I really feel like I should have updated yesterday but I had my principal's memorial service and, well let's just say it was amazingly bitter sweet. Read on!

Katniss POV

"Demer, come here, I have to talk to you about something." I hear Peeta say from the living room as I lay in bed, just like I have these past two weeks. "Demer Rose Mellark, you're going to come here. I need to talk about something with you." Peeta says a bit more firm than I have ever heard him talk.

This is it. He's going to have to tell our daughter that she's not going to have a little brother or sister like we had told her when we first found out. This was going to be hard enough to deal with if we hadn't had her to explain it to.

"What is it?" I look at the door trying to imagine the look on her face. She sounds very confused and I would rather have her stay that way rather than tell her.

"Do you remember when we told you that mommy was going to have a baby?" He asks her. I can't look at the door without feeling it's them I'm looking at so I just stare at the sheets on the bed. "Well, something happened and... she's not having the baby anymore." He tells her faltering a bit. I can hear the sadness in his voice and I know that I'm the reason it's there, I'm the reason our baby is gone.

"I not gonna be big sister?" She asks innocently. I can just see the poor dejected look on her face, It makes me want to cry, so I do. "What happened?"

"You know how we told you that the baby was in her tummy?" He pauses for a moment, "Well he came out too early... and he... well... he... we had to take him far away... to a different district... and we could only go there one once." He tells her.

"Where is it?" She asks innocently not knowing that he didn't actually move, he died.

"It's far away that's why you had to stay with Haymitch for a week." He tells her simply.

Their conversation becomes quieter and I can no longer hear it. I really want to know how Demer is taking the news, so I make the resolve to get up out of the bed and go downstairs.

There is a big difference from deciding to get up and actually doing so. I struggle for the strength to pull myself out of the sanctity of my bed and finally find it. I slide out from under the numerous covers and touch my bare feet to the cold floor. A small shiver runs up my spine as I flatten the entire bottom of my foot on the floor. Slowly I make my way out of the room and pause at the top of the stairs. I want to turn back but at the same time I know I need to keep going on if I have any hope of getting out of the bed ever again.

The stairs are silent as I slink my way down to the landing in the middle. Yet again I have thoughts of stopping and going back upstairs but they are quelled by the softer sounds of Peeta and my precious daughter whispering to each other not too far from me. My desire to see her wins over my sadness and depressed nature so when I reach the very bottom and am about to walk out from behind the wall and hear what they're actually saying I pause.

"Daddy, can I see mommy?" Demer asks sweetly.

"No honey, she's asleep." He replies kindly. I step out from behind the wall and stand in the doorway.

"No she's not daddy." She tells him looking straight at me. He's turned away from me so he doesn't know that I'm in fact downstairs at the moment.

"Yes honey, she's asleep." He tells her.

"No, I'm not." I tell him, even in this small phrase my voice is rough and cracks from the lack of use over the last week and a half. I take one more step in and Demer is already jumping off the couch and launching herself towards me. "Hi baby." I say a small crack in my voice, only this time it's not from under use, it's because of the emotions slamming through my body.

"Mommy, are you okay?" She asks me as she looks up from where her head rises to on my leg.

"Yes baby, I'm okay." I tell her as I stroke her dark hair gently.

"Are you sure?" Peeta asks standing and walking slowly towards me as well. His hand reaches forward and I flinch slightly not knowing exactly what he's going to do, but then his hands trace a line down my face and come away wet. "Why are you crying?" He asks picking up Demer. He holds me close with the arm that isn't supporting her and I can feel her little hand on my arm. I grab hold of the little hand with both hands as I lean into him.

"She's just, so... ours... she's real..." I tell him still not finding the right words. He seems to understand and smiles a bit in the melancholy of the moment. He knows what I really mean, she's ours, she's alive, she's here, she's perfect...

"Hey sweetie, can you go pester Haymitch for a minute?" He asks happily.

"Why do I always have to bug him?" She asks.

"You're just so good at it. Mommy and I are no good when it comes to pestering." He tells her setting her down on the floor.

"Fine," she huffs before running out the door and over to his house.

I usually feel horrible setting her loose on him but today I don't care. I also usually don't like her going over there by herself, even though it's only about ten feet from our porches.

"I'm so sorry." I tell him as I turn and bury my face in his shirt the second the door clicks shut behind her. I can now feel the tears flowing down my cheeks and wetting his shirt where my face is pressed to it.

"What do you have to be sorry for?" He asks as he gently holds my head in place and strokes the hair on the back of my head soothingly.

"This, I've caused you so much pain. For shutting you out for a week and a half, and for not being here when you told her." I tell him trying to remain calm.

I feel his hands stiffen as he grabs my arms and holds me out away from him. "Katniss, none of this is your fault. Don't believe that for even a second." He tells me sternly. "There is nothing you could have done, and you got up, it took your mother years to come to terms with reality, you did in under two weeks." He says before kissing the top of my head.

"You love me, real or not real?" He asks a smile lighting up his face. This question has become more of a joke than an actual question like it was years ago.

"Real." I say smiling through my tears.

You know I really do understand what had happened to Mrs. Everdeen after her husband died. Every time someone I was close to dies I just go totally numb and my mind is blank for weeks. I don't go to extremes like she did but I do know what I think it was like for her... Woo hoo psychoanalyzing fictional characters!