This time, I find it's a lot easier to fall asleep. When I wake up, I find that Sawyer is still fast asleep next to me. He looks so much younger in his sleep, more vulnerable and I can't help feeling the need to protect him from the horrors of the outside world.

He lets out a groan and stretches his arms up, blinking his eyes open. He seems a little surprised to see me but then he gives me a soft smile. "Good morning Willow."

"Good morning," I say, suddenly feeling a little shy.

"Did you sleep well?" He asks.

"No more nightmares," I report. "You?"

"None tonight," he says.

But that doesn't last long. I thought maybe talking about it made them go away, but the next night when I wake up screaming again, Sawyer is there to comfort me. I feel selfish, taking up so much of his nights, but he's assured me he doesn't mind. Eventually we just retire to my room together at the end of the night, much to the horror of Effie who scolds us on how inappropriate it is, but I don't care. Even though the nightmares haven't improved one bit, having Sawyer there makes them much more manageable.

"I thought you said you have nightmares," I ask him one night. We just have District One and Two before we arrive at the Capitol so I'm glad we'll be off this train soon, although I hope our rooms will still be close enough there. If they lock us in like they did after the games, I don't know what I'll do.

"I do," he says.

"But I've never seen you," I say.

He brushes my hair out of my face, playing with the loose ends. "It's not really a loud affair. More like I'm paralyzed by fear. And you're barely getting enough sleep as it is. I don't want to wake you."

"But that's not fair!" I say, upset he's left me out of such a crucial part of helping him. "You should wake me so I can be there for you the way you are with me."

"Most of my nightmares are about losing you," he says. "So when I wake up and see you're here and okay, I'm fine. You help me just by being here, really."

"Still," I insist, stubborn as ever. "You should wake me. Next time, wake me."

"There's no need, Willow," Sawyer says, running his thumb across my cheek.

"You and me Hawthorne," I say.

He smiles. "You and me. I just need to see you here."

"Always," I say, and I don't need the threat of Snow to confirm the truth of my words.

Then another thought occurs to me. "Sawyer, do you sleep with your leg on?"

I can see his cheeks turning red even in the dark. "Well, not all the time…"

Oh. He must have been sleeping with it on because of me. "Isn't it uncomfortable?"

"It's not too bad," he says but I know him well enough by now not to be fooled by his smooth words. He's lying.

I frown. "Sawyer you can take it off. I don't want your leg to be irritated."

"Willow, you haven't seen it without the prosthetic on," he says.

"And?" I don't see the problem.

"It's not pretty," he says.

"I won't judge," I say. When he doesn't reply I start to get frustrated. "Sawyer, leave it on if that's what you want, but it won't make a difference to me either way. That's proof that you survived something horrible."

He studies me for a moment and then nods. I think he might leave it on but slowly, he rolls up his pant leg, undoes the contraption and pulls off the metal leg, gently laying it on the ground next to him. I turn on the bedside lamp so it's easier for him to see but it also ends up illuminating the angry red skin under his prosthetic.

"Sawyer!" I scold him. "It's been irritating you that badly?"

"It really looks worse than it is," he says. Really? Because it looks pretty bad to me, although maybe our perception of what's bad is skewed after the arena.

"Wait right here and don't you dare try to argue with me Hawthorne," I say with a scowl, but he only seems amused.

I go straight to the bathroom and come back with a jar of the ointment from Nana. She had given me more to give to Sawyer before I left but I had completely forgotten about it. I pop down on the bed next to him and examine his leg. I won't say I'm unfazed by it, but it's just foreign. I don't feel anything particularly good or bad looking at it. It's just one of his reminders of the games. A physical one instead of a mental one.

He watches me as I take a glob of the cream and gently rub it into his skin. He immediately relaxes and I know it was bothering him even more than he showed.

"Is this okay?" I ask when I reach the end of where his leg used to be.

He nods. "It's still weird to see it end there."

"I think it shows how strong you are," I say.

"Thanks Willow," he says. "It feels a lot better."

The next morning we have back to back appearances in District One and Two, which is particularly uncomfortable, since Herc and Heyl stood a good chance of both coming home. I didn't kill Lucilla but they must blame me for dropping the nest on her, and I did kill the boy from one, who's name I learned is Asher. How did I not know that before? They don't believe us for a second, they think it was just as much a strategy as Herc and Heyl's strength, their training.

