Sorry for the cliffhanger last week! This chapter is going to be far more pleasant, I promise. This was actually the first chapter that I started planning when I decided to write this fanfic, and I think this will be my favorite one to show you all as of yet because it's one of the scenes I've been waiting for since the beginning. (a.k.a there's some long-awaited Everlark.) I apologize, it's a little rough around the edges, but hey. It's here. So I hope you all enjoy! Pop in and leave a review if you can. :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing at all.

It doesn't take long for this penetrating darkness, daunting in its desolation and suffocating thickness, to suddenly become filled. I feel thick arms weave around my convulsing body, and suddenly Peeta is here, holding my face to the crook of his neck, fingers parting my tangled mane over and over again. He murmurs softness by my ear, promising that it's not real, it's not real. Over and over again like a rhythmic chant. It's not real, Katniss, it's not real.

But it feels so real. Everything did. Temperate afternoons, soft kisses, the unadulterated ardor, our daughter… Even now, the recollections are so clear, so untainted with haze and other dream-like lenses. Those scenes feel palpable even after they've fled, planting a deep ache in my chest. Every image floods to mind… and I'm hesitant to admit it, but I wanted all that—everything in the beginning, at least. Before the sun stopped shining. For a split second, I crave the entirety of what I'd always been so terrified of. Loving Peeta, having a child, having his child…

"It was just a nightmare, Katniss," he whispers gingerly, his lips faintly brushing against the cartilage of my ear as his hands work over my knotted back. His palms iron across my aching muscles in subduing circles as I choke out strangled sobs. "I'm here, I'm here. Katniss. You're alright."

My mind is inundated in sundry images, flickering through my head without an ounce of restraint. Sleeping alone in my own cold bed, grey and creaky. Standing above two dusty graves. But then, something more pleasant surfaces. Holding my ray of sunshine with Peeta's arms twined around the both of us. Instead of easing some of the ache, however, this last scene elicits throatier cries from the pit of my chest.

"It was so real, Peeta," I whimper feebly.

My fingers dig into his back as I clench onto him relentlessly, as if he's my anchor to this earth itself. My tears soak Peeta's shirt over his shoulder, but if he minds, he doesn't parade it. His sighs continue to encircle me, and suddenly I feel his lips against my ear, against my temple, against my cheek. His kisses are far from hungry; it's clear that this gesture is solely for my comfort, not his pleasure. Peeta is the embodiment of sacrifice and altruism; how did I wind up in this boy's bed? How did I come to be with such a forgiving, affectionate soul? I surely deserve none of this. I am detrimental, I am cold in my fiery aggression. Peeta gives and gives, I take and take. The relationship we have is assuredly harmonious, as he balances me seamlessly, but it certainly must damage him. Why he stays with me is beyond my understanding; how a boy who deserves the entire world settles for such a broken, defective girl.

"I know. I know, Katniss. It feels so real… they always do… but it's not, it wasn't. It was just a dream. I'm here."

His assurances are short, cut, but soothing. Each word ripples through my veins, calming me ever-so-slightly.

After quite some time, passed with soothing movements on his part and garroted sobs on mine, eventually, he warily lays my body down beside him in the blankets. I allow him to position me as if I'm nothing more than a limp rag doll, for I have no energy, no incentive. I'm still whimpering as he stretches out on his side adjacent to my silhouette, and the moment I feel his lips find my forehead, I curl up into an emotionally-compromised ball, quivering and sniffling. Peeta reels me in, holding me to his chest like a baby. As of now, I have the reserve of one.

I feel his lips press to my hair, over and over. He doesn't think to ask for a summary of the dream; at this point, he's aware that I never elect to tell him of my nightmares.

But for some reason, when my mouth opens, sequences of fragmented phrases begin to pour out. Uncharacteristically, I exercise no restraint.

"It started out… it began so good, Peeta. It was you and me. It was just us two, and we were happy, and we weren't all that broken like we are here, and it was so incredible. And we were always together, and you loved me and I wasn't afraid and I wanted you back. More than ever. I think we got married… I remember a white dress, and I remember you painting me and you holding my stomach after that, and then we had… we had her…"

Sobs rip through my chest now at the thought of my sunshine. She was something that I knew I could never yearn for in reality—I recall too many conversations with Gale about how bringing a child in this world is selfish and cruel. Even though the Games are over, and the revolution has left Panem a significantly more secure place, the life that I live seems so pointless and barren. The only figment of this reality that keeps me alive is Peeta. Everything else is colorless. I couldn't inflict this hollowness on a child.

But even though I've never wanted a baby, and I suppose I never will… I wanted her then. And I ache for her now. The idea is paradoxical and senseless, but it still rings fresh in my mind.

