Peeta Mellark had been missing from school for a month, and all anyone had heard were ridiculous rumors. His mother finally snapped and killed him. He'd finally snapped and tried to kill her. He'd killed himself. Why it was always about death I'll never know. Why his brother never bothered to straighten any of them out was just as much of a mystery. The two of them disappeared the same day, but his brother came back after a week or so. Peeta was still missing.
I looked over at his empty seat in the center of the classroom, wondering if any of those rumors were true. Or maybe if the truth was worse. School was mandatory; missing even a few days meant peacekeepers knocking on the door, demanding answers. When my little sister Prim had the flu last year and I stayed home to help our mother care for her they were at our door on day two. We were given a deadline to get back. They never did say what would happen if we failed to meet it, and fortunately we didn't find out. Maybe the Mellarks did.
Prim was waiting for me in the schoolyard to start our walk home, a smile on her face and half the Hawthorne brood by her side. Gale loped up behind me and tapped the opposite shoulder he approached, even though I hadn't fallen for that stupid joke since the first time. We were neighbors, our mothers friends for as long as any of us could remember, our fathers lost in the same mining accident four years ago. It was the one thing that finally drove the two of us to something more than acquaintances. My friendship with Gale was begrudging at best, born from our common loss, our need to keep our families going, our skill at hunting and mutual love of the forest. Prim, however, loved every last one of them like siblings, and piggyback rides home from school on Gale's shoulders were her favorite part of the day. He just liked to show off and loved the barely concealed giggles and awws from the girls in the upper school when he kissed her cheek and swung her onto his back.
Our walk home was nearly two miles, one that I spent trying to plan the afternoon's hunt. The first frost was weeks ago, winter wasn't far off, and mom's healing work still had not picked up enough to support us through the harsh weather. After the snowstorm last year that left us suffering through six weeks of fence repairs and peacekeeper border patrols I did not want to run even the slightest risk of being caught short again. The more I dried, salted, and stockpiled the better off we were.
"Six?" Gale raised his eyebrows at me, lowering Prim to the ground. There was never enough food to feed his family of five, especially with his brother Rory's new habit of eating everything he got his hands on when left unchecked. He'd be joining me that night.
"Yeah," I nodded, and he smiled at me before turning to follow his brothers to their house further up the lane. Prim and I climbed the creaking porch steps to our house, pushing the door open and shedding our shoes and coats and noisily dropping our books on the table.
"Girls," Mom called from her seat across the room by the low fire burning in the hearth. "To your room please, and try to keep the noise down. I'm with a patient." Prim ducked her shoulders, muttering a quiet apology before picking up her books and padding off to the small bedroom she and I shared. I scooped my own stack from the table, shifting to see whoever this patient was, the pole that marked the division between our kitchen and living room obscuring them from view.
Peeta Mellark looked up at me from the couch, dropping his eyes the moment they met mine. His father turned to look at me as I slipped across the room toward my bedroom; I hadn't noticed him before, sitting with his back to me. He offered a tight smile and a quick nod, both of which I returned before ducking into the bedroom and closing the door behind me.
"Cordovan Cartwright told me he was dead," Prim whispered to me when I sat down beside her on the edge of the bed.
"Obviously he's not," I smirked, wondering how Prim even knew who Peeta was. Was he popular enough to have admirers in the lower school, too? Was she one of them?
"What do you think is wrong with him?" she looked over toward the door. "He looked fine. Can we listen?"
"Do your homework," I chuckled softly, shifting myself back to lean against the wall and prop my book up against my knees. Honestly, I wanted to listen in too. I could hear the low murmur of their voices through the wall, but even when I strained I couldn't make out the words. Mom sometimes told us about who her clients were, she tried to keep our curiosity at bay, use some patients as chances to teach us about one illness or another. Peeta could have turned out to be one of those cases. But Prim was right, he looked fine.
After an hour or so the shuffle of feet in the living room pulled me away from my reading. Prim scurried to the door, cracking it open to watch the Mellarks leave, hoping to catch a bit of conversation. Mom called us out a few minutes later, pointing to the kitchen table. The two of us sat down on opposite sides.
"Before we talk about this I need to make something clear to you girls," she said, leaning against the kitchen counter and folding her arms over her chest. Prim and I glanced at each other, unsure of where this was going. "Nothing I tell you and nothing you see or hear in regards to Peeta Mellark are to leave this house. Do you understand?"
"Is he okay?" Prim asked, frowning.
"No," mom shook her head. "About a month ago he had an accident, and he has a very serious head injury." I was almost positive accident was code for a run in with his mother. His home life was the worst kept secret in the District. "He needs a lot of help, he has a lot of work to do to recover, and the doctor in town is a little beyond their means."
