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#especially movie!coriolanus
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mans would have fucked sejanus if he thought it’d get him that plinth prize no questions asked
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spacy-snail · 6 months
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Parts of the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes movie that did the book dirty
Spoilers!!
• Snow is the one to suggest feeding the tributes, not stumbling across Sejanus already doing it
• The downgrade of the whole rat problem/rat poison thing
• Grandma’am is nice now???
• The almost total removal of Clemensia’s character, her being a weird suck up instead of her making a normal teen lie, and the fallout showing the absolute apathy Dr Gaul has (and also making Snow realize he can’t even trust the Capitol)
• Dr Gaul literally spelling out what the snakes do and Clemensia still sticking her hand in that stupid snake tank
• Not having Snow calling Lucy Gray “mine” in a creepy way even once to show how he feels he has ownership of her from the very beginning
• The EXTREME downgrade of Snow and Sejanus’ relationship, and the weird bond he has with the Plinths in general
• Ma Plinth erasure
• Tigris erasure
• Getting rid of Arachne’s funeral
• Snow not going out of his way to get Lucy Gray a guitar
• Having a blink and you’ll miss it throwaway line of the tributes and Academy students that died in the explosion
• Not showing the other tributes that did the interview
• Not showing Mama Snow’s compact until Coriolanus deciding to give it to Lucy Gray
• Lucy Gray and Snow didn’t kiss before she went into the games??? I feel like that added and extra layer of her wanting to survive but idk
• The erasure of the iconic “it’s not over until the mockingjay sings” line
• The drones never being fixed was a super weird choice and I’m not sure if I liked it or not
• Snow being super suspicious and running out to put something with Lucy Gray’s scent in the snake tank instead of just getting lucky and putting it in there on the off chance instead of it being predetermined
• The Games ending with the snake scene instead of Lucy Gray having to be clever to outwit her opponents, like I get it’s dramatic but that scene with Dr Gaul was just so weird to me
• Highbottom TELLING Snow to sign up for the Peacekeepers instead of just implying it and also telling him to keep his identity anonymous instead of Snow doing it out of pride
• Sejanus not telling Snow about the diploma he literally bargained for for him
• Sejanus showing up on the train instead of after Snow gets to District 12 and has to wallow in what his life is now before having finally having someone that actually knows him
• Snow not having IMMEDIATE beef with the mockingjays
• Snow not calling Sejanus his brother until the moment he betrayed him
• Them playing the Jabberjay audio at the hanging instead of Snow having to sit with his guilt and finding out via the commander was so so SO cringy omg
• Snow finding out he was going to District 2 BEFORE finding out about the hunt for the guns and who killed the mayor’s daughter was so so weird like why did they choose to do it in that order I feel like it took away all suspense of wondering when the other shoe was going to drop
• Lucy Gray looking that man in the eye and calling herself a loose end while he has a gun in his hand and not getting shot then and there was the most unrealistic part of the movie istg
• Not showing the Plinths in the apartment with them at all and just kinda having a throwaway line about where the money’s coming from
• Dr Gaul never says that she destroyed all evidence of the 10th game because of everything that happened with Snow, Lucy Gray, Sejanus, and the other dead Capitol children
• Snow not throwing away the morphine and Highbottom digging to get it, and instead just leaving it on the desk, idk it takes away the agency of the murder to me, less like an accident and less thought out (and on top of that, not showing how meticulous he was with poisoning the morphine so it couldn’t be traced back to him)
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ichorai · 6 months
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button ; coriolanus snow. (m)
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pairing ; young!coriolanus snow x capitol!reader (gender-neutral)
synopsis ; what did make him pause, however, was the very top button of your shirt. misshaped. odd. not matching the rest of your buttons. his gift to you. “you’re wearing it,” coriolanus whispered. his voice sounded strained.
words ; 3.4k
themes ; fluff, mild angst, smut
warnings / includes ; unprotected sex (not very explicit), possessiveness, themes of classism, we meet reader's rich parents !! and grandma'am and tigris appear, coryo's paranoia, he's not exactly toxic yet but the seeds are very much planted, i tried to keep him in character as best i could </3
a/n ; there will be a third part loosely following the events of the movie (obv tweaked for the fic!)
series masterlist. main masterlist.
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Your home was the very definition of old money—wealth and grace and high status carved into the marble floors, hung up in the large oil paintings, found within the fibers of the expensive carpets leading into grand halls. Snow had to consciously remind himself to appear unphased. He had this sort of life, too, as far as you were concerned.
It was only expected, especially considering your parents’ high positions: with your father being the top admiral of the navy, and your mother a renowned physicist with several awards under her belt. Dozens of rows of medals and framed certifications from both your parents were more than enough for Snow to gauge the mass of their importance.
He shifted the weight of his feet in his too-tight shoes. Anxious. He wore his dress shirt again, though not before asking Tigris to try and rework the buttons. The buttons hewn from his bathroom tiles. Make them look the same, he had told her. They’re uneven. Snow turned away before he could see her mildly crestfallen expression.
It was a special occasion, hence his dressed-up attire. There was a rose pinned to his waistcoat, a deep shade of red, from his Grandma’am’s rooftop garden. Your father had come home today, after months of military work in the districts. And to celebrate such a momentous evening, you invited him to dinner. 
To meet your parents. How utterly fraught.
Though, now that the two of you were officially together (albeit only recently—Sejanus asked if the two of you were a thing and Coryo replied with an instinctive, possessive yes, much to both of your surprise), Coriolanus supposed there was no use in delaying the inevitable.
“Don’t be nervous,” you told him, arm looped around his. The white rose he’d given you upon his arrival was tucked neatly behind your ear, a lovely contrast to your all-black garb. In a light-hearted tone, you added, “Father would be able to smell it on you. The fear.”
Coriolanus shot you an exasperated glance, to which you only smiled. You landed a soft, reassuring kiss onto his cheek, hand sliding down from his elbow to lace with his. 
“You look… breathtaking,” he said, lifting your conjoined palms to brush his lips over your knuckles. Of the many lies that he told you, this certainly wasn’t one of them. 
Your eyes gleamed with the light from the chandelier hanging above you.
“And you look handsome as ever.” A pause. You seemed bashful all of a sudden, averting your gaze to the gold patterns on the marble floors. “I know this is all very new, so I apologize in advance, if my father asks about our, uhm… our future… He’s a very forward man.”
A smile twitched at the corner of his lips and he slotted his free hand beneath your chin, the pad of his thumb pressing lightly over the side of your throat, forcing you to look back at him. “I have no intention of letting you go, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
You smiled again, all sunlight and warmth, and Coriolanus couldn’t help but steal it away with one last kiss. 
“Ready?” you asked, jerking your head in the direction of the dining room. 
Snow swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded.
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Dinner was quite a pleasant affair. The food was better than anything the academy ever served—Coriolanus wondered how you could willingly go from eating such delicacies at home to basic, run-of-the-mill meals the cafeteria provided. There were courses, tender peppered steaks (his very favorite), rich mushroom soups, iced lemon cakes, and several sorts of breads and butters were offered all throughout.
Your mother was a delight, enchanting him with stories of laboratory mishaps and her dangerous adventures with radioactive material. You looked a lot like her, he realized.
Your father, on the other hand, was pressing at first, grilling Coriolanus with dozens of personal questions. If you hadn’t warned him beforehand that he was a military leader, he most definitely would’ve worked it out for himself then. There were times where you politely but forcefully snapped at him, telling him to lay off the invasive interrogation and to let the poor man eat. But Coriolanus really didn’t mind—he’d spent hours upon hours preparing himself for this. He answered all of the questions with effortless ease.
By the third course, your father was satisfied. Reluctant, but satisfied. By the fourth, he was already asking about marriage, much to your mortification. Coriolanus smiled down at his plate, and quietly listened to you lecture your father about privacy and civility.
Yes, dinner was quite enjoyable. Several containers of food from unseen servants were wrapped up for him to take home, at your request, despite his polite protests. It wasn’t a common thing to do in the capitol, but your parents hadn’t batted an eye. 
He was safe. They didn’t know. It was an ongoing mantra the entire night.
He was shown out the door by your father, who clapped a large hand on his shoulder and told him to take care of you, especially while he was gone. Your mother kissed him once on each cheek as farewell, and you did the same, though your kisses strayed far closer to his lips. He caught the mischievous gleam in your eyes. 
The door shut behind him once he strode into the expansive courtyard in front of your mansion of a home. He glanced down at the rose pinned to his coat, wondering if you were still wearing yours behind your ear. A minute later, he jumped out of his reverie when the entrance creaked open once more. You peeked your head back out, eyes alight, pleased to see that he was still there. 
You slid out from the entryway and made your way to him with quick strides, wasting no time to rest your hands upon his chest. To his delight, you were still wearing the rose. “Father and mother left to watch television in the estate’s Northern wing. Didn’t want to kiss you in front of them.”
There were wings to your house? Coriolanus blinked at you, accidentally letting his indifferent mask slip for a few seconds. If you noticed, you didn’t say anything about it, leaning forward to kiss him sweetly. It took him another moment to gather his wits, before winding his arms about your waist and deepening the kiss, nearly bending you backwards with his vigor.
He could never tire of this, he thought, fingers curling so his nails dug into the expensive black fabric of your top. Kissing you, touching you, entertaining the notion that you were his, and only his. 
When you pulled away, your lips were wonderfully kiss-swollen and your pupils were blown wide, to his amusement. Were his eyes just the same?
“Thank you for being here today,” you mumbled, that smile-frown he was so fond of gracing your features once more. “I’m sorry if my parents were too—”
“They were wonderful. You’re wonderful,” he interrupted, tone soft. His hand lifted from your waist to cup your face. Cold fingers against flushed skin. “I’ll see you at the academy?”
A nod, a grin, and a relieved sigh. “Sleep well, Coryo.”
“You, too.” He pulled away, reluctant, allowing his hands to fall back to his sides. “You look good with it, you know. The rose.” With a final nod, he turned on his heel and walked away from your estate, back to his own cold penthouse, where he had to burn newspaper scraps to keep warm.
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The months drew by like a lazy stream of water, gliding over a bed of stones, languid and pleasant. Your time with Coriolanus was nothing short of utter bliss. He was a sweet lover, despite his possessive streaks, always making sure you were alright with what he was doing. The two of you went slow and steady, always asking, always gentle. He kissed you as if you were made of sugar glass, and you held onto him as if he was a fragile ceramic vase.
Exams were drawing nearer with each passing day, and the two of you found yourself studying and cramming more than anything. He would often tell you that there was no need for you to study so hard, especially when you were already at the very top, likely to claim the Plinth prize for yourself, but you always waved him away with a modest laugh. If the two of you weren’t at the library pouring over dozens upon dozens of books, you were finding ways to sneak him into your home: kissing behind stone statues in the gardens, hiding behind velvet curtains, pulling him onto your massive, four-poster bed.
It was only a matter of time until you asked.
His arm was draped over your bare midriff, drawing mindless shapes into your hip. Your head rested back against his chest, mildly sweaty from the lovemaking session the two of you were still dwindling down from. You stared out your window, watching the sun slowly bleed the sky a hazy clementine hue, teeth sinking down into the flesh of your bottom lip in thought.
“Why haven’t we ever studied at your home, Coryo?” you asked. “I’ve yet to meet your cousin. You talk about her a lot… she seems wonderful.”
You felt a cold breath billow over the back of your neck. It sent pleasant chills spider down your spinal column. And you could’ve imagined it, but his fingers seemed to flex over your bare flesh. Twitch. Almost antsy. Did your question make him uncomfortable?
Shifting in his grasp, you turned within his arms so you could face him. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to pressure you, or anything. I just… just know that I’d never judge you.”
His expression was near unreadable, the blue of his eyes even paler than usual with the sunset’s light casting a honey-glow over both of your sprawled-out forms. He kissed you again, hungrily, almost as if to distract you. You let him.
Kiss you, touch you, bruise you. Any of it, all of it.
A low groan barreled within his chest when you fisted a handful of his soft blonde waves at the base of his neck, gently tugging. 
“Nothing you could show me would make me love you any less,” you muttered against his lips, nose nudging against his. “Nothing, Coryo.”
And he, in a moment of love-addled weakness, let himself believe you.
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Come the next afternoon, you were at the door of the Snows’ penthouse, a basketed batch of warm cookies held in one hand, the other holding a heavy bag full of all your textbooks to study. If the two of you were going to study at all today. Your mother was aghast that you were about to visit his home without some sort of gift, and abruptly shoved the basket of goodies into your arms out of seemingly nowhere, as if materialized out of thin air.
“Coriolanus loves the chocolate chip ones,” she harrumphed whilst ushering you out the door. “Honestly, showing up to someone else’s home empty-handed? Who raised you?”
The irony was not lost on either of you, and you barked out a laugh before kissing her farewell and setting off to visit him. 
You rang the rusted doorbell once—curiously regarding the little button once you realized that it was broken. Then, you knocked the door twice, then another two times for good measure. There was a muffled scuffling behind the door, a woman’s voice echoing from behind.
And when it swung open, you were met with an elderly woman, shrouded in a too-large, black tunic with embroidered flowers on the sleeves, the threads loose and pulled, the once-vibrant colors faded. She wore a turban, covering most of her white hair save for the few thin tendrils framing the sides of her face. 
“Hello, I’m Coriolanus’ classmate,” you greeted, in an ever-so-capitol-esque manner. “You must be his… Grandma’am?”
She appeared confused for a moment, before slow sparks of recognition fired across her blue eyes. Coriolanus had the same eyes, you noted.
“Oh!” she crooned. “Oh, dear me! Coriolanus! It’s your lovely friend!” 
There was a bit of commotion down the hall. The brief moment of pause allowed you to finally take in why Coriolanus hadn’t wanted you to come to his home all this time. The penthouse was still quite lavish, as the Snow estate was one of the most expensive properties in the capitol, but it was clear that the space was diminishing with the weight of its upkeep—flickering lights, dusty floors, tears in the wallpapers, mold on the countertops…
Your attention was drawn away from the view when Tigris and Coryo emerged from the same room, and you couldn’t help the smile that threatened to break across your features. His cousin was fretting over his lopsided curls, and he discreetly tried to duck out of her way to get to you.
“My, you are just as gorgeous as he said you were!” Grandma’am said in a pitching tone, wrangling your attention back to her. She lifted her hands to lightly pinch at your cheeks. “Yes, you’ll do just fine.” Her fingers fell away and she scuttled off, murmuring something about the Capitol’s First Partner—
Coriolanus breathed out your name and his hand was on your shoulder, apologizing once, twice, three times (what was he even apologizing for?), before Tigris popped up by his side, bumping him out of the way so she could shake your hand vigorously.
“Hi! I’m Tigris—it’s so nice to finally meet you!”
You shook the blonde woman’s hand, smile seeming to grow impossibly wider. “It’s nice to meet you, too! I love your dress.”
Her mouth dropped open in a flustered manner and a lovely rose shade dusted over her cheekbones. “Oh, this old thing?” She absentmindedly smoothed a hand down the frills of her pink dress. “Yeah, I… oh, it’s nothing, really, I just made it myself.”
“That’s incredibly impressive! You must be a really talented seamstress.”
A sharp clear of his throat made your eyes snap back to Coriolanus. 
“Coryo,” you greeted warmly. “I brought you cookies. Chocolate chip. Mother sends her regards.”
The two Snows in front of you eyed the basket with large eyes. 
“Thank you,” he croaked, accepting the basket from your extended hands and handing it over to his cousin. “Tigris, if you’d excuse us—we’ve got some studying to do.”
Coriolanus began to tug you down the hall, and you waved back to Tigris, telling her that you’d love to see any of her other dresses later. She’d already reached into the basket and had a cookie halfway to her mouth as she nodded at you with a toothy grin.
His room was in around the same state as the rest of the home. Furniture was old, torn, frayed, or simply broken. There were several boarded-up holes in his dresser. There was a box of rat poison below his desk, which was full with all sorts of papers and stacks of yellowing books. You skittered in and dropped your heavy bag down by his bed, allowing him to close the door behind you. You just barely registered the click of a lock.
“So?” he asked, voice sounding much louder in such a confined space. He seemed tense, as if bracing himself for the worst. “Are you disgusted yet?”
“What do you take me for?” you replied easily, having already gathered why he was so afraid of bringing you here in the first place. “I’m not a leech, nor am I vain, Coriolanus. I don’t want more money, and I’m not here to offer you charity to flaunt my wealth. I thought you’d know that by now.”
He stalked closer, observing you like a wolf would its prey. “What is it you want, then?”
When you took a step back closer to his small, rather wiry bed, he would take two longer strides, crowding you back against it. He dipped forward so that his lips were only a hair’s breadth from yours, but just barely not touching.
“You know, I’m sure.”
“I do.” Coriolanus knew that you wanted him just for him, and nothing gave him more pleasure than that simple fact. His nose brushed yours. 
“Would it make me a fool to stay?” you asked, the question fanning over his mouth. Inviting, ever so tantalizing. “You’re not planning on chopping me up and selling my organs for some cash, are you?”
He didn’t laugh at your little joke. Instead, he dove forward, one hand yanking your hips to his, the other winding over to the back of your head. He kissed you desperately, all teeth and tongue, hardened lips and his knee slotting between your thighs. 
“No,” he susurrated thickly, as if he’d swallowed honey and soil, pressing you down until you were fully laid down over his rickety bed, back arched. “You’d be mine. All of you, just mine.”
He swallowed any sort of gasp and moan that fell from your mouth. Greedy, lustful, determined to make you pliable. His kisses didn’t slow down whatsoever when he tore himself away from your lips, freckling them down your cheeks, your jaw, your neck, your collarbones. 
What did make him pause, however, was the very top button of your shirt. 
Misshaped. Odd. Not matching the rest of your buttons. His gift to you.
“You’re wearing it,” Coriolanus whispered. His voice sounded strained.
“Mmh?” You glanced down at the button. “Oh. Of course, I am. I like how it looks.”
His face hovered above yours once more. His stare was so intense you began to shy away, staring at a moldy patch on the ceiling. The silence felt suffocating as you waited for him to do something. Anything.
“I love you,” he breathed out, finally. Upfront and abrupt. It wasn’t often that he said it. Maybe once or twice before, since you said it more than enough for the both of you. 
You laughed then—your wonderful, wind-chime laughter. It was more out of shock than anything. He kissed you soft and sweet, momentarily quelling your chuckling. But as the afternoon of so-called ‘studying’ drew on, the laughter melded into sighs of pleasure when clothes were shed, shifting towards wanton moans of desperation when heated flesh slid against one another. 
You nearly choked when his length breached your entrance, scratching faint red lines down the expanse of his back as he pushed in, pulled out. Rhythmic. Again and again and again—you couldn’t seem to get enough of him on top of you, inside of you, all around you. Your chest was pressed up against his; could he hear your heart beating through your ribs, yearning to feel his? The coil within your lower abdomen tightened. He read your every microexpression just perfectly.
He’d unbuttoned your entire shirt save for the oddly-shaped one, hands groping all over your bare skin, teeth biting down onto the patch of skin just above the button as he rocked himself into a climax, roping you down into the abyss with him. Ragged groans and broken sighs. 
Coriolanus dragged his tongue up your chest and your neck, leaving a cold trail in his wake, and he sucked in a deep breath. When he pulled back to stare at you—flushed, hair mussed, sweat beaded along your hairline, his pearlescent spend between your thighs, your eyes half-lidded… chest only barely covered by his one button…
“Thank you,” he croaked, kissing the space beside your left eye. “For not running.”
“Don’t make me a fool for it,” you replied, looping your arms over Coriolanus’ neck so he could kiss you properly.
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Red Carpet || Tom Blyth x gf!reader
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Summary: Tom takes you to your very first movie premiere and it happens to be the movie that he is the protagonist in. A sweet moment happens between the two of you which leaves fans further fangirling over your relationship.
A/n: I have been constantly asked If I will ever do a Tom Blyth x reader imagine and the answer is yes :). Btw I absolutely love @yzzart’s Tom Blyth x actress!reader imagines and you should totally go check them out!
Warnings: none :)
Wc:
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Divider by @pommecita
You were beyond nervous and excited to attend the red carpet Premiere for The Hunger Games The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Especially since you would be attending as your boyfriend’s plus one who happens to play Coriolanus Snow in said movie.
The two of you kept your relationship as private as you could, but at some point along the way of him filming, everyone knew the two of you were together. Your public affection towards each other during the behind the scenes did not go unnoticed by fans who recorded it and took pictures.
It was bound to happen someday. "You look absolutely gorgeous, darling," Tom hugs you from behind, your exposed back flush against his outfit, as he admires your reflection in the mirror. You hold his arms that were protectively on your waist.
"Thank you, Tom. You look as handsome as ever," You giggle, turning around to place your hands on either side of his face, admiring every little detail on his face that you have already noticed about a thousand times, before placing a gentle kiss on his lips.
You two were on your way to the event, his hand never left your thigh as you lean your head against his shoulder. Your phone suddenly buzzed as you look at the caller id. It was Rachel. You immediately answered it as it went through to face time.
"Where are you guys!" She yells in the speaker, loud chatter in the background. She was already at the event. "We are literally around the corner," You say taking a look around your surroundings as Tom chuckles. "Let me see your outfits!" Rachel stares at you with a wide grin.
You laugh at her energy as you pass Tom the phone as he holds it up so that the both of you were on screen. Rachel gasps as she covers her mouth, "You guys look fucking amazing!" She squeals as you chuckle.
"Wait until you see the back of Y/n's dress," Tom lets out a whistle as you nudge him with a smile. "I can't wait to see! Oh wait, I think I see your car pulling up right now. See you soon!" She quickly says before hanging up.
Tom squeezes your thigh, his way of asking if you were alright without any words. You nod with a small smile. You arrived at the premiere and the flashlights coming from the cameras shone through the windows.
Tom steps out first before lending you his hand, aiding you as you get out of the car. He gives you an encouraging smile as you smile back at him. Everyone started screaming when they saw the two of you, causing you to smile even more.
His hand rested on the small of your back as the two of you were whisked into interviews. "Tom! It's so great to see you, we'd like to ask you a few questions if that is alright?" The woman smiles as she passes Tom a microphone.
"Of course!" Tom offers the man a smile. "What was your favourite things about filming this movie?" You stayed quiet as you look at Tom, giving him a smile. "Well, I was super grateful to be able to work with such incredible actors and actresses, Peter and Viola just to name a few, I really enjoyed the atmosphere on set, we were all like family," Your boyfriend answers.
You saw a lot of cameras pointed your directions so you wave and smile, "Would you like to explain to us and your fans who this beautiful girl is beside you Tom?" You snap your attention back to Tom and the woman. Tom smiles as you as you look at the woman. "I think you and everyone already have a pretty clear idea on who she is," Tom laughs as does the woman.
"This beautiful girl is my girlfriend. She's stuck with me during the whole filming of the movie and I'm so grateful that she's mine," He answers, his eyes not leaving yours as he pulls you closer to him. "He's just too sweet isn't he?" You chuckle at the camera making them laugh.
