Home Fanfics Go Back
He stays with Johanna for three nights, afraid to go home. He sleeps with her boldly, possessively the first night, unrepentant for his actions. The next day, after he'd bathed off the blood and grime, he goes to her again and makes love, this time filled with confusion, with longing for her but also grief for the ruin he was bringing to his family. "I can't face her," he says after, while she sits beside the window and smokes a cigarette. It feels like the Games, like he's living in the liminal space that he and Jo create, where they are insulated from the rest of the world for seconds, hours, just enough time to get their bearings before the next onslaught of Snow's horrors.
While he's with her, Finnick can't sleep. All he can see is Annie standing there, watching him after that fight, shielding their child from him. She saw him as a monster in that moment, and she wasn't wrong. Annie had made it out of her Games without killing another tribute. He and Jo had not - the first time, nor the second.
"Yes you can," Johanna says, blowing smoke out the window. "Annie loves you more than the entire world."
He takes her advice and returns home on the fourth day, and Annie embraces him as if he had been at war. "You're back!" she says, a sad smile on her face. He wonders how many times he's made her worry for him, how familiar this is to her. "We missed you." She walks to the cradle where Seamus is burbling, now six weeks old and awake more than a couple hours a day.
"I'm sorry," he says, and what else can he say? He's messed up. He let the parts he tried to keep inside show. And when he was exposed, he ran away to Johanna, he tried to use her love as a salve for the wound he'd revealed, regardless of the damage to his marriage. Annie looks at him, always more clever than she lets on, waiting for him to specify what he's sorry for. It's morning still, and the sunlight makes her hair look almost auburn. It's beautiful. "I didn't mean to go that far, with Ryder. I need to get better at controlling myself. And I should have come back here, instead of hiding at Jo's."
He called it Jo's, instead of Mags' house. This, in itself, surprises him. He licks his lips, nervous, waiting for her to say something. Annie has always been mysterious, revealing another layer every time he manages to peel one away. But now, desperately, he wants to know what she's thinking: if she still loves him, if she thinks he's too far gone. She shakes her head, the waves of her hair bouncing a bit. She's so beautiful and it makes him ache with premature loss. He may have ruined this and for what? To sate his own frustrations?
"Finnick, I was afraid, but it was because I was shocked, in the moment," she says. "I'm sorry too. I didn't really see how much you were suffering."
He wants to embrace her, to bury his head in the space under her jaw, to breathe in her scent and hold onto her, but he takes a step back instead. He doesn't deserve this. Her, apologizing to him? "You have nothing to be sorry for," he says. "You've been taking care of our son every day, and all I've been doing is drinking."
It's not the truth, but it's close enough. He feels terrible, inside and out, and Annie being understanding and caring should make things better, but somehow it has the opposite effect. He knows that mostly they're tired. They're hungry, and they're tired, and even if he has money from work it doesn't matter if there's nothing to buy, but it doesn't help his rationality and patience. Annie sits on the couch, the cradle just beside her, and invites him to sit with a nod of her head.
He does, because who is he to defy her? Annie could kick him out, and he would go willingly. "Finnick, what was that?" she asks.
He leans forward, mashing his eyes into the palms of his hands. He needs to talk, to explain to Annie what is plaguing him. He begged Annie to explain herself to him, to tell him about her time in the prison, but it is hard for him to do his part. For years, he separated Annie, set her apart from the Capitol, the secret horrors he faced, even those here at home, in what was perhaps a botched effort to protect her. Even now, after it's clear she's at least as strong as he, it's a difficult habit to break.
"I've always had it out for him," he says. "I never liked how he treated Margot. He would always be so controlling with her, and even back then he didn't have steady work - she was the only one bringing in any money for them. He'd just gamble it away."
Annie just waits, letting him speak. He used to find it difficult to sit in her silences, always trying to make small talk or move to the next activity, but now he can appreciate it.
"But that day… that was different. He… asked Jo to sleep with him, for the morphling. I think I lost it then."