"Seriously?" I asked. The idea of someone from town struggling to afford anything was so foreign to me it sounded like a joke. Mom gave me a look.
"Twain—Mr. Mellark—is hiring me to work with him instead," Mom said. "I'll be seeing him three or four days a week, sometimes here, sometimes in town. I know you're in the same class, Katniss, so you need to be respectful of his privacy. He's the same as any other patient."
"Mom," I frowned at her, a little offended she'd think I would be gossiping about whatever happened to him. Even if she hadn't ground into our heads to never talk about who she treated or what was wrong with them I wouldn't anyway.
"It still needs to be said," she raised her eyebrows at me. She turned to Prim, her expression softening to a smile. "Now come help me with dinner." Prim beamed at her, sliding off her chair and joining her at the counter. She knew better than to ask me, as much as she harped on my abysmal cooking skills she never seemed to want to teach me, and I never particularly wanted to learn.
When dinner was finished, the table cleared and dishes mostly cleaned I stepped away from the sink. Planting a kiss on Prim's cheek, I headed for the door. My hunting boots rested on the floor beside it, and I slipped them on, yanking the laces tight before pulling on my father's coat. I slung my game bag over my shoulder, checking to be sure my gloves were tucked into the side pocket. The nights had been getting cold, and yesterday I forgot them. By the time I got home my fingers were numb and colorless. I spent 20 minutes scouring the living room for the soft leather gloves that fit closely enough to still allow me to use my bow to be sure I wouldn't spend another night trying to warm feeling back into my hands.
"Not too late tonight," mom called just before I slipped out the door. "I still have dessert for you two."
Dessert? I looked over at Prim. She shrugged, a smile ghosting over her lips. Dessert was for birthdays and special occasions, and even then it was rare we could actually afford it. I smiled at her before slipping out the door, wondering what the occasion was.
Gale was sitting at the bottom of the porch steps waiting for me. We usually met in the woods, passing through the fence as a pair could be dangerous and call too much attention to us. With night settling in earlier and earlier, though, the fading light offered plenty of cover. He stood as my feet hit the dirt, and I led us further into the Seam, the houses getting smaller and more broken down as we went. Neither of us said a word until we were well into the forest, working our way through a snare line, gathering what little was caught and resetting the snares.
"Why was the baker at your house?" Gale asked. I looked back at him, adjusting the quiver on my shoulder. "I saw him leaving earlier. With the youngest one."
"Peeta," I nodded. One of Peeta's brothers was in Gale's class. The other was much older, and hadn't been at the bakery when we made our visits to trade for a long time. I was sure he'd moved out. Maybe married. I checked the string on my bow, ignoring his question.
"Well?" he looked up at me, fiddling with the knot on the snare at his feet. "Baker kid goes missing for a month, his brother gets all weird and quiet all of a sudden, then he turns up at your house and you're not going to share?"
"You know better than to ask me shit like this," I gave him a look. Every once in a while someone turned up looking for treatment and piqued his interest, and I never gave him any answers. Why Peeta had him asking is beyond me. Unless he was looking for ammunition for when Rye Mellark started tormenting him, which wouldn't have surprised me a year or so ago. Gale had calmed down since he started dating my friend Madge.
"Just curious," he stood, shifting his bag on his shoulder. "Is he okay?"
"Yeah, he's fine," I cocked an eyebrow. "Just, you know, taking a four week vacation from school and dropping by the Seam to hang out. It's a townie thing." It took Gale a moment to catch on to my sarcasm, and I rolled my eyes and turn away as he chuckled. We picked our way to the ridge overlooking the valley. I'd been hoping the migrating geese hadn't passed us by completely yet. The meat wouldn't keep, but the excitement that kicked up when we strolled into the Hob with a dozen birds between us to sell and trade tended to drive up the prices. The money would be just as helpful.
Gale dropped the subject, and we returned home after dark had settled in with little more to show for ourselves than what we'd recovered from the snares. I managed to bring down a hare on our walk back toward the District, forcing it on Gale in exchange for something smaller. He had far more mouths to feed, and his mother Hazelle's work brought in even less income than my mother's.
"She made me wait for you," Prim snapped the instant I was back through the door. I stripped off my boots, hanging my coat and bag on the wall, raising an eyebrow at her. "Dessert?" She put one hand on her hip, tilting her head, and I couldn't stop myself from laughing.
"I'm sorry, Duck," I smiled, kissing the top of her head. "What is it?"
"Pecan pie," she grinned, dropping into her seat at the table. I looked over at mom. She was already at the counter, slicing the pie and setting plates in front of Prim and I. The slice she took for herself looked pitifully small, and just before she sat down I swapped plates, pushing the larger slice she served me in front of her.
"You didn't have to wait for me," I said, and she shrugged, smiling to herself and looking down at our plates.
