A thousand and one apologies for the year+ long wait. I can't make any promises on when the next update will pop up, but I'm really appreciative of everyone who's been reading! Hopefully this chapter was worth the wait!

Chapter 6: Miss Behave

The thunderous crashes from the bowling alley had faded into a Bruce Springsteen song, which played from a single square speaker balanced on the counter beside the register. Katniss could feel Peeta's foot tap the beat against the leg of the table as he chewed on his slice of pizza, and occasionally he'd mumble a few lyrics between bites. There was only one slice left on the metal tray between them, and at the rate they had devoured it, they'd need to order two whole pizzas to replace it.

Katniss filled her plastic cup with beer and took a sip, shielding her lips with her hand when they began to pucker. They'd run out of the PBR special on tap, giving them a pitcher of Blue Moon instead, a luxury, yes, but more sweetness than she was used to.

Peeta wiped his mouth with the wrinkled napkin balled up in his hand. "Have you eaten here before?" he asked.

She looked at the far wall, which was lined with stock head shots of celebrities with their printed signatures in the corner. Elvis Priestly had never been here. According to the sign outside, the place had opened in 1995.

"No," she said, and took another drink.

He finished his pizza and gestured for her to take the last slice.

"It's good, right?"

She smiled tightly as she slid the piece onto her paper plate. She wasn't a good judge, really. She'd probably eat anything.

Peeta pinched the lip of his empty plastic cup, flexing it until it broke apart, allowing him to form a rip down the side. He repeated this until there were several strips anchored from the bottom of the cup, then began to weave the ends into the base. Katniss watched him curiously as he methodically tucked one strip behind the other. When he was finished he slid it to her side of the table. "A flower for you," he said with a proud grin.

She inspected it carefully. It looked like a daisy, but it smelled like lavender and oranges. She nodded her approval, but remained silent.

"This is awkward, isn't it?" Peeta said, cringing slightly. He dropped his forehead to the table and tugged at his blonde curls in mild frustration. "I wish this wasn't weird."

She flashed a sympathetic smile. "Me too." She spun the flower around the table with her finger, then eyed the grease splotched paper plate in front of him. "What are you going to make me with the plate?"

He peered up at her, his chin still resting on the table. There was a questioning look in his eye. A sort of awe he always seemed to carry whenever he looked at her. She didn't deserve it, but she selfishly reveled in it.

"I'll think of something," he said, his gaze so intense that she had to look away. "Plates, napkins, straws, by the end of the night you'll have enough to start a recycled garden."

She bit her lip. "Not a bouquet?" she said timidly.

"They don't last long enough."

The neons shaped like bowling pins and lightening bolts reflected off his glasses, and although she could see his shy smile, she couldn't quite tell if it reached his eyes.

He laughed nervously. "I really, really like you Katniss," he said. His finger was tapping against the empty pizza pan and it vibrated with a metallic twang on the table. "I don't want to screw this up."

She reached out to still his hand from fidgeting. The contact was comforting though, and she allowed for her fingers to tangle with his and rest on the table between them. He brushed his thumb over the back of her hand gently in response.

"I never want to hurt you," he said solemnly. He looked down at her wrist and hooked his thumb beneath one of the elastic bands that hid the marks he'd left on her.

The guilt weighed heavily on her chest, making it hard to breathe. This was all her fault. She had broken him. "I shouldn't have pushed you," she said. She was upset about something else, and she shouldn't have taken it out on him. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"Katniss..." he said. "There's something wrong with me. Something I should have told you."

She felt the blood rush to her ears. She didn't like where this was going. She wanted to stay here with the paper flowers and shy smiles.

"It's kind of hard to explain," he continued. "Sometimes I get these... episodes. And I thought I was better because it'd been so long, but something about the other night – I don't know. It triggered something."

She let her hand slip from his grasp and tucked it in her lap beneath the table. It was her. She was the problem.

His fingers flexed in her absence, and he cleared his throat, masking the hurt that flashed in his eyes. "It's been this way since I was a kid. Sometime in junior high, probably," he said. "It started off as this constant energy. My mind just wouldn't shut down – sometimes for weeks at a time. God, I must have been so annoying then. Not sleeping. Never shutting up. I did great in school that semester, at least. Mania beats Adderall hands down," he said with a misplaced chuckle. "Then I crashed. Hard. I, um, had this crazy breakdown my senior year, after I'd gotten early admissions into Capitol. My mother had me committed because of it."

