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Today is her birthday. Birthdays aren't usually anything special in 12 and, if it's turning 12, it's usually something to dread. The only birthday Katniss has ever cared about was 19 and she's not there yet. Instead, she's turning 18 today and if nothing had ever changed, she would be lining up for the Reaping for her last time this year. She'd have so many names in the ball that she'd be bound to be picked but Katniss likes to think she'd be lucky. After all, she made it to sixteen without ever getting Reaped, didn't she?

It had been Prim who was Reaped that year, Prim who only had one name in the ball and had the best shot out of any kid in the Seam to never get Reaped. Prim, for whom Katniss had sacrificed everything.

On her birthday, Katniss always thinks of Prim. She thinks about how Prim always made it a point to give her something on her birthday even if she didn't have the resources that Katniss had. Somehow magically, there was good flint for starting fires or a little tinder box. Her boots got patched or there was good, pliable wood for new arrows. Prim always managed to make something out of nothing.

Today, so she doesn't think about Prim, Katniss decides to work. She's taking orders in the dining room, bussing tables, working back in the kitchen. Anything to keep her hands and mind busy so that homesickness doesn't threaten to eat her from the inside out. It's always been the mental things she's struggled with. She can deal with pain, hunger, death but she never, ever has been able to deal with thinking about just how much she misses her sister each and every day.

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Once he's out of the water, he goes straight for his pants, pulling them on before he turns to face Katniss again, doing them up as he speaks.

"Okay," he says with a nod. "You can ask me anything you. I'll give you an honest answer."

He doesn't make the same deal with her. Katniss is a private sort of person, and he knows that. She's had enough of her secrets splashed around for the world to see. If she wants to tell him her secrets, he'll be more than happy to listen to them, and even ask questions.

"How about starting with this surprise of yours?" Katniss thinks this is easy enough, since Peeta had planned to share the surprise anyway. She's had enough of having her secrets displayed for everyone to see and she bets Peeta is too. Anything he wants to tell her, she wants him to divulge it out of his own free will and not because she wheedled it out of him.

"That's a pretty safe place to start."

He grins at that and nods, reaching into the basket he'd brought and fishing out a small box. He rattles it at her. Inside the box is a delicate silver necklace. "You're going to have to come get it though," he teases her

Peeta wants to talk to her, to tell her things about himself, to talk to her about everything. He doesn't want to have secrets with Katniss so he'll gladly tell her everything. He wants that sort of close relationship with her.

Edited 2014-08-28 03:25 (UTC)

Katniss rolls her eyes but it's all playful. She's actually enjoying the idea that she can spend an afternoon uninterrupted with Peeta and not have anyone clamoring after her for details about it. She reaches for the box and opens it slowly, wanting to savor it. This is one of the few presents she's ever received in her life that didn't have strings attached.

"Oh...oh, Peeta," she says, touching the necklace lightly. "This is way too fragile for someone like me. I might break it."

It's an unexpected pleasure, this time alone and even more unexpected that it can remain theirs. They've so few moments that are private. He watches her, butterflies in his stomach. Yes, he's given her gifts before, but they reeked of the arena. This is the first thing he'd given her that's entirely untouched by the Games.

He shakes his head at Katniss' protest. "No. You're not going to break it, and if you do, we'll get it fixed." He bites his bottom lip, watching her a moment. "Would you like me to put it on you?"

"Yeah, I would." This seems like more than just a simple gift and Katniss isn't quite sure what more leads into but she guesses it's all right. She'll figure it out as she goes.

He takes the necklace from her, draping it across her collarbone and bringing the ends of it around.

"Lift your hair for me," he says softly, his breath against her bare shoulder.

Katniss gathers her hair up and puts it over her shoulder. It's still wet, so it's heavy, but it's no trouble to hold it out of his way while he puts the necklace on her.

He fumbles a moment with the necklace, fingers not used to working such delicate things, but after a moment it's clasped. He rests his hands against the back of her neck a moment before he nods then pulls back a little.

"Turn around?"

He'd like to see it on her.

Katniss turns around and smiles. It's a little shy and awkward, the way she always feels when it's real and not for the cameras. She isn't so good at this, the one on one, and feels more comfortable with a bow in her hand than a smile on her face.

He likes that smile because it is real. It seems more like the Katniss he's come to know in the middle of the night with the nightmares, the Katniss he knows from years of watching her from afar.

"Are you hungry? I brought some cheese buns and some cold cuts."

"Now, you know I will do anything for cheese buns," Katniss says. It's no real secret that they're her favorite and even the few times she's tried to make them herself, her own are a poor imitation of Peeta's.

