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loungemermaid · 1 year

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Posting the newest chapter of The Loneliest Time because of the whole ao3 thing

Chapter Five: Fade Into You

Word count 3k, rated teen for dumb Katniss pining

Katniss pov

We are living together. There is (slightly) more touching. There is no sex. Nothing even really close to it, not since our deep kissing in the woods the other day. He keeps me quite literally at arms length. I may be wrapped in his arms or sprawled across his chest when we settle down for bed but by the time morning, lilac bright, streams in, he’s halfway across this absolute ocean of bed. Laying on his stomach, or back to me.

Maybe I’ve misunderstood, misinterpreted him. Maybe he’s less um, physical, that way. Maybe we will never have sex. Which is fine. It’s just unexpected. Kisses he takes and gives freely. His arms are never too far away, if I need to be tangled up in them. He sweeps me up and sets me on his lap often, but if my hands start to roam or linger, he catches them and holds them to his chest. His own (big, strong, delicate) hands are never not firmly on my arms or my waist, as far away from my breasts or my hips as he can get. Maybe he’s just as uneasy with all these things as I am. I appreciate the space but I. I notice other couples. I notice other mens’ hands, caresses, shrieked giggles from other women. I remember things my parents did. I want that. And I might be very sad if it isn’t ever like that.

I take to writing all my desires in a notebook. When he asks I tell him it’s journaling. Private. Things about the Games, things that haunt me in dreams. Which is not altogether untrue. His chest, the tiny flashes of hip, his thighs do haunt my dreams. They too send a thrill down my spine. Just for entirely different reasons. Mmm. The broad expanse of his back.

There are other things I imagine. Things I have to create out of wholecloth, because I’ve never seen them. Peeta’s coloring is all in one theme; dawn. He is all white puffy clouds, golden beams of light, dusty pink, lilac. I wonder if the theme continues. If he’s rosy anywhere else other than his lips. If his heavy golden curls, bright as breaking light, blanket him anywhere else. The hair so thin on his arms and legs, and he’s never not wearing a shirt. I wonder how much is on his chest, if any. I don’t remember any in the Arena, but that’s been months. And Peeta’s grown since then.

He is impossibly more broad. The line of his jaw is sharper, his arms wider, his shoulders more square. I say impossible for two reasons. One: we have not been doing any exercise. Our walk the other day, our failed attempt at a picnic, has been the closest we’ve gotten. Unless he’s leaving the house and hauling bags of flour without telling me. Since he still needs his cane sometimes to balance, I doubt it. Not that he wouldn’t have the strength to, just not the footing.

The other reason is he’s still only sixteen. I don’t know when his birthday is (when I asked he only replied in summer, so I suppose I missed it this year) but it’s a young sixteen. I’m wracking my brain to remember if Rye or Soren were this big at his age, but I wasn’t particularly interested in the other Mellarks, so I don’t have either one of them memorized the way I have Peeta. Gale is still taller, but much thinner built. Up and down, as they say. Straight up and down. Peeta is shorter but he already looks like a man. Like the pen and watercolor illustrations of lumberjacks or blacksmiths you’d find in those types of books, the ones passed around the housewives of the Seam, with dogeared pages and underlined passages and plain covers. Prim always wanted to read them, she didn’t understand why she never could. Hazelle read them plenty, why didn’t we? My mother made some excuse when the question came up, which helped because it always left me stammering. I didn’t read them either, but I’d seen them left open a few times, felt my face burn clear to the next day at the lurid words inside. As I chew on my pen, waiting for Peeta to get out of the shower, I realize I might as well be writing my own plaincover novel. Not that anyone but me will ever see these words.

We’re preparing for Soren’s birthday party, and we’re avoiding family. Avoiding isn’t really right. Just…not inviting conflict. Soren is only a little less than a year older than Peeta, so this party won’t be very big, I’m told. Nothing like a nineteenth birthday party.

No matter which side of the tracks you’re on, that’s the one birthday everyone celebrates. Your birthday of aging out, of freedom, of cheating death. They can have a sort of dark theme to them. Lots of images of skulls and bones. Peeta tells me in Town there’s flowers that symbolize death and life, usually weaved together into a crown. Not unlike a Victor’s crown. When I was younger, I must have planned my Nineteenth half a dozen times. After my father died, I didn’t have the taste for it. And now I’ll never have one. Not really. Oh I’m sure I might have a get together, maybe even a cake or something, but it won’t be a Nineteenth. Neither will Peeta. We’ll have to plan something extra special for the others, then, for Soren’s and Prim’s.

