Author's Note: Okay, I don't like this chapter, so you can flame it if you want. I would probably back you up. It is just flat, with no great descriptions or cool moments. I didn't enjoy writing it and I don't particuarly like how it came out. All I could think about while I was writing was chapters that will come after this one.. So sorry for this! Hope you don't find it too tedious!

Chapter Twelve

I try to focus on my feet. I am not comfortable in those shoes anyway, so I don't think anybody will figure out that I am keeping my eyes down only because I want to avoid everybody's eyes. As I am walking down the aisle with Haymitch next to me, I notice something that makes me feel slightly weird. I am actually really not afraid of tidying the knot with Peeta. Interesting enough, the reason of my urge to flee is not my impending wedding, I want to marry that boy, I can't see myself with anybody but him. My problem is the little crowd that is staring at me at this very moment. Some of them, even though I am not looking at them, are sobbing quietly, tears of joy, I hope. I have been in the centre of attention since I volunteered for Prim, but I have never enjoyed it; and today, even though the crowd is much smaller than what I am used to, it is no different. The difference with the other times that I have been with all eyes on me is that this time I have nobody to force me here – apart from Haymitch who is blocking my hand between his side and his arm and preventing my escape. Every other time, when I was taken by the Capitol and shoved into an arena, or forced by President Coin to go here and there and be a public figure against my will, I had no possibility of evasion. This time I can leave whenever I want, and it is exactly because this newfound freedom that I am caressing the idea of fleeing.

"Katniss?"

I raise my eyes and notice that I am no longer walking down the aisle. I am standing right in front of Peeta, with President Paylor on my left, a book in her hands and a black, plain dress covering her figure. Peeta is staring at me, almost holding his breath, he looks calm, but somehow I know he is not. I look at Paylor and ask, "What?" very much like I did when I was sitting in front of Caesar Flickerman. I think I must have blacked out just as much as necessary to miss the beginning of my wedding ceremony.

Paylor looks at me with concern then says, "As I was saying we are gathered here today to join Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark in matrimony…"

From those words, I don't remember much. I think I said all the right things when I was supposed to say them, but I don't remember saying them at all. But since I now have a ring on my finger, it looks like the ceremony was completed in the right way. I remember myself saying "I do" at some point, and I remember Peeta's eyes, just simply huge and staring at me all the time, as if he, too, were waiting for me to take off and leave him there. Luckily for us, my feet seemed glued to the Justice Building floor. It is only when Peeta grabs me by my hand and drags me outside, in the clear light of day, that I am finally understanding what's happening.

People wants to take pictures with us, and I am told to smile more often than not. Peeta has to nudge me in the ribs every time we are posing for a photo and I am about to fall down every five minutes. I can't wait to be home and lose the dress and the shoes, oh but wait! I can't lose anything at all, because we are hosting a party for the guests.

"Are you okay, Katniss?" Peeta whispers into my ear as he pulls me into the car.

I look at him and don't know how to reply. "We are married," I say weakly, and I can feel a spontaneous smile spreading on my lips.

"We most certainly are," he whispers back, placing his left hand on mine. "Do you have any recollection of the ceremony at all?"

I look at him as if he was out of his mind. The ceremony just ended, how can I not remember it. "Of course I do," I say, my voice raspy.

He doesn't fall for that. "You were someplace else." he says, amused. "That's okay, I guess that's what prevented you from leaving me up there all alone in front of everybody."

"Are you saying that I was about to run away?" I try to sound shocked.

"I don't know, I know I was," he replies calmly.

That comes as a real shock. "Excuse me?" I ask, while Peeta waves to the crowd of people outside the car as we move slowly towards our house. They will meet us there.

He shrugs. "Not leaving you up there," he says quietly, so that Dalton can't hear us, "just run away."

"And that is not leaving me up there how?"

He chuckles. "Ever since I was reaped I don't particularly enjoy crowds."

"I thought you loved them," I say matter-of-factly, remembering his attitude when we reached the Capitol or when we were having our interviews.