By the time we get to the Capitol, I'm panicking. But what else can we do? The time for convincing those who need it is over. The crowd here loves us, we don't have to pretend, they'll believe it enough for the both of us. But I know it's not enough.

Back in our old quarters at the training center, I'm desperate, so when I suggest a public marriage proposal, Haymitch encourages it, saying that it won't hurt. Sawyer agrees but he excuses himself to his room for a long time. Haymitch tells me to leave him alone.

"But I thought this is what he wanted," I say.

"Not like this. He wanted it to be real," Haymitch says.

I listen to him and let Sawyer have some time, but by the end of the night, I'm antsy, and I can't stay away any longer.

I knock on his door but I don't get an answer. I open it a bit and peek inside but he's not there. I go to check some of the other rooms when it dawns on me that he might have gone somewhere to sort out his thoughts.

I enter the room they've moved his paintings into and find Sawyer in the back, working on a small canvas. When he sees me coming in, he looks up for just a second, his face expressionless, before going right back to his painting. I walk over to see what he's painting, standing next to him to observe it.

It's a picture of a girl, lying on something, or someone. It's painted from above, like you're watching her sleep. She looks peaceful, safe, an arm wrapped around her shoulders to protect her.

"That's the cave," I say. And the girl in the painting is me. I think. "But you've made me much too pretty," I tell him.

"That's how you look," he says softly. "Or as close as I could get. I couldn't quite capture your full beauty."

"You're delusional," I say, but don't take my eyes off of the painting. Is this how he sees me?

Haymitch's words continue to echo in my ear. You could do a lot worse.

I try to imagine us as married, would we be like my Mom and Dad? Or Nana or Papa? Or would we be more like Sawyer's parents? But I quickly dismiss the thought. Sawyer wouldn't allow us to end up that way. No, if Sawyer and I were married, I don't think much would change.

"I know I said we had a few years. We could really try to find another way," I say. We both know there isn't one.

"Willow, I know we have to, it's just…" He doesn't finish his sentence but I know what he was going to say. He wanted it to be real.

"You're so good and sweet, Sawyer. And I can't help thinking that it would be so much better for you if you had been the only one to leave-"

"Willow-" He tries to interrupt.

"Just let me say this," I say.

He nods and puts down his brush, turning to face me.

"You've had feelings for me a lot longer than I've even really known you. You've had so much more time to figure out how you feel. And maybe it's just a crush, maybe it isn't but either way, you got the short end of the stick. You deserve someone who cares about you so much that your well being is the most important thing to them. You deserve so much more than what you're getting right now. I'm stubborn, and do things without thinking them through. I'm grumpy more often than I'm not and I keep things to myself instead of asking for help," I say, laying it all on the table. Because I might be able to have secrets from the rest of the world, but not him.

"But I…" I take a deep breath, saying out loud what I was too afraid to admit. "I think I want to try. To love you. The way you love me."

He's silent for a long time, to the point where I start to worry about him. "I-I don't know, Willow," he says. "You say that now but…you're so hot and cold sometimes, I don't know what to think. What's to stop you from changing your mind and completely ignoring me tomorrow?"

It's a completely valid question. But still one that catches me off guard. Have I hurt him so much that he's cautious of any feelings I show towards him?

"I can handle pretending for the Capitol to protect you and our families. But I can't pretend here," he says, gesturing between the two of us. "I won't. You know where I stand."

I nod. "I don't know if I can move as fast as the Capitol wants us to, and I don't think you can either," I say. "But I meant it when I said I want to try. I know I feel something with you that I haven't felt before, with anyone else. And I don't want to pretend for the rest of our lives either. Whatever we show to everyone else, I want whatever is between us to be real. I don't know if I'll be any good at this though."

Sawyer reaches out and entwines our fingers and I stare at our joined hands. "There's nothing to be good at, Willow. You just listen to what you want."

"You'll help me?" I ask.

"Always," he says.

At least we've made some kind of headway. Are we supposed to kiss now? Is that what he expects? He must see the panic in my eyes because he's quick to assure me.

"Stop stressing, Mellark. I waited ten years. I can wait a little longer," he says. He gives me a soft smile and I'm so grateful for this boy.

I don't let go of his hand but I wrap my other arm around his waist, resting my head against his chest. He holds me tight to him, resting his head on top of mine.