Gale’s is, of course, sooner. But I don’t know where to go with that, how to navigate it. Today is Saturday. If things were normal, I’d be seeing him tomorrow. But I don’t know if he wants to see me after last week. I don’t know if I want to see him. I file it all in my brain to chew over later. Worrying about it right now won’t do, so I’ll just worry about it later. I tuck my diary under my pillow, set about redoing my hair. This braid didn’t quite turn out right.

Peeta opens the door, hair curling up, robe slightly damp at the collar, steam swirling all around him. He’s sighing deeply, nearly panting, and the sound is absolutely delicious, sending shivers down my spine. Sympathetic vibrations; sometimes when you sing at a glass, you can break it with just your voice. Peeta’s sighs can break me. His skin is flushed sunset pink, and he heaves another sigh(my heart vibrating along with it) as he collapses on the bed, fluttering his eyes closed and just breathing. “I’ll never get tired of havin’ unlimited hot water.” He pants out as he scrubs at his face again.

I am absolutely transfixed, frozen as if caught in hovercraft beam, just staring shamelessly. He’s completely covered, but just by that thin flannel. Flannel that’s sticking to his thighs and chest because of the water. The water that was so hot Peeta’s skin is still steaming from the contact, minutes later. He rolls his eyes over at me. “Um, Katniss.”

“Yeah?” My voice catches in my throat.

“I need to get dressed.”

“Uh huh.” I’m chewing my pen again.

“Katniss.”

“What?”

“Please leave the room so I can get dressed.”

“Oh!” I scramble for my journal and pen, which both fall out of my hands approximately five times. “Sorry!” I call as I run down the stairs. What had come over me?

The walk down to the party is, well. Excruciating. My skin feels like static, everywhere, and I can’t look at Peeta. I can’t look at him because he’s wearing a navy blue shirt, unbuttoned at the collar, sleeves cuffed up. He’s using the cane today, sleek polished dark wood with a gold handle. The Capitol wouldn’t want anything less than pure elegance, even when it came to basic necessities like a mobility aid. His hair is perfectly touseled, having wriggled free of the gel from our walk. He tries once or twice to smooth it back but gives up shortly. “I need to cut it. It’s getting long.” He says with a chuckle, and it’s only then that I realize that I’ve not only been staring down the road, I’ve been doing it in pure silence.

“I like it. Long. But I also like it shorter. It’s your hair and you should do what you like with it. But I like it longer.”

That rambling, stuttering mess earns me another one of the increasingly common looks of absolute confusion he’s been giving me as of late. “Okay.”

I wince all the way to my toes and I have to shake it out of my fingertips, shake out that feeling. “Sorry. I. Sorry.” Another shudder hits me and I have to shake it out again, shake my head to clear it. I have to stare at my shoes to calm down, have to shove my hands in my pockets. It’s a pretty dress, what I’m wearing. Orange and brown plaid, down to my knees with a full enough skirt to dance in. For once I’m also wearing enough underskirts with it, so it flows from my hips. The top is sleeveless, and quite revealing, so I’ve paired it with a thin cream turtleneck, along with stockings, of course. I think Cinna would be pretty proud, though he’d hate that I’m still wearing my boots with them. I can’t help it, I can’t walk in those pretty shoes he sent, not all the way to town and then go dancing after. These are about to give up the ghost. I’ll have to talk to Delly about some new ones. Again, I could have some top of the line, machine stitched boots from the Capitol, but these are my hunting boots. To hunt in boots from the Capitol would be like hunting in a sequin dress. Besides, it’s good to spend my money in town.

We walk near silently the rest of the way, and I can’t help but wonder what I did wrong.

The party is in some little patio, from some restaurant that went under before I was born. There ain’t many in town; there’s no need. No one has any money. Mostly they’re for the very few Capitol tourists that scurry around come Reaping Day. Not exactly enough to sustain a business. Every once in a while, someone might go to one to celebrate something, but even then, that’s Townie kids. So, when this one went under, apparently no one rushed to take its place, and it has, according to Peeta, become the official unofficial place for teenagers to get drunk and dance. Shortly after we arrived, a glass was placed into my hand, a glass I’m still nursing. I’ve been holding up this little corner of the brick wall for a while, watching as everyone flits about, the conversations overlapping and rushing like a waterfall, Rhett Galbraith’s fiddle barely able to keep up. My eyes keep flitting around, because surely this isn’t legal. In fact, I can think of about three reasons why it ain’t, but then again, if I can manage to pay off Cray with a few turkeys, I’m certain a few kids could scrounge up something to make the peacekeepers look the other way for a birthday party. I should relax, but I’ve never quite known how to do that, especially in a crowd, especially when I’m the only non blonde. Well, except for Rhett and the band, but they were probably hired to be here. I take another sip of my drink and wrinkle my nose. It is, by only the most generous of definitions, a fruit and honey wine, made by Pepper Brookshire from the fruit that doesn’t sell at the grocery. It tastes awful, but she’ll get there, probably. It’s only her third batch, and she is only seventeen after all. She might make a decent outlaw yet, once she learns to balance her spices. I’m just about to go up, talk to her, offer to forage for her when Peeta catches me again. “There you are. Been looking all over for you.”

