'there is happiness
past the blood and bruise
past the cursed and cries
beyond the terror in the nightfall'
• where olwyn laurier
will do anything to protect
...
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chapter nine
THE GAMES WERE yet to begin and Olwyn already felt so useless. Both Katniss and Peeta had been down in the training centre all day, and had returned that night. During the long hours in the haunted penthouse, Effie was off doing whatever she normally did, and after some incessant nagging, Haymitch had spent the day mingling and drinking with sponsors. Olwyn would've joined him if he didn't order her to stay put. She didn't argue, the sponsors always rubbed her the wrong way; feeling as if they owned her, as if she was their prize, as if her life was indebted to them. And in all honesty, she knew Haymitch just wanted to keep her away from all that; shield her as long as possible.
Really, Olwyn was left with all the burdens and zero responsibilities as everyone else left to do their respective roles. Haymitch had shouted at her to relax, to "take the easy life sweetheart", with his usual teasing grin. But even he knew the victor would never be able to relax until she left the Capitol, and the circus ended for yet another year. And then, would Olwyn ever be the same after losing yet another two?
She tried not to think about it; the racing of her heart as Katniss told her she trusted her, the slight blush of her cheeks every time Olwyn so much as looked in Katniss' direction, and the thoughts of losing her in the arena that was pushing her past the virtual line of cold, crystal clarity. But it was all so blaring, consuming all waking moments and all the mentor's focus. It was a constant reminder, a painful one at that, of the life of the victor.
Numb. That's all she wanted to be. Numb.
Void of pain and loss, unknown to the throws of love and stupid to the true horrors of life as a victor. It was all she desired, it's what drove her from sleep and kept her as a ghost in a shell. And much like the year before, it had prompted Olwyn to follow the path of the victors before her. A path she swore she would never take, until it all came tumbling down. And yet, here she was, still adamant she wasn't losing her mind; like they all said she was.
As a child, she remembered her own father taking morphling for his bad back. It was only once, the medication was liquid gold among the broken and pained miners of district twelve. She hadn't known how he had acquired it; but knew not to ask question. Francisco Laurier was a man with a short fuse, who hated prying of any kind. So Olwyn tended to keep her mouth shut, to avoid the fury of an alcoholic father.
But this time, she could recall his mood swings and how they had become less pronounced and less violent. Her father, usually a hard-sharpened man who never showed his children any love or care; under the influence of the powerful drug had told his youngest daughter he loved her, promised her the moon and the stars as she looked up at him with dazed eyes, cloudy with confusion and tears.
It was only the next morning, when he became gruff and coarse once more, did Olwyn truly learn what morphling was.
Morphling was false hope, it was the cause of her one positive memory with her father before he up and left. And in the spirit of the games, Olwyn turned to the route she'd only taken once before, the night her own tribute, Ryder Echo died in the seventy third games and the harsh reality of going home without a winner set in. And even then, it was Haymitch who administered the substance, not her.
