Peeta POV-
"Morning, Daddy." Willow says smiling as I open my eyes.
I blink a few times until she come into focus, my beautiful daughter.
I slowly sit up, "Good morning, Princess. How long have you been awake?" I ask curiously.
"I don't know." She says nonchalantly and shrugs her shoulders.
I smile sleepily, "Momma is coming home today." I remind her.
She gasps, "Oh yeah! I forgotted." Willow says excitedly.
"Yeah, I have to go pick her up at 3:30." I say yawning and stretching.
"Oh, can I go with you?" She asks me.
I shake my head, "Actually Finnick is gonna watch you and the girls while I go get Momma from the airport."
She pouts, "But I want to see Momma when she gets here."
"You can. I will go straight to Finnick's to get you after I get her." I assure her.
But this doesn't cut it for her.
"Daddy, please?" Willow begs me bursting into tears and dramatically crawling over and taking my hands.
I roll my eyes.
"No." I say.
She frowns, making a pouty face.
"Willow, I promise as soon as I pick Mommy up from the airport then I will come get you so you can see her."
She crosses her arms and groans, "I want to go with you right then." Willow pouts.
"Baby, pouting is getting you no where. I know that you miss Momma but I said you can't go with me to pick her up. I need to talk to her about things you can't hear." I say sternly.
She groans, "But remember I am a big girl now and you said I'm matcher."
"Matcher or mature?" I laugh.
"Mature." She says seriously, correcting her mistake.
I roll my eyes and snort, "You're very mature but right now you're not being mature at all. You're not going with me to the airport." I say.
She sighs, "But Daddy-"
"No, Willow. I need to tell Mommy something that you can't hear so no one is going with me to pick her up."
Willow frowns.
"Okay." She says softly.
"I promise it won't be that long. Finnick's house is five minutes from the airport. I'll be gone maybe 20 minutes total." I say truthfully.
She nods, "I'm sorry I just want to see her so so so bad." Willow cries.
"I know, sweetheart but I promise you we won't be gone long." I say and pull her into a hug.
I feel the same way when I think about how much I miss her.
"Can we go make us our chocolate tart thingys now? Because I am hungry." She whines.
"Yeah, I need to go check on Carter and Carson and then we can go make them. Go downstairs and I'll be there in a second." I say and get up out of bed.
Instead of that she goes to our bathroom and does her business and then down stairs while I get dressed for the day.
After I go across the hall and check on the girls.
Carson is wide awake but surprisingly not bothering her sister, so she must've just woke up.
She smiles sleepily and I walk over, picking her up.
"Hi, sweet girl." I say softly and take her with me downstairs, letting Carter get some rest.
Willow is already into the food when I get down there. I put Carson in the high chair and go over to Willow.
"These are mine and yours and these ones are for Carson and Carter." Willow says, pointing to two separate piles of food.
I smile, "You want yours warmed up?" I ask her.
"Yes, please." She sighs.
I take the foil off of both of our pastries and stick them in the toaster. I take Carson hers and then Willow and I sit down at the island, waiting for the food to finish.
"How many hours till Momma is back?" She asks me.
I look at the clock which reads 9am.
"About six more hours until she's here." I say.
She frowns, "That's a really long time." She says, sounding like she's about to cry again.
"But it will go by quick, I promise." I say, wishing she would quit acting like this or else this is going to be a really really long New Years Eve.
Willow sighs, "Daddy, and I don't want to go back to school."
"Why not?" I ask her as the toaster pops out two freshly hot tarts. I take them out and place them both on plates and then bring them over to where we were sitting.
"Because that means that me and Mommy don't get to spend the whole days together no more." She frowns.
I look at her and wipe away her tears, "Summer isn't too far away. Then you get to stay with Momma at home for three months."
"Will the baby be here by then?"
"I doubt it but maybe."
She groans, "I hope so because I want to help you guys with it."
"When it does get here that means I get to be home a lot more. I haven't told anyone yet but when the baby is born, I'm leaving the bakery for a few weeks or longer to help Momma." I say.
"With me?" She asks.
"Yep and I think that all next year I'm gonna take you to school for Mommy and then we can all three pick you up afterwards. Do you think that sounds good?"
She shrugs, "Yeah, but I don't want the baby to spend all it's time with Momma. I wish it went to school too because I want to stay with Mommy." She frowns.
"What? You're already jealous." I tease her.
She makes a face.
"Yeah because it gets to be with Mommy and her is my mom too." Willow says angrily.
"I know but you've gotten to spend so much longer with her than this baby has. Don't you want it to be with Mommy too because she such a good mom?" I ask.
"Yeah but while I am at school you and Momma and the baby are here without me and what if I miss something?"
"What would you miss, Princess?" I ask.
She thinks a second.
"What if the baby started to walk or talk or something? I want to see it."
"Sweetheart, the baby won't be doing that for a really long time so I bet you won't miss it."
She groans, "How come I got to go to school? I don't want to."
"Because it's the law, sweetheart. Mommy and I had to go to school too, even when we didn't want to. Mommy had to go to school even after her sister was born." I tell her truthfully.
