Warning: more M rated content.
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Katniss registered the discomfort in her lower body before her mind fully awakened, one eye cracking open reluctantly as she fought her way to the surface of sleep. She felt inordinately hot despite still being nude, and the weight of a strong arm was slung around her bare waist, anchoring her firmly to the bed. She felt the even gusts of warm, steady air against her neck— Peeta was still fast asleep, his face nuzzled firmly into her shoulder.
She groggily thought that it must still be early yet, as Peeta was instinctively accustomed to waking up during baker's hours, starting the day well before dawn in order to prepare for the busy morning crowds waiting hungrily for the hot muffins, gooey pastries and buttery croissants that were breakfast specialties at Mellark's Bakery.
She was no slouch herself, as the apothecary opened not too much longer after the bakery, but she still normally had a couple of hours before having to drag downstairs and out the door. She always stopped to wave at Peeta through the storefront window, knowing his face would be expectantly searching through the throngs of people in front of him to seek her out with a smile at the same time every morning. On school days, they were able to abandon their posts and walk to class together; Peeta always armed with a fresh slice of her favorite raisin and nut bread while she handed him a cup of the strong, unsweetened herbal tea that he tended to favor, Prim twirling around them as they walked. It was their typical routine; a tradition started years ago, and spoke of their level of comfort and familiarity.
Katniss wondered how their traditions would change now and felt the panicked finality of what they had done last night well inside her. In the frenzied moments that lead up to their coupling, Katniss had only been focused on the ultimate goal of getting Peeta and herself on the same page, of sealing the deal so that no one would be able to pry them apart and trade them like cattle to an undesirable peer.
With the morning and her dawning consciousness, she was questioning her every decision, her push to fall in line with her grandparents wishes. Had there been something she could have done to prevent the situation she and Peeta were in now? Was Gale right? She wasn't ready to be married, never wanted to be married. If she had to be, Peeta was her choice- she knew that now. However, the thought of commitment and the inevitable chain of events that marriage lead to made her want to burst out of the bed and run full speed into the forest, leaving behind her every obligation. She was not quite eighteen, an orphaned wild thing, with no one to teach her the ways of a married woman. Peeta deserved better.
He sighed as if hearing her thoughts, but didn't awaken, Katniss tensing as his hand rubbed a slow circle on her stomach before stilling again.
She felt sore and sticky –gummy, even- between her legs and yearned to brush her teeth. She didn't want to wake up Peeta, and didn't know how to extract herself from his embrace. She experimented with pulling away, and bit her lip as she felt his grip tighten instinctively. She turned her head and immediately softened at his peaceful face. His lips were turned up slightly at the corners, and she marveled that he smiled even in his sleep. Propelled forth by an invisible chord between them, she couldn't help craning her neck to place a tender kiss on his forehead. I'm going to be a good wife to you, and I'm not going to run away, she thought grimly. Even if it kills me.
Using the grace and sly maneuverings that she normally reserved for hunting, Katniss slipped out of Peeta's arms and rolled off the bed to land on her feet artfully. She wanted to clean up before they were possibly interrupted , Katniss suddenly plagued with visions of crowing, victorious adults stomping into the room, ensuring that that she and Peeta had made a union, so to speak. She slipped into the washroom that was attached to her bedroom, a luxury that still never failed to shock her even five years later. She brushed her teeth as quietly as possible, ever mindful of the sleeping boy behind her. Katniss scooped some water from the stone basin on the counter and quickly rinsed her mouth out, but froze as she raised her eyes to the mirror before her.
She looked the same.
She touched her hair, poked her face, patted her cheeks lightly in wonder; she and Peeta had done something so monumental, so life-changing, last night. Shouldn't she look…older? Wiser? If it wasn't for the aching twinge that throbbed vaguely between her legs, last night could have been a dream. She widened her eyes and leaned forward to analyze the winter grey irises that looked much the same as they ever had. She ran a hand down her stomach and touched it lightly, flattening her hand the way she had seen many of the newly pregnant girls in the District do, which had never failed to elicit an impatient eye roll from Katniss. She bit her lip and felt numb as she fully realized the possibility of what lay before her.
