How It All Goes Down
- After Snow leaves, Katniss is stunned. She worries about Snow's threats and how to convince him that she's in love with Peeta. The problem is, she's not really sure how much she does love Peeta – romantically, that is.
- She doesn't want her mother to suspect anything, so she pretends everything is fine.
- Katniss has always had a strained relationship with her mother. Ever since she was 11, when her dad died, she was the one who had to protect the family. She's working on making things better.
- Katniss takes a bath and strategizes. She realizes she can't talk with Gale, Peeta, or Cinna about what's happened. Just Haymitch.
- She thinks back to a time when her father was alive, and how he taught her to swim.
- She has a moment of peace, then her prep team shows up to get her ready for the tour.
- Venia, Octavia, and Flavius fuss over her, saying she's let herself go, then they work to make her pretty for the tour.
- While they work on her, they jabber about the Quarter Quell, a souped-up version of the Hunger Games that happens every 25 years. It’s a kind of awful anniversary. The Quell is coming up shortly and Katniss will have to be a mentor to some other poor sap who's a tribute.
- At the last Quarter Quell, twice as many tributes had to compete. That was the Games Haymitch won.
- The team keeps fussing over Katniss. They have Katniss' mother show them a particular braided hairstyle they're going to use.
- Then Katniss gets to meet with Cinna, whom she loves and trusts. He's helping her pretend she's learning how to design clothes, since every victor needs to have some kind of interesting career.
- Cinna helps her dress, then Katniss' media director, Effie, arrives to arrange the filming, which they start right away.
- Katniss sees her sister Prim out of the corner of her eye and has a flashback to the last Games, when the little girl Rue died.
- Then the team dresses Katniss in warm clothes and she puts on the mockingjay pin her friend Madge gave her.
- Then the Victory Tour begins. Katniss and Peeta blissfully run to each other in the snow and kiss as passionately as they can. All of this is filmed, of course.
- They make their way to a train to take them on the tour. Haymitch has to go too.
- That night Katniss goes to meet with Haymitch. He's been drinking but is still lucid. They go outside for some privacy.
- She says she needs his help to get through it all. He says she'll have to put on a show for the rest of her life. She a victor, and that means she can't slip into oblivion; she's always going to have to pretend to be in love with Peeta.
- Katniss realizes just how much playacting is ahead of her.