A/N: Hey I don't know if I need to keep saying that I don't own THG or characters or anything, but I just thought I'd add a reminder here as a precaution. I had to re-read chapter 4 to write this one, found a hilarious error (lol, pasties) and added a sentence or two near the middle to end of the chapter. I suggest you take a look, I don't think it'll prevent you from understanding what takes place in this chapter, but there's a slight reference or two to it in this one. Enjoy!

Chapter 5

That weekend Madge hosted a pool party on Saturday afternoon. The teens were taking advantage of the still hot weather. Since Katniss lived closest to Madge she arrived very early to help her friend set up for the party. When they were finished Madge went inside to put on her bathing suit, Katniss knew that for the girls a pool party was more of a sit at the side of the pool and show off your body sort of thing, but it was rather hot so she decided to take a quick swim before anyone else showed up.

She loved to swim; she had done a few laps in the pool when there was a large splash beside her. She stopped her swimming and found Peeta in the pool beside her; under the water he grabbed her waist and pulled her close to his body. She responded quickly knowing that they had little time. He pushed her up against the pool wall as she wrapped her legs around his waist, getting as close to him as she possibly could. They kissed recklessly, and they pulled away completely breathless when they both could hear car doors shutting and the voices of their friends come from around the side of the house. Without saying a word they broke apart quickly and Katniss got out of the water. She went to her towel that was spread out beside the pool; Peeta must have been in a rush to get in the pool because his t-shirt and sandals were tossed carelessly on her towel. She thought this may raise suspicion, why would Peeta toss his things with hers? So she moved his sandals to one of the patio chairs and picked up his t-shirt to do the same when she stopped, it was her favourite colour, a very dark forest green. She quickly stuffed it into the bottom of her pool bag; she loved wearing guy's shirts sometimes, especially when the guy wearing it smelled as wonderful as Peeta.

She wrapped the lower half of her body in a sarong and went to meet her friends. She found Marvel and took her spot beside him. He kissed her cheek, a far cry from the mind numbing kiss she had just exchanged with Peeta; she looked at her feet, recalling the kiss, smiling at the thought of it. Yes, she had a weakness for Peeta, and if he was going to be pulling stunts like that she knew this thing between them was going to be very dangerous. She knew it was mostly because she didn't want to stop him from doing things like that. It left her exhilarated, she'd never felt anything like it before.

She was by Marvel's side all afternoon, and Glimmer was not at the party, so he was once again playing his role as good boyfriend. Overall, it was a really pleasant afternoon; everything was as it had been with Marvel before the summer. As the evening went on and the sun had set she was finding it easier to be with him, her anger through the course of the day had faded away. Madge's father was a politician in their town, her home was the biggest in the district and her yard backed on to a wooded area. Marvel stole Katniss away from the party and they found themselves under a willow tree, hidden from their friends for a moment alone. She wore a sleeveless dress that she had changed into when the sun had set, she was obviously cold so Marvel held her close, and he kissed her deeply. She found herself back tracking, she wanted to forget about his lies for the moment and lose herself to his familiarity and be as they were before, and so she internally allowed herself to fall under his spell that he could cast over her. He was sweet as candy when he wanted to be, she let him tell her how much he loved her and how there was no one else like her, he looked at the promise ring that he had given her with her birthstone in it.

"Do you remember the night that I gave this to you?" He asked.

She looked at the ring and nodded her head. She did remember. It was their first valentine's day together; they had been together for nearly two months. She was expecting it be her last date with him, but he told her his plans to take her to a nice restaurant in the Capital, and when she told Madge, Johanna, and Delly they told her he never did that for anyone else before.

She was dressed in a beautiful red dress, he was dressed in a suit, and her mom embarrassingly took pictures of them both before they left the house. After dinner they went back to her house, he revealed to her that he had fallen in love with her, and after a lot of thought he pick out the ring especially for her, and she accepted it. Relief had washed over her because she was sure that she had fallen for him too, he'd been such a heartbreaker before, she wondered what she could have done to be so lucky to have Marvel fall in love with her of all people.

