"You're a painter."
I'm jolted awake by the screech of the train. I push my hair out of my eyes only to find it soaked with sweat. I blink rapidly, trying to shake the image of a boy's - or was it a man's? - body being ripped to shreds by wild dogs out of my mind. I sit up straight in my booth as the train slows down, coming to a stop.
Maybe it's a good thing these nightmares are coming back. Maybe it means my memories are returning, seeping into my subconscious. As I get up and retrieve my single bag from the compartment above me, realization floods back. I had asked Finnick about it a few weeks ago, after I'd had the very same nightmare. Real, I think to myself. The boy was Cato, a tribute from 2. He was in the Hunger Games with Katniss and I. He was the last one who died before we "won."
Yes, it's all back to me now. The screams. The howls. Not knowing which belonged to man or mutt. Sometimes it's like this, with the nightmares. I can't place it for a few minutes after I wake up. It just adds to the confusion.
I step off the platform of the train and into the darkness of District 12. It must be midnight or nearly close to it. I don't know why I know this.
"Over here," comes a gruff voice. I can't see him, but I know it has to be Haymitch. Who else would meet me at the station? There's no one left to.
"Haymitch?" I ask anyway. His answer will give me a place to walk to so I don't fall and hurt myself in the pitch-blackness of the night.
Ouch. A bright light shines in my face, Haymitch right behind it. "Let's get you home, boy."
"Why are you here? Did the Capitol pay you to come?" The words come out of my mouth before I can stop them. I wince after I say it, because it reminds me so much of myself in 13. It wasn't a fun place.
Haymitch looks like he wants to smack me upside the head, but he restrains himself. "I'm not getting paid to do anything. I'm here because it would be a disaster to have you stumbling back to the Victor's Village at midnight. Now let's get a move on."
We walk in silence for barely a minute before I'm asking questions again. "Is anyone else here?"
"In the district? Very few. There's us in the Village. And there's a few from the Seam. That's it."
"Do you think they'll ever come back?"
"Oh, yes. Give them time. No one but a native could last in Thirteen for long."
I have to agree with him there. "She hasn't spoken to the doctor at all, you know," I say after another minute or two.
"No, I wouldn't know. Been too busy getting reacquainted with the bottle."
Every time Haymitch says or does something inflammatory, I think that I can't ever get any more upset with him than I am in that moment. But this time I know I'll never be more upset with him than right now. It takes all of the - admittedly small - willpower I have not to shove him roughly to the side. "So you mean she's all shut up in that house while you're drinking to your heart's content? What are you thinking? She could be dead for all you know, she could be…" I start to run towards where I think the street might be. I had taken the Nightlock from her, right? Right? It doesn't matter, she could've found a million more ways to off herself. I start screaming as I run, and the next thing I know, the wind's knocked out of me as I thud to the ground.
"What're you doin'?" Haymitch looms over me, his lantern swinging in his hand. He looks furious. "Of course I didn't leave her to die, boy! She has someone checking on her twice a day, what do you think I am, stupid?"
I get up, rubbing my head. I'll have a lump the size of an egg tomorrow morning. "What was I supposed to think? You taking her home, supposed to make sure she's all right, and then you lock yourself up in your house? You can't pass responsibilities like that off to someone else, that's just…She could be dead, Haymitch! She…why…Katniss…arrow…nest…tree…arena…"
I hear the steady beat of a knife sliding back and forth on a branch…Katniss is sawing the tracker jackers' nest off the tree, she's trying to kill me and the others…
Not real!
I see the nest fall in slow motion, catching in a branch before it plummets down to the ground…Katniss is thrashing in the tree, trying to make it fall as fast as it can…
Not real!
I feel the first insect land on me, plunge its stinger deep into my arm…there's a warbled sound in the distance, it must be Katniss laughing and bragging to her evil allies how she's managed to knock out a handful of Careers in one blow…
Not real!
I smell the blood of the others on my hands, crawling towards my face. Or maybe it's my blood. Or maybe it's coming from my face. Katniss is leaping from tree to tree, shooting arrows at us every chance she gets…
Not real!
I taste the metallic venom of the tracker jackers as they fill my mouth and then pour out of every other crevice in my face. They're buzzing so loudly my eardrums must have burst by now…Katniss is pouring more onto me by the bucketful…She's laughing and taunting me every chance she gets and she soon begins to scream and rage…
Not real! Not real! Not real!
I look at my surroundings and find myself on the ground in District 12 again. I'm soaking wet with both my own sweat and water from the nearby well. Haymitch is standing over me and he pours another load of the water onto my face, all the while yelling, "Get out of it, Peeta! It's not real!"
I blink and start shaking all over. I hadn't had an episode that strong in days. They had usually subsided to a few bursts of fake, shining memories. This one…some of it wasn't even shiny. Katniss had cut the nest. Real. But she hadn't meant to kill me. Not real.
Haymitch sees that I've snapped out of it, drops the now empty bucket, and gives me a hand to stand back up. I'm hacking a horrible cough, water having gotten into my lungs. He thumps me on the back.
"Sorry about that," I mutter under my breath.
"It's not you who should be apologizing," he answers.
I look at him. He can't mean Katniss?
"The Capitol! Snow!" he hollers frantically.
