Chapter Text
"So this is it," Katniss Everdeen- no it was Mellark now, Peeta would have to remember that, remarked as she opened the door to the small house. She indicated with a tilt of her head that he should follow her inside once she stepped over the threshold. "It's not much, but we manage," she continued, reaching around and shutting the door behind him. "Things'll be easier now that we've got you to help."
His new wife hesitated, tilting her little pointed chin in defiance of whatever preconceived notion was floating through her head. She seemed to think Peeta would think this house, which was clean and tidy and cozy-looking even if it were a bit time-worn, wasn't good enough for him. "It's not as nice as what you're used to at the bakery, but we're comfortable here. You'll be free to do whatever you like, just so long as you help me with the heavy work."
Even though he was now married to her, Peeta didn't know much about Katniss Everdeen other than public information, like the fact that she'd opened her butcher shop in the Seam not long after the Capitol fell five years ago. That year would've been her fifth reaping and his second.
Despite being a bit in the dark on details of her, he felt optimistic about making a place for himself with Katniss and her younger sister.
The current situation had to be an improvement over continuing to live with his mother and father. When she'd approached them, Katniss told his parents that she needed more help at her shop. She would be willing to take Peeta on as a husband if they weren't opposed to the match. Of course, they weren't, him being third in line for a business where they couldn't afford to keep him on any longer.
He could be very useful to her, Katniss had said to them, his father had relayed to Peeta afterward- he'd been surprised but not opposed to the idea.
The issue was more that he couldn't begin to imagine why she would've picked him. Katniss was a well-respected businesswoman who was also both young and attractive. He didn't know why she'd resorted to bargaining for a husband; it seemed as though she'd been beating prospective suitors off with a stick for years now.
Maybe it was because of the bread he'd given to her in the past.
Peeta shook his head at that thought- the bread had been such a small thing. That couldn't be why- it was just that the incident was the only connection he shared with her.
Whatever Katniss's reason had been, Peeta was cautiously optimistic about being here as Prim smiled at him from across the room.
The three of them ate the dinner Prim had prepared ahead of time shortly after they arrived at the house, just after Peeta finished carrying his things inside. He left his bag and box next to the front door, where Katniss indicated he should.
In a typical marriage, there would be a toasting after the evening meal. The ceremony wasn't necessary; Katniss and Peeta had done all that was required- meeting to sign the license during the short window of time that had been allocated to them between the bakery closing for the day and the Justice Building locking its doors.
Instead of a toasting, there was a meal full of Prim's friendly chatter and Katniss's murmured responses, followed by the three of them sitting in the living room next to the fire he started for them in the fireplace.
Prim passed the time working on a quilt while Katniss carefully sharpened her knives on a large flintstone. "It saves me time in the morning," his new wife explained quietly, never looking up from her tools.
Peeta kept his thoughts mostly to himself other than a few words exchanged with Prim about her pet goat, unsure yet what his new wife expected of him or what his role would be in this new little family.
It felt a little strained at times but was mostly a pleasant way to while away the time.
When the fire had burned down, and it was time for them to retire, Katniss stood up and stared at a fixed point on the wall, just over his shoulder, before addressing him.
Peeta couldn't help but be awed of her quiet authority. She was so different from his mother, a woman who used brute force and a raised voice to get her point across. She would be a good mother if I ever had that chance with her; he surprised himself by thinking.
He was getting ahead of himself.
"We don't have a second bedroom," Katniss told him. This moment was what he'd been expecting, a speech about having a platonic marriage. And that was fine. Whatever she wanted.
"Katniss," Peeta cut her off, thinking it was probably the first time he'd called her by her name, "it's fine. I can sleep-"
She interrupted him before he could get further into his speech. "And Prim sleeps out here on the couch. You'll be in the bedroom with me."
Oh.
Peeta swallowed nervously. In the tension-filled silence, he swore he could hear his heartbeat thundering in his ears- until Prim broke the lull by giggling from her place across the room, of course.
Katniss sent her sister a scowl that managed to get the younger girl's laughter under control, before striding nonchalantly past Peeta to the washroom where she shut the door quickly behind her.
"Well, you heard her, I guess," Prim bit her bottom lip to keep from laughing. She was at least trying to get herself under control, he supposed
At least one of them found this amusing.
"Bedroom is that way," Prim told him helpfully, pointing to the far corner of the house.
Peeta sat on the edge of the quilt-covered bed, still in the clothes he'd worn for the appointment at the Justice Building earlier that day. He was anxiously waiting for his wife to join him in the room.
