Everlark Fic Exchange

  “What do you mean there’s only one bed?” Katniss hissed at her husband. “We were supposed to have our own rooms, and now you’re telling me we have to share a bed? Did you do this on purpose?”

Peeta glared at her, fury flaring in his blue eyes. If she weren’t so furious herself, she’d push a little harder, but the flint-like nature of his glower convinced her that she needed to steer clear, if only by shutting her mouth once she’d voiced her opinions.

“What kind of idiot do you think I am?” he practically spat at her. “It’s not like I want to spend time with you. I get enough of that at home.”

“A big one.”

“A big one, what?”

“You asked what kind of idiot I think you are. I think you’re a big idiot.”

“Enjoy sleeping on the street,” he said with unnatural calm and turned sharply on his heel. He’d only taken three steps before she crumbled. She had no interest in sharing a bed or a room with the man she’d married a decade ago, but she definitely didn’t have any desire to sleep in the hotel lobby, or worse.

“Oh, come on!” She called after him and hurried to catch up before he made it to the elevator. “You’re not going to leave me hanging. We’re here for work, and neither of us can afford a bad performance review this year.”

“It’d be worth it,” he groused.

“And what’s that supposed to mean?”

Peeta stood to the side so those inside the elevator could clear out and then stepped into the box with his suitcase. He punched the button for their floor and leaned against the wall without bothering to glance her way as she struggled to get inside with her bag.

“Can we not?” he asked tiredly. “You can yell at me all you want in the hotel room, but it’s unseemly in public.”

“Unseemly?” She almost said more, but bit the inside of her cheek instead. She could wait until they reached their room to see how bad the situation was going to be before she said anything else. This whole thing probably wasn’t fair in any way, but she couldn’t help but feel like this was somehow all his fault.

The elevator ride concluded in silence, as did the walk from the elevator to their room. Peeta fiddled with the lock for a full minute and cursed as the red light flashed several times before finally figuring out how it worked and popping the door open to allow them to enter. He flipped on the lights as he entered, and she almost smiled at the familiarity of him scanning the corners for someone hiding in the shadows. He’d started that habit on their honeymoon when they’d not bothered to look before going at it against the door as soon as they closed it behind them. An errant cleaning lady who’d only been dropping off extra towels and pillows had gotten quite a show, very likely one she’d had absolutely no interest in viewing.

The honeymoon was a long, long time ago. So long, in fact, that Katniss wasn’t even sure if she even liked her husband anymore, let alone loved him. They hadn’t been intimate in forever, it seemed, and she hadn’t missed it at all. Well, that wasn’t true. She did miss it. She just wasn’t interested in doing anything with him. All the sexual tension, passion, and lust that had existed between them had simply dried up as real life got in the way. They’d taken out their frustrations and irritations on each other instead of looking for comfort in the other’s arms.

“Do you want to use the bathroom first?” Peeta asked as he set his bag on the edge of the bed and unzipped it.

“First, yes. If it’s okay with you.”

“I don’t care. Knock yourself out.”

He turned his back on her and stripped off his tie before unbuttoning his shirt. He got it over his shoulders and was working on his belt before she shook herself out of her daze and closed the door to the bathroom behind her. Taking her time, she showered and re-braided her hair before brushing her teeth and applying moisturizer. She was just about to pluck her eyebrows when a pounding sounded on the door.

“Can you hurry it up? I’d like to go to sleep sometime tonight.”

Irritated, she jammed her beauty products back in her toiletry bag and ripped open the door. Haughtily, she glared at him and swept by to head to the bed. When she saw what he’d done, she froze.

“What’s this?”

“What’s what?”

“Why are all these pillows in the middle of the bed?”

“They’re making a barrier.”

“Yes, I can see that, jackass. Why is there a barrier of pillows in the middle of the bed?”

“To separate us.”

“But you’re sleeping on the floor.”

“Why the hell would I sleep on the floor?”

“Because we’re not sharing a bed right now. We don’t even sleep in the same room at home anymore. Why would you think we’d do that here?”

Peeta gaped at her, completely dumbstruck. It took a while for him to put words together, but when he did, she wanted to smack him.

“Katniss, I don’t know how to tell you this, but you’re crazy if you think I’m going to sleep on the floor of a hotel just because you decided you don’t want to be married to me anymore. I’ve tried to be understanding, but this is bullshit. I’m not a puppy you can kick.” Peeta shook his head and squeezed his eyes closed and his lips together. She knew that expression because it was one he’d shown much too often in the past several months. That was the look he made when he was about to lose his temper. “Now, I’m going to shower. If you have shit to do, I’d suggest taking care of it while I’m in there because I’m tired, and I’m going to sleep once I’m done.”

She waited until he’d closed the door to the bathroom before ripping the pillows off the middle of the bed. Hell if she was going to sleep in the same bed with him. He’d made a mistake to leave her alone if he thought that was going to happen. She piled the pillows back up against the headboard and then climbed into bed. Once she was directly in the middle, she pulled the covers over herself, set an alarm, and turned off the lights. If she tried, she might actually be asleep before he came back out, and then he’d have to take the floor. They’d barely seen each other in the past few weeks, let alone touched. She certainly didn’t want to start that the night before a big meeting.

It felt like she’d hardly closed her eyes when Peeta exited the bathroom and walked over to the bed. Smirking to herself, she rejoiced in her petty victory. Except… The mattress dipped under her, and she jumped as her husband climbed in behind her. With a shriek, she sprang from the bed and stood clutching the sheets in front of her.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Indignant, she wanted to smack his face. His eyes shone wide and blue with faux innocence that quickly shifted to a self-satisfied sneer.

“I’m going to bed. I told you that before I went into the bathroom. Really, Katniss. You should pay closer attention when I tell you what I’m planning. Someone might think you don’t listen. Not very good for a relationship, you know.”

“I was there!”

“And I put up a barrier, which you demolished. Seemed like an invitation.”

“You are such an asshole,” she sputtered. “Get out the bed.”

“And you’re being a total bitch. Get back in bed, and we’ll stick the pillows back between us. I’m not sleeping on the goddamn floor because you’re too stubborn to actually talk about what’s wrong between us.”

“I’m not sleeping in the bed with you!”

“Then, have fun on the floor.”

Infuriated, she fumed at him with a slack mouth and a hollowed out chest. He knew exactly what to say to hurt her, and maybe that was the problem. He knew her too well, knew all her vulnerabilities and insecurities and disappointments. Because of that, she could hardly look him in the face. If she did, she’d have to admit all the flaws she had, and if she did that, he’d know the same way she does that she doesn’t deserve him. Not in a million lifetimes.

Gutted, she ducked her head as tears pricked at her eyes. He reached for her, but she flinched away from him. She couldn’t handle his compassion, which he offered even when they were at their worst.

“Don’t touch me,” she ordered as strongly as she could, which was a pathetic attempt at regaining control. “Don’t touch me. Just put the pillows back. Please.”

He nodded, and it was almost her undoing. Turning her back, she waited until the rustling stopped before climbing back under the covers and settling on her side. The silence was louder than any noise she’d ever heard. It was matched only by the rush of blood in her ears. She stifled a sob and squeezed her eyes closed as tightly as she could. It wasn’t until she was almost asleep that she heard him.

“Goodnight, Katniss.”

She didn’t bother to answer.

****

Katniss woke to a streak of sunlight on her face and a warm fuzzy feeling that stretched from the pit of her stomach to the tips of her fingers and toes. Safe and warm, she nuzzled into the pillow, only to realize it was hard muscle covered in soft cotton, and there was something stiff poking into her thigh.

She didn’t want to move, didn’t want to risk losing the feeling of being loved and protected and cherished. There’s been so little of that in her life. Since her father died, the only person outside of her family who loved her was Peeta. Peeta Mellark, her childhood sweetheart turned fiancé who became her husband way too young, loved her. Maybe he still did, but it was hard to cling to the possibility. More likely, he wanted a divorce. She’d probably face the rest of her life alone.

She closed her eyes and floated in the sensation of being cared for by someone who didn’t have to want her. The press of muscular thighs and cut hips and…hell, she wanted that. She needed it. Desperate, she ground against the thick shaft and moaned low in her throat. It was matched by one just as frantic and eager.

“Katniss,” he whispered, and she tipped her head back to accept his kiss. He’s a dream, someone who could see past everything she couldn’t accomplish, every failure, every disappointment. “Sweetheart, you feel so good.”

He rolled on top of her and hitched her legs around his waist. They rutted against each other, groaning and whimpering at the pleasure they received from their connection. He made her feel so much better. He made her feel like she wasn’t a failure. He made her feel worthy.

“I’ve missed you so much. Missed you so much.”

Hands scrabbled at her sleep shorts. Heat flooded between them and deep in her gut. She wanted him, craved him inside her, longed for acceptance. Something about him—

“Stop!”

Peeta froze on top of her. His reaction was immediate, which only made her feel worse. She’d lost herself, forgotten who it was in bed with her. She’d led him on and allowed him to think their marriage could survive this when he’d be a million times better off leaving than staying with someone who couldn’t give him what he wanted.

“Katniss?”

“Don’t,” she warned. “Don’t talk to me like you can fix things if you only talk slowly and calmly enough. I’m not a child.”

“Sweetheart, please. Please let me in. I don’t want to lose you,” he whispered fiercely. “Please don’t do this to us.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Tell me what’s wrong. Tell me what I did. Why did you pull away from me? What did I do that was so terrible?”

She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to breathe evenly, but sobs choked her. He hadn’t done anything. He’d only ever been a wonderful husband, and all that did was remind her that she couldn’t ever live up to what he should have. He was loved and respected and admired by everyone, and she was suspicious of the world. He could make anyone laugh, while she stood by awkwardly with an uncomfortable expression on her face. There were a million things like that, but the worst was what she couldn’t quite process enough to allow herself to embrace what he wanted to give her.

He wanted children, and she couldn’t give them to him.

She burst into tears, which she knew was the only guaranteed way to get him to back down from the brewing confrontation. He wasn’t so much of a masochist that he’d purposefully provoke a weeping woman, particularly not his wife, no matter how strained their relationship. Like she knew he would, Peeta released her and flopped onto his back on the mattress next to her. He didn’t try to comfort her. Instead, he allowed her to sob as her tears quickly converted from fake cries to full-fledged howling.

“I’m sorry,” she sobbed, and he accepted her apology without even demanding to know anything else. She knew he was frustrated, but he held the space for her, without pushing, as she worked through her outburst. Finally, she quieted, and he rolled onto his side and tucked a stray hair behind her ear.

“Better?” he asked with such gentleness in his eyes and voice and touch that she broke again.

“No!” she wailed. “It’s not better. It’s never going to be better.”

Exasperated, he sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Without a word, he stalked to the bathroom, and she heard the shower turn on and the unmistakable sound of him stepping into it. Embarrassed, she closed her eyes and tried to still her rapidly beating heart. Nowhere in her plan for this trip did she anticipate break down in front of her husband, but she also hadn’t foreseen that they’d have to share a bed. It wasn’t like they’d been doing that at home. Not for months.

“Shower’s free,” he announced as he re-entered the room with a towel slung low on his waist.

His hair, usually ashy blonde and wavy when it was dry, clung to his head as water droplets traced down his chest. A jolt of lust shot through her, something she hadn’t felt for a long time. Without a word, she passed by him to get ready. When she was done, he’d already left for their meeting. The day passed quickly, and too soon they were back in the room together with an awkward silence hanging between them. Peeta didn’t even bother to talk. He simply got ready for bed and curled up on his side with his back to the wall of pillows between them.

Katniss attempted to fall asleep for what felt like ages, but the only thing she could do was listen to the steady in and out of Peeta’s breath. The sound was so familiar to her, and it was even more dear than that. She missed him so much, and, if the morning was any indication, he wanted her as much as she needed him.

“Peeta,” she hissed. When he merely grunted, she moved one of the pillows that separated them and reached across the barrier. “Peeta, wake up.”

“What do you want?” he grumbled without turning toward her. “Sleeping.”

“I want you.”

Peeta rolled over, but he didn’t make any effort to touch her. Pillows still separated them, but the wall they’d built between them was much worse than the temporary barrier. They needed to talk, but she didn’t intend to. She could distract him, she knew. She’d always been able to with a smile and a kiss and her body.

“Talk to me first.”

“Why? What good will it do?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe it would fix everything. Maybe, just maybe, we could save our marriage. If nothing else, it might make me think you want me and not just a night of meaningless sex. It’s not like we’ve exactly been jumping each other for the past several months.”

She sniffed at his sarcasm, although she couldn’t blame him. He’d put up with a lot from her, but he’d been kind of awful, too. His kindness earlier in the day didn’t make up for some of the cutting remarks and nasty actions he’d resorted to when he was frustrated. Still, his desperate plea for her to let him in struck at her heart, and she didn’t want to lie to him anymore. If she could just get started, the barrier between them could be dismantled.

“You wanted a baby.”

Her voice waved, but it was out there now. She knew it wasn’t her fault, had gone over the medical issues repeatedly, had processed all of it. Still, she felt like a failure. Knowing and feeling were almost never the same thing when it came to pain and disappointment.

“So did you.”

“It’s not the same.”

He signed loudly. Shifting away from him, she curled into herself at his irritation.

“Sweetheart, I love you. I’ve always loved you. Yes, I wanted a baby, but I want you more.”

“You don’t mean that,” she protested.

“I really, really do.”

“How am I supposed to believe it?”

Peeta sat up and grabbed the pillows between them and tossed them to the floor before grabbing her arm and tugging her toward him. He put his mouth next to her ear and hissed, “I want you more than anything else in the world. Do you feel that? Can’t you tell how much I crave being inside you?”

She shivered at the feel of him hard and plastered against her thigh. How he’d gotten there so quickly, she had no idea, but it gave her ideas, especially since she did some quick math in her head and realized it had been over six months since she’d slept with her husband. They still had a million things to talk about, a thousand misunderstandings to navigate, and a ton of baggage, but the removal of the barrier had begun.

“Peeta?”

__________________

  I should be practicing, she thought, instead of pacing the long, white, corridor of Trinket Advertising.

  Katniss still had a ton to do for the Games. Be sure to be fit, to be healthy, to be accurate. To shoot straight.

  She really didn’t want to spend her afternoon waiting for some photographer to ask her to act natural in front of a camera. But she was just glad she didn’t have to shoot with someone from the team, as she was pretty sure she wouldn’t be able to focus with the constant bickering between Johana and Gale or how Haymitch, their trainer, would “Sweetheart” this or that. 

  Still no clue as to why she had been picked to be the representative of her sport for the sponsors and advertising. She wasn’t really sure she knew what it entailed, how much time she would spend parading around the media instead of practicing. She knew archery wasn’t such a popular sport in the States, preventing her from spending huge amounts of time in talk shows, or interviews. 

Plus, seeing the recognition made Prim, her sister, so proud and happy, Katniss hadn’t been able to turn down the offer when it came. 

  “Kathy Everdeen? You’re up next.” The assistant’s piercing voice echoed in the long corridor. Katniss closed her eyes, taking a deep breath to not correct the woman.

  “Welcome to the Strange Name That Can’t Be Taken Seriously Club.” Another voice, male this time, made her open her eyes. 

In front of her was a man of around her age, wearing the male version of the US Olympics shirt she had on..

  Only his was stretched across his broad frame, where she was glad hers was loose around her lean body. 

  He extended his hand.

  “Peeta Mellark. Wrestling. Founding member of the club.” She stared at his hand, before moving a step forward to shake it. “You’re the archer ? Katniss right?”

  She stopped mid-movement. How could he know her name ?

  “I saw your name on the list, so I figured you’d be next ?” He said, almost shyly, as if he had offended her, or invaded her privacy.

  She saw the movement of his hand, that she had left unshaken, going to his hair, his fingers raking through his mane of curls.

  He had done nothing wrong, she realized, just tried to clear the air. She took a breath, before extending her own hand in front of her.

  “Yeah, I’m Katniss. Archery. How much is the subscription to the club?”

  He laughed, before shaking her hand.

  “How about tea after you’re done ?”

  “Too bad I only drink coffee … but I guess if you can wait a bit, that’s doable.” Katniss almost smiled when Peeta started to laugh.

  “Oh my goodness, I have a genius idea !” A voice froze their handshaking. “We are going to do pair shootings! Mix the sports together, along with the portraits. It’s going to be legendary !”   

  A woman with very pink hair matching her very pink outfit stood in the entrance leading towards the studio. As soon as she stopped talking, a flock of what Katniss could only think were assistants came in view, all clapping their hands or praising the Pink Lady.

  “Effie, this is another grand idea! We should start right now with these two!” The woman that had misspelled Katniss’ name said, “as they are both here.”

  “What are you waiting for, Octavia, take her to make-up right now! I need to call Plutarch, I am having a ton of ideas ! Hush hush, now come on, quickly!” 

  Katniss saw the assistants moving as one, starting to circle her and Peeta, moving them forward inside the studio, where a couple were checking their cameras and the large umbrellas reflecting the lights.

  “Cinna, Portia, I had an epiphany!” The Pink Lady walked towards the couple as quickly as her pencil dress and very high heels allowed her, while Katniss was ushered to the make-up table. She noticed that Peeta was following right behind her, with the other half of the assistants. She met his gaze, saw him shrug before he was taken to another table, shielded from her view by the different makeup and hair artists around them.

  “We’ll start with you, Kathy!” Octavia said a few minutes later. Katniss took another deep breath, calming her temper. In just a few minutes, she’ll be gone. Archery wasn’t high on the list of sponsors, nobody cared about them, but for the bow and arrows brands. 

  Katniss didn’t have time to muse as the sound of Octavia’s heels on the tiling started again. She rose from the chair, following the young woman towards a dressing cabin.

  “You’ll find your uniform inside. You’re a S, right?”

  “How do you know?” Katniss asked, surprised that the woman guessed correctly.

  “I have an eye for that. Plus, it’s written on your card.”

  She repressed another eyeroll, trying to keep in mind that Octavia was only doing her job, before she entered the dressing cabin. 

White pants, blue polo lined with red, and a white undershirt to protect her arms. The standard equipment.

  Yet, it was something to see it, to realize she would represent her country in the most important tournament there could be, that she had achieved one of her goals. To be an Olympian.

  She took the polo, turning it slowly, almost afraid to read what was on the back.

  Everdeen.

  Her father’s name, embroidered in the cotton of the shirt.

Pride rushed through her veins as her fingers traced the letters.

  “I did it, Papa. I’m going to the Olympics.”

  ______________________

  It was now official. She hated photoshoots. First, because it was taking an awful lot of time, then because you had to smile. All.the.time. That Katniss hasn’t screamed yet or ran off the door was entirely due to her willpower gained from years of training.

  The photographer, Cinna, wasn’t a talker. He was taking his time to snap picture after picture, never acknowledging Octavia or Effie’s advice for her to smile this way, or that way. Because there was apparently a way to smile properly.

  She could feel her anger rise with each passing minute, the incessant chatter of the women, the silence of the photographer, the heat from the spotlights, the wind from the huge fans, the itching from the label of the polo on her neck… 

  “I think it’s time to pair them up.” The photographer’s voice calmly said, silencing the two women.

From being Effie and Octavia, Peeta made his way towards the scene where Katniss was standing. 

  Before anyone could say a thing, Cinna turned to Effie and his assistant.

“Ladies, can you please check if we have athletes that can be paired tomorrow too? I’m sorry to ask in such short notice, but I think Effie’s idea is something we have to work on.. of course it will mean you change all the schedules..”

  “Oh, my, Cinna, but yes, of course! If you think so ? But will you be able to manage with these two?” Effie Trinket asked. Katniss could feel the sharpness of her gaze as the older woman looked at her.

  “If there is the slightest problem, I’ll make sure Portia comes to get you.” 

  “Yes, please. Because if we can manage to pair Brutus and Enobaria, we might be on something, right?”

  “Right.” Cinna nodded, before moving towards his material, his back to Katniss as he rummaged through his material.

  She looked at her partner in the photoshoot, who seemed as lost as she was. He kept running his hand in his mane of blond hair, before shoving them in his pockets. Seconds after, he was doing the same movements again. She realized she was doing the same, undoing the end of her braid before redoing it, over and over again.

She really couldn’t wait to be out of the studio.

  “Will you two stand back to back, please?” Cinna’s voice startled her, even though it was barely over a whisper. “Portia, can you please close the door?” 

  That’s when she realized how silent the place was without Effie and Octavia. Without their neverending chatter, their disapproving tongue clicks, or their exaggerated sighs.

It almost felt … good.

  Almost.

  She started to move then, turning her back to Peeta, before crossing her eyes, hoping he would take the hint to do the same. The sooner they were done, the better. She had her bow waiting for her, after all.

  She felt the fabric of Peeta’s polo on her arm, yet, never his weight on her back.

  She looked at Cinna, who nodded approvingly, before starting to take pictures. 

  “Should we smile?” She heard Peeta’s deep voice right behind her, asking the question she didn’t dare ask.

  “Do what you want, don’t mind me.” the photographer answered behind his material.

  “What we want?” Katniss echoed, unsure she had heard correctly. The previous hour had been filled with recommendations on what to do, on poses to take, on how to smile … 

  Cinna lowered his camera.

  “I’m not Effie. Beauty is everywhere, it doesn’t have to be faked by poses or false smiles. Just do what you two want.” He shrugged before checking something on his camera. “I’ll need a few minutes to fix this, try to relax.”

  Katniss turned to her partner in shooting, to realize he had already moved and was facing her.

  “You told me you were a coffee girl, right?”

  “Yup. Black, no sugar.”

  “I don’t take sugar in my tea, either. See we have something in common.” Peeta put his hands high. “Oh, no high five ? We’re not close enough yet.”

  “Definitely not, singlet boy.”

  “Ouch, that hurts. Know, Miss Everdeen, that a lot of women find that uniform .. appealing.” He raised his eyebrows, wiggling them explicitly. 

  “I bet they do. The main question is, do you have to shave your torso, so your opponent won’t have the opportunity to pull at your chest hair ?”

  Katniss didn’t know what came to her to ask such a question.  It was like Peeta made it easy for her to talk, when she usually wasn’t famous for speaking or making her voice heard without shouting.

  It was like he had a calm, soothing temper, like a lazy river, ready to cover the fire that was in her.

Maybe they made a good pair.

  “Yeah, the worst is the wax under the armpit.” He deadpanned, not even letting a smile on his face.

  She could totally imagine him taken down to “Beauty Base Zero” as the woman at the beauty parlor had told her the only time she went there. It included all sorts of treatments, each worse than the others. She even told her sister to not gift her with that kind of torture anymore.

  “Ouch.. I hope your girlfriend covers you in aloe after that …” 

Katniss knew she wasn’t the most girly woman around, yet she sometimes put on mascara or had her legs waxed from time to time, mostly for competitions when she had decided to wear the short-skirts or the long bermudas. 

  “Well, meet Hanna, my girlfriend.” Peeta said casually, showing his right hand, wiggling his eyebrows - again.      

  It took Katniss a few seconds to catch up on the double-entendre.

  “Oh, my, you’re disgusting!” Her words couldn’t completely hide her smile. There was something to this man that somehow made her want to talk, to speak, to even trust him. 

  “I bunked with Finnick Odair at the Youth Olympic Games. That was disgusting! He shaves himself ! the room was full of his hair!”

  “Well, you could have collected them before putting them on Ebay. You’d be rich by now.”

  “I should have, yes. Dam, why didn’t I know you back then to give me good advice!”

  “I wasn’t at the YOG.”

  “I know, I would have noticed you.”

She looked at him, with questions in her mind. His eyes were blue, so clear nothing was shadowing them, she was left without words.

  Click.

  —-

  Katniss couldn’t believe she was at the Olympics. In Paris, France. That her childhood dream of bringing a golden medal home was nothing but a few arrows away. A lot of stress, too. She raised her bow, lining the target with her eye, throwing  a quick glance to the small flags lining the area to check the wind, took a deep breath, before letting go of the arrow.

  She knew right away that it would miss the center of the target. A breath of hair on the right, still not enough to get full marks. She had underestimated the wind on this large, open area that the Esplanade des Invalides was.

  “Not too bad.”  She jumped at the voice behind her. Maybe some kind of volunteer that had been allowed inside the arenas for training. She needed to focus on the target, on the little golden area that would make her mark a ten in the competition.

  She took another arrow from the quiver on her left hip, slid it in the bow, looked at the wind, took a deep breath, lifted her weapon, aimed at the target. With the next exhalation of air, she let go of the arrow, knowing right away it would hit the center. 

  She had never been able to explain how she knew, each and every time how her arrow would behave. It was a feeling, a sensation, deep inside of her. 

  Thunk !  

  She looked at the target, saw that indeed the arrow was in the yellow area. She almost let a smile show on her mouth, when the same voice distrubed her again.

  “You might win if you shoot like that.”

  Katniss closed her eyes, letting a sigh escape before turning to face whoever decided to disturb her training. 

  “Peeta!” She felt a smile forming on her face. “What are you doing here?”

  He shrugged. “I was practising, then decided to go for a walk. It’s Paris after all!”

  “Here?” Katniss was pretty sure she hadn’t seen any other sport on the green grass in front of the Invalides.

  “Oh, not here here, over there!” Peeta turned, his right hand moving over his shoulder, showing the Eiffel Tower. “Wrestling is on the Champ de Mars, at the feet of the tower”

  “Really? You’ll have to tell me when you’re in the tournament. So I can come and see you.”

  Peeta’s hand went to his head, his fingers raking through his mane of golden curls.

“You’re sure ? If the press sees you there….”

  “I’ll tell them I came to support a friend.”

  “But you know how the paparazzi are …”

  “We’re in France, not the US, nobody cares about archery or wrestling - no offense intended.”

  “None taken.” 

  Peeta looked around, before coming closer to the barriers surrounding the archery arena, then leaning slightly on them, giving Katniss the opportunity to see the muscles in his forearms. She wondered briefly if he already had his waxing treatment.

  “Something on your mind, Everdeen?”   

  Who was he again? A mind-reader ?  She quickly turned her eyes  from his arms, not lingering on the broad expense of his chest, or how bright his eyes were.

  “Yup. I have to finish training if I don’t want to look too ridiculous when the competition starts.”

“What do you say we try one of these cafés when you’re done?” he casually asked. Katniss could see something in his eyes - was it hope ?

  Damn, was he playing unfair by throwing coffee into the mix. As if she was known to refuse a cup. 

  “I still have a few minutes of practice, maybe a raincheck?”

  He shrugged, before looking around. “I’m in no rush. I can wait. Patience is a virtue, young grasshopper.”

  She nodded, before taking another arrow out of her quirrel. 

   “Yes, Sensei.”

  The arrow hit the center of the target.

  ———————–

  Katniss knew she shouldn’t be there. Not that she didn’t want to, but after  pictures of her and Peeta laughing in a small café had hit the stands, her phone hadn’t stopped beeping, demanding a confirmation if there was something going on between the two of them. That, perhaps, all the rumors that had been born after the photoshoot with Cinna, were not rumors at all.

  Effie Trinket was, of course, delighted. Jo wouldn’t stop asking about LoverBoy, Gale was threatening to beat the shit out of Peeta (Katniss was almost ready to let him try to do that), and Haymitch kept on asking her if her little romance would damage her results in the field.

  Everything was peachy.

  Yet, she couldn’t find it in her to regret the time she had spent with Peeta. She couldn’t remember the last time she had laughed so much, that she had been able to confide to someone as she had done with him, how he had been open to her too. Like two old friends rekindling a friendship after spending years apart. 

  Friends they could have been, they had realized when discussing their native places. They had grown up about a hundred miles apart, in the same district of West Virginia. They could have crossed paths about a dozen times, sharing memories of the Meadow Park, where they both had spent time, Katniss had even worked there when they were younger. 

  Sometime during their afternoon chat, a photographer had spotted them, recognized them, and snapped pictures.

  That was a trending subject on Twitter minutes later, before someone even created a ship name for them. The hashtag #Everlark trended for more than a day.

  Katniss had pushed her phone away, blocked all the numbers she didn’t know, called Peeta to apologize, before focusing solely on her training.

  Her perfect plan had crumbled in hours, when Peeta had caught her in the Victor’s Village Cafeteria, explaining how he was sorry for everything, as the idea of coffees had been his. 

They had ended up sharing a meal with Gale and Jo, as well as some of Peeta’s teammates, who kept joking about the Everlark hashtag. In a matter of two hours Katniss was laughing with them, the pain of Effie’s scheme forgotten.

  That was why she was currently in the corridors of the Arena where Judo and Wrestling competitions were being held. Her own tournament was starting in two days and Katniss would rather watch sports she didn’t understand, then stay in her room, anxiously waiting for her turn to compete.

  Maybe it was time for her to play team mate too. She had put on her US Team attire, gotten her accreditations cards, before jumping into one of the buses that led her to the Champ de Mars. 

  She hadn’t seen Peeta since breakfast the morning before, when she had forgotten to ask him if he was still okay for her to come.

  The building was elegantly sitting on the green grass. In the back, she could see the Eiffel Tower, all dressed up in her beauty and dignity.

  In a few minutes she had found the hall with the wrestlers, and a seat in the ranks reserved for athletes. She recognized Thom and Thresh, two of Peeta’s teammates, who waved at her. She talked to them for a few minutes, learning their categories were competing in the coming days.

  “Peeta should be in two matches.” Thresh informed her as she sat on the plastic seat. “He should make it to the quarters easily. After…”

  “After?” She asked, unsure what THresh meant.

