again, I realized that it was going to take a lot to destroy the whole damn thing.”
“Did you ever end up blowing it up?” Peeta asks.
I sigh. “You both saw how my Games ended. Silka, the tribute I was battling, got an axe to the head.”
“Right. And the forcefield at the end of the arena was why she got the axe to the head.”
“Exactly. But she’d wounded me– badly– before she died. I thought I was going to die, too. I thought they wouldn’t get a Victor this time. I used every last ounce of strength I had to blow up that damn arena.”
“Did it work?” Katniss asks.
I smirk. “It caused an earthquake that they could feel in the Capitol.”
“No wonder they punished you for it,” Katniss says darkly.
“They kept me completely alone in the apartment building the tributes stayed in while they tried to figure out what to do with me. What they figured, though….” I pause. “At my Victor’s ceremony, Snow told me to ‘enjoy my homecoming.’ I didn’t know that meant he was– well. You know I have no family, obviously.”
“We really don’t have to keep talking about this, Haymitch,” Peeta whispers.
I ignore him and continue. “I have no family because when I stepped off of the train that sent me home, my house was set ablaze and my Ma and brother were burned alive.”
Peeta puts a steadying hand on my shoulder. “I’m so sorry, Haymitch.”
“I mean, if I had just filled the goddamn cistern with water, like Ma had asked before I got Reaped, it could’ve saved them. But I didn’t. I got off work early and instead of filling the cistern, went to be with my girl.”
“You didn’t know you were going to get Reaped,” Katniss says, soft but fierce. “It’s not your fault, Haymitch.”
I sigh. “I…it feels like it is. I just wanted to have a normal birthday for once. Or as normal as you could get being born on Reaping Day.”
Katniss and Peeta exchange a look and then Peeta says, carefully, “Your birthday’s on July 4th? Reaping Day?”
“The irony’s good, isn’t it?”
“So you had to– every year, on your birthday, you had to start mentoring two kids who were forced into the Hunger Games?” Katniss says. “No wonder you were always two sheets to the wind by the time Effie pulled the names.”
I grimace. “No wonder my liver’s been pickled beyond repair, either.”
Peeta pats my shoulder and says, “I don’t know what to say, other than I’m sorry, and that we’re here for you.”
“Thank you,” I murmur. “I’m glad I have you two.”
“Getting soft in your old age?” Katniss teases.
I snort. “I’m forty-six, Everdeen.”
“I think your pickled liver would say otherwise.”
Peeta shoots Katniss a look, and says, “We’re glad we have you, too, Haymitch.”
Katniss holds up another photograph from the pile on the floor. This one makes my heart twist.
It’s Burdock, laughing in an apple tree with Lenore Dove. We must’ve been thirteen or so, and it looks like Burdock is about to throw an apple at the camera.
“I know my father is in this picture,” Katniss says. “Do you know who the girl is?”
I take a long drink from my glass, and nod. “Her name was Lenore Dove Baird, and she was a cousin of your father’s. She– she was my girl.”
“The one who you were trying to protect at your Reaping?”
“Yes. Lenore Dove was– she was a very special person.” I pause. “I don’t– I don’t think I can talk about her tonight.”
Peeta nods sagely. “That’s alright, Haymitch. We can make a page for her in our book too, if you’d like.”
I give him a small smile. “I would, yeah.”
“Then we’ll make Lenore Dove a page,” Peeta says, “and one for anyone else you want to remember.”
There’s quite a few of them, I think. Lenore Dove. Ma. Sid. Maysilee.
I put down my drink. “You’re going to need a lot of pages.”