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It had been a long time since she had driven herself anywhere and even longer since she'd made the 13 hour journey between Nashville and Austin. Effie had been lamenting the absence of her driver from almost the very second she left Nashville. Now that she was finally stepping foot on the abandoned looking ranch in the middle of nowhere she was glad for his absence.
Some things were better faced without an audience.
The ground was hard and dusty, instantly staining her suede boots with red clay and dirt. The grass around the property looked like it hadn’t been cut in years. In fact the whole place looked like it was in shambles and liable to fall down in a strong gust of wind.
If she hadn't known it, she never would have guessed that this was the same million dollar ranch that he'd bought with his first royalty check a lifetime ago. She only hoped that the man inside was in better shape than his house.
A creak from the door hinge announced the owner of the property a second before he appeared. Standing on the porch step was Haymitch Abernathy - in the flesh for the first time in five years - wearing worn out jeans and waving a gun around like every hick cliche he professed to despise. His blonde hair was too long and hanging in a limp mess around his head and his plaid shirt was stained with something the might be soup.
“I told ya’ll to get,” he demanded without looking at her. Or at least not seeing her.
"Haymitch," she said quietly, finally getting him to look her way. He lowered the gun for a second only to point it straight at her and narrow his gaze.
It was fine.
Effie already knew the thing wasn’t loaded. Haymitch was all prickly displays and defensive colouration, but she knew he would never hurt her.
Not physically at least.
His eyes roamed over her, taking in the slightly rumpled t-shirt and blue jeans, and her less than perfectly quaffed hair. She had to twist her hands to stop herself from tying to straighten herself up.
When he finally decided to speak his mouth had formed into a cruel snarl. "What are you doing here?” he sneered. “Thought you said you never wanted to see me again.”
It was a fair question to ask. When they broke up five years ago she had blamed him everything, called him out for every promise he’d broken, and trashed anything left of their relationship. She had burned that bridge so thoroughly that she could never go back to it.
And yet …
She lifted her shoulder in a shrug the might have looked more nonchalant if she'd actually be in the habit of shrugging. “That was before my last three albums flopped,” she said, her tone deliberately flippant.
Haymitch snorted back a bitter laugh. “Shoulda known you wanted somethin’,” he said dismissively before turning on his heel and heading inside. But he left the door open behind him and she took that as an invitation for her to follow and not just laziness on his part.
The inside was not much better than the house’s exterior. The house had been old when he bought it, but well-loved and timeless. Now it was covered with refuge, empty bottles and dirty plates covering the surfaces that weren’t occupied by whatever books he was reading at the time. All signs that whatever demons Haymitch had been fighting when they were together had continued to haunt him in her absence.
Perhaps there was some relief to be had in all that. At the lowest points in their relationship she had questioned whether they were simply dragging each other down, if they would be better apart because they couldn’t be any worse than when they were together. Their relationship was all kinds of toxic and co-dependency and when they were together she sometimes she let herself get so lost in him that she forgot all about being Effie Trinket.
She followed him through to the kitchen where he was pulling a stopper free from a bottle of wine with his teeth. He sniffed the contents before offering it towards her like the parody of a good host. At her disgusted expression he just shrugged and downed half the contents himself.
“What were you yelling about outside?” she asked while he wiped a dirty shirtsleeve across his mouth. She looked around the kitchen for somewhere to sit, but everything was either covered in rubbish or in such a state of disrepair it looked like it might collapse even under her slight weight.
He lifted an eyebrow at her as if to say Do you even need to ask?
Turns out that the biggest country music star in the world couldn’t go on a highly publicised rant about the deteriorating quality of her own work without every idiot with a press badge knocking on her ex-boyfriend’s door. Never mind that the fans had hated the albums they wrote together - critically acclaimed as they were. Or that she’d been more productive in the five years since their break up than the eight years that they were together. As far as they were concerned he had been her muse and nothing she’d done since had been memorable or important.
“Did you listen?” she asked him tentatively, unsure of what she wanted to hear him say.
“Did I listen to your forty-five minute ode to your boyfriend’s dick?” he asked her sardonically before taking another draught from the bottle. “Of course I fuckin’ listened, Effie. Just like I listened to the last couple of turds you put out.
“It’s a good thing I made you so miserable, cos you don’t write for shit when you’re happy,” he muttered into the bottle.
“If that was true then I would be making better music right now,” she said without thinking. It was always like that with Haymitch - she often forgot her pretences and masks around him. Sometimes it felt like he was the only person who truly knew her.
But he just scowled at her honesty. “Your fans will keep eating that shit up, love. Why do you need me?” he asked instead.