  “After, in the quarters he should face Katø, the Russian. A beast. “

  “A beast?” 

  “Yeah, 164 pounds of malice and nastiness.”

  “Charming… Maybe someone will eat this Katø first ?” 

  Thresh shook his head.

  “Na, not with this draw. His first worthy opponent will be Peeta.”

  She looked at Thresh, thinking back to the afternoon she had spent with Peeta, remembering what he had told her.

She couldn’t remember the last time she had laughed so much, her cheeks still hurt. They had walked away from the Olympic Archery range, following the banks of the Seine, looking at the amazing monuments, walking by the Musee d’Orsay that Peeta had told her he wanted to visit. 

They had crossed the river on a wooden bridge only for pedestrians, walked along the Louvre, until they had found a small café near the Palais Royal where they were still sitting.

  “You all have bread names? Why? “

  Peeta shrugged,  before leaning down a little on the metallic table, as if he was about to confide his deepest secret.

  “We own a bakery, back in Panem. Maybe one day, I’ll tell you my real name …”

  She laughed, leaning over the table too. She felt bold enough to run her hand on his definitely toned forearm, letting her finger wander up to his shoulder.

  She saw the color of his eyes change from crystal blue to a darker shade, heard him take a breath in.

  But Katniss was on a mission.

  She leaned closer to him, her hand coming closer to his neck, her nimble fingers playing with the collar of his shirt.

  She could feel him tense under her touch, and lifted her eyes, to find his locked on her, as if he wanted to get lost in her. It took Katniss a few seconds to return to her task. With a movement of her wrist, she grabbed his accreditation cards, pulling them over his head before leaning back into her seat.

  “That’s disappointing, actually. Your name is Mark ? Mark Mellark ?”   

  “Because your name is really Katniss?”

  She put down his accreditations, took hers from around her neck, holding them out to him. He took them with a smirk before looking at the name written on them.

  “Your name is really Katniss?”

  “Yep. My mom’s Lily, my dad is Alon, and my sister is Primrose. You’re a bread family, we are a plant family.” She snatched the cards from his hands. “ You’re lucky you didn’t bet a thing, Mark Mellark.”

  “Don’t call me Mark.” He grumbled, leaning back onto his chair.

  “Well, then if you don’t want the world to call you Mark, you know what’s left to do, Mellark!”.

  She casually put down his cards on the table, taking her time to lean back too.

  “Oh? And that would be, Sensei ?”

  “Easy, Grasshopper. Make sure you don’t get a medal.”

  “That, Robin Hood, is not an option.”  

  The steadiness, the certainty of his voice made her shiver. Or maybe it was the wind, coming from large trees nearby. Surely the trees, she thought.

  “I mean,” he started “ we all came here for a reason, and it’s not to give someone else our place on the podium. Plus with all the visibility we have this year, we have to give it our best, right?”

  She nodded. That was what they had to do, what they had trained for, what they were in France for.

  “Katniss?” Thom’s voice took her out of her memories. 

  “Sorry, I was lost in thoughts.”

  “Look down, on the mat. The guy in blue? It’s Katø.”

  “That’s a man? He looks like a mountain of muscles …” 

  “Well, he is a mountain of muscles … “ The referee interrupted Thom’s sentence with the start of the first period. “That won’t take long, he isn’t known for dancing around.”

  Katniss watched as the blond man, so different from Peeta rushed into his opponent, pinning him on the mat in a few seconds.

  “Told you. That lasted 25 seconds, he won’t be tired for the next round.” Thom said. “Peeta’s next.”

  Katniss nodded searching the ground until she spotted him, wearing a red singlet. 

  “Why is he wearing red ? Blue is a better color for him.” She asked, her eyes trained on the now familiar figure walking towards the mat. Damn, these singlets left little to the imagination. To say they were fit-forming was the understatement of the year. She could see all the lines of Peeta’s muscles moving as he approached the fighting zone.

  “Because he’ll be the first one called. It’s the rules.” She turned towards Thresh, who had the biggest smile on his face she’d ever seen him don.

  “Why are you smiling?” She was wondering what had been so funny in her words.

  “‘Blue is a better color for him’ - you sound like -” 

  “Be careful, Thresh. She shoots arrows…” Thom interrupted. “Now if you want to see Peeta wrestle, maybe you can look at the mat ?”

  With a last threatening glance towards Thresh that was met with another huge smile and air kisses, Katniss turned towards the arena, noticing how different Peeta’s posture was from Katø’s. 

  “He’s going to tire the Georgian who isn’t as flexible as he is. And as soon as there will be an opening, he’ll go for it.” Thom explained, as she watched the complicated dance of joint locks, takedowns, and other things she had no idea what they were.

  “This must be exhausting…” she whispered, as she saw Peeta finally going for the pin, immobilizing his opponent on the mat.

  “Well, it’s not crochet that’s for sure!” Thresh chimed into her thoughts as the crowd applauded the winner of the match.

  This was going to be a long day.

  __________________

  She needed to focus, now. Forget she was in the final of the Olympic Archery Tournament. Forget her dream was an arrow away. Forget she needed a nine to win the gold.

  She had to remember the wind, how it came lightly from the right to the left, how she needed to bend the trajectory just a little. She had to calm her beating heart.

  To forget Peeta was in the stands, watching. Katniss had cheered him on as he won his own gold medal two days ago, but now it was her moment.

  She needed to forget. 

  The way he had chased her when she tried to make a quiet exit.

To forget how they had kissed.

Their own celebration.

  She had to clear her mind of all this. 

Forget. Focus.

  A deep breath. 

Visualizing the arrow hitting the center of the target. 

  The chronometer was ticking. Tick. Tock.

  It was her last arrow. Her concurrents had already shot their own.

  She needed a nine.

  Only twelve seconds remain.

  She rose her bow.

Eleven seconds.

  Remembered her father’s proud look when she had won her first trophy.

  She let the arrow fly.

  She knew it would be a ten.

  She had won the gold.

  She fell to her knees, feeling the tears pooling in her eyes.

  “I did it, Papa, I won … I hope you’re proud..”

  The applause around her made her lift her head, then stand up, before she ran towards the stands, her bow still in hand, her eyes fixed on a figure that was coming down the stairs, towards her.

  She felt his arms around her as he hugged her over the bleachers, felt his hands going to her face as he looked into her eyes.

  “You remember to shoot straight, Grasshopper…” he whispered, for the two of them only.

  “Yes, Sensei”, she replied before kissing him.

  Click.

~~~~~

To say Katniss is drunk would be an understatement because she is completely hammered.

And it’s all (mostly) Jo’s fault.

They’d just left the office after a cruddy week when Jo suggested that they should do some sightseeing. Katniss had huffed at the idea, feet sore from her horrible choice of shoes for the day.

“We’re in Florida for the summer. Shouldn’t we at least see what it has to offer?” Jo had asked, hopping into Katniss’s rental before she had a chance to protest.

Although, sightseeing actually turned into bar hopping, and that led to three horrible decisions. One, she allowed Jo to pick out the bars they went to, which, to be fair, the first two weren’t that bad. Maybe only a little questionable around the edges. Two, she can’t remember where they parked, but Jo unhelpfully remembers parking next to a pink convertible that has probably long since driven off. And three, she is still wearing these horrible goddamn shoes.

Although, the throbbing is a little numb now that they are at their fourth bar, throwing back their fifth round of shots of tequila—Katniss shudders a little as the alcohol travels down to her stomach, the aftertaste sticking and burning the back of her throat.

“Listen,” Jo slurs, slamming her shot glass down onto the table. “I’ve heard of this place that does sex yoga.”

Katniss wrinkles her nose. “You mean tantric yoga?”

“Whatever.” Jo waves her hand in a flippant gesture. “But I overheard that the class is orgasmic and the instructor is really good at what he does. I think it’d fix that little dry spell of yours.”

“I’m not going through a dry spell,” she grumbles.

“Oh, really?” Jo drawls lazily. “When was the last time you got laid?”

She decides to ignore the smug look on Jo’s face and changes the subject. “How is this class supposed to fix my dry spell exactly?”

But Jo doesn’t take the bait.

“Answer the question, brainless.”

“God, I don’t know…” Katniss takes a moment to really think about the last time she was with someone, rolling the little shot glass between her fingers as she tries to come up with a viable answer. It’s not like her trusty vibrator hasn’t done a perfectly good job. This is more than she can say about the men she’s been with who never managed to make her orgasm. She’d always have to use her vibrator in the end, anyway… “A year or so. Maybe more.”

Jo purses her lips. “Are you sure your vagina still works?”

Katniss grimaces, nearly falling off of her stool as she glances around the room to see if anyone heard Jo. “Could you not talk about my vagina so loud?” she hisses.

“Vagina, vagina,” Jo echoes petulantly, laughing when Katniss shoves her shoulder.

“I swear, my best friend is a two-year-old,” Katniss grumbles. “Besides, I’ve been managing just fine by myself.”’

Jo cocks an eyebrow. “Vibrators can’t do everything.“

Oh. Well… yes. That’s—

"Okay, how about this?” Jo says, leaning into Katniss a little too heavily. “One of us has to get someone’s number by the end of the night. And whoever doesn’t, goes to this sex yoga class… for the rest of our stay.”

“What?”

Jo merely grins. “For. Three. Months. Deal?”

Again, Katniss wonders how said yoga class is supposed to help with her dry spell, but just to get Jo off of her back (or more specifically, her arm), she says, “Deal.”

Jo takes a long draft from her beer and stands from her seat with all the grace of a baby fawn. “I’m going to win if you keep sitting there, brainless,” she says before she disappears in the direction of the dance floor.

Katniss huffs.

Is she really doing this? She can’t even remember the last time she asked for someone’s number; especially at a bar, no less.

But she decides to give it a shot as she scans the room for potential participants.

She spots a tall guy leaning against the bar top, an amber bottle dangling between two long fingers. And the first thing she can’t help but notice is his blonde curls pulled into a little bun behind his head. Then a wide smile breaks across his face at something the bartender says, and Katniss decides that this is the guy; she’s going to get his number.

Katniss doesn’t even think of the slight possibility that he could turn her down as she finishes the last of her beer. She’s only determined to opt-out of a yoga class that she has no desire to go to.

But she can’t exactly explain what happens next. One moment she’s standing up from her stool, the next, she’s on the floor and the room is spinning.

“Are you okay?” someone asks, and she thinks she answers before she passes out.

~~~~~

Her room is bright when she wakes up, and she groans as the light sends shooting pain through her skull.

And if that isn’t enough—

“Oh good! You’re awake!” Jo says a little too loudly for the hangover Katniss is currently experiencing.

“Jo, please.” she groans. “My head.”

“Right.” Jo comes over and perches on the edge of her bed. “I forget that you’re such a lightweight sometimes, especially after last night.”

“What happened?”

“Well, you tripped over your stool and bumped your head on the table. Thankfully, the man bun guy at the bar was kind enough to carry you to the cab after you passed out.”

Her face bursts into flames, and she drops it down into her pillow in mortification. “Oh my god, that’s so embarrassing.

“Oh come on. You’ve done worse things our freshman year of college,” Jo offers.

That doesn’t make her feel better.

She turns her head to peer up at Jo. “Did I at least win?”

“Nope.” Jo flicks a little card onto the bed with a number scrawled on top. “Her name is Jess.”

Katniss scowls down at the card, not ready to admit defeat. “And how do I know that you didn’t just write down some random number?“

Jo smirks. "Because she’s in my room,” she says. Then she stands up and walks toward the door. “Get that cute butt up, brainless. We’re going shopping for a yoga mat.”

Katniss groans and tugs the sheets over her head.

~~~~~

She’s never placing drunk bets with Jo ever again, Katniss thinks as she splays her hands nervously against her cheap Target yoga mat.

When Jo told her about tantric yoga, the only knowledge she had came from TV series and terrible romcoms. She’d expected a shady studio tucked away in an alley, or beads hanging from the ceiling. But what she found was a studio with large open windows overlooking the white sandy beach, and everything was so… modern—not a single bead in sight. She also didn’t expect the room to be slam-packed.

What’s worse is that her yoga instructor is definitely the guy from the bar. Not to mention, now that she no longer has inebriated shades covering her eyes, the guy is… well, there’s not one word to describe what he is. But holy shit, she was not prepared for the amount of toned, muscled skin on display when he stepped into the room.

She’s definitely getting more use out of her vibrator after this. And again, she can’t figure out why Jo thought this class would help her get laid.

“Okay, everyone,” comes his silky smooth voice over the chatter of the group. “Get on all fours.”

Katniss feels her face heat as she does what he says. This is no time for perverted thoughts.

“Sink the hips back, and begin to draw slow circles.”

Oh god.

Does this guy even listen to himself when he speaks?

“And then rock back and forth.”

There’s no way she can do this for the next three months.

“Now take a deep breath and shift your hips up…”

Sunlight and blood drip down from the iron grate that lets us look up into the arena, and the group of us below scream and cheer as a trumpet blares to signal that Clove has won her fight and her freedom. Cato, standing in the midst of the knot of us that huddle under the grate to catch a glimpse of her against the hot blue sky, raises his hands to catch the gold dust motes that fall onto the dirt floor, as though he’s standing in a cataract of water.

“Fortune be with you!” he shouts as loud as he can, though his voice will be drowned under the roar of the crowds.

“Fortune be with you!” all of us echo, knowing Clove can hear us in her heart if not her ears, wishing her luck.

We do not hear her call back “Fortune be with you all!” But we are certain she will, before she is taken away to be washed and dressed and released into the city streets of Rome as a free woman, and a monster slayer at that. At least, we assume that is what happens. We cannot be certain. That is only what they tell us. And even if it is a lie, it is a pretty one.

Cato lowers his hands. He is triumphant in his friend’s victory, as we all are, but I know he will feel the loss of her tonight. My hand finds Peeta’s and grasps it tightly, grateful that in eight years my love from Germania hasn’t been chosen for the Games. Some people are desperate to fight, come what may, death or liberation. Not me. Strange as it seems, I am almost content with the safety of our bondage.

But we are sixteen now. Any day Seneca could come down to tell me I’ve been chosen. Or Peeta. Cato. Glimmer. Thresh. Rue. Any of our friends still living.

Today the odds were in Clove’s favor. May they be in ours tomorrow. Whatever that means.

~

“Mel,” comes Peeta’s voice, low and gentle. His pet name for me. “Honeysweet,” he says. “It’s time to get up. The chariots are readying.”

Has it really been a week since Clove’s fight? Time passes strangely here, like an island Ulysses might have found on his journey home. But his time was many decades ago. Fewer and fewer monsters dare to run wild. Peeta believes they’re smart enough to realize what might happen to them if they come too close to the city. They don’t offer freedom to a victorious beast. Only fight after fight until there is nothing left but to die. I feel pity for them.

I get to my feet, and brush the dust from my knees. I twist my long, dark hair up into a braid. Peeta’s hands frame my slender hips, thumbs circling gently at my hips, my belly. In other circumstances, they might carry his child. We talked about that, once, on a moonless night when secrets seemed more likely to keep, curled up nose to nose on our bedroll. We spoke of farming land well away from the streets of Rome. Having a family.

“Do I pass your inspection?” I say softly. The sunlight catches at his hair. If it were not blasphemy to say so, I should tell him he looks like Apollo himself, gilt with gold.

Peeta takes my hands and turns me around, my homespun dress of faded red, now a drab orange color, clinging tightly to a body, that, though small, is too big for it now. But his eyes are dark with admiration and even desire. “Beautiful, as always, my honey love.”

I stand on my tiptoes to press a kiss to his lips, lips that gave me my first ever kiss, that worshiped my body with whispered promises, and still cover me in the sweetest touches of love and lust.

“You’re beautiful too,” I say.

“We’re all beautiful,” comes Thresh’s sardonic voice. He smiles a wry smile, close mouthed. “Let’s go.”

“You might have woken me sooner,” I say, as Peeta puts an arm around me and leads me to join the small procession of tributes that files up the dirt tunnel and out into the courtyard where the chariots wait, painted and gleaming in the bright sun.

“You looked so peaceful,” he says, helping me step up into the open back of the chariot. A guard comes to bind our wrists and hands to a set of hooks at the front of the chariot. We don’t resist. This is routine. Peeta and I continue talking as we are bound side by side. “I didn’t want to disturb you before I had to.”

I nod, grateful that my heart belongs to such a generous man. When we first met, we could not speak each other’s languages, and each thought the other looked so strange. But I remember, young as I was, barely eight, huddling with the boy my size as fights raged overhead, his strength becoming my strength, and mine his.

Now, my fingers flex and stretch and find his through the mass of black cords trussing us to the chariots so we don’t try to escape as we are paraded around the city. It’s a veritable weekly holiday, the choosing of the tribute. The crowds will get a look at us, old tributes and new, and decide who they want to be Rome’s champion—or sacrifice—for the week.

Peeta and I have often wondered why we have never been chosen. For a while it was our youth that made us unappealing, but now? Is it pity that stays their choice? You could not see the way we are together and not conclude that we are lovers. Our fellow tributes knew before we did that we loved each other. Fox, a girl brought from Peeta’s homeland, used to tease us about that, before she ...

As the chariots jerk and clatter, starting their journey down into the throngs, I feel the vial of nightlock poison, kept hidden on a cord around my waist, bounce against my skin. Fox taught us how to make the poison from berries, snuck in from the outside by helpful allies. There is enough for one of us, me or Peeta, whichever one might have need.

~~~~~ 

She’s used to this by now—strange guests in dark suits showing up at her grandfather’s house at all times of the day. Thugs, her nanny calls them one evening before bed. And they are, most of them, often wandering down the halls with a glint of ill intent in their eye.

“You stay in your room when they’re here. Do you understand?” her nanny asks, tucking away the last of Katniss’s toys in the white chest near her dresser.

“Yes, nan.”

Except, that night, she doesn’t listen. The sound of her stomach gurgling drags her out of bed and she sneaks down into the kitchen where Sae scolds her for wandering the halls so late at night. 

She’s tiptoeing past her grandfather’s study, hands now full of mini blueberry muffins and a bottle of apple juice, when she hears unfamiliar voices, and… sobbing? Katniss stops, curious, and steps closer to peek through the small slit between the large mahogany doors.

There are two darkly dressed men standing in front of the fire, their rings catching in the warm glow as they gesture toward a hunched shadow behind them. The dim light in the study is barely enough to make out any significant details, but she easily sees the outline of a boy. 

He sniffles softly, a muffled sound heard under the voices of the men in the room. Words are spoken quietly, and she strains to catch what they are saying.

“His parents… One of Coin’s men, I believe… What should we—”

She’s jostled from the door by a pair of firm hands, and she stares up into the fierce face of Purnia, her tight updo making the sharp angles of her face more threatening. 

“You should be in bed,” is all the tall woman says before escorting her to her room.

~~~~~

Later, Katniss hears them bring the boy to the guest room across the hall. And she waits until she hears the click of their expensive shoes disappear down the hallway before she goes to her door and steps out—two muffins and the bottle of juice in her hands.

Quietly, she tiptoes across the hall to the door that is slightly ajar. She pushes it open, unsurprised to find the boy crying in the corner of the room. When she walks closer, she discovers that he’s an older boy, maybe thirteen or fourteen—a gangly thing with blond, curly hair sticking up around his head and oversized clothes.

He looks up when she steps on a creaky floorboard; his eyes are wide with fright until he realizes that she’s no real threat. Scrawny eight-year-olds aren’t as intimidating as old floorboards, it seems. 

Katniss takes him in, now that she can get the full picture of him. And when she looks beyond the baggy clothes, he kind of reminds her of a scrappy character from one of her storybooks.

Except, he doesn’t seem so bad.

Wordlessly, she holds out one of the muffins, and he just stares at it. She jiggles her hand, encouraging him to take the muffin. And when he finally does, she offers him a toothy smile.

“Thank you, little one,” he tells her, which is confusing considering he looks like the little one at the moment. But she doesn’t question it as she sits beside him, her knees drawn up to her chest.

They eat their muffins quietly, and when he asks what her name is, her answer whistles through her missing front tooth. “Katniss.” 

He nods and doesn’t say much else.

~~~~~

She watches the boy as he steps into the dining room, his eyes momentarily catching hers where she stands behind her grandfather in her plaid dress and too itchy turtleneck sweater.

He’s dressed in a black suit, the lights from the chandeliers above reflecting off his shiny, dark shoes, looking every bit like the influential guest her grandfather expects him to be. It’s a drastic difference from the state he arrived at the house in only two days ago. 

However, his blonde curls still hang limply on his forehead, and the color of his skin continues to have a grey sheen. But his blue eyes reflect a bit of life in them, even if it’s fleeting, and she thinks that might mean something as he stands before her grandfather as still as a statue. 

Her grandfather puffs out a cloud of smoke from his cigar, watching the boy with sharp eyes. 

“Have you ever held a gun, boy?” The boy shakes his head. “People around here call me sir when they answer me.”

She can see his bottom lip slightly tremble, but he schools it with a blank expression.

“No, sir.”

Adult talk isn’t something her grandfather allows her to listen in on; numbers and business were of no interest to children. But as he talks to the boy, she gets to witness firsthand how regular people are turned into bloodhounds. It turns her gut a little, even though she doesn’t quite understand.

Yet, all she can do is press her lips into a thin line as the boy slips the silver signet ring on his left pinky finger.

~~~~~ 

He earns his first tattoo when he’s eighteen. It’s on the inside of his left wrist in dark ink, a snake wrapped around a rose, confirming he is owned by the House of Snow. 

He’s no longer ‘boy’. He’s Peeta—a man now, another thug in a dark suit. Although… he isn’t. 

Not to her.

Sometimes, she’d catch him reading in the library when he wasn’t doing a job for her grandfather, and she often marveled how he looked more like the boy she knew and not the man he’s become. His brows would crease in an expression of concentration, and not one of anger which appeared on his face often after running ‘errands’. And then the look would disappear when he caught her spying on him—not that she was ever being very discreet about it.

“Focus on your homework, little one,” he’d say, a small smile on his mouth. Katniss would blush and turn back to her reading for a bit before sneaking glances at him again.

Peeta is still somewhat of a mystery to Katniss, but he’s kind to her—unlike other guests that show up unannounced in her home who see her as the annoying nuisance in her grandfather’s shadow. He remembers her birthday, perching small gifts on the window sill in the alcove she normally hides in. And he never ignores her when he comes across her in the halls or is forced to sit beside her during dinner. Instead, he listens as she prattles on about her studies or what happened in the house while he was away on business trips. 

When it dawns on her one day that perhaps they are friends, he merely smiles as she tells him this and doesn’t disagree with her. It’s at that moment that Katniss felt their friendship is valuable and something she needs to protect—even if Peeta sees her as a little one. Because friends look out for one another, even when they’re out past their bedtime with hands full of food.

“What are you doing out of bed, little one?” he asks when he finds her sneaking out of the kitchen.

“What does it look like?”

Peeta steals one of the blueberry muffins from her pile, a ghost of a smile playing on his lips. “It looks like you’re being a packrat. What happened to the food you brought to your room last night?”

“I ate it all.”

He watches her with an amused gleam in his eye and takes a bite of the muffin he stole. Then he opens her bedroom door and tells her to stay put. “Don’t wander the halls at night, little one. It’s not safe.”

And yet, he’s there the next night, stealing one of her treats and escorting her back to her room.

~~~~~~

The first time Peeta kills someone, she knows, because he cries—she’s no longer that naive to assume that ‘errands’ actually means something else. She hasn’t seen him cry in five years, yet when she finds him curled up in the corner of the guest room, he reminds her of the boy she met so long ago. 

She takes in his marred knuckles, dried blood crusted on his skin, sealing wounds that hadn’t been there that morning. His hair is limp, and the suit he wears is in ruins with holes and a long gash in his side. 

When his eyes find hers, they’re red with a bit of fear in them—no longer caused by squeaky floorboards and a scrawny eight-year-old.

Something conflicting tightens in her chest; one small voice tells her to go to her room like she’s been told many times before, and another tells her to stay. And because she’s never been one to properly listen to warnings, Katniss sits beside him, drawing her knees up to her chest.

She offers him one of the blueberry muffins in her hand, and it takes zero prompting this time for him to take it and slowly pick at the treat with shaky fingers. When it’s gone, she notices that the slight body tremors have stopped and his breathing is now even.

“Thank you, little one,” he says after a moment, and Katniss gives him a small smile.

He’s worth protecting.

~~~~~ 

Katniss can’t stop staring at him, and it’s… enlightening. 

She doesn’t know when the perceptions of a kid are washed away by that of a sixteen-year-old, but she definitely notices how nervous or flushed she becomes when Peeta’s eyes land on her. It’s not that she’s never been shy around him before, but that was from a child feeling praise from someone she admired. 

Now it’s from the fact that she’s never noticed the random gold flecks in otherwise blue irises, or that he is a head taller than most men she knew—his frame filling out the all-black suits almost too well. 

And have pens and silverware always looked that small and fragile in his hands?

When he’d place a hand on her lower back to guide her out of a room, or gently move her out of the way, she’d jump from how it felt like it was burning her through her clothes. But Peeta never seemed to think twice of it, and would simply drop his hand after it served its purpose.

She isn’t blind to the fact that others have long since realized these discoveries about Peeta—apparently, she’s the last to know. Katniss also hates that this will never change how Peeta sees her because she’ll only ever be his little one, and he’s a man who still has needs.

One evening, she stumbles upon Peeta with one of his ‘gifts’ from her grandfather, a tall brunette she’d seen before who has a penchant for short red skirts. It takes her all of twenty seconds to realize what is happening in the dark corridor before she turns on her heel and goes to sulk in her room.

In her bed, she selfishly imagines what Peeta is like as a lover. She wonders if his lower lip would become a little fuller if she worked it between her teeth, or if the gold flecks in his eyes would disappear completely from lust. Would he grip her hips in his massive hands and call her a brat for being too rough? Still, how can she not be when someone else is currently touching what is hers?  

And it’s from these fantasies that her hand travels underneath her silky sleep shorts, and she touches herself to thoughts of large hands and broad shoulders. When her orgasm washes over her in waves, her toes curling, she swears she can faintly hear the sound of expensive shoes stopping outside her bedroom door. Then, after a few seconds, the guest bedroom door closes and she releases the sigh she was holding.

The next day, he finds her in the library because it’s her birthday and he’s never missed a birthday in all nine years that they’ve known each other. He slides a rectangle box across the table she’s sitting at, but Katniss doesn’t look up, still embarrassed about what she’d witnessed the day before.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” he says, and this makes her look up because he only ever calls her that pet name when she behaves. 

The look she finds is soft and maybe a little ashamed.

 Ah, she stayed in her room… for once.

“Whatever,” she mumbles, glancing back down at her book that she hasn’t actually been reading. 

“It’s your birthday,” he tries again.

“Yeah, I know,” she sniffs. “Thanks for reminding me.”

She startles when a hand suddenly covers the page she’s staring at, and she glances up to Peeta’s blank expression. “Don’t be a brat.” Something about that word makes her flush, and she knows it has everything to do with the way she thought about him saying it last night. “Open your present before I leave to run errands.”

Katniss huffs a little, and Peeta replaces his hand on her book with his gift. She eyes the delicate bow on top, faintly wondering how his large fingers formed such an intricate knot. Then she tugs on an end, watching it fall apart before she brushes it off and flips open the lid.

Inside lays a black pearl attached to a delicate gold chain, all perfectly nestled between a smooth dark velvet. It’s definitely different from the other trinkets she’s received from Peeta on her birthday, and she stares at it a moment longer to figure out what it means.

But Peeta must read her thoughts. Or her confusion must be so blatant on her face because he plucks the necklace from the box, and Katniss watches him owlishly as he walks around the table until he’s standing behind her. 

She wordlessly pulls her hair off her neck, holding her breath when his steady fingers brush against her skin as he works the clasp on the chain. After what feels like eons (but was probably only thirty seconds), his hands fall and the pearl pendant dangles from around her neck.

Then he leans forward and whispers, “It means I’m yours, little one.”

~~~~~ 

It’s during one of her grandfather’s infamous soirées that she decides she’s tired of waiting for Peeta to make the first move. Surely it had been her age holding him back, but she’s nineteen now, and… nothing. 

He continues to tease her with gentle (although chaste) touches to the small of her back, and sometimes grazes her bottom lip with his thumb when he pushes a loose lock of hair out of her face. And when she nipped at the tip of his thumb once, he merely shook his head even though his breathing had picked up slightly.

“We can’t,” he’d insisted, shaking his head. But he had kept his thumb in her mouth, a firm pressure against her tongue while he tried to regulate his breathing again.

She’s never been so frustrated in her life, but she has a plan.

She walks into the large sitting room wearing a black floor length dress that shows off a little more skin than what she’s used to. However, her heart soars to the ceiling when she notices the tall brooding figure standing near one of the long windows watching her with an unreadable expression on his face. 

Good.

Katniss moves around the room with her mission in mind, making sure that she is always in Peeta’s line of sight. It becomes easier when a stocky gentleman with dark shoulder-length hair takes it upon himself to talk to her, and Katniss lays it on thick. 

She touches his chest when he makes her laugh, slides closer to him when he whispers something in her ear. And when there’s a break in the conversation, she glances over to make sure Peeta is still watching—he is.

He still keeps his distance, except now there’s a firm set to his jaw.

Hm.