"Well, you love her." She says it simply, as if loving Johanna were as natural as breathing, and not as terrifying as free-falling, and potentially the thing that will tear them apart.
He pushes that thought aside for now, unable to contend with it just yet. "No, I think it was just selfishness," he admits. "The idea that we'll never be free, that someone will just come and buy sex from us forever." He looks at her, trying to make her understand. "I just thought, for a second, 'What was the war for? What's changed if we can't afford shit and someone's still buying Jo's company and-'" he chokes on his words, unable to articulate what, exactly he means, how in the end, the promised democracy did not reach the coast, and all he had, as always, was sex, drugs, and violence.
She takes his hand in both of hers, moving over so they're inches apart now. "What's changed is that our child will never enter an arena," she says, her voice quiet, steady. "And we don't have to worry about horrible prisons, bombings, firing squads, mutts that can kill you just out on the loose." She kisses his temple, then speaks right into his ear. "It's ok to be angry," she says. "To want more. I think it's good. But demand it from Paylor and her people. Make sure they're upholding their promise."
"Have I ever told you how lucky I am to have you?"
She smiles, a blush coming to her cheeks. "Please, tell me more, Finnick Odair."
Finnick spends the day with Annie and Seamus, trying his best to talk about his frustrations instead of letting them stay bottled up. Annie suggests he write them down, or call them in, and he begins to write, his mind wandering to the liquor in the kitchen, but he decides to stay sober tonight. He needed to go back to work the next morning. He'd missed enough days as it was.
He wants to breach the subject of Johanna, but it's Annie who brings her up first. "Do you think Johanna is avoiding me?" she asks.
"Avoiding you?" They're washing the dishes from dinner, Annie scrubbing them then dunking them in the warm water, and Finnick drying them. Seamus is asleep again, this time wrapped against his chest. It's nice, having his son right there, he sees now.
Annie gives him a look that says 'don't make me spell it out,' but he's afraid he needs it spelled out. She rolls her eyes as she hands him the next plate. "You put her in a bad position," she says. "She probably feels like I'll hate her now, since she she slept with you."
He gasps a bit, trying to find something to respond to this with, but all that comes out are stutters.
"Don't insult me by lying about it," she says, and it's the first time since he's come home that he sees her look hurt.
He takes a breath, trying to stay calm. Had he been that obvious? "I couldn't sleep," he says. "Every time, I just thought of the look you gave me, how you were scared of me." Even to his ears, it sounds hollow, like he's making an excuse.
"Finnick," she says, drying her hands on a cloth and setting the kettle on for tea. "I'm not afraid of you. And I don't mind. I just don't want to drive Johanna away. I think I'll go see her tomorrow."
He dries his own hands and gets out the mugs, the twisting in his chest intensifying. "Why?" At her questioning look, he continues. "Why don't you mind?"
She shrugs. "Because I don't. I can't control how I feel. I told you before, I know that it doesn't mean you love me any less."
He pictures Gale moving into the house next door with Johanna and feels as irritated as ever. He pictures Annie leaving after a fight and coming back after sleeping with someone else and almost breaks the mug he's holding. "I don't understand," he says. "Is it because I used to have to sleep around?"
She quirks her brow, looking at him like he's an idiot, and perhaps he is. "No, that has nothing to do with it. That makes me sick, Finnick." She gets out the tea bags, placing one in each mug. "It's because it's Johanna. She can help you with things I can't. She can love you in other ways. And I like to think I can love you in ways she can't."
The next day, Finnick goes back to work. It's nice now, on the boat, the weather beautiful and the water less choppy than it was in the winter. It's almost nice to go out and work, aside from getting up before dawn. It's calm, for a bit, as they wait for the nets to fill, and Finnick sits on the deck in the sunlight, repairing a smaller net, while Royce watches the line and Jude steers. "Heard you gave Ryder the what-for last week," Jude says.
Finnick looks abashed, but Royce just laughs. "Don't be embarrassed, he's had it coming. What did him in?"
"Tried to get Johanna to sleep with him for his shitty morphling," he says.
