"We're never going to make it out of junior year if we keep doing this," I say to Katniss. She's sifting through a bowl of old cookies my parents brought home from the bakery, ignoring me.

"Are there any more peanut butter cookies?" She asks.

"Dumb and Dumber ate the last of them this morning," I tell her, pulling the bowl away and setting it in the middle of the table where our school books are set out. I open to the pages we're supposed to be studying. "Can we please get to work? I don't want to be up until midnight finishing my homework again." I grab my Trig book and throw it on the floor between us.

"Maybe we shouldn't do homework together anymore if this is what happens," Katniss suggests. "We never get it all done before I have to go home."

"That'd be even worse," I reply. "We just have to focus on finishing the work before we reward ourselves with cookies and TV."

"But it's Big Cat Week on Nat Geo Wild," Katniss gripes.

"You hate cats."

"No…" Katniss laughs and shakes her head. "I hate Prim's cat, not all cats."

"Let's finish this and then we can watch TV until you have to go home," I reason.

"How about we watch one show, then we start the homework?" Katniss counters, picking the book up from the floor and setting it in her lap. She mimics my position on the floor – back propped against the coffee table, legs stretched out in front of her. She drums on the top of my book, waiting for my answer. "Come on, Peeta," she hums, begging.

It's like she knows just how to get to me, though it never takes much for her to get her own way. Sit close, smile at me - distract me from what we're really supposed to be doing. It's even worse if she touches me. She doesn't know what her presence does to me, and she can never find out. I value her friendship too much to ruin it by having a crush on her.

She delivers her final blow when she leans to the side and pushes me with her shoulder, coaxing me to agree to watch TV instead of working on homework, her touch sends a line of heat from my shoulder down to my stomach.

"Fine," I agree, exasperated. "One show!"

She flashes me a satisfied smile and pulls my Trig book from her lap, setting it back down on the coffee table while I switch the channel. The show has already started, and I smile to myself, knowing that we agreed to only watch one show and this one is already half over.

Katniss sits back down next to me in the same position, hands in her lap while she looks straight at the TV. I steal a glance at her and notice the way her eyebrows are raised in interest just slightly, and that even though her mouth is pulled up into a small smirk, it still looks relaxed. When I look back to the TV, I don't like what I see.

"Oh come on!" I shout, angrily. "That damn lion is eating the hyena!"

"Nature, Peeta," Katniss says teasingly, patting my knee. "Lions have to eat too, you know, that's just the circle of life."

"Yeah," I nod, smirking. "And so is that." I point to the TV where the scene has abruptly changed from a male lion eating a hyena, to the same lion mounting a female. Katniss laughs at the scene and shakes her head.

"She doesn't look very pleased with her situation," Katniss says, tilting her head and squinting. "I don't think I'd be very pleased either if someone just hopped on my back and stuck it in. It's not very romantic."

"Stop," I say, trying to keep my voice even. She can't talk about this right now. Not when she's this close.

"Do you think the females even come?" She leans over and pushes her shoulder into mine again and laughs at my gasp.

"Katniss!" I shout, horrified.

"Well it's a valid question, Peeta," she points out. "Is there even time for her to get off?"

"Why are you even thinking about this?" She has to stop talking. I can feel my pants growing tighter with every word that comes out of her mouth.

"I don't know," she shrugs. "I just wonder if she gets any pleasure out of it, because it doesn't seem like she does."

"Most animals don't mate for pleasure," I remind her. Steering the conversation away from the pleasurable aspects of sex is doing nothing to stop me from getting hard, and I take a deep breath, shifting my right leg up to try to hide the bulge that is forming.

"Well, that's shitty." She crosses her arms and falls silent, bringing her eyes back up to the television, but by then it's too late for me. She can't see me like this. What kind of guy gets a woody over lions mating?

But I know it wasn't the lions, it was her. It was what she was saying, and the way her shoulder kept brushing mine while she said it. I'm pathetic.

