thecapitol | Pretty paper, pretty ribbons of blue.

Entry tags:

Pretty paper, pretty ribbons of blue.

WHO| Wyatt and OTA
WHAT| Christmas Shopping!
WHERE| Various Capitol shops
WHEN| After getting the Secret Santa notes
Warnings| None at the moment. Will edit if anything comes up!

Like all the others, Wyatt had discovered the note in his room directing him to come up with a gift for one of his fellow tributes for Christmas. Never mind that he'd never even met the "Iskierka" listed on the card, or even known there was any kind of gift exchange going on in the first place.

...But he couldn't say that the idea didn't appeal, the more he thought about it. There hadn't been much to celebrate, that first Christmas of his in the Capitol, but this year....

Picking up the strange card he'd been given - trying not to think of the funds they'd given him as blood money - he cornered his escort for information (the man tried at least to look sheepish for signing Wyatt up) and then headed out into the snow.

Even armed with everything his escort could tell him about Iskierka, Wyatt still had little idea where to start shopping for a dragon. While he chewed it over, he hunted down some other gifts, knowing nothing would really be able to tell Max or Howard what they meant to him, but wanting to do something, all the same.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Wyatt was just leaving one of the many shops he'd been in that afternoon, still weighing the wisdom of the purchase he'd just made - or lack of it - when Howard's voice broke through the chilly air.

As if his thoughts had conjured the boy. The little box in his hand some sort of siren call.

Quickly, he tucked it into one of the deep pockets of his woolen coat and turned with a smile, pausing where he was on the sidewalk to give Howard time to reach him.

"Howard," he dipped his head in a pleasant nod, mouth curled at one corner. "Stayin' out of trouble, I trust?"

"You say that like I get into trouble on purpose." Howard presses his lips together and shakes his head, then licks some run-off from his nose from his upper lip. He jams his hands in his pockets and kicks his way onto the sidewalk, glittering with salt and tread.

For once, he's let his Stylist run a little wild. His scarf has intricate gold embroidery of nutcrackers and rocking horses, and his red gloves have little tassels around the wrist. Though it's hard to look dapper when wearing your own body weight in warm clothing, he manages to look both stylish and painfully festive.

"Whatcha got there?"

Howard was a bright little bird, hopping up beside him. Wyatt's festive spirit regulated to the box he'd just tucked into his pocket and a scarf, an emerald plaid, wound loosely about his throat.

"I say it like ya got a knack for it," he replied without missing a beat. The pull of his mouth growing as he buttoned his pocket, the box safe inside. "An' nothin' for ya to worry yerself about."

"Kinda harder to deny that." He falls into step with Wyatt, rubbing at his reddish eyes. "Don't think I'm not the kind of kid who peeks at presents early. I totally am."

"Good thing I keep 'em close then," Wyatt chuckled. Not particularly surprised, nor troubled, that Howard could guess what he was up to.

Shortening his stride so the boy could keep up, he looked across at him. "So you'll jus' to wait like everyone else."

"Careful, old man. I got sticky fingers." Howard's grin works up to the apples of his cheeks, drawn otherwise taut by stress and thinness. He seems a little out of breath already.

"I ain't gotten you nothing yet."

His smile turned gentle, the amusement in his eyes shifting into something softer and warmer.

"It ain't a requirement, son," he told Howard, reaching out to rest a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Ya don't need to get me anythin'."

He jerks from the hand (The Flinch returned) without thinking. He catches himself immediately, and tries to find words to preclude the hurt and worry he knows will cross Wyatt's face. "Sorry, sorry! It's not you, it's just, since Aunamee..."

Hard to be comforting about this. "I been on edge." He forces a smile. "Let's walk? I beg you haven't even decorated your room yet."

It's there, just as Howard expected, a flash in Wyatt's eyes that he couldn't quite stop. His smile fell, and disappeared, as he pulled back.

But he tried to cover for it. Clearing his throat gently and nodding.

"It's alright, Howard. I understand."

His hands fell back to his sides, settled lightly on his belt.

"An' no, I ain't. An' much reason to, there's a fine tree in the common room."

Howard's lip quivers slightly, but he nods and falls back into step. He doesn't want to be the one who broaches the topic of how vital it is he wins yet. How he doesn't know if he'll survive otherwise.

"That's no way to have holiday spirit." He grins - decorating Wyatt's room will be a good chance to grab some of Wyatt's things for repairs. "We gotta use our kill money for something, might as well be Christmas cheer."

He did chuckle softly at that, a low rumble as he pushed the previous moment's awkwardness away. (No sense dwelling on what Howard didn't really mean and he couldn't change even if he did.)

"Ain't that what I'm doin' out here?" he asked, giving his pocket a little shake, the box inside rattling gently. "I didn't know trees an' lights an' tinsel were a requirement."

If Howard were a dog, his ears would be visibly perked at the sound of the rattling.