“Because it’s not enough,” she answered him. It wasn’t enough for the fans to keep buying her records or defending her work online. It shouldn’t need defending - her music should be good enough to speak for itself.
And right now it was …
She’d been scrapping the bottom of the barrel with that last album. Twelve half-finished tracks waxing poetical about a man who did not inspire poetry. Making puns and innuendos that had seemed clever at the time, but did little to mask the poor writing and uninspired melodies.
Her last good album had been twenty tracks and a bonus edition and she could have written twenty more if she’d let herself drown in her misery the way she’d been desperate to after that last breakup. She could have written an epic poem about Haymitch Abernathy and the devastation that he had left in his wake.
That album was curated misery. Equal parts love letter and a blow-for-blow account of a relationship in its final throes.
“It never is with you,” Haymitch replied, bitterness hanging on his every word. The accusation was one that he had thrown at her more than once in their eight year relationship.
“So what is it you want?” he asked, his tone still scathing.
“What do you think I want?” she replied because it should have been obvious, especially to him. “I want to write an album that isn’t shit. And apparently I can’t do that without you.
“I want us to work together,” she said plainly. Her voice was pleading and it took everything in her not to fall on her knees and beg him. “I want to make something good again.”
He didn’t even pause to consider it before he let out a harsh laugh and shot her down with a simple no.
She pouted, not used to having her requests denied no matter how ridiculous. Haymitch had called her spoiled on more than one occasion.
“What is the problem?” she continued to press. “It’s not like you aren’t working with other artists - you had a song just last week with that K-pop group.”
“I don’t work with them,” he said. “I write something. The publishers send it out. And then I let them make whatever changes they want so they can slap their name on it. I don’t even have to talk to them.”
“You know I don’t work like th-“
“Yeah, I know,” he cut her off sharply. “Which is why this can’t work. You’re gonna want to be all collaborative and shit. And I can’t do that anymore. Not with you.”
“Why not?” Effie demanded prissily, her hands on her hips and the pout firmly in place.
“Why?” he scoffed. “Because I can’t stand you,” he spat, anger finally rising in his voice.
Unmoved by his scorn she argued, “You couldn’t stand me the first time we worked together.”
Haymitch let out another scornful laugh. “Because that ended up so well for us,” he said bitterly. “You gonna let me bend you over the table to fuck out our frustrations like we did then?”
He was saying it to shock her. And maybe to remind her of the better parts of the relationship - the sex had always been phenomenal even when they loathed each other. Even in the end.
Effie would not let him needle her into giving in. She never had before and she wasn’t going to start letting him out-stubborn her now. “Not in this state,” she said with pointed sniff and a glance around the messy room. There was no need to comment on the equally messy man that could do with a good tidying himself.
“Please, Haymitch,” she begged again. Without really thinking about she took a step forward, barely catching herself before she went and reached for his hand. In the same moment she saw him lean forward ever so slightly in return, mirroring the gesture before he could really think about it.
It was the sort of synchronicity that had made them such good writing partners. The natural rhythm they seemed to find in one another. The way their voices would always find harmony, even when they were yelling and screaming.
It was what convinced her to let herself be truly vulnerable in a way that she hadn’t dared with anyone else.
“They’re saying I’m finished,” she quietly. “This is … there’ll still be tours and they love the re-mastered tracks, but … they’re saying I’m done as an artist. That I should hand over the mantle and just be one of those singers that lives off their past glories.
“I don’t want it to be over,” she told him. “But if it is - then I don’t want this to be the last thing they remember me for. I want it to be something great.”
She could see him softening at her confession and she immediately pressed him. “We can work in my studio - “
“I ain’t going to Nashville,” he said firmly.
He didn’t need to say it and she had regretted it the second the words came out of her mouth. As soon as the press got wind of the fact that they were working together they would be relentless - even worse than they’d been when they were together. At least here on his ranch they were remote enough to avoid the worst of the press.
And Haymitch was Texas through and through. He’d abided living in Nashville for just about as long as he could stand it, but she knew there would be no dragging him back there any time soon.
Still, she couldn’t help but sniff disdainfully at the mess that surrounded them.
“This place is a dumpster,” she pointed out unkindly. “You can’t expect me to live in a place like this.”
“You know where the door is,” he said before walking past her and leaving her to his mess.
It took her a week and the help of a local - and discrete - cleaning crew to get Haymitch’s place looking liveable. That was the most she could hope for given the fit that Haymitch had thrown when she’d suggested not just tidying, but maybe rearranging things and throwing out some of the older furniture that was so dated it could apply for social security benefits.
Haymitch did not make the job easy for her, refusing to lift a finger and continuing to act like a total slob, leaving dishes wherever he saw fit. If she hadn’t noted the obvious signs of him curbing his drinking she might have thought that he was trying to drive her away through sheer obstinacy.
