Then
"Let's get married." Peeta said. He was my best friend. Is blonde hair fell in his face and his blue eyes shined. We loved each other, like our Mama's and Daddy's love each other. We kissed sometimes. We got some help from some grown up and our best friends, Johanna, and Finnick, and Annie. We used the rings from the candy machine. We stayed strong until seventh grade, and Johanna and Annie and Finnick moved up in the grades with us. We were best friends. Johanna and Finnick's parents are very close with Peeta, because they grew up together. Annie and my parents are close because they grew up together, too.
Halfway through seventh grade, Peeta grabbed my hand and stopped me in the hall on the way to forth period. Annie is walking next to me. She stops, too.
"I'm moving." He looks destroyed.
"Moving!" I ask. "Where!"
"North Carolina."
We lived in Orlando, Florida.
"Johanna and Finnick are coming with me. We're leaving after school."
Oh, I was so mad. I threw that candy machine ring at his head.
I never saw him again.
Now, Ten Years Later
"Hey, do you want to go to the movies tonight?" Gale asks.
"I told you that I have to take Prim to dance." I say irritably.
"Why the fuck do you have to take that kid everywhere!" he yells. "You never want to spend time with me!"
I sigh in irritation and go outside. He scares me sometimes. I think he might hit me. He follows me. I live with Annie, and she's at work.
"You don't even want to have sex with me! It's been a year! What the fuck is wrong with that!"
This is a very busy town, and people are outside with their kids all the time. Everyone is outside but my neighbor. My neighbor is never outside. He's a loner.
"Gale-"
He grabs my arm, and he's going to leave a bruise.
He's watching from the window. My neighbor. I think he's a writer, because he's always at the desk in his sunroom that faces Lake Michigan, the beach. He loves the beach, I think. He has a boat, and an anchor in his yard. He takes care of it. The bac of our houses face the beach, and my yard has a white picket fence and Annie and I spend a lot of time out there.
"You're not going to bring Prim to dance." He says.
"The fuck I'm not!" I shove him off me. "I'm breaking up with you. Get the fuck out of here.
He reaches for me. "Go! You have thirty seconds or I'm calling the police!"
Annie pulls into the driveway. If he does something she'll beat his ass. Annie is normally gentle, but not when it comes to Gale. She hates him, and she's very protective over me. We're blood sisters, and we've known each other since birth.
She gets out of the car and looks between Gale and I. She sees the mark on my arm, and she starts screaming at him, and then she gets pissed, and she calls the police.
Gale speeds off.
"Sit down." Annie says.
I sit down in the grass and she goes in the house and comes back with an ice pack. She puts it on my arm.
"What happened?"
"He was pissed because I won't have sex with him and because I'm bringing Prim to dance today." I mutter.
"Did you break up with him?" she asks, holding her breath.
"Yes."
"Good. I hate him."
"Me too."
"If you hate him, why did you date him?"
"Because…"
"Because Peeta Mellark." She says. "Honey, it's been eleven years."
"I don't care."
"I still think Finnick is cute, but…"
"You haven't had a boyfriend either, Annie."
"God, we are fucked up, aren't we?"
I nod quietly. A squad car pulls into my driveway, and a cop walks over to us.
"Did he leave a mark?" he asks.
"Yes." I show him my arm, and he sighs.
"Do you want to press charges?"
I really don't, and I don't feel like paying for it.
"I'd rather get a restraining order. Pressing charges will piss him off and send him after me."
He nods. "Well you'll have to go to the court house for that."
I nod. He questions me some, and Annie, and then he asks the neighbors what they saw, and then he gets in his car and leaves.
When Annie and I went off to Business College at University of Michigan, our parents moved to Holland, Michigan, and when we graduated last year, we moved to Holland, bought a nice beach house for cheap and we opened up a pet store together. It gets good business because it's the only one with puppies and kittens and bunnies and hamsters.
Prim is my sixteen year old sister. She loves dancing, so I've got to take her to dance today because Daddy and Mama are going out to dinner with Annie's parents. My parents planned their pregnancies with Annie's. Annie and I were planned, and we're best friends, just like they wanted. Only, Mrs. Cresta didn't have a girl when Mama had Prim, she had a boy, and now Prim and Luke have a crush on each other.
"We should try to find them." Annie says.
"Find who?"
She smiles.
"Johanna and Peeta and Finnick."
"Oh, that'll be-"
"Would you hurry the fuck up!" a girl yells from the porch of the neighbor's house. A guy gets out of the car and walks in with the girl.
I can hear the guy say to our neighbor, "You need a girlfriend."
"Yeah, you've gotta move on."
"Sounds familiar." Annie smiles. "That guy was hot."
"You can find someone! I'm single too. Why not those hot chicks next door?"
Annie smirks.
"Let's go inside." I say. "I need to shower and get changed. I have to get Prim in an hour."
"Alright," Annie says. "I'll make dinner while you're gone. What do you want?"
"Um…I don't care."
"Let's have grilled chicken and mashed potatoes and green beans at the beach."
"Alright." I go and take a shower, and then I put on red heels, short shorts that I pull up to make my ass look better, but no camel toe, and a white crop top with red flowers on it and ruffles and a gold spiked necklace. I put my sunglasses on my head and grab my wallet, phone, and keys. I put on deodorant, and I go out to the garage and get in my convertible BMW. It's red. I put the top down, because I know Prim's gonna ask anyways, and I back out of the driveway and go down the street.
I head to Mama and Daddy's and honk the horn. Prim comes out in spandex and a t-shirt and flip flops, her dance bag over her shoulder, and her blond hair up in a bun.
"What happened to your arm?" she asks.
"Uh…Gale." I say.
"He did that to you?" she demands as I start to drive.
"Yes he did, but I broke up with him and I'm getting a restraining order. Don't tell Mom and Dad. Daddy will want to kill him."
"I hate him." she says.
"Me too." I reply. I pull up in front of her dance and she gets out. I wait till she's inside and has given me the thumbs up to drive off.
I get home and put my car in the garage.
When I walk in the house, Annie is outside talking to someone. I take put my phone and keys and wallet o the table by the door after texting Mama that Prim's at dance, and I brush my hair because it's messy from having the top down, and then I go outback. It's sand, and the beach is right there.
That boy that was at the neighbor's house is here, and the girl, and the boy that actually lives there is here, too.
"Oh, and this is my roommate." Annie says.
"Hi." I say, opening the door to toss my shoes in the house and to let Nugget out. She's our chocolate lab.
Now that I look at them, they all look a bit familiar.
"Now will you tell us your names?" Annie asks.
"Once you tell us yours." The boy says: the one that doesn't live there.
"You guys look really familiar." I say.
"That's what I said." Annie says, "And they agreed with me."
We're quiet for a while. "Well someone has to say their name." the boy that lives in the house says. This is the first time I've really seen him, and he's really cute.
"Why don't you say it?" the other boy asks the girl. The boy that lives there has blond hair and blue eyes. The girl has brown hair and dark eyes and the other boy has bronze hair and green eyes.
"Fine." She says. "I'm Johanna Mason."
I look at Annie, and she looks at me, and then we're quiet.
"What?" she snaps. "That's my fucking name!"
"Now one of you has to say it." The blond says.
He smiles, and my stomach flutters.
I look at Annie.
"Um…" Annie stammers. "I'm Annie…Cresta."
Realization dawns on them, and nobody speaks.
"Is this a joke?" Johanna blurts.
Annie shakes her head.
"Well I'm Finnick Odair." Finnick says. "I can't believe this."
This is too much.
"Um…Katniss Everdeen." I mutter.
"Peeta Mellark."