My Dandelion, Hidden By Snow

Living without Peeta will be hard, but I know that it's the right thing to do. I need to grow away from him, let him love someone better. That is until I hunt in the snow and recall some of the times that Snow has brought us closer. This storm has been raging on for much too long, and I only now realise that Snow has been hiding my Dandelion... In more ways than one.

It's cold. Much too cold. Winter in District Twelve always used to be hard but I didn't used to mind. To me, it didn't matter that I couldn't always get food, just as long as Prim could. And then she used to like the snow, the rare privilege that would appear for sometimes months on end in the year. She loved to see it hiding all the horrors that our District possessed. Now it can't even do that, and she's not here to make me smile.

Before this one, the hardest winter for us had to be the year after my father died.

My mother is still kind of unaware of the world around her, even though it is the coldest winter that the District has experienced in living memory. She doesn't really listen to where either of her daughters are going, especially where her youngest wants to go, so she lets her play outside in the snow all day with Rory, although she doesn't really have a proper coat.

I come back late from hunting with Gale, because we'd been working since before dawn, until many hours after the heavy snow clouds covered the weak winter sun. I walk in and find mother sitting as she usually is at this time of the night, but I can't see Prim trying to talk to her, or even playing with her disgusting little cat. I try to get mother to tell me where she has gone, but it is as much use as talking to a brick wall.

So I go around to the Hawthorne's to ask Rory if he knows instead; he is a smart seven year old, so I doubt that he would have let her get hurt, especially as he knows that I would get him if he did. He tells me that they had been out during the day but, when it had started to get dark, he gave her his coat and she set off for home; did she not get back then?

I shake my head and lie, just saying that she was a little too cold to talk, so I make up that I had come around to check with him what had happened. But, really, by this point, a heavy feeling of fear has filled my empty stomach and made me feel sick. Where is she and how did she get lost between here and our house? I know I have to find her, because she is my responsibility and I wouldn't be able to live with myself, knowing that I had lost her.

I spend the next few hours first running around the main part of the Seam, then through all the back alleys, and then I make my way into Town. It is my last hope and, if it is where she is, I won't blame her because all the shut shops, their warm, golden light pouring onto the dark streets, look a lot more inviting than the cold and ramshackle houses of the Seam. But why and how did she get here?

For a while, I wander around and peer into the shop fronts, looking for the thin frame of my sister, hopefully being looked after by someone kind. Often, I am shooed away before I get a long enough chance to look, but, by the time I have reached the last shop on the last street, I still haven't found her. I don't know what to do because that is my last light gone.

I sink to the floor, my head in my hands as tears begin to slip down my cheeks, freezing where they stop and turning my cheeks to ice. At this point too, the snow begins to fall heavily, but I don't really care that I am in it; I just still want to find my little sister and take her away from it and to somewhere warm.

"Katniss?" a soft voice that I have heard many times around the school but never directed to me whispers.

However, I pretend not to hear him. I don't think I need Peeta Mellark's charity. It was only the week before when he threw those burnt loaves to me after I had fallen over in his back garden, unable to sell any of Prim's baby clothes for a decent price anywhere. He then came into school the next day with a swollen cheek and a black eye, making me feel incredibly guilty, so I looked down to find a dandelion on the ground. Hope.

"Sssh it's okay," he continues. He kneels down on the floor beside me and takes off his jacket from his shoulders, putting it around my shoulders instead. He carefully lifts my hands from my face so his blue eyes met my grey. He smiles at me, but I can tell that he is actually worried for some reason and, because of the bright red colour of his cheeks, I can tell that he's also been wandering around in the cold for a while.

I shake my head and try to look away, but his warm gloved hand on my cold cheeks pulls me back to him. I look up at his kind face and wish more than anything that he'll be able to make it better; stop the snow, find my sister, bring back my parents, make it better than it ever was. But he can't. He's no miracle maker, no matter what the rest of the girls in my year believe. So I bring my knees up to my chest and rest my chin on my knees, shutting my eyes as I sigh.

"Katniss, I found your sister a couple of hours ago," he says quietly, his breath on my cheek beginning to warm the rest of my body. "I took her into my house to warm up. She's fine now."

I open my eyes to stare at him. He's got a look of pure honesty on his face but he can't be telling the truth, can he? I searched everywhere for her and didn't find her, so how did someone who didn't care in the slightest about a Seam kid find her, and why did he then take her in? This boy is somewhat incredible, no matter how much I don't want to admit it.

"Come back with me and I'll show you," he promises, taking my frozen hands in his, before slipping the gloves onto my hands as he puts my arm through the crook of his, his hands now stuffed into his pockets.

After he leads me to my feet, I walk next to him in silence, possibly because I don't know what to say to him and I think my lips are frozen anyway, but mainly because I'm in awe of him. He seems so perfect and caring, even when he doesn't try to be. He's saved my family more times than I would like to count already, and he'll no doubt do it again, numerous times in the future.

