I wake up with a strangled gasp, my heart pounding in my chest and sweat covering my brow. I stare silently into the darkness for a few moments while I try to get my bearings, try to get my heartbeat to slow down. No matter how many times I wake up from a nightmare I can never seem to grow accustomed to it.
At least tonight I didn't wake up screaming and thrashing. In the silence of our bedroom I can hear Peeta's steady breathing behind me, telling me that he is still asleep. The clock on the nightstand shows that it's just past three in the morning. We went to sleep a little over four hours ago and I should let him continue to sleep undisturbed so he can hopefully get a full eight hours without waking up from either his own or my nightmares.
I know, however, that I won't be able to let him continue sleeping tonight. I had a painful nightmare in which something that was never clear in the dream came between us and he left me to move to another district where I would never get to see him again. In comparison to the other nightmares I have this is very timid and decidedly non-violent but it frightens me nonetheless. Just knowing that he is with me in bed doesn't do much to calm me down, either. Often when I dream about losing him he stays with me for a while in the dream even though he doesn't want to anymore and for that reason I need more than his physical presence to feel better. I need to hear his reassuring voice and see him look into my eyes in the way people only do when they love the one they're looking at. I need reassurance that he is still mine and that he's not going to go away.
I twist in his arms until I am lying face to face with him. My movements wake him up and he grunts a little before reluctantly opening his eyes and squinting at me. When he sees that I'm just repositioning myself he closes his eyes again, lets out a sleepy sigh, smacks his mouth and then swallows. The stump of his left leg moves against my knee until he finds a comfortable position. He will be back asleep in less than a minute if I don't bother him but I guess he's out of luck tonight. I gently caress his cheek and give his lips a light peck.
"Peeta..." I whisper.
"Mmm..." he mumbles in reply, not opening his eyes.
"Wake up for a minute."
Very reluctantly he opens his eyes, frowning at me.
"What's wrong?" he asks sleepily.
"Nothing" I lie. "I just need to tell you something."
"Can it wait till morning?"
"If I wait I might forget it and I don't want to forget it."
"I will most likely forget it if you tell me now."
"Please darling, it's important."
He yawns and rolls over on his back, resting his head on his left palm. His right arm wraps around me as I rest my upper body on his and lift my head up to look at him.
"I've figured out one of the things I want you to vow."
It's been five months now since Peeta and I decided to get married. We hadn't really talked about it before but in mid-January we travelled to the Capitol for Effie Trinket's wedding. Our old escort is now Mrs. Tiro Tortora, a name I still can't quite wrap my mind around but she seems to like it a lot since she keeps sending us post-cards with her married name written in gold all around the margins. Tiro is of a fine Capitol pedigree which matters very little to the general population these days but will always matter immensely to the likes of Effie. He holds a legislative position in the government though I'm not entirely sure what it is he does. All that really matters to me is that he seems to be a perfect fit for Effie and at the wedding she was happier than I have ever seen her before.
The night following the wedding, when Peeta and I were wrapped in each other's arms in the early hours of the morning, I brought up the idea of marriage. Marriage itself never really held any allure to me; I've always viewed it as an institution for bearing children and as the only way two people in love can have a life and a home together. Once the war was over that last part was not true anymore. When we were no longer under government control we were no longer dependent on the government to assign us our homes and we were free to move in with, and build a life and home with, whomever we choose. For that reason it never seemed important to me that Peeta and I should get married. If anything I disliked the notion of becoming his wife because that's what President Snow wanted. I was already his anyway, the title itself wouldn't make a difference.
But that night, after having watched dear old Effie get married and felt all the love and encouragement that hung in the air I realized that I might have had the idea of marriage wrong. Maybe it is about more than being under the Capitol's control and being allowed to share a life together and the inevitable birth of children. What I saw at Effie's wedding was that marriage could also be a way to solidify your commitment to one another, give the person you love your future in every way, declare to the world that you want to belong together and that you are an unbreakable unit. I realized I deeply wanted to share that with Peeta and to have us be a couple in every way we could be, committed to each other in every way possible. So before we went to sleep that night I told him how I thought and felt and asked if he felt the same way. It's a memory I often revisit when I'm feeling sad, the way he looked at me in that moment and how happy I could tell I was making him always makes me feel better when thinking about it.
Our wedding is scheduled to take place in late August. For the most part the plans are progressing just fine. We were both dead against a public wedding but while we originally discussed a small and toned-down affair we have now landed on a slightly bigger event. There will be around thirty guests and instead of having a reception at our house we have decided to have it outdoors, on the field between our house and the fence. A very excited Delly Cartwright is helping us arrange everything and it is all running very smoothly.
Except for the part about the vows.
Getting married is of course not as simple as signing documents and toasting bread, not anymore. District wedding rituals have been evolving and developing all over Panem in the years since the war. Some rituals make it to every district while others have only been adopted in a few, and even within each district there are variations. A few of the most popular traditions have been made part of the official wedding ceremony and are now required at each wedding to make the marriage legal. One such tradition is that of the vows.
The way the vows work is that the bride and groom each make three vows during the ceremony. The vows you make are ones your soon-to-be spouse have asked you to make. In other words, I write Peeta's vows and he writes mine. The idea is that each person gets to ask three things of the other that will set the tone for the marriage and at the wedding the other person makes those vows officially. Breaking a vow is legal grounds for a divorce. The problem is that neither Peeta nor I can think of anything to ask of the other.
There are, of course, simple standard vows one can use. You can ask your partner to vow fidelity, support and eternal love but all of that seems pointless to me. I don't need Peeta to vow to me that he will forsake all other women for my sake. I already know that he will, just as he knows I will never be unfaithful to him. Then there are more domestic vows one can make, such as making vows over who cooks and who cleans, but that sounds rather depressing to me in the context. If we are to make each other vows on our wedding day then they should be about something more poignant than who does the dishes and takes out the garbage.