"No, that was just my stay alive tactic." He smiles. "I like being alone with you. That's what I like. You and I and nobody—"

I don't let him finish. I kiss him more passionately than I would normally do, apparently for no reason, in reality, I just discovered that he is more similar to me than I expected. Not necessarily a good thing, but I can't help feeling even more connected to him than before. I case we need another excuse to be connected.

"Hey you kids," says Dalton, when our kiss becomes steamier than expected and Peeta's hand slides from my shoulder to my breast. "I think you should save this for tonight." He looks at us through the rear-view mirror and adds, "Or maybe for the bathroom break that you are suspiciously going to take together…"

xxx

You know that feeling when you have been tense for a long time, and suddenly you are home and you can relax again and because you were so tense, you are now ravenously hungry? That is me at this very moment as I scarf down the lamb stew that I've been served by an unusually elegant Greasy Sae. We are all dining in the garden, where a long table has been placed right in the middle of it by I don't know who. Peeta and I are squeezing at one end while all the other guests are at our right and left, nobody is sitting on the other end of the table. Everybody is talking amongst themselves, laughing, looking at each other, making simple conversation or commenting about the food. Sometimes someone will come and ask us if we are happy, if we like the food, if we want more wine, if they can make a toast in our honor. I have had enough wine to last me for a year, but I've been eating so much that I really don't care, I need to wash down all the delicious food, plus I don't think it possible for me to get drunk after all this food. There are lights all around us, in the trees and on the ground and candles on the table, apparently this whole arrangement has been thought to let us party well after sunset. How sweet of whoever decided this – if I didn't know they were otherwise engaged, I would have thought that there were Effie and Haymitch behind all this. I am afraid to admit that despite this being my wedding, I haven't had too much to do with its actual preparation.

"How's the wine?" asks Haymitch, as he raises his own glass. He is seated at Peeta's left, at the place where Peeta's father should have been seated.

"Good," I say, raising my own glass. Peeta does the same, but he still has the same wine that we were first poured when the party began. I have lost count of my glasses, and I am starting to feeling a little tipsy, still I know I won't get drunk. "How's the party?"

He shrugs. "I little too many crazy people," he replies nonchalantly. "Apart from this, nice ceremony, nice food and great wine."

"You brought the wine," points out Peeta.

"Exactly," he replies with a grin. "I've been saving this for months in a secret location where—"

"Your pantry," says Peeta matter-of-factly.

Haymitch laughs. "Yes, my pantry, good job. Are you spying on me?"

"Why would we be spying on you?" I ask in a slightly slurry voice. "It's not like your life is interesting at all. Not like you have secret affairs with women from the Capitol in your living room, right?"

Haymitch eyes me intently. "No, right…" He raises his glass and pats Peeta's shoulder and goes back to his seat, right next to Effie.

"I think you are getting drunk," he says, grabbing the glass from my hand and placing it back on the table.

"Really?" I ask, taking the glass into my hands again. "You know what you should do? You should get drunk as well and then we can have fun."

"I think I can have fun and stay sober at the same time," he replies, grabbing my hand which is now poking his chest every words he says. "Actually, I think we should ditch the party and start to have fun." He looks at me and adds, "Or maybe just before you pass out."

"Nonsense," I reply. "We need to dance first! It's our wedding!"

"I thought you didn't like dancing."

I don't reply. I laugh and drink, I smile and make what I think are intelligent remarks to the people who come to congratulate us. Everybody is laughing and I am laughing and as soon as Peeta has something else to drink he is laughing too. We dance and he makes me spin and then I dance with Haymitch and Gale and Peeta dances with Effie and with Annie and with every other woman. And then… I need to lie down on the grass… Everything goes black and I just hear people laughing over me and the grass is soft under my body... I feel the Earth spinning and I fall asleep.

xxx

When I wake up it is morning. Birds are chiming from outside the window, the sun is shining right on my face and my naked body is covered by a soft blanket. I look around myself and discover that I am in my bedroom, on my bed. I sit up and the room starts spinning, so I feel like slumping down back on the bed. I moan and patiently wait for the room to stop moving and for my blood to stop pounding into my temples.

"Good, you are up."

I open my eyes and look at Peeta. He is standing in the doorframe, a steamy hot cup of something in his hands.

