The years all blur together. It's all a mess of everyone dying and waking up screaming and Annie not getting better. He can't save them, no matter what he does, he can't save them. Not any of them. Not even himself. His life is a blur of hopelessness and sex and too many secrets wearing him down. He can feel the whisper of lips against every part of his body and secrets in every corner of his mind. He's stopped being able to see an end to it all. But then she happens.

There is something fascinating in the pull of her tanned skin across her face, a little too tight, her cheekbones slightly too prominent to be conventionally attractive. She looks hungry. She looks starved. He finds he likes the too bright nature of her eyes, almost feral, like an animal. She looks wild and strong and free. There is something unyielding in the stubborn clench of her jaw. He looks into her eyes and he sees determination. And he thinks, oh yes, things are about to get very interesting.

He studies her: replays the clip a million times from every angle he can conjure up, studies the look of anguish on her face when her sister's name is called, follows the curve of her arm when she pushes the girl aside with his eyes, analyzes her face to see if he can figure her out, but she is still an enigma. He does not know whether be frustrated or impressed.

He should see her as the competition. He should be looking for all her flaws, all the ways he can take her down. He should meet the eyes of his two tributes, open and innocent and trusting, and tell them, "you're going to win. I am going to make sure of it." He should believe it.

They die early on. He was never betting on them.

She has a wild look about her. He thinks at first that it is just the panic in her eyes, the fear of her death growing larger in her peripherals. But when he looks again he sees that it's more than that. There is something different about her than anyone he has seen in a long while.

He doesn't believe her charade. The mask she wears when she looks at that boy is the one he wears everyday and he's been wearing his far longer than she has.

He watches her closer than he would care to admit, following her screen almost exclusively. She is a fighter, he will give her that. And clever. Cleverer than he ever expected a girl from District Twelve to be. He sees fire in her eyes, burning with an intensity that matches the fire surrounding her. He sees chaos and anger and fear and strength in her. And as she raises the berries to her lips, he thinks, she'll do.

The Mellark boy, with his easy laughter and open heart, has never interested him. It is Katniss, who smiles with angry eyes and clenched fists, that he relates to. She sparks the anger, almost forgotten, within him. And as he watches her turn her eyes to the camera, he feels his lips curling upwards.

She looks younger up close and far more innocent than he was expecting.

There's something almost therapeutic about seeing her raging and crying and screaming in front of him, as if she is the physical manifestation of his own pain. And he looks at her face and sees his love for Annie and he thinks, oh.

He doesn't know whether he's happy or sad to discover that he was wrong about her.

He takes the rope in his hands, twisting it into knots, weaving it in and out, in and out. He follows the grain of it with his hands, tracing the pattern. He doesn't realize he's made a noose until he's holding the finished product.

He tries to tell himself that this is just like the rope, a distraction, That he's imagining a girl with lighter hair and a different kind of madness when he presses her against the wall. He almost believes it.

But not quite.