"Johanna?" I enter her room quietly as she lays there different than the girl who was in the hospital bed in 13. The emaciated girl with the shaved head. She stirs a bit, but her eyes are fixed upon an unknown location in her mind.
"Katniss? How are you here?"
I take her hand.
"Johanna the war is over."
"That's what they tell me. That's what I know. But I don't know which is worse, where I was then or where I am now."
"Now. There are no arenas, no starvation. We take care of each other."
"No, You took care of me."
I sigh.
"Johanna Peeta and I wouldn't be here if it weren't for you."
Her eyes close. Tears flow out and I see her mouth Finnick's name.
"Leave me alone."
I rise and leave her there. Beetee enters trepidatiously. I look at Peeta's forlorn face.
"She knows where she is. She doesn't want to believe it. She said she didn't know which was worse. Here or there."
Peeta sighs.
"Let's go back to the hotel." He looks to Effie. "Call if anything changes."
He takes me by my hand and leads me through the halls, to our room. There he collapses on the floor his back against the wall. His blue eyes distraught.
"I had a flashback." He told me. "When Johanna and I were in the Capitol. She would recount the day for me. She would tell me about how you saved me in the Arena the first time."
I take his face in my hands and look at him. There aren't any words to describe the flood of emotion within them.
"Tell me. Tell me you love me. Tell me you loved me in the cave."
…
I woke from the nightmare, the vision of Cato being mauled by the mutts. So I slipped from my compartment into his. Sliding into his bed. He roused and turns.
"Nightmares?"
I nod. He looks into my eyes. His are beaming with comfort. He had it worse than me. He lost his leg. He draws me into him and kisses me making me warm so I move the blankets away. He wraps his arms completely around my frame. I run my fingers through his golden hair. All there is lighting us is moonlight. I need him. I need to curl up inside him and stay there where he can protect me. Where he nurtures me. I slide my hands up his chest to his chin, warm and smooth. He rolls over so he is on top of me and hovers above me looking at me for a moment.
"Make it better." I whisper "Like I know you can." His presence his company so fiercely warm, not like a flame but a harth, thawing the ice of the memory and laying my down in the moment. Where I feel everything so intensely. I feel the plush of the mattress beneath me and his wildly beating heart. I turn my eyes away. His both loving and devastated. He sighs and moves his hand beneath my shift removing my panties, then he removes his own garments. He lowers and enters me where I can feel his hot breath on me.
"Katniss." He whispers. "Katniss I love you."
I can't reply. I can't turn my back on Gale. Not when he's provided so much. I just hold tighter to him and exhale with growing intensity with each undulation. He lingers deeply, agonizingly slow. He wants me to feel him. He knows what I feel for him. Or he wants to believe it. His breath is quick and ragged, although he is elated and depressed. He finishes me unlike what I've felt before. Not wild like I imagined an orgasm to be, but like a fullness that grew in my pelvis and travelled up into my throat releasing in an expulsion of air. When he is done he holds me into his chest where I wake up in the morning. The first time I let him in me filled me with new vigor, I can make the speech today. I can.
…
"I didn't know if I did or didn't. I loved you on the train. I loved you when I broke my heel and you stayed with me. I knew we knew things no one else could know. I knew I needed you."
He exhales softly.
"I was so devastated by the fact that I didn't know. But I loved you. I had to protect you. No matter what I would have spent the entirety of my life protecting you."
"So would have I."
"Johanna told me you loved me. The first night in the cells. She told me I had to go back to you. That you couldn't function without me."
"I couldn't that's true."
We sit and stare at one another for a while longer. Burning finally I rush into him kissing him. He rolls me onto the floor. His eyes examine me wildly. I rip into his clothes, as he rips into mine. Our hands lose their coordination and go where they want to. His chest, his erection. He thrusts his fingers into me. Getting me wet, then he thrusts inside me and begins to pump. I roll him over and sit on him undulating and watching his face contort in pleasure induced madness. I undulate harder and harder until I come. He sits up and picks me up carrying me to the bed I wrap my legs around his neck as he fucks me until he comes. Sweat rippling down both of us. All we are consist of what we are to one another. We are everything. I need no other world. I need no other comfort, no other being but Peeta. My Peeta.
"I loved you in the cave. I loved you when you threw me the bread. You gave me life."