Here's the next chapter! Enjoy! I do not own Mockingjay.

Ch. 18

Delly looks at me, then Johanna, the guards, and then back at me. I turn silently to watch Katniss leave, Gale close to her, still protecting her. And that's when Delly blows. She looks overly mad at me and I've never seen her so livid and passionate.

"You had a chance! A chance to show them that you could do this, that you could leave and you… you blow it!" She says angrily her voice getting even higher than her normal voice, which is already high as it is.

I see Johanna smile beside me and lean back as if this were a funny comedy that she was watching. "Peeta! They have been nothing, but good to you! Especially Finnick, who actually does care about you, contrary to what you may believe. You act like you're the victim, but so is Katniss and Finnick and her!" She points her finger angrily towards Johanna who does nothing, but stare at it as if it were the truest thing she'd ever seen.

I never heard Delly be so honest, so straight forward with the words she would say to me. It always started with 'Oh Peeta,' or 'Peeta, you have to see it this way'. Never with her voice raised, her face red, her hands moving along with each of her words. And to say the least it scared me and didn't help with the monster inside of me, and the hardest part was, her words were true.

I wasn't the only victim and I did act like I was. I knew it wasn't right, but I was the one that was bleeding the most wasn't I? My whole life, my whole personality, my whole being, was ripped from my hands with out my consent. But, another voice argues.

But, so were the others. Katniss wasn't the same person she was before the Games, even I, crazy and broken, could recognize that. Gale had turned from the boy that dared to leave his district to the boy that dared to go against his leaders. Finnick fell in love with a crazy girl that couldn't be helped. None of their lives were ideal. But, the voice before screams back.

But, they were free. Finnick didn't have to love Annie. Katniss didn't have to become a war martyr. Gale didn't have to become a soldier. They chose to be where they are and I didn't. I didn't choose this. I didn't choose one little piece of it because if I had a choice I would be back home in District Twelve, baking cakes with my dad and Marcus on Saturdays. I wouldn't have to worry about whether I was pleasing my doctors, whether I was scaring the people around me, I wouldn't have to worry about much other than what my mom might say if I accidentally burn something.

It takes a while for me to realize that I say most of this argument out loud, though it was gibberish, it made me sound like a straight out crazy person. Which I was, but they thought, maybe I had moved on from this type of thing.

"Peeta?" Delly looks at me concerned, but her face is still flushed red with anger. She wasn't done with me yet, if she had a say.

The guards grab me by my arms and pull me away from the table, once we're out of the dining hall I feel a slight pinch in my wrist and before I have time to realize what it was, I'm out like a light.

I wake up to Delly sitting next to my bed, with that painting in her lap. I'm not sure why she has it, I haven't seen it since the day she came and showed it to me, but she holds it carefully as if one wrong move would destroy it.

"Peeta?" She asks carefully, looking over my face before going on. "This is why I acted the way I acted today." She says. Sadly, apologetically.

"I'm not saying you didn't deserve it because you did, but I should have handled it better. Just some times it makes me so mad. It's not your fault. I look at this painting and I get mad too because this," She points to me painting, her hand falling on one of the children's faces, "This is what was supposed to happen. Not that." Her hand points out towards the door indicating the past that happened only a couple hours ago.

"We can't change things Delly." My voice was dry from lack of water, she realizes this and hands me a glass before sitting back down.

"Yes, but can't you realize that it's more than just…" Her sentence stands wide open, too scared to finish it for fear of what I might say, or do.

"Me? I know. I like to think I know anyways. But it's hard. And you're right it is supposed to be that, but I don't want that." I point towards the dream painting, the thing I had dreamed only months ago was far from what I wanted now. "I just want home and family and a reason to smile. Not being dragged away by guards or being yelled at by my only friend, but a peace."

I've actually managed to make Delly cry, a couple tears roll down her cheeks, as she does nothing to hide them. I could admire that in her, she wasn't afraid of hiding who she was.

"I know Peeta, and I'm sorry I can't give it to you. I keep on wanting to wake up from this bad dream. When they told me what you did to Katniss, I could have sworn they had the wrong guy. The Peeta I knew would never do that, and the first day I came in here, I saw that it was you, that you were no longer that Peeta that loves with out return, that cares because that's who he is, you were someone completely different." She stops finally going to wipe a tear from her face.

"But what Johanna said, that you were replaced by a totally different person, was a lie. I still see him. In the things you say. Haymitch told me about you wanting to die for the solution, that's you. That's the Peeta I know. And the way you looked at Annie, it's the way you used to look at everyone you loved. I've been seeing you come back, piece by piece, and I know you think he's dead, but the Peeta that painted this, he's in there. Putting himself back together, piecing together the broken parts. You'll come back. I know it."

She gets up and gives me a small kiss on the cheek. She grabs the painting and leaves before I can say anything else.

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