"Crazy night, eh?" he says amused.

"It must have been," I reply croakily, "I am completely naked under this thing."

He chuckles. "Oh, don't let your fantasy run wild," he says, "I undressed you, but it was only because you puked all over the dress."

I groan. "Are you sure? That doesn't sound like me."

"It sounds like the drunk you." He comes closer and sits on the bed next to me, the mattress moves and those little movements make me nauseated. He sees that on my face, but he doesn't stop moving until he is sitting with his back against the headboard and his legs on the bed. If I didn't know him better, I thought he was enjoying this. "Hot tea? Your mother says it helps with hangover."

I shake my head and draw the blanket over my face. I want to disappear. I don't even want to know what happened. My head is spinning and I have the vague feeling that I missed most of last night celebration.

"So, apparently, Haymitch said that you really don't know how to drink," says Peeta, somehow enjoying himself, "he said that he has never seen someone getting drunk with all that food in their body. On the other hand, your mother said that it's because of your small constitution, alcohol is more easily absorbed by your body."

"That's why you were fine."

"No, I was fine because I didn't drink as much as you did."

I bit my lip. It's okay, he can't see me from under the blanket. I am wearing my underwear, actually, so his story must be true. Not that I thought otherwise, I can't really picture Peeta lying to me. "I'm starting to feel that you might be a little bit annoyed with me."

He laughs again. "Weirdly enough, I am not," he says calmly, and once again I believe him. "I was almost going to drink my way out of that party as well."

"But you didn't," I say sheepishly.

"Yeah, I don't know what you've been told, but I'm strong," he says, tapping his fingers on the cup.

"So you are not mad at me?"

"Well, I was kind of looking forward to our first night as husband and wife, but I guess tonight is just as good."

I freeze. Husband and wife. It sounds weird. Especially, when I am the wife. Especially, when I have a husband. Someone with whom to share my life till death do us apart. I know, we have planned this wedding for months, the husband/wife thing had all the time in the world to sink in, but it's only now that we are actually married that the reality of the act overwhelms me. I don't feel different, only, maybe, more mature? It's just in my head, though, because if I were more mature than before I wouldn't be in bed with a colossal hangover.

"Are you sleeping again?" whispers Peeta and I feel him coming closer to me, but with my nauseating breath I wish he is not going to draw the blanket back.

"No," I say. "I was thinking." I stir under the blanket.

"Are you feeling like coming out of that cocoon any time soon?" he asks me.

I groan. "That depends, do I have to?"

He chuckles. "I think you do. Almost everybody is leaving today and they really want to see the beautiful bride one more time before they leave."

"I'm sorry, but the beautiful bride is not available at the moment," I reply, "but we have the incredibly hangover bride, the stinking breath bride or the ghastly looking bride."

"Shall I say that to the guests?"

"I'd rather you not," I reply from under the blanket.

"How about a shower?" he asks.

I groan. "With you?" Not that I don't want to have shower sex with Peeta is just that… I don't want to have shower sex with Peeta when I feel like I will know the content of the dinner I can't remember in a few minutes.

"Tempting," he says, laughing, "but no thanks." He places the hot tea on the bedside table. "I feel like we should wait until we can focus on the sex and not on the vomit."

"Agree."

He pushes with his hands on the mattress and stands up, making the bed wobble.

"Urgh," I say. "Peeta, every time you move this bed I feel like I might just throw up…"

"I know," he says brightly. "People call it revenge."

xxx

The boiling hot shower and the now not-so-hot-tea make me feel much better. Or maybe it is because I just threw up the rest of my dinner – when did I have shrimps? – but anyway, I feel refreshed and beautiful. Okay, not so beautiful after I have had a good look at myself into the mirror. This waterproof makeup is as hard as hell to clean, so I have some dark stains around my eyes and my lips have smeared, fainted lipstick all over them. I look like a clown. I find a pearly white summer dress on the chair next to the bathroom door and clean underwear. Before I start to dress up, I brush my teeth vigorously and dry my hair with a towel. I decide to go for the fresh-out-of-the-shower look, the easiest I know.