I nod. We walk in silence for a few more minutes until we round the bend, coming onto the Victor's Village main street. I walk up to my front porch and turn to Haymitch. "Make sure she's okay, will you? And call me. Please."
He grumbles assent.
I turn and try the doorknob, knowing that it'll be unlocked. It is. I step into my house and am overwhelmed by an insanely familiar smell…It isn't just one thing. It's so many scents woven into each other from the past year of being untouched and I can't even possibly pick them all out now. Maybe I never will be able to again. But it's calm.
I see a box of tapes by the television. Those must be from before the Quarter Quell, when I'd had Effie send them so the three of us could train. It surprises me how easily this recall comes.
I step upstairs, hardly daring to put any weight on the steps. It all feels so fragile, like a ghost. It seems as if I've never been here in my life but at the same time like I've never known any place better.
The door on my immediate right is open and I step in. I'm instantly taken aback by the sheer amount of red in the room. It's filled with canvases, pieces of wood, and scattered sheets of paper. All of them depict a violent act - they must be from the games.
I step up to one and touch it, feeling the grooves and ridges of the paint and canvas beneath my fingers. It's my hand in the picture, holding a short knife. There's a girl underneath the knife, her throat torn open and its insides scattered on the ground around her and my hand. The way the muscles in my hand are painted can only mean that I'm about to stab her.
I fall back, bumping into another canvas. There's no mistaking the girl in this picture. Its' Katniss. She's strewn across a hard stone floor, her hair halfway between being tangled into a mass beyond repair and floating serenely around her head. I can tell she's unconscious. She has a bandage across her forehead, so soaked red that I can't tell what color it originally was. I'll probably never remember it. This room suddenly feels so disgusting. Infuriating. As if on cue, the phone rings and I dash to my bedroom to pick it up.
"She's asleep in her rocking chair, Peeta," Haymitch's annoyed voice comes through the speaker.
"Thanks," I mumble, relieved. Haymitch hangs up without saying another word.
When I put down the phone, I'm overcome with tremors and I realize just how tired I am. I sit on my bed, trying to calm down. If I can't regulate my body and breathing soon, I'll have another episode. At least I can see them coming now.
After a few seconds my hands go still. My breath is steady and the beads of sweat that popped up on my forehead are drying. There's something about being back here, back home - such a foreign word-that keeps me a bit more sane than usual. I lie down, still in my clothes from the Capitol, and close my eyes.
I wait five minutes. I wait ten, fifteen, twenty minutes. I can't sleep. My mind and body are still calm, but they're restless and twitchy as well.
I turn the light on a bit so I can see but not burn my eyes out and open the closet. I find paints, canvases, and brushes galore. I must have had so many supplies that even a full room for them wasn't enough.
Slowly, carefully, I open a paint bottle and sniff it. It's still fresh and the scent brings the same feelings that opening up the front door did with it.
I lay out a few bottles of paint, a canvas, and a few brushes on the floor of the closet and start painting. I don't know what it'll result it, but I find myself mulling over recent memories. Ones that aren't from the Hunger Games.
I pick up a bottle of gray paint and consider adding a touch of 13 into the painting. I throw the bottle aside, deciding that 13 is too drab to be able to turn out well in a painting. I need something vibrant and full of life.
Or, I think, something completely void of life. Like my paintings and portraits in the other room. I pour drops of yellow and orange and red and blue onto a palette next to the canvas. I use every stroke known in my memory.
I am amazed at how quickly the skill comes back to me. I suppose it's like the cake. You can't really unlearn something so ingrained into you for long.
I don't know how much time passes, but when I run out of room on the canvas, I look up and see the faintest rays of sunlight streaming in from the window in the room across the hall. I roll back on my heels, grabbing a towel strewn across the floor and wiping my face and hands with it. I look at the painting in the dim lighting and see swirls of color and life and beauty. Upon closer look, I can see that the colors mesh together in the most perfect ways, forming a scene.
In the upper left corner of the canvas, there's a young girl surrounded by yellow. Her hair is of the same color, although it's a different shade. Her skin is white as snow. She's laughing and smiling at the person opposite her, another girl. This child is the mirror opposite of the first - deep brown hair and slightly lighter skin. They appear to be interacting like old friends.
Prim. And Rue. They're sitting on a cloud, looking at the world below them. It's a happy world, with fresh new buildings and flowers and sunlight. In the bottom right corner is a woman, strong and stoic. She doesn't look happy, but she isn't wearing a frown, either. It's Katniss. She seems content, in the recovered District 12. No one but the three of them is present.
I think she'd like it. But not now. Maybe after we're a bit more accustomed to life here again I'll give it to her or at least show her. She'd like to see Prim and Rue being friends.
Maybe I'll knock on her door later today. In the evening. I don't know if she wants to see me, though, or even if she wants me here. I don't really care, though. I have no where else to go-District 12 is my home. I think she'll come around when she can live again.
I need to get up and do something. I didn't have even the beginnings of an episode when I was painting.
I stand and catch another glimpse of the painting. I see that rose bushes have worked their way into it, as well. Primroses.
Do you think I got Peeta right? I wanted to capture him post-hijacking and still show how he cared about Katniss, if not the same way he did before.
Thanks for reading. :)