"He really ought to get her to just mend those shitty pants he always wears," Jude says, not commenting on the drugs.
"Really ought to know better than to mess with Finnick's woman," Royce adds, and a month ago, Finnick would have contested this, but what leg did he have to stand on? Royce seems to catch onto this and smiles. "Did she thank you for your chivalry?"
"Johanna's never thanked me for anything in my life," he says, spitting.
Royce tugs on the line, then settles it, indicating it's not yet time to haul it in. "Eh, I know you, Finnick. You're a lot calmer than you have been. I bet you got some."
When Finnick doesn't contest this, Royce laughs. "How's Annie feel about all this?" Jude asks.
Finnick shrugs. "She's surprisingly OK with it. They were… they were captured together, in the Capitol, in this awful prison. For like a month. Annie says Johanna kept her sane."
Jude is silent for a while after that, and even Royce doesn't have his usual joke. "With something like that, I think the rules don't apply," he says. "I mean… Annie is smart as they come, and intuitive. No offense, Finnick. If she thought having Johanna around was the right decision, she probably knew it would settle you out."
When Finnick gets home that night, he sees Annie and Johanna sitting in the garden in the ruins of Annie's house in the Victor's Village. Johanna is walking back to the garden, her back to him, and settles a blanket on Annie's shoulders. Annie steadies Johanna's glass as Johanna sits back down beside her. Next to them, Seamus is in a makeshift cradle made from a planter box lined with padding, and he has a silly sun bonnet on his head. Finnick feels oddly invasive watching, as if he's the one walking over to join a couple.
"Welcome home!" Annie says, as Finnick circles around the garden to join them. He doesn't miss the way Johanna shrinks away, how she takes her glass and makes to stand, as if Finnick should sit beside Annie instead. But Annie grabs her hand before she can leave, pulling her back to the bench. "Stay," she says. "You've been inside all day, get some sunshine."
And he has such affection for Annie then, the way she treats everyone with care, the way she notices things that might fall under the radar. He sees that Johanna continues to wear the green seaglass pendant, and despite Annie's encouragement to 'get more sunshine', Johanna is wearing a hat with a brim even wider than the baby's. Though Finnick supposes that there's not much sun is District 7, she'd probably burn to a crisp given direct exposure.
Annie is enjoying the sunlight, wearing a long sleeveless dress that was a little ambitious for the weather, hence needing the blanket. Finnick lays down on the bench opposite Annie and Johanna, and the three of them are quiet, enjoying the evening. When they go inside, Annie gives Johanna back the blanket and whispers something in her ear, making Johanna smile. And then, Annie kisses her cheek, sticking her tongue out as she walks away. Finnick, picking Seamus up from the cradle, isn't sure what to make of this.
After dinner, after Seamus is asleep and they're in bathed, Annie kisses him, pulling him along towards their bed. And she's beautiful, in the off white crocheted nightgown that she spent a month making, slender but not delicate, a little sun-kissed, her hair damp but already reforming its perfect waves reminiscent of the ocean. "I want you," she says, and he wants her too. It's nice to feel her, to taste her, to be with his wife. He pulls the nightgown up to see all of her, and she pulls off his shirt to do the same. "They keep you fit on that boat," she teases.
She pulls off the eyepatch, her fingers soft and gentle. He never wears it to sleep, but he's uncomfortable about being seen without it in the light. But it's Annie - he knows all of her, and she knows all of him. And she kisses the forehead above and the cheek below, the temple right beside.
Afterwards, lying beside her in bed, she rakes her fingers through his hair. "You're beautiful," she says.
"So are you."
She laughs a little, as if she doesn't quite believe him, but how could she not? She's the most beautiful woman he's ever seen, toe to toe with Enobaria, and not nearly as terrifying. She kisses him again, gently, on the lips, before leaning over to blow out the candle on the nightstand.
"What was that earlier, with Jo?" he asks.
"The kiss?"
She was always so terrifyingly direct.
"Yeah."
