Chapter 59

Katniss

"It takes a while to settle down my shivered bones. Wait til' the Panic's out." -Birdy

I seem to push through the darkness of the night that's settled over the house that night. I can't sleep. Any hope of sleeping is gone. As I layed in bed, I tried to calm my racing heart and mind, telling myself that it wasn't real. It's just a nightmare. Just a nightmare. Just a nightmare.

But my attempts at calming down weren't enough. I ended up getting up in the night. So here I am, silently going down the stairs to the living room where I'll await sunrise. I sit down on the couch, staring into the dark, unlit fireplace.

When I finally pry my eyes from the fireplace, I notice that I'm not alone down here. "Johanna? What are you doing up?" I ask."I could ask you the same thing." She replies, "And actually, I was up before you, for the record." "I just..." I say, voice wavering, "I just had a nightmare."

"Me too." She adds simply."I can usually calm myself down after one, but tonight... I know it wasn't going to happen." I say."Maybe if you talk about it. I've always thought that talking about it could make it better. But, really, I've never had anyone to talk to at home. Just me." She says.

I feel bad for her. She didn't have anyone. There's no one left she loves."I don't want to talk about the nightmare." I say."Oh." She replies. I can hear an edge of disappointment in her voice. "I want to talk about something else. The Capitol. Not the Capitol now... The Capitol that tore us from the rebels." I say.

"What about them?" Johanna asks."I don't know. What they did to us, I guess."Johanna nods. It's pitch dark, but my eyes have adjusted to the blackness, and I can just see the outlines of her."Johanna... What did they do to you?" I ask, cautiously. I hate to ask, but I have to.

She sighs."Not exactly what they did to you. I was of use to them, but nowhere near as much as you were. I think you got the brunt of it, to be honest. Not that I got off easy. They still tortured me. They'd do all the same beatings with me. I could... I could always hear you screaming when they'd take you and hijack you." She explains."I screamed a lot?" I ask, the memories foggy.

"Oh my God, yes. I swear, I've never heard anyone scream so much. And I've seen people practically chop themselves in half with their axes in 7. Still, you screamed more, girl." She says."Oh." I say. I feel bad, almost. Like I should have tried to be quieter."But I can't really blame you." Johanna adds on. And she's right.

"Well," She continues, "I remember they'd burn me like they did to you." She holds out an arm with pink scarred skin from a flame that licked across it. "And I had the same cuts and bruises as you did, for the most part." She says.

"What gives you nightmares?" I ask."I... I get my nightmares from other things they did. They would always take me to interrogation rooms and they'd ask me questions about the rebels, and I didn't know anything, so I couldn't tell them. But they didn't believe me. That's how I got most of my scars. Interrogation and torture from it. And that's what gives me nightmares. The pain, the helplessness." Johanna explains.

"I understand." I say."What about you?" She asks. I find it hard to gather the courage I need to delve into the subject. But by the tone of her voice, the way it rattles sometimes, I can tell that she genuinely wants to know. I don't want to deny her of that.

"I get my nightmares from a lot. More times than not, to about the dead; the people I couldn't save; the people who are dead because of me. But that's not always it, I guess. I have nightmares of the Games. I have nightmares of my hijacking. I have nightmares of all of those things at once, made scarier by the fact that my brain can't tell real from not real sometimes." I explain.

"Do you ever just want it all to end? Like, the days are good, but I'm scared to sleep. I know sleep brings nightmares. What do you do? How do you get through it?" She asks me.I want to sound strong. I want to sound like I've got myself under control and that I can fix myself. I want to sound like I do it all on my own. But that's just not the truth.

"Peeta." I state, "I don't do it. I can't do it, actually. It's Peeta."Johanna just nods. I can tell that's not the response she had in mind. I can tell she wanted a big, inspiring story about how I grab my daggers and swords and bow and arrow and I fight my demons off myself.But that's not what happens.

"I wish I could do it on my own. I wish I wasn't so dependent on other people. I wish I didn't get up in the middle of the night to find myself absentmindedly searching through medicines. But wishing isn't going to get me anywhere, is it?" I say.

And it's true. Whoever invented wishing was stupid. What's the difference between wishing and wanting? That's easy. Wishing is when you say that you desire something or something to happen. Wanting is when you might actually get up and do something about it. There's a difference, I think, between wishing and wanting: how you react to it. I think people forget about that.

"I want someone to love me like Peeta loves you." She says. I want to reply, but I don't. I honestly don't know how."I don't deserve him." I finally say.This time, it's Johanna who doesn't reply.

"What was your family like?" I ask. She stays silent. "Or, um, nevermind." I say. I hope I haven't just brought up something too painful to talk about.

"I had a mother. My father left me when I was 7. My brother Zachary had just turned 12 and my other brother, Jason, was just born. I don't know why he left. He just packed his things and walked out on us. After my Games, my mother died from an axe accident." She confesses.

"What about Zachary and Jason?" I ask. She takes a deep breath, and I can tell it's going to be bad.

