The crowd is very quiet. What I said is a shock. Katniss' shocked face suddenly lights up every screen, and she presses her lips together, staring at the floor.

"Oh, that is a piece of bad luck," Caesar says and the crowd seems to agree with him. Some even cry.

"It's not good," I say.

"Well, I don't think any of us can blame you. It'd be hard not to fall for that young lady," he says. "She didn't know?" I shake my head.

"Not until now," I say. I look up at one of the screens to see she too is looking up. Her cheeks reveal blushing, most likely from embarrassment.

"Wouldn't you love to pull her back out here and get a response?" Caesar asks the audience. They all cheer while I'm screaming in my mind to just leave her alone. "Sadly, rules are rules, and Katniss Everdeen's time has been spent. Well, best of luck to you, Peeta Mellark, and I think I speak for all of Panem when I say our hearts go with yours." The roar of the crowd is deafening. I choke out a small thank you and return to my seat. I can feel Katniss' anger leeching off of her.

After the anthem is over, she storms over to the elevator. I have to wait for the next car. I barely step out of the car when she shoves me. She had been waiting for me. I fall into an urn filled with fake flowers and it breaks. I fall in the shards and cut my hands.

"What was that for?" I ask. She looks red as an overheated tea kettle as she stands over me.

"You had no right! No right to go saying those things about me!" She shouts. Just then the elevator door opens and the adults step in.

"What's going on?" Effie says histericaly as she sees my hands. "Did you fall?"

"After she shoved me," I say as Effie and Cinna help me up. Haymitch turns to her.

"Shoved him?" He asks and the fire is suddenly aimed at him.

"This was your idea wasn't it? Turning me into some kind of fool in front of the entire country?" She says accusingly.

"It was my idea," I lie as I pull shards of pottery from my palms. "Haymitch just helped with it." The anger is aimed back at me again as she turns to me.

"Yes, Haymitch is very helpful. To you!" She says.

"You are a fool," Haymitch says in disgust. "Do you think he hurt you? That boy just gave you something you could never ache mice in your own."

"He made me look weak!" She says.

"He made you look desirable! And let's face it, you can use all the help you can get in the department. You were about as romantic as dirt until he said he wanted you. Now they all do. You're all they're talking about. The star-crossed lovers form District Twelve!" Haymitch says.

"But we're not star-crossed lovers!" she insists. Haymitch grabs her harshly by the shoulders and pins her to the wall.

"Who cares? It's all a big show. It's all how you're perceived. The most I could say about you after your interview was that you were nice enough, although that in itself was a small miracle. Now I can say you're a heartbreaker. Oh, oh, oh, how the boys at home fall longingly at your feet. Which do you honk will get you more sponsors?" Katniss shoves him away from her and steps away from the wall. Conna goes over and puts an arm around her.

"He's right, Katniss," he says. She calms down a little but is still very irritated.

"I should have been told, so I didn't look so stupid," she says.

"No, your reaction was perfect. if you'd known, it wouldn't have read as real," Portia says.

"She's just worried about her boyfriend," I say bitterly as I throw another piece of the urn on the floor. Her cheeks burn red.

"I don't have a boyfriend," she says.

"Whatever," I say. "But I bet he's smart enough to know a bluff when he sees it. Besides you didn't say you loved me. So what does it matter?" Shes silent after that, weighing out the options in her mind. Her eyes suddenly become very down cast.

"After he said he loved me, did you think I could be in love with him, too?" she asks.

"I did," Portia says. "The way you avoided looking at cameras, the blush." The others start chiming in but I knew the truth. I knew her better than that. She looks really embarrassed and then she looks at me.

"I'm sorry I shoved you," she says.

"Doesn't matter," I say. "Although its technically illegal."

"Are your hands okay?" she asks, actually sounding concerned.

"They'll be all right," I say, tough they are bleeding pretty bad. Haymitch suddenly suggests we get dinner started. But my hands are bleeding too heavily and Portia takes me to get them looked at. They get wrapped and when I get back, I'd only missed the soup. Katniss doesn't speak, but she keeps glancing at my bandaged hands guiltily.

We watch the replay and its rather embarrassing to have to relive it. Once it's over, it's time for us to go to bed. We have to ride early to travel to the arena. We will go with Portia and Cinna. It's entirely possible that we will never see Haymitch or Effie again so it's time for our final goodbyes. Effie is very emotional, kissing us each on the cheek before leaving, muttering about her possible promotion from our success. Haymitch crosses his arms and looks us both over.

"Any final words of advice?" I ask.

'When the gong sounds, get the hell out of there. You're neither of you up to the blood bath at the Cornucopia. Just clear out, put as much distance as you can between yourselves and the others, and find a source of water," he says. "Got it?"