The gentleman—Marvel is his name—tells her about his travels in Greece and Katniss leans up to whisper replies in his ear, closing Peeta’s view off from her completely. It doesn’t matter what she says, what matters is that when she moves away from Marvel, Peeta is standing right there. And Katniss can’t help but smirk a little.

“Katniss,” he says, voice like a knife’s edge. It’s clearly meant as a warning, but Katniss’s grin grows wider.

“Who’s this?’ Marvel asks.

Never taking her eyes off Peeta’s face, she answers, “Oh, this is my bodyguard. Don’t mind him. He often plays nice.”

The room’s dark. There’s only one small lamp burning in the corner, but that makes the single candle in the cupcake brighter than it would have been if the entire area were lit. It’s a somber celebration, but that doesn’t make much difference. It’s as it should be.

“Happy birthday, dear Katniss… Happy birthday to you.”

As the last note fades into silence, Katniss whispers a birthday wish and blows out the candle.

“Happy birthday to me,” she mumbles. She’s alone and tired and feeling older than she thought she could. In the grand scheme of things, forty isn’t that many years, but the difference between her fourth and fifth decades seems like lightyears. She’s halfway (or more) through life, and she’s hiding from it.

No one could really blame her for running—not with the experiences she’s faced. Her father gone as a young man leaving Katniss, her mother, and her younger sister Prim alone with practically no income and empty stomachs that gnawed at her insides for months as she fell asleep. Her mother falling into addiction to anti-depressants and opiates leaving Katniss to keep the household together so she and Prim wouldn’t be taken by child services and separated. Her beloved sister gone in a house fire that ripped through the apartment building where she’d stayed while enrolled in med school in a neighboring state. That’s enough tragedy for any one person, and that doesn’t even count her own pain and disappointments during the past forty years.

She’s suffered plenty of both. There’ve been days when she has no idea how she continues to function, but she puts one foot in front of the other repeatedly, doggedly, hoping against hope that something will go right for her. The odds should be in her favor, but they never seem to be. Instead, she watches as the world goes by and wonders if she’s brave enough to step back into society and join the rest of the living. She’s been in mourning for long enough.

Forty. It’s a scary number, but it’s also a little motivating. With a shake of her head, she decides. It’s time. Prim would want her to be happy. She’d be furious at the way Katniss has shut herself off from everyone in order to protect herself. If there’s anything that can drive her out of her shell, it’s thinking about the disappointment that would shine in her sister’s eyes if she were still alive.

“It’s time to rejoin the living, Everdeen.”

Her voice is small as it echoes in her empty apartment, but that’s not the intimidating part. What’s terrifying is that she has absolutely no idea how to get back out there. It’s been almost a decade since she bothered, and she can’t help wondering if maybe she’s waited too long. It’s possible there’s an expiration date, and she’s past it.

It’s late, and she’s tired. Heaving a sigh, she heads to her new bedroom and plugs in the airbed to blow it up. Her belongings won’t arrive for another few days, and the thought of sleeping on the hard floor is the reason for her last minute purchase at the local department store. Shaking out freshly laundered sheets as she retrieves them from the dryer, she inhales the clean scent and tucks the corners onto the air mattress. A pillow and blanket that made the cut when she purged her possessions before her interstate move provides a tiny hint of home. Flicking off the overhead light, she closes her eyes and drifts into sleep. She counts the fact that she only wakes from nightmares three times as a win.

****

“I like that there,” she mutters to herself as she adjusts the picture on the shelf to the left of her television. It’s her favorite of the ones she and Prim took together before her sister started med school.

They’d been so happy, arms wrapped around each other and a rare smile gracing her own lips. As it always had, Prim’s grin stretches across her face, and her blue eyes snap with excitement in the image. She deserved so much better than to become a human torch because someone was stupid enough to not know how to douse a grease fire. The senselessness of it all hits Katniss again. Someone cooked dinner, and that act killed her sister. Prim, who only wanted to heal people, died because an idiot didn’t know how to make bacon and then tried to douse the flames with water.

A knock sounds at her door and shakes her out of her reverie. She isn’t expecting anyone, but a second knock convinces her she shouldn’t ignore it. It could be her landlord, and the last thing she wants is a grumpy Haymitch Abernathy yelling at her because she’s inadvertently broken some rule she doesn’t even know exists in the first place. Tossing her braid over her left shoulder, she crosses her apartment and answers the door.

“Can I help you?”

She’s surprised she can get the words out of her mouth. The man standing there definitely isn’t her landlord, and he’s not old, grumpy, or drunk like Haymitch obviously has been every time she’s seen him. The guy standing in front of her must be about her age, maybe a few years younger, and he has shockingly blue eyes which remind her of her sister’s, as well as the same ashy blonde hair that falls in a shock of curls over his forehead. She has the sudden urge to reach up and push them back, but she keeps her hands at her sides. It would be exceptionally inappropriate to grope a total stranger, even if he is standing in her doorway with a smile and a paper bag that smells something like heaven.

“I’m Peeta. Peeta Mellark. Your next door neighbor. I brought you some pastries.”

“Pasties?” She squeaks out the word and immediately wants to smack herself. She sounds a little like a mouse, while his voice makes her insides vibrate. Also, what did she just say?

Peeta does a double take before bursting into laughter. “Pastries, not pasties. I’m not into that— Well, I mean…uh… I mean, I could be, but not the first time I meet a woman.”

His face is bright red, but hers feels like it’s flaming. She can’t believe she said that and crosses her arms unconsciously to cover her breasts before uncrossing them just as quickly. She’s not sure which is worse at drawing attention to the fact that she has nipples that pasties would cover, and… Hell, she’s spiraling.

“I’m sorry,” she babbles. “That was unseemly.”

“It’s fine. Hilarious, actually.” He grins and gives her a onceover, which makes her blush even harder.

“Well, pastries make way more sense and smell a lot better. But, why?” She’s not sure if that sounds rude or not, but it’s better than what she’s already blurted.

“I’m a baker,” he offers in explanation. “Just a little welcome to the building, uh…?”

“Uh…?”

She can’t think. He’s staring at her, and it makes her extremely uncomfortable in a very peculiar way. She’s not able to name it, but there’s something bubbling below the surface. If she concentrates really hard, she could probably identify the feeling. However, that’s not an option when Baker Boy is standing there with a perplexed look.

“You are?”

“Oh! Sorry, sorry,” she mumbles. “I’m Katniss. Katniss Everdeen. Just moved in. You probably already knew that. I, uh, thank you. This is great.”

“You’re welcome. Welcome to the building, Katniss, Katniss Everdeen. Let me know if you need anything. I always have eggs and sugar and more.”

“More?”

“Yeah. Think on it.”

With that, he disappears into his own apartment, and she’s left holding the bag. Literally.

In a trance, she crosses to her kitchen and sets the pastries down on the counter. Flustered, she pulls a bun out and sinks her teeth into a little bite of decadence that’s got to be illegal in all fifty states, Canada, Mexico, and half of Europe. It tastes so good it’s sinful. It’s doughy and filled with cheese, and she moans so loudly she wonders if he can hear her through their shared wall.

“Sweet Jesus,” she mumbles. “That’s the best thing I’ve eaten in a long time.”

She sits there with a grin on her face for a stupid amount of time before realizing she’s hungry for more, and it’s not necessarily baked goods she wants.

****

Katniss rounds the corner and smacks into a wall. With a loud oof and a screech, she flails in her attempt to stay upright and keep her groceries from falling around her. Just when she’s about to lose it all, strong arms grab her and pull her upright. Relieved, she looks up and falls into the blue pools of her neighbor’s eyes.

“Easy there,” he says with the hint of a smile. “Where’s the fire?”

She almost says, “In my pants.” She really does, but she’s made a fool out of herself enough with him already. She frees herself from his clutches and congratulates herself on remaining calm, and then she sees what he’s wearing. Which isn’t much.

“Holy hell,” she murmurs at the sight of sweat-soaked skin and form-fitting running shorts.

“Sorry. I just got back from a run.”

“I…yeah. I see that.”

She can see some other stuff, too, and it is impressive. She can’t stop looking at him. He’s absolutely gorgeous, and she’s just told herself a few days ago that she needs to get back out there and has no idea how. She did say that, and here he is. She doesn’t even have to leave her building to find an opportunity. There’s no way she’s this lucky.

“Can I help with those?” He nods at the bags she’s holding and reaches out to take the ones hanging from her wrists. He brushes her hand with his, and her insides sizzle.

“Sure.”

She’s going to seduce him. Or let him seduce her. Or get him drunk and take advantage of him. Or something.

Every single fiber in her body tingles. It feels like waking up after a decade long nap and feeling simultaneously ravenous and powerful beyond belief. As he follows her into her apartment, she scans the area and decides to just go for it. What’s the worst that can happen? Her neighbor hates her? Well, that would be terrible, but she can move. That’s how turned on she is by him. She’ll risk a broken lease.

“You can just put them there,” she says softly and runs her hand down his arm. He freezes and looks at her, and she stands her ground. Maybe she’s not thinking straight, but she wants him. Now.

“Katniss?”

She presses into him and trails a finger down her bare chest. She wipes a sweat droplet from his skin and bites her bottom lip.

“Yes, Peeta?”

“I’m not misreading this, am I?”

She wraps her arms around his neck and tips her head back. “No, I don’t think you are.”

“Fuuuuuuck,” he drawls.

Looking directly at him, she says, “I really hope so.”

“Oh, hell.”

His mouth captures hers in a searing kiss, and she turns off her brain. She has no intention of thinking, only feeling for the next however long. His tongue is in her mouth, her hands are on his ass, and his sweat dampens her clothes.

Peeta hoists her into the air and wraps her legs around his waist. He stumbles backward to deposit her on the edge of the countertop and rucks up her shirt to slide his hands along her waist. Frantic, she tugs at his waistband, indicating she’d prefer he lose the shorts, and he growls into her mouth when she slips them over his hips. She cups his backside, pulling him between her legs and moans against him.

“Please,” she gasps. “Fuck, please.”

He’s frenetic, all power and kinetic energy as he rolls her leggings down her thighs, baring her to him. When she bites his lower lip, he grunts and shoves his hands between her legs. He pushes inside her roughly, and she whimpers at his pace. His thumb’s on her clit, and his middle finger plunders her as their tongues tangle and dance together.

She’s got him in her hand, jerking and tugging as he swells in her palm. It’s a solid weight there, but she wants it inside her. She doesn’t have time to look. She’s too enthralled in what his lips are saying as they mate with hers.

Katniss tugs one of her feet free and yanks him to her with her legs. His shaft is hot against her slit. She begs for him with her hands and body, but he pulls back slightly to catch her gaze.

“Are you sure?” he asks, his voice ragged and broken. She nods frantically, and he moans in the back of his throat. “I’ll pull out. I promise.”

“Okay,” she agrees.

She’d agree to about anything as long as he gives it to her hard. Then he’s inside her, stretching her as she calls his name. He’s big enough that it’s uncomfortable at first, until her body adjusts to the intrusion and she’s aching for more. By the time she’s relaxed, he’s pumping into her with her name falling from his lips as he bites and licks at her jawline.

“Tug my hair,” she manages to instruct, and he yanks on her braid so hard her eyes water. It’s sexy as hell, and she grapples at his back in an attempt to pull him further inside her. He’s good at this, she realizes. Really good at it, and she thanks her lucky stars she’s the fortunate recipient of such a fantastic experience. He’s doing everything he can to make it good for her, and it really, really, really is.

What they’re doing is so messy, but she doesn’t care. She owns bleach and anti-bacterial cleaning supplies. She just purchased them, in fact, and she’s going to need all of them if the mess between her legs is any indication. She’s quickly losing control, fucking against him as hard as she can.

Skin slaps together, sweat pours off them both, and he nuzzles his face into her shirt. If they had more time, she’d take it off for him—maybe she’ll wear pasties next time just to blow his mind—but they’re careening toward a climax faster than she knows how to handle. She’s desperate for more friction, so eager that she rubs herself as his thrusts stutter and falter.

“I gotta pull out. I’m gonna— shit!”

He yanks free, and she catches the sight of him before her eyes roll back in her head. His skin is pink and glistening with moisture from her body. The first splash of his climax hits warm and wet on her leg, and she arches her back as waves roll through her. Her hand cramps as she contorts it. Her hips buck, and then she’s reaching for him. She clings as her body tenses and releases repeatedly.

When it’s over, she huffs several breaths before blinking open her eyes. Her t-shirt hem has fallen against her thigh, and it’s marked with his ejaculate, as is most of her thigh and stomach. He pants into her ear, but he doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to let her go. That’s fine with her, although it surprises her how affectionate he’s being in the aftermath of a quickie in her kitchen.

“Katniss, that was—”

“Something we need to do again.”

“I think it gives new meaning to the phrase ‘welcome wagon.’”

“Because you want me to ride you next time?”

“Next time?” His eyes are blown wide, his pupils dilated as he realizes what she’s saying. “You want there to be a next time?”

“I’m not sure I want this one to be over.”

Peeta 

“You got a girl, Peet?” Darius asks from his usual spot beside me in the mess hall.  

“No.”  I smile a little and shake my head.     

“Why not?  Every woman loves a man in uniform, right?” 

I glance down at my snow-white fatigues, then to my helmet beside me on the bench.  “Not around here, D.”  I don’t say it with bitterness, just matter-of-factly.   

Darius slaps me on the back.  “Hey, they may act like they hate us, but it’s only because we enforce the law.  They don’t like it, but they respect us for it.” 

I’m not so sure about that.  I think my good friend is a little deluded.  

I’ve been a Peacekeeper for going-on-three years now, stationed in good ole’ District 12.  I got into it to protect the people and keep them safe, and of course, to keep the peace, but more often than not, it seems like I’m just ordering them around.  Or worse.

And now, with the riots happening and the new commander, Commander Thread, in place, the district only seems to be deteriorating further.  The residents are frequently whipped in the square, for one.  I’ve never had to do it, thankfully, but I know others who have.  Even stricter rules are being enforced, tariffs and quotas on every little thing, and we’ve shut down their Hob.  The people, at least those from the Seam, have even started moving out of town, into the woods, forming their own little community of sorts.  We break them up and force them back sometimes, peacefully as we can.  

I hope to God they don’t reinstitute hangings.  

I don’t like the way things are, but I can’t leave.  I’m sworn in.  I belong to Snow and his Peacekeeper organization.  I’m literally branded.  Still, I refuse to be a piece in whatever game he’s playing.  And I’m guessing I’m still hoping I can make a difference, somehow.  

Darius talks about women a lot, wanting to fall in love, get married.  As for me, I’ve never really considered marriage.  I was always married to the job.  After the way I grew up, I was so glad to have an important job, something that mattered, but more and more, my thinking’s been changing… 

***

The first time I see her, she’s standing calf-deep in the lake.  She’s wearing a green, threadbare slip of a dress, and her long, dark hair is braided down her back.  Her skin is a flawless olive, shimmering in the sunlight.  She bends down and digs up some sort of plant growing on top of the water; it has white flowers, green leaves, and long roots with tubers hanging from it.  The bottom of her dress, her legs, and now her hands are covered in mud, but she just looks down at the plant, and she smiles.

As for me, I’m frozen, staring hard with probably the goofiest grin on my face.  She’s just so…ethereal.  I definitely need to paint her later, at least get a quick sketch down before I forget what she looks like.  Nah, I’ll never forget.  She’s too unique.  Too…mesmerizing.  

Her ears seem to prick, and she catches sight of me.  And although it’s hard to tell from this distance, I swear her eyes are silver.  Stupid and enraptured as I am, I wave.  She merely tugs up the strap of her dress, which has slipped a little, and stares at me.  

My god, she’s stunning.  

Who is she?  This silver-eyed, braided vision before me.  Is she real, or some kind of earth goddess?  Hell, I might consider marriage, if I could be married to her. 

Wait, what am I saying?  She’s a local.  Most likely a Seam girl.  We’re from two different worlds; it’d never work.  Mainly because she probably hates my guts.       

***

A couple weeks later, there’s a ruckus just outside of town that I’m called to, a small dispute of sorts.  When I get there, three of our guys are surrounding a local man and…the girl from the lake!  I rush over. 

“What’s going on?” I ask.  

Right away, I’m told by my superior officer to fall in line.  Darius is there, too.  He quietly explains the situation while we look on from a few feet away.  

“She’s been hoarding goat’s milk rather than turning in her quota!” exclaims the man, spitting a little when he says it.  He must have been the one who turned her in.  

For crying out loud.  I groan.  All this over a little goat’s milk.  

“You’re just hoping they take Lady away from us, so you can have her back free of charge!” the girl from the lake growls.  

I don’t know what comes over me, but all of a sudden, I’m stepping up to stand between the girl and her goat and the rest of the men. 

“Let the girl keep her goat,” I demand.  

“Peeta, what are you doing?” asks Darius, concerned.  

“Just…go on, D.  I got this.” 

“Look, there’s no use crying over spilled goat’s milk.”  I joke. Darius turns to me, and I can tell the face he’s making beneath his helmet.  

“What the hell are you babbling about?” my superior officer snarls.   

I don’t even know.  Really I’m just trying to distract him and get him to forget about the girl and let her go.  I’ll persuade my superior, and the local man, because that’s what I’m good at.

But that doesn’t happen.  Things get out of hand when the girl tries to sneak off with her goat while we’re talking, and all but Darius and me point guns at her.  I lose my cool and shove the two guns away from her.  “Hey!  Back off!" 

… 

***

“Where’s Lady?” the girl from the lake demands. 

“Who?”

“The goat.  My goat, dammit!” She starts rapidly firing off words in a native tongue, probably cursing me out.  “She’s my sister’s goat!  She was a gift; she’s important, and I need her!” 

“Okay, okay, calm down.  I saved the goat.  Sent it back to the village with my most trusted friend.” 

“Oh.  Okay.  Well, thanks.”

“You’re welcome.  Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to escort you back home.” 

She eyes me skeptically. 

“I haven’t been ordered to or anything.  It’s just, you took quite a blow, and I want to make sure you’re okay.” 

She studies me a moment; then, apparently, she decides she believes me because she nods.

I smile.  “So, you’ll allow it?” 

“I’ll allow it." 

***

I wake up in a cave, not knowing how I came to be here.  All I remember is the riot getting out of hand, me taking off my helmet and something bashing me in the back of the head, and…the girl!

I turn to my right with a groan, and I see her beside me. 

I try to sit up, but she tells me to lie back down.  It’s just as well, for the entire cave is spinning.  She takes a cloth out of a small, brown bowl of water, rings it out, and places it on my forehead, partially obscuring my eyes.  I move it so I can see her better.  

I moan a little when the pain hits.  

“Shh, you’re alright. Just a nasty gash.  But you’ll live.  I’m sorry that I’m not a healer, but my mother is, and I’ve picked up a thing or two.” 

“You.  What’s your name?” I need to know.  

“Katniss.” 

“Oh.  Pretty name.  What does it mean?” 

She seems amused by this, probably thinks I’m off my head from delirium. 

“It’s a plant.  An edible water plant with white flowers and tubers.” 

“Oh, like the ones you dug up from the lake that one time?” 

Shit.  Now she knows it was me watching her.  

“Yeah, like those ones.”  Her pretty lips upturn slightly.  

I study her a moment.  “Uh, so I assume you knew I was watching you the whole time.” 

“Yeah, I knew.  I have…heightened senses, let’s just say.” 

I nod.  “And how did you know it was me back there?" 

“I saw your tattoo,” she replies plainly, “and your face.” 

“You know about my tattoo?”  I quirk a brow.  

“Yeah.  It means you’re a Peacekeeper, right?”   

I nod. 

"Why are you doing this, then?” I murmur.  

She presses her lips into a thin smile and says, “Because you helped me once.” 

***

“If you’re gonna blend in and be one of us, Peeta, you have to pass the initiation,” says Katniss.   

“Oh yeah?”  I cock my head to the side.  At this point, I’m ready for anything.  “And what’s that?” 

She grins.  “Milk Lady.” 

Except that. 

Katniss is screwing with me, surely.  She wants me to milk a goat?  No way.  I can’t milk a goat.  And yet, I also can’t resist those eyes or that sexy little smirk-smile of hers, so I poke out my chest and clap my hands together.  “Alright, lead the way.” 

“Really?”

"Absolutely. Lady is practically famous.  I’m ready to get up close and personal with her.” 

Katniss laughs so hard she snorts.  “Um, I think maybe you’re not quite healed from that head injury.” She raises her hand to touch the spot, stopping just short.  I catch her wrist and place it on the side of my face, and I hear her breath hitch. 

Katniss strode down the familiar halls of D12 to her office, her father’s old, brown, leather satchel slung across her shoulder and a single muffin in hand, which she’d bought from this nearby bakery she’d decided to try out.  She wore a black boatneck tank beneath a long, ribbed green cardigan (left unbuttoned), black dress pants, and belt.  

At 30, Katniss was the youngest principal in the history of D12 and one of only two female principals.  Her female predecessor, two principals ago, Ms. Lucy Gray Baird had been an inspiration to all, and though Katniss never met her, she felt her influence everyday.  For one, her eye always caught Principal Gray Baird’s picture on the wall‒her dark, curly hair pulled up in a bun, makeup on her face, and smiling.  And two, she’d heard Lucy Gray Baird could sing like a bird and likewise led students to frequently place in All-District (or higher) choral competitions as Katniss had done when she was a teacher.  

But Katniss didn’t participate in those things anymore.  And as for Ms. Gray Baird, well, some said she was alive, but no one knew exactly where she’d flown off to after she retired.  Whether she was off somewhere living peacefully, or dead, strangely, Katniss felt as though her spirit roamed these hallways‒and Katniss was not a supernatural or superstitious kind of person.  

Two years ago, Katniss was offered the principal position.  It was a great honor, and although she hated leaving her teaching position, she couldn’t decline it.  Since she’d become principal, Katniss had implemented some good changes, so she thought, and she truly hoped her father would be proud of her.  

Katniss prided herself on being authoritative, firm but fair, and decisive.  She trusted her gut instincts when making decisions in work and in her personal life, and normally, she made good ones.  Last night, however, was not the best decision of her life, and she’d already caught some heat for it this morning.  But, to quote one of her favorite authors:  ‘[Today] is a new day with no mistakes in it…yet.’ 

Once settled into her office, Katniss brought up her email and her schedule.  She was to meet with the new teacher in only ten minutes.  It didn’t leave her much time; she could either quickly send out a few emails that needed to be sent and scarf down her muffin or save the muffin for after the meeting and deal with the hunger gnawing at her insides. 

Fortunately, Katniss was something of an expert on hunger‒not life-threatening hunger, but she knew what it was like to do without and forego her urges.  Again, not last night.  Last night seemed to be the exception to all rules pertaining to Katniss Everdeen.  What she had experienced last night was similar to what she was feeling now, albeit entirely different‒last night’s hunger had nothing to do with food. 

With a sigh, Katniss dug into her temples.  This was neither the time nor place to be thinking about last night’s escapade, but she couldn’t seem to help it.  As her hang‒headache wore off, more details kept coming back to her, and she felt herself reclining back in her chair a moment.  There was nothing wrong with a little daydreaming, a quick fantasy, although work was not the best place for it; but perhaps, it would sustain her throughout the day.  Resist.  She squeezed her eyes shut, commanding her hippocampus to shut down its function, gripped the arms of her chair, and leaned forward resolutely. 

As she attempted once more to focus on her work, that other type of hunger, actual hunger, pricked at her, urging her to take a big bite of the muffin. 

Great.  In a matter of seconds, she’d thought about the very two things she’d vowed not to‒the muffin and last night.

Satisfy it. 

At least the former.   

Hoping to satiate her stomach, Katniss reached out with pinched forefinger and thumb, thinking she’d just tear a little off the top, but then…no.  She didn’t trust her urges lately, even if last night had been incredible.  She needed to learn, or re-learn, how to control them, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant.  So, she ignored the muffin.  This would be an exercise in self-control.

She returned to the e-mails. 

Not long after, her assistant chimed in over the phone’s intercom, “Miss Everdeen, Mr. Mellark is here.” 

Pressing the button, she talked into the speaker, “Thank you.  Send him in.” 

When the broad, blond man stepped through the doorway of her office, Katniss felt all the blood drain from her body.  Her eyes widened, and her mouth, all of a sudden drier than cotton, dropped open.  Realization dawned on his face, too, his pale eyebrows shooting up and his body going stiff.  Much like hers.  Katniss felt as though she had a ramrod stuck up the back of her shirt for as straight as she was sitting up.   

Oh no, not him.  

But it was him, the man from last night, the man she took home with her after a chance encounter at a bar.  In a flash, those memories her brain had been sorting out, which she’d so deliberately been trying to subdue, came rushing back at her, assaulting her.  And the night’s events unfurled before her eyes in a montage of flirty conversation, sexy looks, sensual touches, lingering kisses, and...sex, incredible sex. 

Katniss felt pinpricks stabbing her all throughout her chest; she could barely breathe.  Inhaling and exhaling, slow and steady, she placed a hand over her rapidly beating heart, urging it to calm down, as if that would do a thing; then, she fumbled for the water bottle in her bag.  She located it and took a quick swig, kind of wishing it was alcohol‒although, look at the mess that got her in…

“Are you alright?” he gently asked.  She glanced back up at him. 

On second look, yeah, it was definitely him, the very same blond man she’d had in her bed less than 3 hours ago.  What was his name…?  It started with a P…something to do with bread…  Shit.  She couldn’t even remember his name! 

But it was even worse than that.  Not only did she sleep with a man who was now her employee, but he was six years younger than her!  

Oh God, was this going to be her legacy now?  Screwing the younger teachers?  She could just imagine the whispers and the looks she’d get, what the parents and her colleagues would say if they found out…  

As for him, he didn’t seem wholly un-phased, although he looked calmer than her.  He was just standing there watching her, his cheeks slightly ruddy and his hands tucked sheepishly into his pockets.  

“F-fine,” she choked out.  But she wasn’t.  This situation was anything but fine.  And what kept reverberating in her head was:  ‘How could I have been so stupid?’  It was stupid enough to get intimately involved with a guy she just met, one much too young for her, while intoxicated, but for him to be a teacher at her school…!  Okay, so she didn’t know that then.

Pushing aside her ignorance over who he was…but yes, there was that.  She really should have known.  Upon recollection, he’d said he was a teacher; he’d even told her that tomorrow was his first day and he had an early morning meeting with the principal of his new school‒there were only a few schools in this area…  She should have pieced it together, or at least, been more cognizant of the warning signs.  

Why had she done it?  Well, all she could really say was that she’d wanted to lose herself last night.  And it had been nice, more than nice.  Last night, she’d realized how starved she’d been for human affection.  For touch.  Closeness.  Had it really been so long?  Or, maybe it was his specific touch she’d been craving?  No, that was foolish. What kind of useless drivel was her mind formulating now?  This is what she was reduced to when she was hungry.  

But how could she have even entertained the notion in the first place?  How did it even begin? Oh yeah, she remembered now…she’d been in a shitty mood, had a bit too much to drink, and he was hot.

Thinking back, Katniss recalled their eyes locking across the bar, and she’d done a double-take, then a triple-take, then a slow observation up and down his body, what wasn’t blocked by the bar, anyway.  She’d planned on leaving it at that, as a look-but-no-touch kind of scenario, because this guy was clearly younger than her, and frankly, she just wasn’t in the mood.  Or, so she thought.  But he had other plans…

Katniss watched him stand from his seat, take his drink and napkin, and approach her.  She swallowed down the lump in her throat at the enticing sight of his lower half which had been previously hidden from sight.    

“Is this seat taken?” he asked.  Polite or cliché line, whichever the case, she didn’t have any fight left in her today, so she merely shrugged.  He was good-looking, and he smelled nice, like a masculine aftershave (a rain-soaked wood perhaps) and strangely, also like cinnamon and dill.

‘Okay, this is fine, so long as he isn’t a talker…' 

He was a talker. 

But Katniss rather enjoyed the velvety sound of his voice, and he seemed nice enough.  He was clearly working subtle flirtations in, and though she appreciated the ego boost, it was best to cut it off before he put in too much effort.  

She was direct, so she went with a blunt tack.  

Katniss sighed, exaggerating her annoyance with him.  “Go away, little boy. Go home to your mother.  I’m sure it’s way past your bedtime.“  This young guy was hot and obviously interested, which was flattering, but she was in such a shitty mood that she didn’t even care if he thought her a bitch. 

"Ouch.”  He grimaced yet seemed undeterred.  Boldly resting his hand on her arm and leaning in to where his lips barely brushed the shell of her ear, he whispered, "I promise there’s nothing little about me." 

Katniss couldn’t help it; she burst out laughing.  "Really?  Is that the line you’re choosing to go with?”

Still, he didn’t seem discouraged.  “I admit it’s not my wittiest remark, but I get better with time."  He shot her a little wink.  

Cheeky kid.  

"How old are you?” she asked.  

“24." 

"I was right, just a child.”

“Last time I checked, the age of legal adulthood was 18." 

Katniss scoffed. "What are you, a lawyer?"  Not her wittiest remark, either.  

"No, a teacher.”

Huh. Small world.  

If only she knew then how very small, indeed…  

“So, how old are you?” He rested his chin on his knuckle, making him look even more boyish.  She couldn’t deny he was cute.  

“You’re not supposed to ask a lady that,” scoffed she.  

"Alright, then how about I guess?"  She rolled her eyes as he went off in his head.  "Mmm…27?”

