I wake before he does. My eyes are barely open before an overwhelming feeling of relief hits me, and it takes my foggy brain a second to process it. Then I realize that today is the day we get to go home. The most difficult thing I have to do today is board a train. Thank god.
Then I realize this isn't actually true. The most difficult thing I have to do isn't to board a train. It's to board a train that will return me to my world, leaving Gale and his family in their new one. Just like yesterday, I'll be saying more goodbyes to people I love. This seems to be the major theme of my life.
I ease out from under Peeta's arm and swing one leg silently over him. After so many years of moving through the woods in every season with light feet, I change soundlessly back into the clothes I wore when we arrived, run my fingers through my hair and braid it back sloppily, and pull on a pair of boots. The sun is up, but the pale light streaming through the window indicates it can't have been up for too long. At least we didn't have nightmares all night. I yawn and lope down the stairs, hoping maybe someone has sent over some eggs or something for us. But I lose track of my thoughts of food when I see the front door cracked open, and just beyond it, Gale's unmistakable shape, sitting on the stoop outside alone in the pale dawn. I know that I move over to the door without making a single sound, but we were hunting partners together for years and I'm not the only one who's light on my feet. Gale greets me without ever turning around.
"Hey, Katniss." My heart aches for him to call me Catnip again, a nickname I used to hate. It feels just now like an item of clothing that you grow out of but adore so much you can't bear to get rid of it. Maybe we're finally too old. Maybe these past few days have done the trick. Gale's voice is raspy, and I wonder if he's been up all night. Peeta and I weren't what kept him up, but we're probably not the only possibilities. I take a seat beside him on the stoop. His grey Seam eyes find mine and they do look tired, but they also see me, in that way that only Gale used to be able to see me, before there was Peeta. I wonder again, as I do sometimes, what would have happened if Prim had never been chosen, or if Peeta had not been my competitor, if he would have lived his life in silence, never working up the nerve to tell me how he felt, watching me fall in love with someone else. The most painful part of it all is that, in retrospect, I cannot see myself having fallen in love with anyone else but Gale. Gale was the only boy I ever noticed at all, and he was the only one who really knew me. I wonder if Gale knows just how possible what he'd wanted would have been, if not for the Games. But if not for the Games is not an addendum you can use lightly. If not for the Games, nothing would be the same at all. It's useless to compare.
"Hi Gale," I greet him. "Get any sleep?" He sighs. Without thinking, I reach out and brush a piece of hair that's fallen in his eyes away. He looks downward. This is not like the Gale that used to hunt with me, so outspoken and firm and direct about everything. This Gale is the Gale that emerged after everything, and he still has trouble looking at me sometimes. I don't blame him. I still have trouble looking at myself sometimes. In the mirror I can see that I'm not the same, and it's not only the burn scars that prove it. I drop my hand back to my lap and we sit in the pale sun in silence for a couple of minutes. When Gale notices that I'm shivering, without words he slips out of his black coat and drapes it over my shoulders. It's warm, and smells like him. I still remember what Gale smells like. I want to close my eyes and bury my face in it, not because I'm in love with him, but because that smell reminds me of so many good times that we did have together once upon a time, in a land far away.
Not that far, I guess. But it might as well be.
"You said you wanted to talk to me?" I ask cautiously.
He smiles a little. "I didn't think you'd want to talk to me, honestly."
"I at least have to thank you for what you did with Rue's family," I say. "That really meant a lot to me, to be able…to be able to meet her brother and sisters." My voice catches in the middle of the sentence and I feel the water rise behind my eyes again. I blink it rapidly back.
"Of course," he says. "It's not a problem. Man, they were cute, weren't they? The older one would have followed you all the way back home if you let her, I think." I think of Nayari chattering away to me the entire evening and I smile. "I think you're probably right about that." It's easier to talk about things that are lighter, since so much seems so heavy. But I have to ask.
"How's life here, for you?" He frowns and looks at his hands, clasped over his knees, like he needs to think about this question for awhile before answering. I already asked Hazelle, but I want to hear his answer.
"Unnatural," he says finally. "You know they give the trees all these chemicals and crap just to make them look prettier?" I laugh, despite myself. "Why does that not surprise me?" The Capitol has always been unrealistically concerned with appearances. Just ask my prep team.
"You miss home?"
"I miss what home was like before all this," he says. "But all I saw when I went back there was ashes, and the images in my head of what it looked like the day they…" He shakes his head. "You have a new life there." For the first time his eyes meet mine and I'm grateful that it's not in Gale's nature to be deceptive, not like it is in mine. He's always had a hard time not saying exactly what's on his mind. It's amazing he liked me for so long and never spoke up about it to me. "If you and I had been able to…it just made more sense for my family to be here. There's a lot more for them here than back in 12. It doesn't really make sense for me to think about myself." I translate this in my head. He has nothing to go back to. If I'd been a possibility, he would have gone back for me. But he can take his family with him anywhere he goes, so there was nothing left for him but ashes. In this light, I understand his decision to leave.
