Interlude- Katniss Present Day
"Mommy! You're not watching!"
I turn my head, shaking out of the daze of an old memory and see my daughter standing with hands on her hips and a scowl on her face. If Peeta weren't upstairs with the red X on the door, this would be the point at which he'd look at me with his 'oh-boy-is-she-your-daughter' look.
I look around quickly, reconnecting myself with my current surroundings. I am on my front porch on a summer morning with my two small children…who are looking at me rather irately.
"Hmm? Oh, I'm sorry baby, what did you want me to watch?" I ask moving over to sit cross-legged on the porch where Bow and Finn are playing together. Finn is wearing a t-shirt and a diaper and is covered in chalk dust. His sister is smiling proudly at her mini masterpiece.
"Very nice, and did Finn agree to this willingly?" I ask even though I know that boy will do ANYTHING his sister says. He just smiles dreamily up at me and then looks over my shoulder at the porch steps as his sister moves on to drawing with the chalk on the porch floor.
"Paw-Paw!" He cheers and I turn to see Haymitch making his way slowly up the steps. He mumbles a good morning and drops onto the porch swing as Finn struggles to his feet and motors as fast as he can over to climb into his lap.
"Why is this child covered in chalk?" Haymitch asks standing the toddler up on his thighs and looking him over. I can't help but chuckle as he holds Finn back from him and the boy tries to propel himself forward into Haymitch's arms. Bow collects her tub of chalk and strides over to sit down in front of them and starts tracing Haymitch's feet on the porch without any preamble.
"So he will look nice for Daddy when the red X is gone, duh Paw-Paw!" Bow announces, not looking up from her work. Haymitch and I are about fifteen feet apart at this point, but the look he casts my way speaks as loudly as if he were whispering in my ear.
I just nod twice before Bow looks up and glances between two of the most important grown ups in her life. She is still sitting by Haymitch's feet, drawing all kinds of silly designs on the chalk shoes she has made on the porch. She pushes her loose bangs back from her eyes with the back of one hand and squints up at Haymitch in the bright morning light coming from a sun not quite high enough in the sky for the porch roof to block its rays. The only sound for a moment is the gentle tingle of the wind chimes Peeta made with the children in the spring that hang beside our front door.
"Will we sleep at your house tonight?" She asks climbing up onto the swing with Haymitch who has set Finnick down beside him and given him something to play with; a new toy I'm sure.
Haymitch smiles and tugs her over into his side with three playful pats on her outer thigh. "We'll see, don't worry about it right now little one, lots of time between the sun coming up and it going down." He whispers pointing to the big yellow ball rising in the sky.
Bow smiles and looks up into his face, her big grin so full of hope and life like her father's usually is that I have to look away for a moment as a stab of pain shoots through my chest.
Oh, Peeta.
"I'm going to draw a BIIIIIIG sun for Daddy, you can watch me Paw-Paw." Bow says as she slides back down to the porch, fixing her nightgown as she skips over to an area on the far end of the porch that she hasn't decorated yet. "Mommy was watching but then she was dreaming and forgot to watch." She says while looking her new blank 'canvas' over in a way only an artist could.
I smile sadly and bring my knees to my chest, wrapping my arms around them and laying my head on top as I watch her. "A memory Bowie, not a dream." I say just like I had said to Peeta on that first morning on the road to the Capitol for the first anniversary celebration.
She shrugs as if the difference is merely semantics and grabs the yellow, orange and white chalk pieces, laying them out carefully before she begins.
I look around at the children's toys in the yard and stand up, smoothing out my own nightgown as I make my way over to sit down on the porch swing beside Haymitch. Finn climbs over Haymitch's lap and settles in between us with his new treasure, which is in fact a wooden goose Haymitch has obviously carved himself and painted.
"Pretty talented with a brush yourself." I say making an impressed face and Haymitch almost smiles as he tugs a hanky out of his pants pocket and starts brushing the chalk dust off of my son. I know that this is merely an excuse for him to turn my way without making Bow more suspicious than she already is and my suspicions are confirmed when he begins talking in a hushed voice without looking up from his chore of cleaning up Finn.
"How long?" He asks in the shorthand we've developed over the years. I smile down at Finn who holds his goose up with a 'quack' and dances it in front of my face.
"Just this morning, Bow saw the X when she got up, I was already downstairs with the early bird." I say quacking back at my son and kissing the back of his pudgy hand that is holding the goose.
Haymitch nods knowingly. "Go grab them some clothes, I've got diapers for the little one over at my place. I'll put them to work, have them help me feed and water the geese, they can chase them around in the yard for the rest of the morning. I can feed them something for lunch and put them in the extra bedroom together for a nap." He says quietly and I reach over to place a hand on his knee.
"Thank you." I whisper and he places his hand over mine, giving it a reassuring pat before he scoops Finn up and blows a raspberry on his neck making the little boy squeal with delight.
"We'll let Bow finish her sunrise first." He says settling Finn into his lap.
"SunSET." Bow corrects, not looking up from her work. "That's Daddy's favorite sun." She explains and I have to fight back a sob as I scoot closer to Haymitch and lay my head on his shoulder.