"Marvel?" Finn repeats. He shoves me aside and rips the door open. "You have a load of balls for showing up here."
"I know." Marvel says.
"What do you want?" Peeta asks menacingly.
"Can I come in?" he asks.
"No." Peeta and Finn say in sync.
"I'm not here to cause trouble. I came to say that…u realize how much of a twat I've been to Katniss. I've come to apologize and to tell her I broke up with Glimmer."
Peeta and Finn look at him in shock, and then Finn lets him into the house.
"I can't believe you fucking remember where this house is." Finn grumbles under his breath. I see Marvel looking at my wrist and he looks like he's in a shitload of pain.
"Sorry for acting like I have a corncob shoved up my twat." Peeta snickers and so does Finn. I just stare at him with my arms crossed. "You aren't ugly; you're actually really sexy without that sweatshirt. You aren't a whore or a skank or a slut or anything I've ever called you, and I'm really sorry for pushing you around and shoving you up against the lockers all the time."
I know I need to forgive him. I don't remember much about my mother because I was so young when she drove off that cliff, but I do remember her telling me to always be the bigger person. So that's what I have to do, I need to be the bigger person.
"Can you forgive me?" he asks.
"Yes." I reply.
He smiles. "Good." He looks at Peeta and Finn. "Am I back in?"
Peeta and Finn look at each other.
"On one condition," Peeta finally says. Marvel raises his eyebrows. "If anyone sees Katniss getting bullied, you have to stand up for her. Fair?"
"Fair." Finn and Marvel say.
They spit in their hands and shake on it. I gag. "You guys are so disgusting."
"Aw come on Kitty!" Finn teases. "Join us!"
"Fuck no." I walk into the kitchen and get some pizza, and then I go upstairs and brush my hair and take off the gauze off my wrist. I clean the cuts and leave them out to air. Football tryouts were today, and so were cheerleading. The teammates should be announced on Monday.
Normally Marvel is the quarterback and Finn is normally defense. There are 24 players on a football team.
As for the cheerleading team, Glimmer is normally the captain, so even though I'm better at gymnastics and moves than she is, she'll never let me on the team even if I did try out.
….a….
I wake up to my alarm at six in the morning sharp. Marvel stayed the night too. On days I don't work, I bike down to a fruit stand and get fresh fruits and I come home and chop them up and I eat the fruits and make the leftovers into a smoothie. I'm probably the healthiest teenager out there. I haven't been sick since I was eight, so I've had perfect attendance and principles list since then because I take notes as the teacher speaks and I study very hard. I make my smoothie and eat my fruit. Peeta comes downstairs with Marvel and Finn. All three of them are shirtless.
"What are you drinking?" Marvel asks.
"She's having her annual breakfast." Finn says. "She bikes to the fruit stand down the street and gets fresh fruits and comes home, eats half and makes the other half into a smoothie, which she drinks as she does gymnastics." He yawns. "Want to share that?" he makes a grab for my smoothie.
"No."
"Why?" he asks.
"Because I paid for it," I reply. Dad comes downstairs then, too. It's been only boys for a lot of my life because when my step-mom was here, she was always working. I had only Dad and Finn when I started my period, and actually, Peeta and Marvel were there too, and it was the most uncomfortable day of my life, riding to the store with four boys and standing with them watching me awkwardly as I decided which pads to get. Ever since then, I've made Dad give me the money so I could go buy the shit myself.
"Going to the gym today sweetheart?" Dad asks.
"Nope," I reply. "The younger ones are there today."
"So?" he asks.
"Dad, they're all like three years old or older and they run around like crazy. The one time Madge begged me to go and I did was probably the worst decision of my life."
"Oh," he says. "Your instructor, or boss or whatever, she called me yesterday."
I stare at him, "And?" I ask.
"She said that there's a pretty big chance you could make it in the Olympics when you get older." He looks at me. "Last time I saw you do gymnastics, you were ten years old and only a level five. You are level ten now, correct?"
"Um…yeah."
"Maybe I'll have to make it down to the gym and see if your instructor was telling the truth. Or…" he looks at me. "You could just show me now."
"Oh yeah, I want to see." Finn says.
"Yeah, I want to see too." Marvel says, and Peeta nods in agreement.
"We don't have much room…"
"I was thinking about getting those beams put in the backyard." He says. "You know the ones on the side of the house that have been sitting there since you were in sixth grade?"
"Yeah?" I ask.
"Want me to?"
"Yeah."
"Alright, boys, how about you help me out?"
….a….
I never did get to show them gymnastics because it started raining. Today is going to be the worst. My alarm just roused me from my sleep. I get out of bed and take a shower, and then I put on white skinny jeans and a tight light purple shirt over my beige pushup and matching vans, and I make my breakfast out of the fruit in the house and pack my lunch and then I grab my bag and triple check I have all of my homework. Finn is sitting in the kitchen eating a Toaster Strudel. Dad comes down. "I hope you kids know that you are riding with Peeta every day now." He says. Last night I got rid of the scabs on my wrist and they're gone to scars. I'm so healthy I heal very quickly.
"Yeah, Peeta told us last night." Finn says. I go upstairs and brush my teeth and hair and I braid it. I hear Peeta's horn honk, and I go downstairs to the car. Finn comes out too, and Peeta speeds off.
…a…
I'm halfway in the school when Glimmer starts in on me.
"You are such a little cunt. I can't stand you. I hate everything about you. You make me sick. You're so ugly and stupid and fat and retarded and lesbian."
I look down at my stomach and back to her.
I am not fat. I do know that. I have abs for fucks sake and I weight 105 and it's all muscle. Everyone that I see outside of school tells me that.
The rest though, it hurts a lot, and I almost cry, but I suck it up and walk past her to my locker. "You deserve to die." She says. She's never said that to me, but I really try my best to ignore her. "You are so fucking fat. You are drowning in your rolls of two hundred pounds."
Peeta, Finn and Marvel are watching me ignore her. "I don't understand how the fuck you got so fat."
Alright, that tears it. I take my sweatshirt off and lift my shirt up to show her my abs. "If I'm fat, then your obese." And then cover my stomach, slam my locker and shove past her to first period, leaving the entire hallway dying in laughter at what I've just said to Glimmer.