With a loaf of bread in a textile bag in one hand and a mug of steaming hot coffee in the other I use my elbow to press down the door handle and nudge Haymitch's back door open. It's a little tricky to get the door open without spilling any of the coffee but I've done this numerous times before and I'm getting the hang of it. I used to bring only bread whenever I stopped by but after learning to drink coffee myself in the morning to get energized for the day I've taken to bringing some to Haymitch as well. He can't spend every day sleeping until noon. I know why he does it but it's not good for him.
"Hey!" I call out as I use my foot to kick the door shut behind me. I groan at the unpleasant smell that fills the house and grit my teeth at the mess of dirty clothes and even dirtier dishes lying around in the room. "Haymitch, you up?"
I get no answer so I head for the kitchen. It's an even bigger mess than the rest of the house and smells worse and there's no denying I find it gross. I've been raised to keep a clean kitchen and it annoys me to no end that Haymitch seems to treat this particular room as a slag heap. How does he get the urge to prepare food in this stench? Not to mention eat a single bite. It's revolting.
I place the coffee mug on the table, using my arm to brush a collection of assorted junk down on the floor to make some room, and bring the bag with the bread over to the counter in search of a cutting board and a knife.
"Haymitch!" I bellow, wondering if he's sleeping downstairs or if I'll have to go upstairs to get him awake.
"Here's an idea for a new routine" mutters Haymitch as he comes stumbling into the kitchen a minute later, his hair on end and his face marked with sleep. "You send a loaf of bread with Katniss in the morning, she brings it to me when she returns from her animal murdering trip in the woods, and on the way she stops and buys me some white liquor. That way everybody wins."
"How does anybody win in that equation?" I challenge. As he slumps in a chair by the table I bring the cutting board, the knife and my bag over to him. "I'd have to get up earlier to bake before she leaves, she'd have to enable your drinking and let's face it, that bread would be in her stomach hours before she's done hunting."
"It's a pretty sick world we live in when a young woman would steal bread from her old mentor" grumbles Haymitch, grabbing the knife to cut himself a slice of bread.
"Sleep well?" I ask dryly.
"Until you showed up."
"Drink the coffee. You need it."
He takes the mug and makes a grimace when he tastes the beverage. It's at least three times as strong as the coffee I drink in the morning but I figure he needs much more to rouse him than I do.
"There's hardly any room for you to even eat at this table anymore" I comment, seeing him look for a good place to set the mug down.
"None of your concern."
"And yet it still concerns me."
I take one look at the kitchen counter and force myself not to sigh. At least the dirty dishes means he's eating proper food. Too bad he's also appearing to be growing penicillin for an entire hospital ward. Topping off the mess of dirty plates, unwashed glasses and burned pots are at least three kitchen towels, dirty and wet and probably crawling with bacteria. How he can live and eat in this mess and not get sick is a question for the ages.
"Leave it, boy" says Haymitch, probably reading my intentions on my face. "I can take care of my own damn dirty dishes."
"Exhibit A."
"Don't you clean enough kitchens as it is with your whole bakery thing?" he asks, referring to the bakery I opened three months ago. I only keep it open Saturdays and Sundays, feeling it best to start small, and the only people working there are me and Katniss.
"Apparently I don't" I answer his question as I begin to fill the sink with warm water.
"That place must be a blast when you and your feistier half are on the outs with each other" he notes as he leans back in his chair and burps.
"Yeah, like that happens often. When it does she manages the store and I stay in the kitchen" I reply, not sure why I'm bothering to answer what was undoubtedly a rhetorical remark.
"I bet your customers prefer it when you're not getting along, then. If Katniss is in the kitchen you've got nobody managing the desk and probably no edible baked goods."
"You think that by insulting my girlfriend you're going to get me to rethink cleaning your pigsty of a kitchen?"
"I just enjoy insulting you and your girlfriend."
I roll my eyes and begin to clear the sink of cardboard boxes and paper towels so that I can fill it up with water and get to work on the dishes.
"You're going to get sick if you continue to live like this" I can't help but commenting.
"That's crap" snorts Haymitch. "I've lived like this since before you lived at all and I don't get sick any more often than the next person."
"Don't you want more order around you?" Making a face I grab a set of dirty plates and carefully drop them into the now water-filled sink. "When Hazelle was your housekeeper this place was nice and I refuse to believe you didn't like it better that way."
