Before the War, seventy-five years was an extraordinarily long time to stay alive. Even the most robust miner eventually succumbed to the black lung or worse after working underground for thirty years. Merchants tended to live a little longer, but not by much. Sixty was incredibly old. Greasy Sae herself had been eighty when she finally passed, and she was the oldest person from Twelve I had ever met.

But I was eighty years old over a decade ago.

If seventy-five years alive is a challenge in our world, seventy-five years married to the same man is not just an accomplishment; it's a near impossibility. Maybe, as time carries everyone forward, people will continue to live longer and longer, and have more of a chance for such a milestone, but I can see already that longer lives and more opportunity means that young people are generally getting married later and later. It's probably for the best. The first year of marriage is especially difficult, and I would not recommend the typical couple attempting it without some baseline of maturity.

Not to say that anything Peeta and I ever did was typical. So I suppose, in our atypical way, we have managed to stay husband and wife for seventy-five years. I guess after surviving two death matches and a war, fate decided to be kind and grant us extraordinarily long life. With no radical body reconstruction from any sort of doctor (save what happened after the Games and the war), we have both lived significantly longer than the Hunger Games existed. Our marriage itself has lasted as long as they did. Many patriotic historians are beginning to push this fact as a kind of symbolic victory over tyranny, attempting to build confidence in a government that, without people like Paylor and Gale running it, is already showing glimpses of the centralized domination that was the signature of the Capitol. I think Peeta and I were just very, very lucky.

But he's dying now, my steady, sweet man.

The neurologists who tried so hard to heal his brain completely told us this would eventually happen, that the walls in his mind would break down with age. They expected it about thirty years ago, and were stunned that it took so long to develop. It shouldn't even be a problem. Most elderly people get it. Dementia, it's called. Mostly, it's curable.

For Peeta, it isn't.

For the past five years, he has had an episode every single day. They aren't like they used to be, though. Instead of being overcome with a violent swirl of confusing memories, it's like someone wipes his mind blank. He can't remember anything at all, and he's terrified, like a small boy. I try my best to calm him, but my eyes are so bad now and my hips move so slowly that nothing comes easy. He will be lost somewhere in the house, and I just can't get to him. Sometimes, I can't even make out where he is, or what he is saying. It's a living nightmare, so much worse than the terrible dreams that have plagued me for most of my life.

Since this began, the episodes have gotten longer and longer, sometimes lasting for hours. Doctors from the Applethorpe Institute in the Capitol have come and gone. There's nothing they can do but leave us with a bottle of pills. One pill will keep away episodes for half a day, but make the next one that follows last a great deal longer. They told us that we can probably expect results from one bottle, but after that, they won't work anymore. We have been rationing them, trying to prepare for the most important moments: our great grandchildren's birthdays, district celebrations, and days like today, our wedding anniversary. Eventually, there will come a day where an episode will start, and then never end.

This morning, he took the last two pills at once before I could stop him.

The cruel thing is that even at ninety-three Peeta is hale and hearty in every other possibly way, while my body is the one that is steadily wearing out, holding on to life through sheer stubborn tenacity. Almost every morning, Mitch, our oldest great grandson, is at the door waiting to walk him to the bakery, and when he isn't, Peeta goes alone, rain or shine. He makes cakes and hands out cookies, just as he always has, while I stay at home, puttering around in the house, occasionally gardening, trying to ignore the fact that I can hardly see and can only walk at a snail's pace. Every other morning Hope comes to read to me, or just to talk. After lunch, I always take a nap. When Peeta comes home, we go for a long, slow walk to the Meadow. It is a schedule that I find as comforting now in my old age as I found our routines at the beginning of our marriage.

"Well, Prim," I say, as I slowly begin clearing the dead leaves from our flower beds as I do every year on this day. "I never thought it would be like this, coping so long without you. And all married to the baker's son, too. But we managed well enough. Two children, five grandchildren, and even great grandbabies now, all from the girl who swore she'd never have kids. Wish you could see them, Prim. The newest one has your name, even. I hope you don't mind, especially since she looks like Johanna already."

I look down the line of the house. Even though I can't make out any details, the bright yellows of all the primroses that Peeta planted so long ago wink back at me. It feels good to be here, even though crouching down into this position took an absurd amount of time. "Of course you don't mind, little duck. You'd never mind something like that. I was the one who minded, and Peeta kissed minding out of me about thirty-five years ago. He's been a good husband, Prim, even after all of these years. The best, really. I hope I've managed to be an acceptable wife."

