A/N - My second ever fanfiction, I'm really excited for this one. I don't own anything from the Hunger Games, and I hope you enjoy this as much as I'm going to write it. I rated it M, but I'm not really sure how it will turn out, I just felt that with my last work I was restricted by the T rating. I might change it back, I don't know, I have a general idea for how this turns out, I'm thinking it's going to be pretty dark, but plans always change.

Chapter 1

When her father died in the mine accident eleven year old Katniss did everything that she could to save her mother and sister. She tried to ration the meager grievance pay the capital provided, she thought they could make it to her birthday, but the winter was just too hard. Prim was too small, too fragile and Katniss provided for her as best as she could. She sold everything, anything that was worth a scrap of value to help feed the little sister she loved so much, but every scrap that she gave to her sister, her sister saved as much as she could to give to their mother. Prim just wanted her mother to wake up, to acknowledge them. When Katniss was out foraging for anything to trade to food, Prim stayed by their mothers side, willing her to wake up and love them again, to realize that she still had two daughters to care for. Prim in her weakening state became sick, she wasn't eating enough, and the food that was left for her mother went wasted, to the rats and mice and any other rodents and vermin who could get into their home through the floor boards that failed to keep out critters and snow and cold from coming into the tiny shack of a house.

That morning Katniss went out with Prim's bag of old used clothing was the morning that Prim looked the worst. She needed food; she needed medicine, medicine that her mother could easily make if she would just wake up, if only she would snap out of the depression that consumed her so entirely she couldn't even look at her own daughters, if only she could see what was happening to Prim, maybe that would help. So when she left she made sure Prim was snuggled against their mother, for warmth and love.

When she crumpled defeated under that old apple tree and the bakers son threw the bread to her he watched the girl that he had loved since that first fateful day in kindergarten, he watched the disbelief on her face at the kindness that had just been shown to her. He watched her tuck the dampened bread into her jacket like a life line, wishing that there was more that he could do, even at eleven he could see how hopeless her situation had become.

Despite the growing welt on his face he went back inside. He didn't want to face his mother, he knew how much resentment that she carried towards the Everdeens, it wasn't fair, for her to hate Katniss and her sister for something that had happened between the adults so many years ago. He knew the story, of how Mrs. Everdeen had been engaged to his father, than ran away with Mr. Everdeen, the very man that his own mother had yearned for, but who only ever had eyes for the baker's girlfriend. So when Mr. and Mrs. Everdeen came together so too did his parents out of mutual heartbreak. Even after all these years he knew it was hard for his parents to see the Everdeen children, that it hurt to look at the very girls that resembled to them a lost future. The dark haired girl his mother wanted to have with Mr. Everdeen, the blonde one his father could see himself having with Mrs. Everdeen.

When he stepped into the back of the bakery out of the rain his mother was there, with a look on her face that said that she had seen what he did. She held out her arms, and Peeta stepped into his mother's embrace.

"They're dying mom, we need to do something. What I did wasn't just charity to Seam trash; I love that Everdeen girl, just like you loved her daddy." A young Peeta explained.

His mother nodded her head, sympathizing with her son, knowing how hard it is to shake the love of an Everdeen from your life. She tended to the wound on her son's face that she had put there, she was short fused, she knew, but this really had gone too far this time. She didn't mean to leave that mark on her son's face. At dinner that night she spoke of the act her son had done earlier that day to his father and brothers. Still feeling guilty about how she had hit Peeta earlier, and wanting to make up for it, she suggested they take a care package to the Everdeens. Some meat from the butcher, some bread, some milk. They could spare it, and his father agreed. Everyone had come across Katniss the past few months trying to trade worthless things for anything she could, and no one had seen Mrs. Everdeen in weeks. It was common gossip among the merchants that Mrs. Everdeen cae from, knowing that she chose this for herself but not preparing for the worst that could possibly happen.

In the end, only Peeta and his parents went to the Everdeen home. Peeta was so excited, he wanted to be Katniss' hero, he knocked on the door, but there was no answer. It looked as if no one was home. He knocked again; his parents looked at each other worriedly. He knocked one last time, this time he held his ear to the door, his mother protested, but he insisted he could hear something. He told them that it sounded like someone singing softly, but it could have also been someone crying from inside, he couldn't tell.

His father furrowed his brow and went to one of the windows and looked inside. Whatever he saw drained the color from his face; he raced to Peeta and took him a few yards from the tiny shack of a house.

"No matter what, don't come in, don't look, I'll get Katniss out but you stay here." His father said with urgency and panic in his voice. Peeta couldn't help it, he looked curiously over his father's shoulder and saw that his mother had also looked in the window and she cried out in shock and covered her mouth with her hands in disbelief. His father ran at the door and broke it open, both his parents ran inside. He could hear yelling and screaming and tears. Katniss was calling for Prim, refusing to leave; lamps were lit where they could be. Peeta couldn't help it. He ran to the door, no one was in the main room, we went to the closest bedroom, inside he saw Mrs. Everdeen on the only bed, her eyes open but not looking at anything anymore, she was so pale, a few small empty glass jars around her, next he ran to the other bedroom, the one whose window his parents had looked inside. He found his mother and father trying to comfort a hysterical Katniss who was holding tightly to Prim's lifeless body.