"They gave you a good job here," I point out. He nods. "Yeah, it's interesting work. I spent all that time in the woods lecturing you about how we needed a new way of governing ourselves, and now we have one, so I guess it's what I was meant to do, to be in the middle of all of it. It gives me things to think about and I stay busy." This, too, I understand. It's sometimes hard to stay busy in 12, since I don't need the money, don't go to school, and don't have any particular aim in life at the moment. I envy Gale the certainty of having a career, even if I don't agree with the one he's chosen. There are a lot of things we'll still have to step tentatively around, lots of landmines wired to old hurts, ready to explode at any moment.
"How do you live without the woods, though?" This question pops out without me even realizing it was in my brain. But I do legitimately want an answer to this, because this is the part I'll never understand.
"I don't," he says, a little flatly, and his mouth twists bitterly. "I feel suffocated here a lot. I mean, I can travel to other districts anytime I want, to go hunting or whatever, but…" He doesn't have to finish that sentence. I know the answer to it. "I mostly just work a lot. I think eventually I'll move out of here, once the kids are a little older and they can take care of themselves better. I don't want to leave Mom. It took her forever just to figure out where everything was so she could go shopping and stuff. It's not exactly small." I nod.
"Where will you go?" I ask. Posy's only seven, so this still leaves him quite a bit of time to even make this decision. "I don't know," he says. I wrap his coat a little tighter around me. "Maybe to 7. I liked 7 when I traveled out there a few times. Or 4."
"You could bunk with Johanna," I say.
"Yeah, speaking of that!" I see a smile play at the corners of his mouth. "What's up with her? Are you best friends now?"
"Something like that," I agree, and it sounds nice coming out of my mouth. "She's about the only one left who has anything in common with me." Besides Peeta. "She was having a hard time being home for awhile, before she got her dog, so she started coming out to visit now and then, and it was good for us to talk to each other about…everything. I don't really know that many women anymore." This is the absolute closest I can get to saying what we both know. If Gale and I are going to talk to each other at all, we have to start out with things that aren't contentious. I know this instinctively.
"I think it's nice," he says. "Although I can't say I ever saw that one coming."
"Yeah, well, remember, we lived together for awhile in 13," I remind him. "She would have been on our squad, except she still couldn't deal with water back then." Thinking about this, I'm glad that Johanna wasn't able to go into the city with us. Our particular squad was rather too adept at dying.
"I wish I had more people here I could talk to, you know, like friends," he says. I'm surprised he admitted this out loud. "But you know you and I were never great at making friends." I smile at him. "I'm still not," I say. "I got lucky."
We sit in silence for a little longer, but it doesn't feel as heavy. Even small talk is something, and I wasn't even sure I would be able to look at Gale for longer than a minute when we first began to plan this trip. I don't want to hate him and live my entire life replaying all the things that happened in my life that hurt me over and over again. If I can't let them go eventually, it will be like they never ended at all, and then what's the point of all this? Except it's not that simple. Back in my head I'm still furious with him, but the anger is at war with so many other emotions—pity, longing, disappointment. I'm not sure how to sort them all out.
"How's 12?" he asks finally.
"Getting there," I say. I tell him about the rebuilding crews and how I work with them sometimes, the progress that's being made recreating our former town, the few people, like Greasy Sae, that still remain and that he was close to. I tell him about the changes with food and travel. I don't talk about living with Peeta, or even about what he's up to. I try to make it as easy for Gale as possible. He listens, his eyes still trained on mine, taking it all in. When he asks if I still hunt in our woods, I nod. The woods are something that I could never give up; something that belonged to me before Gale, when my father was alive. I miss Gale most acutely in the woods, but his departure would never make me give them up. They are my true home. I see the faraway look in Gale's eyes and I know that he's remembering what I remember—the little stone house by the lake, our hollow where we'd meet up to eat and plan, trees we'd climbed to hide from packs of wild dogs. I think we probably could have navigated through our woods without eyes, if we'd had to, by feel and smell alone. I get the impression that me talking too much about that part is causing him pain, and I feel like I should change the subject, but my mind is still tallying all the things that I don't want to talk about. His job. His love life, if he has one. My love life. The war. I settle on something neutral.
"When will those propos air?" I ask curiously. This is actually something I would like to know.
"They'll be editing them together today, but hopefully they'll be ready to go live tomorrow," Gale says. "I think they're planning to launch them at noon, if you want to watch at home. I'm sure they'll show them repeatedly over the course of the day. The citizens are really invested in hearing from you and Peeta." His tone is neutral but the first mention of the name of my lover sounds like a block of wood in his mouth, crushing his tongue. I nod. "I'd be fine if they would just stop caring about where I am and what I'm doing," I say. "I'm still waiting for life to just get back to normal already."
