This is disclaimed by me. I do not own any part of the Hunger Games trilogy.
She's dead asleep when the scream shatters the night and she jolts up in her bed, frightened. Her eyes scan the dark room and she whimpers softly to herself but everything has grown mostly quiet again. She thinks she hears her father's voice but beyond that, there is nothing but a soft note. It's her mother again, waking up from a nightmare. The girl searches for her blanket. It's the blanket that doesn't reach her feet anymore but she keeps it anyway. "When you were first born," her mother had told her one night, "it wrapped all around you and covered you from head to toe. Then I held you really close and we stayed under my blanket because it was so cold and I thought you were way too little to be around when it was that cold."
"What then?" she asked.
"We both fell asleep," her mother had answered. "And when I woke up, you were gone and I was scared until I saw your father had taken you and was sitting next to me. I thought you were probably safer with him anyway but I told him to make sure you stayed wrapped up because the snow still hadn't stopped."
"What did he say?" she'd asked.
"He said, 'of course, Katniss. Go back to sleep.'" She had smiled at her mother's words and then her mother had tucked her into bed, blanket and all. "Go to sleep little one," her mother had ended her tale. "I'll see you in the morning."
The girl knows her mother has nightmares that make her scream in the night. She knows she doesn't like to go into her parents' bedroom when it happens because a lot of times her mother ends up crying and she doesn't like to see her mother cry. She also knows that if she stays quiet her mother doesn't cry as much and it's not long before her father comes to check on her and tucks her in again. So she stays quiet. But the baby doesn't.
The soft note has grown louder and keeps going up. Finally her brother is screaming hard, breaking through the night, crying louder than she would have ever thought someone that little could cry. She gets angry. Because it won't help anything if he cries. And she starts to cry too, but softly so no one will hear. Because she knows somewhere in the house her mother is crying and is a deathly shade of white. She knows that if her mother hears her cry, it will make things worse.
She buries her face in her blanket as she cries and it gets soaked but she doesn't care. Her brother's crying stops and the house seems quiet but a moment later her ears adjust to the house without her brother's crying and she thinks she can still hear her mother. She puts her hands over her head, hoping to block it out and she squeezes her eyes shut as tight as they can get but her mind won't shut and she knows she's not asleep. She's pretending she's asleep when she feels something against her forehead and her eyes open.
Her father's back is moving away at the door and she makes a noise as she stirs so he turns around. "Go back to sleep," he says gently but he moves back towards her.
"Why was he crying?"
"He woke up and realized he was hungry," her father answers, pulling her blanket up over her again.
"But Mother screamed. She needed you. He shouldn't have cried." Her father doesn't say anything, just remains silent, looking at her for a moment. She gets the feeling she's said something wrong.
"He's just a baby," her father finally says, the knots in his face seeming to have worked themselves out. "He doesn't understand yet." She doesn't think this is a good enough answer but she decides not to say anything more. She's too sleepy to talk more. "Good-night," her father says gently and leans down to kiss her on the forehead. Everything is alright. When her father comes in on nights like this and kisses her forehead, that's when she knows everything is alright.
"Good-night."
Her brother is starting to walk on his own, his bare feet picking a careful trail across the yard. She is running. Her feet hit the ground quickly but softly as she attempts to rein in Haymitch's geese before they ruin anything that's in the back garden. Her father is doing the same although he's also keeping an eye on her brother. Her mother went out hunting this morning.
She bounds over toward one of the geese and then freezes when she hears the buzz of something. Her ears almost twitch as they work to pick out the sound and where it's coming from. She's been stung by a wasp before and she certainly doesn't want to get stung again today.
"What's wrong?" her father asks as he heads towards her. She opens her mouth to answer but by then he's heard the buzzing too. His face gets all wrong and she backs up as his eyes close tightly. He sits down on the ground. She wishes her mother was here. There's nothing she can do about her father's "not-reals" but at least Mother will tell her that everything will be okay and that Father will come back in a minute. His hands move to their opposite forearms and his nails dig into his skin. She takes a couple steps back but she doesn't go far. Her mother has always told her she can go to Haymitch's but she doesn't.
Her brother is still wandering around, unaware of what's going on even though she is worried. He falls down near their father and she hisses out her brother's name as he reaches out for their father's shoulder to pull himself back up to his feet but he doesn't stop. Before she has time to think, she dashes forward to stop her brother. Her body brushes against her father's and then she feels her father's arm reach out and hit her stomach. She flies backward and lands in a tangle in the dirt. Struggling for breath she doesn't hear her mother until she's there, pulling her to her feet.
"Alright?" her mother asks her, kneeling down. She doesn't wait for an answer but starts searching over her daughter's body for anything wrong. She manages to breathe again and nods and then yelps as her mother's hand goes over her knee. "Just a scrape," her mother tells her. "We'll go inside and get it cleaned up." She sees her mother's eyes dart over toward her father but she doesn't say anything to him. He's not back yet. Instead her mother scoops up her brother and begins leading them toward the house.
Her mother sets her brother down on the ground in the kitchen and then picks her up and sets her on the counter next to the sink. She turns on the water. "Don't squirm too much," she says, still keeping a hand on her leg and reaching into a drawer to grab a clean rag which she wets in the faucet. "It's going to sting a bit," she warns as she puts the rag against her knee. She flinches but doesn't cry or yelp. "Brave girl," her mother tells her, giving her a smile. She puts down the rag and brushes back a strand of lose hair from her daughter's face. "You know he doesn't mean it, don't you?" she asks.
The girl nods. "He's in a not-real," she replies.
"Mmm-hm," her mother answers, seeming rather sad but she forces a smile. "Smart too," her mother tells her. Then she hears her name. Her father walks into the room, his face pale and looking shaky.
"I'm sorry," he says, his voice pleading. "I'm sorry. I didn't- I-"
"Peeta, she's fine," her mother says. "Just a scraped knee which she gets every other day, don't you?" she asks. The girl nods in return. Her father can't seem to talk. Her mother grabs her hands and she jumps down from the counter. "It's okay," her mother tells her father. There are tears coming to his eyes and his daughter realizes he's about to cry. He looks up and meets her eyes.
"I'm sorry," he repeats. The tears in his eyes build and he lets out a sob. She feels tears building in her own eyes and then she's crying too even though she's not hurt. But her father's crying so she starts.
"Peeta," her mother says sharply. "Peeta she's okay," her mother assures but then moves and picks her up in her arms. She buries her face in her mother's shoulder, hoping to stop crying. "She's only scared because you're crying," her mother says moving forward.
"I pushed her," he says. "I hit my daughter."
"You didn't know what you were doing," her mother replies. Because he doesn't. In his not-reals she and her brother don't exist. "Uhh, you take her. She's getting too big for me," she says shifting her into her father's arms. He takes her cautiously but she curls up against his side and her mother calls her brother's name and goes after him to stop him from getting into something.
"I'm sorry," her father tells her.
She nods in return and pushes the tears out of her eyes. "I'm okay," she tells him. "Promise." Her father kisses the top of her head.
"You're here and mine, real or not real?" he asks her.
"Real," she answers. "I'm real."
Author's Note: I don't usually write in the present-tense and I usually have characters with names so this was a bit difficult for me but it didn't feel right in any other style, although it is in third person, not first person like the books. Let me know what you think if you have a minute to review. Thanks for reading!