Katniss Everdeen
I was glad Gale and I were friends again. But I still didn't feel comfortable telling him that I was pregnant. I had informed my mother of my suspicions the minute we were alone together and she managed to sneak me a test to be certain without anyone else knowing and it was confirmed. I was pregnant. I had just past the three months mark and I wasn't showing at all. The slight starvation in the Games most certainly had an effect on my weight but my mother said that women in the districts rarely showed at this point, but I had a few more weeks before someone would start to see how fat I was getting. And here in 13, where we were given just enough food to survive and never any more, someone gaining weight was bound to draw a massive amount of attention. I had to start telling the people I wanted to hear it from me, now.
Normally, my 'who-to-tell-my-secrets-to' list began with Peeta and Gale. I couldn't tell Peeta seeing as he was far away in the capitol and I didn't know how to tell Gale that Peeta and I had slept together let alone that I was carrying his child. My mother and Prim knew, it wasn't like I had any other real friends here, except for Finnick and Beetee. My fellow victors. And that is how I ended up in a room with just them, sweating and twitching nervously.
"What is it Katniss?" Beetee asked, his brow furrowed the way it always was when he was trying hard to think. "Why are we here?"
"I need to tell you guys something." I said, my voice quivering. Finnick took my hand and looked at me supportively.
"Do you remember the interviews, before the Quell?" Beetee smiled nervously.
"It seems like a lifetime ago, but yes, of course."
"Peeta said that I was pregnant, to try to get the Capitol to stop the Quell?" Beetee nodded but the small smile dropped off Finnick's face. He knew where I was going with this but I couldn't stop. If I didn't get this out now I wasn't going to be able to get it out. "Well he completely made that up but, um," I looked down at my hands. "I just found out that I am," I paused to gage their reactions. So far they just hung on my every word. Their faces were blank, un-showing. And I didn't know how to take that. "I am pregnant." There was a pause.
"Who else knows?" Beetee asked logically, as though I had just told him I had bought a cake.
"My mother and Prim. I wanted to tell Peeta in the Arena but I couldn't figure out how to tell him in front of the audience without making him look like a liar for saying it originally when he didn't know that it was true."
"And how far along are you?" He continued. Finnick just stared at me. Not showing me what he was feeling.
"We think I'm about 13 weeks."
"Why haven't you told Gale?" Finnick finally spoke but even now his voice didn't betray how he truly felt. I looked down again, ashamed.
"He thinks that everything with Peeta, all of it was an act. He knows I have feelings for him but he doesn't know that we," I trailed off and had to let Finnick finish for me.
"Slept together?" He prompted, using the kindest innuendo possible. I nodded. "And Haymitch?"
"My mother, Prim and the two of you are the only ones who know." I confirmed.
"When are you telling everyone else?" Beetee asked. I looked up and decided right then and there on the answer to that.
"When it becomes necessary for them to know. I just wish I could have told Peeta before anyone. But I don't even know how to tell him. God knows what the Capitol is doing to him. God knows if he will even be here when this baby is born. Hell, I don't even know if we can get him back alive and give this baby its father!" And with that I broke down and sobbed. Finnick wrapped me up in his arms and picked me up, out of my chair. I wrapped my arms around him and allowed him to carry me out of the room and towards my bed. He practically ran into President Coin in the stairwell.
"Finnick!" She began cheerfully when she saw his face. "And Katniss?" she sounded less certain when she saw my distraught form, hanging in Finnick's arms helplessly. Apparently she decided not to comment because she continued on as if nothing were amiss. "I'm glad I found you. We are about to meet in the council room and we'd like the two of you to attend."
"President Coin, I think it might be best if I take Katniss back to her rooms instead." Finnick suggested.
"I'm afraid it was less of a suggestion and more of a command Soldier Odair. The two of you are needed, now." I could feel Finnick's silent sight moving through his chest as he turned around and carried me back in the direction we had come from and into the council room. The minute we entered everyone rushed to our side.
"Good Lord, is she all right?" Plutarch cried out as he saw my limp form.
