The Hunger Games Trilogy

by Suzanne Collins

It isn’t possible. For someone to make Peeta forget he loves me . . . no one could do that.

“At least he’s alive,” says Plutarch, as if he’s losing patience with the lot of us. “Snow executed Peeta’s stylist and his prep team on live television tonight. We’ve no idea what happened to Effie Trinket. Peeta’s damaged, but he’s here. With us. And that’s a definite improvement over his situation twelve hours ago. Let’s keep that in mind, all right?”

I look at my little sister and think how she has inherited the best qualities our family has to offer: my mother’s healing hands, my father’s level head, and my fight.

At some point, Gale and Beetee left the wilderness behind and focused on more human impulses. Like compassion. A bomb explodes. Time is allowed for people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second, more powerful bomb kills them as well.

“Don’t trust her, Delly,” says Peeta in a frantic voice. “I did, and she tried to kill me. She killed my friends. My family. Don’t even go near her! She’s a mutt!”

Not only does he hate me and want to kill me, he no longer believes I’m human. It was less painful being strangled.

It’s only now that he’s been corrupted that I can fully appreciate the real Peeta. Even more than I would’ve if he’d died.

It’s gone. He’s gone. Whatever existed between us is gone. All that’s left is my promise to kill Snow. I tell myself this ten times a day.

I shut my eyes and kiss Gale to make up for all the kisses I’ve withheld, and because it doesn’t matter anymore, and because I’m so desperately lonely I can’t stand it.

His intent, his full intent, becomes clear. Gale has no interest in preserving the lives of those in the Nut. No interest in caging the prey for later use. This is one of his death traps.

My father. He seems to be everywhere today. Dying in the mine. Singing his way into Peeta’s muddled consciousness. Flickering in the look Boggs gives me as he protectively wraps the blanket around my shoulders. I miss him so badly it hurts.

I wish Peeta was here — the old Peeta — because he would be able to articulate why it is so wrong to be exchanging fire when people, any people, are trying to claw their way out of the mountain.

Peeta. On the rooftop the night before our first Hunger Games. He understood it all before we’d even set foot in the arena. I hope he’s watching now, that he remembers that night as it happened, and maybe forgives me when I die.

“But that kind of thinking . . . you could turn it into an argument for killing anyone at any time. You could justify sending kids into the Hunger Games to prevent the districts from getting out of line,” I say. “I don’t buy that,” he tells me. “I do,” I reply. “It must be those trips to the arena.”

It would explain why — when Plutarch has a fit over what the bride will wear — I volunteer to take Annie back to my house in 12, where Cinna left a variety of evening clothes in a big storage closet downstairs.

When I open the closet, we all fall silent because Cinna’s presence is so strong in the flow of the fabrics. Then Octavia drops to her knees, rubs the hem of a skirt against her cheek, and bursts into tears. “It’s been so long,” she gasps, “since I’ve seen anything pretty.”

It hurts, but the satisfaction of having Snow watch me dance with my little sister reduces other feelings to dust.

But I push my way through the crowd to confirm what I knew at first sight. As surely as the embroidery stitches in Annie’s gown were done by Cinna’s hand, the frosted flowers on the cake were done by Peeta’s.

“You’re not very big, are you? Or particularly pretty?” I know he’s been through hell and back, and yet somehow the observation rubs me the wrong way. “Well, you’ve looked better.”

All those months of taking it for granted that Peeta thought I was wonderful are over. Finally, he can see me for who I really am. Violent. Distrustful. Manipulative. Deadly. And I hate him for it.

“You’re not afraid I’ll kill you tonight?” “Like I couldn’t take you,” I answer. Then we laugh, since both our bodies are so wrecked, it will be a miracle if we can get up the next day. But we do. Each morning, we do.

I love them 😭

“Peeta and I had adjoining cells in the Capitol. We’re very familiar with each other’s screams.”

“It won’t matter,” Peeta tells the rest of us. “The president assigned me herself. She decided the propos needed some heating up.” Maybe they do. But if Coin sent Peeta here, she’s decided something else as well. That I’m of more use to her dead than alive.

If you’d been taken by the Capitol, and hijacked, and then tried to kill Peeta, is this the way he would be treating you?” demands Haymitch. I fall silent. It isn’t. It isn’t how he would be treating me at all. He would be trying to get me back at any cost. Not shutting me out, abandoning me, greeting me with hostility at every turn.

“Ally.” Peeta says the word slowly, tasting it. “Friend. Lover. Victor. Enemy. Fiancée. Target. Mutt. Neighbor. Hunter. Tribute. Ally. I’ll add it to the list of words I use to try to figure you out.” He weaves the rope in and out of his fingers. “The problem is, I can’t tell what’s real anymore, and what’s made up.”

“You’re a painter. You’re a baker. You like to sleep with the windows open. You never take sugar in your tea. And you always double-knot your shoelaces.” Then I dive into my tent before I do something stupid like cry.

They lost their lives because of me. I add them to my personal list of kills that began in the arena and now includes thousands. When I look up, I see it has taken Gale differently. His expression says that there are not enough mountains to crush, enough cities to destroy. It promises death.

“Pull it together, Four-Five-One,” he says firmly. But you can see him suppressing a smile as he’s double-checking the next pod. Positioning the Holo to find the best light in the smoky air. Still facing us as his left foot steps back onto the orange paving stone. Triggering the bomb that blows off his legs.