In the panic that followed, they hadn't used any type of preventative measures, they hadn't discussed anything really. She knew that there was a very real possibility that she could be pregnant, right now, and the thought terrified her to formerly unknown levels. Katniss was very familiar with the medicines used to handle unwanted pregnancies, had brewed them herself for various District 12 wives and young lovers, but the thought of killing anything that was part Peeta tore away at her insides. If it had been anyone else…
Katniss knew that she could never dispose of Peeta's baby—if she was pregnant, when she was pregnant, as it was practically inevitable at this point. Last night was not a one-off. They were a pair, a pair that was as good as married already, and with expectations to supply a family that would support their future businesses. Not only that, she knew for a fact that Peeta would rejoice at the thought of a child.
"Ugh," Katniss glowered, her eyes following the waddling form of Marolyn Jank from the window, a girl she vaguely knew from her childhood in the Seam.
Peeta spared a glance away from his work to look at her, his face concerned. "What's wrong?"
Katniss rocked back on the stool she was sitting on in the back of the bakery, watching Peeta frost a batch of cookies. "Her," she motioned towards the girl who was disappearing from view, albeit rather slowly. "It's disgusting!"
"Because she's pregnant? Or because she's not married?" Peeta asked her a little bemusedly, used to her outbursts.
Katniss shot him her patented "don't be stupid" look. "Like I give a damn about marriage. But why would she want to bring a baby into this world? She's fifteen, practically a child herself. And she's from the Seam!"
Peeta raised his eyebrow pointedly. "Oh. Hello, mother."
Katniss scowled at the comparison between Lissah Mellark and herself. "You know that's not what I meant. I'm just saying–she can't take care of it. Not really. And then in a couple years it'll be taking out tesserae, going to Reapings…it's just sick. The whole situation. Disgusting," she reiterated, his understanding of the situation very important to her for some reason.
He was quiet for a moment.
"But babies, Katniss," Peeta said softly, his head ducked down so she couldn't see his face, his hand steadily frosting primroses onto cookie surfaces. "They're beautiful."
Katniss thought about a town girl like Shira Clash tripping around town, large with Peeta's child. She felt a stab of mixed emotions that felt a lot like jealousy and rage, and the fingers that had been resting on her stomach turned into claws. No, no, better it be Katniss than anyone else.
She would deny Peeta nothing.
Katniss wet a hand towel and went about washing herself, wincing as she cleaned between her legs thoroughly. She yearned for a bath but feared that she did not have time for that. She threw the spoiled cloth into a laundry basket and hesitated before grabbing two freshly dampened hand towels. She reached for the robe that hung from a hook on the door and wrapped it around her body before entering the bedroom again.
Blue eyes were regarding her from the bed, full of wary hopefulness. She crossed the room and dropped the towels on her nightstand.
"Hi," said Peeta, his voice still rough from sleep.
"Hi," she said quietly, stopping to stand before his prone form, one hand fiddling with her robe belt. She avoided looking at the smallish red stain on her side of the bed, physical evidence of last night.
"C'mere," he commanded gently, and she didn't hesitate to climb onto the bed and fold into the arms that he held out towards her. She laid her head on his bare chest and listened to the steady thump, thump, thump of his heart, feeling calm for the first time since waking up that morning.
"Have you been up long?" she finally asked, becoming drowsy as his fingers made lazy trails on her arm.
Peeta laughed lightly. "I woke up as soon as you left the bed," he admitted sheepishly. "I figured you needed some time to yourself, though." You are so perfect, she thought with a pang of guilt. Even when she was sneaking off to take care of herself, Peeta was still thinking only of her well-being. I don't deserve you at all.
"You know me so well," she murmured instead of what she was really thinking.
He shifted behind her. "How are you feeling, though?" he asked with concern. "I mean, you know, down there," he added awkwardly. Katniss laughed at his words, and he tried to frown before finally chuckling himself. She silently thanked him for unwittingly breaking the tension.
"I'm okay," she tilted her head. "It didn't hurt as much as I thought it would," she lied, the relief on his face the reward for her deception.
Still, she sensed his hesitation. "Katniss…do you regret…I mean, last night-" she twisted around to shush him with a gentle peck of her lips. "Peeta. No. I talked you into it, remember?" He gave her a searching look, not easily put off by her diversionary kiss.
"We're in this. Together," she said firmly, looking him in the eyes. "Okay?" Katniss reached up to play with one of his golden curls.
His face relaxed, the anxiety in his eyes lessening. "Together," he replied seriously, touching his forehead to hers.
