“You’re not very big, are you? Or particularly pretty?”
Okay so! I wrote a one shot about Peeta rectifying his D13 comment about Katniss not being pretty. I got this idea from a headcannon post by @paintedpeeta! It is longgggggg and soft. I hope you enjoy!
Katniss didn’t mean to get frustrated with him.
She really didn’t.
But, the weather in District 12 was particularly dry and sweltering. Not only that, but she didn’t catch anything in the woods. All the animals hid in the shade from the glaring sun. And increased time in the woods doing nothing gave her increased time to think.
To think about him.
Four months after the end of the war, they created a routine. Katniss finally gained the energy and the will to go back into the woods. When she was done, she would arrive home to the smell of fresh bread wafting through the entry way. While she showered, Peeta would plate the food and they would eat. During the day, they worked on the memory book, they talked, read books, and even played around with whatever new hobby supplies Effie sent in on the train that week.
Once they passed time till dusk, they would cook, eat dinner together, and retire to bed.
It wasn’t until a few months passed that they decided to share a bed again, agreeing that more sleep was worth it, even if they agreed that they were “just friends”- relearning themselves as “Katniss and Peeta” after a war that took everything from them.
But Katniss was beginning to get frustrated.
Some days, she was tired of studying his face, only for his gaze to flick away when he caught her staring. She was tired of him sliding his hands away when they got too close putting dishes in the sink. She was tired of being so, so, close to him- but feeling so far away. But other days, they seemed more in synch. Peeta would be more affectionate, light hearted, and teasing. On those days he would allow her to rest her legs on his on the couch, and he would lightly run his fingers up and down her calves. The lack of consistency confused her. Though she wasn’t positive that she would say it out loud, she knew how she felt for Peeta, and she wanted more. Finally, in a world without cameras or wars they could just be whatever they wanted; there didn’t have to be a weird air or confusion between them. But there still was. She couldn’t help but feel that maybe he had moved on. Maybe his gestures were rooted in friendship, and that his attitude of indifference or annoyance toward her in 13 had just stayed with him. Maybe he just stuck around because sticking around was the only way he knew how to protect her- and she knew he wouldn’t ever give up on that.
It got to the point where Katniss would spend all day wishing for darkness to come- which she had never done before- so that he would allow her to coil into the folds of his side and feel the warmth of his skin. Nighttime brought a certain surety for Katniss that she no longer felt in the day time.
On this particular day, one comment swirled around in her brain, over and over. “You’re not very big, are you? Or particularly pretty?”
The words weighed heavy in her brain, making her feel small and slimy, and convincing her that Peeta’s inconsistency was because he was too scared of being honest.
So after spending most of the morning sitting with her frustrations in the boiling outside air, Katniss was in no mood to talk to Peeta, let alone spend the day with him like they had been doing.
At breakfast, Peeta can tell that something is wrong. She hasn’t smiled at him once- and though he didn’t think she realized she even did it, Katniss and her soft smile coming through the door was what began his morning. She didn’t seem to be hurt, and he couldn’t fathom her having any bad interactions while out in the woods. Maybe she just didn’t feel well today. But he wanted to know. He knew Katniss was never good with words, but Peeta didn’t think that mattered. He just wanted her to be honest.
He decided to broach the topic between the loud, angry clanking of her silverware.
“Are you okay, Katniss?” She didn’t even glance in his direction.
“I’m fine, Peeta. Thank you for the rolls.”
He made one of her favorite breakfast delicacies- cinnamon rolls. Instead of scarfing down two and offering him a hug like she did usually, she rose from the table with a loud clammer, and began to wash dishes at the sink. That was usually a job reserved for him.
The war may have changed a lot, but Peeta Mellark knew Katniss Everdeen. And he knew something was wrong. And it was something he did.
Instead of finishing his own plate of rolls, he got up to follow her. If she wasn’t going to talk, he was going to try to make her feel better.
Peeta slid behind her at the sink and wrapped his hands around her waist. For awhile, he hadn’t noticed how she felt whenever he did that, but eventually he started to notice the slight shudder on her skin and the melting of her body into his own.
This time, he only felt the shudder and felt her stiffen to the likes of wood.
“What are you doing, Peeta?”
He nuzzled close to her ear. Katniss wanted to escape, desperately, before he lessened her resolve but his breath on her neck almost brought all of her thoughts to a halt.
“I’m trying to make you feel better. It’s so hot today, I was hoping you would just stay here with me. But you slipped out early instead.”
Katniss felt bad that she left him-she felt like she needed to soak it all in wherever he woke up in a particularly cuddly mood. But today was just not the day. Especially with the heat. And his warm hands burning into her waist. She wanted to turn around in his grip and hold his face, but she snapped instead.
“Exactly, Peeta, it’s hot. So get off of me.” She threw her hands in the air and he released his grip. She missed it as soon as it was gone.
“I’m sorry- I just want to be near you. I’ll get a cool cloth and we can just lay down in front of the fan together, how about that?”
Katniss immediately felt bad for snapping, but her bad mood persisted. Of course he was going to try to take care of her- it’s Peeta. But she was tired of whatever was going on, and if she wasn’t going to get answers anytime soon, she wasn’t going to let it persist.
