Over the rim of my coffee cup and the sizzle of bacon I watch my son come into the kitchen. His hair hangs in his eyes because he needs a haircut but it's the same white blonde he was born with. I always thought it would get darker with time but seeing as he's nearing his nineteenth birthday that doesn't seem to be the case. His green eyes light up when they see the stack of pancakes next to the stove.
Scratching a hand over his stomach he walks over to grab one off the top and I promptly smack him on the hand with the spatula in mine.
"Fuck! Dad!"
Rolling my eyes I sigh. "Dude. Get a fucking plate and pretend I raised you to behave like a human being. And watch your mouth."
He rolls his eyes but smirks at me as he pulls plates out of the cabinet.
We sit at the table and I smile watching him shovel food into his face. He'll probably be driving me crazy in a few weeks but for now it's nice having him home.
"Dad can I ask you a favor?"
I raise my eyebrows as I swallow a long pull of lukewarm caffeine. It reminds me of when he was a baby and I never got to my coffee when it was still hot.
"What's up?"
He drags his bacon through the swimming pool of syrup on his plate but doesn't look up. "I sort of started dating this girl. Well she was a friend first but the last couple months we just kind of started something else."
"Okay….fuck Rye is she pregnant?"
His heads pops up with round eyes. "What? God no! Jesus Dad!"
My heart rate levels a little and I rub my hand over my chest. "Thank god. Sorry you just aren't even looking at me so I thought it was bad."
He shakes his head and without consciously noticing mirrors my movements with his own hand to his heart. "No. It's not bad really I just don't know how to ask."
"Rye. Just ask. Hit me man I promise I can handle it."
A sigh leaves his lips and I notice the shine of syrup on his chin. "Well Katniss…"
"Her name is Katniss?"
"Dad!"
"Sorry. What about Katniss?"
Taking his napkin he starts to tear it into little pieces beside his plate. "Katniss is home for the summer too. But her mother…well her home life from what I gather isn't great and she's been working all semester to save for an apartment but her car broke down and…"
"And?"
His big green eyes meet mine and look like he's bracing himself. "And I was kind of hoping she could stay here. You know just for a few months until we go back to school ya know?"
"You want your girlfriend to live with us for the summer?"
He drags a hand nervously through his hair making it stand on end and shine impossibly from the morning sunlight slanting through the window. "Well she's not technically my girlfriend."
I raise an eyebrow at him. I know my son. Keeping it in his pants is not his strong suit. I bought him his first box of condoms when he was fourteen just in case.
Girls have come and go in a blur of giggles and ponytails around here for years.
What I can say for my child is that he has varied tastes, seems to treat them well, but also bounces out the second another pretty smile comes around the corner. In other words he's a horny little asshole.
"So you want your friend to stay with us for the summer to help her out?"
He sags a little in relief and nods his head.
"What happens if ya'll break up? And don't give me the she's not my girlfriend Rye you just said you were dating."
"Katniss is really cool Dad. I promise it won't be a big deal."
"What about her parents? I don't see her father being exactly okay with his eighteen year old shacking up with you for months?"
He rolls his eyes and in my mind I'm smacking him upside the head because I swear the kid has only been home twenty four hours and I've seen that eye roll more times than I can count.
"Her father died when she was little and Dad no one is going to care. Besides she's not eighteen she's twenty."
"Ahhhh an older woman."
He wiggles his eyebrows and I can't help but grin at him. How the hell is he this old again? Digging my palms into my eyes I sigh. "Fine. Yes. She can stay…but in the guestroom!"
He's already pumping his fist and hissing yes next to his chair.
"I'm not kidding Rye! You are not disrespecting this poor girl here and I am not going to let you make me a grandfather three rooms down the hall. When you're here attempt to keep it in your pants."
Nodding his head he punches me in the arm. "Thanks Dad. I'm gonna go call her and let her know."
