Smiles Are Contagious - Part Two

For the next ten minutes, Plutarch, Haymitch and I discuss other things. They ask me how I am liking 13. I tell them the truth, that although I miss home, the people have been very nice and helpful to us. They tell me a bit more of the incident with Peeta and Katniss, and how Katniss is getting out of recovery.

After ten minutes, Haymitch leaves to go locate Katniss and bring her back here. "We need to fill her in on what you're going to do," he says.

Plutarch and I continue chatting until he comes back with her.

I want to faint when my old classmate enters the room. Although she is wearing a high collar up to her ears, the dark bruises around her neck until still visible and deep. Her tired gray eyes have an aura of frightening density in them, and her hair is in clumps of black. As she scans the room, looking for signs of activity, I notice that she looks even skinnier than last time I saw her, which was during the reaping of the Quell. They have not fully described the effects of the attack on her well enough to me. She looks more exhausted than Plutarch, Haymitch, and the entire recovery team combined.

It takes all the muscles in my body to force a smile at her and look like she's just what I expected her to be like. "Katniss!"

"Hey, Delly," she says without expression. "How are you doing?"

She recognizes me, I think with relief.

I feel genuine tears start to pool up in my eyes. "Oh, it's been a lot of changes all at once," I say honestly. "But everyone's really nice here in Thirteen, don't you think?"

Katniss doesn't fully agree with me. "They've made an effort to make us feel welcome."

They were right about one thing. Katniss has changed.

"Are you the one they've picked to see Peeta?" she continues.

"I guess so," I say with a shrug. "Poor Peeta. Poor you. I'll never understand the Capitol."

Katniss sounds very wise when she speaks. "Better not to, maybe."

I don't know what to say to that. Luckily, Plutarch jumps in here to save me when responding. "Delly's known Peeta for a long time."

"Oh, yes!" I agree happily, for Katniss's sake. "We played together from when we were little. I used to tell people he was my brother."

"What do you think?" Haymitch glances at Katniss for approval. "Anything that might trigger memories of you?"

Of course not. Because we wouldn't want that happening.

Katniss scrunches her eyebrows together. "We were all in same class. But we never overlapped much."

I feel like I have to contribute more to the conversation, even if it's a lie. "Katniss was always so amazing, I never dreamed she would notice me. The way she could hunt and go in the Hob and everything. Everyone admired her so."

Everyone turns to stare at me, including Katniss, who must know it must be made up. Her piercing eyes seem to momentarily soften and her twitching mouth lets me know that she knows I'm trying to help.

"Delly always thinks the best of everyone," she explains. "I don't think Peeta could have bad memories associated with her." Then she blinks and seems to remember something important, and she restates her words. "Wait. In the Capitol. When I lied about recognizing the Avox girl. Peeta covered for me and said she looked like Delly."

I have no idea what she's talking about, but I'm guessing it has something to do with her first Games and Peeta, so I say nothing.

"I remember," Haymitch says, nodding. "But I don't know. It wasn't true. Delly wasn't actually there. I don't think it can compete with years of childhood memories."

I smile to myself. I'm glad they are so confident in my abilities.

Plutarch grins. "Especially with such a pleasant companion as Delly," he says, gesturing to me. I smile wider. "Let's give it a shot."


Plutarch tells me to go down to Room 67, where Peeta is being monitored. I am to go in, talk as much as I can about home without triggering memories of Katniss or anything else Plutarch calls 'dangerous territory'.

"It'll be perfectly safe," he tells me. "We'll all be in the room next door, monitoring you and Peeta. If anything starts to go wrong, the door will automatically fly open and you are to back out of the room slowly. But I don't think anything will go wrong, Soldier. We trust you."

When I reach Room 67, I carefully pry loose the doorknob and enter the room cautiously. I look over to the left where there is a wall of one-way glass that I know the crew is hiding behind. I nod at the glass to let them know I am starting, and slowly begin to walk forward to Peeta's bed.

Peeta Mellark has not changed in the two years that I haven't seen him, at least not much physically. His wide blue eyes observe me with curiosity and loose sanity, and his tousled hair still looks like he stepped out of a giant hair dryer. But now equipped with the knowledge of his so-called 'hijacking', I know that he couldn't be any futher from different than he was before.

I almost begin to cry at all the tubes and wires connected to his body, and how less than three years ago this same boy was sitting in my math class, helping me solve equations. I want to scream at what the wretched Capitol has done to us, but if I screamed, who knows what Peeta might do?

Fortunately, Peeta looks fine. He watches as I continue crossing the room, finally stopping a few feet away from his bed. My faces breaks into a natural smile at how normal he currently seems and how he appears to want to acknowledge my visit.

