Hello, readers! This is, sorta, my first fanfiction. I've written a couple short chapters in the past but have never published them. I came across this site not too long ago and I was inspired to post my own entry. I always wanted more story before the Epilogue in The Hunger Games (how did Katniss learn to cope? How did her and Peeta's relationship take off?) but I guess it had to end somewhere. So this is my take on it. I hope you like it! This chapter is pretty short but they will get longer, especially if you readers are interested (reviews!). It starts the day after Peeta comes back home to District 12. Katniss POV. Let me know what you think and I will continue.

I laid in bed longer than I normally would. Thoughts were swarming around in my head, draining me of any energy that my sporadic sleep had given me. Having confusing thoughts wasn't unusual though. Ever since I returned to 12 thoughts of the past two years had incapacitated me. I didn't know how to function when every move I made reminded me of the horrors I'd witnessed. I lift my arm; I see the long scar Johanna had tore into me. I braid my hair; I'm reminded of Cinna's skillful hands gently twisting it into an elegant style. Which always leads me to thinking more of my mother, then of Prim and my heart feels like it's going to rip even more so than it already had.

I'd never felt more alone than when I returned to my home district. Yes, Haymitch had come with me, as my babysitter of sorts. But he wasn't really living up to whatever expectations the Capitol must have had to put him in charge of looking after me. If I had been in a better mind-set I could have been getting myself into a lot of trouble. Haymitch rarely paid a visit and when he did it was to steal the food Greasy Sae had left for me or scavenge the house for whatever rubbing alcohol I hadn't taken to my mother in District 13 months ago. He wasn't much of a guide in helping me to recover but how could he be? He had never gotten over his experiences in his games so how was he supposed to help me get over my experiences in two games and a blood-drenched uprising?

Haymitch knows what those therapist don't. A simple couch session or a phone call talking about your feelings wasn't going to do any good to erase the visions of the nightmare we've lived through. The best way is to cope in your own way. I guess. So when Haymitch visits and it seems like he's actually there out of the goodness of his heart, to care for me, he just sits with me. I sit in my rocking chair next to the fire in the kitchen and he sits at the table. With a bottle in his hand. When he gets here, he offers me a drink and when I don't reply we just sit there. Hours could go by without a word passing between us, sometimes he falls asleep. But it's the kind of therapy I need right now. I don't need someone telling me they understand or that everything is going to be alright. I know that none of that is true. What I need, if anything, is someone to be there. And despite all of Haymitch's dis-functional qualities, he has been there in his own way. Seeing him reminds me that not everyone I loved died in the horrific war that ruined my life. I'm not totally alone in dealing with my experiences. There are some people that have lived what I have lived threw, done what I have done and have still managed to breath the same air as I do. And one of them happens to be my drunken ex-mentor.

I figured that this was what my life had come to. Blurred visits from Greasy Sae and Haymitch as I sat miserably reliving the deaths of the ones I loved. What was there to look forward to really? So many times I'd tried to give my own life so that others could live but that never happened. Either someone held me back or fate had a different plan. Well, what exactly was fate saving me for? To be the face of the rebellion? Okay, they needed me for that. But there were so many times I could have died during my race through the Capitol and yet I survived. Out of all the people whom died, I survived. For what? I killed Coin, which may have been the plan fate needed me to act out but what now? The people of Panem could have condemned me to death for my actions but instead they sent me back to my home. To die slowly and even more painfully than if they shot me through the heart with my own arrow. Didn't I deserve some peace?

A flicker of peace showed up on the side of my house yesterday afternoon. I still couldn't believe that Peeta was back in District 12. I had already made up in my mind that he wouldn't be coming back. He had lost so much during the uprising; his family and his own character. It made me cringe to think of how much the Hijacking had changed him. The last time I'd seen him, almost three months ago, he was still struggling to control the psychotic episodes. I knew that he might never totally be the same Peeta again. I thought that the Capitol would want to keep him there indefinitely in order to monitor him. I guess I was wrong.

Just seeing him made me feel slightly better. He was alive and well enough that he was able to haul several Primrose bushes across town. The act of him planting the bushes was proof enough that there was still some of the old Peeta inside of him. The old Peeta did things like that out of kindness and the goodness of his heart. Had the doctors in the Capitol found a way to heal him? No, that was impossible.

I probably could have found out all of this information myself but I hadn't stayed outside long enough to talk to him. After staring at him in shock for about three minutes, I had turned around and ran back into the house. A part of me wanted to talk to him about everything and ask him a million questions; give him a big hug and ask him if he was really alright. Another part of me couldn't believe that he was actually back. Was I hallucinating? It wouldn't be the first time. Was the capitol still trying to kill me by sending a hijacked Peeta back to 12? I didn't know, I was so confused. And lately, when things get confusing, I check out. That's why I am here, in my bed. Staring at the ceiling, hoping Greasy Sae doesn't have the strength to make it up the stairs today.