With a whoop he leaves the room. I look across the table and laugh to myself. His plate and milk sit in front of his chair, the table is sticky with syrup and of course he would never have thought to pick up after himself. Welcome home.
I can hear his voice travel down the stairs as I load the dishwasher. I can't help the smile that spreads across my face. Hearing him and tripping over his shit makes this house home and I've missed him so much this year.
It's always kind of just been us.
Us against the world and we are quite the pair after all these years. I don't look back often but when I do it shocks me that it has been eighteen years already. I remember thinking that having a baby would be the end of my world. Now it just feels like it is when life began.
I remember sitting stunned silent and scared shitless. Wrapping my letterman jacket around Glimmer's shaking shoulders and trying to tell her it would all be fine. It wasn't. Her pregnancy was hard and I wasn't really around. Without the baby growing beneath my own belly it was hard to wrap my head around it. So I spent most of the year being sixteen and pretending it wasn't real.
Until it was.
We didn't want to know the gender. She decided to give the baby up for adoption. I remember actually being relieved. When she went into labor I was there because it was the right thing to do. I had to remind myself of that each time she squeezed my hand and again when I thought I would pass out just from the idea of the pain. Her stomach was this contracting mountain beneath sterile hospital cotton. Each time it clenched and her voice rang through the room I wanted to run.
Until I didn't because behind her voice I heard another. It was screeching and desperate. She lay back exhausted and I moved forward drawn to tiny limbs and a furious pink face. White fuzz covered his pink head that they swiftly covered with the tiniest hat I'd ever seen. His. I had a son. I had a beautiful son who I think the minute I heard his voice I knew. I was a goner.
I will be grateful to Glimmer every day for the rest of my life. For making this miracle with me, for growing him beneath her skin, and most of all for the day she sat with me, tears streaming down her cheeks and told me she wasn't ready to be a mother, but if I was ready to be a Dad she would sign the papers.
I came home with a baby carrier, a package of diapers, and my son. When he was a month old we moved out and into a one bedroom apartment that my own father helped pay for Rye's entire first year.
It's just been us ever since.
I mean I've dated. There was even a serious girlfriend or two over the years. One whom I contemplated asking to move in at one point. Well I contemplated until I found her pressed against some other asshole's mouth and car in the Target parking lot.
I'm still not able to smell stale popcorn without getting this irrational feeling of rage.
It's been a pretty dry run over the last couple years though. Getting Rye through to graduation just kind of took over with soccer practices, and SAT prep and this past year I've been working myself hard expanding the bakery. Trying I guess to fill the hours so I wouldn't pay attention to the silence of an empty house or the loneliness of an empty bed.
It's been a long time since I've felt that heat of instant attraction. Such a long time.
That thought has long left my head by the next afternoon. The itch and ache of needing someone is not something I have time for which is why what happens next takes me completely by surprise.
The doorbell rings and the thunder of my son's footsteps down the stairs makes me cringe.
"Dad! That's her. It's Katniss!"
He jumps the last three steps and swings open the door. I hear muffled voices as I brush the flour from my hands and go to introduce myself.
Rye releases the small body he was hugging and says he'll get her bags before jogging away and finally revealing the person that belongs to the limbs.
It's like being hit. My stomach clenches beneath the heather gray Henley I'm wearing. One that is about two shades lighter than the two eyes that meet mine. I picture smoke and storms and feel like I can smell the rain when she smiles at me shyly. Her hair is like nightfall and brushes her chin and collarbone where it falls in waves across her back.
Reaching her hand forward she says, "I'm Katniss."
Her hand is small and smooth in mine and feeling it slide against my skin makes me want to sigh.
She smiles again and I feel like I need to sit down.
"Thank you so much Mr. Mellark. I'm not sure how I will ever repay you for this."
Swallowing I drop her hand and try to wipe the charge of pure lust that burns my palm on the rough denim of my jeans.
