I am such a fucking idiot! Gale chastised himself in his head. She was not alone, she was not masturbating, and she was DEFINITELY not thinking about me!

He needed to sit down. He leaned up against the wall of her house, slid down, and sat on the ground.

He felt hot, prickly tears of hurt and anger and jealousy and regret begin to form in his eyes and threatened to spill over, but he squeezed his eyes shut and forced them away. He put his head down in his hands.

Well, he thought, you have your answer.

He knew his best friend well enough to know that if she had encouraged Peeta to do this, then she had given him permission to do everything else too. She didn't do anything halfway. When Katniss Everdeen told you she was going to do something, she meant it, and she did it.

She had told Gale this morning in anger that she was going to fuck Peeta, and she had been telling the truth. Her brutal honesty was a trait that Gale had always admired and appreciated about her. Today, he was not appreciating it so much.

I pushed her too far this morning, and I pushed her right into his arms. Just exactly the opposite of what I wanted to do.

Inside the window, Gale could hear Katniss gasping and moaning as she reached her climax. A few minutes ago, hearing that sound would have made him come undone. But now, it just made him feel as if he had been punched in the stomach.

The image was seared in his brain, of Katniss running her fingers through Peeta's blond hair as he pleasured her with his tongue.

It should have been me, Gale thought. I loved her first.

After sitting there in silence with his own torture for a few minutes, he heard Peeta's voice.

"Katniss, can I ask you a personal question?"

"Of course."

"Were you and Gale ever, you know... intimate?"

Gale was shocked to hear his name come up in conversation. He wanted to hear her answer though.

"Me and Gale? No, no. Why would you think that?"

"Well," Peeta continued, "It wouldn't be that far fetched. He is your best friend, and you used to be together all the time. I remember, because I used to envy him every time I saw the two of you."

"Peeta, Gale doesn't see me in that way. When he looks at me, he sees a mirror image of himself- a hunter, a survivor, except I'm in a girl's body. He doesn't find me attractive like that."

"Oh, well that's good to know."

"Why Peeta, you afraid of a little competition from other guys?" she teased.

"From a guy who looks like Gale? Who wouldn't fear that kind of competition?" he asked.

"Well, you don't have to worry about Gale. He is not interested in taking me to bed, or he would have tried it by now."

That's not true! Gale wanted to shout. You are so wrong about me, Katniss... So wrong.

"Well," Peeta said to her in a teasing voice, "I'm very interested in taking you to bed. So, if there's no one else you'd rather sleep with tonight-"

She cut him off before he finished speaking. "There is no one else." And she kissed him, as she shifted her body on top of his.

I've got to get out of here, Gale thought. He stood up and started running towards the woods, but when he turned to take one last glance towards the window, he tripped over one of the paving stones in her walkway and went down with a thud.

Katniss' ear, finely tuned from years of hunting, picked up on the sound immediately. "What was that?"

Gale got up and started running again, cursing himself for not watching where he was going.

Katniss jumped off the bed, threw on the robe that was hanging on her bedpost, and opened her back door. She looked out into the yard, where the last glow of daylight was fading into darkness. She saw the man, running towards the woods and then disappearing.

She had done enough pre-dawn hunting in the dark with her friend to know his gait and the shape of his body, even in almost no light. She knew it was Gale.

Shit! She thought. What the hell was Gale doing here?And what did he hear, or see?

She knew there was no sense in trying to run after him into the dark woods wearing nothing but a thin robe and bare feet, so she shut the door. Besides, she didn't want to upset Peeta, so she just decided that she would deal with Gale tomorrow.

Peeta appeared behind her, with just the sheet wrapped around his waist. "Is everything alright?"

"Yeah," she lied. "I thought I heard a noise outside, but it must have just been an animal."

"Oh, okay then. " he replied.

"You know, Mr. Mellark, I don't believe I was finished having my way with you. You'd better get your ass back to my bed!" she teased.

He didn't need to be told twice. He rushed back to her bed, and she followed, pausing to shut the window and the pull down the shade before dropping her robe.

"Now where were we?" she whispered, as she climbed up onto his lap and straddled him.