Author's Notes

These books have left me all kinds of messed up. I can't even look at pita bread without a catch in my throat. And forget about sugar cubes.

The World is Quiet Here

With my eyes closed, the world is nothing but muted light and warmth and sound. It is the sun that seeps into my skin. The grass, soft and fragrant beneath me. The air, alive with the faint murmur of the breeze mingling with birdsong.

It's moments like this that I can almost pretend I'm still the old Katniss. Still the same girl from before the war, before the Games, before watching my sister's name be plucked from the reaping ball. I can almost pretend nothing has changed.

"That one's a turtle."

But, of course, everything has.

The corners of my mouth curve up and I blink open my eyes to the late summer sky. Blue like the shell of a starling's egg. Clouds frothy and white drift by, stretching and twisting like dough kneaded under Peeta's hands.

Peeta, who is sprawled out beside me, my legs half tangled with his. "Where?" he asks.

"There!" comes Ivy's voice again.

She is tucked into my other side, head pillowed on my stomach. Her arm reaches as high as it can go in a point, as though her fingertip could touch the cloud itself if only she tried hard enough. My gaze flickers from her to Dyllan. He's curled atop Peeta, burrowed snugly into his chest like a baby duck and fisting his father's shirt with tiny fingers. His other hand is clasped in mine, the one I'm not running through Ivy's hair.

We are a human knot of clinging limbs and beating hearts. Me and Peeta and my children.

My children. Peeta wanted them so badly, but for fifteen years, grief and fear and doubt made no the only answer I could give. And it killed me a little, that desperate plea in his voice whenever we fought, the defeated look in his overbright eyes, because he was selfless and sweet and good, so good. He deserved everything he could ever want, and what he wanted most was something only I could give him, but I couldn't, I couldn't. There would be too much left to chance. Too much to lose. I wasn't strong enough.

But I thought about it all the time. Little boys with paint-stained fingers and Peeta's blue, blue eyes. Baby girls with chubby, rosy cheeks and Peeta's smile. At first, their faces only terrified me—they could never be, I had failed too many times before to believe I could keep them safe—but slowly, guardedly, that feeling was hushed by an unbidden sense of longing. And after five, ten, fifteen years…

"Hmm, I don't know," says Peeta. "Looks like a whale to me. See the tail?"

"Whale, whale!" Dyllan echoes with a giggle.

Ivy scrunches up her nose and lets out a dismissive noise. I hear the quick, sharp exhale Peeta releases and feel the silent tremors run through him as he chokes back a snort. I know what he's thinking. It's eerily similar to the sound I make when I get exasperated.

"What do you think, Mommy?"

I tilt my head to the side critically, the strands of hair which have escaped my braid tickling Peeta's neck as I do. "Definitely a turtle," I declare after a few seconds of deliberate study.

"I told you, Daddy!" she says triumphantly, as if that settles the matter.

Peeta doesn't even try to stifle his laughter as it comes bubbling up this time, and neither do I.

o-o-O-o-o

It's a lazy, blissful day we spend in the Meadow.

At midday, we have a picnic of cold rabbit, apricots, a thermos of lemonade, and a tin of butter cookies Peeta baked just this morning. They are so rich that every bite practically melts on your tongue.

After, Dyllan naps on a blanket in the shade while Peeta sketches him. Ivy borrows some blank pages and draws alongside him. She hums under her breath and swings her bare feet back and forth in the air as she colors fuzzy, yellow-beaked blobs that look suspiciously like Haymitch's despicable geese.

When Dyllan wakes up, I help him pick flowers that grow at the edge of the woods. Tulips. Poppies. Larkspurs.

It's while I'm kneeling over a patch of bluebells that he turns to me and holds out the bunch we've collected. "For Mamma."

The sudden burn of tears in the back of my throat is as unexpected as it is overwhelming. I can't push a single word around it. So instead, I gather Dyllan into my lap and hold him to me tightly, burying my lips in his wild golden curls until they stop trembling.

I must not recover my composure as fully as I think because when we return to the blanket, Peeta is searching my face over the edge of his sketchpad with a worried expression. I only shake my head to tell him I'm okay. But I can see him take in the flowers clutched in my hand, then Dyllan's proud grin, and I know he has worked out pretty closely what happened. Peeta just about knows me better than I know myself, after all.

As the sun dips to meet the horizon and the first stars are winking to life in the evening sky, the Meadow quietly fills with lights of its own.

Fireflies.

"Now remember, you have to be very gentle since they're so much smaller than you. And before we go home, we have to let them go. Can you do that?"

Peeta's tone, pitched low as if he's telling a grave secret, is at odds with the playfulness shining in his eyes. Ivy and Dyllan give matching nods, looking so very solemn it's all I can do to bite my lip to hold in the smile that threatens to break out.

Peeta and I catch a few for them to start with, dropping each one carefully inside the canning jar we've brought and replacing the metal lid poked through with air holes. The pale, pulsing glow of the fireflies through the glass gives the effect of a lantern.

Ivy goes whirling across the long grass, dark hair streaming out behind her. Dyllan scampers after her as best he can. They shriek with laughter as they chase the vanishing pinpricks of light and squeal with glee when they actually manage to trap one between their cupped palms.

Arms encircle my waist from behind and a chin comes to rest on my shoulder.

"Katniss," Peeta breathes in my ear. His nose is pressed against my cheek. "I'm happy."

I turn to face him. My fingers lightly trace along his jaw, and I let my thumb graze his long, fine eyelashes. After all these years, he is still the boy who I have loved more than anything, more than I ever thought I was capable of loving, though I fought it every step of the way. He is the man who gave me my children, who knew even before I did that I would want them too. Would love them as deeply and fiercely as I loved him.

I lean forward to brush a soft kiss against Peeta's lips, lingering there, my forehead touching his.

Happy. Who would have thought it possible after everything we've been through? We who were scarred, broken, lost. But we are. It's real. Together, he and I found a way to take all the jagged, fragile pieces of ourselves and mend them into something whole and new and beautiful.

"Me too."

End Author's Notes

Because of Rowling and Collins, I can never let myself become emotionally attached to gingers whose names begin with "F" ever again. It just doesn't end well.