When he enters the room he discovers he’s not the only one stuck with Saturday detention today.  That’s something at least.  Peeta loves hanging out with friends (part of the problem, actually; part of the reason he’s here today in the first place) and so the fact he won’t be here alone cheers him up a little.  

Gale, the school thug (for lack of a better word) and the one person Peeta thought might be here today, sits in the far back of the library, his feet propped up on the table as he digs at his fingernails with a pocket knife.  Gale’s eyes keep flitting back and forth between what he’s doing to his hands and Madge, the rich girl no one ever talks to, sitting a few tables in front of him.  Beetee, the genius kid who Peeta has trouble imagining getting into enough trouble to be here on a Saturday, sits towards the front, his eyes firmly on his iPad as he types away.

Peeta’s halfway to the table he’s decided will be his today — the one in the middle, so he’ll be able to chat with anyone who might be inclined to talk with him — when he sees Katniss Everdeen sitting in the very front of the room, her eyes downcast and her hands folded neatly in her lap.

Peeta is so surprised to see her that he nearly trips over the leg of his chair.

Peeta can’t say exactly when he began to notice the girl everyone else at Panem High calls “freak” and “weirdo.”  She certainly isn’t his usual type. Not at all, in fact.  Normally, Peeta goes out with blondes.  Girls who most people would find conventionally attractive.  Cheerleaders.  Energetic girls who are fun in bed and who his mother approves of.

But there’s just something about Katniss he can’t stop thinking about.  The way she talks, the way she dresses… everything about Katniss just screams I don’t give a fuck.  And in a phony place like Panem High that’s something rare and special indeed.

Peeta sets his bag down on his table with a loud thunk, hoping to catch Katniss’ attention.  Everyone else in the room looks up at him questioningly.  But Katniss stays focused on whatever it was she was staring at before he got here.