Living Lies ✜ Hunger Games x Reader

Hot then Cold

It feels abnormal to be somewhere normal. Doing normal things—if that even makes any sense. The neatly folded, blanched white Peacekeeper uniform rests on the Hawthornes' table, taunting you. Your eye rests on a tiny wrinkle in the fabric, and with a heavy sigh, yank the bulky suit off of the wooden surface with a swipe of your hand and spread it out to refold the uniform, for probably the fifteenth time since you've taken the damn thing off.

"Are you going to fold that again?"

You look up suddenly, startled by the amusement and slight concern in Gale's voice. With a wry smile, you whip around to face him. "Yes, actually," you stick out your tongue, mocking playfulness, "it's the only thing that's keeping me sane."

Feeling Gale's gaze studying you silently, you sigh and drop your faltering hands away from the Peacekeeper uniform. He's known you for long enough, he can see right through your weak attempts at trying to be your normal self by feigning sarcasm.

"You were never that good of an actress. How you managed to fool all of Panem into thinking you didn't care for the baker, I have no idea."

"The 'baker', has a name you know," you pause, throwing a glance at your friend. "Seems that you watched the Games enough, you should know."

"I didn't watch them because I wanted to. I had to know if you or Peeta would make it out. How it would affect Katniss and I. But I knew you never had it in you to kill him."

You begin to feel anger boil in the pit of your stomach at his defensive statement. "Right—not because you were hoping that I'd off Peeta so you can have Katniss for yourself. Is that the only reason? Never mind the promise you made to take care of my family, and how it would affect them."

"That is not what I meant and you know it." Without even looking at your friend, you can tell he seems hurt by your accusation. You can hear it in his voice.

But why shouldn't you be even slightly upset—you know Gale, and his hatred for the Hunger Games, but yet he says he watched them to watch you. Even though he thought from the beginning that you end up sacrificing yourself for Peeta, he watched to see it play out... because if Peeta lived, Gale might lose Katniss anyways, but if you lived, and Peeta died, it would be the other way around.

"Were you really hoping that I would break my promise to my friend and to the country so you could satisfy your crush?" you burst out. "That I would kill somebody for you? Or that maybe both of us would die in there and you would never have to worry about Katniss choosing between you and Peeta?"

"I never wanted you to die!"

"But you wanted me to live a hell," your voice raises automatically, and then suddenly and involuntarily drops to a pained whisper. "You didn't mean it, but... That arena, everything, was hell. I made choices I never should have had to, all because I was forced to please too many people. And I hated it.

"But it wasn't until I let go of what I thought I had with Peeta that I realized that I wanted to save him. But I never asked for it. I never asked to die," your voice trails off, breaking into tiny shards of glass and sliding down your throat, leaving cracks. "I never wanted to fool myself into feeling myself die. But I never thought in a million years that I would have welcomed it. I—I... needed out of that arena, some way, somehow. It was a relief. It was pain. But it was satisfaction."

"(Y/n)," Gale began cautiously, "you're not making any sense. You need to calm down."

With a sad smile, you close your eyes, relishing the quiet. "Don't you get it? This is my calm. The Games, they changed me. I don't make sense except to myself—hell, sometimes I don't even then," you rub your hands up and down your face rapidly. "I feel so much at once, it's like a flood that I can't hide from. I have this voice that's always screaming inside my head. Sometimes I'm sure I'm going insane."