Mocking Jay

9
I stop trying to sleep after my first few attempts are interrupted by unspeakable nightmares. After that, I just
lie still and do fake breathing whenever someone checks on me. In the morning, I'm released from the hospital
and instructed to take it easy. Cressida asks me to record a few lines for a new Mockingjay propo. At lunch, I
keep waiting for people to bring up Peeta's appearance, but no one does. Someone must have seen it besides
Finnick and me.
I have training, but Gale's scheduled to work with Beetee on weapons or something, so I get permission to
take Finnick to the woods. We wander around awhile and then ditch our communicators under a bush. When
we're a safe distance away, we sit and discuss Peeta's broadcast.
"I haven't heard one word about it. No one's told you anything?" Finnick says. I shake my head. He pauses
before he asks, "Not even Gale?" I'm clinging to a shred of hope that Gale honestly knows nothing about Peeta's
message. But I have a bad feeling he does. "Maybe he's trying to find a time to tell you privately."
"Maybe," I say.
We stay silent so long that a buck wanders into range. I take it down with an arrow. Finnick hauls it back to
the fence.
For dinner, there's minced venison in the stew. Gale walks me back to Compartment E after we eat. When I
ask him what's been going on, again there's no mention of Peeta. As soon as my mother and sister are asleep, I
slip the pearl from the drawer and spend a second sleepless night clutching it in my hand, replaying Peeta's
words in my head. "Ask yourself, do you really trust the people you're working with? Do you really know what's
going on? And if you don't...find out." Find out. What? From who? And how can Peeta know anything except
what the Capitol tells him? It's just a Capitol propo. More noise. But if Plutarch thinks it's just the Capitol line, why
didn't he tell me about it? Why hasn't anyone let me or Finnick know?
Under this debate lies the real source of my distress: Peeta. What have they done to him? And what are
they doing to him right now? Clearly, Snow did not buy the story that Peeta and I knew nothing about the
rebellion. And his suspicions have been reinforced, now that I have come out as the Mockingjay. Peeta can only
guess about the rebel tactics or make up things to tell his torturers. Lies, once discovered, would be severely
punished. How abandoned by me he must feel. In his first interview, he tried to protect me from the Capitol and
rebels alike, and not only have I failed to protect him, I've brought down more horrors upon him.
Come morning, I stick my forearm in the wall and stare groggily at the day's schedule. Immediately after
breakfast, I am slated for Production. In the dining hall, as I down my hot grain and milk and mushy beets, I spot a
communicuff on Gale's wrist. "When did you get that back, Soldier Hawthorne?" I ask.
"Yesterday. They thought if I'm going to be in the field with you, it could be a backup system of
communication," says Gale.
No one has ever offered me a communicuff. I wonder, if I asked for one, would I get it? "Well, I guess one of
us has to be accessible," I say with an edge to my voice.
"What's that mean?" he says.
"Nothing. Just repeating what you said," I tell him. "And I totally agree that the accessible one should be
you. I just hope I still have access to you as well."
Our eyes lock, and I realize how furious I am with Gale. That I don't believe for a second that he didn't see
Peeta's propo. That I feel completely betrayed that he didn't tell me about it. We know each other too well for him
not to read my mood and guess what has caused it.
"Katniss--" he begins. Already the admission of guilt is in his tone.
I grab my tray, cross to the deposit area, and slam the dishes onto the rack. By the time I'm in the hallway,
he's caught up with me.
"Why didn't you say something?" he asks, taking my arm.
"Why didn't I?" I jerk my arm free. "Why didn't you, Gale? And I did, by the way, when I asked you last night
about what had been going on!"
"I'm sorry. All right? I didn't know what to do. I wanted to tell you, but everyone was afraid that seeing