thecapitol | Flecks of the Heavens' Spat Out Spit [OPEN]

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Flecks of the Heavens' Spat Out Spit [OPEN]

WHO| Jason Compson and Open; Jason and Swann; Jason, Rick and Daryl
WHAT| Jason gets a migraine and is helpless; Jason beats an Avox; Jason gives Swann a gift; Rick and Daryl get the shotguns.
WHEN| Week 6
WHERE| D7 Suites; Swann's place
WARNINGS/NOTES| Avox abuse, migraines, general Jason awfulness. If you're going to tag the second prompt, please PP or PM me first so we can figure out where it's going and how far to take it, because Jason won't hesitate to put someone in jail.

I. Open

He knew he was going to have one of his headaches from the beginning of the morning, when every light seemed to have a ring radiating off of it and everything seemed to smell like rainwater. The one upside to the curse of these migraines is that he usually gets a few hours head start on them, with the feeling of deadly premonition, and so he spends most of the day trying to finish up everything as quickly as he can and clock out early. The calls to Sponsors and thank you cards to donors becomes a race against time, one which he sees himself losing too late to actually prevent disaster.

First he can't see, and then he can't move. Even breathing seems to put too much strain on him, and the throbbing, tightening hammering in his head gets worse with every exhale. The inside of his body feels like a live wire, sparking away inside his skull at camera-shutter speed. Nausea roils inside his throat and stomach, furling and unfurling like the tide.

When he opens his eyes the light is too bright, speckled with floating spots and halos, and he feels like the universe itself is trying to cram itself through his eyesockets and that his bones have made the opening too small to fit. So he keeps them shut and rolls over on the District Seven couch until he's facedown in a pillow, sweating slightly, trying not to whimper.

He has no hope of driving himself home, and even the idea of getting up seems a cruel joke. He tries twice, and both times a surge of nausea and a thunderclap of pain force him back down. So he lies there, hoping to whatever powers that be that his Tributes stick to their schedules and don't come bother him.

II. Open (please read note)

What started off as a strong Arena quickly loses those good odds as the District Seven Tributes die in the field and the District Suite gets repopulated. The worse it looks, the worse Jason's temper gets, until he's liable to throw something at the slightest provocation, which the Games video updates seem eager to supply him with. At least twice this week he's broken a glass, and yesterday smacked a table so hard that he has a ring of bruising around his finger like a wedding band.

With only Nick left in the Arena, Jason and Emily's chances are getting desperate, and the worst blow comes to Jason's ego when he realizes that no amount of fawning and flattery and networking seems to be enough to get Nick more supplies in the Arena. It stings to feel powerlessness, and to make it worse the only person willing to spot Nick a fire-starting kit's funds will only do it on condition that Jason go drinking with him - no sobriety allowed. Jason turns it down, but doesn't leave with his head held high so much as rankled and humiliated, and every ungrateful glance from his Tributes reminds him of how his family used to practically own this damn country and yet here he is, exposing his belly to anyone with money, helpless and inept and so, so frustrated with his life. Dressed in a suit he got from someone else's charity and supporting a home full of ingrates and lonely and with a fury as endless as the sky.

Whatever it is that set Jason off this time, it isn't sated just by smashing a piece of kitchenware. This time he backhands the Avox who rushes in to try and clean up the coffee mug he throws against the floor, sending them into the couch.

III. Swann

For someone who usually agonizes over every half-assi that goes to a necessary cause, Jason doesn't seem to mind spending money on Swann. He complains about it, at times, but it's more to go through the motions of complaining than because it actually bothers him. He buys her coffee when he can and tells her to save her money when they get lunch, getting sulky and defensive when she insists on splitting the tab. Sometimes he buys her a pastry on his way to pick her up for carpooling, although he doesn't let her eat it in the vehicle, and he has yet to ask her to help pay for fuel.

Today he shows up at her place with a large carrier in the back of his car, covered by a blanket, with a towel underneath it to protect the seats. Something inside is making scratching sounds. Jason looks a little frazzled, and shows up a few minutes late from a different route than he usually takes. He presses a button inside the car and the door opens for Swann.

"You coming, Honeymead?"

IV. Daryl and Rick

The rumors spread quickly after the Crowning, and all of them rub Jason the wrong way. A few photographs of him and Beth at the Crowning, him whispering into her ear, have made the rounds on tabloids, some of them even frontpage for the publications hungry enough to fabricate a scandal for readership. Jason's certain that he wouldn't ever touch a Tribute like that, but the fact that people are so eager to believe it of him leaves his pride feeling excoriated.

For his part, Jason doesn't treat Beth any differently, except for being a bit more stiff and cranky with her than he might have been before. But whispers swarm around them like a plague of mosquitoes, making a to-do out of something as simple as him Escorting her to a photoshoot with horses (A PONY FOR A PRICE?, a headline questions; another goes even more outrageous and wonders if Beth will say 'neigh' to marriage). He can only imagine the explanations she's making to the passel of Southerners who seem so eager to protect her.