Tom presses a kiss on your cheek as you could feel your face heating up slightly. "You two are just too adorable! Thank you for your time, the woman smiles as Tom hands her back the microphone. "My pleasure," Tom gives her a final smile before the two of you are once again whisked into other interviews, where you would sometimes be included.
Then it was time to take pictures. Tom's hand never left yours as you both stood where they were taking the photos. Tom protectively places his hand on your waist as you both pose for the cameras. You were almost blinded by all the flashing and deaf from the shouting.
The string on the back of your dress suddenly became loose as you curse under your breath. Tom looks down at you before moving to stand in front of you in a protective manner to cover you from the cameras. "You okay?" He asks concerned. I look at him with a smile from his sweet gesture.
"The back of my dress came undone," He looks over your shoulder. He then pulls you into a hug as you were slightly taken back. You then feels his hands working on tying your dress back. You let out a chuckle as you rub his back.
The cameras directly in front of you were confused but the cameras by the side all awed at his actions. "There you go, darling," He kisses your cheek as he pulls back. You give him a grateful smile, "Thank you."
"Y/n! Tom!" You hear a feminine voice call out as Rachel and Josh make their way towards the two of you. "Hi!" You smiled, pulling Josh into a hug and then Rachel. "Oh you look stunning," Rachel holds your forearms as you couln't keep the smile of your face.
"Have you looked in a mirror? You look gorgeous Rach!" You pull her in for a second hug as you all laugh at something funny Josh had said as the four of you pose for a picture.
After the premiere, Rachel sent you so many links to nearly every single social media platform. There were a bunch of posts and tiktoks about what happened with your dress and how Tom helped you by hugging you.
You chuckle as you show Tom the posts and hundreds of tiktoks that had already been posted. "They love you," Tom chuckles, kissing your forehead as the two of you lay in each others embrace.
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ghostfacd · 6 months
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WIRED AUTOCOMPLETE. | TOM BLYTH
PAIRING. tom blyth x fem!actress!reader
SUMMARY. in which you and tom make a special appearance on wired’s autocomplete interview
installment of this au | recommend reading for more context
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“Hi — we’re Y/N Avocot and Tom Blyth — and this is the Wired Autocomplete Interview!”
You’re both handed a white board, bigger than your face, and there’s a list of questions with some of the words covered.
“Do you want to go first?” Tom asks, giving you a small smile.
“Yes! I’m pretty excited actually,” you begin to peel off the first question. “Okay, first question: what was Y/N Avocot’s first role?”
You think for a moment, “well in terms of roles in general, my first acting role was very small and I believe it was for this ice cream commercial as a kid. I’m not sure if it’s still up but my mom had signed me up for it and they thought I was a really cute kid so they casted me.”
Tom laughs, “really?” He then retrieves his board from the crew. “Okay my turn. Why does Coriolanus Snow turn evil?”
That question makes you slightly giggle, because it’s so broad that it’s nearly impossible for Tom to narrow down exactly what it is that made Coriolanus suddenly switch. “I believe you should be asking Suzanne Collins, shout-out to her for making the entire trilogy and prequel. But honestly? I think he was always power hungry, and even though Tigris tried her very best to bring out the humanity in him, it was just never enough. Especially after Sejanus’s death, I think Coriolanus realized there was no going back.”
“Oh wow,” you say, very impressed with how he decided to answer it. “That was a terrific answer Tom.”
“Thank you m’lady.” You giggle at his antics, rolling your eyes jokingly.
“What role does Y/N Avocot play in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes?” You clear your throat, imitating one of your character’s iconic resting bitch face.
“I play Balleona Laurent, duh.” You joke. “Anyway, yes, I play Balleona, also known as Leona. She’s originally from the Capitol just like Coriolanus. They met at the academy and she automatically knew she had to have him. She comes from the Laurent family, which is a very very wealthy, well off, intimidating family that Coriolanus knows he just has to get into, which is why they start dating. I don’t wanna spoil too much of Leona and Corio in the movie, soooo you guys should definitely check it out!”
“Alright,” Tom adjusts himself in his seat, ripping off the paper for the next question. “Does Tom Blyth have a girlfriend?”
He pretends to think, which makes you bite your lip, suppressing a laugh. “Hmm, very complex question.”
“Oh give the people what they want!” You tease, “yes he does. He’s inlove with Jennifer Lawrence.”
“I am not inlove with Jennifer Lawrence!” He exclaims quickly, “although I greatly admire her work. My girlfriend is Y/N Avocot over here, sadly.”
“Sadly?!” You fake offense, “cut the cameras. I’m gonna beat Tom up.”
You peel away at your next question, the interview already being loads of fun for the both of you. “Is Y/N Avocot a good singer?”
Your head falls forward, and Tom’s automatic instinct is to catch you, not realizing you’re only joking. “Oh God, I hope so!” You say, laughing as you pick your head up. “I’m no Mariah Carey but I like to think I’m a pretty okay singer.”
“More than okay,” Tom chimes in, which makes you laugh.
“Aw, thanks Tom.”
Tom reaches to peel another question off. “Is Tom Blyth American?” This question makes you almost spit out the water you were currently taking a sip out of. “Well, a lot of people get shocked when I say I’m from the UK. I mean, is my American accent that good?”
“Guess so,” you shrug. “Okay next. Is Y/N Avocot in The Summer I Turned Pretty?”
You clasp your hands together excitedly, giving the camera a wide smile. “Yes! I play Maekella Fisher, also known as Ella Fisher, Steven Conklin’s love interest and sister to Conrad and Jeremiah. The first season airs out soon so please stay tune for that! I’m so excited to be apart of this amazing show with such amazing people.”
“I always come to watch her on set,” Tom says, “they’re all such funny and charismatic people. I swear I’ve became friends with everyone on Y/N’s cast.”
“Okay, my last question,” Tom peels off the paper, grinning. “Will Tom Blyth star in another movie soon?”
He smirks, eyes playfully looking into the camera. “Who knows? But I do know that something exciting will be coming out soon so prepare yourselves!”
“Way to tease the crowd Blyth,” you say, rolling your eyes. “Anyway! My last question, this was quick. What is Y/N Avocot’s skincare routine? Oh, I’ve been waiting for this one.”
You sit on the edge of your seat, and Tom finds it endearing that you’re so excited about something as small as this.
“First, I rinse my face with cold water and I dip my face in a bowl of ice and water for 3 minutes. Afterwards, I put on my dewy toner from Innisfree, it’s so smooth and nice. Sometimes I’m too lazy for this step but I also put on sunscreen, it’s important so I always remind myself to not forget— but I love to use Supergoop Unseen’s Sunscreen. I use drunk elephant’s bronze drops if I wanna go for a sunkissed look that day, but I usually don’t. And then I just shake my Tower facial spray and spray it all over my face. Usually, I touch up my eyebrows and do my eyeliner but that’s really about it!”
“It’s true,” Tom adds. “She asked me if I could go buy her the tower spray yesterday because she was almost out.”
“No need to expose me like that,” you say, clinging your arms onto his. “Well thank you guys for watching!”
“Thank you!” Tom and you wave at the camera, smiling brightly.
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after-witch · 6 months
Text
The Driven Snow [Yandere Coriolanus Snow x Reader]
Title: The Driven Snow [Yandere Coriolanus Snow x Reader]
Synopsis: You're a District 2 school graduate who comes to the Capitol with her father before the 11th Hunger Games. You don't expect to meet anyone kind, especially not someone named Coriolanus Snow who offers you his arm, his smile, and treats in secret. 
Word Count: 5270
notes: yandere, abusive relationship, non-graphic descriptions of torture and death (not against reader); uses a mixture of book and movie canon
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The Capitol was not as dazzling as your father described it but then, he had seen it before the war. Though perhaps it was your own bitterness that made you ignore the signs of returning prosperity that sets it above everywhere else.
The repaired elaborate buildings, the fresh pungent smell of plaster and paint. The cars pumping exhaust fumes into the air. The low rumble of garbage trucks that pick up bright green garbage cans, some of which are actually teeming with plastic trash bags. Such waste was unheard of, even in the oh-so-loyal District 2, where only the lowest of the low find themselves starving.
Although not-starving didn’t mean that everything was plentiful. 
You, though, were lucky enough to avoid the lima bean heavy diet that some of your classmates (now former--graduation was months ago) lived on. Or were you? The meat that graced your family’s dinner table, the pats of butter on toast, were all courtesy of your father’s  immense talent in building creative weapons that allowed the Capitol to stamp out every last bit of rebellion in the Districts. That allowed them to regain control. That allowed them to create the Hunger Games.
Which is why you were in the Capitol now. Oh, not to participate in them. Your father’s status in District 2 had seen to that; it would be a scandal if the name of his beloved daughter were to ever be pulled. 
You were there because your father had been given a lucrative contract, one that was sure to cement your family’s wealth for generations: a contract to build high-tech weapons for the Hunger Games themselves. 
They would still be killing. But on a much smaller scale, you supposed, than the weapons your father designed during the war. 
Still. Blood was blood. And if it had to be spilled, well, there was nothing you could do about it except hope they died quickly. Especially the ones from District 2.
Last year’s Games’ had been awful enough. Your family had watched the Games on a modest television set in the privacy of your living room, sent courtesy of the Capitol. 
You wondered if you would ever get the sight of Marcus’ battered, bloated face from your mind; if you would ever unhear the way his body thumped to the ground when that girl had killed him, out of mercy. If you would ever stop imagining what it must have felt like in those last moments.
But it wasn’t all horror. You’d liked Lucy Gray well enough, even though she was from 12. She had a wild way of dressing and the singing--it was practically theatrical, compared to what you’d heard about the previous games. 
Maybe that was why your father got this contract: theatrics. Maybe the games would be more dramatic from now on. Maybe they wanted tributes like Lucy Gray, who sang and spit and poisoned her way to Victory. It was strange, really, that there’d been hardly any talk of her since her win. 
“Father?” You asked, quietly as you could. 
Both of you were standing in the foyer of the grand university in the Capitol. The outside was still a little ravaged, but inside, it was perfectly lovely. Walls lined with books--perhaps some of them were fake--and marble floors and marble busts dotting the sight lines.
“Mm?” He replied, eyes scanning over his clipboard. He flips it, here and there.
“I was just thinking. About last year’s games. About Lucy Gray, and how the Games--”
Your father rounded on you, eyes suddenly serious and blazing.
“Quiet. Weren’t you paying attention on the way here?” Admittedly, you were not. You’d been daydreaming about what you might do now that you were done with school. There was no university in District 2, and your father hadn’t even mentioned a job. “You’re not supposed to mention--”
“Not supposed to mention whom? Ah, ah, ah. Lucy Gray Baird?” called a voice, almost in sing-song.
Your father stood up stiff, and the life seemed to drain from his face.
Both of you look towards the sound of the voice, and now it’s your turn to stiffen. The voice came from a woman standing in the doorway of the very office that your father was waiting to enter. She was wearing an elaborate jacket made of what looked like rainbow snake scales. Her hair was gray and curly. She had, you realized, two different colored eyes. 
Your father swallowed, and you could see the apple of it bob up and down. It made you think, abruptly, of suckling pigs. 
“Dr. Gaul,” he said, in a voice far too tight to be relaxed. “I apologize for my daughter’s insubordination, I assure you, she meant no--”
Dr. Gaul waved her hands at him and approached you. 
“Did you like last year’s games?” She didn’t look angry. No, she looked delighted.
“I…” It was your turn to swallow, your turn to feel that tightness. “It-it was the first time I’ve watched them, ma’am.” You want to ask this woman: do you think I liked watching someone from my District 2 so horribly? Or any District, really? Did I like it? 
Her smile grew wider. 
“I’m glad. You’ll be watching them every year from now on, I hope. We have big plans.” Her eyebrows raised high. “Big changes. Thanks to men like your father.” She glanced at him and you saw disdain flicker across her gaze. 
And then another door opened, and you heard the sound of polished shoes on the marble floor. Dr. Gaul’s attention dropped away from you like you were nothing at all. She turned to meet the sound of these footsteps, and you did too.
It was a young man. Probably your age, you thought, with light blonde hair and eyes that your mother would have described as “baby blue.” He didn’t look at you, or your father. But that was nothing new. You’d only been in the Capitol for 2 days, and you’d already gotten used to being treated as lesser than. Though, at least, you were not so far down on the food chain that you lost your tongue. 
“Ah, my protege,” said Dr. Gaul, giving the young man a grin. The smile on her face almost looked warm, which was somehow far more terrifying than her manic smile from earlier. “Ever the earnest student. Aren’t you supposed to be enjoying the day off, Mr. Snow?”
The young man, this “Snow,” chuckled and lowered his gaze. “I couldn’t stay away once I heard you were discussing some of the new prototypes for this year’s games.” 
He finally looked at your father, and then at you. But only briefly.
“Can I assume that this is…?”
Dr. Gaul nodded.
“Yes. My little designer from District 2. And his daughter.” Her voice dropped a few octaves when she referred to you. She probably didn’t want you here, you thought. You weren’t supposed to come, but your father had begged the Capitol for a pass; it would probably be your only chance to see it, he said, so you may as well take advantage of the chance.
Snow nodded to your father. It was a surprising gesture, almost respectful. But cold, too, like it was done from necessity rather than anything else. 
Your father stammered a bit and nodded back, and you felt shame begin to creep into your bones. It wasn’t fair, to be lesser-than. But weren’t others lesser-than you in your own District, where you ate better food and never worried that your name would get picked, that your blood would be spilled?
Everyone 
But when Snow turned to you, he smiled. It gave him dimples. 
It was the first kind smile anyone in the Capitol gave you. 
“My name is Coriolanus Snow. I doubt you’ve heard of me, but if Dr. Gaul’s teachings have anything to say about it, perhaps one day you’ll know me as a Gamemaker.” 
You didn’t know what to say. Congratulations, one day you’ll be coordinating Games that kill people? Instead,  you gave your name, voice squeakier than you meant it. But it was fitting, you supposed. Here, you were a mouse, hoping you would get a bite of cheese and make it home unpoisoned. 
Dr. Gaul’s face seemed to react slowly, as if she couldn’t decide what she thought about his words or your interaction, but a small smile grew on it, eventually. “I do have high hopes for you, Mr. Snow. Now, shall we?”
She gestured for your father to follow, face once again impassive with a sprinkle of disdain, as she led the two of them into her office.
Snow gave you a smile and a nod before he left.
You waved, stupidly.
Your father didn’t even look back.
--
I’m dead. I’m dead. I might as well be dead.
Your heartbeat kept time with your racing thoughts as you went up and down corridors, begging your shoes to be silent, wishing your breath would catch and stop coming out in terrible pants.
You were lost. You weren’t where you were supposed to be. If someone found you, if the wrong person found you, they would think you were running, trying to get lost in the Capitol; they’d think  you were a rebel. They’d shoot you.
Just when you thought you might collapse and die from your own nervous exhaustion, you heard the most wonderful sound in the world.
Your name.
It was only the moment after that you realized it didn’t come from your father’s mouth, but the lips of--what his name--Coriolanus Snow. The young man who was a Gamemaker-in-training, or so your father said. But that’s all he would say. He kept tight about anything that went on behind closed doors. 
But this Coriolanus Snow smiled at you, and didn’t look at you like you were some kind of insect he might want to pin on a board, and so when you whirled around to look at him you were smiling.
Ah--for a moment. For just a moment, you saw his muscles tense. You saw the expression on his face falter in worry. Like he thought he was about to miss a step on a staircase, and corrected himself; like he thought you were a wolf and you were only somebody’s dog, off their leash. 
But it wasn’t too surprising. You knew most people in the Capitol thought anyone from the Districts wanted to rip out their throats. 
Well, the worry was mutual. Except in your case, you were forced to walk around with the living proof of that worry--all those “Avoxes,” they called them. Without tongues, without freedom. 
But you swallow all that. Because he smiled at you. Because maybe it wouldn’t hurt to make a friend. Especially right now.
“I’m--I’m lost,” you tell him, giving a shaky smile. “I was waiting for my father, but you see, I got to thinking, and I started to wander around and now I’m… well. I don’t know where I am, actually.”
His smile wasn’t very deep, was it? It was like the gloss of paint on the outside of the Capitol buildings. Pretty to look at, but there must be more underneath.
You expected him to lead you right back to where you’re supposed to be.
Instead, he asked you something.
“What were you thinking about?
You couldn’t tell him. Could you? But something about 
“About… the Games.”
You don’t tell him that you were thinking about Lucy Gray and all those snakes, and the way that Dr. Gaul’s outfit that first day made you think of them. Because your father had slapped you across the face when you got back to your lodgings that night, and told you to never, ever bring up Lucy Gray Baird or the 10th Games unless you were directly asked. And you would probably never be asked. 
Coriolanus gave a little snort through his nose. You liked it. It was nice to know that even Capitol people could seem a little dorky.
“They aren’t for another 3 months. Are you that eager to see them?”
You didn’t know what expression you made, exactly. It was so instinctive and fast that you didn’t have time to control it. 
You only knew that it made him shake his head and offer you a sympathetic look.  
“I apologize. That was rude, wasn’t it?” 
And then he did a strange thing.
He offered you his arm. 
Like you were Capitol, like you were a real person, and not some visiting District wench walking on the coattails of her arms-dealing father. 
“Let me walk you back to the waiting area.”
And the stranger thing?
You took it.
--
You and your father were quickly moved into a small apartment within the university, once it became clear that he would be staying in the Capitol through the duration of the Games. It was best, he said, because ordinary people in the Capitol didn’t really want to see new faces from the Districts mingling around unless their tongue had been cut out first. It made them nervous. The rebel bombings, and all that.
You didn’t mind, because it meant you didn’t have to be flanked by Peacekeepers on the streets. 
And, well.
You got to see Coriolanus more often. Sometimes he greeted you, sometimes he didn’t. He did it less often when Dr. Gaul was there,  unless she was talking to your father and it gave him an opportunity.
He asked you things, too, when he caught you walking back to your father’s little apartment. Like what you did back home. What you liked to do. Whether you went to school, and what you planned to do now that you have graduated. 
This morning, he caught you drawing while you waited in a chair outside Dr. Gaul’s office. Sometimes you waited there--you would admit to no one that it was to catch a glimpse of the kindest person you’d met in the Capitol--and other times you stayed in your temporary home.
“What are you drawing?” He asked. But he had a way of speaking that you’d quickly clocked into. He can make a demand sound like a polite little question. Oh, he wasn’t mean about it, but it reminded you of the way your father talked to his underlings back in District 2. On his home turf, he was far smoother than he was here, where his voice stammered and sweat beaded on his neck.
So you handed it over, even though, to your greatest embarrassment, you’d drawn… him.
“Why me?” He had a smile on his lips. His smiles were nice. Kind. The kindest you’d seen since you came here. But they always felt like that fresh coat of paint; like you didn’t know what he really meant by them, and that was how he liked it. 
“You’re… important,” is all you could come up with. You felt small, then. He would dismiss and probably never want to talk to you again. What a stupid answer from a stupid girl. 
But he just smiled. It was like paint peeling a little.  You could see underneath that he liked what you said, although you weren’t exactly sure why. And his expression tightened up so quickly, protecting what you’d seen, that you weren’t entirely sure if it was real or not. 
“I’m just a humble student at this university. Not so important. Not yet.”
--
You were really going to die, now. This wasn’t some panicked imagination gone wrong, some flight of fancy that took a wrong turn.
A pair of stony-faced Peacekeepers had walked up to where you sat in the waiting area near Dr. Gaul’s office and ordered you to come with them.
You asked to talk to your father. They said no. You asked where you were going. They yanked you up. 
And now they were leading you down hallways that you’d never seen before, where there weren’t even Avoxes roaming the halls with brooms and dustpans. 
They didn’t even answer, just spun around and walked back the way they came. You pushed the door open reluctantly--what the hell was going to be on the other side?--and it was--it was--
It was Coriolanus. Standing there in a nice suit, eyes downcast on a book. Until the door creaked and he looked up.
“What--why did you bring me here? Did I do something wrong?” The thought went through you, that perhaps this had all been a test, to see if you were loyal to the Capitol and he’d found you wanting.
“No,” he said, simply enough. He set the book down and gestured for you to step inside. You did, because what else were you going to do, in some strange room in a Capitol University where you’d been forcibly brought by Peacekeepers.
Snow studied your face. Your eyes darted around, from him, to the room, to the door. 
“I wanted to see you,” he said, a little softer. “In private.” 
“Me?” You furrowed your eyebrows. “But… why?”
He smiled. “Come now, you’re a smart girl, even if you aren’t in university.” 
You really didn’t know. Not at first. But then you watched the way his expression softened, and you remembered it, or glimpses of it, that he’d given you before. When he complimented your drawing. When he said your name. When he escorted you back from the maze of hallways. And his smiles, all his smiles, although you were never sure how much they meant coming from home. 
He took a step closer. You didn’t dare step back. You weren’t sure if you wanted to step back, but it didn’t matter, either way.
He pressed his lips to yours and took your first kiss, in a secluded little study in the heart of the Capitol University. 
--
Your days became routine, although the routine was strictly forbidden and could have probably gotten you executed or at best, gotten you a one-way ticket to a tasteless existence.
You wake up. You stay in your apartment.  You wait for the Peacekeepers. You get summoned here and there, always private rooms, secret rooms, rooms out of the way. You meet Snow--Coriolanus, he said, call him that--and you talk (well, mostly him) and kiss and sometimes a little bit more. He gives you gifts. Trinkets, necklaces that you can only wear under your shirt. Food, flaky pastries made with mountains of sugar, sandwiches made with cream and cucumber. 
But how much longer could it go on? The Games were going to start soon. As soon as they were over, you were going back to your District. There would be no more meetings, no more kisses. No more wondering how far he wanted to go or why he liked you or even if he even liked you as anything more than someone to keep him busy. 
You didn’t dare talk about the Games, but you did talk about this. In the kindest way you knew how for such a sensitive subject. 
“I’ll miss you,” you told Coriolanus after one meeting, when you’re both sitting on a sofa and he’s got your fingers tightly wound in his. He squeezed them tight.
“Miss me?” 
“After the Games,” you clarified. “We’re being sent home right after.”
He squeezed your fingers until it hurt a little. Then he looked up at you. To see if you would say something? Or did he not know how strong he was?
“Oh, that. I can arrange for you to stay.”
Your chest began to feel sick.
“Stay? In the Capitol?” You were torn about Coriolanus, but you didn’t want to stay here. You couldn’t. 
“Yes,” he said, as if it was the simplest answer in the world. “You wouldn’t be the first person from the District granted such an extreme privilege. I’m sure I could--”
“But I don’t know if I want to stay.” 
His gaze narrowed and you felt your stomach clench. He looked at the necklace you’d pulled out as soon as the door was shut, at your lips where a dollop of strawberry cream still rested. 
“I treat you so well, and you don’t know if you want to stay with me?”
His voice was calm, and that scared you. It would have been better if he flew off the handle.
Instead, he simply stood up and gently sent you out the door, and called the Peacekeepers to bring you back to your apartment.
--
Every night for the last week, you have cried yourself to sleep. Because every day for the last week, Coriolanus Snow has not sent for you. Not even once.
What if he told someone? What if you got sent back early, and your father was shamed? What if they broke his contract? Or--worse, worse, worse. There were so many worse things than merely being sent back to District 2.
And then he sent for you, and it was the longest walk of your life, though it was no farther than any of the times you’ve been escorted to your secret meetings.
This time, when you pushed open the door, Coriolanus was not alone. 
There was an Avox in the room. 
It was someone from District 2.
You didn’t know her. Not personally. But you saw her, before. She worked in one of the munitions factories and you watched her walk to work from your classroom window sometimes. Then she stopped showing up, and you thought perhaps she got married. 
That delusion was shattered the moment you saw her, eyes downcast to the floor, wearing a simple gray tunic. 
It’s not until Coriolanus tells you to hurry up and come in that you’re able to move. Even then, you weren’t sure how your body did it; how your arms managed to gain the mobility to shut the door, to twist the lock; how your legs moved, one foot in front of the other, until you were standing stiffly in front of him.
The Avox--you wish you knew her name, but she couldn’t give it to you now, even if you asked--moved seamlessly to a table set up nearby. There was tea and sweets. The sort of thing that you and Coriolanus had been enjoying together for the past few weeks. The sort of thing that you were sure would sit sour in your stomach, now. 
The cup shook in your hands when she handed it to you, and your tears dripped right into the tea.
Coriolanus glanced at the Avox and waved his hand. She left obediently. She would never tell the secret she witnessed in his room, that much was certain.
And then he looked back at you.
“Don’t cry,” he said. Soft but firm. A command, not a coo. “You shouldn’t cry here, in the Capitol. You should be grateful to be here. You should be grateful that I’ve arranged all this for you.”
“I am,” you whispered. 
“Then show me that you are.”
And you did. 
You said what he wanted and looked to him to show you how he wanted you to act, and did just that. You didn’t argue, even to lightly banter. You kissed him and nodded along when he told you about how things would be after the Games, when he had arranged for you to stay.
All you had to do was keep him happy until the Games were over, and then you could go home. 
Bitterly, all of this made you realize just how much of your father is in you; he knew how to appease the Capitol. You could do the same with Coriolanus Snow. At least until the Games were over. Just keep him happy until the Games were done and the blood was spilled, and you would go home. 
They wouldn’t let him keep you here after the games. You were sure of that. You’d overheard some of Dr. Gaul’s assistants murmuring how glad they would be to send the District profiteers like your father home once the Games were over. And you? You’re just his useless daughter, an appendage he brought like an unwelcome suitcase. Why would you be allowed to stay?
--
The Games were over. The winner was from District 1. 
You were going home any day now. Just as soon as your father finished tinkering with the designs, gave his notes on improvements that might be made for next year.
The thought gave you a delightful bounce in your step. It was like having a pat of sweet butter in your shoe on a day when you needed good luck-- District 2 superstition, although the strict rationing meant most people didn’t have even a pat to slip into their shoes anymore.
The sweetness didn’t even disappear when the Peacekeepers showed up to bring you to Snow. It was going to be a bittersweet farewell, you were sure. He might be angry. But you would kiss him and tell him that there was nothing he could do, and how sorry you were not to be able to stay, but that was how things had to be.
Except they didn’t bring you down a maze of corridors that led to a secluded room.
They brought you right into Dr. Gaul’s office.
Breakfast threatened to evacuate your stomach with every step. Not just because of nerves, but because of what you saw. Rows of experiments in glass tubes; some of them move. You walk by a room with a half-open door that showed someone strapped to a gurney, face contorted in a silent scream as they fought against restraints. You almost did lose breakfast, then.
But somehow you made it to the desk of Dr. Gaul without a dribble of vomit to show for it.
The Peacekeepers left with no fanfare and you stood there, ramrod straight. Did she know? Was she going to tell you that you were going to be strapped to one of those gurneys, now?
“I’m keenly aware,” she said, keeping her hands primly folded, “on how much you’ve enthralled my star pupil.”
Toast. That’s what will come up first, you thought . The toast.
“I don’t know what you mean, ma’am.” Your voice was so thin and tinny that you didn’t even believe yourself.
And then the prim facade cracked, and Dr. Gaul threw her head back and grinned.
“You really think I don’t know everything that goes on within these walls?  I know every time one of my lab assistants runs into the bathroom to throw up after a particularly nasty experiment. I know every time one of our university professors sneaks into a closet to down a vial of morphling with a student. And I certainly know when my newest protege is having an adorable little District girl brought to him for… canoodling.”
You weren’t even embarrassed. No.  You just felt terrified to the bone. You only hoped that you’d be killed, shot against a wall, instead of made into an Avox. Let there be some mercy in this world. 
”He’s asked to keep you, you know.” Her voice was low, almost a drawl. She tapped her fingers on her desk rhythmically.
“My Coriolanus Snow wants a bird of his own.” Her smile turned darker. “Not a songbird, though. Oh, no. I think he’s had enough of those.”
Her gaze bored into yours, each color magnified by her intense expression. “I think if I let him have his pretty caged bird, he’ll be happy. He’s more productive if he’s happy.” She smiled. “I like productivity. It keeps the Games more interesting.”
She looked you over one more time, and then waved you away.
“I’ve granted his request. You’ll be staying here indefinitely, courtesy of one Mr. Snow. Your father has already been told.” 
You were wrong.
It was not the toast that came up first, but the sweet butter you’d patted on top.
--
You still had your tongue, but you felt as though it was useless, stuck to the roof of your mouth, as Coriolanus fussed over your outfit. Or rather, as he directed an Avox to fuss over it for you. He could afford his own personal servant, now, he told you. He’d almost flinched after he said now, and you didn’t dare press him on it. Had he not been able to afford one before?
“We can’t walk arm-in-arm in public,” he said, walking around you, making sure the outfit was just-right. “But you can stand by me if I stop and direct you forward.” He reached over and fixed one of your buttons. “Don’t speak to anyone unless I’ve told you to, or they speak to you first. Always address someone older as ‘sir,’ or ‘ma’am.” He pointed at your hair, and the Avox began to fuss with it, eventually covering it in a colorful wrap that Coriolanus said was popular right now. “Address someone our age by the last name and Mr. or Ms.”
When he was satisfied with your appearance, he sent the Avox away. You liked it better that way, it was one last reminder of the horrors in the Capitol, even for someone “privileged” like you.  You’d only been without your father for 3 days, but you felt like your nerves were continually on fire. You wanted to go home. You wanted your family. You wanted out of this place.
But that wasn’t going to happen.
For now, you were still living in the small university apartment the Capitol had given your father. Coriolanus insisted on it, until he could figure out how to move you into his own sprawling apartment that he shared with his cousin, Tigris (who, at least, genuinely sounded lovely) and his grandmother, Grandma’am. She was the sticking point, or so you were told, with a thin smile. She hated Districts, and she ought to, he said. They killed her son. His father. 
She would hate you, too. Even if Coriolanus wanted you enough to make you stay with him; wanted you enough to keep you. But for how long? And would he change his mind, if you couldn’t fit in? 
He said your name, and you snapped yourself out of your thoughts. He held you by your shoulders. Gently. Like one would an unruly child that hadn’t yet learned that there were such things as salad forks and dinner forks, as polite conversation and etiquette. 
You got the feeling you wouldn’t have long to learn all of those things and more, to make him happy.
“Remember,” he said. “You’re District. You’re here because the Capitol has recognized that your loyalty can benefit us in some way. Be grateful.”
“I am,” you said, reflectively.
“Be happy..”
“I am,” you said again, your chest hitching.
He smiled at you. Was it real or not real? 
You smiled back, regardless. And he liked that, evidently, because he leaned forward and kissed you. Then he scrutinized your face and wiped at your lips with his thumb--the kiss had smeared your lipstick. 
“Good.” 
He gestured towards the open doorway. This time, he didn’t take your arm. There would be too many people lingering in the university hallways, all making their way to the soiree held to celebrate the end of this year’s Games and discuss what improvements might be made for the next year. 
You dutifully walked behind him, just like he said. And you would do exactly what he said in all respects. You would stay quiet unless you were spoken to, you would certainly never bring up anything confrontational or controversial, and you would make a good impression. You would be a loyal, grateful District citizen who was given the opportunity of a lifetime thanks to the graciousness of Coriolanus Snow. 
Of course you would. 
Your life depended on it. 
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daenysthedreamersblog · 3 months
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ONLY ANGEL II - CHERRY
Don't you call him baby
We're not talking lately
Don't you call him what you used to call me
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part one
summary: coriolanus has at last returned to the capitol only to find you engaged to felix and he simply won't have that...and neither will you it seems
pairing: postacademy!coryo x capitol!reader
warning: MDNI!! swearing, dark themes, violence, infidelity, smut, hand-job, fingering, oral sex, orgasm denial, p in v sex, unprotected sex, spitting, mild breeding kink, v mild daddy kink, probs like a small exhibition kink, coryo probs has a cherry kink (lmao), murder, these two are sick in the head
notes: i saw a tiktok and it was a recipe video and the caption was 'baking bc murder is wrong' and i feel like reader took that personally. this took me way too long to finish and im still not in love with it but hope u find joy in it! (also let me add felix lived in the book but he did die in the movie 🤭)
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"Do you hear that, Coriolanus? It's the sound of Snow falling."
His eyes quiver as water unintentionally wells staring down at his handkerchief, next to everything else that incriminated him.
He had won, he had won, who cares how he had done it. And you had been there, smiling up at him with such pride, not a single thought besides looking at Coriolanus. He had won for you.
And now he was here unable to tear his eyes away from his mistakes.
He hears your heels clipping against the hard floor behind him, but he can't look at you, he can't face you, not yet. You can't see him like this. He needs to find a way out of this first. He wants to plead with you to listen, beg you to stay by his side. You know he wants to too, he can feel it in the air, your shame towards him. You huff out a laugh, the sound ringing out like distant wedding bells in his head, then you're walking away from him without a single word your heels hitting the floor harshly with every step you take until he's left in silence.
Alone.
-
He watches the districts blur past him sitting wearily on the train dragging him away from his home, dragging him away from you. He runs a hand through his buzzed hair, the only solace in the whole ordeal, at least he didn't have his curls to be cursed by the memory of your hands in them. He knows he'll never see you again, even if he returns you'll want nothing to do with him. He glances at Sejanus across from him, the small smile on the Plinth boy's face, and his nails dig into his palm.
"President Coriolanus Snow." You had whispered up at him. Now he was just a useless ordinary peacekeeper sent to die out in the districts while you laid in Felix Ravinstill's bed.
He glares out the window. No he won't have that, not one bit. He'll find a way home to you, find a way to make you proud of him again no matter if he has to obliterate all of District 12 to do it. He'd burn it all down, burn the world down too while he's at it...for you.
One year later
He stares at you the whole entire party, watches you nurse your drink so delicately the color of it staining your lips marroon. You're wearing a similar shade satin dress, the cowl neckline draped across your breast, every curve hugged exquisitely, and your ass... Coriolanus was hard the minute his eyes found you, and it wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.
You never look his way once.
This party was for him, because of him. Because attending University, working under Gaul had thrown The Hunger Games to new heights, him to new heights. Everyone was celebrating another successful game, celebrating his hard work.
You wouldn't look at him.
His work wasn't done of course, he still needed to ascend further to rightfully take the Presidency. He could do it, especially with this newly found wealth and respect. He was back where he belonged; on top.
And you wouldn't look at him.
He knew it had everything to do with that giant rock on your left hand, your fiancé's nasty arm around your waist. He sneered into his own drink, Mrs. Ravinstill. It sounded horrid.
You never sought him out once he had returned to the Capitol after his...punishment. Never came to find him once your fiancé came home from University informing you Coriolanus Snow had at last returned. He knew he'd never see you there; you never intended on going, content on marrying the President. He figured as much, knew it was too far fetched to imagine opening his front door to find you there begging him to take you back. You would never beg.
He needed to speak to you, demand why you chose Felix over him, why you wouldn't come see him in his newly remodeled pent house. He needed to fuck you, be inside you, taste your sweet spit again. Nothing else had gotten him through those horrible months in 12, but the thought of getting back home to you.
And you wouldn't fucking look at him.
He knew you were deliberately ignoring him, another game you liked to play the only thing missing was that hard candy dripping from your lips. A cat playing with her food, but he was different now, a snake rather than a mouse and he had not lied and schemed and clawed his way back for you to pick Felix Ravinstill over him. He watched you peel off heading towards the bathroom, and he took his chance stalking after you. You were fixing your lipgloss when he barged in. You didn't even flinch, only glanced at him through the mirror.
Your smirked as you fixed the corner of your mouth. "Hi Coryo," His cock twitched at the old nickname.
"Marry me." He cut to the chase and you raised an eyebrow at him. He had the money now, the respect, soon the presidency, everything you had wanted him to get, he had gotten. Sure it had taken an unconventional route, but the destination would be all the same. He dug into his pocket, pulled out the red velvet box, and opened it revealing a huge diamond ring, bigger than Felix's. It was the first thing he bought when the Plinth's wealth soon became his. You eyed it and then turned back to fixing your makeup.
"No." You scoffed.
He snapped the box close and tucked it away. "Marry me." You shake your head at him smirking to yourself as you put your lip gloss away. He walks up behind you keeping some distance between the two of you, he needs to touch you but he pauses his fingers itching forward to grab onto your skin. "You never came to see me." He remembers waiting at the train station, to see you one last time. He never got to explain what had happened, how he did it all for you. He even knew if it came down to it he would have disgraced himself by begging you to wait for him, he knew if he did you would only stray from him more. But you never showed up, and soon he was being carted off to District 12.
"Isn't it beautiful?" Your hand tapped against the sink ceramic clinking with the sound of your ring, he should have known better than to expect an answer, "He proposed after graduation, at my party, you were supposed to attend." You met his gaze in the mirror as he towered behind you, the explanation plainly on your face; you had been ashamed of him. "I thought you were better than that." You didn't care that he cheated, you only cared that he got caught.
He takes a step forward as you slowly turn to face him your foot plants between the two of his, knee caressing his thigh fraying his nerves under warm skin. "I am." He can't help it, his knuckle strokes your cheek. "Thought you were my angel...forgive me."
You push up lightly breathing up at him; it was your version of forgiveness. "Do you like my lipgloss?" You ask the sweet fruity scent of it swirling up towards him, he knows what it would taste like.
"Cherry."
"I wore it for you." You add as you toy with his shirt moving even closer until he feels your breath on his mouth.
His bottom lip brushes against yours, breast pressing into his chest, his clothes feel too tight, "Are you gunna let me taste it?" You're too close, his body too hot, his hard cock digging into your flesh as you slip a hand between bodies to run a palm along it; absolution for his sins.
"Should I?" You ask into his open mouth and he finds his hand on your collarbone. He doesn't know why you do this to him, place yourself on the small string just out of reach for him, and it takes everything in him to not choke the air out of you for doing it, for teasing him constantly after going so long with your silence. He should leave you to rot, but he can't. He simply...can't. Your cherry venom had snuck into him, ran through his blood, thickened his arteries, and your fangs were holding on too tight.
"Everything I did was for you."
You raise an eyebrow, "You still got found out." You jutted your bottom lip out your whisper hot against his teeth, he could smell the cherry wine on your breath "Left me all alone."
He grits his teeth, wants to explain he had no control over any of it, but you didn't care. "I'm back now." His hands grab onto your waist enjoying the feel of your body under his palms once more his lips grazing against yours, "I killed anyone who was ever going to keep me from you."
"Not everyone."
Felix.
"I'll kill him too."
You snarled against his mouth, "Good."
He smashed your mouths together, and you opened right up for him. You tasted of cherry, as sweet as before as he sucked the wine from your lips, licking it off your tongue. He thought of nothing but you his whole time out in that pest filled district, he fell asleep dreaming of your mouth, your breasts, your sweet cunt waiting drenched for him back home. You bit down on his bottom lip and tugged backwards before glancing up at him.
Your hands were so far down his pants, running down the length of him, gathering precum and smearing it across to slide a soft hand around the shaft. He groans into your mouth as you grip harder, move faster. "Did you miss me Coryo?" You coo against his face. "Missed my hand, my pussy, wrapped around you so tight." You squeeze, nails grazing as you swirled around his cock. "Did you think of me often? Think of me while you had to cum down a dirty drain?"
He squeezes his eyes tight, "Yes." He pants, and he hates that it was always true. He doesn't like this, doesn't like how you're pulling this power play over him, but your fucking hand was pumping him for all his worth, and he can't find himself to care.
"I'm still your little slut Coryo." Your fingers graze his balls, tongue licking along his teeth. "Are you still mine?"
"Yes." He grunts out not able to stop the cum shooting hard into your hand all on the inside of his pants.
You grin up at him, "Someones quick off the mark."
He wants to slap you, slap that smile off your lips but instead he watches you pull your hand out to lick the cum off of it. He shoves you backwards, shoving your legs apart running a hand up your thigh meeting your bare wet pussy. His eyes flickered around your face, you knew tonight would have been his last straw, you knew he couldn't stay away any longer. He runs a knuckle through your wet folds power surging through him as he pushes two fingers inside of you.
He bites back the groan as his hand sinks into you relishing in the noise as he curls it up inside of you, savoring the moan clawing up your throat. You attach your lips to his as he begins to thrust in and out you pressing up against that soft spot that has you mewling down his throat. He presses a palm to your clit, "Coryo." You whimper out and he's moving his hand faster, fucking you with it vigorously feeling your hips tilt to meet his thrust.
Your walls spasm around his hand. He pulls off your mouth sucking down your neck, teeth digging into skin. "That's it, cum for me angel." His thumb shifts rubbing into your clit pleasure tightening your legs against his own as they try to part further, pushing his fingers deeper. He shoves down the front of your dress exposing your breast for him to knead into his palm, dipping down wrapping his mouth along your nipple rolling it around his tongue, nipping at it gently as your hands run through his hair. "Did you miss me too?"
"No."
He looks at you, takes in your smug expression and all he wants to do is slam your head back so hard the mirror cracks. "You're a fucking liar." He growls out at you, hand covering your face as he thrust hard and deep. "You touched yourself every night thinking of me." He pounds his hand into you harder your back hitting against the mirror, you're getting wetter by it, turned on by his violence the wanton moans spilling past your lips, "Thought about me fucking you since you learned I came back for you."
You let out a breathy laugh, "Fine...I missed you a little." You were never one to show your hand, so he takes what you give him.
He grabs your face between his fingers squeezing, "Don't ever fucking lie to me again."
"I promise." You moaned.
He's holding under you with one hand slamming into you the sick sound of it echoing around the bathroom, "Scream my name when you cum." He leans down close to your ear. "I want you fiancé to hear what a fucking whore you are for me."
And gods you do. You scream his glorious name out into the open air clamping down around him, cumming against his hand letting him draw slow circles around your clit until you whine for him to stop. He pulls his hand out of you and quickly sucks his fingers, swirling around his digits to drink up your nectar sweet pleasure licking up your sweat along your neck.
"Did he touch you?" He nips at your chin.
You chuckled, "I told you before I'm waiting for marriage."
"Such an angel." He kisses your open mouth.
"Your angel."
Coriolanus has his arms wrapped around your body supporting you against the sink. "You didn't come see me." He listens to your heart hammering in your chest as you catch your breath.
You run your hand through his shorter hair. "I miss your curls Coryo."
"Answer me." He finally demands staring down at you.
You sighed, "Felix wouldn't let me." You pouted trying to twist your fingers around his shorter hair but it was harder so you gave up, "So I kept my distance, watching you climb like the man I knew you always were, waiting for you." Your hands snaked around his neck smiling up at him eyes darkening, "Waiting for you to finally come take whats yours."
He searched your eyes, "Want me to steal you away in the night from that idiot of a fiancee?"
"It isn't stealing if it always belonged to you."
His eyes flicker around your face, the reassuring ownership written there. He kisses your lips one more time before stepping back watching as you straighten out your dress once again having to fix your makeup and hair. "Marry me." He asks standing behind you in the mirror.
"No." You turn your body towards him. "I can't." You take a step forward hands resting on his stomach, "What are we going to do about that?"
He wraps his hand around yours, "Whatever it takes."
You don't even hide it as you exit together, not even as you head back into the party side by side. You know as well as him that you looked better next to Coriolanus, you belonged next to him. Your arm is tucked into Coriolanus's as the pair of you approach your soon-to-be husband who's eyes flare in alarm at the sight."Where'd you go?" He asks already taking in the mark on your neck, the flushed cheeks. He wants to grab you, lock you away, but he wouldn't dare move as you had attached yourself with Coriolanus.
Coriolanus looks down your body wondering if Felix can smell his cum sticky against your fingers as you speak. "I ran into Coriolanus." You motion to him as his eyes find Felix's angry ones.
"Coriolanus." He grits out. He knew, the poor bastard knew and he wouldn't say a thing, not in public anyways.
He smirks, "Felix."
You place your ringed hand on his chest, "Coriolanus was just telling me how wonderful it has been working with Dr. Gaul." You lied fingers splaying over his muscled chest white clumps clinging to your skin.
And only because Coriolanus enjoys pissing off Felix Ravinstill he places his hand over yours stroking a finger down your wrist. "You should stop by some day, if your free." He knows you always are, he knows Felix isn't. "I haven't seen you outside classes Felix, it will be nice for all of us to catch up."
Felix opened his mouth the decline sitting there, the bottled up cuckholding rage oozing off of him, but you smiled, dripping with fake sweetness. "Oh that would be lovely, nice distraction from wedding planning." He knew you weren't doing any of that. "How sweet of you Coriolanus." You looked up at you fiancée with those big eyes anyone would fall for.
Felix swallowed, biting out the submission. "How sweet indeed."
What a weak, spineless fool.
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There's a knock on his door.
He watches it for a moment before standing up to unlock it.
"Hi Coryo," You lean against his doorframe smiling up at him. He always imagined you coming here, showing up, begging him, but that wasn't your style. "Gunna let me in?" He moves to the side to allow you to walk inside his home. "This is truly gorgeous." You praised him walking through his newly refurbished home. You had never seen if before, but he was glad for it, the after was more...fitting to the lifestyle Coriolanus wanted to give you.
He wanted to ask what you were doing here, but he knew what you wanted, could smell your arousal like a feral animal. "Does Felix know you're here?" He asked locking the door behind him.
You smirk still taking in the room before turning to look at him. "I hope he does."
Would you tell him? Why you kept lying to the poor man, why you didn't just leave him? Were you waiting for Coriolanus to make the first move in this game you had set up? He moves until he's standing in front of you, glancing down at you, "I got you something."
You gazed up at him under batting eyelashes, "How kind of you."