We continue watching the show in silence. Katniss seems enthralled, so I take advantage of the moment and shift again, pulling the front of my sweatpants away from me in attempts to hide the erection that doesn't show any signs of subsiding.

"What the hell, Peeta?!" Katniss shouts, causing me to jump. I pull my hand away quickly and look at her, only to find her eyes trained right on my dick. She has a smile on her face, but it doesn't look particularly happy – it looks more like she's trying to hold back a laugh. "Do you have a boner?"

I don't know what to say. I wish she would have just pretended not to notice and spared me the mortification right now, but our friendship doesn't work that way. We take any opportunity to embarrass one another, and today, Katniss seems to have to upper hand. The only thing I can do is look away.

"Jesus, Peeta, we were barely touching," she says. She doesn't sound like she wants to laugh anymore, but there's something in her voice that isn't familiar. "Look, I like you and everything, I don't…"

"Who said, it was because of you?" I scoff. "Stop being so arrogant." Of course it's because of her, but I know what the end of that sentence was going to be. She likes me, but she doesn't like me, like me. What the hell does that mean, anyway?

"So you don't think I'm boner material then?" Katniss asks. Boner material? I want to ask her what that is supposed to mean, too, but she sounded so offended that I can't help but stare at her, dumbfounded. "So you don't, then," she says. It's not a question, but a statement.

"I didn't say that," I reply quickly. "But you're my friend."

"So that just automatically counts me out? You're getting horny watching a couple of lions fucking while I'm sitting here right next to you?" She shakes her head. "I'm not sure if I should feel sorry for myself, or feel sorry for you."

"Where is this coming from, Katniss?" I ask. I have no idea how this went from her taking advantage of my embarrassment, to her getting offended at my denial that this is because of her. Why does she even care?

She doesn't answer. All she does is sighs and looks down, seemingly embarrassed over what she said. I don't know what else to say, so I stay quiet until I realize this whole time she has been staring straight at my crotch.

"Stop staring at it!" I finally tell her when I can't take the scrutiny any longer.

"Sorry," Katniss says, finally cracking a smile. She turns her head and looks at the wall while I try to think of anything to get this erection to subside, but I know it's no use. Not with her still here and not with the way she was staring at it.

"You don't have to keep your head turned, just don't stare… that weirds me out," I lie. It doesn't weird me out at all; it just turns me on even more.

"Well, what the hell am I supposed to do? Act like it's not there?" Katniss grouses.

"I don't know!" I yell back. She turns her head again and sighs. "I'm sorry Katniss, I shouldn't have yelled at you." I begin to move. "You can get started on the homework; I'll just leave the room for a little bit, all right?" I'm just about to stand up when her voice breaks the silence.

"What do you usually do?" she asks.

"I usually just think about old Miss Sae and it goes away pretty quickly," I explain. I leave out the part about how it won't work right now because she's in the room and hoist myself up on my feet.

"No, I mean when you don't want it to go away, like… when you're alone."

Did she really just ask me that? All I can do is stare at her, dumbfounded. She turns to me, no longer looking at the wall to her right, and begins to speak again.

"Show me," she requests quietly, looking down to the floor after she says it.

"Stop fucking with me, Katniss. This is embarrassing enough as it is, all right?" I make to walk past her but she stands up to meet me before I can get past her.

"I'm not," she says, looking me right in the eye. "Fucking with you, I mean."

"Right," I say sarcastically, nodding. "I'll be the idiot again and show you, then you'll tell Madge tomorrow at school and then by lunch the entire school will know what a fool I am."

"And I shouldn't be worried that you won't run and tell Finnick that I asked you to show me?" Katniss retorts, crossing her arms. "I'm just…" she purses her lips together, as though she is choosing her words very carefully. "I'm curious, that's all." She looks at me, clearly noticing the unconvinced expression on my face. "And I'm serious."

I should trust her, she is my best friend, but I just can't do it. I feel like the minute I make a move to show her she will start laughing in my face. I move to the side and brush past her, not looking back to her when she calls after me. I just need a few minutes alone to calm down, then we can do our homework, and she can go home.

