#and why it's barely a love triangle and Peeta were always going to happen | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

katnissdoesnotfollowback · 4 years ago

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132. "I haven't slept for four days." Hope this inspires you :)

No clue how long this has been sitting in my inbox, can’t even remember the prompt list! *shame face* Still, I hope you enjoy the angst I’ve cooked up for you @deinde-prandium. Rated M for brief sexual content and two f-bombs.

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“Have you heard? Peeta Mellark is back in town,” Madge says it all nonchalant as she slings her purse over her shoulder and turns the stroller to leave the park.

Katniss lets her head tip forward, so that some of her hair might hide the pain she knows must be showing on her face.

“Hadn’t heard,” she finally manages to say, although she’s not surprised by the news. She’d been half expecting it since his Dad…

When she stands up straight, her face burns with the look Madge gives her.

“You should go see him.”

“Why?” Katniss snaps and Madge holds up a hand in defense.

“It was just a suggestion.”

“You know why I can’t,” Katniss says. Because he’d never forgive her. She still hasn’t forgiven herself.

“It was a long time ago.”

“Not that long,” Katniss argues. The ink is barely dry on her divorce papers, although the separation felt interminable. And through the whole ordeal, there were days when she’d still wake up reaching for Peeta, on his side of the bed. Even though it hasn’t been his side of the bed in five years.

She bites her lip and looks away from Madge’s knowing gaze. Madge sighs and her daughter starts to fuss.

“Just think about it. All I want is for you to be happy.”

“I am happy,” Katniss contradicts and Madge rolls her eyes.

“Sure.”

She was happy, Katniss tells herself.

“You look so freaking happy,” Madge says sardonically, and if Katniss didn’t love Madge as much as she loves her baby sister, she’d probably snap right then.

Instead, her voice wavers as she says, “I haven’t slept in four days.”

Madge gives her a sympathetic smile and pulls her into a quick hug.

“It’s over now.”

Katniss nods. She knows her friend is right. She knows she needs to stop analyzing what happened and stop blaming herself.

It needed to be over. For real.

But when she gets home, she stares at the half dozen boxes piled by the door, waiting for Gale to come by and pick them up. The last bits and pieces of a failed marriage all contained in those six cardboard boxes. They are a reminder that it might actually not be over, after all. She still has to live and work in the same town as him. His mother still comes into the salon every six weeks for a trim and a touch up on her roots.

And even though Katniss knows he will have to knock, since she’d changed the locks on the house, Katniss barricades herself in her room, figuring two locked doors are more protection than one.

She kicks off her shoes, closes the drapes, and spurred on by Madge’s words, opens the hidden pictures folder on her phone.

And there he is. Peeta.

Smiling and happy. Holding her in a blurry selfie or sixteen. Because he would always kiss her at the last second, just as she was taking the picture. Slowly, Katniss scrolls through the roll, her heart aching with could have been until she happens across a video and stops.

Her finger shakes as she taps the white triangle to start the torment.

“Hold on. I don’t think it took.” Her voice is strange to her, recorded like this.

“You’re so fucking gorgeous.”

“Stop the lines for five seconds, Peeta. I want a picture of us like this.”

“Naughty,” he teased and gave her a light spank.

In the video, they were facing a mirror. She’d been trying to take a picture of the reflection so she could see all of them. Their whole bodies, nearly naked. Clad in only their underwear. His hands massaged her breasts. His face was turned into her neck where he kissed and nuzzled and sucked.

“Peeta.”

“I can’t help it. I’m gonna miss you so much.”

Katniss in the video giggled. He’d been about to leave and there she was giggling and trying to snap a picture. But she had wanted so badly for him to have something sexy to remember her by. So pathetic and cliche.

“They make phones and the internet you know.”

“Did you take it yet? I wanna finger you and watch you come in this mirror.”

Katniss in the video gasped coyly, her face pink and happy. They’d made love not ten minutes before she’d unknowingly taken this video. Her body had still been floating on the orgasm, but just a few words from Peeta and she’d been wet and aching all over again.

Her chest feels like it’s cracking wide open and inconvenient tears start to blur her vision. She swipes them away so she can watch. So she can remember.

Video Peeta’s hands began to roam, his dark blue eyes intent and focused on her in the mirror.

Katniss squirms on her bed, aroused and hurting as she watches the couple on her phone. Fingers gripping into soft blonde curls, her body undulating in his arms, following the touch of his hands as they caressed over her. Quiet sighs of delight and his rough whisper of loving, sensual words. They’d been so in love. So happy.

She hasn’t watched this video in years and the tears will no longer be denied, spilling from her eyes as her body awakens. Remembers everything about his touch and his love, even though she hasn’t felt them for real in so long.

“Did you take your picture yet? What’s taking so long?” Peeta taunted her in the video, his smile teasing and happy as he sucked on her pulse point and she shuddered and moaned.

“Screw the picture,” Katniss in the video said and the image swirls and bounces for a second until the phone landed on the floor at her feet, the camera pointed up. Still recording.

Peeta’s hand slid into her panties and he groaned about how wet she was already while she wiggled her hips and rested one hand on the mirror.

“Touch me, Peeta. Make me come,” video Katniss begged in a sultry whine.

“Fuck yes. You know I will. I love making you come.”

“Oh! I — I —“ video Katniss stammered, her eyes closing and her body plucked to the brink on his capable fingertips.

