The Third Tribute

Chapter seven: The last night

I scream and run to Peeta. "Gale! Put him down! Stop!" I yell. "He'll be dead in a minute! You're going to kill him!" I yell, using all my strength to yank Gale off of him.
Peeta's face turns pale and he shuts his eyes tightly. Gale starts to punch him in the chest when I come up with a plan. I get a running start and crash into Gale's arm. Gale releases his hold on Peeta's neck and I push him aside. Gale is examining his arm and Peeta clutches his throat and takes quick, shaky breaths. I try to remember a time when my mother helped someone like him. Yes, she has. I remember she calmed the woman down with reassuring words and she told her how to breathe again. I attempt to reenact my mother's miracle work, but I'm not blessed with her gifts. I start to tear up while Peeta struggles for air. I try to keep calm and comfort him until the medics come so he doesn't give in to the endless sleep called death. Ceasar ends the show, lying to the crowd that we are having technical difficulties and that we will be back in an hour to do Gale's interview, and the medics come and rush him to the hospital floor.They take him to a room and I try to follow but they won't let me through. I end up going back to my room and gather my thoughts. Peeta could be gone. I can't imagine a world without the boy with the bread, but soon I could be living in one.

Fifteen minutes pass and I find myself sitting on the edge of Peeta's couch, comforting him and helping the trauma go away. "You'll be alright. No one can hurt you now. I'm here. Gale is being taken to a therapy session, and he won't want to hurt you anymore when he gets back." I tell him. He still doesn't say a word. "Did you really think you were going to die?" I ask out of pure curiosity. At first I'm sure he isn't going to answer, then he speaks up.
"Yeah. I didn't think you could save me." He says. I chuckle under my breath. "What's so funny?" He asks me.
"It's funny, how Gale tried to pull us apart when all he did in the end was bring us together."I tell him. "If he hadn't done that, we wouldn't be here together right now."
He's finally starting to recover now. "Ever played cards?" He asks.
"No," I answer.
"Well how about I teach you." He insists.

After a half hour of playing cards, it's ten minutes to six, and I leave Peeta to go back to my room. I have to get ready for Gale's interview. I curl my hair the way Cinna showed me and slip on a different dress. I don't like the one for my original interview, it's too long and I don't like to think of how easily I could trip in that one. Cinna stops by right away and fixes my eyeshadow, and I hurry to Gale's interview. I might be late.

You see, to help Gale with his therapy session, he has to be around Peeta a little. The therapist says if he gradually exposes himself before the games, hour by hour, the urge to kill him will be weaker than his own instincts. He could occasionally have a flashback and it could trigger an attack, but it's unlikely it will happen as long as precautions are made. First he has to look at a picture of him, then a video, then see him while being unable to hurt him, then if he handles all of these stages well he should be free of his other self within a week. The problem with that though, is we only have tonight. I get to the interview just on time. Gale is walking up to Ceasar and He has a grin on his face only I could interpret as fake. Everyone else in the Capitol would believe he is actually happy to be here, and that the only tragic thing that happened an hour ago was the cameras "stopped working". I take my seat between Cinna and Haymitch, with Peeta next to Haymitch. We are in the front row as requested, mainly for the sake of Peeta's life. This is his therapy. Keeping him at a great enough distance so that he can't, or at least won't, hurt Peeta, but still tempting him. It's a test to see if he will kill him out of temptation in the games. If he fails, Peeta will most certainly be murdered in a matter of days.

"How do you feel about the new rules this year?" Ceasar asks.
"I don't like them obviously, as they are the reason for my possible death, but I don't hate them either. I understand why they were made, and I have to at least give you credit for being fair. Although six years seems like a bit much to punish a district for one foolish little girl." Gale admits.
"I have to say that I only slightly agree with you on that one. I think it was clever of president snow to over punish your district. If he hadn't, your district would've thought it was okay to repeat their past actions." Ceasar disagrees. Sensing a possible argument, leading to a bad reputation on Gale's part, Ceasar changes the subject. "What if the rule had never been made? Everyone knows about your fondness towards Miss Katniss Everdeen, would you have volunteered for Peeta to protect her?" He queries.
"No. She would never forgive me. I'm her best friend, and I know that if she lost me she would lose her strength along with me. She isn't too strong physically, it's her ability to block out her emotions and act according to the situation, not her feelings, that makes her strong. The feeling of losing me, I believe would be too much for her to block out," he states, "and I don't want to bring her down with me if I die. That's why I want to die with her. I don't want to lose her either, and if only one of us leaves that arena, it should be neither." The crowd gasps and I realize the intensity of my situation. He isn't about to let me live, he thinks the pain would be too great for me to bear. So I'd have to eliminate him to have even a chance of victory. Or I could kill myself, but if he knows I've passed, he will want to join me. Dying for love just became a problem I never thought I'd have to face. Let alone conquer.

