Blooming in the Spring

Chapter 1

I drag myself out of nightmares each morning and find there's no relief in waking.

I picture his face, studying the flickering remains of burning wood in the fireplace before me. The man with sea green eyes and calloused hands from tying knots far too late into the night. His smile that even in the darkest moments seemed to brighten his surroundings. His smile. So kind, so bright, and especially so at his wedding. His bride, who will never see him again. Mutts. Screaming. Begging for help, for mercy. I kill him. I killed him. I killed Finnick.

I jolt forward with a start. No relief in waking. There is no point in nightmares when you are already living in one.

I am empty and want nothing more than to drown it all out--all of the fear, the guilt. The guilt. There is so much of it, all the time. Guilt for those I've killed. For those who I could not save. They haunt me every second of every day, always there, always in the back of my mind clawing their way forward. Today, it is Finnick. Yesterday, Cinna. The day before that, Castor. Prim. Always Prim.

I push myself up from the velvet couch in the living room of my Victor's Village house. House, not home. This will never be home, could never be. I'm not sure there is a home for me, not without my sister. I still feel her in these walls, a ghost of someone I long so deeply for. Sometimes I kid myself into thinking I can still hear her laughing and smell the perfume she used to sneak from our mother's old collection. Peony and bergamot. Her room upstairs still smells of this, I'm sure, though I have not dared to enter it. I don't think I will ever be able to muster up the courage. Dr. Aurelius says it's a good thing to grieve, to let go. He says that his other patients have found peace in acceptance, whatever that means. He wants me to go through her things, says that it could be healing. I don't listen to much he says.

Before I realize where my feet are taking me, I am pushing through the front door to Haymitch's house. He's dead asleep on the couch. I expected as much. He isn't what I'm here for anyways.

The kitchen cabinets meant for things like dishes and fine Capitol china are instead stocked with bottles of liquor of all kinds. Jackpot.

I grab a few mismatched bottles and stuff them into my old leather hunting bag. I don't hunt much anymore. I can hardly bring myself to leave the house most days, though sometimes Greasy Sae pesters me so much I have no choice but to aimlessly wander around the district. She's trying her best to help, I know that. I wish she'd stop.

Haymitch doesn't even stir as I make my way back out the front door. Likely that he won't miss the bottles I took. He hardly has any recollection of his day-to-day surroundings, I'm sure. After he brought me home after the Capitol, I only saw him a handful of times. Sometimes I can hear him screaming obscenities to no one in his house next to mine. Usually, they're followed by some loud clatters and thuds until he tires himself out and passes out on the couch, his current resting place. He's hurting and angry too and I do feel bad for him. I know how lonely things can be, even with Peeta back in 12.

It's been eleven days since Peeta came home and planted the primroses in my yard, which seem to have adapted nicely. Sometimes he accompanies Sae when she checks on me, though he never says much. His clothes are usually stained with paint and he always brings me cheese buns. I think he spends most of his time painting and baking, trying to rediscover the boy he used to be or something.

"They were your favorite," he said the first day he brought a fresh batch to me, trying to aid Greasy Sae in getting me to eat something. "Real or not real?"

I haven't seen him in a few days. Dr. Aurelius told me that some days will be harder for him than others. That, though they've made good progress with him, he still isn't fully himself. Yet, he always reassures me, as if the despicable damage done by Snow could ever truly be reversed. As if things could ever be the same again. It's not just Peeta that's changed. We all have, permanently so. We are practically strangers and although there is a sense of comfort between us, it is not how it was. There is an odd feeling of edginess, of anxiety between us. Like neither of us is quite sure of the other. Or that neither of us really knows what to say. How could we after all we've both been through? After all the time we spent worlds apart from each other.