"We don't get things like this often," she said, picking up her fork and laughing softly at the enthusiastic "mmm" Prim let out, her eyes fluttering closed when she took her first bite. "I wanted to enjoy it together."
"Where did it come from?" I asked, though I was fairly sure I already knew the answer. Very little of what she accepted as payment for her healing work was actually money. Food, oil, candles. Prim's goat was payment for helping Mrs Morgan deliver her youngest child. Mom gave me a look. I did know the answer. I was also pretty sure those were the pecans that I traded with the Mellarks last month.
"It's a thank you," she said, gingerly wiping a crumb from the corner of her mouth. "For taking on Peeta. This was my favorite. He—Mr. Mellark—used to make this for me all the time when we were young." Her voice was halting and wistful. Mom never talked about the past, and in a way I was grateful. After dad died she nearly shut down on us completely. It took Hazelle weeks of gently coaxing my mother out of bed and through some kind of daily routine just to get her to function on her own. It wasn't until Hazelle's youngest, Posy, was born, sickly and small and fatherless for two months already, that she began to come back to herself. She threw herself into caring for Posy, and there was no sign left of how much she had struggled as an infant.
I wanted to ask her about her life in town since I was a little girl. I knew she gave up everything she had to marry my father. Dad had always hushed me, said it would make her sad. It's not quite sadness I saw in her face now, though, and I wondered what she was thinking about. What Mr. Mellark was to her.
"Sounds like steady work," I said hopefully. If this lasted through the winter I wouldn't have to keep making the twice daily trips out into the woods.
"For quite a while," Mom nodded, answering the question I didn't want to ask.
I took care of the dishes once we'd finished, carefully wrapping the pie and setting it aside. The game I brought home needed to be taken care of, and I cleaned and cooked the pitifully small haul I'd brought in before going to bed. I woke early, disentangling myself from Prim to go out and try again. Gale caught up with me halfway through the snare line, and the two of us sat on the ridge, sharing a small breakfast and watching the sun rise.
Peeta's desk was still empty. I was honestly a little surprised, though I'm not sure why. Someone being dragged to see my mother by their parents rarely meant an immediate return to school. I doodled idly in the margins of my notebooks through class, caught up in trying to fit having a steady income in the house into the plans for getting through the winter. If it was enough to save us from the weeks of little more than pine bark and malnourished snowshoe hares and crows we suffered through last year I swore I would bring that baker a dozen squirrels every fucking weekend when spring came.
"Why are you so distracted?" Madge asked when we sat down to lunch. I was still lost in thought, barely even touching the stale cornmeal biscuits I'd scrounged up for my lunch after making sure Prim had something decent to eat for her own.
"Just tired," I shrugged. "Going out too much." She knew I meant the woods, and that I wouldn't just flat out say what I was up to anywhere I could be overheard.
"Gale's been exhausted," she smirked, picking at her own lunch idly. "Stop running my boyfriend ragged, please. I'd like to spend an afternoon with him where he doesn't fall asleep on me at some point in the near future."
"Spend less time in your bed," I retorted. She blushed, kicking me under the table and biting back a smile. I knew entirely too much about the two of them. Mostly from Gale's over sharing, but partly from Madge's excited gushing whenever something new went on between the two of them.
"Did you hear what's going on with the baker?" she asked, eager to change the subject. Her gushing went on where there were fewer prying ears. Gale and Madge didn't hide their relationship by any means, but they still tried to avoid the idiots that were scandalized by the mayor's daughter sneaking behind the slag heap with a seam boy. I looked up at her, raising my eyebrows, wondering what she meant. "He's divorcing that shrew he married."
"Really?" I gave up on my biscuits, pushing the remnants back into the paper bag I'd brought them in.
"I think she finally went too far," Madge said quietly, her brow creasing. I thought the same thing, and couldn't help but wonder what she did to Peeta that meant needing my mother four times a week or whatever it was she had told us.
Divorce was something that just didn't happen in Twelve. Even when Althie Duggins turned up on our front porch looking for my mother, battered and bleeding after confronting her husband about what, exactly, he'd been doing with the widow next door, all she did was leave him. No papers, no formalities. And she was right back there before the year was out. Starting over was near impossible. I had the distinct feeling Mrs Mellark would have a particularly bad time of it, given what everyone knew about her.
While Prim and I waited for Gale and his brothers after school I caught sight of Rye Mellark crossing the schoolyard towards town. He was a step behind his friends, eyes on the ground, a far cry from the outgoing, obnoxious boy I'd bumped into so many times on my way to trade with his father.
Mom was nowhere to be found when we got home, just a note on the table that she was in town and would be home for supper. Prim and I settled ourselves in the living room with our homework, stoking the fire as the wind picked up. The cold worked its way into the house too easily, and by the time mom got home a freezing rain had begun to fall. I wasn't exactly disappointed to be kept home from another cold, unsuccessful hunting trip.
