Chapter Fourteen

Peeta Mellark!

When Effie called my name last year at the Reaping, the people of my district surrounded me. It was for their sake, for the cameras' sake, that I somehow managed to separate myself from the crowd and climb up to the stage to join Katniss without completely breaking down.

Now, I'm alone. No cameras follow me. I'm cut off from the people of my district - even my family. Did they call my name? No - there's a fifty-fifty chance of that happening this time, as opposed to 1 in hundreds. But it doesn't matter. If it's me or Haymitch. Katniss. Katniss.

Rage at my impotence rises up in me, threatens to choke me. I don't throw anything, but I'm tempted to take the painting - my last painting - and break the canvas frame over my knee. It is for myself that I remain calm. Myself and my team. I force myself to drink a glass of water and keep on breathing.

Haymitch. I have to talk to Haymitch. But first, I - I have to see her. I run across the green to her house. Prim answers the door.

"Katniss - " I gasp, pushing my way inside.

"She's not here. She ran off - right after the announcement."

I look at her tear-stained face. "Where would she have-."

"If it weren't for the fence, I'd say the woods. So - I don't know."

We both turn as the door bursts open, but it's Gale. He's red-faced and panting, having made what must be record time from the Seam. He and I look at each other for a moment. It's funny - how little interaction we've had, considering how much time I've been spending here this spring.

Prim repeats to Gale what she told me. "We have to find her before she does something crazy," he says.

"Yes," I say. "But you go. I have to talk to Haymitch. I have to talk to Haymitch before she does."

At Haymitch's, I knock before I push open the door. It's futile usually to knock on his door, but who knows what mood he's in right now? Just because I've never seen it doesn't mean that he doesn't have a weapon other than that knife of his.

Katniss got Haymitch to hire Hazelle as a housekeeper during Thread's crackdown, so entering his house lately has not been nearly as noxious as usual. The old mildew and moldy food smells are gone. Nothing can quite eradicate the smell of old booze, though - that comes from him, anyway.

He's wide awake and hollow-eyed, sitting in a rocking chair by his stove, with a box of liquor bottles on the floor next to him. He's opening one now. When he sees me, his face cracks open in a ghastly smile. "Thought it would be you first."

"What do you mean?" I ask, though I know perfectly well.

"The girl - it always takes her a little longer to see the big picture. She'll spend some time feeling sorry for herself and then she'll remember - she'll be going in with one of us. You always see the whole thing right away. At least as far as she's concerned."

I sit down in the chair across from him.

"So?" he says.

"Haymitch - why is this happening? There's something almost too convenient about the whole thing."

He shrugs. "You know why it's happening."

My breath hurts as I suck it in. "Yes, but - OK, it's one way to - to get rid of a problem without resorting to suspicious accidents. In the short term. But in the long term, it makes no sense. It doesn't hurt the districts to do this. It's a reprieve for all the children of Panem this year. It's the people in the Capitol - they are the ones who aren't going to like it. They fawn over the Victors. I mean, they were voting on wedding dresses just seconds before hearing Katniss condemned to the arena. Why upset the one population you know you have under your control?"

Haymitch's eyes glint at me for several heartbeats. "Peeta, no offense - I know your parents. And while I definitely know where you got your unfortunate romantic streak, I really don't know where you got your brains. Here's the thing - do you think just because these people are in power they actually know what they're doing? ALL they know how to do is grab on and hold on to power. Eventually, all you can do to hold on is keep putting out the little fires and hope that they don't spread. Every once in awhile, that requires something drastic. Do you know how long Snow has been president of Panem? Forty-something years. All the smart people around him, the strategic thinkers, the naysayers, the people with morals? These people were all killed off before they could pose a threat."

"Oh."

"Yes, oh. So?" he says again, softly. "What do you want from me?"

"I want you to let me go back into the arena with her."

He lets out a mirthless laugh. "Your impulse toward self-destruction is impressive, kid. You might want to have someone check on that for you."