Gale gives me an odd, twisted smile. "Katniss, you know that life will never get back to normal, for us."
Before I can respond, a messenger on a bicycle careens up the street and stops deftly in front of us. We look up and shade our eyes to see another Capitol attendant, this one dressed all in yellow. I still haven't worked out what all the colors mean. On the back of the bike is a set of panniers, and I can smell what's in them as soon as I see them. I smile.
"Breakfast," says the attendant, and he smiles too.
Gale helps me carry in the bags of food in which are stored our breakfast. The house is still quiet; no sound from Haymitch, Johanna or Peeta drifts down the stairs, although it's creeping into actual morning now. Only one member of the household—Mutt—greets us at the door, tail thumping against the floor. I reach down to scratch his head. Our train leaves at noon, Lyme informed us last night. A car will come to take us to the train station. Hazelle and the kids will meet us there to say quick final goodbyes. Most everyone else said their goodbyes to us last night, at the dinner. No mention of our return has been voiced, and I'm just fine with that. I definitely need some time to recover from all this craziness. I glance at the clock; just after 8. We still have a few hours, but it's a peaceful few. Gale helps me open the trays, revealing scrambled eggs, pancakes, sausages, toasted bread, jam, honey, tea, hot chocolate, fresh fruit, and on and on. One thing I will always miss when I leave the Capitol—maybe the only thing—is the food. I know it's probably polite to wait for the others to come downstairs, but I'm ravenous at the smell of the sausage, so Gale and I grab a couple of plates and begin loading them up while the food is still hot, carefully closing the trays when we're done so it will stay warm for the others. We chew in silence for a minute and then I look at Gale.
"Hey Gale?"
"Mmm?" he replies, around a mouthful of eggs. His eyes look distant.
"Why'd you want to talk to me?" He swallows and looks surprised.
"Why wouldn't I want to talk to you?" he asks.
I have no answer for this. "I don't know."
"Why did you talk to me is a better question," he tells me. "But I suspect it's the same reason, either way." I nod. Yes. This is a truth. Talking to one another was inevitable, because there will never be a way to just forget. "Yeah. But I can't just go back to the way things were…before. You said yourself that normal isn't really a baseline for anything anymore. I mean…this is nice, though. But…" I can't seem to fumble any words together to express what I mean. Whatever gift of silver tongue emerged at that speech last night has deserted me.
He nods. "I understand. I just thought it would be better to talk even a little if we could than just…be stiff and cold. It didn't feel right. Plus…it's not the same without you." He says this part a little quietly, and fast, as though he wants to get the words out and be done with it, although I already know this.
"It's not the same without you, either," I say. There's some more silence. I break off a bit of toast and dunk it in my hot chocolate.
"Would you mind if I…wrote to you, now and then?" he asks. "Not as the Capitol's ambassador," he adds hastily, and I smile. "I really didn't want to be that, but they thought it was their best shot to actually get you here, even though I argued with them."
"You can if you like," I say, after thinking it over for a moment. "But…give me some time to write back. I need to get in a good mental place to do it and there's still days when it's hard. Especially after all this, I just need some time with…with the woods and home and all." I have to catch myself in the middle of this sentence, as I almost said, "with Peeta." Gale nods but looks happy for the first time, and I'm glad.
Before we can get any further, I hear the creak of a board on the stairs, and with a thump-thump-thump, Johanna comes charging down. He hair looks like she's been electrocuted; it's sticking up all on its ends. She's wearing a black t-shirt that hangs to her knees and slippers but her legs are bare. She jumps the last few stairs and her dog leaps up and runs over to her to greet her. She mushes his ears around.
"Hi, all," she greets us perfunctorily before charging to the stove and beginning to lift aluminum lids to peek at the breakfast food. "Mmm, food. I'm starving."
"Johanna, how about you put some pants on," says Gale, eying her long bare legs. She laughs at him without turning around. "How about you just don't look, if you don't like it, Gale? Or is the problem that you like it…a little too much." She turns, plate loaded with pancakes, and gives him a devilish grin. Gale rolls his eyes. I'm used to this type of thing from her by now, so it doesn't really faze me one way or the other. My prudishness has definitely been whittled away quite a bit after spending so much time in her presence. She plops herself down next to me and begins to shovel sausage bits into her mouth. Suddenly I remember our unfinished conversation.
"Hey Gale," I snicker. Who's that attendant with the long blonde hair? Johanna got to know her really well last night."
"Really well," Johanna agrees amiably.
