Happy Holidays! I really wanted to get you an update before I went out of town next week. I already have Chapter 7 halfway finished and I hope (fingers crossed) to be able to post that in the next couple of days as my gift to you :). I have to admit I struggled with this chapter and did a lot of editing because I wanted to get the characterization right. More A/N at the end!
This must be a dream. A beautiful dream where the details are frenzied and fuzzy in your mind, but the feelings are real and deep. Except, I don't have beautiful dreams. I have horrible, vivid, monstrous nightmares that haunt the very edges of my being. This all feels too good to be real. More good than I deserve after all the things I've done. I gently brush my fingers across the curve of Katniss' side. She lets out a noise of agreement and burrows in closer to me. Her lips graze my neck and I feel my body respond. She's bare from the waist up, as am I, and her arm is draped loosely across my waist. Tendrils of hair frame her face while the rest falls in a cascade across my arm and down her back. Her cheeks are flushed from sleep. I peer down at where my fingers lay gently against her side and my eyes follow the round curve of her breasts, delicate slope of her waist and the fullness of her hips. I relish the feel of her chest rising and falling against me and the way the air leaving her slightly parted lips tickles the fine hairs on the back of my neck.
I still can't believe the night before happened. I hadn't meant for it to happen like that. My plan has always been to take small steps, get to know each other again without all of the other interference and then see what happened from there. But, the air was like electricity and I couldn't stop myself. I had to taste her and I had to feel her even if it wasn't entirely real on her part. Even if she may have just been using me to struggle through her own pain and grief. If I'm honest with myself, there may have been a small part of me that was using her too because getting lost in each other made everything else fall away. In those moments there was no Hunger Games, no war, no torture, no death, no heartbreak, no nightmares, no scars. There was only us.
What started in the kitchen continued once we were upstairs. I had followed Katniss to the bedroom where she shyly excused herself to the bathroom and I took the opportunity to grab a fresh pair of pajamas and underwear and made my way quickly to the second bathroom down the hall. I heard Katniss start the shower as I walked out of the bedroom, so I also took the time to stand under the hot spray of the second tub to wash away the evidence of my overexcitement and gather a little bit of composure before facing her again.
What I hadn't expected as I re-entered the bedroom was to see Katniss sitting on the edge of the bed, her damp hair hanging loosely around her shoulders. The water dripping from her hair made her white tank top sheer. She wasn't wearing a bra. I couldn't breathe. The towel I was using to dry my hair fell to the ground as she pushed me up against the door. The force of our bodies closed the door with a loud crack that made us both jump. Her mouth moved slowly towards mine, faltering just as our lips began to meet. We had kissed a thousand times before, but this was different. Unlike in the kitchen, I was cautious now, shy, and so was she.
Her fingers drifted to the hem of my shirt, ghosting over the small patch of bare skin exposed there, leaving goose bumps in their wake. My breath caught and I shivered. I could feel her body shaking against mine. I closed my eyes and leaned my forehead against hers.
"I don't know what I'm doing," she confessed against my lips.
To be honest, I didn't really either. My inexperience was only slightly less than hers due to the fact that I had two older brothers that loved to make me squirm by oversharing details of their own exploits.
"Me either," I breathed.
She gripped my shirt and eased it up and over my head. It fell to the floor by my long forgotten towel. She took a small step back to take me in. Her hands skimmed the planes of my chest, stopping briefly as she discovered the various scars that littered my body from my time in the Capitol and District 13. She leaned in and gently placed her lips against a particularly gruesome mark that ran the length of my right side. I couldn't think. I was barely breathing. My head fell back against the door. Her lips traveled across the planes of my stomach and moved up to my chest. She experimentally flicked her tongue across my nipple and I had to bite down on my lip to stifle a moan. The experience was more erotic than anything I had ever imagined. I was so hard that it was nearly painful. There was no way that Katniss didn't notice. I was at war with myself as to whether I should push against her or pull back, but she made the decision for me when her palm reached down to stroke me through my pants.
Her touch was light and unsure, but the feeling was unbelievable. My eyes rolled back in my head. I didn't want to come in my pants again and we were getting dangerously close to that happening, so I grabbed her wrist and raised her palm to my mouth placing a light kiss there. I opened my eyes to find her looking at me with such depth that it felt like I could sink into her eyes and be lost forever. She glanced back down to my scars, running her fingers across the burn marks on my neck. Her eyes met mine again.
"I want to tell you how handsome you are, but you are so much more than that. I wish I had the right words," she said shaking her head.
"You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen," I replied.
