Lay Me Down, Let Me Dream

Co-written by Katnissdoesnotfollowback & Titania522

Summary: Katniss and Peeta share a bond so strong, even death cannot defy it. When tragedy threatens to separate them forever, Peeta risks his soul to save Katniss from an eternity of despair. Inspired by the book, What Dreams May Come by Richard Matheson and the movie by the same name, starring Robin Williams, Cuba Gooding Jr. and Annabella Sciorra. Written for Prompts in Panem, Real or Not Real: Everlark Dreamscape Week.

Trigger warnings: Major Character Deaths, Minor Character Deaths, Suicide, Afterlife, Heaven, Hell, Reincarnation (Literally Everybody Dies).

Rated M for Mature Sexual Content.

Day 1 of 7: Cheeks

Peeta

XXXXX

It's true what they say. When a person dies, their life really does flash before their eyes. But it isn't a B-rated film you watch from the back of the audience in some dingy theater. No, you are a part of the film, and you don't just watch but you relive every thought, every feeling, every moment from your expiration from the world, in reverse, until your in your mother's womb again.

I was stubborn about dying and so didn't recognize what I was experiencing, even though everyone had always talked about those near death experiences. I didn't want to acknowledge the fact, even as I literally re-experienced every sensation of every thought and action of my life all over again. I convinced myself that it was a dream. I clung to the earth like a ship-wreck survivor clings to his life raft, even as the angry sea crashes down to dislodge him. It wasn't life I wanted at all costs though. Not in and of itself, despite the bakery, my art, or our cat. It was her. I couldn't leave Katniss, even as the capricious hand of God himself came along to pluck me away.

So, when the moment came for me to finally leave, I was forced to do it for the same reason I had done everything else in my life; because it was better for her. I had had no choice, and in leaving, also left her with no choice but to do what she finally did.

XXXXX

It was one of those perfect spring days when we first met. I was sorting the pastries in the display case of the bakery, earning my way through college as I had earned my way through life, by working in my parents' shop. I'd been tossing bags of flour and sugar for as long as I could remember. I was frosting cookies at five, baking by eight and could run the shop alone by the time I was in middle school. I was a good son, a great student and the best employee that a parent could get; at least, that's the idea I'd always had about myself.

My mind was full of the topic of my next Sophomore art paper - an explication of Chagall's Bella & Ida - when the bell tinkled, the creaking of the heavy wood door clicking closed soon after. I looked up to find a young woman carefully studying the treats, a slender finger tapping her full lips in contemplation as she considered the selection. As she made up her mind, I glanced behind her to study what passed as downtown traffic in town, but I couldn't keep my attention focused, my eyes magnetically drawn back to the dark rope of glossy hair that hung over her shoulder, the smooth, olive-skinned profile. When she looked up at me, ready to order, I found myself falling into the bottomless grey of her eyes, plunging downwards as if I'd slipped on the edge of a small, glassy pond and was suddenly looking out into the world I'd abandoned from beneath its crystalline surface.

I knew at that moment, without real knowledge, but instinctively, that I stood on the edge of something monumental. Suddenly, I felt a great certainty about everything under the sun and all the confusion of my life was resolved in her small form. When she smiled, my heart lurched, as if in recognition of something I'd lost from the beginning of being and had only just found again. I opened and closed my mouth but that moment of recognition had robbed me of speech and instead I floundered like a captured fish on the shores of her lake.

She gave me a shy smile, a certain understanding in her eyes as she tapped the glass case. "I've been looking all over for cheese buns," she said slowly, as if testing her knowledge. "I had the feeling I might find what I was looking for here," her tapping became a small caress as she ran her finger over the case before coming to a stop at the metal boundary of the counter.

"They're here," I answered vaguely, still underwater, swimming upwards under her spell.

She nodded slowly, waiting patiently as I placed a half-dozen in a bag, because I somehow knew that was how many she needed. Like everything that came afterwards between us, I just knew.

As she paid for her purchase, I finally broke the surface, awareness of the world dawning on me again. She would go from whatever mists had brought her and I could not leave to chance that we would meet again.

"Uh, we have blueberry scones...fresh...I just made them and, I mean...they're good," I moved quickly behind the counter, a shaky hand yanking a sheet of wax paper as I slid open the door of the display case. "Or cinnamon rolls?" I pulled one of the sticky buns onto the sheet and handed it to her. "You have to try one, on the house."

