Hunger Games - Extended epilogue

Chapter Six

"You came back to twelve because of two?" I ask, confusion riddling my mind.

"I needed to get away."

"From what may I ask?" I question.

"The town, the people, my job, my girlfriend..." He trails off as he watches my reaction closely.

For some odd reason, the pit of my stomach crunches and swirls and is drowned in what feels like jealousy. Why jealous? Why does my heart do the complete opposite to my head. Of course he's moved on, he has to move on. He doesn't love me, he probably never did. And I never loved him so why's it got to matter so much?

It matters because he meant something to you, a voice at the back of my head reminds me.

I look down in my crossed-legged lap and fiddle with my fingers and a piece of a grass I pulled out of the grassy hill below me.

Unable to reply, the silence carries on. The quietness of either of us talking is a little uncomfortable, but what am I supposed to say?

Oh, Gale, please, tell me all your troubles and worries about this girl and I'll be sure to fix them by tomorrow morning.

"I didn't want that to hurt you, Katniss."

I look up to Gale, woken from my thoughts. His usually bubbly eyes are full of darkness. As dark as the deepest regions of the inky space. His face shows regret and worry of what affect the news he's just revealed has on me.

I shake my head, "No... No Gale. It's-it's fine. Truly." I tell him, not very convincingly as I drop my head back to my fiddling fingers.

"Catnip, I know when you're lying. So don't try that stunt on me, you know it won't work out." He shifts a little closer to me, still with a heap of distance between us.

"I... I-" I stutter, desperately trying to find something to say.

"You have Peeta now Katniss, why does it bother you so much?"

I'm too unsteady for this. I've only just started gaining a small piece of happiness back, an improvement and now it's all fading back to where I began. With Gale. Well more as such, with Gale's absence and distance.

"I know... But it's the not the point." I say quietly, secretly hoping he didn't hear me.

"Then what is your point, Katniss? I waited for you, I did, and for a hell of a long time." His voice becomes increasingly raised and stern at every word. "Do you think it was easy for me, for you to come home with some strange boy after the Games and act like you two were in love.".

"It wasn't like that..." The mood around us is tense as I lower my voice to a husky whisper and keep my gaze to my shakey fingers and the grass I seem to find interesting.

"Then what was it like?!" He hisses.

"You can't blame me for that. I had to act in love with Peeta during those times. You know our families were in jeopardy. If I didn't we'd all be dead right now!" I raise my voice to match his, to look less vulnerable. My eyes now staring deeply into his tense orbs, trying to form an answer out of his silent mode.

I calm myself, noticing how fast my breath has increased.

His quietness gives me a chance to rant on.

"But no Gale, I didn't do it because I wanted to hurt you. I had to do it, to save us. But you... You just ran off." The trembling state gobbles my control up as I try with all I have to fight off tears. "You left me for another district, another home, another girl." Tears beg to escape my fogging eyes as water blinds my sight. I bat my eyelids down a couple of time as a pair of tears roll down both my cheeks.