but i've got a chest that burns a fearless red {leon/trix}

I'm fighting a lost battle between selfishly indulging in people that lapse my loneliness and building concrete walls around myself to further distance myself from everyone and everything I hate. Somehow the two coalesce so imperfectly that my split chest feels more and more fractured as the days trickle past, rolling past each other so quickly that I'm a person divided, lost in a waterfall of crushing anxiety and blissful isolation.

It's in the wake of this that I find myself bruised with the hard blows of blue Mondays and black from those nights I find myself back in those caves, crying out in desperation for a lifeline in the dark.

Like with anything in this life, no one is going to offer you a helping hand unless there's something in it for them. You can't rely on anyone for anything. If you want something, you have to take it yourself. Years and years have passed, and all the time I've told people I would never have made it as far as I did without the help of others, yet really there's only one person that won those Games. There's only one person who killed every person who stood resiliently in her way.

I was the most ruthless and cold of anyone in there. I was a murderer. Right to the core. Justified murder. I had it jammed into me like root algorithm. What I was doing was right, in my eyes, of course it was. Everyone who has won tries to justify it to themselves, and that's why they survived, right?

I'm not so sure these days. Time is a storm that weathers everything that was once perfect. I can't continue to justify what I went through. I had so much support from Pearl, I can't take away from the fact that if she didn't help me, I would probably be dead. I just don't want people to forget what I am. Yes, being a murderer is an awful, awful thing, but being a survivor is everything. It's everything.

Haven't seen Diamond in over a year. It's really grinding away at me. Snow's stopped my visits to District One. He says I don't need to go any more, says that I've learned my lesson. Our "confrontation" in the gardens earlier this year was apparently convincing enough to allow me to have my freedom back. In reality it means I can't see my girlfriend any more. I don't know what to do about it - It's not like I'm allowed to move between Districts as I please. How will I ever see her? I need to talk to Mace, he'll have an answer (and a half-hour long speech on relationships that I don't need to hear).

I miss her so much. She's an escape, and yet she's still real enough to keep me grounded. I don't even know if I can call her my girlfriend when I can never be there for her. I'm just someone who loves her, and wants to be hers, yet never really can. I'm a false promise to her. I nearly break down, but the thought of Diamond slapping me round the cheek and telling me to snap out of it makes me smirk.

I pull a green sweater over my damp hair, exhaling slowly. It's early morning, and I have to be up to watch the Games. Somehow both of my Tributes are still alive. I have that to be thankful for, at least. They're both doing incredible considering one's a drug addict and the other is lost in the past. They seem pretty focused, so they have every chance, I suppose.

I'm supposed to be watching with Lethe, but I've already decided against it. Her and I are in a weird place right now. It's like we're trying to make progress, but I'm so infinitely stubborn, and she's so blindly ignorant. Yet the effort is there on both sides, in a way. I'm not sure. I'm not forgiving her for anything, but I want things to be less tense considering I practically live with her for a third of the year. It's so taxing.

My eyes are rings. Not even the bitter stench of coffee can drag me out of a 6:00AM start. With hands pressed against a cooling cup, I try my best to arrange my thoughts. I'm not staying in this room all day, that much I know. As much as I enjoy trying to distract Phelix from the television with toys and make-pretend games where he's the valiant hero and I'm the bloodthirsty dragon, there's only so much being stabbed with an invisible sword I can take before I start to get uncomfortable.

I don't bother to dry my hair. I let it hang a dark amber, stringy and heavy. Today is not a day for caring how I appear. Capitol Magazines would paint me as a "natural look" if they gave a damn any more. Once they realised how uninteresting I am to all of Panem's elite, they stopped pressing me for photos, interviews, and scoops. The apparent "bust up" with Opal Earnest at Snow's Mansion got a fair bit of attention - They painted us fighting to the death in the gardens over a boy we both liked. I'm not sure whether to be angry any more, it's so farcical that I can't help but laugh at it.

I walk out into the expanse of the Training Center stairwell. The cylindrical building is like the ribcage of a wildebeest, with tiny pods shooting up and down the spine of the magnificent creature. I look around, down the mile-long floorspace that only begins to arc round at the curvature some infinity down my left-and-right. There's no one around. The whole building is literally silent. People either asleep, or busy watching their screens.

"Well, seems like paradise has been abandoned." My voice resonates in the abyss.

They said I'd be claustrophobic after my Games, but it's not really been the case. I suppose they were right in some ways, I mean, such vast, open space like this is comforting. It's not that I dislike small spaces, I'm perfectly fine so long as there's something sharp near me that I can use to stab anyone who wakes me up on a Sunday. It's more the dark that has an effect on me. Complete darkness is too much for me. The anxiety hits me like a gale-force wind, and I struggle to hang on to anything real. It is what it is, I suppose. I'd rather be scared of the dark and sleep with a night-light aged twenty-two than be six-feet under and forgotten.

I go down one floor. Just the one.

I knock sharply on the door, my hands retreating behind my back as I wait patiently for an Avox to let me in. A Capitol representative greets me, fully clothed and glammed up at such an early hour in the morning. I really do wonder what these people look like without all the shit they plaster on themselves, and how long it takes for them to look ridiculous.

"Tell Krigel he's cooking me breakfast, please." I stretch my arms above my head and let out a yawn.

Why shouldn't he? Heaven's been abandoned, after all.