your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine.
your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine. the hunger games/gossip girl. 1900 words. pg13. Dan Humphrey wins the 17th Annual Hunger Games when he's 17 years old.
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Dan Humphrey wins the 70th Annual Hunger Games when he’s 17 years old.
In his exit interview with Caesar Flickerman, he is all humility and self-deprecating jokes and unassuming gestures. Serena van der Woodsen watches it all from the decadence of the Waldorf’s penthouse apartment.
The Waldorf’s Hunger Games parties are the most important social events of the season - anyone who’s anyone goes and places bets on how far which contestants will go, who will be the underdog, who will make alliances.
Serena is lounging in her new 24 karat gold dress, awfully heavy to be walking around in, and Blair is poised to her right. Chuck brought the newest Mood, something he claims is like Bliss meets Ecstasy meets Orgasm, so Nate places it on his tongue and sprawls out on the couch.
Her face is pressed into Nate’s broad chest, his hand running absentmindedly through her hair.
“So Dan,” Caesar Flickerman enthuses, “what are you going to do with the rest of your life?”
His lips and hair are a violent shade of orange. Serena remembers abstractly that she has a gorgeous pair of heels in the same exact color.
Dan is kind of skinny, lean at most, with brown hair and a square jawline. Strange choice for a Career, that’s for sure. Serena appreciates the line of his shoulder on TV. He’s no Finnick Odair, but there’s something there that makes it impossible for her to look away.
“Well, Caesar, I’m just going to live it. If that’s okay with you.”
All of a sudden the awkward gestures don’t hold quite as true. Not fake - but there is certainly something else hidden underneath it all. Serena understands why he won. Caesar Flickerman stares, shocked, and Dan Humphrey sits tall and proud and made of steel.
“I’m glad he won,” Serena murmurs into Nate’s ear later in his room. Nate is so far into his Mood that he can only nod, fingers skimming over Serena’s skin and a delighted grin on his face.
“I’m glad you’re glad,” he half-slurs when he pulls her in for a kiss. Serena settles into it, knees straddling Nate and her impossibly heavy dress on the floor.
Dan Humphrey stays somewhere in her heart though - settled low and warm and Serena wonders where someone can get that kind of strength.
-
Carter opens the door to his bedroom one night to find Finnick Odair lounging on his bed, Carter’s favorite throw pillow strategically covering the only parts worth seeing.
“Hello, beautiful.”
Finnick smiles a smile that almost doesn’t seem real - it’s straight white teeth and tanned skin and pink gums. Carter’s eyes roam greedily up and down, his hands reaching out but Finnick is just out of his grasp.
“Carter,” Finnick purrs, “I have only one rule.”
Carter’s entranced, an erection rapidly straining against his pants so hard it hurts and he’d probably do anything Finnick asked right now.
“Tell me a secret.”
“I love them all,” he says. It hangs in the air for a minute and settles in between the two of them on the bed. Finnick’s hand trails down Carter’s stomach and he closes his eyes.
“Hmmhmm,” Finnick murmurs into Carter’s ear and raises his eyebrow. “Feel free to continue, gorgeous.”
"Serena van der Woodsen and Chuck Bass and Nate Archibald and Blair Waldorf. The whole merry group."
Finnick's hand moves up and down with a gracefulness that's almost unbearable. The nails on his other hand drag across Carter's skin, never stopping always teasing and Carter needs release now.
Fuck, Carter shudders into the small space of Finnick’s collarbone. He tastes like salt, mostly. Fuck, Carter says again and Finnick doesn’t say anything at all.
After, when the room is still dark and dirty and smells of sex, Finnick turns the light on first. Carter meets his gaze once and almost stops breathing; his eyes are a light bluegreen that looks like the sea, but all Carter can see is Nate Archibald.
“I’m sorry, man,” Carter chokes out when Finnick’s buttoning up a shirt. He’s not as big in person.
-
There’s a sparkle to Serena’s skin all the time. It’s sexy and subtle and so frustratingly natural. Blair would know; she spends more time staring at Serena than anyone else.
