PART TWO | THE QUELL
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The two Peacekeepers walk straight into the kitchen, their boots stomping on the ground heavily, leaving a wet trail on the wooden floors. "Good evening, may I help you?" Katniss' mother says, a little too politely. Haymitch goes tense at her tone, the falseness of it shining through like a torch.
"We're looking for Katniss Everdeen." one of the barks at us.
"May I ask what for?" she says, in the same sweet voice.
"That is not for your information." the other one says.
Haymitch decides to intervene, knowing that Katniss' mother isn't going to pull this off. We don't know exactly how long we'll be waiting for Katniss to come back, and we need to be as natural and normal as possible or else they'll know that something is up."Look, I'm her mentor and Katniss Everdeen, the little darling of the Capitol, is my prodigy and thanks to the last time you lot had your hands on her I had to cancel a very important wedding photo shoot," Haymitch snarls in his normal sarcastic voice. "So if you wouldn't mind telling me exactly what you need her for, I would like that very much.
One of the Peacekeepers looks as if they're about to say something, but the other holds their hand up to stop them. "We have a message for her from Thread." they say with a finality to their tone.
"Alright," Haymitch says. "Well, Peeta, what have you heard from your... darling fiancée?"
"She's been out shopping in the market most the day," I say. "Told me she was going to stop off at some traders. Always been close with them, so I guess she's late home chatting to them."
"Typical. Can't get her to stop chatting when she's off the cameras, but on camera, her mouth is glued shut," Haymitch snorts. He turns back to the Peacekeepers, as if he's forgotten that they're even there. "Well, if you're going to insist on waiting for her to come back, I'm not going to wait with you. Peeta, chess?"
I nod, as if this idea of playing chess with Haymitch is a fantastic way to spend our night together. We walk over to living room that adjoins the open-plan kitchen and set out the chess set. Both Prim and Katniss' mother take our lead, making little chit chat to themselves and pretending as though the Peacekeepers aren't standing like robots at the edge of the doorway. Prim decides to sit by the hearth of the fire, reading but not really reading. I watch as her eyes slide off the page, unable to concentrate on any of the words. Katniss' mother begins to make dinner, picking up from where Prim left off cutting the greens, but incredibly slowly, dragging the process out as if it'll make the wait for Katniss seem not as long as it is.
While it feels like hours pass, it's probably much less before Katniss walks into the doorway, the sound of her boots filling the hallway. "Hello," she says in an estranged voice as she notices the Peacekeepers in the doorway.
"Here she is, just in time for dinner," Katniss' mother says, in her overly bright voice.
Katniss pulls off her hood and shakes the snow from her hair. "Can I help you with something?" she asks the Peacekeepers.
"Head Peacekeeper Thread sent us with a message for you," the woman said.
"They've been waiting for hours," Katniss' mother adds on. It implies a heavy question: where have you been?
"Must be an important message," Katniss says.
"May we ask where you've been, Miss Everdeen?" the woman asks.
Katniss works the charade well. "Easier to ask where I haven't been," she says, sighing heavily as she flings her bag onto the table. She surveys the kitchen, taking in Haymitch and I playing chess (which I can imagine how odd it looks), Prim by the fire and her mother cooking.
"So where haven't you been?" Haymitch asks, his voice bored as if he couldn't care less.
"Well, I haven't been talking to the Goat Man about getting Prim's goat pregnant, because someone gave me completely inaccurate information as to where he lives," Katniss says pointedly to Prim.
"No I didn't," she says indignantly. "I told you exactly."
"You said he lives beside the west entrance to the mine," Katniss says.
"The east entrance," Prim corrects her.
"You distinctly said the west, because then I said, 'Next to the slag heap? and you said 'Yeah,'" Katniss recites.
"The slag heap next to the east entrance," Prim says.
"No. When did you say that?" Katniss asks.
"Last night," Haymitch chimes in, as if he was there. As if this was all real.
I can't help but admire how well all of them are acting. I decide I need to join in. "It was definitely the east," I add. Haymitch and I let out a small laugh, which get us a glare from Katniss. "I'm sorry, but it's what I've been saying. You don't listen when people talk to you."
"Bet people told you he didn't live there today and you didn't listen again," Haymitch jokes.
"Shut up, Haymitch," Katniss says. Haymitch and I crack up again, our laughter louder. Prim even gives a small smile. "Fine. Somebody else can arrange to get the stupid goat knocked up," Katniss continues, which makes us all fake laugh even more. I can't even help but admire my own acting skills now, too.
Katniss turns to the Peacekeepers, trying to see what effect our little play out has had on them. The man is smiling to himself, but the woman is unconvinced. "What's in the bag?" she spits. My heart squeezes. If she's been in the woods, she's probably got some sort of game or wild plants in there that would give her away.
"See for yourself." Katniss says, tipping the contents on the table.
I get up the table, noticing bandages, sweets and other assorted non-guilty items that fill my body with relief. "Oh, good," Katniss' mother says. "We're running low on bandages."
"Ooh, peppermints," I say, popping open the bag of sweets and putting one in my mouth.
