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return_to_nolaAnother 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?
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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Date: 2019-04-25 12:01 am (UTC)“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?
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:16 am (UTC)"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."
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:21 am (UTC)Jonah shook his head, because it couldn’t be real. Because this couldn’t be safe. Because he was broken again.
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:32 am (UTC)"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."
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:36 am (UTC)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.
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:43 am (UTC)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.
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Date: 2019-04-25 12:45 am (UTC)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.