coffee / kay

Across a folded up paper tucked away in his pocket sat the address to a small café here in the Capitol. Crumpled, folded, the directions were essentially now illegible as the pencil markings rubbed against each other. It was a nervous tick, fiddling. He found it best to pass time by doing just about anything mindlessly with his hands to keep from getting lost with his thoughts. This wasn’t anything new. Often times he found himself drumming aimlessly along to nothingness on his walks through the District. Or from time to time playing piano keys on table tops despite the lack of any ability to play the piano. But today in particular he found his fiddling to be more of a conscious need than a time passer.

Over the years, he’d received tons of invitations at his doorstep; usually when he made his yearly trip to the Capitol pretending to mentor whoever walked into the arena (though he usually passed on those responsibilities to a begrudged Opal,) though on the oft year finding its way to his home. Lavish parties, “small” social gatherings, a celebration, a ball, over the past twenty-some years Peri had seen it all. All forms of decoration, large cards, small postcards, ridiculous calligraphy, meticulous print, there hadn’t been any lack of attempted versatility in the solicitation of his time.

Peri sighed as he fobbed down the streets of the Capitol. It was hard to imagine how he’d once been wide-eyed and amazed by the city scape. A young naive 17-year old boy who’d only ever seen what lied within his District walls forced into this huge metropolis, now a curmudgeonly middle-aged man, he couldn’t help but notice the postmarks of a depressing capitalist regime. Sure, One wasn’t all that it could be, but at least there was an authenticity that lied in every building. There were stories attached to every inch of his District, generations of families building their livelihood, working hard for just enough to pass by. The Capitol was disillusioned. Year after year Peri noticed new stores popping up on every corner, new businesses emerging depending on the trend. The Capitol didn’t build legacies, it broke the back of its citizens every year in an attempt to make things better and better than before. How could anything be better than its predecessor if its predecessor hadn’t been given the time to even create a baseline.

But who was he to critique? He was hardly a member of either society, One or the Capitol. Just a nomad traveling to and from each region stuck in a never-ending cycle. It was a schedule that took many years to get used to. For a long time it felt as though as soon as he was established, he’d be running off to this, that, and the other. Sure, the alcohol hadn’t helped, but neither did the masses of media following his every step waiting for him to slip up.

Peri reached into his right pocket to pull out his pack of cigarettes and his lighter in one fell swoop. As he drew a filter to his lips, he glanced around the street. He wasn’t followed any more. Every so often an odd reporter would try and talk to him on the streets of the Capitol, but he was by no means big news these days. The career victor was now just another legacy of a long running system and for that, he was happy. He found himself slowing his pace as he got closer to the café, drawing longer drags from his cigarette as a means to walk slower. Why was he doing this? Flick. The ash fell to the sidewalk as he brushed past extravagant citizens. Didn’t matter how many years passed, they definitely were still wearing costumes. Not fashion. Costumes. Peri looked to his washed down jeans and plain black t-shirt and smirked. To think this was out of the ordinary here.

But that’s all he had ever intended to be, ordinary. He was one year away from that when he had been reaped for the 62nd Games, normalcy. As a teen all he’d wanted was a simple life, a wife, a kid maybe. Big dreams meant taking over his parents shop and running it until one day, he would pass it on to his kids. But that hadn’t been in the cards. That’s all Peri had ever wanted after the Games, a return to what could have been. He brought home a tribute the Games immediately following his so he didn’t have to mentor any more, he didn’t attend any of the silly parties thrown for Victors, nor was he sent on a series of missions by the President to do his bidding like some victors he knew. By and by, Peridot Myler had achieved the life he once wanted with one giant stain that followed him every where he went.

As he crushed the butt of the cigarettes beneath his mud-covered once-white sneakers, he allowed himself to stare at the tattoo caressing his left forearm. Seven stars, all aligned in a tiny constellation. Two covered in slight by hair, the black lines now losing some opacity over time. This was his stain. Every thing that the Games had brought him and taken from him. The death of his father, the ensuing suicide of his mother. His allies, Bran, and his sister. All dead, all there. They were all gone now for longer than he knew any of them, time had passed so quickly. These were the memories that he allowed, traced into his skin by some black-eyed Capitolite. This was the pain that he allowed himself to have, seven little stars etched into his skin - a reminder for him alone. It was also the forgiveness that he gave himself for letting them all go.

For such a long time, Peri had refused to forgive himself, only accepting blame for his actions as if they hadn’t been forced on him. And maybe he would never fully reach that state of self-forgiveness that would allow him to reach nirvana. It was easy to come to terms with the fact that none of this was all black and white, and even though time had moved so quickly, his feelings of guilt would come and go for as long as he lived. It was what he did with that guilt, the motivations that guided him, that would ultimately decide who Peri was as a person. Maybe that was how he would reach this state of normalcy that he craved so much in his youth. By learning to control his stains, his guilt, and letting it move through him in actions of graciousness, and not pity.

And maybe that’s why, when the invitation hit his door step, for the first time in twenty-something years, Peri didn’t rip up, toss, or ignore the note. For the first time, he said yes.

He would meet and talk with Glamour Kinkade.