and urchin spines [Ryan]

Three first steps.

One: off the train and into vis family's arms, a refuge in the eye of the maelstrom, minutes after clinging to Temple's shoulders for what Wander refuses to believe was the last time, seconds after Annie asked –tomorrow? in their last moments of silence and ve smiled. Two: hand in hand in hand into the house ve grew up in, once rebuilt nearly from scratch but dense as ever with echoes of laughter and salt. Three: into the breathing water, laughing into the sea breeze and into the face of every Capitol doctor's advice.

(Rest your ribs. Keep your head and arm clean. As though anything could do more for vis health, now and perhaps ever again, than feeling alive.)

Three homecomings.

The last piece of vis heart settles into place as ve wades in. (That's not a lie, but not quite true. Other people took pieces to other homes; gravity will never stop tugging ver in a half-dozen directions.) Ve pauses a moment to take it in, cataloguing the differences: real sand between vis toes instead of rock or silt, a subtly richer color on the horizon, proper brine with the depth of millennia floating in on the wind. A lot of things remind ver of dying these days, but the ocean was home before Glamour Kinkade tried to make it something else (my ocean, he said, as though anything more than a pale drip of the real thing could be owned); the tide welcomes ver back and ve floats gladly on the feeling—then whirls with a sweeping kick, grinning broadly, to splash Annie.

Things aren't simple with Annie—sliver of home in stormy waters, shard of a shipwrecked lifetime carried home, killer of vis friends, friend to one of vis victims. Outside of the Games they might never have stumbled across a reason to meet; after the Games, it's as true a betrayal to call her a friend as it would be to do otherwise. But things are also strange with Wander's family, now, in ways ve feels stupid for not expecting. Cadenza skitters from room to room like she'll fall through surface tension if she holds still a moment too long, Nate stares wide-eyed at the photographs, Teresa clings. Vis mother screamed when ve went for a glass of water in the middle of the night, then scolded ver as though ve meant to scare her, uncharacteristically avoiding what they both knew was the real reason she was angry.

Everything—blood, tears, murder—to get back to vis family, and it's a guilty relief to get away for a few hours. (For all of them, perhaps; it took less wheedling than ve expected to be let out of their sight. Then again, perhaps they simply know that Wander needs this, the same way vis father took one look at Annie on the front porch—Anatalia Morrisen, Career, Victor of the Eightieth Hunger Games, who sent a knife into her friend's eye without flinching until afterward, who could probably buy their entire house on a whim—and fetched her a pastry.) At least with Annie, complication has always been the cost of their relationship, since the hour long before anyone died when they traded names knowing—thinking they knew—that only one of them could make it home.

But here they both are, blood thrumming, shin-deep in this piece of home they never knew they shared.

They both survived. It's time to get back to living.

Leaving the ripples of their splashing behind them (and it is such a relief to compete with laughter and without stakes, a sliver of normalcy ve can't seem to coax the kids back into yet), they wade further out, until Annie deems the depth appropriate and drags her black and blue surfboard forward. Wander follows suit with vis borrowed green one. The healing left arm at vis side does nothing to compensate for vis inexperience, but ve copies her motions as closely as ve can, and if it's not quite smooth, at least it gets the job done.

There ve falters, glancing from the expert to the board and back again. "So I just..." Ve drums the fingers of vis right hand over the board, impressed all over again at the way something so dense and sturdy can float so gracefully. In retrospect, ve's not sure why ve never picked up surfing as a kid; it's the perfect midway between shore and sailing, closer to the land but closer, too, to the water. Too busy, ve supposes, but it seems like a missed opportunity now, and ve doesn't want to let any more of those slide by. "Get on?"


Title song is "Oceanica" by San Fermin. Is it relevant, overall? Eh. Did, considering their weapons, the lines spears and knives and urchin spines / we won't feel a thing stab me directly in the part of my heart dedicated to this duo? Clearly yes. (These kids feel so much, and Annie in particular worked so hard and went on such a journey to allow herself that right. My heart.)

@ Wander: stop ignoring medical professionals!! you are so lucky you have a pile of people to nag you to do your physical therapy lmao