Chapter Text
Because Haymitch is actually one of the nicest, kindest and sweetest book characters l’ve ever read.
Third Quarter Quell had struck everyone like a punch to the heart.
When Haymitch Abernathy had heard the news, he’d nearly had a heart attack.
Effie Trinket, for the second time in her career, had considered resigning—prepared to face execution for treason if necessary.
It would’ve been another scandal for her family—or whatever was left of it, assuming Proserpina was still around.
The Capitol trusted her. From the moment she’d first stepped into the Hunger Games, as a last-minute replacement for the prep team, and later as the escort for District Twelve. She had always been above reproach, flawless.
The perfect Capitol doll.
But relaying information to Plutarch was one thing. Watching innocent children march to their deaths was something entirely different.
Sending her own Victors to their deaths, unbearable.
The guilt would consume her—it was only a matter of time. There would come a day when her eyes would simply refuse to open, and she would simply welcome it. Maybe it was better to hasten that day.
“I won’t reap your name,” she had protested stubbornly, trailing behind her mentor. —Damn her heels, and damn him for walking so much faster than her. “Get that idea out of your head!”
“You, get the idea of refusing out of yours!” he had snapped back, popping open a bottle of moonshine with a frustration that was nearly tangible. They had spent a whole week locked in heated arguments over this single issue.
“Would you rather see Peeta in that arena, or me?”
“I don’t want to see either of you in there!” Effie shouted, slamming her purse down on the couch with a force that mirrored her frustration.
They were finally alone inside Haymitch’s house. She could be as angry as she wanted now. “I want to see Snow in there!”
Haymitch couldn’t stand dramas. And hysterics. Those were a special kind of torture for him, already agitated by itself.
But when it was Effie who was losing control, it was almost… amusing. He couldn’t stay mad at her, not even in moments like this.
So, he clenched his fists, willing himself not to laugh.
“Damn, impossible woman,” he muttered. A begrudging smile tugging at his lips. “I’ll admit, it would be hilarious.” But the decision hadn’t changed. “You’ll still do what we were agreed upon.”
Effie clenched her teeth, standing her ground, though she looked about as intimidating as a soft strawberry cake.
“It’s not fair!” she retorted, her body shaking with all the anger she could muster.
“I know.”
“Tell me you have another plan—”
“Enough!” he cut her off, making it clear that the matter was no longer up for debate.
They had just finished the Victory Tour and received the worst news possible. They would have to work together, for the sake of their kids. “Knock it off, Effie!”
“But Haymitch…” Effie objected one last time, her voice barely above a whisper. “It’s your birthday...”
Haymitch shrugged. “I know.”
She was the only one who remembered.
There was nothing he could do, though it pained him to see her so distraught.
If he’d been calmer, he might have told her to hold on, that nothing was different from before—that the last thing he had seen before stepping into the arena during his own Games had been her eyes.
He would’ve begged her to look at him again.
Those eyes would be the last thing he saw this time, too.