"President Snow... Decided that I was desirable." She says."Like Finnick..." I realize. I don't need her to answer to know its true."If you didn't comply, he'd have someone you love killed. It just so happened that the first time I didn't comply, he took out both of my brothers. Zach and Jason were out together and I guess Snow decided to take them both out at once. They came home that day being carried by 4 men I didn't know. And to think, I was just about to tell Snow I'd do it." She explains.

"Johanna... I'm so sorry." I say. "Zach was 22. Jason..." She says through tears, "Jason was only 10."

"Anyway," she says,regaining her composure, "What time is it?" "I think it's, like, 2 AM." I reply.She closes her eyes and breathes deeply. "I think sleep would be nice."

I agree with her. Except I'm not going back to sleep because I'm too rattled by my nightmare in which the Capitol got Peeta and I, and Peeta died right in front of my eyes. I'm too scared of sleep. But I don't tell her that part.

"I'm going to try to go sleep some more. You should too, Katniss." She says."Yeah." I lie.She rises from the couch and I do the same. She starts toward the stairs, while I head to the kitchen. "Just going to get some water." I say, "Go ahead up without me."

She does as I say and I hear the door to her room close. I don't follow her up the stairs.Instead I walk back over to the couch and sit alone in the darkness.

I try to take deep breaths and ward away thoughts of my nightmare. I can feel panic rising inside me, bubbling nauseatingly in my chest. It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It was a nightmare. Peeta's upstairs sleeping; safe.

I should be able to understand that my nightmare was only a bad dream. I should be able to understand that that wasn't reality. But the images seep into reality, staining my view with Peeta's blood and my own tears. The house feels colder than it did a minute ago, like the temperature's dropping.

I resist all temptations to let my sick brain take over my body and send me spiraling into flashbacks and relapses. I feel my upper lip go numb, a sign of a panic attack or a flashback. I decide to get up to go get that water I had set on the counter. I walk slowly through the kitchen, willing myself to stay sane until I get to the couch. But I feel myself going into a relapse.

My hand is on a kitchen knife. The handle is cool and smooth in my hand. What am I doing? I ask myself, when did I pick this up? I try to cry out to my brain, put it down. Let it go.

I'm back on the couch again. I think I'm safe from myself for a moment until I feel the knife in my hand still. Oh no. I fight the dark side of myself, trying to let go of the knife. Drop it!

But I'm not so lucky. I feel the sting as the blade comes in contact with my hand. I don't make a sound. I watch, dazed, as the knife continues to open little cuts in my hand. I watch as the blood starts to come to the surface of the little wounds.

The knife falls to the carpeted floor with a thud. I look up to see a dark figure in front of me. They must have knocked it from my hands. Is it Peeta? Johanna? Or someone else? It's a shame I lose myself in a relapse before I get the chance to find out. I feel my head hit the cushions of the couch, and that's it.

--

I wake, shivering, but feeling the warmth of arms around me. So it was Peeta, not Johanna. I'm still on the couch, closer to the edge. Peeta's on the inside. I glance over the edge of the couch and see the dark edges of the knife still on the ground. It's dark still, but I can see darker areas on the blade. My blood.

My heart races. I raise a hand closer to my face, and I can see the blood all over my hand. It looks black in the dark of the night. I begin to wonder if my blood really is black, mirroring how I feel in my heart. My hand still stings.

A tear slips out of my eye. My chest tightens. It feels as if there's a lump forming in my throat. A strangled whimper escapes my mouth. I regret it immediately, fearing I've woken Peeta. He stirs a little, but doesn't move his arms that enclose me in his warmth. I think he's gone back to sleep.

It was a close call. But now another whimper escapes from my mouth. It's hard for me to keep it from turning into a wail or a sob. This time, he doesn't stir. "Remember what I said," He whispers, "about not holding it in. It won't make you weak. I've got you here, safe in my arms. I love you. Go ahead."

His words repeat in my head over and over. I can't cry though. It won't come out."Katniss," He says insistently.And then I snap, the tears coming, the sobs prepared to escape my chest. They do it without hesitation, now.

I cry. And cry. And cry. I try to stop; try to tell myself that whatever my sickened brain thinks is real is not.

I keep crying, trying to keep myself awake. Sleep is a dreaded state for me, full of loneliness and pain that can't be quieted by Peeta. He's rarely ever a comfort in my nightmares, controlled by a dark mind that comes out even more ferociously in my sleep.

As I lay there, crying still, I'm overcome with a sense of peace. Not sleep, just peace. I could stay like this for the many hours until morning. But that false sense of peace leads to an awful, sinking feeling as I plunge into the unwanted realm of sleep.

**Hey guys! Aly here! Sorry if this chapter seemed a little boring. I feel like my story is getting boring and repetitive, every chapter too similar to the last. I'm just running out of ideas at the moment. Just a little spot of writers block, I suppose. Hopefully it'll be over soon.

Guess what's coming up! The wedding! Only a few more chapters left until it. ❤️

Please vote and comment your feedback. Actually, it doesn't even have to be feedback. If you just want to talk with me or say something, I'm open to it. Thanks again, guys. I love you all dearly.

xoxo Aly **