This flood is slowly rising up, swallowing the ground beneath my feet.
Tell me how anybody thinks under this condition so,
I'll swim, I'll swim, as the water rises up, sun is sinking down,
And now all I can see are the planets in a row suggesting it's best that I slow down.
This night's a perfect shade of dark blue, dark blue.

*Katniss*

My pace quickens as I near the house. I slide my game bag off my shoulder and clutch it in my hand when I began to go up the steps. I take a deep breath and gently knock on the door.

There's something about the Mellark's house that always makes me nicer. Maybe it's because Mrs. Mellark hates me.

Barlee, Peeta's older brother who likes me as much as his mother, opens the door. He frowns a little.

"Hello Katniss," he says.

My own face and voice tighten. "Hey Barlee. Is Peeta home?" I ask, gritting my teeth a little.

"Yeah, hold on." He shuts the door, and I'm left standing in the cold long enough for me to wrap my arms around myself. I turn and examine the merchant houses around me. I've been here before, many times actually, I've just never took the time to study the other houses.

They're mostly two stories and covered in less coal dust than the houses in the Seam. They are painted in light colors, a deep contrast to the browns and greys of the Seam, but you can see the blackish-grey coal dust settled into the cracks more against the pale yellows, blues, and whites than you can against my house.

"Katniss."

I turn back around and grin at Peeta, my cheeks frozen. "Come in or you're going to freeze," he scolds, looking over his shoulder at his brother who shrugs as he heads up the stairs.

"Sorry about that," he says as if it's the first time it's happened. I lift my game bag a little and shake it playfully.

"I got your dad some squirrels," I say, smiling.

"That's good. He's been asking where you've been." I blush and look down. I've been hanging out with Gale more than I have with Peeta recently. As if on cue, the baker walks out of the kitchen, saving me from my awkward moment and wiping his hands on a dishtowel.

"Katniss! Good to see you."

"Hello Mr. Mellark. Is your wife around?" The question sounds innocent enough, but he only takes squirrels if his witch of a wife isn't here to witness it.

He grins mischievously. "She's upstairs at the moment." I smile and pull out three fat squirrels and hand them to him.

"Great," he says. "Why don't you stay for dinner?"

"Thank you," I say. He walks back into the kitchen.

"Let's go to my room," Peeta says, nudging me in the direction of the stairs. I almost set my game bag by the door, but I know if Mrs. Mellark finds it, she'll yell at Peeta for being my friend, and basically just stir up drama.

I clutch the bag tighter in my fist and walk up the stairs, going to the second door on the right. It's not the first time I've been in his room. We've been friends since we were eleven, so I've been here many times with Peeta's father's approval. His mother fought it, but somehow Mr. Mellark convinced her.

I drop my bag on the floor and nibble on my bottom lip. Peeta crashes on his bed. "Well," he says, raising his eyebrows. "Make yourself at home."

It's funny because I'm usually the one throwing myself down on Peeta's bed. It's just the friendship we've developed where I can't possibly be shy around him anymore because there's not a thing he doesn't know about me. Whenever I get around Peeta, I become looser and tend to grin a lot more than when I'm with anyone else. He makes my day better.

I've known him since we were five. I got called on to sing our anthem and after, Peeta came up to me and said, "You have a pretty voice". We didn't talk again until the day after he gave me the loaves of bread that saved my life. He was the one who plucked up the courage to talk to me the next day after school. He came up to me when I was walking home, holding my little sister's hand.

"Are you okay?" Peeta asked me, making me stop. I only nodded and turned to look at him. His eye was blackened from his mother hitting him. After that, we just became friends. I guess an unspoken bond is formed when someone saves your life.

Peeta props himself up on his elbows and gives me a look. "Are you okay?" he asks.

I wrap my arms around myself. I haven't talked to Peeta in two weeks and here he is acting like nothing has happened, as if the last time we hung out was yesterday. The guilt churns my stomach. I've recently been hunting with Gale a lot more than usual. The event from yesterday pops into my mind and I feel like my lungs have collapsed.

I have to tell Peeta. There have never been any secrets between us, and if I keep this from him, he'll find out eventually and probably be hurt because he'll think I can't trust him.

"Gale kissed me," I say quickly. Peeta sits up, furrowing his eyebrows and causing an angry crease to appear between his eyes.

"What?" he snaps.

I know Peeta likes me; I've known since we were twelve. I could tell by the way he acted around me. At first, I told myself that he's just kind, but he didn't treat other girls like he treated me. Sure, he was kind to them, but it was a friendly kind. The way he treated me was like he wanted more. He doesn't know that I know.

I met Gale Hawthorne right around the time I found out Peeta had feelings for me. We hunted together every morning for the past four years and we still do today. I didn't know Gale liked me. I never thought of him like that, I never thought of anyone like that.

Gale and Peeta don't talk to each other. I guess they just have a mutual agreement to stay away from each other.

After the shock, Peeta's face flickers to hurt for half a second before it hardens. "Is that why you haven't been talking to me?" he asks, his voice low.

