“ oh — ! ” an immediate exclamation escaped her as she realized how her words must have come off. of course, athena wouldn’t know the conversations behind closed doors. the ethics of an already unconventional relationship, changed by two lovers in the early morning sun and tangled sheets of her bedroom.
it was a rare thing, finnick waking up before annie, but this was a rare exception to the confines of a partnership. he’d kissed her head as she woke, served as a place to curl into while she came to, just as she so often did for him. once awake, though, he’d breached the subject of her feeing unsatisfied. when she denied it, it was him feeling it was unfair. him being gone for months at a time several times a year, made to fall over countless others on public television, putting on a show so convincing that even annie sometimes huffed in irrational jealousy. and he was right, it probably wasn’t fair, and she was a creature capable of constant and unwavering love. no one was in denial of that.
the answer after hours of talking, him promising it was what he wanted, her repeating that she would never love someone the way she did him, that they settled. “ finn knows, not in a weird fetish way, and not that i would come to you, ” she paused, deciding to choose her words carefully. “ nothing has to come of this, if that’s not what you want, but believe me that no one is going behind backs or betraying each other. he wants me to love somebody, because i have so much love to give, and because our situation is… a bit unorthodox, to put it lightly. ”
“ wait, ” she said as a ghost of a smile appeared on her lips as if she’d unearthed some great ancient secret, “ did you say your feelings for me ? ”
“ You guys talked about this already?” she questioned though it was hard to meet Annie’s gaze. Suddenly it was much easier to stare at her glass or the pattern of the carpet. Anything to not feel quite so seen or exposed. Never had they addressed the old romantic feelings they had once harbored for each other or at least what Athena had thought were Annie’s old feelings.
It wasn’t a surprise that Finnick hadn’t mentioned this to her. She wasn’t always privy to what was going on with the couple even if there were few secrets that they didn’t share with each other. Maybe Finnick hadn’t said anything because he hadn’t felt like it was his place to tell her about Annie’s possible other relationships.
“ But you didn’t tell him that you had feelings for me?” Would that change how he felt about the situation knowing it was her? Or why hadn’t Annie told him that she was the other person whom she had feelings for. A million questions were already racing through her head but they were momentarily halted as Annie asked her about the way she felt. “ Well yeah,” Athena replied bashfully.
She had always felt like it had been painfully obvious. “ I’ve felt this way since we’ve met but the situation wasn’t exactly ideal.”