"This is as much for you as for her. You gave me the strategy that ended up saving my life. I'd be dead now if you hadn't. I know you did it for her. I know I asked you to do it for her. But still - I'm here. We probably wouldn't even be in this mess if I wasn't. This two-Victor thing was a mistake and the Capitol was never going to let it stand. If she goes in alone, she's dead for sure. But as long as only one of us is left at the end … and you know it has to be her. So. Please, Haymitch."

"You've got your life to live, boy. How do you think I would feel if I stood there and didn't volunteer for you if yours is the name they call? I'd be obligated to save you this time, anyway."

"There are too many ways to die in the arena for that to be a problem. I think last year proved conclusively that I can get myself killed off without too much trouble."

He squints at me. "Is that what you took from it? Seems to me you held out longer than most people would have. If you could have seen me trying to scare up money for the antibiotic you needed … days that took, and every morning I'd think, I'm too late again. But you were still sitting there, heart beating away. Then the Gamemakers interfered and I got to use the money on food, instead." He takes a long drink.

I'm touched - and a little flabbergasted - to get this admission from him. "I hope you set aside something for yourself, after all that effort," I say.

"Oh - I did. I mean, the champagne didn't quite make it into the basket."

I laugh. "Haymitch, don't you see? She needs you there - as the mentor. I wouldn't know the first thing to do. Who to approach. How to approach them. I need to be in the arena to - deflect the blows."

He winces. "What about her? What do you expect me to tell her? She's going to beg me to make sure you don't go in."

"Do you think so?" I ask him.

"Don't go fishing for shit with me," he growls. "She threw all of Panem into chaos just because she wouldn't take the victory over you. I doubt I rate the same level of sacrifice."

"She did it because she was kind - and because she is - she always has been - a rebel."

He shakes his head. "You can't look at that Game - you can't - and not see it, how she feels about you."

"Well, that's over now, anyway. Let's look at the big picture, shall we? If I die in there - what are the consequences? The Capitol takes back my house and someone else is going to have to decorate the cakes. She dies? Her mother and Prim sent back to the Seam. No more victory winnings - they'd have to survive on their own with next to no income. The people who they heal for free because they can afford it? They wouldn't be able to do it anymore. The rebellion loses its - its mockingjay, or whatever she is to them. And me?" I shudder. "How long do you really think I'd last without her? Can't you see? It's - plain math."

"What about me?"

"What about you? First of all, you'd be no use protecting her in there, your withdrawals would be that bad. Your liver would probably keel over from the shock." I smile at him. "Anyway, I am never, never going to ask you to go in instead of me. You owe me this, Haymitch. I was left out of all your little plans last time, and now you owe me - whatever I ask for. And I owe you. And - you earned your victory."

"Earned it?" he says in a strained and faraway voice. "By killing kids? Maybe you earned yours more."

"I can't go around and around on this all night, Haymitch. When Katniss talks to you, I guess you can tell her anything you need to. But I'm begging you - begging you, Haymitch - to let me go back in with her. Please. It's the only choice that is left to me. They call my name - you don't volunteer."

"Has it occurred to you that this would play into their hands? That this gives them the opportunity to force her to do what they wanted her to in the first place?"

I shiver. "To kill me? Sure. But she won't. It won't come down to that again. And maybe – we can make sure their plan backfires."

I finally carry a vague, unsatisfactory OK with me when I leave his house. I suppose he feels obligated to hear her side of the story. I glance over at Katniss' house, wondering if she's back yet. No - I feel instinctively that when she's ready, she will first go to Haymitch. I'm feeling vaguely ill, anyway. Even after every argument I used with Haymitch, I haven't yet exorcised that dream. I don't know what seeing Katniss now, in this mood, will feel like. We're going to have a lot of time together, anyway, in these next few months. Just not as long as I had expected.

But - in a way - this makes sense for me. I'm tired of careening between hope and despair. Of living in fear of her being hauled off and hung in the square. Or being tortured and killed in the Capitol. No - I want her to defy the Capitol again - one more time - and exit the arena to find a full-scale revolution on hand, taking down the people who would hurt her. Somehow - some way - it's got to work out. As with the last arena, my part in it will be small. Except that … except that ... I will again have the chance to choose love over my own life. The very heart and soul of rebellion. I understand this, now. It's bigger than me. It's larger than my circumstances.

