Living Lies ✜ Hunger Games x Reader

Realism

(A/N: Hallo! It's been a while, guys, but I'm back with an update! This chapter is based around a prompt I'm trying (*Start your story with a phrase that's lighthearted and end the story with the same phrase, but with a darker meaning) and also multiple dialogue prompts to help get the creative juices flowing. I hope you enjoy!

-Jay

*****

The realism of it all terrified you.

You were finally home, in District 12, surrounded by the people you called your friends and your family. It made you feel satisfied, happy even. Your mission to get home was complete.

Had the reunion come sooner, or maybe even later, you might feel more secure about how long the relief would last. There was a whirlwind of emotions crashing around in your brain like waves. Your mind couldn't separate peace and quiet, chaos and anarchy anymore. Maybe Gale was right. Maybe you were crazy. But even if you were, you were happier now than you had been in weeks, even months.

Yes, you think, holding your arms out as if to shush the already stunned and murmuring crowd, it's quite possible I'm going insane. But if insanity is happiness, maybe I like it better than suffering.

How does one get themselves into such a convoluted mess as yours? You volunteer for your best friend's little sister so she doesn't get whisked off into an arena or children just like her, trying to kill her. Take her place. And when the time comes, you "give up your life" for the boy who loves the girl who's like a sister to you, only to discover who really holds the power of life and death their hands—they that stole your peace from you. And when you find your sacrifice all in vain, only to lose Prim once again, that's how you managed to find yourself back on stage again. The same stage that changed your life almost a year ago, with just those two little words.

It isn't the same Effie that stands on stage now. Back then, she was plastic, and hollow, a Capitol's echo. You melted her plastic. Now, her shocked face conveys true emotion—the first real pain for her to show publicly.

Haymitch stands to the side. He isn't shocked—he knew all along, of course, he was the one who woke you from your stupor. Rather, he appears angry; and maybe the slightest bit relieved.

Prim and Katniss are one horrified huddle, two braids, brunette and blonde, whose bond can't be broken. Or least not yet.

Your mother is hysterical, whether with happiness or fifteen emotions at once you're not sure. Her face is buried in the shoulder of man who you haven't seen standing upright, looking well, since before you met Gale. Your father seems more distressed than anything.

And Peeta. Oh, poor Peeta. He looked at if somebody had just slapped him across the face with a metal glove. He looked as if someone had shoved ice cold water over his head and down his back. He looked as if he had just told him his best friend was in a bed dying, and there was nothing he could do. The baker was in pain, his face contorted into a frozen look of shock, and his eyes expressed a tidal wave of helplessness. He had changed the most since before your games. He grew from his naïve baker boy impression to the one legged winner of the 74th Hunger Games. A man who had seen things, and felt things nobody should.

And you were causing it. All the pain, shock, and helplessness. The terror, distress, and hysteria. Everything the people you cared about were feeling, came from the lie they had been told. And in that moment, you never hated the Capitol more. 

Finally, the first reaction came. It wasn't from Effie, even, who was standing closest to you where you had rushed on stage. It came from Haymitch, who looked unsurprised but nonetheless ready to spit nails. Why not, when you had just destroyed everything District 13 was planning, and slipped right underneath the alcoholic's nose?