I slam my bedroom door and begin to pace while I try to clear Katniss from my mind, but every time I feel like I'm getting somewhere, I just see that look on her face again when she told me she was serious. She wasn't looking away, she wasn't looking down – she was looking right into my eyes. Maybe she was serious. I can tell when she's lying. She never looks into my eyes when she's trying to lie to me, why would she start now?

Why does she want me to show her that? Does she even still want me to after the way I stormed out of the living room? Is she even still here? I'll go back out there and see if she's still here - I hope she's still here. I hope she still wants to do this. Who knows if I'll ever have this opportunity again? What was I thinking by walking away from her like that?

To be on the safe side, I reach between my mattress and box spring and pull out the bottle of lube I keep hidden there, shoving it into the pocket of my sweatpants before I pull the door open and walk back out to the living room.

I find Katniss sitting on the living room floor where she was sitting before this ordeal started – back against the coffee table, legs stretched out in front of her. I stand in front of her, not saying a word.

"Feeling better?" she asks, keeping her eyes glued to the TV.

"You tell me," I reply. My response causes her to look away from the TV.

"Still?" She asks, stunned.

"I can't concentrate on anything but what you said," I tell her honestly. "Did you mean it?" She keeps staring at the front of my pants, but pulls her eyes away long enough to meet mine while she nods. I sit down next to her and put my hand out to her. "You have to promise me that you won't tell anyone."

"I promise," she replies, taking my hand and giving it a shake.

"Katniss, I mean it," I warn her. "Nobody. Not even that cat you hate." She still has a hold on my hand and squeezes it, pulling me a little closer to her while still looking in my eyes.

"I said I promise," she says firmly. "Now you have to promise that you won't tell Finnick, your brothers, or the whole fucking wrestling team."

"Of course I won't." I shake my head, swallowing hard. "I promise." Katniss nods and looks back down at my pants.

"So? What do you usually do?" she asks again. I hesitate before reaching into my pocket and pulling out the bottle of lube. I hand it to her.

"Well, I like lube when I do this," I admit. "Sometimes it hurts if I don't use it." She nods and hands the bottle back to me. When I reach for the waistband of my sweatpants, I see her eyes move back down. I want to ask her not to look. Let me start and she can look in a minute or two, but the look on her face stops me from asking. She looks… anxious. Ready.

I pull my pants down slowly, lifting up to allow them to move past my ass, but leave the front covering my dick. I take a deep breath and look at Katniss. Her eyes have moved from the front of my pants down to the side of my ass that is now exposed.

"Staring at my ass?" I tease. I had to say something, anything to break this tension. Her head snaps up to meet my questioning gaze, but she doesn't answer. She just keeps moving her eyes back and forth between my face and the grip I still have on my pants, like she's silently asking me to keep going. I look away and at the wall in front of me before pulling my pants down past my dick, feeling it spring forward. I exhale audibly at the feeling of relief.

"Did that feel good?" Katniss asks. Her voice is timid. I want to look at her, survey her face and see where her eyes are trained now, but I can't seem to take my eyes off the wall.

"Yes," I breathe, nodding and still looking forward.

"Why?" She asks, intrigued.

"The pressure," I explain, forcing my eyes off the wall and to her face. "It starts to hurt after a while." I think I catch her off guard when I look at her. Her eyes grow wide when she looks up into mine, and she takes a deep breath before nodding.

"What next?" she asks, turning her body in my direction.

I open the bottle of lube and pour some into my hand, looking back to her as I bring my hand to my dick, coating it from base to tip. As hard as I was trying not to, a light moan escapes from my mouth from the friction. I see Katniss' eyes widen even more at the sound as she stares right back at me, stopping only when I break eye contact to look down at my hand gripping my erection.

