Chapter 12

Friday

Contentment.

That's what I feel as I lie in Peeta's arms with him still buried deep inside of me. My concern for my father is pushed aside as I realise the source of strength Peeta is to me. He is steady and reliable and just what I need. The whole situation feels less daunting and scary with him here. I know he will be there throughout my dad's recovery.

I pull him closer wanting to be joined to him as long as possible. Sex has never been that good. Not even with Gale. The entire time I was just consumed by him. Nothing has ever felt so natural and right in my entire life. It is like I was always supposed to end up here. With him.

Peeta continues to look down on me with a look of pure adoration that should scare me but only makes my heart flutter like a teenage girl. I smile back at him and nuzzle my nose against his.

"I've wanted to do that since the bachelorette party," I mummer.

Peeta pulls back, finally slipping out of me and raises an eyebrow with a smirk.

"It was the fireman outfit wasn't it? Didn't think that be your thing" he jokes.

I smile and shake my head at him before reaching up and tucking some of his messy curls behind his ear.

"It's a shame you are dead set on that art thing. You make one hot fireman," I reply.

Peeta grins and then bends down to give me a soft kiss. Even this brief touch leaves my body humming.

"If it is any consolation, I have wanted you since you kissed me in front of Gale at the cocktail reception. I had no idea you could stir those feelings in me," he mummers against my lips. I smile into the kiss, grateful that I have not been the only one fantasying about the other this week. "Something just changed that night. Suddenly you were no longer like a little sister to me, but this strong, beautiful woman."

He pauses before speaking again.

"This isn't just a one time thing right? You actually want this? With me?" he asks a little nervously.

I smile and nod as reach up to bring him down for a deeper kiss. Peeta opens his mouth readily as our tongues dance together. The kiss is slow and sensual and makes every nerve end tingle. We are both a little bit breathless when we break apart.

"Feel that?" I ask him as I place his hand over my rapidly beating heart. "This is definitely more than a one night thing. This isn't fake for me anymore either."

Peeta smiles as I repeat back the words he had uttered to me earlier and bends down to plant a soft peck on my forehead. I look at him sweetly as he pulls away.

"Thank you for being here for me," I say softly as I stroke the curls off his face.

"I will always be here for you," he replies, his blue eyes sincere as he nuzzles his nose against my hand that cups his cheek.

I know he is being sincere. And I couldn't be any more grateful.

I am broken out of my Peeta trance by the sudden beeping of my cell phone indicating I have a new message. I snap my head towards the sound coming from a purse on a nearby chair. In my Peeta daze I have forgotten that I am suppose to be waiting for news about Dad. I jump out of bed and race to my purse in a panic that something has changed.

I fumble about my purse until I finally latch onto my phone and yank it out the bag. My heart stops as I see I have 5 missed calls and 8 text messages. How have I missed so many calls? The panic rises further and further up my chest. Prim and Mom have obviously been desperate to contact me. That means bad news. I open the last one from Prim, my heart now racing in terrified anticipation. This can't be good. My eyes scan the message as my brain struggles to take in what it is reading.

Katniss, you need to get to the hospital now. It's not good.

Instantly I snap into autopilot. I stuff my phone back in the purse and grab the nearest pair of jeans and t-shirt I can find as I begin yanking on my clothes. Peeta sits up on the bed, still completely nude, with a concerned look on his face.

"Is everything alright?" he asks concerned.

"No everything is not alright!" I snap at him. I need to get to the hospital. His questions aren't going to get me there any quicker. "Dad's got worse."

He's up in an instant, pulling on the shirt and pants I had so carelessly discarded earlier.

"I'll drive," he says as he finishes doing up the buttons on his shirt. I just nod in response as I slip on a pair of shoes and grab my purse. I just need to get to the hospital.

We are both out the apartment in 5 minutes and Peeta rushes through the deserted late night streets of Panem as we race to the hospital. All I can think about in the car is that I hope I am not too late. I try to convince myself that he will still be alive when I get there. I curse myself for getting so caught up in Peeta that I didn't hear my phone ringing. If I don't get there in time I don't think I will ever be able to forgive myself.

I hop out the car before Peeta has even got it stationary and rush through the hospital doors desperate to see my dad. I don't bother waiting for Peeta as I pray that I am not too late. My brain relies on muscle memory as my feet carry me to my dad's room without any conscious thought. As I turn down the last corridor, I grow impatient and I run the last few steps to my dad's room.

I burst into his room without knocking and hope I am not met with the worst.

However after 10 seconds of entering the silent room I know I am too late. Darius sits despondent in the corner. The room seems so much colder, the beeping heart monitors silent and the quiet tears of both my mother and sister confirm what I had been dreading.

