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"What's starweed?" Johanna asks, poring over Katniss's mother's journals. Haymitch had first thought this was just a habit to distract herself from her court date, but now that he's seen her taking notes and cross-referencing the text and the journals, he's come to realize that she's taking this seriously, enough that he's begun to tell the people in the market that they might have a Healer in a couple months' time. He doesn't dare tell her that, of course, knowing she'd be too embarrassed or afraid to mess up.
"It's the hairy ground weed with the little white flowers," he says. "There's a cluster by the gate."
"Oh, chickweed," she says. She takes her pencil, making a note of the second name in the journal. For all her studies of the texts, Johanna didn't seem to have any particular reverence for Katniss's mother's original notes, scribbling over them and around her words as she saw fit. "It'll make you vomit," she says, in case he was curious.
"I'll remember that next time I need to empty my stomach." They're in the spare room with the stills, him working on filling everything to the right levels, and her with a chair and small table, reading. It's nice to have company while he works, he realizes, now that she's here. He's surprised when the phone rings, almost banging his elbow on the copper pot as he extracts himself too quickly.
"Hello?" he's out of breath from moving across the house to pick up the phone, but he doesn't think much of it. It's only Peeta, or one or two other people from town who ever call.
"Haymitch?" It's a woman's voice. One he recognizes, but doesn't immediately place. "Is Jo there?"
"Yeah… hold on. …Enobaria?"
"…Yeah, it's me."
Their conversation is stilted, two Victors left alive after the war with not much in common besides that. Johanna was the thing that tied them together, he supposes. He leaves the phone off the hook and walks back to where she's sitting. "Hey, Jo, Enobaria is on the phone."
He doesn't miss the way she immediately lights up, placing down the book and making her way to the kitchen to pick up the phone. Even now, now that she's back on her medications, he watches her closely, afraid of a repeat of that one day, of her falling, of a seizure, of the impulses in her brain just not working right and making her body break.
He gives her privacy by continuing to work on the stills as she talks on the phone, checking all the valves and gaskets, tightening the pipes wherever needed. He doesn't mind the call at all, except that it reminds him of District 2, of the summons that is now less than a week away. He wants Johanna here, beside him, where they can each work on the things they want and then eat a meal together and climb into the same bed at night. He wants her to show him more games from District 7, and teach him more things he doesn't know about her. He wants to be able to look out for her, to take care of her if she's sick, to spend time with Peeta and Katniss on particularly bad days.
The thought of her going to prison terrifies him. They won't take care of her. They won't mind all of the things she needs, the medication, the way she's picky about food, the way she's half-nocturnal sometimes. He imagines her having a seizure in the prison and biting her tongue, dying while she chokes on her own blood, the guards thinking 'so be it' because they can see the injection tracks on her arm. He steps out to the main room again, in a strange wave of anxiety, just to set eyes on her, and she's crouched to the ground, phone against her face. She looks like she's… crying.
Noticing him, she gives him a small thumbs up and a watery smile. "Yeah, please, as soon as you know," she says to Enobaria. "Tell the girls I said hi."
He can only hear half the conversation, but it's funny. It's hard to picture the Mentor Johanna and the Mentor Enobaria so much as speaking to each other, but somehow, them being friends now, after the war, doesn't feel strange at all.
"Yeah, I miss you too. Bye." Johanna stands and hangs up the phone, and walks over to Haymitch. She wraps her arms around him, sighing in what he can only determine is pure relief.
"What is it?" he asks. Despite the calm that seems to have overtaken her, he feels more tense, the fact that he has no idea what's just happened making him nervous.
She speaks into his neck, unable, it seems, to pull away. "There's a session of the assembly about to pass a bunch of laws and strike down others, according to Enobaria," she says. "One of the changes is the decriminalization of morphling. We should know when the session ends in two days."
He hadn't realized his arms were still around his sides until he's wrapping them around her, holding her close. He had been trying not to, trying to convince himself it was better for both of them if they kept some distance, so that when they were inevitably separated, it wouldn't be so bad. But now that there's a chance she can stay, he gives in. She lifts her head up to look at him and he can't resist, he leans in to kiss her. "In two days, this could be over?" he asks, leaning back in. She kisses him back, pulling his lower lip into her mouth, inserting her tongue. God, he remembers this, and he wants more. He can feel himself getting aroused just from this.
She nods. "Come on, I don't want to think about this for two days."