"Peeta?" I say tentatively. "It's Delly. From home."

"Delly?" I watch as Peeta's eyebrows lift and the curious expression begins to clear out. "Delly. It's you."

I still want to cry. But now, I want to cry out of relief. "Yes! How do you feel?"

Peeta fidgets with his hands. "Awful," he sighs. "Where are we? What's happened?"

Oh, no. This is where it's going to start getting a bit uneasy. Relax, Delly, I tell myself. State the facts.

"Well . . we're in District Thirteen. We live here now."

Peeta frowns. "That's what those people have been saying. But it makes no sense. Why aren't we home?"

There's no real way to get around this. I bite my lip and continue on. Conjure up the past, I tell myself.

"There was . . . an accident. I miss home badly too," I say. "I was only just thinking about those chalk drawings we used to do on the paving stones. Yours were so wonderful. Remember when you made each one a different animal?"

Peeta smiles fondly at the slight memory. "Yeah. Pigs and cats and things." Then he goes back to frowning. "You said . . . about an accident?"

No, no, no, stop it Peeta! I'm trying to avoid that question!

"It was bad," I finally tell him, tears beginning to form all over again. "No one . . . could stay."

The crew behind the one-way glass is probably tensing up so dreadfully right now. One tiny slip of my tongue and everything could go downhill. I try to continue without pause.

"But I know you're going to like it here, Peeta. The people have been really nice to us. There's always food and clean clothes, and school's much more interesting." I add a smile for believability.

Peeta, however, is not faltered. "Why hasn't my family come to see me?"

The tears are threatening to leak. Memories of my parents and Peeta's parents are surfacing. "They can't," I whisper. "A lot of people didn't get out of Twelve. So we'll need to make a new life here. I'm sure they could use a good baker. Do you remember when your father used to let us make dough girls and boys?"

Sadly, my subtle subject change does not work the way I thought it would. Remembering about the bakery for Peeta would equal remembering about fire. The fire.

"There was a fire," he says abruptly; calmly, even.

I cannot hold myself back anymore. "Yes," I say in a murmur.

"Twelve burned down, didn't it? Because of her!" Peeta's voice is slowly raising to a shout. "Because of Katniss!"

My eyes widen. Because of Katniss? How could he even think such a thing? How did we get from chalk drawings to fire to Katniss? Oh, right. He's been 'hijacked' by the Capitol.

"Oh, no, Peeta. It wasn't her fault," I attempt to convince him quickly.

Peeta hisses his next words violently at me. "Did she tell you that?"

I feel the door behind me open up and I begin to slowly back towards it as Plutarch ordered me to.

"She didn't have to. I was —" I try to say, but he cuts me off.

"Because she's lying!" he screams. "She's a liar! You can't believe anything she says! She's some kind of mutt that the Capitol created to use against the rest of us!"

A mutt. This is where Peeta Mellark has come to. There is where he will be stuck with for the remainder of his life. His mind has been played with enough to convince him that brave, daring, and selfless Katniss Everdeen is now a mutation of the Capitol. I'm sure that being strangled was less agonizing for her to cope with.

I still cannot give up. I still am not able to believe that this is where it will all end. "No, Peeta. She's not a —"

"Don't trust her, Delly," Peeta cries frenetically. His hands start to fiddle with the restraints on his arms. "I did, and she tried to kill me. She killed my friends. My family. Don't even go near her! She's a mutt!"

I have now reached the doorway. The team obviously doesn't want me to remain in the room any longer, as a hand reaches though the door and pulls me from the room. But nothing is able to block out Peeta's yells of Katniss's inflictions.

"A mutt! She's a stinking mutt!" he continues screaming. I listen as his shrill and piercing voice echoes into the hall.

I close my eyes to try and block out the mental image of Peeta and I sitting on the floor of the bakery, making dough people and coloring pictures of happy families. Families that are now either destroyed or dead. It's unbearable.

As I walk back to my compartment, I do not even stop to check up with the recovery team, Plutarch, or Haymitch. They are most likely dealing with Katniss, anyway. It's too late for my family, and Peeta's as well. But maybe they can save Katniss's by dealing with her.

After all, she is the Mockingjay. Not me. Whatever I do can be pardoned conclusively. But as the Mockingjay, she must take responsibility for the Capitol's actions upon us all. I have to admire her in a way. Whatever Peeta will do, she can deal with. Her strong spirit may help save us all.


A/N: Okay, that was supposed to be a sad ending, but I can't write sad endings, so I added the last few sentences so that the story will seem a bit happier. Hope you liked it, and I'd absolutely adore it if you left a little review. *hint hint*