I walk downstairs and there is a crowd of voices coming from the kitchen. I move silently, my feet are bare, and peek through the door to see who is there. Well, basically everybody is in there. And once again there is food on the table and people are just walking around and picking pieces of cheese and fruit and pancakes and biscuits. There is no alcohol – after all it is only eleven in the morning – but fruit juices and hot beverages are everywhere.

"Katniss!" Effie is the first one to notice me, standing at the door, and when she calls my name everybody turns to look at me. She walks towards me and circles my shoulders with her arm. "Are you okay?" she asks in a whisper.

I nod and glance towards the people around us. "Is this another party?"

"Of course," she says, smiling. "This is the brunch after the wedding. Luckily you can attend because it would just be a gathering of people without the bride."

"Luckily," I say weakly, but she doesn't even hear it since she has to go and prevent Annie's son to put his tiny hands into the steamy tea pot.

Peeta walks up to me and hands me another cup of tea. "This should be good for your hangover," he says as he drinks some inviting hot chocolate from his cup. "Do you feel any better?"

"Much better," I say, sipping the tea. "I didn't know we were hosting a brunch."

"Yeah, same here," he replies casually. "Effie's idea, apparently." He sips and looks around the room, I follow his gaze and soon we are both looking at Effie and Haymitch. They are filling their plates with fresh fruit and every now and then Haymitch puts a strawberry on Effie's plate and she fills his plate with cottage cheese. They graze each other's hands in a most natural way, and they don't look suspicious at all… unless you actually know that they had sex on Haymitch's kitchen table two days before. Next to them, my mother and her new… friend, Newell, are chatting cheerfully. I don't know exactly what they are talking about, but when he feed her a strawberry I have to look away. Johanna and Gale are on the other side of the room. If I didn't know that they were together, I couldn't have imagined it from their current behavior. Johanna is eating ravenously pancakes and strawberries – what's with the strawberries, really? – her eyes fixed on the plate, while Gale is having a slice of cheese with his hands and looking at Annie. Annie is talking to Beetee and Dalton and the others are just enjoying the buffet.

"I have to say that I am quite happy that you decided to keep this wedding private," says Plutarch as he walks towards Peeta and me.

"How so?" asks Peeta.

"Last night wouldn't have been very flattering for Katniss, I guess," he says matter-of-factly, "but I reckon it would have attracted millions of viewers." He winks and smiles.

I darken. "Well, thank you for not broadcasting my most embarrassing moments, Plutarch," I say, "did you enjoy the wedding?"

"Very much indeed," he replies, "I got to see how you get married in this District and at the same time it was nice to have a bit of Capitol traditions as well." He smiles. "Paylor was good too. Did you know that this was her first wedding?"

"Interesting," replies Peeta when I don't say anything. "Maybe we should thank her."

"You should, yes," says Plutarch, gesturing to the President to come closer.

Paylor excuses herself from Greasy Sae and walks gracefully towards us. "President Paylor, I believe the Mellarks want to say something to you."

Right, the Mellarks, that's who we are now. "We wanted to thank you for performing the ceremony," I say quickly. "We know you must be busy, so we appreciate you coming all the way from the Capitol to marry us."

"My pleasure," she replies, "it's actually nice to get away from the Capitol frenzy every now and then."

Peeta nods knowingly and I do too. After all, she is not from the Capitol, she is from the Districts just like us, I can't imagine what it would be for me to be forced to live in the Capitol all my life. I can understand why she is happy to be here with us.

"So are we going to open our presents now?" asks Peeta.

"Oh my good boy, no!" exclaims Plutarch. "Effie would be horrified. You have to open them once everybody left and then send 'thank you' cards to the people who gave you the presents."

"Sounds like an awful lot of unnecessary work," says Paylor truthfully.

"It is," replies Plutarch calmly, "but it's the way it works." He turns towards us. "Oh, but you don't have to worry, I know Effie is going to stay here longer to make sure that you don't forget anybody."

"Yeah, that's why she is staying," I mutter, not softly enough because Peeta elbows me in the ribs. I know I shouldn't, but I have this urge to let Haymitch and Effie know that I know about them, just to see their faces. Probably Peeta wouldn't be too happy about that, especially because at the question, "How do you know?" the answer would be that he spied on them from the pantry door.