Over the next couple of weeks books began appearing in our living room, papers and notes hanging out of them, pages dog eared. The titles were all long and dry and complicated, peppered with phrases like "intracranial trauma", "neurointensive care" and "cognitive rehabilitation". I flipped through one at one point out of curiosity. I fell asleep before the end of the first page.
"Katniss?" mom poked her head into our bedroom. I looked up from the book in my lap. "Could you come out here for a moment?" I nodded, scooping Prim's legs off my lap to get up from the bed. She frowned at me, silently asking what mom wanted. I shrugged. I had no idea either and stuck my tongue out at her as I followed mom into the living room.
"Something wrong?" I asked, dropping down onto the couch as she took her seat by the fire.
"No," she hesitated a moment, straightening her posture and clasping her hands in her lap. "I actually want to ask for your help with something, if you're willing."
"With what?" I watched her wring her hands, fiddling with her wedding band.
"The boy in your class I'm treating, Peeta," she dropped her hands and looked up at me. "I'd like you to help with his therapy."
"How could I help with his therapy?" I raised an eyebrow. My eyes dropped to the stack of incomprehensible books on the coffee table.
"Honestly, not much right now," she sighed, offering me a weak smile. "But that will change as things go on. He needs social interaction, at the very least. The sort of injury he has... it sets you back. He has to relearn a lot of things, and adapt to what he can't. I need to see how he interacts with someone aside from his family and myself, as well."
"So, what, you're going to drag me to the bakery with you and make us be friends?" I asked, giving her a look.
"No," she chuckled, shaking her head slightly. "I'm asking if you'd like to help. I'm not going to drag you anywhere, though yes, you would go with me to the bakery sometimes. He's going to start coming here as well." I nodded, turning the idea over in my head. "You don't have to, and before you decide I should probably-"
"I'll do it," I cut her off. She blinked at me for a moment, as though that answer caught her completely off guard.
"Oh," she paused before smiling at me. "Thank you."
"What were you going to say?" I asked. Mom leaned back in her chair, her expression tensing for a moment.
"I don't know how well you knew him," she began, rolling the fabric of her skirt between her fingers as she spoke. "He's not the same. And he might never be. He tires very easily, he has trouble speaking, his balance is so far off it's hard for him to walk. There's more, it's just... I want you to be prepared. Some will get better, some might go away, but some of those things won't."
"So he's a mess," I said, trying to hide how much the things she said bothered me.
"And you need to be a hell of a lot nicer about it when you see him," she gave me a pointed look. I nodded and she relaxed into a smile. "He's going to be here tomorrow afternoon when you get out of school. Prim is going to the Hawthorne's-"
"I am?" Prim asked, hunching up her shoulders and ducking back into the bedroom doorway when the two of us looked over at her. She'd forgotten she was eavesdropping.
"Yes you are," Mom smirked, waiting for Prim to disappear into the bedroom before continuing. "I just want you to talk to him tomorrow. I'm curious to see how he'll do. Keep it light, let him lead the conversation if he can. If he can't... tell him what he's missing at school, I guess."
"He's missing people spreading shitty rumors about him," I scoffed.
"Maybe a different topic, then," mom sighed. "And watch your language." I rolled my eyes, pushing up off the couch. I paused before returning to the bedroom, pressing my lips together for a moment, trying to figure out whether or not to ask.
"Mom?" I said, and she looked up at me. "Are his parents actually divorcing?"
"Yes," she said, leaning forward to pick up one of her books from the coffee table. "It's going to be finalized next month." I nodded as she sat back, settling the book in her lap. "And that's not a suitable topic of conversation."
"Goodnight, mom," I turned toward the bedroom, closing the door behind me quietly. Prim already had the lantern turned down, sitting on the edge of the bed in her nightgown.
"You get to help mom," she said quietly as I changed into my pajamas. The jealousy was more than obvious in her tone.
"Only until she realizes I'm useless for that sort of thing," I planted a kiss on Prim's cheek, dropping down onto the mattress to lay behind her. She loved helping mom, and she didn't just have an interest in healing, she had a talent for it. I'd seen her all but handle some patients on her own, while mom just stood back for moral support. Not bad for an 11 year old. Prim sighed and laid down beside me, tugging the blankets up over us.
"Maybe," Prim said skeptically. I reached over her to turn off the lantern before kissing her hair and drifting off to sleep.
This story wouldn't exist without my husband. The idea came from him, the planning, the reviewing, the editing. All him. A year ago he was poking fun at my fanfiction habit and now he's coauthoring. The subject matter is very close to our hearts, and I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed working on it together. He can be found on tumblr as yourpeetaisshowing, and I can be found as alonglineofbread. Come say hi.