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Crazy how many people want characters in fiction to speak and act like they’ve had 20 hours of intensive therapy. Could NOT be me I want these bitches fucked up insane

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#thinking about peeta answering katniss's question about his nightmares being only about her to distract and divert her attention from a poss #just enough vulnerability and honesty so she doesn't question him #showing enough appreciation for her being there for him and helping with his nightmares and sleep as well #out not the full honest truth #he's mastered the art of camouflage by hiding in plain sight

this is tooooooo good to leave in the TAGS !!!! the people need to see!!! @caught-inside-pages

I know that in the year of our lord and savior 2025, most of thg tumblr is pro-Peeta, but one thing that irks me is his frequent fandom portrayal as intensely vulnerable or essentially helpless. yes this man wears his heart on his sleeve, but he still tells half-truths about his upbringing and omits things he’d rather not say. He lies and manipulates and twists reality—for the greater good, perhaps—but charisma is his weapon as much as Katniss’s is a bow and arrow. what makes him a good man and such a likable character is his ability to admit weakness, accept help, not be prideful, and to ultimately and endlessly value humanity. sure, he’s patient, but he’s not a doormat. he’s not physically incompetent. he’s not a perfect goody-two-shoes soft boy. he’s a real human being with flaws and a heart bigger than the sea.

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“Katniss is confused, she hesitates for a moment, and that’s all it takes for Peeta’s insecurities to kick in” is exactly their relationship

What do you think Katniss was going to say to Peeta the morning after Gale was whipped when he told her to get some sleep and why do you think Peeta interrupted her?

So this is the passage. It’s right after Katniss wakes up, and soon after, she goes to bed wishing Peeta’s arms were around her—so she’s already starting to waver on her thoughts about Gale from the night before. She’s faltering, and by the next day, she’s already hoping Gale won’t even remember what happened.

A lot of her thoughts during the scene where Gale gets whipped come from guilt. Even the one line about her and Gale being together ties him to the rebellion more than anything romantic. That’s why I think she was probably planning to tell Peeta more practical stuff—like her thoughts on the rebellion and how they can’t just leave everyone behind. Even when she’s at her most romantic with Peeta, Katniss isn’t great at expressing her feelings. So I really doubt she was going to bring up anything romantic with Gale, especially when she’s literally just a few hours away from saying she doesn’t have time for that kind of thing.

I take Peeta’s response as him knowing Katniss really well—but also filling in the blanks wrong because of his own self-esteem issues. During the cellar scene with Gale in Mockingjay, Peeta tells Gale that Katniss pretty much confessed her love for him. But she never actually does anything like that. All Peeta really sees is her sitting by Gale’s bedside, holding his hand—the way you’d do with family.

Peeta might know Katniss well enough to recognize that her spiraling in that moment made her briefly consider a romantic relationship with Gale. However just like Katniss I don’t think he’s looking at it only in terms of teen romance. Earlier he ruefully mentions he doesn’t think Katniss will run away after she mentions Gale would have other plans. Peeta might think Gale has a significantly greater effect on Katniss’s worldview than he actually does, enough for her to change her plans for him. For a boy who’s never seen himself as the first choice, watching someone get prioritized like that looks like love. Especially when the equivalent concern Katniss had for him was with a camera around. He doesn’t know about Katniss’s voice cracking earlier in the day at the prospect of leaving without him. He doesn’t know how much he’s impacted Katniss yet and how he’s canonically the only person whose voice can reach her when no one else’s can.

Whatever the reason, it mirrors what happened at the train tracks: Katniss is confused, she hesitates for a moment, and that’s all it takes for Peeta’s insecurities to kick in. He pulls back, not really wanting to hear the rest. The whipping chapter may be the shippiest chapter for Gale and Katniss, but the chapter after it truly marks how Katniss and Peeta have made it more about their own issues.

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Katniss: I’m not sure how I feel about you except I am willing to die for you and I will try to do so even though you told me not to and I really don’t want to marry you except I resent any implication of other people saying our engagement or love is fake and all things considered it’s a great option for me and also I don’t want to have children except one of the only good dreams I have is one where you are a father and also I’m not sure if I enjoy kissing you but I get mad that you don’t kiss me and when we get to kiss and it’s my idea, it makes me feel all hungry and warm inside and I can’t really handle romance but I think you’re so hot that if the world was different I would be pregnant right now and also I will truly crash out if you’re not around

Peeta: …. Ok! Friends forever!

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"Lucy Gray is the Songbird and Snow is the Snake, so why is Haymitch's--"

No...... There's a Songbird and a Snake in all of us. That was the point of Ballad. Not that Lucy Good Snow Bad. It's Literally just a Two Wolves metaphor. Will you feed the Songbird or the Snake? Snow Chose Snake.

