Peeta Mellark {does not have nightmares} (![]() ![]() @ 2015-06-30 11:40:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log, katniss everdeen, peeta mellark |
WHO: Peeta and Katniss
WHAT: OH GOD PEETA WOKE UP A GIRL
WHEN: {backdated} 6/24 & 6/27
WHERE: Peeta's apartment
RATING|STATUS: PG | Completed log
Katniss had gotten used to staying overnight with Peeta. She slept better this way, and she was closer to Prim, and it was better than being in her own apartment. She should probably have just given it up and officially moved in with the two of them, but she kept going back there. It was quiet and empty, but sometimes that was what she needed. At night, though, emptiness was awful. It was a lot warmer and safer in Peeta’s arms. Normally it was, at least. But for some reason, this morning, she felt uncomfortable and a little bit… smothered. It was more than just the fact that he seemed closer to her than normal, it felt like there was something… wrong. She finally woke up fully, and realized that it was because it wasn’t Peeta holding her anymore. With a small, surprised sound, she scrambled to get out of the bed as quickly and away from the girl in the bed as quickly as she could. -- Peeta was, surprisingly enough, not having a nightmare. He’d had one earlier in the night, but after he’d gone back to sleep, arm wrapped around Katniss, assured that she was still beside him, he slept hard, not dreaming and feeling like only a minute had passed between falling asleep and being awoken by a great deal of movement next to him. It was a moment before he realized that her side of the bed had been vacated. “Katniss?” he asked sleepily. Only...it wasn’t his voice that he heard. Although throaty, this voice was higher. He pushed himself up on one elbow and his hair fell into his face. A lot of hair. “What the--?” He bolted upright and swept his hands through hair that went halfway down his back, but they weren’t his hands. They were smaller, almost delicate. Peeta stared at them in the dim light, completely confused by the sight of them. He leaned over and snapped on the bedside lamp, giving him enough light to actually see the feminine hands attached to his body. “...Oh my god.” There were definitely breasts under his t-shirt, and when he threw off the covers, his one remaining leg was thinner and girl-shaped. He looked up at Katniss, panic written all over his--her?--face. --- Katniss stared at her, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. She had never seen the girl before in her life, and yet she was familiar. The way she said Katniss’s name was familiar, too. She was completely speechless for a while, until the girl in the bed threw off the covers, and she was missing part of her leg, the same way Peeta had been. She looked from the leg, to Peeta, and then back again, trying to comprehend what she was seeing. Finally she said, incredulously, “Peeta?” -- Peeta was no more able to comprehend what was going on than Katniss was, but he was hindered by the fact that he was suddenly in a girl’s body. It seemed to be a very nice girl’s body, but it wasn’t his body and he was kind of freaking out “Katniss help me, why am I a girl??” he asked loudly, voice much too high. The level of panic was steadily rising with each passing minute, and his emotions were running away without him--the urge to cry was very strong, and he wasn’t at all prepared for it. He needed to stand, he thought, so he could better deal with this, but when he reached for this prosthetic leg and tried to fit everything together, his hands trembled and it no longer seemed to fit the new size of his stump. A tear slipped out from behind his eye as he growled in frustration and threw his hand across his cheek to hide the fact that it had ever existed. --- Katniss stood there dumbly for a little while longer, staring at her — no, him — trying to make her mind catch up to what had happened. Strange things had happened to her here, and they always sent her mind into a tumble of confusion. She didn’t have any answers for Peeta about why this had happened, or how. But seeing him struggling with the prosthetic that now didn’t fit brought her back to her senses. She moved around the bed and tried to help, but it just didn’t seem to fit. “It’s okay,” she said, after a moment. It wasn’t at all okay, but she was clinging to the idea of helping him with this as a way of keeping her sanity intact, so the words came out anyway. “We can go down to the clinic, I’m sure they have crutches or something that would work for you.” Looking up, she peered more closely at his — her — face. She could see Peeta in the expression on those unfamiliar, feminine features. It was incredibly strange, and disturbing, that something could affect him this way, but at least it was still Peeta. Waking up and feeling like there was someone else beside her had been even worse. “I don’t… I know how how this happened. But that really is you, isn’t it?” --- On top of the fact that he was, you know, female, Peeta was really frustrated with the fact that everything was affecting him so strongly emotionally. He’d always felt things strongly, even if he hadn’t shown them, but now his hormones and emotions were heightened and it was quickly becoming very problematic because he couldn’t think around them; he was used to having a lot of feelings, he