DISCLAIMER: HG CHARACTERS DO NOT BELONG TO ME
"You love me, real or not real" Peeta says to Katniss as they lay side by side on Prim's bed. She pauses, contemplating her answer. She did love Peeta, but she knew she was not, 'in love' with him. It was storming outside, now the end of September, it was still quite warm in the District causing powerful storms to move through the area.
Unable to fall asleep due to the loud, crashing sounds of thunder, she slips out of bed and peeks under her bed and sees Buttercup crouched in the very back. Knowing the cat hated the loud sounds outside, she tells him in a gentle tone she will be in the next room and heads into Prim's room. Knowing Peeta was not asleep for he immediately made room for her on the bed when she entered, he began playing real or not real the minute she laid down beside him.
Knowing she had to answer, she is thankful her back is turned from his as she says, "real".
It was the truth. But she was not expecting his next question.
"Gale was your boyfriend real or not real?"
She forces herself not to sigh, for she didn't want to talk about Gale with Peeta of all people.
She turns her body, so that she is facing him and says, "Peeta-things with Gale and I were-complicated."
"You didn't answer."
"It doesn't matter, what we were-it's in the past. Gale is no longer a part of my life."
"But you love him" Peeta says it as a statement of fact.
"I don't know" she says in a defensive tone.
"It's okay Katniss, I know I can't compete with him, its why I've always been jealous of him."
Katniss leans forward and looks into his eyes as she says, "you don't have to be jealous" and kisses him softly, their first kiss since that fateful day in the arena.
She kisses him in order to stop the current conversation, but also to gage what her feelings for Peeta are. She owed it to him to try being more than friends, for almost six months had passed since he started sleeping in Prim's room a few times a week. Clearly Gale had moved on, it was time for her to move on as well.
Once the kiss ended, she pulls back, and they smile at each other before she lays down and drifts to sleep in his arms.
The next morning, Katniss awakens to the sound of Buttercup scratching at the door. She rolls over and sees Peeta fast asleep. She silently gets out of the bed and follows Buttercup out of the room and down the stairs into the kitchen. As she pours a bowl of food for the cat, she glances over at the calendar and sees the date is the twenty-fifth, Gale's birthday. As Buttercup begins eating his breakfast, she goes upstairs to her room and into her closet. She takes out a small box near her shoes and opens it. In the box is a medium sized leather crossbody hunting bag. She had seen the bag in a new store that had opened over the summer in town. Promising him she would get him a better gift next year for his birthday, she knew she had bought the gift in the hopes that they would have reunited by the fall. Both being the stubborn individuals they were, neither was willing to apologize after their last conversation in May.
Thinking she most likely will never give him this gift now, for she now knows he has a girlfriend-one he is currently on a weekend trip with; she places the bag back into the box and into the closet then heads downstairs, figuring Peeta is in the kitchen by now beginning to make breakfast for the two of them.
February
Katniss looks out the window as she sits on Peeta's lap on the bed breathing deeply, her hands wrapped around his back. She hears as Peeta's grunts intensify in her ear and his hands move down her back. As he comes, she feels him reach down and push her slightly forward closer to him, giving him access to grab her backside, squeezing it as he came. Not expecting this move, Katniss keeps her head on his shoulder, frozen as a statue as she stares forward, watching the snow come down outside.
She began having sex with him right after the holidays, knowing it was time for them to take the next step in their relationship. Now that he had been with her for a couple of months, she realizes he must be willing to take more risks when it came to their love making.
She also realized, that while she enjoyed being someone and feeling something, that she lacked sexual chemistry with Peeta. She didn't have that feeling of passion that she had with Gale, despite knowing that Peeta loved her and wanted her just as much as he did. Peeta touching her the way he did just now, did not elicit the same response.
She tells herself she needs to give it more time, that she needs to stop comparing Peeta to Gale.
"Are you okay?" Peeta says softly into her ear.
"I'm fine Peeta."
"You seemed somewhere else just now."
Knowing she needed to come up with an excuse quick, she pulls back and gives him a quick kiss then says, "Seeing all the snow outside, I was thinking, looks like I won't be able to hunt today."
"Guess you are stuck inside with me all day then" he says with a smile.
"Guess so" she says teasingly then leans forward to give him another kiss.
Gale concentrates on the report he is reading, trying to finish the last paragraph, telling himself he will take a break once he finishes the last section. Once he does, he gets up from his desk to stretch his legs, refills his coffee, and when returns to his desk, picks up the phone and calls his mom, telling her not to wait for him tonight for dinner, that it's going to be another late day.
"Okay, I'll leave a plate for you, but I am concerned that you are working too many hours Gale."
"There's a lot going on right now, but we are close to flushing out the resistance groups from District 2 for good."
"I just hate to see you have to fight….again."
"It's my job to protect the District mom."
"And it's my job to worry about you."
Chuckling in response he says, "fair enough, I'll talk to you later."
"Oh Gale before you go, Eden called again, she sounded….distraught that she hasn't been able to reach you."
Gale sighs and says, "Thanks for letting me know, I will call her back on my lunch break."
