Right okay, so now the story will be as close to the book as I can get it which includes direct quotes and paragraphs from the book c: So thanks Suzanne Collins for writing like half of this! Enjoy please and ignore any mistakes
The day of the reaping's hot and sultry. The population of District 12 waits, sweating and silent, in the square with machine guns trained on them. Katniss stands alone in a small roped-off area with Peeta and Haymitch in a similar pen to the right of her. The reaping takes only a minute. Effie, shining in a wig of metallic gold, lacks her usual verve. She has to claw around the girls' reaping ball for quite a while to snag the one piece of paper that everyone already knows has Katniss's name on it. Then she catches Haymitch's name. He barely has time to shoot Katniss an unhappy look before Peeta volunteers to take his place.
Katniss and Peeta are ushered into the Justice building with the hopes to say their last goodbyes, but they're only met with Thread, head Peacekeeper.
"New procedure," he says with a nasty smile.
They're marched out the back door, into a car, and taken to the train station. Katniss begins to panic. This wasn't fair. She had to say goodbye to everyone. Peeta takes her hand, sensing her discomfort. She wants to push him away, jump out of the car and hug her sister one last time, tell her how much she loved her.
Effie and Haymitch appear, escorted by guards and they're all shoved onto the train. The wheels began to move seconds after their feet pass over the threshold.
Katniss stares out of the window, not saying a word, her eyes wide. She savors the last bit of District 12 as the woods overtake the view. With her hormones raging from pregnancy, it takes everything she has not to have a meltdown in the middle of the train. She wasn't going to see Gale or her mother or Madge or Prim ever again. She wanted to punch something, to scream and cry, but she only remained silent as though her lips were glued together.
"We'll write letters, Katniss," Peeta says gently. She wondered if he was feeling the same way. If he was resisting the urge to have a mental breakdown. "It will be better, anyway. Give them a piece of us to hold on to. Haymitch will deliver them for us if…they needed to be delivered."
Only hers would. If she wrote any. She knew she wouldn't. She was terrible at transferring her thoughts to paper and she didn't want her loved ones to think she was illiterate.
Katniss went straight to her room, burying her face in her pillow and hoping she could suffocate herself. Effie knocks on her door to call her to dinner but she doesn't want to eat. Her appetite has completely disappeared over the past week. Certain things made her sick while others just didn't appeal to her. Her mother told her she would have a huge appetite but there was nothing. She went to dinner anyway, not wanting the whole group to come after her.
The meal was quiet. There was no light chatter or even any arguing between Effie and Haymitch like usual. Peeta compliments Effie on her gold wig and she tells him she wanted it to match Katniss's pin and how she thought they could look like a team.
Peeta notices Katniss's empty plate and frowns slightly, but he doesn't point it out. The smell from the chicken Effie is eating makes its way to Katniss's nose and she has to try very hard not to throw up. By the time the dessert is served, Katniss is feeling nauseous.
"Shall we watch the recap of the reapings?" asks Effie after everyone finishes their custard.
Katniss is the first to stand. "I'm not feeling well. I'm going to bed."
She ignores the curious and somewhat pity look she receives from Effie and goes to her room. She leans over the toilet for a while, sure something's going to come up, but nothing ever does and she's left wondering if she was even nauseous or if she wanted an excuse to go to her room.
Katniss wakes up screaming hours later, her nightmares filled with faceless tributes hacking away at her. Not able to stay in her compartment, she ventures out into the hallway, wrapping her arms against herself in an attempt to chase away the images still in her head. She faintly hears the television on and follows the sound to find Peeta on the couch watching old Games. She kind of recognizes the one where Brutus becomes victor flashing on the screen.
Peeta notices her and he rises and flips off the television. "Couldn't sleep?"
"Not for long," she says, squeezing her arms tighter around herself. She clears her throat as she remembers what usually happens after she comes to Peeta with her nightmares. But that was obviously over.
"Want to talk about it?" he asks.
She shakes her head and Peeta's arms immediately go up. Katniss moves into them quickly, accepting the affection greatly. She was so needy. Peeta buries his face into her hair and his breath fans out against her neck. She doesn't want to let go of him.
A Capitol attendant arrives, causing them to break apart. He sets a tray with a jug and two cups on a table. "I brought some warm milk," he says, glancing at them. "And I added some honey and just a pinch of spice."
Katniss blinks in surprise. "Oh," she says, "thank you."
He gives a slight nod, and his mouth opens like he wants to say more but he simply shakes his head and leaves the room.
"What was that about?" Katniss asks.
"I think he feels bad for us," Peeta replies.
"Right," she says sarcastically as she pours the milk into the two cups.
"I mean it. I don't think the people in the Capitol are going to be all that happy about our going back in. Or the other victors. They get attached to their champions."
Katniss ignores Peeta and instead gestures to the blank screen. "You're watching the tapes again?" she asks.
"Just checking out their fighting techniques."
"Who's next?"
Peeta grabs his cup of milk and settles himself on the couch. He lifts the box of tapes into his lap and shuffles around before shrugging. "You pick." He hands out the box.
Katniss ends up picking Haymitch's tape since he's never told them about how he won. She sits next to Peeta and snuggles up to his side, resting her cheek against his shoulder. They both take interest in the force field Haymitch uses to win.
"That force field at the bottom of the cliff, it was like the one on the roof of the Training Center. The one that throws you back if you try to jump off and commit suicide. Haymitch found a way to turn it into a weapon."
"It's almost as bad as us with the berries," Katniss says, laughing slightly. Peeta shakes his head a little as though she's lost her mind.
"Almost, but not quite."
They whip around and Haymitch is standing behind them, sipping on a bottle of wine. Peeta glances between the two until he stands up and gestures towards to door. "I'll walk you to your room," he says to Katniss. She nods and follows him, avoiding Haymitch's amused eyes.
Peeta stops Katniss outside her door and leans against the frame. His hand reaches out almost tentatively, but it stops in the space between them. She knows what he wants to do and she shifts her weight from foot to foot, waiting. He bites his lip and drops his hand back by his side.
"How are you?" he asks. Katniss rolls her eyes and slides her fingers around his wrist. She pulls his hand against her stomach where there is a pretty noticeable curve. You'd have to be blind or stupid to not see it now, yet no one asked about it. Not even Effie who was pretty nosy. She was nearly 17 weeks pregnant. Almost halfway there. Peeta smiled slightly and it felt as though he had punched her in chest. She knew he wanted kids. And here she is, pregnant with his baby, but he was never going to see it because Katniss wasn't going to make it out of the arena. She knew he was thinking the same but reversed. If she had to get pregnant, she wouldv'e done it earlier so Peeta could keep the baby. But the odds were never in her favor.
Peeta rubbed her stomach slightly before he pulled his hand away and straightened. "You should get some sleep."
Faceless tributes with weapons and blood smeared on their clothes popped into her mind and she realized she didn't want to go to sleep by herself. "Will you…?" she trailed off hopefully, tipping her head toward her door.
He gave a sad smile. "Of course."
As Katniss snuggled up to Peeta's solid, warm body, she thought of how lonely she would be without him and knew what her and Haymitch planned was the right thing to do.
Please review! Thanks for reading!
