I do not own any characters from the Hunger Games Trilogy.
Warning: Heavy cursing, slight OOC, and mentions of suicide.
"Peeta, I'm sorry," she was sobbing at this point.
They were at opposite ends in the living room of their suburban home. He thought that they were happy. Despite their youth, the couple were living the American dream. There was even a damn white picket fence in the backyard for the garden. They just recently graduated from the state university, she with a degree in environmental sustainability and he with degrees in marketing and art. They pursued their passions. They had a three bedroom home in the nice suburban area outside the downtown area. A home ready to raise a family in. They were well respected in the city of Panem. She researched at the lab and he was given his father's bakery to run when the patriarch of the Mellark family passed a year ago. To every outsider, they were the perfect couple. They were almost like a fairy tale. The handsome man with his outgoing, charming personality and the beautiful woman with her reserved yet compassionate persona. They complimented each other. Both were intelligent, had good jobs, and were liked by all their peers. Everyone believed that the engaged couple were destined to grow old with a beautiful family. The couple had recently moved into the neighborhood six months ago and only a three months into their residence, cracks began appearing. It wasn't long before everyone knew the truth.
Except for Peeta. It's always like this. The one who will be the most hurt by the secret will discover it last. He remained blissfully unaware until now.
"You're sorry? That's absolutely amazing. Should we call the news? Katniss Everdeen is sorry." Never before has she heard him be this vengeful and angry, but she knew that he had a right to be, especially after what she just told him. The bright blue eyes that had always shone were now dull and dark. Eyes that now held tears because of her.
"I am! I am sorry. So sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen." She couldn't control the tears rolling down her face anymore.
"What do you mean 'you didn't mean for this to happen'? If you truly did, then it wouldn't have fucking happened in the first place!" His normally soft, almost melodic voice was now bellowing and angry. He's never one to yell. Never. After growing up in a household like his childhood home, he never raised his voice nor did he ever curse. It wasn't in his kind hearted nature to say anything crass.
"I'm-"
"Sorry. I get it." Cutting her off, he continued to pace. Never in his life has he felt this anger. This hatred. This devastation. He looked at the woman sitting across the room. She was supposed to be his future, his forever. She was the love of his life and there she was causing him this agony, he thought bitterly. He continued to pace around the room, pulling at his messy blond hair, trying to find an outlet for all of the anger, hatred and pain he held in his body and mind.
"Peeta, please stop. I really am truly sorry," she pleaded to her fiancée, or rather her ex-fiancée. She knew that there was really nothing she could say to alleviate his pain. She knew that it didn't matter how many times she apologized. She had broken him.
"Fuck you!" Grabbing the nearest thing to him, he launched it at the adjacent wall and saw it shatter to pieces. The frame that once held a photo of the pair in the woods behind their home, laid shattered against the floor. The violent act gave him the slightest, momentary ounce of relief from his pain. He continued to rip the frames and his paintings from the walls and launch them around the room. But no matter how many things he broke, he knew nothing could relieve him of this excruciating pain he felt. Blinded by his tears, he knocked over the vase that once held the flowers he gave her for their anniversary a few weeks ago. Their fourth year anniversary. Upon this realization, he stopped. They've been together for four years and it didn't matter at all anymore. Four years, he gave her all the love he had. Four years, he lived and breathed and strived to make her happy. Four years. Gone. Wasted.
"Four years," he whispered. He stumbled into the arm chair farthest away from her, his head falling into his hands.
"It was all a lie. Four years. That's how long it was, wasn't? The amount of time in my life I gave to you, only for it be for nothing. The period of time you took from me. The time in my life when I had been living a complete lie."
"No, Peeta, no, it wasn't all a waste," her voice wavered. Deep down, she knew that there was some truth to his statement and she hated herself for admitting it, even in the slightest.
"It wasn't a waste? What do you mean it wasn't a waste? I thought you were happy! I thought this is what you wanted! Not even once did you express any of your unhappiness with me and you fucking know that if this wasn't a life that you wanted, I would have followed you anywhere, given you anything. Because I love you. I would have given you any life you wanted without any hesitation."