It’s summer in the Capitol - which means less clothes and newer treatments. Serena’s hair is especially gold today, down to her waist and tangled in knots. Blair’s own hair lies flat only slightly past her shoulders. It’s a dark blue, navy really. It matches Serena’s eyes, Blair thought when the job was done.
“What’d you put in your hair again?”
This is a game Blair plays again and again.
“You know I don’t use anything in my hair or skin,” Serena half-laughs into the sticky, humid air around them.
“Oh yeah. Sorry, I forgot.”
Her voice is flat and hard but Serena doesn’t notice. Blair holds a hand next to Serena’s, watches as the light dances across Serena’s perfect tanned skin. The sun only glares angrily off of the ruby Eleanor got implanted in Blair’s pinky for her thirteenth birthday. Blair sighs and sinks back into her pillows, fingering the ends of her hair.
The truth is that Lilly had it done when Serena was an infant - some sort of glittery infusion that was brand new and only available to a select few. Serena’s never been told this, and the treatment’s not an option anymore.
-
On the very first day that purple becomes available, Chuck goes into the most expensive surgery center and gets his skin tinted lavender. It is distinctly feminine, and the lady who’s performing it raises a non-existent eyebrow.
“I’m Chuck Bass,” he purrs. “I’ll look better purple than most people do normally.”
The procedure is long but Chuck makes sure he has more than enough drugs for the whole ordeal to be pain-free.
Bart doesn’t look up from his desk, and it is two days later when he squints hard at Chuck and sighs, “Purple, Charles?” with a disappointing nod.
Chuck holds his head high but his jaw wavers, just for a second, just enough to matter. Bart doesn’t say anything and Chuck’s words get stuck in his throat somewhere - a jumbled mess that might be lookatmelovemeImissmomImissyou if he lets them.
He doesn’t.
-
“Well done, Humphrey. Can’t say I thought you had it in you.”
This is after - after Dan killed five people (the boy from 3 and the girl from 7 and the boy and girl from 10 and the boy from 12). This is after he survived.
Johanna Mason is a fierce thing up close. She talks close to you - too close for comfort and Dan thinks her cheekbones could slice him from this angle. She smiles a smile filled with things Dan understands now. They’re at a dinner in the Capitol, and he can’t bring himself to eat anything.
“Jo Mason. It’s nice to meet you.”
There are adoring Capitol fans waiting to meet him, and he doesn’t want to spend too much time with her. He has Jenny and Dad and Vanessa waiting back in Two, and he’s heard stories just like everyone else.
Johanna cocks her head and her smile turns into a feral grin that gives him the shivers.
“Don’t ever call me Jo, Humphrey.”
She snags the drink out of his hand and finishes it with a graceful flick of her wrist, wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and walks away without looking back. Finnick Odair watches her carefully from across the room.
Dan turns away from both of them.
“I’m Serena van der Woodsen,” a beautiful girl says in front of him. She is Capitol, clearly, but minimally so. It makes it easier to look at her.
“Dan Humphrey,” he offers.
She smiles brightly and leans in close, whispers, “I already knew that.”
-
Blair’s eyes change colors every day. It was something she picked up when she was little, and she likes it so much she keeps adding extra colors to the catalog.
Today, they are violet and Chuck Bass can’t stop looking at her.
-
Dan starts dating Serena. He gets a warning from Finnick and a slap in the face from Johanna. Haymitch sighs and takes another swig from his bottle.
“You should stop this. You should stop this now.”
Dan is sitting on the couch, Haymitch to his left and his hand on his shoulder.
“It’s for her own good,” Finnick empathizes. Dan remembers the look on Finn’s face when Annie was called - it was all terror and anger and love and despair.
-
Daniel, the note reads, It has come to my attention that you’ve captured the heart of Serena van der Woodsen. As you’re probably aware, she is from one of the Capitol’s most prominent families. Because of her high social status, it’s incredibly important that you keep her happy. Due to such, you will be exempt from other Victor responsibilities. Hope all is well with you and your family. Jenny is in her last of the reaping, if I’m correct. May the odds be ever in her favor. President Snow.
