The first day of Kindergarten. Her hair is braided into pigtails, and her eyes are bright and happy. They ask who could sing the song, and her hand is in the air, excited, confident. She's blithe and happy as a child can be, despite the squalor.
Yet he keeps to wistful stares, wise in his youth, knowing she's not his. Not yet.
A rainy night, twelve years old. She's trudging through the rain, the bones of her face too visible- hunger robbing her cheeks of their childhood. She looks like what his mother calls gutter trash. But she's special, he thinks. Different. Not gutter trash, though she is looking through their trash
His hands are steady as he pulls the bread out of the oven, hardly feeling it, his muscles strong and practiced. He thinks of her, emaciated, and of their normal customers- surly Peacekeepers, the other merchants, haughty in their riches in a place where so many have so little.
She deserved it more, he thought, and he slid the bread off the tray, still steady despite it being a "mistake". He put an abashed look on his face- he was a good actor, for all the good it did him, and pulled it out, the once expensive loaf blackened.
The beating, physical and verbal, was worth the smile that had flitted across her face.
The Reaping, 74th Hunger Games. He watched as Prim had been called up, squaring her shoulders and hiding her fear. And as Katniss runs after her, volunteering, then climbing onto the stage with the same confidence, face a mask. But he's watched her too long, knows that behind that mask there's more, that she's scared and worried and still a bit shell-shocked.
He's called up, but he's not thinking about it, he's thinking about Katniss, how he might have to kill her, kill Katniss, can't kill Katniss. Can't kill Katniss. He said it over and over, a mantra, can't kill Katniss, can't kill Katniss.
And then he feels a bit of giddy happiness, as they're told to shake hands, and he feels hers under his, callused and warm, for a few seconds.
Maybe this wouldn't be so bad. No, not bad at all, if more hand-shaking happened.
The 74th Hunger Games, In the Arena. He feels her kiss him, different from any other kiss he'd gotten, not that there'd been many. If she ever came to him, he wanted to be ready. He turns to jelly, melting, forgetting any imminent danger- in fact for those brief seconds, he was lost to the world.
She pulls away, and he feels oddly disconnected, like he was missing an arm, a leg, an eyeball. Their eyes meet, and for a moment, he thinks he sees his happiness, reflected in her eyes. Then its replaced, by confusion, then covered, turned to a blithe smile of a girl who was in love and kissed as a matter of course
He feels himself grow light, happy, the feeling of sunlight and flowers, birds and summer, dancing in the rain. But still there, nagging constantly in the back of his brain, was the sense that something was missing.
A train, from the Capitol in Panem to District Twelve. When he hears her say it, that it wasn't real, that she wasn't his, he needs a second to catch his breath.
Disbelieving. Perhaps this was a nightmare, a cruel trick of his mind. A character building experience, he decided, a chance to face his fears.
Denying. Surely not, she had kissed him, held his hand, curled up to him on a sofa. Smiled with him, a happy couple, to legions of viewers, all over Panem.
Delaying. He looked out the windows, the meadow with wildflowers in all colors, grasses a beautiful green, sky the light blue of his eyes.
Dithering. He pinches himself, attempts to pry his eyes open further, pull himself from sleep, its sinking in slowly, the realization seeping into his brain, bit by bit...
Drowning. Suddenly, it rushes to him all at once, the weight of years and years of waiting, hopes, wishes, daydreams, fantasies all rolling together and becoming heavy, weighing him down and pulling him under.
Distressing. It's there, he knows it, can't deny it. Hates it. Wonders why him, why it was his hope that had to be brought up just to be crushed and smashed.
Deceiving. They get off the train at District Twelve, holding hands, the smiles on their faces fake, no more real than as if they had pasted pictures to their faces.
Deciding. Deciding that this isn't love, that it isn't real, that maybe it was better just hoping than taking a risk and falling short.
Training, Preceding the 75th Hunger Games. He watches her, carefully, out of the corners of his eyes. When she doesn't think he's even watching. Innocent behavior, normally, nothing special, but sometimes, sometimes he catches glimpses of her life that he wasn't meant to see.
Involving her "handsome cousin", as it was put. The way she blushed when his hand went to her shoulder, the way she jumped and smiled when he snuck up behind her, gait quiet and agile as a cat, scaring her with a poke, breathing down her neck.
He feels her, slowly, slipping away. She was like soap, he thought. You get a steady grip, but move it and it begins to slip, then before you knew it away it flew. He should've gotten her earlier, he thought, before she was lost to him.
Or maybe she already was.
Following the 75th Hunger Games- Quarter Quell. He feels numb, body and mind. His limbs are numb, pins and needles on every inch of his skin.
His mind feels the same, as if the blood was rushing back to it after being stuck for a long time.
A very long time. Since Kindergarten, to be exact. When Katniss bewitched him, when she had become an itch in his mind, to recently, when she was all he could ever think about.
Storybooks tell you that sacrifices are noble things, that love conquers all. And perhaps, while his mind was fogged with it, it did. But now, it was as if he had been near blind his entire life, and only now slipped on spectacles, the world jumping into clarity.
He had never been selfish, but as his eyes explored the sparse cell, Peeta began to regret what Katniss had made him do.
So...like it? Hate it? I think this is the first romance I've ever done...so review? Please?