Katniss pauses the video. She’s breathing hard and the ache in heart covers her entire being now. Tears are drying in her lashes and she takes a few deep breaths.

But then she pushes play again. And watches. The whole thing. All the way to the end. Until both of them are flushed and perspiring, having just orgasmed together, and Peeta is grinning as he turns his face into her neck again, holding her close as he whispers.

“I love you, Katniss.”

************

She didn’t discover the video until after. When she picked her phone up off the floor, still warm and giddy and content from the sex. Then she didn’t tell him about it, thinking maybe she’d send it to him one night when they were missing each other. She wasn’t sure how she’d get it through to him, given the shoddy reception and infrequent calls. Perhaps simply as an attachment on a Skype chat one night. Of course, she’d have to ask him to watch it after they hung up. She wasn’t sure she could handle watching his real time reaction to her basically sending him amateur porn of them.

But she never got the chance.

He’d gone missing six weeks into his deployment. Presumed dead.

Katniss had cried for what felt like months. Maybe it was. There was a black hole in her memory that swallowed everything in the months immediately following Peeta’s disappearance. She does remember obsessively watching that video, just to see his face and hear his voice. Hear him say, “I love you, Katniss.”

Walking down the street now, breathing deep lungfuls of crisp autumn air, Katniss feels it again. The stab of pain, the numb ache. The tears welling. Just like every morning she’d woken up without him.

Nearly a year after Peeta had gone MIA, Gale had come home, contritely carrying a box with the handful of personal things Peeta had taken with him. A framed picture of Katniss. A small sketchbook with a charcoal pencil worn down to a mere nub. The first book they’d read together, a preserved between acrylic dandelion marking the middle of chapter six.

That had caused the tears to flow anew. Because that was the point where he’d stopped playing with her hair and she’d stopped reading aloud, glanced up to look at him and ask why he’d stopped. Only to be met with his lips.

Their first kiss.

The warmth and comfort had been immediate, spreading through her body fast enough to steal her breath away. The exhilaration and desire had been intoxicating. She’d dropped the book and grabbed hold of his hair with both hands so he wouldn’t stop.

Eventually, he did stop. Placed one more kiss on the tip of her nose and smiled at her. As though he’d been expecting exactly that to happen and couldn’t be happier.

But Katniss hadn’t been expecting it.

She hadn’t been ready for how fast and hard she’d fallen for him. How completely he’d come to fill her heart.

Then he was gone.

He was gone and Gale held her while she cried. He’d lost a friend and a fellow soldier too when Peeta disappeared, so Katniss didn’t think anything of it. She and Gale had been friends since they were teenagers. They’d shared so much that this shared grief over Peeta felt right. Katniss knew he was the only one who could possibly understand.

What she didn’t understand, still to this day, was how the grieving and the holding turned to kissing and then to fucking. Then to marriage.

She tries to retrace her steps, walking with her hands shoved in her jacket pockets and the familiar sights of their hometown all around them.

She’s lost within seconds and then she’s standing in front of the bakery. The windows are empty and dark. A For Sale sign making her heart ache.

He’ll be hurting, she knows. Missing his dad.

Maybe hers is the last face he’ll want to see, but hers may be the only one who truly knows what losing his dad will mean to him. The only one who knows everything about what his life was like living in the apartment over the bakery with his mother who could sometimes be too harsh and cruel, with his father who let it happen and made excuses that enabled her to keep going.

With a deep breath, Katniss walks down the alley to the back and climbs the stairs to the door, hesitating for only a second before knocking. Selfishly and cowardly hoping he isn’t home.

But of course, he is.

They stare at one another over the threshold, and the quirk of one eyebrow is all the reaction she gets.

For her part, it takes everything in her to keep her jaw from dropping to the floor.

Gone is the sweet man she once knew. Peeta had always been so wholesome and clean cut. Adorable with his wavy blonde hair and kind blue eyes. The man standing before her looks dangerous. Like he’s been to hell and back a few times and doesn't want to talk about what he had to do to survive.

Katniss isn’t sure that she wants to know what he had to do to survive. They’d gotten word that he’d been found and rescued a week after her and Gale’s wedding, and Katniss had fallen apart. Gale had been understanding at first, then gotten annoyed. Then furious. Jealous, even.

She’d been terrified of what Peeta might think. Terrified of how she had hurt him by moving on and marrying Gale. But it hadn’t mattered. Someone else had told Peeta what happened first, probably one of his brothers, and he hadn’t come home since then. Hadn’t tried to contact either her or Gale. There was no other reason for his silence upon his return. She had no idea where he’d been living or what he’d been doing in the past two years. She couldn’t bear to find out.

He’d gotten tattoos and let his hair grow out, she thought now. That’s what he’d been doing. She didn’t let herself even consider the possibility that he might’ve found someone else. Fallen in love. She knew she had no right to the bitter jealousy coating her throat at the very thought of him in someone else’s arms. But she felt it anyways.

He was now a stranger to her, with hard eyes and his mouth set in a hard line and his jaw stubbled with a day or two of growth, clenched even harder. Scars twisted around his neck and beneath his ears. A thick line of scarring had been seared into his left cheek. Oh God, Katniss thought and nearly became sick. Had they tortured him?