Dan burns the note, grabs Johanna’s bottle of white liquor and dumps it all over the clean white paper.
Finn hands him a lighter and Dan’s hands shake as he drops it into the garbage can.
Johanna hits him on the back of the head and grumbles, “You owe me a bottle of something better, fuck face. Make it whiskey and I’ll consider forgiving you.”
Haymitch laughs and offers to share his. Finnick takes a swig before passing it around and Dan realizes when the liquor burns the back of his throat that this is some kind of family.
-
Two days later, Dan takes Serena out on a date at the most public restaurant in the Capital. President Snow sends him a message the next afternoon about how lovely of a couple they are.
Jenny sits at home, in Two, and does not get reaped.
-
The part he doesn’t count on?
Somehow, he actually falls in love with her, despite her selfishness and naivety and the fact that she doesn’t know what it feels like to kill someone else.
It’s half-miracle, half-curse. Dan doesn’t mind. Everything these days is.
-
“Dan,” she murmurs, brow furrowed in confusion and lips pursed, “aren’t you happy here?”
Right before that, high in the sky of the Capitol in her bedroom, he said I’m leaving when he wanted to say I’m going to make a difference.
And she is from here, Capitol through and through in all the ways that count. Serena, he wants to say, Serena you don’t know anything. But he swallows the words and kisses her softly instead, his hand on her back as she smiles into it.
He calls Johanna when Serena leaves, murmurs I’ll help from the inside, here soft and quick in case anyone is listening.
Johanna laughs without mirth, says, “Hope she’s worth it.”
“Shouldn’t you be staring at Finnick longingly somewhere?”
“Fuck off, Humphrey. Go to hell.”
-
Katniss Everdeen sets the Capitol on fire.
Dan arranged a meeting in President Snow’s house the same day - something routine and unsuspicious. They catch on to him before he can pull his gun out.
His death is short and relatively painless; Snow steps over his body without looking down once.
Serena disappears in the chaos and Jo finds Dan's body in the aftermath.
This is what war is, she knows, but she vomits on the carpet violently as soon as she sees it's him.
This is what war is, she reminds herself. This is what war is.
-
-
Dan Humphrey wins the 70th Annual Hunger Games when he’s 17 years old.
In his exit interview with Caesar Flickerman, he is all humility and self-deprecating jokes and unassuming gestures. Serena van der Woodsen watches it all from the decadence of the Waldorf’s penthouse apartment.
The Waldorf’s Hunger Games parties are the most important social events of the season - anyone who’s anyone goes and places bets on how far which contestants will go, who will be the underdog, who will make alliances.
Serena is lounging in her new 24 karat gold dress, awfully heavy to be walking around in, and Blair is poised to her right. Chuck brought the newest Mood, something he claims is like Bliss meets Ecstasy meets Orgasm, so Nate places it on his tongue and sprawls out on the couch.
Her face is pressed into Nate’s broad chest, his hand running absentmindedly through her hair.
“So Dan,” Caesar Flickerman enthuses, “what are you going to do with the rest of your life?”
His lips and hair are a violent shade of orange. Serena remembers abstractly that she has a gorgeous pair of heels in the same exact color.
Dan is kind of skinny, lean at most, with brown hair and a square jawline. Strange choice for a Career, that’s for sure. Serena appreciates the line of his shoulder on TV. He’s no Finnick Odair, but there’s something there that makes it impossible for her to look away.
“Well, Caesar, I’m just going to live it. If that’s okay with you.”
All of a sudden the awkward gestures don’t hold quite as true. Not fake - but there is certainly something else hidden underneath it all. Serena understands why he won. Caesar Flickerman stares, shocked, and Dan Humphrey sits tall and proud and made of steel.
“I’m glad he won,” Serena murmurs into Nate’s ear later in his room. Nate is so far into his Mood that he can only nod, fingers skimming over Serena’s skin and a delighted grin on his face.
“I’m glad you’re glad,” he half-slurs when he pulls her in for a kiss. Serena settles into it, knees straddling Nate and her impossibly heavy dress on the floor.