They fuck for the first time in a free Panem that afternoon, and then again that evening. It's different - they're older, a little more cautious, but by the second time he learns more or less what's alright and what isn't, what makes her clench her teeth and what makes her moan. He watches her come and it's beautiful, and he feels greedy, and wants to try again, just to watch her, but she pushes him away. "Please, give me a minute," she says, out of breath.
But when she recovers she pulls him close, until they're inches apart, and then he's inside of her, and he isn't thinking about much else. How long had it been since he had had sex without worry? Without paranoia about Snow or war or death or other responsibilities? Before he was reaped? Maybe ever. Its incredible to just look at her, to touch her, to feel the pleasure he's feeling, and that's it.
After, she unwraps the morphling, just putting a bit of the powder on her finger and shoving it up into her gums. She tugs on his arm until he's laying on her lap, and she strokes his hair, his shoulders, his back. "What's wrong?" she asks.
"Have you ever had sex without worrying about anything?" he asks.
He can't see her expression, but he hears her laugh a little. "I've never done anything without worrying since the day I was reaped."
"Don't admit that," he says. "Everyone thinks Johanna Mason isn't scared of anything."
"I don't know if it's the prison itself that scares me, or being alone. Even as a Mentor, we had each other. Even when I was captured in that dungeon, I had Peeta and Baria. I think I'm afraid of the prison now because I would be absolutely alone."
He tilts his head down to kiss her thigh, then leans back so he can look up and see her face. "You're not going," he assures her. "You're staying here with Katniss and Peeta and I, and you can call Enobaria and tell her to come visit if she wants, but probably wait until spring because she'd freeze her District 2 ass off if she came here in the winter. And we can go visit 7 if you want, next year."
She nods, smiling a little. "Baria would hate your moonshine. I can't wait to listen to her insult it."
"Well she's empirically wrong, what would she know about it?"
"She works at a vineyard now," Johanna says. "So nothing about white liquor, but plenty about wine."
"Ugh, pretentious District 2 bullshit," he teases.
The next day they hear nothing, but the following day, they leave the television on all day, a constant drone while Haymitch pretends to attempt to clean up the house, and Johanna sits on the sofa in front of the television, reading and rereading the same sentence in the medical book again and again.
Finally, the Capitol shows cut out for a news report, and he joins her. He can feel her tenseness, and he grabs a jar of the moonshine, knowing it isn't the best coping mechanism, but hoping that after today, they won't need it nearly as often. He takes a sip and passes it to her. She takes a swig as well and winces, unused to the strong taste of drinking it straight.
They watch the host go through the introductions, the report on election progress, and then call in a correspondent. "Yes, I am here to report on some important updates from the legislative session that just finished today," she says. She's dressed up for the news, but she doesn't look traditionally Capitol. She's wearing a tailored dark green suit and her brown hair is straight and shoulder-length.
"First of all, there are no longer laws against inter-District travel, except those specifically applying to trade and commerce. If you and your family want to move or visit another District, please carry identification, but you are free to do so. Next, there are a series of laws passed about work conditions and hours. These will be posted in all town centers, and include limits on hours you can work in a week, a minimum wage, and other changes. For employers who cannot accommodate these changes, there is a labor bureau to reach out to for assistance. There are also updates on several laws that disproportionately affect the outer districts: there are no longer criminal charges for morphling-"
Haymitch misses the rest as Johanna jumps on top of him. "Yes! Yes!" he says, unable to contain his smile.
He feels her shaking, and at first thinks she's laughing, but looks down to see her sobbing against him. She's buried her face against his chest, and he wraps his arms around her. "Hey, it's alright. It's finally over."
She nods, but seems unable to stop the torrent of emotion. "It's over," she repeats, after a minute.
"You don't have to go to the hearing. You don't have to go to prison. You didn't commit a crime."
She nods again, as if trying to internalize all of this information. "Nothing ever works out," she says, and he wants to contest this, to tell her things will be fine now, the war is over, but he knows what she means, a little too well.
He knows why she cried instead of celebrating. She was too unprepared, ready for the news to end without mention of morphling at all. Nothing good ever happens. That's what people like him and her had come to learn from the Capitol, right from the start. And when something good did happen, you braced yourself, because something worse was probably right around the corner.
But he knows that was Snow's pattern. That was the Capitol of the past, before the war. They need to let themselves believe that things might get better, because if they don't, why did they fight at all? "It just might work out," he says, kissing her temple. He knows she's sensitive there, around her hairline, but she doesn't flinch away. Instead she presses harder into the contact, and they stay like that for a bit, until she leans back to take another sip of the moonshine. He almost laughs at that.