Her eyes widened, as she stood somewhat dumbfounded before me. "I...you're giving me this?" she asked with a sudden wariness that made me panic.

"A...sample." I stuttered nervously, hoping desperately that I hadn't done anything wrong. I was suddenly intimidated by her restrained energy, which vibrated around her like a quivering bow.

Those eyes! She continued to study me as if she was trying to decide whether to trust me or not, when she brought the roll to her lips. Her eyes fluttered closed as she visibly savored the treat, a small moan escaping her lips that rolled over my body and settled in the middle of my stomach. I knew without her telling me that she liked it.

"This is amazing!" she exclaimed when she'd finished it off.

"There's more where that came from," I answered, which finally drew a smile from her. "What's your name?"

She discarded the wax paper and looked up at me with eyes alive with mirth. "Katniss."

"Katniss," I repeated as if in a daze before snapping to. "I'm Peeta, of Mellark fame," I jerked my thumb in the direction of the bakery sign announcing Mellark's Family Bakery, since 1952.

Katniss held the bag, now spotting in places from the buttery buns within, and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "Good to know. Now I'll know where to find you." With a wry expression, she pulled the door, causing the bell to tinkle happily again and just as she'd entered, she left, allowing a burst of spring air to enter the shop behind her, overpowering the pungent smell of spices and yeast.

I leaned against the counter, letting out my breath and shook my head at myself . Expecting the giddiness to fade, I returned to my work but found myself repeatedly getting lost in the memory of those grey eyes every time I let my concentration wander.

XXXXX

As soon as my brother, Rohan, showed up for the afternoon shift, I pulled off my apron, dusting myself so that the air around me seemed suspended with billowy puffs of flour that floated gently to the ground. When I was clean enough, I bound upstairs to the apartment I shared with my family over the bakery and collected my school things, heading towards the University Library. I was looking forward to getting that paper out of the way and, as a reward, work on my Modern Art project.

As I walked, I couldn't stop thinking about the girl, Katniss, who I'd met in the bakery that morning. I didn't know her any better than I knew the traffic attendant that guarded the walkway from wayward traffic. And yet, she was profoundly familiar. I remember wracking my brain, wondering who she was, who she reminded me of but I continuously came up empty. My rational mind told me she was a stranger but another instinct, the one that took over me when I held my paint brush in hand, the wet fibers hovering over the canvass, causing me to plunge downwards in search of lines and forms; this same instinct told me that she was not a stranger.

I shrugged at the paradox, wishing only that I'd thought to get her number so that I would stop obsessing over it and get my head into my work. As I sat down at the computer station, I pulled out my papers and books, logging onto my account so I could pull up the draft of my paper. I was lucky that the library had giant windows that stretched from floor to ceiling so I could still enjoy the now waning sun. It was a modern building, so the surfaces were smooth and shiny. The designers of the library had consciously added the dark wood and plush chairs that were so typically associated with libraries but it was too new to give a sense of sacredness to the information found inside.

It took me back to the summer I visited New York City with my family and we wandered into the New York Public Library. No library could ever compare to the feeling of standing before the eternal knowledge that that library could give. I paused to savor the feeling, wondering at the way the mind could make connections between so many disparate things and create meaning out of them. I realized at that moment that the feeling of timeless awe that I'd felt beneath Milton's ceiling was the same feeling I had experienced when I stood before Katniss.

I smiled at myself as I pulled out my notes and books and forced my wandering mind to focus on my art paper.

XXXXX

After an hour of almost uninterrupted focus, I was suddenly brought out of my zone by a loud sound of books tumbling onto the table of the cubicle adjacent to me. Even with the earbuds in place, I felt the vibration of the heavy tomes against the wood of the table where I worked. I rubbed my eyes tiredly - I was almost done and would soon print and edit my paper when the person at the table next to me caught my attention. I could tell it was a girl by the perfect part of her hair visible to me as the young woman bent over her things, no doubt sorting them.