I begin to run my hand up and down slowly, showing Katniss what it is that I do when I'm alone and needing relief. I bite the inside of my cheek, stifling another moan that wants to break free when I look at her. She's sitting on her feet; head tilted, eyes downcast. Her mouth hangs open just slightly and she keeps swallowing hard, breathing out loudly each time she does.

"What do you think about when you do it?" she questions, never taking her eyes off of my dick. I can't answer that, because every answer is the same. You, Katniss. I think about you.

She's asked enough questions – it's my turn now.

"Do you touch yourself, Katniss?" I don't stop running my hand over my dick while she contemplates whether or not she wants to answer me. I watch a whole range of emotions wash across her face – shock, fear, embarrassment, and finally, after I give myself a squeeze and finally let a fully audible moan pass my lips, she nods.

"Yes," she says, her voice unsteady.

"Why don't you show me too, then?" The need to change the focus from what I think about has become so strong; I'm beginning to say things I wouldn't normally say, especially not to Katniss. But it doesn't matter what I may be doing right now, she can't know that I think about her when I want to get off.

To my surprise, Katniss doesn't look offended by my request. She looks up at me, then to the clock on the wall, but not once does she look upset by what I just asked her to do. I let go of myself and wait to see what she does next.

"What time will your parents be home?" she asks.

"Not until after they close up the bakery tonight," I tell her. "And you know my brothers don't come home until curfew at ten."

Katniss stares at me, her gaze so intense that it feels like her eyes are burning a hole right through me. She hasn't refused, but she hasn't agreed yet, either. I let go of my dick and turn to her.

"I showed you, now you show me." I don't know where my voice is coming from, but the fact that Katniss hasn't slapped me yet is almost as surprising as what I'm saying.

"Are you sure nobody is going to be coming home any time soon?"

"I swear," I answer. "But if you want, go make sure the top lock is secure. Nobody is getting in if that's locked." I can't take her to my bedroom. What would that mean if I did?

She hops up off the floor quickly and practically sprints to the front door. I hear the top lock click, and soon she is back in the living room.

She stops abruptly when she re-enters the living room, standing a few feet to my left and staring as I run the tip of my finger up and down the length of my dick. I wait a minute for her to join me on the floor, but she doesn't move. When I look over to her, she seems frozen, staring at my finger as it moves along the shaft. I nod to her, letting her know that it's alright, and she begins to undo her jeans.

"If you tell anyone," she begins.

"Hey," I cut her off. "I said I wouldn't." She pulls the zipper down and begins to pull on the fabric, pulling them down slowly. I notice that she's removing her panties off with her jeans and in a minute, she's standing in front of me with nothing on below her waist, kicking her jeans off her feet.

Something inside of me snaps and I know I need to touch her. She looks so embarrassed standing there. Our friendship may revolve around embarrassing one another, but right now, I want nothing more than to make her feel safe. I reach out for her with my free hand and she takes it, allowing me to pull her closer and down, where she comes to rest on her knees at my side.

I let go of her hand and place it on her bare thigh, running my hand across the skin and feeling myself twitch. I may not be able to tell her how I feel about her, but I can at least try to show her. She closes her eyes and inhales through her nose at my touch.

"Show me," I coax. She nods, and with her eyes still closed she brings her hand between her legs, moving to spread them as she kneels on the carpet.

I wrap my hand around my dick again and resume the up and down motion from earlier as I stare at her hand as it rubs small circles between her legs. I almost lose it when I hear her first moan. I have to squeeze my dick so hard to calm myself even the slightest. I force my eyes away from what she's doing to look at her face. She must sense my eyes on her, because she looks away from what I'm doing and up to my face.

"Are you… wet?" I ask. The question sounded better in my head, and now I want to take every word back.

"Getting there," she answers, looking back down to my hand. I add a few twists to the up and down motion now, and notice that she matches it by twisting her hips and grinding on her hand.

I seem to lose myself in some sort of trance watching her as her body moves over her hand like she's done this a million times before in her room late at night. I think about those times now. I've been in that room plenty of times before, but the thought of her in the bed we sit on when we do homework, using her hand to make herself wet, writhing on it like it was… me. I begin to moan while I watch her. I wonder what she thinks about. Who she thinks about.