I shake my head. "No, this only happened yesterday while we were hunting."

Peeta nods, scowling. "So are you two dating now or...?"

I sigh and finally give in. I sit next to Peeta with my fingers knotted in my lap. I don't open up, but I feel I owe it to Peeta for some reason.

"I...I don't know, Peeta. I've never thought of Gale like that. I'm just...I'm confused." I drop my head in my hands. Peeta touches my back and I surprise myself by not shying away.

"Just tell him. If he really cares about you, he'll understand," he says softly. I rub my palms into my eyes.

"Hey, I know," Peeta says suddenly, his tone changing to mischievous. "Why don't I teach you how to make bread?"

Before the protest can even pass my lips, Peeta says, "Katniss, it'll get your mind off things, trust me. It'll be fun and it can make up for us not talking for two weeks."

Oh, right. I do owe him something. God, do I hate owing. "Okay," I say slowly.

"We needed bread for dinner anyways."

*Peeta*

Of course Gale would kiss Katniss. Of course, of course, of course. I knew it would happen, it was destined to. On days at school when Katniss eats lunch with Madge instead of me, the girls at my table swoon over Gale and ask me if he and Katniss have a thing. It is always the same answer. No. But now, my heart drops at the thought of having to tell them yes.

Katniss nudges my shoulder and I look down at her. I realized I stopped halfway up the sidewalk to the bakery. I blink and walk the rest if the way. If my mother knew I was using fresh ingredients just to find a way to sort of flirt with Katniss, she'd kill me. Oh well.

I flip on the lights and head to the kitchen, Katniss trailing behind me. She doesn't really cooperate with mixing the ingredients, but when time comes to knead the dough, she shuffles forward. I don't know if it's out of curiosity or just to see what I'm doing, but I'm about to make her contribute.

"Here, come knead the dough," I say, touching the small of her back. I'm surprised when she doesn't react to my touch. She doesn't usually like it when I touch her too much.

"Uh, no that's okay. You do it, I don't know how," Katniss says. I push my hand and she takes a step forward.

"I'll teach you. Just put your hands on the dough." Katniss huffs and lays her hands over the lumpy mass. I come up behind her and place my hands on top of hers. I push down on the heels of my palms and push forward then curl my fingers and roll it back towards me.

I'm not super close to Katniss, but I can feel her body heat pressing against me, practically mocking me since I can't get any closer. A few more minutes and Katniss is kneading the dough herself, but I don't dare let go. I lean forward a little to look at her face. She's got the smallest smile formed on her lips.

She suddenly looks up and my eyes dart away to look back at our flour-covered hands. I like the way our hands look together, her olive skin in contrast to my pale skin. The burns on my hands and wrists are noticeable but the calluses I've become custom to seeing on her fingers aren't visible. It feels strange doing something so...romantic with my best friend. I take my right hand off hers but continue the motion with my left.

I place my hand on her cheek and when I pull away, there's a powdery white handprint there.

"Peeta!" she says. I also like it when she says my name. Katniss pats her own hand in the extra flour and taps my cheek.

"We match!" I joke. She rolls her eyes but I grin anyways. She turns her head to look at me and she looks cute with flour on her face. What I would give to kiss Katniss Everdeen right now, but I know I can't. She doesn't know I like her and I don't want her to get even more confused. A confused Katniss is a cute Katniss, but it makes her irritable, too. I have liked her since we were five and she sung in front of everyone. As soon as I heard her voice, I knew I was a goner.

I remember my father pointing her out on the first day of school and telling me he wanted to marry her mother but she ran off with a coal miner.

I'm brought back to the present when I hear the bell over the door ring. I freeze, my hands still on top of Katniss's. The bakery is closed so the only people that would be coming in would be one of my family members.

Not my mom, not my mom, please not my mom, I pray. Lucky for me, it was my brother, Rye. He pauses in the doorway to the kitchen, raising his eyebrows. I'm glad it's not Barlee, either; he doesn't like Katniss as much as Rye does.

"Hey Peeta, hey Katniss," he says, grinning at me. I'm confused at his grin until I realize how close Katniss and I are, our hands still together in the dough. Plus, bakers DO find making bread with someone other than your family member romantic. I don't pull away though.

"Hey Rye," Katniss says. Rye quirks his eyebrow at me.

"What are you doing here?" he asks. Rye is only two years older than me, so he still has to work in the bakery or our mom would chew his head off.

"Making bread for dinner," I say, trying to signal him to leave with my eyes. Apparently he gets the message.

"Hmm. Well, don't burn anything."

Katniss laughs, a sound I love, but don't hear often. The suddenness of it startles me. She just grins at him.

"No promises."

A/N: The idea of Katniss and Peeta being BFF isn't an original one, I just thought I'd play around with. I don't really like how this chapter turned out, I'm still rusty from having writer's block for like three months and not even trying to overcome it. I'm working on it! Do you like it? Tell me in the review and if you do, I'll add another chapter(: