Acknowledgements:
First and foremost, thank you to all of the readers who stuck with me on this story.
Especially thank you to everyone who reviewed.
BaronessKika and Sighing39 both provided invaluable advice. Neither wanted me to kill off Mr. Mellark and BK was extremely verbose in both reviewing the love scenes and making sure that Mr. M. was not cruelly treated during his death. Poor Mr. M!
Ashley H. and a few of my Facebook friends for their invaluable skiing advice.
Doc kept asking me why I didn't just move it to spring and make it a one-shot. Thanks, Doc. Haymitch drinks scotch in this one as a homage to you.
Premise:
The entire premise for this story came from a plot bunny handed to me by Sighing39 while I was on vacation on the East Coast. It was snowing outside and she PM'd me to ask, "What if Katniss and Peeta were stuck in a cave in a snowstorm? – No cameras, No Capitol, No leg injury?" I evidently have a problem with actually finding a New England winter storm anything but cold and wet, so I had to build a larger plot.
There are a million plot holes and problems with this story; I kept telling myself not to overthink it while I was writing. Please, if anything annoyed you, know that it probably annoyed me too. I found it especially difficult to put something like a CSI/Law and Order spin on Snow's trial, and the casual way in which I barely covered it. Thank you, Sighing 39, for some help in that regard.
Locale:
Okemo is a lovely ski resort. We travelled there when I was a kid, before it became as large as it is today and as popular. It immediately came to mind when I needed a mountain resort. It is located near Ludlow, Vermont, a bustling resort town of under five thousand.
Niagara Falls was the logical romantic elopement location. The Poconos were a close second simply because there used be a Mount Airy Lodge commercial that used to play on late night TV when I lived on the East Coast.
I chose Boston as the city for their move because I know it better than Albany. It's a wonderful city with wonderful food. The North End/Little Italy is a great place for Italian food. If you have never visited this city, it's worth it. So much history, and you must have some seafood while you're there!
Playlist:
I listened to the following while writing this. Music was especially helpful while writing the love scenes. Unlike Building the Dream, which had an extensively diverse playlist, this one was mostly …um…love songs. (I use the term loosely – they are mostly "panty disintegrators", which probably contributed to some of the heat behind these love scenes.)
Maxi Priest – Close to You
Eagles – I Can't Tell You Why
R. Kelly – Ignition
Toni Braxton – Unbreak My Heart
Crazy Town – Butterfly
Muse – Madness
Justin Timberlake – Suit and Tie
Linda Ronstadt – Ooh Baby Baby, Blue Bayou
Jason Mraz – I Won't Give Up
Train – Marry Me
Rihanna – S&M
Jodeci – Come and Talk to Me
Inspiration and Trivia:
Peeta's tattoo (having a tattoo at all, really) is inspired by the fic Wear Your Heart on Your Skin. If you haven't read it, it's lovely and wonderful and made the idea of a tatted Peeta too irresistible to pass up.
Haymitch drinks scotch in this story because of my husband. His black t-shirts and love of baked goods are a homage to Cookies from Mellark's.
My brother is a paramedic. When I first wrote the beginning on this story, he and my husband ragged on me tirelessly about Peeta's potential head wound. (Doc wanted him to have a broken femur.)
I won't lie: I watched the cave sequence from the movie REPEATEDLY during The Cave chapter to get a vocal cadence to the dialogue. I just kept calling it "research".
I have a "Dog is Good" I Like Big Mutts shirt. It's awesome. I also have one of their It's all fun and games until someone ends up in a cone…" shirts. Great company, great product. (And no, I don't work there.)
Katniss seems to have an unending array of supplies in her room: condoms, baby oil, ribbon, ice cream sundae stuff. It's evidently a magical portal to another universe. The reality is that she gets the ice cream stuff from the kitchen. Everything else is stuff that I think would be fairly normal to have in a place with its own bathroom.
Snow's dialogue was the first time I've ever tried to use alliteration to produce characterization. I'm not sure how well I did. Did anyone pick up on it?
I know that "Dad" was lowercase in the original text. I should go back and fix that – My apologies.
Process: This was more like my Building the Dream process of writing as I posted. I seemed to have a better grove this time. Not sure how the output was from a reader perspective. I think it's at least as decent in terms of writing style as Cookies From Mellark's, which was written all at once and then posted while I edited. Perhaps the difference is the length of the story?
Next up:
The completion of the Moving On Trilogy (Moving On/Building the Dream/Growing Together) was supposed to be next. I have two other projects that cut it in line, so I apologize for that. It is my opus and I love canon Peeta, so I will write it, I swear.
Next up is the continuation of Girls Night Out. It's an A/U romp with Johanna Mason and her roommate Katniss Everdeen. They come to deal with life and love and loss in Los Angeles. The first chapter of it was written for Prompts in Panem – frat house challenge. The rest will not all take place in a frat house.
After that is sort of a darker project. It's still incubating, so I'm not sure when and if it will come to fruition or if it will be posted to FF.