“You don’t forget the face of the person who was your last hope.”
“Remember, we're madly in love, so it's all right to kiss me anytime you feel like it.”
“I am not pretty. I am not beautiful. I am as radiant as the sun.”
“Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor.”
“Destroying things is much easier than making them.”
“Deep in the meadow, hidden far away
A cloak of leaves, a moonbeam ray
Forget your woes and let your troubles lay
And when it's morning again, they'll wash away
Here it's safe, here it's warm
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Here is the place where I love you.”
“I'm coming back into focus when Caesar asks him if he has a girlfriend back home. Peeta hesitates, then gives an unconvincing shake of his head.
Handsome lad like you. There must be some special girl. Come on, what’s her name?" says Caesar.
Peeta sighs. "Well, there is this one girl. I’ve had a crush on her ever since I can remember. But I’m pretty sure she didn’t know I was alive until the reaping."
Sounds of sympathy from the crowd. Unrequited love they can relate to.
She have another fellow?" asks Caesar.
I don’t know, but a lot of boys like her," says Peeta.
So, here’s what you do. You win, you go home. She can’t turn you down then, eh?" says Caesar encouragingly.
I don’t think it’s going to work out. Winning...won’t help in my case," says Peeta.
Why ever not?" says Caesar, mystified.
Peeta blushes beet red and stammers out. "Because...because...she came here with me.”
“I don't want to lose the boy with the bread.”
“I can feel Peeta press his forehead into my temple and he asks, 'So now that you've got me, what are you going to do with me?' I turn into him. 'Put you somewhere you can't get hurt.”
“You’ve got about as much charm as a dead slug.”
“You here to finish me off, Sweetheart?”
“And then he gives me a smile that just seems so genuinely sweet with just the right touch of shyness that unexpected warmth rushes through me.”
“Yes, frosting. The final defense of the dying.”
“Peeta, you said at the interview you’d had a crush on me forever. When did forever start?
Oh, let’s see. I guess the first day of school. We were five. You had on a red plaid dress and your hair...it was in two braids instead of one. My father pointed you out when we were waiting to line up."
Your father? Why?"
He said, ‘See that little girl? I wanted to marry her mother, but she ran off with a coal miner.'"
What? You’re making that up!"
No, true story. And I said, 'A coal miner? Why did she want a coal miner if she could’ve had you?' And he said, 'Because when he sings...even the birds stop to listen.”
“May the odds be ever in your favor!”
“District 12: Where you can starve to death in safety.”
“If Peeta and I were both to die, or they thought we were....My fingers fumble with the pouch on my belt, freeing it. Peeta sees it and his hand clamps on my wrist. "No, I won't let you." "Trust me," I whisper. He holds my gaze for a long moment then lets go. I loosen the top of the pouch and pour a few spoonfuls of berries into his palm. Then I fill my own. "On the count of three?" Peeta leans down and kisses me once, very gently. "The count of three," he says. We stand, our backs pressed together, our empty hands locked tight. "Hold them out. I want everyone to see," he says. I spread out my fingers, and the dark berries glisten in the sun. I give Peeta's hand one last squeeze as a signal, as a good-bye, and we begin counting. "One." Maybe I'm wrong. "Two." Maybe they don't care if we both die. "Three!" It's too late to change my mind. I lift my hand to my mouth taking one last look at the world. The berries have just passed my lips when the trumpets begin to blare. The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouts above them. "Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you - the tributes of District 12!”
“It crosses my mind that Cinna's calm and normal demeanor masks a complete madman.”
“One more time? For the audience?" he says. His voice isn't angry. It's hollow, which is worse. Already the boy with the bread is slipping away from me.
I take his hand, holding on tightly, preparing for the cameras, and dreading the moment when I will finally have to let go.”
“Katniss, the girl who was on fire!”
“Kind people have a way of working their way inside me and rooting there.”
“Yes, and I’m sure the arena will be full of bags of flour for me to chuck at people.”
“Rue, who when you ask her what she loves most in the world, replies, of all things, “Music.”
“For there to be betrayal, there would have to have been trust first.”
“Because when he sings...even the birds stop to listen.”
“And while I was talking, the idea of actually losing Peeta hit me again and I realized how much I don't want him to die. And it's not about the sponsors. And it's not about what will happen when we get home. And it's not just that I don't want to be alone. It's him. I do not want to lose the boy with the bread.”
“You’re not leaving me here alone,” I say. Because if he dies, I’ll never go home, not really. I’ll spend the rest of my life in this arena, trying to think my way out.”
“Sometimes, when I clean a kill, I feed Buttercup the entrails. He has stopped hissing at me.
Entrails. No hissing. This is the closest we will ever come to love.”
“My spirit gets nourished in faraway places. Sometimes I wonder if it's a biological need, perhaps a biological flaw, that compels me to seek the excitement and challenge that comes of being in a place where nobody knows me.
Other times I think that my compulsion to settle into communities that are different from the ones I know is related to my passion for experiential learning. I learn best and most happily by doing, touching, sharing, tasting. When I'm somewhere I've never been before, learning goes on all day, every day.”
“They say a girl becomes a woman when she loses her mother. You, child, were born a woman.”
“I held a brief debate with myself as to whether I should change my ordinary attire for something smarter. At last I concluded it would be a waste of labour. "Doubtless," though I, "she is some stiff old maid ; for though the daughter of Madame Reuter, she may well number upwards of forty winters; besides, if it were otherwise, if she be both young and pretty, I am not handsome, and no dressing can make me so, therefore I'll go as I am." And off I started, cursorily glancing sideways as I passed the toilet-table, surmounted by a looking-glass: a thin irregular face I saw, with sunk, dark eyes under a large, square forehead, complexion destitute of bloom or attraction; something young, but not youthful, no object to win a lady's love, no butt for the shafts of Cupid.”
“What we think about ourselves becomes the truth for us.”
“What do you care more about? The kids or your hair?”
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