Who: Annie Cresta, Johanna Mason and Katniss Everdeen When: Backdated: Monday, December 21st. Evening Where: Annie’s apartment What: Girl’s night with an interruption by renegade mistletoe. Warnings: Family Friendly Status: Log | Complete
Johanna and Annie had made plans to get together for a girl’s night and Johanna had suggested they invite Katniss as well. In the dreams Johanna and Katniss had become close and Johanna wanted the other Victor to feel included in things that they did so that she would stop thinking that they hated her or expected something of her and when Annie agreed, not that Johanna thought she wouldn’t, Johanna extended the invitation to Katniss who accepted.
On the night of the girl’s night, Johanna picked Katniss up and they had headed to Annie’s apartment. Over dinner they’d talked about various things from vague references about the dreams to the snow that had been falling since the beginning of the month. Johanna had heard about the snow the year before, but she hadn’t moved to Orange County until after the new year so she hadn’t experienced the craziness of snow in California. Sure, she’d been around snow many times before, but snow in California was rather bizarre.
Once dinner was finished they had moved out to the walkway just outside Annie’s apartment that led down to the beach. The snow had let up and it wasn’t too cold so it was a perfect place to sit around and drink wine and talk a little more.
Annie had no problems with inviting Katniss along. It had made sense that they try to get the girl more involved. She knew how easy it was to hide away and the anxiety but they were all a dysfunctional family, so really. Besides, it would be good for them. All of them. With the stress of the dreams and Panem in general, moments where they could just relax? Super important.
Vague references to the dreams were usually the extent of Annie’s talking about them anyway unless specifically asked. But she wasn’t surprised by the snow as she had shown up soon before it had started the year before. She’d even been mistaken as a snow princess by a random kid who’d been at the benches she was at one day.
With plates and everything in the kitchen, it was outside and Annie curled her legs under herself on her chair as she sipped her drink. All in all, it was a much needed mellow evening.
Katniss had been surprised and touched when the girls had invited her over. Having kept herself distant from the group for so long, she’d figured it would be difficult, but they had all really started coming together after Gale’s ‘death’ and ‘undeath’. There was still a large part of her that was waiting for them to blame and shun her, but with every meeting she had with them, she was more and more hopeful that that would never happen. She had a feeling that the others had Dreamed further than her, so she could only pray that what was to come wasn’t so bad.
Matching Annie’s position on the couch next to hers, she raised her glass by of a sort of toast. “Thanks for having me over, even if the weather decided to go a bit crazy on us again.”
Johanna held her glass up as well, “I’m just glad you decided to come.” She was glad that Katniss was including herself more when they did group things, like going over Gale’s on Thanksgiving. Considering their dreams, they all needed each other to get through them of it was likely that they would all go crazy. After taking a sip of her wine, Johanna placed it down on one of the patio tables and pulled her sweater tighter around her, “Ya know, I heard about the snow last year, but this is kind of ridiculous.” Most people wouldn’t be sitting outside in the cold like they were, but truthfully it didn’t feel as cold as it could have so why not hang outside for a little while? If they got too cold they could just go back into Annie’s living room.
Glass held up in the toast, Annie gave a small nod of agreement with Johanna. It wasn’t like she was the most social of everyone, but she knew the importance for everyone of having people there. Even if they didn’t talk about the dreams much. For Annie, they were over and while they were painful, there was also hope and she’d been keeping tabs on everyone after everything in them as well.
“I remember it from last year. Apparently someone mistook me for a snow princess.” Admittedly the someone had been a child so she had played along with it. “But I wasn’t expecting the snow then.” Now, well, she had gone through a month of it and after everything else that happened in Orange County, snow suddenly wasn’t the strangest thing to happen. The Christmas characters that seemed to have been showing up for a couple weeks? That had been stranger but that had come to an end as well.
Katniss had never really been bothered by cold, something she unfortunately seemed to share with her Dream self. She had layered up before leaving the house, so she wasn’t feeling it just yet. Taking a sip of her drink, she looked down at her drink. “Can’t say I didn’t think about not coming,” she admitted with a little quirk of a smile. “The Dreams still shake me up and it’s so easy to chicken out and not come to these sorts of things,” she admitted. “Haymitch is a big help though. He keeps me going out,” she laughed a little before shaking her head and turning the conversation away from sad, uncomfortableness. “Sorry, so a snow princess hey? What happened?”
“We’ll have to thank Haymitch for making you come then.” Johanna smirked and took another sip of her wine. She wondered if what she’d said to Katniss a few months earlier when they’d run into each other had done anything to help her also. She’d been a little harsh with her during that encounter, but she couldn’t really help it. Not now when a little of her personality from the dreams had bled over.
Annie nodded in agreement with Johanna before she contemplated the question about what had happened when she’d been mistaken for a ‘snow princess’. “His father apologised and then we helped him build a snow castle. Nothing really. He just had walked up to me, about, six years old I think?” It had been hard to tell and it wasn’t like she’d ever seen the two again. Just a random occurrence that had happened when she first showed up in Orange County.