My father has died.

Both Prim and Mom look up at me with tear stained eyes as I enter the room. Darius eyes are filled with sympathy. I am frozen to the spot as they reality sinks in. Prim is up in an instant and wraps her arms around me. My own arms remain uselessly at my sides as my whole body goes numb and forgets how to function.

"He had a massive cardiac arrest about an hour ago. The doctors tried to revive him, but he was just too weak from the previous heart attack. We tried calling you, but you weren't answering. There was nothing they could do. He died half an hour ago," Prim sobs.

30 minutes.

My dad has been dead for 30 minutes.

I should have never have left the hospital. They said the next 24 hours were crucial. I should have stayed until he was more stable. I should have been here. He would have wanted me to be here.

Instead 30 minutes ago I was fucking Peeta.

As if on cue, there is a knock on the door and Peeta pops his head round the door with a look of trepidation. Prim looks up at him with puffy eyes and he knows without asking what has happened. I look back at him emotionless, still numb from any feeling, and Prim passes me to him where he engulfs me in a massive embrace.

As I did with Prim, I don't return the embrace. All I can think about is that my dad is dead. He's not going to wake up. I don't feel anything.

Peeta doesn't say anything knowing that there are no words that can comfort me right now. Instead he just holds me tight and rubs what should be reassuring circles on my back.

But for once his embrace doesn't comfort me. I feel too cold and numb to appreciate it right now. And Peeta is the last person I want near me at this point.

I squirm out of Peeta's embrace and he looks a little shocked at my rejection of his touch. I turn to look at the lifeless figure on the bed. Even from here I can see how pale he is. I didn't think it was possible for him to get any paler but now all colour and warmth has been drained out of him. It is so strange compared to his usual tanned and warm tone. I begin to walk slowly over to him and Mom, who has been silently crying this whole time.

When I reach him, I stretch a hand out to tentatively touch him. I jerk my hand away after only one brief touch of his cool flesh. It confirms that no blood runs through his veins. I am no stranger to death. I have lost count of the number of cold and lifeless kills we have brought home over the years. But nothing can prepare you for the loss of a parent, the one constant in your life.

And the coldness is such an unfamiliar association with Dad. He had always represented warmth to me. His warm smiles and hugs were something I could always rely on. Now they are gone.

I can't make sense of it all. He was fine. It was only this morning that he was drinking with Haymitch and making jokes about becoming a grandfather. He seemed healthy and so full of life. This shouldn't have happened. He was one of the strongest people I knew. What chance do the rest of us have if he just dropped down dead?

It hits me now all the things he will miss out on. He'll miss Prim's graduation from med school. He won't be there to give Prim and I away at our weddings. He'll never meet his grandchildren. I had never imagined him not being there for any of these events. He was 61. He should have had years to enjoy these things. But instead of being there he will be rotting in a box in the cold, hard ground.

I feel like a little girl again as I look down at his pale face, desperate for him to wake up and tell me everything is going to be okay. I know it is corny, but my dad was my hero. I didn't think there was anyone better to be called my dad.

So many of my childhood memories involve being with him in the woods. He was the one who cheered loudest when I shot my first squirrel, made dandelion soup with me when we got stuck in a cave due to heavy rain, my trusty sidekick when I was battling goblins and fairies on grandfather's estate.

Even in later life we were always close. Constantly going out hunting together. Dad encouraging me to go for that promotion at work. Consoling me when I got my heart broken. I had always admired his values and have tried to live by them. He made me the person I am today.

He was always there for me, and yet I wasn't there for him in his final moments.

No one moves to embrace or comfort me again and I am glad. The only person I want to comfort me is lying on the bed in front of me.

I hear Prim shuffle behind me and move back round to put an arm around Mom. Mom has been silent the entire time I have been here. I can't look at her, the all consuming grief all too evident in her eyes. I can barely handle my own grief let alone hers. Because as much as it hurts me this will hit Mom the hardest.

I have seen many of my friends parents become too comfortable with each other or drift apart over the years. My parents have never been like that. Dad would still bring flowers home for Mom on a Friday evening and take her out dancing at the weekends. I had grown up in a house where affectionate touches and romantic gestures were the norm. They were the poster couple for how to make a marriage work. My dad still looked at Mom like he was the luckiest person in the world to just be near her and Mom would always brighten up as soon as my dad entered a room. To this day, anyone who had seen my parents together couldn't doubt their love for each other.

I can't even think how my mom is going to cope now her best friend and love of over 35 years is gone.