"I suppose I'll keep you around," a deep, if somewhat wavering, voice answers me. I smile into the flowers so he can't see. Only now that I'm half-deaf can he sneak up on me, and he takes advantage of it often.

"You always come up on my rotten natural ear," I chide him, trying to scowl. It's a bit amusing that the one the Capitol fixed is now the only one that works properly. "You're going to surprise me one of these days and end up with a broken nose."

He reaches down and pulls me up to him slowly, gently. I can feel my bones creaking. "I've had worse," he confesses conspiratorially, as if I don't know.

I wipe my dirty hands on my trousers and lean into him. "How was the bakery?"

Pulling his other hand from behind his back, he reveals a single cheese bun. "You tell me."

I eat it, dirty fingers and all (because at this age, who really cares about a little dirt?) while we begin to slowly make our way through the yard toward the town and eventually the Meadow, as we have done every day, regardless of weather, for the past ten years. "I think I gave a cookie to every single child in the District today," he chuckles. "Fletcher was pulling his hair out. Says he doesn't understand how I managed to stay in business for forty years without him keeping me in line."

"He gives them out when he thinks you're not looking," I share my son's secret.

"Oh, I know all about that," he grins. "Thinks I don't notice."

We pass the bakery and Peeta reaches out to graze his fingers across the back wall. "Long life's more genetic than anything else, Vick told me the other day. I wonder how long he'd have lived…"

I lift his large, scarred, age-spotted, beautiful hand to my lips and kiss it in response. I often wonder the same thing about my father.

At the edge of town, I feel a small tremor run through his body, an episode that the medication is suppressing. "I don't want to go like this, Katniss," he says after a long silence.

I squeeze his hand. "I know."

In the Meadow, we're surprised by a large crowd. This March is so unlike the one when we were married – it's bright and warm and all of the violets are coming out early. The trees are in flower, and the woods are aflame with golds and reds that outline the branches. The field is completely full of dandelions. For the first time I can remember, it is warm enough on this day for the first spring picnic. Hope has arranged it all, blankets scattered in what I think is a messy circle surrounding two unfamiliar chairs. They're probably so I don't have to lower myself to the ground. A little piece of me is offended by this, but then I smile when I get close enough to realize that based on what I know of my family and friends, these chairs were made as a gift. Everyone is already sitting on the blankets, eating and talking, and they cheer when we arrive. I feel Peeta's grasp on my hand tighten before my daughter wraps her arms around me firmly, burying her face in my neck. I kiss the top of her silvered dark hair.

"Tell me what those chairs look like," I tell her.

"Jasper carved them out of oak," she begins. "They're different, but the same. Dad's has grain and bread and cookies and dandelions on it. Yours has trees, and plants, and deer and a bow. They interlock with each other, sort of lean into each other in a way. They're like thrones, I guess. I told him it was a little much, but he's pretty heavy-handed with the symbolism. He said that anyone who manages to stay married for this long deserves something ostentatious. I asked what he was insinuating, exactly."

I run my hand across the smooth wood, wordlessly appreciating the craftsmanship of Gale's youngest son, using touch to experience the small details that I can't really make out. I wish he and Johanna were still here to see it. Gale went first out of all of us, about twenty-five years ago. Something in his heart just exploded, a time bomb that had developed over years of stress. Johanna was never really the same. When she found out she had cancer, she didn't fight the way she could have. Doctors might have been able to cure it, but she didn't seek help. Didn't even tell us until it was too far along to hide. They never did get married. I think she only refused to get on his nerves.

"They're beautiful," Peeta insists. "Don't listen to her, Katniss, she's just being modest. She also didn't mention the mockingjays on yours."

"Well, sometimes she gets embarrassed about that, Dad," Hope replies, and I can vaguely see the blush on her cheeks, so much like her father's. "Why don't you sit down, and I'll bring you some food."

"We can get our own food," I insist.

"Momma, I want to, okay? Let me take care of you for a while."

We sit and immediately, Peeta is ambushed by three curly heads of hair, a blonde and two brunettes. The little ones love him best, but I don't mind. The mother of one of them, my son's daughter, comes to my side and squeezes my shoulder in wordless congratulations.

The day is flawless.