"What does it feel like?" Katniss asks suddenly, snapping me out of my trance.

"What?"

"I mean, does it feel good?" she shakes her head. "No, stupid question… of course it feels good, but… what do you feel like?"

"Well, what do you feel like? I counter.

She doesn't answer for a minute, and then quickly takes her hand away from between her legs. I'm just about to let go of the grip I have on myself when she lifts her hand up to my eye level, rubbing her thumb over the two fingers she used, and I see them glistening.

"Want to find out?" she asks. This time I really do let go of myself. I stare at her in awe, trying to gauge the expression on her face. She can't be lying; she's still looking into my eyes.

"Really?" I manage to reply. She walks even closer to me on her knees and nods.

"Go ahead," she says.

I have no idea what to do. Do I try to copy what I watched her doing before? I inch my hand up reluctantly and move it between her legs. There is no space between us now that she's gotten even closer, and I place my entire hand over her middle, feeling how warm it is. There is wetness on my palm, but I don't move. I keep my hand over her and wait for her. Finally, she reaches down and grabs my wrist.

"Like this," she says, she pushes all but two of my fingers down, pushing them up between her folds. The heat and wetness there is even more apparent and my dick twitches again at the contact. She stops guiding me and hisses inward when my fingers graze the nerve at her front. "Rub here," she says. "In circles, like I was doing." She lets her hand fall from my wrist and I begin to rub circles, but her hand is quickly on my wrist again. "Gently," she tells me. "Like this." She takes her other hand and puts two fingers to the inside of my wrist, gently rubbing circles on the skin, and I begin to mimic her pressure and movements. "Yes, just like that." She gasps.

"You're wet now," I comment, enthralled, though my voice still sounds unsure.

"Yes," Katniss moans in answer, bucking against my hand just as she was doing to herself. My fingers slip through her folds as she moves her hips.

I can feel my dick beginning to throb from the lack of attention and what I am doing to Katniss, and I take a chance at speaking again while Katniss is caught up in the moment.

"Do you want to know what I feel like?" I ask, trying my best to keep my voice from breaking. She moves against my hand a few more times, and I almost forget that I even asked her a question. Her face looks so relaxed. Her eyes are closed as she rocks her hips, using her hands to hold her shirt up just enough so I can see her bellybutton peek out from under it.

"Yes," she answers again. It's the only word she seems able to get out right now. She opens her eyes and stops her movements, but I continue the circular rhythm that I've worked myself into.

Leaning over, she reaches her hand out in the direction of my dick, but stops when I haven't given her instructions, just the way I did earlier.

"Just wrap your hand around me, like I was doing," I re-assure her, halting my movement between her legs until she's situated.

"Do I need lube, too?" she asks.

"Do you want some?" She shrugs her shoulders at my question and I reach to my side and grab the bottle, squeezing some into her hand. She wraps her hand around me, but doesn't move – the lube starts to drip from her hand and down. When I gasp, she tenses. "It's alright, your hand just feels different than mine," I explain. "Better." She looks at me, but doesn't speak. "Just move your fist up and down, like I was doing before."

She begins to slide her hand up and down, re-coating my dick with the fresh lube I poured into her hand. I can't hold back the moans by biting my cheek anymore, and I let her hear them freely, so she knows she's doing a good job. I resume the circular motion against her nerve and soon, her moans are also filling the room, mixing with mine and the sounds of her lube covered hand slipping over me time and time again.

"Rub faster," she instructs, suddenly letting go of my dick. I don't have time to protest, because she takes that same hand and clutches my wrist again, rubbing a faster pattern into my skin, along with the lube that remained on her hand. I match her movements and she begins to buck more dramatically against my hand, gripping my wrist to keep me in place, clutching hard so her wet hand doesn't slip.

With each hard thrust she makes against my hand, my fingers slip further and further into her. They soaked now, and her breathing is getting heavier and heavier, I wonder if she is close.