"We're going to have to go in the back way," he admits as we reach the back of his house, the garden already covered in a deep sprinkling of snow. "My mum doesn't know that Prim's from the Seam. She thought she was someone from the Town who got lost. She won't let you in if she sees you."

Still, I can't find it within myself to talk, and I think it's probably better if I don't now. So I stay in silence as I follow him, sneaking up the stairs and trying desperately not to pause as the warm, sweet smell of bread fills my nostrils. It's only when I catch sight of my sister sitting on a bed, wrapped in blankets and close to a heater that I finally shout, "Prim!" letting go off Peeta and running forward to envelop her in a tight hug.

After that, I took Prim back to mother, and she hardly seemed to notice that we had gone. But I never thanked Peeta for looking after her, and I still never have. I'm unbelievably grateful for every secret thing he did for us, I am just not the kind of person that can easily thank someone else.

I sigh and get back to my feet, pulling the jacket further around me and zipping it up to the very top as I pull the hood up over my head. I'm getting no game whilst the weather is like this, I'm really just sitting here in the mere hope that some brave animal with venture out into the snow to find some food of its own. And I don't even need game to eat actually, I just want something to be the same as it was before the Games.

I stretch out my fingers in the gloves, trying to bring some feeling back into them as I clasp the bow tighter in my hands, the arrow that is loaded in it balancing without me holding it. The Victory Tour started when it was snowy too, and I was in fact wearing this coat; I'm only wearing it again now because it's so warm in comparison to the outside world. I don't want to be reminded of what changed my world so much.

I possibly hate the snow now. There's no longer my little sister playing in it to make me smile. She managed to quickly forget about the time she got lost in it but I never could forget, especially when I found Peeta looking at me whenever the white flakes began to fall from the sky. And then choosing to hunt in this makes it even worse. I no longer have my best friend to joke around in it with, because he was the one who took my little sister away from me. He was the one who kept me hunting all the time, the reason that I was able to kill people and why I had to come back with Peeta.

Peeta. His name burns my tongue even when I don't say it out loud; I just have to think it for him to take over my mind, like the venom sometimes still takes over his mind and body. He still confuses me; he confused me for such a long time before, and he probably will forever confuse me, so I don't know why he still fascinates me. Why is it that I am so easily drawn to him, like a mockingjay is to a song?

I know the reason why we broke up, and it makes me feel like there is a pain in my chest from the moment when I told him to leave me alone and to find someone better. As I sit down at the edge of the lake where my father used to take me, I realise that the truth probably is that I do love him. I mean, we went through too much to not feel something towards each other, and he even felt it before.

But, the internal battle that still rages inside of me is based on the fact that I didn't actually tell him to leave me alone, I just ran away. Three months ago, we decide to just be friends. A week later, that promise failed and we began a relationship again, but as if we were starting a normal relationship, as normal people. We pretended to completely forget about the Games and to start over, but it was hard, especially with Peeta's random episodes.

They were hard to cope with, but we somehow still managed. Quite often, I was the one to set him off, so I thought it was only right if I brought him back to normality. How I managed, I do not know, but I think it was because I needed him there for me as much as I needed him for anything else. He was my Dandelion, the thing that was tying me to the ground and, without him there, I didn't know how I'd cope.

Last week, we slept together. That's the harsh reality of the truth: the boy who provided me with hope in my darkest days was the boy who had always loved me, and it was he who managed to finally persuade me out of my lifelong promises. I probably always knew that, if I was ever going to fall for anyone, it would be my beautiful boy with the bread. Last week, I decided that maybe it wouldn't be so bad if I did get married and have kids, just for him perhaps.

It was later on that night, when I was still lying in his arms, that I looked out of the window and saw it beginning to snow; it hasn't stopped since. I must have said this out loud because he tensed up, and I luckily noticed this because I sprang out of bed before he managed to strangle me. It only took one look at his face to tell me that I wouldn't be able to get him out of that mess.

I grabbed a jacket and pair of trousers from the room next door and threw them on before running downstairs. I quickly left a note on his table, saying, "Find someone better," and then I left his house. I ran back to mine and cried for the rest of the night because I hated what I had done, although I could see that it was really my only option if I wanted him to have the best life possible.

As I lay back into the deep drifts of snow, just a little melting under the small amount of body heat that escapes my coat, I begin feeling guilty about him. He hasn't left his house all week, and I can't help but feel it's my fault. He must feel so unwanted once again, but if only he knew that I do really want him, I just can't risk being hurt by him like he nearly did. It was too hard to imagine, so I don't want to experience it.

