I Have Been Known to Surrender to Anything That Stands [Open]

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

WHO| Howard and open
WHAT| Howard returns to Capitol life. He's not very good at it.
WHERE| A small cafe in the Capitol.
WHEN| End of Week 6
WARNINGS| Mentions of starvation and a stress disorder.

He has to win next time. He's never known this before, not like he does now. If he doesn't win this next time, he's sure he'll either die for good or lose himself completely. There is a point when forging the iron where blows stop forming it and start to distend it, and he's crossed over into the second half of the process.

He returns to Panem the same way he has every time. He returns to schedule, to letting his Escort point him politely in the right direction so she can get him out of her hair and focus on her more promising Tributes. For the most part, she's fond of him, but not about to invest too much energy. Even if he wins one of these days, he'll hardly make a useful Mentor - she predicts he's the type to self-medicate - and so she generally gives him a free reign these days. "Don't do anything gauche, dear." "Make sure your clothes are clean before you step out". "Curfew's at eight p.m., remember that. I want you sleeping in your bed tonight and not in some alleyway again, dear."

He hates that she calls him 'dear'. He hates that she reminds him of a mother - not his mother, but one nonetheless. But he doesn't have the will to hate her, so instead he just hates pieces of her personality as some proxy for the whole. To tell the truth, he doesn't even remember her name beyond 'the Escort'.

Back to scale, he thinks as he weighs himself in the morning, and he laughs at himself without humor or regard for anyone who might hear him. Seventy-two pounds again. Like always, after he dies. Seventy-two pounds and jaw sore from where they ripped his rotting teeth out and replaced them with shiny white straight ones between him dying and him waking back up in Panem. He's back to padded clothing to hide the way the bones jut from under his skin like fingers through latex. Once again he has to sit patiently before he goes anywhere 'people might see him' while his Escort pats makeup on his cheeks to hide their gauntness and pallor, and to distract from the dark circles under his eyes.

He makes sure all his allies are still alive, and he makes sure to set money aside for Wyatt, which comes in handy soon enough. And then he slips back into the life outside the Arena that he's arranged for himself as delicately as dominoes. Get food, get coffee, training center, lunch, training center, dinner, find a quiet spot in town and sleep for a few hours, wake up and read a survival guide or a first aid manual or watch Games footage on his device, sneak back into the Tribute Center before dawn and hope his Escort doesn't give him too much shit in the morning.

Being a creature of habit, he's soon found himself a favorite tiny cafe. Capitol citizens with their inquisitive stares and loud outfits that jab at his eyes and grating, hiccuping voices tend to ignore it, preferring more bombastic locales than a little hole in the wall. Tributes occasionally come in, and Mentors. No one stupid enough to poke and prod about how exciting the Games are and how did it feel to die, how did it feel to choke on your own blood? Isn't it so much nicer, now that you're back?

Well, isn't it?

From a cozy armchair, he can read his book on field-dressing different wild animals while watching the sun go down over the tips of Capitol skyscrapers. He parks his feet up under his butt and shakes the hood from his jacket off his head, not willing to let go of his large mug of hot, creamy coffee even long enough to leave it on the table next to him. He cradles it to his chest like a nursing infant. The warmth from it radiates even through the cotton padding over his concave gut and makes him feel, for a moment, like he's holding a small star inside his core.

He still startles as if he's about to leap out of his own flesh whenever the bell on the door announces visitors and catches him off-guard. Sometimes when someone walks in, he spills his drink on himself and dissolves into frustrated swearing right in front of them.

Comments

Re: aaaa Mindy 8D

[hit_girl_mindy]

It was something that should have been abandoned after the night, but there were some things Mindy could not let go, and despite swearing like a sailor and cutting off limbs at the drop of a hat, there were still some signs of her childhood there. Something things just persisted, and Mindy was content with it.

She snickered at the description. "Hey, she had a trap that pretty much ripped my leg off. Getting the eye ripped out was the least I could do." She took a long drink, looking over at him. "You're made up. I thought these people were supposed to, I don't know, keep you well fed and strong 'till they let the dogs loose on you."

Re: aaaa Mindy 8D

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Hey, I just died. Gimme a break." He wrinkles his nose as if trying to feel out the makeup his Escort patted onto his face. "I've only had like, what, three days to get all well-fed and strong? I'll get there."

Not really. Howard's not blessed with the genetic makeup for being physically strong, at the very least.

"You should've gotten both eyes. It'd be hilarious to watch her stumble around."

Re: aaaa Mindy 8D

[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy wasn't sure she bought that, but then he WAS there longer than he was, and hell, hadn't she been starving too?