Rye returns and grins at me and then down at Katniss. He offers to show her to her room and together they climb the stairs. I purposefully do not look at the curves of her thighs and ass as she takes the steps, but I don't miss the look she gives me over her shoulder with once again the same sweet smile on her pink lips.
Fuck.
Just…fuck.
As I predicted the romantic aspect of their arrangement is over fairly quickly. Rye is quick to say it is because they found they are just much better as friends. I wonder if it has anything to do with the strawberry blonde he was grinning at stupidly when I surprised him for a caffeine fix at the Starbucks where he works.
I might have overreacted when I found Katniss crying as she left the bathroom. Assuming my hormone driven son had cause the poor girl pain I flew off the handle at him in the garage. By the time I calmed down and they both had assured me that the friendship decision was mutual and she was not upset I felt foolish. I also tried really hard not to think about her eyes and how when she blinked one tear ran down her cheek to her lip. About how much I wanted to reach up and wipe it away with my thumb.
It turns out that Katniss is pretty wonderful. She was quiet at first and she's quick to scowl. I find that it is just that much more enjoyable though working to make her smile, or laugh. She has a laugh that seems to travel the length of my spine until it makes my head fuzzy.
As a group we all have a routine. We all go to work. I'm the first home do to early baking hours. I cook dinner according to who said they'd be home. Some nights they go out with friends, others they stay in and we all fight over Netflix decisions or play poker beneath the dim kitchen lighting. It's nice.
Katniss has a dry sense of humor and it makes Rye and I laugh. She's also surprisingly easy to bring to blush, which my perverted son seems to get some sick thrill out of at every opportunity. There's something about the flush of blood beneath her skin that makes my chest warm.
Rye starts dating strawberry blonde cutie in the visor. And he keeps dating her much to my surprise. When Katniss ribs him about his late nights it is his turn to be embarrassed. Seeing my son happy makes me happy. But it also means that he's around less and less as a human buffer.
Because as the weeks pass Katniss and I become closer. We laugh all the time and for some reason find that we can talk to each other about anything. I should stop these talks. These late nights where we each stretch across the couch facing each other with our feet touching beneath a blanket. But I don't. They feel too good and I have been so lonely. Saying goodnight is hard and sometimes I stay until she falls asleep. I tuck the blanket around her small body and curl my hands into a fist to keep from brushing the hair off her face.
Wanting to touch Katniss is something else that takes up hours of my days. Because sometimes I think she wants me to. Sometimes I can feel her eyes resting between my shoulders or on my hands while I cook. I'll look up across the couch or the dinner table and those fucking eyes are on me and everywhere they touch I feel it.
One night she comes home drunk. I wake out of a fitful sleep to the chime of keys and stumbling heavy steps. As I descend the stairs she swings though the door and giggling collapses on the floor. She never giggles. She tells me that Rye is safe and staying at their friends and names off whoever brought her home. I can hardly understand her between her slurs and laughter.
She mumbles something about someone named Gale and how she should be interested. It makes jealousy green and thick boil for just a moment but she continues as I help her to her feet. She sighs saying he kissed her but she stopped him.
As I ease her onto the couch her voice drifts as she mumbles, "His eyes were all wrong. No blue."
Her lashes flutter against her soft cheek as I pull off her shoes and cover her with the emerald green throw I keep on the ottoman.
She whispers as her eyes close, "This is my favorite color. What's yours Peeta?"
I smile because it's the first time she's used my name. "Orange."
She wrinkles her nose and I laugh. "I like sunsets. I like how it sets the sky softly on fire."
She sighs. "Sometimes. Sometimes when you look at me… I feel like I'm on fire."
I swallow and watch as slowly her breathing evens out and I go to stand. Her small hand grabs my wrist.
"Please Stay."
As sleep finally claims her I lean forward with my elbows on my knees and run my hands over my face. I look at her softly parted lips and her full cheeks. This gorgeous stubborn girl that has gotten underneath my skin so deep it feels like we grew there together.