I just can't think of anything I want Peeta to vow to me. Sure there are things I would like him to do for me over the course of our lives and certain expectations I have but blatantly asking him to promise me those things at our wedding seems very unromantic. I don't want to tether him to promises made in our early twenties when we don't know what life is going to throw at us. Peeta feels the same way and hasn't been able to think of anything to ask for me to vow.
Which is why he looks a little surprised now that I'm telling him I know what I want one of his vows to be.
"I want you to promise me that from the moment of our wedding to the moment when one of us dies I will never have to go a single day without you."
He takes a moment to answer.
"I'm not going to promise you that, Katniss."
His reply takes me by surprise and after the nightmare I just had it frightens me to hear him say such a thing. Why would he refuse to make a vow like that? I can feel my heart begin to beat stronger as I start to worry for real.
"What do you mean?" I ask with a scowl. "Why not?"
"I won't stand there on our wedding day and make vows I don't know if I can keep."
His answer doesn't calm me down one bit. My frown deepens and I lift myself up a little further.
"Why wouldn't you be able to keep such a promise?" I ask, irritation clear in my voice. "Is there any reason why we wouldn't be able to see each other at least once every day? We're going to be married."
"I'm not saying I don't want to be able to promise you that" says Peeta, more awake now. "I just don't think it's realistic. Say, for the sake of argument, that your mother is ill and you need to go to her but I can't leave because I have to work. That's all it takes for me to have to break that promise."
"Then promise me that you will try to have us spend at least part of each day together, from the wedding to the end."
"Okay" nods Peeta. "I'll promise you that." His promise makes me calm down enough that I notice he's looking at me with the love and affection I wanted to see when I woke him up. His hand reaches up and caresses my cheek and with that simple gesture my worry and my discomfort melts away.
"Good" I say softly.
"Good." He pauses. "I still can't think of even one thing I want you to vow to me."
A sudden grin flashes across my face.
"How about..." I say, running my hand down his chest, dipping under the waistband of his underwear.
His eyebrows shoot up and he gives me a pleased but incredulous look.
"That's something you think you ought to promise me in front of our friends and family?"
I laugh and move my hand down further.
"It would be rather fun seeing the looks on everybody's faces..."
"Okay then" smirks Peeta, moving his other hand so that his head is resting on both his hands. "You can promise me that at least once a week you will wake me up in ways that you know I much appreciate."
"But what about at night time?" I ask innocently as my hand begins to touch him in less than innocent ways.
"I have some ideas for that as well." His voice is deeper, a touch hoarse, just the way I want him to sound. "I just need to decide which one I want to go with, to make it as shocking as possible."
"I can't wait to hear what you come up with" I laugh and lean down to kiss him.
"It will be dirty, I can assure you." His hands move and cradle my face as he kisses me sloppily before pulling back with a smirk. "After all, I'm not the one whose mother will be there."
That realization puts an end to my laughter, and to the movements of my hand, but the sudden scowl that appears instead makes Peeta laugh.
"Just give me a couple of weeks and I'll think of something suitable" he tells me. "Something non-sexual and suitable, I mean." He reaches up and brushes a strand of hair from my face in a soft, loving gesture. At the moment the mood has changed from sexual to emotional but I don't mind. "The thing is though, all I really want you to promise me is that you'll share your life with me and let me share mine with you... and you'll be promising that anyway. That, in itself, is more than I ever dared to hope for."
I lay my head down on his chest and let out a small sigh. I can hear the steady beating of his heart, soothing and reassuring. The blonde hairs on his chest tickle my nose a little and when I take a deep breath he smells lightly of sweat and very much of his own natural scent. I can't stop myself from thinking back to the nights I used to rest my head on his chest when I still didn't understand how I felt about him and to the nights when I lay awake in District 13 wondering what Snow's henchmen were doing to him, petrified that I might never get to fall asleep to the sound of his steadily beating heart again.
"I just don't want to have to long for you" I tell him in the darkness. "I did more than enough of that when you were in Snow's captivity and when you first came to Thirteen and were hijacked. Longing to see you in the evening when we've spent the day apart is one thing but I never want to have to long and ache and miss and know that you're not within walking distance from me. Not ever again. I've done that enough to last me a lifetime."
"You say that now" replies Peeta and I can hear from the tone in his voice that he is smirking. "Wait until we've been married forty years and you're sick and tired of staring at my face every day."
I don't find that very probable. More likely I'll grow increasingly dependent on him and end up being unable to function at all if he's not around. The thought of it is distressing in a way but after everything I've been through and everything I've lost I find I don't care if I lose some of my independence. I've lost Peeta before and now that I have him safe in my arms and in my heart I would rather give some of my independence to him than lose him again.
"I will love you until my heart stops beating" I tell him. "And I will never grow sick and tired of looking at you."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah" he teases. "Go to sleep, already."
I give him a playful smack and he laughs.
"Is that what I get for bearing my soul?" I ask.
"If you insist on doing so in the middle of the damn night." Any other night his teasing words wouldn't bother me at all but given the nightmare that woke me up his response to what I just said to him hurts a little. Before the feeling can take hold he wraps his arms around me and pulls me closer. "Seriously though, you are everything to me and you always will be. It's a luxury to be the one you wake up in the middle of the night."
The smile returns to my face and I feel an almost painfully strong sense of love and relief. Sighing with contentment I close my eyes to drift off to sleep.
"It is an even greater luxury to have you here beside me when I wake up from a nightmare in the dead of night" I whisper.
The kiss he places at the top of my head in response is the last thing I am aware of before falling back asleep.