Hello guys it's my CJ. I'm sorry for not being on here in a long time. This a Valentines Day Drabble I was writing for something on Instagram and I decide to post it here too. Enjoy
I open up my eyes and notice the rays of sun that beam through the window as its brightness cascades down onto the floor. The birds are singing their usual morning tunes like every other normal day, but today feels different. Everything is just as normal as any other day can be around here, but there is something in the back of my mind telling me that it isn't.
I turn around in the bed to ask my husband a question, but I'm faced with emptiness. He isn't there.
"Peeta?" I say out loud.
Could that be it, the difference I felt? Peeta is usually in my bed everyday, whether it's him or I who wakes up first, but this kind of thing has happened before. It's happened if we've had a fight, he had a flashback that was particularly bad, or when he has had to sleep over at the bakery when there's a bad storm.
Peeta was here when I fell asleep. If there was flashback in the middle of the night, Peeta didn't wake me up about it, there was no storm, and I can't recall anything I said to make Peeta mad at me.
I sit up in the bed and turn by body so my legs are dangling off the side of the bed. I can feel my feet are touching the cold floor as I get up. I open the bedroom door and walk out into the hallway where I notice the smell of breakfast in the air. That must have been where Peeta has been.
I walk down the stairs and into the kitchen to see him taking out a fresh patch of cheese buns from the oven.
"Good morning," I say.
He turns to look at me, realizing I am there.
"Good morning," he responds as he places the cheese buns on a plate. He extends his arm in offering. "Cheesebun?"
I take one from the plate with a little smile. "Thanks," I say.
He smiles in return. This whole situation has me confused. Am I missing something? Peeta and I have only been married for one year, and our anniversary is in the spring, so it hasn't passed yet. My birthday is far from now and has Peeta's already passed. I can't think of any reason why today would be important.
I look toward the table and notice Peeta has cooked more than just cheese buns. The table is filled with my favorites deserts, eggs, bacon, and hot chocolate. I take a seat at the table and start eating, trying to figure out why he would go to all this trouble.
"So I was wondering if you wanted to go out to the meadow later," Peeta says as he sits down next to me.
"Pee—" I start, but he interrupts me.
"We don't have to go to the meadow, we could even go to the woods if that makes you happy," He suggests.
"Pee—" I try again, but he does the same as before.
"We don't even have to go anywhere. We could just stay here and—" he continues, but, frustrated, I cut him off.
"Peeta! What are you talking about? What's all this?" I gesture to the food on the table. "I don't get it. What's the occasion?"
He stares at me with a mix of shock and hurt. His usually bright eyes turn to a dark, gloomy color.
"You really don't know what today is?" He asks. I shake my head in answer. He lets out a puff of air and gets up from the table, the chair making a loud noise as it scraped against the floor. He makes his way to the stairs and I follow him. He heads where he always heads when he gets upset, his painting room.
I grab a hold of his hand to stop him midway up the stairs. "What am I forgetting, Peeta?" I ask. He shakes his head and pulls his hand free from mine, heading up the rest of the stairs. I let him go.
The fact that I'm the one who caused him to be like this makes me feel absolutely terrible. I've got to find out what today could possibly be that would make him so upset when I forgot it. I get dressed out of my nightwear and put on my usual hunting clothes and head outside.
It's a sunny day, considering all the snow we've gotten during this winter. That doesn't change the fact that all the animals are still in hibernation, so I'm lucky if I even get a couple of birds that haven't flown south.
When I get to the woods, I head toward the strawberry bush to pick some. I remember when Gale and I used to sell strawberries to Madge and her father. Now she's gone along with all the others, buried here in the meadow. It's funny how many memories a couple of strawberries can resurface. They can remind me of a great friend I once had, and a revolution I started to save everyone I loved.
Walking in the woods is helping me to clear my senses, but it's doing no good in helping my memory. I shoot a couple of wild turkeys and ducks that were luckily there, along with picking the strawberries. I start heading back to Victors Village to see if Haymitch wants any. I let him have the first of the choosing so he doesn't complain afterwards for not having any food.
