{ violet } in your lonely heart | saffron/jacinta

я𝑜𝓈𝑒
Mentor

2,890 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her/they/them
last seen Nov 23, 2023 2:34:11 GMT -5

anyway don't be a stranger

{ violet } in your lonely heart | saffron/jacinta May 28, 2020 0:13:55 GMT -5

Post by я𝑜𝓈𝑒 on May 28, 2020 0:13:55 GMT -5

JS

The last time Jacinta was in the Capitol, she was almost a different person.

She has spent so many nights here, drinking the evenings away at parties, interviewing with hosts while high as a kite, barricading herself in her room to the point that her escort had to come drag her out.

Everything has changed so fast, too fast for her to keep up. Her life is headed in a direction she never thought it would be going — unless she can reverse it, but she is not holding out for that.

She had been irritated to have been sent away from District Seven, and from Mackenzie, in a time like this, but she keeps it to herself. Jacinta knows when to hold her tongue and how to pick her battles.

Her vexation was lessened when she learned Saffron was here, too. The two victors grew friendly when Jacinta visited District Ten many months ago. Saffron has invited Jacinta over to catch up, as it's been a few months since they last saw each other.

When Jacinta arrives to Saffron's Capitol living space, she invites her in and they sit down on the sofa.

"What did they call you to the Capitol for?" she inquires. "An interview?" Jacinta is here for fittings with Colt, but she wonders what brings Saffron to the city.

❧

i'll whisper quietly
i'll give you nothing but truth

"even stars burn out."

[ retro gm ] angel lí ✨
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bloomtodeath

{ violet } in your lonely heart | saffron/jacinta May 28, 2020 4:03:55 GMT -5

Post by [ retro gm ] angel lí ✨ on May 28, 2020 4:03:55 GMT -5

SL

There were not many Victors that intimidated Saffron - at least not at this age - but Jacinta Salazar had been one of them. Perhaps it was her cool outer shell, her savageness in her finale, the pang of jealousy she had felt around her closeness with Ment or simply for her stark beauty. Saffron would be lying if she said she did not feel abrasive around the girl at first. Thankfully, after a cordial dinner with Jacinta and Quinn's obsession with the girl from Seven, the two had fast become friendly.

It was easy to talk about Ment with Jaci. Easier than anyone she had encountered before. How guilty she felt for her death, and even moreso for the relief she felt after Clementa had passed. Some nights she still felt the sobbing girl slam her fist into Saffron's face, how she had let her pummel at her until she had snapped and shoved the girl away, hammering her own fists into her - how awful Clementa being left alive, being dead, being both was. Jacinta listened that night on their couch when Quinn had been put to bed and Enzo had stopped hovering. Two glasses of wine sipped between them, Saffron had learned of Jaci's own nightmares - though some, she suspected, the girl kept to herself.

Saffron didn't blame her.

So it was a relief to see an old friend in the Capitol after a painful twentieth anniversary interview with Sardonyx, who had spent the entire hour of filming pulling her teeth for facts about her daughter. Quinn, so close to ten. Even closer to twelve, the Capitolite had reminded her. Every question was a bullet to her head, every answer a blank - she had spent a decade hiding her daughter from these people, all so desperate to see her follow in her parents footsteps. Over my dead body, Saffron had silently seethed - but the worst part of all was that she knew, deep down, Quinn would adore their attention.

And she was petrified of what her daughter would do to get it.

So sue her if she needed a drink at eleven o'clock in the morning. "Jaci! Come on in," she waved in with a smile, two glass stems in her other hand. "Make yourself comfortable."

What a relief it was to have company, even if it were only for a while. She was due back at the station in a few hours and her depature from the Capitol couldn't come sooner - but as nice as Blue was to have around he did love to pry. Saffron needed a change of pace, else the poor man might walk away with a wrung neck.

"I'm sure as hell glad to see you here," Saffron sighed, placing the wine and glasses onto the ridiculously shaped coffee table beside them. "Thought for sure I'd be alone."

"What did they call you to the Capitol for?" Jacinta asked as Saffron settled next to her on the couch. "An interview?"

"Twentieth anniversary" Saff nodded, her orange hair still styled from this morning bobbing with the movement. She still couldn't believe that much time had passed - most days it felt like yesterday, and then others a lifetime. "Though they were more interested in my daughter than me," she added quietly, ignoring the lurch in her chest, "which is terrifying..."

She shook her head, shaking off the idea with a sigh. "Anyway, drink?" she gestured to the glasses, already unscrewing the bottle top. "Lord knows I need one. What're you in for?"

❧

breathe like a child
it's taken the winter
to find who i am

“and men said that the blood of the stars flowed in her veins.”

