This was originally posted in a Ballad of a Drunk & His Lady. I had planned for it to be a two shot and hence posted it there but as I was writing it, it grew into a multi-chapter fic, so here we are! There will be 5 parts, at most.

Part 1

Haymitch Abernathy lay slumped on the sofa, his breaths coming out in puffs of smoke. The air was chill and it made him shiver, but when he felt the cold icy dread passed through him, he jerked awake.

His eyes landed on the figure standing next to him on the sofa. He wasn't surprised with the sudden cold now that he had seen her there. "What?" he grumbled.

The woman was pale but her blue eyes shone like bright stars on the night sky in this dim house.

"You're drunk again," she huffed.

"What an astute observation, sweetheart."

"Haymitch," she sighed, "you've been back here for three months now. You've not done much except to get drunk. You haven't even unpacked your things that you brought back from the Capitol!"

He had been back for nearly three years but he supposed, time move differently when one is in a different plane.

"Go away," he muttered. "You're a nuisance."

Effie glared at his dismissal but left the room. She knew it was fruitless to argue with him sometimes.

Haymitch did not see her again until that afternoon when she glided into the room. Effie glance around and then fixed him with a stare.

"Look at the mess you've made of this house! Would it cause you great physical pain to clean up once in a while? I think not. Now, I can't have our house looking like a pig sty – please, clean your mess."

"My house," he replied without much thought.

They have had this argument countless times and no matter how many times he tried to tell her that this was his house, she didn't seem to get the message.

"Technicalities really," she waved her hand as if it was a mere pesky problem. "It's really our house – I stay here, too, don't I?" she laughed then and added, "I still wonder what made me move in with you - especially when I know just how messy you'd be."

"I've been wondering the same thing. I sure as hell didn't invite you here," he shrugged.

"I'm sure you did or I wouldn't have moved in. That would be bad manners."

He gave her the side-eye. He had not invited her to move in. He had woken up one day to see her standing at the foot of his bed and his heart had nearly gave out especially since he had attended her –

"Please pick up your shirt," she ordered.

Haymitch growled under his breath. She really shouldn't be ordering him around. Not in her state. How long was he supposed to sit here and let her think that everything was as it should be when it was not? Three years was a long time.

"You pick it up if it bothers you too much," he told her seriously.

Haymitch stared at her, watching her reaction.

Effie gave a long suffering sigh, letting him know just how much he was inconveniencing her. She moved forward, hands outstretched.

She was close, her fingers nearly hooked around the collar of his crumpled shirt when it plunged through it and into the floor board before it resurfaced. Haymitch held his breath, waiting for it to sink in and for her to understand the implications.

"What - " her head snapped up, dumbstruck.

"Try again."

Confused, Effie did it over and over only to give a cry of frustration after the fourth attempt.

"You do know you're a ghost right?" Haymitch asked bluntly, raising an eyebrow incredulously. "Ghost just… passes through things - nothing solid 'bout you."

Effie gasped. "Don't be preposterous."

"What?" he rolled his eyes. "You've never noticed that all these while ever since you "moved in" here, you never had to open doors to go from room to room?"

"I - "

"Seriously, sweetheart, when was the last time you actually held something in your hands?"

That seemed to strike something in her because she looked down at her hands, pale and silvery, and shimmering in the light.

"You're a ghost, sweetheart," he said, gently this time. "I'm sorry but… But that's what you are. You'd probably need time to digest all that. I sure did when you first came to me," he said and snorted, "just my sort of luck to have my house inhabited by a spirit, eh? And you of all people."

"I am not a ghost," she told him firmly, arms crossed in front of her chest. "That's not funny at all, Haymitch."

What he told her had angered her. He could see it in the way her brows were creased together; the way her lips were pinched into a thin line; the way she stood, all stiff and tall. Effie crept closer towards him and in her rage, the lights above her flickered. The old vase cracked and fell apart. It startled her enough to calm her down. The lights came back on.

"Haymitch?" she was looking at him with complete uncertainty and she came to a stand directly next to him. It made him shiver.

"You're very cold," he informed her. "When you enter a room, it gets chilly. It's … It's worse when you try to touch me. I said try 'cause your hand just passed through me and the feeling's similar to having frozen ice dumped inside me."

Effie looked stricken, still toeing the fine line between believing him and thinking it was a joke on his part.

"Go look in the mirror," he said finally.

She did and her face was a myriad of emotions; disbelief, shock, confusion.

"I – I don't understand," she shook her head, staring at the clear mirror where nothing reflects back. "I don't …. How am I…?"

He opened his mouth to explain but the front door was thrown open. Katniss trudged into the house without knocking.

"You have a guest or something? Thought I heard you talking," she said.

Effie seemed to have temporarily forgotten about her non-existent reflection in the mirror. Her face lighted up at the sight of Katniss but when she spoke, her voice was guarded, remembering the times the girl had brushed her off.

"Hello, my dear."

The girl walked right past her into the kitchen.

"Peeta's made you some cinnamon rolls – I'm putting them here," she said and glance over her shoulder at him. Katniss sighed. "Clean yourself up, Haymitch. You'd know what Effie would say if she could see you."

Haymitch muttered something under his breath that sounded like "thanks" and "mind your own business."

"I've been telling him the same!" Effie exclaimed. "And… And I can see him, Katniss. Why would you think that I can't?"

Katniss ignored her.

"I'm going to the woods," she told her former mentor and left the house.

"She's just unhappy with me," Effie said brightly, passing the incident off just like she had done countless of times before. "I must have said something to upset her. You always said I run my mouth."

"She can't see you," Haymitch told her simply. When all she did was stared at him as if he had lost his mind, he stood up tiredly. "Come on, sweetheart. Somethin' I gotta show you. I should have showed it to you sooner."

I had this idea at work while thinking to myself, "if i die, i'd probably come back as ghost, still thinking i have urgent files to clear". I'm trying to keep this close to canon as possible with that twist.