"But, I didn't want a life with you!" She gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. Tears were streaming down her face, but even through her blurred vision, she could see Peeta's face crumple in hurt and pain. But, it was too late to take back what she had said.
"I didn't want this planned out life. I didn't want this life in this suburban home. I don't want to be a soccer mom. I don't even know if I want to have kids," she confessed all of her secrets to him. She had held them to herself for the entirety of their relationship, not once letting Peeta know that this life they were going to have in this suburban home wasn't one that she wanted.
"Then, why didn't you tell me this earlier? Why wait until now? When we're engaged. When we just graduated. You never once mentioned that you had hesitations about raising a family. Never did you disagree about buying this house. I bought you this house specifically because it's so close to the woods and you loved it! Fuck, Katniss. I have a mortgage in my name! You didn't say anything! Why did you wait until now? Why couldn't you have broken up with me years ago? When I actually had a chance to recover and live a different life than the hell that I'm currently in! You took everything I had! My heart, my life, my future and completely obliterated all of it! Four fucking years, Katniss. You had four damn years. Why the hell would you tell me now!?" And with that he launched the vase from the end table across the room and the shattering noise echoed in the room. Her sobs came back. She was ignorant to think that Peeta would be able to recover. She knew that her confessions had devastated him.
"Because I was scared and I didn't know what to do! Every single day the lies were getting bigger and I just didn't know how to deal with it. Before I knew it, four years had passed and I'm living in a home, expected to raise a family in here with you. I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt you and I'm sorry that I did." He couldn't respond. She was scared? Where was this fearless woman that he had known for years? The woman who fought for everything. The woman nicknamed the Girl on Fire by her uncle because she never backed down from a fight. The woman who stood up for what she believed in. Where was she? He was too stunned to respond to Katniss so they sat in silence.
"You brought him here when I was gone, didn't you?" She looked at him in shock.
"The look on your face tells me yes. How did I know? Well, now that explains the pity looks I thought I was imagining on all of the faces of our neighbors. Whenever I'd have a nice chat with old Mrs. Henderson across the street, she would always look at me like I was some hurt puppy and so would everyone else on this street. I thought I was imagining it. But, now I know. Those looks were real. Every single person on this street probably knew more about the infidelity of this fucked up relationship than I did." He always had an ability to read people. He was a people person. He knew how to interact with everyone and he knew how to react and respond to any person he met. He got it from his father. For the past few months, he thought he was just misjudging people. He couldn't understand why everyone looked at him like they felt sorry for him. But, he knew the truth now. And it hurt. A lot.
"You know, you should have gone for acting. You always said you weren't good with words and you weren't good at showing your emotions. Well, fucking hell, you managed to lead me on for four years, saying all the right things, acting all the right ways to make me believe that what we had was real. That our love was something real. But, joke's on me," shaking his head, he got up and paced around, the wreckage of his violent fit cracking under his leather shoes. As he looked around their home, he muttered, "What am I even supposed to do with this house now?"
"Peeta, you can have the house. I'll leave."
"And you're assuming I'm going to stay? Absolutely not. This house was our future. This house was for the both of us. This was a house where you brought your lover to fuck with when I was gone. Now? There's no single way I can live in this house." His words made her sob harder. She never felt this hatred in her life. Hatred of herself. She couldn't stand that she hurt the most amazing, caring man in the world because she was too damn scared. Her lies went too far and she couldn't take them back./p
"I'm sor-"
"You're sorry. Is that all that you can say, Katniss? I fought so hard for us to work. My mother hated you and I tried my hardest to get her to see that you were an amazing women. She said that all you were was some whore who would never love me. That I was deluded. That I didn't know what the real world was like and it wasn't all fairy tales with happy endings. That there was no chance in hell we would last. But, I fought back. I made my mother believe that she was wrong and she even grew to like you a bit. All along, she had been right." All he could do was scoff. His wretched mother was actually right and he couldn't stand it. Silence followed and Katniss didn't dare break it. He stopped and looked out their window.