"Enough now, mother."
"Mother?" I echo, surprised and a tad bit offended that he used the female parental. "Look, I just want you to have a nice home. I want to be able to come visit you without feeling sick to my stomach. Do you seriously not notice how much this place smells?"
"With this attitude you're very welcome not to come visit."
I refrain from further comment and focus on the dishes. While Haymitch eats I debate with myself just how big of an effort I should be making with the cleaning. There doesn't seem to be much point to it unless I do it properly but that would take me all day. Just cleaning the kitchen would have me here until lunch.
I can't help but wonder what would happen if Haymitch met someone and brought her home to this pigsty. Who'd want to stick around? I don't suspect Haymitch is thinking anything along those lines but his loneliness concerns me. The thought of him being cooped up here all alone most of the time does not sit well with me. I remember how tough and saddening it was to move from a house of five to a five times larger house with only me. How badly it stung that my family didn't move with me, no matter how much they all insisted that it would be too much trouble to not live at the bakery. My mother was actually concerned they might take the bakery away from them if they no longer lived on the premises and she might have been right about that but it was depressing all the same. I know there's a difference between being alone and being lonely but spending your entire life in the kind of solitude Haymitch does can't be good for anyone.
When I'm done with the dishes I move on to clearing the counter. Haymitch, now done with both bread and coffee, remains sitting at the table, eyeing me as I work. If he really wanted me gone he would leave the room and head back to bed and the fact that he doesn't suggests to me that he likes having my company.
"Don't take this the wrong way…" I begin carefully, scrubbing a particularly sticky stain with a sponge.
"Nobody asked you to clean up" he grumbles.
"That's not what I was going to talk about." With an irritated huff I grab the bottle of cleaning spray, which I'm sure either Katniss or I must have bought, and attack the stain with more than just the sponge. "It's just… When was the last time you had a visitor besides me or Katniss?"
"Lenny wandered in through the back door a few days ago."
"Geese don't count."
"I'm not much for human company."
"Doesn't it get lonely?" I can't help but ask.
Haymitch studies me for a minute before answering. I can see the wheels in his head turning as he tries to figure out what I'm going for. He can read Katniss very well but I've always been more difficult for him to figure out.
"Since when are you concerned that I'm lonely?" he finally asks.
"It's a big house to live in all by yourself. Trust me, I know." Proceeding with caution I bring up a subject I can only assume must still be a sore spot. "You never tell us much about your… social life over the years. I know the other mentors were your friends and I know you enjoy our company so I know you're not a hermit." Finally I get the spot out and I throw the sponge in the trash, opting to use a new one to clean the rest of the counter. "Has there been… Has there been anyone else? Since your girl died, I mean?"
I make sure not to look at him right now but I can guess that he's got a pretty unfriendly scowl on his face.
"Not everyone needs to have a someone to be happy, boy" comes the answer, the tone low but not entirely hostile.
"This is you happy?" I challenge.
"You think a woman would turn my life into one full of sunshine and rainbows?"
My instinctive response is to confirm that. I know the pain and darkness he lives with will not disappear overnight, or perhaps even at all, through the magic of love and companionship but I do believe it could make his life much, much better. I think of my own life, the terrors and the haunting memories and the thing dr. Aurelius calls post-traumatic stress. It's a lot to live with and my life will never be carefree and, well, full of sunshine and rainbows but the presence of one Katniss Everdeen makes life not just endurable but sometimes filled with incredible joy and emotional satisfaction. Love is something the darkness cannot overshadow.
I think back to two nights ago when we went to bed early and made love. I think of the way my heart leaps with joy when she looks at me with lust and like she can't get enough of me. How soothing it is to the sadness in our lives to be able to give her pleasure and to have her give pleasure to me. My heart is overcome with warmth and happiness when I think of the words she whispered to me while looking at me with that look in her eyes. Katniss, who used to say very little in bed, has over the past three years become more verbal and sometimes I'm not sure she's fully aware of what she's saying. The words just seem to be slipping out of her when the moment overcomes her. It's my greatest privilege to be the one she says those things to, the one she feels comfortable and secure enough with to enjoy intimacy in every definition of the word. During sex two days ago the words "I'm so in love" fell from her lips and it brought me such joy and such affection for her that I needed a moment to gather my composure. She, as most often, was unaware of the effect she has and was surprised when I needed a moment.
Not everybody needs this kind of togetherness in order to be happy or lead a fulfilled life, that I know and can understand. I do however think that finding something like what Katniss and I have, finding something even a third as fulfilling even, would do wonders for Haymitch and help heal his wounded soul. There are some things that are so difficult to live with that having someone in your life to help carry that burden can make all the difference. Moreover I have no doubt that Haymitch didn't choose a life of seclusion. It was the only option he saw available to him after Snow had his family and his girlfriend killed. That, in my opinion, is not the same as not needing a relationship in order to be happy.
"I think you deserve to have love" I answer his question. "I think it would do you good. Katniss and I are your family but we cannot take the place of a romantic partner."
"Boy I have lived this way for a very long time" says Haymitch, leaning forward over the table. I walk over and begin to gather the garbage, the clothes and the various other times sitting on the surface and he lets me stay near. "I don't want to make room in my life for a woman. I don't want to have to compromise, I don't want to give up half the bed and I don't want my home to suddenly also be somebody else's home. I get that you don't understand that but I do expect you to respect it."
"I'm not setting you up with someone, or anything" I point out.
"You'd better not be." He gives me a strange look that makes me frown. "The relationship issue is a little too important to you, though, it seems. Peeta do you ever think you and Katniss might be too co-dependent?"
The question has me flummoxed. I don't even understand what it's supposed to mean. I know Katniss and I lean on each other and count on each other to carry us through the difficulties we're faced with, something that began in our first arena, but I've never seen it as being co-dependent, whatever that means.
"We're not" I answer, giving Haymitch a look.
"No need to turn your spines out. I know you're in love and it's good that you have each other. Did you ever stop to think though that you might be taking it a bit too far? You can have a loving relationship without depending on one another for everything."
"Katniss and I need each other in all the right ways" I say, giving him another wary look as I fill the trash bag up with assorted junk from the table. "You make it sound like we can't go get the mail without each other's company. You don't see Katniss anywhere here right now, do you? We're perfectly capable of getting by alone, we just don't want to."
"That's not entirely true though, is it? Before you moved in with her I saw the pair of you running from one house to the other if you didn't start the night off in the same bed. A healthy relationship leaves room for things like being able to sleep through the night on your own."
"You don't know what you're talking about" I say defensively. "You see only what you want to see."
"And you see me as being unhappy because I don't need another person to make my life happy. You're not going to be able to always be together – you realize that, right? I think you'd be well off taking a step back and learning to handle life on your own, at least for a day at a time." He gives me a pointed look. "You remember how Katniss' mother crumbled when her husband died. Do you want that to happen to Katniss too, or do you want her to be able to get a grip and move forward if you end up dead before she is?"
Finding the sudden turn of the conversation wholly unpleasant I snort and tie up the garbage bag, refusing to answer. Of course I don't want Katniss to fall to pieces and lose the will to live if I were to die but she and I need each other. We pull each other through. At least at this point in our lives, just a few short years after two Hunger Games, a war, the loss of our families and having been burned in an explosion. I don't think it's fair to demand that we be able to hold everything together without one another just yet. That's not what she and I do. We save each other, protect each other. Right now we're at a place where we need one another and I'm not going to feel bad about the best thing in my life.
"I think you're just telling yourself all of this to make yourself feel better" I say, though I know it's unfair. "And you win. I won't try to tidy up this garbage disposal of a house. Not much point anyway. You'd have it back in the same condition by next morning."
"Stepped on some tender toes there, did I?" asks Haymitch smugly.
"Have a nice day, old man."
With those parting words I head for the door, the large garbage bag flung over my shoulder. Stepping outside and filling my lungs with fresh air feels like heaven.
Once back home I find I need to change my clothes as the smell from Haymitch's house seems to have permeated the fabric of my t-shirt and slacks. Either that or it's just stuck in my nose and won't go away for hours yet. I take a shower and change into clean clothes and feel a bit better after that.
I head down to the kitchen and grab the recipe book from its place on the shelf by the table. The book is a pet project of mine, modelled after Katniss' plant book, in which I try to recreate all the things my parents used to bake and jot down the recipes once I'm convinced I've gotten them right. My mother and father kept most of their recipes in their own heads but the two books they did have were of course lost in the bombings. I don't want all those recipes to be gone forever so I do what I can to preserve them. Some recipes are easy, ones I've been following day in and day out since childhood, but others are trickier. There were some things we only baked on special order, other things we only baked at certain times of the year. Some of them I never participated in baking myself but I was lucky enough to get a taste every now and then. It can take me days sometimes to try and recreate the recipes for those kind of breads and treats, experimenting with different spices, flours and methods. For the past two days I've been trying to bake teacakes the way my father did, as a type of soda bread. It's been going so-so.