The news program has ended now. He supposes he'll have to see the other new laws on the rerun. They both sit quietly for a bit, emotionally drained, but not yet tired. "I think we should celebrate," he says, mostly because there's not much to celebrate anymore.
"Celebrate what? The fact that I'm not a criminal?"
"Sure. I'll bring the liquor, you bring the-"
"The what, the drugs?"
"I was going to say the tobacco, but alright."
"And where is this party?"
"I'm sure Peeta won't mind hosting."
They arrive at Peeta's an hour later, once they've cleaned up a bit and had a meal. Peeta and Katniss look surprised to see them, but don't turn them away, so Haymitch makes himself at home. "Ransom rematch, I think," he proposes. Katniss had been sitting quietly, not quite sulking, but getting a feel for them, but now she looks a little interested.
Johanna shakes her head. "We have two teams here, clearly. We should play dogfight."
She begins to explain the rules, until Katniss leans forward, her drink sloshing a bit. "Oh, it's crusade!"
Crusade was a game that Haymitch had almost forgotten about, a time-wasting game to play while waiting for school to start or waiting to meet someone. Johanna explains how to bet on it, and how to make it into a drinking game, and they are sure to clarify the house rules, each of them playing with different groups, in the past.
Johanna is significantly better at crusade than she is at ransom, it turns out, so even with Haymitch's lack of ability to bluff, they win by a significant margin. When they finish the third round, Peeta brings out leftover cake, and they each have a slice, and only then does he ask. "So, what is the occasion?"
"Not going to jail!" Johanna says. She gets up, swaying a little after a few drinks, and twirls, laughing. She sits back down on the arm of Haymitch's chair. He pulls her onto his lap and she doesn't fight it, she just settles into the new position.
"Jail? What?" Katniss asks. Conversely, she looks sober now, her face all worry. Somehow, Haymitch forgot that Katniss didn't know. He had explained the arrest to Peeta, but not Katniss, and neither of them had known about the summons.
Though Johanna remains relaxed, and she pulls Haymitch's arms around her, perhaps trying to reassure herself of the words she is telling Katniss. "I was arrested in District 2 for morphling," she says. "And I had a court date coming up. Almost certainly going to jail. But the new law says it's not illegal to possess morphling. It's going to be ok."
Katniss bites at her knuckle, a worried smile behind it. "I- you didn't tell us," she says. Haymitch can tell she's hurt, despite the relief, and he wonders if it's because she's come to care about Johanna, or because after all this time, there are still people hiding things from her. Maybe both.
"Yeah, I don't know. I wanted to believe if I just pretended things were ok, they would be. But it was really looking like I was going to be in trouble. My hearing was in three days." She runs her hands through her hair, pushing it back. It's past her chin now, after a year. "I'm sorry."
Katniss softens. "I'm glad it's ok now," she says, almost shyly.
When they walk home, the air is cold enough to see their breath, and Haymitch wonders if it's going to snow soon. "How cold does it get in 7?" he asks.
"Probably colder than it ever does here," she says. "We get feet of snow every year, and you can go ice fishing on all the ponds."
"Sounds horrible."
"It wasn't so bad. We always had a big fire at home, and in the town square. We would make this toasted bread with cheese on top, it was so good."
"You'll have to make it with Peeta's bread."
It feels like a risk to even plan for a future, to think about a single meal he'll have in the future with Johanna. But when she nods, and says "Sure, let's do it," he can't help but allow himself to hope.
There will always be a hole inside of him. There are things that have been taken from him that he will never get back, and he knows it's the same for her. But as he opens the door to his house and realizes that from now on he doesn't have to live in it alone, he gets an odd, almost joyful feeling. He wonders if this is contentment, and if it's alright to feel it.
"You're sure you're ok staying in District 12?" he asks. He doesn't add 'with an old drunk like me?'
They take a few seconds to shed their coats and boots, and she's standing with him in the living room, both of them tired and a little tipsy, and she grabs his face in her hands and kisses him. "I want to be here," she says, when she pulls away. "Are you alright with having me here?"
He nods. Over her shoulder he can see her books, her clothes, her cigarettes. He wants her to stay. He doesn't want this house to be only his things, anymore. "Yes, stay here."
Later, when he's almost asleep, he watches her. She's still bad at sleeping, tossing and turning, sometimes getting up in the middle of the night and going back to bed mid day. But right now she's asleep, relaxed like she never is when awake. It feels unreal, and he has to convince himself that he's not dreaming. Snow is dead. The war is over. This is allowed, and things are only going to get better. He closes his eyes and lets himself believe that the rest of their lives will be full of ordinary days.