As he turned around to face her, he couldn't help but ask, "Did you always think of him when we were intimate?"
Katniss barely heard it. She glanced up and met his blue eyes that shone from across the room. There was a slight hesitation in the question; she knew that even though he desperately wanted to know the truth, he was scared. Katniss bit her lip. There were times, more that she would like to admit, where the thought of the grey eyed, olive skinned man would finally push her over.
"Yes."
Peeta closed his eyes. Though it hurt, he wasn't surprised by her answer. The room was silent. Both were in tears. The two were at opposite ends of the room with the shards of glass, wood, and ceramic littering the floor around them. Peeta was too angry to say anything and Katniss was at a lost.
The past hour had completely changed his life. One minute, he was happy, preparing a meal in the kitchen for him and Katniss. The next, Katniss stumbled into the kitchen with tears in her eyes. After persuading her to sit across from him at their dining table, she spoke, uttering the words that he will never forget for the rest of his life.
"I've been having an affair with Gale Hawthorne."
The admission floored him. Agonizing pain flooded his body and he couldn't think straight.
"How long?" It took every ounce of him to formulate words in his muddled mind.
"On and off for the past two years."
"No."
"No?"
"I know you Katniss. Though I was incredibly ignorant and stupid for not seeing that the woman I love was fucking another man for half the time of our relationship, you were emotionally cheating on me the entire time, weren't you? You were never with me."
"No, Peeta, I did love you. Just not in the way you wanted me to."
"Love? You're actually claiming that you love me? Well, you have a twisted way of showing it."
In hindsight, it explained a lot to him. It explained why she refused his proposal the first time. It explained why she didn't want to leave Panem when they graduated, even though all throughout high school, he distinctly remembered her wanting to leave. It explained why it took her so long to tell him that she loved him.
"You didn't want to leave Panem when we graduated. However, I distinctly remember a certain someone moaning and groaning about leaving this hell hole of a small town once you walk across that stage with a diploma in hand. But, lo and behold, it's the second half of senior year and your mind completely changed. Tell me what your reasoning was for that again?" He knew the answer. He knew that there were clues even before their relationship started that she was with another man. If not physically, but emotionally.
"I didn't want to leave Prim alone with my mother." She was holding back because she too knew what he wanted her to say. But, she knew that it would only bring more pain.
"Katniss, what else? There was another reason.
"Because I didn't want to leave my best friend."
"Bingo. Your best friend. Gale fucking Hawthorne. That should have been a red flag even before our relationship started." He paused as a thought occurred to him.
"Why did you call me that night at the end of our senior year? What did you even start this relationship?" There was a slight hesitancy before she finally answered.
"Because you were safe. You had a plan. I knew you loved me so we were already half way there."
"No. There's more. There's something you're not telling me. Something else happened that I don't know of. What initiated you to call me that night? What made you finally go on a date with me after years of knowing me? I've known you for years, Katniss and unfortunately, it was no secret in the town that I had a crush on you, but I stayed your friend, knowing that I'd rather have some form of relationship with you even if it wasn't romantic. I had asked you to prom and you outright rejected me. I always thought that it was because you finally found that you had feelings for me, but with what's happened in the past hour of this hell, I know it wasn't. Something made you call me and it sure as hell wasn't anything remotely similar to you having found your undiscovered feelings for me. Why did you call me?"
"Gale and I slept together a few nights before I called you. I was scared. I didn't want to become the shell of being like my mother so I ran." Her answer came out in the faintest whisper.
