CHAPTER 11: Stay With Me
Life had a way of coming in spurts. Peeta could remember a time when he was little when there were five new babies in district 12. Another time when a handful of people all lost their lives to a chest-infection. Now, it felt like everything was suddenly about marriage.
This wasn't exactly true, Peeta told himself, it only seemed like life came in spurts.
Life was confusing enough without thinking about other peoples' plans, lives. It was easier to work on learning the types of bread his father used to make. It was soothing. Knead, fold, turn, knead, fold, turn, pinch, knead, fold, turn, knead, fold, turn, pinch, more flour, knead, fold, turn, pinch. He tried to be thankful that his memories of his family were relatively untouched. It was the memories of the Games that seemed confusing, seemed jagged. His time with the careers in the first Games, had he been friends with them? Did they already know there was something wrong with Katniss? Peeta tried to feel out whether or not this was right.
Katniss was home. He rarely heard her come home, it was more of a sense, a presence in the house. He wondered sometimes if he was just a little paranoid. Katniss was in the kitchen now. Neither of them spoke. There was a soft thump as Katniss set her bag on the table.
"Real or not real, the careers in the first Games knew you were dangerous."
Katniss paused.
"We were all dangerous, Peeta, real."
Knead, fold, turn. It was not exactly the answer he was looking for.
"No, they were scared of you. Why?"
Peeta did not look at her. "I got a high training score, an 11, Real. We had the best stylists, Portia and Cinna, Real."
Knead, fold, turn, pinch. Peeta considered this. The score made sense, Peeta had clear memories of Portia and of the chariot ride through the capitol. Knead, fold, turn, pinch. The bread was done and Katniss' answers made sense.
They hadn't talked much since she had told him that they were married. He put the bread onto the baking stone and turned to face her.
He smiled hopefully at her, holding the carefully kneaded bread out.
She was holding up a large, black rabbit. They smiled at each other carefully.
"Rabbit stew?"
"Yeah. Rye?"
"Yeah."
Katniss carefully skinned the rabbit while Peeta cleaned the counter off and started the broth for the stew. They usually prepared dinner in silence, especially lately, but it seemed more comfortable today. Katniss hummed softly as she stirred some large carrots into the stew. The sun was setting behind her in the picture window. Sometimes, he could tell there was no truth in what the Capitol had put into his head. The way the sun danced in her hair and the sound of her beautiful voice made it impossible to think she was anything but human. They sat for dinner at the small table Peeta had set up in the kitchen.
After they had a few bites, Peeta set his silverware down. "Can I ask you something?"
Katniss gave him a strange look. He was always asking questions. She nodded as she stuffed a bite of stew into her mouth.
"Will you tell me about... you told me it was real... tell me about our wedding?"
"Peeta..." she began.
"I've been thinking about it. I think it's real. Why doesn't anybody else know about it?"
Katniss' eyes widened, she swallowed slowly. "It was after our engagement party at President Snow's mansion. We did it on the train on the way home... You said that... that you wanted to remember everything about it," she smiled at the irony. "I didn't want to wear pink-"
"Because your dress was pink," Peeta cut in. His eyes were squeezed shut, and as Katniss mentioned pink, a vivid image of her pink dress in a pile on the floor in her compartment on the train came to him briefly.
Katniss smiled patiently, "My slip was pink. I wasn't wearing my dress anymore."
"That's- why it was on the floor." Peeta supplied, eyes still closed.
"Yes. So you gave me your shirt. You told me..." she trailed off, and took a deep breath. "You told me that you had always hoped that you would bake the bread for our wedding toast. But an Attendant brought us this hard little roll." Her voice began to shake, "We toasted it over the fire with a fork, and we had to switch hands because it was so hot."
He opened his eyes, frustrated that he couldn't feel the flames licking the his hands even as he tried with all his might to recall them. He was surprised to watch a nostalgic smile play across Katniss's lips as she mentioned, "My half got all burned, even black in a few spots. Yours was perfect, golden. You ate my half anyway, without complaining at all..."
Peeta closed his eyes and for just a moment could taste the blackened bits of bread. He also remembered that... that she was crying. Opened his eyes again and looked at her carefully.
"And you... wanted to?"
She sighed, defeated. "I didn't know. But we toasted. I fed you my toast. I ate your toast. You didn't make me."
Katniss tried to pull herself together, keeping her eyes shut tight. Peeta stared at her thoughtfully, seemingly unaffected. When he thought about it, the memory was clear. Realistic. Matte. Peeta closed his eyes too. For a moment the two of them sat at the table, both of them with their eyes closed. Peeta searched his memory for any feelings, digging around where there seemed to be only pictures and emptiness. Katniss was willing the feelings down, she blindly reached out to cram another piece of bread into her mouth and landed on Peeta's hand.
