AN: Katniss and Peeta and the struggles of drowning inside. A small AU thing I've written up to try to get some things out of my own head. There may be more, depending on how things go the next little while in my real life. Inspiration from Mumford & Sons 'Lover's Eyes'

I feel the bed move as he shifts to the edge and rubs heavily at his eyes. It's not yet dawn but I'm already awake, curled chest to knees and my head tucked against my hands. His warmth slowly sleeps from its place around me as I listen to his heavy gait move from the bed to the closet, to the bathroom down the hall. Every morning he wakes before the dawn and heads to his bakery to prepare the finest cookies and breads that the city has ever tasted.

Most mornings I rouse myself and prepare for my morning jog with Prim as he showers and dresses. Some mornings I join him, abandoning my work out for exercise of a different variety.

But today I simply tuck my cheek closer to the pillow and clench my eyes shut at the strip of light that lands across my face from the hallway light.

When he returns some time later I'm still awake, stilled curled like a tightly wound coil under the covers. His large frame blocks out the light as he peeks through the doorway to regard me. I don't move. Not today.

"I'll see you this afternoon," he whispers quietly, his lips pressing to my forehead before his thumb brushes my cheek. I don't open my eyes. Or move. Or do anything. "I love you." The statement echoes off the walls as he shuts the bedroom door quietly and heads down the stairs.

It's been two weeks since I ran my morning jog. Two weeks since I moved from this bed for more than a few hours. I don't know what's wrong with me, not really. I just want to sleep and hide from everything I have to do which really isn't much considering my shifts with Haymitch at the bar have petered off lately.

"Are you coming in tonight, sweetheart?" Haymitch garbles into the phone, the noise of a rowdy lunch crowd rolling through behind him. It's the third shift I've called in for since it started. It's been one week.

"Um..." I hum aloud, but just barely. The old man sighs audibly before letting the silence crawl across the line. "I don't think I can make it." My words are quiet, timid. More silence meets me.

"I don't – it's none of my business – but, are you doing good Katniss?" He hesitantly asks. I feel my throat tighten at his words.

Haymitch had never much been one to broach things he didn't want to talk about and I never pushed him for details on why he drank so much, but now he was asking and I was afraid of telling something that I didn't quite understand myself. I wasn't doing good at all.

"I'm okay. Just tired is all," I mumble in response and the man coughs, starting a sentence and then abandoning it.

"Okay. Look, I'll take you off the schedule for now. Give a call when you're back on your feet, or if you need anything, 'right?" His voice is more gruff than usual and I can't tell if it is annoyance or something else.

"Alright."

That was a week ago now. I hadn't called him back and he hadn't called me which was really all for the best. All I wanted to do was sleep anyways.

"Katniss, are you coming down for dinner?" Peeta pokes his head through the door, the light from the hallway haloing around his blonde mess of curls. It is dark outside again and I realize I've slept through most of the day. Just as well, I figure, I didn't sleep much last night.

"Okay," I reply though my body doesn't comply despite my stomach growling anxiously. My eyes meet Peeta's across the small space and he frowns ever so slightly. I try again, stretching my legs from my chest and moving my hand across the cotton sheets.

I wanted to get up and go to dinner. I hadn't eaten since sometime yesterday. But I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

"Why don't I bring it up and we can have it here?" Peeta suggests, witnessing my struggle and forcing a fake cheeriness to his voice.

"Okay."

Ten minutes later he returns, tray laden with two bowls of soup and sliced fresh bread. The smell wafts towards me and my stomach aches appreciatively.

"I'm sorry it's not much, I was short on a few things downstairs," he states, setting the tray on the side table and shifting onto the bed. I try to ignore the fact that the reason we don't have much is because I haven't been to the store in days. "Hey, let's sit up to eat." He smiles and pulls affectionately at my hands until I'm sitting up and shifting myself back against the headboard as he pulls the tray down before me.

