So, I really was intending to update this earlier so you won't be stuck on a cliffhanger for too long. But alas, life got in the way. I hope you guys can forgive me.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own the Hunger Game s or the film/novel Don't Say a Word. This story is for entertainment purposes only. I make no profit out of this and all of the characters, unless otherwise no ted, belong to their respective owners, the great Suzanne Collins and Andrew Klavan.

Chapter 6: Bad Influence

Grey met Blue.

There were certain events and memories in Peeta's life that stayed etched in his mind like a piece of art. Take for example, the time his seven-year-old self threw a football through the tire swing in his backyard for the first time. He remembered feeling so happy and so powerful that he ran inside his house, and dragged his dad away from the fridge to show him how he scored through the tire swing. It was then that he realized that he wanted to be the best football player in all of Fresno…no…in the WHOLE world. Coincidently, ten year's later this same blue-eyed, blonde haired boy led the Mockingjay's to back-to-back championship victories.

Although scoring his first touchdown and winning those back-to-back championships would forever be at the top of his list of favorite moments in his life, nothing can ever beat the most significant memory of all. The day Primrose was born. Peeta loved his little sister since the first time he saw her in an incubator with a tube in her nose to help her breath. Wires and needles were sticking to her small fragile body. His mom had had many complications during her pregnancy resulting in giving birth to Prim two months earlier than expected. He never knew it was possible for someone to be so tiny and so fragile. It was then that he vowed that he would never let anything bad happen to her. He promised her as well as himself that he would never let any harm come to her and that he would kill the bastards who dared to try.

However, much to Peeta's amazement, both those memories were now being topped by the single look of a pale girl with dull and lifeless eyes. Yes, the first time Peeta Mellark looked into the eyes of the Katniss Everdeen, the suicidal girl from school, would forever go down in history as one of the most oddly magnificent times in Peeta Mellark's life.

Peeta could do nothing but look back at the girl who lent him a pencil in math class. He tried to remember what her eyes looked like then, but found that he could not. The shyness and innocence he swore he saw were now vanished and replaced with an eerie and empty look. He imagined that they were not as dead as they seemed now. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he had a vision of a sparkling gray-eyed girl that was full of life and full of dreams. He imagined her walking down the halls of Panem High with grace and dignity accompanied with a confidence that would make Glimmer cringe. He imagined her laugh, he imagined her smile, and he imagined the feel of her soft braid in his hand. All this scared him though. How could he imagine these things about a girl who had no intention to live let alone someone he didn't even know? However, although imagining her laugh seemed scary in his mind, what scared him the most was his imagination of the warmth of her body pressed up against his own.

It took a few seconds before Peeta finally remembered how to breathe. His eyes became watery and a bit blurry from not blinking for fear of loosing the sight of her eyes on his own. He let out a deep breath before he finally blinked his eyes and moved to sit up straight, never once breaking their eye contact.

"H-H-Hi," he said, somewhat above a whisper.

The young girl did nothing but stare back with an empty look in her eyes.

"Y-You're Katniss Everdeen, aren't you?" he asked.

He felt like smacking his head with his hand. He's usually very good with words and is known as a smooth talker at Panem High. Why was he acting like such an idiot? Why couldn't he just talk to her like a normal girl?

'Because she's not,' he thought, 'she's Katniss Everdeen.'

As he answered his own question in his mind, he suddenly heard a quick scuffle of feet enter the room. He wished whoever came into the room never did, because once that person came into the room, the gray left the blue and went back to staring at the wall.

"What are you doing?" asked the voice.

He looked back to see who it was that ruined the small connection he had with Katniss. Once he did, he wished he never had, for staring back at him were the intense eyes of Dr. Cresta.

"I-I…"

"Save it!" She said as she put a hand up to stop him from talking, "Get your stuff and go to my office."

"But…"

"Now!"

Peeta reluctantly stood up, walked out the room and went to her office. There, he met a man about Dr. Cresta's age sitting down in her chair looking over some papers. He said his name was Finnick Odair and that he was a good friend of Dr. Cresta.

"Good luck with her," he said, "Annie can be quite the bitch sometimes."

"I heard that!" He heard Dr. Cresta say as she entered the room with a frustrated look on her face.

"Annie, you know I was just playing around."

"Whatever," she said as Finnick stood from the chair and allowed Dr. Cresta to sit in her own seat.

Peeta exhaled a deep breath, "Look," he said, "I didn't do anything. I swear!"

