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It's the anniversary of the armistice, and it's raining in District 12. It's a cold, gray rain that makes Peeta want to stay in bed and sleep away the day. He's already told all his regulars there will be no bread today, he knows he won't have the energy to run the ovens and knead dough, let alone talk to people coming by the house. But he ought to do something. It's been a year since they changed Panem, since the war ended and the plan was decided on for a democratic election. But it's also been a year since his family's death, since Primrose's death, since Katniss's mother left and never returned, since half of District 12 was reduced to a pile of rubble and ash.
There's others, too, the more he thinks about it. Finnick is dead, leaving behind a son who will never know his father. The rest of the Star Squad: The Leeg twins and Boggs and Mitchell. Messalla, Castor, Homes, and Jackson. All the allies who died in the arena: Wiress and Seeder, Chaff, Mags, more he didn't know the names of.
And then there were the ones who survived. He flips over in bed, staring at the rain hitting the glass of his bedroom window. He and Katniss slept apart last night, so it's still just him and his thoughts. He thinks about Annie, stuck in that prison with him and just because the Capitol figured it would kneecap Finnick. And it probably did. And Enobaria, captured just because she happened to be in combat with Johanna at the end of the Games. Jo herself, the only good intelligence the Capitol had captured, nearly killed with their sadistic interrogations.
He thinks of Katniss, the symbol of the rebellion, and what it cost her. He wonders if she'll ever really recover, and if it was worth the cost. He thinks of Haymitch, who had been fighting as a rebel longer than Peeta had been alive, and wonders if the whole thing happened too late for him. He sits up, shaking the thought away. He really isn't usually such a pessimist. Haymitch fought for Katniss, he dragged her across the finish line. If he still had that fight in him, Peeta ought to, also.
He gets dressed quietly, trying not to wake Katniss if she's still sleeping. But when he creeps down the hall, past her room, he sees her hunched on the side of her bed, obviously awake, but unmoving, as if contemplating something. "Katniss?" he asks, wondering if he can enter.
He and Katniss had been getting along well lately, but today feels especially tense, like they've reverted into the past, to the days just after the war. Katniss doesn't answer and he risks an unusual reaction - her frustration or her chasing him out - but he gets the opposite, the Katniss he almost forgot about, that of the wraith. She is almost unresponsive where she sits, leaning forward, looking at something in her hands.
He steps closer, expecting something of Primrose's, a picture or a small trinket, but he is surprised to see a tight wad of morphling wrapped in plastic. "Where did you get that?" he asks.
He supposes he should ask he she's used any, but he doesn't think she has. He quickly understands what's happening, now that he is looking at her properly. The meditation is over whether or not to use the morphling, the only thing that got her through the first few months. He knew that quitting was hard, he was there while she thrashed in bed, while she vomited and had a sick stomach for weeks, and he knew that after she stopped there was a new loss sitting next to her grief: that longing for the drug.
"Took it from Jo," she says, almost a mumble.
He doesn't know if he's ever seen her steal anything, outside of the arena, and this surprises him, but again, he needs to let the little things go. "What do you want from that?" he asks. He sits on the bed, still a distance from her, but he doesn't want to be standing over her anymore.
He wonders why morphling never appealed to him. Probably because he's afraid of his mind being scrambled now, after the prison. Not having worries sounds nice, but he knows they'll still be there, in reality, and that gap between what he thinks and the truth feels a little too much like the brainwashing he'd already experienced.
She shrugs. "Something else."
"We have something else," he tells her. "We had a whole war to get something else." He knows it stings. It hurts him too. His family is dead because of their efforts, but he has to believe it was worth it.
"Is this really better?" Katniss asks. She's rolling the morphling ball between her fingers, and he can hear the words catch in her throat.
"Yes! It has to be." He imagines his life if there was no rebellion, one of them dead in the Quarter Quell, the other working as a whore in the Capitol. Their families struggling to put food on the table, alive, but feeling the wrath of the Capitol more and more each year. Snow would probably reap Primrose just to be sure District 12 understood that Katniss was not the start of anything. No, the war had to happen, he's accepted this now.
Katniss hands him the ball of morphling and stands, getting dressed. "Come on," she says, "We need to get cover on the primroses to get them through winter."
