It wasn't a whole day after the games when they started for both of the winners. Grueling, agonizing, nightmares. For Katniss, she relived watching Rue die, having Clove over her with a knife digging into her throat, watching Cato snap Peeta's neck, and even though that last one never happened, it was too much. Every night for a solid week, it's all she would see once she closed her eyes. It wasn't enough to see what she'd done in the eyes of the people she knew, she had to see it whether she was awake or hopelessly trying to escape them with slumber. And each night ended with losing Peeta. Each night she woke screaming and thrashing from her oh so special bedroom in District 12's Victor's Village and she felt no more important than the plant she was named after.
After three whole weeks of the never-ending atrocities that follow her wherever she goes, she decides to climb out onto the roof of her "house". Off in the distance she can see the slums she once was a part of. A place she still feels tugging at her heart strings, begging her to come back. But she's a Victor now. Her life is far too great to even think of mingling with the commoners. She hates what her life has become, but at least her glorified murderer status allows her mother and sister a guaranteed better future. In a huff she clutches at her knees, trying to ignore the cold and the emptiness inside of her. It's a terrible feeling and she feels it with every breath she takes. That's what she's become, a hollow shell of Katniss Everdeen, the first volunteer and first female victor from District 12. Her left cheek presses against the leather of her pants and she notices something off. There's someone else on one of the Victor's roofs. She strains her eyes to get a better look, it's definitely not Haymitch, her drunken mentor, it's Peeta, a boy she may well have developed feelings for while they both pretended to be star-crossed lovers. Well, she pretended. He claimed to have been in love with her since they were only in Kindergarten. During the games, she didn't believe a word of it. But when she didn't return the feelings on the train ride home and the cold shoulder she got when they actually arrived in their separate houses made her to believe. Peeta loves her, and she's finding herself falling for him just as bad.
But everyone Katniss has ever loved has been torn away from her. When death blew her father to pieces, when depression tore her mother's spirit from her very existence, when the games ripped Prim from her and her from Prim, and when the games killed an innocent girl like Rue. The odds have never been in her favour.
Carefully, Katniss crosses the rooftops via trees; Peeta lives three houses down from her. Once to the rooftop next to his, she calls out quietly, "Can't sleep?"
He doesn't turn to look at her, but he doesn't ignore her either, "Wouldn't stay asleep long if I tried." There must have been something in his hand because he throws it across the street onto the roof of one of the unused houses. The slight noise it makes echoes quietly throughout the village. Making the two victors hate it even more.
"Same here, I keep seeing every moment of the games played out, just each scenario is somehow worse. If that's even possible." Katniss responds, hugging her knees tight to her chest, hoping to cage in the paranoia inside of her.
Out of the corner of her eye she sees Peeta nod, "I know how that is. Though, somehow, they're only about you."
Katniss looks up at him in disbelief, sadness, adoration, but doesn't say anything. There's nothing she can think of that could possibly follow such a confession. She starts to chew on the pad of her thumb since the inside of her cheek had suffered enough through her time in the games.
That's when Peeta turns towards her and gauges her reaction. The expression on his face is something akin to elation, but he doesn't want to push her. Not so gracefully, he jumps to the roof she's sitting on. Quietly, he takes a seat next to her. His arm goes to wrap around her shoulders but she's already leaning into him. Her hands are still at her face and her knees are still tucked into her chest. If it wasn't for her head on his shoulder there would be no inclination of affection. It's not much; Peeta knows it's a lot coming from the girl he has fallen in love with. The cold and calculating warrior with a heart of gold and a spirit that could crush the strongest oppressions. She truly has no idea of her effect on others; that's what scares him the most. When the day comes that she accepts her beauty and her power over people he just might lose her to someone richer, more handsome, more… everything.
"Peeta…" Katniss whispers into his side. It doesn't take him long to realize that she has fallen asleep. He chuckles quietly to himself and allows those few seconds before the nightmares take over her, she wakes, and pushes him off the roof. He brings her closer to him and he lies back against the cool tile of the roof. Then he allows himself to close his eyes for a few minutes.
Those few minutes turn into the first dreamless sleep the two tormented winners have experienced in weeks. Katniss is the first to wake, Peeta soon follows suit. He wakes up to two soothing grey eyes looking down at him with something he can't quite place his finger on. No one has ever looked at him like that. He starts to say something when he's silenced by a pair of soft lips pressing against his. His hand reaches up to cup the back of her neck as he allows himself to imagine that she actually loves him and that everything that happened back in the games was real.
Katniss pulls away and gives him a genuine smile; he forces himself to smile back, "You don't have to keep kissing me." He tells her; though there's nothing else he wants from the world than to feel her warmth and affection.
For whatever reason, she blushes a light pink, "What if… what if I want to?" She whispers, her words still carrying some of her usual bit.
That causes Peeta to shoot up and look around, there's no cameramen, no one trying to get a sneak peak of the happy couple, no nothing. He looks back at her with an unsure but hopeful smile. The smile she gives back fills his heart with so much joy that he isn't quite sure what to do with himself. He wraps his arms around her and pulls her towards him, "What changed your mind?" He whispers into her long, dark, hair.
"When I'm with you, there's no more nightmares. Since… since the games… I don't think I can function the same without you." She rationalizes. Katniss isn't one for the touchy-feely so Peeta accepts that as the closest he's ever going to get to a love confession.
He pulls back and kisses her lightly on the lips, "You're the girl on fire, and I'm the boy who was smoldered by it."
This causes Katniss to laugh, thinking back to both Cinna and the first time they appeared before the public as the allies from District 12, their hands linked and high in the air. She remembers the love confession; something she thought was a ploy to make her seem weak when it was actually the thing that made her more desirable to the public. All of the "fake" kisses in the cave, that one real kiss that caused her heart to beat like a drum and burned her skin was the closest thing she felt to love, everything Peeta did for her, to protect her. Everything just sped up the inevitable. She's in love with the boy with the bread, possibly has been for years. Her hand twines with his and she doesn't say a word. She just cuddles in close to him while they watch the sun rise above the horizon, lighting a new path for them to travel down, and a new sort of battle that both of them would have to fight. One that both of them want to win this time around… but wouldn't mind tying for, yet again. Their own personal games.