Archive of Our Own ^beta

I can hear them through the wall. The woman’s moans, Beetee’s soft grunts. The way the bedsprings move. It makes me want to cover my ears, bury my head under my pillows, sing or hum to drown everything out. But I can’t. There’s still some sordid and masochistic part of me that needs to listen.

The prostitution starts as soon after winning as possible. I was sixteen, almost seventeen. My first appointment was set a few days after my Victory Tour. They kept me safe and happy for my Tour, Beetee was the only one to give me any sort of warning. But still, he couldn’t prevent it, so it didn’t make much sense to distress me early. He kept me sane in the tiny way he could. The first year or two, I was popular with men who wanted to feel powerful. I never had enough to eat growing up. I was so small. And I know I’m vague most of the time, scatterbrained. Even now, I’m having trouble keeping all of the events in order. The thoughts run through my mind and then run away. There are people who like that. People who want someone vulnerable and afraid and easy to dominate. Sometimes I think they’re the ones I hate the most. I usually hate the most whoever I am with at the time.

Beetee tried to protect me some, but there wasn’t much he could do. He can’t even protect himself. He’s called for appointments about half as often as I am, but he’s older, and male. He rarely has male clients; Beetee jokingly says he isn’t pretty enough. There always seem to be more male clients than female. I have female clients sometimes. No matter who I am with, I try to block out as much as possible. When victors trade stories, other women advise me to move more, try to please them and they will be done faster, but I can’t. I can’t be complicit in this. The only way I survive with any of my mind intact is to let my thoughts leave my body.

The other District 3 victors are a lot older than me. They’re also old enough to be left alone. This leaves it to Beetee and me to comfort and understand each other. He’s the only person I don’t need words with, and paradoxically, that makes them flow more easily. We can speak for hours. He’s smart and creative and interesting so we discuss inventions and science and possibilities. He’s also really witty. He can always make me laugh and think and forget about the rest of life. Sometimes I drift off while just staring at him. For a while I was embarrassed by how attractive I found him. Then, as we got to know each other and I got old enough that the age difference mattered less, I stopped trying to hide it as much. I even got up the courage to tell Beetee that I thought of him a lot. Thought of him tenderly. Cared about him. I didn’t say the one big word I was thinking, and it’s a good thing I didn’t because he was upset enough as it was. He told me I was broken. Not capable of tender feelings. He said the same for himself. I think he’s wrong for both of us. But I didn’t say that. Maybe I should have. Maybe I should have fought him, maybe I should have kissed him, maybe I should have made him look me in the eye and flat out tell me he could never love anyone. But I didn’t. I was afraid of losing the only person I have. I still am.

I know that no matter how many people get my body, he’s the only one I give my soul to. And I know I’m not content with loving him chastely from afar. I will, if it’s all I can have. I have been. But I know what I want, I know that watching him makes me feel warm, feel excited. I know when a client is rough, thinking of Beetee makes my body wetter, able to handle it better. I know that I would enjoy sex with him. It wouldn’t be the loveless hollow thing that it is at my appointments. But I won’t push him. I don’t want to tell him I love him if he is afraid of love.

This trip to the Capitol was rather routine. Mentors are getting new tablets this year, better equipment to send sponsor gifts sooner, to monitor our tribute’s vitals more easily without staring up at the large screen for twenty four hours a day. I recognize the basic design as District 3 work, although not mine, but they still call us in for training anyway. They take advantage of having us in the Capitol with interviews and parties, and now her. Beetee’s date. She’s led into our suite, our escort on her arm, avoxes and a chef in our kitchen, prep team ready to present us as perfectly groomed well dressed upstanding citizens of Panem, not crazed killers or shy inventors. Gala’s been our escort for several years now, enough to be used to this, enough to keep a big smile on as she introduces us. I purposefully ignore the Capitol woman’s name as it is said. I don’t want to know it. Gala comes over to us to give us little hugs before she leaves, and hisses last minute instructions in our ears. “You,” she pokes me, “only need to be quiet and nice for the duration of this meal. I expect polite conversation or else.” Then she pokes Beetee in his side. “You need to be ‘on’ for a little longer. You can handle it. You’ll have to.” She gives an airy laugh and leaves, telling the woman to enjoy herself, closing the door loudly behind her.

Dinner is lovely. The food, I mean. Capitol food always is. The chef has cooked for us before, and prepared many of our favorites. It’s a bit of a joke, because Beetee’s barely eating and the woman only has a bite or two of each dish, murmuring about her figure. Every moment her eyes are on me is a moment that Beetee can relax so I put all my effort into nodding at her little stories, hoping that the smile I have for warm buttered bread will pass as a smile at her latest anecdote.