"Peeta…" sighed Dr. Cresta.

"I didn't mean to fall and distract her from…from…her wall watching or whatever it is that you call it…"

"Peeta…"

"Please don't call my dad, I didn't mean to do it. I can't help it if I'm an idiot. I think it's from hanging out with Gale too much. If you want, I'll stop acknowledging his existence …"

Annie and Finnick both looked at each other with confused looks on their faces. Who the hell was Gale?

"…I'll stop acting like an idiot just please don't call my probation officer…"

"PEETA!" yelled Dr. Cresta, "Would you stop babbling and just shut up?"

Peeta sat stunned in his chair and let out a breath he didn't know he was holding in.

"I'm not going to call your probation officer or your dad nor am I going to forbid you to see this Gale person."

"You're not?" Peeta asked, "T-Then what am I doing here?"

Annie sighed again and rubbed her temples with her fingers.

"Just don't let this happen again."

She suddenly went back to reading the papers on her desk, a clear sign that Peeta was being dismissed. He suddenly stood up with a confused look on his face and quickly walked…no…ran out the door. He found that his cart with the fresh sheets was outside the office. He then began to push it towards the next room on his list all the while asking himself:

'What the fuck was that about?'

"Annie," said Finnick as he sat in the now unoccupied chair in front of Annie, "what's wrong?"

"Nothing," she sighed, "I guess I'm just shocked."

"Why?"

"Because!" she exclaimed, "I am one of the best doctors in Fresno. There is not one patient that I can't diagnose. I-mean sure, sometimes it takes a lot of time, but I usually can't get them to shut up after 24 hours of them being admitted! And now this suicidal teenager, who by the way doesn't exist, won't look or speak to me. But low and behold this juvenile delinquent comes along and does nothing but fall on his ass and poof! She looks at him! What, do I have to fall on my ass to get her to look at me too?"

Annie suddenly inhaled a deep breath before she met the eyes of her friend who had an amused look on his face.

"What?" she yelled.

"Annie," he began as he tried to suppress a laugh, "are you jealous?"

"Why the fuck would I be jealous?" she asked, quite taken aback.

"Oh, I don't know, because he actually accomplished what you have failed to do in the past two days?"

Annie heaved a loud sigh…hmm…sigh…she seemed to be doing that a lot lately.

"Look Annie," said Finnick, "you have to stop beating yourself up for it. I-mean look on the bright side, at least we know she's not deaf."

"Why do I have the feeling that you're enjoying this?"

"I'm not," he said while miserably failing to keep a straight face.

"Ugh!" she exclaimed.

"Annie, I'm sorry." he said still smirking at her, "It's just that I can't believe you're getting so worked up about this. It's not the end of the world you know."

"It might be for her!"

"You don't know that!"

"Yes I do because I'm the only person that she has right now!"

Finnick gave a loud sigh, "Annie, have you thought that maybe this could be a good thing?"

"What do you mean?"

"Maybe Peeta falling on his ass isn't a bad thing."

"Well, I don't see how it is a good thing."

"You said before that you wanted someone else to talk to her. Well maybe that person is Peeta. I-mean think about it. If it took him two seconds to get her to look at him, imagine how long it'll take him to get her to talk."

Annie sat in her seat and let the words of her friend sink in. It was true. Peeta had accomplished something that for once, she had failed to do. If he got her too look elsewhere, then maybe, just maybe he could get her to talk.

"Peeta!" exclaimed an overly active Prim as her older brother strolled through the front door of their house. She quickly abandoned her coloring and her movie in the living room and ran over to him. Peeta, seeing that she was about to jump into his arms, bent down, picked her up, and carried her towards the kitchen.

"Hey Prim," he said after he gave her a soft kiss on her cheek, "How's my girl doing?"

He set her down on the island in the middle of the kitchen and walked towards the refrigerator.

"Bored! Gale's no fun. All he does is eat and sleep."

Peeta rolled his eyes. Yup, that sounds like Gale.

"Did you have fun with Rue today?"

"Yup! I had so much fun with her," she said referring to their neighbor who was the same age as Prim, "Her mom took us to the park and then she bought us ice cream!"

"Really? Ice cream before dinner?"

Prim looked down at the ground, "Please don't tell mommy. She's gonna get mad if you do."

Peeta let out a small chuckle which caused Prim to look up at him, "Don't worry. I won't tell. But you better eat all of the food mom made for you, ok?"

Prim gave him a soft smile while she nodded her head in agreement.