was not used to being overwhelmed by them--outside of an actual life-or-death situation, anyway. He gripped the mattress and swallowed back the rest of his tears, determined to get a grip on himself so he could think this through. He thought about what he’d tell Katniss if their roles were reversed, and took a deep breath to steady himself. When that didn’t work, he took another one, and another one, and another one, until he felt a little calmer. “I feel a little sick, but yes, it really is me,” he replied, voice still eerily high to his ears. “I don’t think I can even make it to the bathroom without crutches first.” --- The amount of emotion made Katniss feel a little uncomfortable, more uncomfortable than the rest of it, which was still more than a little disturbing. She didn’t know how to help calm him down; he was the one that was good at this, not her. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to wake up in such a different body, but she knew she wouldn’t like it. She wasn’t sure she’d want to be touched, either, but she sat down beside him, and tentatively put one hand on her shoulder. “I’ll ask Prim or Johanna to get something for you,” she said. “In the meantime, I can help you walk.” -- Peeta just buried his face in his hands, not a single part of him alright with needing this much help. He didn’t want to leave the apartment, so he wasn’t sure he’d need the crutches for anything other than trips between the bathroom and the bedroom. Not even the living room, because he didn’t want Prim to see him like this either. Not that it was terrible to be female, it was just...well, this whole thing was embarrassing, that’s all. Peeta was used to helping, not being the one who needed the help. “Has anything like this happened before that you know of?” he asked, lowering his hands and sitting up straighter. He rolled his shoulders back as he decided that he wasn’t going to be a victim in this. He hadn’t been a victim when the Capitol made him a pawn, nor when he’d lost his leg, and he certainly wasn’t a victim anymore after the hijacking, so whatever this was, he could get through it until he was back to normal. Maybe he’d need to lean on Katniss more, but between the two of them, they could overcome anything. --- “Yeah,” Katniss said. She did vaguely remember something happening, but it took her a moment to remember what it had been. “People got switched into other bodies… they went back to normal after a few days, I think.” It was one of those things that she tried not to think about too hard. There were so many things like that now, a whole list that she could have rattled off. She still, instinctively, tried to focus her mind on what she knew was real, so that she didn’t get things confused, but this was real, wasn’t it? It was real and it was happening to Peeta right now. But whatever happened, they’d figure it out. She’d managed to survive the arena again, even if it wasn’t entirely real, mostly because Finnick had been there with her. Peeta was still here with her now, and they could get through this, too. -- Over the next couple days, they didn’t exactly figure it out. Each morning, Peeta woke with the hope that he’d find himself back in his own body, and was disappointed to find out he still had a female body. Each night, he went to sleep beside Katniss, but not close to her, trying to stay hopeful even while he felt a little defeated and anxious. It was messing with his sleep, causing him to have difficulty falling asleep, and doing no favors for the nightmares, which had steadily been getting a little better since they’d started sharing a bed again. But Saturday morning was different. When he woke, he almost didn’t let himself dare to hope, after another two mornings of waking up female, but when he put his hands to his chest, he found it flat. As soon as he realized what he wasn’t feeling, he sat up quickly and pulled back the blanket to look down at himself, sighing with great relief when he saw himself instead of the more slender female parts he was always disappointed to see. Katniss wasn’t awake yet, and he didn’t want to rouse her before she was ready, so he just laid back down, this time close to her, and put his arm around her in the hopes that he could go back to sleep. --- Katniss wasn’t in much better shape. It was strange and uncomfortable, suddenly, to be close to Peeta. She bore up under it for his sake, because he needed her help, but she didn’t like it. She didn’t like that this had happened to him, in general, and she also just didn’t like his new body. Mostly, it was just the fact that it wasn’t his. She’d never had reason to think about it before, but Peeta just didn’t belong in a female body, and… apparently she didn’t really like cuddling with a female that wasn’t her sister. Even if, underneath that, she knew it was Peeta. So she’d taken to sleeping with her back to him, so that she didn’t accidentally curl against him, which just felt incredibly strange and awkward. Neither of them slept well that way, but she did manage to sleep a little bit. In fact, she was deeply enough asleep when he awoke that she didn’t immediately wake up when he put his arm around her. For a few long moments, she came very slowly back to consciousness, as if she was swimming up to the surface from deep under water. Then she shifted, drowsily, to