#because I would not use headcanons to justify my wiew

[mitsuki91]

I... Can not even know where to start to reply to you.

I think the most miscomunication here is about the concept of love. Do you ever romantically loved someone? I don't want to inquire in your life mind you, but this can explain something.

Love, expecially romantic love, is not Agape. Coriolanus and Lucy Gray didn't have an Agape love, this was pretty clear. They have Eros. Eros is a flame, is burning, is possession and jealousy. Is the rappresentation we have for sexual and romantic love, intended for a partner.

Of course Coriolanus would be jealous. (Expecially because Lucy Gray's ex helped Mayfair to sell her as a tribute, but here we are in another analysis point; that's only to say that he has real concern about Billy Taupe and Mayfair that went beyond "jealousy"). Lucy Gray is jealous and possessive too to his Coryo. "You are mine and I am yours". She said that, not him.

Lucy Gray performed at the start. For the capitol, to stay alive. For Coriolanus too at the start, until he starts to open up to her, telling her about his family situation (that no one knows!) and so, because trust and respect as love are built on sharing, she starts to open up too. She let herself being seen as vulnerable - but only to him, not the capitol. She perform for the capitol, and it's a performance they both agree on. She said us herself! "Everyone thinks they know all about me / They slap me with labels and spit out their fables / You came along and you knew it was lying / You saw the ideal me / And yes, that's the real me" that are her lyrics in the love song she write for him! She clearly tell us that their bond is real, that they performed together for the sake of the capitol, to let Lucy Gray stay alive and win, but that she was real with him! That Coriolanus saw the real her!

The love you are describing, the love when you walk away to let the other person be free and happy even if you suffer doing so, it's the Agape love. It is not the only Valid™ love in this world. And Coriolanus and Lucy Gray knew each other only for what, a month and half? They are in the early stage of their Eros love, and that's why I told you that maybe their love in the end will not work if they end up not finding a middle ground (but, as I said with my example about arguing and listening to each other, I am quite sure they would work even with all their differences. Anyway it's beside the point now). Still Eros love is love and also a valid one! And a one used for romantic partners. Jealousy is part of that love. The needs to control your partner, to know where he is everyday everytime, is part of that love. Expecially if it's only in your mind as a thought and you do nothing - nothing armful - about it. Hell, still to this day if I leave the house I text my husband telling him where I am. I text him even when I finish work and I go home, even if he knew damn well my schedule and it's the same everyday. He text me when he go out to grocery shopping even if I know he would go that day; he text me the exact moment he left the house and the exact moment he came back, even if I am at work and I can not check the messages. It's not lack of trust, it's not control, if we forget sometimes nothing happen, it's just... Caring. Love.

Not only the PureLove™ is RealLove™ and until you cross the path of abuse (which Snow did only at the end and I might say because of a mental breakdown, but let's not dig in there here) you are good to love as you please and as the other person let you do it because it's the same for them.

Lucy Gray was the first one to be possessive about Coriolanus and her love, their love, is not at all an Agape love.

Hot take:

Coriolanus Snow did not love Lucy Gray, even though he loved her.

Bear with me for a second I know this sounds like an oxymoron but I promise I can make it make sense. The TL;DR is that both SnowBaird shippers and detractors are right, but also very very wrong. I’ll explain.

People who say Snow was genuinely in love with Lucy Gray are wrong. Flat out incorrect. And I say this so bluntly because of one simple factor: before the games, he needed Lucy Gray to promise total devotion to him. This 16 year old girl was about to be thrown into an arena to fight to the death and his concern was whether she was committed to him?? That’s not love. That’s need. Remember the saying “if you love someone, let them go”? It exists for a reason. If you truly love someone, you want what’s best for them. You want them to be happy, even if that means stepping away. Snow was not ready or willing to do this. If there was even a chance of him having to step away, he was prepared to just leave her to her fate to die. And this happened relatively early in the story when you look at the importance of events. Most of the moments we can point to and go “that’s a turning point for him” happen either during or after the games. Funnily enough this ties to a very simple fact of the story that seems to fly over a lot of fans’ heads, if they’re not just outright ignoring it.

Snow did not lose his mind or go insane over the course of the story. The whole point is that he was always this way, and looked every opportunity to choose to be a good person dead in the eyes as he dashed them to pieces, burned them to ashes and used the charcoal left over to draw happy little doodles on their graves. This story has two points, with the first being a subversion of the “uwu villain with a tragic backstory to excuse their actions” trope. The second one is gleefully stewing in all the ways the people Snow wronged in his early life haunted him until the day he died, especially Sejanus and Lucy Gray. That’s just one example of Snow not actually caring about Lucy Gray, but there are more. They’re sprinkled all throughout the story, culminating in the final scene where he attempts to murder her.

However

Coriolanus Snow did have genuine feelings for Lucy Gray. He was prepared to ruin his entire future to save her, knowing that getting caught cheating would destroy all he’s worked for his entire life. When he was forced to become a peacekeeper, he asked to go to 12 in hopes of seeing her again. He went out of his way to track her down and they shared genuine moments together. By now, he has no ulterior motive for being around her. No prize, no game to win, nothing to gain except happy memories. Snow wanted to be with her. And Lucy Gray wanted to be with him. There’s a skeleton of a genuine relationship there, inklings of the love story Lucy Gray was convinced they were destined to have. That wasn’t fake, those were real feelings and it could have been beautiful. If it wasn’t for one tiny little problem: Lucy Gray is not who Snow thought she was. She isn’t who he wanted her to be. In other words:

Coriolanus Snow thought he loved Lucy Gray Baird, when in actuality he loved the idea of her he’d created in his mind.

You see, this boy is the least reliable narrator to ever narrate in the history of ever, beaten out only by Humbert Humbert. And in similar fashion to Lolita it looks like people are making the mistake of taking his word at face value when the point the book tries to make is that you should not do that. Snow looked at his choice to keep bashing Bobbin over the head after he was already knocked out and decided to take it as evidence that all human beings lose their humanity when cornered (even though he was no longer cornered), he is very clearly not a trustworthy individual when it comes to making logical deductions. Especially because he can be neck-deep in denial sometimes. Snow never cared about Lucy Gray, the Covey girl, singer and performer who lost most of her family to a massacre and was forced to stay in one district rather than moving around like she used to. He cared about Lucy Gray Baird, district 12’s female tribute for the 10th hunger games. And those are not the same people. Tribute Lucy Gray Baird was locked in a zoo, forced to perform at all times to survive. Lucy Gray was free to be her authentic self (trauma not withstanding) and while she loves to perform, it’s a different kind. There’s no pressure, she can leave the stage if she so desires. She can roam as free as one can in the districts and no longer needs a mask to live.

In the book, Snow outright says he wishes she was still locked in the zoo so he knew where she was and she couldn’t leave. He loved the Lucy Gray that was contained. The one that was considered his by the people around him. The girl who relied on him completely because she had to. He loved what she was forced to be in order to not die, and when he saw the real her he wished she would be more like the girl he met. Which was not the real Lucy Gray. Snow loved the act she put on, and to some extent the control he had over her. He had genuine feelings for her, but not for the real her.

To conclude this rambly mess: shippers will pretend Snow genuinely loved Lucy Gray for all she was. This is not true. A certain subsect of people who hate this ship will say he never cared for her at all. This is also not true. And in a fandom for a book about the nuances of even the worst people on earth, that’s very funny.