Knowing I should stop this. Knowing it is wrong and that she is just a girl and I have no business feeling what I do I lean back. Settle my head against the deep cushion beneath my head and close my eyes.
Only the empty room hears my answer.
"Always."
The next morning I wake up on the couch by myself.
Rye calls while I'm still at work to say he's staying the night with strawberry blonde again. I really need to try and remember her name. As I add pasta to boiling water I hear Katniss come in and wonder if it will be awkward after last night's conversation.
It's not. She greets me with a smile and washes her hands. We work well together setting the table adding vegetables to the salad. I pour a glass of wine and she helps herself to some. I make jokes about corrupting children and she rolls her eyes at me. Someone is forever rolling their eyes at me.
I talk more than she does but when she responds I love the expressions that find their way across her face. She insists on doing the dishes because no matter how often I protest about it Katniss Everdeen is the most stubborn person alive when it comes to keeping things fair.
After changing into pajama pants I walk back into the kitchen to make some tea. Her back is to me with suds up to her elbows and by some miracle she must not hear me come in. She's singing and as she sings she sways in front of the sink.
Her voice is beautiful. It's lilting and smoky and I'm drawn to her. I don't realize I'm right behind her until the warm smells of honey suckle and sun fill my nose. I want to bury my face in her hair until it is all I can breathe.
She must sense me because she stills. The heat of her back seeps into my chest.
My whisper sounds rough even to my own ears. "You know we have a dishwasher."
Her breath escapes her lips. "Old habits. We never had one."
Nodding I step forward so I am now next to her and so close our bare shoulders brush. I might imagine it but I feel her sigh at the contact and her eyes drift across my bare chest and stomach.
She swallows. "What are you doing?"
Grabbing an extra sponge I stick my hands into the sink. "Helping."
"Oh."
For a few minutes the only sounds are the slosh of water and our breathing.
"You have a beautiful voice."
"You weren't supposed to hear that."
Laughing softly I bump her with my hip. "I don't regret it. Feel free to accidentally entertain me anytime."
She narrows her eyes but bites into her lip to keep from smiling. My eyes linger there a little too long.
"What about you? Any secret hobbies, talents, skeletons in the Mr. Mellark closet?"
Rinsing a plate I shake my head. "I'm an open book."
"You can draw."
I turn to her. "How?"
"Rye showed me some of your stuff. You're really talented. Though I'm not surprised."
Flattered but confused I ask, "Why?"
"Your hands. You're good with your hands…or seem to be."
Her voice trails off at the end and for once I am at a loss of what to say so I say nothing. The water is still warm on my skin and the plate beneath my fingers was probably clean minutes ago. I am about to pull it out when I feel her fingers. They run along my wrist beneath the surface with her nails dragging against my palm. They're slick from soap and my eyes close as they slip along mine.
Her breathe is hot against the shell of my ear. "I think about your hands all the time. I can't seem to stop."
I feel her turn my wrist so I'm palm up beneath the suds and a small sound escapes my lips when her thumb nail drags back and forth against my pulse.
I'm already hard tenting the flannel pants that hang from my hips. I know she can feel it. When she moves and her thighs brushes against me I hiss.
It makes me snap out of it so fast I almost fall stepping away from her. "Fuck, I'm sorry. Katniss we can't. I'm so sorry."
Her fucking eyes drift down until they settle on my groin. They go a little hazy when embarrassed I tuck myself into the waistband of my pants so it isn't so obvious. God just my own hand almost makes me groan. There is no hope of it going away with her only a few feet from me.
She's breathing hard and it does beautiful things to her breasts that rise above the neckline of her tank top. Her skin is so tan from the sun and freckles spill across her shoulders everywhere the sun has kissed.
Disappointment and even a little anger drift across the heat behind her eyes. She simply says, " Well I'm not. Goodnight Mr. Mellark."