I find myself walking toward Town. I don't know why - but I need to go back home. I guess I need someone to pity me - only me. I walk around to the back of the bakery and see that the light is on in her office. I hesitate for a long time, hoping nothing more than to not be hurt by her again. It's become a running theme in my life and I just want it to somehow end - somewhere.

I walk through the kitchen door and feel the welcome heat and smell of it, even now, long after baking is done for the day. The lights back here are dimmed. My father and brother are upstairs, probably. I hear a sound coming from the office though.

I open the door and she looks up from the desk, where she had lain her head on top of her folded arms. Her long hair is loose - it's a ragged mixture of blonde, dirty blonde and the streaks of gray that are starting at the roots. Her eyes and nose and mouth are all narrow - giving her a pinched-in look. Her face is blotchy and red from crying.

She makes a sound and I go to her. She starts to rise to meet me, but ends up collapsing and I catch her. Sobs like dry heaves come out of her and I fold her in me - I'm so much bigger than her now. For years, she's been too afraid to hit me. But also, afraid to touch me at all. Perhaps she felt she'd rescinded that right. Or tried to talk herself into believing that I wasn't worth it, to somehow make her own actions more justifiable.

I don't know and I don't give a shit right now.

The next morning I wake up bleary and exhausted from the trials of the night before. Mercifully, I was too worn out for nightmares. It's too late to bake bread and I couldn't possibly think of a thing I want to do less. I have to go see Katniss. I just don't even know what I will say or do.

Prim answers the door in her nightgown and robe - staying home from school today. She looks stricken, drained, and just - tired.

"Did she make it home last night?"

"Ye-ah," says Prim with a funny expression. "But it might be awhile before you can see her. She got drunk with Haymitch last night and - didn't have a great night, or morning. She's still asleep."

I roll my eyes. But I'm really pissed at Haymitch. He has no right to let her follow him down that hole. She has to get ready for the Games. The one thing we know is that she will be going back in. Therefore, we should be prepping her - we should be doing nothing but.

I spend the morning paying off Ripper, who sells white liquor out of her home, to keep from selling anything to Haymitch or Katniss; calling Effie, who sobs and sobs on the phone until I ask her to send me recordings of the Hunger Games for all the living victors; fending off sympathetic visitors who show up at my doorstep periodically. Delly and Lily cry; the guys stand around awkwardly. People bring me eggs, flowers - jars of preserves. Maybe I'm not as removed from District 12 as I thought.

In the afternoon, I go over to Haymitch's house when I know Hazelle is scheduled to be there, and with her help root out and empty every bottle of liquid I can find, while he groans and nurses his hangover in his bedroom. After scouring the upstairs, I go back downstairs to a rare and amusing sight - Haymitch and Katniss, sitting in the living room, sipping something hot out of mugs. I put a box of empty bottles on his dining room table and look at both of them. "There, it's done."

"What's done?" asks Katniss, her eyes widening.

"I've poured all the liquor down the drain."

Haymitch jumps up and reaches for the box like a drowning man. "You what?"

"I tossed the lot."

"He'll just buy more," says Katniss.

"No, he won't. I've got an arrangement with Ripper."

Haymitch turns to me and vaguely swipes toward me with his knife. I've sidestepped this maneuver before and I do so again without even thinking about it.

"What business is it of yours what he does?" asks Katniss angrily.

I look at her and meet her anger with my own. "It's completely my business. However it falls out, two of us are going to be in the arena again with the other as mentor. We can't afford any drunkards on this team. Especially not you, Katniss."

"What?" she sputters. "Last night's the only time I've ever even been drunk."

"Yeah, and look at the shape you're in."

She blinks and she's asking me, with her eyes, where is the boy with the ready arms to hold her, with the kisses she likes without admitting it? She'll eventually work it out, I hope. That boy threw the last games into confusion. Katniss can have no more emotional connections to the boy going with her into this arena.

Because I love her - now, more than ever - I have to put a halt to the closeness that has been growing between us. She did more than enough the first time, and she didn't even like me that much then.

"Don't worry, I'll get you more liquor," she says to Haymitch.

"Then I'll turn you both in, let you sober up in the stocks."

