Priya

[nola_peeta]

Another cupcake waiting for Jonah.

It had been happening for a little while now. They were gorgeous little treats: cakes and pastries, all lovingly made and carefully decorated. They appeared as if out of nowhere. They were, he was sure, intended for him.

No one could have really known that Jonah had this particular culinary weakness, which made it even more of a mystery: he ate clean and organic ninety-nine percent of the time, after all, and was mostly seen at the studio with tea and kombucha and a baggie of grapes for a snack.

So who was leaving him these treats? No one in his classes was particularly clingy or affectionate; no one lingered afterwards in any suspicious way.

Were the cakes coming from the outside? But if they were, why would anyone leave them for Jonah? He didn't even quite have a handful of friends, and certainly none who would launch a sweet campaign like this without telling him. It was spooky; it was nice; it was alarming.

So Jonah took his cupcake and sat on a bench outside the studio to eat it, and maybe he was paranoid, but he thought that a woman perched across the street was watching him.

... could these cakes and pastries have been dusted with poison? He paused mid-bite. Was this the culprit? Jonah didn't recognize her. Or did he?

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[nola_katniss]

Priya was on an identical bench across the street, one foot dangling down, her other knee brought up to her chest so she could rest her chin on it. She had her phone out and she was ostensibly looking at it, but her eyes kept darting up over the screen to Jonah. Peeta.

She noticed he stopped, that he was looking at her. Did he recognize her? A trill went through her saying yes, remember me, but she shook it off immediately. He shouldn't have to remember. He deserved better. She could make it alone if it meant he was safe and happy.

So Priya smiled in that small, awkward way that strangers did when they accidentally locked eyes, and then went back to staring intently at her phone like that was the only thing she cared about. It was killing her not to look up.

[nola_peeta]

Jonah watched her closely, intently. He didn't know her, but he knew her. Right? He called, after a moment, a tremor in his voice "Are you watching me?"

[nola_katniss]

"No," she called back without looking up, but of course that gave her away. If she hadn't been watching him, there's no way she would have known he was talking to her, no way she could have responded that fast.

[nola_peeta]

So, yes. “Did you give me this?” He called, holding up the cupcake.

[nola_katniss]

Priya looked up then, but she focused on the cupcake, careful not to make eye contact, and nodded.

[nola_peeta]

“Why?” This time, he was more wary, and he set down the cake.

[nola_katniss]

She looked around at passing people, hating that they might be listening to their conversation. But Peeta was obviously unsure of her, so she wasn't going to approach him, no matter how much she wanted to. "I thought you'd like it."

[nola_peeta]

The only possible question: “Why?” Oh, and also, “Who are you?”

When the street between them was clear, Pietro lobbed the cake, easy and low, back to Priya.

And when he did that he was struck with so much déjà vu he was dizzy.

[nola_katniss]

Priya caught it out of the air like it was nothing. "Don't you want it?" She licked a glob of frosting off her hand from where she'd caught it. See? It was safe.

I'm Priya. I'm Priya. She said it to herself a few times before she tried it aloud, wanting to say the right name. "I'm Priya."

[nola_peeta]

“Can you come over here?” Jonah suddenly wasn’t sure what he was seeing anymore.

[nola_katniss]

She hesitated for a moment but, well, he'd asked, and she wasn't going to refuse him. "Okay," she announced for his benefit, so she wouldn't startle him when she unfolded her leg and stood. Priya crossed the street slowly, not coming straight at him, and sat a little way away from him on the bench. She held out the cake, in case he wanted it back.

[nola_peeta]

And just like that, he saw her clearly. She was Katniss. Of course she was.

Jonah didn’t know what else to do, so he said “Hey Katniss,” took the cake, and started to eat it.

[nola_katniss]

Oh no. No no no. Priya's heart broke a little more; Peeta had remembered and it was her fault.

But he was also eating the cake, so. "Hi Peeta."

[nola_peeta]

Oh. He hadn’t remembered that part; at first, he had just seen Katniss. He set the cake down, calmly, and dropped his head to his knees, covering with with his hands. Peeta. It was coming back.