Coriolanus went into his old room picking up the present and walking back out to you. He holds out the pretty box for you watching as your fingers traced the box along it. "Figured since you can't get anymore from your Daddy, it would only seem fitting for me to fund my favorite habit of yours."
You pull the bow loose letting it fall around your feet before pushing the lid up to reveal the glass jar inside full of cherry suckers. "Oh Coryo," The smile flickered onto your lips as you stuck your hand inside to pull one loose. He watched you unwrap it, watched you push it into your mouth. "Mhm," You moaned body heat radiating off you as you stepped closer your hand palming his cock through his pants. "Taste almost as good as you."
"Dirty girl." He gritted out as you shoved your hand below his waistband soft fingers wrapping around him. He can't look away from your face as your tongue rolls along the red ball, as you stroke his hard length. "Get on your knees."
You pop off the sucker. "Is this my second gift?"
"Do you deserve a second gift?" He ask hand stroking down your cheek.
"I do Coryo, I've been such a good girl while you were gone." You breath against his lips.
He tugs the sucker loose and shoves it into his own mouth missing the taste of it mixed with your sweet saliva. He sets the box back down as you climb down onto the floor in front of him pulling him out of his pants. You lick the tip, swirling your tongue around him before pushing him in further until he hits the back of your throat, and even then you try to keep forcing him deeper.
His hand is in your hair as he lets your hand pump the rest of him that wont fit inside your hot mouth, tongue flat against the base as he ruts against you. You gaze up at him, tears welling involuntarily as he hits the back of your throat over and over again, and you smile every-time. "Missed sucking my cock that much angel?" You nod, a moan vibrating down his dick. His other hand comes around your face feeling the spilling over spit run down your chin as you sloppily bob your mouth up and down him. He remembers having to finish into a his hand all that time away imagining this, you greedily sucking his cock. He tries to force your head to move slower, to enjoy the feel of your warm mouth wrapped around him, but he struggles as your grip tightened around him, your other hand coming up to cup his balls.
He hisses, fucking your mouth faster, letting you take what he was giving you. He wants himself stuck between your teeth as much as the sweet sugar you consumed. You want it too as you suck in your cheeks sucking him harder. "You want my cum baby girl?"
You come off him for a second mouth wide, tongue outstretched to graze the underside of him, "Always Coryo." It goes straight to his head...and his cock.
His thighs tighten and he is shoving himself back into your mouth, holding you tight against him to spill down your throat as cherry filled saliva slips down his own. "Swallow all of it." He doesn't need to tell you twice as you keep sucking and licking up his twitching cock keeping every last drop inside your mouth to slip down your throat. And even when you come off him you lick the tip clean smirking up at him.
"Even better than I remember." You tell him as he helps you to your feet. His hands come around your face as he kisses you savoring the cum and cherry sugar in your mouth. He licks it off the roof of your mouth, sucks the juice off your tongue before he pulls away letting you press a soft lasting kiss to his lips.
"What are you waiting for?" He whispers fingers tracing your puffy lips. He wants to spill his guts, describe how you roiled inside of them. You only smile up at him like you knew he would carve it all out for you, he would, and it makes him want to strangle you. "Leave him."
You reach up pulling your sucker free from his lips and pushing it back through your own. "I wish it was that easy." Your sigh was answer enough, there was no way to move forward with Felix's ring around your finger.
His hand lands at the base of your neck anger filling him. "I should leave you." He hisses out tired of watching you be with another man when you belonged with him, belonged to him.
"You wanna leave me?" His fingers dig into your jaw as a smug smile plastered onto your lips he wants to slap it off your face, he wants to fuck you unforgivably to regain his power you thought you had stolen when he was sent away, "I fucking dare you."
You know he never could, and he hates you for it, "You want me to murder all of Panem to prove myself to you?"
"Would you?"
Candy scented breaths ease out of you, no fear on your soft features, and he knows his answer immediately. Yes. He would, he'd do a lot worst to keep you looking at him.
"No... Not all." Just one more, is what you don't say. He drops his hand watching as you go to the door. You put one hand on the knob as you threw a wicked grin over your shoulder cherry sucker pushed into your cheek, "Bye Coryo."
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It's no surprise after that night you began showing up to 'visit' Felix during his studies at The University. He sees you walking up the set of small stairs, a classy black tweed minidress hugging your body, the white little ribbon bouncing in your hair, candy between your teeth as you walked towards the hall littered with men.
He wished he could grab you, kiss you, fuck you in front of everyone so they know who you belonged to, who got to go home to you every night, who got to hear your pretty little moans. He wanted them to be envious of him, not that idiot Felix. It wasn't fair, and frankly it wasn't right.
You state you're there for Felix, but you never go in the direction his classes are, and you certainly never come when he's free of them. Your eyes fixate on Coriolanus, "Hi Coryo." Your voice slides down his spine like sugared ice as you stop in front of him.
"Can't stay away hmm?" He smirks down at you.
"From you?" You raise an eyebrow toying with the stick of your sucker the pout in your bottom lip. "Never. It was so hard this last year..."
His hand comes around toying with the ribbon in your hair. He tugs it lightly watching your head lean back at the movement. "Always such a slut." Because only you would be so brash about your desire for him, you truly only come here so he can fuck you in the bathroom. The ribbon slides out and into his palm, the collection of them all still stuffed away in his old peacekeeper box. He remembers gripping them between his knuckles when he had to fuck his fist in that disgusting barrack. Your tongue darts out for him, swirling around the tip of your candy, licking up the length of it. "Want my cock in your cunt that badly huh?"
"Come over for dinner," You purr up at him as a hand strokes down his shirt. "Felix works late tonight with his uncle."
He shakes his head at you as you roll the ball across your bottom lip, "Filthy fucking girl, want me to come fuck you while your fiancée is away."
You drag your tongue up the center, "You can fuck me while he's home too."
"You would let me." He watches you nod, "Let me fuck you right here against this wall too?" You gaze up at him not needing to answer, he knows you'd let him. He leans down to whisper in your ear, "Such a fucking whore, well then go on, pull your dress up. I know you're not wearing anything under it." He watches as your eyes darken, fingers actually going to the hem of your dress, and he fights the urge to shove his hand so far between your legs.
Felix calls your name and he finds his hand around your wrist holding you to his side, "Yes darling?"
You watch your fiancée walk towards the two of you worry laced on his face while Coriolanus mouth presses to the shell of your ear, "Stop calling him darling."
He pulls the sucker from your mouth to shove into his own as you smirk sidelong at him, Felix stopping in front of you. "You shouldn't have come." Felix says hand going to your waist, trying to pull you away, peering around the filled hallway, but you stay planted next to Coriolanus. Coriolanus fights the urge to burn his hands where they touch you.
Your eyes glance up to Coriolanus for a fleeting second. "I wanted to see you." He knows your words aren't meant for your fiancée
"It's a busy time. I have to get going." He eyes you, eyes Coriolanus with your sucker in his mouth. "I'll see you at home later."
Home. Coriolanus hates that, that wasn't your home, simply a prison preventing you from living with him. "Okay." You say, but make no effort to move. In fact you lean into Coriolanus's hand as it lands on the small of your back.
"Go home." Felix tries to sound demanding summoning all his strength to keep his eyes on you instead of Coriolanus.
Your smile is sinful, finding delight in whatever dominance Felix had forced himself into. "We were just catching up, you understand don't you." You don't even mention the invitation you had offered, the door you would leave open for him to come inside.
Felix's hand grips your arm yanking you towards him. "We talked about this." Felix tried to say it quietly as if Coriolanus wouldn't hear him, grinding his foot into the floor like a stubborn child. There was no hiding your wandering eye, no hiding how Coriolanus was always on the receiving end of it. Felix was now figuring out how to grow some balls to say something about it, but you didn't care. You never would.
You step forward placing the hand he held on his chest and he knows you wish you could plunge you painted claws through his sternum to rip out his heart. You pat his chest instead looking over your shoulder at Coriolanus, "Bye Coryo." You leave them standing there hips swaying as you walk away.
"Stealing the Plinth fortune wasn't enough for you?" Felix grits out eyes on your ribbon in Coriolanus's hand, your candy between his teeth.
Coriolanus's fingers toy with it watching you leave as he repeated what you told him, "It isn't stealing if it always belonged to you."
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He arrived early. He knows the door is unlocked but he is still a gentleman so he knocks on the door to your and Felix's future forever home. He knew you had moved in together after the engagement, had gathered as much when he went to your old home and found it empty. You open the door wide and the air knocks out of his chest. He'll never get over you, he knew that then carted away on that train to 12, he knows that now with the blood staining his hands.
He knows you'd lick it off.
"Hi Coryo." You smile allowing him into your home closing the door behind the two of you. You lock it; he cherished the sound.
He held out the bouquet of white roses he brought, "For you."
You lean forward inhaling as you gaze up at him under dark eyelashes. He often heard Felix bragging about working with his uncle, how beneficial it was, how the position simply suits him. Well Felix could brag all he wanted, it would never do him any good.
Coriolanus looks around taking in your decorated home, the pictures of you and Felix lining the walls. They were hideous, "Where did you mother ever go off to?"
"She was so distraught after Daddy died." You frown, the perfect sadness sketched on your face, as you took the flowers setting them in a pretty vase at the center of the table. "She was overcome with grief."
Your father had died suddenly....unexpectedly.
What a tragic accident.
He remembers your fake tears, he especially remembered comforting you at the small lunch-in your mother had after the funeral, comforting you by fucking you in your parent's bed while guest downstairs mourned your father.
He was hard just thinking about it, thinking about licking those sweet crocodile tears away as he plunged himself into your hot cunt. He wanted to do it again, take you in you martial bed simply to prove a point, to prove the same point he had back then. That you belonged to him.
You sighed turning to look at him leaning back against your large dining table. "I reached out to Dr. Gaul and she was more than happy to help me." He took slow steps towards you your eyes following him until he towered over you. "She found a nice facility to...take care of her."
His hand came up snaking around your neck, thumb stroking your jaw. "You're a piece of work you know that?"
"You play your games," The well hidden wickedness flashes behind your eyes, the woven in manipulation surrounding all you touched. "I play mine."
You let his other hand grab onto your waist. "There are worse games to play."
He leans down to kiss you, your mouth so soft and warm against his, he feels you open, tongue sliding along his. He pulls your body against his, breast pushed onto his chest as his hands hold you tight. He's sick of letting you go. "Do you still want a man angel?"
"I want you," You breath into his open mouth and the hand on your hip slips between your legs.
He groans out at the feel of you, grinding his cock against your body fingers running up your drenched pussy. He wants it all, wants that sweet addiction only you can give him, and it still would never be enough to satiate him. He laid you back, spreading you open like his own personal feast and digs into your cunt.
Your moan reverberates through him as his tongue licks up your center passing over your clit in teasing strokes, nails digging into his scalp. He wants Felix to walk in, to see how Coriolanus could make his put together fiancée come so undone in his own home. And how he'll never get the chance to even try. But he wants to be inside you, so he hopes your stupid soon-to-be husband would stay away a little while longer. You sigh his name, the sound like a psalm, and he thinks he'd still fuck you even if Felix walked in right now.
Coriolanus glides his tongue along your clit two fingers pushing into you as your back arches for him. Then he moves faster, curling his fingers against that soft spot. He knows your close already, knew your body like the back of his hand, he can tell by the tightness in your legs, the pants of air you force out, so he keeps fucking you with his hand, keeps his tongue pressed against your throbbing clit.
He pulls away before you cum.
"Coryo." You whine eyes wild and offended.
Coriolanus simply smirks, "That's for not coming to see me."
His fingers begin moving again, his mouth wrapping around your clit and you relax taking it in, feeling the pleasure he was giving you. Your fingers curl, legs trying to stay spread but they're shaking too much as he brings you closer and closer again. You're right there, he can feel your walls trying to clamp down around him, feel you pushing down against his face to keep him there.
He pulls away again.
"Coriolanus!" You cry out.
He laughs watching you glare down at him. "And that's for being a fucking brat all the time."
You can't retort, can't argue as he spits down on your already soaked cunt, dipping down into you again your eyes squeezing shut the deep groan coming from your throat. He would make you suffer more, but the taste of you always sends him into a frenzy and he can't help but become drunk off your pleasure. His tongue moves side to side in quick motions as his fingers thrust in and out, curled up along your g-spot. It's too much already, too intense from failed orgasms. Every breath is a mewling whimper as you thrust your hips back downward into his face to chase your climax.
He'll play nice with you, as long as you remember who was in power.
"Who's your Daddy now angel?" He smirks against you before wrapping his mouth around your clit.
You scream his name as you come hard against his face, rivers of pleasure dripping down his chin, onto the table and floor. He keeps moving his tongue slowly against you drinking in everything not caring that it's overstimulating as you keep spasming around him, not caring as teeth graze against your clit. His tongue dips inside of you gently thrusting in and out and you're clawing at him for more, and he would, he would fuck you with his tongue, make you cum over and over again just like this, but you tug on his hair.
"Coryo," He loves the break in your voice as you whine for pleasure, how sweet it sounds coming from your devilish tongue. "Fuck me."
Anything for you.
He pulls away and stands up flipping you over, unbuckling his pants. He strokes a hand down your pretty hair, running over the angel cake softness of your bare skin, his hand lands on your hip. He's inside you before you can breath walls enveloping his cock, its so wet he slides in so fucking deep. His hand twist in your hair yanking it back to arch your back as he quickly starts fucking you viciously. You claw at the table moaning into the open air. "You like that hmm?" He drives himself in hard wrapping his hand around your body, slithering it up to your neck. "Like when I fuck you like the whore you are?" You did and you were, just for him. Only ever for him. He squeezes your throat a little enjoy the little gasp you give him before he limits your air supply. He's high off it, high off you, of the power you allow him to take.
You reach a hand back holding onto him as he fucks you brutally, abusing your cervix with every hard hit of his cock, your a mess because of it. He knows you're close again as he lets go listening to you gulp down more air throwing you over your peak and he adores the feeling of you clamping down around him as you do, crying out for him over and over again. He doesn't take long to finally spill himself into you with a hard tug on your hair to push himself deeper, to make sure every drop stays inside. "I hope I get you pregnant." He leans down to kiss the side of your neck.
You lean into his touch as his cock twitches one last time. Neither of you move as he drags his lips over your shoulder gently sinking his teeth in to taste your sweat. He pulls out and tucks himself away allowing you the space to turn around and face him. You just smile and shake your head playfully at him as if you didn't want the same thing.
"Here," Coriolanus digs into his pocket pulling out a small vial. You eye the cloudy liquid knowing what it was; poison. "Just a few drops into his food or water." Your smile drips in sweetness as you take it. "Not tonight, it's too suspicious." He runs a finger through your hair. "Whenever you want to come home to me."
You kiss him as you pocket the vial.
The door opens a few seconds later. "Coriolanus." Felix pauses eyes flitting between the two of you taking in the damning sight.
"Oh Felix look at the beautiful flowers Coryo has brought us." You motion to the fresh vase you had set up at the center of the table.
"What are you doing here?" Felix swallows ignoring you.
You waved him away, "Oh I figured you would be happy to be having dinner with an old friend."
"How long have you been here?" Alone. But he won't ask that.
"A while." He smirks back.
Felix, wising up, finally looks down your body at the fresh trail of cum sliding down your thigh. His eyes hold fear to a situation he has no idea how to control. "I made pie." You disappear into the kitchen leaving the two of them alone to stare at one another. Coriolanus doesn't say anything, simply walks around the table to sit at the head of it, where he belonged. Felix sits across from him when you return as you began to set the food put, finally placing a sweet scented desert near the center. "Cherry...your favorite." Coriolanus finds his palm splayed against your waist, you glance at him as you straightened it, "Darling."
You move taking the seat to the right of Coriolanus foot rubbing up against his. "My favorite is apple." Felix corrects you, hand wrapped around a butter knife.
"Oops." Your smile is saccharine as you blink innocently.
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After a tense dinner in which you deferred every veiled accusation shot your way, he knew Felix was far too aware to let it keep happening under his nose. It was only fair he allow the two of you to come see where Dr. Gaul and him worked, to prove his companionship to an old friend, to make up for his impropriety with said friend's future wife.
He never said the two of you had to come at the same time.
He knows the minute you walk through the lab doors, your hair half lightly pulled back with a pretty ribbon, wearing one of your tight skirts and white mock turtle neck, cherry candy in your mouth he would have no more of this arrangement.
No more, no more fiancée, no more hiding his claim on you. No more. He doesn't care if he has to kill all of Panem to keep you, he'll do it gladly. He'd force your hand to use the poison tonight.
You kiss his cheek the scent of you, the sugary taste, pulsed around him, heightening his senses, hardening his cock. You tuck your hand in his arm letting him walk with you. You took everything in like this was a sick version of an art gallery. He showed you around knowing you were only vaguely interested in the various creations held inside their tanks, talked about future plans for future games. He followed next to you, watching you peer into the cages of those muttations, tapping on the glass to watch them squirm. You belonged next to him, you knew that now more than ever. You looked so much better with him than you ever did with that pathetic excuse of a fiancée.
You pointed to the cages filled with black birds.
"Jabberjays." He followed you as you walked towards them. "They can memorize and repeat conversations."
You poked your finger through the bar, awe in your eyes. "This was how you did it." He stared at you as you glanced back at him realizing you knew he had incriminated Sejanus, how he had sent the poor boy to the hanging tree to get back here. In the place he once felt guilt sat validation, the lust in your eyes proving what he had done was right.
"How did you..." He should have suspected you knew, you were too close to the top to not know, too woven into the group of elites, but it still surprised him.
You only smiled as you watched one flare its wings out in alarm as your finger inched closer to it. "I went to Dr. Gaul a month after you left." Your lip pulled back in disgust, "Disgraced myself by begging her to let you return."
Heat ran through him, pounded in his blood as you glanced over at him, "Show me." He needed to see it, hear you say the words you said then.
You pulled your hand away from the birds turning to face him. You took his hands, then slowly you lowered yourself to the floor onto your knees raising your palms in supplication. "Please," You bowed your head. "Please let him come home to me." You never begged for anything, but you had begged for him. He keeps his eyes on you as you slowly looked up at him, his hand comes under your chin. It must have worked. He was set to be sent to District 2, but things had changed and he had come back. You climbed to your feet hands still holding his, "She said she always planned on letting you return, but you need to learn a lesson first." He knew you agreed with her, "And then one day she called me in, played the recording for me, said you were on your way back." Your body pressed into his, his hard cock aching at the friction, your whisper a caress onto his lips. "I came so hard that night imagining it, came so hard knowing my Coryo was clawing his way back to me."
He wants to ask why you didn't come running into his arms when he stepped off the platform, but it made sense why you didn't. You had wanted to see what he would do next, if he would submit to his woes, grovel in his defeat, or would he climb, would he take what was so rightfully his.
"And what would you have done if she hadn't let me return?" He asked needing to know, needing to know you burned for him the same.
Your eyes honed in on his face, "Anything."
"My sweet villain." He strokes a thumb down your cheek. "My darling angel."
"All for you."
He kisses you softly, delicately letting his mouth slide across yours tasting the sweetness you offered like a drug. Your tongue slips through, spit exchanged in unison, swallowing each other, fingers curling around his neck as you pulled him to you.
"Stop." Felix voice cuts across the room. "Enough." You take too long to peel your mouth away from Coriolanus, too long to slyly look at your fiancé. "You're leaving with me. Now."
"She doesn't want to go anywhere with you." Coriolanus sneered.
"Look," Felix sighed, "I have let this go on for far longer than it should have, I knew you didn't want to marry me and you wanted to rebel against that, I figured you'd grow out of this phase once we left the Academy." Your eye twitched, "Enough now, you're going to leave with me, and you'll end this affair before you embarrass us both."
You don't move.
Felix takes a single step forward out of frustration. "Do you even know what I've been protecting you against? He's a murderer, did you know that? He killed a tribute in the games, killed Sejanus too." Well at least he didn't know about Highbottom, or your father. "He'll kill you too, if it came down to it, if you got in his way."
"Right now Felix," Coriolanus glares. "You're the only one in my way."
Something like fear flares for a second as he takes another step forward. "He's using you! I read all his letters he tried to write you asking you to make someone bring him back here." He wants to feel upset you never received his soft hearted words, but maybe it was for the best you never saw that side of him. He glances at your face, a mask of cool indifference, but your eyes quivered for a single moment in wake of the lost news you would never have, and resentment fills your features. You finally began moving forward towards Felix, his demeanor began to relax as you listened but your steps fell silently violent. "I figured if he was sent to 12 he would be far enough away from you, we could finally be happy."
You stilled, "You."
"I had to!" He exclaimed, "He would have never stopped coming after you! I had to tell Highbottom he cheated, had to get him away from you." Everything. It was all Felix's fault, all of it was his fault. Coriolanus's eyes flared wide with unadulterated rage, he wanted to murder Felix with his bare hands, he wanted to tie him down and force him to watch as Coriolanus took you over and over again while he could do nothing but finish in his own pants because that was the type of scum Felix was. but he clenched his jaw, no he didn't want Felix to see you, he didn't want Felix to hear only what Coriolanus could hear, that was a better punishment, to never know what it was like to truly have you, and later tonight he would die with you standing over him.
"You disgust me."
"I was trying to protect you." Felix urged again as his hands came around you. "H-He's a monster."
"I made sure of it." Your smile was laced with venom as your hands wrapped around his forearms. "You always lacked a spine Felix Ravinstill, I knew that the minute your sweaty adolescent hand grabbed mine you were nothing but a weak little boy who had everything handed to him." You sighed, disappointed. "And I wanted a man."
His eyes flickered around your face, behind him water lapped from the wake the eels made in the small circular pool. "He's a liar and a cheat. He will never amount to anything more than that."
"Neither will you." You glanced over at Coriolanus. "Yes." You finally said a weight seeming to move off his chest, "I will marry you."
Felix scoffed hiding the shake of his breath, "You can't be serious. We're already engaged you would be a fool to call this off now. You're a woman with no education, no family, you'll be ruined."
"I am not a woman, I am a god." You took one step back fingers still grazing his forearms and from afar it would have looked affectionate, "I was born to marry the President of Panem, and you know what they say..." You stood in front of him and something in Felix's eyes shifted with realization.
"Snow lands on top."
You pushed watching as his body fell backwards towards the open pool. He was too far away to fall fully in so his back hit cement roughly, something cracking in his spine as one wrapped around his shoulder yanking him the rest of the way in his screams echoing around the room. You stood there watching as they swallowed his body deeper and deeper until he was nothing, then you tugged that ugly ring off your finger tossing it in after him.
He moved around the pool, avoiding the puddles of water made when his body had hit the water, until he's standing in front of you. He admires you for one second, one second to take in the calm look on your face in the wake of murder, the glow that seemed to settle around you as eels swam around your dead fiancée. Then he's moving, connecting your mouth, tongues melding with each other as he sealed his lips around yours finding heaven in your honeyed spit. He was crushing your against him as you twisted your hands into his shirt, pulling it out of his pants as he pushed the hem of your skirt up, needy, insatiable.
