X

…

She was laid out on the couch when I came barging in to the house. A brown blanket covered her small frame that didn't even look to lie across half the couch. The blanket was wrapped around her and another blanket was rolled up under her head acting like a pillow. She looked beat, overly tired, and stressed beyond belief.

Approaching her small figure, I nearly make it a foot from her before a hand grasp my shoulder pulling me back.

"That was fast, boy." Haymitch grunts as he pulls me into the kitchen on the home.

I nod, not sharing any details on the subject. He didn't need to know that the moment the message came through I was already packing my things. His call was just another reason for me to get the hell out of the Capitol. I hated the Capitol and all its fabrication. It held no interest to me, no one I cared for was there… presently. And Katniss was in need of help in 12 - I had every reason to get the hell out as fast as I could. And so I phoned in a few favors, jumped on the first hovercraft they had available, and in less than six hours' time I was being dropped off in a field on the outskirts of town.

He nods. "Well, good you're here."

"What's wrong?" I ask him for the first time as I had asked myself after he abruptly ended our call.

"Somethin' happened."

I stand there and wait for him to continue and spread some light on the subject, but he doesn't. Instead he stops there as if that was the end of the discussion.

"What do you mean something happened, Mitch" I press.

"The girl's got a sister -"

"Prim," I interject, catching him by surprise, "the one she volunteered for."

"Mh hmm," he grunts continuing, "and well, 12's not like 2, boy. We live in a completely different world than you do. Remember that, you've seen this place before on your Victor Tour, there's no doubt in my mind that you know it.

These people live the worse lives possible: hunger, poverty, death. And to say, for the most part things are laid back here as a result. If ya think of it there's no reason to make any worse than it is, that's why it's called hell cause its… unpleasant. So the Peacekeepers aren't as strict as they should be and people do their best to help one another out.

Katniss's father was… one of those people in the district that took advantage of the little freedom we're given and not in a destructive way. He just pushed the furthest he could with the Peacekeepers and the rules, sneaking out of the district a few times a week to go hunting."

"Hunting?" I ask and at the same time state. "That's why she was so good with the bow and arrow in the arena?"

"Her father taught her how to shoot from what I understand," he nods.

I nod, waiting for him to continue.

"Well, she didn't go out on her own. The Hawthorne kid, ah - Gale, would go out with her, they were close. The two families could be mistaken as relatives not just for their looks, but how they interact with one another. And so of course when Katniss volunteered, he promised to watch out for her sister."

He pauses, looking down at his shoes.

"Mitch," I say, "What happened? Something with this Gale, the Hawthorne kid?"

He shook his head. "Prim."

"Prim as in Katniss's sister Prim?"

He nods. "I don't know how they found out, probably had the penthouse bugged, that's the only time and place the boy ever mentioned she hunted. And one time, it was said one time. They hada have bugged the house, that's the only logical reason how they'd known she hunted."

He pauses again, shaking his head in dismay.

"What did they do, Mitch?" I press, feeling anger begin to build in me.

"They sent out a new Head Peacekeeper, Romulus Thread." He takes a deep breath, finally looking up from his feet to me. "First day supposedly, he found Prim trading some cheese with the shoemaker. He arrested the girl, took her to the square, and had her cuffed to the whipping post. She was given thirty lashings."

"She's twelve."

"She was twelve." He corrects me.

"What do you mean "was?"" I press, feeling the anger spewing.

"She died boy. Her body couldn't cope with the lashings and she died."

"She was trading fuckin' cheese," I just about shout, my insides boiling with anger. "She wasn't going outside the district or murdering people in the streets! She was trading cheese!"

"Stealing is punishable by death ya know."

I looked to him confused. "Who said she stole the cheese!?"

"Thread, boy, who else would," he tells me as if I hadn't been paying attention.

"Why would he say that!?" The anger within me growing with rage.

"To have a reason to make an example of her. Haven't you been listenin' to me," He says looking me in the eye. "Katniss and others have been sneaking out of this district for years now. Sure they're all just picking berries and shooting quails, but to the Capitol it's not an act of survival, it's an act of rebellion."

He snorts shaking.

"A rebellion. That'd be something, that'd be exactly what Snow deserves."

"Mitch," I say pulling him from his thoughts, "But why murder a little girl?"

"A rebellion is the Capitol's worst nightmare, boy. That's why Thread was sent here. To stop any chance of a rebellion even though these people are too inadequate to start one, too busy working themselves into the grave to feed their families."

"But kill!?"

"Katniss traded her game. People knew, even the Peacekeepers, and they knew how she got it and how easily she got away with it. Kill the girl's kid sister for selling cheese, make people think twice 'bout what they do."

"That's insane," I say, stating the obvious. "And what, no one stopped this?"