"They're mine." Katniss says, sweeping for the bag, but I toss it over to Haymitch who stuffs loads of the sweets into his mouth. He gives the bag to Prim after that, and it's almost as if we're playing piggy in the middle with Katniss. "None of you deserves sweets!" she says to us all.
"What, because we're right?" I say, wrapping my arms around her, but instead of leaning into it to appear like the sweet couple we're supposed to be, she gives a yelp of pain. She tries to turn it into something else, but I know that it was a noise of pain and nothing else. I raise my eyebrow, but I try to diffuse the situation. "OK, Prim said west. I distinctly heard west. And we're all idiots. How's that?"
"Better," she says, accepting the kiss that I plant onto her lips. She turns to the Peacekeepers. "You have a message for me?" she asks.
"From Head Peacekeeper Thread," the woman says. "He wanted you to know that the fence surrounding District 12 will now have electricity twenty-four hours a day."
"Didn't it already?" she says in a sick, sweet voice. My stomach knots again in worry, though. The electricity must have been what kept Katniss behind for so long. How exactly did she hurt herself?
"He thought you might be interested in passing the information on to your cousin," the Peacekeeper says.
"Thank you. I'll tell him. I'm sure we'll sleep a little more soundly now that security has addressed that lapse." Katniss says. The Peacekeepers mouth tightens as Katniss' fiery attitude comes out a little more, but there isn't much more they can do so they both give curt nods and leaves.
As soon as they leave, Katniss slumps against the table, a noise of pain trailing from her mouth as she does so. "What is it?" I ask her immediately, trying to hold her.
"Oh, I banged up my left foot. The heel. And my tail-bone's had a bad day, too." she tells me. I help to lead her over to one of the soft chairs to rest herself on nicely.
Her mother crouches down beside her, easing boots off. "What happened?" she asks.
"I slipped and fell," she says, but she's met with disbelief in all of our expressions. "On some ice." she adds, making us all realise once again that the house is bugged and we can't talk safely here. Not now.
"There might be a break," Katniss' mother tells her as she strips of Katniss' socks. She checks out her right foot. "This one seems all right." She then judges her tail-bone, saying it's probably badly bruised.
Prim goes off to get Katniss' pyjamas and helps her change into them by the fire. When Katniss is changed, we all have dinner of stew and bread and Katniss eats three entire bowls. The fire crackles as the night wears on, and the atmosphere between us all seems a lot calmer. I'm even beginning to enjoy the games of chess that Haymitch and I are playing together.
"How was school?" Katniss asks Prim, who sits with her head on Katniss' knee. She strokes her soft blonde hair as they suck on the peppermint sweets Katniss bought earlier.
"All right. We learned about coal by-products," she says. "Are you going to try on your wedding dresses?"
"Not tonight. Tomorrow probably," Katniss says.
"Wait until I get home, OK?" she says.
"Sure."
Katniss' mother brews some sweet chamomile tea, slipping some sleep syrup into Katniss' cup. It reminds me sharply how Katniss tricked me with the sleep syrup and berry concoction back in the Games just to save me. The memory brings a fresh wave of sadness and heartbreak as I remember how strongly I truly thought Katniss cared about me, loved me, wanted me to stay alive.
I volunteer to get Katniss to bed, carrying her in my arms. I go into her room, which is much barer than my own full of paintings back in my own house, and tuck her into bed. As I'm about to walk away with my goodnight hanging in the air, she catches my hand and holds onto it. "Don't go yet. Not until I fall asleep," she says.
I fall to the floor by the side of her bed, encapsulating her hand in both of my own. "Almost thought you'd changed your mind today. When you were late for dinner."
"No, I'd have told you," Katniss says. She pulls one of my hands up to her face, leaning her cheek against the back of it and inhaling deeply. Deep down, I know she's just in a state of low inhibition due to the sleep syrup, but my heart warms with her actions. Everything about these moments reminds me of the time I thought she loved me, truly loved me. "Stay with me."
"Always." I say, but she's fallen into sleep and didn't hear my words. It takes all of me to try to leave her, to try to remind myself that she's just in a sleep syrup induced state and that she doesn't love me. She loves Gale.
Days go by and spring comes around. I go by the Katniss' house every single day to bring her cheese buns (a new favourite) and help her to work on a family book she started to document plants and flowers. She told me she wanted to record all of her families knowledge into it, with her father's advice about edible plants and her mothers about medical uses and everything she knows herself, too. I help her as an artist: she describes the plants, bringing me samples whenever she can, and I sketch them onto the heavy parchment paper. Then, she puts down all the information she knows about the plant.
It takes up a lot of our time, but I don't mind. I get to spend my whole days with her and her lovely family from time to time. It's quiet work, but I love hearing the tales about her father and times in the woods. I love watching her print out the information carefully into the book, her face full of concentration. Her tongue sticks out slightly of her mouth as she puts the words onto the paper, locked onto the task.
One afternoon, when I'm shading a blossom into the book, I notice that Katniss is staring at me. I look straight up at her, our eyes locking onto each other. There's an intense, fizzing chemistry between us and I want to reach over and touch the braid that frames her soft face. "You know, I think this is the first time we've ever done anything normal together."
"Yeah," she agrees. "Nice for a change."
I fall into her eyes. I fall in love.
