The ground, frosty beneath my feet, crunches as I make my way up the drive to my new mansion in the Victor's Village. My mother, Prim and I had moved in a couple of weeks ago, and they had settled in quickly. I was the only one who still used our old house in the Seam, still the official residence of my mother and sister. It was the one place I felt I was home. Back when we lived there, life was hard, but I always had known my place. Unlike now, when I'm so famous and so rich and so hated by the Capitol.
Winter has settled in on District 12 now and though my family have no need for meat anymore, I still go hunting in the woods. Gale has gone to work in the mines, so he has no time to come with me anymore – his 12 hour shifts have put an end to our partnership six days a week. He and his mother, Hazelle, are determined that the boys, Rory and Vick, and the baby, Posy, will never have to sign up for tesserae. As it is, Hazelle works her hands raw washing clothes for the wealthier citizens of 12, and with Gale working in the mines, there's less food coming in. So I said I would hunt for them. I have nothing to do anyway, as there is no pressure to feed my mother and Prim anymore. Still, I could see how Gale's pride took a fall when Hazelle accepted my offer. But I owe him from when I was in the games. He kept his promise of looking after my family – now it's my turn to repay him. Because I hate owing people. Even if he is my best friend.
Another person I can't seem to stop owing is Peeta. First, he gave me the bread, and then kept us alive in the Hunger Games. And now it's all we can do to avoid each other. I still don't know how I feel for him – I won't deny I feel some longing for his hand in mine, his arm around my shoulders. But it's buried under the guilt and shame I feel when I remember what happened on the way back from the Capitol. How I hurt him so much that he can't even look at me anymore. The sound of his voice as we pulled into the station. It was hollow, pained. To know that I'm the cause of that makes me feel ashamed. And I miss him. I'm so ridiculously selfish but I can't help it. We've been through so much in the Hunger Games that we're tied together. You can't break bonds that go that deep. But can you bury them and pretend they aren't there? I know I'll always feel attached to him in some way. And with the victory tour coming up soon, we'll have to throw away the indifference and coldness we have put between each other and pretend to be the 'star-crossed lovers from District 12' again.
My thoughts have got me distracted and I nearly break my neck when I slip on some ice. The weather is definitely getting worse. As I arrive at my house in the Victor's Village and let myself in, my mother comes bustling out of the kitchen, cheeks pink from the heat, bundles of rags in her hands. She looks flustered, and as soon as she sees me her face smoothes with relief.
"Katniss! Finally! I need you to go into town for me. We need more bandages, and we should probably stock up on some rubbing alcohol, we're running low. Here! I'll write a list."
I watch, perplexed, as she darts around the kitchen, checking cupboards and shelves, while running in and out of the room to check on her patient. Peeking around the door frame, I can see Prim ladling a snow coat onto some poor man's stomach. I don't go in to the room. Although I am in awe of my mother and Prim, who turn into completely different people when they see a sick or injured person, I cannot be in the same room with one. Whenever desperately injured or ill men or women come with their families to my mother, that's usually my cue to run to the woods.
I wait in the hall for a bit, and finally, just when I try to find the courage to go in to my mother, Prim comes out and hands me a list.
"How is he?" I ask, genuinely concerned for the man. A serious injury in district 12 can mean death for a family, and I assume he has one waiting anxiously in the next room.
Prim gives a small subtle shake of her head and sighs. I take that as my cue to leave and pull on my leather jacket and hat again. Outside the cold hits me as snow starts to fall, brushing my cheeks and getting caught on my eyelashes. I slip and slide my way into town, and take refuge under a shop front from the weather, which is quickly turning into a blizzard. I scan the items written down on the shopping list, and my heart sinks when I see the last one.
Bread.