“You’re sweet, junior.”

“Thanks, but I prefer ’Peeta.’"  He stuck out his hand, and reluctantly, she offered hers.  

"Katniss.”

“Katniss,” he repeated, tasting her name on his lips like it was a fine wine or something.

This guy was good.  He’d kept her talking and gotten her to introduce herself.  He hung onto her hand, placing his other atop their clasped ones, trapping hers there.

“Well, Katniss, so you’re older than me."  He shrugged.  "You look young, and it doesn’t really matter to me, anyway."  

"Why not?”

“Because you’re beautiful.  I’d know; I have an eye for beauty."  He flashed her a perfect smile.  "Why don’t you let me buy you a drink?  It seems like you’ve had a rough day, and I could use one, too.  No harm in having one together, right?” 

She eyed him suspiciously. 

“Look, I’m not planning on getting sloshed; I’m just a little nervous about my first day of work tomorrow, so I could use a little something.  Keep me company?  I promise you’ll barely have to put up with me at all.”

Smiling faintly, Katniss nodded. 

Yes, he was very good.  Persuasive.  Incredibly persuasive.  He’d persuade her of a whole lot more that night…

Even knowing where it was inevitably leading, they’d taken their time at the bar, chatting about a little bit of everything but nothing really.  Peeta (that was his name) kept touching her in a manner that was just enough to get her engines revving but not enough to make her uncomfortable.  

And Katniss had thought, why not?  Why not give herself a little treat?  She made it sound like she’d gone for an ice cream at Dairy Queen rather than dragged a young, hot guy she just met home, but at the time, it hadn’t mattered.  She’d impulsively decided to live a little, for once.

And he was good, so very good. 

They’d barely made it in the door before they were tearing at each other’s clothing, lips roaming, bodies pressed up against each other.  They’d slammed into a couple of surfaces before he picked her up and she wrapped her legs around his waist.  He’d carried her off to her bedroom, which took her a moment to remember where it was.  He’d covered her body with his, propping himself up slightly, and she’d ground her hips up and into him while he teased her center and tasted her tongue, then her breasts, then moved lower. 

He’d eaten her out, and after, he’d pressed her up against her headboard; she’d had to grip it tight and hold on for the ride as he swiftly entered her from behind.  Then, when he was ready, he’d flipped her over onto the bed and slipped inside her again, lacing his hands with hers and thrusting strong and steady until she reached completion a third time.

By the end of the night, they were sweaty and spent, and she was a little hoarse. 

But she recalled how it wasn’t all fast and rough.  He’d also been tender with her, brushing the hair out of her face, peppering her face with little kisses, and whispering sweet nothings into her ear while he spooned her.  

But all that fun was over.  Now, it had come back to bite her in the ass. 

First off, Katniss had woken feeling disoriented, and a bit sore.  When she remembered (the gist of) what had happened, she’d been mortified, but at least the mystery guy with the odd name had had enough sense to be gone when she got up.  

Good, she’d thought.  Saved her the embarrassing conversation of having to kick him out.  

At the time, it had seemed like a better idea to go to her place than his.  He would know where she lived, yes, but if he tried to murder or harass her, that’s where her neighbor came in. 

Her cranky old neighbor, Haymitch, was a cop, when he wasn’t drunk, that is.  Katniss imagined him to be like one of those rogue cops in the movies and TV series, who wasn’t afraid to pop a cap into someone who deserved it when the criminal justice system failed.  And for some strange reason, he’d taken a shining to her.  Most of the time they mutually despised one another, but occasionally, it was as if he flipped a switch and decided to be pleasant, and he could even be protective of her.  He’d hollered and acted crazy once to get rid of a guy for her, even pulled his badge on another crazy boyfriend.  And if all that didn’t work, at least she had a weapon under her bed.  

Speaking of crotchety, old Haymitch Abernathy, she’d passed him in the hall while he was stumbling out of his door for this morning’s paper, and he’d accosted her…   

“Ya really shouldn’t be dragging strange men home from bars, sweetheart.  S’not safe.” 

“Didn’t know you cared, Haymitch,” she said dryly, folding her arms.  Although, she did.  He was a textbook type, putting on a tough façade, acting as if he didn’t care about anything or anyone when actually he cared a lot.  

“Sure,” he shrugged, “you’re like the daughter I never had‒and never wanted.”  He added the last part with a slight curl of the lips.  

“Gee, thanks, Haymitch.” 

“No problem.”  He scratched the back of his head and cleared his throat.  “So, I take it this one was okay?” 

Katniss rolled her eyes.  “Yeah, he was okay.”  More than okay…  “He even left without me having to tell him to.”  She tapped her fingers against her arm.   

“Ah, a smart one.  However, I do have a complaint.  Y’all made quite the racket last night!” 

“Haymitch, god!” Katniss groaned.  She pressed her fingers into her temple.  They did; they really did‒she was surprised they hadn’t broken her bed‒and she was trying hard not to smile about it.  Not in front of Haymitch.  “Please, please do not talk like an overprotective parent one minute then comment on my sex life the next.”  

“Then keep it down, why don’t ya?!” 

God.  Well, now he knew about her one-night stand.  Oh well.  Not like he’d say anything to anyone, and he was the least of her worries.

Back to the matter, and the man, at hand.

Peeta Mellark, the new teacher, stood in the middle of her office as if he didn’t dare come closer without permission.  He was dressed in an orange and white striped button-down dress shirt tucked into navy pants, and he wore a navy tie.  His ashy blond hair was gelled and slightly coiffed.  

He looked good. 

He’d looked good last night, too, more casual, dressed in a slightly form-fitting baby blue Henley and jeans, and his hair had fallen in waves across his forehead.  Last night, he’d been cute and hot and fun; today, he was handsome and distinguished, and he’d suddenly aged five years.  Katniss couldn’t decide which look she liked better on him.  Both were attractive in their own right…but no, she absolutely should not be focusing on his looks right now, or ever. 

Composing herself, she finally beckoned for him.  “Mr. Mellark.  Have a seat.” 

He sat down, threaded his fingers together, and gave her a tentative smile. 

Well, he certainly was much less confident today.  Not that she could blame him; she was rather a jumble herself.  She supposed she’d better address the elephant in the room.  

She sucked in a breath and swallowed the lump in her throat before proceeding.   

“Sorry, I, uh, didn’t realize it was you.  I couldn’t remember your name at first.” 

Good one, Katniss.  

“Ouch.”  He gave a little chuckle.  “Well, I remember everything about you, Katniss.  Like, you have one sister; your favorite color is green; you love to get out into nature and go hunting, and you’re obsessed with hot chocolate and love to dip your bread in it.”  

Well, they had covered some informational ground last night, hadn’t they?

His sexy grin returned, and just like that, the ice was broken, and he was the same cheeky, charming, albeit slightly smart-mouthed man she remembered from last night.  

“Are you trying to be romantic or piss me off?” she blurted out.  

“Neither.  Just saying…” 

“By the way, you should address me as Ms. Everdeen or Principal Everdeen.  And we’re in a meeting.”   

“Excuse my informality, Ms. Everdeen,” he stressed her name.  How was it he could sound both contrite and like a smart ass at the same time?  “I suppose it is much more appropriate if I call you that here.” 

What was he inferring?  That he might address her differently elsewhere?  That they might actually associate with one another outside of school ever again?  Their night together had been fun, amazing, really, but that was over.  Even if she wanted to see him again, it was now forbidden… 

Damn it all if thinking of it as ‘forbidden’ wasn’t getting her all hot and bothered.  She squeezed her legs beneath her desk, digging her nails into the arms of her chair to ground herself.  

She inhaled and slowly exhaled.  “Yes, it is.  Thank you, Peet-Mr. Mellark.”  

Katniss still couldn’t understand what in hell was the matter with her.  And how had she not put two and two together last night?  She supposed it was because she hadn’t been on the hiring committee when he was hired; she’d only seen him as Mr. Mellark on paper.  And they’d only exchanged first names last night. 

Plus, she’d been stupid and horny.    

“By the way, how’d you sleep, Ms. Everdeen?”  Peeta gave her that sassy little smirk of his.  

She scowled at him.  “Never you mind how I slept.”  

Peeta chuckled.  

He was on dangerous ground.  If he kept laughing at her, he was gonna get his cute, tight little ass fired.  But then again, she couldn’t really do that.  She had no legitimate reason to fire him.  Sexual harassment, maybe, but she certainly couldn’t not claim that without coming clean about what happened between them.  

“You know, I wanted to greet you properly this morning, but I had to get going.  So sorry to just leave a note.” 

Yes, she recalled his note.  It was…a little sappy for her taste, but sweet.  

Katniss sighed and rubbed the back of her neck.  All of a sudden, her shoulders felt tenser than ever and that small twinge from before had become a gigantic pain.  

“Did you injure yourself?” He wasn’t laughing or smiling this time; he seemed genuinely concerned.    

“No,” she snipped.  She had, but she wasn’t going to admit it to him.  She certainly wasn’t going to tell this young, twenty-something that she’d pulled a muscle having sex with him.  How humiliating that would be.  Granted, it was probably made worse from sleeping on it the way she did, but the initial pull came from the sex.  It made her feel much older than she was, and he seemed just fine.  Bodies truly didn’t seem to function the same in the thirties as in the twenties; it was like an invisible line was crossed.  “It’s nothing,” she told him.  “Just a crick.”  

“Oh, I’m sorry.”  He paused.  “You know, there’s a remedy for that.” 

“Oh yeah?” She eyed him suspiciously, waiting for the inevitable pick-up line‒an offer to massage it for her or something.  And dammit, she was getting turned on again!  

“Heat,” said Peeta.   

Oh.  She internally berated herself for her lusty thoughts.  What was worse was that now she couldn’t get the image of him massaging her out of her head.  

“There is also massage, of course.”  He flashed her that brilliant smile of his. 

Damn mind reader!  

With a sigh, Katniss drummed her fingers several times on her desk.  Okay, this would be fine.  It was over and done with, and they could begin a new, professional relationship‒so long as he got it through his head that this wasn’t fun and games.  

“Okay, let’s get something straight, Mr. Mellark.  This can’t happen.” 

“What can’t?” 

“This.”  She motioned between them.  “You…and me, whatever.  Not again.” 

“Oh, so we are going to talk about it,” said Peeta, crossing one leg over the other.  

“I think we need to.  Because this…I don’t know…this flirtatious talk and those smiles of yours can’t continue.” 

“I can’t smile at you?”  Peeta’s brow furrowed, and he placed a hand on his chest. 

“Not like that, no.” 

“I was just being friendly, Miss Everdeen.” 

“No, you weren’t.  You know what you were doing; you…nevermind.”  She placed both hands on her temples and rubbed.  Once she’d dug in really good, she covered her face with one hand, dropping the other to her desk.  Suddenly, she felt his large, warm hand cover hers.  

When she looked up, Peeta was leaning forward.  Her gaze flickered between his bright blue eyes and his hand covering hers.    

“I’m sorry to cause you stress.  I promise I won’t make things difficult for you.” 

“Thank you.”  Katniss’s words came out with a gust of breath.  “I appreciate that, Mr. Mellark.  Thank you for being mature about this.” 

“Uh, yeah, no problem.”  Peeta removed his hand and used it to scratch the stubble on his chin.  She couldn’t help drifting back to the way that stubble had felt against her inner thighs…  

“I mean, what happened was a complete coincidence,” he continued.  “No reason it should affect our positions here.”  He dropped his hands to his lap and folded them.

“Right.  So, then…”  She perused his file.  Thank God she was a speed-reader because she hadn’t had the opportunity to learn about him in a professional capacity, as she should have been doing, last night.  “I see you have your Master’s in Elementary Education.  And hm, seems you come highly recommended.” 

Peeta’s hand had raised to partially cover his mouth, and she thought she caught the slight upturn of his lip.  Was he laughing at her struggle to keep her composure, or…She swore if it was because she’d said ‘come’ she was going to reach across her desk and slap him, consequences be damned!  He said he would be professional! 

But really, what did she expect?  He was young and most likely, immature, and she had just banged him last night.  He probably wasn’t taking her seriously right now, at all. 

“What?” she snipped. 

“Nothing.” 

Peeta was eyeing her muffin now.  Did he really have such a short attention span?  How did he ever make it through school, let alone become a teacher?    

“I hope you enjoy the muffin,” he commented.   

“Thanks.”  What a strange segue.  

“You know, I was going to make you breakfast this morning, but since it was your place, I didn’t want to overstep my bounds by rummaging around in your kitchen.”

How thoughtful.  But overstep his bounds?  Well, they were both so far out of bounds last night that the boundaries weren’t even visible.  

“Plus, I had to leave early for this meeting with you, which I didn’t know was with you, since you never gave me your last name last night, and I was only told I would be meeting with Principal Everdeen.”  He gave a sardonic little laugh.  “What are the odds?” 

“Glad you find this so damn funny, Mr. Mellark.” 

“Not funny ha-ha, just kind of ironic.  Not great literature-ironic or anything, but interesting.” 

Katniss huffed.  “Mr. Mellark,” she chided.   

“I know I’m supposed to address you by your title, but you can call me Peeta if you want.” 

“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” 

“Well, then I suppose suggesting a rain check on breakfast would be a bad idea?” 

“Yes, it definitely would.” 

Peeta nodded.  “Well, at least you have the muffin. Do me a favor and tell me how you like it.”

“Alright…"  She sighed.  How odd.  Then again, Peeta didn’t seem like the typical guy. He’d made a lot of…quirky remarks last night.  “But let me remind you, this is a professional meeting.” 

“Of course.”  

Before she could go on, Peeta interrupted.  

“But you have to admit, it is a bit ironic, isn’t it?” 

Katniss folded her arms on her desk and dropped her head to rest on them a moment.  “Peeta…,” she began in a warning tone when she raised her head.  

“You’re not at all glad to see me?” 

“No, Peeta.  Sorry, but I’m not.”   At least, not here she wasn’t.  “This is horrible.  It’s not ironic, and it’s not fate, unless you count it as a cruel joke of the universe, if you believe in that sort of thing.” 

At the look on his face, she huffed in exasperation.  “How can you not be as mortified as I am?  It’s worse for me, but how do you feel knowing you fucked your boss the night before your first day of work?” 

“Well, I’m not ashamed like you are, and I can brush it off.”  Apparently, he couldn’t.  “Two people met in a bar; they liked each other; they hooked up; it’s no big deal.” 

“Maybe not for you.  But can’t you see how this changes our whole dynamic?” 

“Only if we let it.”  

Katniss sighed.  He made a good point.  Perhaps he was wiser and more mature than she gave him credit for, even if he wasn’t acting it right now.  Maybe if she started treating him more like a colleague and a man rather than a kid. She certainly saw him as all man last night.     

“Alright.”  Peeta casually folded his hands in his lap.  “What is it you’re concerned with?” 

“I don’t want anyone to know we know each other, let alone that we had a…physical involvement.” 

“Fair enough.”  Peeta nodded.  

“And you’re to always address me by my title, not my first name, and definitely not by any of those little pet names you were spouting last night.” 

Peeta laughed.  “You didn’t like them, huh?  I guess it was a little much; I just get…chatty when I’m turned on.” 

Katniss rolled her eyes.

“Sorry.”  He cleared his throat.  “Anything else?” 

“I also want you to know that what happened last night…that’s not me, or something that I normally do.  Ever.” 

Peeta nodded.  “I didn’t figure you for the type.  And neither am I, if I’m being honest.” 

Katniss pressed her lips together. 

“So, may I ask–and I’m not fishing for a compliment here, but‒what was different about last night?” he asked.  

“Well,” Katniss heaved a sigh. “I was in a crappy mood last night, a really, really crappy mood.  I don’t want to get into it; it’s personal, so let’s just leave it at that.”  She thinned her lips  “I was upset; then there was the alcohol, and you were…”  There.  It was more than that, of course, but she wasn’t going to stoke his ego further, nor add to the inappropriateness of the situation by saying how attracted she was (still is) to him.  Not like it would come as a surprise, given her enthusiasm last night.  “Nice to me.” 

Again, Peeta nodded. “I see.  Well…”  He raised his broad shoulders and paused as if he didn’t know what to say next.  “I hope I made your night better.” 

Katniss couldn’t help it; she snorted.  “Um,” she picked at her nail, grinning slightly.  “You did.  You…definitely did.”  She looked up then, the smile falling away.  “But I meant it when I said we should be professional, so I think this should be the very last this topic is ever brought up.” 

"Anything else?" 

"No, I don’t think so." 

“Okay, then, let me see if I have this straight. You are Ms. Everdeen or Principal Everdeen to me, and I am Mr. Mellark to you. We’ve never met before today, but we have a mutual respect for one another and a purely professional working relationship.” 

“Right.  Very good.” 

“Well, I do have a very high IQ.  It’s in my file, you know.” 

Again, she rolled her eyes.  

She’s not sure why he stands out to her. There’s nothing particularly unique about him. He’s not short or tall or big or small. He’s not drop-dead gorgeous or ugly like a troll. He doesn’t move like an athlete or sparkle with the magic of a performer. He appears normal in every sense of the word, but that doesn’t mean she can’t see how special he really is. At least she thinks he might be—if she had a chance to actually speak to him.

That doesn’t happen, though. She’s too far away when she sees him picking up a loaf of bread, and she can’t seem to move once he’s left her line of sight. She stays frozen in the freezer section (the irony!) for several minutes. Hopefully, everyone else thinks she’s considering her options in breakfast burritos, but she’s actually involved in an out of body experience that follows the young man from the back of the store to the registers, out the door, and into the parking lot where he must load his groceries into his car and drive away. His life is no different, but hers will never be the same.

It has to be because she’s lonely. It’s been a very long time since she’s been in a relationship. In fact, it’s been so long since she’s kissed a man, she kind of wonders if she’s forgotten how to do it. Katniss has never been that popular, but she’s enjoyed her fair share of attention. She tries really hard not to spiral out in the freezer section, but Christ on a cracker! Something about that specimen of manhood has made her question her life’s choices. Why hasn’t she run into him before now? Clearly, she’s been living wrong.

Except, she hasn’t. She’s done absolutely everything she knows to do to be a good person. She supports her little sister and sends money to her mother who needs every speck of help she can get. She has a best friend who’s been by her side since they both lost their fathers when they were barely teenagers. She helps out at a shelter and donates money to the food bank because she knows way too well how hunger can impact a person’s life. In other words, there’s no reason her weekly grocery trip should result in an upheaval to her world. It’s simply not fair, and she plans to file a complaint to who it is that runs fate and destiny. She has a bone to pick.

Somehow, she finds everything on her list and heads to the front of the store. When she gets there, she unloads her groceries and watches as the cashier scans each item. Digging into her wallet, she’s stunned to find she only has a twenty and the total keeps rising. Mortified, she watches as the number climbs to $34.15.

“I don’t have… I mean, can you take off the…”

Trying to figure out what she can live without until her next paycheck, she surveys the food and toiletries. Almost in tears, she stammers for a few seconds before the cashier speaks.

“Don’t worry. Another patron paid it forward. He left a twenty and asked that I use it if anyone needed help. Looks like you could use some.”

“I— I couldn’t. It’s not right.”

“The guy seemed pretty adamant that I only offer it to someone who could use a break. It seems like that could be you today.”

Katniss nodded slowly. “Do you have any idea who it is? I’d like to thank them.”

The cashier shook her head. “Young guy. Stocky, medium height, ashy blonde hair, blue eyes. Very polite. Named Peter, I think. Something like that.”

It’s got to be him. The description’s too similar to be a coincidence. It seems the guy that froze her in place with his looks is as kind and compassionate as he is special. Now, he’s even more intimidating.

She nods her thanks and takes the change and her purchases. The five in her pocket gives her a little joy, but the feeling of not having money still bothers her. Maybe it’s time to get a credit card. She’s been warned off them for so long that she never applied for one, but now, it might be something she should do. Maybe. It makes her nervous to think she could get in financial trouble with it. She’s been poor her entire life. It might be too tempting to resist.

When she makes it back to her apartment, her attempt to unpack her groceries is interrupted frequently by long pauses in which she fantasizes about finding the guy who’s rocked her world and given her daydreams about all the ways she needs to thank him (appropriately and not so much) for the rest of her life. It’s not unrealistic at all. Totally doable, she decides. After all, how hard can it be to find him again? They live in the same town.

****

The answer to that question is that it’s very hard. Difficult isn’t even the word to describe the problem she has in trying to find the Boy With the Bread, which is what she calls him even though he’s definitely an adult. The person she saw from afar was all man if the stretch of his shirt across broad shoulders was any indication. Still, the alliteration makes her smile, so she continues to refer to him as such.

It shouldn’t take so long, but it does. Months pass, and she wonders if she’s made it all up and imagined the creature that changed her life. She keeps her eyes open in public, scans the local news and social media sites, and seriously considers setting up an online dating site just to see if he’s looking for someone. She’s getting desperate, but then fate smiles on her again.

She’s sitting in a coffee shop, something she hardly ever does, when he walks in the door. She doesn’t normally have time for such a mundane, normal activity that other people her age seem to enjoy all the time. She’s usually working during the day, and she has no desire to consume copious amounts of caffeine after 5 pm when she gets off work. Today, though, she has time. She’s taken a half day to run errands and go to the dentist, and she needs the jolt the espresso will give her to survive her reduced shift.

He ducks through the doorway just as she’s taken a sip of her hot beverage, and she almost chokes on the liquid. He shakes the umbrella he’s holding just outside the door and shoves a riot of blonde curls off his forehead that have shrunken up and frizzed from the rain. It’s adorable.

He’s wearing an emerald Henley and faded jeans that hug all the right places. The sight of him freezes her in place, but that doesn’t stop her from tracking him as moves past her. She’s close enough to see his eyes are blue before he marches across the café and approaches a man sitting alone in the corner. They clasp hands and grin at each other, and the vision in green heads to the counter to order.

She’s dumbfounded. Here he is again after so long, and she can’t think of a single thing to say to him or how in the world to actually approach him without making her look absolutely insane. She racks her brain trying to think of an intelligent topic, but she’s jolted from that when the barista walks to the end of the bar and calls a name.

“Peeta! Chai Latte.”

That’s his name, she realizes, and it’s like the sun’s broken through thick, heavy clouds. It’s just unusual enough to fit him and still feel familiar. He smiles at the woman behind the bar and takes the cup from her. He ordered chai, and she files that information away for future reference. He might not like coffee, which seems important.

She’s pondering a trip to the bathroom just so she has an excuse to pass by him when she suddenly understands that he’s leaving. He and his friend are talking as they walk to the door, and she catches the sound of his voice.

“—we can change that, the numbers will—”

His words are swallowed by the rush of traffic outside, but that silky tone she hardly had a chance to listen to has already taken up residence in the part of her brain that creates unrealistic fantasies. She daydreams for longer than she should. In fact, it’s only the vibration of her phone against the table that reminds her she has to get to her job. What a chance encounter, but now she has a name to go with that face.

****

She’s tried to find him again. She’s googled and returned to the coffee shop when she’s had a spare minute or two. She’s asked around and continues to check dating sites. Nothing. She’s found absolutely nothing. Without a last name, she has very little idea how to find out anything else. Frustrated, she goes about her daily life with a weight on her shoulders that shouldn’t be there. He’s a stranger she’s glimpsed only a couple of times.

Frustrated and full of pent-up energy, she joins a gym. There’s nothing quite like working up a good sweat to ease tension and kickstart her brain, so she spends her free time running the track, lifting, and participating in every hot yoga class the establishment offers. After a month, she’s leaner and stronger than ever, but she hasn’t managed to come up with any ideas that might help her find the guy she desperately wants to thank for saving her when she wasn’t sure how she’d eat for a week.

She’s two laps into her normal ten when she glances down from the elevated track and spots a pickup game of three on three basketball on the far court. Three blonde men face off against three with dark hair, one of whom looks remarkably like her best friend Gale Hawthorne, who she hasn’t seen since he left town for a job almost a year ago. As she jogs closer to the court, she realizes it is him teamed up with his brothers. The blonde men look like siblings, too, but she doesn’t spare them much of a glance. She’s got more laps to go, and she doesn’t want to draw any attention to herself. Gale didn’t bother to tell her that he’s in town, and she’s a little miffed by that.

It’s another three passes by the court before it hits her that the blonde men look familiar. She puts on a burst of speed to get back to where she can see the men closeup and almost trips over her own feet when she spies him. It’s the guy. THE guy. The cashier had said Peter, and the barista had called him Peeta. She stops in her tracks and grabs the railing when someone bumps into her from behind.

“Watch it!” he yells as the jogger passes her. “You’re not supposed to stop on the track!”

She dismisses him with a wave and sprints to the nearest stairwell. If she can just catch them… She bounds down the stairs, three at a time, and bursts into a bustling walkway. She dodges and shoves her way free and streaks around the corner to find—

“Catnip! What are you doing here?”

“Gale!” Sweat drips down her forehead and stings her eyes. Cringing, she swipes her hand across her face and tries not to cry. “Where are—? I thought you were playing basketball.”

He throws her a bewildered look and nods like she’s lost it a little. “We were.”

“You’re done?”

“Yeah? We’d been at it for a while. Are you… Have you been watching me?”

Katniss rolls her eyes, although that’s not really very fair. She had noticed him. It’s not like that’s not the case. “Who were you playing with? I saw Vic and Rory, but the blonde guys… Who, er, who were they?”

The expression on his face would be priceless if she weren’t so desperate to find out the information. He looks like he’s swallowed something very, very distasteful, and she tries hard not to snort with laughter.

“Why?”

She takes in his narrowed eyes and realizes she’s going to have to lie to get what she wants. Part of the reason they haven’t been as close since he left town is due to his sudden confessions of feelings toward her. She’d let him down easy, but things have been strained since then. There’s no need to rub that in his face when all she wants is to find out about Peeta. With a straight face and innocent eyes, she explains, “I think one of them door dinged my car a couple of weeks ago. The gym won’t give out membership information, but if you know who they are… Well, I’d be really grateful, Gale.”

He falls for it when she bats her eyelashes at him. She should feel terrible, but all’s fair in love and basketball. Of all people, Gale should want her to be happy, no matter if that means she’s interested in someone else or not. She’s no damsel in distress, unless she can’t pay for her groceries or something. However, her simpering works, and that’s really what she needs.

“Mellark is the last name. They all have bread names. It’s weird.”

She rolls the name around in her head for a bit. Peeta Mellark. It’s a nice solid name, and now she has more information to help her figure out how to find him. Almost giddy with victory, she stretches up on her tiptoes and kisses Gale’s cheek in gratitude. Backing away before he can reciprocate, she hears him as the distance widens between them.

“Do you want to grab dinner sometime? Maybe?”

“Sorry, Gale! Got to go. Really good to see you!”

With that, she turns her back and slips down the hall to the women’s locker room. She doesn’t bother to shower before grabbing her bag and heading to her car. She’s barely closed the door before she’s on her phone and typing in the name Peeta Mellark. She has a thank you to deliver.

****

Surprisingly, it’s not much easier to find him now that she knows his full name. She unveils a lot of information about his family, but not him. Apparently, they own a few local bakeries that she tries out and loves. Still, Peeta’s family is not the same thing as Peeta, who is remarkably absent from social media and with no online presence. She’s willing to admit, she got cocky, and now she can’t figure out how to recover from it.

“Where the hell is he?” she mutters as she comes up empty. Again.

Frustrated, she runs over all the data she’s gathered about him. He’s kind, compassionate, and thoughtful; all of those qualities were on display at the grocery store. He drinks tea and has a very good-looking friend who he talks to about numbers; that she learned at the coffee shop. He’s athletic and has two brothers he likes well enough to exercise with them; that information, and his last name, came from the gym. It should be enough to go on. It’s not.

She’s at home on her couch and paying bills when it suddenly hits her that she may never see this guy again. Peeta Mellark seems to be a figment of her imagination for all the good it’s done to try to find him. That and the small number in her bank account are both so unpleasant that she decides she’s going to have to break down and do something she’s been avoiding and delaying for a very long time. She’s going to have to open a line of credit. She’ll only use it for emergencies, but she can’t rely on the kindness of strangers to bail her out the next time she doesn’t have money for groceries, let alone car maintenance or an unforeseen medical crisis. It’s been months since Peeta saved her, but the humiliation of not being able to take care of herself still hasn’t faded. Before she can change her mind, she grabs her purse and heads to the bank. The time is now.

“Can I help you?” A bubbly blonde teller named Delly asks, and Katniss takes a deep breath to fortify herself.

“I’d like to open a line of credit. Can I talk to someone about that?”

“Sure!” she practically squeals. “Let me just call someone to help you.”

She’s led down the hallway and past a few desks to a small office. Once ushered inside, she sits and raises her eyes to view the person across from her.

“Oh…”

The man before her is stunning—green eyes, bronze hair, a swimmer’s build. It’s the guy’s—Peeta’s—friend, the one he was with at the coffee shop.

“Ms. Everdeen. I’m Finnick Odair. Want some sugar?” he asks and nudges a candy bowl toward her.

“No, I’m fi—.”

“Hey, Finn. Can you— Oh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you were with a customer.”

She jerks at the sound of his voice. Peeta Mellark is standing in the doorway, and her heart is in her throat. She has a sudden flashback of the coffee shop, when the two of them walked past her discussing numbers… Now, it all makes sense. They work at a bank together. Of course they do. Peeta turns to leave, and she calls out.