When she straightened, I stared in open shock. It was her, the girl from the bakery, and if I had been dumbfounded by her before, I was floored by her now. Her face was etched in a scowl of irritation at the books toppled in disarray at her desk but it did not detract one iota from her perfect symmetry. I had the sudden, unbidden thought of what the skin of her smooth cheek would feel like cupped in my hand and impulsively flexed and unflexed my fingers in response to her phantom flesh. It was a long moment before I realized that she was staring back at me.

"Hi," I croaked out, certain that I was the color of red beets at having been caught ogling Katniss.

"Hi," she answered, all movement frozen as if she were a deer caught by a hunter.

Time held itself in check as we studied each other, students moving around us as if they were dust motes caught in sunlight. It wasn't until another book threatened to slip out of place that we both came to our senses again.

"You're a student here?" I asked dumbly as she returned to stacking her books.

"Yeah. And so are you," she observed dryly, eyeing my backpack and papers. "And yet, it doesn't surprise me at all to see you here," she smiled shyly, leaning awkwardly against the cubicle edge.

"No? Well, then, how...how did you know I'd be here?" I joked, but only half-heartedly. There was something about this girl that made me feel like everything we said to one another had already been said before.

"I didn't," she answered cryptically, the flames of something unquenchable dancing across the surface of the crystal gray waters. "I just figured you'd eventually show up again."

XXXXX

"Botany?" I asked as we sat on the library steps. We had begun talking across the cubicle, to the chagrin of other visitors who were disturbed from their studies by our banter. We were the lucky ones, because the night was breezy and warm and we were the only ones on the giant stone steps. It was where I'd learned that she had grown up in the Seam, and had attended school in the impoverished part of town. She spoke of archery and winning an academic scholarship and that was how she was at Panem University.

"Yeah," she answered, "It's all my dad's fault. He loved the woods and took me with him every chance he could."

"He must be proud of you," I said.

The change in Katniss' face was so swift, I quickly regretted my comment. "He would have been, but he died a long time ago."

"I'm sorry," I said.

We lapsed into a gentle silence as Katniss played with the end of her braid, her face dark and inscrutable. After several moments, she asked, "How about you? What do you want to be when you grow up?"

I chuckled at this, relieved that I hadn't shut her down with the memory of her loss. "I'm studying Art History. I love art and will probably end up teaching it but," I gave her my most winning smile, "I happen to be a pretty good at drawing so maybe, one day, someone will pay to buy my work."

"I don't see why not," she said, smiling back.

"I could draw you one day...if you want…" I blurted out, "...that is, if you want, you know, if you want to see me again…" My heart was pounding so hard, it made my teeth chatter. I felt a soft hand on my arm, which stilled all the angst, leaving another kind of excitement, one that hummed low in my blood.

"I do, Peeta. I want very much to see you again."

XXXXX

Love at first sight would be an understatement to describe the way I had been smitten by Katniss. It seemed that by the time we stopped before the door of her apartment after our first date, I had already embraced the premonition of her indispensability in my life as a fact. It wasn't just that she was exquisite - she had the most unblemished skin, grey eyes like cut crystal and a body, as I learned later on, made to fit with mine like a missing puzzle piece.

No, what Katniss Everdeen possessed was a fierce devotion to her loved ones, unwavering loyalty and an almost inexhaustible persistence. Almost. Because little did I know that even one like her could reach the limit of her endurance

But in that moment, as we stood before the door, what I saw was the limitless possibility of my life open up before me. I was in love in a hopeless and pathetic way.

"I had a really nice night," Katniss said.

"Me too," I said, unable to tear my eyes away from her face. The night hung heavy with the scent of jasmine blossoms, a fragrance that I would always associate with her, even after, when blossoms were no longer possible. She swayed, as if enchanted and I wanted very much to reach out to her and simply hold her, to root her to me and keep her from floating away. As I contemplated her, the splintery wood door opened and a young blond girl poked her head out.

"Katniss?" she asked, eyeing me warily.

"Prim, I'll be up in a minute," Katniss hissed, a flush of pink climbing up her neck.

"You know I don't like to be alone!" Prim said and if she seemed young before, she appeared positively infantile now, her pink lips protruding in a dramatic pout, slender arms crossed in front of her before she turned and stomped up the stairs with exaggerated irritation.

"Johanna's with you!" Katniss retorted in a huff before turning back to speak to me. "I'm sorry. She's not used to me being out after dark," Katniss explained with exasperation.

