over the rainbow / marceline & garnet

marceline jeon .

"thought i was the only one,
turned out i was everyone"

It's dinnertime at the training center. Marceline does her best to enjoy it, to savour the taste of Capitol cooking, but finds herself unable to so much as describe the flavours on her tongue. She cuts, she chews, she swallows. It's been this way since she arrived. Her appetite, already near insignificant, has dwindled day by day since leaving District Eight. Nonetheless, she's eaten what she's been given, supplementing the taste with memories of her favourite meals from back home. She cuts, she closes her eyes, she chews, and she swallows. But when Marceline opens her eyes, she's still here. The only trace of home is the ring on her finger, and the boy sitting across from her: Garnet Beauford. Chronically under socialized as she is, starting a conversation with him is harder than she thought, especially with how difficult he's becoming to look at. 

Garnet is a handsome guy, but in him she sees her brother-in-law, and so she sees her nieces and nephews. She wonders if they ever passed each other on the street before, or if they've managed to avoid each other their whole lives up until now. She doesn't remember him from school, but she only attended two days a week, and spent those two days alone. Always, always alone. Her family were always hassling her to spend more time with people, even if it was just them, and she always said no. If Garnet Beauford spoke to her back in Eight, she probably would've said no too. 

"My family are all probably getting home right about now. They're optimists, like fatal optimists, so I wonder what they're doing. Probably walking around like nothing's wrong. That's what they always do." Marceline finally says. Talking gives her a break from forcing herself to eat, and gives her time to stab at her food instead, restlessly pushing it around the plate. "...You got anyone at home?"

Marceline misses District Eight. She misses her family, and she misses her job, and she even misses the smog. She's grieving them all, grieving herself on their behalf, and desperately trying not to grieve the future that's been robbed from her. Try as she might, her mind wanders that direction regardless. And so, before he even answers, Marceline is already mourning Garnet's hypothetical family and friends -- stand ins for all of the strangers she coldly brushed past or ignored on the walk to and from work. There's so much about her home that she doesn't know that's now lost to her. To Garnet too.