All credit goes to Suzanne Collins! Sorry this is late! I know I said I'd upload Sundays but I was so incredibly busy! But I hurried and wrote and edited this all today! I hope you enjoy! Thank you if you've followed or reviewed! If you haven't, please do!
Chapter 3
"Hey Catnip." When I hear those simple words, I feel my blood run cold and I immediately freeze. There are still tears on my face but I make an effort to wipe them with my sleeve. But I don't turn around. I slowly stand up but continue facing the woods, away from the voice. I am beginning to think I imagined it. With everything else that has happened today, I wouldn't be surprised if I am going crazy. It wouldn't be the first time somebody has thought that.
But then my thoughts are interrupted again, "Are you just going to face away from me forever?" I stiffen. I didn't imagine it. This is real, this is happening.
Slowly, ever so slowly, I turn. I shut my eyes as I rotate my body all the way around and just stay like that for a few minutes. I hear a twig snap and feel the presence of somebody getting closer and I flinch. "Stop." I mutter this under my breath, barely audible, but he hears it and I hear the light shuffling cease to exist.
It takes a few moments, and immense effort, but I finally open my eyes. I knew he was here but I still find myself surprised when I see Gale, here, in the flesh, less than three feet in front of me. I take him in; he is older, more adult looking. His jaw is more toned and his arms more muscular, not too much though, more the way I remember my dad. I finally urge myself to raise my eyes and I find my gaze trained into those familiar eyes. Those gray eyes that are identical to mine. Those gray eyes that I grew to love and trust. Those gray eyes that haunt me now, forcing me to relive every bad moment, and every death. They shine with the same gray tint that the smoke held. I have no good memories of gray smoke. The smoke that burned down the Hob, the smoke that ate my district, the smoke that rained around me in war and the arena. The same smoke that swallowed my sister alive.
His lips were turned up in a small half smile but I see is disappear as he takes me in. I don't know what I look like, but it must be bad. I haven't been taking care of myself the way I used to. I am thinner and less healthy. My hair has faded from its once rich color to a worn brown color. I imagine I look much like my mother always looked to me. They told me she used to be beautiful but I never believed them. I am sure Willow has had these same thoughts swirling among others in that innocent mind of hers.
I am jerked back to reality when the male in front of me says two simple words. I didn't know I wanted to hear them so bad until he just now said them, "I'm sorry." And just like that, the load is lifted, no completely but just like he lifted one small pebble of thousands that has been weighing me down. When he plucks this single on those, it causes an avalanche. I explode and let everything go, not in relief though, in anger.
"How could you? How could you do that? How could you just leave me?" My voice cracks midway my last sentence and I stop, fighting the tears behind my eyes before I am so dried out, that silent ghost tears are all the trail down my face. Invisible to everyone but me.
Gale just stands there, staring at my frail frame. But he looks at me sadly and with an almost regretful air to him. I know that can't be true though. He doesn't care. He left me. He did it on purpose. He hurt me on purpose.
"Do you really think that?" His husky whispers cuts through to me and I realize I just said those last thoughts out loud. I just said he hurt me out loud for the first time ever. Peeta knew without asking, but nobody else knew what they pain in my eyes was specifically from, just from the war, they'd assume. The pain in his eyes is stretched thin and I just look at him, nodding wordlessly.
He tries to talk again, "Do you really think I would ever hurt you on purpose? Do you think that I really meant for all that to happen? Do you think I wanted all those people to die?" His words are heavy and they fill the air, making it impossible to breathe. I feel my lungs burn but I refuse to even breath in one sip his lies.
"Yes. I do. I do think that," my voice is rising now, in a way that it hasn't for years. "You did this to me. You hurt me! You did it on purpose! You meant for all those people to die! You killed the one person that you knew I loved more than anything! YOU killed Prim! You knew it would break me so you did it! You are just like everyone else! YOU USED ME, JUST LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE!" All I see in his eyes is confusion and hurt. But I don't care, he didn't. He made me this way. He knew it would happen. I see his mouth open as if he is about to say something but I ignore him and add more. "I can't believe I ever felt anything towards you. I can't believe I trusted you. And let me just say, I did I trust you, with everything I had and everything I was. Never, did I ever, think you would betray me like you did. Never did I think you would be the one to kill those I fought so hard to protect. You said you didn't know, you said it wasn't you. But it was! It was! Wasn't it?" My cries echo in the silent forest and I just stare at him expectantly, waiting for some kind of reply. But I get none, just like I always have been. Nobody bothers to give me answers.
I raise my shoulders a little higher and push past him, which turns out to be easier than I thought it would be. He simply falls out of my way, his mouth still slightly agape. "You're still the same. Not even giving me any kind of answer," I growl over my shoulder as I continue on my trek. The feeling inside me is the worst I've ever felt. It is a mixture of relief and anguish, though I am not sure which one is dominant. But I need only think of Peeta, and Willow, and Rye, and I keep pressing forward. I think I hear somebody trying to come after me but I only march on firmer and more determined to escape.
Then I hear it, "I am so sorry, Katniss. So, so sorry. And I know it means nothing, but I'd change everything in a heartbeat. Everything." I am not sure if I am supposed to hear this but I ignore it and run. Eventually, I am able to breath again as I hear the footsteps behind me disappear.