The Sterling Nightingale ⟷ Finnick Odair/OC

And why is it that in the early mornings,

Chapter Twenty One | And why is it that in the early mornings

"It was terrible to see a young and beautiful woman – a girl in all but name – still standing almost at the threshold of golden and fantastic dreams, which should have made her youth one long, perpetual holiday." Emma Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel

Finnick is still awake when the phone blasts through the silence of the living room. Truthfully, it is a very soft sound – a twinkling of notes that warn of an incoming message – but in the blurry quiet of early morning, the suddenness of the noise makes Finnick dart up from the couch with a startled inhalation. Who would be calling at this hour?

Apprehension fills him. It's rare to get private phone calls during the Games, and his first explanation is that perhaps Snow has set up extra clients for him before he enters the arena. A sickened feeling lurches through him at the thought. Snow has his own way of contacting him regarding clients, but Finnick never has any of those during the Games...usually. He stares at the phone for a long moment before striding purposefully forward.

When he answers it with a hesitant hello, the voice that responds is none other than the father of the woman he had just been thinking about.

"Finnick. I was hoping it was you," Gemma Cornelius says. His voice crackles slightly over the connection.

How strange, that the night Finnick watches Sil's first Hunger Games, her father contacts him. Phone calls into the Capitol are a rarity in and of itself, but he's not entirely surprised that the Cornelius family has the ability to make it happen. Gemma has the money to pay the extensive bill, though that doesn't mean they are safe to speak privately. The Capitol monitors all calls, especially ones concerning their Victors.

"Gemma?" Finnick asks in confusion.

He frowns and turns, glancing behind him at the television screen. It is paused at the scene when Sil becomes a Victor. The dead look in her eye is unfathomably strange, and yet so familiar. Every Victor looks like that after their Games, but Sil is clearly not like every other Victor.

"Forgive me," Gemma says, "Yes, it's me. I do hope I didn't wake you up?"

"No, I was already awake. Watching previous Games." The brief explanation does not go over Gemma's head.

"Ah, of course. You must find Silver's Games quite confusing, don't you? She was a different person back then." Gemma chuckles, and Finnick is once more left with the odd impression that the older man knows a lot more than he is actually saying.

He'd like to ask Gemma about the questions spinning round his head. Why has Sil changed so much? Is there a specific reason? Why does she hide herself away and dumb herself down?

Instead, Finnick merely hedges, "It's definitely strange..." And he hesitates, partly because he's not sure what to say, but mostly because he does – and he's not sure it's a good conversation to have during a dubious late night call that is undoubtedly being recorded.

"I know this call isn't private," Gemma says a moment later, as if reading Finnick's mind. "I didn't want to put you in this position, but suddenly I find that I have nowhere else to turn to. I fear for my daughter."

His eyebrows shoot up. "What's wrong with her? She seemed fine this morning."

Worry shoots through him and he begins to think back. Had Sil really seemed fine? Something has been off about her for days now, but the moments between her bright personality and this strange new one are only that: moments. And yet...

Watching Sil's Games have not answered any of his questions. It's only caused more to form, catapulting through those moments between her and making him wonder, in so many ways, what he's missing. Because clearly he's missing something, and he knows instinctively that it is important.