"At least your food wasn't, shit, two potatoes? I owe the Doc for that. I got stiffed at Cornucopia. Arrived too late. Better eat up, because, what, I guess sponsors want us looking healthy, right?"

What the fuck DD sponsors want anyway?

"The makeup needs a better touch up," she noted, then sighed. "Yeah, but you know how it is. Leg all mangled up, searing pain up and own your body. Plus, she turned tail and ran after saying some snide crap she thought sounded 'cool.'"

As far as she was concerned, no one could do that when they were bleeding out of their eye.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Hey, I got kidnapped by a serial killer. Let's not play Who's-Got-It-Better."

Howard doesn't like kids. As a general rule, the best they can hope for from him is to be vaguely tolerated. But he decides at that point that he'll tolerate Mindy for now.

"Sponsors want us looking sellable. That don't mean healthy."

[hit_girl_mindy]

She kept her eyes looking impassive, but her ears perked up. So. There was someone like that in the Games. She wondered when that was going to happen.

"No kidding. And he decided to just kidnap and go after you? That is a pretty tough act for follow. He's still in the games too, I bet."

Well that just added to the list of things she was going to have to keep an eye on.

"You'd think healthy and sellable would go hand in hand though."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard shakes his head, dismissing the train of thought. He doesn't want to talk about it. He really doesn't.

"Haha, you ever seen fashion models? They look healthy to you?" Having starved before, Howard's very keenly aware of malnutrition in others now, too.

[hit_girl_mindy]

Ok, he wasn't that casual about his death yet. It must have been bad. She understood to leave well enough alone.

"Fashion models don't have to represent a district, just their own gross selves," Mindy retorted. "We have to look our best or something like that. Least they could do is make us 'FABULOUS.'"

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard waves a finger. "Fashion models represent a brand. So do we. That's what my Escort is always telling me."

[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy made a disgruntled noise. "Yeah, that'll be fun, trotting around parties like I'm some kinda street walker. At least i can take comfort knowing that everyone else has to do it too. So what about you, got a sponsor?"

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"I got people who send me stuff, if that's what you're asking." He isn't surprised the girl has a mouth on her. Business as usual, as far as he's concerned. "They like me for my winning personality."

[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy did not figure him to be the squeamish type: Howard's mannerisms marked him as someone who'd seen way more than he should, and was dealing with that.

"No kidding. Somehow I don't see you playing nice and docile for your fellow sponsors."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"I'm not rude, if that's what you're asking. Not on purpose, at least." He shrugs with his face. "They like a certain image of me. They think I'm vulnerable."

[hit_girl_mindy]

"Wasn't thinking rude: more 'real.' My impression is that you don't play into the bullshit of being nice and showing them how badly you need the sponsorship. Didn't really peg you as 'vulnerable' ether. Do tell."

She'd need this information herself, after all, if she was going to get any sponsors.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

He supposes, to her, he might not look terribly vulnerable. She's about his size, although built like a child and not like a skeleton with the vital organs taped in.

"You'll see when you watch the footage. I cry easy. That's basically it."

[hit_girl_mindy]

"No kiddin'. For the cameras, or do you have reasons?"

Hey, she was curious.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Ouch.

"Who doesn't have reasons, around here? We're in a fucking death match."

[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy shrugged.

"If I'm crying, it'd be for sponsors. Otherwise, the hell with having people see me cry. I already have the handicap of looking like the poster child for happy WASP Americana."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"What, and I don't look like some African kid off the Save the Children campaign?" He smirks and goes back to his coffee.

[hit_girl_mindy]

[Mindy snorted]

You're not THAT damn skinny. Besides, you know these people don't know the difference.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"I don't know, man. I've seen some Rottweilers that outweigh me." On that note, he stirs more sugar and cream into his drink. "They wanted me to do the whole heroin chic thing when I first arrived."

[hit_girl_mindy]

"Well, I mean, you COULD," Mindy said, "but think about it, you'd have to look like that almost all the time. Lips chapped, skin scraped, shivering all the time. You'd look like shit. I get in the games you'd have no choice but outside? They're supposed to pamper your ass a little, why not take advantage of it?"

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Who says I'm not taking advantage of it? It takes a while to put weight on." He shrugs. "I just died."

[hit_girl_mindy]

"True," Mindy said. "Now that I think about it, I was pretty damn near starving too. Thank fucking God for the Doc and her potatoes, or I wouldn't have needed Azula's help."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Tell you one thing." Howard grimaces. "I never want an entirely inedible Arena again. That was bullshit."

[hit_girl_mindy]

"No kidding," Mindy said, sharing a look of disgust. "Yeah, not enough to have total strangers trying to kill me, let's starve you too! Christ, I'm surprised no one was eating someone else in this thing."