I was taken aback that a girl of Katniss' age would have a curfew. "Do you have to be in at a certain time?"

"No! I mean, not really. But Prim is really too young to be left by herself." Katniss said, glancing toward the stairs where Prim had escaped.

"Is she your…?" I asked, completely confused now. "I mean, you don't look old enough to have a girl that old…" If she had a child, surely it would have come up during dinner.

"You mean my daughter?" Katniss asked with a look of astonishment before bursting into laughter. "Oh, god, no! She's my sister!"

"Oh, okay. I guess you help your mother out by watching her." I said, still unable to capture her living arrangement.

But Katniss only stared at me as if debating something with herself. Finally, she cocked her head in the direction of the stairs where her sister had gone. "My mother isn't with us anymore. When my father died, she became very depressed. She was committed two years ago but she might as well have been gone long before then." She squared her shoulders as if in preparation for a fight. "It's just me and my sister."

Katniss hadn't failed to surprise me that night, not with her story of her academic scholarship, working her way through school, her love of nature, her dreams to become a scientist. However, she never mentioned her mother and now I understood why - it was shame that flushed her cheeks as she confessed to her sister's dependence on her. I felt pity for this girl who was so brave, so responsible and I was hurt on her behalf that she should have ever had to endure such a heavy burden at such a young age.

I thought all of these things under her watchful eyes. Without warning, her gaze hardened and she looked at me pointedly. "I don't date very often because I'm a package deal and not everyone wants to date a girl who has to work when she's not in school and is raising a kid by herself. If you're not up to it, there's the street," she indicated in the direction of the pavement. "No hard feelings."

Her vehemence caught me by surprise. "Is that an ultimatum?"

Katniss eyes widened momentarily, as if in fear. "I suppose it is."

"Okay." I said.

"Okay? What's okay?" she demanded and even her anger captivated me.

"Okay." I said as I stepped towards her. "I accept your challenge. Now can I kiss you?"

Katniss froze in shock, before her lips curled in humor, her laughter bubbling up, warm and raspy in her chest. "Yes. You can kiss me."

I could have devoured her right then and there but restrained myself because the warm press of her mouth beneath mine was so perfect, I wanted to savor just that sensation alone. She was everything that was soft and inviting, though her character was one of the toughest I'd ever known. I would eventually sketch that moment - her hands resting against my shoulders, my own hands on her hips, her head tilted back to reach upwards towards mine. I would try hard to capture the sense of the inevitable that later accompanied every moment of my life that I spent with Katniss. I felt it even after life and I had parted ways and made everything that came after our separation virtually impossible to endure.

XXXXX

My family, before Katniss, had been made up of my mother, my father and my two brothers, Rohan and Phillip. My mother, a somewhat taciturn woman with a fierce disposition, was the minority amongst so many men. One of the few things she approved of about my relationship with Katniss was that it infused, right away, the addition of two women in the middle of so much testosterone. She would never be best friends with Katniss - that was not my mother's way and Katniss had zero tolerance for pretension of any sort - a quality my mother had in abundance.

However, Prim was another matter altogether. She had the type of personality that could conquer even the hardest heart. She was so young; only 12 when I first met her but her gentle, wise spirit was evident even then. Her pale blond hair and soft blue eyes bespoke innocence and purity and it was hard not to get pulled into her sphere of influence.

"Peeta and I made these," she said excitedly after one night after dinner.

Katniss smiled at the plate Prim held. "What did you make, little duck?"

Prim beamed in pride as she showed the contents to Katniss. "Almond cookies. And look here," she pointed at a group lying on the plate, "I frosted them. Here is one in the shape of a katniss flower, just for you. "

"Oh, thank you!" Katniss said in happy surprise as she pulled her sister into a tight hug.

"Peeta taught me," Prim said proudly.

"Well, you're a quick study. You'll be able to make these on your own in no time at all," I said, which caused her to flush with pleasure.

After Katniss tucked her into bed, she sat down next to me on her sofa, curling her feet under her and leaning against me.

"She's everything that's good in the world for me," Katniss said in a moment of unguarded candor. "The day my father died, if it hadn't been for my Uncle Haymitch, we would have been in foster care. My mother fell apart and Prim was truly devastated by that. She didn't understand why she couldn't reach my mother."