"Do you want cookies?" I ask after a while. "I can bake some." It's something Dad does for Mom all the time.

"Only if I get to help. I need the practice. I can only bake so many loaves of bread," he says.

"Is that all you've learned to bake?" I ask.

His cheeks turn pink and he nods. "But I've gotten very good at it!" He defends.

"After six months of practice I should hope so," I say. "Then I guess it's time to graduate to cookies. Think you can handle it?" I tease.

"I'm a Victor! I can handle anything," he says in that superior tone the Capitol uses.

Luckily the cabinets are fully stocked so I pull out the ingredients we'll need and I'm reminded of when I made us cinnamon rolls the night before the Games. That seems so long ago now. I decide on chocolate chip cookies for us because we have the luxury of chocolate.

Sawyer picks it up really quickly, even repeating back the measurements and the steps to me to show me he's got it. The only hard part is stopping him from eating the dough before we get it in the oven. Although after about the third time, I'm sure he's doing it to get a rise out of me.

"Sawyer! You'll make yourself sick!" I say, after catching him stealing another spoonful as I place the cookies in the oven.

He shrugs. "It wouldn't be a bad way to go."

"Right. Imagine the spectacle if you survive the Games only to succumb to some raw egg," I grumble, taking the spoon from his hand.

"Now what?" He asks, sitting on the counter.

I join him. "Now we wait." Then I ask, "Is this how you imagined you'd end up?"

"You mean somehow winning the Hunger Games only to be marrying the girl I've been in love with since forever? Can't say I have."

"Be serious," I bump his shoulder.

"Honestly, no. I mean, I never thought I would be reaped. None of my siblings were. And running into you in the woods that one time was a stroke of luck. I'd hoped I would have eventually worked up the courage to talk to you beyond hunting, but you seemed so independent, like you didn't need anyone. I didn't think I could offer anything to warrant your friendship."

"Everyone needs someone, Sawyer," I say. "And you have a lot to offer."

"Like what?" His smile is self-deprecating and I don't like it.

"Well, you're kind and good, but you know that. You care so much about other people and you're so friendly to everyone. And you're patient. So patient, especially with me. And I know I'm not the easiest person to be around. But you would be patient with me. You would wait until I was ready, so I think we would have eventually become friends."

"So what about you," Sawyer eventually asks. "Did you imagine you'd end up here?"

"No," I say. "But better this than having Dani reaped. That would have been much, much worse."

"When did all of this become so complicated?" He asks.

The easy answer would be the berries. But it was probably long before that. "Maybe when you announced your crush on me to all of Panem. Or when we both believed we could make it home safely together." And then because I have to know, I ask, "Hey Sawyer?"

"Hm?"

"Have you ever kissed a girl?"

"Besides you?" He asks. "Yes."

I'm surprised by how much that bothers me. "Oh."

"But it was just a dare during lunch at school. Gilly Weavers. It was fine I guess. And she started dating Junow the next week. Why do you ask?"

"I was just wondering," I say. He raises a brow so I try to explain myself more. "Well it's just that, I knew what I felt for you in that cave was because of you and not just kissing someone for the first time, because…someone else had also kissed me," I say, leaving out Levi's name. But Sawyer is more than aware who I'm referring to.

Sawyer seems to consider this a second. "I guess for you, your feelings followed that kiss, but for me, I felt that way about you before we ever even touched. And that moment in the cave confirmed it for me," he says.

I nod. Then I lean over and kiss his cheek, because he's being exactly what I need him to be, patient and honest, slowly allowing him to trust him with every fiber of my being. I hope one day I can be the same for him.

I jump off the counter to pull out the cookies and place them on the stove.

"They'll take a few minutes to cool," I say, turning back to Sawyer who's staring at me wide eyed. "What?"

"Nothing," he says, looking a little guilty. "I just wasn't expecting that."

Oh. It was just a kiss on the cheek. But it was real, maybe that's why. I step in front of him and he automatically grabs my hand.

"I did say I want to try," I say, not sure if I had done the right thing.

"I know," he says. "It's just a change for me too. I had resigned myself to this never being real. And now that it is, it'll take some getting used to."

"Baby steps," I say because that's how I'm taking this.

"Baby steps," he says, tapping our joined hands against his lap impatiently. "Can we have cookies now?"