"Come on Mom. You need to eat or drink something. Come with me to the café," Prim encourages her.

Darius gets up off his seat at the sound of Prim's voice and makes his way over to help her. Mom's eyes don't leave Dad as she shakes her head at Prim's suggestion. Prim looks down at her pained.

"Please Mom, you need to get out this room!" Prim pleads.

Mom still does not move. Prim looks across to me with tears threatening to break through again. She's knows as well as I how hard Mom is going to take this and that staying in this room isn't going to help her. Sitting and staring at him is not going to bring him back. Leaving this room will be the first step to accepting that he is gone.

"Let Katniss say goodbye," Prim almost whispers.

Mom's eyes snap up to look at me for the first time since I arrived. The pain is so palpable in her eyes that it evens manages to break through my numb body. It slices right through me and I can feel it tearing a piece in my heart.

I just want her to leave. I can't stand to look at her and be confronted with the grief that threatens to consume me. Being in the same room with her at this moment is too much to handle on top of my own emotions.

She stares at me for a long minute, not moving or speaking, before gently nodding her head and pushing the chair back to get ready to leave. I see a flicker of relief wash over Prim's features that our mother has responded in some way and gently guides her to the door and down to the pokey café downstairs. Darius follows closely behind, concern for my sister evident.

The door swings shut and I am left alone with Peeta and my dad. I keep looking at Dad struggling to accept this is it for him. He will never do anything to make me scowl or laugh again. There will be no more hunting.

And I feel guilt. Guilt that I wasn't here when he died.

Peeta moves up beside me. I don't acknowledge his presence in any way. There's a feeling niggling in the back of my head and I'm scared if I face him it will all come pouring out.

"I know there is nothing I can say to make this better for you," he starts. "But I'm sorry this has happened. I know how much he meant to you."

His words bring that niggling feeling to the forefront of my mind. The numbness disappears and I feel the first emotion since I discovered my dad had died.

Anger.

"If you knew how much he meant to me, why did you convince me to leave him?" I spit, all my anger fired at him. "I should have stayed here with him."

I see the shock on Peeta's face at my outburst. Clearly he thought I was going to fall, sobbing, into his arms asking him not to leave me. But that couldn't be farther from the truth. I missed my dad's final hours because I was with him.

"Katniss…" he begins to say with a hint of caution, but I don't want to hear his excuses.

"No! Don't!" I snap. "If you had wanted to help me you wouldn't have taken advantage of me and fucked me while my dad was taking his last breaths! I will never get those last moments back! I should have been here with him but I wasn't because you couldn't keep it in your pants!"

I am screaming at him now, all my anger directed and pointed towards him. I don't stop to think if I am being fair to him. All I can think about right now is how I wasn't here because I was with him. How I let my dad down because of him. I hate him for taking that away from me.

"Thought you would reward yourself did you? Spend a week pretending to be my boyfriend, why not get a quick fuck to make the whole thing worthwhile!" I yell.

"Katniss it wasn't like that…" he begins and I can see the pain in his eyes. Pain for me or himself I don't know and I don't care. I have just lost a father. I don't want to deal with his pain. "I'm sorry I couldn't get you here in time. I know you are hurting and need to take it out on someone but don't push me away! Please know it wasn't just some quick fuck for me. I fell in love with you this week."

"Love me? Don't be so stupid!" I scoff, my anger towards him only intensifying. "It's not real Peeta, or have you forgotten our relationship is fake? I don't need you. You are just my best friend's brother and I don't want you any where near me right now. I despise you."

He flinches at my words and a see a mixture of sadness and pain register across his face.

"If that is what you really want," he says pained.

I nod my head tersely at him, desperate for him to leave. He gives me one last pain filled look before turning and walking out the door.

The door swings shut and I stare at the space Peeta just vacated. Now I am truly alone for the first time, all my emotions come rushing out. It is a tsunami of anger, grief and guilt and they all come crashing in causing me to drown within them. The tears finally begin to fall and I struggle to breathe as I choke on the waves of emotions. The pain radiates out from the centre of my chest, flooding my whole body and overwhelming me completely. I collapse on the ground in a heap, pulling my arms and legs up to my chest, desperately trying to plug the gaping hole in my heart.

A/N: I think I am going to run and hide away from you all now. I know the majority of you will hate me for killing off Mr Everdeen and Katniss's subsequent actions towards Peeta. Particularly 2 days before Christmas. I have had this story fully planned out from the beginning and you will just have to trust me with where I am going with this. There are still 2 chapters left of the main story for things to work out.

As always thank you to everyone who has followed/favourited/reviewed my story. It really does make my day. Happy holidays!