mercury veins //lethe & jasper's wedding

Dearest Lethe,

Our relationship started with a letter, and now I believe as we move to new steps, higher than ever, I must write this letter - to you. It isn't so dramatic as a declaration of love, nor as tragic as a breakup, it is, just simply, it exists as much as you or I, and I hope that someday you come to treasure it as our past, and the beginnings of our future. Perhaps in that sense, it is important to both of us but I won't give this to you until after the wedding, because if anything, this is just a ramble to pass the time.

See, I'm writing to you whilst we're both on the train right now. It's not as if we're two lovers long separated between Districts, or even death, no, you are one cart up ahead and I haven't seen you in a couple of hours. You've told me that if I need you for anything just to go ahead and find you, but see I feel rather uncomfortable in doing that. After all, that's where the tributes are staying and as adorable as they are I seldom think they have the chance. I don't understand that about you, Lethe. This large sort of facade that you carry, an air of indifference when it comes to such unintelligible human sacrifice. It makes you stronger than me, for sure. These kids - you've watched so many grow up so fast, this is your seventh pair as a mentor. Maybe you didn't want to be reminded of that fact at all, it just amazes me that despite this situation you stay so strong.

They're probably strong, those two kids, they do have you as a mentor after all, but who know - as you read this, they might be long gone and you might want to forget them. And who knows, if you read this twenty-five years from now, you may not even remember their names, and neither will I - so I won't bore you with those details or pain you with them either. Sorry. Your little sister is glaring at me from a side window, I haven't been able to tell if she's been doing it the whole train ride, or if it's just me still nervous about your family and such. Your mother is very warm, but the rest of your siblings - I'm sure that they're just looking out for your best interests and perhaps Jasmine isn't looking at me begrudgingly so much as trying to keep an eye out for what I might do - and my solution was grabbing a piece of paper and writing a letter to you.

I have one question for you Lethe, and take it as you will. I have asked you many "one questions" before, our relationship could be summed up in a series of one questions: would you like to meet? Will you marry me? And now I will simply ask this: what am I to you?

I do not mean this to be accusatory in any way shape or form, but I do worry sometimes. Not of you, of course. But the situation. Because here I am, on a speeding metallic train going faster than I could ever imagine, travelling to lands I have never even dreamt of seeing and yet I'm hunched over a mahogany table writing this letter to you. I'm sure the rest of your family has been admiring a quick peak into what the Districts actually are, but I just cannot seem to bear it as I'm wondering if the passing looks from your family are nothing more than snickers and intense judgements from something that I don't know about you.

That's the thing, I think. I wish to know more about you. Not in some creepy, stalker way. But in the way that each night when we go to bed, I want you to tell me about your day. I want to know your favourite colour and paint murals of your favourite horses, carve marble statues of your favourite people and most of all, I want to care for Eden alongside you.

Let me start this letter again because it's becoming too tragic for me.

Dear Lethe,

I love you and I can't wait to be married. I'll love you always.

Jasper.

He sealed the paper in a yellow envelope he had on hand on scribbled in the nicest way he could, Lethe across the front in bolded letters. This, he would hold on to, storing it inside of his silk black jacket and laid back on the velvet couches that were meant for tributes. These trains, after all, didn't carry many people in them besides those who'd risked death, those who were about to risk death, and Capitolites who ventured to and from the Districts on occasion. They were metal death boxes, and a sort of irony presided within him, the irony was unsettling that he rode death to his wedding and that did not escape Jasper one single bit.

Upon arriving at the Capitol, he was not prepared for the sort of greeting they received. A thousand cameras clicking away, the lights blinding, almost as blinding as the outfits of the photographers, this was not a place for a regular District kid, even the nephew of a mayor. Jasper couldn't see the Turner family behind him, yet he feared that they might be huddled together pushing along, yet he couldn't for the love of himself turn around to try and save them - this was a madness beyond which of any he'd experienced, the fame that came along with simply falling in love was devastating. A typhoon of light followed by piercing screams, "Here! Here! Mrs. Turner! Eden! You pretty little thing! Jasper, over here! Smile!" Succumbing to nausea, Jasper simply smiled and moved forward, step by step, in his head he counted how many it took between the train and the building. Two-hundred and twenty-six shuffles before exploding into the safe zone, that was all it took.

Lethe was already gone by the time he arrived, probably ushering the two children upstairs for their meetings, floor five, that's what he'd been told - he waited patiently for all of the Turner children to be escorted in before he made his way up the elevator, going up. One of the kids pushed the button for the fifth floor but he didn't take notice who, the glass skyscraper amazed him beyond anything he'd ever seen, such architecture was never seen in the likes of Five, this was all so extraordinary it felt almost as though he himself was in a fairy tale. Maybe the wedding wasn't real at all? What a weird dreamscape it would be, alongside Lethe's family.

Maybe any minute he would wake up, dressed in homeless rags, scratches all along his body from where the rats had bitten his fragile bones within the night time, perhaps all this education, this life style, writing letters and sticking them on walls, training to be a mayor - all of this was just a dream because the Capitol couldn't be real. There was no way that such a place, so extravagant, eccentric, incredible existed while all the other Districts wallowed in filth trudging through poverty and fighting in the streets for food. There was no way such greed existed, and all because they reign supreme. And yet despite all of this misbelief, the trickery and illusions before his eyes as he stared out the windows of the elevator, truly, the only thought wandering through Jasper Somerset's mind was: how do I get to live here?