"How is it that you're so good at this stuff? I'm terrible at anything that doesn't have to do with killing things."

"Anything, huh?" he teases her. "I might have to hold these cheese buns for ransom in that case." She's getting better. He's had a good deal more practice than she.

He shrugs a little. glancing sideways at her before he decides to actually try and explain his theory on it. "You learned how to kill things because it was what you had to do to survive. I learned how to use words because it's what I had to do. My mother has a temper; she gets angry easily, but if I could use words to soothe her then my brothers and I were safe."

He pauses. "As for the relationship stuff, I think you just have to realize that all of this is possible, and you want it. It gets easier after that."

"I didn't know that about your mother. I guessed," Katniss admits. She knows that Peeta got a beating for helping her that day and she will never, ever forget that. "But I didn't know for sure. I guess...I guess you do anything you need to do to survive."

Peeta shakes his head. "It's okay. I don't think most people do. It's not something you share, you know?" It had been worth it that day. He nods. "We all do. That doesn't mean we can't learn other skills once we've got the opportunity."

After all, he knows how to wield a sword now, though that hadn't been a lesson he'd wanted to learn.

The corner of his mouth quirks up in a crooked grin. "Stick with me, Girl on Fire, I'll show you the way," he teases her, tugging at her hair lightly.

"You'll teach me how to win friends and influence people?" Katniss teases back. She isn't exactly the best at being sincere when it comes to playing the crowds but she suspects Peeta isn't either. Peeta is just better at faking it than she is.

"I look forward to learning something."

He quirks an eyebrow, grinning at her. "Something like that."

He gets the cheese buns out of the basket and sets them between them on the blanket then gets some goat cheese and some strawberries.

He watches her a moment, bottom lip tucked between his teeth. He's got that look again, half awed. "I think we're both learning a lot here."

Like how to be themselves without any faking, how to grow together in a way that wasn't possible back home.

"I taught you how to swim," Katniss says, "And you taught me how to be a nice person. So I think we're both doing well on the learning things." One of the things she's noticed about the Nexus over being back in one of the Districts is that there are books everywhere. Most of the books back in 12 are mostly to teach you how to work in the mines since everyone is going to end up there anyway. That's not the case here.

"Have you been to the library yet? They have books with actual history in them and not propaganda."

Peeta considers that before nodding. "Yeah, I think so too now that you point it out." He smirks at her. "However, you were always a nice person. I'm just teaching you how to be more social. There's a difference." She picked Mags, Beetee and Wiress for her team in the 75th. Nice isn't Katniss' problem. She just needs to learn how to deal with people in general.

His brow furrows a little at her words. "I've looked at some of the cookbooks, but I hadn't thought to look at the history books. What do they say? Are there any about Panem?"

He'd definitely check them out after this.

"That's the thing," Katniss says. "They don't even mention Panem. There was this whole world with different countries and different people and none of it mentions Panem or the Capitol at all. It's like the Games never existed and the world as we know it doesn't exist. It's...weird. I don't know if it's true or not, I haven't been able to compare it to anything, but I think it's talking about some of the same places. I recognized 12 on a map."

Peeta's brow pulls into an expression of confusion, one of thought. None of what Katniss is saying makes sense, but at the same time, he trusts her and knows she's telling the truth.

"How is that even possible?"

They'd been led to believe that Panem was the world. At this point, he's accepted that there is so much to the world than Panem, but the idea that Panem isn't even mentioned is mind boggling to him.

"I wouldn't put it past the Capitol to cover up all the history of anything before it existed," Katniss says.

"Think about it. The only thing we ever learn about in school is about how to mine coal and how the Capitol saved us all from uprising. But we know there's more. We know they learn different things in the other Districts than we did in 12."

He considers that a moment, head tilted slightly before nodding. "No, you're right. It falls right in line with them keeping us all so insular and separated. We only know what we need to know. What's to say that whatever happened in the past isn't something that the Capitol has decided we don't need to know."

It certainly explains the lack of books in general in District 12, the lack of any useful programming on the television except for what comes directly from the Capitol and Snow himself.

"Exactly. Typical Snow," Katniss says, sighing a little. "I kind of want to read all of it though. I want to know everything he's been hiding from us all these years because there's no weapon greater than knowledge."

She glances at Peeta. "You have to help me, though. You're better at wording things."

"Of course, I'll help you." He's intrigued as well, but even if he weren't he'd help Katniss out. "I'll get some notebooks and we'll take notes then we can go back and reference things, try to figure out similarities and why Snow might have changed things anyway."

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