“Wait! Stay with me.”

She claps her hands over her mouth and wills herself not to blush, but it’s no use. She’s just asked a perfect stranger to stay with her, and her invitation sounds much more intimate than she means it to. He must think she’s insane. Maybe she actually is. She pushes down a sudden urge to flee the situation and escape to the safety of her apartment.

This is out of her wheelhouse. Shy, introverted, and intensely private, Katniss worries the end of her braid and bites her lip. Every instinct she has tells her to run, but the temptation of him before her is too great. Rising, she crosses to him and holds out her hand.

“Hi. My name is Katniss. You saved my life once, and I’ve been on the hunt to find you for months. Thank you.”

Peeta and his friend exchange looks, and she fights the urge to shrivel back into herself. Finally, he looks directly at her and takes her palm in his. With a smile so disarming she nearly faints, he answers.

“Peeta Mellark. It’s nice to meet you.”

The touch of his hand on hers melts her insides. She dreads when she finally has to let go, but maybe she won’t have to. With a shy smile, she cocks out her hip and looks up at him through long lashes. Her flirting may be a disaster, but it’s all she’s got.

“It’s so nice to meet you, too.”

Forlorn, she stares down at her lager, it’s the first moment of quiet she’s had since she entered the pub. Plutarch had been the first to drag her away, talking about everything from what his lunch was like to how much the station was missing her shows. She had only been able to nod and smile, making agreeable noises at the appropriate times, but otherwise letting all of his words wash over her. Finally, after what seemed to be an eternity, Plutarch had bustled off through the crowd to go talk to another unsuspecting colleague. She had tried to crane her neck over the other patrons’ head, to see if she could spot either Johanna or Annie, the only reason she had relented and come to this thing. But before she could make any discernible recognition, Fulvia, Plutarch’s right hand woman, had sidled up behind her, saying that they simply must ‘catch up’. Ever straight to the point though, she had skipped pleasantries and gone right to the heart of the matter. What had she been doing this past year? 

The answer was a pretty simple one, but for some reason that escaped Katniss, it needed lots of explanation. She had spent close to forty-five minutes getting her brain picked apart. Trying, to no avail, to explain to the silly woman the exact reason she had uprooted her and left everything behind to travel all over the globe. Meeting new people, not many, but some. Enough people, Katniss thought. At first, there hadn’t really been a point in it, other than she had to get away from the shit show that was her life. Five years she’d worked at that stupid radio station, blathering on about meaningless things that made her mind fog up with the mundanity of it all. And all she had gotten out of it was a small damp flat in the north of London, with expensive bills and an insufferable landlord. Five years of only seeing her little sister once, twice if she was lucky, a year. Five years of shattered dreams and a dead end job. And still, this woman could not understand why she would want to leave. Of course Katniss never said any of this to Fulvia, but it had been swimming around her head throughout the entirety of the conversation. Instead, she had given watered down reasons and held her tongue as Fulvia had gone on to say, “But what about that boyfriend of yours? I remember him being so supportive…” 

She didn’t want to get into that, how she had left him behind. It had been a year and the wound that it had inflicted still ran too deep, was too painful to get into. Especially with nosy, judgy Fulvia. So, she had politely excused herself from the conversation, taking to the bar and ordering herself an overpriced pint. Fantastic. It wasn’t like she was strapped for cash or anything. 

Having given up on searching for Annie and Johanna at this nightmarish reunion, she had found herself a quiet corner in the buzzing room, sitting on a lumpy sofa and setting her drink down on an aged wooden table that had ring marks on the surface from drinks overspilling. It wasn’t often that she thought about Peeta, having long since trained her mind to immediately turn and run in the other direction if any thoughts began leading her down that painful path. But now, with Fulvia bringing him up, and being surrounded by people who had all been privy to their relationship, it was only inevitable that she should think of him. Specifically, the last time she had seen him.

 —————————–

His face had closed off, completely shuttering all emotions that would otherwise flick across his face. And still, as he stood, staring blankly at her, she continued talking. Trying to explain herself, explain why she just had to leave.

“Please Peeta, believe me when I say it isn’t you,” she whispered, “I just feel so trapped in my own life, and I feel as if I don’t leave now, I never will get anywhere.”

“What about us?” he replied, tone blank and neutral, but still betraying the underlying anger and confusion.

She shook her head sadly, tears falling unbidden from her eyes. Desperately wanting him to hold her and tell her it would be alright, but needing him to stay well away from her so that she could do this. Finish this, clean and precise as Johanna had told her to do it. 

“Right,” Peeta said, voice hollow.

They stood there, silence engulfing the little flat. It was never silent in there, the generators downstairs always humming, her boiler constantly gurgling away, but it seemed even these held their breath, waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

“I think you should leave now,” Katniss said to her feet, not daring to look up at his face. 

She stood in her kitchen, stock still, as if any movement from her would cause her to break and shatter on the linoleum tiles of the floor. She listened as Peeta collected his toothbrush and spare clothes. Katniss flinched at the sense of finality she felt when the door banged shut.

 ————————-

Their break-up had been anything but clean and precise, and it wasn’t a wonder considering that Katniss had been at the helm of it. It was ironic, really, that for five years, her income had depended on her being able to talk for hours about nonsensical things, always upbeat and on the ball for the listeners chiming in, but when it came to her own boyfriend, she hadn’t been able to get the words out right. She had made him think that it was him that was suffocating her, when in actuality it was everything. She was pushing thirty and already she could feel herself stagnating. 

She wished that she could do it again, try not to make such a mess of it as she had done. How could she have known, though, the profound affect it seemed to have had on Peeta? He had always been so supportive of her decisions, only asking that she open up to him and be honest. Of course she hadn’t expected him to be completely OK with her decision, but she had been hoping that he would at least understand her reasoning. Instead, he had been angry and confused, perhaps even rightfully so, before he had completely shut down becoming cold and distant in the moments prior to him slamming out of her little home.

“Penny for your thoughts?” a perky voice said next to her, pulling Katniss out of her reverie. 

Looking up, Katniss couldn’t help but smile at the big brown eyes that were peering down at her. Rue. Her intern from a year ago. She didn’t look much different,  just a little older and worse for wear. But that’s what this job did to you, lured you in with promises of bigger and better ahead, before getting you trapped and very much stuck. 

“You don’t want to know,” Katniss replied, shuffling over and making space for the young woman.

“Oh, and why’s that?” Rue asked, her lips quirked upwards in a smile.

“Neither thinking, nor talking about it will solve a thing,” she mumbled down at her glass before taking a prolonged drink from it. She reveled in the fizz and slightly bitter taste as it washed down her throat. 

“Well, if you’re gonna be all closed off to me, your favourite intern, I’ll let you in on all of my issues to date,” Rue said, taking a sip from her own glass.

Katniss smirked. It was true that Rue was her favourite intern, but that wasn’t exactly a feat. Most interns that Katniss had been given the responsibility of taking care of had been so awful that they were fired within their first two weeks of working at the station. 

“So, remember how you warned me before you left, that this job ‘will suck me dry of all inspiration and motivation’ whilst also ‘dashing my dreams and love for the craft’ but not before ‘restricting what me on what I can talk about, and instead giving me stupid shows that will make me want to die’?” Rue paused, taking a drink from her pint.

“Yes, I do recall telling you all of those things, I assume you’ve come to the conclusion that I was correct and that you should have saved yourself while you could,” Katniss said, trying not to gloat at the fact that she was at least right about something, and it wasn’t just her overreacting and being dramatic.

 Rue nodded her head vigorously, her corkscrew curls bouncing, “Well, I’ll be honest. At the time, I thought you were just being dramatic, or maybe you were bitter about something, but you really were so right. I can’t get anyone to take me seriously or invest in any bigger show ideas, or get them to take on or promote more obscure artists. The sponsors continuously overlook me so that they can pour more money into presenters who have a body to boot. Even though that shouldn’t matter, ‘cause we’re on a fucking radio, nobody is looking at the face or body behind the voice anyway!”

 “And as soon as I try to get Plutarch or Fulvia to give me a recommendation so that I can move to something a little more low key and less industrious, they tell me that I shouldn’t leave, that I have so much potential, and that it would be such a waste for me to go do something less mainstream, because how will I ever be recognised then?” Rue finished with a defeated groan, flopping back against the leather cushions. 

Looking up at the ceiling, Rue asked, “How’d you get out? I mean for me, it’s just an endless cycle of early mornings, playing music that makes my ears bleed, and frustration that after all my hard work, I’ve just become another peppy girl on the radio.”

Katniss snorted at this, “Depressing, isn’t it? After all the analysing of different styles of music and poetry, it amounted to this.”

“Fuucckk,” Rue groaned at the ceiling fans, “It’s depressing because it’s so painfully true. Do you know how many hours I spent holed up in my room studying for my Music and English A-Levels just so I could at least get a seven, and now I’m stuck here.”

Katniss nodded her head, “Only ‘cause I did the same thing though. What were we thinking?”

“Ugh, I know! My mum told me that this was an ‘unsustainable career path’. I hate to say it, but I think she may have had a point.”

A crash came from the other side of the room, effectively interrupting their mutual venting session, a clattering of glasses fell to the floor and shattered, causing both Katniss and Rue to jump before turning around to see what happened. A flustered waiter apologised profusely to a skimpy blonde who looked upon him with narrowed green eyes, and a stain that looked an awful lot like red wine spilled on her yellow dress. The few people who had been applauding the waiters slip up began to slow their claps when they realised that the unfortunate woman who now had a stain across the front of her dress, was not taking it on the chin as it were. In fact, she looked like she was a few seconds from throwing a fit.

“Oof, would not want to be that guy,” Rue remarked, “Glimmer looks about ready to go get his ass fired.”

Katniss turned to look at Rue, who was leaning her chin on the back of the sofa, “How’d you know her name?”

Rue made a face, “She’s a presenter at the radio station, she does the show that Annie used to do.” 

“Shit, really,” Katniss said, blowing air through her teeth to make a low whistling sound. “That show was one of the more popular ones.”

“Still is. Rumour has it that the company hired her to replace Annie, who was making noises to leave, so they sent her Glimmer as an intern. Annie left a week later, claiming that the work environment had become insufferable.”

Katniss had turned back to watch as the waiter bent to pick up the broken glass, whilst so-called Glimmer rolled her eyes impatiently at another waiter who was handing her paper towels to try wipe up the mess on her dress. While watching, Katniss listened intently to what Rue was saying, “People weren’t surprised when she quit. Glimmer is quite literally the epitome of a toxic work environment.”

“Oh well, this just makes me all the more glad that I left,” Katniss said. Annie had emailed her when she’d quit, but hadn’t given a reason why. At the time, Katniss had just assumed it was because both Johanna and herself had already left, but this must have been the breaking point for her. 

“Oh, she’s not even the worst of it,” Rue said, a cynical smile touching her lips as they watched another woman with jet black hair and pinched features walk up to Glimmer, she took the paper towels from the waitress and threw them down to the floor, yelling something unintelligible, “That’s Clove. As you can see, she’s got quite a temper on her. She’s the one who replaced Johanna as DJ. The two of them together are quite… formidable.”

Katniss turned in her seat to grab her drink from the table so she could drink and watch this scene unfold in front of her. She would be lying if she said that it wasn’t just a teeny bit entertaining. Taking a sip from her mellowing beer, she almost choked when she saw who was joining the show. Blond ashen curls, broad shoulders, and a slight limp from a rugby injury that had never quite healed. It was Peeta. Her Peeta, consoling this shallow, pitiful, blonde bimbo. 

She could feel Rue’s eyes on her, watching for a reaction. Katniss swallowed painfully, oblivious to the taste, eyes glued to what was happening in front of her very eyes. Maybe it wasn’t him. It couldn’t possibly be him. There was no way, absolutely no fucking way, that the Peeta Mellark that she had known all throughout secondary school, was even remotely affiliated with such a cow. Deep down, Katniss knew that she was possibly being a little harsh, but jealousy, lots of it, was rearing its ugly green head, skewing her opinions.

“Yeah, and then there’s that,” Rue uttered, “reason number fuck knows what as to why I ‘strongly dislike’ Glimmer.”

Katniss breathed deeply, shoving down the irrational, possessive anger that was overcoming her. She cleared her throat, which had become exceptionally tight in the last two minutes, “Are they… an item?”

“I wouldn’t say so,” Rue said, turning around to face the other way again, “as far as I know, they’re just fuck buddies. Who knows, though, maybe he does the wine and dining as well.”

Katniss, following suit, also turned around, sitting stoically, and taking slow sips from her sweating drink. “So he’s fucking her.”

Rue nodded, sighing a little as she did so, “I know it might not be my place to comment-”

“It probably isn’t then,” Katniss interrupted, wanting very much to go back to her hotel room now.

  “But,” Rue continued, “you were really fucking dense to let that man walk away from you. I have no idea what happened between the two of you, but even I can appreciate that ass, and oh my god those shoulders,” she pretended to fan herself, before turning incredulous, “and he’s not even my type.”

Katniss snorted at this, turning around for a quick second, to survey the specimen that was now patting down an incensed Glimmer. She couldn’t deny that he still looked sexy as fuck. He definitely seemed to have fared this year a little better than her. Turning back around, she looked down at what she was wearing. A simple dress that she’d bought from a charity shop when she was sixteen, it was light blue and the material was soft and light, perfect for the humid weather that London summers were, but it did look as if it might be on its last legs. Her hair was loose for once, and hung in ebony waves down her back, but otherwise she hadn’t made much of an effort, as could be seen by her scruffy trainers and mismatched socks. She didn’t need to impress these people anyway. 

“Yeah, stupid indeed,” Katniss muttered. 

They sat there then, silence washing over them, until the unmistakable sound of a speaker system being plugged in echoed throughout the crowded room. Katniss looked up to see her friend climbing up onto the bar, a little wobbly on her feet, but her voice was commanding no less.

“Alrighty, I’ve been asked to do a little set tonight, but because I forgot to set up a good playlist that will please all of you old folk, I’ll be taking requests,” she made to get off the bar, but paused mid-step hollering across the room, “And if I think your song request is shit I won’t play it, feel free to take it personally.”

Katniss didn’t really care much for the offer to request music, she was just relieved to know that Johanna had, in fact, shown up. She had been wondering whether either of her ex-work-colleagues had actually bothered. Knowing that Johanna was here, though where she’d been all night was something Katniss would like to know, meant that Annie was probably here as well. 

Rue, on the other hand, immediately got up. Kissing Katniss on the cheek, she proclaimed, “Oh, I have a song that Jo simply must play.” 

She walked off into the crowd, but abruptly turned back, looking down at Katniss, who was still cocooned in the soft leather of the sofa, “Also, if you get any interesting job offers don’t be scared to recommend me,” with a wink, she waltzed off again.

Alone once again, and trying desperately to distract herself from the ‘pat down’ Peeta was assuredly still giving Glimmer, Katniss gulped down the rest of her pint, before standing to go get another. 

Waiting at the bar for the barmaid to get to her drink, she tapped out a rhythm on the polished wood. Distracted, she almost didn’t notice the familiar opening chords to a song she hadn’t let herself listen to in a year. 

Johanna’s voice sounded over the speaker system, “For all you lovesick idiots here tonight, Don’t Stop Believin’ by Journey.”

Katniss’ breath stilled in her chest, this must have been some sick joke the universe was playing on her. Despite herself, Katniss searched the room for the familiar face that she had once danced to this with at prom. Scanning the crowd, her eyes finally landed on a seemingly just as stunned Peeta Mellark, his face so pale and pinched he looked like he was about to throw up. He, too, looked to be scanning the crowd. He couldn’t know that she was here, could he? She knew  that she should probably shrink back into the shadows, or, better yet, vacate the premises and head back to her hotel room, to avoid any unnecessary drama that she most certainly did not need. Yet, against her better judgement, she stood her ground, not actively looking to be seen, but not hiding from sight either. 

Her eyes stayed on him, noticing with a missed beat of her heart that Glimmer and Clove were both conspicuously absent. The song had already passed the first verse when Peeta’s eyes finally locked on hers. His eyes widened in surprise, but beneath it was still the same warmth and affection that had always been. Her sharp intake of breath told her all she needed to know, those baby blues could still make her knees weak, could still make her feel like she was adrift and untethered in a desolate ocean, with him being the only tether to reality. Their gazes locked on one another as the second verse began;

A singer in a smoky room

The smell of wine and cheap perfume

Peeta’s eyes stared holes into her, and for a moment it was as if no time had passed, as if he was standing on the other side of the school’s assembly hall as an entire year group of nervous sweaty eighteen year olds danced the evening away to overplayed 80’s tracks. Katniss was even greeted with the familiar erratic beating of her heart, wishing and hoping that he’d just bottle up the nerve and ask her already!

That night, she had been the one to walk across the dance floor to ask him to dance, but tonight, it seemed it would be Peeta who would take the first tentative steps towards her.

For a smile they can share the night

It goes on and on, and on, and on

 Drink forgotten, Katniss stepped away from the bar, walking towards the people already congregating to dance on a small open space on the floor. The first chorus sounded through the room;

Strangers, waitin’

Up and down the boulevard

Their shadows

Searchin’ in the night

Streetlights, people

Livin’ just to find emotion

Hidin’ somewhere in the night

They met in the middle, and Katniss looked up at him through her lashes. 

“For old times sake,” Peeta murmured down to her, offering his hand.

She tried not to let his remark sting, that their relationship is in fact in the past. That he had moved on from her, that she should too. But falling into his arms, head resting over his breast bone listening to his heart thumping away, letting him sway them to the music, felt so natural and familiar. The tears stung behind her eyes, and she bit her lip to stop herself from sobbing out loud. She didn’t want to be sad, to mar this song with her regrets, when it was accompanied by so many good and happy memories. Of the two of them messing around in his kitchen, or her bedroom. 

So, she swallowed down her tears, and let herself fall back in time to when things were simpler. Letting the music and words wash over her, rejuvenating her weary soul.

Workin’ hard to get my fill

Everybody wants a thrill

Payin’ anything to roll the dice

Just one more time

Some will win

Some will lose

Some were born to sing the blues

Oh, the movie never ends

It goes on and on, and on, and on

She laughed when he spun her, then recaptured her in his arms. He swooped low, before lifting them back up and spinning them in slow circles. 

Strangers waitin’

Up and down the boulevard

Their shadows

Searchin’ in the night

Streetlights, people

Livin’ just to find emotion

Hidin’ somewhere in the night

She took the lead, moving them faster, along to the tune of the song. Pulling away from his embrace, but holding on to his hands, as she spun herself to lean her back against his chest with his arms crossed protectively over her.

Don’t stop believin’

Hold on to that feelin’

Streetlight, people

Don’t stop, believin’

Hold on

Streetlights, people

As the song began to slow again, and Steve Perry ad-libbed his way through the end of the song, Peeta turned her again so that they were pressed chest to chest. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and their steps became so minuscule they could do it on a pie plate if they wished to do so. She stared up into his bottomless blue eyes, a genuine smile lighting up her face for the first time this evening. 

“I missed you,” he whispered.

Her smile faltered slightly, and she looked down, ashamed at how easily she had let herself fall back into his arms. The moment of magic had ended, and she was thrown back into the icy cold reality of her life. For christ’s sake they hadn’t spoken in a year, and now suddenly they were dancing and laughing on the dance floor!

Don’t stop believin’

Hold on to that feelin’

Streetlight, people 

He turned them one last time. He leant his cheek on the top of her head, sighing quietly as if knowing about the beratement Katniss was giving herself in her head. He swayed them as the song faded out. She pulled away, chancing a glance up at his face. The pain she had inflicted onto him shone through his eyes, and though it killed her to do it, she could only pull further out of his arms, backing away. He watched after her, arms limp at his sides, and she turned, pushing through the crowd.

“Oi, watch it!” Someone called after her as she shoved past people. 

Finally, after stepping on numerous toes and elbowing a few people in the sides, she made it over to the makeshift DJ table. Johanna was leaning against it, chewing on a toothpick as she announced in a lazy drawl the next song. Behind her shoulder she could see Annie leaning heavily into some guy with bronzed curls and tanned skin, Katniss thought that she had seen him before in a couple of Annie’s instagram posts. 

“Ahhh, Brainless,” Johanna called out when she spotted a breathless Katniss standing before the table, “here to make a song request? Maybe another one that you can dance to with lover boy.”

“What the fuck, Jo?” Katniss cried out, “Did you put that song on just to mess with my head? ‘Cause it sure as hell worked.” Katniss ran her shaking hands through her hair, not caring if she messed it up, or if it got tangled. 

Johanna raised her eyebrows in surprise, “Wait, you don’t actually believe I put that song on, do you?”

“Well, who else, Johanna?!” 

“I didn’t even know you were here up until five minutes ago, let alone him!” Johanna spat out, incredulity lacing her voice, “And besides, I’m only taking requests this evening. I did let everyone know,” she sniffed, rolling her eyes.

“Ok fine, if it wasn’t you, then who?” Katniss hissed, “Because I will start throwing arms if I have to, Jo.”

“Jeez, don’t get your knickers all in a twist, it was only a little dancey,” Johanna teased. Looking at Katniss’ bemused face, she relented, “If you promise to not beat the living lights out of her, I’ll tell.”

“‘Kay fine, I promise,” Katniss said, her anger subsiding a little. Whoever it was, it wasn’t their fault that she couldn’t just leave when she definitely should have, “Just tell me who.”

Johanna nodded her head in the direction of the bar, Katniss followed her gaze, eyes greeted with an apologetic looking Rue. Rue grimaced a little, apparently having watched Katniss’ outburst. At least she looked sorry, Katniss thought. 

Her anger having dissipated, the feeling of regret and sadness settled cold and heavy in her stomach. She deflated against the table, feeling very tired all of a sudden, “I need a smoke,” she muttered, “Lighter,” she held out her hand.

Johanna grumbled under her breath, fishing through her pockets for a lighter. “Give it back after,” she warned, slapping it into Katniss’ outstretched palm.

Katniss weaved her way through the crowds once more, being a little more careful to not piss off so many people this time, until she got to the coat rack next to the door. The coat rack itself was leaning over under the weight of all the coats draped over the top of it. After some digging around, Katniss found her light jean jacket and pulled it out from underneath the mountain of others piled up on top of it. Pulling it on, she pushed open the door to the pub and stepped out into the night. 

It looked like the sun had just gone down, streaks of orange fading into the sky as dusk settled over the stinking, sweltering city. It had cooled off quite a bit from earlier, and Katniss huddled herself further into her jacket, trying to leech off any residual warmth from it. She walked down the shallow stone steps,  found herself a place to light her cigarette. Leaning against the cold brick wall behind her, not caring if she got her coat or dress dirty. She fished a loose cigarette out of her coat pocket, and lit the fag, taking a long drag from it, breathing it back out into the cooling air.

“Those things kill, you know,” A voice sounded from behind her. She scowled at how it made her heart leap hopefully in her chest. 

“I know,” she almost growled, wanting him to fuck off back to Glimmer already. She couldn’t deal with having him thrust back into her life, pretending like nothing happened between them. Like she hadn’t irreparably fucked up their entire relationship, just because she felt ‘claustrophobic’.

“I thought you were quitting?” Peeta asked, walking to stand next to her and pulling out his own cigarette. 

She passed him Johanna’s lighter, “You can’t talk,” she snorted as she watched him light his, “And anyway, I am. I just keep emergency ones in all of my coats, and in a few of my trousers.”

Peeta laughed at this, “Yeah, sure does sound like you’re quitting.”

“Hey,” she protested, “I never keep a lighter on me, that way I have to ask someone, and then they’re also accountable for my inevitable lung cancer.”

Peeta’s eyebrows rose at this, and he took a puff from his own cancer stick, “Oh yeah, and how long did it take you do that mental gymnastics.”

Katniss only rolled her eyes, and they both stood next to each other staring out at the street. They watched as a bus pulled up at the stop, and an old man stumbled out, hobbling into the Ladbrokes opposite. A siren blared somewhere in the distance. Two extremely drunk men sat on the steps a good ten metres away from them, but were loud enough for their slurred words to reach the two.

“Listen Katniss, about before,” Peeta started, breaking their comfortable silence, “I didn’t mean to make you feel crowded or guilty, or anything like that.” He looked to her, but she stared resolutely ahead, taking slow small puffs from her cigarette.

“It’s fine,” she finally said, “forget about it. I probably shouldn’t have even danced with you in the first place, what with you being with Glimmer and all.”

“Ah, shit,” Peeta breathed out, “I didn’t think you knew about that.”

“Yeah well, I do,” Katniss snapped. 

Peeta looked as if he wanted to say something, but Katniss cut him off before he could, “I really don’t want to know.”

Peeta nodded his head. They were quiet for a moment.

“I mean, it’s not like you’re not allowed anyway,” Katniss said, scuffing the toe of her already scruffy trainer against the cracked pavement.

Peeta huffed out a bemused, short-lived laugh, “Care to explain that, whilst we’re out here talking civilly?”

“What?” Katniss asked, “Are you asking why I broke up with you?”

Peeta nodded his head once more.

Katniss sighed, “I feel like I’ve told myself and everyone around me the same explanation about a million times, but standing here it doesn’t feel like enough.”

“Well, that’s convenient,” Peeta whispered.

Katniss sighed, trying not to sound too exasperated. What’s it to him anyway, she thought. “Look Peeta, I told you before, and I’ll say it again. It wasn’t you.”

“Doesn’t mean I’ll ever stop asking myself if I did something,” Peeta said.

Katniss finally turned to look up at him, as he stared up at the darkening sky, searching it for the few visible stars, “We’re not even thirty yet, Peeta, I’m not ready to settle. I wasn’t last year, and I definitely am not this year. And I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if you told me you weren’t ready yet either, and you’re allowed to be with whoever you want, even if it is someone as silly and shallow as Glimmer. I guess it’s better to get your mid-life crisis out the way now,” she said with a smirk, before sobering and adding quietly, “I’m not completely oblivious Peeta, it’s not like I don’t see her appeal.”

Peeta looked down at her, opening his mouth, she was sure, to deny that Glimmer’s big boobs were the reason. She held up her hand to stop him, “Who knows though, maybe someone’ll convince me to come to this thing again next year, and I’ll see you again. Hopefully with someone other than Glimmer. And just like this year, I’ll steal you for a dance, and then lure you outside for a smoke, and we’ll catch up,” she paused for dramatic affect, stealing herself for what she was going to say next, “After that, you’ll kiss me, right up against the cold brick wall,” she watched as Peeta’s eyes widened at her bold statement.

  Maybe it was her pint of beer that had made her so free and uncaring with her sentiments. Though Katniss would never describe herself as a lightweight, she admitted to herself that it had been a good six weeks since she’d had a proper drink. On second thought, she remembered the last time she drank before tonight being a little over a week ago, and it had been a cider. She grimaced at the thought. Fuck, she mused, when did I become a lightweight? Peeta cleared his throat uncomfortably, prompting her to continue, but unsure of whether she was finished or not. Katniss mentally shook herself before finishing in a low, sultry voice, “Just like you’re going to do this year.”

 “Fuck,” Peeta breathed out, and Katniss watched him visibly struggle to swallow. She tried, and failed, to suppress her smug little smirk, that she could still affect him like this. It eased the green beast within her, the one that had wanted to stamp her foot and cry out earlier when she had witnessed Peeta wiping down the front of Glimmer’s dress. She shook her head. She didn’t want to think of Glimmer, Peeta was out here with her now, that must count for something, right?

“Are you, umm - being serious?” Peeta stuttered, and despite herself Katniss grinned at how flustered he was getting, the pink staining his cheeks betraying how agitated he really was, “Or are you just pulling my leg?”

Katniss took a long drag from her fag, sucking on it until it was down to the stub, “Do I look like I’m joking, Mellark?” 

She watched as his pupils dilated even more in the darkening night, until the blue of his irises were only thin rings around the black pits of his desire. She reveled in being able to do this to him still, after all this time. It comforted her, in a weird, possessive, unhealthy sort of way.

 “No,” he whispered, voice hoarse and barely audible. He dropped his cigarette on the floor, not even bothering to stamp it out before stepping forwards. Large hands came to a rest on her waist, pushing her further back against the wall. She bit back a slight moan at the way he seemed to shelter her, the stark contrast of the cold wall behind her, nipping at the backs of her legs, and the heat that enmantend from his body and radiated onto her. She took a deep shuddering breath, pushing her chest upwards against his. Her hand shook slightly as she stubbed out the remnants of her cigarette against the wall next to her, before letting it fall to the ground as well. 

Their faces were so close now, their mouths only a hair’s breadth apart, all it would take is for one of them to lean in, to close the tantalisingly small space between them. “Tell me you want me to,” Peeta uttered, breath fanning her face. She bit her lip, a sly grin gracing her features.

She leant up on her tiptoes, tracing a path to his ear lobe with her breath, “Peeta Mellark, I want you to kiss me up against this brick wall, until I’m breathless and my knees are weak.” 

 He groaned loudly, and she was about to tell him to be quiet when his lips descended greedily on hers. Knocking the breath right out of her, as he sucked and bit tenderly against first her top and then her bottom lip. She whimpered, admitting to herself that she had missed the way it felt to be kissed by someone who cared. Who didn’t just do it as a way to get into her underwear. 

