Katniss

I hear the door open somewhere downstairs, and I know it's either Mom, Prim, or Gale—all three of which have been doing fairly frequent rounds to our Victor's Village house recently. I rarely ever convince Haymitch of visiting me anymore; usually I'm the one having to go over and clean up after his nasty drinking habits…although I wouldn't mind a drink myself.

I've never been a good actress, and I'm more than convinced that all of Panem would have to agree with me. It's probably good news, then, that I have to act sullen for this year's Victory Tour. Great. Now I get to go to districts where I'm responsible for at least two deaths from their population.

"Catnip? Are you there?" I was right on my third guess; it's Gale. I don't bother replying; I'm far too worn out from all the trauma I've gone through, and he knows it. I hear his velvet tread go down the hall, and suddenly he's inside our study, watching me as I stare, frozen, at the vase with the single white rose. Embedded in my second victor crown, a personal gift from President Snow himself.

"You can't be here forever," he says earnestly, taking a seat across the table from me. I'm sitting, limp; shoulders slouched, with a cold, expressionless mask plastered on. He rolls his eyes and takes out an apple from his bag. I turn suddenly to see what he's doing. He's actually setting up lunch for me.

"What are you doing?" I ask warily, knowing the answer but wanting to hear it from him. It's a rare conversation when he voluntarily talks to me, rather than to the nutshell that's consumed me.

His lips twitch upward in a faint attempt of a smile as he organizes a small jug of water, the apple, and a freshly baked loaf of bread, on the matt in front of me. I avoid looking at the loaf of bread. I know what Gale's doing. He wants to get me to talk about it. Because he knows, even if it kills him to hear how much I miss Peeta, that it'll be good for me to release my feelings.

Well, that's not happening. Neither is his explanation. I rip off a chunk of bread and stuff it in my mouth, making it gross and impossible to say anything to him for at least a few seconds. He looks at me, eyes narrowed, probably furious underneath his calm exterior. What's happening? I want to scream at him. Peeta's dead! Why isn't everything the way it used to be?

Because Peeta isn't dead, you idiot, a small part of me whispers back as I painfully try to swallow a portion of the bread in my mouth. Not in here. My hand instinctively creeps up to my left temple, foreseeing a strong headache about to overwhelm me. All at once the memories come back to me. Beetee lying, almost lifelessly, by the coil of wire. Peeta somewhere trying to chase down Brutus, while Johanna finished off Enobaria. Peeta avenging the cannon he thought belonged to me, killing Finnick. Johanna, killing Peeta. Johanna, being too close to the water at midnight.

"Are you okay?" Gale asks, his eyebrows furrowing together as he takes me in. He knows I'm still mulling over what happened at the Quarter Quell—thankfully, he's still keeping his distance. He knows it's too cruel to try to make me fall in love with him when I've just been forced to fall out of love with Peeta. Haymitch said once that this grieving matter would probably keep the Capitol off my back for a while, but I doubt it's worth it. Anyway, he hasn't been in top shape himself recently. I know he won't admit it, but he's just as affected by the loss of the boy with the bread as I've been.

I shake my head, keeping my gaze trained on the rose. He follows my line of sight, and, when he spots the item of interest, gently grabs it out of the vase. I do nothing to stop him. He delicately pulls off one petal after the next, until there's nothing but a thorny stem resting between his thumb and his index finger. He smiles at me bitterly before tossing the stem out the window.

"You're going to get better," he says confidently, standing up from his seat and walking around the desk to me. He ducks, and plants a light kiss on my cheek before exiting.

My mother arrives soon afterwards, followed by Prim, whom, as always, is carrying Buttercup in her arms. Even the sight of the nasty-looking cat doesn't trigger some sort of reaction from me.

"We brought you some food from the…" Prim begins cheerfully, but then her voice trails off and I realize what she meant to say. I'm proven right as she puts on the study a tray of cookies and cheese buns. He used to bake those, I think, then slap myself mentally as I realize how pathetic I've become.

Why am I torturing myself about him? I'm back with Prim, with Gale and my mother. I should be ecstatic! I should be…over the moon, celebrating life. But instead what am I doing? Sulking. Sulking like the proper widow I'm supposed to be. It makes sense, I guess, since I'm supposed to be pregnant with Peeta's child and all. Besides, it's not like I don't have a good reason to be depressed. I was being completely honest when I told him I would be the one person that would be broken if he didn't survive these Games.

But this time, he'd taken the berries before I could. This time, I'd won, and he'd won because of it. Because the one thing he'd wanted was for me to come home, and I'd given him just that.

And I hated myself for it.