Drabble prompt from Titania522's 'ridiculous prompts' list.
"Who wouldn't be angry? You ate all my cereal and faked your death for three years!"
Thank you a TON to titania522 and katnissdoesnotfollowback for the beta and fun chats! Happy birthday to the heroine of this fandom, the girl on fire. May she never find herself without Peeta.
Katniss stared through the doorway into the kitchen, stomach empty and growling in protest, disbelieving what her eyes were seeing. It was five in the morning and Peeta Mellark was sitting at her table, eating. Eating. Like he hadn't been fake dead for three years and randomly showed up without a phone call, a letter, or even a message through Haymitch.
"You're dead," she said, a bite of anger in her tone, weighing the choice between jumping him and killing him for real after leaving her alone all this time.
"Correction, I was dead," Peeta replied casually, spooning a mouthful of cereal and irritatingly crunching it with his teeth. It wasn't that he was eating cereal any differently than another person would. It was that he was back, without warning, after leaving her for a year to think he was dead. She was never in the loop when it came to making secret plans. Not to mention another two years had gone by, seven hundred and thirty agonizingly lonely days, after she found out about the plan to fake his death so Snow would have no leverage against her during the war.
She didn't know what to do. She looked at his face. The face she's seen every night in her dreams, slightly older, his jaw more chiseled and hair a little shaggier, but his eyes still the brilliant, piercing blue she remembered. When his eyes lingered on hers, she wanted nothing more than to run into his arms, saying and doing all the things she wished she could have over the last years without him. He glanced away, back to the bowl of cereal, and the pride Katniss was so well known for rose up inside her, rendering her immobile. He should make the first move. He's the one back from the dead. Isn't he happy to see me? Why is he just sitting there? No, she won't be the first to crack.
"How have you been?" he asked, his eyes returning to sweep over her form, thinner than when they were last together, and her hair matted from sleep. She probably looked a mess and Peeta was most likely wondering what he ever saw in her. What a fine time for him to materialize. He couldn't have waited until she'd at least showered?
"Pretty good," she lied. He grinned. He knew, but he wouldn't hear it from her. Not yet, anyway. She hadn't been anything remotely close to good. Sleepless nights, missed meals, constant thoughts of him and whether or not she would ever see him again.
Katniss forced her feet to carry her into the kitchen, pulling down a clean bowl to get her own cereal. Reaching for the box, she picked it up, noting the hollowness. She shook the box lightly, her jaw setting and her eyes hardening as one flake, the last flake, fell into the bowl.
"I hope you don't mind, I ate the last of it," Peeta said without concern, clueless to the ire building in Katniss' being, continuing to spoon the sweet, crunchy flakes past his perfectly formed lips. Lips Katniss' own haven't touched in over three years. She realized how much she took for granted when she had him back then. It was almost enough to stop her from acting on the anger she was feeling. Almost.
In one swift movement Katniss backhanded her bowl, sending it careening into the far wall, bursting into jagged pieces as she let out a frustrated scream. She grabbed Peeta's bowl, still half full of milk and cereal, his spoon only catching air as she flung it through the kitchen door into the hallway, letting out another high-pitched cry. She threw the empty box on the floor and stomped on it repeatedly as if it were a deadly insect threatening her life.
"Whoa! Whoa!" Peeta conveyed to her in a tone befitting that of a runaway horse, throwing up his hands in total surrender. He was eerily still as Katniss began to sputter and choke on rapidly forming tears, his eyes enormous with concern.
"It was my favorite cereal, Peeta," she grieved, her voice and breath spasming erratically through the words as she leaned onto the table for support. Her legs were weakening by the second.
"Katniss, I'm sorry. I- I had no idea-" Peeta stuttered, obviously caught off guard at her reaction.
"Do you know what it's like to have to go without my favorite cereal, Peeta?" She was practically hysterical, beating her hands over her heart and screaming through the newest outpouring of sobs. "I love that cereal! I love it so much I would do anything for it!"
Understanding dawned in Peeta's eyes, and he reached for her. She didn't wait for his hands to make contact with her shaky limbs, instead closing the distance between them in two, quick steps, climbing into his lap like a child and burying her head between his neck and shoulder. His strong arms, arms that had tormented her in her nightmares, arms she thought would never hold her again, encircled her and pulled her tight into his chest. The familiar smell of him, a smell she hadn't realized she'd missed so much, brought another wave of weeping, and Katniss allowed Peeta to soothe away all the pent up despair she'd been tamping down for so long with calming strokes of his hands and quiet promises. Sshhh… it's alright. I'm here now. We won't ever be apart again. They sat in blissful silence, grateful to be wrapped in each other's embrace, for what seemed like hours.
"I'm sorry," he whispered into her ear after her sobs had died down and she was able to see clearly.
"Me, too," she said softly back, her hands roaming hesitatingly the broad expanse of his chest, becoming more frenzied as they made their way to the nape of his neck and into his hair. She needed to touch him. Feel him. Pinch him. Kiss him.
Without further thought, she crushed her lips to his, taking him completely by surprise, but it was only a second before he joined her eager search for comfort, each of them not daring to hold anything back from the three long years they'd waited to be together again.
"Kat-nish," Peeta mumbled through fevered kisses, his hands content to stay tangled in her hair.
"Not now, Peeta," she answered, silencing him with a bruising kiss. "I've waited too long…" she trailed off, kissing him breathless and leaving his mind to piece together what it was she had been waiting so long for.
Their lips never broke contact as she dragged him out of the chair and onto the table with her, living out one of the fantasies she had played over and over in her mind after learning Peeta's death was faked. She was unwilling to be separated from him again, in any form. They may as well seal their lips together forever as far as she was concerned. It felt too good to stop, and Katniss protested with a disappointed whine when Peeta pulled back.
"Katniss, I want to tell you something. And I need you to hear me," he pleaded, his face still close enough that Katniss could feel his breath on her cheeks. The thoughts that bombarded her mind were anything but pleasant; I'm married. I have a kid. I don't love you anymore. You don't deserve me. I realized while I was fake dead what a selfish person you are. She had so resigned herself to never having anything with Peeta that she was completely shocked at his words.
"I love you, Katniss. I always have, and I just need you to know." His voice was adamant, as if this was his one and only chance to tell her. His eyes were pleading, his expression sincere. "It's all I've thought about telling you since they woke me and told me I couldn't see you. It's been torture not being able to be with you."
Katniss nodded her head in understanding. It was a torture she'd known well. Maybe it was time she admitted out loud what she'd admitted to herself every day for the last 36 months. She loved Peeta. Loved him so much that living without him was more brutal than anything Snow could have concocted to torture her.
"I love you, too, Peeta." The smile that broke out on his face was the source of indescribable joy that bubbled up from inside, causing her own wide, smile to surface.
"The only thing I wanted more than to tell you I loved you was to hear you say it back," Peeta admitted, still grinning from ear to ear.
"Well, it's a special kind of day. It's not all the time your other half comes back from the dead and eats all your cereal." Peeta laughed heartily at Katniss' serious expression, and she thought she'd never heard anything so magnificent. It made her want to hear more. "Peeta," she hummed, her thoughts and intentions turning amorous as she began to run her fingers over his lips. Lips that had been far too occupied with talking in the last few minutes.
"Katniss?" he questioned back, raising one eyebrow suspiciously.
"Take me to bed." Her words spurred him into action, scooping her up in his arms and hastily making his way to the staircase. Katniss squealed as he took the steps two at a time, her excitement at finally having him all to herself too much to keep inside. Before reaching the doorway, however, her stomach growled in reminder that she hadn't eaten. "You're going to the store after this, by the way. I need my cereal."