After dinner, I try to slip away, but she waves me over. I meet Beetee’s eyes, and he tries to smile at me, give me some strength, but his eyes are empty. That upsets me more than anything else.

“It’ll cost more if you want both of us.” I pick up my sweater and set my jaw, ready for battle, as it were.

“What?” Dear girl…” she sputters. Her eyes are wide and surprised enough that she probably is one of those who truly believes we’re here of our own free will. I wonder if this liaison is maybe even a gift, she literally doesn’t know there’s been an exchange of money. “I only thought you could join us for some conversation!” Beetee meets my eyes and mouths the word ‘please’.

I don’t want Beetee to get in trouble or have to deal with a bad tempered client, so I stop. If I can keep her attention off him for even a second, it will be helpful. “It was a joke,” I say, shrugging. “I’m very bad at Capitol humor, but I try.” She laughs, more comfortable now. They all know there’s something off about me, I get a lot of leeway.

“Oh yes, I see.” She pats Beetee’s thigh, he holds back most of his flinch but I can see the anger in his eyes and the way his nostrils flare. I sit down, next to Beetee, even though she had nodded towards the seat next to her. He relaxes slightly into me, his arm and upper thigh touching mine, inching himself away from her. She asks questions about Beetee as a mentor, about our daily lives, while she must be a District 3 fan, she’s obviously only interested in Beetee’s life so I answer vaguely, as noncommittal as I can be with my hesitant syllables. I downplay the amount of time we spend together, not wanting to prick her jealousy. I stay out in the living room as long as I can, trying not to look at her hand massaging his thigh or the way she keeps glancing at him through her eyelashes, licking her lips. The moment I have the freedom to do so, I practically race to my bedroom, shutting the door and leaning against it, trying to keep the anger and  fear and frustration out.

And this leads me back to being able to hear them. I know they make Beetee take something, that way he’ll be hard and he’ll be able to enjoy it a little, at least physically. I wish they gave me something like that. Sometimes alcohol helps, but then, I’ve seen too many addicts among the other victors. Alcohol or morphling. So I’m mostly on my own. Anyway, the pill he’s made to take means that his sounds might be genuine, and I want to close my eyes and pretend they are, but that they’re for me. I want to pretend so badly, but I feel dirty and I don’t want to betray Beetee in any way so I stop and that’s when I try to cover my ears and hum but I feel like maybe I need to punish myself by listening, or that maybe I can help him by taking some of the pain. All I know is that I can’t tune it out or ignore it and I press my face into my hands so at least my tears won’t get all over.

I can only relax when I hear her leave, and even then, only slightly. My lips feel swollen from biting them and my eyes feel red from clenching them shut, but a glance at the mirror shows that I look the same as always. None of my emotional turmoil shows. The one benefit of my occasionally expressionless face. I change into a nightgown, hoping I can finally get some sleep, or at least lay in bed in the dark and clear my thoughts so I can rest for a little while. I almost don’t hear the rap at the door, it’s so light and hesitant. “Come in,” I say. It sticks in my throat, but Beetee must be desperate to see a friendly face because he comes in immediately. He looks empty. He looks so unlike the Beetee I know and love that I want to cry for him. He’s carrying a towel and a bundle of clothes.

“Can I use your shower? I…I can’t be alone. Not in my room, by myself.” I nod. He smiles weakly, and enters my bathroom. I spend the next ten or fifteen minutes staring at the closed door, listening to the shower run. My brain leaves my body. It might have been twenty minutes. I can’t keep track of time when I do this, when I’m not actually there. I just can’t handle that my sweet gentle Beetee is upset. I sit on my bed and clench the comforter and just wait, wait to see if my wonderful Beetee is still empty when he leaves that bathroom. If there’s something dead inside him that I will have lost forever. When the door cracks open, I jump up, unable to hide how on edge I am or my eagerness to see him. He looks better. Still not himself. Not my Beetee.

“You…” I fight for the words, the ability to express any of what I feel or to give even a tiny crumb of comfort. He still waits, patiently. He is so kind. “You can stay.” I motion vaguely to my bed. We’ve shared a bed before, when one of us was particularly upset or scared. Not often and not recently, but he doesn’t need to be alone. “I can…chair. I can sleep in a chair if you can’t be touched.” His smile is much more genuine now.

“I would love to share.” He puts down his discarded clothes, and now fidgets endearingly with his hands. He breaks the silence abruptly. “Does this make you feel dirty?” At first I think he means us sharing a bed, but then I realize he means the appointments. The sex.

I bite the side of my lip, trying to think of how to put it. “No…not dirty. Used.”  My hands ball up the silk of my nightgown, clenching the material in my fists so I have something to focus on. “The act isn’t dirty, it’s the intention. The…that I don’t want it.” I’m not sure if he understands me. Sex isn’t dirty. Carnal love isn’t bad. I love you, Beetee. That’s not tainted.

