Spring 2014

It was raining.

A tall, handsome young man was chasing after a willowy blonde in a black dress, calling out her name.

"Madge," he panted, an umbrella in his hand. "Madge, wait."

Too late, Madge Undersee thought. Two seconds in this downpour and it had already soaked her to the bone. A lot can happen in two seconds.

Two seconds and her hair was already plastered to her forehead, dripping water into her eyes, making it all but impossible to see her boyfriend Seneca hurrying toward her in his previously immaculate three-piece suit.

Two seconds and her own dress was already like a second skin, clinging almost obscenely to every curve on her body. Dad would have had a fit.

A suspicious dampness that had nothing to do with the rain blurred her vision.

The umbrella sent water spraying in all directions when Seneca finally managed to wrangle it open. He quickly held it up over her head. "Sorry," he apologized, looking at her anxiously. "Your dress—"

"Don't worry about it." Worse things have happened.

Seneca hesitated for a split second before pulling her into his arms. "Maysilee and Haymitch are already there," he whispered, his lips brushing her ear.

Aunt Maysilee.

"I'm not ready," Madge said, burying her face in the crook of Seneca's neck, breathing in the designer perfume that complemented hers exactly. Wearing his-and-hers scents had been his idea, when they first started dating six months ago. His parents and her parents were friends, and while they were supportive, they had been surprised and not as optimistic about the match as Madge had expected them to be. Not that it matters anymore.

Seneca's chest rose and fell as he sighed. "Nobody ever is."

Madge's bottom lip started to quiver. "I wish—I only wish—"

A taxi pulled up next to them, and her heart leaped at the sight of the familiar dark-haired head that emerged from it.

"You came," was all Madge could say.

The new arrival tore her away from Seneca and hugged her fiercely. "I said I would, didn't? I talked to my adviser and got on the first flight out of Iceland I could find. Grad school can wait."

Madge was weeping openly now. "You came," she repeated, her chest heaving with sobs.

"Shh, shh," her best friend said, her own voice breaking as she stroked Madge's hair and held her close. "Annie's here."

.

ooo

.

SEATTLE (Associated Press)—Residents of the town of Vostead, WA, braved torrential rains and came out in droves yesterday afternoon to pay their last respects to their departed mayor Eric Undersee, 54, and his wife Mathilde, 51, who were killed a few days ago in the 100th mass shooting in the United States since New Year's Day 2014.

A lone gunman opened fire at a Vostead High School assembly where the mayor and his wife were invited guests. The school's principal, three teachers, and eleven students were wounded. Besides the Undersees and the gunman who shot himself at the end of his rampage, there were no other casualties.

The Undersees are survived by their only child, Margaret, 25.

.

ooo

.

"How's she holding up?" Haymitch Abernathy asked gruffly, swirling the whiskey around in his glass. It was the morning after the funeral, and he was sitting around Eric and Mathilde's kitchen table with little Annika Cresta—well, not so little anymore—while his wife Maysilee went and talked to Madge in her old room.

Annie held her cup of chamomile tea with both hands, savoring the warmth of it. "I'm a little worried," his niece's best friend admitted. "She's not crying anymore. She hasn't, since the funeral. And she doesn't talk about her feelings... whenever she opens her mouth, it's facts, the most cut-and-dried things you can think of. I mean, she's not the most outwardly expressive person to begin with, but this is different. It's hard to get any reaction out of her."

"You've been friends for how many years now? Twenty?"

"Yep," Annie confirmed, taking a sip of her tea. "We met at pre-ballet. Or so people tell us; neither of us can actually remember what happened. It might as well be a lifetime ago, because as far as I know Madge has always been... there."

Haymitch nodded in understanding. "I know the feeling. It was like that for me and May."

"I thought you met when you were sixteen?"

"We did. But I'll be damned if you could convince me that she wasn't around for all the years before."

Haymitch knocked back his whiskey and poured himself another glass. It seemed a bit excessive for ten o'clock in the morning, but Annie had known Madge's uncle long enough to recognize that it was Haymitch's idea of breakfast.

His next question caught her off guard. "Is Madge's boyfriend any help at all?"

Annie was surprised to hear the hostility in his tone. "You don't like Seneca."

"He's a decent enough fellow," Haymitch granted. "But he's just not right for Madge, and if you ask May she'll tell you the same thing. Even Eric and Mat thought so."

"I know what you mean," Annie said. Madge and Seneca cared for each other deeply; she knew that much. But there was always something missing, something Annie couldn't quite put her finger on. Or, rather, something she absolutely could put her finger on, only she was too afraid to say it out loud, worried that she might be wrong, dreading that she might be right.