It was his turn to smile smugly, he pulled away from her, and she chased his lips with her own. Wanting them back, wanting him to plunge and plunder. She huffed out a frustrated growl when he moved even further away. She opened her eyes, taking in his face that grinned with feigned innocence down at her, “What’s the matter Everdeen?” He asked teasingly, “Knees not weak enough yet?”

She glared at him, he knew exactly what he was doing, and she wasn’t having any of it, not tonight. Lifting her hands to his hair, she played with the blond locks, smiling up at him demurely. She would tell him what she wanted step by step if necessary, but she didn’t think it would be. Cocking her head to the side, she mirrored his look of feigned innocence, before tangling her fingers into the shorter hairs at the back of his head, and pulling his lips back down to hers. He grunted against her, and she opened her mouth ever so slightly in invitation. 

It took her all of two seconds to lose all inhibitions, Peeta’s hands moved up from their resting spot on her waist, one cradling the back of her neck and one stroking up and down her back in a motion that made Katniss giddy with desire. Their tongues met in a dance, reacquainting themselves. Peeta’s dove into her mouth, rediscovering everything he already knew about her. 

Peeta placed his leg in between her own, which had opened a little of their own accord, bringing it upwards slightly, daring her to grind up against it. Stubborn as ever, though, Katniss refused to take the bait. Knowing him, he would probably tease her, pull away before she could really get going. But when he tugged on her bottom lip with his teeth, she relented. She could feel her knees turning into jelly, forcing her to slump down onto his leg. She ground down on it experimentally, the rough material of his jeans rubbing up against her boy shorts. Katniss swore into his mouth, and did it again, letting the motion stimulate her throbbing center. She was almost glad that he couldn’t feel the intensity of the heat that seemed to be pouring from her core, but another part of her needed him to know that he could still do this to her. Could still drive her to do halfway insane things, like letting him ravage her up against a wall with all of her ex colleagues a mere few metres away. Pulling his head down further, she held him there, desperate to drink more of him in. 

“Katniss,” he whispered against her mouth, before diving right back in. 

It was her turn to grunt at the power in which he started almost devouring her mouth, she could only cling to the locks of hair wrapped around her fingers, in hopes that she wouldn’t just crumple to the floor. She was rocking against his leg in a steady rhythm, each stroke of his rough denim trousers against her center making her more frantic, desperate for more. Her nerve endings felt frayed, threatening to short circuit and send her spiralling through the abyss. Peeta continued to busy himself with her mouth, pulling away before delving back in, more thorough and rough each time, so that she could only whimper helplessly into his mouth.

It was when the hand that had been stroking leisurely circles into her spine crept towards her front before meandering downwards, that Katniss came somewhat to her senses. She stopped his hand with one of her own, before it could get to the hemline of the skirt to her dress. She pulled away from his lips that had been stroking soft sublime on hers, and looked at him. Eyes blown wide, lips swollen and red from kissing, blond hair tousled and mussed from all her incessant tugging. She was sure she was mirroring this disheveled appearance back at him. He lowered his leg from where it had stayed resting against her, but his hand stayed trapped between their two bodies. If it weren’t so painfully obvious how much they had missed each other, it would be comical how fast and hard they’d fallen back into heated touches and frantic kisses. 

She took a deep breath, wondering if she should apologise, or at least explain, but her brain was still fogged with arousal, and she was finding it very hard to look him in the eye. Instead, she got back on to her tip toes and brought her arms up around his neck, pulling him close to her for a hug. She rested her head against his shoulder, and he slowly brought his arms around her waist, holding her to him as well.

“One day, Peeta,” she began, talking into his neck, “one day…”

“But not today,” he finished for her.

She nodded and squeezed him tighter, a hundred memories of them together flooding her mind, and for the second time this evening she had to fight back the urge to sob. She could only be relieved that he had understood, understood why she couldn’t let him do that, not now, and certainly not here. 

He squeezed her back, and she swore she felt him inhaling her smell, at any other time this would have turned her on beyond reason, but now it only saddened her. How had she managed to fuck it up again? He pressed a quick kiss into the juncture of where her neck met her shoulder, before releasing her from his grasp. 

She wobbled, still a little unsteady on her feet, but managed to start walking in the direction of her bus stop. As she walked past the two drunk men that were still sitting on the stone steps to the pub, she heard one of them call out to her.

“Is the show over, sweetheart?” he asked, sarcasm along with whatever he’d had to drink lacing his voice, “That’s a shame, me an’ Chaff here were really startin’ to ge’ into it.” 

Katniss turned to look at the man who had said it, scathing reply waiting at the tip of her tongue, but before she could say anything, the other man, Chaff she assumed, slurred out;

“Won’t you give an ol’ man a kiss before you go?” The two men guffawed as he made kissy faces at her.

“Arseholes,” Katniss muttered under her breath.

The man with salt and pepper hair down to his shoulders called after her again, though all traces of amusement were gone from his voice. He sounded surprisingly sober when he told her, “I see the way you have him wrapped around your finger, sweetheart, you could live a hundred lifetimes and still not deserve what he gave you tonight,” he burped loudly and continued, “One day he’ll realise that, he’ll realise that he’s better than tha’, be’er than you.” 

 Katniss tried to ignore his words as she waited at the traffic light for the little green man to pop up so she could cross the road, but they still made her blood run cold, because maybe he was right. She turned her head to the side, waiting impatiently for the cars to come to a slow at the T-junction, when the old man, who had since left the betting shop, added his own snarky comment to the fray. If she had known how many people were watching them, she wouldn’t have let it get that far, or go on for so long.

“When do you think he’ll notice the exact degree of your indifference?” He asked in a voice that was weathered and old, but still demanded her attention. He had posed his comment as a question, but he said it as if he already knew the answer. She wasn’t indifferent, she thought, but doubt coursed through her. Hadn’t she just used him to prove a point? A stupid petty point, that she was better than Glimmer. She shook her head at the notion, it had just been a drunken mistake, nothing more.

She turned her head to face the decrepit old man, biting out a response, “Those are some awfully big words for a filthy old beggar, let’s hope you don’t choke on ‘em.” 

The old man threw his head back and laughed, his cracked voice making it sound more like a cackle than anything. To her surprise the man actually did start choking, on his own blood. He bent forwards, crouching low as he spat blood to the floor. 

“Gross,” Katniss muttered, before hurrying across the road. To hell with the traffic, she thought, she just needed to get the fuck out of here.

 The shame and regret were already starting to curl themselves around her, and she felt almost sick with it. She was once again being reminded of how easily being around Peeta could fuck with her head, how it could make her do things that she otherwise wouldn’t do. That she’d sworn to herself wouldn’t happen again. Because, yes, her drink might have had something to do with it, but it was also him, he was intoxicating. The moment she had noticed he was in the room, she had wanted him, needed him. And it might be true that she could make him feel the same way, but people never seemed to see that he was just as good at it as she was. He was always the sweet golden boy, who had had the misfortune of falling in love with the likes of her.

She looked across the street when she arrived at the bus stop. The pub was pouring light from it’s windows and she heard the music playing. Peeta had already disappeared, and Katniss wondered how much he had heard. She hoped none of it. The old man was shuffling into the Tesco next door to the Ladbrokes, and the two men were still sat outside the pub, drinking from flasks. She looked up at the timetable that the bus stop provided, and cursed under her breath when she saw that her bus wouldn’t be arriving for another seven minutes. 

She was about to start walking down the highstreet, so that she wouldn’t have to stand, waiting like a sitting duck, when her phone vibrated in her coat pocket with an incoming message. 

Pulling it out of the pocket, she read what it said.

Johanna Mason [Sent 10:21pm]: Where are you? I’m hungry and bored, wanna get smth to eat?

Katniss considered ignoring the message, but her stomach rumbled in response to the thought of food.

Katniss Everdeen [Sent 10:22pm]: At the bus stop across the road. Don’t you have a set? 

Johanna Mason [Sent 10:22pm]: Ofc you are. Yh I do, but any moron can do this. These song requests are driving me insane tho, so… food?

Katniss Everdeen [Sent 10:23pm]: Yh alright, what tho?

Johanna Mason [Sent 10:24pm]: I could really go for a kebab… and a smoke. We’re leaving now.

Katniss looked up from her phone. Shit. Johanna’s lighter. Peeta still had it. She watched as Johanna banged open the doors to the pub. Trailing after her was a wobbly Annie and the man from earlier. Katniss looked around her, hoping one of the many corner shops littering the street were still open, but they were all depressingly closed. Katniss glared at the closed signs on all the shop doors as if their existence offended her eyes, because in that moment, they really did.

 Kpkpkpk

There’s nothing but the sound of crickets and frogs filling the vast darkness of the night.

It’s another moonless night out here in Panem… or is I like to call it ‘the middle of nowhere’. It’s weird, how dark nights feel here, there’s barely a start peeking tonight, but in a strange way, I like it.

Sitting on my aunt and uncle’s porch to watch the infinite dark ahead while listening to the nocturnal critters it’s about my favorite thing to do… it’s what did used to do when we came here for long summer stays, anyway. He used to say he felt at peace and relaxed, connected with nature. Too bad it took him to be gone, for me to appreciate what he meant by that. So every night I come out here and sit in the steps hugging my knees, staring at nothing but the deep, black night surrounding the cabin, whisking my dad was sitting next to me.

Tonight is different than usual, though. It was raining until recently, and the smell of wet earth is so familiar my chest feels tight and my throat is knotted.

“Petrichor, Katniss,” I mumble the words noiselessly, “is the smell of rain, hun. It smells the same everywhere in the world.”

I lean my chin on my knees, wishing I could go back to feeling numb like when my parents just died. But thinking of the word petrichor, while smelling the thing, is bring forth a plethora feelings and memories I don’t know how to handle.

Dad used to love Scrabble, crossword puzzles and trivia challenges. He tried to get me interested in those games, teaching me words and their meanings, every time he had a chance.

I wish I had been more enthusiastic about learning the darned stuff; it would’ve meant an extra moment spent with Dad, and less regret to feel right now.

An involuntary whine leaves my chest. It hurts to think about it, and not for the first time, I dig my nails into my skin to keep myself rooted in place, and not tear running into the void.

I feel like I’m spiraling out of control, I fear this time something will break in my head and I’ll do something crazy, like scratch my skin away and run wild into the woods, like a beast… but the overwhelming thoughts gets halted when I hear soft noises from out in the distance.

It’s like the crunching of footsteps on the gravel at the mouth of my aunt and uncle’s property. It’s too dark and isolated here, deep into the country. I’ve seen big wildlife roaming around: deer, raccoons, coyotes and even a lynx. But the longer I hear the noises, the more certain I am I’m being stalked by something big and fast.

My heart beats erratically in my chest; every hair in my body stands on point, fear is clawing its way up my chest and into my throat, my eyes feel about to pop from my skull, and then I’m disentangling my knees from my arms, standing up as tall as I can— which isn’t saying much—and then I call into the night, “Who’s there?!”

I hear a faint disturbance of air, and then…

“Good evening, Katniss!”

Slowly, from the shadows, a blonde head pops, eerie for a second. Broad shoulders follow, and then a torso. Before the rest of his body comes visible into the light of the porch, two more blonde heads come into view, flank the first person on either side: Shoulders, torsos, Jean covered legs… The three Mellark brothers make their way leisurely towards me.

I nearly faint from relief after the rush of adrenaline pumping in my veins. Going through so many emotions: grief, sorrow, dread and relief, so fast in such a short amount of time has left me winded and unsteady.

I lose my balance, but one of the boys— Peeta, the youngest— breaks ranks, and rushes to hold me upright.

“Are you okay?” He asks softly, helping me sit back down on the porch steps. I lean my head against the main post.

“I’m okay. Just a little lightheaded,” I try not to glare. They gave me a fright, but I doubt they did it on purpose.

It’s something I’ve learn over the years. People in Panem are kind of quirky.

“Sorry we scared you,” Peeta offers, sheepishly. “We wanted to check up on you, and bring you something…” he looks up at his two older brothers and Rye — the middle one— steps forward, holding up a brown, paper bag, with little greasy spots on the sides.

I can guess what’s inside. They’ve been bringing me cheese buns almost daily, since Peeta found out they’re my favorites.

Rey hands the baggie to Peeta, and the latter offers it to me with a soft smile.

“Thanks,” I mumble, gratefully. I can smell the cheesy, yeasty treat through the bag; I can feel the warmth of the buns too! “While I love freshly baked cheese buns, you guys didn’t have to make this trek just to bring me a treat… on a dark, moonless night no less,” I fix them with a glare. “How did you even get here anyway? You couldn’t have walked and I never saw a car coming?”

My aunt and uncle’s cabin is at least 4 miles from town, and surrounded by woods; but then again, most houses in this weird little place are built in similar locations. It seems the townsfolk take their privacy extremely seriously.

“We rode our dirt bikes,” chimes Rye in, cheerily. “Not much light on those bulbs, though, but it’s okay. Our night vision is prime!” He gives me the A-Okay gesture.

“Rye,” the eldest, Bannock, warns lowly. Baring his teeth.

Rye shrugs and slips his hands on his Jean pockets.

I swear Rye hisses something like “it’s true” under his breath, but Peeta has been rubbing my back with the tip of his fingers all this time, and I’m getting drowsy, so I may have imagined the whole exchange.

“You should eat those while they’re still warm,” Peeta murmurs close by my shoulder.

I nod, and open the bag, releasing all the delicious smells of the buns, while Peeta massages my shoulders, encouragingly.

I must be really out if it tonight, because outside of my family, I’ve never been comfortable with people touching me… but, my family is all gone now, and I can’t go through the rest of my life without human touch, can I?

Grief stricken me out of nowhere, and barrels through me. I gasp at the acute pain in my soul at the loss of my parents. But in an instant, I’m enveloped in strong, thick arms, warm and steady. I’m sobbing into a hot, solid chest, covered in the softest cotton I’ve ever felt.

“Shush… I’ve got you, Katniss. I’m here for you,” Peeta whispers soothingly into the crown of my head.

He smells so good; like cinnamon and dill, from the bread he must’ve made this afternoon at his family’s bakery.

It takes a few minutes for me to get a hold of myself, and embarrassedly push out of his embrace, “I’m sorry,” I mumble, mortified.

Bannock presents me with a handkerchief, and I take it gratefully to wipe off my face and nose, before returning the soiled square of fabric to him.

I’m not sure why the Mellark brothers are being so nice to me. I’ve never been around them more than a handful of days over the past few years, when we came to see Dad’s remaining family outside mom and I, his half brother, his wife and their child.

I don’t know the Mellarks all that well, but in the handful of weeks since my parents’ funeral, the three brothers have been incredibly attentive and generous to me. Peeta more than the other two, but I don’t mind… I like him best anyway.

“It’s okay to cry and be devastated, Katniss.” Says Bannock, sagely. “You’re going through the worst time of your life, and we care for you… like family.”

“Oh,” I sit straighter, blowing my nose. I feel a little strange hearing him say that, “thank you? I appreciate your kindness,”

He nods, “Peeta’s right, though. You should eat the cheese buns before they go cold.”

“A full stomach always helps me feel better,” Rye adds, patting his belly, and smiling at me.

My stomach growls, as if to show agreement. I am hungry. I didn’t touch my supper earlier. I pick up the bakery gingerly, and pretty much shove my nose into it. The steam curls out of the baggie, filling my nostrils with the delicious smells. I pluck out a bun and practically inhale it in a second; quickly followed by another one. My third cheese bun, I decide to savor, slowly.

The Mellark siblings just hang around while I devour my treats.

The front door opens just as I’m wiping my hands on my leggings. My aunt’s head peeks out of the door.

“Oh, why hello everyone!” She greets, as bubbly as always. She’s wearing a dark purple wig, to match her dark purple outfit.

“Good evening, Effie,” says Peeta, standing from his squatting position next to me. “We brought Katniss a gift,” he points at the now empty bag in his hand.

“How sweet of you, Peeta!” my aunt gushes, “thank you for checking on our girl, and making sure she’s put something in her tummy before bedtime!”

I roll my eyes. Aunt Effie keeps treating me like a kid. I hate it. I’m 17 and mourning, not a freaking baby!

“It’s no problem at all, Effie! We were just on our way home anyway.”

“Well, it’s always nice having you boys over,” she offers, “but it’s getting late, and Primrose is already in bed, which is why I came out here to begin with, to let Katniss know that her sister was already asleep, so she’d know to tip toe back inside when she was ready to go to bed herself,” my aunt smiles.

I feel a slight pang of guilt; I’ve been wallowing in my own sadness this evening, and missed tucking my sister in to sleep. She’s the only person I’m sure I love, yet tonight I’ve let my own misery drown me.

“Don’t mind us, Effie,” Says Bannock, “We were about to leave…” he pauses and then calls a meaningful, “Peeta?”

“I’m going to wish Katniss a good night, and then we’ll go,” he says.

Not for the first time, I wonder if Peeta has a crush on me? I wouldn’t know he did, even if I wasn’t feeling so rotten inside. I’m not very good at flirting… but with Peeta it is different I think. He’s so nice to me, he’s taken up asking if I’ve eaten that day and if I haven’t, he feeds me something from his family’s bakery without charging me… it’s like he actually cares for me and my well-being, and his brothers care, because he does. It’s mesmerizing at times.

Peeta looks me in the eyes, “Are you ready to go inside?” He asks, offering his two open palms to me. He helps me up from the floor, and then smiles sweetly. He doesn’t let go of my hands while we stand facing each other.

Then something strange happens. Peeta doesn’t blink, as his clear-blue eyes bore into mine, and then his pupils blow out full, until only a ring of deep, glowing azure remains for his irises, “Sleep well, Katniss,” his voice sounds deeper and warmer than usual, “Rest and have a relaxing, dreamless night. Remember what I said: we are all here for you, to help through this hard time… alright?”

I feel groggy, “Yes, Peeta,” I mumble feeling my eyelids getting heavier.

“Oh dear, can you please instruct her to walk herself to bed? She might look lithe, but I promise, her little body is as heavy as any of us,”

Huh? What’s aunt Effie going on about? I don’t understand.

Peeta chuckles, squeezing my hands warmly in his, “You heard Effie… don’t fall asleep until you’ve gone into your bedroom and change into comfy pajamas.”

I nod, “Okay,”

“Good night, Katniss, I’ll be back tomorrow. Try to eat something on your own, I know you’re sad, but you need your strength for when the solstice comes.”

What a weird thing to say! Everything is strange here though… so I nod and march inside the house, mumbling my good nights to everyone and rubbing my very sleepy eyes. Once I’m in my sleep clothes, I lay in bed, and try to ignore the yearning of having Peeta rubbing my back like he was doing while I ate my cheese buns.

KPKPKPKPKPKPKPKP

Prim died on a Tuesday, after a very long, strenuous battle with poliomyelitis. My sweet little sister’s face looked as fresh as a dew drop even in death. 

  “Come now, Katniss,” my mother calls from the open door of the mortuary hall, where visitation took place an hour ago. 

  The mortician has arranged for the coffin to be taken to the cemetery and put in the ground this afternoon. There will be no graveside mourning. It’s all we could pay for, but then again the war has left everyone penniless nowadays.

  A big, rotund man comes to close the coffin, and offers a curt nod. 

  That’s it then. The very last time I’ll ever set eyes on Primrose’s sweet face. 

  “Katniss,” Mother whispers, insistently. It’s probably all she can muster before breaking down in tears.

  I look on at the box my sister’s body lies in, numb and heartsick. I bring my 3 middle fingers to my lips and then rise them in the air. My last salute to my beloved Little Duck. I step away from the coffin and shuffle towards mother. 

  Up close, I can see the deep, dark bruises under my mother’s eyes. She used to be beautiful in her youth— according to friends and old photographs— but now she just looks tired and defeated. I guess having to bury first her husband and then her 15 year old daughter, in less than a year, would have that effect on anyone.

  Prim would’ve looked like our mother, with their soft blonde locks, almond shaped blue eyes and alabaster skin. She had a softer spirit though, she enjoyed music and loved animals. She always said that if she was older, she would’ve joined the Red Cross and signed up to serve as a nurse to our boys in the Pacific, like Father did… Father wasn’t a nurse though, he was a chaplain. 

  It’s funny to think that I inherited so much of my father, like my dark hair, gray eyes and olive skin. We both also share the same aversion to human pain and blood that moves my mother and Prim to action; but unlike Prim, my father’s calling to help the soldiers in their worst situations, passed me and went directly to my baby sister. 

  I sigh… Prim would’ve made a terrific army nurse, if only she hadn’t wasted in bed with that odious disease! If she had been given the chance to live, I’m sure Prim would’ve had so many boys trailing after her. She would marry at some point and have a beautiful full life. 

  I don’t plan on marrying and having a family. If the acute pain in my own chest wasn’t enough warning,  watching my mother walk silently from the funeral home to our apartment, with her head bowed and listening to her quiet sobs at night would be enough evidence that there’s too much sorrow in losing one’s husband and children. 

  I think my efforts will be better spent in cultivating my mind, and getting my degree in botany, like my father always dreamed, anyway… plus, I’m not much of a looker… not like Prim at any rate. 

  We finally arrived at our modest home. Mother drifts ghost-like into the door, and then we both shuffle quietly into our separate bedrooms. There won’t be a meal at the table tonight, but I make sure Prim’s old tomcat gets fed and watered, and after he meows in distress at my sister’s door, I open mine, and let him strut inside my bedroom and hop into my bed. The hideous fur ball and I distrust each other, but he understands his mistress is never coming back, and he’s the last thing I have from her… so he lets me pet him and he cuddles close to my chest as I fall asleep, crying. 

——————————-

Mother and I walk slowly through the busy streets of town, mostly ignoring the bustle and disarray around us. People shout, cars honk horns, a baby cries in the distance, and the few young men rush back and forth in the busy sidewalks, like they’re being lashed by invisible whips.

  “We should stop by the grocer and see if we can pick up some eggs.” Says my mother, pulling her “Sugar Book” out of her handbag. 

  Because of the war, everything is being rationed, from sugar to shoes.

  I could care less about food and clothing, though. But I still go into the shop, dutifully. 

  I’m so immersed in my own thoughts, I don’t see the lanky man walking towards me with his arms full of vittles. 

  We collide. The man’s groceries fly up in every direction, raining over me, as I sit on my rump on the floor. 

  My mother is nowhere to be seen. Typical.

  “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you there!” Says the man, pulling a packet of oatmeal from the floor, while extending his other hand to help me up. 

  “No… it’s alright, I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

  “Well, let’s agree that we’re both klutzes, and leave it at that?” The man offers.

  I’m on my feet, dusting my skirt off and righting my blouse, “Sure, let’s do that.” I scowl at the skew state of my clothes and finally look up at the man. 

  He’s smiling down at me, and I must admit, his smile is dazzling. He’s got short brown hair, greenish-brown eyes, and a smattering of freckles over his nose. He also towers above me. 

  “My stars! If it isn’t Katniss Everdeen!” The young man says, unexpectedly excited.

  I blink owlishly at him, and try to place his face, but I’m horrible at remembering people. Or their names. 

  “Marvel Quaid,” he offers genially, unfazed by my lack of response, “we went to grade school together?” He prompts, “My pa used to sell luxury goods in District One?”

  “Oh, I think it’s coming back now,” I say smiling for the first time in what feels like months. “You used to throw sticks, pretending they were spears or something,” I tell him, showing that indeed, I do remember him.

  Marvel scrunches his nose, “Javelins, actually. I was pretending I threw javelins. I saw a fellow doing it for the Olympics in a film, and then he won a medal for it. I thought to myself that making a victory lap with the good old American flag flapping after oneself looked like fun; well, I wanted to be a victor too!” He chuckles, then deflates. “But as everything, those dreams are gone now, crushed to dust under the weight of the war.”

  As is the norm, once the war gets brought up, gloominess settles on, dampening the cheeriest of spirits.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m all too familiar with the sentiment.”

  Marvel nods, grimly. 

  “We lost Father in France.” I’m not sure why I said it. “We put my sister in the ground last week, too.” I avert my eyes. 

  “Aww, geez, Kit… that’s truly awful. I’m so sorry for your loss,”

  I’m mildly surprised I don’t immediately recoil at his little pet name. I guess the fact that he doesn’t sound condescending while delivering his condolences, helps. 

  “Oh, well, as my father would’ve said, at least their toils in this world are over. They can finally rest in peace.”

  After a moment of heavy silence, Marvel shares, “I’m being shipped out tomorrow morning.”

  I scowl, “Oh,” I bite the inside of my cheek, wondering how he’d manage to evade the draft for this long? Marvel is my age, 19 going on 20… boys get sent to the front lines at 18. “I… I could write to you… if you wanted?” I offer shyly. 

  Isn’t that what young women are being told to do, in order to keep our boys’ morale from plummeting?  

  Marvel grins, showing slightly crooked teeth, “That would be swell, Kit!” He stares at me for a long moment, then sighs, “I should go back to my shopping, before they miss me at home. Lord knows when will I have the chance of doing something as mundane as picking up my mother’s weekly grocery allowance.”

  These days it is not only uncommon seeing men doing grocery runs, but simply seeing young, able-body men around, period. All of our boys are either in Europe or the Pacific, fighting to keep the devastation of the World war from reaching our shores.

  “Well, for what is worth, I hope you get to return home safely… you know, so you can do all the boring tasks your mother tells you to do. And when I say safe, I mean, I hope you don’t run anymore into spaced out girls, like me,” I smirk. 

  “Oh, Kit, if only you knew how much I’ve enjoyed our accidental skirmish. It’s like a gift from above, seeing you after all these years. Your smile and the color of your eyes will forever be branded in my mind, to give me a reason to fight. To have a dream,”

  I’m momentarily floored by Marvel’s florid little speech. Nobody has ever said anything nearly as sweet and gallant as that to me, and for a moment, I forget all about my dead sister and father, the war, and my own sorrow. 

  I avert my eyes, bashfully, as he finishes picking up his vittles off the floor.

  “That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me,” I lean over to pick up a can of milk, and put it on top of his pile. 

  “I only speak the truth,” he smiles brightly. 

  My mother chooses to interrupt at the exact moment I bat my lashes at him, “Katniss, there you are! I’ve been waiting for you by the counter.” She shakes her head. 

  Marvel wobbles on his feet, rearranging his load, and then greets my mother, warmly, “Mrs. Everdeen, how nice to see you again,” 

  My mother eyes him, unimpressed. “Good afternoon, young man,” she answers. 

  “Ma’am… pardon my forwardness, but, would it be too troublesome to ask Miss Katniss to accompany a soldier about to be shipped out, to supper in the town?” 

  My mother narrows her eyes, distrust dripping from her voice as she speaks, “I’m not so sure that’s a good idea. My daughter and I are in mourning, you see,”

  “Oh, this won’t be an untoward celebration of any kind, ma’am. With the war raging on, we’re all in mourning. All I ask for is one last night of normalcy, a chance to reconnect with an old grade-school mate,” he smiles, hopefully, “For old times sake?” 

  I’m watching my mother’s face closely, with bated breath.

  “Very well,” Mother sighs, “You may ask Katniss out to dinner. But have her home by 9 sharp!”  

  I don’t hesitate to step up and give him directions to my apartment building in District 12. 

  I spend the rest of my day giddy and nervous, pressing my best Sunday suit, the gray one with the matching jacket, and polishing my only pair of leather shoes. There isn’t much I can do about my hair… the thing can’t be fashioned into the favored waves, not even putting it in curlers overnight, so I let it be. 

  I briefly wonder if this was all Prim’s doing? Meeting Marvel and mother’s somewhat easy aquiciscent. Prim hated seeing me sad, and constantly talked about how she’d love to help me get ready for dates with a beau. She couldn’t wait to be of courting age and date a strapping, young man herself… but of course, that would never happen for her, but she would probably still want to see me have those things. 

  Maybe Marvel is right, and our serendipitous encounter is a gift from above, to heal our wounds… at least for the night. 

  ————————-

  Marvel arrives at my house in his father’s car at 5:45. Riding is now such a luxury, with gasoline being rationed and all. He takes me to a quaint little dinner in the middle of town. We share malts, a greasy burger, and a small portion of fries and onion rings. 

  We talk about baseball:

  “You’d look good in a baseball uniform, Kit! Can you still run as fast as you did in school?” 

  I laugh. “I’m not much for sports,” I demure, “but I’ve heard playing in one of the new teams pays alright. Anyway, I’m gonna be starting my second year of college soon. I put my studies on hold while Prim was at her worst, but now that it’s only just me and mother… I’m anxious to go back to study.”

  “Wow, beautiful and smart!”

  We talk about cars:

  “I loved driving… but Mother sold our car when my sister took a turn for the worse. She didn’t want to at first, saying that Father saved up to buy it, and it held sentimental value to her, but I had to push to sell it. We needed the money and gas was a nightmare to come by, anyway,”

  “The only reason we still have ours,” says Marvel, “is because Pa is too stubborn to let go of the things that still made him feel wealthy.” He scowls, “He’s trying to get into the ice business now, since it’s pretty much the only thing one where the raw material is plenty and relatively cheap, and there’s guarantee that people will buy the product… everyone still needs ice for their ice boxes, right?” 

  No one can afford luxuries anymore with every penny going out to support our boys in the battlefields.

  We talk about many other subjects: his sister’s wedding; my father’s unit getting pinned and killed by Germans… We didn’t get a body to bury, but I got a medal on his behalf as his eldest child. 

  Marvel lets me sniffle against his chest, and then kisses my lips slowly. 

  I’ve never been kissed on the lips, and I feel my face heat up. 