Buying bread will mean going into the bakery, where Peeta might be. And I know if I see Peeta, all my memories and feelings I left on the train that brought us back from the Capitol will come flooding back and it'll be all I'm able to do not to run away empty handed. I'm trying to think of a way not to run into him – maybe I'll peek in the front window, or ask someone coming out of the shop who is manning the till – when I slip and fall, for real this time, onto my back, slamming my head into the ground in the process. I lie there for a bit, in the cold snow, until the world has stopped spinning and assumed its usual horizontal position. I sit up straight, bringing on another round of dizziness and a wave of pain in my back. My fingers probe the back of my head and come away with wet, warm blood on them.
"Can this day get ANY worse?" I snap at myself, while pulling off my hat and scooping some snow into it, to use as an ice pack.
I slip and slide the rest of the way into the square to the closest shop I see. I stumble up the bakery steps and into the shop. Seeing who's behind the counter, concentrating on drawing with long strokes of chalk, makes me scold myself for my earlier comment. Of course this day would get worse.
"Oh," says Peeta, when he looks up, and sees me standing there like a deer in headlights. "Hello."
I continue to stare. He looks better from when I last saw him – he's put on weight, enough to make him look healthy again, and his cheeks have lost their hollowness. His hair is still the same, the ashy blonde waves still fall over his forehead, and his eyes are as piercing as ever. However, they're more guarded and wary, and this feels like a blow to the stomach, because I'm the one who made them like that. When I think of that, I let out a gasp, as if someone actually has punched me in the stomach, and the world swirls around me again.
"Katniss?" Peeta asks, and his eyes widen when he sees me take my bloody fingers away from my head to inspect them, still in a daze. My hat isn't making much of a difference – it's soaked through. Looking at it makes me dizzy again, and I step back to steady myself, accidentally bumping into a display cabinet and knocking over the cakes. "What have you done to yourself?"
He comes over to me, and we touch for the first time in months as he guides me to a chair. I groan as I sit down – any movement sends ripples of pain through my back. I let him take my hat and pull my coat off me, because I'm starting to sweat in the warmth of the bakery. He takes a look at the back of my head and I try not to cry out as my hair pulls at my scalp as it's released from my usual braid. He gasps when he sees the cut.
"What happened?" he asks, and I mutter something about falling and knocking over cakes. My head can't form a coherent thought. The combination of the pain in my head and the shame I feel that Peeta is looking after me, again, even after all I've done to him, has got me confused and slightly annoyed. But that's just the kind of guy Peeta is. He's too selfless and kind to leave me to rot in the snow, even though that's what I would have done by now if I were him. Which just shows how much better he is. Even in the arena he was working to keep me safe, and I didn't give him a second thought until it was announced that two tributes from the same district could win.
And I'm suddenly furious with him. Why doesn't he hate me? I lead him on then stomped all over his heart. He should despise me and throw me out into the cold and the snow and stop being so nice.
That's why I decide to do what Peeta is too good to do. I stand up suddenly, and although the world spins I ignore it. "I'm leaving."
"What?" he looks baffled. "You can't leave now. You can barely stand up without feeling dizzy."
So he noticed my shakiness. Damn.
"Bye Peeta," I growl. I lurch towards the bakery door but he gets there first, barring the way. I glare at him. Why doesn't he hate me? It would be better if he did. I would know where we stood, what our relationship with each other was. Friends, Enemies, or two people that avoid each other in the street. I turn on my heels and make my way towards the back door of the bakery, where I traded my squirrels for bread with Peeta's father. Peeta takes a second to realize where I'm going. Swearing under his breath, he chases after me as I stalk through the shop. He ducks under my arm as I'm about to open the door and stands in front of it, again blocking my way out.
"Let me go," I frown, because I really don't understand why he's keeping me inside. Considering all that has happened between us, this is the opposite of what I expected him to do.
"No," he says simply. "You're hurt. I don't want to be the one responsible for your death after you pass out in the cold and catch pneumonia."
Just scowling at him doesn't seem to express the anger and confusion I feel right now, so stalk back to my chair and slam myself down on it, sending waves of pain across my back that hurt so much I let out a whimper. Peeta comes over, concerned, and his sharp intake of breath when I remove my layers of jumpers until I'm in a simple vest lets me know how bad the bruising is.