Once he hangs up the phone and picks up where he left off in his reading, his mind begins to wander. Knowing his conversation with her won't be easy, for he didn't know if he should tell her the truth of what's been on his mind. While she hadn't done anything wrong, her request asking him to consider the possibility of the two of the moving into an apartment together resulted in him telling her a week later that he needed time before he could a decision could be made.
It wasn't that he didn't have feelings for her, he cared for her a lot, but he knew he didn't love her, and he knew that moving in with her would take their relationship to a whole new level.
He knew it wasn't right to move in with someone when his heart belonged to another, but he was torn, knowing that Katniss has moved on with Peeta, he knew he needed to move on with his life, and that perhaps in time, he would come to love Eden.
He somehow manages to make it through the next section of the report then sees it is noon, and time for lunch. After getting up again to stretch his legs and grab his food to take back to his desk, he picks up the phone and dials Eden's number. She picks up after the 2nd ring.
"Hey, it's me, sorry it has taken me so long to call you back. Things have been crazy here at work" he says to her.
"I understand. But it's driving me crazy I have not heard from you. I can't stand thinking I have done something wrong."
"You haven't done anything wrong. I just—I am not ready for us to move in together."
"We don't have to move in right away, we could just start looking for places right now, the lease is not up on my apartment till June."
"I can't agree to it Eden, I'm not ready, I'm sorry."
"You know I need to get out of my current apartment Gale. I can't stand my roommates."
"I know, and I can help you find another apartment, or a cottage nearby."
"You know I can't afford a cottage unless I get another roommate, plus it would be too far away."
"Then we will have to look at a smaller apartment for you then."
"I know it might seem like we are rushing things, but we get along so well, I really think us living together won't change anything. Plus, if we find something, you can move in first and by the time I move in, we would be just a month shy of our one-year anniversary."
Gale didn't want to tell her he suspects part of the reason she doesn't get along with her roommates is because they had started dating shortly after she had moved into her apartment. And he had begun spending Friday and Saturday nights at the apartment for he did not want her spending the night over at his family's house when they first started dating.
Deciding he needs to tell her the truth he says, "I'm not concerned about us rushing things, we do get along really well, my family really likes you, we have fun together-"
"That's one way of putting it" she says teasingly, for she felt she and Gale had an amazing sex life. And knows it is part of the reason she has issues with her roommates for they were jealous.
"But I cannot commit to you right now in the way you deserve. I need more time before I can do that."
"I don't understand" she says in a confused tone.
"I think your feelings for me are stronger than mine are for you."
He hears silence on the other end for what felt like an eternity before she finally says, "I mean….I know we haven't talked about if we love each other or anything like that but….are you saying you don't love me?"
"I'm saying when we move in together is my way of saying that I do, when I make a commitment to someone or something, I'm all in, I'm in it for the long haul."
"Okay…but I wasn't expecting this."
"I know, I'm sorry."
"So, what now?" she asks.
"I don't know" he says in a tired tone. "I mean it when I say things have been really crazy here, I'm probably going to be gone for a few days, possibly longer, I am leading a group of soldiers and we are planning an attack soon, but I can't say where."
"What does that mean for us?"
"That I just…need some more time to sort out my feelings. I do care about you; I don't want you to think that I don't."
"I don't know if I can wait around for you Gale, I get that you are not ready for us to move in together, but I need more-I mistakenly thought you felt the same way about me."
"I understand. Can I contact you once I get back?"
"Yeah, but I need to know what you have sorted out in regard to your feelings."
He promises her he will contact her once he gets back, then eats his food as he continues reading through the report, before moving onto the next one.
March
Katniss finishes the last page of the book she, Peeta, and Haymitch were working on, a book about the former tributes. Peeta did the artwork, while she and Haymitch wrote information about the tributes. As she lets the ink dry on the page, she looks up and sees the time is 5:15 pm. Knowing dinner will be ready by 5:30, she gets up from the desk and heads downstairs. Now the beginning of March, spring had not arrived in District 12 yet, for it was still very cold and snow still fell upon the District from time to time. She had seen on TV that District 2 had a bad storm that passed through their area last night, bringing a lot of snow to the District.
When Katniss walks into the kitchen, she sees Haymitch sitting at the table. Pleased to see her former mentor was sober enough to join them for dinner tonight, she hands him a plate as they make their way to the counter and begin filling their plates. As the three of them engage in conversation, discussing the medicine factory that was now up and running. Just as Haymitch predicted, the opening of the factory did bring some residents back, but not many, and about a hundred people were living in the District now. Katniss expected that number to rise only when a child was born, and so far, no children had been born.
While Peeta talked about applying for a job at the factory, he is interrupted by the sound of the television beeping, letting them know an alert was about to come on. Haymitch goes over and turns the television on, then Paylor's face came up on the projected screen.
Katniss continues to chew her food as Paylor begins talking, informing Panem that District 2 had been tracking and advanced upon resistance groups in the mountains of the District, at times engaging in combat. Going on to say that Panem's forces had control of the District, so much so that the majority of the residents in the city had no idea any conflicts had occurred. But that yesterday, during the snow storm there was an attack from inside the nut, trapping over one hundred soldiers inside.
Katniss's fork makes a loud bang as it drops on the plate, unable to process Paylor's last words, that the government official of the District was trapped inside the nut as well.