It's now, though, that I finally realise why he had an episode and why he can't come out in this weather. Snow's come back to haunt us, in more ways than one. True, the cold weather did used to bring us together: when he'd give us food in exchange for a beating when we were starving; when he rescued my sister from freezing to death in the cold streets of the District; when he pretended to still love me during the Victory Tour, just so everyone else would be safe. And then President Snow forced us into a death game together, only letting us both come out alive if we lived together.

And now it's come back. This time in comparison, it's driven us away from each other. The first mention of it made him snap, causing me to run away. I haven't been able to look back since, too scared of what it will mean. It's also then kept him away from me, because he hasn't been able to leave his house so he can see me, and I've been staying in the meadow all day, hoping against hope that I'll be able to hunt to distract myself from the horrors of our life.

To be honest, now, well, I wouldn't care if I stayed here for ever and froze to death. I doubt that anyone else would care, either. Gone are the days when Katniss Everdeen, the Girl on Fire and the Mockingjay mattered. As well, gone are the days when she couldn't freeze because fire seemed to follow her everywhere she went, whether or not she liked it. I'm nothing now.

I pull the gloves off of my hands, stuffing the old Capitol accessories into my pocket as I shut my eyes, sinking my hands back into the snow. It's so cold, but strangely soothing. I mean, the snow has started to fall from the sky again, so that the flakes settle onto my face to cool my hot cheeks, melting almost instantly. Then the snow on my hands feels as if it's killing any dirt I have on my hands, physical or not.

However, I can't fall asleep completely in this cold scene as the fingers of my left hands close around something frozen beneath the surface. I sit up and begin pushing away the snow that covers the flower, desperate to see what the hardy plant is that can survive in this harsh weather, and even why it would want to survive it. Who would, I'm beginning to wonder?

When I first see a yellow petal, I sit back as a tear slides down my cheek. I can't do this. If he's going to keep appearing everywhere, I need to talk to him. We need to make some kind of agreement where we'll decide what we're going to do. I won't be able to live without him for much longer, even if we are just friends again. I'll find him a great girl, one who won't keep setting off but who will still love him; one I'll be forever jealous of.

Before I know it, I have picked the flower from its home beneath the snow and stood up, cradling the beauty in the palms of my hands. After being under the snow for so long, its yellow petals have begun to turn pale orange, just like his favourite colour. As for the flower itself? It's so strong for having been able to survive the most difficult conditions, but then it still looks almost the same. For it, nothing's changed and nothing will. It's forever my hope.

And, after all this time, I only now know that Snow has been hiding my Dandelion, in more ways than one. He changed him so that he forgot what I was really like and only saw me as a mutt. But then, we began to grow back together more than we had before, only for Snow to reappear and throw us apart once again. Now, I find my Dandelion, hidden by storms of Snow, and I know that I'm never going to leave him again.

So, without a second thought, I put the dandelion carefully in my plaited hair and then run back to the edge of the Meadow, throwing my bow and arrows into their place and then continuing on, no longer worrying if they're safe. I carry on running, the slippery road underfoot hardly fazing me until my footsteps slow down to a walk when I catch sight of all the houses in the Victor's Village, his still dark.

I sigh, stuffing my hands in my pockets to hide them from the cold as I walk up the path to his house, only stopping as I stand in front of the door, my fist raised to knock. I don't know what's stopping me because, less than a few seconds ago, I was determined to win back his heart. Now, well, I can hardly bring myself to knock on the door, just so that I can see him again.

After a few minutes where I fight with myself, my fist collides three times with the wood and I'm left standing on the doorstep, waiting for him to open the door. I stand in silence, listening carefully to the sounds behind the door and forcing myself not to speak because I know that, if I do, he will definitely run away. For now, I might have more of a chance of him coming if he doesn't know it's me.

It's not long before I do hear movement behind the door but, most unfortunately, it's moving away instead of to it. Soon, after hearing more movement but still not the door being opened, I slam my fist into the door again, this time harder, though. "Peeta Mellark, if you don't open us this damn door now, I swear I will break it down to get to you!" I find myself shouting.

Still, he doesn't answer and I give up, sliding to the floor and sitting on the doormat. I sigh before resting my head in my hands, rubbing my eyes as I breathe in deeply, not letting myself cry. But then I take my hands away from my face and to behind my head, removing the dandelion from my hair and putting it in front of me, revelling in its beauty once again. "I can wait all day and all night here, Peeta," I whisper quietly, running the petals through my fingers. "I'm never giving up on you."

"It didn't seem like that last week," a hard voice replies from the other side of the door.

I gasp and spin around on my knees, pressing the palm of my hand- without the flower in- to the door, resting my cheek there too. "Peeta, you don't realise just how sorry I am," I say as strongly as I dare. "Yes, maybe I meant it at the time but I was scared. Now I see how much I actually need you, and how much I will struggle to live without you."

