effie trinket (escortof12) wrote in thedoorway, @ 2013-06-12 00:58:00 |
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Effie stormed out of her place, she was so angry that she forgot to turn off the lights and the television. She liked television, it was nice to watch something else other than children killing each other. Effie even decided to get an account on Netflix. She had asked around about different shows to watch and someone had told her that Netflix was a good place to start. It was weird though, thinking that the characters she watched on the television could arrive in New York any minute. That’s what she was doing before logging on to the network. She was watching a show called How I Met Your Mother it had a popular rating on the site and thought she’d give it a try. It was...very different but still pleasant to watch. Of course logging onto the Network changed the tone of her evening. She was having such a nice day, and of course leave it to Haymitch to ruin it. Well not completely ruin it, but enough to make her want to pull her hair out. She had no idea until this point that Peeta was the one keeping Haymitch fed. She almost wanted to go out and find Peeta and Katniss to yell at the pair of them. While it was great, he was being somewhat fed, but he needed to learn how to take care of himself. As much as she hated to admit this, it would kill her if something bad happened to him and it wasn’t until she got a good look at him that she found how dangerous it was becoming. Effie arrived at his room, knocked hard three times and waited. She was going to feed him, yes. Make sure he had a good meal tonight, but it was going to come with a price. -- Haymitch didn’t know how to use his computer, but had someone help him set up his phone to do voice-to-text posts which made frustrating individuals over the network very easy for him to do. He was standing in front of the oven with his phone in his hand carrying on several different conversations, all equally as aggravating, and trying to keep an eye on the goose inside the oven to see if it would start to cook or not. What Haymitch didn’t know was that he hadn’t turned the oven on and that was really no way to cook a goose. He was really hungry though and he’d already spent the money he made earlier in the day playing Chess at Central Park on alcohol. “It’s open,” Haymitch yelled over his shoulder. He already knew it was Effie because she said she was coming over and he didn’t really care who came in these days. If someone wanted to come in and murder him they would have a fight on their hands and if Haymitch knew anything it was how to fight, even if he was ragingly drunk. -- Effie heard his voice, and after he spoke she walked in to find him standing near the stove. Seeing him standing there, she didn’t realize how bad Haymitch was getting until now. Now Effie was beyond angry, she was livid. “Haymitch.” She said rather calmly but she was almost shaking with rage. “Get the goose out of the oven.” Something had to be done, it was more than just him not eating well since Peeta left. He was letting himself go, completely. And Effie cared about him too much to let it happen, even though she constantly fought with herself as to why she couldn’t just give up. Effie didn’t even wait for him to respond. She looked around his place to his things. If she could find any clean clothes she would grab them and fold them into a pile and set them on the back of the sofa. There wasn’t much she could find. But still she searched, if she had to go out and find a hairbrush or a toothbrush at a local drug store, then she would. But it was obvious that something had to be done. -- Haymitch had lost a lot of weight since coming to New York. Back in District 12 he had as much money as he would ever need in his entire lifetime. He never had to do anything himself. He spent his money freely to help the local economy (at least that’s what he told himself) and kept himself fed that way. Now that he was in New York and spending all of his own money on alcohol he had neglected to eat anything other than what Peeta provided him with. He didn’t think he had gotten that bad considering he hadn’t looked in a mirror since he arrived either, but he had lost some weight and his hair was getting a little out of control. Something could be done about the smell as well. “What?” Haymitch turned his attention to Effie and scowled. She was talking to him like he was a child and something inside of him told him to rebel. “No, I’m going to cook him. Look, I’m trying to take care of myself.” But obviously it wasn’t working out so great. The oven wasn’t even on. -- “The OVEN ISN’T EVEN TURNED ON.” Effie said, her voice rising. She stopped working and rubbed her forehead. Her eyes were closed as she tried to gather her thoughts. “You can’t keep doing this Haymitch. You just can’t. We aren’t always going to be around to help you. What would you do if I went back through the tesseract tomorrow? Huh? What about Maysilee and everyone else? What if there was no one else here to make you eat?” She closed her eyes again, took a deep breath and made a wiping gesture with her hands. “Do you have anything else you might need for the next few days? Because I’m not letting you stay here when you clearly can’t-” She stopped and tried again. “You’re staying with me for a few days. I have enough money to get you some essentials.” Then Effie gave him a look, a look that told Haymitch that he would have no say in the matter. That she was prepared to knock him out and drag him to her room if she must. Even if that was a little much, knowing full well that Haymitch could take Effie down in a heartbeat. But she was mad, clearly and who is to say what Effie was capable of when she was like this. -- Haymitch lost interest in the oven as soon as Effie pointed out it wasn’t even turned on. He knew he would never figure out how to turn it on without her help and she didn’t seem like she wanted to help him cook his goose. He just left the goose in the oven though and crossed over into the living room to where he had left his bottle of scotch on the coffee table. If Effie was going to yell at him he needed to be drunk for it. “Then I guess I wouldn’t eat or SHIELD would feed me. It’s probably