He was a nervous wreck- excited, full of anticipation, scared-as-shit; mostly, he was having a hard time comprehending that this woman he'd barely spoken with wanted him to make love to her.
It's not like Peeta was entirely inexperienced, he'd kissed a few girls from school and had even gone a little farther than that with the grocer's daughter at a party when they'd both drank white liquor than either could handle, but sex?
He'd never even come close to sex.
And Katniss was older- only three years, but what if she'd had a string of experienced lovers? He didn't want to disappoint her, but a part of him knew it was inevitable.
But then again, there was the other point. Sex. With a beautiful woman.
His wife.
And Peeta still didn't know why she'd chosen him.
Katniss stepped into the room then, interrupting his thoughts, walking so softly he almost didn't hear her.
She'd changed into a long faded floral print nightgown that began at her neck and flowed down to her ankles and wrists. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, and her hair was unbraided, loose and soft around her shoulders, and there were all of these little wispy hairs sticking up around her hairline as if she'd just finished washing her face.
Katniss looked fresh and young and impossibly pretty, and he swore that his heart skipped a beat.
"Would you mind getting up for a minute?" she asked softly. "I need to turn down the covers."
Peeta stood quickly and moved out of the way, hoping this sense of not knowing what to do with himself would fade soon. His pulse was thrumming through every pressure point in his body- he'd give anything to know what she expected of him.
Katniss went to the other side of the bed and pulled the covers back before casually climbing in.
He told himself to relax.
Once she was under the blankets, she glanced over to where he stood indecisively. "Do you typically sleep in your clothes?" she asked wryly.
Peeta felt the heat race up his face. "No, I just wasn't sure what I should do," he admitted, aware that he was making an absolute mess of this.
Katniss glanced away again after a so-quick-Peeta-almost-missed-it perusal of his body. Things were tense for a moment between them before she also spoke, "I don't want to do anything tonight. I mean," she began, "I don't want to have..."
The stutter in her voice was like a balm to his nerves. Peeta immediately felt some of the tension escape from his body.
Katniss was unsure of herself as well, maybe even as much as he was.
"I don't want to sleep with you tonight," Katniss finally managed to finish getting out. "I'm not ready for that with you yet."
Yet?
The word yet felt doable. A word like yet meant Peeta had time to think about things- yet was like a far-off promise that neither of them had to fulfill any time soon.
"Oh, that's fine," he said.
At her curious look, Peeta exhaled sharply, figuring that he ought to explain himself. Most eighteen-year-old men probably wouldn't have had that reaction, Peeta realized.
"Not that I wouldn't want to," he began, sensing the way Katniss began drawing into herself almost immediately. He didn't want her to doubt her attractiveness for a moment, "you're a beautiful woman."
Peeta watched, fascinated while she flushed a lovely shade of deep pink.
Katniss looked away then, mumbling something about him being a flatterer as she slid beneath the covers. She wouldn't look at him but continued to stare up at the ceiling as he removed his pants and shirt, leaving him in his boxers and undershirt.
"I usually just sleep in these because I get pretty warm at night. I don't own any pajamas. I could get some if you'd like, though."
"It's fine," she told him, eyes still focused straight ahead while he pulled the covers back. Noticing how stiff she seemed, he decided to try and get her to relax a bit. He didn't know why, but he had this compulsion to make her smile.
"You can look at me all you want, you know. I don't mind if you see me," Peeta said as he climbed in beside her. "I'm yours to do with what you want now, anyway." Katniss groaned, and he laughed a little at his joke (it wasn't really a joke though, was it?) as he lay back on the bed.
Once he'd settled, she glanced at him; her mouth turned up a little in one corner in mild amusement. "Don't get ahead of yourself, Mellark," she told him.
A few moments later, when they were both settled, Katniss turned out the light.
As Peeta lay beside her in the still and quiet, the darkness gave him a boldness he hadn't felt until then. Maybe it was that yet word giving him hope like perhaps she wanted this to become a real marriage between them and not just a paper one.
"You never said, Katniss. Why me?" he asked, rolling onto his side to look at her, just managing to make out her features in the dark. "Couldn't you have found someone with better prospects than me to marry?"
"You're very direct," she told him evasively.
Peeta laughed under his breath. "When something is weighing on my mind, yes, I am direct."
After a long moment, one where he was beginning to think she wasn't going to answer, Katniss sighed. "It was simple. You needed my help."
That made him pause.
