To my surprise, my narcissistic brother Riley was the one consoling me as I looked on in horror. He is the only one who knows about my feelings for her. My mother would beat me if she knew, my father would definitely understand, but he wasn't the best at keeping a secret- especially with my mother. And my eldest brother Jacob is pretty much indifferent to everything. That's when he even listens at all.

"Don't worry bro, if any girl from District 12 has a chance at coming out of there alive, it's her", he says, nodding in her direction. He is trying to help, and I love him for it, but it doesn't ease my pain, though he is right. She is the strongest person I know.

I met her when I was five years old. She and I were in the same class in primary school. Before our first day of school, my dad brought me there, and her mother brought her. As Katniss' mother met the teacher, my dad bent down next to me and whispered, "I wanted to marry that woman." He pointed to her mom.

"But, she's from the seam." I said.

"She didn't use to be. She married a coal miner."

"Why on Earth would she do that?" Everyone knew coal miners were the poorest in district 12.

"Because let me tell you son, when he sang, even the birds stopped to listen." I looked at her mother, then made quick eye contact with Katniss, and quickly looked away.

Later on in that day, our class had a music lesson out in the courtyard of the primary school. The teacher asked the class who knew the meadow song and her hand shot straight up in the air. She picked the paper up to sing. I wasn't paying attention. I was horsing around with a friend, but then I heard the most harmonious sound, a sound she undoubtedly got from her father. I wasn't paying attention to the words, only to her voice. Then I noticed that the birds stopped chirping. I remembered the words my father said to me before... "…even the birds stopped to listen." I was mesmerized by her voice, and at that moment I developed my first crush.

When we were eleven, a horrible mine incident took place that killed several mine workers, including her father. The next day at school I immediately went to look for her, but she wasn't there. She wasn't there that entire week. That Friday, I came home from school and ducked in the hallway when I heard my mother mention her family.

"Well, I heard that his wife won't even take care of their daughters. They are only eleven and seven. How sorry is that?" This was the first time I ever heard my father talk back to my mother.

"Oh, shut up Mera. You would be lost too if it happened to you."

My mother, disgusted, told him, "No it wouldn't. I'm not stupid enough to marry a man from the Seam."

My father was angrier than I'd ever seen him, but he'd never lay a hand on my mother, so they just shouted back and forth for awhile. I went into my room, and looked out my window for a long time, staring at the distant smoke that came from the now-obliterated mine. I couldn't help but wonder if the Capitol was to blame. I was also wondering, if Katniss' mother was too upset to take care of them, how were they eating? People from the Seam are already scary skinny as it is. I kept thinking that there must be something I could do, but I didn't know what.

The next week, Katniss and her sister Prim returned to school. Katniss' clothes were already fitting looser, and I wished I could help. Even just by talking to her. I made a point to go to her house after school, regardless of what my brothers would tell my parents. I wanted to talk to her and make sure she was okay. Even if she wasn't, I wanted her to know that someone cared. After my homework, I successfully snuck out of my house and into the Seam, but before I could get to her house, I noticed her heading towards the district fence.

"NO!" I shouted. She must not know the fence is electrified. I shouted at her a few more times, while sprinting in the direction, but she didn't hear me. Then she somehow got on the other side of the fence, just fine. I was in awe. What was she doing? Why would she risk her life to go the other side of the fence? I mean, what is out there?

The curiosity got the best of me and I waited for one hour, then two, then three went by, when I finally saw a silhouette about her height and stature climb under the fence where she'd gone in. She had a bag in her hand that I must not have noticed before. As she got closer, I could see through the top of the bag, that it was various leaves, but mostly pine needles. Since I was already in trouble anyway, I decided to break my after dark curfew and stick around a little longer. From the abandoned store roof I was sitting on, I could see into her family's kitchen window. Katniss' mother was sitting in a chair, staring into nothing with a blank expression on her face, Prim was complaining to her mother that she was hungry, to which she received no response.

Katniss put the pine needles along with some water into a pot on the stove. In ten minutes, she scooped some into three bowls, and forced her mother to eat before she herself ate her bowl of pine stew. It was sad to watch, and I so desperately wanted to bring her bread, but I had to devise a plan first.

That's when I suggested I start selling day old loaves at the Hob. I thought after I'd sold a day's worth, I'd take whatever was remaining to her house. My mother wasn't so sure about the idea, but she said she'd think about it, and that was satisfactory for now.

As the weeks went by, I noticed changes in Katniss. The happy little girl that liked to sing became distant and unreachable. She never volunteered for anything anymore, and no one had heard her sing since the accident. She just sat there, day after day, looking like she had more important things to worry about than the history of Panem. Every day, as soon as the bell rang, she took off.

One day, several weeks after the death of her father, I had my first encounter with her outside of school. It was raining that day, so I ran home to avoid being too soaked. As I was doing my homework, I heard trash cans rumbling outside. It's no big deal, sometimes we'd get kids from the Seam stealing food from our trash cans, and my mother would normally shout obscenities at them, and they'd take off. But this was no ordinary Seam girl. It was her.

