Mockingjay(6)

I hesitate at the door marked 307, anticipating the questions from my family. “What am I going to tell them about Twelve?” I ask Gale.

“I doubt they’ll ask for details. They saw it burn. They’ll mostly be worried about how you’re handling it.” Gale touches my cheek. “Like I am.”

I press my face against his hand for a moment. “I’ll survive.”

Then I take a deep breath and open the door. My mother and sister are home for 18:00—Reflection, a half hour of downtime before dinner. I see the concern on their faces as they try to gauge my emotional state. Before anyone can ask anything, I empty my game bag and it becomes 18:00—Cat Adoration. Prim just sits on the floor weeping and rocking that awful Buttercup, who interrupts his purring only for an occasional hiss at me. He gives me a particularly smug look when she ties the blue ribbon around his neck.

My mother hugs the wedding photo tightly against her chest and then places it, along with the book of plants, on our government-issued chest of drawers. I hang my father’s jacket on the back of a chair. For a moment, the place almost seems like home. So I guess the trip to 12 wasn’t a complete waste.

We’re heading down to the dining hall for 18:30—Dinner when Gale’s communicuff begins to beep. It looks like an oversized watch, but it receives print messages. Being granted a communicuff is a special privilege that’s reserved for those important to the cause, a status Gale achieved by his rescue of the citizens of 12. “They need the two of us in Command,” he says.

Trailing a few steps behind Gale, I try to collect myself before I’m thrown into what’s sure to be another relentless Mockingjay session. I linger in the doorway of Command, the high-tech meeting/war council room complete with computerized talking walls, electronic maps showing the troop movements in various districts, and a giant rectangular table with control panels I’m not supposed to touch. No one notices me, though, because they’re all gathered at a television screen at the far end of the room that airs the Capitol broadcast around the clock. I’m thinking I might be able to slip away when Plutarch, whose ample frame has been blocking the television, catches sight of me and waves urgently for me to join them. I reluctantly move forward, trying to imagine how it could be of interest to me. It’s always the same. War footage. Propaganda. Replaying the bombings of District 12. An ominous message from President Snow. So it’s almost entertaining to see Caesar Flickerman, the eternal host of the Hunger Games, with his painted face and sparkly suit, preparing to give an interview. Until the camera pulls back and I see that his guest is Peeta.

A sound escapes me. The same combination of gasp and groan that comes from being submerged in water, deprived of oxygen to the point of pain. I push people aside until I am right in front of him, my hand resting on the screen. I search his eyes for any sign of hurt, any reflection of the agony of torture. There is nothing. Peeta looks healthy to the point of robustness. His skin is glowing, flawless, in that full-body-polish way. His manner’s composed, serious. I can’t reconcile this image with the battered, bleeding boy who haunts my dreams.

Caesar settles himself more comfortably in the chair across from Peeta and gives him a long look. “So…Peeta…welcome back.”

Peeta smiles slightly. “I bet you thought you’d done your last interview with me, Caesar.”

“I confess, I did,” says Caesar. “The night before the Quarter Quell…well, who ever thought we’d see you again?”

“It wasn’t part of my plan, that’s for sure,” says Peeta with a frown.

Caesar leans in to him a little. “I think it was clear to all of us what your plan was. To sacrifice yourself in the arena so that Katniss Everdeen and your child could survive.”

“That was it. Clear and simple.” Peeta’s fingers trace the upholstered pattern on the arm of the chair. “But other people had plans as well.”

Yes, other people had plans, I think. Has Peeta guessed, then, how the rebels used us as pawns? How my rescue was arranged from the beginning? And finally, how our mentor, Haymitch Abernathy, betrayed us both for a cause he pretended to have no interest in?

In the silence that follows, I notice the lines that have formed between Peeta’s eyebrows. He has guessed or he has been told. But the Capitol has not killed or even punished him. For right now, that exceeds my wildest hopes. I drink in his wholeness, the soundness of his body and mind. It runs through me like the morphling they give me in the hospital, dulling the pain of the last weeks.

“Why don’t you tell us about that last night in the arena?” suggests Caesar. “Help us sort a few things out.”