It feels good. My hands in the flour, mixing in the other ingredients, bringing my kitchen, and in a small, humble way, my family, back to life. But especially the kneading – working the dough, over and over again, feeling it in between my fingers, losing myself in the repetition and familiarity. It helps me clear my head. It calms my nerves. It helps me think.

As morning approached, I let myself out of Katniss' house and came home, trusting that she would sleep until Greasy Sae showed up. I left my windows open just in case I heard anything that contradicted my assumption.

When I came home, I rummaged through my kitchen, worried that after my long absence I wouldn't be able to start baking until I could get my hands on some supplies. I was pleasantly surprised to find a box with all the basics sitting on my countertop. I had no idea from whom or when it came, but I couldn't deny the anticipation I felt to start making bread again.

I didn't have many opportunities for baking while I was in the Capitol. The hospital where I stayed had a small kitchen, but virtually no counter space, and certainly lacking most of the staples and tools-of-the-trade that bakers would consider minimal requirements, at best. I had used the lack of opportunity to bake there to focus on my other therapeutic activity, painting. I appreciated both the similarities and differences of the two hobbies, though, and it was not lost on me that both were efforts to create things, as opposed to destroy them.

This morning, though, I am relishing being able to bake once again. I don't have any fancy ingredients to draw on yet, so the bread I'm making is simple, but hearty. I'm torn between wanting to take my time with the process so I can keep sorting out my thoughts and feelings from the last 24 hours, and being eager to have finished loaves to start putting my new plan into action.

As I've worked, I've started making a mental list of things I know. Making lists was a strategy Dr. Aurelius suggested I try. At first it produced more frustration than results, as I would try to list things about my past that I struggled to remember. But with time, I found something therapeutic about trying to organize my scattered thoughts into some semblance of order. So, as I continued to mix ingredients and squeeze the bread through my fingers over and over, I make a list of things I know.

1. Haymitch still drinks too much.

2. Digging dirt feels good.

3. Greasy Sae is kind and good people.

4. I am capable of fighting off episodes, sometimes.

5. It is still possible to succumb to an episode.

6. Seeing Katniss for the first time did not trigger an episode.

7. Katniss is not well.

8. I still love her.

I don't know how long I've been standing at the counter, hands gripping the dough, arms covered in flour, just staring. That last item takes me by surprise, and I'm not quite sure where it came from or what to do with it. Do I really know that? Maybe it doesn't actually belong on this list. Maybe this is a tampered memory, intruding on a list where it has no place. This is most likely just a programmed response, a lingering souvenir, courtesy of the Capitol. Or maybe, I'm not remembering the difference between knowing, and hoping.

I shake myself out of it, setting aside my quandary the same way I set the dough aside to rise. I don't know where that thought came from, and I do not want to waste time right now figuring it out. I replace it with "8. I want to help Katniess get better" and move on from there. As I'm mixing the ingredients for my third loaf this morning, I hear my front door open, unceremoniously and with a loud bang as it hits the wall behind it. I don't even have to look up before saying, "Morning, Haymitch."

I get a grunt in response. He sits down on a stool at the island I'm working on and watches me for a moment, still consuming his liquid breakfast.

"Anything I need to know?"

I smile to myself. I've missed Haymitch's conversation style more than I realized. But I can't help myself from having a little fun with him this morning. I guess I'm surprised by how much bantering with Haymitch relieves tension for me.

"Hmmm…I'm not sure. Have you ever actually baked anything before, Haymitch?"

I laugh again at the look on his face. He's not amused, obviously, but I'm in too good a mood to care. It's been a long time since I felt like I had a purpose, besides not going crazy in a mental hospital, of course. And it's been a long time since I baked. I'm not going to let Haymitch's surly outlook ruin this for me. He just continues to glare at me, though, not interested in playing along this time.

I concede. "She slept. I moved her upstairs. Came home right before dawn." I had already decided that I did not need to share anything about what I had spied last night. Some part of me knew that Katniss would feel telling Haymitch about it would be more of a betrayal to her than trying to strangle her to death.

He's regarding me now, trying to see if I'm withholding anything. I stay focused on my kneading, and try to keep my face expressionless. I know him well enough to guess that he's already spent time analyzing what's happened, that he's worried about her. I also know he's not going to just play counselor and babysitter, though. And, I decide, despite whatever feelings he may have, his own capacity for helping her is limited by his own ability to cope with day-to-day life. He's not exactly the role model for recovery she needs. Neither am I, I admit to myself. But, like it or not, we're all she's got for the time being.

"She needs to eat more," I say, waiting to see how engaged he feels like being this morning.

"Yea. But now that baker boy's back in town, I suspect that won't be as much of an issue. So what's your plan, kid?"

I debate how to respond to this. I know I need his help, but I'm not entirely sure in what way. I also suspect he has a plan as well, but know better than to expect him to share it with me until he wants to, or more accurately, until he decides it is strategically to his advantage to do so. Part of me is irritated by these games we play with each other. Especially now, trying to decipher what is real and what is just Haymitch being Haymitch can be downright confusing for me. But part of me accepts that this is Haymitch – these games allowed him to save two tributes instead of one, helped bring down a dictator, and keep him as close to sane as possible after all the horrors he's lived. He wouldn't really know how to be any different.