"You're a monster." He tells you the very thing he knew himself to be, kissing down your neck.
"And you love me for it." He does, but he'd never let you know that, never give you that kind of power over him.
The two of you are on the ground as he cups your ass, rolling your hip against his hard cock fighting with his pants. He can feel your arousal seeping down to his skin as you unbutton his pants, freeing him from restraint. You stroke him once, twice, three times before you lift up and sink down on-top of him. You slide down excruciatingly slow, letting him stretch and fill every inch of you. He watches your head fall back, your throat bob as the moan breaks loose, until your hips are flush against his.
He's reaching a hand out to go under your shirt and cup your breast as you take a shaky breath. Then you are moving, rolling your hips along him hand gripping at his chest.
"Look at you." He can't help it falling from his lips as he watches you ride him, watches you slide up and down his cock, kneading the flesh of your breast. "My angel."
You were an angel, God's favorite angel.
You would go by a different name now too.
"Mrs. Snow."
You moaned louder as his other hand found your clit between bodies rubbing circles into it as you fucked him faster chasing your own high. He digs his hand into your bra rolling your nipple between his fingers, thrusting his hips up to meet your own hitting the deepest parts of you. Your foot plants on the ground and you tilt forward, nails digging into his shoulders. He knows your close as your sweet breath pants into his face, as your lean down and swallow his mouth with your own whining down his throat.
"Cum for me." He nips at your bottom lip. "Come on, be a good girl and cum on my cock."
He feels you clamp down around him, crying out his name as your orgasm washes over you still moving up and down his hard length in a lazy motion riding yourself out on him. He grips your hips and flips you over pushing your leg up to his shoulder spreading your other knee out to open you up.
He pounds into your wet cunt the lewd slapping sound overtaking the small wake of waves in the pool beside you. You grip his arms as he forces your body against his, thrusting roughly into you as you fall apart within his hands. You claw down his chest, completely lost in the pleasure he was giving you, and his hand finds your throat and you love how harsh he could be with you. You had both changed in your time apart, or maybe there was no point in hiding the darkness after everything you'd done for each other.
"No more games." He hisses out with each brutal snap of his hips. "You're mine now." He hooks his fingers in your bottom jaw opening it wide, and then he spits down your throat. "Fucking say it." He lets his fingers slide off as you leave your lips parted for him to spit into your mouth again moaning for it, for him.
"Yours." You nod fervently lapping up his saliva, arching your back, "I'm yours Coryo." A second orgasm hits you, squeezing around him too tightly. He slams into you one last time before cumming deep, fucking all of it into you letting your legs fall numbly around him. "It was all for you anyways." You whisper once he stills letting him brush stray hair away from your glistening flushed face. "The games...I only played them for you."
He leans down, "Well I guess that makes you a victor too." He kisses you gently feeling your arms wrap around his neck. After a few minutes, he pulls out of you tucking himself back in his pants and helping you to your feet.
You glance down at the calming waters no ounce of remorse there for not taking the quieter route of poison. He thinks a violent end was more fitting too, for all that Felix had put the two of you through. You wave your hand around, "You need to delete the footage." You're moving bending down towards one of the puddles. "Before anyone sees, we'll say he tripped or whatever." You flash a wicked grin, "Another accident darling."
You stick your hand into one of the puddles and splash it onto your face. You stand up and start screaming. "Help! Please!" You wail running towards the door. "Please he fell in! He's dying!" He was dead the second he fell in but you don't let on to that. You shoot him a look, "Go."
He's stands there in awe of you, but what else is new.
Then he's moving heading to the computer to edit the footage of you murdering your fiancée to be with Coriolanus Snow.
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You move in a week later after all the funerals and arrangements were made. You came in the cover of darkness keeping a low profile regarding your new life; he didn't blame you for wanting to, best to let the dust settle to avoid looking suspicious.
He watches you in his bed, dawn's sunlight peeking through curtains as you sprawl out under rumpled sheets. You're beautiful, like a fallen angel from the heavens dropped onto his mattress just for him.
His hand runs down your spine feeling the sleepy groan rumble up your back as you turn to look at him. "My whole life all I've ever wanted was to wake up next to you." It's too soft he knows, he'll blame the lack of sleep due to fucking you through the night. He kisses your naked shoulder, fingers tracing the golden necklace that held a small 'C' on it, "I almost lost you."
"You almost did." You agree knowing you had almost turned your back on him, let him slip away to wallow in his mistakes.
"Never again," He mutters into your skin.
"I'll take that ring now." You purred into his ear.
He sits up digging into his bedside table fetching out the ring box, and opening it up for you. He plucks it out to slid onto your finger perfectly, watching you admire it with a certain sweetness he only could associate with you. "Mrs. Snow." He caresses your cheek, "First Lady of Panem."
You smile up at him, "I like the sound of that, Mr. President."
THE END
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endnotes: omg hi thank you all so much for reading!!! i hope you enjoyed reading!!! i truly believe all the nice comments on part one gave me performance anxiety about this so hoping it meets everyones standards 😭😭
taglist: @ryswritingrecord , @aoi-targaryen , @urfavnoirette , @sleepysongbirdsings
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targaryenluvs · 6 months
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— HUNGER GAMES
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a/n: look at my cute lil smiley fin 😭 god i love hunger games so much you don’t understand it’s my comfort movies and finn is my comfort character ❤️
RED MARKED STORIES HAVE DARK THEMES. READ WARNINGS PLEASE.
FINNICK ODAIR
— want and desire (req) dark themes
— summary: you’d thought you’d escaped the capitol, and to some extent, him, the ever so sweet and charming finnick odair. but apparently your fate had been signed, as it seemed you couldn’t get away from him, no matter how hard you tried.
— spring cleaning (blurb req)
— summary: finnick finally decides to clean out the garage with your help after you asking him forever.
— victors spoils
— summary: a victor should be celebrated! a victor should get what ever they wish, even if it’s a sweet capitol girl who misplaced her kindness in someone who was in desperate need of reprieve and distraction.
— lonely waters
— summary: even if you resided in the fishing district you only ever got close to the water for swimming late at night. it was your favourite time of the day, but it leaves you open and vulnerable to predators and people, the water won’t save you.. silly girl, don’t you remember? finnick odairs a champion swimmer.
— my people ft annie cresta
— summary: you’d been hired to help keep annie’s home clean and to keep her company. what you didn’t expect was to fall in love with her. and to find out that she was with finnick, and annie doesn’t want to let either of you go. but you’ve found your people, and you couldn’t be happier.
— miss officer
— summary: you’re tasked with training finnick odair for war and to fight in the captiol. only problem? he’s completely enamoured with you.
— breakups and makeups
— summary: you and finnick used to date, but it took a nasty turn when you heard rumours of his dalliances. but now the two of you reunite apart of the same alliance. will you make up or break up? again?
— damage control & lifeline (anon blurb)
— summary: finnick and his mentor getting into a fake relationship for damage control after peeta and katniss’ stunt at the 74th games + finnick saving his stylist from execution by proposing marriage.
— unrequited (anon blurb, implied smut)
— summary: you’d divulged one to many secrets to your favourite victor and he wasn’t afraid of using them against you. karmas a bitch!
— oh baby! (smut)
— summary: finnick found you to be as cute as ever. but you aren’t exactly the smartest in the room according to him. luckily, finnicks more than happy to help his sweet baby succeed, and he will not let you forget him.
— capitol girl (req blurb)
— summary: finnick loves his favourite victor.
— love you best part two (req, smut)
— summary: your boyfriend doesn’t exactly like you around other men without him.
CORIOLANUS SNOW
— trapped
— summary: after the 10th hunger games, coriolanus set his sights on a girl from his younger years to be his wife. disgusted by his actions and scared by the rumours your family agreed. as you realise he wasn’t the same boy from before, snow finds himself intrigued, especially when you seem to be visiting a friends house too often.
— delicate*
— summary: coriolanus had to marry. lucky for him one of the most eligible girls of the capitol was up for grabs. only problem? he hoped his cold exterior would keep her away but nothing broke her sweet spirit. what happens when he finds himself being drawn to her light? and how far was he willing to go to keep it untainted and all to himself?
— ravage delicate pt 2
— summary: he’d won the election, much to your elation. now you’d have to navigate the fame, fortune and status as the first lady of panem. but coriolanus just wanted you all to himself, and he’d do anything to scare you into his arms.
— safe and sound ft lucy gray baird
— summary: somehow you’d ended up in the games, snow and lucy would do anything to keep you safe.
— worth it
summary: coriolanus made the mistake of protecting lucy gray during the bombing, rather than you.
— runaway
summary: you’d always considered coriolanus to be a friend of yours. family even. but after sejanus’s death you find him to be off. he’s keeping something from your family and you’ve run out of time to get as far away as you can.
— our little dove ft lucy gray baird
— summary: you reunite with your dear songbird after the games, but it seems the capitol has followed her home, and taken an interest in the two of you.
— our little dove alt ending
— summary: you reunite with your dear songbird after the games, but it seems the capitol has followed her home, and taken an interest in the two of you.
— late to the party
— summary: after corio was sent away to district 12, your managed to come to terms with the fact that he did not love you by any means. but what happens when he realises he liked that affection? and what happens when you’re already in a relationship?
— brown jewel (req)
— summary: he was a lifeline and you’d grabbed on in hopes to avoid the reaping, but you were coriolanus’ obsession and he was not going to let you go.
— temper tantrum (req)
— summary: you were the daughter of one of the richest couples of panem. everything you’ve ever wanted, handed to you. coriolanus had a short temper and you were stubborn. who knows what could happen?
— mr president (req)
— summary: mr president seems to be especially enamoured with his favourite maid, you.
— all grown up (smut)
— summary: you were always tigris's annoying rich friend to coriolanus, but once he returns from 12 you seem to be irresistible, not only to him.
— charity (req)
— summary: president snow was praised for his love and devotion to his wife, a cripple. if only they knew how you’d ended up that way.
— love you best (req, smut, read as coryo or finnick)
— summary: your boyfriend doesn’t like you around other men without him.
PEETA MELLARK
— sweet like sugar (blurb req)
— summary: peeta teaches you how to bake since you’re nowhere near as good as you thought, not that you’d admit it.
—paranoia (dark req)
— summary: peeta tries to reintegrate into society in district 13 and get over his fear of you being taken from him. no one noticed just how badly the capitol messed him up until he lashes out.
SEJANUS PLINTH
— coming soon!
LUCY GRAY BAIRD
— safe and sound ft coriolanus snow
— summary: somehow you’d ended up in the games, snow and lucy would do anything to keep you safe.
— destined
— summary: you and lucy enjoy time together at the lake.
—our little dove ft coriolanus snow
— summary: you reunite with your dear songbird after the games, but it seems the capitol has followed her home, and taken an interest in the two of you.
— our little dove alt ending
— summary: you reunite with your dear songbird after the games, but it seems the capitol has followed her home, and taken an interest in the two of you.
KATNISS EVERDEEN
— coming soon!
JOHANNA MASON
— underestimate (blurb req)
— summary: johanna learns not to underestimate you.
ANNIE CRESTA
— my people ft finnick odair
— summary: you’d been hired to help keep annie’s home clean and to keep her company. what you didn’t expect was to fall in love with her. and to find out that she was with finnick, and annie doesn’t want to let either of you go. but you’ve found your people, and you couldn’t be happier.
TRIBUTE!READER
— coming soon!
(in general, no ship just the reader in the arena, with katniss n peeta etc)
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rewrite-canon · 6 months
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im going crazy with how people are starting to agree with snow that sejanus was really stupid and deserved what was coming to him. reading the books first should be a pre requisite to the movie idcccc if that takes away the wider audience, the wider audience all have smooth brains anyway.
“why was he colluding with rebels when he could’ve just thought about it pragmatically 🙄” i’m in your fucking walls. sejanus was never dumb, snow just kept pushing that perception of him through the book to deflect the fact that sejanus was an actual good person. snow thought himself the personification of good and benevolence, which was why everything he did had to have some half-assed excuse as to why he was justified in doing it. it was why he was actually tweaking in the woods when lucy gray left him, because he wanted to rid himself of her but he didn’t have an actual reason so he convinced himself of the most random scenario ever to justify trying to shoot at her. so we can establish that snow was an evil broke boy who clearly wasn’t good— then sejanus was a direct confrontation of snow’s own shortcomings towards that (i don’t think i have to detail how sejanus was genuine, it was obvious). coriolanus and sejanus are like the direct opposite characters of each other, and snow knew and took pride in this to an extent. which is why snow couldn’t admit that sejanus was good to himself, thus sejanus was deemed ‘stupid’ to protect his own deluded self actualisation (but this also includes other aspects like how the war made the plinths rich and the snows poor, leading to resentment and jealousy from snow).
“but that still didn’t mean he wasn’t doing dumb things throughout the book” was it really that dumb? a rebellion will always include some level of risk but i don’t hear anyone calling heavensbee stupid because it actually worked out for him. plus sejanus is district, so if we use our common sense of who he is as a character and emotional intelligence of his situation, it’s pretty easy to see why he would get in touch with rebels. he’s literally always yearned for the districts, he never once cared about his money or safety, which isn’t stupid, it’s sad. this was his way of dealing with the guilt of profiting from his people’s suffering— again, not stupid. you could argue he was reckless, especially when he went into the arena, but most people who simply cast him as a ‘dumb character’ ignore how troubled he is and fall into the very filtered lens of snow who was just concentrating on his stupidity.
sejanus’ growing radical actions had nothing to do with stupidity and everything to do with feeling helpless and like nothing was changing. he tried minor/low-risk things such as attempting to change the perception of the districts in the capitol, advocating against the hunger games etc etc. of course it didn’t work, so his options grew limited to more radical courses of action. its a natural line of thought— activists literally do it in real life when they feel as if their cause isn’t getting enough attention (eg. setting themselves on fire). sejanus is a desperate character who is so selfless in light of snow’s constant self-preservation. snow will always put himself first and be paranoid that he will be betrayed like he’s betrayed others, so he never understands sejanus’ disposition to help and trust people, so he labels him dumb. omg. like. sejanus is so not-stupid i’m actually gonna start freaking out!! this is defamatory leave my boo alone!! plz go read a book and work on media literacy i am begging!!!
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mackandcheezy · 6 months
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Don't Blame Me (Coriolanus Snow x Reader)
​​A/N: I have yet to see ABAOSAS so simply this is for the vibes, major plot changes from the book/ movie so dont mind that, simply I saw a hot morally grey man and decided I can fix him so this is for all the girlies with a toolbelt ;) 
His eyes had been glued to the screen for what felt like hours. The little specs of graininess following his vision everytime he blinked. Coriolanus Snow did not falter for anyone-- that was until he met you. Something about your blind optimism reminded him of a child, and god how he hated children, but somehow on you it was like a drug he couldn’t get enough of. It made something warm start in his chest, and little fires erupt in every nerve. It was nothing like he had ever felt before, he hated it, and yet he couldn’t get enough. And now he was going to watch the only thing that made him feel that way slip between his fingers like nothing more than a single snowflake. At some point the snow had to melt and here he was watching it live. 
He kept replaying that last conversation over and over. “I’m going to survive, there is no if,” he remembered how you brushed your fingers across his cheek through the rusty bars of the zoo. If he closed his eyes and thought about it hard enough he could feel the warmth of your fingers against his face again. He refused to remember the single tear and question that had prompted that response. This could not be a one time thing. He just got you and there was no letting you go now. Love is a drug and he was nothing but an addict. 
Coryo was jolted to reality when he noticed another tribute sneaking up behind you. He couldn’t remember his name. There was no point, the only one that mattered was the victor and that was you. It had to be you. 
Staring into the depths of your form he begged you to wake. The bile was already crawling up his throat burning a trail in its wake. Stomach clenched he closed his eyes as he heard what could only be described as a battle cry leave the murderer’s mouth. 
Three seconds. He was allowing himself three seconds of grief before he had to move on. To survive. Snow falls on top and he faltered for you but now it was over and he had to go on. 
That was until he opened his eyes to your form. You were standing over the tribute, eyes wide as the saucers that Grandma’am used to take tea in. A bloody knife dripped blood down your pale dress leaving you in a haunting shade of wet red down your right side. He didn’t remember you having that, deciding you must have fought the tribute for it, you always were good at getting what you wanted, especially from him. You took his every waking thought like it was nothing so what was a knife? 
“I killed him. He’s dead. I killed him..” Coryo could do nothing but watch as you spiraled within the tunnel. He wanted nothing more than to hold you and tell you that this was nothing more than a bad dream. Though part of him knew that in a way the person who brushed his cheek was gone. 
He quickly fixed the look of concern dawning his face, remembering how you had told him once that his “human was showing.” That single thought gracing the smallest of smiles on his lips. 
In a twisted way seeing you covered in a thick sheet of red brought him comfort. A small part of him knew that was wrong. Knew that his comfort came at the cost of a human life. But none of them deserved to live as much as you did. Now he knew you could do it, knew you had what it took to win, with the added bonus of having a weapon. He had not felt so much joy since hearing of the opportunity to go to University. You were the key to his new life, and it started now. 
He remembered thinking you were weak when he offered you the posion and you declined citing that “cheaters never win.” Coriolanus felt the entire essence of his personality crumble when those words left your perfectly pink lips. It set something inside of him aflame. You made him almost want to be a good person, almost, because if anything happened to you he would do whatever it took no matter the cost. He was ready to put his own future at risk for the assurance of knowing that you would live to see tomorrow's sunrise. Because you deserved a tomorrow more than he ever did. 
The games were coming to a close. Only a few tributes left and he watched intently as you moved around the arena. Even caked in blood, dirt, and who knows what else, he had never seen a figure more beautiful. 
He couldn’t help but allow himself to think of you adorned in the luxuries of the capitol. An egregious dress adorning your shoulders and your hair in some unnatural twist. Somehow it never looked as good as you did right now. Raw and natural, locks framing your face in small clumps. You were going to get out of this and he was going to get you out of those crummy districts. You deserved more than any of those pathetic traitors, and he was going to get you that. One way or another. 
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lu-vin-it · 4 months
Text
Luck
── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────
Part 2
Summary: You'd always been close to the Snow's, especially Tigris. You lived beside them, starved with them during the war, and helped feed them after. You've also had a crush on Coriolanus for forever.
Pairings: Coriolanus Snow x Reader
Pronouns Used: None Mentioned
Word Count: 10,962
Warnings: A LOT of murder, y/n is a tad evil!, poison, drug use (morphling), they drink some champagne too, typical Hunger Games stuff, somewhat consistent with the actual movie timeline, somewhat consistent with the book, most of the dialogue is pulled directly from a transcript of the movie
A/N: My first Hunger Games fic, Yay! It's a man, Boo! This is also a two parter unfortunately so get ready for the cliffhanger!! This is the longest fic I've ever written! I am embarrassed. Thanks to @lemkay-luminary , @lunatiqez , and @mictodii for proofreading, ilysm bffs!!!
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Your family, the Rose’s, had a similar standing to the Snows. Maybe that’s why you got along with Tigris so well. You knew what she was going through, you understood her day to day struggle. 
Tigris and you were pushed to be friends by your parents, before the dark days. You were two years younger than her, but still, the two of you became inseparable, especially after your parents gained back their fortune and moved into the penthouse beside theirs. Sometimes you thought you spent more time in their home than your own, after your money came trickling back.
Most of the time you spent your allowance on the Snow family. Your parents pretended to not know. You constantly bought Tigris new thread, buttons, or fabric. She refused to let you buy anything expensive; so you would go to a shop, buy the cheapest things you could find, and give those to her. Then, the two of you would sew together, usually giving the pieces to the Grandma’am or to Tigris’s cousin, Coriolanus. 
Coryo was in your year at the academy, so you spent a great deal of time with him as well. You were pretty close with him too, though you wished you were closer. 
The night before the Reaping and the Plinth Prize, you got home late. You had to lug dinner, your school books, and buttons all the way across town by foot. 
When you arrive home, you open your bedroom door to find Tigris sitting by your bed. 
She gets up and gives you a hug. “Is that bread?” She asks, glancing into your bag. 
“And stew! Come, sit.” You walk into the room and over to your table. Tigris follows suit, adjusting her robe slightly. “Is everyone asleep?” You start pouring the stew from the canister into bowls.
“Yes, your sister was already asleep when I got here and your parents stopped by thirty minutes ago to say goodnight.” You nod and hand her a bowl. “Thank you! You’re my favorite.” 
“You’re welcome! I have the buttons we needed too. Where is the shirt?” 
“Oh, it’s in my bag.” She nods to the purse sitting by your bed. She stands up and gets the shirt swiftly. You take it from her and unfold it, it looks nearly perfect. The buttons are just the missing piece. 
“This is perfect! Beautifully done, T.” 
She blushes. “Stop! It’s really your doing. That is the thread you gifted me. And these buttons are going to outshine everything else.” The way she said it made you instantly believe it. 
The rest of the night, you and Tigris slowly sew on each button. Trying different stitches in order to find the perfect one. Once you did, you lay the shirt down on your couch, and nod off to sleep, your last thoughts were of Coryo. What would he think of you helping with it? Would he smile in that one way he does sometimes? You couldn’t help but grin at the thought.
The next morning, you woke up earlier than usual with Tigris. You had to look your best today, even though you weren’t in line for a Plinth Prize, you knew there’d be plenty of pictures taken if Coryo wins it, and he will. You took the rest of the bread with you as you went to the Snow’s penthouse, just two houses down.  
“Have you seen Tigris with my Father’s shirt?” You hear Coryo ask as you walk through the door. 
“No.” The Grandma’am replies. 
“Coryo?” Tigris calls out as she walks through the foyer. You trail behind her. 
“Tigris?” Your classmate finally comes into view, shirtless. You look away. 
“I’m sorry we’re late.” Tigris apologizes.
“It was my fault, my first alarm didn’t ring.” You say with a frown. “But! We did it!” You gesture for Tigris to get the shirt, she does. 
“Well, we did something.” She hands it over. Coryo starts putting it on.
“I think it’s gorgeous.” 
Tigris looks at you, clearly thankful for the compliment. “It’s beautiful.” 
“Best cousin ever, and best friend ever.” Butterflies erupt in your stomach, you don’t let them show. “Tell me everything.” 
“Where do I start? I told Fabricia, at work, that she needed to bleach her white curtains and I slipped in the shirt while she did it. And of course we have Y/N to thank for the buttons.” 
“How much were they?” He asks, furrowing his brows. 
“Don’t worry about it. Think of it as an early graduation present.” You brush him off. 
“Oh. Did you find the potatoes? I boiled them for starch and you should really eat something today.”
He shakes his head. “Save them for Grandma’am.” He buttons the last button. 
Tigris grins, and fixes his collar. “You look so handsome! Grandma’am! Come see!” 