"You mean Lisa?" Gale laughs. "Well, you probably made her happy, Johanna. Just the other day she was bemoaning the lack of available women around here. She's from the Capitol originally and apparently women and men being with the same gender was relatively common among the Capitol people—I mean, they were pretty open about it—but in the districts it was mostly hush-hush. With the influx of all the new district people, I think whoever swings your way is probably still keeping it to themselves."
"Men?" my mind catches on that part. I never thought about men being together, but I guess it's not so odd, since I got over the thought of Johanna and her women lovers pretty fast. It's true though that I never saw anything like that in my time in 12, although I realize now that it must have been happening out of my eyesight anyways.
"Guess I made her night then," purrs Johanna. "She definitely seemed…satisfied."
"Well, you have good taste," says Gale. "All that hair." I feel a flash of totally unwarranted and unfair jealousy that I can't prevent at these words, but then it fades. I don't know if Gale knew Johanna liked women or not, but the fact that he's so blasé about it means that he must have come to terms with it pretty well since he got here.
"Katniss wouldn't indulge me," says Johanna, a faux-pout on her face, "So I was left with no other choice." I shoot her an exasperated glance, but Gale laughs. "Is that so, Katniss?" he teases me over a forkful of eggs. I throw a raspberry at Johanna but she opens her mouth in time to catch it. "Mad skills," she says triumphantly. "Mad skills all the way around, if you know what I mean."
"We know what you mean," says Peeta as he emerges into the kitchen carrying a pair of sweatpants in one hand. "You're about as subtle as a brick. But I'm glad you're getting some of it out of your system finally so you can stop torturing Katniss."
"You like when I torture Katniss, you liar," says Johanna without turning around. I see Peeta's grin but he merely throws the pants in her lap as he passes. "And put some pants on, Johanna."
Peeta gets his food and comes over to sit by us, giving me a swift good morning peck on the cheek. Haymitch is down not too long after, and though he hasn't brushed his hair, he appears at least to have showered, and even fills a plate with food before coming over.
"What's happening today? Where is everyone?" he rasps, squinting at us and blinking, apparently still recovering from last night.
"Home today," says Peeta, smiling at me.
"That's good news," agrees Haymitch, looking slightly less surly. "I've had about as much of this fun as I can handle," he adds sarcastically.
"No offense, Gale," says Peeta, ever polite.
"None taken." Gale sounds a little formal. "Sorry we dragged all of you out and put you through this again. If it makes you feel any better, I think you exhausted everyone else as much as they exhausted you. I heard President Paylor telling Commander Lyme that she thought it would be more efficient to just conference via video from now on."
"Score," says Johanna. "You've effectively managed to alienate everyone around you again, Katniss. And here I thought you were out of practice, being all loving with me…"
"I managed to do that all by myself, did I?" I ask. She sniffs. "Well, it wasn't me," she tells me, "The people in the Capitol seem to adore me." She grins like a shark.
"I don't think you can extrapolate one attendant to the entire governmental team, Johanna," chortles Peeta, clearly having her exploits fresh in his mind as well.
"Loving isn't the first word I'd pick to describe Katniss," smirks Haymitch. "Sorry, girl on fire." I smirk right back at him. "I'll go up against you in that contest any time you like, Haymitch," I say. But for all the snark, it feels good. Everyone sounds like themselves again, and I'm glad for it. Somewhere along the line, I started thinking of the people around this table as my family.
When we finish, Peeta and I climb the stairs to our room to pack the few things that have migrated out of our suitcases. I feel inexplicably guilty because I have so little opportunity to see Gale that it feels like I should be spending these last few hours near him, but even the little conversation we had was exhausting, though I'm glad we were able to have it. He excuses himself and disappears into the bedroom in which he's been staying, anyways. Johanna goes outside to have a smoke and walk her dog. Haymitch is still draining a cup of coffee he laced with something from a flask when he thought I wasn't looking.
I sit on the bed and swing my legs over the side, watching Peeta neatly fold his things into the suitcase he brought. Mine are haphazardly tumbled around my own suitcase, of course. I watch how the sun slanting through the window twinkles off his blond curls and the downy blond hair that covers his arms. Soon we'll be back in our bed. I never attached much meaning to a bed; it was only ever a place to sleep and escape the tension and anxiety that nagged me every day in District 12, but for some reason the idea of Peeta and I having a bed seems like less of a necessity and more of a luxury. As though he senses me, he glances up to see me watching him. I used to watch him like this and turn my face away before he could catch me, but now I meet his gaze directly and smile at him. Smiles feel much more natural on my lips now than they ever did before I met Peeta. He smiles automatically in response to mine. "What?" he asks. I shake my head. "Nothing," I say, "Just glad to be going home." Again, he tracks my thought process easily. "Back to our own house and bed," he says with relish.
