Chapter Text
Gale
He kisses him and tastes her. They are all together now, just the three of them.
The intoxicating aroma of cinnamon and pine makes Gale go wild. It’s now hard to imagine one without the other.
They are in bed together tonight. It isn’t always like this. Most of the time Gale occupies the room down the hall. He doesn’t like to sleep with other people, doesn’t like to let his guard down. War taught him that’s how people die. But right now, he is at his most vulnerable and completely defenseless. Wrapped between the two people he loves most in the world. It hurts because he knows if even one of them was taken away from him, he would be irreparable.
It’s a kind of hunger that can never be filled. He will never get enough of them.
-
Peeta Mellark made himself almost impossible to hate.
Which made Gale hate him even more.
“You’re sure you want this?” asked Gale. “Most guys don’t go for this kind of thing you know.”
“I want whatever makes you and Katniss happy. It’s all I’ve ever wanted.” Says Peeta. He’s not lying, which only makes it worse.
“You know it won’t be the both of us forever. At some point she’ll just have to choose the one she can’t live without.”
“Well, if that’s what you really think.” Peeta gave the slightly taller boy an earnest smile. It makes Gale feel warm and uncomfortable. “May the odds be ever in your favor.”
-
It feels like a trap. Like he was a wild animal falling into that hard grip of a snare.
Katniss couldn’t or wouldn’t choose between them. Gale had been wrong. It must have been Peeta that filled her head with such nonsense. Now Gale had to make a choice. Either give in to this bargain and share Katniss or possibly be lost to her forever.
It’s not a question though when she comes to meet him. There are tears in Katniss’s seam grey eyes, the same as his own. He would give Katniss the world if he could.
“Stay with me.” She asks.
He wraps his arms around her. “Always.”
Katniss kisses him deeper than she’s ever kissed him before and there is a strong taste of cinnamon and dill on her lips and Gale tries desperately not to enjoy it.
-
They start out on separate schedules, almost as if Katniss is a child of divorce. They split half the week and alternate weekends. It’s insane, Gale thinks to himself. But Peeta concedes to taking the beginning half of the week, so he’s not too burned by it. This way is the best, he tries to tell himself. It’s the only way he’s going to be able to compartmentalize having to share Katniss. Pretending Peeta doesn’t exist.
Except there are signs of him everywhere in her apartment. There is his burnt orange hoodie on her couch. His food is in her refrigerator. His soaps in her shower.
It makes conversations awkward. Katniss does her best not to bring him up, but Peeta is the other half off her life. Eventually, Gale concedes and Peeta becomes almost a specter. This unseen presence leaves wonderful aromas and plentiful food and chips away at Katniss’s walls. Gale is certain that she never touched him that way before Peeta. Never took him in to herself. Never seemed as comfortable before him.
Gale is beginning to like Peeta, in some ways. And it makes him angry.
-
He’s out fishing by himself one night morning on an alternate weekend. The silence doesn’t quiet his mind today. Instead, he thinks about what Katniss must be doing. If she’s nestled against his sleeping body. If he paints her with slow, warm kisses as she wakes up. If he makes her a full breakfast of ham and bacon and those cheese filled bread rolls.
If Gale is being honest, most of his thoughts are about Peeta. He apparently spends an inordinate amount of time thinking about a man he never sees and should by all rights resent.
He wishes he could be there with them. Sharing the experience of a late Saturday breakfast. Seeing Katniss’s sleepy smile as she wraps her braid. Peeta’s warm voice humming in Gale’s ears as they prepare breakfast. It’s only in the quiet of the lake that he admits to himself that he misses being a part of their lives. That he’s letting his pride get in the way of his happiness.
It’s a thought he tries to drown, but it follows him to the shore.
-
There’s an accident in the mines and Gale thinks he’s going to die. He thinks that he’ll end up only a few feet above his father, as the dark tunnel shakes and ruptures. There’s no point in trying to save anyone. The cave’s walls are coming down.
Gale is pinned between a break in the sediment. There’s no exit, no way out. It takes three days to rescue him, but for Gale it seems like hours. He burns his throat screaming for help. His body burns from dehydration. The adrenaline never stops. It’s his worst fears realized.
And in those moments between his screams, when he simply has nothing to look at but the darkness in front of him, Gale can only think one person. It’s not his mother or his brothers. He just thinks of Katniss and wishes beyond anything that his final words could be with her.
He and a few others are rescued. Katniss is right outside the construction line, her face filled with tears. Her face sickly and frayed. Next to her with a strong hand on his shoulder is Peeta.
They meet up with him in the ambulance and Katniss sobs into Gale’s chest. She’s still trapped in the days of trauma. Not really believing that he’s here, that her small hand is wrapped around his fingers.