"Her?" he finally murmurs back, his voice light in its enquiry.

My cries are muffled in his chest. "We had a daughter. I don't know her name, but she looked like you… and she looked like Prim… she was the sun. She was so beautiful."

His arms, which are laced around me, seem to relax in their grip slightly. I can tell he's thinking.

"We had a daughter?" he muses quietly into the darkness, his voice catching in my hair. His question is brimming with guilty satisfaction—Peeta's always wanted kids, and I know that the thought of having a child is one of the most satiating notions in his world. My stomach wrenches after I hear his delicate coo—I want to take it back. I shouldn't have given him hope.

My fists are balled already, but I clench them more aggressively, my fingernails digging into the skin of my palm until numbing sparks shoot up my wrists. "But it didn't last long," I continue more flatly than before, tears welling at my eyes again. "Before I could even get to know her, she was gone. We buried her in the meadow where they buried everyone from Twelve after the war. I came across that meadow yesterday, and maybe that's partially why I had this dream… She was gone, Peeta. And it was just you and me again."

After this break in summary, I can sense the newfound rigidity in his grasp. But he kisses the crown of my head again and waits for me to continue.

"It wasn't the same," I choke out angrily. My rage is not directed at him, or at her… I feel rolling spite for myself as my words build up in my chest. I'd told myself all along that it was wrong to love, that it was dangerous and destructive, but I hadn't listened. And I lost everything. "You and I wouldn't speak anymore. We couldn't touch. We would be lying in your bed, on opposite sides of the mattress, not even able to look at each other. You were broken, I was broken, and neither of us could do anything to mend each other. And then I was back at my own house, cooped up in my own bed for most of the days, although sometimes I would sit by the window and watch as you left for the bakery and came back for dinner. I never spoke to you again. My dream ended with me standing in that same meadow, standing over two graves instead of one, and I had never felt so damn empty in my life. It was like every sliver of hope I'd ever had was ripped from me, leaving me naked and alone and helpless. Everything that I ever loved was gone. You were gone, she was gone."

My sobs have resurged, emptying into Peeta's chest as he clutches me to him. At first, he says nothing as I cry, to let me release every pent-up fear before trying to pick up the pieces. He just rubs my back, kisses my hair, holds my shattered body against his.

After quite some time, when my tears have dried my eyes and my muscles are sore from trembling for over an hour without pause, I hear him whisper the same assurance once more.

"It's not real, Katniss."

"It felt so real. It was more real than any nightmare I've had…" My voice cracks, submerging from a desiccated, tight throat.

His lips find my forehead, sticky with sweat. "But it's not, love," he whispers against my skin. The term of endearment sends tingles all through my system, and I release an uneven sigh. "I'm here, aren't I? It's you and me. I couldn't ever leave you, not even if I wanted to. You're my fire, Katniss. You keep me warm and safe and you give me light even when I'm surrounded by darkness. You're the only reason that I rarely have hallucinations anymore, and that I can't seem to ever stop smiling." I laugh weakly through a constricted throat.

But even his little pep talk wears off soon after it's been uttered.

"I don't know how you could stay with me, Peeta," I murmur back, my voice wavering. I nuzzle my cheek against his chest, minutely picking up on his heartbeat, beating clearly through the warm skin over his ribs. I wonder for a brief moment if my heart is as steady as his, or if it's jagged, warped, faint. "I'm so broken."

And then he surprises me. The fingers of one hand, which have been soothingly brushing through my tangled mess of hair, pull closer—they lightly delineate my jawline to place under my chin, and with two fingers, he tilts my head up. Our gazes interlock, the shimmering pools of blue wet with blurring tears but still enshrouding me in a cloud of devotion. I can see it in his eyes, and see it in the way he smiles sadly at me, and the message is thousands upon thousands of times more clear than if he were to articulate it in speech.

I love you, Katniss.

But he doesn't say the phrase. Instead, he blinks back the moisture and gulps, finally responding to my previous statement.

"So am I."

I lie there with my knees tucked up into my chest, arms curled around myself as if to hold the hundreds of shattered fragments that constitute as my body together. But in this moment, I realize this action is unnecessary. He is twined around me like a ribbon, keeping every shard of my splintered soul in place. He holds me together.

So am I. It echoes in my head. Peeta is broken, too—most days, I seem to forget that. Lately, he's been so spirited, so suave that it seems impossible for him to be not wholly repaired from the hijacking and the war. How naïve it was for me to believe such a blatant lie. Peeta is not fixed in the same way that I am still just as ruined. He only stands strong for me in furtively masked pain so that I am protected and provided the elements of comfort that I need to heal. He disregards his own needs to satiate mine. He gives and gives. I take and take.

