Blooming in the Spring

Chapter 8

Peeta does not return after his flashback, nor does he call.

I'm sick with worry all the time but Haymitch assures me that he will keep checking on him. Still, I can't help but let my mind wander off to the worst place imaginable. 

Only three days pass without him and I am constantly dragged into devastating nightmares of Peeta's lifeless body and ashy face and glossy eyes. Sometimes clutching an empty bottle of pills, sometimes a bloodied knife, sometimes nothing in the case where his heart simply stops beating. I imagine every possible way he might be taken from me and I think of what it would feel like if he was. How I might react. I picture myself going insane, losing my mind. Maybe even clutching a bottle of pills myself. I am consumed with horrible thoughts of losing him and of losing me and while I know rationally Peeta is still alive, I can't shake the very real fear of never seeing him again. What if he just never comes back? What if he never trusts himself to be near me again? What if the kiss we shared only three days ago was the closest I'd ever get to him again? 

I feel all alone all over again. 

Someone must have called Greasy Sae because she begins her visits to my house again. Though she'd stop by sometimes on occasion, since Peeta got back, her appearances became much less frequent. Now that she's returning often again, I am even more afraid that Peeta will not be. 

I can hardly drag myself out of bed, so afraid and so alone with no one here to understand the way I'm feeling. Haymitch does try to come and see me as much as he can, though I know his time is being split between me and Peeta. He doesn't tell me much about him other than he's alright, which makes me suspicious that he is in fact not alright. Still, he tells me that it's better to leave him alone right now. He's had a few more sessions over the phone with Aurelius. Haymitch tells me that this will pass and not to worry. Peeta will be back soon enough, he says, he just needs time. Somehow, I don't believe him. 

Haymitch finally manages to get me out of bed and situated in the living room, though I nearly cry at the sight of Peeta's left-behind art supplies and books and his favorite blanket that someone has taken from the place he sat on the couch and folded it neatly over an armchair. I am constantly reminded of him and I ache for his comfort, for his touch, for the sense of security he gave me. He was only back for a short while but I finally let myself get used to having him around. Now what? We go back to acting like strangers? Somehow I'm not sure I can take that again. Because if anything, even if Peeta and I are never meant to be together romantically, we understand each other better than anyone else ever could. There is no one who knows what we've been through together, not even Haymitch. And I long so desperately for someone who just understands. Without me having to tell them, without them asking me a million questions about how I'm doing or how they can help. Someone who just gets it--gets me. Peeta is the only one who can do that for me. 

I decide shortly after Haymitch disappears out of my house again that I can't sit around here waiting for something I'm not even sure will come. I have to see him. I have to show him that I'm okay, that I'm not angry with him. How confused and frightened he must be, all alone in that house. I don't know how he does it. Even before the Quell, he lived alone there. I never asked why his family didn't come to stay with him, not even his brothers. I know they had the bakery to manage but at the cost of abandoning their son? It seems unthinkable to me and living alone in this house is nearly impossible for me now. I can't imagine how he must feel, so isolated. 

I slip a light jacket over my shoulders; the past few days have been so gloomy, some of the coldest we've had yet this spring. I halfheartedly lace up my hunting boots that I hardly wear anymore. I hardly make it out of the house anymore, let alone the woods so I haven't had much of a need for them. They bring me a mild sense of comfort though and I can use all that I can get.