She cleared her throat and pulled away, reaching over to the night stand in order to pick up one of the wet hand towels that she had dropped a moment before. She steeled herself before reaching down to pull away the blanket still covering Peeta's body. She met his questioning look and desperately fought a blush. "May I…?" she asked. He nodded slowly, puzzled astonishment written on his face.
She peeled back the covers and got a good look at what she had felt, rather than saw, last night. Peeta's nude body was, in short, a masterpiece. He was all lean yet sinewy muscle, his abdomen well defined and ending in a v shape that lead to- hello. Katniss now had visual confirmation that the pain she had felt last night had not been due to a fluke. Peeta was blessed in that region. Don't blush, don't blush, don't blush, Katniss commanded herself. That's been inside you, for Capitol's sake.
She dragged her face away to meet Peeta's eyes and saw love and acceptance there.
"You can look," he whispered softly. "My body…it belongs to you–my first and my only."
She marveled at how easily he put himself out there. At how unashamed he was. At how sickeningly happy she was that he had been a virgin, too, though she had suspected as much.
"Can I-" her voice cracked slightly, her tone oddly formal. "May I clean you, Peeta?"
Peeta's eyes widened, his face flooding with gratitude and wonder as he nodded. This was another marriage tradition in District 12; the bride symbolically washing away her innocence from her husband's body. The act was intended to forge a sense of trust between a bonded pair, the wife showing loyalty and deference to the husband, the groom vulnerable and dependent on her care. Katniss had originally not intended to follow through with this particular ritual, and clearly Peeta had not expected it either, but the towels were there…and he was just so…
He was silent as she gently wiped his body down with the cloth, starting at his face and working her way down his torso and legs before using the other towel to clean his most private of areas. She tried to stay clinical, but when she cupped his sensitive sack to clean underneath, Peeta moaned slightly and she all but rushed through the rest of the process. He was getting hard, and Katniss looked away, fascinated but unsure of how to handle his arousal. She was very much aware that they were on borrowed time, and any moment an embarrassing ambush could possibly come barreling through the door.
"I'm so sorry, Katniss," Peeta groaned, self-hatred lacing his voice. "It's just that you're so- god, I'm such a disgusting animal, I can't even control myself during this specia-" he broke off in a gasp as Katniss grasped him firmly in hand.
"Show me how you like it," she whispered. He gaped at her. It was her doing that put him in that state. It would be grossly unfair of her to allow him to suffer the rest of the day –a day that was bound to be fraught with stress and anxiety– without alleviating some of the tension that she could so easily help with. Last night was the worst of it, she could definitely handle this. Not the worst, you liar, the voice inside her whispered. You know you liked what you did last night.
"Katniss, you don't have t-"
"It's something I need to know," she interrupted, Peeta gurgling out the rest of his words as she slid her damp hand down his shaft in an experimental motion. "Show me," she said again, this time more demanding. "We may not have much time." Before we're interrupted was the silent implication.
He was silent for a moment, his breath coming out in uneven bursts. He finally reached out and wrapped his fingers around hers. "A little harder," he instructed softly, as if in a dream. "I won't break." She adjusted her grip accordingly, wondering at the feel of the velvet encased steel beneath her fingers. "Now, like this." Peeta guided her hand, giving her the rhythm that he liked best, faster and more irregular than Katniss would have ever guessed on her own. His hand fell away as Katniss mastered the rhythm, his head dropping back against the headboard. She watched the emotions play out on his face, saw the near pained expression cross his features that she now recognized as being an indicator that he was close. "Ungh," he grunted out, his hips starting to jerk. "Katniss-"
Her eyes widened as he came, thick streams of white shooting out onto his stomach and her hand, barely registering Peeta's whispered thankfulness. He did that inside of me, she thought in fascination. She was surprised at how much she enjoyed making Peeta do that. She shifted and felt a twinge between her legs, and she wasn't sure if it was from pain or pleasure.
Katniss gently wiped his stomach with one of the hand towels as Peeta followed her movements with his grateful eyes, feeling strangely tender and womanly, as if she was a real wife and not this twisted creation of her grandparents and the Mellark's.
Peeta caught her hand and kissed each knuckle gently. "I love you," he said starkly. "You don't have to say it to me. But I'm going to show you, and tell you, every day– that I love you. And maybe one day..." he trailed off wistfully, his eyes an endless sea of blue as they bore into hers. "Maybe one day you'll be in love with me, too."
