Chapter 10 - The Idea
"Peeta, Peeta" I hear Katniss screaming.
I turn around and there she is, on fire. She is screaming for me to help her. I start running towards her, blanket in my hand. Then I trip over a dead body and start falling ...
And then I wake up.
I am in my bed. My whole body is covered in beads of sweat. I am breathing heavily. I sit up on the bed and rub my eyes. I am trying to get hold of my surroundings, when I hear it again.
"Peeta, Peeta." Katniss is screaming again ... from downstairs.
I jump out of the bed and run towards the stairs. I am half way down when I see her. She is standing in the hall, holding something in her hands. As soon as she sees me, she looks at the floor.
"What's wrong?" I ask stopping in the middle of the staircase.
"Umm ... Nothing." She says still not looking at me.
"Are you alright?" I ask her ... may be she had a nightmare too.
"Yes ... I just wanted to ... tell you something." She says finally looking at me. I watch her closely. Her cheeks are flushing. It's almost as if she is embarrassed by something.
Then I look at myself. I am only in my shorts.
"I will be right down." I say and go back to my bedroom. I pull on some cloths and brush my teeth. I come downstairs and see her sitting on the couch. The center table is littered with papers.
"Do you want tea or coffee?" I ask her going into the kitchen.
"No." She says.
I pour hot water for my tea and pull out some cookies on a tray. Then, I take my tea-cup and tray and sit beside her. The littered papers are my sketches. Katniss' plant book is also there.
"So?" I ask hesitantly. I don't know if she is still upset about Prim's sketches.
"I had an idea ... " She starts. "You remember this plant book?"
"Of-course."
"Remember how we add all the information in this about all the plants, so we never forget."
"yes..." I am not sure where she is going with this.
"well ... I was just thinking that we can do the same thing for Prim ... and others." She says and looks hopefully at me.
"Like put information about Prim so you won't forget?" I ask her. It's hard to imagine that Katniss would forget anything about Prim.
"Yes ... like everything and the sketches. And not just Prim ... your family too." then she pulls out few pages and shows them to me.
In two pages she has written about my family. Everything I had told her when I had shown her the sketches and other things which she already knew. More pages are dedicated to Prim. She had carefully written all the facts, all the little details, all the anecdotes that she found important. It's like a biography. I read a few snippets and a lump forms in my throat.
"When did you write all this?" I ask her.
"Last night, in Prim's room." Where she had locked herself yesterday.
"This is good." I tell her.
She smiles, "It made me feel good too. And we can add more things about your family. We can make another book, like this one." She says.
"To preserve the memories."
"Yes ... something like that."
I look at her. She seems serious about this and excited too. And I have never seen her getting excited about anything. May be this will help her. Like Dr. Aurelius would say, help her to accept, help her to come out of her shell.
"We can add about Cinna, Finnick, Rue, Boggs ..." she says.
I nod and can't help but increase her list "Mags, Wiress, the morphlings ... " I suggest. And she nods vigorously.
I guess, this will be a good thing to do. To remember people who died to help us survive. And others like my family, who were unnecessary casualties of the war. We can honor their deaths ... and there are so many of them.
"We will need lots and lots of paper." I say.
"yes ... " she says, "May be I will ask Dr. Aurelius. This could be part of my therapy. He can send the papers."
I nod. "What exactly do you want to write about them?"
"Mainly things we know, but if we can find more information, some facts may be ... that would be great."
"We will need Haymitch's help."
"Right ... Lets go to Haymitch." She says enthusiastically. And she starts collecting all the papers from the table. I couldn't help but smile at her enthusiasm.
We almost run to Haymitch's house. As usual he is slumped on the couch. Katniss lifts the jug of water, but I stop her.
"We need him in a good mood." I tell her. She nods and keeps the jug down.
I wake him up by shaking him vigorously. He wakes up rubbing his eyes and sees both of us. "What do you lovebirds want?" He asks groggily. I ignore the taunt and sit beside him.
"Katniss has this amazing idea about a book." I start.
"You are writing a book, Sweetheart?" He asks yawning.
"Not for publishing." Katniss says as she sits in front. "Look at these." She gives Haymitch my sketches. We tell him about the book as he goes over the sketches and the content that Katniss has written. Then we ask him for his help.
"No way ... nah nah." He says carefully putting papers on the table as if they are going to explode. "I don't want any part of this. I am not the one to raise the dead. I say let them rest in peace, forget about them and move on."
"You are the one to talk." I say feeling annoyed. "You haven't forgotten and you haven't moved on ... not in last 25 years." Then I pick up the liquor bottle. "You think you can forget about them by drinking? This is your definition of moving on?" I ask him.
"Hey ... be careful with that." He grabs the bottle from me. "At least I don't lock myself up and weep." He says looking at Katniss.
"No ... you drown yourself in this and think you are invisible." Katniss snaps.
"Where are you getting liquor from, anyway?" I ask him. I hadn't seen anyone selling these in the market.
He mumbles something. "What's that?" I ask.
"Effie sends me. But she is very strict about the amount ... so I have to ration it." He tells me.
"Effie ... really?" It's hard to imagine Effie encouraging Haymitch to drink.
"She knows I can't do without it ... so ... and anyways I won't have time for your stupid book. I am going to do geese farming soon."
Both me and Katniss look at him with our mouths open. I wait for it ... anytime now he is going to say 'just kidding'. But he doesn't.
"Geese farming?" I ask eventually. "Do you even know anything about farming poultry?"
"My great-grand father used to do it." He says as if that cleared the matter.
"Yes and that talent is something genetically transferred, I am sure." I say smirking.
He looks at me frowning.
"Come on, Peeta. He will come around." Katniss says and gets up.
"Ask Effie ... she can get you all the data you want." He grumbles as we leave.
We reach Katniss' house and start arranging things for our big project. Katniss calls Dr. Aurelius and tells him about her idea. He promises to send boxes of papers from the next train. She also calls Effie and after a lot of one way conversation, gets Effie to send us the relevant information.
"Hows Effie?" I ask as Katniss comes back and sits beside me.
"Just the same. Eager to please. Offered me to plan the whole project." She says smiling.
"What is she doing now a days?"
"Working for the national TV. Something about scheduling programs."
"She will excel in that."
"yeah ... if she doesn't kill her co-workers by nagging over each second, that goes unplanned." Katniss says fondly.
"May be we should call Plutarch or someone from District 13 ... I mean we do need information on Boggs, Jackson, Castor ..." I say after a while.
She frowns. "May be ... I mean we can talk to Cressida or Pollux."
"Umm ... Pollux can't talk." I say trying not to smile.
She looks at me angrily. "Yes ... but he can listen ... and still help us."
"Okay."
But then she smiles. "I don't really want to talk to Plutarch."
"I can do it." I offer.
She nods. "Lets start with Prim and your family first." She says turning towards the papers in front.
A/N: I know the story was going a bit slow ... I mean I was taking one day at a time. But I felt, those first few days will be hard for Peeta and he needed to sort of settle in his new life. So I went into some specifics. Also, I was trying to set up a routine for Peeta and Katniss. Hopefully, it will move a little bit faster now. Thank you for sticking with me.