Chapter 4 – Shine a Light on It
If Katniss hadn't been lying down, she would have fallen over, or needed to sit down at least. Of all of the scenarios that could have led to him sitting here beside her at long last – meeting buddies, a bachelor party, even a vacation with a girlfriend - the possibility of Peeta being married had not occurred to her, and it tore at her heart a little, even after all these years.
"Wow," she managed, wishing fervently for that mimosa which had yet to materialize. "I hadn't heard a thing about your engagement. Congratulations." She offered him a smile that she hoped appeared sincere. She needed to get away. Now. Before his wife showed up.
But apparently, Peeta wanted to talk. He looked at her curiously. "I didn't realize that you still kept up with the news from home."
"Rory Hawthorne keeps Prim up to date." Katniss dropped her sunscreen and e-reader into her beach bag.
"They still talk?"
"Talk?" Katniss smirked. "I'd say so. Every night over the pillows."
"Whoa. They're together now? They're still kids in my head."
"Tell me about it," she said as she stood up. She picked up her white sarong, completely unaware of the way he watched her as she wrapped it about her slender waist and stuffed her feet into her flipflops. "Well, I've got a spa appointment in a little while," she lied. She had planned to spend the entire morning on the beach, engrossed in her new book. "I'd better take this stuff to my room and get changed. It was nice to see you again, Peeta. I hope you and your wife have a nice vacation."
"Uh, yeah. Sure, Katniss. You too. I'll see you around," he said, though his voice sounded tired now.
She didn't notice his eyes on her back as she beelined across the sumptuous grounds of the resort to her room where her beach bag got tossed carelessly onto what should have been Jo's bed.
She flopped down on her own bed, still thinking about her talk with Peeta. She supposed it was her own fault that she'd been surprised by the news he was married. It's not like she'd made any real effort to keep in touch with the goings-on back in Panem. Prim rambled on about Panem regularly, but it was just easier to block it out. Thoughts of Panem always brought on bad memories of her mother staring off into space and of long, hungry nights when she'd fed Prim what was left in the fridge while she went to bed with an empty stomach because she hadn't been able to make her father's survivor benefits stretch to the end of the month. Still, Katniss was convinced that if Prim had ever mentioned Peeta getting married, she would have remembered. In fact, her chatty sister knew absolutely everything that was happening back in Panem, but she hadn't mentioned Peeta's name once since they left. Katniss frowned and wondered why that would be. She couldn't possibly know. Could she?
She climbed off the bed and, crossing to the desk, switched on her ipad. She connected it to the resort's wifi and then scrolled through her favourites. Her finger hovered over Prim's name. She thought Prim was on nights this week at the hospital, so she was probably home and awake at this time of day. She bit her lip. Probably. It didn't matter. She needed to know. She pressed FaceTime.
When Prim's face appeared on the screen, Katniss grinned.
"Hey! Are you seriously FaceTiming me from Mexico?"
"Sure am, Little Duck. How are you?"
"Great. I just woke up. I was looking out the window at what's left of the snowbanks and feeling incredibly jealous."
Katniss smiled wider. Just seeing her little sister's face made her feel immeasurably better. "It's gorgeous. Want to see?" She swapped to the rear camera and listened as Prim enthusiastically oohed and ahhed over the room. Then she opened the patio door to show her the exotic garden where the pool was only steps away. "It's a swim-up room," she said, gloating a little.
Prim's mouth was hanging open. "Gah! Katniss! You are not helping."
Katniss laughed as she switched the camera back. "I wish you were here, Prim. It's nice, but…"
"You're lonely."
"Yeah."
"It would be so great to be there with you right now, but I really think this trip is going to be good for you. You should try new things. Meet new people. Honestly, you've been taking care of me for so long I think you've never really had a chance to take care of yourself."
That was probably true. "When did you get so smart, Little Duck?"
Prim stuck out her tongue. "I've always been smart. You were just too busy to notice. So come on. You haven't talked to anyone at all?"
"Well, I talked to the flight attendant yesterday, and the desk clerk when I arrived…"
"Katniss!" Prim sounded exasperated.
"I'm kidding. Well, sort of. I just got here, Prim. Give me a little time, OK?" Her sister sighed. "Hey," she said, trying to sound nonchalant. "Guess who was on the flight and is staying at the resort?"
"Who? Liam Hemsworth?"
Katniss laughed at her sister's fangirl obsession with the actor who looked like an older, glossier version of Rory. "No. Peeta Mellark." She watched her sister carefully. Prim's poker face was even lousier than her own. She was right. Prim was hiding something. "Do you remember him?"
"The baker's son? Kind of. He was your age, so I didn't know him."
"I was thinking today that you'd never mentioned him in all your reports from back home."
"Well, Rory doesn't talk about him. He doesn't like him much."
Katniss made a skeptical face. Everyone back home liked Peeta, except Gale. "What? Why?"
Prim wouldn't look at the camera now. "Rory blames him for why we left Panem. He says that you and Gale would have gotten together if it wasn't for him."
Katniss sighed. What had Gale told Rory to cause him to believe that? "Prim, you know why we left," she said tiredly. "I've explained this, like, a thousand times to you. I couldn't leave you there with Mom. She's just too fragile. She needed help. I had to get an education if we were going to have any kind of future. I thought she was well enough to take care of you when I left, but… You know what happened, Prim. You couldn't keep living like that. And we did OK, didn't we?"