"What's the point to this?" asks Haymitch.

"The point is that two of us are coming home from the Capitol. One mentor and one victor. Effie's sending me recordings of all the living victors. We're going to watch their Games and learn everything we can about how they fight. We're going to put on weight and get strong. We're going to start acting like Careers. And one of us is going to be victor again whether you two like it or not!"

I leave them to chew on that.

For the next couple of days, I walk into town to have breakfast with my family. Katniss' anger at me carries her over three mornings of going without her precious cheese buns before she finally cracks and calls me one evening.

"Come over for dinner," she says abruptly.

"Why?" I challenge her.

"Well, you're the one with the plans. You want to let the rest of us in on them or not?"

I grin into my phone. "Sure, I'll be right over."

I bring over my notebook and after dinner, the five of us sit around the table. "So," I begin. "I think that we can assume - right off - that any strategies, especially the one from last year, are not going to be sufficient on their own. Though we can't discard them entirely. I'm sorry, Katniss, but - unless you really don't feel like you can do it again - we probably should go in, for the sponsors at least, as the 'star-crossed lovers.'"

She blinks at me. "Of course."

"Anyway, then we can at least go in together - to protect each other - from the start."

This time she smiles a little when she nods.

"But we also need to train. We know now how brutal it can be, and all the weapons training I ever got was in the training center last year. I need more practice - and Katniss, you could use practice on hand-to-hand combat. And - Haymitch, I don't know how long it's been since you did anything other than swing at the air with that knife. And - we need to get back into shape."

That has their attention, and Katniss finally looks at me with something other than mild annoyance. "So - you have a plan for this?"

"Well, I've drafted a schedule, of sorts. Nothing complicated. Mornings we do strength and endurance training, alternating weight lifting and running. Afternoons we work on combat skills. I thought we could start on hand-to-hand, but also, Katniss, we would want to learn to climb trees, study up on plants, learn some trapping skills. I would like Gale to help here, if he doesn't mind giving up part of his Sundays."

"Gale?" she says doubtfully.

"You've always said he is better at snares than you."

"We could put you on a diet - for putting on weight," says Katniss' mother suddenly.

"Yes," I nod, scribbling that down in my notebook. "And finally, I got that box of tapes from Effie today. We should all sit down and - I know this isn't going to be pleasant - we should get to know the fighting styles, and also, you know, the thought processes of the other people who might be reaped with us. I know it might have changed, in the meanwhile, but I don't think it can hurt to know. Whatever else about this Quell, at least we have the forewarning of knowing roughly who our opponents will be."

After dinner, Katniss walks me and Haymitch out to the front porch. And we both watch Haymitch limp home. I give a sigh - I don't know how easy it will be to get Haymitch into shape, after twenty-five years of major neglect.

"What is it?" she asks me, looking at me closely. I know she's still waiting for something from me, some proclamation of the self-sacrifice I intend to make for her; some declaration of my never-ending love. But these things are already known. In the arena, when the time comes, will be the place for declarations. And once again, it will be completely true - and completely a strategy. Then one or both of us will be gone, and this strange game will finally be over.

"Nothing - Haymitch. I doubt we have the time to get him into arena shape."

She sets her mouth. "We'll have to make sure of it."

We look at each other and my resolve is tested. No big deal - this is going to happen. And I don't intend to withdraw from her entirely; no. The Capitol is ripping us apart forever, so I intend to enjoy her presence as much as possible. But as her ally.

"It might not be him," I shrug.

She's on the verge of saying something, but thinks better of it. It's funny how it always comes down to this. Like it was in the training center, when we were opponents straining against the pull of the friendship that was already flickering to life between us. Now we are at cross-purposes again and she knows and I know that if we talk too much about it - if we hash it all out: Haymitch's life or mine - some things will be done and said that can't be undone, things that have no place given the future that we will never have. Things she will have to save for Gale.

"So, I guess I'll see you tomorrow," I say, at last. The days are growing longer and the sun is only just now beginning to set - the trees on the horizon are darkening into a smudgy line and the overlay of the soft orange light over the pale blue sky is creating streaks of violet and magenta around the molten glow of the sun. Beautiful. When I descend the steps of her porch and turn my feet in the direction of town and not my house, she stops me.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going to meet some people at Aster's. Her birthday is today."

