A story detailing the grief Katniss endures in her first few months back in 12.
Disclaimer: Some of the content is very similar to Collins' own writings in Mockingjay. None of these characters belong to me, but to the original brilliant author, Suzanne Collins.
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I can almost feel it again, licking at my scarred flesh, burning, devouring, destroying. I see it everywhere I look, lingering on the edges of my vision, no matter what I do or where I go, which is pretty limited these days anyway. After my arrival in 12—two months ago? Three? I don't bother to remember—I haven't left the wooden rocking chair that sits infront of the fireplace except to use the bathroom. I spend my days sitting infront of the fire, watching the way the flames dance and flicker, leaving a glow of light in the small room. I stare at it for hours, maybe even months—because who's keeping track?—hoping it will just engulf me, swallow my broken form and end all of my suffering. But I don't even deserve that much.
Greasy Sae comes over regularily. She checks on Haymitch, cooks, cleans, tries to feed me. And when that doesn't work, she sighs, the sound tired and old, and leaves me alone before coming back for dinner and repeating the same routine. I wonder if she feels obligated to take care of me since there's no one else to do it and decide she must. Besides, it's the only way she feels she can repay me, as if I've ever done anything needing repayment. After all, I am the Mockingjay; the one and only.
Sae is the only one that visits. When Haymitch isn't completely drunk, he sometimes makes an appearance, stumbling through the door and mumbling things I don't bother to understand. My mother remained in 4, taking care of Annie and her unborn child. She doesn't call, not that I'd answer anyway. Gale lives in 2 now, claiming some sort of official title after the war. Johanna lives there too, working alongside Gale and Paylor in a plan to help better connect the Districts. Similar to my mother, we don't stay in contact.
Thinking of Gale brings on another wave of pain and grief that I try hard to push away. Images of war and bombs and exploding parachutes and baby sisters caught in the middle make my head swirl and I squeeze my eyes shut as if to stop everything.
Peeta hasn't come back.
Everyone is gone. Whether they've moved on or died, everyone in the world has left me alone and it's all my fault. The realization that all their lives have continued to go on without her the one thing that is worse than my self loathing, making me want to all scream, cry and curl into myself, rotting away for whatever is left of my life at the same time. Thinking of her is the only thing that makes me feel anything besides numb. Besides that, I am hollow.
"Child," I hear Sae's soft, mothering voice call, "let's take a bath, hm?" Her hair is pulled back into a tight bun but with strands still managing to have escaped and lines in her face are deeper than they were two years ago. I wonder if I helped create them.
I study her for a moment before turning back to the fire, eyes dead as they always are now. Sae knows I won't put up a fight, but won't put in much effort either. She positions one of my arms over her shoulder and gently but firmly helps lift me from my chair. I wish I had the strength to tell her to leave me alone, convince her I don't deserve anything but to lie here and die. But really, I don't have the strength to do anything anymore.
Winter turns into spring. The days become longer and warmer, the flowers begin to bloom outside my window and life slowly returns to the world. I barely notice. I don't want to notice. I don't want to think that even after everything that's happened, life has continued to move on, just like everyone else. Maybe I'm the only one that hasn't.
One day while sitting by the fire, curled up in the same rocking chair, I hear it. At first, I think I'm imagining things, finally gone crazy like everyone else believes I am. But no, there it is again: a loud, scratchy meow not far away, followed by the same irritated hiss I've heard ever since I tried to drown him after Pr— she brought him home. I rise from my place by the fire with what little energy I have and crossover to the door. And there he is, matted fur, missing ear and all.
We sit there for a moment, glaring at one another until I spit, "She's not here, you stupid cat."
For old times sake, Buttercup tilts his ears back and gives me another long hiss and other than feeling mildly irritated, I'm just glad that one person in this world dared to stay consistant.
"I said she's not here!" I shout again. "Go on you dumb fleebag!"
Instead, Buttercup positions himself at my feet, waiting. Waiting for her. The very thought is enough to make my eyes spring with tears, flooding them until everything around me blurrs.
"She's gone! She's gone!" I scream.
