Flares | Johanna Mason

V. Shadows

Ethan

"Johanna?"

When Ethan came to visit his sister, to help clear his head after the argument from his mother and Ella's illness returning, he didn't expect to find Johanna next to the grave. He could tell that he startled her as she jumped at Ethan's words.

Johanna stared at him, her lips slightly parted but no words coming out of them. This was the first time he had seen her speechless, he would have laughed if they weren't next to his sister's grave.

Her eyes darted down to his hand which was holding a throwing knife before darting back to his face, her eyes asking a silent question. He had several more on him but the one in his hand was the only one visible. "I'm not going to use it on you."

Johanna still looked at him questioningly, her head slightly tilted. This silence was killing him. For once he wished she was her usual blunt self, to just ask him the question she was thinking of instead of just staring at him and making him play detective to figure out what Johanna wanted to know. "Are you actually going to ask me anything or are you just going to stare at me like I've killed your fucking dog?"

He had a habit of swearing profusely when he was angry but then again he had a habit of swearing anyway so the only way people knew if Ethan truly had lost his head was when his fist connected to the other person's jaw. However, he couldn't do that here, he couldn't lose his head next to his sister's grave and not to Johanna, who had the reputation of her temper being like a firecracker, something he had seen first hand.

"I haven't got a dog" was the only thing what came out of Johanna's lips. Ethan had to laugh at the absurdity of it. He knew that Johanna was being cautious, tiptoeing on the thin white line between respectful and being disrespectful. Then again, Johanna had always had little jabs at him or anyone for that matter so she had crossed that line long ago.

"Really, that's the best you could come up with, 'I haven't got a dog'. Oh fuck me, who are you and what have you done with the real Johanna?" Ethan was laughing all the way through saying it. This could not be the same Johanna who held him up against a wall in the Capitol and threatened that if he didn't put an effort in in training, his chest would become acquainted with her axe. This could not be the same Johanna that threatened to drag him by his hair and force feed him when he starved himself on the way back home.

When he looked at Johanna's eyes, he could see the anger in them, the fire in them. Good, this was the same Johanna he knew. This was confirmed by the shorter girl shoving him up against a nearby tree, making him drop the throwing knife into the grass below. Her face was stone cold and her words had the same ice to them.

"One more word and I'll jam that knife into your eye."

Ethan lips slightly twitched into a small smirk, there was something so familiar to the situation they were in now, one of their backs shoved against something, the other threatening to do this that or the other.

Johanna was intoxicating, he couldn't deny that. The fire in her, the anger that was on full display now and by the manner in which she carried herself. Then the anger and amusement she awoke in him, the need to tease her which was prevalent now. "Well, look at you pinning me against something. It's very familiar, Jo. I know I'm quite handsome so I don't blame you if you wanted a closer look."

Two can play that game, Johanna.

Johanna's hand covered his mouth before he could say anymore, trying to keep the same stony expression on her face but the mischevious glint in her eyes gave her away.

Johanna removed her hand from his mouth and stepped back a few steps to give Ethan space.

"I assume you have questions?" Ethan asked after a sigh and picking up his throwing knife before twirling it around in his hand.