As we lie curled together, falling apart at the seams, I find my arms untangling from my own knees and slipping around his ribs. My palms find his wide shoulders, and I press my weight into him.

"What are you doing?" he coos gently, eyes still trained on mine.

"You're always the one to hold me together. It's about time for me to return the favor."

My forehead finds the tender crook of his neck, basking in his surrounding warmth. We hold each other as we lay intertwined underneath the comforter, soft but sweat-caked skin meeting here and there. He breathes a sigh of gratification as he relaxes in my grasp, and I can feel my own muscles beginning to untangle. We don't need to guard ourselves in this secret place of ours—we have each other to keep ourselves in one piece, no matter how cracked and fragile we may be.

For a final time, I feel him gently press his mouth to my temple. "I love you," he murmurs through the darkness.

My mind expects my entire body to grow rigid at his declaration as it always had before, but bizarrely, I feel myself slacken in his grasp as an even exhale rolls from my tongue. I haven't heard that familiar string of words usher from his mouth since before he returned to Twelve, since before the war, before the entire revolution…

But Peeta loves me again. He loves me now just as he used to.

That is all that is pertinent.

I draw my head from his neck to look up at him, his blonde eyelashes glimmering in the moonlit rays that pan through the open window as his gaze flickers down to meet mine. Even though his subsequent smile conveys slight guilt, his expression reflects his assertion, and in this moment I can't remember having ever trusted someone so completely.

Within my chest, a flame ignites as my heart rate speeds. This warmth that balls up in my core is so new, so surprising—but I recognize it. I've felt it before. On the beach in the Quarter Quell, when Peeta was offering to die for me, and after promising that I needed him, I kissed him in a manner in which I'd never done so before. For that first time, I'd executed the gesture not for the cameras, not to gain sponsors, not as an act. I'd done it out of pure affection, voluntary and spontaneous all the same.

That same hunger rises in my throat now, that need-based longing for Peeta. For the past few months, I'd been curbing that desire, too afraid that it would only shred me apart. But as I lie here, wrapped in the warmth of the boy with the bread, I realize how futile and ridiculous my attempts have been.

As I watch him attentively, eyes flickering between his pools of cerulean and his slightly parted lips that beg the same question I'd been asking myself for months, I consciously decide to give in. This craving that has been rooted inside of me for week after week is not going to subside, as I should've assumed by this stage. It's only going to grow with every touch, every soothing word, every night that we spend grasping on to each other to keep us pieced together.

So I cave. I relinquish my stubborn reluctance to leave myself open for Peeta, cognizant of the notion that I am vulnerable as is. It's pointless to push him out any longer, not when I need him to keep me whole, and not when he needs me back likewise.

One hand slithers from his back, around his ribs and then up to his angular jaw where I cup his cheek in my palm. His eyes flutter closed for a brief second as he leans into my touch.

This hunger grips hold of me now, binding every nerve in my body with its aggression. I knew this would happen eventually, and in this very instant, all of the pieces of my jagged, multifarious puzzle seem to fall into their rightful place. I let my longing win.

When his eyes flicker back open to lock with mine, and he smiles with unmatchable compassion, my mind runs black as it lets my muscles take in the reigns of the situation.

His breath washes over my face as I lean in, pulling myself up to him, closing the distance between us. He meets me in the middle, and my eyes flutter closed as I feel the satiny skin of his lips gently mold into mine.

Within seconds, the world around me has disintegrated. My body impresses into Peeta's as one muscular forearm remains secured against the small of my back, the other sliding through my hair. He lures the breath right from my lungs as his lips part over mine, and I grasp fervently at the back of his neck to keep him with me.

I hadn't kissed him in so long—disregarding those two kisses the night that I attempted to draw him from his hallucination—and now, as we lie tangled together in the bed sheets, I'm curious as to why not. We move harmoniously together as if we were born to do just this, and for the first time in weeks, everything feels so right.

Nevertheless, this hunger that grasps at every inch of my body is not quenched like I originally predicted. Kissing Peeta does not satisfy that thirst—it only causes it to flare, making me need him even more. My fingers knot in his curls, and he gasps for the air that evades both of us but doesn't stop.

My mind is muddled, desperate, yearning for more of him, more than I've ever wanted before. Peeta kisses me with an unregimented intentionality and a manner of fierceness that I've never experienced from such a gentle soul. But he is still careful with me, and even though he kisses me fearlessly, he is careful not to pull on my hair too hard, or squeeze me too tight. He does not bite. I have never felt so wanted and simultaneously secure. He is as ardent as he is careful. Peeta loves with fanatical intensity, but he is gentle, he is considerate.