"Committed?" she said, her eyes widening.

"She didn't know what to do with me," he said. "I was hallucinating these things that weren't there, I couldn't even tell you what was real from that time, the memories are mostly foggy... shiny, almost."

"Why would they send you away though?"

His blue eyes were wide and slightly wild when they met hers. "They were afraid I'd hurt them."

Katniss took his hand again and held onto it tightly, ignoring the faint ache in her wrist. She knew what it was like to be abandoned. She had spent years being kicked around homes that didn't want her. She wasn't going to leave him.

"Joke was on them, though, because as it turned out, I only wanted to hurt myself." He was quiet for a long moment before he spoke again. "I was in and out of the hospital for four months that year. Each time I'd get this handful of different colored pills, and they'd sit there and watch me. Observation they called it, but it felt like I was their lab rat. Too depressed. Too manic. Add some anti-psychotics for good measure."

What's wrong with you? The question lingered on the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed the words. She lowered her gaze, feeling ashamed.

"There's no exact diagnosis," he said, seeming to sense her curiosity. "Bipolar, probably, but it's not like cancer, there's no sure way to tack it down." His hands fidgeted for his beer, but he'd already broken down his cup. "Sorry, that's a lot to digest. It's just... I wanted you to know that it's my fault, really."

"How?"

He lifted the pitcher of beer off the table then lowered it, running his finger along the side to catch the dewy condensation. "The meds they have me on. They're mood stabilizers. They're supposed to keep me in neutral. Not numb or anything, just boxed in, if that makes any sense. I still felt happy and sad and scared and angry, only less of it, I guess. Until I met you."

She pulled her hands back into her lap and chanced a look at him, her breath catching at the wistful expression that softened his already round features.

"Like I said, I hadn't had an episode in years. Made it through undergrad and everything without a single all nighter. And because of that, I think I was probably getting a bit more lax in my treatment than I should have been. Mind over matter isn't exactly the best defense for a crazy person, but I was convinced hat I was still in control. And then I met you and it was like getting struck by lightening. Suddenly I felt like I was on top of the world. More alive than I'd ever been, and that was both exciting and terrifying, because I wasn't sure if it was the start of hypomania or if it was something else. So I went back on the medicine and I threw myself back into my routine and it all seemed to pass. And after, I thought that the lapse was behind me, but then you called, and I was losing control all over again."

"I'm sorry," she managed to say.

"No," he said eagerly, reaching out to take the hand that was hidden beneath the table and instead gripped air. "It wasn't anything you did. It was because I really liked you. I'm not blind. It's not like I've never noticed girls before. In fact, I've probably noticed about every girl. But noticing you was different, and I was having these feelings that were very confusing."

He picked up his napkin and began to shred it into long strips. His posture had changed entirely. Shoulders slumped with his chin tucked against his chest to shroud the deepening flush to his cheeks.

"I, um…" his eyes flickered to meet hers than darted away. "One of the symptoms of a manic episode is an increased sex drive, and, well, I was starting to feel very friendly towards you. I'd been thinking about – doing things. With you. A lot. And when you came onto me the other night, I could also tell that you were upset about something, but I couldn't really distinguish between what was real and what I was projecting. And then we were arguing and everything got away from me, and it triggered something and I couldn't get back to myself in time." He was shaking now, his breath ragged as if he were reliving the events. "I shouldn't have - I'm so sorry. I couldn't get back."

He shook himself from his daze and sat straight in his seat. His eyes landed on her for a brief moment to gauge her silence – or maybe to confirm that she was still there – before he continued. "I went to see my psychiatrist this morning. He upped my lithium and said it may take a few weeks to stabilize, which means I'll have a lot more sleepless nights to think about this." He flinched. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say it like that," he said, scrubbing a frustrated hand over his face. "Look, I'm not asking for your forgiveness. And I don't expect you to ever want to talk to me again. I just wanted to explain myself so you didn't go off thinking I was some kind of creep. Although, I wouldn't blame you if you still thought that I was."

Katniss swallowed the lump in her throat and kept her eyes trained on the floor. She knew she should say something, but she didn't even know where to begin. Instead, she reached for the plastic flower he had given her and pressed her thumb against a drop of remaining beer until it coated her finger. One of the petals sprang free from the woven design and she carefully folded it back into place as he had done before.

