Katniss and Peeta Mellark:There are Far Worse Games to Play

Chapter 3

A couple of hours later, Annie and Finnick leave, but not before Finnick tries out his dads old sugarcube joke.

"Do you want a sugarcube mum?", Finnick asks Annie. Exactly how his father would have a thousand times before. When he says this Annie gets tears in her eyes and looks at her son proudly. "Bye Finnick", Peeta and I say at the same time. "Bye Auntie Katniss and Uncle Peeta", he replies, only just audible because he has half a dozen sugarcubes stuffed into his mouth. "Bye guys", Annie says. "Bye Annie", Peeta says. "See you later Annie", I say. Finnick waves one more time before Annie closes the door behind them.

***

I turn around to face Peeta and I see him smiling at me. "What are you smiling at?", I ask him. "You", he says laughing. "What about me?", I ask him. "When you were looking at Finnick and he offered you a sugarcube. He's just like his father", Peeta replies. "I know he his", I say. After I say this, he comes closer to me and I wrap my arms around him tight, as if I'm gonna lose him if I let him go again like the times he was taken by the Capitol. "I love you Peeta", I whisper to him. "I know", he replies. "Let's go over to your mothers

house for a bit", Peeta suggests after I unwrap my arms from around him and link hands with him. Then we walk to my mothers house. When we get inside, after we knock several times without an answer.When we walk in, hand in hand, we find my mother, asleep on the table with a puffy red face. She only got back from District 4 a couple of days ago, after helping set up a hospital there. She must still be going through the grief of losing Prim. She mustn't have had time in District 4 to worry about it because she was so concerned with her work. "Wake up", I whisper to her. She sits bolt up right. "Wha.. What did I miss?", she asks. "Nothing. We just came to see you", I answer. She looks at the pair of us, me leaning my head on Peeta's shoulder and our still linked hands. All of a sudden she gets a small smile on her face. "I'm glad you came to see me", she says, still smiling. "What are you smiling at mum?", I ask her. "Just you, Katniss. I always thought that Prim was the one that was going to end up with the perfect life and the family but you've ended up with that life. Except for the family bit", My mum answers, smilingly even more brightly than I thought was possible. "We're working on it", I say which makes us all laugh loudly. It's good to see my mother smiling and laughing again. I haven't seen her like this since my father was still alive. We sit there talking and joking for another hour or so before Peeta and I decide to get going.