“No. Stop trying to take care of me.” Katniss continued with the dishes and hoped that her hostility would convince him to at least leave the room.
“Of course I’m going to take care of you, what are you talking about?”
“No! You don’t need to anymore.”
“Katniss, seriously, you need to tell me what’s going on here.” Peeta tugged on her arm in an effort to get her to turn around and face him.
Katniss slammed a plate down and finally looked in his eyes.
“I don’t know what’s going on here! There’s no cameras here. You don’t have to pretend that you want to take care of me and start over with me.”
“Katniss I want to start over with you. I want to take care of you, why don’t you think I do?”
“I told you that you don’t have to pretend! It’s fine, I know that things are different now, okay?”
“Yeah, maybe things have changed a little, but-“
She cut him off. “But nothing, Peeta! You don’t even think I’m pretty, just admit it to me already!”
With the way those words cut into Peeta, you would have thought Katniss threw something. She hated the look on his face. The disappointment, the sadness, the way his broad shoulders turned slightly in.
“You...you think I don’t think you’re...pretty?”
“You told me as much.”
Realization washed over Peeta’s face and his shoulders fell even more as he remembered the retched days of District 13. The retched days where he struggled to tell the difference between the love of his life and the illusion of her the Capitol pumped in his veins. He didn’t think she remembered that day- when the venom that controlled everything spoke for him and commented on her body and her face.
“I didn’t think you remembered that.”
“Of course I remembered that.”
“It really hurt you, didn’t it?”
“I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter.”
Peeta shook his head and moved around the island to come closer to her.
“Yes, it does. You have to know that that wasn’t me in 13. Don’t you know that?”
Katniss wasn’t sure. Yes, logically she knew that her Peeta didn’t say that, but why did it still swirl around in her brain?
“Yes, I know.”
Peeta let out a small breathy laugh and rolled his eyes.
“You aren’t any better at lying these days, Katniss.”
This time it was Katniss that rolled her eyes as she stepped forward to move around him. Instead, Peeta caught her by the arm and trapped her, with her back against the kitchen island and his arms on either side of her.
As his blue eyes bore into her own grey ones, Katniss was speechless. She didn’t know how to say everything she wanted, and she wasn’t completely sure Peeta knew why she was upset in the first place. But sure enough, he did. Because Peeta Mellark knows Katniss Everdeen. That’s one thing she was sure of.
“I’m sorry I’ve been so...inconsistent. Im terrified of doing something wrong, Katniss. Sometimes I still feel like a mutt.”
Katniss interrupted him. She hated when he referred to himself as a mutt.
“You’re not-“
“I know. Sometimes I still feel like I am though. I already hurt you once, what if I snap and do it again?” Peeta lifted one hand to rub away the heat rushing to his face. “But sometimes I feel so warm and comfortable here with you that I just let myself go. Because at the end of the day, Katniss, this is all I want to do. I want to be with you, take care of you, build a life with you. I want to figure out what being us looks like after all this time and pain. But we have all the time in the world to figure that out, because it’s just you and me. So if you’ll let me, I’ll stop trying to hold back so much, and I’ll stay right here with you.”
She felt overwhelmed with so many sweet words. Peeta never lost his gift. Still, she looked him in the eyes and whispered “Always?” in confirmation.
“Always, Katniss.”
The hug he wrapped her up in was suffocating, and still felt so impossibly good as it did long ago. One of his hands came up to stroke the back of her hair, just like she did to him.
Katniss did not want to let go, but Peeta did, and he did so abruptly, grabbing her by the shoulders and pulling her back to look at him.
“I forgot something.”
Katniss let a smile creep on her lips.
“What, Peeta?”
“I think that you are the most beautiful woman in the whole world. Every moment of every day.”
As he tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ears, Katniss blushed.
His hand stayed pressed to her cheek, lightly grazing it with her thumb. They both stared at each other, not quite knowing what to do next. But Katniss caught his gaze flick to her lips, and she knew what he was waiting for.
“Damn you, Peeta Mellark! Just kiss me-!” Katniss was half laughing, but half serious. She didn’t even get to finish her sentence.
Katniss thought that their hug felt so impossibly good, but nothing rivaled the feeling she got as his lips moved against hers and made her feel like she was floating.
She felt him smile into her mouth and heard him say in a low voice,
“I thought you’d never ask.”
From that day forward, Katniss got kisses freely. And after every one, he would pull away from her and tell her she was beautiful.
When he greeted her after a trip to the woods, “Hello, beautiful.”
When she kissed him after he found a missing puzzle piece, or when they finally finished a board game that took ages, “You are so beautiful.”
When they finished an entry in the memory book, “That was beautiful, Katniss. Oh, and so are you.”
When he made her taste a new recipe, “Did you like it, beautiful?”
When he stroked her hair to lull her to sleep, “Goodnight, beautiful.”
And in no time at all, Katniss Everdeen really did feel like the most beautiful woman in the world, and Peeta Mellark would make sure it always stayed that way.