I brushed my fingers across her cheek and down her scarred arms, my eyes never leaving hers. Then, her lips met mine and we poured all the passion we felt in that moment into that kiss. Hot and wet. Lips and tongues.
We stumbled towards the bed. My prosthetic hit the edge and I fell backwards onto the mattress pulling her on top of me. My lips found a sensitive spot on her neck that made a low moan tumble from her mouth, so I worshipped it and tried the other side too. My hands slid against the warm skin of her back, sides and stomach. Her tank top had ridden up to just below her breasts. My exploring fingers stopped there. I looked up at her. With shaking fingers, she reached for the hem and pulled the shirt off, flinging it to the floor. Then, she was bare to me for the first time. She straddled my waist. I sucked a greedy breath in through my nose. She leaned down until her skin was flush with mine.
"Touch me, Peeta," she sighed in my ear.
So I did with my hands and my mouth. When I pulled a taut bud with my lips and lightly scraped it with my teeth she made a noise in the back of her throat that ended with my name. It was the most wonderful sound and I vowed to hear it as many times as I could for the rest of my life. I had never felt more alive.
I flipped us over and pinned her underneath me so we were skin on skin. Her legs parted for me and I sank down against her. We both groaned in satisfaction. I bucked into her and she raised her hips to meet mine. The pleasure that rolled through me was nearly too much. I brought my mouth to hers and as I moved against her again she keened her approval against my lips.
And, suddenly we were at a precipice. My body begged me to continue. To move my hands to her waistband and remove the last pieces of clothing. To feel what it would be like to be enveloped by her. My mind screamed at me to slow down. This shouldn't happen yet. We need more time. We're both still too fragile to take this step and neither of us are ready for any possible consequences from our actions tonight.
I stilled on top of her. Our chests heaved together and our ragged breaths met in the night air. With my forearms still holding myself above her, I nervously played with the ends of her hair that had fanned out around her head like a halo. I was unsure of what to say, how to put into words how badly I wanted this and how much I wasn't ready. I'd always been so good with words.
"Peeta," Katniss murmured against my cheek.
I met her eyes, dark and hooded with lust. "I…I don't think we should…"
Her eyes shifted away from mine to look at the wall. "Can we just go to bed then? Like we normally do?" She asked.
"Yes."
I lifted myself off of her and awkwardly turned to sit on the edge of the bed. I adjusted myself with the waistband of my pants. I turned to look back at her as she crawled under the covers still topless. I closed my eyes trying to burn that image into my brain.
"I'm…I'm just going to use the bathroom and then I'll be back," I stammered, my prosthetic tripping slightly on one of the shirts on the floor.
She just nodded, looking sheepish and flustered as I quickly slipped into the bathroom and closed the door.
I looked down at myself straining against the fabric of my pants and underwear. I definitely couldn't go back out there to her with this and the ache was unlike anything I had felt before. I placed my hot face against the coolness of the tiled wall. I had no choice. I gripped myself firmly. It was embarrassingly fast. The thought of Katniss' hand touching me, her bare breasts pressed against my chest and in my mouth had me spilling myself into my free hand within seconds. I washed up quickly in the porcelain basin, allowing myself a moment to take a couple deep breaths. Everything was catching up with me and I suddenly felt exhausted. I opened the bathroom door to find her curled up on her side waiting for me. I sat on the edge of the bed, removed my prosthetic and laid down beside her. She moved her head to my chest. I ran my fingers through her hair. Neither of us said anything. Her breathing became deeper and more even. I could feel myself drifting into sleep as well and just before it pulled me under, I whispered the only thing I could think to say into her hair.
"I love you."
The early morning sky is just turning a lighter shade of blue as I watch the tree line outside the windows. The sun has not yet risen, but it will soon. The baker's hours instilled in me as a child have never really left. I'm always up before the sun and usually before Katniss. I don't mind it though. I like watching her sleep, especially now with her naked chest pressed tightly against me. My father and brothers would be so happy that at least this part of the life I dreamed about was coming true. They knew I loved her before the rest of the world did. I believe they were always there quietly rooting for us in the background. My mother was another story entirely. She never approved of Katniss or her upbringing or my devotion to her. She tried repeatedly to beat it out of me. It never worked.
My arm is falling asleep. I gently and slowly wiggle my fingers to get rid of the tingling in my hand. Katniss stirs at my side. She stretches. Her hand slides across my chest as the sleepiness fades. Her eyes pop open. She looks at me and then down at her bare chest. Her cheeks turn crimson and she springs away from my side. Her hands grip the sheet pulling it up to cover herself. I sit up slowly trying to understand what is happening. I watch as her eyes dart frantically around the room trying to locate her tank top. It is lying abandoned on the floor next to my prosthetic. I reach down, pick it up and hand it to her carefully.