[nola_katniss]

Oh fuck. Oh god. "No, Peeta, I'm--" she started, voice pained. Priya reached towards him, hands hovering helplessly near him. She wanted to rub his back or grip his arm or something, anything that would make this less horrible, but she didn't feel like she had the right. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean... You weren't supposed to remember."

[nola_peeta]

He was Jonah, right? He was Jonah, he had a life as Jonah. He couldn’t be Peeta. He couldn’t live that nightmare. He couldn’t be brainwashed again. He had tried so hard to fight against it, to learn to deal with the flashbacks, but how do you deal with a flashback like this? Jonah couldn’t move. He couldn’t. He wanted this to go away. Silent tears streamed out of the eyes he was trying to keep squeezed shut. He couldn’t move.

[nola_katniss]

Her whole face had gone red as she tried not to cry and completely failed at it. She crossed her arms tightly in front of her chest because it was killing her not to touch him but she knew she shouldn't, not if he was caught up in a flashback and thought he was being attacked. "It's okay, Peeta. You're safe. No one is going to hurt you, I promise. Just breathe." Except she'd hurt him. She should have just stayed away.

[nola_peeta]

Was anything real? He remembered children, Katniss loving him, had all of that been an illusion? Were they still in the Games? Was he dead? Was this even actually Katniss? It probably wasn’t even Katniss. He looked up at her, suspicious, on edge. “Who are you?”

[nola_katniss]

God, it hurt to see him like this, like he'd been on his worst days. "I'm Katniss. I'm your wife." She felt like a knife was piercing her chest. "I know I look different. It's confusing. But I'm real. I swear I'm real."

[nola_peeta]

That used to be the one thing he could trust, eventually: Katniss would tell him if something was real or not real. But right now Jonah, or Peeta, or — right now he didn’t believe her. He got to his feet, wary and tense.

[nola_katniss]

Priya didn't follow after him; instead, she brought her knees up towards her and didn't move at all except for a gentle rocking back and forth, a self-soothing gesture. "I'm sorry, Peeta."

[nola_peeta]

Jonah didn’t know where he was going, but he had to get away. He couldn’t figure out his own reality and it was terrifying. He started to walk away, and when a pedestrian accidentally bumped into Jonah, he shoved that poor person away without a second thought, and he did it with far too much heft. He wasn’t thinking. He

[nola_katniss]

Shit. Shitshitshit. Priya went wide-eyed at the shove and scrambled up from the bench. She stopped to make sure the stranger was okay as quickly as she could before she chased after Jonah. Her hand closed around his wrist, and she knew he wasn't going to react well to it, but she also knew he'd hate himself if he hurt anyone while he was confused and she couldn't let that happen. "Peeta. Stop."

[nola_peeta]

Jonah shook his hand free, terrified of how angry he was. “Don’t touch me!”

[nola_katniss]

She held up both her hands. "I won't. But you need to go somewhere else, okay? Somewhere quiet." She was terrified he was going to hurt himself, she was terrified he was going to hurt someone else and the cops would come. "Please. I swear on my sister I'm just trying to help."

[nola_peeta]

“Not real.” How could it be? How could any of this be real? Jonah wanted to go home but home was an illusion too, wasn’t it?

[nola_katniss]

"Real," she challenged right back. "We're here, in New Orleans, and we have new names now, and new lives, and they're real. It's not...it's not a trick. I don't think it's a trick. I don't understand either but it's real."

[nola_peeta]

Jonah shook his head, because it couldn’t be real. Because this couldn’t be safe. Because he was broken again.

[nola_katniss]

"I'm sorry. I didn't want you to have to remember. I wanted you to be happy and be normal and just...be." Priya almost never talked this much, never poured herself out this easily--not that it was easy. It was killing her, facing all of this, but she'd happily take all the pain if it meant Peeta felt even a little bit less of it. "I love you, and I'm sorry."

[nola_peeta]

No, Jonah couldn’t do this. Every time he blinked he saw something horrific. He couldn’t. He couldn’t do this. He turned in the opposite direction to try to walk away again.

[nola_katniss]

Priya let him. She watched, carefully, to make sure he didn't lash out again or get in trouble, but she didn't let herself chase after him.

[nola_peeta]

Jonah headed home, or the place that had been his home until lately, his head down and war ringing in his ears. Maybe at home, it would stop.