I stuff my free hand in my pocket again, rock back and forth on my heels, resolutely staring at a spare bit of straw on the ground. “I’ve been here.” I say, and it sounds meaner than I meant. I try and soften. “Did you get to catch up with some of your friends?”

“Mm.” He takes a sip from the jam jar serving as his wine glass, tries to hide his distaste of it, and I can just about pick out his real thoughts then. That the distaste isn’t just Pepper’s melomel. It’s that none of these people have been by a single day since we got home. Not to chat, not to ask if Peeta wanted to hang out. I’ve occasionally been over to Madge’s, but not a soul has come over to visit Peeta. “A little. Been wanting to talk with Delly but she looks…busy tonight, so.” He flicks his eyes over to Delly and Soren, who are caught up in the most awkward kissing I’ve ever seen, and that’s counting the replays of my own kissing.

I bite back a laugh. “That’s. An interesting development.”

Peeta smiles. “Mmm-hmm. They uh, signed their contract earlier today, apparently. A two year engagement. They’ll be married the July Fifth after their Nineteenths. Guess they’re getting used to each other.”

“I always thought that-” and I stop myself from following that line of thinking, because the look Peeta tells me both confirms it anyway and tells me it’s best not spoken about. I take another sip. Right. I can’t help it though, so I try and ask discreetly. “So, they both are?” I whisper, and Peeta only nods, and only once. “Better that way, right?”

“Oh, yeah. Definitely.” He whispers. “It. No. It’s much better this way.”

Technically, legally, no one is supposed to mind who marries who. We all have the freedom to marry who we choose, or not at all. But that doesn’t mean everyone is going to like your choices here. Whether that’s intermarriage between Town and Seam or same sex marriage. Delly might be alright, not a ton of Town families mind their daughters being lesbians. Saves on dowries, I suppose, and it’s built in childcare. A lot of townspeople send their children to stay with their lesbian aunts or neighbors before school(that’s actually how Peeta and Delly met. Peeta’s aunt Rooba married Sutton, a family friend of the Cartwrights, and they babysat them both for years). With boys it’s different. Maybe because they’re expected to carry on the family business, maybe because it’s seen as unmanly, whatever the reasons, it always causes a stir. Another reason I’m becoming more grateful I grew up in the Seam. You might get some old people saying it ain’t right, or that it’s a waste, but honestly it usually works well for gay couples in the Seam. It’s not uncommon for a gay couple and a lesbian couple to share households, pitch in everything together, save up money for their nieces and nephews, and not have to work nearly as hard as other young couples just starting out do. It’s something I’ve considered once or twice before, but I couldn’t do it. I don’t have the heart for it.

But the reason Peeta told me to hush wasn’t because of society at large, it was because of his mother. If she found out that her favorite son was gay…well. It wouldn’t end well. I wonder if she’d actually kill him. That’s happened before, once rumors started to spread about someone, next thing you know a “wild dog” had gotten out, or they’d died of “fever” or some other equally thinly veiled excuse that no one believes. For the Mellarks it’d be almost too easy. They have pigs. All it’d take is one good push while Soren was out feeding and that would be that. A tragic accident that no peacekeeper would ever think twice over. I shudder into my drink, look into Peeta’s eyes. Yeah. A lavender marriage would be best. I set my drink down, not really wanting to pretend to drink it, and maybe it’s because of the music, or the way the kerosene lamps make Peeta’s hair shine like gold, or maybe it’s the slight chill in the air, or the tree frogs and mockingjays singing in the distance, or maybe it’s just because I can’t stop thinking of how he looked out of the shower, but I stick my hand out. “I know it ain’t proper, me being the one to ask, but do you wanna dance?”

He blushes like sunrise, like the first gentle rays that peak out and burn the sky bright pink. “I think I can let that go, just this once. Yes, I’d love to dance.”

