I open my eyes looking at the mirror and into the conservative face of an older Abnegation volunteer. Regardless of the feuding between our factions I do not dislike him; his presence has been somewhat peaceful today.
His voice is smooth and composed as he presents my results to the aptitude test,
"Erudite"
My results don't come as a surprise, I have expected as much. Testing results I have acted as a Erudite, just as I have been trained to, growing up as one of them. I have reviewed the aptitude the way I have been trained to for the first sixteen years of my life, and my Erudite result reflects that.
I nod and he focuses back on the machine. "You may exit the way you entered."
I leave the room quickly giving no reply. As I enter the cafeteria many of my fellow Erudites try to gauge my result by my expression, but my face betrays nothing. Many of them wondered if my outspoken nature would put me in Candor, but they don't know just how much I hide. I don't value honesty, I value the choice of what to keep in and what to express.
When I find my seat, the chatter starts up again, albeit quieter and most likely about me. My friend, Kara raises an eyebrow as I sit down but I ignore her, choosing instead to pop my knuckles, one by one. I know this irritates her to no end, but before she can snap at me Eric Rama walks in; he's a "friend" of ours, but Kara's been obsessed with him since we were small.
We're not supposed to share our results but the sordid smile on his face says it all.
Dauntless.
Eric's known for ages that his blood would burn during the choosing ceremony, and he's let it be a widely known fact among our fellow Erudites. He takes a seat staring at me from across the table, cocky smile firmly in place.
"Kara Stuart."
Kara jumps as her name is called and I give her a sympathetic look, I know she's been worried about the test. She looks hopefully toward Eric but his gaze doesn't waver from me. "So Veda, were your results everything you wished them to be?"
I look back, a bored expression on my face. "We're not allowed to discuss our results." I know it won't satisfy him, but I'm hoping for once he'll take the hint and shut up.
He scoffs, "Since when has that stopped us?"
Eric is of course talking about our late night training sessions. While he makes his interest in Dauntless perfectly clear, he's one of the few people who know about my similar plans. Together we've been training for the initiation process, being in Erudite does have its perks; one being that pretty much all the information you want is at your fingertips. We don't know all about the process but we've found more than anyone else I think, we also know that by being transfers we'll be at a disadvantage, at least for part of the process.
"It's not stopping me; it's an excuse not to tell you." I then turn to another boy in our year and insert myself into his discussion. Somewhere behind me I can hear whispers of "Candor."
Its night now and I lie on top of my covers with a book I found about Dauntless. I'm studying all I can now because I know once I get there tomorrow my days of study will be few and far between.
I've known I wanted to be in Dauntless since we first started learning about the other factions in school. It isn't the guns and fighting that attract me like they do Eric. What interests me most is the strength and strategy shown by most of the Dauntless, well that and the choice they are afforded. The Dauntless are the least uniform faction which intrigues my vain and selfish side, the exact side that makes me an impossible candidate for Abnegation, not that I want that life anyway.
I shut the book and slide it under my bed; I won't be able to take it with me. It's not nostalgia that makes me think of this, its greed. My little brother will probably tear my room apart, he'll take my books, any clothes he can get away with, no doubt he'll take my variety of blue ties and shoelaces. I take my journal out from its place under my mattress and turn it in my hands.
I still haven't decided what to do with it yet, I can't take it with me, but I can't leave it here to be laughed over either.
Suddenly I hear small pebbles at my window and know its Eric. If I wasn't watching for him already while training this was his signal. Right now he'll be crouched behind the wall so that if my parents looked out the window they couldn't see him. I'm more than a little confused though; we've stopped our little training sessions two nights ago to give our bodies a rest before we choose.
Regardless I quickly change into dark jeans with a black long sleeved shirt. These are the only times I don't have to wear blue, so I don't. I creep as silently as I can out my window and across our small lawn. As a parting gift to me, the creaky gate of ours stays silent. Eric is just like I thought, crouched against the wall, and I must admit he looks pretty good. His hair is growing a bit longer than usual and he's dressed all in black. His pale arms are a striking contrast to his clothes. He looks up at me and I see a fag in his hand, I glare at him and he puts it out. He knows I hate it when he smokes around me.
Once we are under the cover of trees I know I can talk without being heard. "So, what did you drag me out here for?" I try to sound annoyed, but honestly I wasn't sleeping anyway and welcome the diversion.
He rolls his eyes dramatically, "Honestly Veda, I dragged you out here? I just thought we could talk, but if you want to go home feel free." He finishes with venom in his voice. "I couldn't care less." His face returns to its usual look of disinterest.
"God stop being an ass, will ya?" I find a tree trunk to lean against sliding down its base, and pat the seat next to me. Eric ignores it and sits in front of me. "What did you want to talk about?"
"I don't know, we could talk about our results." He pretends to be disinterested, but fails miserably.
I roll my eyes before replying. "Hm, okay I'm guessing your results were what you wanted, you're not very good at hiding anything. Maybe you should be in Candor."
"Why, are you worried about the company there? We all know that's where you were put." He snarls back.
I took a deep breath to calm myself down, "Just like you Eric, I was put where I expected to be put." I spoke with the hope that he would believe that to be Dauntless.
Luckily he believes me and let it go. "It's our last night here." He speaks with excitement evident in his tone and eyes. "Let's do something." The way he speaks reminds me of my little brother Ethan back when he was young and excitable.
I can't stop the smile from spreading on my face, so I don't. "Okay, I'm up for anything."
He takes out his lighter and smirks. "Bonfire" we say in unison.
"Wait, let's go home first and get stuff to burn." I was now possibly more excited than him.
He looked around confused, "There's plenty of shit here to burn-"
I cut him off quickly, "something symbolic, something distinctly Erudite. When we go to sleep tomorrow we won't be Dauntless yet, but we won't be Erudite either."
His face is impassive for a few seconds before a rare smile graces his lips. He simply nods and we part ways, my house is twice as far as Eric's so I sprint home thinking of all the running I'll get to do as a Dauntless initiate.
When I get back to our training destination Eric has already started a fire. He looks up and raises an eyebrow, "You're book-burning? Wow maybe you really don't belong here." The fire is big, but can't be classified as a bonfire yet.
I smile, glad I don't belong here. "Yeah, and what did you bring?" Technically I'm burning my journal but still, it's a book, written by me. He answers with a nod of his head and I see a stiff family portrait and look back to Eric.
He has his back to me but I see his rigid posture. He's symbolically burning his family, I decide right here I'm can't trust him, not now, not ever.
After a while of adding flammable materials we give up, we'll just have to deal with a big fire. I slowly rip pages out of my journal and add them to the fire. I've been tearing for a while now, and am only a third the way through. Hastily I throw the whole damn thing into the flames. Eric follows my lead with his family portrait. We sit for a long while, staring into the flames.
"I'm ready, are you ready?" I ask him quietly, barely over the crackling of the burning wood.
He only nods in reply.
A/N - Sorry for the bad grammar, If someone wants to beta, I'll love you forever, seriously.