He rubs his forehead, pinches the bridge of his nose just above his glasses. Those are sure signs of his tension headaches, and I instinctively move forward to help him. I catch myself and stop before I touch him, but what amazes me is that he didn’t flinch at all. His face flashed a look of disappointment for a split second after I stopped. I think he wanted me to touch him. I move my hand towards him, very very slowly. He lets me rest it on his shoulder. “I don’t feel like my own anymore, Wiress,” he says softly, almost pleadingly. He sounds like a child who needs comfort, which encourages me to step closer to him. I can feel his ragged breath on my face. “They own me. The Capitol. I don’t have anything.” His acceptance of my touch makes me bold.

“I see you in there. I still see you and not them.” I graze his cheek with the fingertips of my free hand, rejoicing that his reaction is not a shudder, but a shiver. A movement of pleasure.

His voice is so soft that it is almost a whimper. “I just want a part of myself that’s untainted…a part they can’t touch.”

I shut my eyes. I can’t tell if this will hurt or help but I have to let him know. “There’s a part of you in my heart, Beetee. There’s nothing they can do to you there. Nothing they make you do… it doesn’t change that part.” I wait for him to push my hands away or to tell me to stop thinking like that, but instead he rests his forehead against mine, the coolness of his glasses frames caressing my brow.

“Do you really think that’s true?” he whispers. I want to nod, but I can’t without moving him away, so I have to find my voice.

“Yes.” I breathe deeply. “You’re deep in there.” I move my hand to indicate my heart and leave it, resting between us. “They can’t change how I love you.” He inhales sharply at the word. Love. He doesn’t argue, though. “They’ll never have all of you. Never,” I tell him, fiercely. His shoulders relax and his hands find my upper arms, holding me in place. His eyes meet mine, he looks mournful, but not upset anymore.

“Thank you.” He whispers. He tilts his head, rolling it from where our foreheads were touching until his mouth is on mine, warm and inviting. He is soft and sweet, and I feel pure bliss until I realize why he is doing this, and I have to pull away.

“I’m not them.” I know my eyes are wide and scared, I have seen my own panicked face many times in the mirror. “I don’t need thanks, I don’t need payment.” Beetee seems surprised and lost. I wonder if he acted on instinct, if he didn’t even mean the insult, it was just what he is used to. Even then, my rational brain can’t get through to the part of me that is upset. My brain is shutting down, my thoughts and my heart are racing. My nails pick at the silk of my nightgown. “No, no, no. No no no no.” I know the sounds are coming from my mouth. I’m aware of it, but unable to stop it. Beetee is in my room, handsome, wonderful Beetee. Intelligent and patient and kind and sweet and funny. Fresh from the arms of a Capitol lover, treating me the same.

Beetee stares at me, arms awkwardly at his sides, eyes hurt. “I…I thought,” he stammers. “Thought you wanted…” I shake my head vigorously.

“I only want what you can give freely.” My hands claw at my mouth and I have to speak through them. I feel like I’m choking.

“You love me.” His voice is empty. I nod. “I just…wanted to know what that felt like. If it was different. Because you loved me.” He looks so very old all of a sudden, so very tired.

I stop, lick my lips. My entire mouth has gone dry, nervous. My breathing is heavy but it’s obeying me, calming as I force my lungs to steady. “That’s different. You should have said.” I take a few faltering steps towards him, a few ragged breaths. “I don’t mind, don’t mind kissing you if that’s the reason…if it’s for you, if it’s because I love you.” I reach out to lightly grasp his arm. My breathing has finally gone normal again, no more gulping lungfuls of panic. “We…we could try again,” I offer. He smiles slightly, and instead of agreeing, simply cups my cheek and draws me near. He’s much more tentative this time, lips hovering over mine for a moment before they touch.

Our kiss is beautiful. It’s nothing like touching a client. I hold my desire back; let Beetee take the lead in the kiss. He increases the pressure a small amount at a time, but he keeps up the contact, so eventually our bodies are pressed together and his arms are around me and his mouth moves insistently over mine. I’m a lost cause, so permanently his that I can never untangle our two hearts. I would do anything for him.

The kiss lasts a while, even when he pulls back slightly, it’s just to breathe through his nose and touch my lips again and again, over and over. He seems to have a difficult time stopping himself. When he speaks, his voice is full of wonder. “It’s so different. Not the same at all.” He runs a fingertip down my cheek.  I slowly open my eyes to find him gazing at me like I’m his salvation. It’s too much to handle, I can’t meet his gaze head on.

“It’s time for bed,” I mumble, backing away and pulling the covers back. When I turn my head to look at him through my hair, he seems to have gotten shy again.

“Thank you.” He slides into bed next to me. “For everything.”

“Sure.”