"You were doing fine before, it seems." His sharp answers seem colder and more biting than the freezing temperatures that I sit in outside. It seems that the boy that was once always so happy has gone, again replaced by the hijacked boy that made the Capitol him, after keeping him in there for so long.

"I know, and I'm sorry. It's only after a week of being without you and not seeing you that I realised how special you are," I admit. "Even seeing no lights in your house has been hard."

"I didn't think you were at home either," he complains.

I sigh. "It's true, for most of the time I wasn't. I was so scared that you had changed back to the boy who hated me, instead of the boy who loved me. It took me so long to remind you of some of the things that life was like before, I didn't want to see them all disappear in front of me again."

"I wouldn't have changed if you had stayed with me," he argues, his soft voice returned, although it still cracks slightly as he talks. "Katniss, you were helping things be so much better, in fact, I thought we had improved on how we were before the Games, and I only needed to know that you'd still be with me to know that everything would be okay."

"Then let me back in," I plead.

"No." The answer is so sure and definite, completely different to the one that I was expecting, or at least hoping for. I wanted him to welcome me back with open arms but it seems that it can't and won't be.

"Why not, Peeta?" I whine.

"I don't want to risk hurting you," he confesses, me hearing a tear stuck in his throat. "Katniss, I'm fighting to keep you safe and, if it does mean that I have to follow your suggestion to find another girl so I can't hurt you, maybe I should."

"No, Peeta." This time, it's me who's sure. Before, I was so certain that he needed to find another girl to stop the episodes but, now that the idea leaves his lips, I hate it. "I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I saw you with someone else." Tears begin forming under my eyes too, and I have to inhale deeply to stop myself from letting them fall.

He stays silent for a few moments and I'm half afraid that he's gone again until, eventually, he whispers, "Katniss?"

"Yes," I reply quietly, turning around again and sinking back onto the floor.

"I saved Prim from the snow once. Real or not real?" he asks.

"Real," I answer. "And it was probably more than once, though."

"You were wandering around town for hours to find her, when I found you and told you that I had already found her. I gave you my jacket and then my gloves, and then I lead you back to my house. You took her home nearly straight away but, before you left, you said that I was your dandelion in the spring," he reminisces. "Real or not real?"

I don't answer for a while as I swivel around on my knees again, quietly opening the letter box above his head and posting through the dandelion I found less than an hour ago. "Real," I repeat as the metal clangs shut. "And, Peeta, you still are."

I quickly get to my feet before he has the chance to answer, walking away without a second thought. I've done all that I can do, so now it's up to him. If he chooses to let me back into his life, I won't ever leave again, but if he doesn't, well, I tried my best and there's only a certain amount that I can do to persuade the hijacked boy that I actually love him.

It's when I'm halfway between his house and mine that the crunching of snow under foot catches my attention. However, I don't turn around until his warm fingers have appeared on my hip, spinning me around so I can finally look him in the eye after a week of being without him. And, I can say, he looks as awful, or maybe possibly worse than me.

He has dark bags under his eyes and his face is pale, because he obviously hasn't been sleeping all week either. His eyes look haunted too, the sparkle gone. Then the bones of his once strong body are already showing due to his thin frame, which will be because of the fact that he hasn't been able to eat, like me. But, the thing that scares me most is the cuts and bruises that cover his body, which I know are from when he hasn't been able to control himself through an episode, all of which will have been my fault that they occurred to the perfect boy, who deserved none of these horrors.

"Katniss, do you really mean it?" he asks quietly, moving his hands so that they are now holding mine, warming them up because they are as warm as his bakery's ovens in comparison to my frozen ones.

"Of course I do, Peeta," I reply. "I've never meant anything more in my life. I know now that you mean the world to me, and more."

He smiles softly, leaning his face down so his forehead is resting against mine. "Well then, Miss Everdeen, the Girl who was on Fire and is now frozen, shall I take you somewhere warm?"

I nod but, before he gets the chance to lead me away and back to his still open house, I grab his cheeks and pull his lips down to mine, kissing him gently for the first time in the week that we spent alone. Although the movement is so simple, it speaks every word that we can't form, and it proves my point to him, I hope. As if he understands, he returns the kiss, wrapping his arms around the bottom of my back and lifting me off of my feet, holding me close to him. I feel so safe with him now, that I can't imagine being anywhere else.

When I pull away so he can carry me back inside, I wrap my legs around his waist and whisper out loud for the first time ever that he will hear, without cameras cuing my words, "I love you, my Dandelion."

Author's Note: Okay, this is just a little one-shot that I thought of aaaaages ago but only just got around to writing; originally, it was going to be part of And From Those Moments series, but I haven't done anything with that story for a while. Honestly? It's not as good as I had imagined that it would be, but I don't think it's too bad. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it and let me know what you thought by leaving a review!