Holding Out For A Hero

Chapter Twenty Five

Peeta bangs on the door, begging for me to open it but I don't, I'm in a complete state of shock. All the doors are locked and when he tries opening the back door I still don't budge. Tears roll down my cheeks but I don't sob, I watch the shadows move across the house as the hours pass.

"Your touch leads to fatalities."

That is probably one of the most accurate things that has ever came out of anyone's mouth about me, especially for Peeta Mellark. I somehow fall asleep and when I come to its pitch black outside and I hear a loud grunt and the back door finally opens. I see Haymitch with a hatchet in his hand, sweat sheens on his face.

"Sweetheart?"

I don't answer him and he slowly walks over to me. When he's right in front of me he kneels down.

"Hey,"

He puts his hands on my shoulders.

"Relax, your tensed up."

I slowly do and he brushes dark curls away from my face that got lose from my braid.

  "You wanna stand up?"

I nod a little and he helps me up where I grimace as my stiff body finally moves. My legs are numb and Haymitch has to hold me tight while leading me to sit on the living room couch. He turns on a light and I squint at the burst of light. He sits down in the recliner and looks at me.

"You know Peeta didn't mean it like that,"

I look anywhere besides Haymitch as tears begin to build up once again.

  "You don't cause deaths Katniss." He says softly and my bottom lip begins to tremble.

"Why don't you tell that to 100,000 unmarked graves in the meadow, or Prim, Rue, Cinna, Finnick, Boggs, Leeg one and two, Castor, Peeta's family."

My voice is flat when I say their names, like its a recited line I've spoken too many times.

"You were doing what you thought was right and you did what you needed to survive." He says and I scoff.

  "I did a great job didn't I?" I say sarcastically and he nods.

"For a eighteen year old, hell yeah."

Silence envelops us besides my quiet sniffles, then the fear once again envelops my chest and I start to get frantic.

  "What will my child think when they hear what I did, killing hundreds of thousands of people, men, women, children... It didn't matter they were killed because they were standing with me and if I just ran it with the berries then everything would be fine-"

I then just burst into back sucking sobs, maybe it's from my hormones, maybe this is all me overreacting to something that was never meant to be taken as a threat but I can't take it. I hear Haymitch move and then feel his hands on my shoulders, resting his forehead on the top of my head.

  "Listen to me," I nod and he goes on.

  "If you killed yourself and ran it things would be just how they were, you would've left your mother, now mourning a daughter and a husband. She would've let Prim starved and Gale wouldn't of had a friend... I'd still be a drunk."

He pauses and bites his lip, shaking his head.

"You didn't kill anyone Katniss you know who did? Snow did, he's the monster, he's the murderer, all you did was try to end it. You weren't the one who threw children into a death lottery for others enjoyment, you weren't the one who made a barrier of children around a mansion just to get blown to bits, you Katniss gave this nation another chance at life... You gave all of us another chance." He pauses.