Katniss was getting a little teary eyed at the memory of how they had started, the promises he had made to her, and how it turned out he could break her heart, but in a much more hurtful way than anyone before her. Marvel wiped a stray tear from her eye. She looked him in his dark brown eyes. "Where did we go wrong? Was it me?" She asked, referring to his indiscretion.

She was surprised by his reaction. She was expecting comfort, a hug of reassurance or something, instead he huffed in exasperation. "Please, don't bring that up. I thought we were past that." He stepped away from her and ran his hand through his hair quickly.

"I know, it's just, I think of it a lot." She wanted to add that she knew about what happened between him and Glimmer during his beach house trip as well, but she also wanted to see if he came clean on his own.

"Don't think about it, just forget about it. I hate myself enough for it; please don't look at me that way." He stepped to her and seemed to see the hurt and defeat in her eyes, she had let her guard down for a moment. His heart broke a little at the sight of her, seeing that his strong willed Katniss was struggling with her emotions. "I told you that wouldn't happen again." He kissed her, trying to fix her with his kiss, not knowing that she had found someone else's kisses could make her forget far better than his could.

He took her hand and together they walked back to their friends at the party. It was getting late, and so they said goodbye to their friends and Marvel drove Katniss the short distance to her home before heading back to his.

She went into her room and pulled out her bag that she had taken to Madge's and found Peeta's t-shirt inside. She held it up to her nose and inhaled his comforting scent, somehow, even through his soap and whatever colognes that he wore, he somehow always smelled like the bakery. The cinnamon, vanilla, and fresh bread smells always lingered on him. She put the shirt on with a pair of short pajama bottoms, and went upstairs to say goodnight to her mother and Haymitch. She wanted to spend some time with Prim, but found that she had a friend over for a sleepover, so she returned to her bedroom, and was both extremely surprised and confused to find a shirtless Peeta in her bedroom.

She slammed the door shut behind her. "Are you crazy? How did you get in here?"

He smiled at her, "I came in through the window with the broken lock. I figured that was code for 'Peeta visit me anytime you want'. I really hope Haymitch didn't hear that part, he would kill me if he found me in here wouldn't he?" He said playfully. "I walked to the party, and I really didn't want to walk all that way home without my shirt, and I had a feeling I would find the thief here, although it does look better on you than it does on me." Peeta stood and approached her, admiring her body as he walked towards her. "Now that I know my shirt has a good home you may as well keep it."

Katniss shook her head nervously and took the shirt off, leaving her in her sport bra that she normally wore to bed, and handed Peeta his shirt. "You need to leave now, what if my mom or Haymitch does come down here and find you here in my room. I would be dead." she whispered. She walked to her drawer to get another shirt to sleep in, she felt Peeta's strong hand on her shoulder, and traced a line with his finger down her arm and back up again. He gave her goose bumps, she closed her eyes and allowed his hands to roam her neck, back, and finally to wrap his arms around her waist in a hug so he could put his chin on her shoulder.

"Katniss, why did you break up with me? When we were kids?" He asked. She opened her eyes and looked at him as best she could from the side.

"I thought you said we never broke up." She teased lightly, trying to avoid giving an honest answer.

He looked as if he were going to say something when there was a knock on the door. They jumped apart from each other in a panic, she pointed to the closet and he ran as quietly as he could to hide inside, the door started to open and Katniss ran to the door to stop it from opening fully to allow him time to hide. She was somewhat relieved that it was only Prim, but was still terrified of what would happen if she knew Peeta was here.

"What do you want Prim? I'm half dressed!" Katniss exclaimed.

"You always walk around here dressed like that." Prim smiled as she rolled her eyes. "Besides, it's just me and Rue here." Katniss saw little Rue peeking at her from behind Prim's shoulder. Katniss and Prim's dad had been friends with Rue's dad through work, the two families knew each other well, and Rue was one of Prim's good friends.

"Ok, but you can't just come barging into my room like this." Katniss complained, she felt like she was sweating bullets.

"I'm not in your room first if all and I knocked first." Prim pointed out.

Katniss rolled her eyes. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"We're going to watch a movie here in the den and do our nails. Did you want to join us?" Prim asked.