"Aster Linwood?" she asks with a slight frown.

"Yeah, she's a friend of mine. And - I'm trying to make it up to my friends. I haven't been a good one. I was so depressed and lonely and sorry for myself after the Games … now that I know that I don't have - that I might not have - much time left, that's something I have to make up."

I look up at her, trying to read her expression. I could take her with me. It's a party, she's my fiancée - in a normal world it would be a matter of course. But it's too close to dangerous territory, for her to go as - my date. And she would hate it, anyway.

"Oh, that makes sense," is all she says, then she goes inside.

We have roughly eight weeks until the Reaping, and it goes by with frightening speed. In order to not draw too much attention from the Peacekeepers, we jog around the perimeter of Victors' Village. We make weights out of old plastic containers and do our conditioning in my basement. There are 56 living victors, besides the three of us, so we watch a tape or two a day, going all the way back to the 11th Hunger Games, which was won by a sixteen-year-old girl who we realize with a start must be a survivor of the Dark Days. When I wonder out loud if Effie sent me the wrong tape, Haymitch grunts and says, no, it's not a mistake. She's still alive.

While I'm pleased with my and Katniss' progress, Haymitch's body resists the change and it is weeks before he can run laps without losing his breath. He's got no aim with his knife, is awkward with even the sticks we use to practice sword fighting, and finds wrestling to be a ridiculous chore. I'm glad I'm not going to have to rely on him to help Katniss in the arena, because I'd be getting pretty genuinely worried by now.

Gale does join us for three straight Sundays and teaches - as best as he can without being in the trees - how to string and set a variety of snares. Even Katniss pays close attention to this - despite years of spending time with him in the woods, she isn't nearly as good as he is.

Katniss is careful to hover around the two of us during these sessions. Maybe she's worried about words blowing up between us. And maybe he has some lingering resentment of my usurping whatever his relationship was with Katniss. One kiss. But he doesn't say anything. We are very polite to each other. My fight isn't really with him and his isn't with me. It's with Katniss, really, running away from the subject with such speed there's dust in our faces. And it's with the Capitol - throwing her and me together, and now forcing us apart.

I try to observe their behavior together and it's comfortable - she'll chuckle at something he says that only they know about; she's easy with her teasing and in expressing her frustration when he goes too fast - but it's not as close as I always imagine, at least not around me. They're not like a 'couple' - absently touching each other, standing close - nothing like the subtle things that lovers do in public when they're not even aware of it. This isn't exactly proof of anything, but I take a fragile sort of comfort in it.

One day, Katniss goes inside to use the bathroom, leaving Gale and me alone together, sitting in Haymitch's back yard, twine and sticks between us. I give him a sideways glance and say, "Don't worry. She'll come home again - and alone this time."

He grunts, finally looks up at me. It really is startling, the physical similarity to Katniss - the eyes, not only the exact same color, but also the same shape. The set look of the mouth. He's tall and broad where she is slight and short, but otherwise, they could be siblings, let alone cousins. "Do you really think the Capitol is going to let her come home?"

"I have to believe it," I say. This is the thing I don't spend too much time thinking about, because there's nothing I can do about it. "I believe she can make it to the end. I don't know what happens after that, all I know is that she is going to win this Quell."

"Yeah."

But I'm looking down at my hands now, everything else blurring but my white fingers with their little burn scars. If I squint hard enough, I can still see the nightlock berries in my palm. "I wish she had just let me die. If she had just taken it - taken the victory - all of this would never have happened. She'd be safe, everyone would be safe."

"Huh. She's said exactly the same thing about herself."

I smile, but it hurts a little. "That sounds like her," I say shortly. "But silly. She had no real reason to save me over herself."

"Well -" he starts. But Katniss comes out with the slam of Haymitch's back door, hurrying over as if anxious about the small amount of time we've already spent alone together, and whatever he was going to say is lost to the moment.