I don't yell. I really scream. So loud that I'm sure Haymitch would be able to hear it, if he isn't passed out somewhere. Though this still doesn't scare the stupid rat like it should and he sits there, wining and crying as he seems to understand what I'm saying. That she isn't coming back. Ever.
I fall to my knees, crying hot tears into my hands as the tears seem to come from an endless supply within me. I cry for everyone I've ever lost: I cry for my father, I cry for Cinna and Mags. For Mitchell, Boggs, Leeg 1 and 2. Finnick. Even Gale and my mother. But mostly, I cry for Prim.
I press my cheek to the cool tile floor as I sob. My tears create a small puddle on the ground beside me, but I don't have the heart to care. Then Buttercup does the unthinkable, the unimaginable up until now, when I'm seemingly the only one he has left; either of us has left. He utters another soft cry before curling up beside me, nuzzling my chin gently. We lie there and weep together.
I fall asleep for awhile, dreaming of nothing. When I wake, I am met with a pair of yellow eyes shining the moonlight. Buttercup sits unmoving beside me, guarding me from harm. From then on we form an unlikely bond of two lonely souls tied together, out of the ashes from when everything either of us has ever known has fallen apart.
A few weeks after Buttercup's return, there is the incident with the primrose bushes. I'm curled up in my bed as I have been for the last three days. Sae's gotten progressively more worried over me. I refuse food and won't speak to her or even Haymitch when she brings him in to talk to me. I don't even really know what happened before this. All I can remember is Sae bringing her granddaughter in to say hello while she made dinner and then that got me thinking of herand how she was as a child, smiling and carefree like Sae's granddaughter is now and how she should be here to grow up and have a child who's just as smiling and carefree as she was, but that will never happen because of me. Because I killed her. I am responsible for the deaths of thousands because I couldn't be the good little girl I was supposed to be and die in the first arena like I was meant to. And she died because of it. Because of me. My sweet Prim.
The next thing I know I am lying in bed, hidden beneath the sheets while Sae sits beside me, trying to coax me into eating something. I don't realise I've fallen asleep until I wake up to the sound of a shovel against the dirt. I know it can't be Haymitch, who's probably already drunk and passed out in a pile of vomit and Greasy Sae left to go home after breakfast, which must have been hours ago. For a fleeting moment, my chest tightens in fear and I go into survival mode on instinct, assuming it must be someone else that's come to rip me from my home again, because I'm the Mockingjay and they won't ever leave me alone.
But peering out of the window, slowly, hesitantly, I know that I am mistaken. I move downstairs as quickly as my weak legs will manage and throw open the door. I squint against the sunlight, having not really seen it in so long, and am met with a pair of stunning blue eyes. He looks shocked for a moment and then relieved, before his expression changes into one of disappointment. He covers it up quickly, though, replacing it with a smile instead. He stands up the shovel up which he uses to rest his arm.
"Hi, Katniss," Peeta says, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. The way he says it makes it seems as if we're old pals, like the last two years haven't even happened. A part of me is irritated but I try not to let it show.
I give him a small nod in hello and look over to see what he's been working on, my breath hitching in my throat. Roses.
At first I'm furious, about to scream horrible, vile things in his face and ask how he could be so cruel. But then I see it is not just any rose. They're evening primroses. A gift; a peace offering. And then all those awful things I am about to say fall off my tongue, making my mouth go dry and my throat tighten.
Peeta sees where my gaze is directed and says, "I thought we could plant them... for her," and my heart clenches in pain.
I should tell him Thank you or I'm sorry or just about anything. But my tongue feels like sandpaper and the growing lump in my throat makes it difficult to say anything. So instead I just nod, too weak to even offer a smile. And then, without any attempt at a goodbye or an excuse—but I remind myself we are past those anyway—I step back inside to the safety of my home, shutting the door a bit too loudly behind me and run up the stairs. I fall, making a hard thump sound on the wood, but I pick myself up just as quickly and I don't stop running until I've reached the bathroom, where I shut the door behind me and sink to the floor, breathing as if I have just run hard through the town square. I rest my face in my palms, which are dirty and calloused, just in time for the first tears to fall.