"Katniss," I whisper, trying to keep the hurt out of my voice.
She snatches the shirt from me and turns her back towards me pulling the shirt over her head quickly. I reach out and lightly touch her shoulder. My fingers barely make contact with her skin and she jumps up from the bed.
"Katniss, please," I try again. The pain is evident in my voice now. I can't help it.
She turns to look at me. Her eyes are wide and glistening with unshed tears. The only emotion I see in them is fear. She's afraid. Of me?
Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no.
This is exactly what I feared would happen. I can physically feel my heart breaking beneath my ribs. I can feel my own tears building.
Shit. Don't cry. Not now.
With her back to me again, she quickly throws on pants and a shirt over her pajamas and turns towards the door. Her hair is still loose and billows away from her face and back with her fast pace. She opens the door and stops. Her hand rests on the door frame. She turns to look at me again. The tears are falling from my eyes now even though I've mentally begged them not to.
"I…I can't Peeta," she murmurs so softly I almost don't hear her. The tears are falling from her eyes now too. Then, she disappears into the darkened hall. I hear her light footsteps on the stairs. The front door slams shut. I grab the bedside lamp and hurl it across the room. I watch it shatter into a thousand pieces. Just like me.
I throw back the sheet, painfully attach my prosthetic and throw my t-shirt over my head. I rush down the steps and out the door.
"Katniss!" I yell into the humid morning air, but she's gone. She's always going to be faster than me especially when she wants to run away. The dew from the grass of the front lawn covers my foot and gathers at the hem of my pajama pants. I can barely feel it and didn't even realize I had run out without shoes. I run my hands through my hair, tugging on the ends in frustration. I keep trying to go over the details of the night before to figure out what changed between the time we went to bed and the moment we woke up. She wanted me last night. She asked me to touch her. She told me not to stop. But, I did stop. Was that it?
I turn and head to the darkness of my house. So much has changed between yesterday and today that it's hard for me to remember that it hasn't even been a full day since I officially moved out, although I only moved the necessities. With my bare foot tracking mud across the wood floors, I turned and climbed the stairs, entering my study at the end of the hall and slamming the door with enough force to make several paintings fall from the wall.
Confusion, regret and heartbreak sweep through me and then a feeling of déjà vu. I've been here before. Felt these things before, standing alone in this room surrounded by the images of death and destruction and the woman I love who doesn't love me back. Maybe my mother had been right all along. I'll never be somebody that someone will want. I'm too soft. Too weak. A "miserable, fucking waste of space." As she so often put it.
I spy a nearly finished painting sitting on an easel. It is of Katniss at her birthday party with the look on her face as she realized what was happening. I had been working on just a few days ago and it was almost finished. I grab it from the easel and toss it across the room with strength that I had forgotten that I had. The wooden frame collides with the wall and splinters. I watch it fall to the floor. Then, it is like I can't stop myself. The room becomes a flurry of canvas and wood and paint. At some point I hear what sounds like glass breaking and feel a sharp pain in my hand and foot, but I'm too far gone to really pay attention.
It's the painting of my father's hands that stop me. It is still leaning up against the wall unfinished. As soon as my eyes catch sight of it I crumble to the floor. I'm a sweaty, shaking mess of tears, sweat, paint and I then realize blood. The glass door to an ornate enclosed bookcase is broken. The fingers and knuckles of my right hand are cut and bleeding. There's several small pieces of glass embedded in my bare foot. I pull them out slowly and then curl in on myself next to the painting. My father would be disappointed at the way I handled myself in this room. He would say it isn't like the Peeta he knew. He would be right. I'm not that Peeta anymore.
I hope no one is too mad at me for ending it here. I promise I will get the next chapter up as quickly as I can! Also, since this story is not told from Katniss' POV I wanted to make a little side note about her behavior in this chapter. She really struggles with emotional intimacy and everyone she loves has either left her or been killed, so realizing that she could possibly have intense feelings for Peeta and then acting on those feelings would be a lot for her emotionally (IMO). Plus, she is kind of an "act first, think later" sort of person, so the physical part of their relationship moving faster than the emotional part (at least from her perspective) would be realistic to the character.
I can't say thank you enough to everyone who is reading, favoriting and following this story! It fills me with such happiness to know that you are enjoying it!