BLOOD ON MY HANDS || Finnick Odair

twenty eight; tainted memories.

A/N: just as a heads up this chapter has a lot of content surrounding mental health, mainly at the end where the italicized paragraphs are. That advice and content is in no way professional, it is just things that I have learned when I've struggled with anxiety and depression and ect. My hope is that maybe what I've learned could be helpful to others; unfortunately it won't work for everyone. It's awful, but that isn't your fault. You may just have different aspects to learn or understand. I hope you find them somewhere 💞

In the shadows of the lavish apartment, Eden stood with only a towel around his waist. It had been month since Flora's birthday, and March was slowly coming to an end. The cold winds and crisp air were changing into dewy mornings and budding flowers.

The view from the penthouse balcony was beautiful, and would have been even more so if he opened the doors and stepped on to it. But it was still cold in the nights and this wasn't his apartment, so he stayed put.

A pair of hands slide around his middle from behind him, circling them to grasp in a kind of lock. If they were partners, Eden would've called it a loving embrace. They were not. A better descriptor would be a gesture of possession. Of ownership.

"Are you happy?"

Selene was a kind enough woman. In her late thirties, hair rolling in blonde waves down her back. Her gifts were often things for Cissy, occasionally a cookbook for Eve as his sisters love for cooking had been mentioned in an interview he did. Yes, she was kind enough, and a little naive, but she still paid the president to have him in her bed. Her hands then pressing flat to his stomach makes him tense.

The answer he wanted to give her wasn't what she wanted to hear. It was the opposite. Many people in the Capitol seemed to have made it their goal to bring the famously heartbroken Eden Koyle back to life. To replace what he lost to fulfil their own selfish fantasies.

No one could be Flora.

No one could replace her.

But failing to please these people, who wanted the version of him the media had created, would be devastating. Snow would take his baby away. His only reason for waking up every morning.

Citizens of the Capitol wanted the confident yet brooding boy who had smothered his dying friend and torn his enemy apart. Who volunteered to save the love of his life when it meant the end of his own.

They wanted the popular character he had turned into in the past eight months. For little Narcissa, the wide eyed baby with the beginnings of strawberry blonde curls growing, he would be that person. He could become someone else to keep her.

So, without turning to face her; "yes," Eden lied.

Numbness was all he felt when she smiled against his back.

•••••

Days later, from the couch in his apartment living room, Eden stared blankly at the screen. His sketch pad was tossed onto the cousin to his left and his coloured pencils were strewn everywhere.

It was mid day, still cool in the sunshine, but he kept his apartment windows wide open. Maybe he was running a fever, or maybe just simply overwhelmed. The breeze helped with the heat coming from his body anyway. All he knew was the moment Rin's face appeared on his TV screen he had gone numb.

Since he had missed the introductory part of the program he had no idea what was going on, but eventually it sunk in. They were going through the twenty three deaths with a live audience submitting their opinions on each. Who they liked or hated. What strengths they thought each would have had. Who they thought was the most attractive. But the main conversation was how the audience thought the twenty three tributes should have died.