"Oh would you excuse me," says Paylor, "but I love those strawberries. I suppose they come from District 11, don't they?"

"They do," says Plutarch, "Katniss' mother ordered them especially for this brunch."

I look at them walking towards the strawberries and even though I am sure that the little fruits are delicious I just don't feel like ingesting anything solid yet. "Am I the only one who feels like she doesn't know a thing about this wedding?"

"No," replies Peeta. "I think that while we only wanted to get married, the others wanted everything to be perfect and we just let them do whatever they wanted." He stops and sighs. "By the way, when I say they I mean Effie."

"Right," I agree, "just, it's not that bad after all. She did everything, everything was perfect, she was happy, we were happy… it was a win-win."

Peeta looks at me and smiles. "Look at you, all positive and happy." He nudges me playfully with his shoulder and when I am ready to nudge him back my mother comes over to us. I haven't walked away from the door yet, but it is okay, I guess, because people keep coming to say something to us, so we are not exactly left out of the party. Nobody, except Plutarch, mentions last night mishap, luckily, but they all look intently to me as if they wait for my permission to start commenting on it.

"I am afraid Newell and I will have to leave first thing in the afternoon, if we want to make it back for tonight shift at the hospital," she says quietly.

"You are leaving so soon?" asks Peeta, quiet upset. I think he will actually miss her more than I do. She is now the closest to a parent he has. Apart from Haymitch. Who doesn't really feel like a parent at all.

"We need to," says my mother. "I have been away from the hospital quite a long time and they need me. They also need Newell, so we are catching the same train back to District Four." She smiles and sips some fruit juice from a crystal glass. "We will come to visit in the summer, though." She eyes me. "Or maybe you can come and visit us in District Four." I cringe. I feel like every other person will soon ask us to go visit them in some part of Panem. I don't want to go anywhere though.

"Yes, I guess we'll see you soon." I smile to her.

"Yes," she says, grabbing my hand and squeezing it.

Delly, whose presence I haven't even noticed for the whole wedding, makes her way through the people and comes to us, a plate full of eggs and cheese. "Katniss," she says, "I wanted to tell you that I loved the ceremony yesterday, and this food is just delicious!" She spoons some cheese in her mouth. "You have to give me the recipe of these eggs."

"You have to ask Greasy Sae," says Peeta.

"Yes, she is the cook, not me," I reply.

Then it's this over and over again. People come to say something to us, something meaningless, something funny, and then go back to the food and then come back and say other things. Until one after the other they all decide that they have a train to catch or things to do before they leave. As I feared, they invite us to their houses. Johanna makes me swear that we'll go to their wedding, and I promise that if I go I'll lock myself in the bathroom. Gale shakes Peeta's hand vigorously and he hugs me, but speaking has never been his strong suit, so he doesn't say anything. Then finally, there are only Greasy Sae and her granddaughter, Effie and Haymitch and Peeta and me in the house.

"We survived the Mockingjay's wedding," says Haymitch, raising his glass to toast to that.

Effie glares at him. "It was a most gracious event," she says, even though I know that she would have rather not have had the bride drunk on the ground. "I will stay for another week, just to make sure you send out the "thank you" cards to everybody and do all the things that you have to do after the wedding."

"Like what?" I ask.

She smiles nervously. "Like you know, things that you have to do after the wedding… if you don't know, Katniss, that means that I do have to stay to show you. We don't want people to think you are ungrateful, do we?"

xxx

I lie on my back, my breath is ragged. Peeta's is too. Beads of sweat are covering every inch of my skin. I have to say it is quite nice to have the house for ourselves once again, I could scream just as loudly as I wanted and the bed was screeching in protest all the time.

"So," says Peeta next to me, "first time as husband and wife."

I nod, even though I know he can't see me, I know he can hear my head brushing on the pillow. "Not too bad," I say as I slide my foot near his leg and up his calf. "Are you ready to go again?"

"Again?" He seems to ponder this for a while, but after only two seconds he adds, "Okay."

I am loving married life.