Shattering Secrets [2]

Four

   My heart seems to stop , and so does the world around me. My mind is replaying the gunshots over and over again, my hands shaking.

   "What?" Katniss gasps at the alarming sound, but I ignore her, trying to run for the doors, trying to somehow bring the man back from the dead. Somehow rewind time so I could somehow stop this tragedy.

   "Coral, stop! You can't save him!" Finnick holds my waist , trying to stop me from struggling against his grip. "Coral, stop!"

   "Did we do that? Did we just kill him?" I look up at him, tears running down my face, my eyes stinging from the now dripping makeup.

   "You didn't do anything but offer your condolences to the dead" Finnick wraps me up in his arms and I cry into his chest, remembering the first time he held me like this. The first time he helped me pick up my broken pieces. This time might be harder. A lot has happen sense that last day.

{~}

   The water ran over my face and down the drain, over and over again. My prep team has told me five different times now to get out of the shower, but I keep asking for five more minutes. I'm trying to wash away the pain of everything. My skin has been scrubbed over and over again, my hair washed so much that my scalp feels raw. Washing my body over and over again will never get rid of the horrors that it had to endure, but I still can't help myself from trying.

   I step out onto the rug, and Alessandra wraps a towel around me. "I was just about to drag you out by your left ear, Coral"

   "Give me a break Alessandra, it's been a hard day"

   "It's been a hard year" she picks up a hairbrush, and starts to brush out all the knots in my hair, just like my mother once did.

   "When will this all end?"

   "Not until we're dead" Haymitch says from the door and I smile at him. He is dressed up in a suit for the dinner, and he even looks sober. Even though I know he's not.

   "Well isn't that reassuring" Alessandra grumbles under her breath, she never did like Haymitch.

   "We need to talk Coral" he sits across from me, I'm still in my towel, my hair still dripping on the white carpet. "Alone" he looks up at Alessandra.

   "Fine! Fine!" She hurries out of the room, grumbling more things under her breath like 'I don't even want to be here' 'not like I want to smell the alcohol' 'stinky bastard' I laugh as she shuts the door. She is just like my mother, and it is hard not to love her for it.

   "Can we make this quick?" I ask, uncomfortable that he is seeing me in such a state.

   "I don't think that the rebellions will stop anytime soon. The video being leaked didn't hurt just you, and everyone around you, but it hurt the Capitol" for a minute I though he was going to defend the Capitol, but then he went on "we need to fire them up more, do something more to get the rebellions sparking. He won't be able to control them all"

   "That will just put us in more harm Haymitch, I can't lose any of you. If something happen to any of you-"

   "It won't, Finnick , Caesar and Alessandra will be with you, you will all protect each other, and me and Katniss will be together, and you know how good she is with a bow. Shot one of my liquor bottles right out of my hand once"

   "You shouldn't drink so much Haymitch"

   "That's not the point of this conversation, I'm saying we have to rive things up a bit"

   "Alright, rive things up a bit" I say to myself.

   Haymitch grabs my hand "but also know this ; sometimes all you have to fear is yourself"

   When he stood to leave, I realized why he drank so much, he wasn't afraid of anything but himself.

{~}

   The next two weeks went by in a blur. District by District I talked to parents of lost ones.

   I had killed so easily, stabbed their heads with knives, watching their blood drip onto the grass. I stood in front of the families, said my sorry's. Said I had to do it. Said I had to survive.

   The thing is, I didn't have to. I chose to. I chose to kill in such a horrid way. I chose to kill so easily.

   District after District , crowd after crowd, cheers after cheers. It didn't matter to me, nothing else mattered because all I could hear in my head was the old man getting shot. All I could see is the little girl who gave me flowers and looked up at me like I was a true hero, a true Victor.

{~}

   On the last night of the tour, when I was on my way home, I picked up the bottle of wine and poured myself a glass.

   That night, I realized that wine could not only wipe away the thoughts or the memories, but it could also help you sleep.

   That night, I realized why Haymitch loved drinking so much. It gave him peace. It gave him an hour or a day or even a week without the memories of what he had to do in the Arena.

   That night, I also realized that wine wasn't going to help because even when I poured it into my glass, the dark red color reminded me of blood. I couldn't become like Haymitch, I couldn't become lost in the everlasting cycle of wanting one more drink.

   I didn't want to become anyone that I wasn't. I wanted to become the old Coral, the sweet loving Coral that everyone knew. And I knew that it wasn't going to happen if I drank my sorrows away.