Right now he's in the District Seven kitchen, glasses parked precariously on the tip of his nose as he writes by hand some math for the District budget. He's taken to putting most of his notes on his phone lately; he used to be able to leave writing around, but that was when most Tributes were entirely illiterate. His suit jacket hangs over the back of a chair and his shirt sleeves are pushed up to his elbows. A cup of coffee, long-cooled, sits beside him, and he occasionally asks his phone to answer some percentages questions for him.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I'll try and smile more for you, I guess." He kisses her back and goes around the car to let her out. "But no one else. They haven't earned my good humor."

Before she gets out of the car, he lifts her and carries her across the parking lot, laughing to himself.

Swann laughs and beams when he picks her up and carries her, arms locking around his neck as her feet kick in the air. "You're so ridiculous!" she cries through laughter. "My legs are going to atrophy and I'm going to have to get a wheelchair!"

"My mother's haven't yet, so I think you'll be fine." He grins and sets her down on the curb in front of the restaurant. "Looks like we're the only customers."

Which Jason will prefer, honestly. He's already feeling calmer than when he got home, but not up to explaining his injury to bystanders without ranting about it.

She grins back at him, taking hold of his hand and squeezing it as she leads him to the door, opening it and walking in. A bell chimes their arrival, and it's warm inside, cozy and sweet-smelling, and she heads for the counter, looking up at the menu for a moment before ordering.

"Can I have a lemon crepe and a glass of water?" she asks the girl at the counter, then glances at Jason, waiting for him to order too.

Something about this place is 'traditional', as opposed to the more cutting-edge restaurants in the Capitol. There are menus, silk flowers in little vases on the tables, and a woman behind a stove who is wearing her hair in a simple bun rather than in an extravagant style. The overhead lamp is dim but warm, and Jason realizes as his eyes seem to relax how his light sensitivity hasn't completely vanished since yesterday.

"Strawberry crepe and decaf coffee, please. Black." He slips his credit card over to the barista. Behind the counter, he squeezes Swann's hand, then twines their fingers. They take a seat near the window.

"Thank God it's nearly our day off." He settles in, glancing out the window to make sure his car's lights are appropriately off. "Maybe if neither of us have any more dire health emergencies, we can try kiting again."

Swann likes that it's not as modern as most other places, likes that it's little and cute and sweet and classic. It makes her comfortable, in a way that she's usually not at fancier places.

She sits across from him and rests her elbow on the table so that she can prop her chin in her hand as she looks at him, and she stretches her leg under the table to bump her toes against his. "As long as we can sleep in first."

He bumps his toes against hers back, then slouches a bit in his seat so he can tap his ankle against hers. He can feel the leather bow from the buckle scratching against him over his sock.

"I'm not opposed to that. But how long do you expect us to sleep? We already spent most of yesterday in bed. That ought to count for something against our debt."

She regrets now her decision to wear shoes that she can't slip off, that she has to actually unfasten. All she can do is rub their ankles together, gently so she doesn't catch his sock and damage it.

"We don't have to be asleep. I just don't want to get out of bed until it feels comfortable. We can go out a little later, too, when it's warmer."

He likes this, planning with her. It's like he's sketching out an alternate life for himself, one away from everything he hates in the one he has. One without family or work or obligation, just the easy pleasure of having her company (of having her).

"Then you're going to need to switch beds, because yours is the most comfortable one I know. I sleep deeper there than any mattress I've owned."

The crepes come and he sips coffee, cuts it with a fork.

She takes a bite of her crepe, closes her eyes and sighs at how good it tastes. She knows that she'll probably only manage a few bites, half of it at most, but at least those bites will be delicious, won't be the blandness of toast and oatmeal that Eta enforces for a few days after a bad episode.

"It had to be special-made in One, you know. Because of the shape of the bed. And if you sleep that well on it, then I can't get rid of it, or you might miss it and go get one yourself."

"I don't see the tragedy in me getting a new bed, honestly. I haven't changed mine in twenty years." Some of it's just old-fashioned paranoia, as if the presence alone of movers in his bedroom will siphon off the money kept in his strongbox.

He finds he's hungrier than he thought, even having eaten. The last day seemed to take it out of him. When it's clear she won't be finishing hers, he cuts a few pieces off with his fork and takes them for himself, giving her a teasing look like he's trying to be sneaky.

"The tragedy is that you'll go sleep in that bed instead of mine. That said, probably you should get a new mattress before one of the springs in yours breaks your spine. No wonder you have trouble sleeping."

She rubs her ankle against his again, then sees him taking her food. She sticks her tongue out for a second, but then pushes the plate toward him and takes a sip of her water, resting her cheek on her hand as she watches him eat.