Gale's interview ends, going down in history as one of the most touching interviews of Panem. Gale needs to finish his therapy before we go into the games, and the private sessions are scheduled for eight o'clock, giving Peeta and I an hour and a half to help him overcome his dangerous fear of losing me to Peeta. Gale has to have a guard with him whenever possible so that he doesn't harm anyone, so we meet him and his guard in his room and we talk for a while. He throws hateful glances at Peeta every once in a while, and I wonder if he only holds back his anger to pass therapy. Maybe he wants to fake it so he will still be able to kill him without as much shame in the games. I shake off the thought to rid myself of terrible visions of Peeta's neck being snapped, or waking up beside him, dead, after a long night of running from bloodthirsty enemies.

Peeta leaves the room when he catches Gale looking at him hungrily. Not in the way a man looks at a woman, but the way a phsychopath looks at his next victim. The kind that gives you the chills because you can read their thoughts through their eyes. Thoughts about your murder. So when his guard is done with his shift and Peeta has left we are alone. Left to bask in our own terror. He is afraid of losing me, and I'm afraid of losing the real Gale. If his other self gets away with its mischievous plan he won't be the same. We sit by the windows overlooking the city. We stare curiously into the forever raging crowd of citizens that are barely human. "How do they live with themselves? Being so fake?" He asks no one in particular.
"They must be so wrapped up in their dyes and wigs they don't remember what a real person is." I half joke. But Gale isn't laughing. He stares into the empty, clear sky. A blank expression on his face. "Gale? Are you alright?" I ask him calmly. He hears me. I can tell, but his head doesn't turn to face me. Yet his eyes meet mine in the corner of his vision. He looks angry. "Gale?" I ask. Concerned about his mental stability. I need to get his attention. I slowly reach my hand to his while he stares away, and when my fingers brush his he immediately turns to me.
"Katniss," He mutters.
Relieved, I reply. "Yes?"
"We could do it you know. Leave the country."
"Gale, don't be ridiculous. We wouldn't make it five miles. They'd catch us."
"Maybe, maybe not. Maybe there's another place out there. A better one." He insists.
"What if there isn't?" I pause for a moment. "What if we are really the only ones." I debate.
"You can't believe them. They are liars! The whole lot of them!" He argues. "How could you! What happened to rebelling? I thought we were going to escape together..." His voice drifts off to a still silence at the end.
"We still can Gale, if we just let them take us. If we go...If we die...We can be together. It's the only way. It's the only way now." I tell him.
"Okay. Together?" He asks.
"Together," I promise. Even though I don't plan to keep it.

I leave Gale to himself because I'm not even supposed to be in his room without a guard, and I start back to mine. I stop at Peeta's door to knock before I hear him talking out plans to himself. "If I die, she could make it. If I live, she won't. Which one? Me, or her? What am I going to do?"He yells at himself and curses. "Why me?" He screams. I decide its best not to stay long. I wait until his screaming turns to a light sob and I knock. He shuffles over to me and lets me in.
"How long have you been there?" He asks.
"Not long..." I say. It's only half true. I come in and embrace him. "Meet me in the arena." I tell him. "Okay?"
"Okay," He replies. "but only if you promise me this: if it's just us in the end, it's going to be you that gets out of there. You may not love me back, but I know that I love you too much to be your undoing. So I've come to terms with my imminent death. It's okay."
I don't move, and I don't want to. I just stay nuzzled into his shoulder for a long moment, and in a matter of seconds I reach for his face, and I turn it towards mine. His cheeks are warm and glow with affection, and his lips are twisted into a soft smile. I Slowly turn him to face me. "I don't want to be yours, either. I don't want to be anyone's. It might be me that gets out of this, but everyone has a good shot. I believe in you. You just need to believe in yourself." I whisper back. I'm tempted to kiss him, but I know Gale will certainly kill him, and maybe me, if I do. So instead I wrap my arms around his neck and he slides his onto my waist. "I didn't think it would come to this, but I love you," I murmur before thinking. "and understand that I have to hide it or Gale will kill you. So if I ignore you I don't hate you, I just don't want you to die," I say. I bring my hands down again. "so I have to go." I break off of him and go towards my room. I go to my bed, and I dream of a future with no Hunger Games. I dream of a future with no President snow. I dream of a future with a promise of happiness rather than misery, and most of all, I dream of a future where Peeta and I can be companions, living in harmony and without flaw, and where Gale doesn't want us dead.