.

ooo

.

Madge was sitting up in bed, tapping away at her laptop and surrounded by newspapers, when Maysilee came in.

"Madge, honey," her aunt said, her forehead creased in concern. "What are you doing?"

"Documenting," Madge answered in a neutral tone. She chewed on her lip as she peered at a copy of the Seattle Times. Maysilee had been studiously avoiding the media since her twin's death, directing all of the reporters to Haymitch who then told them, in no uncertain terms, to fuck off. And yet here Madge was, devouring every article, every mention of the shooting that she could find. Gun control advocates up in arms over local tragedy.

Maysilee sank down on the bed next to her niece. "I can see that, but why?"

The younger blonde pressed her lips together so tightly they turned white, and Maysilee thought that her niece would break down and cry. But Madge's eyes stayed resolutely dry. "I don't want to forget."

"Okay, sweetie. If this is what you need to do... I'll support it."

Madge turned to look at her aunt with those indigo eyes, and in that moment she looked so much like Mathilde had in her twenties that Maysilee's heart ached.

"It hurts so much." Madge's voice was plaintive, wounded. "It hurts, physically. Here." She gestured toward her heart, her stomach, her head. "Everywhere."

Maysilee opened her arms, and Madge crawled in. For a while, they held each other in silence.

"The first few days... I couldn't breathe," Maysilee said quietly. "It felt as if my lungs had been torn from my body. It was always the two of us together, and now… it's not." She pushed Madge's hair away from her face. "But then I look at you, and I know she isn't really gone. Even though you are your own person, I see so much of her in you. I look at you, and it's like turning back time."

The corner of Madge's mouth twitched slightly. "That's a lot to live up to."

"I can't promise you that things will get better, Madge." Maysilee pressed a kiss to her niece's temple. "But it will go on."

Madge nodded, and pulled herself upright. She ran a finger around the edge of the box Maysilee had brought. "What's this?"

"Oh, just some things that Grandpa Donner left us when he died. I've been holding on to them, but I think it's time to pass them on to you."

Madge lifted the lid, and immediately the musty but comforting smell of old books filled her nostrils. She picked one up and leafed through it, but it was in a language she couldn't even identify. She ran her eyes down the page, trying to find words she could actually pronounce. Finally, she came across a name that sounded vaguely familiar. "Vik Hallvardson."

She looked up at her aunt. "I thought we were German."

"We are," Maysilee said. "But we're lots of other things, too. You know, out of all the states, Washington has one of the highest populations of Scandinavian Americans."

"I thought they were mostly in the Midwest." Annie's older brother Rafe had gone to college in Minnesota, and for a time he had dated a girl from Minneapolis. She'd given him a Minnesota Vikings jersey.

"Oh, they are. Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa… the Dakotas are up there, too." Maysilee was a statistician by profession. "But there's a fair few here, and in Oregon and California. In fact, Vostead is an Anglicization of Scandinavian words. It means 'wet place'."

"You're kidding."

"Swear to God." Maysilee rummaged around in the box, and came up with a silver, T-shaped pendant engraved with intricate twists and turns. "Or, more appropriately, swear to gods."

Madge recognized the symbol. "Mjolnir. Thor's hammer."

"Do you remember what Thursday—Thor's day—is in German?"

If Maysilee had blinked, she would have missed it, but for two seconds the ghost of a smile appeared on Madge's face for the first time since her parents died. "Donnerstag."

"That's right." Maysilee placed the Mjolnir pendant in Madge's open palm and closed her niece's fingers around it. "Donner is German for thunder."

.

ooo

.

St. Paul, Minnesota

"Gale. Gale. Hey asshole, wake up."

Gale Hawthorne opened one crusty eye experimentally, and decided the throbbing in his skull wasn't worth it. He rolled over in bed and pulled the quilt up over his head. "Go away," he mumbled, hoping his friend and roommate Bristel would get the hint.

"I take it things didn't go too well with Katniss."

You have no idea. Gale had been so drunk that he'd passed out on his stomach, and he could smell the booze on the drool on his pillow. The box with his grandmother's engagement ring was still in the pocket of his jeans, pressing painfully against his thigh.

For what seemed like the hundredth time in the past twenty-four hours, Gale wondered what the hell had possessed him to propose to Katniss Everdeen. Sure, she was his girlfriend, and he was crazy about her, had been for nearly a decade now.

Sure, they were getting to be that age when things like marriage started to be an actual possibility and not just some vague reference to the future. Katniss was twenty-five now, and Gale was twenty-seven. When Gale's parents were twenty-seven, Gale was in second grade.