I let myself into his house and I'm engulfed by the horrible stench of liquor and unwashed clothing. Fortunately, when I find him he is conscience and half sober sitting at his table.
"Have a nice hunting sweetheart? It's a shame you didn't take Bread Boy with you, he's been moping around here for the past hour," he says waspishly.
"I didn't think he'd want to go hunting with me since he's upset with me forgetting what today is," I snap back through clenched teeth as I empty my game on the table.
"Well, it's only the most important day for lovebirds like you two to celebrate," he tells me snidely while looking through the game on the table to make his choosing.
"What day is it then? I have no clue what it could possibly be and have been wondering all day!" I throw my hands up in agitation.
Haymitch sighs, chooses two of the wild turkey legs, then looks back up at me. "February 14th? You know, hearts, chocolates, flowers, love," he says in a sarcastic happy voice. I look at him blankly. "It's Valentines Day, sweetheart."
I freeze in shock. Valentines Day! That's why Peeta was so upset! I forgot the day that he's probably been waiting his whole life to celebrate with me and completely I forgot! How am I going to fix this?
"Dammit! How am I going to fix this?" I say, voicing my thoughts out loud.
"Now that's something I can't help you with, sweetheart. You're going to have to figure that one on your own," he tells me with a smile. If I wasn't so upset about the situation, I would've rolled my eyes.
I send him a shaky glare and collect the remaining game from the table and put it back in my hunting bag. Usually on Valentines Day, I would see my father give my mother flowers from the meadow since it was all we could get. I remember how she would smile at the bunch of flowers he brought home and how excited Prim would get when she gave her one. I head toward the meadow looking for some flowers. Unfortunately, little to no followers grow during the winter time so my plan might not end up workings a well as I hoped. Right when I'm about to leave unaccomplished, I spot it. I nice sunny batch at the edge of the woods filled with dandelions. Perfect!
I head toward there and carefully pick a bunch so it makes a nice bouquet. Hopefully Peeta will like this and not be upset, even though he has every right to be.
When I make my way back to our house, I realize I don't even have anything to say to him. It's not like I can just say, "Hey, sorry I forgot one of the most important days of your life." Ugh, why couldn't I have just marked it on the calendar or written a note to remind myself. I wouldn't be in this situation if I had.
I make my way into the house and up the stairs and stop in front of Peeta's painting room. I knock. He doesn't answer, but I know he's in there.
"Peeta?" I call as I knock again.
Still no answer. I huff out in agitation. Fed up, I try to open the door and find it locked. This just gets me more aggravated.
"Fine! If you don't want to act like a child, that's just fine with me! I'm trying to make up for all this, but if you're just going to block me out, I shouldn't even bother trying!" I yell to the closed door.
Yelling at the door is getting me not place, but him not answering is just getting me more and more anxious. Finally I just can't take it anymore.
I slide down the door, with my hands on the wood, dropping the dandelions onto the floor. I can almost feel as if he is doing to same one the other side and that I am feeling the heat of his hands from the other side of the door.
"Peeta, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I didn't remember today. I know what this day must have meant to you, and I feel awful for forgetting it." My eyes start welling up with tears and a small smile appears on my face when I remember this morning. "You did all these lovely things for me over the years and I'm so sorry that I've never shown you anything in return."
Tears are falling freely down my face now. My voice cracks when I continue my confession. "You have helped me since before I had ever even talked to you. In the first games, I didn't return any affection back toward you and I broke your heart. And that's exactly what I did this morning and I'm sorry. I don't deserve you for all the things you done for me. You have every right to be mad at me. I'm just so sorry."
Sobs rake my body and I have to lean my forehead against the door. I think I've just about ruined everything, but that's when I hear the click of the lock coming undone and the knob turning. I've just raised my head when the door comes flying open and arms wrap around my wast a lift me off the ground. Two hands grab my face and a pair of lips crash onto mine.
