↳ i don't rise from the ashes, i make them...
oc x finnick odair
catching fire - mockingjay pt. 2 (flashbacks included)
TW: Depression, thoughts of suicide, use of drugs/alcohol, use of tobacco, detailed gore, use of weapons, death, and mentions/sug...
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The conclusion of the parade is anything but frivolous. Once I step down from my float, Finnick's hand in mine to help maintain my balance, it's becoming blatantly obvious how different this year's celebration is going to be. Of course, it was never a particularly exciting event on the behalf of those from the Districts. Each year since I won my Games, the trio of Asher, Finnick and I, and later Johanna once she won her Games, would find one of the local bars nearby to order a couple of their extravagantly sweet drinks from the menu.
We never clinked our glasses or chanted aloud our giddiness over the lingering events and the futures of our tributes, but rather chose the route of speaking softly over our booze and trying to drink our problems away.
This year, we won't be doing that. We're stuck in government custody, so won't be able to leave the Training Center or convene with other Victors. I hate to think about how much I'm going to miss it - the feeling of an excusable stab at drowning our pain - to feel like nothing matters for even a second.
However, this year, everything happens to matter.
Our asses are back on the line.
"See - it wasn't that bad," Finnick states, casting me a glance with half a smirk. If I never knew him personally, I would never consider all his internal struggles. He stands on the stage of fame so seamlessly - as if none of it were real enough to bother him. To an outsider, the screams and shouts seem as though they're all beneath him and he's too good to respond to their inquires.
"It wasn't that bad," I reply, looking at him and blinking my long, fake lashes. "I just kept thinking what Aylo was doing at home. I wonder what she thought of me - of us."
I feel his hand in mine, warm and present. I glance at it, seeing our fingers intertwined and unable to believe that five of them belong to me. I never imagined my hand in his - calloused and scarred beyond repair. I always thought it'd be a different girl whose hand would reside in his, but instead, it's my hand that his has chosen to find sanctuary within.
"She's probably thinking about you a lot, Izzie. Not just when you're on screen, but I don't think she's ever doubted your reasoning. She knows you. She trusts you."
"I know, but I still can't help but think that I made the wrong call."
The width between the sea of selfishness and selflessness is becoming thinner and thinner. Either I stayed home with the family I once fought to return to and looked pathetic by allowing a poor old woman or a struggling, mentally ill girl to take the step beside the individual I care about so deeply, or betrayed them to take the spot that was always destined to be mine.
