Chapter Seven

"Peeta," says Calla, "Your eyebrows are going to be the death of me."

The entire room giggles - my three preps and Katniss' team. Katniss just looks over at me with a wan smile and I shrug. I just came in to hang out with her while she is being prepped - I was supposedly ready an hour ago. But my prep team was there, too, so I found myself back in a chair, lights and magnifying glasses shining in my face, the better to see any flaws.

"His hair is so light - it's practically invisible," Calla continues, explaining to the room at large while she grabs her tweezers and plucks the offending hair.

I don't ask - despite the millionth temptation - why my invisible hair needs to be removed. I just suppress a yawn - last night, my nightmares included something new: some version of the slaughterhouses we toured in District 10 two days ago. I'm not squeamish - not really - but my head can't help making the grotesque comparisons - the shapeless lumps of dead flesh, and what was left of Cato at the end of the Games. Am I supposed to accept it - now that I am part of it - that the Games are inhumane and that's that? How? How do I do it?

"Sweetie" says one of Katniss' team, suddenly. "I thought you went to bed with your makeup on, but these are just dark circles. What's happening here? You should have said something - I would have prepared a mask. As it is, I'll need to rethink your foundation …."

I squint at her. Now that it's mentioned, her face is unnaturally pale, except for underneath her eyes. She looks away from me, up at the ceiling. "I'm not sleeping very well," she explains.

For the rest of the day, I let this go, as I have been dreading District 8 for some time - maybe from the day I woke up in the Training Center after the last games were over. Walking out onto the stage, I try not to let it take over - that creeping sensation, the dread and the horror of it all as the dark trees part on the clearing with the fire.

The town square itself could not look more different from the woods at night. We look out over a great industrial complex - buildings made of cold metal; not a green thing in sight. The air smells of the un-alive: oiled machines, waste products, gasoline fumes. But the sound is in my ears - a crackling fire, the crackle of dead branches.

I look down and see her face on the banners. She had a full head of dark-colored hair and soft hands - velvety soft. They are staring at me - what remains of her family - but I can't look down at them, can't meet the eyes. The canned speech, so ridiculous … who cares, Effie? I think to myself, even as I read the words, about the beauty of noble sacrifices … so inadequate. She didn't want to die for her district. She wanted to live. And if she didn't know how to defend herself in the arena - well, good on her. She was gentle, and innocent, and her pulse was like the beat of a song ….

I feel Katniss' lips, softly, against the knuckle of my hand. By this sign I know for sure that I am stumbling over the words and that she, for once, is trying to pick me up. Pax … the word swims around my card - that is the name of the girl I sat with in the woods, desperately waiting for her to die - all to maintain my standing with the Careers. And I didn't even know her name until now. I hate this. I hate this. I hate this.

"What's wrong?" Katniss asks me later, coming upon me sitting on the floor in the outer parlor of our room in the Justice Hall.

I shake my head. "It's that girl. I can't get her out of my head."

"Yeah, I know," she says, joining me on the floor.

"You'll mess up your dress," I protest. It's a lovely, foamy dress, pale blue and glossy.

She shrugs that off. "Do you want to talk about it?"

I consider it, then shake my head. "No time," I say. "And - I'm not sure I'm ready. Maybe - someday, though. Thanks. What's wrong with you?" I ask her, getting a good look at her heavily made-up face and remembering. "You look thinner. As well as tired."

"I can't sleep. I can't eat. And it's not just nightmares. It's this impossible task. Did you see that crowd out there today? They looked ten times angrier than the people in 11. And their lives - in those factories - they must be miserable. Why wouldn't they rebel?"

I hadn't processed it, but I think back now over our appearance. District 8 seems large and glum. Miles and miles of factory buildings ring the district, spewing smoke that makes acid-gray layers in the tired sky.

"What should we do?" I ask her.

She stands up and holds her hand out to me. "Effie gave me sleeping pills. We'll see how those work. Apart from that - we keep on doing what we're doing."

The festivities in 8 are mercifully short, as apparently the travel time between 8 and 7 will take longer than our previous inter-district travel. I know nothing about 7, except that Panem's lumber and paper products are produced there, so I imagine there must be a lot of trees. Maybe it will feel a bit more like home.

Katniss heads to bed as soon as we get back on the train, but I go to the dining car and sit down at a table by a window. What is the point of even attempting to sleep? I can almost draw out exactly what my nightmares would be tonight. I'm staging my own rebellion, right here and now, against them.

A train attendant walks by and offers me warm milk, or a late-night "aperitif" - apparently, this is alcohol - but I refuse both. I will accept neither the comfort of normal sleep, nor the haze of the substance-induced. I ask instead if there is any blank paper and pencils on board.

I used to sketch on nearly a daily basis. Some days, it might amount to no more than doodles in the margins of my test papers - but even these I took pretty seriously. But ever since I came home from the Games … I do a rough sketch for the paintings, sure, but as far as working on an actual illustration, I've shied away from my old routine. Sketching is so intimate, and I've been terrified of what might come out of my pencils. It's bad enough - the process of transferring nightmares to the canvas. There are things in my head ….

I want to put down the staring, hungry faces from District 11. Or - the weather-beaten barns of District 10. Or - the withered rice fields of District 9. Something, anything, anything. But in my head, the districts are not the equivalent of their industries; they are kids - dead ones, and the living ones yet to die - their names on slips of paper, waiting this year's Reaping, and the next and the next. The kids not even born, yet, whose lives I will be plotting against as a mentor for District 12. For years to come.

I look down at the piece of paper - and startle myself to see that I have already moved the pencil across it.

"How do we live with this?"

A cold, moist wind keeps slapping me on the face throughout the ceremony, throughout our speeches, in District 7. I'm tired, but less distracted, and I recite mine - and listen to Katniss' - without zoning out on what is going on.

District 7 is not much like home, but by far the nicest-looking District we've visited, so far. Set in the mountains, the air is cold and clear, and all around us are the marches of giant fir trees. After the speeches, we take a walk through the forest to check out a lumber mill. The sheer size - both in height and circumference - of the trees makes everything feel so small and petty, and our footsteps are hushed by the soft ground and the thick atmosphere of the trees - piney and dark and ancient.

"Katniss," I say, looking back at her and seeing her drag her feet. "Want a lift?"

"What?" she asks.

"Climb on my back, sleepy," I grin at her.

Everyone coos in delight when Katniss clambers up on my back and knots her hands around my neck. But I'm startled - she's a slight person, yes, but she feels way too light on my back.

We spend all too brief a time here, because it's another long trek to District 6.

"Nearly halfway done!" exclaims Effie as we board the train. "How are those pills working for you, Katniss?"

Katniss shrugs. She looks no more rested than the day before.

I'm finally too tired to avoid sleep tonight, but it doesn't last long. It's not even the nightmare, but just the dream that starts up and threatens to eventually become a nightmare that goads me awake. Then I'm restless, tossing and turning in bed. I get up, put on a robe, and leave my car again.

I'm a few cars down, when I hear it. It's muffled behind the noise of the train, but unmistakable - Katniss, crying out. I bang on her door, but the noise doesn't stop. Then I just open it and step inside. She's in bed, asleep, but thrashing around, and screaming.

"Katniss?" I run to her and then hesitate, a moment, before touching her arm.

She wakes up with a start, stares at me foggily, and then holds out her arms.

I don't even think about it. This comes naturally. I climb up into bed with her, lie down next to her, and wrap my arms around her. "It's OK, it's OK."

"It's not OK," she murmurs into my robe.

"Yeah, I know. It's not OK."

As she starts to sob, I hold on to her as if she's an escaping part of me. I'm startled by just how normal and - and - right this feels. It's not just like comforting a friend, nor - I imagine - sleeping with a lover. It's like finding that piece of yourself you thought you had permanently misplaced - that part without which you have been staggering, like a lost thing - like a person with a partial limb.

I slip into sleep without even realizing that it has happened, and my dreams are made whole again. I walk through the woods and I am following her - her tread light and sure. I wake up in a cave and she is sitting over me, holding a wet cloth to my face.

Trust me.

In the morning, I wake up in her bed and I am not even startled to find myself there, my mouth buried in her tangled hair. She's asleep, her face in my chest. There's a knock at her door and I jump, waking her in the process. "Come in?" she says fuzzily.

"Rise and shine, superstar …."

It's her prep team - Katniss always has to prep earlier than I do. We all stare at each other, but Katniss just sits up and stretches. "I'll be out in a minute," she tells them.

When I look at her, despite her cool tone, I see that she is blushing. "Sorry - I fell asleep," I tell her. "Do you want me to talk to them?"

She shakes her head. "They won't believe you. Besides - it's what they think is happening anyway, right? Or what should be happening. It can't hurt - maybe it will get back to the Capitol, somehow."

"Oh." I start to get up. This conversation is making me all kinds of uncomfortable. And I'm all over the place in hypocrisy, because on the one hand - yes, I want them to think it; some part of me wants them all to still believe it, because I did, and it's embarrassing to be the one person who was fooled. On the other hand, it's not for anyone to know, to intrude upon - this space that is more sacred than sex, by far. On the third - hand, or whatever - I don't want her to think about sex, to worry about what is in my head when I'm next to her. That's automatic, natural - and controllable. But I don't want to have to explain that, and I would bet every last cent of my Victor's winnings that she would really not want to hear the explanation.

"Peeta."

I turn to her.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize," I tell her, firmly. "I slept well, at least. For the first time in a long, long while."

"Me, too."

That day, I understand the difference between real sleep and what's been passing as sleep for the last six months. I taste food again, I sense the wind and the sky - the colors and textures of the buildings - like I did before I was a tribute. It's easier, today, to see things in perspective - to feel less angry about the things I can't change, to feel less troubled about the past. I do fret a bit more about the future - but even this change is good. I can think, clear-headed, about what this will entail. I'm not less worried about it - but I am less scared.

I notice I have a sense - a feel - for the crowd. Each District is unique - how could we not be, when we are kept so isolated? - but there are some common threads. Some districts are weighed down with resignation. Some are wound up with tension. Some just hum with curiosity at the sight of us and, now that the barriers are broken - or temporarily removed, at least - Katniss and I can show more affection in front of them. I put my hand on her back and it must look as natural as it feels. She cranes her head up to give me a spontaneous kiss on the cheek and I know - that there is at least appreciation in it, if not real feeling, and this helps.

All through dinner in the District 6 justice building, Katniss eyes me, an expression on her face that is half question, half demand. I find myself unwilling to wait until the train to answer it, so, after a show of leading her, kissing and blushing, away from her food, I find an alcove with a coat-rack in it and hug her close to me.

"What is it?" I ask her.

"Come back to my room tonight," she whispers into my hair.

I part from her a little so I can get a good look at her face. I can see that she, too, has benefitted from the night of sleep. "Are you sure?"

She blushes. "Yeah - I don't care what anyone thinks. As long as - as long as - you don't."

"Life's too short to care what people think," I answer.