It's quiet for a long while the only sounds filling the room that of our breathing and the spoons hitting the bowls. I'm not done when he finishes – not close to halfway even – when he puts his dishes aside and turns fully towards me. I feel his gaze upon me, burning into the side of my face where the stray hairs from my unkempt braid don't hide me.

"Katniss," he starts slowly, shifting slightly and still watching. Out of the corner of my eye I see his hands curl in the sheets, tensing and releasing nervously, before settling. "Something isn't right. I'm worried."

The concern in his voice, the way his words crack at the end, forces me to look up at him quickly. I watch the shutter of surprise pass over his features before he returns to his concern.

"You've been staying home a lot. Talking even less than normal, even for you. It's like sometimes you're not even here even though your body is right in front of me. I don't know what's going on but I want to help. Please let me help you," Peeta doesn't plead, but I can't ignore the hint of desperation in his words.

"I –" My throat tightens and my mouth dries. I don't know what to say. I don't know how to stop whatever it is that's happening. All I know is that I just want to sleep and not be a burden anymore. Not to him, not to anyone. I just want to sleep.

His face doesn't let me say that though. Not Peeta. He doesn't know how much I need him or how much I want to make him happy. Deep down inside I know I want that, need that, for him. I just don't know how to do it right now.

"I'll be better," I try instead, looking away from his searching gaze. I look at my bare feet as they lay exposed from under the sheet. His hands distract me as they reach over into my line of sight and grasp at my foot before pulling it into his lap.

"You don't have to be better, just tell me how to help," he murmurs as his strong kneading fingers press into the soles of my feet. My hands shake on the edges of the bowl of soup I still cradle before he takes it and places it quietly on the side table. His hands return to my feet and begin massaging deeply, pressing into my arches and forcing my toes to curl.

The moan slips out of me without notice and I stretch backwards onto my back as he continues his ministrations. It feels good – my body hums under his hands just like it always does.

Abruptly, my feet are placed back on the bed and I feel him snake his body alongside mine until his nose nudges my shoulder and the heat of his palm spreads across my stomach. It feels so nice, like something I've missed for so long finally returning to me. It's only a flicker though before my mood stalls and my body feels quiet again.

Watching, eyes wide, I let him rise slowly above me, his knuckle grazing my chin before his lips press against mine. The kiss is slow, languid, as his tongue slides across the crease of my mouth. I grant him entrance if only because I know he needs this – I know that a denial would only make him more concerned – so I let him kiss me. I let his hands slip into my hair and his nails scrape lightly across my scalp as I feel numb beneath his tongue.

"Katniss," he breaks away after a moment. My eyes are closed but I know he's staring at me. He noticed. He always notices everything.

Tilting my chin up and away, I clench my eyelids tight together trying to keep the hot tears from spilling free. I don't want to do this to him. I don't want him to feel my pain. My aching numbness.

I don't know what's wrong.

"Katniss, look at me," he asks quietly and guides my face back towards his. I can't open my eyes. He'll see so much more if I open my eyes. He always does.

"I'm sorry," I gasp and my lungs heave with the struggle to keep the tears at bay.

"Don't – Katniss, don't apologize, please." He pleads. Peeta never pleads. I can feel his hands framing my face now. I know he's on his knees, kneeling above me but still so close as I try to turn and curl into myself. "Let me help – just tell me what's wrong and I'll fix it. It'll be okay – please just tell me."

I shake my head and the tears break loose, flowing down my cheeks and into my hair. The silence is deafening. He rarely sees me cry.

Without anymore said he releases me from his grip and my body instinctively curls away until my back faces him and my face is pushed into the pillow as I sob. So consumed in my tears I barely notice that he's flush against my body, his arms wrapped tightly around me and his face tucked against my shoulder, until the numbness returns to me and the tears dry up.

His own silent tears wet my shirt some hours later. I don't sleep much that night. Neither does he.