It was Prim's turn to sigh. "Yeah, we did great. But Gale said…"
"What Prim? What did he say?
Her sister looked back into the camera. "Katniss, Rory said that Gale came home on prom night all upset because you'd been dancing with Peeta Mellark. And, you came home late and alone that night and you wouldn't talk about it. You hardly left the house all summer, except for work at Sae's."
Katniss closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Then she shook her head. "I suppose he didn't tell Rory what he'd been up to that night."
Prim shook her head.
"God. I was so embarrassed, Prim. Gale ruined everyone's night. He completely humiliated me and made a fool of himself and Madge."
Prim's eyes grew bigger and bigger as Katniss recounted the most embarrassing night of her life, but feeling better and better as her little sister took her side.
"Aw, Katniss. I'm so sorry. That was a rotten thing to do to you. Did he ever apologize?"
Katniss nodded, remembering their awkward conversation when she'd returned from Pittsburgh that Christmas. He'd apologized for the prom and confessed that seeing her with Peeta had made him realize that he had feelings for her. Katniss was still reeling from shock when she'd felt his lips on hers and been forced to push him away.
"When he saw me with Peeta, he just kind of lost it, I guess. But that wasn't Peeta's fault. It was Gale and Madge's behaviour that started the whole thing in the first place."
Prim frowned. "I don't know how you can defend him, Katniss, after what he did."
She scowled in confusion. "Who? Gale?"
Prim rolled her eyes. "No. Peeta."
"What do you mean, Prim? I just explained…"
Prim cut her off. "Katniss, do you really think I've forgotten that night not long after I moved down? You stayed out all night and when you came home you were just … floating. And then you weren't."
Katniss felt her heart sink down to her belly. "I didn't know that you knew about that," she said flatly.
"Katniss, you're my sister and we shared a room in a tiny apartment! You don't think I heard you crying every night for a week? You barely got out of bed to go to school. I was so scared. If Johanna hadn't told me what happened, I would have lost it."
"Jo told you!"
"She had to. I was freaking out. I was so afraid that you were getting sick like Mom. She swore me to secrecy before she told me and then she said if you didn't come out of it soon, she was going to track him down and personally kick his bread-making ass. But you did."
Aw, Jo. Bless your ball-busting heart of gold. Katniss could still remember the way Jo had hauled her out of bed one afternoon, claiming the best cure for a broken heart was getting loaded and man-bashing with your best pal. Jo had mixed them margaritas with tequila Katniss suspected she'd stolen from the Hob and regaled her with stories of her drunken hook-ups until Katniss was too drunk to stand up and laughing to hard to try. In the morning, she'd nursed a killer hangover and started to pack Peeta Mellark into a corner of her heart. She thought she'd left him there. Until yesterday.
"Well, it doesn't matter now," Katniss said. "Peeta got married. He's here on his honeymoon."
Now it was Prim's turn to be shocked. "No. I would have heard that."
"He is. He told me not two hours ago on the beach."
Prim looked thoughtful. "Huh. Did you meet his wife?"
"No. And I don't want to. Listen, I'm trying to decide what to do tomorrow. Jungle tour in a dune buggy or snorkling with sea turtles?"
Prim rolled her eyes, whether at her artless attempt to change the subject or the choices at hand, Katniss would never know.
"Duh. Jungle tour," Prim said. "Feeling better now?"
"Yeah, I am. Thanks Little Duck."
They made promises to talk again soon and disconnected. Exhausted by the conversation and the emotions of the day, Katniss decided to curl up and have a nap.
Peeta's damp t-shirt clung to his body and sweat was dripping off of his nose, but he continued to push himself on the treadmill in the resort's well-equipped gym. Usually, the relentless monotony of running in place helped him to think, but not today.
How did his life turn into such a mess? He couldn't remember the last time he'd tried something creative in the kitchen. His bottles of paint back home were dusty. The engagement to Delly. The endless extra hours that he'd put in to pay for her ring and this trip that she'd wanted. He felt like a twisted, mutt-version of himself that he didn't recognize.
The treadmill slowed as it moved into cool-down mode and he reached for the towel he'd hung over the bar to wipe the sweat from his face and neck before scrubbing it over his damp hair. When the machine finally stopped, he wiped it down quickly and moved to the free weights, still brooding. And, just as they had for the better part of the last two days - for the better part of his life if he were honest with himself – a pair of silver eyes floated to the forefront of his consciousness. Damn. His life was confusing enough right now without that sexy scowl peering at him over the top of a pair of sunglasses.
The familiar longing had hit him like a punch in the gut. He was man enough to admit that, and if the hurt 19-year-old he'd been had surfaced long enough to use a half-truth to give her a taste of her own medicine - well, he was human enough to admit that too.
The way she'd paled at his news this morning and fled had shaken and surprised him. He hadn't expected her to care. The guilt was pricking away at his conscience, but in a way, it gave him hope. Peeta might not be sure of who he was anymore, but he was certain that the good man his father had raised him to be was still in there.
By the time Peeta returned to his room, he was able to concede that the workout had done him some good after all. He needed to straighten out his life and whether by fate or circumstance, it seemed that his first course of action would be resolving things with Katniss Everdeen once and for all.