NOOOOO

“Don’t trust them. Don’t go back. Kill Peeta. Do what you came to do.”

I feel the arena all around me. It’s as if I’ve never left, really. Once again I’m battling not only for my own survival but for Peeta’s as well. How satisfying, how entertaining it would be for Snow to have me kill him. To have Peeta’s death on my conscience for whatever is left of my life.

Why can’t I just let him go? Slip him a pill, pull the trigger? Is it because I care too much about Peeta or too much about letting Snow win? Have I turned him into a piece in my private Games? That’s despicable, but I’m not sure it’s beneath me. If it’s true, it would be kindest to kill Peeta here and now. But for better or worse, I am not motivated by kindness.

“You’re still trying to protect me. Real or not real,” he whispers. “Real,” I answer. It seems to require more explanation. “Because that’s what you and I do. Protect each other.” After a minute or so, he drifts off to sleep.

Now the only one without a weapon is Peeta, but anyone whispering my name with a bunch of mutts doesn’t need one anyway.

We’ve covered about three more blocks via an overflow pipe and a section of neglected train track when the screams begin. Thick, guttural. Bouncing off the tunnel walls. “Avoxes,” says Peeta immediately. “That’s what Darius sounded like when they tortured him.” “The mutts must have found them,” says Cressida.

😭😭

I can’t tell if he’s yelling, although his mouth is stretched wide. We watch, utterly helpless, as the flesh melts off his body like candle wax.

A quick glance at our party tells me something’s off. “Wait! Where are Jackson and Leeg One?” “They stayed at the Grinder to hold the mutts back,” says Homes. “What?” I’m lunging back for the bridge, willing to leave no one to those monsters, when he yanks me back. “Don’t waste their lives, Katniss. It’s too late for them. Look!” Homes nods to the pipe, where the mutts are slithering onto the ledge.

the victims’ blood. Carried across the sewer. Cutting through even this foulness. Making my heart run wild, my skin turn to ice, my lungs unable to suck air. It’s as if Snow’s breathing right in my face, telling me it’s time to die.

Far below, I can just make out Finnick, struggling to hang on as three mutts tear at him. As one yanks back his head to take the death bite, something bizarre happens. It’s as if I’m Finnick, watching images of my life flash by. The mast of a boat, a silver parachute, Mags laughing, a pink sky, Beetee’s trident, Annie in her wedding dress, waves breaking over rocks. Then it’s over.

I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU SUZANNE

My hands slide up his wrists to clasp his. “Don’t let him take you from me.” Peeta’s panting hard as he fights the nightmares raging in his head. “No. I don’t want to . . .” I clench his hands to the point of pain. “Stay with me.” His pupils contract to pinpoints, dilate again rapidly, and then return to something resembling normalcy. “Always,” he murmurs.

We are completely at the mercy of a decrepit tiger-woman with what I can only hope is an all-consuming passion for Snow’s death.

“Trust me, Plutarch’s thrilled,” Cressida adds. “That’s because Plutarch doesn’t care who dies,” I say. “Not as long as his Games are a success.”

They emphasize how dangerous we are. Show us exchanging gunfire with the Peacekeepers, although not the mutts ripping off their heads. Do a tragic tribute to the woman lying where we left her, with my arrow still in her heart. Someone has redone her makeup for the cameras.

“No, you won her over. Gave up everything for her. Maybe that’s the only way to convince her you love her.” There’s a long pause. “I should have volunteered to take your place in the first Games. Protected her then.”

idiot

But my best friend predicts I will choose the person who I think I “can’t survive without.” There’s not the least indication that love, or desire, or even compatibility will sway me. I’ll just conduct an unfeeling assessment of what my potential mates can offer me.

It’s a horrible thing for Gale to say, for Peeta not to refute. Especially when every emotion I have has been taken and exploited by the Capitol or the rebels. At the moment, the choice would be simple. I can survive just fine without either of them.

“Never underestimate the power of a brilliant stylist,” says Peeta. It’s hard to tell, but I think Tigris might actually blush under her stripes.

I wrap my arms around his neck, feel his arms hesitate before they embrace me. Not as steady as they once were, but still warm and strong. A thousand moments surge through me. All the times these arms were my only refuge from the world. Perhaps not fully appreciated then, but so sweet in my memory, and now gone forever.

Shoot me. That’s what he was mouthing. I was supposed to shoot him! That was my job. That was our unspoken promise, all of us, to one another.

Everyone inside the barricade is a child. Toddlers to teenagers. Scared and frostbitten. Huddled in groups or rocking numbly on the ground. They aren’t being led into the mansion. They’re penned in, guarded on all sides by Peacekeepers. I know immediately it’s not for their protection. If the Capitol wanted to safeguard them, they’d be down in a bunker somewhere. This is for Snow’s protection. The children form his human shield.

I have the same reaction I did the day Effie Trinket called her name at the reaping. At least, I must go limp, because I find myself at the base of the flagpole, unable to account for the last few seconds. Then I am pushing through the crowd, just as I did before. Trying to shout her name above the roar. I’m almost there, almost to the barricade, when I think she hears me. Because for just a moment, she catches sight of me, her lips form my name. And that’s when the rest of the parachutes go off.

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