Peeta shifted in his seat and rested his clenched fists against the table. He wasn't waiting for her to say something, he was waiting for her to leave, and a part of her wondered why she hadn't. That's what every other person in her life would have done to her. Haymitch would probably have a field day on the topic, she thought bitterly.

"Maybe we should invite your therapist and my therapist to go bowling," she mumbled flatly. Her eyes widened. Had she said that out loud?

"You too?"

There was a flicker of hope behind his expression that she found overwhelming. He wasn't some perfect guy with a perfect life. He was just as broken as her, but he trusted her. She had to learn to trust him too. What had Haymitch called it? Empathy.

"Well, no," Katniss said. She felt her shoulders tense at the base of her neck as she searched for a way out, but after his confession it seemed silly. She could do this. She could be honest. "It's for anger management, I guess."

"I can see that," he said, letting his easy smile return. "Did you want to talk about it?"

She shook her head. "I also apparently suffer from severe trust issues."

"I understand," he said, but she could sense that he was hurt by her caginess.

She opened her mouth to say something, but any word failed to sound. She wasn't ready to tell him.

Katniss dabbed her napkin at a pool of grease on one of her pepperonis, pursing her lips in an attempt to conjure the words that could help alleviate the uneasy tension that had settled between them. She looked to Peeta – he was always much better at these types of things – but he was busy holding the pitcher of beer to the light, studying it with fake interest, as if her earlier dismissal hadn't bothered him.

The crash of pins between the rumbling thunder of balls rolling down their lanes filled the bowling ally and brought her back to attention. "Do you want to maybe bowl a few games?" she asked, shrugging her shoulder noncommittally, in case he declined.

His eyes snapped to meet hers, obscured by the neon lights that reflected off his lenses. He hesitated, his expression questioning, until finally, a relieved grin curled his lips.

He chuckled in that bashful, uniquely Peeta way, and shook his head. "Bowling? Let me guess, another art that you've mastered to an ego crushing degree."

"It's not an art," she scoffed, picking the piece of pepperoni from her slice of pizza and popping it into her mouth. "It's a science."

He plucked the last piece of pepperoni off her plate and wiggled his eyebrows challengingly as he ate it. "You just want to show off," he said.

"No. It was for the shoes."

"The shoes?" he repeated quizzically, and Katniss folded her slice of pizza in half to take a bite.

Where was she going with this? she wondered, suddenly feeling mortified for mentioning it. She looked down at his sneakers, which were always impeccably tied in an elaborate looking knot. Was that something normal to notice? The way someone tied their shoes? That was the thing about Peeta though, she noticed everything about him.

She bowed her head to hide the flush in her cheeks. "I'm curious how one unravels those tangled knots on your shoes."

He followed the line of her gaze and smirked in recognition. Shaking his head at her, he kicked his toe against the leg of her chair in a playful gesture, forcing it a few inches from the table.

"Don't knock it until someone stomps on your untied shoelaces, and you end up with a broken collarbone," he said. His tone wasn't serious, but there was a faint, warning look in his eye.

Katniss was weary she had touched upon a sore subject, but then he began to laugh, so contagiously that soon, she was laughing too. But then they weren't laughing, and Peeta was looking at her with such intensity that she forgot how to breathe.

She became mesmerized by the lines of his mouth. The corners of his lips were stained by the marinara from the pizza, and when he set his jaw, there was a shallow dimple in his chin that became more pronounced. She lifted her eyes to meet his and only caught a flash of his darkened eyes before he was kissing her.

She gasped, allowing for his tongue to touch hers. The kiss was spicy from the pepperoni and slightly sour from the beer, and their lips moved against the others with an unexpected ease. Katniss felt an unfamiliar warmth pool in her stomach, sending a fluttering sensation from her chest to the tips of her fingers. She wondered if this was what it felt like to be happy.

"Sorry," he said after the kiss had ended, but the shy smile that lingered afterward said otherwise. "You, uh, had something right here," he said, pointing at the corner of his own mouth.

"Right," she said, unable to refuse her smile that now mirrored his. "Did you get it?"

He kissed her again like she had wanted, and she melted against him as much as the table between them would allow.

"Okay, no bowling," he said, his face still so close, his features were an intoxicating blur. "What else could we do?" Katniss was ready for more kissing, and leaned in for another only to be met with a finger against her lips. "I think they have Go Karts."

She stared at him incredulously. "You're kidding."

He appeased her with another kiss that was too brief, his fingers tugging on the ragged end of her braid.

"Can we stay here a bit longer, please?" he said.