"Remember, you promised me we could spend a whole day in it," I tell him, "At least." He stands and stretches, shaking out his bad leg a bit, and crosses to the bed, leaning down and lightly kissing me. I raise one hand to cup his cheek gently, my fingers just sliding up into the fine hairs at his temple. He shivers. "That's one promise I'll be very glad to keep," he says. I can't help myself, and wrap my legs around his waist. "Lay with me for a bit," I implore.
"Gotta pack," he says halfheartedly, but I know he'll do as I ask. Peeta's powerless to resist whenever I ask him for anything, even now. I lean in and kiss the tender spot just above his collarbone. He groans comically. I slide my hand a little deeper into his hair and tug on it a little. "Pretty please, Peeta," I whisper in his ear. I feel that hot feeling slipping down into my belly and throbbing. My belly is always where it ends up when I miss Peeta's touch the most. It gives me goosebumps up and down my arms and legs. It's been all of two days since we've really touched, and I'm still at the earliest stages of our lovemaking where, under all my stress and exhaustion over being here, I want more. I understand why Johanna's so attached to this feeling. Peeta tilts his head to give me better access and closes his eyes. Those long golden eyelashes flutter on his cheeks. I use my heels behind his knees as leverage and pull him tighter against me. I slip the hand that's not in his hair down his chest and then find the hem of his shirt and tickle my fingers underneath. The muscles in his stomach stand out from balancing as I tug him forward. I think he's trying to hold out just to make my life difficult, because I can feel those muscles contract at my touch. I know Peeta's body like I know my own. When he stands his ground, a little smile playing at the edges of his mouth, I unravel myself and lie down on the bed. I pull my shirt up over my head and drop it on the floor, and reach around to unhook my bra, too. When I lie back again, my shoulders and back are bare against the comforter. I used to be nervous being naked around Peeta, but it's faded away by now. When he feels me pull away, he opens his eyes and looks down, and I see the flicker of hunger in the back of them. He sits down on the bed next to where I'm stretching, arching my back up off the bed a little for him.
"What makes you think you can just get what you want whenever you want it?" Peeta asks, and I think about the sensation of his heart, pounding, pressed against mine. I'm sure it's pounding now. I raise my eyebrows to him. "Not interested?" I ask.
"Hmm…" he pretends to think it over, but I see his eyes roving hungrily over my bare skin and I know he's just playing with me. I can wait him out. I grin and run my hands lightly over my own chest, my thumbs lingering over my nipples, making them pucker together. Peeta bites his lip. I continue down to the hem of my pants and tug the buttons loose, wiggling out of them and pulling them over my hips. I push them off the end of the bed with a foot and all that's left is my underwear. Slowly I push them, too, down with my thumbs and raise my ankles out from them, one by one. Last of all, I reach back and tug my hair loose from its braid.
"How about now?" I ask, and close my eyes, and wait.
It only takes a second, and then my head is tugged back, hard, as his hands bury themselves in my hair and pull—not gently, like I do to him, but hard, insistently, the way he knows I like. A small sound of satisfaction escapes me. He bites the place where my shoulder meets my neck hard enough to leave a mark, and I feel my hands gather fistfuls of blanket at my sides as my toes curl. That pounding heart I knew was there finds the center of my chest and meets up with mine, finds its rhythm. Peeta's kissing me everywhere, and roughly, his teeth find my lower lip to tug it out, one hand moving just around my throat under my jaw, light as a butterfly but there, holding my head back in a way that makes the warmth in my belly shoot down my body like a bolt of lightning. I don't resist in the slightest; this is what I wanted. This roughness feeds me somehow, ignites something inside me that feels like a beast roaring at the same time as it melts me into something pliable, moldable, even weak. It's the only time I can be weak and accept it; the only time I can surrender and know things will be okay. Maybe it's unorthodox; I wouldn't know. Johanna's not the most reliable source of information on mainstream behavior, being as how she's so far out in her own world too. But my body knows what it wants and has all along, and what it wants is to draw this roughness out of Peeta, who I know is so gentle at heart that he would never hurt me, never truly humiliate me, but who plays at it because he knows, as usual, what I need. And because he, too, likes the way it feels, I think. It feels real, not like he's faking it for my sake. Maybe this kind of emotion can't be faked. His other callused baker's hand finds its way between my legs and closes over me, and I gasp audibly. Somewhere in the back of my head I know that we should be quiet, because of Gale, but it seems so far away. When his fingers first find their way inside me, a way they know all too well by now, my breath hitches and I feel the sounds building in my throat. Peeta's hand shifts over my mouth.
"Shhh," he whispers, and I find that this is so hard, this silence. My eyes fly open and find his blue ones, above me, and he nods in approval. I fix my eyes to his the way he likes and force the sounds back down my throat. I shudder all over with the effort as he moves his fingers.