Sure, Katniss and Gale were, in the eyes of all their friends at least, an old married couple already. They had gotten together when Katniss was seventeen and Gale was nineteen, and before that they'd been best friends for two years. It had always been Gale and Katniss, Katniss and Gale. Anything else was absurd. Anything else was unthinkable.

But Katniss had never been very good at relationships, or emotions, or anything like that, really. She'd been almost pathologically oblivious to his hints and advances back in high school. It wasn't until Gale went off to college, and Katniss flared up with hot jealousy over his string of one-night stands there, that she finally decided to claim Gale for herself. Even after that, Gale always suspected he was more into her than she would ever be into him, a feeling that wounded his ego more than he would ever admit to anyone. He was Gale "Love 'Em and Leave 'Em" Hawthorne, for god's sake. He was a legend.

His suspicions were confirmed yesterday, when they drove out to Minnehaha Falls—the place where they had their first kiss—and Katniss dumped him before he could even get down on one knee.

"We used to be good together, Gale," she said. "But we've changed, and we're not anymore."

There was no arguing with that. After eight years of dating, the magic had begun to wear off. Half the time they were at each other's throats, and the other half they were freezing each other out. At first Gale didn't mind too much, because the makeup sex was great, but in time even that had fizzled out. He grew more and more possessive, and Katniss grew more and more resentful. She repeatedly refused to move in with him and Bristel and their friend Thom, choosing to stay at home with her family instead, saying that her little sister Prim needed her around. Prim, who was now twenty-one, about to start medical school, and who was practically engaged to Gale's brother Rory already.

"I'm willing to put in the work to make things good again," he said, not wanting to go down without a fight. "I'll make a good husband. I'll make a good dad."

"I know," Katniss said, her eyes shining with tears. "You'll be the best."

"I make enough money now, and so do you. Our parents never had that when they got married."

She spoke the words so softly, Gale could barely hear them. "I know."

"Is there anyone else?" he dared to ask, bracing himself for the answer. There was that priest, or at least that guy who used to be in the seminary and then wasn't anymore, the guy who ran the soup kitchen Katniss liked to volunteer at. Peter something or other, his name was. Gale had seen the way the guy's eyes followed Katniss around whenever he thought she—or Gale—wasn't looking. Not that Katniss ever picked up on these things. After all these years, Katniss Everdeen still had no idea, the effect she had on people.

"No, of course not," Katniss answered immediately. "I would never do that to you. I would never do that to anyone."

Gale put his head in his hands. "What are you doing, Katniss? What are you doing to us?"

"I'm saving us," she insisted. "We have to end this now before we ruin our friendship forever."

And by that time Gale knew it was a suicide mission, but if anything was going to change her mind, it was the truth. "I love you, Katniss."

Her silence said more than words ever could.

.

ooo

.

Bristel hauled him out of bed, no small feat as Gale was six foot four, nearly two hundred pounds, and had recently consumed what seemed like enough liquor to fill the Great Lakes. "Clean yourself up," he commanded. "You have a video call in fifteen minutes."

"A video call?" Gale repeated, feeling disoriented by the way he heard the words come out of his mouth a full second after he'd thought them in his head.

"Remember yesterday, when Thom said he ran into Professor Latier in Oslo and gave him your Skype info?" Thom was in Norway for three months on his company's dime, and he had been insufferable since first landing a week ago. If there was anything Gale and Bristel knew about Thom, it was that he was really, really into blondes, and an all-expenses-paid trip to Scandinavia was their friend's idea of heaven. "Well, Latier rang you up an hour ago while you were in a Jägermeister coma. He's calling you back at four."

"It's not Jägermeister," Gale felt compelled to say. "It's this new Polish vodka. It's ninety-six percent alcohol."

"Do I fucking look like I care? Just take a shower, perform an exorcism, whatever it takes to get you presentable."

Twelve minutes, one shower, two naproxen, and thirty-two ounces of Gatorade later, Gale was seated at his desk, the blood in his veins pulsing to the synth pop beats of the Skype app's ringtone.

The face of the man who was once Gale's adviser filled the screen of his laptop. "Mr. Hawthorne." Dr. B.T. Latier grinned broadly. "I see Mr. Brenner has managed to bring you back from the dead."

It had been five years, but Latier's calm voice still sent chills down Gale's spine. Gale half-expected him to say that they'd found something wrong with Gale's transcript somehow, and that they were sending him back to engineering school.