"Oh, no, the mattress has been swapped out a few times. Just not the frame. It's a family heirloom or something like that." Not that Jason really cares about that, but it's stayed out of convenience. "Mother throws a fit when I try to save money by having Benjy use the old mattresses. I say it's not like he can tell the difference, but then she insists on all sorts of sleep technology foam for him and badgers me until I do it."

He polishes off her food in short order, intermittently smiling at her throughout, watching her sip her water.

"It must be nice enough, if your family's kept it around. My dad keeps all the family stuff, it's mostly dark and heavy, the furniture. There's a lot of, um... scrimshaw?" She makes a face. "Grandpa Honeymead collected it, scrimshaw and ivory carvings and stuff like that."

She takes another drink of water and smiles, thinking about the second thing he said. "Well, maybe he sleeps better on the foam kind? Wouldn't that help with all the, you know, the noise? If he has a good night's sleep?" Her voice has a soft edge that it always gets when Benjy is brought up, the one she can't control because he really is innocent, he's probably the only innocent person in the whole Capitol.

Edited 2015-03-18 23:38 (UTC)

"If it makes a difference, I haven't heard it yet. Like I say, I don't think he can tell. When we were kids we tried to see how hard we had to pinch him for him to feel pain, and he could stand more than a normal person." Caddy had a fit about it. Jason was four.

He holds none of the sentimentality (the empathy) that Swann does for his brother. "Ivory's good stuff. Did you know that in the days before Panem it was outlawed? How's that for madness?"

She lets it go, knows it's best for now if she does. He won't allow her to give Benjy cake, there's no way he'll listen if she insists that it's nice anyway, to give him good mattresses and not just assume he's immune to normal levels of pain.

Swann reaches across the table so he'll hold her hand, her eyebrows arching. "Why? Did it used to be dangerous before, did we somehow change it and make it safe?"

He squeezes her hand. "I don't know. Apparently animals used to be endangered, we couldn't just engineer them. At least, that's what my brother - Quentin, not Benjy - said."

Strange to imagine, a world like that.

He gets up, still holding her hand. "Ready to go?"

"Uh-huh." She stands up too, lacing their fingers together and moving close to him. Her head is cocked thoughtfully, thinking about the idea of animals being hunted to death, instead of disappearing mysteriously like dinosaurs. "I suppose I understand that. It would be sad if all the elephants and whales and things disappeared just for little decorations. It must have been hard before we could engineer animals, making sure that they lasted and didn't all die out."

"I don't know. What I say is maybe if an animal was so weak it got put to better use being jewelry or clothing, maybe it didn't deserve to get revived. Maybe it'd be better just as an occasional surprise muttation for the Games." He shrugs as he takes her hand. "We do better than nature, I guess."

As usual, the tip for the waiter is pitiful, but he doesn't let Swann see what he puts on the check. He takes her back to the car, and leaning back against the car, he lifts her a bit so he can kiss her..

He opens the door to the backseat, rather than the passenger's.

"Don't say that, maybe it wasn't down to toughness. How can they defend themselves against guns and things like that?" Your lady has a soft spot for animals, Jason, maybe don't prod at it.

She wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him back, her toes brushing the ground as he holds her up just that little bit. He opens the back door and she arches her eyebrow, but gets in anyway, crawling across the seat to wait for him.

"Well, we haven't driven Districters to extinction yet, so they manage somehow."

He grins, because he's joking, really, and the orange light of the streetlamp makes his cheeks look rounder, his smile deeper and younger. He climbs in after her, closing and locking the door behind them, before meeting her lips with his. He pursues her like a teenage boy, made clumsy by the small space of the back of the car.

For a moment, he pauses, cradling her face and looking at her in the light of a Thursday night, the orange and blues casting new shadows on her face, making those dark eyes seem wide and pooling. He doesn't need to say he finds her beautiful. He probably would stop believing it if he did say it out loud. So he doesn't.

She touches his cheek, looks up at him with hooded eyes and a soft smile. She feels warm inside, like maybe she contains sunlight, and it's been a long time since she's felt anything like what she does around Jason, even for all his faults, even when they fight and she cries.

"What?" she asks softly, leaning her head into his hand.

"Nothing. Aren't I allowed to just look at you?"

He lowers his hand from her chin to her neck, the place where he stamps so many kisses on her like a cattle brand, then her collarbone that juts forward like a stick from a bird's nest. The shadows make it severe, but drape her lower body in a sort of mystery.

"Doesn't anyone do that anymore?"

She moves her hand to graze the back of his, where he's touching her, then slides it up his arm to grip his bicep. His sleeve rumples under her hand, and she rubs with her thumb where the fabric's gone taut.

"Look at me? No. No one really looks at me anymore."

I do. He leans in and kisses her again, feeling how every part of her is small (her teeth her tongue her nose her chin). His hand descends further, into the shadows, down to her thigh. Usually her thighs are covered in crinoline and no one sees how strong they are from yoga and her towering heels.

"Their loss."

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[cw: things gonna get raunchy]