They go outside in their boots and jackets, and Katniss takes a shovel to their compost pile to add some to the little garden on the side of the house filled with primrose flowers. The flowers have mostly died off this late in the year, but the plants still look hardy, so Peeta finds some downed branches and covers them up with those as well. When they finish, they are fairly wet but not cold, thanks to the effort, and Katniss looks content.
"Should we go to the market district?" Peeta asks.
Katniss nods. "Sure."
Hand in hand, they walk slowly down to the market district. It's flattened now, black and burned out, but there is a growing memorial on the edge, dedications to all the members of the District who were killed in the bombing or elsewhere in the war. His parents are there, and his brothers. He sees his father's picture and pauses, temporarily paralyzed by the unexpected wave of emotion. "We did it," he tells the photo, imagining his father in front of him. "We ended the war. The Capitol has fallen. There are no more Hunger Games, and everyone has enough to eat."
Katniss steps into place beside him and grabs into his hand again. "And you can make the perfect loaf of bread."
It's the first time in a long time that she's even half-joked with him, and that she's complimented his work. He smiles, despite everything.
As they turn to walk further along the memorial, he sees Haymitch approaching. "Happy armistice," he calls out, with the same bittersweet feelings they both seem to be feeling.
Peeta nods back in greeting, and they walk closer. There are a few more people out, despite the rain, coming to pay their respects on the anniversary of the end of the war, so he wants to keep his voice down to let them mourn in peace. "Good morning. Is Jo feeling better?"
He shrugs. Peeta supposes none of them feel particularly good this morning. "We got Enobaria to send along more of the medication, at least."
"And yourself?" Peeta watches the way Haymitch's eyes trail along the memorial. His family is long dead, Peeta knows, but Haymitch is over 40 now. He's had a long time to get to know the people in the District, to have people close to him that Peeta isn't aware of. It's the nature of being a Victor, Peeta knows now. Every friend or lover is a liability, so it's in Haymitch's benefit to act like a loner. But that didn't mean there was truly no one he cared for.
Haymitch shrugs again, taking his time to look over Peeta, then Katniss. He sees Peeta's family in the memorial, Peeta can tell, from the way his face softens a bit. "War's over," he says. "We can drink to that."
They do, in the end, in an odd sort of gathering. Peeta and Katniss stop home to change clothes and get a loaf of bread and some eggs, and walk the short distance to Haymitch's house. Johanna is there, sitting at the table in Haymitch's old sweater, looking much better than last time Peeta saw her, but that wasn't tough to beat.
What is interesting about the scene is that she's got Katniss's mother's old medical book cracked open, her finger to the page, one leg tucked up on the chair as she studies. "Did you find something?" Peeta asks, breaking her concentration.
She closes the book, putting it on top of a pile that he sees now has a couple other books on it as well. She's been studying. She shakes her head, her usual easy smile on her face. Peeta wonders for the first time if this is a product of the Capitol, if he spent more time with Finnick he wouldn't be so alarmed by such a switch every time he sees it. She's been trained to put people at ease, a little voice in his head tells him. She knows she has to perform.
He wants to shake her and tell her that the war is over, that she doesn't have to use that stupid fake smile, that she doesn't have to make sure he's alright, no one will punish her for a misstep. But he remembers her voice in that Capitol prison, trying to keep his mind right. Repeating to him night after night that Katniss was not a mutt, that the Capitol were the ones who were liars, that District 12 was real and he would get to go home to there, and she did put him at ease, at least for moments at a time, so what right does he have to tell her anything now?
"I thought I would try to make myself useful and learn the basics," she says. "I did work at a clinic in 2 for a year, not that I was any good at anything."
Katniss moves closer, and at first Peeta thinks she's regretting leaving the book, and it seems Johanna does too, as she looks up at Katniss with what seems to be a combination of fear and confusion. All of the sharp defiance seems to be drained out of her now after a few days in bed, and she waits for Katniss to move.
But Katniss reaches the spot where Peeta is standing and shoves her hand in his jacket pocket. She pulls out the little bundle of morphling and tosses it back across the table to Johanna. "Sorry, I shouldn't have taken this," she says. She steps back, and then, as if realizing everyone is waiting on her blessing with the book, she turns back to Johanna. "I think I have a journal or two she kept, with her reports about people she treated, if you want those too."