"Put your hands on me," he whispers, and it's only then that I realize I've been so paralyzed with pleasure that they're still clutching the blankets for dear life. They spring free and in a second, Peeta's shirt is over his head too and they're fumbling shakily at his belt. His teeth catch my nipple and hold. I'm grateful that he's keeping his hand on my mouth, because only that firm press is forcing me not to cry out.
When Peeta too loses his clothes to the floor, he shifts off me and lies behind me, my back to his chest, the way we do when we're about to sleep. I'm confused at first. He keeps one hand over my mouth the entire time, and I'm panting into it. The other parts my legs, eases one up over his own and back, and then I understand, in the moment that he bites the back of my neck and pushes into me. I'm so turned on at this point, by his wandering hand and his teeth and that feeling of pressure that forces my voice back into my chest and seems to amplify every sensation I can't voice, that his movement is easy. When he feels my whole body go rigid, he takes his hand away and kisses my earlobe softly, kindly. My Peeta, this balance between salty and sweet we find in bed together. "Are you okay?" he whispers, ever the gentleman. I swallow and nod as he presses slowly deeper. The sensation is new, and I don't like not being able to see his face, so I crane my head around to find his eyes. I see in them all the sensation I feel coursing through me, and I can tell by the quickness of his breath how far gone he is, too.
"Keep quiet, or I'll put it back," he whispers, teasingly. I nod frantically again, but I'm not sure I have the willpower to be silent without help. He moves deliberately inside me so as not to knock the head of the bed back against the wall and give us away. Our feet find one another's and twine together. My head, sweaty strands of hair falling over my face, falls back limp on the pillow as he nuzzles into my back, kissing between my shoulderblades, panting and groaning quietly into my hot skin, breaking his own rules.
"You're…cheating…" I gasp, as his fingers find the sensitive place between my legs and begin a circular rhythm that matches the movement of his hips as he presses into me.
"Be good and do what I told you to do," he laughs softly.
"Yes, Peeta," I whisper back, unable to stop myself from smiling, but melting at the sweet taste of the words in my mouth that I will only say for him and no one else.
We're getting better at lasting a little longer, although I can never say I'm fully sated by the time Peeta finishes. It occurs to maybe that maybe we should do it more, and he can teach his body to last longer, because when I feel his hand clench down on me, when his bite finds my shoulder again and digs in until I see shooting stars, I feel a sense of loss almost immediately. I'm still throbbing, goosebumps covering me from head to toe, shaking my head dazedly as though by wish alone I could make it last longer.
Peeta collapses, panting, behind me, and wraps his arms around me tight as my endorphins begin to crash and I feel cold. All except one part. The part where we're still connected is still hot, and it makes me squirm. In the heat of the moment, Peeta's fingers fell away, and now I want them back. I bite my lip, wanting to ask him to finish what he started, but before I can, I feel the kisses begin to trail down my spine, and they silently make their way down to the triangle of my back between my hips before Peeta flips me and a soft "mmm" sound escapes me, because I know what happens next.
It only takes five minutes or so for Peeta to finish me…maybe not even that long. I'm already primed for him to begin. When my orgasm crests, I bite down on the inside of my cheek so hard I taste blood, determined not to tarnish the peaceful morning for any of us, not even Gale. Peeta rests his head on my belly and closes his eyes, his head moving up and down with my breaths. I reach out my fingertips, stretching just far enough to hook the end of the extra blanket that hangs over the top of our bed, and shake it out over the two of us. This is one time he doesn't need to ask me to be quiet, because all I want is to lie here and listen to our breathing, together, safe. Safety seems like such a luxury…not something that we must have, but something we've been granted as a gift for fighting so hard. And even then, our determination was never a guarantee. Luck, I think, as I begin to drift, maybe it all just came down to luck.
"Time to get up," he whispers, and I feel strong, steady arms where I didn't before, wrapped around my chest, holding me close. I don't remember how he got back up there, which means I've probably been sleeping. The blanket is tucked into our chins, forming a small cocoon of warmth in which we dwell together. I groan. "Five more minutes," I mumble, and snuggle down deeper into the embrace. Peeta laughs. "Just like a kid before school."
"Mmmhmm," I respond, already drifting again. All of this week is catching up to me now. It will be a miracle if I stay awake on the train. He gives me a few more minutes, but I can't bring myself to actually sleep again since I know we have to go soon. Finally I sit up and stretch, reaching for my clothes on the floor, because outside of Peeta's arms and our hollow, I'm cold. The sun is high in the sky. Peeta's right…time to go.