I feel my breath suck in fervently as his lips leave mine to pepper kisses on my cheek, then my jaw, and then down to the tender skin of my neck and collar. My breaths are short and gasping as his lips trail miles around. When I whimper his name, his grasp around me tightens and I feel him moan softly against me.

As he whispers kisses over my skin sticky with sweat, his lips seem to mend the cracks that have wedged through me. He heals me with each touch, and I feel renewed, full of life, and full of hope. Peeta is my dandelion—he is beautiful, gentle, and promises a type of revitalization I'd never thought possible.

When his lips rise to meet mine again, I taste my name as he pours it out through parted lips in a fervid sigh. I fell him whisper something about necessity, but my tangled mind can't register much more than my avid hunger and the taste of his lips. Now, nothing matters but him. I suppose I have matters to worry about, but they can worry about themselves until the morning. Kissing Peeta erases my fear, my worries, my pain. He donates a sensation of ecstasy that is unfamiliar but overwhelmingly beautiful.

I don't tell Peeta I love him, in part because I don't know how to convey it correctly. He doesn't ask me for me to vocalize it either, thankfully. But I illustrate through actions and overt infatuation that his feelings for me don't go unreciprocated. He is mine, and I am his.

Eventually, our hungry kisses slow to soft, gentle, elongated ones. Our breathing and heart rates slow, but his hands don't leave my back, my cheeks. My arms remain laced around him with no intent of departure.

I imagine that I could kiss Peeta until the light of morning chases out the midnight gloom, until we're bathed in pastel pinks and oranges. I imagine that he wouldn't contest if I tried to. But after quite some time of lying still with him, tangled into one whole being instead of two broken ones, I pull away to look at him. He's now lying on his back, hands lifted to cup my face as I have one resting on his chest. We watch each other for several minutes, smiling in a comfortable silence. His thumb brushes over my cheek, through my hair, grooming it away from my face. I trace imaginary lines over his torso and collar, amusing myself with the goose bumps that arise where my fingers trail.

Eventually, I lower my body to rest on his chest. His heart beat is thunderous, synchronized with mine. We lay together peacefully.

I all but completely forget the dream as I snuggle up against his warm silhouette. Here and now, the only relevant idea is that we're together. Even though the morning may bring new trials, fresh fears to conquer, we can do this as one. Tingles shoot up my spine as his fingers find mine, ribboning together. His lips gently brush against my forehead; they feel like velvet, and I lean into his kiss. With his remaining hand, he slides his knuckles underneath the fabric of the back of my shirt, tracing up and down with his fingers over the contours of my spine. I shiver pleasantly. The room is warm and hazy with sweat, but we are comfortable for the time being. Even though bliss is characteristically relative, I am confident that this exhilaration is absolute.

Sleep begins to seep into my bloodstream; my eyes feel heavy, and I fight to keep them open. Peeta can see my struggle, and he chuckles musically at the battle.

"Go to sleep, love."

His voice wraps around me, and I gaze up at him through thick lashes to watch his eyes glowing underneath a brow glimmering with perspiration. But he is smiling wider than I've seen in weeks.

"I don't want this to end." I feel like sleep may interrupt whatever affection he has for me—it may be a feeble to fear this, it may be ridiculous, but whatever I have with Peeta is what I ache to have after the sun has risen and the cloak of darkness has evaporated. I've found that many emotions are magnified in the night; I pray this is different.

His chest rises and falls with steady breaths; the rhythmic movement lulls me closer to unconsciousness each second.

"We have a million more moments just like it waiting for us," he murmurs gently.

I hope so.

I feel darkness closing in as my mind begins to falter. "Stay with me, Peeta."

As sleep begins to take me, and my eyes close for a final time tonight, I drown in an abysmal pool of black. Only his voice pulls me back to the surface, even though it's for a brief flicker of a moment, iterating a single word that I've heard from his lips before in response to the same question.

It soothes me all the same.

"Always."

Thank you for the read! Sorry for taking so long to include some well-needed Everlark. I wanted to pace things a little slower than many of the other fanfictions I've read by showing just how painfully long it takes Katniss to become comfortable enough to open up to Peeta again. After reading several articles about PTSD, I've sort of changed my view on the whole Peeta/Katniss situation and so that's influenced the pace of this fanfic. I believe that both of them are extremely traumatized after the war, and when people have PTSD (or a mental disorder like it) I think that progress isn't easy or quick and relapse is possible at any time after being so devastated. I wanted to show that idea by dragging this plot out. But I hope I didn't lose any of your interest in the meantime! Please leave a review if you can if you think that I've interpreted the epilogue of Mockingjay wrong and/or I need to speed things up.

Well, anyway, happy holidays to you all! Until next time :)