He was afraid to take her home with him, and maybe she should have been too. Things between them had been moving too fast. They barely knew one another outside of a few ill fated encounters, and the amount of baggage they both carried did not fare well for the intensity she felt towards him.

"Okay," she said nervously.

"Go Karts then?" he said, his tone so hopeful and bright that her heart began to beat a little faster.

Her eyes widened in a brief moment of panic that she quickly stifled. This wasn't a big deal. She could be honest. "I don't know how to drive," she admitted shyly.

"Really?" He raised a curious eyebrow.

"I've never had to," she shrugged, leaving it at that. She could barely ride a bike.

"The great Katniss Everdeen isn't the master of something?" he said, his smile a bit too pleased. He tucked her loose hair behind her ear and she held her breath in anticipation of another kiss that never came.

"You don't know that, I haven't tried it yet," she found the composure to say.

"I'll teach you," he said.

There was a track behind the alley that twisted and looped across itself with a few gradual turns. Being a Friday night, the roped off ramp leading up to the loading area was packed with teenagers and a few adults with their kids. Peeta and Katniss watched the little cars zip around the track with the hum of the lawn mower engines that propelled them no faster than 15 miles per hour.

The operator opened the gate to usher them into the pit lane, pointing at a kid and then to the car they should occupy.

"We want a double," Peeta said, pointing towards the two seated cars that only the young children with parents were filing into.

The operator looked at him dubiously then pointed towards the last car in the line with a shrug.

Peeta pantomimed opening the driver side door for Katniss and gestured invitingly towards the seat.

"Seat belt," he said, buckling frayed lap strap across her hips. He pointed at her right foot. "Green means go." Left foot. "Red means stop. Two footed driving is not really applicable in the real world though, and should never be practiced unless you want to taunt every driver behind you with an unpredictable misadventure. At least if you have an automatic transmission. Involving the clutch is opening an entirely new can of worms. You'd probably enjoy it with maintaining RPMs and things. That's all about math and science, right?"

She lifted both eyebrows calmly. "Green, go. Red, stop," she repeated to reel him back in.

He chuckled sheepishly and scratched at a lock of hair that was curled around his temple. "Yeah," he said. He climbed into the passenger seat, barely fitting in the small compartment with his knees against his chest, and buckled his own seat belt.

The operator came through and instructed her to hold down the break while he pulled the ignition cord that brought the engine to life. Each car rolled out one by one, and when it was Katniss's turn, she switched her weight to the green pedal, jerking them forward abruptly with a few sputtering leaps.

"Gradual," Peeta advised politely.

"Sorry," she said.

The car whizzed ahead to its top speed as she approached the first turn and she cut the wheel sharply, the entire car skidding a few feet to the left before it moved forward again.

"I know, I know, centrifugal force," she said before he could.

"If that's what you call it," he said. He pointed towards the next turn. "Anticipate it," he said. "You've got to ease into the break first."

She began to lightly press the red pedal until the car slowed to a manageable speed then gently turned the steering wheel.

"Green," he said on the outside edge of the turn and they seamlessly began to speed up again. "And now you've got it!" he beamed proudly.

She rounded the next turn without any instruction and pressed more confidently on the gas.

"Now go ahead and parallel park beside those tires over there," he said. She flashed him a pointed look before quickly returning her attention to the road. "Kidding!"

The kart was already handicapped by its heavier load, and Katniss's inexperience slowed them even more, so the other cars were beginning to lap them before they'd reached the start line again.

"It's okay," Peeta shouted, waving the cars past them. "Go around!"

She elbowed him in the ribs causing the kart to jump to the side and Peeta dropped his arm across her shoulder and placed his other hand on the wheel to help steer.

The fifteen minutes of track time had ended and the operator was flagging cars back into the pit lane. Katniss idled on the break while they waited for their car to get switched off, the warm hum of the engine seeming to match the silent giddiness that she was feeling. She glanced at Peeta and then away again. The second time she snuck a glance, he was looking at her too. They smiled at one another as if sharing a secret then turned to face forward at the same time. The arm that was around her shoulder tightened, and she only needed to tilt her head slightly for his mouth to find hers. The kiss they shared was the chaste kind, full of awkward angles and quiet laughter. The kind that she should have experienced a hundred times before this, yet was only discovering for the first time.

Her foot lifted from the break and the kart lurched forward enough to bounce softly off the rubber bumper of the kart in front of them.

