the pain bites deep

Disclaimer: I still don't own Divergent. Hopefully Veronica doesn't mind that I'm borrowing them for a bit.

"Another bad one, eh?"

When I step—no, it's more like a stumble—towards the blonde girl on the front porch of my grey house, she steps back, like I'm an infection. Well, maybe I am.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I say coldly, in the Abnegation manner my father raised me with.

"Like Hell you don't know what I'm talking about," the girl said, going against every nature that I know. Well, she is Dauntless, I suppose. "I can see the blood seeping through your shirt. Marcus tore you a new one, didn't he?"

The Dauntless girl takes a step closer to me, not a drop of concern in her cold blue eyes. "You need help," she says. I shake her off.

"My father will hear you, and then he'll go ballistic," I say quietly. "You should go."

"Like Hell I'm going. You need to get to a hospital." That girl really has a thing for the phrase 'Like Hell.'

I shake my head. "I'm fine."

I feel my feet turn towards the door as I hear her scoff.

"Are you asking for trouble, Abnegation?" she asks angrily, but for the first time, I see emotion seep through her cold eyes.

"Are you, Dauntless?" I ask back.

"Well I'm not the one going into the wrath of Satan," she shoots. "Why are you voluntarily going back in there?"

I mumble something under my breath.

"What's that, Abnegation?" she asks angrily.

"Nothing," I snap back.

She looks at me, pity filling her gaze. "You need help," she repeats.

"Yeah, you said that."

"No, I mean you really need help. No normal person should have that much blood on them," she says, and if her voice wasn't so despondent, I would have mistaken it for concern.

I roll my eyes. "Well, what do you propose? We go in there and ask my dad nicely to bandage me up and give me a cupcake?"

She smiles. "So it is your dad. I knew it."

I roll my eyes again.

"Not feeling very Abnegation, are we, Tobias?" she says angrily, flaunting my name.

"Not feeling very Dauntless, are we, Beatrice?" I shoot back, and I see her redden, offended. "You aren't the only one who knows things."

She scoffs. "My name is Tris."

"Whatever, Tris."

She sighs, grabbing my wrist and dragging me down the steps. I let a strangled yelp out.

"Quit moaning," she says involuntarily. She turns back towards me, looking slightly guilty. "Sorry."

I roll my eyes, shaking my head, trying to ignore the tears rising.

She leads me through a course of roads and alleys, eventually taking me to a small creek that runs through a park. She tears off a strip of her shirt, running it through the water.

"Take off your shirt," she says calmly, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world.

I turn bright pink, shivering at the thought of stripping in front of this girl.

"Oh, come on, Abnegation. It's not like Jeanine Matthews is watching. Just take it off!" she says impatiently.

Uncomfortably, I take off my shirt, and I see her jaw drop in mock shock. Even when she stops nervously joking, her eyes don't move.

I see one of her black-clad fingers rise to my back, tracing all sorts of shapes that hurt like hell.

"Oh, God, Tobias. This is bad," she says, and for once, there is no sarcasm in her voice. "Why do you let him do this?"

I sigh. "I don't think I have any choice, Tris," I say sarcastically, but the pain bites deep behind my words.

She sighs dramatically. "I mean, why do you still stay with him. You could have gotten out. Chosen Dauntless. Been free. Why stay?"

I feel one hot tear streak down my cheek. I let the words stumble out of my mouth like children stumbling out of a school building.

"What's that, Abnegation?" she repeats.

I sigh, rolling my eyes again. "You wouldn't understand."

"Try me."

I shake my head softly. She runs the wet rag of her sleeve down my back, cleaning out wounds that have been sitting in that state for months.

"Seriously, Tobias. Why?" she asks, her voice softer than I ever imagined her speaking.

I take a deep breath. "Because I deserve it, alright? There. You happy?"

She frowns softly at me. "No. You don't deserve this. What makes you think you deserve this?"

Now the tears have begun to stream. "Because I am a bad, selfish monster. I deserve this. I thought about leaving, Tris! I am an awful human being and I deserve worse than this." Suddenly, the words begin to spill like a waterfall, flowing faster and faster the more I go on.

By the time I finish, I feel Tris's blue eyes on me, widening in horror.

"You are not an awful human being, Tobias. You stayed, despite your ass-hole father, that's better than anything I ever could have done," she says sheepishly.

"No, that's not what I—I'm sorry, Tris. I didn't mean it like that. I mean, this is all I am meant to do. Live a silent, lonely life in Abnegation. You were destined to do so many greater things. You are meant to be gorgeous, and strong, and brave—"

She cuts me off.

"I have a theory that selflessness and bravery aren't so different."

I sigh, mesmerized by her vision of perfection. "No, this isn't—no," I say, flustered. "I'm sorry, Tris. Sorry for whatever happened that made you think you had to get out, but that isn't me. I have to go," I mumble, standing up. I sling my blood-soaked shirt over my shoulders and onto my back.

"Wait, Tobias!" she calls, voice sounding anxious. "You can't just… go back! Not now! He'll kill you."

"He very well may," I respond calmly.

Her eyes widen. "That is more Dauntless than anything I have ever heard," she whispers, almost out of my hearing range.

Maybe I would run away, someday. Maybe I would go live among the factionless, or find a new life elsewhere. In theory, I could see myself leaving the fence, running off into the great unknown, exploring, doing all of the very un-Abnegation things that I am not permitted to do, but I can't do that now. No, I can't run now. Maybe when I'm stronger, braver, more Dauntless, but I can't run now. I don't think I could live with the guilt.

All I live in is a world of maybes.