"I'm going to come, Peeta," she gasps, her breath hitching. I've been so busy watching my hand cover her, and the movement of her hips, the sound of her voice causes me to look up at her face. She's completely lost right now; eyes closed, jaw clenched, and hand gripping my wrist so hard that I'm beginning to lose feeling in my hand, but I don't stop her. I let her go, and I watch her. She doesn't look like the Katniss I know, but more like the Katniss I dream about - so lost in her ecstasy that she forgets for a minute that we're only friends. I keep swirling my fingers as she rides my hand.

Her whole body tenses suddenly, and her mouth falls open, bringing with it a moan at least 3 octaves higher than her speaking voice, on the next exhale, my name falls from her lips expertly, like she's said it during moments like this before. She falls forward, only holding herself up by placing her hand on my shoulder. Before she pushes herself up, she buries her face in my hair and I hear the sound of a light kiss against the curls.

I don't know what to do next. I wait as she hovers over me, cheek resting on the top of my head while her breathing begins to come back to normal. My hand is still between her legs, slick with her come. Finally, she moves away and I slip my hand out from between her thighs.

"Sorry," she apologizes, looking down at my hand, her cheeks turning red.

"Don't apologize. That was…" she looks at me, waiting for the rest of my sentence. "That was awesome." She begins to laugh, but still looks embarrassed, and I take my hand that is still slippery and wet and grab my dick, rubbing her all over me – she seems to notice, because I see her look up out of the corner of my eye.

"Can I?" she asks. "You did for me."

"With your help," I remind her, knowing damn well I never would have been able to do that without her guidance.

"Help me," she says, suggestively.

"Hold me again, like you did before, but closer to the top," I instruct, removing my hand and letting her smaller one replace it. "And this time, don't move, I'll do the rest." She nods and sits on her legs, settling in.

I place my hands down on the floor at my side and use them to push myself up. I watch as my dick slides through her hand and back again. Between what this looks like, and how long I've been hard, I know I'm not going to last much longer. I concentrate on the view before me, and hear Katniss groan as she looks on at the sight as well – I join her with a few groans of my own.

She takes the initiative and grabs the lube again, pouring some over the top of her fist, coating the head of my dick as it pushes through her hand again, and then there's that sound again, the rhythmic sloshing of the lube plus her hand on me.

"Fuck, that's sexy," Katniss says, gasping after she says it. She looks at me, eyes wide like she can't believe she said that out loud, and then I'm done.

"Gonna come," I manage to choke out as I raise my hips slamming them into her wrist. Suddenly she tears her hand away, and I drop onto my ass, using both hands now to grab for her arm, shaking my head.

"No, no," I beg. She lets me guide her hand back to my dick and she grips me again. I keep both hands over hers and begin to move up and down again. "It's okay," I sooth, pumping our hand over me in unison a few more times before I feel my orgasm begin deep in my stomach.

I cry out, keeping my hands over hers as I spasm and burst, the liquid running down my hand and between my fingers, catching Katniss' hand where one of mine doesn't cover.

"I'm sorry," Katniss apologizes again. "I got nervous."

"It's alright," I smile, letting go of her hand; I motion for her to grab the box of tissues on the table behind us with her clean hand. "Your hand just felt really good. And different."

She wipes her hand off and pushes the box to me, abandoning it in favor of her pants which she silently puts back on before excusing herself to the bathroom to clean up better. I wipe my hands off and make sure nothing dripped onto my shirt, When I've inspected everything, I wash my hands in the kitchen and sit back down in the living room, unsure of where to go from here.

Katniss comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later, smelling like the soap we keep on the sink. She sits down next to me once again and re-braids her hair before turning around and grabbing my Trig book.

"So, I think you were right," she says, opening the book and finding the page we're supposed to be working on. "Next time, we do homework first, and then reward ourselves."


Feel free to add this story to your alerts. There will be at least 2 more parts to this story, possibly 3. I haven't decided yet :)