bad press when one of your refugees drops dead of starvation. I doubt they’d let that happen.” Haymitch tapped the side of his head like he was the smartest one in the room, which was debateable. Haymitch opened his mouth to protest, but when he saw the look on Effie’s face he knew it was no use. Effie was going to mother him for a couple of days and then release him back into the wild and Haymitch couldn’t exactly complain. It probably meant being sober for a few days, but also meant food and he liked being fed. “Do I have a choice in this?” he asked, but knew the answer already. -- “They are not our babysitters, Haymitch. If anyone they would send you to a rehab and force you to become sober. Which isn’t a bad idea, now that I’ve seen how well you’ve taken care of yourself. But I’m not forcing you to go. Not right now anyway.” When Effie was sure she found everything Haymitch could use, she picked up her items and thrusted them to Haymitch’s hands. “Take these. I’ll come back later and make sure the goose is taken care of. But he’s not staying in my apartment.” Her eyes glared at his question. “And no, you don’t have a say in this. This is not a vacation, okay? There’s nothing wrong with having a drink, but you can’t do this to yourself anymore Haymitch. There’s a part of you that still wants to live or else you would have done something about it ages ago.” Not that she wanted to think about her friend doing something like that. “This isn’t going to be some big therapy session, but I- well a lot of us want to see you get better, to be healthier. There has to be a reason in there somewhere that makes you want to keep going, and well that’s a start. But I’m not going to sit back and watch you wither away.” -- Haymitch didn’t even want to touch on the rehab subject. He had tried that once in the Capitol and it hadn’t exactly turned out well for anyone involved. That wasn’t a road he wanted to go down again. It was better to ignore that part of the conversation and pretend it wasn’t happening because that was the mature thing to do, right? Haymitch took his belongings and frowned at them. When did he get that purple shirt? It was possible that it was something Cinna had made for him and he had never bothered to wear. “Why the hell not?” Haymitch snapped, looking up from his haphazard pile of belongings. “You looked on for years while all of this was happening and never cared to try to help then.” Haymitch knew he was aiming below the belt, but something inside of him had broken. When people threatened to take his drink away things tended to get really ugly. “I’m not your goddamn charity case. You’re not going to absolve everything that the Capitol did by helping one person who doesn’t want your help. I shouldn’t have even come to any of you for food. Look where it’s got me now!” He threw his clothes on the floor like a toddler in the middle of a temper tantrum and went into the kitchen to finally let the goose out of the oven. It flapped and hit Haymitch square in the face on it’s mad flight away from the big metal box. “God damnit,” he cursed and held his lip in his hand which was now bleeding. “I can take care of myself. Get the fuck out of here.” -- “Don’t you dare.” Effie snapped. He was right. She never did a single thing in the past to try and help. She used her fear of what the Capital could do as a crutch to not do anything. “Don’t you dare say I never cared.” Effie blinked a few times. Her face was growing hot and she knew that she wouldn’t be able to hold back tears for very long, but she would rather jump off the building than rather have Haymitch see her cry. “You’re not a charity case. Do not blame us because we care, Haymitch. You’re only mad at yourself because as much as you tried to push us all away, you’ve found that there are people who care about you. No matter how much of a pain in the ass you can be.” Effie wanted to find something to help his lip, but all she could do there, shaking now with hurt and anger. “Look where it’s gotten you know? Look around you Haymitch, you have real people here in this damn building that care about you. Just because you thought that would be impossible to find again doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.” He had never spoken to her like this before. Even at their worst, never like this. She was hurt. “Maybe you’re right.” Effie said softly. “Maybe the only reason I am trying to help you is because of what I couldn’t- didn’t do in the past. But that doesn’t change how I feel about you. Against all odds, you are my friend. The only person that was ever there for me. You were the only person that came close to caring. You’re the only true friend I have, here and there.” Effie couldn’t stop herself. Her throat was closing and her eyes were burning with tears. She walked to the door, she opened it slowly and without looking at him she said. “There’s a key under the doormat. If you change your mind.” She closed the door gently behind her and headed back to her room. -- It was still strange hearing Effie call Haymitch her friend. He never really considered her a friend back when they were working together. He had tolerated her during their time together and that was about it. Maybe it even made him feel a little guilty for not regarding her as an actual human being. He was doing to her exactly what the Capitol did to everyone in all of the Districts and he hated himself even more for treating her that way when he realized that. Haymitch just let his lip bleed as Effie went on. He had his back turned to her because he wasn’t able to actually look her in the eyes and he remained quiet, holding his lip. He was suddenly wracked with guilt which was not an emotion he handled very well at all. In fact his continuing reason for drinking was because of the guilt he felt for all of the things he didn’t do, couldn’t do during his time as mentor. Even though he had helped win the War against the Capitol.. well, it didn’t help. None of it did and now he had hurt Effie too. He let Effie go and only turned around to look at the door when he heard it shut behind her. Then instead of following after her and admitting he was all wrong and to please help him he went straight for the bottle of scotch and sat down on the sofa to drink it. |