This strange man before her was more viking than boy next door… and Katniss found that she didn’t care. Somewhere inside this hard shell of man was the boy she once knew and loved. Somewhere behind all the hurt and the pain was his shy sweet smile that always made her feel warm all over. Somewhere under that hard stare was the softest, most loving and understanding gaze Katniss had ever known. And that jaw… she knew just how to kiss and lick along it to make him relax and then tremble with need.

She hasn’t forgotten a thing about him. No one could make her forget.

The longing swells inside her heart until it eclipses everything else. The guilt, the fear. Because maybe, maybe, what they once had between them doesn’t have to be gone just yet. She’s not exactly the girl in that video anymore either, after all.

“Peeta. You’re home,” she says and steps towards him, already wrapping her arms around his neck. He hesitates for a moment and then slowly, his arms slide around her. Perhaps not as steady as they had been, but still strong and warm. She chokes back a sob and turns her face into his neck, where she knows she’ll be able to pick up his scent.

“I can’t... can’t quite believe he’s gone yet,” Peeta whispers, his voice rough and gravelly, although she easily recognizes it as his. “And now you’re here…”

Katniss tightens her hold on him, her arms stiff but her body limp against his as they hold one another.

#words are peetas thing not mine #smut happens #sort of #sprinkles liberal amounts of aaaaaaangst #and then retreats back into working on spellbound #deinde-prandium #look at that ask

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talesofpanem · 5 years ago

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Waves

Author: @xerxia31

Rating: M

Summary: A visit to District 4 provides the perfect setting for Katniss and Peeta.

___________

It takes years to convince them. Katniss always has an excuse; her confinement to District 12 hasn’t been lifted, she’s worried how Peeta might react to the long train ride, they can’t leave Haymitch alone for so long. But Annie wears them down with her letters and phone calls and not-so-subtle guilt trips about how fast little Finny is growing.

So in the fall, when District Four’s oppressive heat tempers into something a little more tolerable, Katniss and Peeta find themselves boarding a train far less comfortable than the old tribute trains had been, for a three-day ride.

And Katniss’s concerns were for nothing because Peeta finds he loves the train, the scenery that rushes by, familiar and untainted by the Capitol. He loves the narrow bunk they squeeze into, the way they’re forced to sleep spooned together, his cock nestled against the firm swell of her ass. And he especially loves how the constant clack-clack-clack of the rails muffles the sounds of Katniss’s pleasure as they make use of that tiny bed, the sway of the train only enhancing their lovemaking every night and each morning too. He’s almost sad when the train finally arrives at their destination.

But only until he actually sees the district. Only until they’re standing outside Annie’s weather-beaten little shack just steps from the beach.

They’d stopped in District Four during the victory tour, had danced at the justice building there, seen a glimpse of blue water stretching to the horizon from a car window. But being here by choice is completely different.

He loves it.

They’ve barely dropped their bags in Annie’s spare bedroom when little Finny is dragging Peeta to the beach. Katniss and Annie laughingly tell him they’ll follow, once they’ve changed themselves.

Peeta is awestruck by the beach in District Four. He loves the crash of the waves and the screams of the seabirds. He loves the wide blue sky that reaches down to kiss the equally blue water, a thousand different shades melding together. He loves chasing Finnick and Annie’s young son up and down the white sand, stopping to collect seashells and coloured bits of glass along the shore, tucking each treasure safely into a bucket.

When Finny coaxes him into the water, he finds he loves floating in the undulating sea while the youngster swims laps around him, loves the warm, clear water so different from the lake back home. He even loves the salty sting of it against his sunburnt lips.

And he really loves the swimsuit that Katniss is wearing when finally she emerges from Annie’s place. He’s seen her in less, it’s true. Five years married, he’s seen every inch of her olive skin, kissed the firm swells and mottled scars, catalogued every freckle and dimple. But strutting down the boardwalk in two tiny pieces of sunshine yellow fabric moulded to her curves like a second skin, she’s a goddess.

They spend the day in the sun, swimming and sunbathing, flirting and stealing kisses. As evening falls, they sit on a blanket, eating their fill of briny shellfish and spicy dipping sauce. Katniss traces the new freckles that dot his shoulders and nose, smiling contentedly.

Finny’s chatter wanes, his eyes glassy and hooded. Annie takes her tired boy back to the cottage, leaving Katniss and Peeta alone on the blanket, to watch the last of the sunset paint the waves in muted orange and gold. Their part of the beach is deserted, sheltered from the more public areas by a wharf that paints shadow patterns against the darkening sand. “It’s so beautiful here,” Peeta almost sighs.

“It is,” she agrees, but there is something guarded in her voice, and he turns to face her, his brows lifted curiously.

“You sound less sure,” he says, a smile in his voice but worry in his heart. He knows that the largest part of the reason they’re here is because he wanted it, that Katniss would have been happy staying in District 12.

She shakes her head, not quite meeting his eyes. “I guess I’m just tired,” she deflects.

Peeta gazes at his wife, bathed in the sunset. Her hair is loose, the breeze blowing saltwater-waved tendrils around her face. The dying sun gilds her, sets her hair and eyes alight. She’s more radiant than the sun. “Not too tired, I hope,” he teases. She’s still in that nearly indecent scrap of swimsuit, and he’s been hard all day.

At her coquettish smile, he advances. He loves kissing Katniss, the way her lips soften and part beneath his own, the low sounds she makes in her throat. It’s gentle and loving, at first. But then her hands twist in his hair, tugging the way she knows is his undoing and he groans.

