Chapter 1: Spring Dance

I can't even remember what it is we were fighting about, what it was that got him mad when he came to walk Prim and I to school this morning. All I know is that thinking about Gale is still making me seethe, even at the end of the school day as I go to my locker to collect my schoolbooks and things. Further down the hall, I see Prim running up to me. Normally, she waits for me under our favorite tree in the schoolyard, but I guess she just could not contain herself this afternoon. It is Friday, after all, the weekend, and she wants to go play in the Meadow with me and her goat, Lady. I hug my baby sister affectionately. Prim, the one person whom I am certain I love.

Just as I am stuffing the last of my books into my satchel, I look up only to nearly bump into a head of blonde hair and deep blue eyes. I am struck by their shade... eyes as blue as a summer sky...

It is Peeta Mellark, the Baker's youngest of three sons. We have been classmates in Upper School for years, though we have never spoken at all. We only interacted once, and it was years ago, when we were small children, just Prim's age. Maybe even a little younger. When my family and I were starving, Peeta Mellark tossed me bread in a pouring rain. Seeing him now directly in front of me and nervously looking as though he wants to actually speak to me fills me with shame as I am reminded how I have never thanked him for his kindness, even years later. He probably doesn't even remember the encounter.

"Hi, Katniss," he finally gets out.

I dip my head slightly in deference. "Hello," I reply, trying not to make my voice sound so guarded, so wary. I have never been very good at making friends, and have a bit of an anti-social disposition. When you live as hard of a life as I do in the Seam of District 12, you learn not to be so trusting of other people. Everyone has their own ulterior motives, and Peeta is surely no exception in this moment. He must be after something if he is willing to speak to me for the first time with little to no forewarning.

There is a brief awkward silence until Peeta appears to remember why he is standing there. I ignore how Prim is glancing between the two of us curiously. "So... you know about the Spring Dance tomorrow night?"

I immediately bristle. He isn't actually going to...? "I don't do dances," I inform him flatly. And it's true, I haven't been to one school dance. Gale tried to get me to go to one about two years ago, and at first I thought he was asking as a joke.

Still, I have to admire Peeta's pluck. He's persistent, for he finally gets out. "Well, would you like dances better if you went with me?"

I raise one eyebrow at him, taken aback and very confused. "Like a date?" I ask, hugging my books to my chest. Beside me, I hear Prim gasp, her eyes shining.

"It can be whatever you want it to be," Peeta placates gently. I know better, though, and so does he. Any boy asks a girl to an event or a meal, it's a date, no matter how innocent. And if there is one thing I do even less than dances, it's dates. I have already vowed to never fall in love or get married, never mind having kids. A husband is just something to lose and be forever emotionally wounded by that loss; just look at my mother after Daddy died in a mine accident when I was 11. Babies are just something to lose to the sadistic Hunger Games.

Besides, Peeta and I are strangers. Plus, he's a Merchant. I'm Seam. The last example of a Merchant and Seamer getting together in any romantic sense is the courtship of my own parents, which caused quite the scandal a mere twenty years ago. There's only one thing a Merchant boy is after, people say, and that's getting into a Seam girl's pants. At least until his more prejudiced parents make him grow up and toy the class line.

But Prim is already begging me, "Say Yes! Katniss, say Yes!"

"Primrose, hush," I order, though my eyes don't leave Peeta's. At least until I look over...

And see Gale watching the scene with intense scrutiny, a scowl on his face, but his eyes pleading and fearful. He has witnessed the entire exchange and overheard at least enough of it. I frown back at him, still furious over our spat this morning, even if I have forgotten what it was about.

This is what motivates me to turn back to Peeta and say with no nonsense, my expression blank. "Yes. Pick me up at seven." And I take Prim's hand and flee the school building, leaving an elated Peeta and consternated Gale in my wake.

When there is a knock on our door at precisely 7:00 the next evening, I nearly faint and have to beg Mother to open the door for me. Peeta is standing on our stoop in a nice shirt and slacks. He carries an umbrella, clearly in reaction to the storm clouds gathering overhead. If Mother is surprised by my gentleman caller, she doesn't give away anything on her face. She seemed more surprised when Prim blabbed to her yesterday that I was even going to the Spring Dance at all. But I suppose she understands, as she once broke all tradition when it came to a Merchant, when she wasn't much older than me.

The dance is in full swing when Peeta and I get there. I grow increasingly hot as I dance in Peeta's arms all night, his piercing blue eyes making my insides do things I have never known them to do. By the time we depart after the Last Call, it is pouring outside the school, and despite my protests, Peeta insists on us sharing his umbrella as he walks me all the way home.

We stop just outside of my front porch. Peeta turns to face me and I tense, wondering what he is going to do. It is tradition for two people to kiss after a date. At least, that's what Madge has always gossiped about at our lunch table in school.

"Good night," Peeta says. He starts to turn away, and I become too relaxed. For all at once, the boy seems to gather his courage, as he doubles back, swoops down and kisses me full on the mouth.

I freeze in shock, but only for a moment. It is my first kiss, and I don't want to screw it up. Peeta's hands cradle my face, his lips slanting over mine. To my shock, I feel my eyes suddenly flutter closed. The umbrella, which up to now, I had been holding, slips from my hand and falls into the muddy dirt.

"Uhmmmmm..." The sound comes from the back of my throat, and it prompts Peeta to release me... even if I am not yet ready for him to. I gape at him, speechless, watching as he smiles shyly, picks up the ruined umbrella, and walks away in the rain. I touch my kissed lips in wonderment, suddenly realizing that I would be content if no one else, save for Peeta, ever kissed me again.

Peeta's magical kiss prompts me to tentatively agree to a relationship.

Only weeks after Peeta and I start going out, I lose my new boyfriend to the 74th Hunger Games.