"And after that?" she asks.

"Stay Alive," he says, sounding much more serious about it than he did on the train. Katniss starts to her room but Portia stops me.

"She does care Peeta," she says in her thick Capitol accent. "You saying you loved her, that meant something to her. She doesn't want to think about that given your current situation. But she isn't as cold as she seems. She has a good heart. I know you see that." She kisses my cheek and smiles. "Try to get some sleep darling." I nod and go into my room. I hear Katniss tossing and turning in her bed. Like me, she can't sleep. I finally give up and decide to go to the roof and try to get some fresh air.

There is a celebration going on down on the streets. It makes me sick to my stomach. I flex my bandaged hands. They still hurt and I really do wish she had been told. I start thinking about how all this is working. I know for her to live, I have to die. Haymitch's stupid plan will never work. She doesn't love me back. Her hatred is even more hurtful than the fact that I've embraced death. I need to die as myself. I need to not let them turn my death into some show. Just because I'm willing to sacrifice myself for her, I need to at least die with my dignity.

"You should be getting some sleep," she says behind me, making me jump. The sound of the streets drowned out her already near silent movement. I just shake my head.

"I didn't want to miss the party," I say. "It's for us, after all." She comes up beside me and leans over the edge of the rail, squinting at the colorful figures on the streets.

"Are they in costumes?" She asks.

"Who could tell?" I answer. "With all the crazy clothes they wear here." I look at her and notice how she doesn't even look drowsy. "Couldn't sleep, either?"

"Couldn't turn my mind off," she says.

"Thinking about your family?" I ask.

"No," she admits, sounding guilty that they hadn't even come to mind. "All I can do is wonder about tomorrow. Which is pointless, of course." She looks at me with regret and then I notice she's staring at my hands again. "I really am sorry about your hands."

"It doesn't matter, Katniss," I say. "I've never been a contender in these Games anyway."

"That's no way to be thinking," she says.

"Why not? It's true. My best hope is to not disgrace myself and..." I hesitate, not sure how to finish it.

"And what?" She asks.

"I don't know how to say it exactly. Only...I want to die as myself. Does that make any sense?" I ask her. She shakes her head, her eyes questioning. "I don't want them to change me in there. Turn me into some kind of monster that I'm not." She bites her lip, looking a little uncomfortable.

"Do you mean you won't kill anyone?" She asks.

"No," I say. "When the time comes, I'm sure I'll kill just like everybody else. I can't go down without a fight. Only I keep wishing I could think of a way to...to show the Capitol they don't own me. That I'm more Han just a piece in their Games."

"But you're not," she says. "None of us are. That's how the Games work."

"Okay, but within that framework, there's still you, there's still me," I say. "Don't you see?"

"A little," she says. "Only...no offense, but who cares, Peeta?" At this point, my patience has worn thin with her. She is just so stubborn, it's just as irritating as the cuts on my hands.

"I do," I say. "I mean, what else am I allowed to care about at this point?" I lock my eyes with hers, demanding an answer. It must take her of guard because she takes a step away from me.

"Care about what Haymitch said," she says. "About staying alive." I sadly at her. She really doesn't realize I really have no motivation to live through these Games when she's in there with me.

"Okay," I say. "Thanks for the tip, sweetheart." She almost looks like I've slapped her across the face when I use the nickname Haymitch uses that I know irritates her to no end.

"Look, if you want to spend the last hours of your life planning some noble death in the arena, that's your choice. I want to spend mine in District Twelve," she says.

"Wouldn't surprise me if you do," I say. "Give my mother my best when you make it back, will you?" The words leave my mouth before I can stop them.

"Count on it," she says turning around and stalking away.

That's the last time I see her before the Games. Portia escorts me to the hovercraft where I'm given my tracker and taken to the arena. There is a breakfast ready for us and I force myself to eat it as much as I can. For all I know, this could be my last meal. When we arrive, we are lowered into my personal launch room and I take a shower and brush my teeth. My outfit for the arena is not unlike something I would see Katniss wearing at home, which makes me wonder whether we are going to a thick wooded area like at home. Portia hugs me as I'm called to the tube.

"Good luck," she whispers. "I know you don't intend to come out, but don't you dare go down without a fight." I nod and step on the circular metal plate and a glass cylinder is lowered around me.

I stand tall as I'm raised up. For fifteen seconds, in in complete darkness. But then I'm lifted out into fresh, pine air. I look around to see that my earlier hopes are answered. The arena is the kind of place that would be Katniss' paradise. I hear the voice of Claudio's Templesmith boom around us as I spy Katniss five tributes to my left.

"Ladies and gentlemen, let the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games begin!"