We drag our luggage down the stairs and we're the last ones there, my eyes still red from sleep. A black car is already idling outside, and Johanna has remembered to snag the food from the fridge, and is packing it neatly into a brown paper bag. There's no sign of Gale, and I assume he must have headed back to Hazelle's to escort them to the station. Haymitch glances up at us, but we must have succeeded, because there are no snarky cracks about implied sex from anyone, just looks of determination to finish this journey. It's easier for everyone else, at this point—their farewells here are over, the few they had. I steel myself for one final set, but I don't look back as we file out the door. I won't miss this house, and I won't miss the Capitol. It's only the people I'll miss. Mutt jumps into the car last and I think, amused, about how much vacuuming they'll have to do to get all that yellow fur out again once we're done. He lies his head on Johanna's lap, and she's uncharacteristically quiet for the ride back to the station. The train will drop her off first, before continuing on to 12. Johanna I will miss, too, but she comes to visit pretty regularly now, plus she'd laugh at me if I ever got emotional over her departure, anyways. The ride to the station seems to be shorter in reverse, as if time is conspiring to bring us back. When I glance at the clock hanging from the station wall…a station that's relatively quiet at noon on a weekday…I see that we'll already be boarding soon. One of the Capitol's silver high-speed bullet-nosed trains waits on the platform, and beside it, Vic holding Posy's hand, is Gale's family. To my surprise, I see tears in Hazelle's eyes. I don't remember the last time I saw Hazelle cry. Out of respect and uncertainty, I hang back a bit, and the others stop behind me.
"Out there with no mother…" I hear snatches of conversation, "Are you sure…"
Gale's low voice is harder to make out, but he reaches out and tenderly wipes her face with the edge of one sleeve. "…never…don't worry…people that care…"
Hazelle takes a deep breath and stands up tall, the way Gale does when he's trying to get it together again, and nods. "Just haven't…awhile…who knows when…"
Gale hugs her, and he must be whispering, because I don't catch any more. The others aren't close enough to hear, plus they don't have a reconstructed ear, and I'm glad. Peeta's the most perceptive though, and I'm sure he knows what's going on. I give them a minute and then say, louder than I need to, "Ready?" so they know we're coming.
When I make it out onto the platform, there are no tears in sight. Hazelle is smiling, and Gale and Rory each stand at one side, one arm around her waist. The door to the train car slides open, and an attendant, wearing the green that all the train attendants wear, stands ready at the door. Another attendant steps down to the platform and begins to carry our bags inside. I hug the kids, one by one, and Rory surprises me by kissing my cheek and smiling at me. He's as tall as I am now. "You take care of yourself out there, Katniss," he says, and I'm reminded of how Gale was at that age, so like him. "Thanks, Rory," I say, and a thought about the past sails through my mind like a ship in water. What we did saved him from the Reaping. Saved all of them.
Moments like that make all the hurt and loss worth it.
Hazelle is next as the others say their farewells to the kids, and her arms are like iron bands around me. "If you ever need anything…" she whispers fiercely, but I don't want her to cry again, so I finish her sentence, "I'll call, Hazelle, I promise. I have your number. I'll write, too, I told Gale I would. But I'm okay. I have Johanna and Peeta and Haymitch and Greasy Sae."
"And Buttercup!" adds Posy, and we all laugh. Hazelle nods and leans up to kiss my other cheek, and I grasp her hands tightly and will myself not to cry either, if only because I don't want to set a bad example. I'm so exhausted that it doesn't take much to bring crazy emotions forth, I think. I try to remember that with the transit system improving every week, I'll be able to come back, even if for only a day or two, if I want to. It's just building the mental fortitude that's hardest. "Don't make me worry about you, either, Hazelle," I smile to her. She cups my cheek in her hand again and I close my eyes, because despite everything, I miss that touch every day—the touch of a mother. "I'll take good care of her," says Gale, and she hands me off to him. He was on the platform to meet us when we came in, too. My first glance to him then constricted my stomach, making me nauseous. I made sure when we walked in that I spaced the others in between us, so he couldn't get too near me. Now when I reach up and hug him, my stomach contracts for a different reason, but it's all complicated in my head and it makes it hurt to try to work everything out, so I resolve to go to the woods and think about it for awhile when we get back home. In the moment, I just breathe him in, and find a tiny corner of regret that he isn't returning to our woods with me. As with Hazelle, I have to push these emotions back. He doesn't hold on too long, as though he were afraid of making it even harder on both of us.
"I'll write," he says, when we break away, and I nod. "It was good to see you, Gale," I say to him honestly, and I know he knows that I mean it, because his smile reaches his eyes.
"You too…Catnip," he says, and I can't help but smile back. We're still broken, maybe, but less.
When we board the train, I spare a single glance back and blow a kiss to them, my surrogate family huddled tightly together on the platform. Posy returns it, and then the train door closes behind us, and I have to turn away.