My mind is such in a daze that I can't comprehend what just happened. It starts to clear up and I realize Peeta just burst out of the room and is kissing me like a madman at the moment. I start returning the favor by kissing him back with as much passion. My hand that was lying limp at my side finds its way up to Peeta neck and roams through the gold locks that end there. His hands lay firmly on my cheeks to tilt my head up to deepen the kiss. We eventually have to part to come up for air. He lays a gentle kiss on the tip of my nose and leaves a trail of light kisses from my nose to my cheeks to my forehead. Our foreheads come to rest on each other's while we stare at one another in adoration.
He's the first to speak up. "Katniss, you have no reason to be sorry for. It's me who should be sorry for blocking you out. I've been acting ridiculous, wondering how I was going to apologize to you for acting this way. I was about to go out and find you when I heard you come up stairs. Katniss, you make me happy every single day I'm with you. There's not a day that goes by where I'm not thankful for having you. If it's anybody who doesn't deserve the other it's me who doesn't deserve you."
Tears well up in my eyes and slowly fall down my cheeks and Peeta wipes them away with his thumb. He starts to lean down and I meet him half way for another heart stopping kiss. He quickly pulls away and before I can ask what's wrong, he reaches behind with his hand for something in his pocket. He takes out a small black box.
"I wanted to give this to you. I couldn't wait till our anniversary, so I decided today." He opens up the box and inside is a gold bang with my pearl on the top. I gasp in surprise. I thought I lost it but apparently he had it this whole time. "I know you don't usually like anything to flashy so I made it as simple as I can. I was cleaning up our room one day and I found this on the floor and I couldn't believe you kept this the whole time. Since it was on the floor I wanted to make sure you would never lose it again. Nothing came to mind till I remembered that we didn't have rings at the time of our toasting and I figured that was the best way to do this. I wanted to give you this ring to remind you that even though we are broken, can have hard times, and have are nightmares we still have each other and that we are together. Always. That's no matter where you go you have a piece of me with you on your finger to acknowledge we are each other's."
He slides the ring on my finger and leans my hand up to his face to kiss each of my fingers. I place my hand which he just kissed on his cheek. Our eyes lock on each other's, with smiles on are faces. His eyes are so blue it's so easy to get lost in them. His hair is so yellow it's like the meadow in the spring with the sea of dandelions. Dandelions!
I look back into the hallway where the bile of flowers are on the floor, half crushed by either one of our feet. I grab what's left of the bouquet and make my way back to Peeta. He lifts up one of his eye brows with a little smirk on his face.
"I didn't realize what day it was when I took a trip to Haymitch's. The only thing I could think of was flowers and I came across these but I think there so special now," I say referring to the wilting pedals.
He take them from my hand with a smile on his face. I places a small peck on my lips.
"As long as I have you, I am the happening man in the world. No gift can compare with the feeling of waking up with you in my arms every morning," he says.
"Stay with me?" I ask. I already know the response but I love to here him say it every single time.
"Always," he responds with a wider smile than before. I swear if he smiles any winder his face might break into two. "Katniss?"
"Mmm?" I hum.
"You love me, real or not real?" he asks.
A smile breaks out on my face. He too already knows the answer to that question himself, but as me he loves to here my response. I remember the first time he asked me that was one of the best days of my life. We were both so hurt, broken, and scarred but he made me feel like most wholest and beautiful person in the world.
"Real. You?" I respond.
"Real." he says.
"Peeta?" I ask.
"Mmm." He hums back to me like I did to him.
"Happy Valentines Day," I say putting my hand on the back of his neck and the other on his cheek. He lets out a small laugh and leans into my touch. He places an arm around my waist so I'm pulled up against him. He sets the flowers down on a nearby table and places his hand on my cheek. We kiss once more and lean our heads against each other's.
"Happy Valentines Day," he says in response.
~Fin.
I hoped you enjoyed it! Please leave a review for appreciation. I really love reviews! Also I would like to thank my best friend QE3 for proof reading. Thank again! :)