“Coriolanus Snow, future president of Panem,” Tigris joins. “We salute you.” You and Tigris both salute Coryo. 
Later, you and Coriolanus walk into the academy shoulder to shoulder. Clemensia, Coriolanus’s class partner and a classmate of yours, comes up to you two.
“Why, Coriolanus Snow, Y/N Rose.” 
“Clemmie.” Your friend replies. 
“Are you two sweating?” 
“It’s reaping day, we gave our drivers a day off.” You reply. 
“Ugh! Those ingrates should be begging to chauffeur you around today.” Clemensia replies, not looking at you once. “Just don’t forget I was your class partner while you’re gloating over the Plinth Prize.” 
“Prize? Please.” Coryo shakes his head. “I just want to serve Panem.” 
She hums. “Hungry?” 
“Cook served steak for breakfast, we had to throw half out.” She seemed to believe his lies. 
“Shame on you, Coryo. Don’t you know that they’re starving out there in the districts?” The three of you walk in. A friend of yours, Juno Phipps, calls you over. 
“I’ll see you soon, Coryo. You’ve got this.” You squeeze his shoulder before walking over to Juno . 
A moment passes before the bell rings and you have to rush into the veiwing room. You run over to where Coriolanus is standing with Sejanus. 
“…There’s no plinth prize today.” You overhear. Sejanus walks away. You go up to the blonde. 
“What just happened?” 
Coryo’s jaw tightens. “He said there was no prize today.” Your heart shatters for him. 
“Come on, the reaping is starting.” You place your hand on his arm. “Today, Coryo. There’s no prize today.” You emphasize. He glances at you and nods. You drop your hand and walk in, Coryo following.
You sit down right as Dr. Gual starts speaking.  
“How tantalizing to see all your shining young faces on this auspicious day.” She starts. “I am Dr. Volumnia Gaul, your humble gamemaker, in charge of the War Department and all its affiliated concerns. I’ve broken free of my laboratory today, to examine you, the leaders of the next generation. I won’t be around forever, after all.” She laughs. “And now to that end, I am honored to introduce you to the creator of the Hunger Games themselves, Dean Casca Highbottom.” Your dean steps up, clearly high on morphling, but then again when is he not? 
He clears his throat. “Select students, faculty, and of course, Dr. Gaul, I have summoned you all here today for the 10th annual Reaping Ceremony in which we choose two children from each district to throw into the Capitol Arena to fight to the death in the Hunger Games.”
He gestures to the top students, sitting in front of the room. “And here sit.. our own twenty-four top prospects all waiting to hear the results of hard study in this prestigious institution.” 
He pauses. “Eager to learn who’s won that Plinth Prize, no doubt. And a golden future. However, I am here to tell you that there’s been a change this year. One final assignment to prove your worth. Because… the esteemed citizens of the Capitol have grown bored of the Games and simply aren’t watching anymore. And if the games are to continue there must be an audience. So, Head Gamemaker Dr. Gaul has stepped in to… incentivize patriotic values with her own unique flair, starting with you. The Plinth Prize will no longer be determined by who has the best grades.” 
The top students burst into a mixture of confusion and anger. “But by who is the best mentor in the Hunger Games. This is a brand new role. As the reaping progresses live, I will allocate each district tribute a capitol mentor behind the scenes, one who must just persuade them to perform for the cameras.” 
Someone calls out. “Obviously, the best mentor will be the one who’s tribute wins the game.” 
Arachne, an insufferable blonde girl, replies; “What if I get a pathetic runt girl from one of the poor districts, like 8 or 12? They’re just going to die in two minutes like they did last year and the year before.” 
“Your role is to turn these children into spectacles, Ms. Crane. Not survivors. Victory in the games is only one of our considerations. Your entire future rests on this last project. Oh, and I must tell you that anyone caught cheating to give their tributes an unfair advantage,” He laughs. “Will just not have any future at all.” The reaping music starts. “Oh! Here we go. Let the reaping begin.”
Dean Highbottom grabs cards and starts reading off the mentor to each tribute as the tributes are chosen. You zone out until you hear Coryo’s name. District 12, girl. Lucy Gray Baird, to be exact. The tribute walked to the stage, stuffing a snake into a girl’s dress on the way there— you wished you could’ve seen it, but the cameras panned away. When Lucy Gray got to the stage, she stood in front of the mic, and started singing. 
“You can’t take my past. You can’t take my history.” The room erupted in noises of confusion. “You could take my Pa, but his name’s a mystery. Nothing you can take from me was ever worth keepin’. Nothing you can take was ever worth keeping.”
“Singing? Is she out of her mind?” Arachne yells. Your eyes don’t stray from the screen. 
“Can’t take my charm. Can’t take my humor. You can take my wealth, cause it’s just a rumor. Nothing you can take, was ever worth keeping.” Lucy grabs the mic. “You can’t take my sass. You can’t take my talkin’. You can kiss my ass!” She lets go of the mic, making it thud, as she turns around to the peacekeepers. The room laughs at her. 
“Well, she’s mentally ill.” The blonde remarks. You all get up, you decide to wait a couple steps behind Coryo as Dean Highbottom speaks to him. 
“At least.. since the assignment is to turn them into spectacles.. at least Lucy Gray already is one.” You offer to your friend as the dean walks away. 
“Let’s go home.” He says instead. You frown, but start walking with him anyway. 
Once your at the Snow residence, Coryo tells Tigris everything, you chime in from time to time to add on.
 “He’s sabotaging us.” He looks at Tigris, and then to you. “That girl’s not going to win these games. You saw her. She’s underfed, unstable.” 
“The dean said it’s not just about winning.” You say.
“Everything is about winning. If not the Games now, then the crowd. Lucy Gray won’t survive a minute in that arena.” 
“So that means we have to make every second before then count.” Tigris says. 
The blonde nods. “I’ll get her to sing again.” 
You snort. “I wouldn’t sing a note for you, if I were her. I wouldn’t do anything at all, unless I could trust you.” Tigris nods.
“She’s district, Y/N.” He sighs. “She knows we hate her, and she wants us dead. How am I supposed to get her to trust me?” 
“Imagine it was your name that they pulled, and you had just been ripped out of your home. I’d just want to know that someone still cared about me out here.” Tigris says, softly. “Don’t discount her just because she’s district, Coryo. You might just have more in common with her than you think.” That is the difference between you and your best friend. She is so kind.. and you are.. you.
Coryo nods and stands up. “I think I know what I need to do.” He walks into his room with a short farewell. 
“What do you think he’s going to do?” Tigris asks. 
You furrow your brows. “If anyone knows, it’d be you.” Your best friend shakes her head. 
“I may know him the best, but you two are basically the same people. What would you do if you were him?” You think for a moment. What would you do? 
“Meet her at the train station.” You say with a nod. “Get her to trust me, and sing. Her singing is probably the only way he’s got a chance of winning.” 
“You’re right.” 
You sigh. “I just hope he is too.” With that, you stand up. “Well, I better get home. Love you, Tigris.” Your best friend stands up and hugs you. 
“I love you too, N/N. Have a good night.” 
You grab your bag which was on your chair and put it on your shoulder. “You too.” 
The next morning, you wait for Coryo outside like you usually do, but when there was no sign of him five minutes before class started, you sprint to class. 
You sat down next to Sejanus like usual. His face is full of confusion when Coriolanus doesn’t follow you. 
“Where’s Coryo?” 
“I don’t know, but I’ll be giving him an earful for not telling me I didn’t have to wait outside.” You whisper in response. You didn’t want all your classmates hearing the anger in your voice, but Sejanus knew you well, and besides, it wasn’t the first time Coryo made you mad. 
He laughs. “Sure you will. I’ve never seen you actually yell at him. He gives you one look and you melt.” 
You gape at him in offense. “I do not!” Sejanus goes to reply, but Dean Highbottom walks in, stealing all attention. He turns on the TV at the front of the room. It flicks on revealing Coriolanus and Lucy Gray Baird standing in a cage, holding hands. You are suddenly even angrier than before. 
“…But this dress was my Mama’s, so it’s extra special to me.” Lucy says, showing off the skirt with her free hand. 
“Mhm, and she’s in District 12?” Lucky, the reporter asks.
“Well only her bones, darlin’, only her bones.” Everything about her infuriates you. Her voice, her smile, her hair. “Do you know my mentor? Say’s his name’s Coriolanus Snow and clearly, I got the cake with the cream, ‘cause nobody else has even bothered to show up.” You curl your fists in your lap. 
“Did the gamemakers tell you to jump in the cage with them?” 
“They didn’t tell me not to.” You put your tongue in your cheek. ‘Didn’t tell you to hold her hand, either.’ You think to yourself. “They just said it was a mentor’s job to introduce our tributes to the citizens of Panem. And I thought, well, if Lucy Gray is brave enough to be here, then why shouldn’t I be, too?” Lucky hums.
“For the record, I didn’t have a choice.” Lucy Gray adds. 
“For the record,” Lucky looks at a couple of Peacekeepers making their way to the cage. “I think you’re about to be whisked away, young man.” Before you could see anymore, the camera pans away, following Lucky as he signs off. 
Thirty minutes later, Coryo waltzes into the classroom, he gives you a smile and you barely hold back a scowl. 
“Your little excursion was in violation of about five different Academy rules, Mr. Snow.” Dean Highbottom says. “Chief among them, endangering a Capitol student.” Coryo stops in his tracks, about to sit down in his seat beside you. 
“What, who?” 
“You. I’m moving for the Gamemakers to disqualify you immediately.” 
Coryo sits down. “You said we had to get our tributes to perform, not that we had to stay away.” 
“I’ll add insubordination onto the list.” 
“Holding her hand, Coryo, introducing her to people, you make it look as if we’re one and the same as those people.” Clemensia spits. Although you agree with her, you stay quiet. 
Sejanus scoffs. “Coriolanus didn’t show those people anything that they didn’t already know—“
“I don’t need your help, Sejanus.” 
“—That the tributes are human beings. Just like us. That’s why nobody wants to watch the games. It’s because people know deep down that winning a war 10 years ago doesn’t justify starving people’s children, taking away their freedom, their rights.”  
“Snow fell down in the cage. It fell in the cage, but landed..” You look over to see Dr. Gaul in the doorway. She wears the same smug smile she always wears.
“On stage.” Coryo finishes her riddle. 
“You’re good at games. Maybe one day you’ll be a gamemaker like me.” 
“If the games continue at all.” Sejanus mumbles.
“Oh they’ll continue with performances like young Mr. Snow’s in that zoo. And I came here to ask your star mentor a question.” We all wait in anticipation. “What are the Hunger Games for?” Instead of waiting for Coryo to reply, you turn to the book on the table and read, blocking out the sounds of Sejanus and Dr. Gaul arguing. 
After class, you leave as quickly as possible, ignoring Coryo as he tries to stop you. When he stops, you glance back to see him frowning at you. A pang of guilt racks you, but you continue walking away. You knew it’d be bad to confront him now, you were more angry that Lucy Gray got his attention so quickly than anything. And you knew Coryo would see that.
You are able to avoid him until you are on your way to lunch, and he pulls you into a classroom. 
“Why have you been avoiding me?”
You sigh. “I’m hungry, Coriolanus. I know you are too, let’s go to lunch, please?” You move to open the door but he moves in front of it. 
“What is your problem?” 
“What’s yours?” 
“My problem is that you’re ignoring me! And you didn’t defend me to Highbottom!” 
You roll your eyes. “You told Sejanus not to.” 
“You’re not Sejanus.” 
You scoff. “Yeah well you were treating me like him.” 
Coryo scrunches his face up. “What?” 
“No warning this morning? I waited outside for you for thirty minutes.” You start. “And imagine my surprise, when I finally do go to class, that you blew me off for some district scum!” You spit. Coriolanus stares at you in shock. A second passes before you realize what you said. “I didn’t.. they aren’t scum, I didn’t mean that.” You rush out. 
“You did mean it.” It’s like a switch is flipped, and you can’t help but feel drawn to this side of him. A smirk slowly appears on his face. He takes a step towards you. “You know how much I need the prize, Y/N. Forgive me for not telling you?” He takes another step, and you back up, crossing your arms. “You know I’d never purposely blow you off for Lucy Gray.” He reaches his hand up to your face. A foreign gesture. Butterflies erupt in your stomach. “Why don’t you come to the zoo with me later?” He gives you his signature smile and you melt. 
With a sigh, you nod. “Fine, whatever.” 
“Come on, wouldn’t want anyone catching us here alone, rumors may start.” You squint your eyes at your friend, was he flirting with you? “Lunch?” He offers you his arm, and you loop your own through it.  
In the cafeteria, you and Coryo sit at a table across from one another. You eat in silence, while Coryo tries to put food in his pocket. 
“Trying to fatten that girl up so you can finally start taking bets?” Sejanus asks, sitting in the other chair at the table.
“You think they’ll give those kids a scrap if we don’t give them a reason to do it? How do you think your tribute will have a chance if he can’t eat?” You reply, defending Coryo. 
Sejanus looks at the blonde boy. “I see you’ve already gotten back into Y/N’s good graces.” You roll your eyes, Coryo smiles slightly. Sejanus turns back to you. “He was my classmate, back in 2.” 
“It’s not your fault it’s him.” 
“See, I know. I’m so blameless, I’m choking on it.” He looks at his tray. “My Father bought him for me, you know, at the Reaping, just so he could show me that I could never go back..But being Capitol is going to change me.” He admits quietly. 
“So do something about it.” You say.  
“Quite the rebel.” Sejanus jokes. 
“Oh yeah, N/N’s bad news.” Coryo says with a nod. You laugh.
Later, you and the boys go to the zoo. Sejanus immediately tries to talk to Marcus, while you and Coryo look for Lucy Gray. 
“Lucy Gray!” The blonde calls out as you approach the cage. “This is Y/N Rose, a good friend of mine.” 
“Well hello there, Y/N.” It takes everything in you to smile. 
“Hi, quite a show you put on at the Reaping. Beautiful voice.” 
She tilts her head to the side with a smile. “Oh stop, you’ll make me blush.” Coryo pulls the food out of his pocket. “That for us? Jessup!” You furrow your brows. What was she doing? 
“I’m not hungry.” A boy, the other tribute from 12, replies. 
“Do you think I can’t hear your stomach growling, Jessup Diggs? Come on.” Jessup gets up and takes half of the food, and then sits back down. 
You wince, seeing a nasty bite on his neck. “What happened to his neck?” You ask.
“A bat bite. The first night on the train, he didn’t sleep a wink the whole journey ‘cause he was keeping the bats off me so I would get some rest.” Noble. ‘Is he not aware of the whole fighting to the death thing?’ You wonder. 
“Can you take it?” You look over to see Arachne taunting a tribute. “Come on, try harder than that.” 
“One thing I learned in twelve, is that hunger is a weapon.” She gestures to Arachne. “Your friend over there sure knows it.” 
“She isn’t our friend.” Coryo says quickly. 
“She’s poison with perfect teeth.” You roll your eyes. 
“Are you going to share everything that I give you with Jessup?”
“Why? You think I ought to build up my strength so I can strangle him in the arena?” She laughs. “Not exactly my forte.” 
“I might have a chance to help you, make some suggestions to the gamemakers. I might even be able to get the audience to send you gifts in the arena. Food and water to keep you going.” He pauses. “You just have to try singing again to win people over.” 
Lucy Gray crosses her arms. “I don’t sing when I’m told, I sing when I’ve got something to say. Besides, I’ve seen your arena, there’s no place to hide.”
“What’s your point?” 
“The guards say you get money if you get more people to watch and you say you wanna help me, so which one is it?” You look at Coryo, wanting to hear his answer. Knowing he would say he wants to help her, but hoping that he’d crush her instead. 
“Both.” You look down to conceal your smile. 
“One more time!” Arachne yells. 
“I’m not playing this game.” The tribute replies.
“Come on!” 
“You shut up.” She growls.
“Uh.. No, thank you. I saw you staring.” 
“Please.” 
“Give me something. I’ve been sitting here for 15 minutes!” 
“Always thought there was plenty of food in the Capitol.” Lucy Gray says, staring at Arachne and the tribute. 
“You know, one time, during the war, I ate a whole jar of paste just to take away the ache.” You look at Coryo sadly. You remembered that day, 
“How was it?” 
“Pasty.” You smile. 
“That little one, she’s so sweet. So young.” Lucy Gray points at a young girl sitting on a rock. “Something about her reminds me of my cousin Maude Ivory. I can’t stand to think of them without me.” 
“I’m sorry.” Coryo replies. 
She gives you both a pained smile. “You two seem like a good match.” 
You shake your head. “Oh— Well—“ 
“Thank you.” Coryo interrupts you. You glance at him, but his face gives nothing away. You aren’t sure what was happening with Coriolanus, was he trying to hint at something?
“Come on, just take it.” Arachne taunts again. This time, the tribute takes the bottle, and breaks it. She then uses the broken bottle to slit Arachne’s throat.
You gasp. “Oh my—“  You grab onto Coryo, He pushes you behind some peacekeepers as he runs for Arachne. “Coryo! Stop— What are you doing!?” Fear racks your body, and your eyes fill with tears as the peacekeepers start firing without a target. The tribute that slit Arachne’s throat fell, being shot at least twice. Peacekeepers forcefully remove Coriolanus from Arachne while others grab her body. You run over to Coryo and hug him tightly. “A-Are you okay? Were you shot?” You pull away and scan him. 
“I’m fine, were you hurt?” You shake your head and hug him again. 
That night, you sat on the Snow’s couch, Tigris’s arms around you, completely silent. 
“It’s starting again. This is how it begins, the war.” The Grandma’am says. 
“It was my fault.” Coriolanus replies quietly. “I suggested that we meet the tributes.” 
“You’re just lucky that your songbird didn’t peck out your eyes, too.” 
“She’s not a rebel, Grandma’am. She’s just a girl.” Tigris argues.
The old woman laughs. “Trust me, that one hasn’t been a girl in a long time. Outside this Capitol, they’re savages, one and all. However they may smile, she will use you. You must use her too, or you’ll end up dead in the trees like your Father.” You reach out and put a hand on Coryo’s shoulder. He doesn’t react, and the four of you sit in silence for a moment. 
“I should go home, see my parents.” You give a pained smile. “Can’t spend my whole life here.” Tigris smiles at you. “I’ll stop by tomorrow with dinner.” You stand up, giving Tigris a quick hug, and then giving the Grandma’am a kiss on the cheek. 
The next day was even worse. All of the mentors went to the arena with their tributes, and after five minutes, the arena was bombed by rebels. You didn't even know until Sejanus came knocking on your door hours later to tell you that Coriolanus was injured. You ran to the hospital. 
“Tigris!” You whisper-shout when you walk in. She quickly stands up and rushes over to you. “How is he?” 
She engulfs you in a hug. “Okay. Nothing is broken.” You let out a breath of relief. You let go of her and walk to the side of his bed where two chairs were. You sit in one of them, Tigris going to sit in the other. You look at him sleeping soundly, he looked fine.
A tear falls down your face, but you quickly wipe it away. “How long has he been asleep?” 
“Couple of hours, he passed out after Lucy Gray saved him.” Your neck snaps to Tigris. 
“She saved him?”
Your best friend nods. “Something collapsed on his leg, she lifted it for him, got him out.” 
You furrow your brows. “I’ll be back.” You kiss Tigris’s cheek. “There’s food in my bag, eat some?” She nods. You rush out, heading straight for the zoo. 
“Lucy Gray!” You yell when you get there. It was starting to get dark, so there were more peacekeepers than usual. “Lucy Gray Baird!” You call out again. Finally, the girl pops her head up from behind a rock, her face morphs into confusion when she sees you, but she stands and walks towards you. 
“Y/N? What are you doing here?” 
“You saved him.” She nods slowly. Tears pool in your eyes again. “They said he may not wake up until tomorrow.” The tribute deflates. 
“Well.. I appreciate you telli—“
“Do you need anything?” You interrupt, swallowing your pride. 
“Well.. Coriolanus said he’d get me a guitar for the interview tomorrow night.” You nod. 
“I’ll get it for you, and if he doesn’t make it to the interview I’ll have Sejanus, he’s the boy from 2’s mentor, give it to you.”
“I appreciate that, but, aren’t I competition? Why would he help me out?” 
“Sejanus doesn’t see things like we do. Plus, his tribute escaped, he’s already lost the prize.” 
“Okay then. I appreciate you, Y/N Rose.” You nod. 
“Sleep as well as you can.. I know it’s hard on the ground, but..” You pause. “Coryo needs this prize.” Lucy Gray cocks her head to the side. 
“Don’t you mean I need to win the games?” 
You shrug. “They go hand in hand.” 
“Hm.” She nods. “You have a good night, Rose.” You turn around with a wave, and head back to the hospital. 
“Where’d you go?” Tigris asks as you sit beside her. 
“Zoo. Needed to make sure Lucy Gray was taken care of.” She nods. “Has he woken up yet?”
Tigris smiles. “For a minute. He asked about you.” 
You glance at Tigris, trying to not sound so eager. “What did he say?” 
“He wanted to make sure someone had told you, and then he wanted to know where you were. I told him you ran home to change.” 
You nod.  “Thanks.” You look at the clock on the wall. It was already eight. “If you want to go home, you can. I know you have work tomorrow. I’ll stay here.” 
“Are you sure?” 
You nod. “I told my Mom I would be at yours all night.” 
“You’re an angel.” She hugs you. “Get some rest, N/N.” 
“You too.”  
Tigris came back a few hours later so you could actually go home and change, but then she had work. You sit with Coryo all day. Your Mother stops by around three to drop off some food. 
“Are you coming home tonight?” She asks. 
You glance up from the food. “Probably not, doc said Coriolanus would be up soon, so I’ll probably help Tigris look after him tonight. She does work, so she’ll need to rest.” 
“The Games are tomorrow, Y/N. You need to get some rest too.” 
“Oh! Speaking of, Lucy Gray needs a guitar for an interview. It’d be a shame to buy a new one since.. Well, since she won’t be around to enjoy it. Would you mind getting Tessa’s and giving it to Sejanus when he goes?” 
She tilts her head to the side. “Does your sister know about this?”
“She will when you tell her?” You scrunch your shoulders up and give her a smile. 
Your Mom huffs. “Fine. What time will Sejanus be at the house?” 
“In an hour.” 
“Okay. I love you.”  
“Yeah, you too.” She leans down and kisses your cheek, you return the gesture, she then leaves. 
Two hours later, Sejanus walks in. 
“Y/N? Hey.” You glance up from the pants you’re sewing.
“Oh, hello, Sejanus.” You place the pants on the table beside you, carefully placing the needle on top. “Why aren’t you at the interview?” 
He shrugs and sits down beside you. “Wanted to watch it with him, I guess. And you. You guys are my best friends.” ‘What? He barely knows me.’ You think to yourself. You smile. 
“Oh, alright then.” You grab the remote and turn on the TV. The interviews were about to start. 
“Has he woken up yet?” 
“Once last night. I was at the zoo, but Tigris was here.” 
