I sat straight up, the bed springs groaning beneath me. My breathing came heavy, my long legs were tangled in a mess of sweaty sheets, and my groping fingers found no protective set of arms wrapped around me. I was alone. Just me and my nightmares.

They were the same every night. Well, almost the same. Every now and then, someone else from my past would find some way to haunt my thoughts, remind me of how I took their life. Weeks ago, it was Cato screaming at me in my sleep with blood trickling from his temple, the muttations creeping behind his broken body. Then it was Rue's family, weeping over the girl's flightless body and surrounded by mockingjays singing in unison, "You weren't quick enough to save her." Mags running into the fog, Wiress floating while her blood polluted the salty water, Boggs being blown to bits, Finnick's gurgling scream, Cinna's final glance at me through the glass that prevented my help.

Prim. She was in them every night. Although the images of Prim, standing before me with singed blonde hair, streaming tears, and her scorched shirt pulled out in a duck tail, were horrid, it was what she said and held in her hands that frightened me most. "The Girl on Fire let me burn," The Prim in my nightmares would repeat in a chant and she would approach me in a slow death march, her small scorched hands held out in front of her, offering me a gift. A curse. Something that reminded me of the man that took everything from me. A white rose.

Even Peeta found his way into my nightmares. Someone else that Snow took from me. Although nightmares of Peeta were never real, as the ones of former tributes and my sister were, they were just as frightening. And when I would wake in the morning, screaming his name, reaching out to find him beside me, he was never there. Not anymore.

A few months after Peeta returned to what was left of District 12, he began coming over at nights. At first, he would only stay for dinner. Then as time progressed, he would stay until I fell asleep and finally, I convinced him to spend the nights with me as we had on the train. The nightmares began to cease and on the rare occasions that they returned, I would awake and be comforted in his embrace. "Not real, Katniss." He would tell me.

His flashbacks had been gradually getting better. He was doing well, sensing when one was coming on and learning to control it. But late one night, after I had washed up for bed, I entered the room to find him already laying across the bed, his arms behind his head and his gaze on the ceiling. I didn't notice anything was wrong until it was too late. I had crawled into bed beside him and pulled the thin sheet up to my waist, turning to look at him. His eyes were dark. The blue in them were veiled by the lies that the Capitol had fed him, hijacked him with. "Peeta?" I had asked softly, my fingertips grazing his forearm. He snapped at my voice. Suddenly his hands, strong but ones that I had known to be soft and artistic, were snaked around my throat, increasing their force. "Peeta," I had choked out, my hands on top of his in a weak attempt to save myself. "This isn't real Peeta. Wake up. Wake up, Peeta. Come back to me," He didn't come back to me after that night. When he snapped out of it and realized what was happening, he was out the door and running from me. Each night I asked him over for dinner, he would refuse, tell me that he would be busy helping Thom.

Now, I had lost track of how many weeks it had been since I've spent more than five minutes with Peeta. I have fallen into a poor routine. Wake up screaming, take a long shower, get lost in the woods for the better of the day, come home to feed Buttercup scraps from leftovers, welcome Greasy Sae in to prepare dinner, and fall back into my nightmares.

I slid off of the bed and scavenged through my drawers for something to wear for the day. When I settled on a green t-shirt and tan shorts, I shuffled into the bathroom where I would take my long shower. Then I would get lost in the woods, feed Buttercup, visit with Sae, and fall back into my nightmares and wake again the next morning to do it all over again.