Gale struggles to look up and doesn’t believe it. Peeta, heavy with sleep and exhaustion, has the most relived look on his face. His small smile makes Gale feel warm, feel safe. Although maybe that’s the morphling entering in to his system. Someone would later tell him his family was also there. But the hunger and exhaustion cause Gale to pass out. Peeta’s warm smile burned into his brain.
Its in that hospital bed that Gale decides there are more things than just survival. He will never enter the mines again. Determined not to be killed by the same system that killed his father. And that no matter what the cost, no matter what the requirement, he will spend every moment he can with Katniss. Even if a day came where he would only live on crumbs and his beloved would betrothed to Peeta. They’ve never really been enemies, despite whatever Gale thought. He would never have the heart to take her away from him.
Gale moves in full time with Katniss as he recovers. Peeta dotes on him every chance he’s there. And Gale tries to hate it, tries to hate him like he always has. But Peeta is so genuine, so kind. He’s not bothered at all that Katniss refuses to leave his side for a few days. It gives Gale hope that maybe he really did belong in their lives. It’s a warmth he’s not used to that cradles in his stomach. No longer the provider, but the provided.
-
It gets to a point where Gale looks forward to seeing Peeta every time he comes over. He’s living some kind of nightmare, but finds himself enjoying it. Katniss is more open, more honest and freeier with him than ever before. She’s always denied her feelings for the both of them. But something about Peeta allows her to open up and let Gale into her heart for the first time since they were teenagers.
Gale knows this can’t last. He knows the fire is still in him. That one day it will consume them all. But Peeta runs his fingers through Gale’s hair and he feels something he hasn’t since before his father was alive. He feels love.
-
It’s late and Katniss is bundled up between them on the couch. Her face pressed up against Peeta’s shoulder. Asleep she almost looks like a child, Gale thinks to himself. Without her usual controlled mask she looks so precious, so vulnerable. Almost like Prim. Since Peeta entered their lives, even Gale has noticed that sleep has finally become a respite among all of them. Gale hasn’t had a nightmare since Peeta came to live with them. To share their bed.
The seam boy has his fingers wrapped in Peeta’s long curls. It seems strange how perfect his two people fit together. How easy it comes for them to fall into each other’s arms. To give themselves totally over to another person. It’s never been easy for Gale, not even with Katniss. Once you give something like that to anyone, they have control over you. Gale was still playing his game, pretending that at least a part of could live without them. It was excruciating but necessary.
“She doesn’t need me, you know.” Gale says in a half whisper. Peeta winces as his eyes adjust from the brightness of the television to the figure cloaked in darkness beside him.
“What?”
“I’m saying, you won. I concede. You don’t have to keep me around anymore if you don’t want to.” Gale said, before he had time to feel the regret building in his chest. It was now or never. Just between him and Peeta. If Katniss couldn’t make a decision, then one of them would have to.
“I never saw it as a competition.” Said Peeta.
“You can’t honestly expect her to keep us both around forever.” Said Gale. “I told you, Katniss is only going to keep the one she can’t survive without.”
“You’re her best friend. Katniss would never let you go. And I thought things were going good between us-“
“And we’ve had our fun.” Said Gale. His face burning with the memory of Peeta’s kiss. “But now she’s got you and you’ve got her. There’s nobody left who needs me.“
“That’s not true. Katniss does.” Peeta tries to move closer, but its awkward with Katniss in between him. As Katniss shifts in her sleep, Peeta reaches over to touch Gale on the cheek. For a merchant, Peeta has strong hands. For such strong hands, they are warm and inviting. The baker leans over as much as he can which isn’t too far from Gale’s face.
“And I need you too.”
Peeta gives Gale a kiss and it’s nothing the seam miner has ever experienced before. The fire that burns in the very pit of Gale’s soul, the one that has kept him alive for so long, burns itself out. From the burnt kindling, an ember remained. It is no longer a raging inferno, but a glowing crackling warmth. The anger that Gale kept inside since the world took his father away, has cooled by giving him Peeta Mellark.
Gale begins to cry. The pain, the anger, the regret, now all started coming to the surface with nothing to consume it. Peeta slowly and gently hushed him as the feelings now came to surface. He cradles Gale’s face in his hands.
“Please. Stay with us.” Peeta gently whispers. He doesn’t have to get a response to know the answer.
Always.
-
He kisses Peeta for the first time and it reminds him of Madge Undersee.
He kissed like a starving man. Gale is being savored. Gale is being cherished. It was unlike a merchant to be so generous, to be so honest with himself. It makes Gale furious. He gets even angrier when Peeta knows exactly what to do with his hands. The way that Peeta’s warm breath feels against his chin.