I hardly sleep. It feels impossible with the war waging between my fucking morals and my body. Hell I can't lie even my heart is invested at this point.
When it comes time for my day to begin I drag myself out of bed.
It's still dark outside as I make my way down the hall. The floor is cold beneath my feet and I pause just for a second as I pass her door. I don't know why but I place my palm against the worn wood. It's like I can feel her behind it.
Closing my eyes I make my way into the bathroom trying not to wonder what she sleeps in.
The pipes hiss and groan in the walls and steams fills the room. Stepping beneath the spray makes me sigh and I imagine the hot water washing away all the filthy thoughts that plague me.
Grey eyes and pink lips. Dark hair and dusky skin. Stubborn strength and shy smiles. All of them need to be washed away one scalding bead of water at a time
I scrub my body and hair and my frustration only mounts. I do everything in my power not to think of her. But each time I close my eyes she's there. Her laugh. The way her back arches when she braids the hair off her face. My mind betrays me as I think of her by the pool the weekend before. Her skin was slick from water as she cooked beneath the summer sun in the tiniest blue bikini I have ever seen.
I couldn't look at her without picturing slowly untying the strings at her hips and burying my mouth against what lay beneath it.
I smack the tile and the sound is loud and wet because I can feel my cock stir between my legs. It hurts it's so hard. I refuse to jack off to her in the shower like some pervert. I run my palm against it and just the small contact makes me bite back a low desperate groan.
I won't think of her. I won't.
Leaning my head into the glass door I take it between my fingers and then fully into my fist. My eyes close and my breath hisses through my teeth because it feels so good. I go slowly like I'm punishing myself. Slow sure strokes as steam fills my lungs and hot water pelts my back.
I grunt as I'm getting closer and it echoes in the closed space above the sounds of falling water and the slapping of my own skin on skin.
But even above that I hear a softer sound, a whimper and it's needy, close, and indisputably female.
My eyes fly open and meet silver. Wide silver eyes with lush black lashes and fat black pupils. Her mouth is open in a small "o" and she's watching me.
"Katniss…"
Her whisper interrupts me. "Please don't stop."
My eyes grow and she comes closer. So close that she's leaning her own head into the glass inches from mine. "Don't stop."
"Katniss…"
"I think of you."
I can't seem to look away from her mouth, her eyes.
She licks her lips. "When I touch myself. I think of you."
I can feel my heart in my throat and the words leaving hers make me see black.
"Fuck…" The word falls from my lips but it only spurs her on.
"I can hear you in here most mornings. Sometimes you say my name. Do you think of me too?"
My chest rises and I'm breathing in so much steam I'm convinced I'm not getting enough oxygen. Blood pounds in my head and in my cock beneath my fingers because just the idea of Katniss with her hand buried between her legs and my name on her lips is too much.
I stare at her but don't trust my words so I simply nod.
"Then please don't stop."
I count to ten. I wait for my mind to make sense of this and for it to put a stop to it. But I realize that beneath her gaze I am useless. I can deny her nothing. So my hand begins to move. Again slowly. She watches and her palms flatten against the glass when I move faster, her fingers curling in time to my movements.
When her eyes lift up to meet mine and she bites her lips I moan out loud.
When she starts to whisper how much she wishes it were her hand and how she thinks about what I would taste like I can't keep my eyes open. I just lean against the glass hard and stroke faster and try to breathe.
When she asks if I ever think about being inside her it ends it for me.
"Fuck! Fuck Katniss!" I spill against the glass and watch as it washes down the drain. I can hardly stand my legs are shaking so badly.
Dragging in air. I swing the door of the shower open.
I can't do this. We cannot fucking do this and she's going to drive me crazy.
Angry I get in her face. "You have to stop! We! We have to stop."
She never even flinches. Instead she grabs the hem of her shirt and pulls it over her head. Grabs me by the back of my wet hair and says against my parted lips, "I can't."