"I know about the things your mother has always done to you, Peeta."
So someone had noticed the bruises, the occasional broken bones- the "accidental" burns. Katniss had noticed.
"And you helped me once. You were kind to me when nobody else was."
She must mean the bread- the loaves he'd given her that winter after her father died in the mines. That bread had meant a beating for him, but on that day, Katniss had looked as though she were dying, and he supposed another thrashing from his mother was worth keeping her alive another day or two.
But now she had paid that small kindness back by marrying him?
"And I did need extra help in the butcher shop. It just seemed like a good solution," she explained.
"To marry a stranger?" Peeta asked softly, disbelief evident in his tone. "I just think you could've found someone better."
Katniss stirred, turning over and settling down again before answering him. "You're the only person who showed any thought to either Prim's or my welfare then," she said, "so, I don't know... I just figured if I had to marry, it ought to be to a kind man. And I knew you were kind. And strong. And I figured that if you were both kind and strong, you were my best option."
Peeta was utterly dumbfounded. "It was just bread," he whispered. "It wasn't that much."
"No, it was more than that. It was hope." Katniss's voice sounded like it was growing more distant with sleep.
It was astounding to him that she could relax so soon, lying next to a man she hardly knew. For the first time in his life, Peeta felt like maybe he could be good enough for someone. Worth something to Katniss at least- her and Prim. She'd given him this chance, and in turn, he would try his best not to let either of them down.
Tentatively, Peeta ran his fingers across the hand she'd left splayed out on the mattress in a light touch.
Her fingers curled around his for a moment before releasing.
"Go to sleep," he whispered to her, "rest easy."
It was too soon to feel this way, but Peeta couldn't help the early stirrings of love that were forming in his heart. He hoped Katniss wouldn't notice yet, not until she was ready.
He was already a goner.
"Peeta, can you come and help me with this?" Katniss asked him, the sound muffled because she'd bent over at the waist and grasped the hem of her shirt. She used it to wipe off her forehead while waiting on his response.
Peeta caught a quick, tantalizing flash of soft-looking skin before she dropped the hem and straightened up again. "Of course," he said, shaking off thoughts that the image had inspired. Peeta still couldn't believe this beautiful little woman was his wife, his. Nothing had happened between them, they hadn't even kissed each other, but that promise of yet was still floating in the air between them.
He moved aside the pan of meat scraps he'd been chopping to grind for sausage later and wiped his hands off on a towel before joining her.
"I can't quite manage it," she explained, gesturing to the animal before crossing her arms over her chest.
He huffed out a laugh at his petite wife's disgust with herself. "No wonder. This thing is bigger than you are," Peeta said as he stepped around her, but only after placing a light hand on her back to let her know where he was. He couldn't help being thrilled by the sense of mutual awareness that was developing between them. He was careful to initiate some contact between them, but not too much. If she'd allow it, he'd hold her tight and never let her go.
Instead, Peeta grasped the hooves of the hog carcass and quickly picked it up, lifting it high enough to impale the hooks through the animal's flesh so that Katniss could separate it into halves and clean out the organs and entrails.
"You make that look easy," she said, smiling up at him.
Peeta made sure to step far enough away to give his wife the space she needed to get back to cutting up the hog. "Good to know I'm earning my way," he said lightly.
She laughed, her whole face lighting up with it, and Peeta grinned at her.
"Just keeping my end of the bargain."
Before he let himself become mesmerized by the way her face lit up when she seemed happy, he forced himself to look away from her.
He didn't want to. Looking away from Katniss was something Peeta had to remind himself of more times a day than he could keep track of doing.
Since they'd married just a few weeks ago, Peeta had been using light jokes and easy charm to try and cover the more profound things he felt for Katniss. He was so happy to be a part of her life. They spent most days working side by side in her shop, and things were so peaceful. This new life he was living with her and Prim was like a dream.
He would do whatever it took to make sure that she never grew tired of him.
Peeta moved to step away from her so that they could both go back to work, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm. "Did you need something else?" he asked softly, unable to figure out what she wanted. Everything about her was a mystery to him still. It was exciting and fun, but a little help now and then would be valuable. He just wanted her to be happy.
Katniss bit her lip and stared up at him, looking like there was something more she wanted to say.
Peeta waited. She seemed like she needed time to gather her thoughts.
"It's nothing," she said finally, shaking her head like she was trying to clear it. "It's just that I was kind of wondering something."