"And you ran to me. Because I was safe. Because I loved you. Because I was probably the last person you would fall in love with. I wasn't the man you were in love with, but I was your friend. Someone you trusted. You chose me because choosing me would mean you wouldn't have to actually accept whatever you had with Gale. That's why you chose me." The pieces all connected together. He collapsed into the chair closest to him. He couldn't stand it anymore. His head and heart ached. His entire body felt limp and weak. He was drained emotionally, physically, and mentally. He had said his piece. But, no matter how much he yelled and threw things around, he knew that his heart was beyond repair at the moment. Nothing could fix this. Dramatic as it may sound, his life was literally ruined. His heart was thrown in a shredder and the future he thought he had had vanished. He could sit here and cry and yell as much as he wanted to, but nothing could alleviate any of the pain he was enduring. He once saw himself as an old man with an older Katniss by his side, sitting on the back porch of this home, watching their grandchildren run around the backyard. He always thought that that was what his future held for him and he couldn't be any happier. But he was wrong. Reality was completely different and he never expected this to happen. Maybe it was because he was too much of a romantic and idealist. He knew that their relationship had hit a bump in the road the first time he had proposed and she had rejected it.
It was Katniss' birthday and he had made her favorite lamb stew. They had been dating for a little over two years and he couldn't be any happier. He couldn't hide the fact that he was slightly shaking and he could tell that Katniss knew that something was up by the way she glanced at him from across the table in her apartment. Finally taking a deep breath, he got up and knelt down on his knee.
"Katniss, I have loved you from the very moment I saw you. It took us years to get to where we are and I couldn't be any happier. I love absolutely everything about you and if I wasn't so nervous, I would have remembered the rest of this spiel I planned out. So let's just cut to the chase. Katniss Everdeen, will you do me the honor and marry me?"
It felt like a year had passed before Katniss had finally answered, "No. I'm sorry Peeta, but it's too soon for me. I don't want to rush things. But, I love you so much, Peeta. Please understand that."
All he could do was numbly nod and get up to embrace her. He mumbled to her that he did understand and that he would wait until she was ready. /ememHe understood, but that didn't make the pain hurt any less.
How stupid he was to think that that would be the worst pain he would feel from Katniss. How completely and utterly deluded he was to think that. He was wrong. So, so wrong. He couldn't stand being here anymore. He had to leave. It was too much for him.
"I'm leaving and don't you dare fucking follow me because I can't stand the sight of you anymore." He got up and grabbed his coat, heading for the door.
"Peeta, wait!"
"What? What else could you possibly say right now that would make me feel better? You could try. Because, so help me God, there is nothing right now, stopping me from jumping off a fucking bridge, leaving the ruins of my life behind me. Go ahead and try, Katniss. Tell me why I shouldn't because right now I don't give a shit about whether I live or die. I don't care. You ruined me."
"You don't mean that, do you, Peeta?" Even if she didn't love him, she did care for him and she knew that what she told him would hurt him, devastate him. But, for him to contemplate suicide? No. She didn't think that at all. It wasn't possible for him. It wasn't in his makeup to do something like that. Right?
He contemplated answering, but said nothing. As he turned back and grabbed the door knob, he saw a glimmer from his left hand. His engagement ring. He got both of them a ring to symbolize the unity in their relationship. What a fucking joke. He could feel the inscription burning his finger. emAlways./em He promised her always, but she obviously never did the same. Slipping it off his finger, he flung it to the side of him, into the room in disarray.
"Looks like I won't be needing that anymore." And with that, he left the house.
To anyone passing by the suburban home on that rainy day, they wouldn't be able to see the woman inside, on her knees, sobbing. They would see a man with gorgeous blue eyes and blond hair walking away. Walking away from the ruins of his life. Walking aimlessly to wherever his decimated future led him. Away from the supposed happiness and love that the suburban home once held for him. Away from the woman who annihilated his heart.
A/N: Should I do another chapter, giving you a glimpse to their future? I haven't decided if I wanted to yet. I've written another story for the Hunger Games, but I didn't get a lot of feedback, unfortunately. So, please review and let me know if that's something you all would be interested in. If there's a high demand, I definitely will do one. If not, this is where Katniss and Peeta unfortunately end.