  “Would you… like to take a drive with me, Kit?”

  We drive all the way to the city limit. It’s exhilarating to be in a car again, and sitting at the overlook, at twilight,  alone with a handsome boy, feels positively forbidden! 

  I’ve never done anything remotely injudicious all my life, and this whole moment feels… magical… exciting! 

  Tentatively, I initiated our next kiss, but he takes over in a rush of caresses and flitting touches. 

  “Beautiful, graceful, Kit. You have no match!”

  “Marvel…” I kiss him again, not knowing how to answer his sentiments with words.

  His hands are restless, groping my shoulders and elbows. “I wished he had more time! I would’ve loved to marry you before departing. I would’ve show you so much passion and love!”

  “You still can show me, Marvel… you absolutely can!” 

  It’s all the permission he needs to dive into a frenzy. He doesn’t stop until the deed is done, and we’re a sweaty, tangled mess of limbs in the back seat of the car, only partially clothed. 

  A deep feeling of lethargy pours over me. My muscles are sore and heavy, and wished I could fall asleep in here. 

  “I intend on coming back to marry you, Katniss,” Marvel says, stretching his lanky, long legs to zip up his pants. 

  I sit up and start finger-combing my ruined hair, hoping my mother won’t notice the strands are extra frizzy. “Um… I guess we should after this,” I say shyly, gesturing between us. 

  “You could still go to college while I’m away,” he offers with magnanimity.

  “You… wouldn’t mind that?” I ask incredulous, college women are so rare, unless they’re trying to become nurses or teachers. Most girls start courting right after high school and get married in the span of one to two years, and their husbands don’t normally encourage an education beyond what their wives came into the marriage with; so to hear Marvel say that wouldn’t mi d me stay in college is just about the greatest thing possible!

  “My darling, Kit, I don’t want you to be one of those girls pining and wasting away for her beau. I’ll be busy at war, it’ll be unfair to keep you from occupying your own time while you wait fir my return. Go to college, my clever girl!”

  I smile indulgently at him, leaning closer to slip his necktie around the collar of his shirt, “You are truly a generous, loving man,” I say.

  Marvel beams, circling my waist with his arms pulling me against his body. “It’s all inspired by you, sugar plum!”

  I giggle, kissing his cheek, “I’ll write to you every day!” I promise. 

  “That’s nice… but just so you know, I might not be able to write back right away. It’ll be a while before I get settled enough to write. But you’ll be in my thoughts every minute of every day, and that’s the honest truth! I’m serious about marrying you when I return, Kit,” he kisses me again. And then, he looks at his watch, sighing. “It’s 8:32. We should get on going, gotta keep in my future mother-in-law’s good graces!” 

  We share a carefree laugh, and finish tidying ourselves up to drive back to my house. 

  He walks me to the door, takes me in his arms, and kisses me passionately before promising he’d be back to officially ask for my hand in marriage, and for my part, I swear I’ll write to him every day until he returns home safe and sound. 

  But neither of us keeps our promises in the end, although I tried. 

  ————————-

  Three weeks go by and I keep my word of writing daily letters. I receive no word in return from Marvel, but think nothing of it… Europe is far and traveling by sea is tedious and time consuming; Marvel will get in touch once he’s settled down. 

  Another week goes by, still without news from my would-be fiancé. I still don’t worry. I’ve been busy with university, and the few other girls attending school with me keep me busy, but my heavier workload is starting to get to me.

  I’m usually so tired and moody after school that socializing with my classmates becomes a chore. I barely eat supper before I’m passing out in bed, and my letters to Marvel start to get shorter and simpler with every passing day.

  I skip writing one afternoon altogether, and take a long nap. Buttercup— Prim’s ugly cat— perches on my bed like a sentinel to watch me sleep. I believe he’s worried about me… stupid, clingy cat thinks I’m sick.

  But the feline’s intuition proves right, because just two days later, I shoot out of bed and run into the washroom to spill every last ounce of last night supper into the toilet. I must’ve caught a bug or something! 

  I feel queasy and lightheaded every morning after. My appetite wanes and it seems my delicate stomach can only tolerate pears, and broth. 

  I visit the post office to place out my letters to Marvel almost everyday; Every time I come, the nice old mailman comments on how sweet it is to see all the young-uns holding romance strong. Marvel has yet to respond to one of my letters, so I just smile tightly and demure. 

  I’ve been thinking though; the longer I go without news of my supposed future husband, and despite the whirlwind night of romance with him, I start questioning my actions, my promises. I never wanted to marry before, and suddenly I was okay getting a hasty, unofficial engagement with a virtual stranger, I barely remember from grade school… maybe it’s better if Marvel never writes. 

  My plans on earning a college degree and finding a well paying job will go unencumbered— I’m aware women in prominent working professions are as rare as snow in July, but women’s presence in the working forces keep growing as industries need laborers to keep up producing while the men fight in the war. Educated women are almost becoming less rare. 

  At the two month mark since I last saw Marvel, I become weepier than usual… is to be expected in my opinion; Prim’s been gone for a little over two months and she was the only person I knew I loved. But now I’m worrying about my health on top of everything.

  One morning, while I’m kneeling on the cold, hard floor in front of the toilet, feeling miserable and tired, my mother calls my name from the open door.

  “Katniss, I think it’s time to get a test.” She states evenly, and then enters the room to fetch a damp washcloth to wipe my face clean. “I hope I’m wrong, but I’m afraid you may be with child,” she sighs. 

  I squirm. “No,” I gasp. “I— I can’t be with child. I just can’t!” But the thought has crossed my mind a few times already. “It’s not supposed to be this way!”

  “I know, child,” My mother pats my head, “there’s only one way to know. Get dressed for the day, I will call the most discreet physician I know, and have him pay us a visit.” 

  ————————-

  Doctor Aurelius— a physician my mother has helped deliver babies and treat maladies with— confirms the pregnancy with a grim face. 

  I sit at my kitchen table numb and despondent. My mother writes a check to the doctor for his services, while talking in no so hush tones in the other room. I listen to their whole conversation, as if submerged in water.

  “I blame myself for this, doctor. I should have kept a closer eye on her,” 

  “Don’t blame yourself Ms. Everdeen, it’s that war business bringing out all sorts of evil into the world! It’s unfortunate the rise of these cases in our community. Young ladies— from good families!— engaging in acts ought to be saved for marriage. Youth do things without thinking, guided by fear. Our boys fear they may not return from that senseless, awful war, and settle down properly, and I don’t blame them one little bit.”

  “The only solace I have right now, is that my poor husband is not here to see the shame that’s fallen over our family,”

  “I understand the sentiment, ma’am. There’s no telling how Preacher Everdeen would’ve taken this blow. But I’m sure things will work out as soon as young Katniss hears from the father…” 

  I dissolve into silent tears then. My mother escorts the doctor to the door and then there’s silence. 

  My pinky finger curls into the soft fabric of the table cloth, and I try to ignore the urge to vomit boiling in my stomach. There’s one thought circling mi mind: my college days are over.

  ——————————-

“Ah! Miss Everdeen, I have something for you.” Says the mailman as soon as I reach the desk. He smiles, but rather sadly, like he’s about to give me bad news. 

  I’ve come to the post office with urgent letters every day for 6 days, and he’s never looked at me this way. 

  The old man digs around for a moment and almost reluctantly, passes a parcel tied up in twine. An envelope is attached to the top of the parcel, and with a sinking feeling, I realized it’s a stack of my own letters. 

  “It came in today, miss.” Says the man, voice laced with pity. “Sorry for your loss.” He says. 

  At first I don’t understand what he could possibly mean by that; he’s offered his sympathies fir my dead father and sister already; it makes absolutely no sense to repeat himself randomly after so long. 

  Then it hits me like a ton of bricks. 

  I gasp, and press the parcel to my chest. “Oh no! Marvel!” I whisper. I give the man a hasty wave, thanking him, and rush out of the post office like mad. 

  Tears run down my cheeks, while I dash home, imagining the worst. “Poor, Marvel!” Is all I can think.

  “Katniss, what’s wrong?” My mother calls, alarmed, when I rush to my bedroom, sobbing. She follows me in, and watches me tear into the envelope at the top of the stack. 

  I frown in confusion when I’m met with handwritten, chicken-scratch scrawl, instead of a formal missive typed in official US military stationary. 

  My scowl deepens as my eyes rove over the flowery vocabulary, and then I screech, “What?!” 

  “Katniss, what’s going on?” 

  I ignore my mother when she approaches to read over my shoulder; I step around her, shaking the piece of paper in my hands and stand by the window, as if sunlight will make the words change their meaning.

  I smooth the creases and folds on the page over, and read out loud, “Dearest Kit, sorry it took so long to write, it’s been a wild time since we arrived and finding time to correspond with everyone back home it’s been hard.

  “At times, your letters have been the sole source of light and hope in the darkness of this conflict. Is for that reason, and with a heavy heart, that I must come clean to you now. I truly meant it when I swore to come back and make you my wife, but as the Good Book says, the Lord works in mysterious ways, and love has sprouted out the most unlikely place! Kit, I’ve fallen in love and married a lovely gal here in England…”

  I stop reading. He goes on talking about the why and how, but I sincerely don’t care. 

  “That good for nothing, virtue dasher, future crushing… liar!” My mother bleats to the ceiling, raising her palms over her head, dramatically. 

  I’m angry too, of course. I feel used and disposed of like a dirty rag, but my mother’s reaction is borderline hilarious. Except, it isn’t. 

  I’m pregnant, unmarried, and soon— once my still flat stomach starts rounding— I’ll be socially ostracized for my condition. My only saving grace was the promise of marriage that bastard Marvel had given me. But that’s gone now. 

  “I knew that boy was bad news the second I laid eyes on him! He never even introduced himself to me, the little weasel! This is my fault. My fault! I should’ve never allowed you to run amok with the likes of him…”

  “Mother, will you please?” I nearly growl, gesturing at the open bedroom door.

  She stares at me uncomprehendingly for a moment, before pursing her lips in disapproval, and stalking out of the room muttering her aggravation under her breath. 

  I sink into my bed with Marvel’s stupid letter crumpling in my fist. A single, hot, angry tear rolls down my face, and for the first time since finding out of its existence, I hug my midsection and address my child, “I’m so sorry for dragging you into this mess. I know you didn’t ask for a mother like me, but I’m all you got now, little one. I promise we will be alright… I’ll try not to let you down.”

  ———————-

  My mother has been unbearable for the last two days. She cries in her room worse than when Prim died, and when she sees me, she starts lamenting my poor choice, like I’m not even standing there… as if I don’t feel discouraged enough. 

  I keep myself busy with my education. I will need to earn this diploma now more than ever before, and I need to do as much as I can before the baby arrives and my studies get put on hold. 

  In the meantime, I scout the newspapers for possible work options to sustain me and my mother. Our savings keep diminishing and the small stipend my mother got from the Army since my father passed away is becoming more insufficient by the day. 

  There’s a knock on the front door, and I push out my chair unhappy by the interruption. 

  “Afternoon Miss Katniss! Would you let your mother know she’s got a telephone call down in the lobby?” Says the building’s doorkeeper. 

  “Of course, thank you. She’ll be right down!”

  Telephones are yet another luxury we had to give up when moved to this small place after losing my father. 

  I go back to my job hunt, and my mother descends to the lobby, quickly. 

  She returns after only 10 minutes, almost running through the door, excitedly calling my name. Tears wet her face, but her smile is so blinding, even without knowing what sort of news she’s heard to cause her such joy, I stand from the table with nervous anticipation. 

  “Oh, Katniss! Katniss my dear daughter, you’re saved!” She exclaims, hugging me tightly. 

  I’m confused. I step away from her embrace, “What do you mean?” 

  “It’s the best thing possible ever, I tell you! The Lord has answered all of my prayers!”

  “This is all so exciting and all, mother, but… could you please share this great news already?” 

  My mother cups my face in her hands, and beams at me, “You need to pack your things, darling! Your father’s good friend, Reverend Undersee, has found a husband, and you are to wed, in three days time!”

  —————————

Reverend Undersee and his daughter, Madge, meet me and my mother at the rinky dink bus station, in the equally tiny town my mother has banished me to.

  “Katniss! How long has it been?” Says Madge, hugging me enthusiastically.

  I bite my tongue to keep the acidic retort of “not long enough!” to leave my mouth. 

  “Welcome to Panem,” says the reverend, soberly, shaking my mother’s hand in greeting.

  “Thank you, revered. We appreciate your hospitality and your understanding,” my mother responds, then gives me a pointed look and a wordless command. 

  I nod and mutter, “Thank you, sir. Madge,” 

  I scowl at a crack in the pavement, not feeling an iota of gratefulness for this charade! 

  Any man agreeing to this questionable union has to either be desperate, or be hiding terrible, ulterior motives to go along with all of this. Nobody in their right mind would willingly marry a girl pregnant with another man’s baby, and be happy about it… unless that’s the reason! 

  I shudder at the thought. 

  But it is a very real possibility that my intended is a simpleton, who can’t find a wife otherwise… or worse! It could be a man very advanced in age, looking for a supple, young body to leech off. Gross!

  My mother had been too excited about the news that a man offered to marry me (as if I asked for, or even wanted a husband!) to bother to ask his name. 

  Reverend Undersee coughs daintily, clears his throat, and starts, like he’s giving a lecture at the university. “It is our Christian duty to lend a helping hand to widows and orphans in their time of needs. Same way it’s our duty to keep the memory and honor of an old friend from being dragged into the mud.”

  I wince at the harsh words, and let my face fall lower, if that’s even possible. 

  “Well, it’s a good thing that we are all recipients of the abundant grace of the Lord, which covers multitude of faults, and it’s never hard to reach,” a deep, velvety, masculine voice cuts into my embarrassment. 

  I lift my eyes from the ground, to find a man striding confidently in our direction. He smiles kindly at me, his eyes fixed on my own, like I’m the only person still standing in the station.

  He finally cedes our staring contest, to take in the rest of the group.

  A knot forms in the pit of my stomach, because I recognize him from years past when my family used to visit this town, and I’m afraid I know exactly why he’s here. 

  “Good afternoon, all. I apologize for my tardiness, I had a last second detail to take care of before leaving the house,” he nods in our general direction, taking his hat off; a riot of ashy blonde curls falls onto his forehead, before bending forward to shake my mother’s hand, “I’m Peeta Mellark, at your service, ma’am. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.” 

  “Likewise, mister Mellark,” says my mother, her lips twitch tersely, “Widow Everdeen, and this here is my daughter Katniss… your bride.” 

__________________

“Do I really have to do this?”

“No. You really don’t.”

Katniss stares at her manager, Effie Trinket, with a tiny bit of hope in her eyes, but that’s squashed all too soon. As one of the most famous musicians in the world, she knows this is all part of her job. It doesn’t matter how much she hates it or how high her anxiety spikes. She’s a superstar, and a significant part of her job is press and publicity. A photoshoot with celebrity photographer Peeta Mellark isn’t the worst thing in the world, but she still doesn’t want to do it.

“Don’t lie to me.”

Effie sniffs and tosses her head. “Then, don’t ask stupid questions. Of course, you have to do this. It’s been on your schedule for weeks.”

“I hate it,” she mutters before addressing the other woman. “No more photoshoots for a while. We’ve already got plenty of candids and professional photos from concerts and practices. You know I just want to make music.”

“Chin up. Smile on,” Effic chirps. “All artists want to concentrate on what they love. So does everyone who’s good at what they do. This is part of your job, too.”

Katniss is about to retort when she’s interrupted by a gruff voice and the presence of someone she wasn’t necessarily expecting to see. She steals herself.

“If it isn’t Katniss Everdeen. How’s it going, sweetheart?”

Katniss cringes as she catches a whiff of Haymitch Abernathy. He’s clearly got a drinking problem, but he’s one of the most sought after and trusted agents in the entertainment business. He also happens to represent Peeta Mellark, the photographer who’ll be shooting her in a few minutes.

“Haymitch,” she returns in a clipped tone. She doesn’t have anything against the man, but he can be cantankerous and more than a little irritating. She doesn’t have time to be annoyed by him right before a photoshoot she doesn’t want to do anyway.

“The boy will be here soon,” he assures them. “In the meantime, hair, makeup, and wardrobe is down the hall.

“Boy? We’re not scheduled to meet with a child, Mr. Abernathy. Katniss is much too important for that. She’s got her Mockingjay tour to promote, so we want only the best. It’s going to be big, big, big, after all.”

Haymitch studies Effie, and Katniss can’t stop the grin that splits her face. She coughs to disguise a giggle and hides her face behind a raised hand. Her manager is a silly goose, but she’s got an attitude that could ruffle half the feathers in Hollywood while plucking the rest.

“Relax,” he drawls. “Loosen your corset. Peeta’ll be here soon. Ms. Everdeen, down the hall to your right. It’s beauty basic back there.”

Before she can chortle or blurt out something offensive, she makes her way down the hallway. The team, led by stylist Cinna and fleshed out with a grooming trio, practically remakes her in a program so intensive, it almost feels like they stripped her down to her skin, gave her all new parts, and painted and pasted her back together. When she’s finally able to glance in the mirror, she hardly recognizes herself. Hesitant and unsure, she stumbles to the studio and hunches her shoulders in the open, brightly lit room. If she could disappear, she definitely would.

“Katniss! So good to see you. You’re absolutely stunning. A fitting tribute to music and your record label.”

She turns to the honeyed voice over her left shoulder. The photographer is gorgeous, as he always is. It’s been a while since she’d posed for him, but he always seems to know exactly how to capture something that makes her look much more beautiful than she’s ever felt. He has a gift, and she’s glad he’s the one in charge of today’s shoot.

“Peeta,” she returns in greeting in between exchanging air kisses with him on both cheeks.

“Let me look at you,” he gushes and pulls back to survey her. Her hands are clasped in his, and he squeezes her palms as he studies her form. “Cinna’s outdone himself, but he has an amazing palette. I can’t wait to get my lens on you.”

Heat floods her chest and neck, working upward until the tips of her ears burn. There’s something charming about his effortless compliments. They’re disarming but genuine in a way very few people can manage. She wonders how often he can talk his way into or out of anything, including the pants of any man or woman he wants.

“Let’s get started,” he says and drops her hands. “I’d like to begin with the white background. Standing first. Concentrate on your face. We’ll move to full body shots later. Headshots now. Let me see how you are.”

It’s awkward at first. It always is, but he wears her down as the minutes pass. He doesn’t stop talking to her, and it’s more than just photographer’s terms and unnecessary small talk. He has a way of making her feel like he actually cares about her and not her image, even though that’s what his work captures.

“How’s Prim?” he asks in between sets, and Katniss does a double take. She’s only mentioned her sister to him once when they’d first worked together, but Peeta always seems to remember the things that are important to her.

“She’s great. Halfway through her residency in Santa Barbara.”

Peeta nods as he checks the lighting. “You get to see her often, then?”

“Not often enough,” she replies softly in an attempt to disguise her melancholy. Her little sister is busy, and it’s been difficult to find time to connect with her tour schedule and Prim’s brutal hospital shifts.

“But you’re proud of her…”

The words wash over her like gentle rain. Of course, she’s proud of her baby sister. Becoming a doctor is so much more interesting than the life Katniss leads. Singing for crowds of people doesn’t save lives, at least not literally. Maybe in a figurative sense if her fans are to be believed. Somehow, a hasty “This song saved my life.” doesn’t feel as genuine as the medical work her sister performs every day.

“She’s my hero,” Katniss admits. “She’s always been so much better than I have. More loveable and friendly and caring. Smart as a whip. There was this one time…”

She loses track of time as she shares her memories. Peeta’s a good listener, and he moves around her as she speaks. It’s relaxing, she realizes, to tell him about the only person she’s sure she really loves. Prim’s the one who knows and accepts Katniss the most, so it’s only natural that she lights up when speaking of her sister. Beaming with pride and adoration, she lets down her guard as, one by one, her muscles relax.

“What’s her specialty?”

“Emergency medicine. She’s cool under pressure—much more so than I am. The first time I sang in public, she had to talk me up on the stage. Even a talent show in my hometown was too much for me.”

“But you’ve adjusted.”

“I’ve adjusted, yes. No way to do what I do without having done so.”

“I’m glad you have someone like Prim. I’m not close with either of my brothers.”

Katniss blinks into the lights and allows her vision to go fuzzy. If she can just lose herself in the glare, she can pretend she’s on stage all alone and won’t have to think about all the people who’ll see these shots once they’ve been published. The thought of people surveying her body in private—potentially having men use the images for their own pleasure—makes her extremely uncomfortable, but there’s nothing to be done about it. She’s a public figure, and this is all part of what she has to do in her job.

“I didn’t know you had brothers,” she muses. She can just make out Peeta’s shadowy figure if she concentrates, but she doesn’t bother. He’s doing his job, and she’s performing exclusively for him.

“Two. Both older. We grew apart, I guess. If we were ever close, that is. I had a…complicated home life.”

“That I understand,” she murmurs. Pressing her eyes closed, she inhales deeply and then blinks them open.

Click, click, click, click, click.

“That’s the money shot,” Peeta crows.

Startled, Katniss breaks from her reverie. “What?”

“I got the shot,” he explains. “Come see.”

Dazed, she swallows the stab of betrayal she feels. She doesn’t open up that often, and he’d lulled her into a false sense of security. It was only for the camera, and that seems wrong somehow. Cheap, maybe. She moves to him anyway, curious about the picture he’s captured of her. Glancing at the screen, she gasps. He’s done it again. This is why she almost enjoys shooting with him, even though the sessions are excruciating with any other photographer.

“Exquisite, isn’t it?” he asks softly.

She shivers at his words. His voice is low and gentle, and the image he’s captured takes away her breath. She’s never been particularly pretty. She’s too small and plain for that, but Peeta’s found something in her that’s stunning. Her face is delicate and serene under a halo of dark curls interspersed with tiny braids that create the effect of a crown. The angle he’s captured makes her lips look lush and plump as they curve into a shy smile. Her gray eyes sparkle with affection that makes her appear happier than she can remember being in a long time. There are dozens of them, images he’s captured without her even realizing he was shooting. He’d crafted the situation so very carefully. He’d asked her about her sister and then documented the bond between them.

“You’re a genius. You know that?”

Peeta ducks his head and grins. “I have a subject that’s as close to perfection as possible.”

“I don’t know about that,” she protests, but she can’t help the warm glow of happiness that flickers in her chest. He’s always had a way with words, but that doesn’t lessen how nice he makes her feel every time he turns his attention on her.

“I think we have what we need,” he says, and she has to stop herself from staggering at his abrupt dismissal. She’d assumed he’d need at least another few hours with her. The disappointment that their time together is over already surprises her, but she can’t think of any reason to protest her freedom. Instead, she thanks him and flees to wardrobe where she puts herself back together as quickly as possible and escapes. Once home, she locks herself in her studio and pours her heart into her music. Finally, she has inspiration for her next record.

****

“Rise and shine, Katniss! It’s going to be a big, big, big day!”

Katniss groans as Effie’s voice grates on her nerves. It’s the second full week of her North American tour, and Katniss can’t remember what a full night of rest feels like. Sleeping on a moving bus has never been fun, but she’s even less okay with it in her late twenties than she was a few years ago. Getting old is terrible, and she’s still young. She has no idea how older celebrities spend so much time on the road, let alone how those with families separate themselves from their loved ones for months moving from city to city and performing for crowds of strangers.

“Why?” she asks petulantly. She’s an adult, but that doesn’t mean she can’t pout when she’s really over it all.

“Why what?” her manager asks in clipped syllables.

“Why is it going to be a ‘big, big, big day’?” She’s being rude, but she can’t quite find it in herself to care. She’s tired and grumpy and feeling very lonely in a massive sea of people. Alone in a crowd while her whole life is on display for others to dissect and examine and bet on while she just tries to survive.

“Well, I never,” Effie gasps, and Katniss almost apologizes. Instead, she throws her arm over her eyes and attempts to fall back asleep. “Nope! None of that, Katniss. You have press this morning, and we need to review your talking points.

Press junkets are the absolute worst. Katniss sincerely considers quitting her job and living in the mountains somewhere. Maybe she could learn how to shoot a bow and arrow and hunt and forage for her own food so she never has to see anyone else ever again. That’s how much she wants to avoid the people who’ll only ask her the same questions repeatedly and try to find some way to get an interesting anecdote about her private life.

It turns out to be even worse than that. Plutarch Heavensbee of Capitol Records, a real game changer, spends his five minutes with her pitching a singing competition show to her that sounds so far out of her comfort zone, she wants to crawl out of her own skin. Johanna Mason, who works for Wood magazine (How in the world that publication got an interview slot with a musician, she has no idea.), asks about the stage setup instead of anything that has to do with music. The day gets worse and worse, but she actually wants to vomit when she sees who’s got the last interview of the day.

“Katniss Everdeen, my dear. Sweet as a sugar cube.”

“Finnick,” she responds with barely concealed irritation. “Nice to see you again.”

“I doubt you really think that,” he quips as he settles into his chair. “Got any secrets worth my while today?”

“Oh, I don’t know. It seems like everyone always knows my secrets before I do.”

“I think that might actually be true.” He surveys her for a few seconds before pulling a magazine from the bag at his feet and handing it to her. “Have you seen this cover yet? It’s really very lovely.”

Katniss glances down and catches her breath. It’s the latest issue of Victory Village Records magazine, and her face gazes back at her in full gloss. It’s even more stunning than the raw image Peeta showed her when they’d been in his studio together. He’s made her as radiant as the sun.

“Lots of airbrushing.”

“Is it? Seems pretty real to me.”

“It’s supposed to. That’s what a good photographer does.”

“Tell me about that.”

“About what?”

Finnick studies her, a smirk gracing his lips and one eyebrow raised. “Tell me about the photographer.”

“Why?”

“Because he seems to be able to get images of you that no one else can, and he’s said you’re his own personal muse. That’s a high compliment.”

“I’m not a muse.”

“Maybe you are to him.”

“Peeta’s got plenty of talent without needing me to make him look better.”

“Yet, he makes you appear the best you can. The camera loves you, but only when it’s with him.”

“Are you suggesting that I’m unattractive in every other photo?” Katniss tilts her head and purses her lips. He doesn’t take the bait.

“It just seems there’s something special with him. You’re stronger together than apart. He makes you likeable.”

“We’re a good team, I guess.”

“I know how terrible that must be for you.”

“Is there a point to this interview?” She’s tired of his familiarity. They aren’t friends, but he seems to think he deserves access to her most private thoughts.

“What inspires you?”

“I’m sorry?”

He repeats his question, and she bites down her irritation. “What were you thinking about when he shot you?”

“How much I dislike photoshoots.”

“You shouldn’t. Not when you’re a symbol for the revolution in music that’s burning up the charts. You’re on fire.”

She doesn’t have anything else to say. She’s not sure if what he’s saying is a compliment or not, but she’s done with this conversation.

“I think your time’s up.”

“Just one more question,” he tries, but she cuts him off before he can ask.

“Tick tock. The clock says you’re done.”

Finnick leans back with a smirk on his handsome face. He’s a peacock, but he’s disgustingly charming if you like his sort of smarmy manner. She, for one, does not.

“Okay, Girl on Fire. Have a good day.”

She’s never been so glad to be left alone as she is when he’s walked away from her. As she gets up to leave, she realizes he’s left the magazine. When she passes by his chair, she grabs it and tucks it into her bag. It seems a shame to let Peeta’s work go to waste.

****

The tour’s almost over when the flowers come. She’s in her dressing room preparing to go on stage. Effie breezes in like she owns the place carrying a bouquet of red and white roses that give off a smell so sickening that she gags. When she reads the card, she finds they’re from Coriolanus Snow, the president of Capitol Records. He’s a villain in the music industry—consistently refusing to allow artists access to masters and making deals with ironclad contracts that are never in the musician’s favor. He’s been trying to sign Katniss for years, and she continues to refuse. She’s much happier with her smaller label, Seam Records, who first promoted her back when she was a scared young woman of sixteen just breaking onto the music scene.

“I don’t want these,” Katniss insists. “Please get them out of my dressing room.”

“This came, too.”

Effie tosses a new magazine into her lap, and Katniss is stunned to find her face on its cover. “This is Rolling Stone,” she gasps. “This is… Is this from the photoshoot with Peeta?”

“It is. The cover story. Finnick Odair is the author. Title of the article is Girl on Fire. Starts on page 12. There’s a note inside,” she answers before sweeping from the room.

Katniss waits until she’s alone again and then opens the magazine with shaking hands. She finds a folded sheet of paper inside the front cover and unfolds it with a ragged breath.

Congratulations on the success of the Mockingjay tour. You have no idea the effect you have. In a world of glittering diamonds and fake gems, you’re more like a pearl—classy, beautiful, and priceless. You’re not a dime; you’re an eleven. When you’re back in L.A., I hope you’ll allow me to take you to dinner. You inspire me, Katniss.

~Peeta Mellark

She reads the note five times before anything makes any sense. When it does, a genuine smile breaks over her face. That hasn’t happened in much too long. Flying on the high, she throws herself into her show and gives the performance of her lifetime—at least so far. They’ve talked about what to do next, possibly working in New York with some other musicians, but Katniss decides that’s not the next step. When she descends the stairs at the end of the show, Effie’s there ready to plan. Katniss cuts her off with a wave of her hand.

“We’re going back to LA.” When Effie protests, Katniss interrupts. “I have another album ready. Time to get back in the studio.”