District five was far from a busting metropolis, far from distinguished, and intelligence levels had sunk below what he imagined to be what district ten was like. Oil riggers didn't need any information beyond what was needed in the industry, no professionalism, no need to learn to write or spell - the Capitol, this was an idea that perhaps someday Jasper could get used to. If only he was allowed to come here with lethe when she was mentoring, was there a way to bypass the rules and get that done, living three months a year here among the rich, the powerful, picking up tricks of the trade, make a growing economy out of district five. If anyone could do it, it was Jasper - he could change the district forever, make it rich and important, the one the the Capitol looked to and thought, "Yes, that is our favourite district." It could be done, if only he was mayor and if only he could stay here.

The sound of the elevator bell took him out of a trance, as a few murmurs of 'wow' could be heard under the breath of the Turner'. even under his own breath Jasper was amazed with the residence in which he would stay for the wedding. The Capitol sure didn't spare any expense on where the tributes would spend their last peaceful moments. But this, this place would be Jasper's own beginning, a memory that he would carry with himself forever. Everything was so extravagant and beautiful from the floors, to the counters, to the tables and the buffets that sat atop them - this was a life that anyone could get used to.

He planned on it.

Days passed, ceremonies continued. There was the chariots, which Jasper got to watch from the safety of the large screen TV that slid down in front of a wall in their living room, everything was so clear and crisp as if each pixel contained a thousand more pixels that made sure every colour was just so perfect. There was only a few times that Jasper actually got to watch the passing tributes and that was as they went and came from training - he tried to stay out of their way, his wedding celebration was probably far from any of their minds after all, this was their death sentence. The interviews happened the night after training ended, and yet again he cuddled up with a blanket and the warm tingly fire place and relaxed on the silk couches to watch. Every smirk and act that the poor children put on, it was sickening, yet necessary. He had to remind himself that everything done was so necessary.

It wasn't long before it was the night before the wedding and Jasper started getting impatient and antsy as he strode around the apartment complex. The sick fascination that he had procured with the Capitol had turned into a form of disgust as each Avox casually passed by and Jasper was reminded that these once were citizens - that thought kept him up at night, along with each and every doubt in his letter to Lethe. Perhaps it was the fact that he hadn't seen her in days that made him more worried about the wedding itself, but she had been busy after all, the tributes had launched into the Games, and she had to be in the mentor room and -

There was no more time to worry. As per some sort of tradition, Jasper stayed away from Lethe as this was the last time they would share different beds. It was kind of weird, he felt, but it was what it was. Jasper also knew that Lethe herself was going out to party, he'd brushed by a red-eyed Peridot Myler in the hallways and he was pretty sure that he wasn't crying, though any fact was contestable with the victors, they were an odd bunch after all. There was no bachelor party for Jasper, after all if he had the choice he wouldn't really have one anyways, he didn't fancy himself a people person to the extent of friendship. He would much prefer a glass of red wine by the fire reading a book, and that's what he did. On the last night before he was to be married, Jasper sat down and read a book of classic poems, like any classic poems, they were all about love.

It wasn't long before a waddling Eden came to his legs asking where her mother was, Jasper wasn't all that close to Eden yet - not for a lack of trying, that is. Perhaps it ran in the family to have the strongest poker face when it came to the public, but it kept him uneasy most of the time. Eden was the most adorable little girl in the world, and Jasper would promise that until the day he died he would take care of the precious little girl. Jasper, after all, knew quite a bit about the father, besides his name - and he felt it was his duty to take care of the little girl. "Out with Klaus, I believe. Are you and Daisy ready for tomorrow?"

"Yes," the little girls eyes sparkled as she climbed on the couch beside him. "What are you reading?"

Jasper smiled as he cozied up next to his future daughter-in-law and showed her the leather bound book. "100 Greatest Love Poems of our Time. Sounds tacky, I know, but they're sweet."

"Read me one?"

And so he did.

"I carry your heart with me (I carry it in my heart) I am never without it (anywhere
I go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling)
I fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) I want no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you.

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(Here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart.

I carry your heart (I carry it in my heart)"

The procession went by in a blur, a fury of stylists came in, plucked, prodded, waxed, touched up everything about Jasper that he had initially found to be completely alright about himself - this was the Capitol after all and perhaps he just wasn't to the standard that they needed - but one day.

Flash, suit, flash, moving, going, church, flash flash flash, everything was speeding by so quickly and before he knew it the oak doors were creaking open, Jasper knew not to turn, he had to wait until she was beside him and then he could see what she truly looked like today - more beautiful than any other day, he imagined. And yet in his mind, he couldn't imagine a more beautiful Lethe than the annoyed frustrated, kicking up a storm in the middle of a park Lethe that he had first met. The one with fire in her eyes and a lack of shamelessness for what she said aloud.

But like most times, he was proved wrong yet again. As he turned to meet his soon to be wife, he gasped, taking everything about her in - she looked more amazing, more beautiful more -

"Since the day we met, I've wondered what it would be like to stand like this. Perhaps not in the Capitol, but just next to you, the most beautiful girl I've ever seen and promise everything I possibly can. There is not much that you haven't faced in this lifetime, but now I ask that you share whatever burden you can, weigh it on me. I promise to be your Atlas, carrying everything on my shoulders, to take care of you and Eden and most importantly, I promise to love you for the rest of my life."

Do you, Jasper Somerset -

"I do."