"Bake bread and paint. Haven't really gotten past that yet." I decide the "less is more" approach is best for the time being.

He snorts at me. "Hah. Yeah, right. Don't try to con a con man. Let me know when you're man enough to own up."

And he starts out of the kitchen, but turns before he hits the front door.

"Be careful."

I look at him now, and I know he's sincere. I also know he's talking about more than just how I go about inserting myself back into Katniss' day-to-day life. "I will." And he leaves.


It's bright – too bright. As I slowly open my eyes and realize where I am, my brain rejects the information initially, insistent that this is not where I really am. I lie motionless, staring vaguely at nothing in particular, as I try to recall the source of my certainty that I shouldn't be here.

I remember running through the forest, desperately trying to escape from creatures real and imagined. I remember waking up downstairs, angry and hurt and…the cat. I remember the cat. But nothing else comes after that until now. I do not know how I got home, or how I ended up in bed. My curiosity wanes after a moment, not really caring, either.

I begin to stir, and that's when I see him again. Buttercup, curled up at the end of my bed. I just watch him at first, not feeling anything. My mind wanders, wondering how he was able to find his way back here all the way from District 13. For a scrawny, mangy thing he certainly has shown a level of determination and scrappiness over the years that even I have to grudgingly admire.

He senses my movements and stretches, looks at me as if to say "Yeah, what?" and then jumps off the bed and out my bedroom door as if he owns the place. I sit in the bed for I'm not sure how long, not really thinking about anything, my tired mind lacking the energy or focus to begin my daily torments yet.

Fleeting images of my rampage through the forest last night flit through my mind. The despair, the feeling that I do not deserve to be wrapped in these blankets, blinking in the bright light of day, lingers like a fog in the valley on an early spring morning. I am disappointed in myself for not having the courage to meet my end in the forest, alone. But I am too drained to muster much indignation or any other emotion, really. The emptiness simply engulfs me once again.

At some point I notice my stomach growling. Persistent, loud, and annoying in its repetition. Still feeling numb and disconnected, I get up and head for the door, when I catch a glimpse of an image in my bedroom mirror. At first, I startle, convinced that there is some kind of intruder in my room. But at second glance, I realize it's only my own relfection that I don't recognize. Gaunt, pale, messy, a shadow of the person I expect to see – I do not know this person.

My hand slowly goes to my cheek, tracing the thin line of my jaw, the circles under my eyes, pushing stray hairs off my forehead. Oh, if my prep team could only see me now, they'd probably faint on sight, I think to myself. The movement brings my forearm into focus, and I notice the multiple scratches and bruises. I trace my fingers over them, and a distant, disjointed memory of branches and trees and bushes pushing against me as I made my way through the woods forms loosely.

Without realizing it, I make my way to the shower. At some point I find myself standing there, letting water run over me. I do not know how much time has passed, how long I've stood there letting the warmness envelope me, reminding me of the way strong arms used to after a nightmare. I wash my hair, my body, wincing every now and then as unseen injuries, both bodily and emotionally, protest at certain movements. But the shower feels good, and I reluctantly admit that it's been too long.

Once dressed, I head downstairs, feeling forced to quiet the incessant protests of my empty stomach. I don't hear anyone, and wonder for a moment just how late I've slept. When I come into the kitchen, however, I stop dead in my tracks.

It's there, on the table, unassuming and innocent in its presentation. I look quickly around for an explanation, but find none. I look back to the table, confused, uncertain, and then with dawning comprehension. I stare at it for a few moments, not sure of what to do. The simplicity of the item belies the deeper choice with which I am confronted. For all my lack of engagement the last few months, the message is not lost on me now.

Bread.

Two loaves, small but perfect. Waiting for me. Nothing else, no one else. Just bread.

Tear-strewn emotions threaten to overwhelm me, but, this time at least, I am able to will them to descend again. I slowly move to the table, and let my fingers caress the firm crust of one of the loaves. I chastise myself for my momentary surprise. After all, this should have been expected. Peeta is, if nothing else, fairly predictable. And the meaning of his simple but poignant gesture does not escape me.

Accept the bread, and accept him. Eat the bread, and survive. Just like so long ago. But it's not that simple, anymore, is it? It's not just a matter of starving to death, of being so hungry that I can't move anymore, of feeling so overcome by hopelessness and despair that I simply collapse against a tree, resigned to my inevitable fate.

Or is it?

I take the bread and move to the counter, halfheartedly trying to convince myself that I am not actually making a choice by doing so. But as I slice the bread and take the first few bites, I glimpse a new emotion, or at least one which I haven't felt in I don't know how long. And I wonder, as tears silently stealthily undo my earlier resolve and streak down my cheeks, if it might actually be possible for my life to be different than this non-existence that's entrapped me for so long.