"Peeta," she choked out, hating herself for not being able to say those words back, for failing him so soon. "I don't care for anyone as much as I care for you. Like I care for you," Katniss added, frustrated at her hopeless attempts at making him understanding her feelings for him. She hardly knew herself, and it was hard to put into words.
He smiled a lop-sided, wry smile, pulling her closer to him. "With one exception," he murmured into her hair, Gale always hovering between them, an unspoken name on his lips.
"No exceptions," she said firmly.
They were both silent for a moment before Peeta broke the quiet of their thoughts. "I think it's probably time to get dressed," he said slowly, clearly not relishing the idea of facing the day either. "I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be at the bakery this morning or not," he added uncertainly, his routine completely knocked off-kilter. It was Friday morning, a time that he generally handled at Mellark's by himself until it was time to leave for school together.
"I think you deserve a morning off today, Peeta," she pointed out with a slight smile. "We both do." He shrugged ruefully, a creature of habit.
He stood up and walked towards the bathroom, and Katniss couldn't help but stare at his well-formed backside for a moment. "We should go get our marriage license, probably before we go to class," he remarked thoughtfully, the eagerness in his tone unmistakable. The Justice Building held strange hours now that there were new, direct-from-the- Capitol attendants that were itching to take the first available train back to the city for the weekend. The building would probably be closed by the time the school day was over.
"I'm using your toothbrush," he called from the wash room. "Yuck," she called back, making a face as he turned around and chuckled at her. "Husband's rights," he said, his voice garbled from a mouthful of mint paste.
"Hey! You don't have any clean clothes!" she exclaimed in dismay, standing up from the bed with a stretch.
Peeta laughed as he walked back into the room, grabbing his boxers from the side of the bed and slipping them on. "I'll be okay, Katniss. Wearing the same clothes again today is really the least of our worries," he said wryly, stepping into yesterday's slacks.
She glanced over to reply and saw him frozen, staring at the bed. Katniss turned away her flushed face, knowing what he was looking at and busied herself with slipping on her underclothes while he was lost in thought.
That damn bed sheet was going to haunt them for life.
Peeta coughed and turned to face her just as she finished snapping her bra back on.
"What should we do about that, do you think?" he asked carefully, clearly not wanting to embarrass her, but was ever the practical thinker.
"Leave it," Katniss said simply, pulling on a simple blue shift dress and flat shoes that she knew Grandmother would approve of. She marveled at how comfortable they were with this morning ritual of changing clothes; at how normal everything felt for a second, as if they were a regular married couple, dressing together for the day.
Peeta still looked skeptical, pulling on his shirt and shoes before he approached her. "You're sure…" he trailed off, putting a hand on her shoulder. He was still so innocent. Still wanted to believe the good in people, wanted to believe that maybe his mother really just wanted to make a good match for him, desired the best for him, and that bloody sheets were just an archaic blurb in long forgotten history books.
But Katniss knew it would be the proof that Grandmother and Mrs. Mellark needed for their agreement.
It was an assurance that their contract had been sealed in blood.
Katniss reached out to entwine their fingers. "Let's go get married," she said gently, and lead him away from the room.
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Thank you for your reviews, alerts and PM's. They are so very encouraging. Thank you for your patience as well. My update schedule became extremely messed up due to real life. Never fear. I am not, and will not, abandon this story. However, as many of you have likely heard, this site is cracking down on stories with explicit content. At the moment, I have not posted this fic at any other locations, and I'm still waiting on an AO3 invitation to come through (what's up with that, by the way). However, the best place to keep up with my happenings is through my tumblr account. My URL is everpeens dot tumblr dot com. If for some reason my story should ever be pulled, that is where I will likely post.
I hope to update this story at least once a week from now on. I'm also close to posting another AU that I'm extremely excited about, so be on the lookout for that if you're interested in other stories by me. In the meantime, you should check out some of these other fantastic AU's:
Love You Long Time by JazzyLittleMonster (seriously, this girl is talented, and I just love her).
Stories of Us by Ameiko
Strung up in the Air by DeathCabForBritney
The Story of a Scar by Jaded Angel
Two Wrongs by JLaLa
Mutually Assured Destruction by All3Unforgivable
Knot Your Fingers through Mine by monroeslittle
Review if you'd like a chapter four teaser. Until next time!