I've been approved to go for lunch with the rest of District 13, something about me going - more - crazy if I have to stay locked up by myself for a long period of time. That's fine with me. Maybe Katniss will be there. You know, Katniss, who was the great love of my life, who almost broke into tears when I said that I must have loved her a lot...I see glimpses of that sometimes. Sometimes in my mind she isn't always a mutt, but she wouldn't know that because she's stopped visiting. I must not have meant as much to her as I thought.
They've been having me rewatch all of our Games, to show me what really happened...they showed me the beach during the Quarter Quell...she said she needed me, and then we find ourselves here. She hasn't visited, she hasn't come to even say hi. I can always feel when she's here, but that feeling has since stopped. We seemed to have connected on a cellular level, so now when she's abandoned me...well, it's not easy, and she's never here, so what exactly am I supposed to do? If I asked her to come again, would she? I know it must have hurt her when I said she was a real piece of work, but it's true, she knows that, that's why she hasn't come.
I don't hate her all the time. There are times where it's unbearable the amount of hate that's there, but there's also love to. It must be so powerful that it could overcome all the haze of what the Capitol did. I still remember those nights on the train. That's certainly something worth remembering. I can remember the training center roof before the Quarter Quell, moments like those make it hard for me to not love her. I think I said something about freezing the moment, and living in it forever...I think she said okay. It's the memories like these that make her abandonment so much harder. Yes I get that she's a very busy person, but she hasn't come to see me in weeks. Haymitch has, and I haven't quite forgiven him yet. He left me in that arena, I mean I get why he had to, but...okay, to be fair, it was Katniss and I being separated that really sealed my fate in that arena.
I've tried to talk Haymitch into getting Katniss to come, but every time I try to ask him, something always seems to come up and he leaves. Maybe he knows she'll never talk to me again...for the part of me that still loves her, the part that remembers the train and the roof...that part of me is aching, and it doesn't seem to be on the mend anytime soon. Maybe she'd rather spend her time with Gale...maybe they really were made for each other.
"Time to go," says one of my many guards. Yeah, guards. I'm guarded.
We make it to the cafeteria, and as I live and breath, she's sitting with Gale. It shouldn't surprise me, but the sting in my chest, the surge of jealousy I feel, makes me clench my hands so tight they turn blue. I'd been jealous of him before, but I at least got to kiss her, and hold her, all things he wasn't able to do...and now here we are. He's not holding her, he's not kissing her, but he may as well be. She doesn't even see me. I feel invisible. I've never felt that way with Katniss before. I'm finding I do not like the feeling.
I get my food and make my way to her table, I may be invisible but I will make myself known. She's laughing. Laughing. And with other people. She's abandoned me and she's laughing with other people. Other people, including Gale. I'm trying my hardest not to feel jealous, but I can't help it.
She just choked...great. First time seeing me in weeks and she chokes. Not exactly the response I was going for here. There's a lot of responses I would have deemed acceptable, well, this was not one of them. No never. This would never be one of them.
"Peeta!" screams Delly. "It's so nice to see you out . . . and about."
Okay, well I would have taken that kind of a reaction from Katniss.
"What's with the bracelets?" asks Johanna. I haven't seen her recently either. I don't even know what she's up to. The only person that really comes to see me is Haymitch, and the ever changing number of doctors. I'm sore for company. No one really comes to see me. I heard Prim came yesterday, but they wouldn't let her see me, and I guess I'm a ticking time bomb, so whatever...at least she made an effort.
"I'm not quite trustworthy yet," I tell her. "I can't even sit here without your permission." I nod to the guards behind me. It's annoying, but apparently that is the truth. I wait for Katniss to answer, but she doesn't. Of course, how foolish of me, thinking that she would.
"Sure he can sit here. We're old friends," says Johanna, patting the space beside her. I look to the guards who nod, and I take a seat. "Peeta and I had adjoining cells in the Capitol. We're very familiar with each other's screams." Sad, but true. If she screamed now, rooms away, I would know it was her. On the other side of her I see Annie cover her ears with her hands. Trying to escape reality I guess? "What? My head doctor says I'm not supposed to censor my thoughts. It's part of my therapy," says Johanna.
"Annie," says Delly a little too brightly, "did you know it was Peeta who decorated your wedding cake? Back home, his family ran the bakery and he did all the icing." Great, Delly of all people is praising my talents, and then there's me, sitting here, like an idiot, hoping that Katniss would say something to me...would actually look at me.