"I can't even imagine what that must have been like," I said with sincere empathy. It wasn't perfection, but I had my family and could count on my parents. "Prim's won my mother over - that says a lot."

Katniss chuckled. "Your mother intimidates me," she admitted.

"She intimidates me!" I answered, a shiver of fear at the idea of my mother's wrath running through my body. "But she is smitten by your sister so we might have a reprieve from her general foulness because of that."

Katniss laughed. "You see, there are advantages to having adorable twelve year olds in your life."

"I have no complaints," I answered before turning to kiss her. She tilted her head upwards and kissed me back, her lips parting beneath mine in invitation. I could spend a day just kissing her - the taste of her made me simultaneously both full and hungry. When she reached up to tug my curls, I lost all sense of where I was, my hands making their way down her sides to grasp her hips. We ended stretched out on the sofa, Katniss laying pressed beneath me. I couldn't stop kissing her, my mouth flooded by her as she nipped at my lips before letting her tongue have free roam. Like so many times before, I pulled away before things got too heated.

However, to my surprise, she wrapped her legs around me and clutched me to her. I was trapped and though I was at least twice as strong as her, she had me at her mercy. My body reacted to her with sudden and total abandon. I ground my hips into hers as her hands found their way beneath my shirt, fingernails raking across my skin. The sensation was so delicious, I gasped into her mouth, eliciting a satisfied smile from her.

"Peeta…" she sighed as my lips ran the length of her neck and shoulders, "Let's go to my room."

"Are you...are you sure?" I panted, trying to gather my senses.

"I've been sure ever since you gave me those cheese buns…" she whispered with an intensity that left me breathless. "Please?"

I was up in a heartbeat, pulling her up off the sofa and lifting her up in my arms. She laughed as I carried her to her room, shushing me even though I hadn't said a word. When we had passed the threshold, I kicked the door shut, causing us both to tumble ungracefully onto the bed. We both laughed as we peeled away the layers of our clothes, our humor at our clumsiness giving way to a more serious kind of play and I realized in that moment I'd never touch another woman again. This epiphany caused me to pause in my frantic movements and I savored her unveiling, knowing that all my firsts from now on would only be with her. I kissed her shoulders, her arms, her beautiful, perfect breasts, her belly, so flat and smooth, I left open-mouth kisses over the expanse of her smooth skin. She moaned and sighed, gasped and shouted as I made my acquaintance with her body for the first time that night. With methodical precision, I pressed her backwards onto the bed, spreading her legs widely and buried my face in the apex of her thighs, wanting nothing more than to wear on my hair and skin the distinct smell of her .

As I stroked her with my fingers and tongue, learning the secret to her pleasure, I felt her pant against me. She held my head in place as I lavished her with my tongue, plunging and sucking until she bowed her back and called out my name - "Peeta!" quietly , always quietly - and comically shushed me again even though, again, I hadn't spoken. The tremors of her release wracked her body and in that sweet moment of abandon, I sheathed myself in a condom and slowly sank into her still fluttering depths.

I held her gaze as I moved over her, slowly at first to draw out her orgasm before I built momentum, enjoying the infinite warmth of her around me. Her eyes were dark with her own desire, and I got lost in them again. She pulled me down again for a kiss, rolling her hips in time with my rhythm and in this way, I rocked us both to our next precipice, where I fell over with her, hurtling through space. The sound of my name on her lips never ceased to thrill me but in that moment, if I never heard another sound again in my life, it would have been enough. Katniss clawed and shuddered with her orgasm while I groaned and let go, falling in a useless heap of flesh and bone when it was over.

My senses were scattered to the four winds, the ability to concentrate on anything rational having floated away on the waves of my release. But there was one certainty that I had, the one that I possessed from the day I met her, the one that I would keep after everything had been said and done. I loved Katniss. Loved her in such a way that it felt like I'd loved her all my life.

"As if I already knew you before I'd even met you," she whispered quietly and I realized I had said the words out loud. It didn't matter, for our love was a secret knowledge we had carried within us before the day she walked into my parent's bakery. She took my face in both her hands, her thumbs caressing my cheeks and kissed me, deeply, languidly, with the full intent of marking the moment before pulling back to gaze at me.

"Is it even possible to love someone in that way?" she asked. "Can something like that be real?"