settle closer against him, without thinking about the fact that she shouldn’t. She startled awake when she suddenly remembered that she shouldn’t curl up closer to him, only to realize that it didn’t feel weird anymore. His arm was strong, and the weight of it across her body was comfortingly familiar; even better, the part of his chest that she could feel against her back was muscled and firm. Barely daring to hope, she turned over so that she could see his face, and — yes, he really was himself again. She found herself just admiring him for a moment, taking in all the masculine features of his face that she’d never expected to miss. She put a hand to his cheek, and said, voice thick with sleep, “You’re back.” It was a stupid statement, considering he hadn’t really gone anywhere. But it had felt like he had. -- Peeta was all too familiar with that feeling, that he wasn’t himself, that he’d gone somewhere and had only just come back. It felt good to be back in his own body, and for Katniss to feel comfortable enough with that to be close to him; he hadn’t argued with her when she’d put physical distance between them, because he’d been uncomfortable himself, but he still didn’t like the feeling. At her reaction, he smiled and replied, “Seems so. Is this better?” --- Katniss nodded, still staring at him, her fingertips tracing over the line of his jaw. Then she pressed her palm against his cheek, and leaned in, pressing a kiss against his lips. She’d really, really missed him. Especially his face, and his arms around her, and… well, every part of him, honestly. He had been the same person, but it wasn’t the same, either. She didn’t know how to articulate it, but he was much better now. She’d missed being able to touch him without feeling strange about it, but now she could, so she curled up closer against him, her forehead resting against his. “I missed you.” -- He probably shouldn’t have been surprised when she kissed him, but he was, though he tried to keep from reacting that way. This was the first kiss they’d shared since being separated in the arena, and if he were honest, he’d missed kissing her. And he shouldn’t have, because she didn’t feel the same way about him as he did her, but even knowing better couldn’t stop his heart from skipping a little beat at the touch. “Yeah, I missed me too.” And her, but that part was best left unspoken. --- Amusement flickered across Katniss’s face, but then disappeared quickly when she realized that he really must have missed being himself. Peeta, who was so determined to hold onto himself throughout the Games, and had been forced to deal with losing his sense of self in his mind already, now had to deal with it with his body as well. She really wanted to kiss him again, but didn’t want to confuse them both. Instead, she wrapped her arm around him, twined her legs around his, and hugged him tightly, her cheek pressing against his. She wanted to tell him that it wouldn’t happen again, that she wouldn’t let it happen, but she’d been helpless to stop it the two times that it had already happened. At least this time it had been less damaging and long-lasting than the last time, or at least she hoped so. Turning her head, she brushed another kiss against his cheek, and then relaxed against him, her forehead against his temple. -- Even though they’d been close since his hijacking, it felt extra nice now to have that intimacy between them back, and as her grip on him tightened, he decided it was probably safe to bury his face in her hair and sighed, finally content for the first time in several days. It hadn’t been exceptionally difficult the last few weeks to find contentment, especially not since Katniss all but moved into the apartment with him, but living in a different body had left Peeta struggling to get comfortable. He’d never been so glad that something had ended, not even their first Games. “What would you have done if I was stuck like that?” he wondered aloud. Her discomfort with the situation made him pretty convinced that she didn’t like women the same way she liked men, so he was pretty sure any chance he’d had with her would be gone, but more than that, would either of them have been able to get comfortable enough with it to still be the other’s rock? --- “I don’t know,” Katniss said honestly, after a moment’s hesitation. “Gotten used to it, I guess.” If Peeta had been able to get used to it, had gotten comfortable in that female body, then Katniss supposed she might have been able to do the same. A lot of what made it so uncomfortable was simply that it bothered him so much. But that wasn’t all of it, and she wasn’t sure she would ever have felt quite as interested in being close to him. She wondered what that said about her. It certainly didn’t seem like anything good. She’d never thought of herself as shallow in this regard — she didn’t feel any less comfortable around Peeta now that he only had one leg, for instance — but having his body changed so much had been so incredibly strange. Even if he had been scarred and bent and twisted beyond recognition, his body would still have seemed more like his. Maybe if he’d accepted it as his own, it would have seemed more normal to her. “If you could get used to it, I think I would have,” she said finally. Then, lightly, “Or I’d have gotten used to cuddling the cats instead.” |