 Naked To the One you Love

| Peeta |

“What are we doing?” Katniss asks as I lead us toward the meadow.  It’s early still, the sun barely making its presence known along the horizon as it bleeds its hues of purples, oranges, and pinks into the morning sky.

“Having breakfast,” I tell her simply, shivering from the cold.

“In the snow?” She quibbles, rubbing her hands together to warm them up.  I sneak my arm around her shoulder and pull her close.  She allows it, pressing her popsicle nose into my neck.

“Just be quiet and follow me,” I tell her, which grants me a scowl— no surprise there.  When we finally reach our tree, we climb up and I surprise her by opening the door to our tree house.

“Wow, it’s a lot bigger than last time,” she smiles, looking around the tiny room to inspect my handy work.  It was only a little more than a week ago when I found a large plank and, with Rye’s help we got it to the top of this tree.  Using some of my dad’s tools, I nailed the plank to one of the sturdier branches.  Each day since then I have come out here, adding more planks to it, and now it looks like a tiny little house.  Or well, well … more like one … very small room of a rather tiny house.  It is just spacious enough for the two of us to stretch out comfortably, but it’s a place of our own, somewhere to go when we need to get away.  It’s the closest we can get to the woods since the fence is electrified twenty-four-seven now.

We spend the morning in our little makeshift tree home, enjoying the breakfast I packed and watching the miracle of another sun rise.  After surviving the games with the love of your life, you learn to appreciate the little things in life.  Like sunrises and sunsets.  Like sharing meals with your loved ones.   Things you didn’t think were important before suddenly become of the utmost importance.  So, Katniss and I bask in the warmth from the sun and just enjoy being together like this.  With no cameras and no Haymitch.  No Effie or prep teams chasing our tails and scolding us about schedules.  As much as we love and adore all of them, it’s nice to have a break from them.  Finally, it’s just us, which is just the way I like it.

“I think it’s time to get Prim,” Katniss tells me when she sees the sun positioned above the bakery.  It always amazes me how she knows what time it is by the position of the sun.

I frown and jut my lip out, exaggerating my disappointment.  “No, not yet.  Just one more minute,” I whine, leaning in for a kiss.

“Come on Peeta, I don’t want Prim walking home alone.” Katniss contests, squirming out of my arms.  As much as I don’t want to leave right now, I know she’s right.  We leave everything in the tree and climb down, deciding we’ll most likely return once Prim is safely back at home.  Together, we walk to the school and wait for Prim just outside the gates of the school yard.  I’m not sure how much Prim knows much about what’s going on, if anything, but Katniss and I are too afraid to let her walk anywhere in the district alone.  Afraid of what Snow might do. 

Everyone, even Katniss’s mom said her father’s death was just a stroke of bad luck— that he had an aneurysm that no one knew about, that ruptured.  That if they’d had the technology the people in the Capitol have at their fingertips, they could have caught and treated it.  But we know better.  There was no Capitol technology or any fancy device that would have spared his life.  There is no doubt in my mind— or Katniss’s that Snow was the cause of her dad’s untimely death.  Of course, it wasn’t him per say, because he was clearly safe inside the President’s Mansion in the Capitol, but more than likely one of his spies here in 12.  The timing of everything was just too coincidental, not to mention the fact that he offered his condolences before it even happened.

“Oh, I told Rye we’d stop by the bakery on our way home today,” I tell Prim and Katniss, giving Prim a little wink.  It’s a lie, but Katniss doesn’t know that.  When I clued Prim in on my master plan just the other day, she was more than happy to go along with it— knowing that we all need something positive in our lives— something to celebrate.

We stop by the bakery and I breathe a sigh of relief that my mother is nowhere in sight.  She isn’t supposed to be here for another hour or so, but that hasn’t stopped her from making an unscheduled appearance before.  Rye has trouble keeping a straight face as he prepares a bag for us, filled with Katniss’s favorites.

“Hey, I uh … I was about to head out and stop by to see Dad, I can walk Prim home,” Rye suggests, also aware of my plan.

Katniss squirms in place, uncomfortable to even the thought of letting Prim out of her sight but I assure her it’s okay.  Rye will protect Prim and keep her safe.  They have grown rather close over the last few weeks … or, well, ever since Mr. Everdeen got sick while Katniss and I were still on the Victory Tour.

I remember thanking him for being there for my surrogate family and he rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, like you’d ever let me hear the end of it if I was there and didn’t help if I could.”  

‘Right,’ I thought to myself.  ‘It had nothing to do with you actually caring about them, let alone that you are a decent human being,’ but I kept those thoughts to myself.

“Prim is safe with me, I assure you that I will take extra good care of her,” Rye assuages.  Katniss squirms uncomfortably, so Rye adds, “Katniss, I promise.  You have my word.”

“Extra good?” Katniss smirks after a second, her shoulders slowly relaxing. “Maybe on your way there, Prim can teach you some grammar,” she says in that snarky tone of hers.

“Katniss, we’ll go straight home, I swear!” Prim decrees, clasping her hands together and poking her lip out.  Katniss narrows her eyes, which is preceded with a scowl, but then she finally concedes.

“Fine.  Go straight home.  NO detours.”

Prim wraps her arms around Katniss’s waist and squeals, “Thank you, thank you, thank you Katniss!  You are the best sister ever!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Katniss remarks, trying to hide her grin.  Like me, she finds it extremely difficult to deny Prim anything.

After Katniss and I collect our stuff from the treehouse, I get an idea.  “I want to make a snowman,” I tell her with a cheeky smile.

“A snowman?  Seriously?  But it’s cold Peeta,” she whines.

“That’s the point.  You can’t make a snowman when it’s warm.”  So, that’s what we do, we build a snowman until she gets the bright idea to chuck a snowball at my face.  And then— it’s on.  I scoop up a ball of snow and sling it at Katniss, hitting her square in the shoulder.

With her impeccable aim, I should have known that I had no chance in the world of besting her in a snowball fight. 

“Hey, that’s not fair,” she whines when she sees the pile of snowballs I have hidden behind the snowman.  She might have impeccable aim, but I am the youngest of three boys— I had to work twice as hard to keep up with them.

“You started it,” I tell her and chuck another ball of snow at her.  For the next hour or so, we have fun, smiling and laughing while getting snow blasted in our faces.  Katniss tackles me from the side and slams me down on my back.  She straddles my hips, pinning my arms to the ground.

“I win, you lose,” she says triumphantly, planting a victory kiss to my lips.

“That may be true, but I think it’s me who is the real winner here.”

Her eyes knit together in confusion, “And just how exactly do you figure that?”

“Well, you’ve got me pinned to the ground, I’m trapped underneath you.  I’ll gladly lose to you if this is my punishment,” I tell her with a crooked grin.

“Come on, let’s go home.  I’m cold,” she says, climbing off my hips and helping me up.  Under normal circumstances I do not need help getting around with my prosthesis.  However, the snow adds many challenges to my already uneven gait.

No longer able to feel either our fingers, toes, or our faces, we make our way back to my house to warm up.  Rye and my dad are hanging out two doors down, at the Everdeen’s, so I don’t have to worry about anyone barging in on us.  Once I get the fire started, we curl up on a blanket I spread out on the floor, soaking up the heat from the flames.

“I’m going to take a shower,” Katniss tells me once the feeling in her fingers returns and then she makes her way upstairs.  Her absence gives me the perfect opportunity to get everything in order.  The moment she is out of sight, I begin creating a mental checklist of everything I need to do.  Once I hear the water splashing against the tile floor, I zip into the kitchen and get to work.  I begin by filling a tray with the cheese buns from the bakery— Katniss’ favorite, and pop them into the oven to warm them up.  And then I take out the dough of the white bread I prepared a few days ago, made for this exact occasion.  I open the drawer that contains the papers and pull them out.  “Certificate of Marriage,” I whisper the words aloud.

“Please be okay with this Katniss,” I anxiously tell myself. “Stop it Peeta.  She loves you, you love her; that’s the only thing that matters.” I remind myself, trying to talk myself up so I don’t chicken out. 

Once all the bread is ready to go, I place them on a table next to the couch and wait for Katniss to come back down.

I am not waiting long when she comes gliding down the stairs in an immaculate floor-length orange summer dress.  The straps holding the dress up on her shoulders are skinny, and for some reason they remind me of spaghetti noodles.  It is snug at the top and gets looser the more the light orange fades into a deeper orange.  My eyes nearly bug out of my head at the sight of her.  She is beautiful, she is exquisite and stunning and just … WOW.  It must be one of the dresses Cinna sent back with her, because I’ve never seen this one before.  And although this one is clearly a dress meant for days with bright sun and scorching heat— it’s not like we’ll be going outside.

It is so unlike her when she twirls around once, a huge smile on her face.  “Do you like it?”

For a moment, I’m speechless, “I … I love it, it’s beautiful; you’re beautiful.”

She blushes, joining me on the floor and I prop some pillows up for us to lean against.

“Are you hungry?” I nervously ask her.  Dammit, why am I so nervous?

“What do you think?” She huffs, her eyes narrowing with her trademark scowl, which forces a chuckle to escape from my throat.  It’s a stupid question to ask anyone who is a resident of 12.  Everyone is hungry, even those of us who are more fortunate than the others.  I hand her the platter of cheese buns, but she’s eyeing the other tray.  “What’s that?” She asks, pointing behind my back.

“Oh, it’s nothing.” I tell her and shift my body, hoping to block her view.

“Oh my God, Peeta; is that—” The papers are all but forgotten as her eyes go saucer eyed when she catches sight of the bread behind me.  She crawls over me and picks the bread up, delicately turning it over and over in her hands.  “Is this—”

I bashfully look away and nod my head, “It is,” I admit.  Her head snaps to the right— and then to the left as she surveys the room.  And then it all hits her at once as she realizes what this is.  For a moment, I am afraid she’s going to go running for the hills, but instead, she reaches for the bread knife and begins sawing at the loaf.  She frees the piece of bread and impales it on a poker before placing it over the fire.  While she rotates the poker to evenly toast the bread, she looks over to me, her silver eyes glistening with the flames and smiles.

“Do I ever tell you how much I love you?  H-how important you are to me?” She asks as her eyes meet mine.  And maybe it’s just the heat from the flames, but her cheeks suddenly flush into crimson.

All my anxiety dissipates into her gray orbs as I extend my hand out, curling a strand of her hair around my finger.  “It is implied every single day, in everything you do,” I tell her softly.

She pulls the poker back and places it down next to the hearth, but not before removing the slightly toasted bread from its prongs.  She juggles the bread from one hand to the other— again and again as she waits for it to cool.

My eyes are cemented on her while my anxiety rises to a new level as I await her next actions.

“Peeta … you are … the most amazingly incredible person I know— have ever known.  And … I never thought I wanted this, but you— you changed everything for me.  You changed the way I see the world, and I … I can’t imagine a life without you.  And … even if I could, I don’t want to.”

Woah, wait a minute, what is she doing?  Those are supposed to be my words.

‘Katniss, what are you doing?’ I ask her in our silent form of communication.

‘I think you know,’ she smiles mischievously at me.

“Uh-uhn, no, that’s my job, I had this all planned out.”

“Oh, so that’s what today was all about?” She exclaims with a bright smile on her face.  I can’t help but return the smile as I lean over and press my lips against hers.  Using my weight, I push her down onto her back and kiss her deeply— thoroughly running my tongue along her lips, sucking … pulling her bottom lip into my mouth until she shivers.

“I love you Katniss Everdeen,” I mumble through our connected lips.  “I love everything about you; even the things I hate about you, I love.” I crawl up next to her, our bodies continuing to absorb the heat from the flames as I stare longingly into her beautiful grey eyes.

“You ruined my plans, I’m not sure if I can forgive you for that,” I quip, smiling and gazing into her perfect eyes.

“What if I …” She intentionally hesitates, lifting the seam of my shirt up and tracing her fingers lightly across my stomach, “do this?” She finishes, sending goosebumps prickling against my skin and I squirm from side to side with her touch.

“Nothing’s ruined,” she promises.  “All I said, was I wanted for it to be ours; that I didn’t want the day I became yours, and you mine to be in front of a Capitol audience.  As long as it’s just us, I don’t care about the rest.”

And she says she’s not good with words.

I take her hands into mine, our heads sharing the same pillow as we stare into each other’s eyes, “Katniss, I was mesmerized by you since I was a five-year old, snaggle-toothed little boy.  I can’t even remember a time I didn’t love you; and for so long, I never thought you would give me the time of day.  I thought … for so long I thought that just being your friend would be enough, but after having your love— after having your heart … I can’t imagine a life without you.  I know you only said yes because of … well, because of everything, but I swear to you, I will be the best husband you could ever hope to have.  I—”

“Peeta, I—” She interjects, but I stop her.

“Please Katniss, please let me finish,” she nods, not pushing it any further.  I glance down to the bread and then back at her, “I offer this toasted bread to you with the promise of being your best friend.  I will listen when you need someone to talk to; when you just need to vent, my ears will be open, or if you just need a sounding board, I will be that too.  You will never have to be alone again because I will be by your side.“

‘Always,‘ I add in our silent way.

“Even when you don’t think you want me there, I will be.  I will hold your hand when you’re scared, and I will be right here, right next to you, scared with you.  I will tell you that everything will be okay— because even if it’s not, we will have each other.  I will always, always be there to catch you before you fall.  And … and I’ll give you a push if that’s what you need, too.  Because I love you.”

Her eyes are pooled with tears and her chin quivers as she reaches for our toasted slice of bread and holds it up between us. It is the only thing separating our lips.  And then I part my lips and allow her to feed me the bread, our bread.  Our little slice of heaven that signifies our love.  I sink my teeth into the perfectly toasted bread, as does she.  Our teeth sink into our promise to the other and then we seal it with a kiss.

“I love you Peeta Mellark, my husband.”

“And I, you; Katniss Everdeen; my wife.”

“I think that would be Katniss Mellark now; get it right,” she tries to scowl at me but fails, erupting in a giggle.

“I like the sound of that, Mrs. Katniss Mellark— Oh, that reminds me!” I exclaim jubilantly, nearly bursting at the seams as I jump up to collect the papers the mayor had given me earlier this week.

“What’s that?” Katniss asks me.

“It’s um … they’re the papers.  To um, make it official.”

“Seriously?  When— How?” I breathe out a sigh of relief when she doesn’t object.  That she seems genuinely excited.

“The mayor.  But … we can’t tell anyone; she’ll be in a load of trouble if anyone finds out.”

“My husband … conspiring with the mayor,” Katniss beams, glowing with pride.  I am incapable of concealing the cheesy, shit-eating grin when she calls me her husband.

As I watch her grip the pen in her hand and sign her name on all the dotted lines, I pinch myself to see if I am dreaming.  I can’t believe it; I am actually, really, truly and officially married to Katniss Everdeen— Mellark.

“Wait!  I have something for you,” Katniss says and rushes up the stairs.  I hear her run into my room and then a drawer slams before she is sprinting back down the stairs.

“You already gave me a ring, and I um … I want you to have this Peeta,” she says, her cheeks flushing as she reaches for my hand.  Refusing to meet my eyes, she slips something onto my finger.

I pull my hand up to look at what she’s placed on my finger to see a ring adorned to the pointer finger of my right hand.  Then she takes her ring off the chain of her necklace— (the one I gave her in District 4 the night of my true proposal to her— the one that once belonged to her mother, given to me by her father) and does the same.  

It’s a tradition in 12 that goes along with the toasting.  Everyone knows that your wedding ring is typically worn on the fourth finger of your left hand, but in 12, it starts out on the pointer finger of your right hand.  There was a tradition from before the dark days that said you start off like this because there is a vein … or maybe it’s an artery that runs from your finger to your heart.  And since marriage is the ultimate promise, by doing this you are connecting your hearts together.  Once the ceremony is over, then you switch it to the fourth finger of your left hand.

Katniss leans over to kiss me and we switch the ring to our proper fingers while our lips are still conjoined.  For now.  I will eventually have to find a clever place to keep mine until … until well, I don’t know.  But the Capitol cannot know we are already married.

After all the traditions are complete, I take our marriage papers to the office room upstairs and tuck them away in a safe place.  Then, with a little extra pep in my step, I find my way back to the main room and scoop Katniss into my arms.

“Peeta!  What are you doing?” She squeals like a giddy schoolgirl, encircling her arms around my neck.  Carefully, I make my way up the stairs and into my room— our room.  Who am I kidding?  It’s always been our room— no piece of paper or ceremony was needed to decide that for us.

“I am carrying my wife over the threshold.  The toasting isn’t complete until that’s been done,” I remind her with a kiss.

“Okay,” she says, nuzzling her head against my chest.  No thanks to my artificial leg, we make it up the steps successfully.  I press my lips against hers as my foot passes the threshold.  Now, all the standard traditions of 12 are complete, except for the final one.  The one that really seals the deal.  Consummation.

Just thinking the word in my head causes me to stumble.  My brain seems to forget how to gracefully put one foot in front of the other and I fall face first onto my bed, my body nearly crushing my beautiful wife.

She giggles; a foreign sound, but it is one that I cherish.  “I love you,” I say, pressing my forehead against hers.

“Smooth,” she says, and I can feel her lips forming into a smile against my mouth.

“So, now, we’re supposed to um …” There is a nervous energy between us; she’s scared, as am I.  Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever been more terrified in my life, and that’s saying something— having survived an arena and all.

“Katniss, you know … we don’t have to do this, we can just—”

“What? You don’t want to?” She interjects defensively.

“No, no— I mean, yes, I do.  I was just saying … if you don’t want to, it’s okay.  We don’t have to, we can wait,” I stumble over my words trying to reassure her.

“I want to Peeta,“ she says certainly, never taking her eyes off mine.  "I have wanted to for a while now, and I think we’ve waited long enough.  Will you … will you help me unzip my dress?” Her eyes flit to the floor as she smiles nervously, her cheeks taking on a rosy hue.

She doesn’t have to ask me twice.  While Katniss and I have done many things, getting caught up in heated kisses, touching in places I would rather not mention, we have never gone this far.  We have never gone all the way.  She turns around and pulls her hair to the side, granting me access to her zipper.  I scrupulously glide the zipper down until it refuses to budge another inch and delicately slide the sleeves down her arms.  A frown of disappointment encases my lips when she begins to braid her hair.

I press my lips to her bare neck and kiss my way to her shoulder, which causes a moan to expel from her lips.  “Leave it down, please.”

“Mmm hmmm,” she moans.

“My God, you are so beautiful,” I tell her, my lips trailing down to the crest of her shoulder.  Finally, I sling her dress into the chair next to my bed and she nervously flips onto her back, incredulously facing me. 

‘Oh my God, Katniss is naked, bare to me and in my bed,’ I think to myself as I stare her up and down.

Feeling self-conscious … probably due to my ogling her, she reaches over and pulls the sheet to cover her near-naked body.

“No, what are you doing?” I ask her, tugging the fabric back.

“I just … feel so … naked without my clothes,” she says, flushing with embarrassment.

“Well, that’s kind of the point, isn’t it?”

“Well then … be naked with me,” she says, tugging on the hem of my shirt, eager for me to remove it.  I slide my shirt off and it joins her dress in the chair.  I am hesitant to remove my pants, still self-conscious about my leg.

“Pants too,” Katniss whispers in a raspy— so, so sexy voice.

“I … I—”

“Peeta, I love all of you, even the Capitol-made parts,” she takes charge and flips me over, undoes the button of my pants, and I am too paralyzed to refuse; not that I would want to.  She removes my pants, then sits up and straddles my hips.  With nothing but our underclothes on, we are completely bare to each other, and I understand what she meant about feeling naked without her clothes.  There is nothing to conceal our insecurities, both physical and emotional.  But that’s the point, right?  To be completely open, bare— naked to the one you love.  To have nothing— no secrets between you.  However, underneath all my anxiety, I don’t know if I’ve ever felt anything quite this amazing before.  We slip under the covers and I click the lamp on that sits on my nightstand.  It emanates a soft glow, perfectly lighting the room, while producing a shadow over the insecurities.

“Can I take your leg off?” Katniss asks me.  She must be in my head again— I was just too embarrassed to take the initiative— afraid she would find my mutilated leg … repulsive.

“Okay,” I say.  For the first time I realize she’s had a lot of practice helping me put it on and take it off as she slips it off with ease.

“I don’t want any part of the Capitol here for this,” she says, placing kisses against the scar on my leg.  I pull her up to me and flip her back onto her back.

We are a tangled mess of arms and legs, our tongues dancing together in a frenzy, yet in perfect synchronicity.  As if they’d been practicing for years and years until they reached utter perfection.  I trail kisses along her neck, down to her collarbone and across her shoulders.  I want to kiss every inch of her body; I don’t want to miss a single bit of her skin.  I reach down and cup her perfect breasts in my hands and she moans out in pleasure, which causes my cock to pulse until it is fully erect.

“Touch me Peeta,” surrendering to her every command, I stroke her arms, and then add light touches to her perfectly flattened stomach.  I caress my hands up and down her legs, trying to muster up the courage to touch her there.  Finally, I do, and she’s so hot and wet for me.  I slide one finger inside her center and keep it in there while I use my thumb to rub circles on that little bundle of nerves that I know has the power to make her come undone.

Her body tenses up and I know I’ve hit the right spot when she pants out my name.  “I could be satisfied … happy, just doing that to you … every second of every minute, of every single day,” I tell her once the intensity of her climax has subsided.

“Then how would you make me cheese buns?” She says with a heavy breath.  Smiling, I inch up to her face and kiss her.  Soft and light at first, and then harder, deeper— as if I am starving and her lips are the only way to satiate my hunger. 

“I need you Peeta; I— I need you closer,” she breathes into me and I instantly know what she means. She wants me to be inside her.  We have both wanted this for such a long time, I almost can’t believe it’s actually happening.  I kiss her softly as I fumble my way on top of her.  Using one elbow to prop myself up, my other hands grips onto my cock as I tease her entrance with my hardened member.  Even without being inside her, I can feel how wet she is.  Which only causes my already rock-hard cock to pulse even harder.  She spreads her legs open for me and I fumble nervously, guiding my cock into her entrance and sliding inside her— slowly at first.

“Is this okay?” I ask her, recalling an embarrassing conversation with Rye as he gave me the intricate details that a girl’s first time can be painful, and that it’s important that they are “ready” prior to penetration.

“More Peeta, I need all of you,” she demands, locking her legs around my hips and digging her heels into the back of my calves.  Slowly, I push myself deeper into her, impaling her, until finally, I am fully submerged into her heat.

“Holy FUCK!” I gasp, crying out when my cock is surrounded by her walls.  “Is- is this okay?” I ask her again, not wanting to do anything that might hurt her.  It is taking every bit of willpower that I possess to keep my body still— to prevent my hips from ramming deep— and hard, into her.

“Oh God, Peeta, you feel so good.  Please … please, Peeta—” she begs me, and I’ve never been very good at denying her anything as I submit to her will.  Slowly, I partially retract myself from her center and then slowly, slowly push myself back inside, our pelvises grinding against each other.  Her nails dig into my back, finding their way to my ass and then she squeezes—

“Holy FUCK, how did you just do that?” I ask when her walls tighten around my cock.

“What … this?” She grins, repeating the action, “You like that?” She says in a teasing, seductive voice.

“Katniss— stop … or I’m going to … or I won’t last, and I want … this has to be perfect,” I beg her and then she reaches up, encircling her arms around my neck and pressing her mouth to mine.

“It’s already perfect because I’m with you,” she tells me in-between heated kisses.  And once again, she stupefies me with her words.

“Oh God, I love you too, my perfect, beautiful, amazingly gifted wife,” I tell her, while gliding in … gliding out of her sex.

“Katniss … I’m not sure how much longer I’m going to last if you keep doing that … where do you want me to—”

“Right where you are,” she tells me, knowing what I am trying to say.

“But,” I question her with a raise of my brow.

“I took that pill Effie gave you— I mean, me,” she explains, running her tongue along my ear.

I shiver from the contact and lose all control as I slam into her— again and again before grinding into her center once more.  We both grind; hard and slow, and deep— achieving the perfect rhythm until I feel that familiar stirring deep in my stomach— and then we’re both moaning, and yelling, and whispering— shouting— gasping the other’s name and I’m spilling into her, filling her with my seed; both of us believing that Effie’s miracle pill from the Capitol will prevent any watering of said seed.

0 – 0 – 0

__________________________________________________

Hurt.

Everything hurts. 

Everything burns. It hurts, it burns.

  Can’t open my eyes

I am not strong enough

It’s too hard.

  It hurts.

  Why is there a white veil on my head?

Am I dead?

  It hurts so much.

I am not dead.

  I can hear.

Someone shouts.

  Where is Peeta?

  Peeta ?

He can’t be dead

if he’s dead, I’m dead too.

I can’t lose him.

Not after Dad.

Not after Prim.

  I can’t.

  I have to see him.

See him breathe!

  I have to save him.

He saved me.

  Move.

I need to move.

  It’s so hard to open my eyes!

  I can feel …

I feel something warm on my thigh. I  can feel!

  Sirens.

I hear Sirens. I want to hear him! 

  I have to open my eyes

Or I have to talk.

I have to know !

  Why are my eyelids so heavy ?

  Light hurts.

Everything hurts. everything burns.

  Peeta.

I need Peeta.

Light hurts, but I will take the hurt.

  There!

Peeta is here.

He’s hurt.

He doesn’t move

  Sirens - They are near

Not near enough

Peeta can’t die.

Or I die too. I can’t lose him.

Not after Dad … 

Not after Prim !

  There’s something warm on my thigh.

It moves.

  I have to look down.

  I look down.

  Sirens are coming.

They are near.

  I can hold on.

As long as I feel his hand move.

  He’s alive.

I’m alive.

They set out to find a table, a place to fairly arm wrestle when something catches Peeta’s eye.

His future wife and temporary opponent follow him and Finnick with her two friends, both woman and blond. That’s when he notices their Ladies crest on the rings they wear. It makes him swivel his head to see if anyone is eyeing them suspiciously. Luckily he doesn’t catch any suspicious eyes on them.

But the rings mark them as nobles. Peeta is sure when he dares a second quick glance at them.

Panic sets in, and deeply as he realizes they could be discovered, the both of them. Their families’ wrath would be of little concern compared to what would happen if the whole crowd of people realized their leaders, royalty no less visited a place such as the Hob. His family would face the ruin of their Prince if he was found here, not to mention Katniss. Who would be subjected to even worse accusations as a woman.

“We need to get out of here,” Finnick whispers, having noticed what he has and elbowing his side. “Not only us, but for them as well. Now.” Nodding, Peeta glances around before stoping their group and turning to Katniss. Speaking in as hushed a voice as he could manage.

“Their rings?”

Confused, she looks to her friends and handmaids, Madge and Delly. Kind woman who, while they didn’t always see eye to eye with her yearning for freedom, cared for her as she did them.

With horror, Katniss looked and saw on both their hands had Lady Everdeen’s crest on their fingers. Recognizable and obvious. In fairness, she had not warned them to put away their jewelry and finery, as she had. For a moment, she is touched by Peeta’s warning, but it is fleeting. Their little wager would be dangerous. Any more attention could have their identity revealed by someone who looked even the littlest bit too close.

The idea made her heart race and stomach sink.

When she sees him gesture to a break in the crowd forming, Katniss acts quickly. Grabbing Delly and Madge’s hand and pulling them along. A shush silences their worries, and they follow her hastily. Though her blood runs ice cold when she hears a random voice speak.

“Do you recognize that girl? I swear I know her-”

Thankfully, they make it out of the ally where the Hob hides, and no one seems to pay them much mind despite someone coming far too close to the truth for comfort.

When they are several minutes away from the market, they stop. Deciding to get her friends to safety and have a more private conversation with the blond Prince, Katniss speaks up. “Madge, Delly, go back to the castle. I’ll be along shortly. Try to distract my mother if the two of you could.” She says.

“I’ll escort them, miss. It will be as if they took a stroll in the gardens.” Finnick says, and everyone agrees.

For a moment, the two of them watch their company leave before Peeta says something. “So, the Hob?” It is curious but also teasing and lightheaded. More importantly, not haughty. “I go there to sell my paintings, sometimes. But I always bring Finnick. Not a wholesome sort of place.”

“Yes, well. It will sell arrows to anyone…even a Lady whose been banned from her families weapons.” She points out. “Though, I also will bring my game there, too. My mother doesn’t know, and the commoners get fed. Though I don’t think I’ll be doing much hunting any time soon, now.” There is an uncomfortable silence after the words.

Peeta knows, from experience, the feeling Katniss was daring to express. His own parents had demanded he stop his painting- which is why he sold them at the Hobs for perhaps more than he should. It would do good to replace the paint and canvases he used. All of his friends who happened to be female, as well, were strictly forbidden, lest he establishes a reputation as a rake. Admittedly he could be teasing and agreeable…but none of them moved past flirting.

This marriage had made them both hide things clearly. And it was ironic this pain was something they could share. The fact grates at him, though, and he offers an olive branch.

“If you meet me here tomorrow, I will bring you the arrows that were broken. You bought them, fair and square.”

Katniss smiles, noting the meaning of his words. It relieved that her betrothed seemed to have no intention to try and stop her from hunting the way her family had. It still wasn’t the most pleasant thing, not having a choice in their marriage. But this Peeta seemed kind and intelligent. Surely she could make the most of her time with him.

“I look forward to it, Prince Peeta.” She says, smirking