I thread my fingers in her wild hair, tugging gently at the tangles I found there. "It's real, Katniss. As real as you and I are at this very moment."

XXXXX

We were married almost the year to the day that we met, right after graduation. We had a small wedding party - my brothers, her friend Johanna, who had often babysat Prim, as well as Prim herself, who served as the maid of honor. To round out the pack was my best friend, Finnick, and his wife Annie, whom I'd known all my life in Panem.

"She's a work of art, mate," Finnick had said when he first met her. "How on earth did you catch someone like that?"

"Oh, stop it, Finn!" Annie said in that breathless way she had of speaking. Finnick was studying medicine and, being several years older than me, was almost done with his medical studies and searching for a residency. Annie taught first grade at the local elementary school. "Peeta is quite a catch! She's as lucky as he is."

"Thanks, Annie!" I said good-naturedly as I raised my beer bottle to toast. "The only good taste Finnick ever showed was in marrying you."

Annie chuckled as Finnick groaned. "Well, flattery will get you everywhere!"

Finnick had to eat his words on the day of our wedding. I was positively dashing, not just because of the very expensive wedding suit. Katniss would finally be my wife and I didn't think there were many other things that could make me more happy at that moment and that happiness shone brightly in every thing I did.

XXXXX

We'd gone to the sanitorium where her mother was being treated to break the news of our engagement and upcoming nuptials. I had begun accompanying Katniss and Prim on these trips because they were hard on Katniss and left her in a depression when they were done. It was clear that Katniss took after her father because Mrs. Everdeen was an older version of Prim. She had once been a beautiful woman but now it was obvious that she lived like a shadow among the living.

"Momma!" Prim chirped cheerfully, kneeling before her seated mother and hugging her gently to her as if she would break.

"My girls. My darling girls," Mrs. Everdeen said in a mild panic and I understood suddenly why Katniss' mother could not be in the world any longer. Everything, even her own instinctive love for her children, overwhelmed and terrified her, reducing her to immobility as a defense against those intense feelings. I gripped Katniss' hand as we watched Prim try to talk to her.

"Katniss has some news for you, mom!" Prim said with heartbreaking hope. Perhaps she thought the idea of something happy might bring her back to herself.

"Mom," Katniss said. "You remember Peeta, right?"

"Yes, dear, of course," the wraith-like woman said gently, nodding kindly to me.

"We're getting married," Katniss started shakily. She cleared her throat before speaking again. "Peeta and I are getting married this summer, after graduation,"

Mrs. Everdeen looked from me to Katniss and back again, wrestling with comprehending her words. "Married?"

"Yes, mom. Married," Katniss answered but something in her voice hardened, catching my attention. I moved closer to her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"Married?" repeated Mrs. Everdeen. "I was married once," she whispered. "But now he's gone." She turned her head to look out the window as if she could see her deceased husband there.

"Mom?" Prim asked, prodding her gently. "Did you hear what Katniss said? She's getting married! I saw her dress! She's going to be so pretty!"

But Mrs. Everdeen was no longer with us. Maybe she'd gotten lost in a memory of her own, one that she shared only with her long-lost husband. Katniss sagged against me and I understood what was in her voice earlier. She'd seen this coming. She knew her mother would not have the means to give her blessing, which is what Katniss desperately wanted. It wasn't cruelty, though I was impatient and secretly angry at what I thought was her mother's selfishness at the time. Knowing what I know now, I understand that Mrs. Everdeen's soul was half in this world and half in her husband's plane and she could no more fully interact with those of us here on Earth than we could have conversed with the angels. I now recognize her desperation and illness for what it really was - terminal, soul-rending heartbreak. It was a condition that had seized her from the world of the living, a condition her daughter would someday succumb to. And it would be fully and completely my fault.

XXXXX

So Katniss was not only beautiful that day. She was radiant as the sun. And I was a satellite caught in her orbit, full of happiness and the monumental importance of the moment. On that day, I bound myself to her and to her sister in the most powerful way I knew how. They both belonged to me, to care for in equal measure. When I said "I do," I did so with all the naive optimism of youth, and gave myself over to the illusion of my immortality. For I truly believed I would have the rest of my life to show Katniss all the ways that I loved her.

XXXXX

Part 2 of 7 tomorrow!

Thanks to abbythebear and solasvioletta for betaing this fic!