We sit together in the lounge as the train picks up speed, taking us home again. I don't look out the windows to see the Capitol trail out like a flag as we pass it. Johanna and Peeta settle in for a game of chess, and Haymitch makes the most of his last few hours by sampling a variety of brightly-colored liquors. I pile up a napkin with pecan tarts that someone has left in a display for us, along with other snacks and lunch things. I'm not very hungry, but I nibble on the sugary stuff for a while, and sit at Peeta's feet on the carpet leaning my head against his knee. He strokes my hair absently. Johanna beats him handily. She usually does. We pass the time that way, playing board games and nibbling at the food left out for us, and it startles me when an attendant enters the room to notify us that we'll be approaching District 7, though the clock on the wall tells me that several hours have passed already. It seems like we spent another lifetime in the Capitol this week, but when it comes to the person who's probably most important to my life now, besides Peeta and Haymitch, time is treacherous. But Johanna, of course, will never let any of us get away with weakness. When she hugs me, it's with a thump between my shoulderblades hard enough to hurt.
"Ow, Johanna," I complain, and then she squeezes my face between her hands until my lips mush into a pucker, and moves it back and forth. "Don't worry, brainless, I'm sure you'll find something to live for once you finish moping about me. Peeta's an okay runner-up, I guess."
"No one knows how to give a compliment like you, Johanna," says Peeta from behind me. She turns to him. "You take care of her." Her tone is fiercer, more commanding. In a lower voice, she adds, "Yourself, too, Peeta." He pulls her into a hug. "Don't worry, I'm sure you'll be back to aggravate us all and provide us with inappropriate details about your personal life pretty soon, Johanna." He bends down to scratch her dog's head, and he thumps his tail against the wall. Haymitch hugs her roughly. "Same goes, Johanna," he grunts.
"Nah, I'm all good," says Johanna. "I was thinking maybe I'd spend some time over at the mill when I get home. Reminds me of how things used to be, before. Plus, everyone always needs new wood to put all the buildings back up, so." She shrugs. But before she steps off the train, hauling her own bags as she's waved the attendant away, she turns back to me and I see the fleeting look of love that passes between us in her eyes as clear as day. For a moment, she looks like that vulnerable girl without the hair, passed out in her hospital bed, teary at the smell of fresh pine needles, and then those deep brown eyes resolve into their determination once more and she tosses a careless salute back to us. Just before the train door slides shut, I hear her call back.
"Oh, also, you guys were much quieter this morning when you were fu…" The airlock of the door seals off the last word, but I'm laughing. Last word, as always.
And then, there's us. Greasy Sae and Delly await us on the platform of 12, Delly waving enthusiastically and all but jumping up and down. To their credit, they don't ask questions, not even Delly. They each pick up one of our bags, despite our protestations, and walk us home, telling us about the progress that's been made in 12 this week, the new shipments of food, the bakery, which is almost finished. Peeta looks happy. My feet feel right again on the familiar paths that lead to town, where we take a few minutes to buy the essentials, like milk and cheese and bread, and then back to our house. I walk them, as I have for years, without even thinking about it. Buttercup's been yowling for us. Delly's been helping one of the last seamstresses in town to do repairs and mend things, to earn some money for her family and keep her hands busy. Greasy Sae has already delivered a pot of stew, with actual beef in it, to our kitchen for tonight. I kiss her cheek and thank them both when we reach the entrance to the Victor's Village, promising that once we've rested up we'll meet up and fill them in on the details, since they're obviously curious, though restrained. I'm practically stumbling through the door by the time we've dropped Haymitch off with an invitation to a late dinner, and the house is filled with the smell of beef and vegetables and gravy simmering on the stove. Buttercup twines around our ankles, meowing for attention, even from me. Our house looks the same as ever. Greasy Sae also took the time to stack our fireplace with wood, so we shake out our comforter that I missed so much in front of it and Peeta lights the wood, and as the sun sinks below the horizon and our district is shadowed again for the day, we lie together with Buttercup, watching the flickering flames that our fancy decorative Capitol fireplace couldn't produce. This is the difference between there and here—the Capitol is cold, but home is warm. The Capitol is the past, and against all the odds, I still feel in my heart that 12 is the future for us. For the first time now, I'm allowing myself to savor the hope, instead of cringe away from it. It's no longer a gamble—Peeta's life, or my own? Somewhere people probably go through each day taking it for granted that the sun will rise and set and rise for them again, but I feel that we are luckier for looking at each sunrise and sunset and remembering that they are gifts we once thought we'd never have. How far we've come just from that time Peeta found me out in the snow, broken in pieces, wanting to surrender more than anything in the world. Before Peeta helped me learn to love. Tomorrow, there's rest. The day after, there's my woods. And after that? I don't know. But for the first time now, I'm finally looking forward to finding out.
To finding out what can possibly lie in wait for us, and meeting it, together.