That didn't sound so bad. "What is it? You can ask me anything," he prodded. He didn't care what she said, just so long as Katniss didn't tell him to leave. Hell, she could ask him to go jump out the window right now, and he would, happily, as long as he could come right back inside.
He was such an idiot for her.
"Why," Katniss looked over his shoulder in that funny way she had when there was something direct she needed to say to him. Her voice dropped, and he couldn't believe the words she said to him next. "I was just wondering why you haven't tried to kiss me yet."
"You want... you want me to kiss you?" Peeta asked incredulously, his voice cracking. How was he supposed to have figured that out? She was so confusing. "I didn't know," he admitted to her.
Katniss shrugged. She glanced at his face quickly before looking away again, appearing to be as nervous as he felt. "I'm not always good at saying what I want. Only if you want to, though, I don't want to tell you what to do. I don't want things to be like that with us."
With us?
Peeta died a little on the spot, he was sure. Was this some kind of dream? If it didn't make him look like an idiot, he would pinch himself. Quickly he stepped closer to her, full of anticipation and ready to kiss the hell out of her honestly, but stopped short before putting his hands on her shoulders.
A sudden reminder of where they were right now was the only thing that stopped him. "Did you mean right here in your shop?" he asked. The butchering room wasn't exactly the most picturesque environment, and Katniss deserved over-the-top, well-thought-out wooing, not a hasty kiss with his hands that smelled like blood all over her.
Peeta just wanted to show her how beautiful and cherished she was to him. "I just think our first kiss could be somewhere nicer than this, you know? Let me take you on a picnic or something. I'll, I'll make you dinner and everything. You deserve something more romantic than this."
Katniss scowled, crossing her arms over her chest again. "Why isn't this place good enough for you?"
He stared at her in disbelief. She was mad because he didn't want to kiss her in the smelly butcher shop?
Katniss sighed. "Just forget it, forget I said anything."
Oh my god, I am an idiot, Peeta realized, staring at her angry face, the one that more than anything he wanted to start kissing and never stop.
He licked his lips.
"I mean, if you wanted to kiss me, I think you just would have done it," she went on.
Well, that did it.
"Katniss, shut up," Peeta said suddenly, surprising even himself, but not able to make himself feel bad about saying it to her. From where had this assertiveness come?
Her eyes flared with something. Anger that he'd rejected her or because he told her what to do, or just plain excitement, he wasn't sure which. Maybe it was both. "What did you just say to me?" Katniss asked, backing away from him.
He laughed. Oh no, Katniss wasn't getting away now.
Peeta followed her as she moved further away from him. "I told you to shut up," he said smoothly.
And there it was again, that same look on her face from the night they'd gotten married when he told her she was beautiful, that of course, he wanted her when they were both ready to take that step. Nervous anticipation, Peeta supposed he'd call it.
What was happening right this minute was an exciting change in their dynamic. Was this what Katniss wanted from him?
When Katniss's back hit the brick wall, he caged her in with his body, his hands going to either side of her shoulders. She was breathing heavily, and so was he, her eyes focused on his lips. Peeta couldn't decide where to look because every inch of her was so lovely.
"So you want me to kiss you?" he asked softly.
She nodded. "I do."
He bent his head close to hers. "You know, you shouldn't get mad because I want to do nice things for you." Peeta wished his hands weren't so gross because he wanted to touch her face so badly right now. "I just want to show you that you're beautiful. I want you to know what you mean to me already."
"Flatterer," Katniss whispered, closing her eyes. "I just… I don't want you to think you need to do this because I got you away from your mother, that's all. I don't need special things, just a little affection."
This moment right here had to be a dream- it wasn't possible to be this happy. Katniss had no idea what she'd opened herself up to with him.
"Can't we do both?" he asked.
With her head resting against the wall, she shook it back and forth.
She was so cute.
"What do you mean?" she asked him.
He didn't answer right away, just let his lips brush against hers.
Katniss sighed at the light contact.
"I think we can both have what we want. And you're crazy if you think I'm doing this out of obligation," Peeta said, pulling back just far enough to speak. His heart was ready to beat out of his chest. "You have no idea, Katniss."
"Well, why don't you show me then?" she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck and standing on her toes to reach his lips.
Okay, so he guessed they were doing the touching each other with their dirty hands' thing.
Well, she'd started it, Peeta supposed, sliding his arms around her waist and pulling her closer as she leaned into him, parting his lips with her own. When her tongue slipped into his mouth tentatively, he groaned.
He had no idea what they were doing, but he sure was glad they'd begun.