Darker And Colder

4.13: Many Ways

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12th March

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Chapter 62
Johanna's POV

I push the limp bits of food around the tray, unappetised.

The doctor sighs. "Ms Mason, you need to eat."

"I'm not hungry," I insist. "Do you know when I can have visitors? That's why I'm here, isn't it? In the Capitol? You could've just left me in thirteen otherwise."

"I don't know," they say as they shrug. 

"Great," I reply, my eyebrows raising.

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I stare at Finnick and Peeta in silence. "Snow's dead," Finnick says bluntly.

"You think I don't know that?" I jeer at him. I don't even know why I'm like this anymore. Didn't Hazel teach me anything? "It's all I hear, and at least it's good."

"How are you feeling?" He enquires calmly.

"Like my lungs are ripping themselves apart. But apparently that's already happened and the feeling is just them repairing themselves. Weird, right?"

Finnick just sits there, unmoving. Something about his body language, the tense speaking, alerts me.

"What's happened?" I ask. "Not with Snow or Coin, I know about that. Is everyone okay? Katniss? I mean, she's insufferable when she's being the saviour of every being, but she's not too bad altogether."

Peeta is the one who speaks, unsurprisingly. "She's okay, I think, just in a coma. Unresponsive right now."

"That's nice," I reply, "we could start a little club. Do you think that'd be fun? We could call it 'I was in a deep sleep induced by the Capitol and everybody thought I was dead'. Peeta, you can join too, right?"

They completely ignore this, and Finnick just looks at me darkly. "Johanna," Finnick begins, "Hazel... she..."

I try to get up, but am restricted by all the wires. My arms flail against them and press myself up against the pillows in an act of futility. "What happened to Hazel? Is she okay?"

"I'm so sorry. There was an explosion, and she-"

"Stop-" My head shakes.

"She was trying to save their lives, Johanna... She wanted you to know that she was trying to save them."

"Stop" I whisper sharply. "Just stop. She's not-"

My throat catches at the words. So many years building up barriers to have them crashing all down. Training myself to be indifferent.

In that second I remind myself of Katniss. Barriers fallen down by a hole made for one person to come through. All those years both of us built them up so high and wide, that it took far to long to make a gap for one person we loved. And still, they fell down. That's why we build them, and then we are foolish enough to be kind.

"Johanna, I'm so sorry," Peeta says.

"Get out."

"Johanna..."

"GET OUT."

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I won't let anyone come near me.

There was no point in putting up these walls if I'm just going to allow them down.

I promised I wouldn't fall in love. Not again.

And I won't again. It's been too many times for me to make that mistake one more time.

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The last time I'd saw her, she was like the lifeline I needed.

An amazing healer, of the physical and the heart.

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I remember she was growing her hair back out. It came down past her ears in black corkscrews lined with brown. She looked so precious, fragile. It's not surprising that she broke.

I remember her hazel eyes, just like her name, undying burning embers.

I remember her spirit. She was never proud of where she came from but I knew she was proud to help people. And I was proud to know her. And I loved her. So, so much.

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Finnick's POV

I leave Katniss's new room after only half an hour after having talked to her for a while, and then am drawn further down the corridors.

"... you can't do that, it isn't-"

"I can do whatever I want. I'm not staying here."

"Johanna you can't-"

I open the door, seeing Peeta trying to calm down a clearly angry Johanna.

"Finnick," Johanna says, glaring at me, "tell Peeta that I can do whatever I want, because he doesn't seem to believe me."

"She's trying to discharge herself," Peeta interjects.

My jaw drops. "You're trying to do what?"

Johanna starts turning dials on the small computers next to her hospital bed. "There's no point in me staying any longer. It's within my right to discharge myself. I'm sure the Capitol would've loved me to leave quickly anyway."

"Johanna, no."

"Excuse me?"

I hold my posture back up. "You can't."

"I think you'll find," she smiles angrily, "that I actually rather can."

"Maybe, but you should stay here. I know you don't want to, but they're trying to help you."

"I have no reason to get better," she shoots at both me and Peeta. "I didn't care before Hazel came, and I certainly don't care anymore. There was never a point to this anyway. All we do is survive, and it's getting far too boring."

"Johanna, please," Peeta begs, "Hazel was an amazing person. Of course you're going to be the most hurt by this. We'll never know how that feels, but-"

"Oh, yeah, right," she scoffs. "Like you wanted to live when you thought Katniss was dead. Like Katniss was when she thought you were. Well I'm sorry that I don't understand your heterosexual culture, but I don't think we're altogether that different. We're both in love- we've both lost."

"I- I didn't realise you thought that we thought it made you different."

"We don't," I say. "Peeta just meant that you were the closest, really. Even if we were engaged. That... it doesn't change how close you were to Hazel."

Johanna's eyes start to look glassy, but she manages to hide it. If she's ever come close to crying before, I've not seen it.

"She's not coming back," Johanna whimpers fiercely. "She was trying to save lives, but she should've left them. She was so much more important."

"Johanna-"

"No, I'm going. I can't stay here. They think it was heroic here. It wasn't. It was just stupid, a waste of the life she could've lived. The life she was going to live with me. With the child we would have adopted, and a house on the moors. Out in the Capitol? To them, that's not important at all, our life together, just because she saved the rest of them. But to me? It'll always make me hate them, and I know it's wrong because she has preserved so many lives, and it's all she ever wanted. But I'll never be able to forgive her for leaving me, and the Capitol for taking her."

And she finally breaks. Tears stream and the walls crumble down. Everything seems to mush together, comforting and screaming and sadness. Trying to stop her from changing the dials of drugs to something fatal, and the nurse eventually coming and having to sedate her.

Grief comes in many ways. Sombre, numbness, humbling and just downright ugly screaming for the one who was ripped from you.