And we do. It’s not perfect. It’s probably not even very good. I only know fast dances and Peeta is still a little unsure of himself, a little unsteady. But it feels good. It feels like the parts that have been missing, it feels intimate and close, like more of our hearts are stitching together. I’m humming under my breath before I know it, this song I haven’t heard in years. It’s more Town than Seam; they prefer older songs usually. Classical music, songs before the Dark Days, before the Fall. It’s slow, repetitive, and I think it’s supposed to be a woman that sings it, but Rhett’s brother is doing a good enough job at it. I know people are looking, and I don’t care. I want so desperately to be closer to Peeta, for him to quit this pulling away, to stop all these chaste kisses and put his hands on me. To touch me. To stop holding back. I nuzzle my nose in his chest, breathing in the familiar scent and feel the warmth enrobe me in fondness. “Fade into you” I sing, my voice crackling like fireplace embers, because I want this moment to just be for us, but it’s not, because there’s people around. Always someone around, always people watching. But I can’t help it. If I don’t say(or sing, in this case) it I’ll go mad. “Strange you never knew.” And I’m begging. I’m begging he gets what I mean by that. I’m pleading with the universe that he feels what I’m trying to say, the things I don’t have words for. That I could just press all this emotion from my chest into his and he’d just know.

But he doesn’t. He drops my hands and runs off, and I don’t follow him. He leaves and I don’t follow him because I can’t stop the tears running down my face. He leaves and I run the other direction because I love him and for some reason, we can’t ever talk about that.

#mer.txt #the loneliest time #fic tag ig #everlark fic #mutual pining #katniss being oblivious #autistic katniss #misreading social cues #brief mentions of homophobia

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chaoticvintagelesbian · 2 years

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Spoilers for Catching fire of the Hunger games series, if u havent watched it dont read.

Rewatching the 2nd hunger games film, Catching Fire for the first time in a years here r my thoughts chronologically, & I've got a lot to say about this one:

- They actually show Katniss's PTSD, flashbacks and nightmares.

- Gale being a "nice guy", christ hes a an sh*tty

- watching them back to back, they recast the cat!!!

- Snow is a fabulous villain.

- CINNA 🥰

- Caeser Flickerman's banger theme tune!

- The camera's interview is so awkward

- Effie deserved Katniss snapping at her on the train

- Peeta acknowledging that he cant hold her to wot they did to survive in the games! Peeta's already way above Gale. Peeta king 👑 of communication.

- just asking each other their favourite colour is adorable

- The Mockingjay!

- Peeta offering to talk to make it easier for Katniss

- Peeta giving Thresh & Rue's families some of their winnings. Katniss's speech about Rue is beautiful, I'm sobbing

- I love district 11, f*ck the peace keepers!! That poor old man! Haymitch: Who's going to protect them!?

- Haymitch knows better than anyone that you never escape the games.

- Jennifer Lawrence is fabulous

- Haymitch cares about them so much, we love him.

- Katniss barely holding it together on the victory tour. She looked so horrified at the little girl saying she would volunteer just like Katniss did.

- Caeser Flickerman has no right to be so iconic.

- Peeta is amazing! I love him and Katniss

- Does Effie have to say Mahogany in every film?

- Peetas disgust at the Capitol compared to what people in the districts are going through.

- I love the politics of catching fire

- Seneca decided to stop breathing - Plutarch

- F*CK GALE!!!! SHE DOESNT HAVE TO LOVE U ROMANTICALLY FOR BOTH OF U TO SAVE UR FAMILIES!!!!! Gale's right about rebelling, but he isnt even trying to understand her trauma.

- I love the anti corporal punishment, pro riots/rebellion, f*ck the police message of catching fire

- Peeta without question helping to save Gale cos he's not selfish

- Prim being a great nurse!

- I don't think Katniss has ever had any romantic feeling for Gale, he's just her best friend at most, a lot of the time he's barely that, she would've thrown herself in front of that whip if it was anyone she remotely cared about.

- The trauma of all the victors. Haymitcch is right they're not winners, they're survivors. Nobody ever wins.

- Effie actually kinda realizing the games arent the honour shes been indoctrinated to think they are.

- Katniss didnt ghetto say goodbye to Prim 😭

- Finnick & Maggs!!! We love them.

- Finnick Odair 🥰

- The Capitol is even more perfect in this one

- Johanna Mason is iconic and fabulous

- Wiress & Beetie r great

- Maggs is the sweetest

- Transition from Seneca Cranes hanging body to Caeser Flickerman's banging theme song!

- The Victor's interviews are very persuasive & interesting, they each show a lot about the characters

- Slay Johnnana!!! Make him pay for it

- The costumes in this one is a step up from the first.

- the fact she knows that Cinna is in danger for the Mockingjay dress

- Peter "We actually got married" Mellark, Peter "If it werent for the baby" Mellark

- All the Victor's holding hands in a show of unity

- CINNA 😭 (Jennifer Lawrence was amazing in this scene)

- The arena is beautiful

- finnick: oh Sh*t Katniss might actually love Peeta.

- THE FOG ,, MAGGS!! 😭😭

- Tick Tock The arenas a clock

- PEETA! JOHNANNA!

- bye bye district 12

I love this film, for me, it's my favourite in the series.

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