Here's the chapter you've been waiting for! Peeta's backstory!

This chapter contains a trigger warning for possible dubious consent.

My conversation with Thresh reverberates through my mind for several days. He's absolutely right, of course. I'm going to school to disciple people like Katniss. My job as a pastor will be to guide people like Katniss. If she was anyone else, I wouldn't be afraid to ask those kinds of questions. In fact, I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't. But Katniss is different. As a Teen Pastor, I won't be discipling people that I'm in love with. And I am in love with Katniss, it's high time that I admit it. She's all I think about. When I'm baking at work, I'm thinking about her. When I'm in class, I'm daydreaming about her. When I'm with her, I can hardly concentrate on anything else except hearing her voice and the feel of her slender fingers interlaced with my own while we watch our movie or football game. Finnick says this is how it was with him and Annie in the beginning of their relationship too, although they were friends for many years beforehand.

"How long was it before you were able to concentrate on anything else?" I ask him during our weekly Thursday evening conversation. Bracing my phone against my shoulder, I clear enough dirty clothes from my futon so I can sit down. I've gotten really good at the frantic Friday afternoon clean up, in preparation for spending most of the weekend with Katniss, but my standards of living tend to fall back towards bachelorhood during the rest of the week.

"Well, if I tell you I almost flunked a semester of Advanced Old Testament Theory, would that frighten you?" Finnick asks with a chuckle.

"Yeah!" I exclaim as I finally sit down. I fumble with the release on my prosthesis, working it loose until it drops onto the floor with an unceremonious clunk. Leaning back with a grateful sigh, I start massaging my stump with my free hand. "This is my last year, Finnick! I can't afford to fail a class!"

"Calm down, baker boy," Finnick laughs. "Your GPA is so high it wouldn't even matter if you failed a class at this point."

"Hmph," I say petulantly. "It would still matter to me."

"C'mon Peeta, I'm just giving you a hard time," Finnick says, serious now. "I don't think you'll be flunking any classes. Not with your work ethic. You're a model student."

I wince. That's what I used to hear from my high school teachers also, and all it did then was cause a lot of my classmates to make fun of me. I had my fair share of friends in high school, but never anyone like Finnick. Or Katniss.

"So anyway," Finnick says, changing the subject. "I'm assuming you've told her about your leg, yeah?"

"Yeah, she knows about it."

"Uh huh," Finnick replies. "And exactly how much does she know?"

"She knows that I had an accident," I mumble. "I haven't told her the rest yet."

"Aaannnddd when do you plan on doing that?"

"I don't know!" I say, raking my hand through my hair. "Not yet. I'm... not ready yet."

"You mean, you're afraid of how she'll react?" Finnick asks.

"You know that I am!" I yell, almost dropping the phone. "Finnick, I love her! I'm in love with her, and I've never felt this way about anyone! And yeah, I'm scared! I'm scared of what she'll think of me if I tell her. I'm scared she'll be repulsed by me. She's so pure, and she's perfect for me. And I can't lose her. Just the thought of losing her terrifies me so much, I've had nightmares about it!"

Finnick is quiet for a few seconds. "And, how does she feel about you?"

I flop over sideways, right into the pile of dirty clothes. "She... ah... she told me that she feels safe with me. That she feels like I can protect her. She said that I remind her of her father that way."

"Okay. Am I correct in assuming that her father isn't alive, then?"

"She hasn't said that specifically, but the way she talks about him makes me think so. She speaks about her whole family that way."

"She hasn't told you about what happened to her family?"

"No. And I haven't pushed her to do so. It seems to be a very painful subject for her."

"Uh huh. And has it occurred to you that if you were to open up to her a bit, she might then do the same?"

"Yes, it has," I reply, balling up whatever pair of pants I'm lying on into a makeshift pillow. "Believe me, it has. But not yet. I don't know how I know this, but it's not time for that yet."

I hear Finnick make that clucking noise he always makes when he disagrees with me. "Well, you obviously know her better than I do. But please, don't wait too long. You're on a pretty delicate timeline here, between not wanting to be too forthcoming too early in the relationship, and out and out hiding things that are important. And no one wants to feel like their significant other is hiding things from them."

Exhaling shakily, I turn onto my side. "Yeah, that's easy for you to say. Annie already knew all about you, before you even got together."

"Yes, and that the fact that she loves me anyway is a testament to how rare a woman she is. Don't you think Katniss is like that?"

"Yeah... but-"

"Peeta!" Finnick barks, frustrated. "You had an accident. You made a dumb mistake with one girl, and then had a freak accident. It could've happened to anyone! And don't you think God has forgiven you?"