Haymitch had been standing back in the doorway to the kitchen, arranging things for their meal, but he comes forward now, standing behind Johanna. This is new, Peeta thinks. This is a change. In the past, Haymitch would have checked on Katniss, or at least asked her if she was sure about giving such an item away. Perhaps his message that he and Katniss could manage for themselves had finally gotten through.
"Yeah, I'd love to read them," Johanna says. She pockets the morphling without a word, and Katniss takes a seat across. Peeta takes over the cooking, and Haymitch makes them each a drink, a strong cocktail with his moonshine and apple cider.
"Have you ever played ransom?" Johanna asks, once Peeta finishes and they all have a plate.
They shake their heads, even Haymitch, so Peeta realizes this isn't some Capitol game she's bringing up.
"Oh. We used to play it all the time in 7. It's easy, you'll pick it up fast."
The rules are simple, and although Johanna wins the first two rounds, she doesn't win any after that. They continue playing through two more rounds of drinks, long past when all the food is gone, and even Katniss becomes animated. Peeta watches her eyes light up as she gets competitive against Haymitch, leaning across the table to insist "no, you said 3 so you have to stick with your first answer!"
In the end, Haymitch does win, with Katniss behind, and then Peeta and Johanna losing. "It's ok, Peeta," Johanna says. "I taught it to Enobaria, and then she kicked my ass every time. I blame the Capitol for messing with our heads."
It stings a little less than usual, thinking about the torture. Perhaps it's just the drink, but he thinks it's having them all together, having other people who understand what's happened to him and Katniss, to their families, it makes it slightly more bearable. By the time they leave, it's late afternoon, and he feels full and sluggish and a bit hungover. He and Katniss take a walk towards the Seam instead of going straight home, the fresh, cold air feeling nice after such a long time sitting indoors.
"What are you thinking about?" Peeta asks Katniss, after a few minutes of walking in silence.
She looks troubled for a moment, as if figuring out how to say what she wants to say. "I didn't think about them, for a few minutes there, while we were playing," she says. She kicks a stone on the path.
They pass by a row of familiar houses, Gale's and Katniss's old house among them. Katniss looks but doesn't stop, continuing on their way. Other people are living in those houses now. There was no extra space in District 12: they couldn't keep the Everdeen house as a tribute to the Mockingjay. After the war, they needed all the space they could get.
"It's nice to get your mind off of it for a minute," Peeta says. Because it is. If he had to think about his family or that Capitol prison every moment of his life, he would go insane.
"Is it ok?" Katniss asks. She turns to him, distressed. "I forgot. About Prim. About Rue, and Finnick, and Mags, and Boggs and everyone. I just… enjoyed something on the fucking anniversary of the war."
"On the anniversary of peace," he corrects, gently. He pulls her to him, hugging her. He hardly ever initiates contact, careful as he is to not make her uncomfortable, but right now he moves without thinking. "Katniss, you can't punish yourself for the rest of your life just for surviving."
"I just-"
"Prim would have loved that game. She would have been awful at it, but she would have tried very hard."
At this, Katniss cracks a small smile. "Every second I think about what I could have done differently."
"You think I don't? How I could have protected my family. How I could have gotten on that hovercraft to avoid the prison. If there was a way to warn the District about the bombing. Over and over and over."
She pulls away, looking at him, almost as if she's seeing him properly for the first time in how long? Weeks? Months? She gives him a sad smile. "The other two are probably the same way?"
"Oh, of course."
Katniss chews on her thumbnail for a moment, perhaps comforted slightly by the fact that the regret she is feeling is not unique, and then she leans her forehead against his, their faces inches apart. "Thank you," she says. "I know I'm… defective now. So thank you for staying with me."
"Katniss, you're not defective. And this isn't a chore. I want to be here. I mean it."
She kisses him then, gently, just a memory of the passionate kisses they once shared. It tastes like moonshine and her lips are cold from the November air, but it's so nostalgic, so Katniss, that he almost cries. "Let's go home," he says. "I want to make a cake." She smiles at the suggestion.