Yet despite the state of the rest of the house, Haymitch’s studio was pristine.
And recently used. Which could only mean one thing given how jealousy Haymitch guarded his privacy. The only person that he would condone to use his home studio was his niece - though not by blood - Katniss Everdeen.
“Is Katniss making a new record?” she asked him curiously as the two of them settled into their respective seats. They naturally fell into their positions like sides of the bed. Haymitch on the right side, next to his favourite channels on the mixing board and her on the left side near the small side table where she liked to rest her notepad when she wasn’t working.
“Maybe, but not really,” was his perfectly vague answer. “We’ve been laying down some tracks but nothing serious. Just to see how it feels.”
She nodded knowingly. After the way things had gone with Katniss’ former label, it wasn’t surprising that she might be a bit wary about putting herself in the public eye again.
“She and I could do a duet - if she was interested,” she offered with a cautious smile. It was hesitant, knowing how protective that Haymitch could be when it came to his niece.
That he didn’t immediately shoot down the idea made her feel like there was still hope for them yet.
Another week went by before Haymitch finally asked the question.
“So when did you break up with the boyfriend?”
Haymitch never called her ex by his name - always ‘the boyfriend’ or some less endearing moniker. Though he surely knew it. The man’s name had been plastered alongside hers enough in the last two years. You couldn’t speak of one without other. Someone had even given them a portmanteau.
“Six weeks ago,” she said, seeing no point in hiding the truth from him. “Plutarch said we needed to wait for the right time to announce it.”
The utter disdain on Haymitch’s face at the mention of her publicist was understandable and not surprising. “Of course he did,” he muttered.
If Haymitch was surprised that the breakup had happened around the same time as her recently publicised meltdown, he didn’t show it. She’d been figuring out a lot of things around that time and her ex-boyfriend was only the tip of the iceberg.
“He asked me to marry him,” she admitted, her eyes dropping to the blank page in front of her. “And then everything just sort of … fell apart. The thought of spending the rest of my life with him …”
It had been a dread that would creep up on her any time she let herself stop for even a moment. For the past four years her days had been filled to the brim with so much work that she didn’t give herself the time to stop and think about what her life had become. She had let herself get caught up in the whirlwind of a man that wanted to marry her and didn’t give herself a second to question whether he was what she wanted.
“That’s what you should write about,” Haymitch said softly. And then because he couldn’t let himself be gentle for even a moment, he added with a snort, “Instead of writing fifty allusions to how great the guy’s dick is.”
She couldn’t help but let out a laugh that felt like a weight lifted from her shoulders. “For the record it was only an okay penis,” she told him superciliously, finally meeting his eye. “In my experience, men who have nice penises do not need you to write a forty-five minute ode to them.”
His eyes twinkled with mirth when they met and she thought he understood that his penis was in the latter category.
Going back to the more serious topic, her voice dropped to a low whisper. “I thought it was what I wanted,” she said quietly. “I’d been dropping hints about rings and the perfect proposal. And then it happened and I just froze. I guess sometimes you don’t know the answer until someone asks the question.”
“Til someone’s on their knees and asks you,” Haymitch corrected. It was the poet in him that could pick a song out of the simplest turn of phrase.
As soon as he said it she could hear the melody in her mind. The words came easily after struggling for a week to get anything on paper. “She would have made such a lovely bride, what a shame she’s fucked in the head.”
“But you’ll find the real thing instead,” Haymitch continued in his raspy voice that was too beautiful to be wasted on singing demos for other artists. He picked up the tune easily, finishing the couplet with a familiar metaphor. “Patch up the tapestries that I shred.”
She quickly jotted the words down, humming the melody aloud as Haymitch scrambled to get the recording set up before they could lose it.
Her smile was effervescent as she met his gaze across the studio. The hungry look in his grey eyes was a familiar one.
But that could wait until the track was down.
Effie had a hard time pinpointing how long it took before they slept together.
It was kinda inevitable.
“You know that’s why those other albums sucked, right?” Haymitch said one day as they basked in the afterglow.
“Why?” she prompted.
“Because they weren’t real,” he told her simply.
It was so like him to be philosophical after sex. Effie turned on her side and propped herself up on her elbow so he could see when she rolled her eyes at him.
“We wrote two albums about a fictional town in West Virginia,” she pointed out to him. Needless to say that she still considered them some of the best work she’d ever done - the lives and heartache and folktales of these characters they’d made up to fill their fictional town. Each album had been it’s own little anthology.
“Yeah, but they were real,” Haymitch countered with an easy smirk. He leaned forward to peck and kiss to her lips. “This is real.”
And she knew this time around, it was enough.