It’s at that moment Gale knows he’s a goner.
-
Gale then gets a call from his ex Johanna a few days later.
“So, you’d rather get cucked by bread boy to be with Brainless than have full rights to me.” She starts.
“Its not like that.” Gale defends. He doesn’t know what else to say because it’s too confusing. Too intimate. It’s not just about Katniss anymore, if Gale is being honest and he’s not. “How did you find out, anyway?”
“Peeta told me. Because he’s actually a good fucking friend.” Said Johanna. “Can’t say the same for you and Cat-Piss.”
“There’s no reason to be mad at Katniss.” Gale redirects. The old him would have just hung up and stopped the conversation. But something in him wants to make it up to Johnanna.
“I’m not mad at Katniss you asshole. I’m mad at you! God… this is exactly why we broke up.”
“We broke up because you went after Chaff.”
“Yea, because it sucked being your girlfriend while you gave moon eyes to Birdbrain.”
There was a pause and Gale let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.
“I’m sorry Johanna.” Said Gale.” You deserved better than me.”
Johanna gave a sharp sniff as if she was crying, but without a break in her voice she replies “Way to state the fucking obvious.”
Gale almost misses it. But before Johanna hangs up, she whispers, “Don’t you dare break their hearts, Gale Hawthorne.”
-
No one tells Finnick. At least, not that Gale knows.
But he and Annie aren’t too curious about their living situation. Finnick is jovial and dismissive and doesn’t bring it up. But Gale overhears Finnick talking to Peeta in a concerned, hushed tone.
I hope you know what you’re doing.
-
“So, you think you got this whole relationship thing figured out, don’t you sweetheart?” Haymitch takes a glass out of the cabinet without asking and fills it from the tap.
The older man is Katniss’s mother’s boyfriend of five or six years. Despite barely being on speaking terms with her mother, Haymitch has always made some sort of effort to keep the peace between them. They’re more alike than either of them would admit.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Katniss
“What’s what supposed to mean?”
“That sweetheart thing. You only say it to be sarcastic.”
“Me? Old lovable Haymitch not being sincere? I spit at the thought.” Haymitch rolled his eyes.
“Come on. If you have something to say to me, don’t pussyfoot around it.”
“Well pardon me for not necessarily being over the moon on your little threesome thing.”
“There are lots of polyamorous relationships that are perfectly fine and work out.”
“Polyamorous is just a two-dollar word for fucking complicated.” Haymitch took a seat on the kitchen barstool. “It’s just, what’s your endgame here Katniss? You, Gale and Peeta move to a white picket fence in the suburbs. Have a couple of kids, only you won’t know whose are whose.”
“I don’t remember asking your opinion.” Scowled Katniss. “And we’re just seeing how things go for now.”
“Ah, but see sweetheart, eventually you guys are going to hit a wall. Eventually you’ll have to have that conversation. Theres gonna be questions, there’s gonna be choices. And sooner or later its going to come down to only two of you or none of you. You can’t just live here in this fantasy and not decide what you want. You kids aren’t gonna be kids for much longer. Eventually you’ll grow up.”
“I’m not a child Haymitch. I’ve made my decision and all that matters is that right now I have both of them, alright. And if that’s not okay with you or mom, then you both can fuck off.” Exasperated Katniss.
Haymitch’s eyes darkened as he wet his lips. He got quiet for just a moment.
“There was this girl.” He started. “Her name was Alma. I was about nineteen and she was I think seven years older than me. I liked her, I liked her a lot. Anyway, she had this boyfriend Plutarch. Also a bit older than me. I was mostly in it for her but…. Me and Plutarch started bonding after awhile. We became something a little more than friends. Most of my family was gone by the time I became an adult. Plutarch, while he was kind of a fop, became something like a brother to me.”
A sharp silence hung between them. Haymitch was tapping his fingers against his glass of water.
“What…. Um… what happened between you and them?” asked Katniss.
“There came time to make a choice. She wanted a family. Plutarch was the stable one. The kind one. The smart one, per say. There wasn’t going to be room in their world for a hanger on like me. I lost both of them. And it nearly killed me.”
Katniss stood quietly as Haymitch made his way toward the door.
“You know, I’ve always liked Peeta. I’ve never been crazy about Gale, but he’s always treated you right. The odds must be in your favor if you found two people who not only love you unconditionally but are also willing to put themselves aside for now. I’m only going to tell you this for your own good, you could live a thousand lifetimes and never deserve those boys.”
That night Katniss wraps both Gale and Peeta around one of her arms. She practically drapes them both across her body. Because Haymitch is right, and she knows it. But life without the two of them seems impossible.