Night One
Katniss and Peeta’s baby was only three days old, and Calliope Charm was already in love.
Effie had never known what it was like to raise a child in a place where the world didn’t feel like it might end tomorrow. She was trying. She was trying so hard. But when Calliope looked at her with those wide blue eyes and asked to sleep over —one night, just one night, please, mommy, I’ll be good, I promise— Effie felt her heart splinter down the middle like a snapped wishbone.
“No,” she said, too sharply. “No, darling, you sleep in your own bed tonight.”
“But why?” Callie Charmwhined, already pouting, already winding herself around Effie’s legs like a goose who didn’t understand boundaries. “I love the baby! Auntie Katniss said I could! Uncle Peeta too!”
Effie crouched, hands on her daughter’s small shoulders. “Because you’re six. And because... Because we have a routine, and your pajamas are here, and your comb, and you like the way I braid your hair before bed--”
“Katniss said she’d braid it!”
Effie flinched.
Haymitch was leaning in the doorway of the kitchen, arms crossed, lips pressed thin. He hadn’t said anything yet, but she could feel the weight of his gaze on her spine.
“She’ll be alright,” he said finally. “They live two blocks away.”
The word hit her like a slap. Away.
Her daughter would be away.
No.
She stood up too fast. “I’m not discussing this. Not tonight.”
Calliope’s lip trembled. Effie softened at once. “We can ask them over for dinner tomorrow, yes? You can see the baby then. I’ll make a rhubarb crumble. You like that.”
“But I want to sleep there,” Calliope muttered, turning away, cheeks flushed with small-scale betrayal.
Effie watched her stomp off to her bedroom, her homemade dress—yellow gingham with crooked daisy buttons—flaring out behind her. She left the room, too.
Haymitch followed Effie out onto the porch, the evening warm and soft around them. The geese were already tucked in, their honking quieted, the meadow stretching long and golden under the sinking sun.
“You’re gonna have to let her grow up, darling,” he said gently, nudging her with his shoulder.
Effie rubbed her temples. “She’s six, Haymitch.”
“She’s safe, Effie.”
That was the part Effie could never quite believe.
*
Later, when Calliope came back out with her stuffed bear (way too dirty to Effie's like, but the kid wouldn't let her wash it) in hand and hopeful eyes, Haymitch looked at Effie once, just once, and Effie exhaled.
She smoothed Callie’s curls behind her ear. “Alright. One night. But you brush your teeth. And if you feel scared or cold or... Or if they say no --”
“They won’t say no,” the kid squealed, already out the door, already bounding down the steps.
Effie watched her run, her skinny legs flashing under the hem of her dress, the toy flapping along beside her like a talisman.
How do you explain to a six-year-old that it's not about trust? Not about Katniss or Peeta or the baby. It's about fear that roots itself in your marrow and won't leave. About what happens when people vanish and don't come back. About how many nights Effie spent in a cell, wondering if she'd ever see the sky again. About how silence still makes her nervous.
She didn’t sleep.
Haymitch snored softly beside her, one hand flopped over the pillow she’d pressed to her chest like a life raft. She stared at the ceiling and imagined every terrible thing. Fires. Earthquakes. Rebels bombs. Peacekeepers coming back. Some sick twist of fate, some new evil, some old nightmare.
For all she knew, Snow would raise from the grave —did he even have a grave?— and go after her daughter.
Calliope would be cold. Or the baby would cry and wake her and she’d be too scared to ask for help. Or what if someone broke in?
Effie got up.
She paced the kitchen. She sat in Calliope’s empty bed and held the soft sheets to her chest.
She thought of how they’d taken her, the day the rebellion started. She hadn’t been anyone important, not really. Just a face, barely a name. But she’d known too much. Said too much. Worn too many masks. The cell had been cold. Her skin had cracked. Her voice had stopped working around day two.
Effie clenched the blankets. Not again.
Two minutes later, she shook Haymitch awake.
*
She was on the porch by dawn, pale and shaky, arms wrapped tight around herself.
Katniss came up the road just as the sky began to pinken. Calliope Charm was holding her hand, bouncing slightly with tired excitement.
Effie didn’t wait.
She was down the steps before either of them could speak, pulling her daughter into her arms so fiercely that Callie squeaked.
“I’m okay, Mama,” the kid giggled, surprised. “Uncle Peeta made pancakes!”
Effie pressed her face into her hair. She smelled like syrup and unfamiliar blankets.
“Did you cry?” Her daughter asked, tugging back just enough to look up.
Effie swallowed.
“Only a little.”
Haymitch was in the doorway now, eyes soft with understanding. Katniss gave her a small nod and turned back toward home.
Calliope reached into her little bag and pulled out a smudged drawing. Similar to the ones she usually made; a big man, Haymitch, a woman in a long dress, her, and a little girl. But now there was a baby with big eyes right next to them.
“This is you,” she said, pointing to a figure in a long blue dress. “And this is me. And the baby. I want one.”
Effie laughed through the lump in her throat. “One what?”
“A baby.”
She smoothed her daughter's curls and whispered, “One miracle at a time, baby.”