The Hunger Games - Peeta's POV

Chapter Thirty-One - Good in all the Bad

When we board the train, I am thinking. Once the interview ended, we went straight to our rooms. When we were dismissed from our rooms, we were sent to say our goodbyes. When we said our goodbyes, we were sent to the train. Katniss and Haymitch say something about President Snow and the "berry stunt" but it is quickly forgotten. I'm sure it will come back to me during the Victory Tour, when all the memories come flooding back. The train is physically the same as I remember it - too expensive to be real. But the memories that line the walls are too much to bear. What do we do now? What is there left to do?

I try to spend the day confined to my room. But everything that I see in there belonged to a younger, more innocent boy. I think about what I said on the rooftop to Katniss, how I didn't want to be a piece in their games. That I wanted to die as Peeta Mellark, the boy who decorated the cookies every Sunday. Now I am afraid that I will not return even as him. That I am to become a faraway man, living in a life of solitude. Maybe I will resort to drinking, like Haymitch, whose life does not seem so undesirable. Everyone wants to forget.

My quarter is too much to swallow, so I spend the trip looking out the window in the living area. I watch the raindrops race down the window, as I did as a kid. I watch the water settle on the blades of grass that coat the ground. I watch the rain turn into snow, and then I watch as the layer becomes thicker and thicker.

Is there even a reason to return? I have become a mutt, a monster that kills. A monster that kills a 14 year old girl who wielded no weapon. To be accepted by people who are now buried deep in the ground, dead. No doubt my mother will not care. She will not care that I have become the very things that made me tremble at night. The very thing I thought would kill me in the Games. Perhaps it has killed me. Perhaps it has killed Peeta Mellark, and what has submerged is a colossus, unable to be detained. And it is to join its mother who is the creator, the person who has cursed everyone who touches this colossus. Because now, the mother will use me for my riches. Live in the plentiful house, with the plentiful food that is bought with the plentiful money. The brothers will live with me as-well, and along will follow the father. All to pretend they loved Peeta Mellark. Even when all they could wake up to was a son, who wore bruises as easily as clothes. Who saw the scars as normality. Even if any of them ever loved Peeta Mellark, there is no use now. He has been fed to the dogs.

Katniss eventually joins me. I guess her room is filled with memories. Is she mourning too? Does she think Katniss Everdeen is gone? She sits down next to me, and joins the show. It's nothing special. It's watching the untamed world live freely. It's watching the forest come alive while we journey to the supposed valhalla of Panem. Instead, it is the smallest district of the lot, the one that is known for the deaths by starvation, and a promised layer of ash every turn you take.

"What do we do now?" I ask, not to start conversation, but because I want to know the answer. I want to know.

"I guess we try to forget." That sounds fun. That sounds like exactly what I want. To drink liquor, to throw up every morning, as long as it means that the nightmares are forgotten during the day. As long as it means that my life has not consisted of the past 16 years. What would be ideal, would be to start a new beginning. To become someone else. Someone of different morals, someone of different stories. Someone who deserves a life. Preferably with Katniss. But why? Why do I want to live my life with Katniss? She is only sure to remind me of the scars of my past. Then why do I want her? Why?

The first two stars have appeared. On an empty night, only three stars stand. The snow begins to slow, and the clouds disappear. It disintegrates, and out blossoms hundreds, thousands of stars. They have to. They have to be. And they are the same as the night on the rooftop. Oh, they are. It reminds me of what I promised there. I promised to the stars that I would not turn into a mutt. That I would not become a Capitol slave. And I haven't. I have, though, killed the girl. I have watched as people die as they fight for life. I have listened to torture, cries of pain. But I have also heard beautiful four-note melodies harmonised by mockingjays. I have watched as Katniss turns alive in the woods. I have watched Rue hop from tree to tree, as effortlessly as birds. I have watched the good in life, and the bad. But I want Katniss in my life. I want for us to fix each other. And we can, because of our past. Because of our past we can become stronger. We may have broken, but the pieces scatter. Our loved ones can pick them up, and puzzle us back together.

"But I don't want to forget." Because we can mend each other. Because in a life where the people are bad, the good shines through. The good is what we notice, it's what we treasure.

I look up at the stars, the brilliant stars. And on the days where I couldn't see them, where I cursed them under my breath for not holding my wishes, they had. They kept me as Peeta Mellark. They kept Katniss alive. They kept the good in all the bad.