Pure Torture: a Hunger Games Fanfiction

Chapter 82

Katniss

"Your head is running wild again.
My dear, we still have everythin'
And it's all in your mind." -P!nk

I find myself awake. Wide awake. At 3am. I sit upright in bed, breathing heavily and trying to calm myself down from a nightmare. Peeta doesn't wake up. I gulp down the entire glass of water sitting next to my bed and decide to go check on Willow. She typically wakes up around this time in the morning, and surely enough I find her laying awake in her crib.

For the first couple of weeks, I was too scared to have her sleep in her room. Peeta and Haymitch moved her crib into mine and Peeta's room so that I could check on her whenever I needed to. Since then, she's been sleeping as any other baby does.
I stare down at the baby who barely opens her eyes at me.

"Nice try, Willow. I know you're awake." I say. I pull her out of her crib and when she starts to cry a little bit, I decide she's hungry. It was harder at first, but when Peeta and I figured out a feeding schedule for her, things started to work out a little better. It was quite uncomfortable at first, and I wasn't really sure if I was doing any of the feeding right, but she hasn't starved yet, so I'm thinking it's okay.

The other thing that's taken Peeta and I a bit of time to adjust to is the diaper-changing. First of all, it's gross. It's disgusting. But you have to do it, so you do it.

I still get scared when she cries. I don't think I'll ever not get scared when she cries. Peeta ends up having to take Willow from me sometimes when he gets scared I'll cross some line into hysteria or something of the like.

After she's fed and changed, I hold her in my arms and sit in the rocking chair. The room is dark except for one little night light, which lets off a warm white light. Willow looks up at me, but I can tell that being fed and changed has made her drowsy and that she's on her way to sleep.

"You want me to sing to you? I can sing to you if you want. Your Aunt Prim used to love when I'd sing to her when she was a little girl." I ask, as if she'll actually answer. I take her silence as a yes.

"Deep in the meadow,
Under the Willow,
A bed of grass
A soft green pillow.
Lay down your head
And close your sleepy eyes,
And when again they open
The sun will rise..." I sing softly.

I know she's asleep but I continue the song. When the song's over, I watch the little infant in my arms sleep, her little thumb in her mouth.
"You're gorgeous," I say. "You're, like, the most beautiful baby I've ever seen."

Her eyes stay closed.
"In a few years, I'll still be telling you that. Except you won't believe me, then. Growing up is hard. But I'll make sure you live a better life than I had to. Soon you'll know about it, but I'm going to keep it from you until you can understand it." I say.

"Yeah..." I repeat. "I'm going to make sure you don't have to grow up so quickly or face the pain I've been through. Mommy and daddy have been through so much together. You're going to be mad, when you're 6 and nobody will tell you why I wake screaming. Or when you're 12 and you can't be in the room when the other kids learn about the Games. You're going to be so mad that nobody will tell you."

I watch her sleeping and a wave of guilt washes over me.
"I'm going to tell you now. Then, you'll never be able to tell me that nobody told you anything. You just won't remember." I say, laughing a little.

She stirs a little and yawns.
"Pay attention, Will. You'll want to hear this."
Almost miraculously, her eyes open.
"I guess you are listening. I'll tell you all about my life and daddy's life."

The words seem to tumble out.
"Your aunt Prim was 12. The chances of her getting picked were so... they were nearly nonexistent. My name was in there 20 times. I was 16 and was putting my name in there for tesserae. They reaped Prim's name and I had no choice but to volunteer for her. Daddy was the other one picked." I say in a voice that people always use to talk to babies.