"I should call my mother, and let her know I'm being held against my will here," I snarl, when he comes back from behind the counter, a bowl of hot water, rags and bandages in his hands. He nods to me, and I take the gesture as an allowance to use the phone. I dial my house number, and Prim answers the phone.
"Hello?" she asks hesitantly. She still isn't used to talking to someone without seeing their face or knowing they're close by.
"Prim, it's me," I say quickly, putting her at ease.
"Katniss," she breathes out a sigh of relief. "Where are you? Mother's worried sick – she thinks you got caught in the blizzard. Are you alright? Your voice sounds a bit slurred."
Blizzard? I cross over to the window, and sure enough, there's a snow storm blowing ferociously through the square. "I'm fine, I just fell, that's all. I'm at the bakery, it looks like-"
"You fell?" Prim says sharply. "How bad is it?"
"I'm fine, it's just a scratch. Prim, I-" Peeta takes the phone from my grasp and props it between his shoulder and his ear while he mixes some kind of mixture in with the hot water. "Prim? Hi, it's Peeta. Yes, it's bad – it looks like she gashed the back of her head pretty awfully. Her back's a huge bruise too. I have a herbal remedy for bruises that you gave me last time I fell, but I'm not sure what to do about her head. Uh huh… yes, it's bleeding pretty heavily… ok, I'll wait here, you go get your mother."
I watch while Peeta takes instructions from my mother, checking cupboards and looking in pots, and I feel slightly in awe and slightly annoyed. He's still looking out for me, still trying to help me. The thought of this makes me feel quite pleased, for some reason, until I remember that he should hate me, and then it makes me confused.
Since I'm going to be here for a while, at least until the storm lets up, I open the display cabinet and start putting the cakes back in place. Peeta really has a talent for icing – the decorations on these cakes are so precise, so meticulously placed that it would almost be a crime to eat them. Prim and I used to walk past the shop window after school sometimes. She loved looking at the designs of the cakes, even if we couldn't buy them. I decide to buy her a pretty one for later, and pick a small cupcake with swirled icing and a small primrose flower placed on top.
"Good choice. She'll like that one," It seems Peeta has finished his conferring with my mother about my head. He's soaking some rags in a bowl of water and unwinding clean bandages. "I'm just going to clean your head and then bandage it up. When you go home your mother can treat it properly, but until the blizzard lets up, you're stuck here." He motions for me to sit down in the chair and I do, more carefully this time because I don't want to hurt my back again.
"It's going to sting a little," he says while picking out a rag from the bowl. "Put your head on your knees."
I do and when he touches the rag to my head I give a hiss and a yelp of pain. It's going to sting a little? Understatement.
"Sorry," he apologizes, but he doesn't stop slowly wiping away the congealed blood from my scalp and cut. "I'm nearly done, Katniss."
After he finishes cleaning my cut he bandages my head so that I look like I'm wearing a turban. I'm really sleepy for some reason, and my eyes keep falling shut before I snap them open again. Peeta sees this and smirks.
"What?" I growl, irritated.
"You look so funny – like you're a fortune teller on one of those Capitol shows on television," he chuckles. Scowling at him makes him start to laugh out loud.
"Well, I'm glad one of us is amused," I retort. He sobers up quickly when he realizes that I'm not joking, I'm actually pretty annoyed. I think of a cutting comment to say but when I open my mouth I let out a massive yawn, and he grins. Exasperated at myself and him, I flop down on the floor as gently as I can and make myself comfortable.
"Wake me when the blizzard stops." I command. If he replies I don't hear it, because as soon as I close my eyes I fall asleep.
My dreams, usually nightmares, don't make an appearance for once – I can only think that it must be the result of my injury. When I wake up, it's not from screaming, or hurting myself after thrashing around. It's the ring of the little bell that signifies that someone has entered the bakery as the door is wrenched open, and a voice I know all too well is calling out my name in worry.
"Katniss?" Gale cries, and I rest my bandaged head in my hands. This was certainly not turning out to be my day at all.