"What the hell did she do now?" Haymitch's voice pierced through the noise.
"Katniss?" Gale rushed to my side and attempted to take me from Finnick. "Let me handle this Odair." There was a threatening tone in his voice that I didn't like the sound of.
"I'm fine." I mumbled. Finnick set me into a chair and slid in next to me keeping his arm around my shoulder. He leaned over to me and whispered.
"Tell them. Sooner rather than later." I nodded.
"I'll get to it." I mumbled back.
"Get to what?" Gale asked loudly. Finnick glared at him for his lack of tact.
"Don't worry about it." He responded for me.
"What, are you two sharing secrets now?" Gale hissed.
"Gale just stop. I'll tell you later, okay?" It came out a bit harsher than I had meant it to but I was still trying not to cry. I couldn't let these people see me cry. Gale slid into the seat straight across from me and started me down the entire meeting.
"I think we can all agree that these commercials aren't really working." Haymitch begins. I tune him out until Finnick nudge me, his eyes wide with hints.
"Sorry, what?" I cut into Plutarch's soliloquy. Everyone turned to look at me. "Sorry," I repeated myself. "I kind of zoned out." I said weakly.
"I was simply saying that I know you want to get out there and help the movement and we want you out there but since everyone thinks you're pregnant we should probably circulate that you miscarried in the electric shock." Nods and murmurs of agreement went up around the room and I glanced at Finnick for support. I had planned on telling Gale first but there was really no way around this one. They had just given me the perfect intro.
"Or," I cut in loudly. Too loudly. Everyone was staring at me again. I felt self-conscious. I looked back down and my hands until Finnick pulled his hand from around my shoulder and squeezed my fingers in his.
"Come on girl on fire, be brave." He whispered.
"Or, we could show a video of me getting my first ultra sound on the Capitol's television. We can talk about how I wanted Peeta here for this moment and that's why we are televising it, so that in his own way he is here. We can say how sad I am that the Capitol is keeping Peeta away from his family and how I want him back to me before I give birth to this baby and that I will fight everyone in my path until he is home where he belongs."
"That actually could work, too. Play the desperate mother card. How easy will it be to find a pregnant woman's ultrasound and hook it up to a monitor while we film Katniss?" Haymitch said, breaking the silence. People began responding, starting to draw out a timeline for how far along I should be exactly. Finnick squeezed my hand once more, urging me on.
"I don't think all of that will be necessary." I cut in once more.
"Katniss, the Capitol will pick apart this story and anything else we show their people, and try to discredit it. We need to figure out exactly what would make sense. It needs to be long enough that Peeta would have known by the time he said it, so as not to discredit him, and yet short enough that you wouldn't have been showing by the time you left the Arena. It needs to be…"
"13 weeks." I said quietly. They still weren't getting it. They poured over a calendar and started hemming and hawing, wondering if it should be 12 or 14 instead. But not Haymitch. He was looking at me oddly.
"Why do you say that Katniss?" He broke in through the chatter. "And how did you come up with this oh so brilliant plan? You haven't exactly been paying attention oh gee, since you got here." His voice was dripping with sarcasm and I glanced at Finnick who nodded his encouragement one final time before taking a deep breath and answering him.
"I came up with that because I want Peeta here for my first ultrasound and if I can't have that then I at least want him to see our baby. I think that an image like that will help him keep fighting. I came up with it because I want Peeta here so that our family can be whole and I am completely and without a doubt terrified that he's never going to come back to me or our baby and that I will be alone when I give birth. And I came up with it because that terror is making me more and more sure every single day that I will fight every single human being, every mutt, and every mechanical trap that the Capitol puts between us in order to get the father of my unborn child home as soon as humanly possible." Tears were streaming down my cheeks. I hadn't been this emotional in years and now, this stupid pregnancy was forcing me to be the emotional mess that I had run away from my entire life. I had stood up and I had the attention of the room. You could hear a pin drop. "I came up with it, Haymitch, because I am 13 weeks pregnant."