Gale's face grew warm. "Professor Latier," he managed to say, trying not to go cross-eyed as he focused on the screen. "It's great to hear from you again. Thom said you were working in the private sector now."

Latier chuckled. "Did he tell you I went over to the dark side?"

"Well, yes," Gale hedged. "But I thought you told him to say that."

"I did, I did," Latier said, cleaning his glasses and putting them back on. "Are you still with Panem Industries?"

"Yes," Gale said, wiping his clammy hands on his jeans.

"Working on what?"

"Technologies for mining safety, mostly." His father had almost died in a cave-in when Gale was fourteen, and since then Gale had made it his personal crusade to improve working conditions in the mines. As much as he hated Panem Industries and as creepy as their CEO Coriolanus Snow was, his job put him on the right track to do just that. Eventually.

Katniss's dad had worked in the mines, too, and he'd been in the same accident. The long, onerous class action suit that followed was the entire reason Gale met Katniss in the first place.

Gale felt sick to his stomach, and not just from the Polish vodka. How could he function like a normal human being when everything in his life reminded him of Katniss?

Latier nodded thoughtfully as Gale described his projects and responsibilities at Panem, or at least the parts that he was allowed to talk about. "Do you have a non-compete clause in your contract?" the former professor asked.

"Just three months."

"Excellent. I can work with three months." Latier leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms over his chest, and smiled. "How would you like to come work with me?"

"With you?" Gale repeated.

"Yes. You're brilliant—that's a given—and I've always admired your work ethic, Hawthorne. This company I'm working for, sometimes I think it's got more money than sense, so I'm going to go ahead and surround myself with people I trust."

"Thank you, Professor," Gale said humbly.

"Our headquarters are in Stockholm. Lots of locals, lots of expats. It's a very dynamic, very multicultural environment—you'll like it a lot." Latier scribbled on a piece of paper and held it up for Gale to see. "This is what you're likely to get paid. I expect you'll like that a lot, too."

Holy shit, that was a lot of zeroes. "What currency is that in?"

"It's in Swedish kroner," Latier said. "It includes your rent and a small stipend for other expenses. Scandinavia is expensive, mind you, so all our expatriate employees get a cost-of-living allowance. If you have dependents—a partner, kids—it'll be adjusted upwards. Are you married? Engaged?"

I could have been. More thoughts of Katniss came bubbling to the surface, but Gale pushed them back down. "No, but would my parents and siblings count as dependents?"

"Unfortunately, no. Not unless you can demonstrate that your contributions are their main source of income."

Gale allowed himself a sheepish smile. "Oh, well, it was worth a shot."

"I know it's a lot to take in, but here's what we can do," Latier continued. "My boss will need to meet you anyway, and there's a conference in Iceland that we're attending next week. So how about you come up and meet us in Reykjavík, ask us any questions you might have? We'll pay for the flights, put you up at a hotel for three days—that's standard for all our prospective expats, and there are no strings attached."

Gale dragged a hand through his hair. This was happening too fast, too soon, and it all sounded too good to be true. But Professor Latier was vouching for him, and even if Gale didn't accept the offer—or get one in the first place—he still would have gotten a free trip to Iceland out of it. Hell, Gale could even take the money he'd been saving for marrying Katniss and spend it on a flight to Norway to visit Thom, see what all the fuss was about. He had another friend in Denmark, though Gale wasn't entirely sure that visiting Johanna Mason—Katniss's other best friend—was a good idea.

He twisted the ring on his finger, lost in thought.

"So what do you think, Hawthorne?" Latier wanted to know, bringing Gale back to the present. "Are you in or not?"

And if Gale did end up taking the job, some distance from Katniss was just what he needed. Okay, so Sweden was probably overkill, and anyone who knew them would almost certainly think he was running away, but still...

Gale's face broke into a huge grin. He touched his left wrist, something he had a habit of doing each time he made a decision or a promise, though he could never really explain why.

"I'm in."

.

.

.

A/N:

I hope you're liking it so far! Again, it's not necessary to have read Enthralled to follow along, but I would definitely recommend it. There will be lots of references and callbacks—for example, Annie's brother Rafe is Ulf from Enthralled (both names mean "wolf"). Grandpa Donner's Mjolnir pendant made its first appearance in Enthralled, as well.

Vostead = våd/våt means "wet", and sted/stad means "place" or "town/city".

Medea Smyke, captain of the Gadge ship, is responsible for imprinting me with male!Bristel. He's absolutely irresistible in An Extra Dividend.

If these notes haven't bored you yet, there's even more nerdery on my Tumblr under the tag #previously on ATY.