Two nights before the Reaping, we finish the last tape at Haymitch's house. Just the three of us. The game tapes have kind of blurred together. There really are basically two types of games. Career years that follow the predictable pattern: alliance, hunt, break-up of alliance, final showdown. And non-Career years in which something unpredictable - usually something about the arena itself - favors some non-Career tribute and propels him or her to the end, with the Careers as often as not destroyed in an early accident or natural disaster. Our year I would have characterized as a typical Career year - except for Katniss, the unpredictable element.

"Well, that's that," I say, updating my notebook and glancing over at Katniss, who is picking at her fingernails. "I think that we've finally earned a break."

Haymitch's groan of relief makes both Katniss and I laugh.

"So, we have tomorrow off? Is that what you're saying?" Katniss asks me.

"Yes." It's Sunday tomorrow and I figure - I can go frost cakes one more time at the bakery and have dinner with my family. She can have her entire Sunday with Gale.

"So …"

We all sit in silence together. Haymitch's house. Which has become the perfectly fitting home for the dysfunctional family that the three of us are. I think of Haymitch living in this place alone for all of these years - a quarter of a century. I hope there are at least two of us left at the end of this. No one should have to be as alone as he has been.

Katniss and I leave together. We stand together on his porch and listen to the crickets, which make a riotous sound tonight. She looks fresh and healthy in the moonlight, and her eyes glow. I'm tempted again - to say something, to do something. But it's not time, yet. We hear Haymitch's phone ringing and we both jump, startled. I've never seen or heard him take a call.

"Probably Effie or something," says Katniss, with a chuckle that dies into a sigh.

The next day, after frosting as many cakes as make any kind of financial sense for the bakery - and a somber early supper with the extended family - I start to head home, but the thought of the empty house depresses me. So, first I take a walk, through town, toward the Seam - to the Meadow. It's full of dandelions in their later stages - all white and puffy. I pick one and blow away the spores, making my one and only wish.

That's when I see her. She's alone, sitting in the grass - staring at the fence that divides her from her woods, from freedom. I'm surprised she is alone. And I leave her alone, to say her good-byes.

I have one last task to do at home. I have accounted for everything else. What money I have left from my first year of Victor winnings will be released to my father once I am gone, and I have directed it to be secured for my cousins' upbringing. Most of my possessions have been packed away for easy removal, the instant I am killed in the arena. Just one thing remains. I box up all my paintings. On each box, I indicate the person I want to have the painting. My family, my closest friends - Katniss, of course, several for Katniss. Even one for Gale. It's not an original idea, but I just can't bear the thought of the Peacekeepers coming in and throwing them all away.

Reaping day is hot and sticky. I put on my favorite pants and t-shirt, sticking my notebook of tribute research in my front pocket. Then I pick up Haymitch and Katniss and her family and we walk together into town.

It's quiet, and far less 'festive' than normal. The town square is dusty, there are no new banners besides the one that was raised when Thread arrived. The Capitol cameras and sound systems have arrived. But there's no sense of scope or scale. The thin crowd that has already started to gather part for us when we walk through them, all staring at us sadly. Instead of the usual rows of teenagers before the stairs of the Justice Hall, there are two small roped off areas. One for Katniss, who stands alone. One for me and Haymitch.

The normal routine - the anthem, the history of Panem, the introduction of Effie Trinket, who comes out lacking her usual verve, though she is wearing a spectacular gold wig. There's no mentor - yet - to also take the stage, so that part is skipped. Then, soon enough, Effie is casting around inside the bowl that holds Katniss' name. Katniss walks, stone-faced, up to the stage and puts her chin up. And now I hold my breath, just hoping for one result. Because I'm not one hundred percent sure I can trust the man beside me to do what I asked. With relief, I hear his name, not mine. And as he walks up to the stage, I count to three and put my hand in the air.

"I volunteer as tribute," I say.

Like before, I look to Katniss' face for inspiration for my walk up the stage. But as she looks at me, her expression crumbles, and sadness fills it. So, I smile at her and mouth, "It's OK."

And when I look out at the crowd, not listening to the recitation of the Treaty, my 12-year-old cousin's face is the only one that really comes into focus. I silently wish her and the rest of them success in all the dreadful years to come, and then I'm whisked off the stage and back into the Games.