я𝑜𝓈𝑒
Mentor

2,890 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her/they/them
last seen Nov 23, 2023 2:34:11 GMT -5

anyway don't be a stranger

{ violet } in your lonely heart | saffron/jacinta May 28, 2020 17:03:42 GMT -5

Post by я𝑜𝓈𝑒 on May 28, 2020 17:03:42 GMT -5

JS

Jacinta and Saffron are a strange pair, unlikely friends. It was really Ment who bonded them together, as if her spirit guided their paths to intersect. Jacinta does not believe in life after death, but it's a soothing thought.

After her Games, Jacinta was convinced that Saffron would dislike her, and so she never approached her until years later. She had cared for Ment, but she also made a death pact with her after she sobbed over Tobias's death, wishing it had been her instead. It was only then that Jacinta realized that Clementa had truly wished to die. That night, as they watched Tobias's face appear in the sky, they kissed and Jacinta asked Ment to survive as long as she could, and in return, Jacinta would grant her the mercy of death. They swore on it, but it didn't matter. Ment died the next day and Jacinta was all alone.

"I can make it painless," she had promised Ment. "You wouldn't feel a thing."

It was selfish. Jacinta wasn't ready to lose another ally after Quillon and Tobias, and she wanted Ment to help her survive. Even so, Jacinta still thinks it would have been better if she had killed Ment. She didn't deserve to die like that, bleeding out from her leg in that cold, dark forest of skeletons.

She carried Ment to the hill, where she took her last breaths. Ment died with her eyes open, staring up at the endless black sky. Jacinta closed them and let the hovercraft take her body away. She watched as it disappeared, cold solitude engulfing her.

Saffron seems to understand, or maybe it just doesn't bother her anymore. They've both had years to make peace with Clementa's death — though Jacinta is still roused from her sleep by nightmares of her.

She listens as Saffron tells her of her interview, but soon starts to wish she hadn't asked.

"Though they were more interested in my daughter than me, which is terrifying..."

Jacinta suddenly feels very ill, her stomach roiling with a wave of nausea. A lump forms in her throat and she swallows it down, but nearly chokes on it.

Unease passes over her face for a moment, a break in her once calm expression, but she quickly resettles her composure.

"That sounds... very uncomfortable," she manages to say. A shiver runs down her spine as she is reminded of Eden Turner and Cedar Halt, and then of what happened to Violet, to the Lowe sisters, to the Frays. "I'm sorry you had to sit through that."

When Saffron offers her a drink, her first instinct is to say yes, and it gets the best of her.

"Oh, sure—" and then she stops herself as soon as the words fall from her mouth. "Well, actually... I can't, but thank you."

❧

i'll whisper quietly
i'll give you nothing but truth

"even stars burn out."

[ retro gm ] angel lí ✨
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8,148 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Apr 23, 2024 19:42:21 GMT -5

bloomtodeath

{ violet } in your lonely heart | saffron/jacinta May 31, 2020 6:00:36 GMT -5

Post by [ retro gm ] angel lí ✨ on May 31, 2020 6:00:36 GMT -5

SL

She sips her glass slowly, testing out the taste of wine in her mouth. Saffron was all too aware of how much she had tasted these past few months, terrified of wasting away like Arbor Halt had in her youth. One glass didn't hurt, she told herself. One a day, well - that was a different story.

"Oh, it's nothing I'm not used to," she waves away with her hand, adding a polite "but thank you." She was still a girl from Ten, after all - and Jaci deserves nothing but her pleasantries.

"I feel like Quinn loves it, though," she adds quietly, a near decade of anxiety slipping from her mouth in a quiet confession, "that's the bit that scares me..."

The victor takes another sip to silence herself. "There I go again!" she laughs, putting her own glass down to pour another for her friend only to be stopped suddenly by the girls words.

"Oh?" Saffron pauses, taking her hand back to her own glass. She wondered what had changed since their last meeting. She had fond memories of sitting by the crackling log fire that winter's night, giggling about their stylists and taking quiet moments to remember that year's tribute deaths.

Perhaps--

It would be rude to ask. "I'm sorry, I-" she shifts in her seat, perhaps it wouldn't be so painful. "I shouldn't've..."

Jacinta had bared a little of her soul to her so bravely that night, as all Victors eventually did with one-another. So why did she suddenly feel embarrassed, as if she had intruded on something too private and forced a secret out of her friend?

It was a strange relationship, victor and victor. They shared so much pain, so much grief, so much joy. Watched each-other at their lowest, at their best, seen them murder children and get married and reunite with hugs. Held each-other as they sobbed, fought with one another until they were blue in the face, drank themselves silly and dragged their friends down with them. They knew so much about each-other in a way no-one else ever would.

And yet they hardly knew each-other.

"Jaci - forgive my intrusion, and you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," there she goes again with her Ten manners. "But you're not...?"

She pauses to look at her friend, swallowing back guilt, as her voice lowers to a whisper.

"Struggling, are you? Like Arbor did? If I'd have known I would never of offered..."

❧

breathe like a child
it's taken the winter
to find who i am