Without breaking the kiss he pulls her into his lap, straddling him, freeing his hands to rove over her bare skin, to trace the goosebumps that erupt under his fingers, to palm the twin swells of her ass, perfect fistfuls. He thrusts his hips upward, grinding his hard cock against her, only two thin bits of fabric separating him from her heat. She gasps, her head tipping back, the elegant column of her throat an irresistible temptation. His mouth waters, and he wastes no time, her skin salty under his tongue.

She shivers. “Let’s go back,” she murmurs, but he shakes his head, speaking into her throat.

“Too far.” Plus Annie will want to chat, and the walls in her cottage are paper thin. “I need you.”

She tenses in his lap. “Here?” There’s something in her voice that catches Peeta’s attention, cuts through his lust-haze. He expected her to demur, to object half-heartedly. It’s what she always does when they make love by the lake or in the woods around 12, protests that someone might see them. But that’s not what’s happening now. This is something beyond her typical inhibitions.

“Katniss?” he whispers, heart stuttering, doubt creeping in, the dark part of his brain arising.

The memory hits him so hard and fast he can’t brace for it. Another time, another moonlit beach, wet sand beneath him, Katniss in his lap. Lulling him into a false sense of security with kisses, before she can rip his throat out. The mutt. The murdering, stinking mutt.

“Not real,” the mutt is saying, holding his face. “Not real, not real.”

It’s over nearly as fast as it started, the distorted vision fading away like mist until he’s back on the beach in Four, shaking and panting. Katniss is still on his lap, cradling his head against her chest, singing softly under her breath. He wraps his arms around her waist, squeezing her tight, inhaling her natural soothing scent under the chemical sweetness of sun lotion.

“Were you on the beach in the arena?” she asks gently, and he realizes that’s why she was so reluctant to make out here. She knew it was too much like the games, was afraid it would trigger a flashback. And she was right.

“Yeah,” he rasps. “I’m sorry.” Katniss shakes her head, and he knows she doesn’t need his apology. They’re past blaming each other for the things that happened to them during the games and the war.

In the safety of her arms, Peeta tentatively unpacks the old memory, tries to work past the shiny edges to the truth beneath. Over the past five years, he’s gotten pretty good at it. He’s seen videos from the games, over and over in therapy sessions, trying to rewrite the distorted versions that the Capitol had fed to him in his hijacked state. But his own memories, those are more tenuous, more difficult to see clearly. He can see her in his mind’s eye, younger but just as beautiful. Silver eyes shining in the moonlight, burning with passion. “You wanted me then,” he murmurs. “Real or not real?” He doesn’t ask very often anymore, doesn’t need to, but it’s a safety net, a warning that they’re looking back on things he’s unsure about or things she might still carry guilt for. But she smiles at him, one slender finger tracing his bottom lip.

“So real,” she says, her eyes shining just like in his memory, the one he knows is true. “Kissing you on that beach stirred up feelings I’d never experienced.” She sighs, her body relaxing, fingers twining in his curls. “If the lightning hadn’t hit the tree…” she trails off on a groan, lost in the memory. He can’t resist kissing her, and the passion with which she responds surprises him, so soon after he’d lost it and she’d had to talk him down. She starts to rock above him again, grinding against his erection which had deflated a little in his fear and confusion, but which rages back to aching hardness at the feeling of her body moving against his own.

“Let me take you back to the cottage,” he says, barely getting the words out around her insistent mouth. He shifts, intending to stand with her in his arms, but she shakes her head, catching his face in her hands, holding his gaze with heavy lidded eyes that burn with passion.

“No,” she says. “Here. Now. I want to replace that old memory with a new one. A better one.” He searches her face, looking for any sign that she’s kidding, or worse, that she’s only saying it out of pity. But her expression is open and eager, her cheeks and chest flushed with arousal, her nipples hard and straining against the tiny triangles that hold her breasts aloft.

He’s helpless to deny her.

Katniss kisses him again, and he slides a hand between them, teasing the edge of her bottoms for just a moment before plunging in to cup her. “You’re already so wet,” he moans.

She laughs breathlessly. “You’ve been half naked all day, running down the beach like one of those guys from Plutarch’s show.” She gasps when his thick fingers delve deeper. “It was torture.”

Katniss is seldom the aggressor in their lovemaking, he’d called her pure once, long ago, but shy is perhaps a better description. Not today.

Today she pushes aside one of the cups of her swim top, and guides Peeta to feast on her small breast, moaning just a little too loudly as he suckles hard on the turgid peak, steadily fingering her all the while. She rides his hand and whimpers his name, he smiles against her breast. There are few things Peeta loves as much as his wife calling out his name in pleasure. Nothing so solidly convinces him that she wants him, and no one else.

She slides a hand between them, gripping him over his trunks and he nearly chokes. But the angle is awkward with their arms pinned between them. He moves to lay her back on the blanket, but she shakes her head. “Stay where you are,” she whispers, pushing his arms to his sides..

He’s amused, but does as she asks, leaning back a bit on his palms. She shimmies his trunks down just enough to pull his cock free, throbbing and aching, a pearly drop of precum already beading at the tip. Her thumb spreading the wetness down his shaft makes him shudder, arching in helpless ecstasy.

She strokes him steadily, knows exactly what he likes. Her hand, her soft noises of pleasure and the visual of Katniss rumpled and flushed, squirming on his lap with her tits swaying slightly is nearly enough to push him over the edge. He groans her name in warning, then groans again when she stops.