Dan Humphrey stays somewhere in her heart though - settled low and warm and Serena wonders where someone can get that kind of strength.
-
Carter opens the door to his bedroom one night to find Finnick Odair lounging on his bed, Carter’s favorite throw pillow strategically covering the only parts worth seeing.
“Hello, beautiful.”
Finnick smiles a smile that almost doesn’t seem real - it’s straight white teeth and tanned skin and pink gums. Carter’s eyes roam greedily up and down, his hands reaching out but Finnick is just out of his grasp.
“Carter,” Finnick purrs, “I have only one rule.”
Carter’s entranced, an erection rapidly straining against his pants so hard it hurts and he’d probably do anything Finnick asked right now.
“Tell me a secret.”
“I love them all,” he says. It hangs in the air for a minute and settles in between the two of them on the bed. Finnick’s hand trails down Carter’s stomach and he closes his eyes.
“Hmmhmm,” Finnick murmurs into Carter’s ear and raises his eyebrow. “Feel free to continue, gorgeous.”
"Serena van der Woodsen and Chuck Bass and Nate Archibald and Blair Waldorf. The whole merry group."
Finnick's hand moves up and down with a gracefulness that's almost unbearable. The nails on his other hand drag across Carter's skin, never stopping always teasing and Carter needs release now.
Fuck, Carter shudders into the small space of Finnick’s collarbone. He tastes like salt, mostly. Fuck, Carter says again and Finnick doesn’t say anything at all.
After, when the room is still dark and dirty and smells of sex, Finnick turns the light on first. Carter meets his gaze once and almost stops breathing; his eyes are a light bluegreen that looks like the sea, but all Carter can see is Nate Archibald.
“I’m sorry, man,” Carter chokes out when Finnick’s buttoning up a shirt. He’s not as big in person.
-
There’s a sparkle to Serena’s skin all the time. It’s sexy and subtle and so frustratingly natural. Blair would know; she spends more time staring at Serena than anyone else.
It’s summer in the Capitol - which means less clothes and newer treatments. Serena’s hair is especially gold today, down to her waist and tangled in knots. Blair’s own hair lies flat only slightly past her shoulders. It’s a dark blue, navy really. It matches Serena’s eyes, Blair thought when the job was done.
“What’d you put in your hair again?”
This is a game Blair plays again and again.
“You know I don’t use anything in my hair or skin,” Serena half-laughs into the sticky, humid air around them.
“Oh yeah. Sorry, I forgot.”
Her voice is flat and hard but Serena doesn’t notice. Blair holds a hand next to Serena’s, watches as the light dances across Serena’s perfect tanned skin. The sun only glares angrily off of the ruby Eleanor got implanted in Blair’s pinky for her thirteenth birthday. Blair sighs and sinks back into her pillows, fingering the ends of her hair.
The truth is that Lilly had it done when Serena was an infant - some sort of glittery infusion that was brand new and only available to a select few. Serena’s never been told this, and the treatment’s not an option anymore.
-
On the very first day that purple becomes available, Chuck goes into the most expensive surgery center and gets his skin tinted lavender. It is distinctly feminine, and the lady who’s performing it raises a non-existent eyebrow.
“I’m Chuck Bass,” he purrs. “I’ll look better purple than most people do normally.”
The procedure is long but Chuck makes sure he has more than enough drugs for the whole ordeal to be pain-free.
Bart doesn’t look up from his desk, and it is two days later when he squints hard at Chuck and sighs, “Purple, Charles?” with a disappointing nod.
Chuck holds his head high but his jaw wavers, just for a second, just enough to matter. Bart doesn’t say anything and Chuck’s words get stuck in his throat somewhere - a jumbled mess that might be lookatmelovemeImissmomImissyou if he lets them.
He doesn’t.
-
“Well done, Humphrey. Can’t say I thought you had it in you.”
This is after - after Dan killed five people (the boy from 3 and the girl from 7 and the boy and girl from 10 and the boy from 12). This is after he survived.
Johanna Mason is a fierce thing up close. She talks close to you - too close for comfort and Dan thinks her cheekbones could slice him from this angle. She smiles a smile filled with things Dan understands now. They’re at a dinner in the Capitol, and he can’t bring himself to eat anything.