“Speaking of, where is she?” 
“Work. Did you get the guitar?”
 He nods. “Yes! Lucy Gray is ready.” 
You give him a small smile. “Good. Thank you.”
He shrugs. “I want him to win the prize. I dunno how I’d survive University without you both.” You nod and turn to the TV, the girl from district 3 was being interviewed. She was the first, since all of the tributes from 1 and 2 were dead or, in the boy from 2’s case, on the run. 
You and Sejanus watched in silence until the girl from 11 came on stage, and Coryo started stirring. 
“Coryo?” You stand up and stand at the edge of his bed. He slowly opens his eyes. 
“Y/N?”
You grin. “Coryo! Right on time, Lucy Gray is almost up.” You nod to the TV. 
“How’re you feeling?” Sejanus asks, standing. 
“Fine, really. So, they’re actually going on with the Games?” Sejanus nods. “Wow.” 
“I first met this young lady in the zoo not too long ago,” You glance at the TV, Lucky was about to introduce Lucy Gray. 
“She’s coming on.” You tell them, sitting down on the edge of the bed. 
“From District 12, Lucy Gray Baird! Get over here with that guitar, you songbird!” Lucy Gray walks on wearing your sister’s guitar. 
“Did you get her that?” Coriolanus asks. You glance back and smile.
“I went to thank her for saving you, she mentioned you were going to get her one.” He smiles back at you, searching your eyes. “You’re very welcome.” You wink and turn back to the TV. 
“…We fell on hard times, and we lost our bright colours, you went to the dogs and I lived by my charms.” Lucy Gray sings. The donations start going up. 
You reach back and place a hand on Coryo’s forearm. A moment passes, as you watch the donations pile up, Coryo slowly moves his arm and slots your fingers together. Butterflies erupt in your stomach. 
“…So who will you turn to tomorrow, I wonder? For when the bell rings, lover, you’re on your own.” 
“It’s working.” Coryo says, breathing a laugh. 
“Of course it is.” You look back at your friend with a grin. “Snow lands on top.” 
He smirks. “Snow lands on top.”
The interview ends and Sejanus leaves soon after, leaving you alone with Coryo. 
“I brought you food, it’s cold now, but I can get it heated up for you.” You tell your friend as you turn to him. 
“Y/N, thank you… For everything you’ve done to help me.”
 You smile and squeeze his hand. “You and Tigris are my best friends.” 
“You’re my best friend too.” He hesitantly sits up. “Will you help me get home?” 
“Sure, you need to get some rest, big day tomorrow.” You stand up. “I’ll go tell a nurse.” 
The next day was the start of The Hunger Games. You got up especially early so that you could have breakfast at the Snow’s and then go with Coriolanus to watch the games. 
“Tigris? Coryo?” You call out, entering the penthouse. 
“Hello, Y/N.” The Grandma’am says from the table. 
You walk over with a smile. “Good Morning! How did you sleep?” 
She shakes her head. “I barely slept. Whispers of another rebellion keep me up.” 
You give her a sympathetic look. “I’ll keep you safe if there is one. You can come with me to my family’s bunker.” The Grandma’am gives you a wary look as if you couldn’t be trusted. She did that with everyone these days, although she had yet to do it to you too.
“Good morning!” You hear Tigris say as she leaves her room. 
“Morning. I brought food.” You open your bag and pull out containers.
“Of course you did.” She sits down beside you. “How did you sleep?” 
“Fine, I’m nervous for today.” Tigris frowns, as if she’d forgotten what today is. Coryo steps out of his room a second later. 
“Good Morning.” He sits down beside The Grandma’am, giving her a kiss on the cheek. There are circles under his eyes. 
You give each of them a portion of the food you brought. “Someone didn’t sleep.” You tease. 
“I went to see Lucy Gray last night.” 
You furrow your brows. “After I left?” He nods. Why would he do that? “Too bad you didn’t tell me. I would’ve loved to see her one more time.” Tigris’s eyes flicker between you two. 
“You don’t think she’ll win?” No. 
You smile sweetly. “Of course I do, Coryo. But when she does she’ll be shipped back to 12. We’ll probably never see her again.” Coryo seems to believe you, and sinks into his seat. Your stomach aches from jealousy. 
A few minutes pass, and once all of you are done eating, you stand. “Well, I think we ought to be on our way.” Coryo nods, and stands up as well. “See you soon, T.”
“Have a good day, I’ll be watching from work!” Tigris stands up and gives you and Coryo each a kiss on the cheek. 
When you walk downstairs there’s a car waiting for you like usual. You slide into the backseat and Coriolanus follows. Once you’re both buckled, you close the privacy screen between you and the driver. 
“Why did you go alone last night?” You ask suddenly. 
Coryo raises his eyebrows. “I felt like I needed to tell her thank you, like you did.” 
“All alone at night?” You chastise. “Did you learn nothing from Arachne? You could have been killed!”
He scoffs. “They’re in a cage.”
“The Peacekeepers aren’t.” 
“The Peacekeepers aren’t going to shoot me.” 
“Not purposely but they’re awful shots! You saw what they did when Arachne was attacked, why did you put yourself in that position?” 
He sighs. “I was giving her something.” He admits. “She isn’t going to win on her own, so I gave her something, is that what you wanted to hear?” 
You blink at him in surprise. “What did you give her?”
“It’s best if you don’t know. If Highbottom finds out I don’t want you dragged into it.” 
“But I want to be dragged into it. Coryo, do you know what they’ll do to you if they find this out?”
Your friend scowls. “Of course I know. But this is the only way I have a chance at winning.”
“Coryo, you’ve already completed the assignment. Lucy Gray is a spectacle.” 
“You and I both know he won’t give it to me unless she wins so just forget about it.” You frown and scoot closer to him, laying your head down on his shoulder.
“Maybe I should just save up my allowance for a while and I could give it to you–”
“No, Y/N–”
“It wouldn’t cover the whole thing but it’d make a dent in the tuition at least.”
“No. I’m not letting you do that.” 
You can feel tears filling your eyes. “Then Lucy Gray has to win. I won’t survive The University without you.” 
He grabs one of your hands. “She will.” 
You walked into The Academy hand in hand with Coryo, you tried to let go before you got out of the car, thinking he wouldn’t want people to see, but he just picked it back up. 
When you walked into the room the games were being viewed in, Dean Highbottom walked up to you. “That friend of yours, Plinth,” He starts, nodding to Sejanus who was talking to another classmate of yours. “You might want to find him a seat near the door.” He grimaces before walking away. 
“Weird.” You mumble. 
“Coryo, Y/N!” Sejanus calls. He walks up to you both. 
“Hey.” Coryo replies, his face stone. 
“How’re you doing? You alright?” 
The blonde nods. “Better.”
Sejanus grimaces. “Tell me this will be over quickly.” The screen in front of the room turns on revealing some tributes. 
“We should take our seats.” You say. You turn to Coryo with a smile. “Good luck.” You squeeze his hand and then walk over to the viewing stands. 
“Everyone, as you know, we’re about to go live.” Lucky starts. “Just because you’re not hosting doesn’t mean you're off the hook, help me! Don’t get lost behind your screens. No yawning, no gum chewing, keep your chins down, heads up, shoulders back, and smile! It's why we have teeth.” He grins. “Okay, ready? We’re gonna start guys. Five, four, three, two…” An orchestra plays and the cameras turn on. “Good morning, I’m Lucretius “Lucky” Flickerman. A man who needs no introduction. Weatherman, amateur magician, and today, I’m honored to say, first ever host of The Hunger Games!” Everyone breaks into applause, you join in, clapping unenthusiastically. “In my hand, an envelope, sealed. My prediction, the winner, will be opened by me, at the end of the big show’s end.” He brings his hand up to his ear. “We’re getting word… alright, we’re about to start! We’re starting everyone! Happy Hunger Games!” He turns to the students. “Remember, when your tribute dies, get out.”
You can hear the Tributes entering the arena, and reluctantly walking to their marks. Then, you see something else. Marcus was tied up, half dead, in the middle of the Arena. You gasp with the rest of the room. 
Sejanus stands up in shock. “Marcus!” He yells.
Lucky grimaces. “Guess we can all sleep better now that we know he’s off the streets!” 
“You’re monsters!” Sejanus shouts at the Dean. “All of you!” He runs out. The countdown starts at ten. You sit up straighter. 
“Jessup! Jessup!” Lucy Gray shouts. You furrow your brows. Everyone around her started running to the pile of weapons in the middle of the Arena. 
“What is she doing?” You mumble. Reaper, the biggest tribute, runs straight at Lucy Gray with a scythe, but she ducks. Then Coral, the girl tribute from 4 runs at her with a trident. She dodges the first and second blows before backing up and dodging the third, causing Coral to impale another tribute through the stomach. 
One of your classmates leans down and throws up. You scrunch up your face in disgust. 
Two tributes were already dead. Lucy Gray rolls off of the rubble, narrowly missing an axe swung by the boy from 7. She stands up and manages to get away from two more strikes before someone throws a knife, hitting the boy's arm. Another knife is thrown way too close to Lucy Gray. 
She looks around, finally finding Jessup across the arena. She screams his name again and climbs on top of the rubble, knocking out one of the other tributes with her elbow once she gets up. She rolls off the other side, making brief eye contact with Coral, who pulls her trident out of someone’s chest. 
Lucy Gray reaches Jessup and pulls him up, shouting about how they had to go now. Some of the other tributes already started chasing them, but Lucy Gray manages to run into some of the tunnels, dragging Jessup with her. 
“They’ve gone underground quickly, but we’ve prepared for this!” The cameras switch and you can see Lucy Gray again. 
They run through the tunnels, checking all the doors that they pass. Every single one is locked.
“What you’re seeing now, is a live feed of security cameras.” 
“C’mon..” You grip the bench. 
Coral and her group enter the tunnels, and Lucy Gray starts frantically looking for some hiding place. She finally gets through a small entrance on the bottom of a door, then, she pulls Jessup through it. 
Two other tributes are found by Coral’s group in the tunnels. They are slaughtered on sight. 
“Do you think they’re done?” One of your classmates asks. 
“Looks like it.” Lucky turns to the cameras. “To the children watching, that was violent, horrific, and disgusting.” He turns to the girl that threw up. “Ms. Phipps, please, if you’re going to vomit, do it off camera.” He gives her a pitiful smile and then looks at the camera. “Thirteen tributes still remain. Reaper still looming large on top of the charts, while Coral and her pack try to make a play. Six tributes gone in minutes. If they keep it going up at this pace, we’re gonna be outta here in no time!” He then starts giving the weather report. 
You stand up and walk over to Coryo’s seat, placing a hand on his shoulder.
“She survived the worst part of the games, who's to say she won’t survive the rest?” You give him a lazy smile which he returns. 
“Rose, back to your seat. The rules for spectators are very clear.” Highbottom reprimands. You nod at the dean and squeeze Coryo’s shoulder before walking away. 
You stay there until 8, when all viewers are forced to leave.  You give Coryo a small wave and a smile before you leave, he only waves in response. He looks exhausted. 
At midnight, Dr. Gaul shows up on your doorstep. 
“You need to come with me, now.” 
You squint your eyes. “Why?”
“It’s about your friend.” 
Your brows furrow in concern. “Is it Coryo? Is he okay?” Was he caught? Was Dr. Gaul here to bring you in for questioning?
“Mr. Snow is fine, it’s Sejanus Plinth that’s in trouble. I don’t know how he broke in, or who he bribed, but Sejanus Plinth is currently in The Hunger Games arena and I need you and ‘Coryo’ to get him out.” 
You sigh. You always did have a feeling this ‘friendship’ with Sejanus was going to end up costing more than it’s worth. “Fine. Let’s go.” 
Dr. Gaul ends up taking you to a car that Coryo was already sitting in. She doesn’t blink twice when you sit next to him, or when he holds your hand, something that’s become a daily thing at this point.
When you arrive at the arena, you and Coryo are ushered through the gate. You both wince at the turnstile as you walk through it, it was loud enough without the voice announcing, “Enjoy the show” for all of the tributes to hear. 
Coryo pulls you closer to him and you put up no fight. You walk towards Sejanus as fast and as quiet as you can. You’re incredibly paranoid, frantically looking around you at all times. 
“Thought they’d send my Ma.” He murmurs when you get close.
“We wish they had.” You reply, venom lacing your voice. Sejanus didn’t even flinch. 
“You guys need to go.” 
“We’d like to, we really would. But we promised we’d get you out.”
“Why?” 
“Because you're our friend.” Coryo says. You want to say ‘Speak for yourself!’ but you don’t. 
“I had to do this. I had to go where the cameras are.” His voice breaks. 
“Do you actually think anyone is watching this?” You butt in. “Gaul cut the feed.” 
“Tributes kill you in here and she’s just going to say it’s the flu.” Coryo’s tone was startling. It was vicious. You barely had a chance to react when you heard a footstep. “You need to decide right now. Do you wanna fight these tributes, or fight for them? Because if you’re going to make real change, you have to stay alive.”
“How can I make any change from out there?”
“You’re rich, and smart, and you care.” You reply shakily. You need to get out of there. Every bone in your body is screaming at you to run. 
Coryo nods. “You’re the only one in that class who stood up to Gaul, right?” You can hear metal scraping, and though you try to convince yourself it wasn’t a knife, you still cling to Coryo’s arm. “We’re dead right now if we don’t leave. Come with us, spend your Father’s money on some good, or just be another dead body in Dr. Gaul’s war.” You can’t open your mouth to voice your desperation to leave, so you continue to look around. “Trust me, please.” 
Then you hear it. A boy tribute was shouting at you as he ran towards you with a knife. 
“Run!” Sejanus yells. You book it to the exit, but you were the slowest out of the three of you. Coryo’s grip on your hand remained tight as you all ran. 
As you get to the turnstiles, the tribute grabs your other hand, causing you to scream. He plunges his knife into your hand making blood spray everywhere, and you barely acknowledge it before Coryo grabs a plank of wood and hits the Tribute over the head. He hits him with all his force four times. You weren’t sure which one was the killing blow. You didn’t think about it for long, either, because as soon as Coryo started to pull you again, you realized that the knife was still in your hand, and blood was still gushing from it. 
You lean on Coryo in the car ride to Dr. Gaul’s office. You can barely stay awake, but both your friend and the esteemed Gamemaker insist that you stay conscious. Something about blood loss. You scarcely remember anything leading up to your arrival at Dr. Gaul’s office; Just that you were given some blood in an IV, stitched up, and given some morphling for the pain. Thankfully, you were right as rain once the adrenaline went down. You were exhausted, yes, but back in your right mind. 
You walk outside of Dr. Gaul’s office to find Coryo waiting on a couch. 
“Are you waiting on me?” You ask. He looks up at you, as if he hadn’t noticed you yet. You tilt your head at him, but he just stands up and walks over to you. 
“You’re okay.” The blonde places a hand on your cheek, you lean into it. 
“I am. I’m very tired, and my hand hurts, but I’ll be okay in the morning.” 
He lets out a breath of relief. “Good. That’s good.” 
“Don’t you have to get back to the Academy?” 
He nods. “I’m going to walk you home first.” 
You shake your head, but a smile tugs at your mouth. “You don’t have to do that.” 
“I do. You lost a lot of blood, and I won’t be able to forgive myself if something else happens to you.” 
You furrow your brows. “Coryo.. This wasn’t your fault.” 
“I should have told her not to send you in.” 
“You think she would have listened to you?” You laugh. “You’re charming, Snow, but I don’t think your smile can capture Dr. Gaul.” 
He smirks.“What’s this about my smile?”
You roll your eyes to try and seem annoyed, but your smile betrays you. “There’s the Coriolanus I know. Welcome back Mr. President, I missed you.” 
“Happy to be back.” 
You giggle. “I’m sure you are.” His eyes flicker to your lips. You lean in slightly, begging him to kiss you. He listens to you. It’s three seconds long, you wish it lasted forever. Butterflies flew in your stomach, dancing in joy. 
“You have no idea how much I’ve wanted to do that.” He whispers. 
You snicker. “Please, I’ve had feelings for you since I was twelve.” You accidentally confess. 
Coryo’s smirk grows. “Really?” 
Your face drops. “No. I never said that.” 
“Which part? That you have feelings for me, or that you’ve had them since you were twelve?” You cringe. 
“Yes?” 
“Oh well, no going back on it now.”
“I think there is.” 
“I’ve had feelings for you since I was sixteen.” 
You tilt your head to the side in faux surprise. “Only two years!?” You shake your head. “You have some catching up to do.” Coryo laughs, and leans in to kiss you again. You reciprocate immediately. 
You walked back to the penthouses hand in hand, something that Tigris immediately clocked when you stepped into their home. Previously, Coryo waited till you were outside to pick up your hand. She gave you a secretive grin, saying that she needed you to tell her everything, you gave her a nod. 
“Why are you back so late?” Tigris asks you. 
“Dr. Gaul sent us in the Arena tonight, Tigris.” You let go of Coryo’s hand to take off your coat. You look at him in time to see his face fall at the mention of the arena. How could you have forgotten what he had to do there? You silently curse yourself.
Tigris’ face suddenly gets serious.“What?” 
You and Coryo sit across from Tigris. “To get Sejanus out.” 
“What happened, are you guys okay?” 
Coryo replies this time. “I killed one of the tributes. A boy.” You grab his hand again. 
“That must have been awful.” She says, grasping her chest. 
“It was.” He pauses. “Then it felt.. powerful.” You don’t respond, but he sees something shimmer in your eyes. Something that tells him you’re not afraid of him. 
“Coryo,” Tigris starts, he finds the total opposite response in her eyes. “I know you want to be like your Father, but what I remember most about him, was that in his eyes, the only thing there was hate.” She pauses. “You don’t have to pay the same price to survive. You can be good.” Coryo scoffs. “You are good. Believe that, believe me.” 
“I’m going to go back to the Academy.” He stands up, giving you both a kiss on the cheek before leaving. 
“What was that? Holding hands, kissing on the cheek? He doesn’t usually do that.” 
You smile slightly, looking at your lap. “I dunno. Lately things have been different, he’s been holding my hand a lot.. and today he killed that tribute for me.” 
“What?” 
You nod and hold up your bandaged hand. “I think his name was Bobbin? He stabbed my hand when we tried to leave.. Then he was on the ground, and Coryo was over him with a plank of wood. Next thing I know I’m walking out of Dr. Gaul’s office.” You leave out the kiss. The timing wasn't right. 
“Wow. I’m so glad he was there.” Tigris pulls you in for a hug. “I’m even happier you’re okay. I couldn’t stand to lose you.” 
The next morning you were back at the Academy as soon as they let people back into the viewing room. You aren’t allowed to talk to Coryo this time, but he nodded to you when you walked in, and you smiled at him as you sat behind him.
“Wakey, wakey, my Capitol friends! I’m Lucky Flickerman and welcome to day two of The 10th Annual Hunger Games! Now, while most of you were getting your sleep last night, something scintillating happened. Bobbin from District 8, slaughtered. Which one of these beasts killed Bobbin? Well it doesn’t matter. Reaper is still at the top of the boards,” 
As Lucky drones on, a classmate of yours Lyssie, pipes up. “Why aren’t they showing us who killed the little boy? It doesn’t make sense, he was killed right there and there are clearly cameras surrounding him.” You tense up as she wonders aloud. She was Bobbin’s tribute. 
“They said they were old, Lyssie. Probably just another one of Coral’s gang.” Festus replies, shrugging. 
The cameras cut to Lucy Gray and Jessup, still in the same spot they were when you left last night. Jessup gasps, waking up Lucy Gray. He starts frothing at the mouth, and you furrow your brows.
“What did you do to me?” He asks. 
“Nothing!” Lucy Gray yells back. 
“Lyssie, what is he doing?” Coryo demands. 
The girl stares at the screen in confusion. “Something’s wrong. He wouldn’t turn on her like this.” Lucy Gray stands up and starts running, leaving the room she’s in, and the tunnels. 
“Go to the stands.. Go to the stands!” Coryo shouts at the screen. 
“Stop running! What did you..” Jessup groans. “What did you do to me?” Lucy Gray starts to run across the arena. 
“I didn’t do anything!” She reaches a pile of debris and starts climbing one of the collapsed pillars. It flicks to Jessup’s face again, as foam drips out of his mouth, he starts to climb the pillar too. 
“The foam! The posters from the war— Rabies!” You yell, barely being able to construct a sentence. 
“Y/N is right. Send him water.” Coryo tells Lyssie. 
“Wait what?”
“You remember those posters in the war?” She nods. “Rabies makes you afraid of water. Send him a drone.” 
“It’ll scare him!” That was true. Yesterday, the only drone that was sent went haywire, dropping the water on the tribute. 
“Yes, away from her. Jessup is done, Lyssie, you’re the only one who can get it right to him.” She bites her cheek, but looks down at her computer and selects the water. “Thank you.”
“It’s nothing to be proud of.” The drone flies in. 
“What’s wrong with me? What did you do to me?” Jessup gets dangerously close to Lucy Gray, but the drone hits him, breaking the bottle of water, and splashing all over him. He backs up off of the pillar with a scream. Lucy Gray climbs down and leans over him. 
“Jessup? I’m not going anywhere, okay? You watched over me, now I’m going to watch over you. Sleep, Jessup, sleep now.” The boy whimpers.  
Suddenly, Coral’s group enters the middle, slowly walking towards Lucy Gray. They circle her, spouting taunts. 
“Oh look at that, the pack doing what it does best. Packing it in.” Lucky narrates. “Lucy Gray is cornered, Mr. Snow going for his communipad.” You look at Coryo’s screen to see him sending ten waters to Lucy Gray. The drones fly in, hitting the group. A bunch of the waters break, causing dust to stir in the air, and broken glass to be thrown everywhere. Lucy Gray runs over to a fan, maneuvering it open, and then shutting it. 
“These drones aren’t very good.” Coryo says, acting innocent. You grin. 
“Hey! You can’t attack the tributes!” Festus yells.
“I’m just sending water.” 
You look back at the screen. Lucy Gray leaves the air duct, running to the water, and placing down the one she brought with her, dumping out all the rest. She ran back to her hiding place immediately. Coral was killing the girl from District 2, while her group watched. When she was done, she walked over to the water. One of the other Tributes held the last one in his hand, about to take a drink. 
“Hey, do you really think you deserve that water, right now, Tanner?” A sound from across the arena interrupts them. Wovey, another tribute, ran into the tunnels. “This should be fun.” Coral says as she runs after her. The group follows her. 
Once the door to that tunnel shuts, Dill, the youngest tribute in this Game, limps out from behind some debris. 
“Ah, what do we have here? Oh! It’s Ill Dill, tuberculosis on legs.” She goes to the water and takes a sip. A second passes before she starts coughing, a common plague with her. This time, however, she doesn’t stop. She coughs, and coughs, until blood splatters from her mouth, and she falls back onto the ground, dead. You put your hand on your chest, to seem upset. 