The look of pure mischief she flashes makes his dick jump. Then she’s taking him in hand again and shifting aside her tiny bottoms. Her wetness envelopes him, scalds him with pleasure as she sinks onto his shaft, and he howls.

She’s so tight in this position that she has to wiggle and shift to work the whole length of his cock inside, he gasps and grunts with each slick slide.

Once her body is finally flush with his she pauses just long enough to kiss him hard. Then she’s riding him, strong thighs flexing, her pussy gripping every inch, her head flung back.

It’s so hot and so unexpected that he barely hangs on. They are technically in a public place, though he hasn’t seen any sign of another person in hours. He’s even not shielding her body with his own. The knowledge that they could get caught, that someone might see his gorgeous Katniss riding his cock with wild abandon, it’s a fantasy come to life.

“Peeta, Peeta,” she begs, and he can feel the first flutters of her impending orgasm. He brings his thumb to his mouth, moistening it and making sure it’s sand free. Then he slips it between their bodies, strumming her clit.

She comes like a lightning bolt, wailing her release. Her pussy grips him like a velvet fist and that’s all it takes to make him lose control. He levers his hips up, fucking her with several hard thrusts, then stills and erupts.

Peeta collapses back on the blanket, Katniss sprawled across his chest, panting and trembling with aftershocks. He wraps her snugly in his arms, pressing kisses to her hair, loving her. She’s practically purring, and he’s filled with contentment.

Waves lap at the shore, the sound soothing and hypnotic. Peeta would be happy to lie here all night, but Katniss is shivering in the night breeze. He rolls them over, slipping from her body with a groan.

His wife lounges bonelessly, watching him with soft eyes and a languid smile as he rights her bikini, kisses that ticklish spot by her belly button. “That night,” she says, her voice dreamy. “I dreamed of this. Of a world in the future with no Capitol and no games. Where we could be together. Where we could be free.”

He’d hadn’t dreamed it, not then, not like that. On a beach far away, in a different time, he had only wanted to give her a chance at that life. He was certain he’d have no part of it. As if reading his mind, she reaches for him, tugging him back down, his warmth covering her cool skin. She wraps her arms around his back, kisses his jaw. “I only wanted this life with you,” she whispers in his ear.

She’d said something similar on that other beach, and he hadn’t believed it, not really.

He did now.

His memory of that time is steeped in uncertainty and melancholy. But that time is gone. Now he has a life beyond his wildest dreams. A bright and happy home in a peaceful district. Friends old and new. And Katniss, who really does need him, just like he needs her.

Peeta kisses her again, slow and deep. “Let’s make more beach memories,” she says, wrapping her calves around his waist. And he laughs.

A lifetime of new memories to replace the bad.

A lifetime with Katniss.

He can hardly wait.

#tales of panem #talesofpanem #week 7 #waves #xerxia31 #submission

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approximately12screamingcats · 6 years ago

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the hunger games re-read part 1

so the first time i read the hunger games i was...10? 11? somewhere in there. the last time i read them (before now) i was probably 13. i decided about a week or two ago i wanted to read them again, because it had been awhile and i knew i would get more and different things out of them now than then.

i just finished the first book, and i wanna share some of my thoughts, contrasting them to old ones and giving new ones

under the cut because it’s gonna be real long

katniss

i’d say the biggest difference in my last times reading these and now is my opinion on katniss. when i was younger i had the easy opinion that she was boring and annoyingly emotionless. but honestly that’s really not true, and i think it was in part influenced by her portrayal in the movies, which i always thought was good enough but could’ve been better, and i’d go so far to say now that her casting wasn’t great. but also, a movie in third person is very different from a book in first.

but really what i found, katniss is not emotionless, and she’s not boring. no, she’s still not what i would consider a favorite character of mine, i don’t love her, she’s not exactly my type of character that i love. but she’s interesting, and already a fascinating example of what hardship can do to a person. emotionless was such a wild impression to have of her, but i know i wasn’t the only one that thought that. i can say i definitely do not think that now.

she clearly says near the beginning of the book that she’s learned and taught herself to appear emotionless, so that she doesn’t betray her true feelings about the capitol and endanger herself or her family. but she isn’t emotionless at all. she feels very deeply, whether it’s ones she can identify like her love for prim, or ones she can’t, like her (growing) love for peeta.

the most marked thing about katniss is how her entire life has been driven by this need to survive. it encompasses everything she does, everything she has always done, and overshadows almost everything else. since she was eleven years old, she’s had to provide daily for her family, constantly watching out for starvation and arrest and death by wild animals. it’s no surprise she has no idea how to feel about things outside of that. she even says after the games she doesn’t know who she is when she doesn’t have to fight for food every day anymore. i haven’t gotten there yet, but i think that same theme comes back in the beginning of catching fire. her identity has been wrapped in this survival mode, and it’s twisted her into this person that has had to suppress any and all wants of things that could interfere with surviving. she’s not emotionless, she just quite literally has not had the time or energy to think about anything else and how to process it.

the romance

there’s a lot of opinions surrounding this romance. frankly, at the simplest levels, it’s part of the plot. the star crossed lovers of district 12. but yeah, of course there’s more than that. this is a little hard for me to evaluate without bringing up the other books, but tbh i’ll say what i think now with this one fresh in my mind and the others more distant, and see if it changes after catching fire and mockingjay.

