Gale
When I left the Capitol this morning, I had been told that I would get the "best sleep of my life", but as I lay here watching the crystal chandler above my bed sway to and fro, I can't help but suppress a laugh. Why I'd hung my hopes on the platitudes of Effie Trinket, is beyond me. I should have been more dubious of a woman whose job it was to transport children to their deaths. This train with its beautiful furniture, luxurious carpets, and the personal chef makes letting your guard down easy. Add the turbulent nature of my next assignment and I wanted to believe, but after two days on this damn contraption, I'm anything but relaxed and rested. A sigh of frustration heaves from my chest and I flop onto my side to stare out the window at the passing landscape. The sun has just started to rise and I can see that at sometime during the night the vast farmlands that had occupied the view have given way to the gentle slopes of mountains. The sight of the hillside re-ignites a low-grade anxiety I've been harboring since I was given my orders last week. Swallowing back bile, I attempt to re-direct my focus by muttering the speech I've prepared for the assignment under my breath. My lips have just begun to silently form the words of the over-rehearsed rhetoric when a knock on my cabin door mercifully interrupts the process. "Come in," I say, rising up on my elbows.
The door slides open and a man dressed in a crisply ironed maroon porters uniform, with hair dyed to match, appears in the doorway. "Sorry for disturbing you so early Captain Hawthorn," the man apologizes in his clipped Capitol accent, "but we are about an hour out from your stop," he states.
"Oh...okay. Thank you," I mutter. The porter nods and disappears behind the click of the door.
Flopping back onto my pillow, I yawn deeply and give my aching body a stretch. I need to get up, get a shower and find something to eat, but my limbs refuse to comply. I sigh and watch the chandler above my bed swing in time with the sway of the train. Miniature rainbows from the crystals decorate the lush velvety printed wallpaper. The tiny spots of light seem out of place here amongst the dark furniture and silver satin bed covers. Lifting a hand, I put my fingertips to a velvety tuft of wallpaper and let the light play on knucks. A voice surfaces. It's "the" voice I've been studiously pushing out my mind since I boarded this damn train.
"Yeah, a lot of things should count for something that doesn't seem to, Katniss. I've got some memories I can't make sense of, and I don't think the Capitol touched them. A lot of nights on the train, for instance."
My logical mind reminds me that the version of Peeta who spouted those words was still deeply influenced by his high-jacking at the time, but after days of denial, my imagination will not be denied the imagery is words invoked. My mind's eye easily paints a crisp picture for me. I squeeze my eyes shut but it floods my thoughts anyway.
Katniss is lying in this very bed, her small frame draped in the same satiny soft gray blanket that I currently lay under. Her dark hair is bed-tossed and fanned out across a pillow...and Peeta's chest. She's curled into his side with her head resting in the crook of his neck, her nose press along his jaw.
I rub the heels of my hands into my eyes but the images will not be denied now that they are free.
Next to her and free of a shirt, Peeta lies with his arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders. His chin rests tenderly atop her nest of hair, a look of contentment on his face.
The tableaux is natural, it's clear that they are home in each other's arms. Long dormant feelings of anger and jealousy grip my gut and I grind my hands even harder into my eyes. "Ugh!" I growl. "This is the last thing I need to be thinking about right now!" I yell at the opulent room. I fling the blanket off and sit up, I toss my legs over the side of the bed and take a few frustrated breaths, desperately trying to shove the damn thoughts back into their locked box in my brain.
"Damn train," I grind out between clenched teeth. When the Rebels won the war the assets of Capital were all re-purposed including the luxurious "Tribute" trains. They are now used for transporting government officials and passengers who are willing to pay a higher price for the luxury experience. While they did remove all of the Capital propaganda and took down photos of past tributes to soften the experience, it hasn't worked for me, but then again, I'm a special case, I guess. I have no way of knowing if this the same train that used to come to Twelve to collect our tributes, but my overactive imagination hasn't let that small detail stand in the way of my torture. As if on queue, Peeta's voice echoes in my head once again.
"I've got some memories I can't make sense of, and I don't think the Capitol touched them. A lot of nights on the train, for instance."
I try to soothe myself with the knowledge that these words were spoken over a year ago and by someone who was at the very least unstable and I've just about convinced myself of the contrived reality when my traitorous thoughts flash to Katniss's face that day in the cafeteria. I growl at my defeat when yet another painful memory pushes forward to punish me. Her face is drawn and pale at the words, lips pulled down in sadness, while tightly restrained tears prick at the corner of her eyes. It's this moment that I feared the most lay here, it was the moment that betrayed her verbalized words with the unsaid ones. I knew instantly that she hadn't bristled because what Peeta said was a lie, no, she was upset because he carelessly treads upon something deeply important and precious to her. When she snapped at him and ran out of the cafeteria I knew it wasn't anger that drove her, but because her heart was breaking and she refused to let others see it. I knew at that moment that she cared more deeply for him than I had allowed myself to believe, but I'm excellent at avoidance. I had fallen in love with her months before she was reaped that first time but I avoided telling her, thinking I had all the time in the world to act, to win her over. When she'd come back from 74th already in love and I had avoided that reality too. I'd foolish 13 to try to make a go of, tried to win her, but it was too late. And then bombs fell and everything changed for us forever. My obsession with destroying the enemy destroyed her life instead. I'd cocky, thought my way was the only way to win, never took a second to think that those same strategies could be used against those I loved. Katniss had tried to tell me, tried to explain what an arena was like, but I didn't listen. Death and grief are good bedfellows I found out. My vibrato took a lot of innocent lives, but only one really ended up mattering, at least to me…and of course to her. It was over, the war and anything between us, so I boxed up all of my memories of her and locked it up tight. I moved to Two, went to work, and tried to forget. It's all gone well, I worked from when my eye opened till they closed at night, leaving no room for myself pity, that is until now. Until this trip and this damn train.
Grunting, I run a frustrated hand through my hair and straighten my spine. Now that my carefully packed box of feelings has been upturned by this trip, I'm not sure my "work until I drop" tactic is going to help, I guess I'm just going to have to function around my turbulent feelings. It's not a pleasant thought, but I've done it before. Taking one last cleansing breath, get to my feet.
Thirty minutes later I'm showered, dressed, and standing in the back of the train as it pulls into the station.