“Jo Mason. It’s nice to meet you.”
There are adoring Capitol fans waiting to meet him, and he doesn’t want to spend too much time with her. He has Jenny and Dad and Vanessa waiting back in Two, and he’s heard stories just like everyone else.
Johanna cocks her head and her smile turns into a feral grin that gives him the shivers.
“Don’t ever call me Jo, Humphrey.”
She snags the drink out of his hand and finishes it with a graceful flick of her wrist, wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and walks away without looking back. Finnick Odair watches her carefully from across the room.
Dan turns away from both of them.
“I’m Serena van der Woodsen,” a beautiful girl says in front of him. She is Capitol, clearly, but minimally so. It makes it easier to look at her.
“Dan Humphrey,” he offers.
She smiles brightly and leans in close, whispers, “I already knew that.”
-
Blair’s eyes change colors every day. It was something she picked up when she was little, and she likes it so much she keeps adding extra colors to the catalog.
Today, they are violet and Chuck Bass can’t stop looking at her.
-
Dan starts dating Serena. He gets a warning from Finnick and a slap in the face from Johanna. Haymitch sighs and takes another swig from his bottle.
“You should stop this. You should stop this now.”
Dan is sitting on the couch, Haymitch to his left and his hand on his shoulder.
“It’s for her own good,” Finnick empathizes. Dan remembers the look on Finn’s face when Annie was called - it was all terror and anger and love and despair.
-
Daniel, the note reads, It has come to my attention that you’ve captured the heart of Serena van der Woodsen. As you’re probably aware, she is from one of the Capitol’s most prominent families. Because of her high social status, it’s incredibly important that you keep her happy. Due to such, you will be exempt from other Victor responsibilities. Hope all is well with you and your family. Jenny is in her last of the reaping, if I’m correct. May the odds be ever in her favor. President Snow.
Dan burns the note, grabs Johanna’s bottle of white liquor and dumps it all over the clean white paper.
Finn hands him a lighter and Dan’s hands shake as he drops it into the garbage can.
Johanna hits him on the back of the head and grumbles, “You owe me a bottle of something better, fuck face. Make it whiskey and I’ll consider forgiving you.”
Haymitch laughs and offers to share his. Finnick takes a swig before passing it around and Dan realizes when the liquor burns the back of his throat that this is some kind of family.
-
Two days later, Dan takes Serena out on a date at the most public restaurant in the Capital. President Snow sends him a message the next afternoon about how lovely of a couple they are.
Jenny sits at home, in Two, and does not get reaped.
-
The part he doesn’t count on?
Somehow, he actually falls in love with her, despite her selfishness and naivety and the fact that she doesn’t know what it feels like to kill someone else.
It’s half-miracle, half-curse. Dan doesn’t mind. Everything these days is.
-
“Dan,” she murmurs, brow furrowed in confusion and lips pursed, “aren’t you happy here?”
Right before that, high in the sky of the Capitol in her bedroom, he said I’m leaving when he wanted to say I’m going to make a difference.
And she is from here, Capitol through and through in all the ways that count. Serena, he wants to say, Serena you don’t know anything. But he swallows the words and kisses her softly instead, his hand on her back as she smiles into it.
He calls Johanna when Serena leaves, murmurs I’ll help from the inside, here soft and quick in case anyone is listening.
Johanna laughs without mirth, says, “Hope she’s worth it.”
“Shouldn’t you be staring at Finnick longingly somewhere?”
“Fuck off, Humphrey. Go to hell.”
-
Katniss Everdeen sets the Capitol on fire.
Dan arranged a meeting in President Snow’s house the same day - something routine and unsuspicious. They catch on to him before he can pull his gun out.
His death is short and relatively painless; Snow steps over his body without looking down once.
Serena disappears in the chaos and Jo finds Dan's body in the aftermath.
This is what war is, she knows, but she vomits on the carpet violently as soon as she sees it's him.
This is what war is, she reminds herself. This is what war is.
-