"Yeah, I know he has... but..."

"But what? Peeta, I slept with almost half the girls in New Orleans before Annie. She knew that, and she loved me anyway. From afar at first. She was my friend. My funny, beautiful friend who prayed for me. But then, it was like she just crept up on me. Slowly. And before I even realized it, I was in love with her too. And she forgave me, and I know the Lord forgave me. And, with her help, I finally forgave myself. And that right there, my friend, is where you're stuck. You still haven't forgiven yourself. And there's absolutely no way for you to move forward until you do."

I'm quiet for almost a full minute. "You're right," I finally choke out.

"I know I'm right," Finnick replies. I can hear the satisfied smile in his voice. "So, when will you tell her?"

"Soon. I'll tell her soon."

He sighs, defeated. "All right. But again, don't wait too long."

"I won't."

I cringe as I attach my prosthesis the next morning. I haven't replaced the protective sleeve that goes underneath it in probably close to six months. I'm supposed to replace them every month, according to what the physical therapist told me when I first got my fake leg. But the sleeves are expensive, so I had been replacing them only every couple months at first. That quickly stretched to every three months, until this last time when I realized I was down to my last one. I'd been meaning to head down the mountain to the medical supply store for a while now, but somehow always managed to find an excuse not to go. And especially since Katniss came into my life, I haven't wanted to waste any of my time driving down the mountain for medical supplies, when I could be spending it with her instead.

"I'll get some new ones tomorrow, before church," I mumble to myself as I finish getting dressed. I wince with each step going down, limping my way into the kitchen and donning my apron. I grab a couple aspirins out of the first aid kit on the wall and get to work prepping croissants.

I'm limping badly by the time Katniss arrives at around 6pm, our takeout Thai dinner sitting on top of her Bible. I manage to hide the worst of it from her while we eat, popping another couple aspirins while she's in the bathroom. I keep hearing Finnick's voice in my head, reminding me that I need to tell her the whole story, but it never seems to be the right time. But when exactly is the perfect time to tell someone that their church-group-leader-who-wants-to-be-a-pastor boyfriend was an idiot in high school, and threw away his virginity on a girl who he later found out was sleeping around? The answer to that question, is never.

Katniss and I have just locked up the coffee shop after group and are heading up the stairs to my apartment when the toe of my shoe slips off the stair. I immediately fall forward, slamming my shin into the step, hitting exactly the spot where my stump attaches to the prosthesis.

"Peeta!" Katniss exclaims, grabbing onto my arm to help me back up. "Are you okay?"

I cringe against the pain, trying not to give away how much it hurts. Stupid, clumsy idiot! "Yeah," I croak out. "Yeah, I'm okay. Let's just get upstairs."

Katniss wraps her arm around my waist to help me hobble into my apartment. She sets me down onto the futon and pulls my shoes off, grumbling about the double-knots, and gasping when she sees blood on my pant leg. "Peeta, you're bleeding!"

"What?" I say weakly. The pain is so bad I feel woozy.

Katniss rolls up my pant leg. "There's a lot of blood here, Peeta!" she cries. "How do I take this thing off of you?"

Lowering my trembling hand, I release the prosthesis and lean my head back, closing my eyes against the swirl of nausea in my stomach. Stupid, stupid, stupid...

"I need to get you a washcloth," Katniss says as she inspects my leg. She hurries to the dresser and returns with a couple of washcloths. She soaks one with cold water from the sink and presses it to my forehead. "Stay with me, Peeta. Don't you dare pass out on me!"

"I'll always stay with you," I whisper, willing myself to stay conscious. "Always, always, always..."

Katniss peels the blood-soaked cloth sleeve away from my stump and gasps. "Peeta," she says, holding it up for my inspection with one hand as she tries to stem the bleeding with the other washcloth. "Look at this! It's completely worn through!"

Shame floods my body. "Yeah," I mumble. "I need some new ones. I've been meaning to go, but I just-"

"You just haven't made the time," Katniss snaps. "Peeta, you should never be too busy to take care of yourself!"

"I know," I whisper. "I'm sorry."

We sit in silence for a while, with Katniss checking the washcloth every couple minutes to see if the bleeding has slowed down. Finally she stands up, guiding my hand to hold the washcloth and grabbing her bag. "You don't even have any first aid supplies here," she says. "So I'm gonna go and get you some. That's a Rite Aid there, a couple stores down, isn't it?"

