She's slept by now, the kind of exhausted dead sleep which is just an absence of consciousness rather than anything like rest. Slept, attempted dressed herself this morning without going wrong. Which something had, of course. She'd managed her pants all right, the dark ones from that fancy outfit she'd been given, and new underwear from the new box, she'd managed that first, but then it came to pull on a top. She'd wanted to wear the shirt with the cute octopusses on it and then frozen with her hand extended, imagining the kind of ludicrous corpse she'd make if she died wearing it. If the flood came. If the roof collapsed. If a trap opened up in the stairs. If someone killed her. It's enough to make a girl cry. It's enough to make that girl laugh, because she's being absurd.
It takes her a while to calm down after that, and some of it is spent trying to muffle her hysterics with a pillow. Afterwards, she wears the shirt with something of a defiant air, daring her mind and the world to punish her for it.
She makes it down to the kitchen, doesn't manage to make breakfast. She tries, but dressing has taken her energy and all she can do is follow Finnick's quiet instructions. That's fine. She can do that. Except Peeta's here, and oh, oh, oh, he must have heard her earlier.
Annie wants to run. Bolt. Run outside, never mind the rain. Run back upstairs and hide, let Finnick deal with being social. She can't. She can't, she can't, she can't. But something of her pride lingers, grimly hanging on. The same desperate edge which made her pull on the adorable shirt despite the violent visions behind her eyelids.
So when she sees Peeta, she straightens and looks at him. She tries to gage his mood, his likely reactions. She tries not to stare too long, too intensely, and is dimly aware that she's failing spectacularly. Everything in her head is going too fast and too slow, all at once.
But she has to try.
"Hi," she says.
No, no, no, she needs to say something else. Something neutral. Sociable. Not crazy, she's been too crazy lately and the cliffs aren't coming down, the arena isn't breaking, no one's died. (That she knows of.)
3rd July, Morning | Peeta Mellark
It takes her a while to calm down after that, and some of it is spent trying to muffle her hysterics with a pillow. Afterwards, she wears the shirt with something of a defiant air, daring her mind and the world to punish her for it.
She makes it down to the kitchen, doesn't manage to make breakfast. She tries, but dressing has taken her energy and all she can do is follow Finnick's quiet instructions. That's fine. She can do that. Except Peeta's here, and oh, oh, oh, he must have heard her earlier.
Annie wants to run. Bolt. Run outside, never mind the rain. Run back upstairs and hide, let Finnick deal with being social. She can't. She can't, she can't, she can't. But something of her pride lingers, grimly hanging on. The same desperate edge which made her pull on the adorable shirt despite the violent visions behind her eyelids.
So when she sees Peeta, she straightens and looks at him. She tries to gage his mood, his likely reactions. She tries not to stare too long, too intensely, and is dimly aware that she's failing spectacularly. Everything in her head is going too fast and too slow, all at once.
But she has to try.
"Hi," she says.
No, no, no, she needs to say something else. Something neutral. Sociable. Not crazy, she's been too crazy lately and the cliffs aren't coming down, the arena isn't breaking, no one's died. (That she knows of.)
"Why did you picking painting?"