HEART OF GOLD | CORIOLANUS SNOW

𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 67

Lilith laughed, briefly, and yet the sound seemed to resonate around the atrium, vibrating across the space between them, molecule by molecule, until Coriolanus felt inexplicably like the intangible wave had touched him.

"I was, sir," she said. "I am."

"Then why do you look like that?" he asked, smirking as she continued toward him, the hems of her skirt skimming the marble and granting the impression that she was gliding across the floor. "They did tell you I was here, did they not?"

Unlike his previous visit, he had not encountered any other Golds. The mistress of the house hadn't bustled in on them, suggesting perhaps he'd like to stay for dinner? He hadn't run into the master of the house on his way out—not yet. His entrance, however, had been spotted by about five different Avoxes, two of whom had fled up the stairs, presumably to notify their young mistress of his arrival, though conceivably not by telling. Lilith, who'd stopped an arm's length from him, ran with his slip up.

"They told me someone was here to pick me up, not..."

She faltered, and Coriolanus raised his brow, amused, pretending he hadn't seen her biting her lip. It was a bad habit—a very bad habit.

"So, you thought I'd, what, meet you at the airport? Or District Two?"

"I—I don't know, sir," stammered Lilith, chuckling.

"You could at least have some faith in my upbringing," he retorted. "It would break Grandma'am's heart to find out the grandson she raised was being viewed as anything less than a gentleman."

Humor and shyness drained out of Lilith, and seemingly unwittingly, she stepped toward him, eyes earnest and urgent.

"How is she?"

Given the hushed phone calls Tigris had been having with her, Coriolanus thought she would have been up to date. Although, since the elderly lady had regained consciousness last Thursday night, neither of the cousins had quite left their grandmother's side. Tigris had been so relieved, moreover, she was constantly in tears and barely intelligible. She even forgot to give him the cold shoulder. With the three of them huddled on the Grandma'am's king-sized bed, it felt like the old days. Only, they weren't burning books and living in fear of not seeing another sunrise. Not from freezing or starving to death, at any rate.

Not since he was a boy had Coriolanus watched so much television in a single seating, and he had been appalled by the lack of standard of the programs offered. Perhaps the Games were thriving because everything else was so dreadful. But he'd dismissed the thought: No, the Games were thriving because he had made them so. External factors not within his control might have boosted the ratings, but the credit for the Games' success, ultimately, still went to him.

The week's events had cast his priorities into a different light, and Coriolanus hired two more private nurses. He already had two in his employment, but they had been shared between the Grandma'am and Strabo. And because Ma had strained her back the previous week trying to transfer her bedridden husband into his wheelchair all by herself, as if recognizing the limits of her own flabby body would have killed her, she had been ill-equipped even to roll him onto his side. So, she had solicited help to change his soiled diaper, a job that shouldn't have required two aides—but they went anyway. Coriolanus would have sacked them both on account of negligence if they weren't so familiar with the Grandma'am's routines and amongst the handful of humans she could actually tolerate. Instead, he dedicated them solely to her services and assigned the new hires to Strabo. He was their benefactor after all.

Apparently, some phlegm and vomiting had ensued, and while everyone had been so busy cleaning up an invalid who couldn't even articulate his own discomforts anymore, it was a maid out to perform her daily dusting duties who discovered the Grandma'am passed out on the rug between the sofa and the coffee table in the living room. The doctors had not been optimistic about the prognosis, but his grandmother was, if nothing else, just like him: