Sixteen days. As much as I will my subconscious not to, I can't help but mentally make a note each morning of how long it's been since I got off that godforsaken train. Sixteen days since I returned. Since I spoke to him. The sun is truly risen now and I feel an instant pang of shame, quickly slipping out from under the covers. Just a few months ago I would never have been able to lie in a four poster bed well past dawn, watching the day go by through the window overlooking the Village. These past couple of weeks I couldn't seem to do anything without feeling bad for it; eating the meals most people in the district will never have, wearing the clothes that cost more than the miner's annual income, wallowing in trauma all day in a way no one else has time for. Spending time with Prim was at once both my salvation and my undoing all in one, for I couldn't look into her hopeful little face without seeing twenty two other families who are wracked with grief at the loss of their child.
The water envelopes my skin and soothes my angry mind, a cascading waterfall of anaesthetic. Showering is my favourite time of day – the only time of day I feel normal, anonymous. Ironic really, considering a shower is anything but normal for me. Everything in my old world before the games was assessed in value, and a shower took money, time, resources and technology we did not have. It was the epitome of luxury to be able to cash in all these things in the aim of becoming clean, an endeavour as vain as they come. To my Seam mind, a dirty scalp and muddy elbows is a sign of hard work, of prosperity, an admirable indicator of resisting the poverty laid out in front of us. Nonetheless, I am not a Seam inhabitant any more, I am a Victor, and Victors have showers.
Prim and my mother are not home. They spend a lot of time at the old house still. Mother says it's because her medicines are there and it's closer to her patients, which is true, but I know they simply prefer it in the Seam. I do too – this house feels as much like home as the Capitol does – but I'm too embarrassed to spend time in the Seam any more. I stick out like a sore thumb. I ventured into it the other day when I was returning Posy to the Hawthorne's after looking after her for the day, and eyes followed me from every corner. People literally stopped and stared, kids pointing. I felt like the walking dead. Needless to say I have not been back since.
I spend the day in silence as usual. I don't mind it, though. I walk up to the woods and sit on the jagged rock overlooking the river, the spot where my father and I used to eat our lunch. This is where I spend most of my time these days, just sitting. Sometimes my mind is blank and I numbly watch the ants and birds and occasional deer. Other times my mind is reeling, spinning round and round in circles like the washing machines in the laundry room of the Capitol train. A phrase or a word gets stuck in my head, repeating itself over and over and over. On these days, my body feels heavier and my head swims and I allow myself to cry. Today I watch a spider crawl towards the outer edge of its web in a crack in the rock next to me, where it has caught a fly. Rue. It gets closer. Rue. With one gulp it swallows the fly whole. RUE. There is a hole in the web now where the fly was, the intricate silk pattern ruined, and it bothers me more than anything else. I tear the web down and watch as the spider scuttles away.
Prim is home from school and mother is cooking dinner over the fire by the time I return. It is an unspoken rule that we use the fancy kitchen as little as possible, preferring to use the fire like we used to. In the back of my mind I register that these gestures are for my benefit – I know my family are trying to help me acclimatise to my new life. It's a futile attempt though. They must realise that.
I don't have to go to school any more – apparently winning the games relieves me of all need for an education – so I help Prim with her homework. I'm not concentrating though because something feels wrong, more wrong than normal, and I can't shake the uneasiness fogging my mind. The image of the hole in the web keeps playing in my mind. I realise after a while Prim is talking to me.
"Huh?" I ask.
"I saw Peeta today." Her eyes are fixed on the fire and I'm glad she cannot see the shock on my face. I decide I shouldn't care and I won't take the bait and enquire into it. I last about thirty seconds.
"How come?"
"He did a talk in school. I suppose we wouldn't know because District 12 hasn't won the games for so long, but every year the victor comes and does a speech in their district's school. I guess he volunteered to do it for the both of you. Did you not know about it?"
Come to think of it, I do have a vague memory of Haymitch, during one of his drunken visits last week, mentioning a speech. My heart is pounding and my head swimming with confusion at what Prim is inferring; that Peeta is still looking out for me, still covering my back even after everything that happened. What happened to him hating me for the lies I told? Sensing no reply from me, Prim went on.
"I talked to him afterwards. He brought me back to the bakery and gave me a cookie. He… he seemed pretty down, Katniss. I don't think he's been sleeping much, and I don't think he ever sees his friends now he's not in school…" She looked up at me, watching me carefully. I don't know what she's hoping to see in me – sadness? Empathy? Love? I'm almost positive I'm not capable. I keep my face blank.
"That's enough Prim. It's bedtime."
Sleep evades me, as it does every night. I lie staring at the velvet ceiling of my four poster bed, wishing it was the wooden beam ceiling at my old home. The person I have expertly avoided for the past sixteen days has barged a hole in my thoughts and I cannot think of anyone but him. He must feel just as I do when in public these days – humiliated, embarrassed, manipulated. To stand up in front of a room full of kids, two of which we must mentor and inevitably watch die next year, must have been hellish. It was no more his duty than mine, and yet he did it without so much as a single complaint to me. It hurts that he is still looking out for me and it hurts that he is so unassailably good and better than me and most of all it hurts that I am not with him. Ever. I have seen glimpses of him crossing the Village to go into town, or a flash of his face through his window, but other than that we have avoided each other successfully. I must fall asleep at some point because suddenly I am dreaming of the spiders web in the woods except this time the spider is a bright, artificial white colour like President Snow's roses and when it eats the fly and leaves behind a hole in the web I start to hear Rue's screams. The sound of the cannon is firing and I am in the arena and the hole is growing and growing and I feel as if I am drowning and –
I awake, curled up into the foetus position, my nails digging into my bare legs, my face wet from tears. I cannot stop my heart from beating fast through my ears and my fingertips and the walls are closing in and I do not know where I am so I run until I am on my porch steps and then my feet find the ground and now I am at Peeta's door. I slip in, knowing I don't need to knock. I've never been in this house but it is similar to my own and it takes no time at all to find his bedroom. The door is open ever so slightly and I walk in silently to the cold room, shivering as I realise I am wearing only a t-shirt and underwear.
He is there, lying on the bed above the covers, eyes closed, and I know he's not asleep. I say his name and his whole body jumps, eyes wide with fear and I know he is feeling that split second of blind terror every victor feels when someone moves too quickly or a certain memory comes flooding back. I realise this makes me feel better – I like that he's going through the same shit as I am. I sigh. I really am as bad as Haymitch says.
"Can I stay?" My voice is surprisingly calm.
To his credit, it takes him only a few seconds to answer.
"Always."