Willow frowns, "But that is dumb. School is stupid."
I roll my eyes, "Don't talk like that and I think it can be too but you have to go whether you like it or not. If you don't Mommy and I could go to jail. Did you know that?"
Her eyes get big, "No." She says quietly.
"So that's why it's important that you go and you keep going." I say.
"Okay, Daddy. I'm sorry." She says.
I shrug, "Please quit being whiney though, Willow. We have to stay up real late tonight and you don't want to have to go to bed while everyone else has fun, do you?"
She shakes her head and looks down, taking a small bite of her food.
"Then stop because if you keep acting like that I will make you go to bed and you know Mommy will too."
"I know. I'm sorry I just really miss her and when I think about it I get sad." She tells me, her voice high-pitched and sad.
I frown, "I know, sweetheart but there's nothing to be sad about. There's only a few more hours then I will take you and the girls to Finnick's house and I'll go pick Momma up and we will come home and maybe if you act nice you can sleep with us tonight." I say.
I feel bad that I'm scolding her for silly things like this but she's being ridiculous. I can always tell when she doesn't feel like she's getting enough of Katniss's attention or even mine because she gets super whiney and cries about things she usually wouldn't cry about. And she's super clingy to me or Katniss, whichever person is around.
"Okay." She says softly.
I too often catch myself getting angry with her for stuff like this but I often forget she's only five years old and is still very much a child. I think many times Katniss and I both just expect more out of her since she's always been so overly mature for her age that when she does have little outbursts we get easily frustrated.
"I'm not trying to be mean and hurt your feelings by saying you can't go with me to pick Mommy up but I really really need to talk to her about something that you can't hear about. Alright."
She nods.
"I love you, Willow." I say and nudge her knee with mine.
She sniffles, "I love you too."
"Hey, but tonight is gonna be a lot of fun. We get to stay up extra late and spend more time with Mommy."
"But Carson and Carter are here and they love Mommy too. I won't get all her tension." She pouts again.
"Willow, stop. You're being ridiculous. You never have a problem sharing Mommy with anyone, how come you're being so rude now?" I ask her.
"Because I haven't seen her in forever and I love her."
I don't say anything.
After we finish eating I take our plates and put them in the sink and go to Carson who I haven't been watching very closely obviously.
I think she's only eaten a little piece of her food, the rest of it is all over her-in her hair and hands. There's pieces of it stuck to her face too and the cherry filling is all over her little hands.
I make a face, "You need a bath, little girl." I laugh.
"Can I take a bath too?" Willow asks me.
"You can after I give Carson one. She is dirty!!" I say and take the dirty tray off the high chair and set it on the table.
"Baby, can you go get me her bag?" I ask.
Willow nods and goes into the living room.
I take Carson in my arms, even though she's a sticky mess and I carry her to the bathroom.
Willow comes in with her diaper bag and sets it on the counter.
I start bath water and start stripping her down.
"You're a messy little thing." I tell Carson and she laughs and beats her sticky hands on her chest and smiles.
Willow giggles, "Her is so silly."
"She is very silly." I agree with Willow.
After the bath water is ready I stick her in there and start scrubbing the jelly and crumbs off her little chubby cheeks and out of her brown hair.
She splashes water at me and laughs.
"Quit." I chuckle as she slaps the water.
Carson giggles her little toddler laugh, "Water." She says.
"Yeah, that is water." I confirm.
Soon she's all cleaned up and I grab a towel to dry her off with.
I drain the water and wrap the towel around her warm body.
She lays her wet head on my shoulder as I rinse out the bathtub for Willow's bath.
"Go get you some clothes for today but don't wake Carter up." I say.
"Yes, sir." She says and goes up stairs.
I lay Carson on the couch and start dressing her in some warm clothes.
"Now let's see how long it takes you to get messy again." I laugh.
She smiles and I set her on the floor with some toys.
She plays and Willow comes back down with clothes in her hands.
I take them and set them on the bathroom counter. I start the water and she does her thing and gets in.
"I will be right back to check on you, I'm going to go sit with Carson for a minute." I say.
"Okay." She says.
I leave the bathroom and go sit in the living room with Carson who is surprisingly staying still for once.
"Block." She points and reaches out for a pink one.
I laugh, "Here." I say handing it to her.
She throws it across the room and then stands up and runs to go get it. She brings it back and then makes a throwing motion.
"You want me to throw it?" I ask her with a laugh.
"Yeah." She cheers.
I laugh, shaking my head.
This little girl is something else. So unlike her sister I'll say.
I softly toss it across the room and she runs in full force after it, picks it up and turns around throwing it right to me.
I catch it and toss it back and we do this for a few minutes while she laughs, claps, and jumps up and down hysterically.
"I'll be right back, kiddo." I say standing up and handing her the block instead of throwing it this time.
I go peak my head in at Willow who is in the tub now.
"You good?" I ask her.
She nods and I leave.
There's a knock on the door and I go to answer it.
It's two people I never thought I would have to deal with the rest of my life.
***Fml school in the morning. 8 hours to be exact. I will try to update tomorrow :( and sorry this wasn't too interesting but there is a cliff hanger