Her braided brown hair whipped in the wind, the wispy bits over her ears getting in her eyes. She giggled as she pushed them away for the third time, and not being able to stand watching her for any longer I jogged over, calling her name.
"Katnip!"
I tried to make it seem like I hadn't been watching her, but it was no secret now that I am completely infatuated with her. The way she braids her own hair of a morning, re-doing it because she isn't satisfied with it. The cheeky look she gives me when she knows that I know I've done something wrong but she loves me for it anyway, the way her lips fit perfectly with mine... I never imagined that after she came out of the arena for the 74th Hunger Games that she would take to me as willingly as she did. No more fighting, no more tears, no more Peeta.
Have you ever been in love? Like gut wrenching, heart pulling, love? I have. I have been for about a year now, but with a girl that didn't know I existed in a boyfriend capacity. We would always be running off past the boundaries of District 12 where we would hunt together, I the traps and her the bow and arrow. We would spend hours out there hunting for our next meal, until that fateful reaping day where her dear sister was to be pulled from the ball, and she to volunteer.
"Capitol to Katnip, are you there?" I tease.
"Oh sorry Gale, I've been so out of it lately." She replies in the exasperated tone that makes me think she doesn't sleep enough. I lean in and hug her all the same. I can smell the woods on her, the fresh moss pasted to her neck from wiping away a bug or one of those pesky hairs, that have flown into my mouth. I laugh and fake gag at the same time before picking Katniss up by the hips and hugging her to me, spinning her around like she was an infant that just came running to her father.
"You're very happy today aren't you?" Katniss observes, kissing my forehead.
"I just never believed that I would end up with you the way I have. I thought for a while there..." I digress.
"What? That I would stay with Peeta?"
"Well, yeah. I mean, that kiss. Then that whole thing after the Games where Haymitch was saying that you would have to pretend to be in love with him..." I put her down.
"...and that I was actually in love with him and you didn't think for a second that I would play all of Panem and trick them into believing I was in love with the Boy with the Bread?" she finishes in a hushed voice.
"Well if you're going to put it like that."
"I'm just messing with you Gale, chin up." She produces a small bread roll from her pocket and throws it at me, I miss catch it and it rolls into the puddle of mud at my feet.