anyway, since addressing the love triangle is unavoidable, i have always liked peeta and katniss as a couple more than gale and katniss. originally, i think at least 50% of why was simply because i liked peeta and i didn’t like gale. interestingly, that opinion still holds solid, but that’s not really why i like katniss and peeta better anymore.

katniss, already in book one, is not ambivalent to peeta and she certainly does not dislike him. honestly, i used to think it wasn’t until someway through catching fire that she began to really love him (romantically). but this read through made me realize she is already starting to in this book. it’s under the surface, and definitely doesn’t take hold until catching fire, but it’s there. their connection is emphasized and shown multiple times even before they get into the games. so many times it’s made apparent that she at least cares about him, but i’d say there’s beginnings for more than that.

the unfortunate thing is that being pushed into the whole love story thing for survival, and in front of everyone, is a really terrible environment for someone who barely understands her own emotions to be processing new ones. she’s worried about him dying, she’s incredibly hurt when she thinks he betrayed her for the careers (betrayal is a very strong word for her to choose here too, when she’s been pondering this whole time how one of them has to die). she very evidently wants him to live when she finds him by the stream. frankly, he was already dying, if she really didn’t care about him, she could have easily let him die without it even looking suspect to the audience. she’s not great at medical, which is shown a lot.

and i mean, how many times does she say she can’t bear the idea of being without him? of him dying? yes, usually these are either quick thoughts in a tense moment, or fraught with confusion or other musings, or paired in direct contrast with gale, but they’re there. she worries about it a lot. at the very end, when peeta realizes “it was all a sham for the audience” she even says she’s not sure if it was only fake, and that she misses him already.

to an extent, there’s bonding from trauma here, but i don’t think that’s an invalid manner of bonding? and it’s not just in and after the games that this shows either. it’s there a little bit from the start. she just has to get to know him.

i need to restrain myself from diving too deep into what’s coming here, but i’ll say this: as the books go on, obviously a lot more happens, but i really think one massive block in the way of katniss admitting to falling in love with peeta is the fact that it’s so blatant and open in front of the capitol. katniss hates the capitol, as does most everyone in the districts. but having her whole life on display like that, forcing her out of a decision, doesn’t mean she doesn’t love him, but it is very easy to see how that would make someone (especially a private person) want to withdraw away from that relationship. and katniss, having such a difficult time with her own emotions anyway since her live has been all about survival, doesn’t need that extra barrier on everything to muddle up her emotions and make it harder for her to tell what’s real or not real (lmao).

as for gale, cause i know some people think she clearly loves him, i can get into that more as i get back into the other two books. but from this one so far, and what i remember, a lot of the gale vs peeta stuff isn’t so much about a straight up romance love triangle, but more about what katniss’ life is vs what she wishes it could be. katniss presents herself as a cold and hard person, but she really isn’t like that. she loves soft things, she wants to live in peace, she loves rue and prim and got excited about giving a goat to her sister that she splurged on a ribbon for it. she sang with her father and only stopped when he died. she says she could never admit to her mother how much she needs her gentle touch. the life katniss is living, silent and stoic and always fighting in the woods, is not what she wants. gale, her friend that she definitely genuinely loves (platonically), is parallel to her life. the hunter, full of rage against the capitol, symbol to everything she’s known out of necessity, not want. peeta is calmer, gentler, a symbol to the life she wishes she could have. that’s why they eventually settle down in the epilogue. gale was never the romantic partner katniss needed.

but ive gone far past book one and i’ll get back into these analysis later when catching fire and mockingjay and the epilogue are fresher in my mind.

the rebellion

when i first read these books, my favorite parts were the action and peeta. but man. reading this through now, the story of this rebellion and the rising of people for their justice just screams through the page. and im not even to catching fire yet. it hit me when district 12 raised the salute to katniss, but it hit me even harder when rue died and when cato died. i mean...rue’s death. how katniss covers her in flowers. sings for the first time. drawing to light the utter inhumanity of what the capitol puts children through. but this part got to me specifically:

“I can’t stop looking at Rue, smaller than ever, a baby animal curled up in a nest of netting. I can’t bring myself to leave her like this. Past harm, but seeming utterly defenseless. To hate the boy from District 1, who also appears so vulnerable in death, seems inadequate. It’s the Capitol I hate, for doing this to all of us.”

i can almost hear the lament in that line, “it’s the capitol i hate, for doing this to all of us.” because that’s the truth. they throw up this show, driving them to competition, to hatred, but in the end, even the careers are victims of the capitol.

cato’s death too, for so many of the same reasons. i mean, it’s hard to read this and not feel outright repulsion at what hell the capitol is putting on these people. making the mutts, making them look like the tributes, and then the sheer agony of cato being eaten alive. when katniss and peeta decide to kill him, to relieve him of his misery, it again reveals the truth of things, behind the fancy gold curtain the capitol tries to put up in front of the games.

“It takes a few moments to find Cato in the dim light, in the blood. Then the raw hunk of meat that used to be my enemy makes a sound, and I know where his mouth is. And I think the word he’s trying to say is please.