Reaper jogs up to her, calling out her name. He leans down over her for a moment, shaking her, crying. When he stands up, he brings her body to the center of the arena, he goes around bringing every body over to the center, piling them. He then gets up and walks over to one of the flags hanging, grabs it, and pulls. It falls down with ease, you weren’t even sure how it managed to stay up throughout the bombing.
 He lays it over the bodies and falls to his knees. “Are you going to punish me now!?” Reaper screams into the sky. “Are you—“ 
“Capitol students,” The screen switches to a different broadcast, revealing Dr. Gaul. “I’m afraid I must interrupt our Games to announce a tragic loss, one that affects us all. Felix Ravinstill, the son of our beloved president, has, this morning, succumbed to his injuries sustained in the rebel bombing. Out there in the districts, they will be celebrating this young boy's death as a triumph. I will not allow my Games to give our enemy such a victory. I swear to you, here and now, before the sun goes down tonight, a rainbow of destruction will engulf our arena. Even if it means there's to be no victor in these Games.” You furrow your brows. Coryo stands up, making eye contact with you before he looks at the Dean. 
“I need to see Dr. Gaul immediately.” He didn’t say anything else before he left the room. You frown before turning back to the screen.
Thirty minutes later, Tigris arrives. Her hair was nicely curled and she wore a pink pantsuit made of dreams. She must have borrowed fabric from her boss, Fabricia.
“You look beautiful!” You say with a grin as you hug your best friend. 
“Oh please, you should look at yourself.” She sits down beside you.
“I don’t hold a candle to you.”
She shakes her head. “Where’s Coryo?” 
“He went to see Dr. Gaul, he’ll be back any minute.” 
“Why’d he go see her?” 
You shrug. “I expect we’ll find out in a few minutes.”
As if on cue, Coryo rushes back in seconds later. “Lucy Gray, is she okay?” 
“She won’t be for long.” Festus replies. 
“Wait, what’s wrong with Treech?”
You look at the screen, Treech suddenly starts coughing, just like Dill did before she died. You didn’t think anything of Dill’s death, but Treech was fine before. When he coughs up blood and falls to the floor, you know what happened. Coriolanus gave Lucy Gray rat poison. That’s why she left a water bottle. She must have put some in the water. Your mind is swirling with potential scenarios, if you’ve already found this out, Dr. Gaul definitely has. 
You hear the wind start blowing, causing you to snap back to reality. Something was being lowered down into the arena, and Lucy Gray was finally out of the air vents. The huge cylinders get set down, and the drones fly off. They start to crack, before both cylinders break, and millions of colorful snakes fall out. You gasp. 
Wovey comes out from her hiding spot, curious as to what everyone was so surprised about. “Is it over now? Can we go home?” The snakes went after her immediately. 
“Wovey!” Reaper cried. “Wovey, no!” The little girl screams as the snakes wrap around her legs and bite down. 
The arena bursts into chaos. Everyone remaining was taken by the snakes, all but Lucy Gray, who sat on the mountain of debris with snakes covering every inch of her body as she sang. They weren’t hostile towards her. 
“It’s over! Dr. Gaul! Dr. Gaul you need to get her out of there!” Coryo screamed at the Gamemaker. 
You stood, going over to Coryo. “Dr. Gaul, let her out, she won, you have to let her out.” 
“It’s over!” The entire room shouts at her. 
“Get her out.” The Gamemaker finally says. 
“Yes!” The room cheers. You jump into Coryo’s arms, hugging him tightly. 
“You did it!” You yell. You pull away and grab his face. “You did it, Coryo! You won!” He laughs. 
“I won!” He places his forehead against yours, before backing up and giving Tigris a hug as well. 
Later that night, you, Coryo, and Tigris opened a bottle of champagne in their living room. 
“To Coriolanus Snow, winner of The 10th Annual Hunger Games!” You toast clinking your glasses together before taking a drink. 
Tigris finishes her glass in one drink. “Okay, as much as I’d love to continue celebrating, I have work tomorrow so we’ll have to celebrate this weekend.” She stands up, kissing you both on the cheek. “Goodnight! Congratulations, Coryo.” 
“Goodnight, T!”
“Goodnight.”
The second she disappeared behind her bedroom door, you set down your glass, then took Coryo’s to set his down as well. 
“What are you doing?” You look at him, and lean in to kiss him. His hands instinctively go to your waist, and yours go to his shoulders. This kiss is longer than your previous ones, you savor each other as you move in sync. 
When you break, giddy grins take over both of your faces. “I wasn’t able to do that before.” You say with a small shrug. 
“Maybe you should do it again, you know, to make up for it.” You roll your eyes but lean in again.
Two hours later, you and Coryo were laying on the couch, silently looking at one another as you traced his features. “You’re so handsome, Coryo.” 
“Thank you.” He cusps your cheek. “I don’t deserve you.” He whispers with a frown. “You’re so good, and I’m so.. awful.” 
“If either of us are awful, it’s me.” 
“You’re not awful.” 
“I am. I didn’t even flinch when you killed that boy in the arena. I was.. happy that you defended me. And that’s only a bit of it.. I am rotten. You and Tigris are so much better than me.” Coryo sits up, causing you to also sit up, basically all the way on his lap.
“Not only did I kill someone, but I felt good while doing it. And I can’t tell myself I wouldn’t do it again. Especially if I’m defending you in the process.” He confesses. 
“I think I’d do the same for you.” You reply. 
You went home a few hours later, completely exhausted. You slept until twelve the next day, when Tigris barges into your room, yelling that Coryo is to be shipped off to District 12 in the morning. Your heart drops.
── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────
Part 2
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coconut-dreamz · 3 months
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cornelia street
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'i'd never walk cornelia street again' | tom blyth x reader
part one
a/n: i wasn't going to post a part two but i always wanted to write a story based of cornelia street and it worked so well !
you blinked a few times at his response. "you couldn't wait until morning?" you answer, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes. he laughs at your comment. "maybe i should've, but i couldn't. i've missed you so much lately. i just had to talk to you." you were silent for a moment, you wondered how you had ended up here. it was just a few years ago when you first met.
we were in the backseat drunk on something stronger than the drinks in the bar "i rent a place on cornelia street" i say casually in the car
you and tom were in a cab headed away from the bar you had just met at. you had previously whispered into his ear between kisses, that you rented a place nearby. you were both more than tipsy and definitely not in the right mindset to be doing this. 
but that didn't matter, you might have been tipsy on the drinks you had, but you were drunk off his kisses. you gave more than the necessary amount of money to the driver as you dragged tom out of the cab and up to your apartment. 
we were a fresh page on the desk filling in the blanks as we go as if the street lights pointed in an arrowhead leading us home
you and tom were walking down the street hand in hand. you'd been seeing each other for a few weeks now. there was no official title on your relationship, you just went on dates and hung out and maybe did things further than kissing sometimes. everything about your relationship was rather spontaneous, but one thing that was constant was that you'd walk home together after every night out. walking hand in hand down cornelia street to your apartment.
and i hope i never lose you, hope it never ends  i'd never walk cornelia street again that's the kind of heartbreak time could never mend i'd never walk cornelia street again
as time went on, tom officially asked you out and you asked him to move into your apartment. things were going amazing, especially since he had just landed the role of coriolanus snow in the newest hunger games movie. you were so proud of him, you always knew that he'd be successful, he was so talented.
as tom began filming for tbosas, a strange feeling filled your stomach. you weren't sure what it was at first, but quickly realized it was jealousy when you saw him and rachel interact over a facetime call one time. you knew that if things ended between you and tom, you  might never recover. 
to you, he was your soulmate, he was the one for you. he was everything. and because of that you knew that if things ever ended, you would never be able to walk cornelia street again. it would remind you too much of tom.
and baby, i get mystified by how this city screams your name and baby, i'm so terrified of if you ever walk away i'd never walk cornelia street again
despite having lived in new york long before you had met tom, the whole city reminded you of him. everywhere you went, you'd be reminded of him. it was both a blessing and a curse for you. he was still gone for filming and you missed him dearly, so it nice to be reminded of him. but every time you thought about how he was filming, you'd be reminded of who he was filming with. rachel. she was so beautiful and so talented, of course tom would rather be with her instead of you. it would be hard to avoid cornelia street if it all were to end. 
back when we were card sharks, playing games i thought you were leading me on i packed my bags, left cornelia street
before you even knew i was gone
you'd had enough of the games you and tom were playing. all the constant fights which led to tom's indifference of your relationship. you were tired of it all. you needed to get away from it, you needed to get away from cornelia street.  you packed up your bags and arranged to stay with a friend, indefinitely. 
too bad tom had caught you as you left, which led to an awkward encounter where you told him you were leaving him and not to contact you for at least 6 weeks. in all honesty, you never expected him to contact you again after that. he seemed so checked out of your relationship lately. 
but then you called, showed your hand i turned around before i hit the tunnel sat on the roof, you and i
"love? you still there? or did you fall asleep?" tom interrupts your reminiscing. "huh? oh yeah, sorry." you answer him,  brought back to reality.  "can i see you soon? i missed you so much. can we just talk about all of this?" he pleads with you. "sure," you almost immediately agree. you'd never thought you'd hear this from him, but it was a welcome surprise. "do you want to get coffee later today? my treat, for waking you up so early. i'm on a short break from filming so i'm back in new york right now." you just hum in response. you can hear a smile in tom's voice as he gives you more details and bids you a goodnight.
you never thought you'd be walking down cornelia street again, but here you were. walking towards the cafe you and tom would always go to, way back when. tom spots you immediately when you walk in. he stands up from his seat and envelopes you in a bear hug. "i've missed you so much." he whispers into the crook of your neck. it takes a moment for you to reciprocate, surprised by the affection and his confession. "i missed you too, tom" you answer him.
you hold my hand on the street walk me back to that apartment years ago, we were just inside barefoot in the kitchen sacred new beginnings that became my religion, listen
after coffee, tom invited you to come over. it felt weird being invited to your own apartment, but you just laughed it off. you had deja vu as you walked down the street with him, hand in hand. as you looked up to the window of your apartment, you remember how you would dance around in the living room together. you remember all of your firsts together in that apartment. 
as you entered your old apartment, it looked just how you'd left it. "i couldn't bear the thought of moving anything around. i knew you'd come back so i kept it just how you like it," tom explains when he sees the look on your face. you just smile at this. "i was hoping you would."
"i rent a place on cornelia street" i say casually in the car
it had been a few weeks since you and tom started talking again. you both came to an agreement that since it was your apartment and he was still filming for the new season of billy the kid, you'd move back in and he could stay with a friend instead. you both knew it was too soon to move back in together. your relationship needed a lot of mending to be done to get to that.
tom was back once again for a short break from filming and you'd gone out to a bar with some friends. in similar fashion to when you first met, you whispered into his ear "i rent a place on cornelia street" in between kisses in a darkened hallway. he just gives you a knowing smile as you led him out the bar and hail a cab. it seemed you both would continue to walk cornelia street again.
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thestarlightforge · 6 months
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TBOSAS Meta
This started as a couple-paragraphs-long Everlark & Coryo x Lucy Gray rant. It turned into an essay on the politics of systemic oppression and how we illustrate it in fiction, with The Hunger Games and Ballad as case studies. Regardless, I hope others enjoy, lol. This is where my brain lives, now, as I expect it will the rest of 2023. Cheers!
***
It’s been interesting, the last few days, some of the discourse that’s popped up around TBOSAS. FASCINATING political discussions, as I’ve come to expect for a Suzanne Collins release. (#1 in my heart.)
Personally, I always separate books vs. movie canon with her franchise. With the OG Hunger Games, sometimes I felt the films were better—like she got another pass at it and REALLY took advantage, and utilized the hell out of taking it out of Katniss’s first-person POV to develop other characters and the world (still without detracting from her narrative)—while for some details, I preferred the books.
With TBOSAS, though, the book and movie feel almost entirely different to me.
There are MANY shared elements, of course, and I feel either version gels quite nicely with the OG franchise. It’s not even that there’s that many continuity differences—some things cut or altered for time, sure, but the bones of the plot are the same. Both illustrate astute political commentary, Coriolanus’s descent into madness, Tigris’s shift in position on him (foreshadowing her full turn by Mockingjay), and Lucy Gray’s role in his life in both his initial downfall and his defeat by Katniss. The actors and creative team all did BEAUTIFUL work bringing it to life, and I honestly love both versions.
But fans who mainly like the book may be frustrated by the sympathy Coryo garners in the film.
Normally, I’d say this is because the book reveals more internal monologue—and it does. But honestly, one of the things I was most impressed by in this film was how legible the actors’ internal monologues were. It was clear, the amount of work they all did to that end. So I don’t know that it is just more. I think it’s also different.
Book Coriolanus devolves much earlier and more obviously. He starts from the same pressed circumstances and has moments of goodness, but he becomes the villain we know him eventually to be pretty damn fast.
Film-Coriolanus has a much slower descent. Ironic, honestly, given the film has far less time than the book does.
I think as a result of this, I’ve seen discourse comparing beats in his relationship with Lucy Gray to Katniss and Peeta. For example, that beautifully shot/choreographed/performed scene in TBOSAS with him and Lucy Gray on either side of the fence after the bombings that night, where they almost kiss and he asks her, “Is this real? If I’m going to risk everything?” being compared to Peeta’s long game of “real or not real” throughout Mockingjay. Everlark folks (rightfully) pointing out that for Peeta, the refrain is about shared trauma, especially between him and Katniss, and both of them grounding their relationship in mutual trust—while asserting that for Coryo, the same refrain comes from a place of selfishness.
I get where this opinion comes from: President Snow is probably one of the most violent, sadistic, genocidal dictators in modern popular fiction. His relationship with Lucy Gray started as transactional—even more acutely in the book. Nearly everything Book-Coryo does is for his or his family’s personal gain.
But to me, half the beauty and tragedy of the film is this delicious possibility—the hope—they showed us.
THG has always had a strong anti-war philosophy in general, with through-line commentary on showmanship, propaganda, surveillance and performance: The recurrent themes of cameras always bring on them, the arenas and entirety of Panem being a stage/game—and how those things impact authentic human relationships. Everlark hit for so many because of the ways authenticity bloomed out of that hellish, contrived pit. Coriolanus and Lucy Gray’s relationship started out similarly contrived: Thrown together by the politics of the Academy, the uprising, the districts, the Capitol and the Games—helping one another survive. Largely unlike Katniss and Peeta, they both played the game intentionally, to varying degrees. (Personality wise, these four really have almost nothing in common, lol.) Lucy Gray is a good person, both in the end and from her start (unlike the terrorist Coriolanus becomes). But she is a performer. He’s right about that.
So honestly, I don’t see much purpose in reading Peeta’s question as valid while Coryo’s wasn’t. I think that judgment is colored by dramatic irony—us knowing who they each become. But in theatre, we talk about living honestly in imagined circumstances. It’s used in a lot of acting techniques, but particularly for people playing villains. To stay grounded in the truth of it, you have to believe honestly in the imagined moment, not the gestalt; Leslie Odom Jr. was a great Aaron Burr because every performance, he believed in the whole journey, from hope to ruin. Tom Blythe was a great Coryo because he invested in the earnest reality of Snow as a young man, not the devil we know he becomes. And at that point in the story, at the cages that night with Lucy Gray, Coriolanus was honestly grounded in similar struggles as our OG heroes: Trying to provide for and protect his starving family. His family (and the Capitol at large) reeks of privilege, and his prejudices were obviously flawed. But in his developing love for her, he was steeped in starvation, the same political forces as lashed all citizens of Panem, and was clawing his way from beneath just as much Capitol propaganda as people from the Districts—perhaps even more so, given his Grandma’am and how his father died. Because of their given circumstances, politics bled into everything—but eventually, so did feeling, and they had several moments of genuine bonding, trust and connection which the actors invested in beyond their political need for each other. There’s a constant push and pull: Holding hands at the zoo for the cameras was political; her reaching for his hand in the arena visit was less so. The first “Stop treating me like I’ve already lost” in front of everyone was wit-soaked survival, while “Please don’t let me die in that arena tomorrow,” near-whispered and with hands held between them where the camera would struggle to see, bled into real vulnerability. Saving him from the other tributes in the cage-ride to the zoo was about survival; risking her life to go back for him when the arena was bombed was at least a mix. Her motivations for singing in her interview are complex—perhaps guilt that a “rebel” attack nearly killed Coriolanus, his advice she’d get the most money that way—but I feel strongly that a non-zero amount of her was motivated by wanting to demonstrate that she trusts him, which for her is even higher-prized than love. And I also feel that, after the hospital and her “final performance”—leading up to their near-kiss at the zoo—Coriolanus scoped out the arena (and ultimately took all those risks to help her cheat the Games) both because he wanted the Plinth prize, in theory, and because he increasingly desperately wanted her to live.
The waters between them were thoroughly, legitimately muddied—which I believe was intentional, that constant tension between authenticity and politics. And as much as he was falling for her, Coriolanus saw that Lucy Gray was just as clever and good at crowd-work as he was—maybe better.
So to circle all the way back to this Everlark comparison: Given the absurdly multilayered situation, is it really that selfish or unreasonable he would check in with her during that moment through the fence? That this child—wrapped in oppressive patriarchy, violence, starvation and propaganda—would ask for reassurance before he was willing to be vulnerable, or to potentially risk his family’s lives?
Some artists are hesitant to engage with the humanity of “villains,” their origins, because they feel humanizing them excuses them. In real life, I get this: Second chances aren’t always the answer, and people need to be held accountable. But isn’t it more powerful storytelling to demonstrate the corrosive nature of all systems of oppression in our fiction, to show how they can corrupt even those who try, than to condemn people before they’ve even had a chance? Isn’t the beauty of Lucy Gray’s whole thing that everyone starts out good, and it’s our job to choose to stay on the right side of that line?
And when President Coriolanus Snow finally chokes on his last rose, wouldn’t it be a more satisfying victory if we imagined him as a real-feeling person—full owner of sixty years of horrifying choices—rather than a cartoonishly evil cardboard cutout?
Book-Coryo has a more obviously manipulative/evil streak, much earlier on. To make it plain: He’s an ass, and his “love” for her reads more like obsession. But my favorite aspect of the film (and I feel one of the most compelling) was how it illustrated that these systems of oppression can make tragedies of almost anyone: All but those at the very, very top. Suzanne’s anti-capitalist politicking—how classism turns everyone below the 1% against each other, where the “upper middle class” (doctors/lawyers/actors) is vilified to the poor as a red herring while a handful of robber-baron CEOs amass almost all wealth on the planet—strikes again. She, Francis Lawrence, the film’s creative team and these actors came together to put tragically human faces on that struggle—how hard it is to stay a good person amidst intense, violent, systemic oppression.
But none of that sings quite as true if you go into it having decided that Coriolanus was evil in his bones. The stakes are so much higher, richer, otherwise. If his love—for Tigris, for his family, for Sejanus, and yes, for Lucy Gray—was, or became, authentic.
It’s not a descent into madness if he’s already mad. Or, as he put it in the original Hunger Games film: “Hope. It is the only thing stronger than fear.”
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itsshizyne · 6 months
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My thoughts on The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes as a book reader:
• The movie was honestly really good, I enjoyed the fact that we could see most things from Snow’s perspective. Especially the final dialogue exchange between Snow & Lucy, I feel like it was perfect for their last words before Snow turned on her.
• The costume design was AMAZING!! Especially the chosen design for Dr Gail’s outfits. I could talk about those red and white garments FOR HOURSSSS!!!
• MY BABY BOY SEJANUS!!! I literally gripped my seat during THAT scene, it broke me, and it made my heart ache when it was clear that snow deeply regretted the decision to report back to Dr Gaul.
• I really wish they added more about Tigris’ character, such as the things she had to resort to in order to help her family survive the war. I just feel like we did not get to see the true extent of the relationship between Coriolanus and Tigris, I know it’s only a film with limited time, but I just wished they could’ve added it in.
• I also wish we learnt more about the Covey just like we did in the books, such as Maude Ivory, Goatman ect…but I absolutely LOVED the Covey.
• Tigris saying “You look just like your father.” Made my blood run cold, I feel like it ultimately represented the final transition to the ‘President Snow’ we come to see in the main Hunger Games Series.
• Also I wish that we had the exchange between Strabo Plinth and Snow, alongside more of a relationship between Sejanus and Coriolanus such as the small gestures (for example Sejanus and his cookies that his Ma often made and gifted Snow.) I feel like it would’ve added more to the deep betrayal that we get in the books.
I could say so much more but it would go on for hours so I’m going to stop here :)
Overall, the movie was great. It was definitely worth the wait, and I will be making it my personality for the next couple of weeks!!!
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tea-space · 6 months
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THE HUNGER GAMES THE BALLAD OF SONGBIRDS AND SNAKES MOVIE SPOILERS
So I watched the TBOSAS movie today & I have thoughts. It is good as its own thing I think they did a great job to put the most important things into this one movie. Since they couldn't squeeze everything in the movie it took some liberties to cut off & change moments around a bit.
I think the changes they made to how the 10th hunger games play out was a great change. And I loved that they kept the violence.
The movie didn't show any of Coriolanus inner monologues which is a shame it's my favorite part of the book but having the audience come out and interpret how Coryo feels themselves isn't so bad either since Tom Blyth's portrayal as Coriolanus snow was magnificent.
The movie focused more on Coriolanus relationship with the prominent characters & sadly cut a lot of interactions with his other classmates. Especially Clemensia we don't hear or see her again after she gets the snake bite or even if she's still alive.
The chemistry between Tom Blyth & Rachel Zelger was amazing it really shines through to their character's relationship. Regarding the snowbaird relationship they added a new moment that wasn't in the book replacing a scene in the book. We got only one kiss from them in the movie contrary to the many kisses in the book.
The last part in the forest cabin between Coriolanus & Lucy Gray felt really tense like they were about to kill each other right there & then I loved it. Tom Blyth's performance really shined through this part, the hurt & betrayal he felt after he got bit made him look scary.
The fate of Lucy Gray was left as ambiguous as it was in the book. But we clearly get to see Coriolanus shoot her down but nothing more other than the birds singing the hanging tree which paranoid him. I wished they addressed the part where they erased the records of the 10th hunger games but it wasn't mentioned.
The ending showing Coriolanus full transformation to a villain was chilling I can really feel he carried a different vibe then what he was like in the beginning of the movie.
Overall a great film to show the beginning of the hunger games & how it developed to what we know it as down the line. A villain origin story showcasing how Coriolanus experiences shape him & how he rose to power. Like Coriolanus said snow lands on top.
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thief-of-eggs · 5 months
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As much as I do adore Tom Blyth as Coriolanus, I’ll still never forgive them picking someone so goddamn tall to play the roll.
I will always mourn the loss of short and skinny Coriolanus. Especially in comparison to Sejanus, who isn’t just stronger than him- he’s meant to be clearly well fed and taken care of. Sejanus’s growth wasn’t stunted, and god damn I wish he was taller than Coryo in the movie.
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