"No thanks." Katniss said quickly and shut the door. Prim knocked again and Katniss whipped the door back open. "Yes?"

"You have all the good nail polishes, can we use them?" Prim asked.

Katniss walked around her room looking for the box of nail polish before realizing that they were of course in the closet. After peeking carefully at Prim she opened her closet as quickly as she could, she could see Peeta, and she prayed that from her doorway Prim couldn't, and got the box from the shelf as quickly as she could. She slammed the closet door shut and gave the box to prim. "Have fun, please don't disturb me tonight." Then shut her bedroom door and wished it had a lock.

She heard the two girls giggling as they walked away, and Peeta let himself out of her closet. "I guess you're stuck here until those two fall asleep." She sat on her bed and Peeta put on his shirt and joined her.

He looked at her smiling in a way that said he knew something she didn't. "What?" She asked.

"I really hope we can trust Prim, she totally saw me." He chuckled quietly. Katniss put her face in her hands and groaned. Peeta reached out and took her hands away from her face. "It'll be fine, she'll keep your secret, she's crazy about you." He pulled Katniss in for a light kiss.

They hung out in her room for hours. They talked and compared music they like to listen to, who liked which movies. They teased each other and joked with each other. Katniss allowed Peeta to initiate a very heavy uninterrupted make out session, when the hunger took over her body again she found herself voicing her desires and begged him to hold her closer, tighter. They were so dangerous together, she loved every minute of it, she didn't know how Peeta could satisfy her so completely, and at the same time make her body want so much more. When it got to be well past midnight Katniss worried that her sister and Rue would never fall asleep, to which Peeta agreed that he should be getting home. He removed his shirt and left it for Katniss.

"I thought you said you didn't want to walk home without at least a shirt on? Isn't that why you're here?" Katniss pointed out. Peeta got his backpack that he had taken with he had taken to the party, opened it, and pulled out a pullover hoodie and put it on.

"You keep it. Like I said, it looked better on you than me." And with that Peeta opened the window in her room and snuck out into the night. Katniss couldn't believe how she hadn't thought of just doing that earlier, of course he didn't need to leave from the same window he came in through, but maybe she didn't really want him to leave all that much.

Katniss was very pleased with the way her night had ended. Reconnecting with Peeta on a more personal level had been fun, and the way she let him explore her body had been fun too.

What Katniss didn't realize was that earlier in the night she had a bigger impact with Marvel than she thought as well. When he left the party he had time to reflect on the hurt he had caused her. Seeing her wall come down and her vulnerability exposed for him to see made him feel so bad and guilty about what he had done. He had gone to Glimmer's house directly from the party, he wanted to make it clear to her that things would between them were over, that he was going to be faithful to Katniss, and that the time at the party and the beach house were mistakes that he regretted deeply. Glimmer had been very angry with him and he left her house satisfied that he had gotten his message across and that she wouldn't be bothering them anytime soon. He felt bad that he did not come clean to Katniss about his mistake with Glimmer during his week away at the beach house. He had allowed Glimmer to be all over him, and had even had one night where he let his guard down and allowed himself to fall to her advances once again. He allowed her to suggest they be alone, he had taken her to his parents' bedroom where he had been sleeping for the week since they had been clear that was to be off limits to his friends. Glimmer was tall, blonde, all legs and curves; he wasn't immune to her body. They began to kiss, but the whole time he was thinking of how much this would hurt Katniss if she ever found out. She pulled out all the stops for him, but he just ended up feeling bad, and found that she didn't have the effect on him that Katniss did; he wanted to be doing this with her. So he had put the brakes on, saying that he had to make sure the guys didn't ruin the house, when really, he just wanted to get away from her to think. He had played these games with girls before, but being with Katniss was different, he loved her, and it hurt him to think of what he had just done, another betrayal.

When he was at Glimmer's house she had tried to convince him that they could continue on without Katniss knowing, but he knew he would just feel too guilty about it if he did. He did love Katniss, she was going to be his forever, and he didn't think there was anything she could do to change that, not knowing that Katniss had a weakness for a certain blonde of her own, and when she had been presented with the exact same proposal she had chosen differently than he just had.