Pity, not vengeance, sends my arrow flying into his skull.”

these parts are the first set up we get for what happens later. the games are awful enough, but seeing them so raw and unhindered, from the first hand account, you can’t look away.

i don’t know. i can’t put it into words yet, but it moves me immensely. just the story of a people oppressed for so long, revealing the horror and setting themselves free.

other small observations

i kinda wish i had read these books again when i was 16. because 16 sounded so old when i was 10-13, but now it seems young. i would have liked to read it knowing i was the same age as katniss, picturing how that really would be.

i also forgot cinna was not literally lenny kravitz.

i have not read a book this fast for recreation in years, and im LIVING.

#m #the hunger games #thg #thg reread #katniss everdeen #peeta mellark #gale hawthorne

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peetabreadgirl · 8 years ago

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Writer’s Block 4.1

So I’m taking a different approach to finishing this story. Instead of writing a monster chapter, it’s easier for me to do chunks of it at the moment. I’ll post every 2000 words here, and when it’s complete I’ll post it as one continuous chapter on the archives. Just seems easier for me. Hope you like this one! 4.2 isn’t far behind… Let me know what you think!

What the fuck am I reading? I toss the book aside and try to forget about the alien species commingling with human women as they take over the world with their disappearing magic lube, never-ending sexual appetite and nanocytes that heal the bruises they leave behind from their love-making. If it can be called that.

None of that garbage is going to help me write the next scene. The scene. The one I have zero experience with. Every time I sit down to write it I get nervous and edgy. But I need something written down that at least Peeta can make changes to. He won’t be much help to me this week since he’s busy finishing up an art project that’s due at the same time. I told him not to worry, that I would wrap things up on this end so he could focus elsewhere.

I was relieved at first, but now I’m just stuck and the more time that passes with no new words appearing in the doc, the more I wish I had his insight. And not just professionally. I want the knowledge of what it is I’m supposed to be writing poured into me from his hands and his lips.

I think about the last time we worked on the project almost five days ago. He’d promised we would take things slow and my insides had done a happy, albeit nervous, jig. He’d eradicated any hatred I’d felt for him that day, which must not have been much when I think about how easily he’s rooted himself inside me. Made me look forward to his help when I’ve always worked alone. Since then we’ve only seen each other in class. And damn it if I haven’t laid awake every night wondering when it’s going to happen.

It cost me fifty bucks I really didn’t have, but I was able to get my computer fixed at the tech lab on campus, so we don’t need to share a computer anymore. Peeta emails me every night to check in on how the story is going and asks how my day was. I answer with the mundane details of class and work, wishing I were more vibrant and interesting, and fudge a little about Julia’s and Adam’s progress, then wait for a reply. It always comes within a few minutes.

Thinking about it, I open my computer and log into gmail. Nothing yet, but he’s probably not finished with his day. I don’t normally hear from him until close to 10:00 PM, and it’s only 8:45. I know what I need to do, so I take a deep breath and prepare to be honest with him about the story. About how I’m struggling and could use his help, but I don’t want to take him away from his art project. When I’m done, I read over it, delete parts, add more, edit, edit, edit. A writer’s life for me, I guess. I can’t even put together a simple email until it’s been beta’d like it’s being published in the New York Times. I glance at the clock. 9:30. It’s taken me 45 minutes to relay my honesty to my partner.

I don’t let myself obsess over it anymore and hastily click ‘send’, the swooshing sound ringing in my ears and setting my nerves off. I tell myself it’s fine. We both want an A and Peeta knows I’m limited in this area. If he can help, I don’t doubt he will.

I’m filling in all the unsexy parts of the story when I receive his reply.

Katniss,

I’ll be done in an hour. I can swing by your place and we can talk about it?

Peeta

I reply quickly with ‘see you soon’ and where he can find my room, then set about tidying the space. It doesn’t take long since it’s so small, just a studio with a kitchenette and a tiny bathroom, but I don’t have to share it with a roommate. When I’m done I sit on my daybed that doubles as my couch and rearrange the order of the pillows a few times, checking which formation looks the fullest.

I brush my teeth and change into fresh clothes since I’ve been wearing the same ones all day. Black yoga pants and a loose, t-back midriff seem to say that I’m comfortable and confident even though I feel nothing of the sort. I go with it, ignoring the hesitancy blooming over the sliver of toned stomach I’m showing and my bare shoulders and arms. I tug on the hem, but that provides an easy view of my cleavage and I suddenly feel self-conscious. Maybe this isn’t such a good idea. A long sleeved turtleneck that covers my butt might be better in such a confined space with a hot guy who makes my stomach flutter.

I’m about to whip it over my head when the knock comes at my door. I freeze, panicked and glance at the clock. 10:42. He’s early. No time to change now. I take one last look in the mirror and cringe at the messy braid I forgot to fix, so I take out the band and run my fingers quickly through the dark strands in an effort to make it presentable, then stand in front of the door with my hand on the knob and count to three.

The door swings open and Peeta stands on the other side. My breath whooshes out of my chest at how adorable he looks. Tousled hair, backpack slung over one shoulder, a grin in place that’s warm and curious. His eyes seem tired, though.

“Hey,” he greets me, and I remember I should invite him in. I step aside, widening the door and he crosses into the room, setting his bag down next to my desk. He turns and I see his gaze sweep over me quickly.

“Thanks for coming, Peeta. I know you’re busy with other things.”

“I’m a little tired.” He admits what I already detected as one of his hands reaches for the back of his neck. “But I’ve been waiting for an excuse to see you.”