I shake my head, trying to sit up. "Yes, but I don't want you going there alone!" I protest. "There's a bunch of teenagers that hang out there on the weekends, trying to get people to buy liquor for them from the ABC store next door. You could get hurt-"

"I can take care of myself, Peeta Mellark," Katniss says firmly. She takes the cloth from my forehead and rewets it. Then she yanks my phone from my back pocket and puts it into my hand. "You call me if you feel lightheaded again, or if the bleeding picks back up, or anything else, and I'll call 911. Otherwise, I'll be back in fifteen minutes."

"Please be careful!" I say as she goes out the door. Lord, please keep her safe! Don't let anyone take her from me!

Katniss returns exactly fourteen minutes later with gauze, bandages, three tubes of antibiotic ointment, and a bottle of pain pills. She mixes the ointment with some lavender essential oil from her bag, before carefully applying a thick layer to the entire bottom of my stump. Then she wraps the whole thing up expertly, props my leg up on a pillow, and has me swallow two of the pain pills with a glass of water.

"There," she says, sitting down next to me after washing her hands and cleaning up the bloody rag. "How does that feel?"

"So much better," I say in relief. I wrap my arm around her shoulders and pull her close. "Thank you. I can tell you come from a family of healer-types."

Katniss leans her head against my chest. "No," she says. "I'm not the healer type. My sister though, she was the one who could fix anything, heal anything. She wanted to go to medical school someday, before..." and she shakes her head. She's closing herself off again, turning inward. Refusing to open up and tell me more. Maybe Finnick is right. Maybe it's time I lead by example.

I inhale shakily and tighten my arm around her. "Do you think, that your sister could've saved my leg, if she'd had the chance?"

I feel Katniss nod against my chest. "Yes," she says, her voice muffled. "I bet she could have."

"The doctors at the hospital said it was one of the worst cases of blood poisoning they'd ever seen," I say. "But if what you say is true, then I bet your sister could've saved it for me."

Katniss sniffs and looks up at me. "Peeta," she says. "Tell me what happened." I feel my heart start to thump and my stomach swoop. "I asked Delly a while ago, about what happened to you. And all she told me was that you'd had an accident when you were in high school. She said you didn't like to talk about it."

"I don't," I admit. "Finnick and Annie are really the only people who know the whole story. Delly doesn't know it. Not even my parents or my brothers know it."

Katniss cups my jaw with her hand, her beautiful grey eyes boring into my own. "Will you tell me?"

I press a quick kiss to her forehead. "Okay." And I do. I tell her the entire horrible, embarrassing, hideously ugly story.

I started dating Glimmer when she asked me to the Homecoming dance during my senior year of high school. She was blonde and blue-eyed, with the kind of body that all the boys salivated over. I'd known who she was pretty much my whole life, from school, but we didn't hang out with the same group of people. So I was quite surprised when she asked me to the dance. She said she enjoyed herself though, and it seemed like we had a lot in common. We both liked superhero movies, we both liked football, and we both thought Instagram and Facebook were lame but Tumblr was cool. My mother even liked her, since she was pretty and came from a wealthy family. That right there should've been my first clue.

After we'd been dating for a couple months, she started pressuring me to have sex with her. I told her no. I'd never slept with anyone, and didn't want to until I knew I was with the girl I wanted to marry. It became a point of contention between us, causing more than a few fights and even a temporary breakup. But still, I stuck to my guns and refused.

Things came to a head the night of our Senior Prom. Glimmer and I and her friends, Cato and Clove, Marvel, and Lindsey Fox and her date all rented a limo together and ate dinner at a fancy steakhouse. The dance was the usual cheesy, deejayed event, and afterwards the limo took us all to a cabin near the woods that Cato's family owned, to spend the night. Marvel had snuck some of his father's scotch along and I'd taken several gulps of it, trying to fit in and calm my nerves at the same time. Somehow, the combination of the scotch and the slinky, dark blue dress Glimmer was wearing convinced me that I was in love with her by the time we arrived at the cabin. So when we walked inside and she pulled me right into a bedroom, I didn't try to resist. She'd even come prepared with condoms.

I suppose the during part was okay, but after we were finished I felt awful. My head hurt, and I felt dirty, used. Glimmer asked me if I wanted to go for round two and I declined, leading to another argument. Our shouting back and forth was interrupted by Marvel, knocking on the door and asking if we wanted to go play flashlight tag out in the woods. That suggestion didn't appeal to me at all, but I didn't really want to stay in a middle-of-nowhere cabin by myself either, so I agreed. We all grabbed flashlights and went out into the woods, still dressed in our prom clothes.