"What did you do after?" asked Peeta as he started to heat up some left over chicken his mom had left for them.

"After we went to the park, we went back to her house and we were playing with her Barbi dream house. She has a really big one, bigger than mine!" she exclaimed as she spread out her arms to show her brother how big the dollhouse was, "I was having so much fun. But then Gale came to pick me up and then I started coloring."

At the mention of his name, Gale groggily walked into the kitchen and stretched his arms.

"Do I smell food?" he asked.

Peeta rolled his eyes as he took the chicken out of the microwave and began to get some clean plates. Gale looked towards his friend and gave him a lazy smile.

"Peeta," he said, "When did you get here?"

"Nice of you to be paying attention to who's walking into the house," said Peeta.

"Well, I'm sorry but who would've thought that the Little Mermaid could put you to sleep?"

Peeta once again rolled his eyes and continued to serve the food on the plates.

"Prim," he said, "its time for you to get cleaned up for dinner."

"Can I keep watching TV after?" she asked.

"Yes but only if you promise to pick up your things afterwards."

Prim gave him a warm smile before she jumped off the island and ran out the kitchen. Meanwhile, Gale sat down on one of the stools and let out a loud yawn.

"Your grandma called by the way," he said, "She just wanted to check up on you guys."

Peeta nodded his head as he gave Gale his plate to eat.

"Thanks Gale," said Peeta as he sat on the stool across from him, "thanks for picking up Prim and staying with her."

"Dude, you know that it's no problem. I definitely owe you for covering for me last weekend."

"Yea, you're right, you do," said Peeta as he let out a chuckle.

Gale rolled his eyes and began to scarf down his food, "You know, you'll thank me for this later."

"How exactly would I be thanking you for this?"

"That 'bad boy janitor' look is good for you. Girl's dig guys who get in trouble with the law."

Peeta rolled his eyes at his friends comment.

"It's true," he continued, "show up like that at school and girls will be screaming your name more than they already do."

"Gale, I fail to see how wearing a janitor's uniform is going to help me get laid."

Gale just shrugged his shoulders as he continued to eat, "You never know. Last month, Jonny Woof got caught stealing at the mall and was forced to clean highway 9. Some girls saw him and that same night he got laid like 5 times. I'm telling you, that uniform can do wonders for you."

Peeta just chuckled while he shook his head.

"Your mom know's your sleeping over right?" he asked.

Gale nodded his head, "Yup, and let me be the first to say she wasn't too thrilled about it."

"Why's that?"

"She thinks you're a bad influence on me," he said as he scarfed down the rest of his food.

"Now, why would she think that?" asked Peeta with sarcasm in laced in his voice.

"I don't know, something about you getting caught and making me choose between my family and you. But I told her that I'm gonna be the one to turn your life around. So then I basically fed her a whole mess of bullshit about how I'm obligated to help my best friend."

"If only they knew Gale," said Peeta.

"If only she knew what?"

Peeta sighed as he ran his hand through his hair, "Never mind."

Gale just shrugged his shoulders and started to pick food from Prim's plate.

Just then Prim ran into the room and sat on the stool next to Peeta. She lightly slapped Gale's hand away from her plate as she started to eat.

"Did you wash your hands?" asked Peeta.

Prim nodded her head and gave Gale a dirty look as he took a piece of chicken from her plate.

Peeta just shook his head and leaned back on the stool. Today had been eventful for him. Not only had he been taunted and not to mention hit on by crazy people, but he also managed to find Katniss Everdeen locked away in her cell like room. He never meant to disrupt her from her wall watching, but he can't say he wasn't glad that he did. She seemed lost and cold, not at all like the shy girl from school. In those few seconds that he was staring at the fragile girl, he found himself comparing her to Prim when she was a newborn. She was so small and fragile, almost as if she would break with a simple touch. He remembered that all he really wanted to do was go up to her and hug her. He felt the sudden need to protect her just like he felt the need to protect Prim.

Prim suddenly turned towards her brother and met his eyes. She gave him a big toothy grin as she swallowed some more chicken. In that instance, he swore he saw Katniss' eyes in Prim's. His eyes widened with shock as he looked away from his sister and instead turned towards his friend who had managed to take some more of Prim's food. It was then that he realized that her eyes would now forever be engraved into his mind and would haunt him wherever he went.

But maybe that was a good thing. He couldn't help but be drawn to her like a moth to a light bulb. Maybe Gale was right. Maybe he would thank him for this later.

…oh god…did he just say that?

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