"Watch it!" the agitated driver grunted over their shoulder.

"Sorry!" Peeta said. He flashed Katniss a teasingly reproachful glare, and they both laughed before they were kissing again.

"Get a room," the Go Kart operator mumbled under his breath as he switched off their engine.

They climbed out of the car and Peeta took her hand. "That sounds like some sound advice," he said. And despite all the kissing, the implication caught her off guard.

She wanted Peeta. She really wanted Peeta. She had been ready to go home with him earlier. But now, when she really thought about it, she was just as afraid of that room as Peeta had been before. What if things changed once they got there and they began to argue again? What if they said or did things that couldn't as easily be forgiven?

She wanted to stay here, where things were good. Where they were happy.

She caught his hand as they crossed the parking lot and held onto it tightly. It was dark now, but still not late, and while the parking lot was fairly full, there wasn't much traffic through it.

When they reached his car, Katniss leaned against the passenger door before he could open it, turning so she was facing him. He smiled at her lazily, accepting her silent invitation with a kiss that made her knees go weak. His hands held innocently at the nape of her neck, tangling his fingers through her sloppy braid to kiss her more deeply.

She gripped at his waist, rocking him forward just enough for their hips to bump together. She did it again, more deliberately, and his hand fisted in her hair.

"Let's go," he whispered against her mouth.

"Not yet." She wrapped her arms around his neck to kiss him again. Her breath catching when his touch moved down her side. A hand palming her breast before sliding down her back to cup her ass and hold her firmly against his erection.

"We need to go," he said.

"No!" she said frantically. She didn't want to leave this. She didn't want to ruin things again. Didn't want the harshness of reality to ever settle back in. She reached blindly for the handle and cracked open the door to the backseat. "We could stay here," she said.

He looked at her quizzically, but any hesitation was gone in a flash. Before she could even process it, she was spread across the backseat, her body keening as he touched her everywhere at once. The door was still wide open and his feet were still on the pavement, using the steady earth as leverage to thrust against her.

He reached between them to unbutton her shorts, shucking them along with her underwear down her legs in a single motion. His face dipped between her legs, his mouth hot against her entrance as his tongue swept agonizingly briefly between her folds. Then he was kissing up her stomach and the steady pressure of his cock through his jeans was rocking against her.

"Fuck," he muttered, as he nipped at her breast through her thin tee shirt. He struggled to slip his wallet from his back pocket, refusing to break his exploration of her as he rifled through it. He paused suddenly and collapsed against her. "Do you have a condom?" he asked with a deflated sigh.

She scrambled to sit up on her elbows. "What? Um, no."

"Okay. Okay. Well are you…" his face was already flushed, but the color seemed to deepen. "Are you on anything?"

"No."

"Shit," he said. "It's okay, my dorm's only a few blocks away."

He began to pull away and she panicked, locking her legs around his waist to hold him in place. "Do you think you could pull out?" They didn't have time to do much else in a crowded parking lot.

His eyes were glazed behind his disheveled glasses while he contemplated her question. "Yeah," he said with some uncertainty, nodding his head to garner more confidence. "Definitely."

He loosened his belt and lowered his jeans and underwear enough to release his erection. She slid to the edge of the bench, opening her legs wide as he positioned himself against her. They groaned in unison when he slipped inside, his pelvis crashing against hers erratically as he pumped with frantic strokes. Their night of kisses and innocent touches had kept her on edge the entire night, and she came on the first thrust with little provocation.

It was quick, less than a dozen strokes before the warm shot of semen pooled slickly across her pelvis and abdomen. They stared at one another, bewildered and out of breath, and then he began to laugh.

"Did that just happen?" he said.

She smiled nervously. "Yeah."

"Jesus," he said with a chuckle and then let out a heavy breath. "Wow." He dabbed at the mess he'd left on her stomach with the inside of his shirt. "Fuck," he said with a disbelieving smirk.

There were people waiting outside the entrance to the bowling alley now, and although Katniss doubted they could see them, she was painfully aware of how exposed she was. She pulled her shorts on, and hastily plaited her braid into some semblance of normal. Peeta was sitting beside her in the back seat, and when he took her hand into his and brushed his thumb across her knuckles, it was with such adoration that she wondered why she had been in such a hurry to hold onto him. This - whatever it was between them - wasn't something fleeting. He was hers if she'd have him, so long as she didn't let him go.

"Let's go back to your place," she said.

He nodded with a smile, "Okay."

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