kill for your love - the hunger games

(080) who will dry your eyes when it falls apart?

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KILL FOR YOUR LOVE.

act three.

(chapter eighty, who will dry your eyes when it falls apart?)

hospital ward / finnick and annie's compartment, 75 ADD.

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HOLLOW.

THAT WAS THE only word that came to Juniper Hale's mind. Hollow. Her heart had been ripped out of her chest, shattered on the tiled floor. Her mind had been torn out of her head, squeezed and pulverised until it no longer existed. It was like her tongue had been cut off as punishment for her sins. Her ears acted as if they were no longer working, as if they were blocked. 

People were speaking. Some looked into Juniper Hale's face, squinting their eyes as if they expected some sort of reaction. They laid hands on her shoulder or on her cheek. She supposed they were saying some sort of apologies or condolences.

"We know you two were very close." 

"When we win the war, his sacrifice will have been worth it." 

Sacrifice. 

("I know you are," Juniper replied, voice muffled. "Just don't be you, Finn. Don't be heroic.")

Hadn't she told him to not be heroic? To not be himself? Hadn't Juniper told him that or was she imagining things? Why did it fall on deaf ears? Why did he not listen?

Why was Finnick dead? 

Finnick was dead. Finnick was dead. Finnick was dead.

Juniper clenched her jaw as the statement rolled around in her hollow head like a mantra. A sick, twisted mantra. A mantra that caused great damage that even the Hale woman didn't know herself if it could be fixed. 

"How is she not reacting?"  

A paunchy man was sitting in the chair opposite of the hospital bed, arms crossed. Plutarch.

"Because they sedated her, idiot." 

Someone was standing up with his hands on his hips, beard and hair scruffy as his grey eyes bore into Juniper's soul. Haymitch. 

"Maybe she doesn't know how to react..." 

A woman was sitting on the edge of the bed to Juniper's right, red hair flowing with freckles dotted against her cheeks. Lucy. 

"Why don't we all just stop talking for a moment?" 

A doctor was standing close to her, an ID card attached to his breast pocket. Dr. Aurelius. 

Finnick was dead. Finnick was dead. Finnick was dead. 

Juniper didn't want to believe it. She wasn't going to believe it. Finnick Odair couldn't possibly be dead. He couldn't have possibly sacrificed himself. Juniper had told him not to. She had made him say that he wouldn't be himself, that he wouldn't be the saviour, that he wouldn't be heroic. 

Why didn't he listen? 

Why was Finnick Odair dead? 

Plutarch had told her it had happened early hours in the morning. He said it was because of mutts, something they hadn't expected. They were underground. Katniss had killed him out of mercy. So, whilst Juniper Hale and Johanna Mason were begging everyone to let them go outside to get some fresh air, Finnick Odair's exploded body was rotting down in a sewer in the Capitol.