We were about ten minutes into the game when I realized I had no idea where anyone else was. I called out to Glimmer, trying to not sound scared, but when she didn't answer right away I became more frantic. I started walking back in what I thought was the direction of the cabin, keeping the beam of my flashlight trained on the ground in front of me, when I suddenly heard a muffled moaning sound off to my left. I jerked my flashlight up to see Glimmer leaning up against a tree, her eyes closed and mouth open, the straps of her blue dress dangling off her shoulders, and Marvel's face buried in her neck.

"What're you doing?" I gasped in shock, causing both Glimmer and Marvel to jump in surprise. "What are you doing, with him?"

Glimmer smirked, leaning into Marvel as he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. "Oh Peeta," she said. "Did you really think that I was in love with you? You were like the only guy at our school that was still a virgin! You, with your blond hair and broad shoulders and the skimpy little wrestling singlets. Don't you know how many girls wanted you? And yet, you wouldn't even give them the time of day! You were like the poster boy for the perfect, pure teenager, and it was disgusting! So, when Clove bet me a hundred bucks that I couldn't get you to sleep with me before graduation, I jumped at the chance. And too bad for her, but I won."

A growling sound escaped from my lungs as I stared at the two of them, smirking at me and pawing each other. "You mean, it was all for a bet? How you acted?"

Glimmer rolled her eyes. "I didn't need the money, you idiot. A hundred dollars to me is nothing. But, at least it'll help pay for the limo for tonight." Marvel started to laugh, like she'd just told the funniest joke he'd ever heard.

My mind was spinning. All of a sudden events of the past several months made a lot more sense. Where Glimmer would disappear to during lunch every day. Why she never invited me to her house. Why she asked me for sex pretty much every time we were together from Christmas break on. It was all an act. She'd been with Marvel, and who knows who else, the whole time that she was with me.

"Oh my God," I stammered, staring foolishly at the pair of them. "I need to get out of here... I need to go home... how can I get out of here?"

Glimmer tsk'd. "Oh Peeta, I'm sorry. But I'm afraid I can't come over tonight. Marvel and I have some things to... study," and she snaked her hand around his neck and pulled him into a kiss. "I might be free tomorrow morning, but I'll have to let you know."

I stumbled backwards and started to run, blindly through the woods, not really paying attention where I was going, when suddenly the ground disappeared from under my feet and I fell down an incline. The incline wasn't that steep, and I would've likely been okay, if my left foot hadn't found an old, rusty bear trap and set it off. That thing slammed shut over my leg and wouldn't budge.

I screamed, as loud as I'd ever screamed before the pain was so bad. I again called out for Glimmer, shrieking that I was trapped and bleeding and in horrible pain. After a few agonizing minutes I heard her approaching with Marvel, holding his hand possessively, causing another piercing pain to travel up from my leg and stab me right in the heart.

"What do you need now, Peeta?" Glimmer snapped. "I thought I told you I'd be busy all night tonight."

Tears of pain and shame rolled down my face. "Can you at least help me?" I stammered. "My leg is stuck in this thing, and I can't get it out."

But Glimmer just smiled at me. "Oh, but you're such a smart boy, Peeta. I'm sure you can figure something out."

Then she yanked on Marvel's hand and they turned around, walking back up the incline, their flashlight beams growing dimmer and dimmer the further away they got. "You can't leave me here!" I screamed. "It's getting cold, and my leg is bleeding!" But the only response I got was the sound of their crunching footsteps and the tinkle of Glimmer's laughter.

By the time paramedics found me the next morning, I was barely conscious. I was taken to the hospital, where they had me on heavy-duty drugs for several days trying to save my mangled leg. But after about a week they said it had to be amputated, because the infection had set in too deep. I had to stay in the hospital for over a month after the surgery, mainly due to complications. My stomach got so messed up from the strong antibiotics I was on that I couldn't eat for a while. My leg didn't heal as fast as they wanted it to since I couldn't eat and regain my strength. I missed my high school graduation, and the only people who came to see me in the hospital were my brothers and my parents. My mom tried to get me to press charges, but really, against who? And for what? Against myself for being a fool? Somehow I didn't think that would help too much. It certainly wouldn't give me my leg back.

I first met Finnick and Annie while they were working as chaplains in the hospital. There was a group of three hospitals all connected to each other, and it was their day to work in the Children's Hospital. The first time Finnick tried to talk to me, I told him, very rudely, to get out of my room and leave me alone. He left, but not before dropping a Capital Kings CD on my bedside table. When he and Annie returned the following day, I allowed them in. He didn't ask about my leg, or how I was doing. All he asked was if I'd listened to the CD. When I told him I hadn't he offered to listen to it with me. And it was a really good CD. It was so good that it took me listening to it three times before I realized it was a Christian music CD.