"Uh, duh. They're a requirement. I'm not letting you spend Christmas like a lonely old man, okay? My last two Christmases sucked and I'm not wishing that on no one I like." He cants his head to the side. "Who you shopping for?"

"An' fancy decorations'll ward off all that?" he asked, leaning back at the shoulder, looking at Howard incredulously.

But he wasn't fighting. Just pulling Howard's tail some as they strolled down the sidewalk.

"I 'spose it is better to be safe rather than sorry."

Pulling his hand away from the pocket with the box, he reached into his breast pocket instead, pulling out the neatly folded card he'd found in his room.

"Capitol says I'm to get somethin' for Iskierka." He looked at Howard hopefully. "You know her?"

"Fancy decorations are the antithesis of bitter." Howard looks quite proud to have pulled that vocabulary word out of his hat.

"The dragon?" Whoa, awkward. Howard's face blanches a few shades. His eyes widen and he stares at the snow. "Uh, yeah. She lives in my Suite. Pretty sure dragons are cold-blooded so maybe you should get her a heat rock or something."

Wyatt noticed Howard's reaction, the way he paled even more than he had when he'd tried to touch him.

Clearly, Howard did know her.

For a moment he was silent, wondering if it would be better to just let it go.

"A heat rock..." he finally echoed, slow and uncertain. Not because he necessarily disagreed, but because he had no idea what that was supposed to be. "Don't 'spose you'd mind pointin' one out to me?"

"Sure. We can probably find it at a pet store or something. It's like...it's a rock you put in aquariums that heats up so lizards and stuff can stay warm."

Howard's much more comfortable talking about this than how he knows Iskierka.

"And I should hit the pet store anyway so I can get something for Sigma. And maybe a Santa hat for my Tribble."

That didn't exactly clear things up - he would have to see it for himself to really understand - but he fell into step just the same. Trusting in Howard.

At the mention of the fuzzy little tribble, he couldn't help but smile.

"How's the little bit doin' by the way?" he asked. "Get through the arena alright?"

Pasha had said it would - that it would be waiting just as happy as when it had been left - but like the heat rock, he was more inclined to believe it when he saw it.

"I think it misses me, but it's kind of hard to tell, you know? It purrs but then it kind of always does that." It bothers Howard to leave one of his pets in the care of an Avox, especially since he's still not certain he isn't torturing the poor thing by not feeding it.

Howard takes Wyatt down to the same petshop he stole Sigma's cat from. Patterned puppies yip and gambol in the front window. Howard pauses in front of a cage of kittens and reaches his hand in to pick up one blue tabby.

They were quite the bunch, these Capitol folks. Just when Wyatt thought he'd seen everything, they brought out the tiger-puppies and the pink kittens.

What would they think of next?

The kitten mewled, that high-pitched cry of a baby, and Wyatt reached out to pet it, scratching the tiny ears gently.

"'Spose I could get Max a pup to go with his cat," he joked. "But it'd probably figure the little thing was a snack."

"That cat thought I was a snack," Howard says, making an exaggerated pout. "Wish I could have a cat."

He gazes wistfully at the kitten in his hand, then dumps it back into the pen.

An employee comes by, sees their cuffs, and clears his throat at them.

The kitten padded off, returning to it's bothers and sisters all stiff-legged and fluffed, and Wyatt turned narrowed eyes onto the employee. Nothing way his eyes roamed over them and lingered at Howard's wrist.

"Heat rocks?" he asked flatly.

The employee seemed to consider it a moment, as if weighing whether or not to lie, then nodded down the aisle.

"In the back."

"Let's just boost 'em," Howard mutters, wondering if he can turn the marshal lawless just for this moment. He wanders to the back and points out the rocks. "Something like that?"

While 'boost'em' was not a phrase Wyatt was particularly familiar with, he was able to figure out the meaning by context.

"Someone bein' an ass don't give us the right to steal from 'em," he murmured with a frown, following Howard toward the back of the store. "Though it does mean ya don't have to pretend to be nice to 'em."

And if Howard wanted to let loose with that sharp tongue Wyatt knew all too well he had, he wouldn't say anything.

Moving up beside him, Wyatt looked over the boxes, at the few rocks out on display and arched an eyebrow.

"...Bit on the small side, ain't they?"

"These people watch us kill each other on TV. I'm having a hard time respecting the law right now." But Howard keeps his hands to himself, balled up in little fists inside his coat pockets.

"Maybe get a whole bunch of them and fill a stocking with them?"

"Hmm." Wyatt hummed thoughtfully, a rumbling sound in the back of his throat as he reached out to take one of the display stones in hand.

Plastic - like so many things in this place - with a long cord sticking out from one side.

"An' she's 'sposed to lay on these?"

Didn't sound particularly comfortable... but then he wasn't dragon either.

Pretty paper, pretty ribbons of blue.

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