My mother immediately started shouting at her to leave, and I watched from my bedroom window. She tripped over what seemed like nothing, and fell onto a tree stump, grasping it and letting her body slide down it, and then lying on the ground. In the rain, I noticed her clothes clinging to her skin, and it was then that I noticed just how skinny she'd become. She was starving. She was weak, she hadn't tripped, she just didn't have any strength. I knew her poor mother couldn't provide, and her dad wasn't here. She'd gather leaves and pine, but that's not enough. I immediately ran downstairs to the bakery, and purposefully dropped two loaves into the fire. When the ends were scorched but the middle was still okay to eat, I told my father that I was going to feed it to the pigs. He barely looked up from his sales report, just waved me off. I walked outside on the ledge of the bakery, still below the apartment, and tossed the loaves in her direction. She noticed them on the ground, then looked up at me, thinking maybe I didn't mean to throw them at her, and that I was just getting rid of them. Then I nodded towards them, and mouthed, "Take them" to her. She didn't say anything, but the look in her eyes when she held the bread in her hands was enough for me. She was grateful.

My mother saw what I'd done. "Stupid boy!" she said, swinging a belt in my direction. "If you feed one, they'll all come rummage through our trash!" She hit me over and over, on my back, face, arms, neck, everywhere. I went to school with a black eye the next day. As a punishment, she let me sell the loaves at the hob, but only if Riley went with me. She said that way she knows I'm watching the Seam kids starve, only selling bread to the people who could buy it. Little did she know, that as the weeks went by, Katniss came to the hob more and more, with more and more game. She'd come with squirrels, fish, berries, even once she drug home a deer, with help from fellow Seam kid Gale. I'd guessed that they began hunting to feed their hungry families. She looked better. Was still just getting by, but if she had enough strength to hunt, then she was eating well enough to keep her and her family alive. That was enough for me to sleep easier at night. Katniss and Gale sometimes bought some bread, and each time I wanted to talk to her, ask how she was, how I could help. But I was too nervous with Gale there, and too afraid of what Riley might tell my mom.

She and Gale seemed to get closer, and I could tell that he thought of her as something more than a friend. She didn't seem to feel that way about him, but she'd been through a lot, and I'm sure romance definitely was never the first thing on her mind. She was the head of the household. She had other priorities. But it still bothered me a little when Hob workers talked about she and Gale's inevitable future. I wished it was she and I they were talking about, but Gale was strong and a good hunter too. So if by chance she did end up with him, that wouldn't be so bad, at least she wouldn't be hungry.

My thoughts are brought back to the present when Effie announces she's drawing the boy's name now. I'm crossing my fingers that it's Gale, for two reasons: One, he is strong and capable, and two, he loves her, and do anything he could to protect her. But my hopefulness is shot to hell when Effie reads the name, "Peeta Mellark".

I don't think about it. I don't allow myself to think about it. I just focus on putting one foot in front of the other. I do that repeatedly until I'm standing on the other side of Effie as she announces to the whole of Panem that the district 12 tributes stand beside her. Katniss is watching me. She remembers me. I can't get much else from her expression other than that. I don't allow myself to look at her. It's too hard.

My eyes drift in her direction, and I want to look into her eyes and tell her somehow, that I'm here for her. That she can talk to me. But it's too late, because Peacekeepers are ushering her into a room where she will say goodbye to her family. And, at the same time, I'm being ushered into mine.

Jacob, Riley, and my mother are in the room, but my father isn't. I don't have time to worry about why. Jacob pats me on the shoulder and then reluctantly hugs me, but says nothing. My mother is sobbing, to my surprise, but then she sees a Peacekeeper in the corner and has to keep up her reputation, so she starts her gossip again. "Well, you know, maybe District 12 will have a winner this year."

I know she isn't talking about me, but that's okay. I'd rather Katniss win, anyway. She has a family to take care of, two guys that love her. And one of them will still be alive after the games. I don't have anything. My family doesn't need me. My friends don't need me. I'm not leaving a girl behind. I'm following her into the arena. If I can keep her alive, I can die peacefully, knowing I served a purpose. I just want to show the Capitol that we aren't just pawns for their entertainment. We have feelings, and we are capable of sorrow, regret, and pain, just as they are. I plan to somehow, some way, before I die, show the entire country that the Hunger Games are wrong.

Riley doesn't say much either, he just sits next to me on the couch. He looks like he is trying to find something to say. I give him a hug. "Riley, it's okay. You don't have to say anything."

He wipes a tear from his eye before it falls, and then my family leaves the room. My father convinces a Peacekeeper to let him in as they leave. He squats down in front of me and puts a hand on my shoulder. "Shitty luck, huh son?"

He pats my back. "Listen, we love you. All of us. And we'll be rooting for you. But don't you worry about Katniss' family. If she…" he struggles to find the words, "…dies, I promise I'll look after her mother and sister, regardless of how many veins your mother bursts."

I stifle a laugh. And then come to the horrifying realization that it may be the last time I laugh. I hug my father and tell him I'll do my best, though I don't mean I'll do my best to survive. I mean I'll do my best to keep her alive. But he doesn't need to know that. Just before peacekeepers push him out the door, he tells me, "You're more than just a pawn in their games. Don't lose sight of yourself."

And those are exactly the words I needed to hear.