“That’s really cute,” Katniss smiled at Annie. Kids had never really been her thing, but she understood they were a source of joy for other people. “So uh, what’s the plan for the rest of the night?” she asked, sitting herself more upright and taking a swig of her drink.
Johanna smiled over at Annie, “We should get you some flowy, sparkly dress and you can go out to the park and wander around and see if any other kids think you’re a princess.” Even back in high school and college, Johanna had never really had any close girlfriends so she was glad that she now had Annie and that Katniss appeared to be coming out of her shell. “Well, we can have more wine. Or we could try and build a snowman.” She wasn’t sure if the snow was heavy enough to actually do that or not.
Often times Annie found she did better with kids and animals than adults. Less judging, less of a threat. But she didn’t pay it much mind and instead just quirked a brow at Johanna’s comment. “I’m sure it could be arranged.” She worked at a movie studio after all, “But I think that would be cheating. I was dressed normally that time.” Sipping her wine, Annie shrugged as Johanna listed possibilities for things to do. “I’m good with one glass…” Since she rarely ever drank, really this was a very rare happening that she was drinking wine tonight, “We could definitely try at any rate.”
“It’s Christmas, let’s definitely try!” Katniss smiled, sitting forward to pour herself another glass before looking up to offer the others a refill.
“Alright. Snowman making it is then.” Johanna took another sip of her wine and leaned over to place the almost empty glass next to the wine bottle once Katniss replaced it. She was about to get to her feet to start the snowman making when she glanced over at Annie. She wasn’t really sure why she did what she did next, but for one reason or another, she was compelled to lean over towards her friend who she was sharing a bench with and pressed her lips to the other girl’s.
Annie really had no plans on drinking anymore. For her, one glass was more than enough and would be her month quota of alcohol. But it did seem like snowmen were going to be a thing. Which was always fun, and as it seemed that the Christmas characters had disappeared, they didn’t need to worry about it coming to life.
Or, Joanna could kiss her and instead of panic as she normally would, Annie just..returned the kiss. She didn’t know why, just a strange compulsion that seemed to take over.
Katniss looked up from pouring the wine out and nearly knocked over her glass when she saw her two friend’s kissing. Catching the glass and steadying it on the table, she watched for a couple of seconds, stunned, before shaking her head and awkwardly clearing her throat. Suddenly feeling very awkward, she dropped her gaze to her wine glass and drank from it, feeling a blush colouring her cheeks as she did.
Johanna had never kissed another girl before and until now had never had the slightest inclination to, but in this case, she couldn’t help herself. However, just as quickly as the compulsion came over her, it was gone and she quickly pulled away, cheeks flushing both from the situation and the cold, “I….what….that was interesting.”
Trying to process what had just happened, Johanna ran a hand through her hair and was turning her head, suddenly remembering that Katniss was there as well when she noticed something move out of the corner of her eye, “What the fuck….do you guys see that?” Johanna could have been going crazy, but she was pretty sure there was a sprig of mistletoe floating through the air, away from them.
And then it was done and sense seemed to come back to the both of them, Annie’s eyes widening in shock.
“I know I don’t drink much but I also know I’m not drunk…”
She didn’t like feeling out of control of her own actions. It made her tense and fidgety. Annie was suddenly very aware of everything, senses on alert and so when Johanna noticed something moving, she turned her attention to where she was looking. And…. floating mistletoe. Of course. Because Orange County.
“Right…. magical mistletoe. Why not.” Because suddenly kissing someone and then seeing mistletoe floating away? Logical leap was that it was magical since they were in Orange County.
Katniss quirked a smile at them. “Well, if you two would like a moment alone…” she trailed off, looking up at them from under her lashes. A cheeky grin started forming on her cheeks as she watched them.
“Oh haha.” Johanna reached for the cork from the wine bottle and threw it, lightly, in Katniss’ direction, “Too bad you don’t have your bow right now. You could shoot that thing down.” But when Johanna looked in the direction of the mistletoe it was gone. “We should probably let the others know about this. The mistletoe. Not the kiss itself.” Although she was sure that Peeta would probably get quite the kick out of it, “Or we could not and hope that Peeta and Gale get ambushed by it.” Now that was an amusing thought.
“I support hoping that Peeta and Gale get ambushed by it. Peeta’s weird enough already, he doesn’t need to be given ideas.” Because if they warned him, that would mean he would put it together. Nope. Annie was perfectly content with that not being a thing. Still, at least the mistletoe had gone away and would hopefully stay away now. Damage had been done and all of that. This evening had certainly gone in a completely different direction than initially planned. Not that there had been much planned to begin with.
“Yeah...you can’t tell those guys,” Katniss grinned, putting the cork down that Johanna had thrown at her and she’d caught. “If you do and you say it’s something that’ll make you kiss then they’ll ask how you know that and quite honestly? I’m not that good of a poker player,” she joked, looking at her friends and feeling more relaxed than she had for a good number of months.