Disclaimer: The Hunger Games does not belong to me. If I was Suzanne Collins, Scholastic, or Lions Gate Entertainment, I certainly wouldn't be writing fanfic.


Our Victory

"It's a girl."

I look up, my body entirely spent as I hear my daughter cry after 16 hours of labor. My forehead is bathed in sweat and it's everything I can do to not let myself drift off to sleep even though I am so very tired. I won't let that happen. Not yet. I have to see her. I have to see this new person I've felt grow and move inside me for so many months. Months that filled me with terror at the reality of bringing a child into this world and the inadequacy I felt towards motherhood.

But my husband had wanted her. Peeta wanted our two person family to grow and I could not deny him anything. Eventually his dream became mine and I wanted it too, even if the thought was still a bit terrifying. Parenthood was something we would approach together, just as we did everything.

I watch as she is cleaned and wrapped in a pale pink blanket. Peeta is enraptured by her and after what seems like an eternity he places her in my arms. He kisses me sweetly as he lets her go.

"Hello," I whisper to her. She is amazing. Dark hair, even darker than mine, crowns her head and she looks at me with wide blue eyes. I almost swear she recognizes me.

Further words utterly fail me as the bond that began with her stirring inside me is firmly cemented. I marvel at the ten perfect fingers sticking out of the blanket and I lower my head to kiss each hand. I am completely in love with my daughter. Amazing doesn't begin to cover it after all. She is perfection.

I look at our daughter and I know who she is. We had gone through names ahead of time. So many names and we had a couple of choices depending on whether our child was a boy or a girl. But in this moment I know that neither of them will do.

She's our victory. Our victory over everything that was ever done to us, everything we went through, and that it did not break us. No, we are stronger together, our little family. All three of us. Peeta and I have our scars, and we always will, but with our daughter in my arms there is rebirth this beautiful spring day.

"I know who she is, Peeta." I tell him as I caress her cheek and then glance up at him with a smile.

Peeta smiles back, his eyes alight. "Who is she, Katniss?"

"She's Victoriana Primrose Mellark."

"Victoriana." I watch as he forms his mouth around the name, trying it out. There had never been a question what our child's middle name would be. Primrose for a girl or Cinna for a boy. But Victoriana symbolizes everything. He nods in approval and I know he understands. He always does.

She is our victory of life.

end


A/N: There you go. I've never written Hunger Games before and I'm not sure I will again but I do love the series. I'm trying to work through some Doctor Who writer's block and hopefully turning my attention away from that for bit helped.