While I work my mind wanders and keeps going back to my conversation with Haymitch. Do I depend too much on Katniss? Does she depend too much on me? To what degree would that be a bad thing? Katniss Everdeen loving me and needing me is all I ever dreamed to hope for. Am I now supposed to think that's not good? That it might in fact be a disadvantage for her to feel that connected to me?
These thoughts stay in my head and almost distracts me from the work at hand. I don't even hear the door opening or Katniss coming inside the house and leaving her hunting gear in the hallway. It's not until I feel a pair of hands sneaking around my waist, working their way up to land on my chest, her cheek resting against my shoulder and her body pressing against my back that I know she's come back home. I'm filled with affection for her, in love with her simple gesture of showing me she's missed me and she's glad to be back home with me. It's a small and simple thing but it means so much. Maybe it is co-dependent but there's beauty in it.
"I've missed you" I tell her in greeting, hoping that knowing that makes her feel the same way I feel knowing that she's missed me.
She makes a sound in the back of her throat that tells me she's smiling at my words and she rocks us back and forth a few times.
"What's my man been up to?" she asks. "Making any progress with the teacakes?"
"I… honestly have no idea" I confess. "How was the woods?"
"The usual." Her lips press a kiss against my neck and then she moves away from me to fetch her game bag from the kitchen table where she apparently put it before walking up to me. "I wasn't able to catch anything so I stopped by the market and got us some broccoli. I thought we could combine it with the other veggies we've got left and make a pie. What do you think?"
"Sounds good" I nod. I move over to the oven and remove the last batch of teacakes. "We could have these with the pie, assuming they're edible."
I look over at her just in time to catch her rolling her eyes as she hops up on the kitchen island, bag of broccoli in hand.
"Everything you bake is edible. It's tiresome that you second-guess yourself to that degree every time it takes you more than a day to remember a recipe right."
I chuckle and grab the broccoli bag to put it in the fridge at the same time as I take out butter and cheese.
"Well, you never know. One of these days I'll stumble upon a combination that tastes horrible and not even Haymitch's geese will want to eat the finished product." I grab one of the teacakes that has had time to cool off a bit and begin to butter it. "I'm not even sure what I added to the mix this time so I guess it would suck if it turns out to be the correct recipe. Here, try it."
I walk over to her, handing her the bread, and she takes a bite with a scowl on her face. She chews slowly and the scowl stays in place but it doesn't seem to be a reaction to the bread. I take a bite for myself and decide that it tastes okay but not right.
"Is something the matter?" she asks. "It's not like you to be too distracted to know what you put in your experiments."
I hand her the rest of the bread and shrug a shoulder, walking back to the counter to take care of the rest of the baked goods.
"I had a… weird conversation with Haymitch. Nothing to worry about." I don't want to tell her what he said because I don't want her to have any concerns about whether or not our relationship is healthy. She can overthink things and if I'm overthinking this she's bound to be even more preoccupied with it than I have been today. So instead I choose to focus on something else. "I'm a little bit worried that he's lonely."
She seems to ponder it for a second while chewing on another bite of bread. Then she shrugs a shoulder and swallows, jumping down from her seat.
"He knows where to find us if he wants company."
"That's not the kind of loneliness I meant."
She walks up and stands beside me, leaning her back against the counter.
"If he is lonely then only Haymitch can do anything to rectify it" she says. "We have to let him choose for himself if he wants to be alone or with somebody."
I nod slightly, choosing to leave the subject at that. She seems to sense though that I'm not entirely at peace. When I finish putting the bread into bags and placing them in a neat row on the counter she turns to me and pulls me into her arms, kissing my shoulder gently before resting her cheek against it. She doesn't say a word and she doesn't have to. I pull her closer and try not to think of how painfully empty the rest of my life would be without her in it.
I don't know how to define what we share, what we are or what that means in our lives. With Katniss holding me close I decide it doesn't really matter. As long as she and I feel good because of it then to me it will be healthy. As for Haymitch's possible loneliness, I guess she's right.