"So why," Peeta asked, not moving his hand, not taking hers, "why doesn't anybody else know about it?"
Katniss felt frustrated. "That was the point, Peeta. It was for us. It wasn't for anyone else. It was so they couldn't take it from us. We never went to the justice building and we never talked about it again. Before we did it you asked," she closed her eyes tightly, "you asked if we would be together, husband and wife, and I said we were allies... And sometimes, I ask myself, real or not real?"
Katniss wished this conversation weren't happening. It seemed like the day had been going so well. There was just so damn much to think about. Gale and Madge and that stupid word she still could not think of the meaning of and a baby. She wanted to be happy about Peeta seeming better, but, like many times in the past few years, there were too many things going on in her head. She wondered if her head would ever be clearer. Maybe it would help to think about one thing at a time.
She took a steadying breath and tried to sift through her thoughts and pick one. Peeta, and their secret marriage. How did she feel about it? How did she... when she opened her mouth to answer, instead of saying anything having to do with Peeta, her lips betrayed her.
"Gale is getting married."
Selfish. That was the first thing that flashed through Peeta's mind.
"No." Katniss knew she couldn't take back what she had said, and she could see in his eyes that her response was a terrible mistake. This whole thing was a mistake, telling Peeta they were married.
"I meant- there's going to be an...," she paused. What was that damn word, "An election." So much for keeping on one topic. "An election. Did we read about those in school?"
"Are you changing the subject?"
"No, it- I...," Katniss had never been good with words, and this was an especially bad case of her having no clue what to say. "Gale was on TV with... Madge." She choked on her school friend's name. "They were on TV with their... with their daughter, saying they wanted to be a part of the election... to protect... protect..."
Just like that, she found the word she was looking for. "I wanted to protect you."
"So you married me."
"Yes." Her voice trembled, and she bit her lip, hard, trying to steady it.
"That's not why people get married, Katniss."
She tore her hands away, throwing them desperately into the air. " I know that, but I- Peeta... I care about you so much... more than..."
Words failed her. She rose, and the trembling in her voice travelled to her entire body. She dropped a hand to the table to settle herself.
Peeta caught her hand, and brought it to his lips, bringing back to him a vivid memory from the first Games that he and Katniss fought in. In the dark, in the cold, in a rainy cave, he caught her hand, and brought it to his lips. Though he could still see a rain-slick Katniss, starved, wounded, and beautiful, shining with the game makers' torrential blessing, the memory was matte.
"Real," He said, eyes snapping open. His voice was steady, and strong.
"What?" Katniss was choking down her anguish with such effort that she barely heard him, but the conviction in his voice steadied her, just as it always did on the rare occasion it was still there.
"You care about me, more than you can find the words to express. Real."
Katniss's face broke into a grateful smile, and tears soon followed. "Real."
"You married me in secret, because... because you wanted me to know this, no cameras, no crowds, and no Capitol."
"Real!" she jumped on the end of his sentence, and fell back into her chair, wrapping her other hand around his.
Peeta smiled, a bit sadly, but it was a genuine smile.
"That's still not a reason to marry someone."
Katniss tried to pull her hands away, but he held them fast. She was surprised that the emotion that surfaced first was anger.
"So what? What do you want me to do?"
He looked at her, face ambivalent and asked her, "What do you want to do?"
She took a steadying breath, and brought her hands, with his in tow, to her forehead. She rested on their collective hands and closed her eyes. What did she want? What did she want from the boy with the bread - the boy who'd given her everything he had until there was nothing left to give her? Her dandelion in Spring, her ally in the Games, only remaining friend, her only remaining family, Peeta Mellark. What did she want from him?
The words came out, plain, and hopeless. As she said them, it was as if they were the air that was keeping her lungs inflated. She had wanted to say something that made sense. Something strong, and clear. Instead, she squeezed his hands as she had done a million times - for the first time, what felt like a million lifetimes ago, in a chariot, on fire, then on a beach under a pink sky, and again in the capitol, at the end of the rebellion as everything was collapsing; holding on just so he wouldn't slip away - she held his hands, and in a tired and strained voice, she whispered, "Stay with me."
He leaned in, placing his forehead on their hands, and was quite for a long moment. Katniss braced herself for his response, but couldn't bring herself to pull away. He lifted his head so that his lips brushed their interlocked fingers as he responded, "Always."