He hears her exhale, not quite a sigh. It's newly dark, he can't yet make out her features. "I used to hate Johanna," she says. "I used to think she was trying to take you from me. But I changed my mind. Maybe it was getting older. Maybe it was watching her almost die."
It's hard to process all of this, mostly because it's hard to imagine Annie hating anyone. But truthfully, this is more what he expected, than the radical acceptance he sees now. He can't accept Gale, so it doesn't make sense that she can accept Jo. He feels inadequate that she's a better person than he. He tries to really think about her words. She wasn't upset anymore, because it was clear Johanna wasn't trying to take Finnick from her. He thinks about the necklace, her grabbing onto Johanna's hand, the kiss. "Do you like her?"
"I do."
June is good weather, but it's also the month where they're the hungriest since they've arrived in District 4. They have enough, technically, but Finnick's lost a few pounds, if he had to guess, and he knows Johanna has been giving them some of her rations. Annie tries to eat smaller portions, but she has to breastfeed Seamus, so Finnick is constantly trying to get her to eat more, regardless of cost, since they had a scare when her milk supply decreased. The problem is, sometimes there just is no more food.
Johanna spent a small fortune buying them powdered baby formula in case of an emergency, and Finnick brings back seafood every day he works, but the other things: the flour, sugar, butter, fruits and vegetables, those were few and far between. They planted in the garden, but the growing season was late in District 4: the harvest wouldn't be until the autumn.
Finnick goes to Jo's after work one day, finding her hunched over the sewing machine, working on some fabric diapers. He sees the paper patterns she had drawn up tacked to the wall. "Seamus go up a size?" he asks.
She shakes her head, sipping the pink wine right from the bottle that stood by her left foot, the one not working the pedal. Miracle of miracles, the alcohol was still cheap. "No, Lacey Marnes is having a baby," she says. "These are the smallest size."
"Well, at least I know her boyfriend has money, they can pay."
She smiles hollowly. "Only thing you can buy with cash is morphling, liquor, and fish," she says. "Everything else is just gone," she says.
"I don't understand. Is it the trains? Are we in a drought? Where's all the stuff?"
"Your guess is as good as mine," she says. "But Annie and the baby need food." She says this as if she doesn't, but he doesn't comment on it. "I was thinking I should go, to the Capitol or District 2 or wherever, see if I can't force some hands."
"Johanna, you shouldn't have to go back," he says, but it lacks confidence, because how bad could the Capitol be, compared to this, really?
"I don't want to," she says. "It was awful, just being near that prison, last time. But we can't live like this. I think it has to be one of us. Only a Victor will know how to deal with them, how to force them to pay attention."
He pictures her going, and never coming back. Maybe because she realizes once she's out that she can just go anywhere, and why subject herself to the torture of District 4 when she could be anywhere else, or maybe because someone doesn't want to let her go back. He imagines her running into one of the guards from that prison, or meeting one of her old Sponsors. He wraps his arms around her from behind, stopping her from doing her sewing work. "I will go," he says.
She scoffs, jerking a little in his grip. "Is this your savior complex?" she asks. "That Finnick Odair always has to be the protector, shielding everyone?"
He can't see her face, but he can hear the resentment in her tone. "I didn't mean to get you wrapped up in that," he says, thinking of how Snow snared her into his plan to protect Annie. Which of course led to him thinking of Haymitch and Plutarch's Quarter Quell plan that landed her in that prison.
"It's not that," she says, her voice thick. "You just, you're always throwing yourself into danger without thinking of the consequences. You have a child now. You lost an eye last time you went to the Capitol, Finnick."
He laughs a little, and he can feel her growing more restless in his arms. "You're lecturing me like I'm Katniss," he teases.
"Well stop acting like Katniss and I'll stop."
"Let me do this," he says. "I love you, Jo, but you're kind of shit at sucking up to people to get them to do things for you. This is definitely my forte."
He feels her still at the words 'I love you', and only then does he realize what he said. "Take care of Annie while I'm gone, will you?"
"O-Of course."