Oblivion

"Katniss! You've got to hear this!" Peeta calls me from upstairs.

"Coming!" I shout back to him, and scurry up the stairs, leaving the memory book Peeta and I started three years ago open on the couch.

As I walk into our bedroom, I see that he has the television turned on, and that Paylor is on the screen.

"What?" I ask. I look at him, and he just smiles.

"Listen," he says, and pats his lap. When I sit down, he raps his arms around me and starts kissing me.

"I can't multi-task, you know that." I say with a smile of my own.

"Sure you can," he says, but he stops the kissing and nods towards the screen.

"I'm proud to say, we are reconstructing all of Panem, and there will be a meeting in the Capitol. All the Hunger Games victors are required to attend this meeting, as it is of great importance." Paylor said.

I looked at Peeta. "What?"

"Shhh." he said and put his finger to my lips.

I looked at the screen again, hopeful. "Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, a hovercraft will be sent to your house in District 12 in approximately one hour. Be ready. Oh, and congratulations."

Congratulations? For what? As I open my mouth to ask, Peeta takes my face in his hands, and kissed me again. I kiss him back, but after about thirty seconds, I pulled away from his sweet lips for air. "We need to pack," I whisper.

"Fine."

I stand up, but Peeta keeps his strong arms around me. I laugh. "Let go," I demand in a playful tone.

"We have nothing to pack, really. Just ourselves." He insists.

He has a point. There's nothing I need that I won't have with me forever, and that's Peeta.

"Just let me get the locket," I insist. At this, he lets me go. Because he knows of what value his gift is to me.

I walk over to my desk, and pick up the locket. Lifting up my braid, I gently put it around my neck. The bald spots in my head from the fire had grown back, but my skin was still a rainbow of white, red, and pink, as was Peeta's.

When I walk back over to him, I try to hug him, but he refuses.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing," he mutters, and turns around and slips something out of his pocket.

What happens next brings tears to my eyes.

He gets down on one knee and pulls out a ring. A plastic one that I found in the woods by the lake that my father and I would go to, before the mine explosion. I buried it in front of my old house when I was about twelve. After Prim questioned its presence in our home.

Then, he says, "Katniss Everdeen, I love you now, I always have, and I always will. You're what gives me the will to live. Will you marry me?"

By the time he says those last four words, tears are streaming down my face. I nod slowly. "Of course, Peeta," I say. He stands up and slips the ring onto my finger. He hugs me and lifts me off the ground. He twirls me in circles and my orange, yellow, and red dress spins.

"Katniss Everdeen, girl on fire, has returned. And her unattended inferno? Is as bright as the sun and lightened the night sky." Peeta says with a smile. For the slightest second, I wonder, How would he know what President Snow had told me? He wasn't there. But the sensation of not knowing passes quickly.

When he puts me down, he gives me a long kiss, and I kiss him back with all my force.

Two ear-bursting beeps. The hovercraft.

"Let's get going," Peeta whispers.

I start to walk out, holding his hand, but he sweeps me up in one swift motion and runs down the stairs, outside, and, before I know it, onto the hovercraft.

Beetee pats the two empty chairs, one next to him, and the other next to Enobaria. But Peeta shook his head and sat me down on the floor, and he came down shortly after, me still in his arms' embrace.

"Why are you crying, brainless?" Johanna asked me.

"W-w-we're engaged," I choked out, barely audible, but, I--and everyone else that has had to go through a day in the arena--can understand anything.

"So cute," she says, and rolled her eyes.

"When's the wedding?" says Enobaria. Her tone is a little excited. I wonder why, when I remember, That's right. I had heard Brutus say that she enjoys weddings.

"We got engaged today, so how would we know?" Peeta says in a joking tone, and smiles at me, his wonderful smile.

"Congratulations," Beetee said. "But we have more important issues."

Peeta and I look into each others' eyes, his smile wiped from his face, and I know that something serious a lot more serious is going on than a little reconstruction of Panem.