He shakes his head. "If anyone stepped up they would have been good as dead, too."

He pauses looking into the other room at Katniss.

"All these people got in this district got beside their families are their hands and the clothes on their backs. You give your hands to the mines to earn a few coins to feed your family. You give your clothes to you family to keep them warm. And you give yourself to your family; you do whatever you can to make sure they get the best.

You die stepping up for a kid whose sister is most likely to die in the Hunger Games, whose father is already dead, and whose mother is a mental case your family will die, and for a worthless cause. Life may be a shit hole, boy, but you still gotta think before you act, especially when it means life or death."

…

I was seated across from her on the ground.

To my surprise she was asleep. It had been a little over twenty-four hours at this point. It probably been days since the last time she was able to successfully shut her eyes for more than a ten minute period. Plus with the large amount of morphine Haymitch had told me he had to inject her with from going hysterical seemed it would help her stay under.

Letting out a sigh, I pulled myself off the ground and on to my feet. Then raising my hands above my head I stretched out my core before walking into the kitchen.

There I went straight for the sink, turning on the faucet and splashing its cold water against my face. Awake. After a few moments of this, I reached for the faucet and shut off the water. I wiped my hands over my face as if I was using a towel to dry my skin yet it did not succeed to fulfil the job.

I let out another sigh. Then turning away from the sink I cut myself a slice of bread from one of the many loaves in a basket upon the counter. I cut another slice after I had cut my own, placing this one on a plate from the cabinet along with some dried berried from another basket on the counter, creating a nice platter for Katniss when she woke.

I pour myself a drink, one of Haymitch's favorites before returning to Katniss.

I take my same seat on the ground across from her so I sat directly from where I see outside the front of the house as well as the back and so I knew Katniss was fine.

I set her platter on the small table where she lied before eating my own.

The light outside seems and the house seems to grow more silent in time. Haymitch returns twice saying he's checking up on her for Effie's sake, but I know better to know he too is worried. I cut myself another slice of bread which I eat with some cheese and meat I find in the kitchen. I refill my drink as well.

It is after I return from the kitchen, filling the glass for the second time that I find Katniss awakening form her state.

I sit down in my spot and be still.

First, her nose twitches. Then her whole core shifts, uncurling and then re-curling back into herself. Her one hand travels from out under the blanket, flexing as if it was its first time. Her toes curls and then she attempts to open her eyes. She does open them, but not enough to make me believe she can see me. Those gray orbs are clouded and there's no doubt in my mind that the morphine it still swirling around in her blood stream. She squints them so that they look to not even be open. Then slowly, she widens them as she grows accustom to the light filter through the room. When they get to be the widest she can manage, she blinks a few times as to clear her vision.

She doesn't say anything and either do I. Instead like before, after the alcohol situation, she just stares at me, taking my person in and confirming I'm real. And I oblige yet expect the standstill for what it is.

It's sometime before she murmurs a single word at me. "Don't."

And I know - I think I know what she is saying: "Don't look at me like that. Don't pity me. Don't."

Then, for some odd reason I find my body acting without my mind consent as I hold my glass out to her, as a gesture and an offering.

And with great pleasure it brings me, she makes the slightest shake of her head.

No.

And I was happy so because even if she had agreed and reached out for the glass, I wasn't sure I would have given it to her. In her situation and in her state of mind I couldn't allow her to do that - become an addict. It was out of the picture and not only my mind, but was a thought of Peeta's. She wasn't to become and alcoholic like Haymitch or a dripper like Johanna Mason. It would do her the exact opposite of good.

I myself would know that. Pumped on steroids for years and mixed with the trauma of the Games I just about lost my mind, did at one point. And it took over a year, but thanks to all the fucks given, Aurelius slowly helped me wean my body off of that.

Then here, right in front of me by my own hand I had tempted her. I offered Katniss a drink, a liquid escape to all her problems. Yet, I was hopeful to see her deny the gesture. With the Games and the hardships of her district and the Capitol and the death of her sister, she was still stubborn at hell. Good stubborn.

Therefore, withdrawing the glass I set it on the floor behind me. Then reaching for the platter I had made her hours ago, I held in directly in front of her face.

She shook her head again and I shook mine.

"This is not an option."

Her eyes glinted away from me and down at the platter with displeasure.

And so I compensate with her, "Just one bite, that's all."

There's a long pregnant pause that makes my stomach twist before her hand slowly reaches out to the plate, her fingertips being extremely careful in the process to avoid coming in contact with the slice of bread and grab one of the berries instead. Then like that, she pops it into her mouth.

"Good," I say forcing a smile and setting the platter back down on the table, "That's a start."

Her eyes fall and she brings the blanket closer over her so only her face was exposed.

Then, we sit there in silence. The sun disappears, the room goes dark, and the air remains still. Time goes on.