"I'm going to go hunting," I said absently. Just as quickly as I had come, I had decided to head back out. Gale looked at me for a moment, but then nodded, to nobody in particular.
"Be safe, Catnip," he said quietly. His hand slid from my shoulders to the small of my back, where he tapped his three fingers and gently pushed. "Go quick, or you'll miss the prime time. Don't want dinner to escape," he flashed me a subtly brilliant smile and opened the door for me.
I smiled back and slid back out into the icy air. My previous footprints were already dusted away by the new snowfall, so essentially, my trip to Peeta's was washed away. Of course, he would remember it, as would I. When do you ever really forget?
As I met the crossroads, I crossed diagonally between two of them, where the snow piles were significantly higher. I might have been older than I was when hunting was a way of life, but hunting was something I knew I'd never forget. I slipped down the snow bank as quietly as I climbed across it, and then broke into a run. The sole of my leather boots gave a thankful bit of traction as I ran.
The woods were blissfully quiet. The blistering blizzard would mean my own tracks would be quickly covered, but it would also mean the same for my prey. Regardless, I needed my bow and arrows. Skirting the edge where the District 12 fence used to be, I hooked my arm against the back of an old maple, where I pushed myself up and reached for my arrows. Though it was perfectly legal to hunt, I still hid them. The hiding place changed with each storm and weather event, but the tree had been a safe place so far. As I slid down from the ice covered bark, I noticed how even with the span of years, the vegetation still grew in a controlled line on either side of where the old sign was. For some reason, though the fence had been long dug up on and changed into scrap metal, the plants and trees never crossed the border. Perhaps, in their own plant-like way, they felt there was still an unspoken border between the wild and civilization.
The new development of Panem had meant that what was once deemed 'the wild' was no longer. New towns were growing across the land, seeing as there were much more than was ever used during Snow's rule. However, President Paylor, who had grown to become a friend of mine, had personally assured me that Gale and I's woods, our clearing (however, both were now my children's just as they were ours) would be safe from development.
I moved onto a maple across from my bow and arrow's hiding place, where a perfectly placed branch stood. I reached back to pull up my hood as the wind shifted, now gusting in my face. I looped my arms around the lowest split in the tree, rolling my back to bring up my feet against the trunk. Pushing off with my feet, I made it to the top, where I seated myself on a branch and waited for the deer.
The deer were easy to spot as they wandered across the snow covered clearing. The white spot beneath their tails may blend in with their surroundings, but their bronze-brown coats were a dead give away in a snow covered forest.
It took me a few tries, but eventually I swung up one leg to rest my foot against the trunk, as I slowly lowered my back against the wide branch. It also took me a bit to get comfortable on the tree — something I was not used to having to do. Hunting seemed peculiarly unnatural for me on this winter's day, but it had always been an activity so perfectly in sync with my movements and thoughts. Today, I just couldn't get it right. Nevertheless, the deer hadn't yet moved. Rotating my shoulder, I wrapped my fingers against the wood of the bow, securing the arrow between my fingers. I kept my grip firm, yet elastic, just as my father had taught me before he left that day, for the coal mines, never to come back.
Inching my fingers back from the wooden arrow, strung across the horsehair of the bow, I finally brought them back to my hand, feeling the vibration of the arrow as it was released from the grasp of the brow. Effortlessly, it carved through the air, dividing it into time that had already passed, and time not yet passed, until it met it's end— in the neck of the buck.
"Agh!" I shouted as I kicked myself free to escape the tree. The buck had fallen to the ground, thrashing its legs. Blood spotted the otherwise flawless snow, as the doe and fawn scattered off.
The buck was big enough that Gale would have to come meet me to bring it in, but the flailing hooves were enough to take out a limb. Normally, it was unthinkable for me to miss an animal. The arrows always seemed to slip from the notch in the bow at just the right speed and force, so it could pierce the eye without a drop of blood.
Approaching the buck, it's eyes rolled back towards me, causing it to bunch it's hind legs underneath it and push off the snow covered ground, away from me. My arrow was still buried deep in it's neck.
"Ugh," I groaned, tucking my bow under my arm and storming off. It was unthinkable for me to miss a shot. The day's conversation still rang in my head, but I had been able to push it off into the corners of my mind in the beginning of my hunt. Now, it kept slipping back into the front, begging to be thought of, discussed. Tromping through the snow, letting my feet drag, I succumbed to the thought.
My biggest question was why did Peeta stay? It must have been obvious that Gale and I would not ever leave the charred grounds of District 12, for just past the old fence line was our heaven. It was Peeta's home, too, but in a different way. The rebellion cost me Prim (whose name still causes me to well up in tears every time I hear it), but it cost Peeta his entire family. I still had my mother, albeit a couple hundred miles away, and of course, I had Gale. And now my children. Peeta was alone in a district of people he didn't know.
And, how much pain did it cause Peeta to stay and watch the children, that he thought he would have with me? And almost did, considering his plot during the Quarter Quell. How can he bear knowing that I have somebody else now?
I paused in my tracks, looking down at the snow below me. The forest was almost eerily still and silent, and the sun had already made it past the trees. It was getting dark, and time enough to head back to town, with or without dinner. Despite that, I had another errand to run before I returned.
Beating down the path I had come, I broke into a run towards town. Approaching the fence line, I slowed my pace, choosing a brisk walk to take me to the familiar white house. I could see a light on in the back. He was home.