As dusk is falling, Juniper Hawthorne emerges from the woods and silently approaches me. Everyone else is distracted by a story Peeta is telling, interrupted every few sentences by cries of disbelief and argued corrections from Vick who is sitting on a folding chair about ten feet away from him. They do this all the time, arguing like… well… like two old men, which I guess finally makes sense since that's what they are. When no one is looking, Johanna's only daughter slips a small, knotted cloth bag into my hands, and then grasps my wrist with her strong, worn fingers. Though she is past sixty, she carries the unblemished, peerless beauty that I've been told came from Johanna's mother's mother. Her short auburn hair is untouched by gray, but she has her father's unwavering silvery eyes. The eyes of a hunter. When her uncle died quietly in his sleep about ten years ago, she moved into his cabin, and has stayed there ever since.

"I want you to know, it has been more than an honor," she murmurs. Without another word, she turns and strides back into the woods, swinging her bow over her shoulder.

I feel my daughter behind me before she speaks. I guess everyone hadn't been distracted after all. "What was that about?" she asks suspiciously.

I draw her close and show her the contents of the bag, "Tell me how many will make it certain."

Her kind eyes are filled with a mixture of outrage and sorrow. "Momma, I–"

"He took the last pill today," I interrupt her.

The outrage is not gone, but it is joined by understanding. Despite having my sister's personality and my husband's kindness, my daughter still has a great deal of my fire. She bites her lip hard, as though trying to make a choice, and then answers, "Four. Probably less, but four will be plenty." Her embrace is fierce, long, desperate and wordless, before she returns to her husband's side, burying her head in his shoulder.

We leave before everyone else, claiming to be tired and old, but really, wanting to spend the last hours of our anniversary alone. As we say our goodbyes, I hug everyone a little longer, a little tighter, looking each one in the eyes that I can't quite see. My oldest grandson starts a small bonfire, and everyone gathers together. As Peeta and I walk to the edge of the Meadow, I hear my son begin to sing "The Hanging Tree."

The mockingjays in the wood fall silent.

It's hard to believe the world that has grown out of the ashes of what used to be District Twelve.

"What did Juniper give you?" Peeta asks. Nothing escapes him.

"An anniversary present for us to share," I whisper.

He squeezes my hand.

Before we enter the house, we stop at Haymitch's grave and stand for a moment. I still chuckle at the ostentatious marker that Effie insisted we erect. I had readily agreed with her, despite Peeta's protest for something more aesthetically pleasing. But I knew how much Effie's monstrosity would have both annoyed and touched the old drunk. That alone was a fitting memorial to the man who, in his way, had been mentor, father, savior to us both, maybe even to our world, but hadn't really been able to save himself from the demons that haunted him.

When we enter the house, Peeta carries me up the stairs, still strong and steady enough to do so. He sits me gently on the bed, and then kneels beside me, stroking my hand. I feel him beginning to shake. The medication is wearing off. "I love you so much, Katniss," he whispers in a rare moment of sadness, tears gathering in his eyes, "but I'm going to die not remembering." He's right. Like this, he's going to die in terror, completely alone. I have no idea how long it will take, or if I'll last long enough to take care of him until then.

It's time, I realize.

I pull out the small satchel full of berries, while slowly sitting up.

"I don't want to live without you," I whisper back.

His eyes are unreadable, as though he is fighting with himself. What about the children? The grandchildren? Our friends? I'm certain he is wondering, but I am still, after all of these years, not certain what his answer will be. The truth is that we have been in the world long enough that, though they will mourn us, no one will be irreparably damaged if we are gone. But Peeta, for all his open, easy manner, is still sometimes a mystery to me.

"Trust me," I say.

"I always wondered how they actually tasted," he jokes in way of response, though the tears swim in his pools of blue. He's right. We never got much of a taste the first go round. I pour half of the nightlock berries into his hand, squinting to see that they are well more than four. Then I struggle to my knees, accepting the help he gives me. I spill the berries that remain into my own palm, feeling the weight of every single one. I move in closer so that I can look into the beautiful eyes of the gentle man that has walked beside me for three quarters of a century longer than I deserved.

"On the count of three?" I ask.

He leans forward and kisses me with a lifetime full of tenderness.

"On the count of three," he murmurs.

"One…"

Our free hands find each other and we grasp them tightly.

"Two…"

This is so very much more than I ever expected from my life.

"Three…"

They taste sharp, tart with a tiny edge of sweetness that grows once I swallow.

"I love you, boy with the bread," I whisper.

He smiles a smile that fills the entire universe.