My cheeks heat up at his sweet words. I want to tell him he doesn’t need an excuse, he can come over any time, but I don’t. I confessed more to him a few days ago than I have to anyone, ever. I’m confessed out at this point. Instead, I grab a pen and my notepad, because sometimes I just need to hand write my ideas, and plop down on the couch, trying hard not to think of it as a bed. Also, if he kisses me tonight I don’t care if pen and paper fall to the floor. Hell, I could chuck them across the room if I feel like it.

“Ready?”

“Um, sure,” he says hesitantly as his arm falls to his side. I know I probably made a mistake by not acknowledging his kind words, but it’s just so hard for me to say things out loud that bare my feelings. Writing is always safest.

The bed - couch! - dips next to me when he sits. He’s quiet, waiting for me I suppose.

“I think we should outline the scene exactly, so I’ll know how to proceed. Things like,” I pause, deciding how best to say what needs to be said. Why did I agree to this? My heart is beating so fast it feels like it’s about to pass the speed of sound.

“It’s okay. You can say whatever it is.” His encouragement is soft, sweet. But I still find it hard to give voice to such sexual thoughts.

“Um, things like… where they are exactly, and maybe h-hand placement. Kissing, foreplay, body alignment. Those types of things that I’m not… really…” My mouth feels like a drought has taken up residence there, and I swallow to try and regain some moisture.

His hand on mine stops my frantic doodling. Something I didn’t even realize I was doing.

“You don’t have to say anymore. I get it.” He takes my hand and sets it on his thigh. I watch as he runs his fingers back and forth between mine tenderly. It’s soothing and arousing all at once. “I know this is hard for you, Katniss, and I’m here for you, and for this project. You can trust me, okay?”

I blink and look up at him briefly. He’s so pretty. And charming. And so, so believable. I nod my head and remove my hand from his, hating every second afterwards that we’re not touching. Pen poised, I look at him for guidance.

“Okay, well, let’s think about this. People don’t generally start out with sex. There’s a lead up. Where are they right now?”

“In the car,” I answer.

“Coming from?”

“Work.”

“Have they done anything besides work related things?” he asks.

“What do you mean?” I cock my head to the side slightly and tap my pen on the pad.

“Like, have they gone on a date or spent time together in a non-work environment,” he explains.

I shake my head and mumble something about adding that to the parts of life I know nothing about.

“You’ve never been on a date?” he asks in disbelief. I sigh, knowing that when I look at him I’ll see the tone of his question reflected in his pretty blue eyes. Eyes I’d rather not find pity in. Our gazes connect and it’s there. It bothers me.

“Is it that hard to believe?” I ask with minor annoyance. More at myself for revealing yet another right of passage I’m apparently missing out on than with Peeta.

“Well, yeah, but not for the reason you’re thinking. I just can’t see no guy ever asking you out. Katniss, you have no idea.” He shakes his head slowly, like he’s willing me to understand. But I don’t and I’m too embarrassed to continue this part of the conversation.

“Can we just talk about the outline please?” I ask quietly as I doodle a triangle in the corner of my notepad and fill it in.

He rubs his palms over this thighs distractedly, but I can feel his eyes on me. It seems like he wants to say more but, thankfully, he doesn’t. “Okay. Yeah, so let’s, uh, send them on a date. Someplace nice. Adam is trying to show her he really doesn’t hate her, so he would put some effort into it. Low lighting, ambience, table for two in the corner…”

I write down everything he’s just said and when I’m finished I glance up, glad we’re moving on. “Next?”

“He should drive her home after that, and she can ask him to come inside. That’s kind of how a guy knows his date might want some intimacy.” I stare at him as he explains further. “Something more than a goodnight kiss under the porchlight.”

Invites him inside, I write before waiting for more instruction.

“She can offer him wine or a beer. That might help relax the situation if one of them is nervous.” It definitely would, I think, remembering how quickly my inhibitions had flown out the window the first time we kissed. My cheeks flame and I don’t look back up.

“They sit on the be-couch?” I offer, inwardly scolding myself that I almost said bed. I see Peeta shrug through my peripheral.

“Sure, if you want things to start there, but they’d probably move to the bedroom at some point.”

“She lives in a studio. Kind of like this place,” I tell him, waving my arm around. He knows I’ve basically formed Julia’s character from my own life, so this admission doesn’t take any skin off my nose.

“Right,” he says right before he yawns. I feel terrible. He’s obviously been running on little sleep and now he’s here, helping me when he should be in bed.

“Do you want some coffee?” I ask him, nodding to the single cup, hand-me-down machine I keep on my desk, stifling my own yawn. He’s contagious.

“No, thanks,” he says sleepily, curling up behind me on the… couch. His arm slips around my waist and he pulls me down with him, my back against his chest. “Let’s just take a quick nap and then we’ll finish up, k?”

I lay there for a minute, trying to figure out what I should do, but before I can answer or move I hear his breathing even out, soft puffs of air on the back of my neck. Even if I weren’t sleepy and we didn’t have a deadline fast approaching for this project, I don’t think I could move away from the warmth and comfort I feel with his body wrapped around mine. It’s been too long since someone has held me, and never in the way Peeta is now.

I take a deep breath and blow it out, my body relaxing further into him, giving in to his wish. He’s right. A nap is a perfect idea.

#writer's block #4.1 #peetabreadgirl #everlark #katniss and peeta #bed sharing

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