"Thank you, Peeta. It was beautiful."
"My pleasure, Annie," I tell her. Katniss gives me a weird look...it's almost warm.
"If we're going to fit in that walk, we better go," Finnick tells her. He collects their tray and they stand up to leave. "Good seeing you, Peeta."
"You be nice to her, Finnick. Or I might try and take her away from you." I don't know why I just said that, maybe to get at Katniss, maybe because I haven't forgiven Finnick for separating from me in the arena, because if they got him out, they sure as hell could have gotten me out at the same time too.
"Oh, Peeta," says Finnick. "Don't make me sorry I restarted your heart." Then he and Annie leave, but not before he shoots Katniss a concerned glance. Great, they're all chummy now too. This is what happens when you don't rescue a guy from an arena and he gets messed up by the Capitol, doesn't remember why he loves the woman he loves, yeah, that's great.
When they've gone Delly turns to me and with a reproachful voice says, "He did save your life, Peeta. More than once."
Here's my chance. "For her." I nod at Katniss. "For the rebellion. Not for me. I don't owe him anything." It's true. Finnick saved me, because they wanted Katniss, because they wanted their Mockingjay. That wouldn't happen if I died in that arena, I may be confused, but that much I know to be true.
Katniss straightens, irritated. "Maybe not. But Mags is dead and you're still here. That should count for something." That should count for something?
I shouldn't, but I do. "Yeah, a lot of things should count for something that don't seem to, Katniss. I've got some memories I can't make sense of, and I don't think the Capitol touched them. A lot of nights on the train, for instance," I tell her. I didn't realize just how bitter I am about her abandoning me, until the words are out of my mouth. She looks stunned by what I've just said. It's as if what I've said implied more than I actually said. The train, I'm talking about the train. The nights when the only reasons my nightmares weren't as bad, was because she was asleep in my arms. It's something I could really use right now. But that's not going to happen, is it?
What about her and Gale though, since I seem to be out of the picture, does that mean he's in it? I raise my spoon at them. "So, are you two officially a couple now, or are they still dragging out the star-crossed lovers thing?" I kind of want an answer and at the same time I don't, because if they aren't that means that things are over for us...and if they still are, she has no good excuse for abandoning me like this.
"Still dragging," says Johanna.
So she has no good reason. That's great. I tighten my hands into fist trying to calm myself but it doesn't work so I spread them all the way out. I can't even believe this. I loved her so deeply that it's still there, but did she not love me at all? Was that "I need you" in the Quarter Quell just a lie to appease me so she could sacrifice herself. Was it purely about saving me? Did love really have nothing to do with it?
I suppose not.
Gale is all tense by Katniss. If he wants to fight, I'm all for it. I was on a wrestling team, I can take him. Then Gale speaks up, "I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself." Great, Gale's holier than thou comment is here. I was wondering when it would make an appearance.
"What's that?" I hazard to ask.
"You," he says simply.
Of course that's what he would say. Gale and I have never seen eye to eye on anything. I don't think that would change now. I have a feeling that we'll always be competing over Katniss, looking at the Quell recaps...I would have thought I'd won then, not that Katniss is something to win, per se, but I thought at least that she had decided...on me, and then...maybe I was wrong. Maybe I've been wrong the whole time.
"You'll have to be more specific," I spit out. "What about me?"
"That they've replaced you with the evil-mutt version of yourself," says Johanna.
And here I thought she was on my side, and I'm sorry that I'm upset because I've been abandoned by the one person, left on this earth, that I love. I can't always explain why I love her, or in what ways, but right now, I don't love anyone. I don't like anyone. I feel completely alienated from everyone I've ever cared about, even Delly seems upset by what's just happened.
Gale turns to Katniss now, "You done?" She agrees and they're up and on their feet and leaving the area. There's nothing I can do to make them stay, but one last look from Katniss and I wonder if the girl I loved is in there at all anymore. Maybe we've both become the mutt versions of ourselves...maybe that started long before now, maybe that's what really happens to the victors, maybe we all become mutts.
Watching Katniss walk away with Gale is not easy, I'm not okay with it. But she's been walking away from me since the first day I got here...though to be fair the crazy version of me did try to kill her, but I'd have at least thought that my comment about the bread would have changed things...except now instead of fleeing to another district, she simply won't talk to me. And I can't tell which one is worse. I still love her, so I suppose that's why it hurts.
And for now...there's nothing I can do if she won't talk to me...