After that he and Annie came by almost every day. They left more CDs for me to listen to. They left me books to read and DVDs to watch. They offered to pray for me and with me. They became my friends, the closest friends I'd ever had in my life.

I tried returning home to my parents' house after I was discharged, but I was only there a few days before I realized that I needed a completely fresh start. It was too hard running into people that I knew from school. News about what happened to me had spread throughout Victors County, and I couldn't go anywhere without people pointing and whispering. I was embarrassed about my ugly, peg-leg prosthesis so I wore pants all the time, even in the dead of summer when it was in the nineties and humid.

And then came the breaking point. I made the mistake of telling my parents and my brother Rye at dinner one night that I wanted to attend Panem Bible College in the fall instead of the State University where I'd been accepted. My mother nearly choked on her food, with my brother raising his eyebrows and hastily excusing himself from the table. After my mother recovered, she announced that I would not be allowed to use the college fund they'd saved for me to attend some 'religious school for sissies', and that if I was absolutely certain I wanted to continue down this path, I would have to pay my own way.

I packed up my stuff a week later and moved in with Finnick and Annie. I slept on their couch for almost a year before they moved away, back to their hometown to start their own church. I was accepted to Panem Bible College, but I had to wait a year before starting because I had to raise money for tuition. I worked various odd jobs before the church opened the coffee shop, in the spring before I started school. I applied for the pastry chef position before the shop even opened, and it was because of me that they converted what was supposed to be attic space into a livable apartment.

Katniss is quiet for a few minutes once I finish. At some point during my story she'd taken both of my hands, holding them between her small ones. "Why did you wait so long to tell me?" she finally asks.

I can't bring myself to look at her, so I keep my eyes trained on our sandwiched hands. "Because, I was ashamed," I mumble. "I'm still ashamed. I was a fool, Katniss. I allowed myself to get led down a path that ended with this horrible thing happening to me, and it was all my fault."

"It was not all your fault," Katniss says, shaking her head at me. She brings my hands up to her lips, kissing my knuckles. "It sounds to me like it was just a freak accident." Her grey eyes look into mine. "I just wish you would've told me a lot sooner. Why didn't you?"

"Because," I whisper. "I shouldn't have even ever been in that situation. I should've seen Glimmer for what she was a long time before that. And I-" I stop as tears of shame roll down my cheeks. "I slept with her, and I shouldn't have. I felt so dirty afterwards, Katniss. I felt used. And that's not how it should be." I reach up to cup her face. "That's not how I want it to be, someday." With you. "I love you, Katniss. I love you, and you deserve to have someone as pure as you are, when that time comes."

Katniss smiles, that soft smile that she seems to save only for me. "How do you know that I'm pure? I don't think I've ever talked about that before."

I lean in and kiss her forehead. "It was just a guess," I say. "But I think a good one. Am I right?"

Katniss lays her head on my chest. "Yes." We're quiet for a couple of minutes. Thank you Jesus, for not having her run out the door once she'd heard my story! Thank you, thank you, thank you! And then, right on the heels of that prayer comes the realization. I told her I loved her. I said the actual words 'I love you' to her. To her face! And she didn't run away! She didn't say it back, but she didn't run away. This is good!

"I should stay here tonight with you," she murmurs after a while. "Make sure you don't start bleeding again." I instinctively tighten my arms around her as her words fill my heart to almost bursting. Then she sits up on her elbow to look at me. "And then tomorrow we're going down the mountain to get you those cloth sleeves that you need. I'll drive us." She covers my mouth with her fingers before I can protest. "No arguing," she says firmly. "What time do you get off work?"

"I get off at ten," I reply, looking at her in awe. "Saturdays are my short days."

"Good," she says, smiling. "I should be ready to wake up by then. We'll go down as soon as you're done. And, I don't want you wearing your prosthesis until your leg heals up, so you'll just have to use your crutches for a while. Okay?"

I turn my head, kissing her fingers. "Okay."

"Okay. Now, what movie is up for tonight?"

I pick up my laptop from the coffee table and flip it open. "Ah, it looks like we're up to Age of Ultron."

Katniss snuggles back down next to me. "All right then, Steve Rogers. Boot it up."

So, that's quite a story, don't you think? What do you think of Katniss's reaction?

Please don't hesitate to leave me a review!