Three in the Morning

The Culprit

Katniss

My eyes fly open as the piercing scream of a fire alarm hits my ears. I mindlessly throw the covers off myself and sit upright on my bed. The alarm clock to my left reads 3:06 in the morning. Really? Ugh.

Clearly I'm still half asleep, because I fail to remember I'm clothed in nothing but a bra and pink soffe shorts until I'm halfway out the door of my apartment. So I snatch a blanket from the foot of the bed, wrap it around me, and retreat from the room again.

I end up half walking, half tripping down the stairs. Wild commotion on top of the blaring alarm sounds all around me, but I barely notice and awkwardly and emotionlessly make my way down and out the door.

You never realize how many people live in your building until they're all pooled in the parking lot on a muggy July night. Morning, I mean. Three in the morning.

Firemen race back and forth between their four obnoxiously red trucks and my building for what seems like hours, when according to my phone, it's only been about thirty minutes. As if things could get crappier, the wind refuses to keep my hair out of my face, and my blanket in place. I'm dripping with sweat practically, but flashing my upper body and ninety nine percent of my legs to people I see every day of my life is not something I want to do at the moment.

There's a guy conversing with a cop under the light of a streetlamp who seems to be getting a scolding. I laugh when I notice he's in nothing but a pair of polka dotted boxer shorts. Some little girl standing to my right gives me a look like she thinks I'm crazy for laughing amid such chaos. I roll my eyes. Then her mom gives me an identical glare

"Hey lady," she says, "would you mind putting your boobs away? I wasn't planning on my son discovering those for a while." She finishes, shielding the eyes of a boy who looks to be about ten.

Embarrassed, I pull the blanket tightly around me and decide to walk around a bit. It doesn't seem like we'll be allowed back inside for a while. Apparently the polka dotted boxer boy had the same idea, because while I'm checking the time on my phone (for most likely the hundredth time in a row,) I unwittingly bump into him.

"Oh, hey." He says, and his blue eyes meet my own.

"Oh, you're the culprit, aren't you?" I tease.

He blushes. "Yeah. This is where baking cupcakes in the middle of the night gets you. I wouldn't recommend it. You might just fall asleep like me and set the building on fire."

I laugh. "And why you were baking at such an ungodly hour?" I ask playfully.

"A baker never rests. My brother's getting married next and he asked me to supply all things dessert, so I'm practicing. I'm Peeta, by the way. Mellark."

Mellark. That name rings a bell, but I can't put my finger on where I've heard it before. "I'm-"

"Katniss." He finishes for me with a smile. "I get a coffee from Gloria's on Thirty Seventh Street every morning before school as well. I'm there every time they call out your name."

"Oh." Well, I don't really know what to make of that, but okay.

"Oh, my God. That's weird, isn't it." He cracks himself up, "Sorry."

Peeta Mellark. Baker. The Mellark bakery. Of course. I'm so stupid. "The Mellark bakery downtown, that's yours?" I ask.

But I think the name runs deeper than just a bakery a few blocks away. Mellark . . .

"It's my family's. I'm in culinary school right now, so it's basically just my dad, mom, and brothers that bake stuff at the moment."

"Tell them that their cheese buns are to die for."

"Oh, no," he grins, "those are crafted by yours truly."

"Hook me up with some of those sometime and I'm yours." I joke.

"In that case," He says, "let's do business, Miss..."

"Everdeen."