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you know what? it’s clever to have Peeta’s “you love me. real or not real?” come after “so after” because I think that presents a stronger case that he does know, and he’s just wanting to hear her say it, and now she finally can

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Thinking about how much Katniss denied being a good healer I’M SOBBING

Her immediate denial that she “got [her] father’s blood” because that’s a perfect example of the alienation of so many mothers and daughters. Katniss’ relationship with her mother is especially strained, and the way she tries to entire separate herself from her mother even though Peeta is right that she’s better at healing than most is just so reminiscent of how many girls try to avoid seeing themselves in their mother. Accepting that she inherited her mother’s ability to heal means accepting that she has her mother’s blood at all.

She sees her mother as weak because she does not want to envision herself falling into the same illness as her mother did. And that happened anyway because, at the end of the day, they are more similar than they would like to admit.

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Peeta Mellark’s role in the rebellion is often undervalued, cast as the emotional foil to Katniss’s pragmatism or Gale’s radicalism on here. But this view overlooks the strategic depth of his resistance. Peeta’s defiance isn’t loud or violent—it’s rooted in emotional autonomy, which, in a system built on fear and control, is very subversive. From the start, Peeta challenges the Capitol’s values. Giving bread to Katniss at risk of punishment. Confessing his love on television before the Games. Choosing connection over self-preservation in a system designed to strip people down to their most primal instincts. He reframes their story from bloodsport to tragic romance, challenging the entire premise on which The Games operate, that when it comes to survival, people become no better than animals.

But he retains his humanity and exercises emotional autonomy by refusing to play along with what the Capitol expects from every tribute— to fight for their lives while disregarding everything else. In doing so, he forces the Capitol audience to see them as human beings, not just district savages killing each other for entertainment. And if I see anyone undervaluing his contributions or portraying him as dead weight, or as someone whose role in the rebellion was coincidental or anything less than deliberate, I’m going to scream.

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katniss’s first memory of Peeta happens with baby clothes:

She tries to sell the last things she can to survive. When no one buys, she drops Prim’s old clothing in a muddle puddle and leaves them there. She’s too weak to survive, too weak to kneel down and pick them up. She gave up. She was going to let the community home take them— give in to the one thing she had fought so hard to prevent:

Then, Peeta tosses her the bread. She doesn’t tell us if she goes back for the threadbare clothing, she instead runs home to Prim.

He didn’t just save her life, he saved Katniss’s reason to live: preventing Prim from getting taken to the community home.

If we examine this more generally as a metaphor:

Katniss had given up on kids. She dropped the last hope she had about having children in that mud puddle. She spent all day in front of adults, none of whom spared her any food or help. She realized she could not care for herself, never mind a child. The only person who helped her reclaim her position as protector was Peeta.

She was forced to leave the dream of caring for the child behind until Peeta arrived. Until the bread.

So it makes sense he would ask for a child and ensure the safety to care for them in the epilogue. It’s her going back for the baby clothes. Only now, she’s not too weak to pick them back up.

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Of course he asked about the goat! The GOAT. The thing Katniss did for Prim because she loved her and then pretended it was out of pragmatism. How she masks her love in front of others. How she downplays it. And he wonders...he wonders again about those nights on the train. About those kisses in the cave and on the beach. Was it cold, calculated indifference? Or was it a goat?

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something i love about the “if it weren’t for the baby” moment is just how bad peeta feels about it.

because despite the ease at which he lies on the screen, he can’t look into katniss’s eyes. and he comes from the stage with tears falling down his face.

because having children in panem is terrifying nightmare. because while you can have the precious love for your child, the people you love can be taken from you at any time. from the child murder game. or from the horrors at home.

and this is a terror that katniss knows well. so well that she tries so hard to distance herself from love in the first place. and why it is so scary when she ultimately fails.

but this is also a terror that peeta is intimate with. a third child, unwanted by those closest to him. abused for the smallest mistakes. forced to camouflage his true self for preservation.

of course this unwanted, hurt child was terrified of having children.

and yet, just like katniss, it was the logical conclusion for his love. he caring, selfless love.

leaving both of them dreaming about a world without the games. where their children could be safe.

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Katniss in the arena: I could be killed at any time, so it’s important that I stay on high alert

Haymitch in the arena: OOH LOOK AT BUNNY

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I finished my thg (first book) reread, and if this part (and the whole section about Peeta's operation and Katniss screaming and banging the door) doesn't tell you she was already down bad at that point, I don't know what does.

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— Richard Siken, Portrait of Fryderyk in Shifting Light (via letsbelonelytogetherr)

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Joy Sullivan, from “Soup”, Instructions for Traveling West

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Joy Sullivan, from “Culpable”, Instructions for Traveling West