Work Text:
*
It happens so fast.
Shrieks, from all ends of President Snow's banquet room, echo each other like District 12's mockingjay calls. Katniss's head rings with them.
Those around her, cornering Katniss, flee.
And… a warm, familiar-feeling hand snatches onto her.
Katniss lurches in her high heels, but follows at Cinna's back as he tugs Katniss's wrist and opens a door with a hand visibly bleeding.
"Come inside. I want you to sit down. Haymitch took Peeta — they're alright." It's enough for her hearing that. Cinna makes sure she's on a velvet and elaborately patterned sofa before turning to a dining stool. He passes her a glass of water. Katniss assumes it is. "Drink. It'll help."
She breathes hard, gasping, taking a mouthful of it at room temperature.
No…
Katniss remembers the tiny stemmed wineglass — and its clear liquid — and several fingers of one of the Capitol citizens roughly pinching Katniss's nostrils to force her lips open — ughh, another mouthful of water drips down Katniss's chin as she struggles against a noisy gag-gasp.
In no time, Cinna kneels beside her and encourages Katniss to breath through the spasms for air, to look at him, to focus.
His faint, gold eyeliner… Katniss refocuses on that, eyeing him. Slowly, so slowly, breathing's gotten easier.
"Good. Tell me exactly what happened, Katniss."
"You were there," she protests.
Cinna offers a slight shake of his head. "Only at the end of it."
Right… Katniss ended up without anyone she knew well during the party, forcing awkward laughs, overhearing conversations. Peeta and Haymitch drifted towards the new Gamemaker, Peeta's golden head occasionally swiveling in Katniss's direction. Making sure she wasn't far. Then…
Katniss's eyes lower to Cinna's dark brown knuckles.
They're starting to quickly swell up. Very quickly. Not difficult to tell even with the blood.
Cinna promptly touches over his injury, with another uninjured hand, and gazes reproachfully to the door.
Nobody's coming.
Thankfully.
"I…" Katniss says, getting Cinna's attention back. His eyes soften. "I was being congratulated… about the engagement to Peeta they all saw because of Caesar Flickerman's interview, and… our 'victory' after the Games." Her face scrunches, perplexed. "Someone complimented my… my lipstick?"
Somehow, this makes Cinna beam.
"It's all over you now," he points out, chuckling, unpocketing a gold-threaded handkerchief and dabbing Katniss's mouth gently. Until it mottles a shimmery, fiery pink. Katniss scrubs herself with the back of a hand, tasting the oil residue left of her bath. Like dried lavender blossoms.
Katniss grumbles, and then realizes in the silence building between them… Cinna's waiting for her. To explain further.
Sighing, she does: Effie introduced someone else from the Capitol who kept asking about Peeta's paintings. His talent as a Victor. Every one of the Victors are meant to have one when they don't attend school or work in their District. And asking what talent Katniss chose for herself. Katniss told him it was dress-making. Cinna picked it for her. Katniss never told anyone but Peeta about how Cinna makes all of Katniss's dresses.
"Nothing else happened. Up until… the man Effie introduced? He was drinking heavily when we were talking. I said I wanted more of the hot raspberry soup, but I was only having one bite for each dish. I said I couldn't have more. He didn't care, I don't think. He… he tried to force me to…"
"And before you knew it… I was there," Cinna reiterates, having over the same sudden scene playing in Katniss's memory.
Katniss being pried out of the man's hands… Cinna's fist going out… and the shrieks, the people of the Capitol backing up or fleeing…
"What's gonna happen, Cinna?"
She slips off her heels, getting up, Katniss's bare, brown feet padding the fine marbled tiles. Katniss takes another glass of water. As well as a clothed, folded-up napkin from the dining stool. Cinna grimaces for a moment, allowing her to shift his hands onto Katniss's lap full of ruffles.
"There has got to be a punishment planned from the Capitol, right?" Katniss acknowledges grimly. "This is President Snow we're talking about…"
"Someone put their hands on you. I won't regret doing what I did in that moment, Katniss." As soon as she hears Cinna's softly spoken words, Katniss jerks her head up to stare into his unsmiling expression. Her gray eyes wide. "But… I forgot myself. There is no excuse."
"Are we in danger of losing Sponsors?" she asks.
Cinna makes a contemplative hum.
"Both fortunately and unfortunately… I believe they're far too in love with you to consider dropping out."
Katniss's teeth grit.
"I… ugh, I don't love any of this," Katniss mumbles out. Then, "I don't love Peeta."
"That's not your fault."
A part of her guiltily recoils, and she loosens her hold on the blood-tinged napkin pressing on Cinna's injured right hand.
"Something's wrong with me, Cinna…"
"I'm supposed to be madly in love with Peeta… or, at least, convince everyone… and I haven't even been able to do THAT right."
Cinna rarely looks at her so sharply and so sternly, and the corners of Katniss's eyes burn wetly.
"Stop putting yourself down," he insists. "You are under an intense amount of pressure."
"I'm not saying I'm not. But that's… that's not why."
Katniss forces herself to look back down, concentrating, using a bit of the water to rinse off the blood drying. Cinna grunts lowly, obviously feeling the pain whenever Katniss rubs in, but he doesn't pull away. She takes a breath and a half to apologetically squeeze Cinna's fingertips.
"Another boy back in District 12… he's my friend. Gale. I get confused around him. And he's disappointed. Gale wants to kiss me, and hold me, and probably do stuff with me. But, Cinna, I don't want any of that stuff. Kissing or… stuff. He still kissed me. He said he had to do it once."
"But you didn't want to kiss Gale."
"No," Katniss whispers, and it's like a whole weight coming off her. Cinna's understanding… she just needed someone to listen like he is. Believe her. Everyone is gonna fall in love, or so Katniss thought. One day, she'll find love and make babies, and it sounds not at all like Katniss.
(And… President Snow knows about Gale kissing her. Gale's in danger, like Katniss.)
"I feel like I let Gale kiss me to make him happy," she says. "What if I'm doing the same thing deep down with Peeta?"
"Does it feel the same?"
Katniss's mouth twitches downwards. "A little…"
She pours the rest of the water onto Cinna's knuckles, puddling the floor, and looks questioningly around the small, darkened room. "I don't have anything to bind this," Katniss informs him, worried, despite this not being a life-threatening injury. Cinna needs to heal. His hands…
"Let me worry about it," Cinna says reassuringly, his grin warming the center of Katniss's chest. "You have done everything you could, thank you."
"But…"
Without either of them standing, he hugs a surprised-looking Katniss, pulling her in. She feels fingers burying into her dark and curled-from-straight hair. The colorful multitude of jewels, embedded in, sparkling. "Nothing is wrong with you, Katniss Everdeen. Understood?"
Katniss's throat clenches.
She hugs him back, arms tightening around Cinna's neck. What feels like his head rests on top of Katniss's.
"I'm gonna do all I can for you. I promise."
"Why?"
Katniss doesn't know why. Why Cinna defends her, why he fights for her no matter what it is… or why the secretive twinkle in his eye. She doesn't know, and Cinna's mouth holds a long, affectionate kiss against her forehead. One of Cinna's hands lifts, presses in, cradles Katniss's nape.
"Because, when you are friends with somebody, it is what you do," he murmurs, slipping Katniss's heels back on.
While getting led out, Katniss thinks…
It's never made more sense than now.
*