The sight was too much; he ran from the house and vomited in the yard. A young Peace Keeper with reddish hair who was walking by came upon him, asked what he was doing out so late at night alone. Peeta pointed to the house while trying to catch his breath, though his body was still being wracked by dry heaves, his stomach empty and nothing left to throw up. The Peace Keeper looked curiously towards the house, and then ran when he heard the horror coming from within.

From what they could gather before Katniss stopped talking completely and shut down from shock was that she had found Prim next to her mother. She told them about how sick Prim had been, the adults assumed that Mrs. Everdeen committed suicide when she realized that her youngest was dead, unable to cope with the loss of her husband and young daughter. Katniss ran home with the bread Peeta had given to her, eager to feed it to her sister, but instead had come home to both of the lifeless bodies within, and dragged her sisters body from her mother who Katniss felt didn't deserve her daughter's comfort in death, she had done nothing in life to deserve it, and Katniss had been singing to her lifeless sister softly until the Mellarks came to the house and rescued the young girl from her torment.

They took her home to the bakery, everyone knew the horrors that awaited children who went to the community homes, and they agreed that Katniss had already experienced far too much. The Peace Keeper who was there that night did not object, allowing them to take her before the other Peace Keepers arrived. Peeta gave up his bed, sleeping on the floor in the family room. Mrs. Mellark stayed up all that night with Katniss, and in that night something within Peeta's mother changed, after seeing the horrors of what this young girl had gone through, she vowed internally to never let her children go unloved, unappreciated, that night opened her eyes to just how far children will go for their parents. She was determined to be worthy of her own children's love, she knew she had fallen short of that so far.

When they brought Katniss home to the apartment above the bakery she wouldn't speak, she wouldn't eat or drink. They gave her food; they would place it on a plate and leave it on the bed beside her. Despite being merchant folk, the Mellarks didn't have much. Their apartment had three bedrooms, one of which was hardly bigger than a small storage closet, which is what it was being used for, to hold surplus bags of flour and other ingredients. The morning after Katniss had arrived Peeta and his oldest brother Graham helped his mother empty it and Peeta gave up his small cot for Katniss, opting to sleep in his room on the floor until something else could be arranged, if ever, it was hard to come across furniture in District 12. They moved Katniss to the cot in the room that afternoon once it was finished; she was still catatonic, just staring into space.

Peeta was worried for her, the images of her lifeless mother and sister on his mind would be burned there forever, he couldn't imagine what Katniss had to be feeling, and she had been there alone for hours, lost in her own mind. He looked at the room; she had come to them with nothing. He knew how this world worked, he would need to act fast, he raced out of the bakery, knowing that the bodies had probably already been removed; the home would be cleaned out shortly and issued to a new family within a few days. When he got to the shack that had been the Everdeen's home he hesitated for a moment to gather his courage and shake the images from his mind before going inside. He looked around and found the empty game bag that he had seen Mr. Everdeen come to the bakery door with whenever he traded squirrels for bread with Peeta's father. On the back of a chair was the large leather jacket that Katniss had been wearing in the rain the day before, he stuffed it into the bag, along with a picture of her father and mother on their wedding day, and a family picture that must have been taken when Prim was still a toddler. He found a book of plants that he thought she might like to keep, it was the only book in the house so it must have been important. He tried to see if there was anything else in the house that would be important to Katniss, the only thing he could think of was to get a few items of her clothing. As he was walking home he came across a small pile of charcoal embers, he picked out a few that looked promising.

When he got home, he took a piece of paper from the sketch book that his father used draw cake designs, and a fresh warm cheese bun from the cooling rack in the back of the bakery. He went to Katniss' room, put the fresh bun beside her, and removed the contents of the game bag where he thought Katniss might be able to see them. Then he sat beside her on the floor next the bed, and began to talk to her, and began to draw.

"Katniss, I know you don't know us very well, but I promise, we will keep you safe." Peeta began to draw with the bits of coal. "I saw everything yesterday, I had nightmares from it last night, and I know that you probably see the nightmares when you aren't even sleeping. I bet you can see them right now, it's not something any of us will ever forget." He sat next to her and drew silently for a long time.

He was concentrating on his work, it was dark outside before he spoke again. "I'm not very good yet, but I will be one day. I'll keep practicing until I get it perfect for you Katniss." He turned the paper to her, only her eyes moved to the paper to see a rough sketch of her and Prim looking through the bakery window at the cake displays. Peeta had seen them there countless times. A few tears escaped her eyes. "Please eat Katniss, if she saw you this way you know she'd do it all again, but for you this time. I'm not going to eat until you do, don't waste it." Peeta begged.

She sat up slowly, took the picture from him and examined it through a tear stained face, she reached for the now cooled bun and took a bite. She asked for some water, and Peeta ran to get it for her, and she drank from the glass that he handed to her. When she finished eating half the bun she handed it to Peeta who ate the other half, knowing that she intended to share it with him. She lay back down and continued to cry silently, but it was progress and Peeta was happy that she had done that much. He looked to the doorway seeing that his father and mother were looking at them with a hopeful expression; they had been checking in on Katniss all day, but it seemed that their son had found a way to communicate with Katniss, they looked relieved that she was showing a bit of progress. It was going to be a long process to get Katniss back to life.

He stayed with her all that night, sleeping on the floor next to Katniss' cot, at some point in the night Katniss' hand found its way into his.