Disclaimer: I do not own the Divergent Trilogy

Life... is a strange thing. When you think about it, we are all just living on a planet, waiting to die. We serve no purpose, have no meaning. It doesn't matter if you become a rockstar or the president. You have the same exact fate as that homeless girl on the street. You'll end up dying, one way or another. What is the point in living if in a thousand years, nobody will even know who you were? And when the sun explodes and planet earth ceases to exist? How important will you be then?

The sunlight spilled through my window. I kicked the lime green covers off of my body and padded into my tiny bathroom. I ran a hot shower, cleansing all the sweat from my body. The hot water felt good on my still-healing skin. After a few minutes, I shut the water off and dried myself with a towel. I looked in the mirror and sighed. My blond hair went down to my shoulder blades in a tangled mess, even after being lathered in shampoo. My face was scattered with an array of scars, but there was that long scar that would never go away. The scar that had permanently damaged me.

I walked into my room and got dressed in a black tee, skinny jeans, a black zip-up hoodie and converse. I attempted to brush out my hair, but when I was done, it still looked like a mess. Giving up, I put it in a bun and flipped my hood up over my head. Then I grabbed my new backpack and walked down the hall to the kitchen.

My mother stood next to the stove, cooking pancakes. She was very pretty. She had blond hair like mine, except it was tamed, and her eyes were a pretty blue. She was wearing a white apron and had on a blouse and a pinstriped skirt. She looked up and smiled when she saw me, causing me to flinch slightly.

"Hi sweetheart," she said. She put three pancakes on a plate and placed it on the counter. "Eat up. You don't want to be late for your first day."

I sat on a wooden barstool and stared at my food, finding no appetite. Just to please my mother, I awkwardly ate a few bites and headed for the door as fast as I possibly could.

"Have a good day!" she called, just as the door slammed.

I shoved my hands in my pockets and started walking to my new school: Five Faction High School. It was one of those fancy schools that you have to apply to attend. I only applied in the first place because my mom didn't want me to do my online school anymore and it was only a few blocks away. Every student was placed in a faction based off of their application. If you believed in placing everyone before yourself, you were placed in Abnegation and had to wear gray. If you wanted world peace, you were placed in Amity and had to wear red and yellow. If you were REALLY smart, you were placed in Erudite and had to wear blue. If you believed in justice, you were placed in Candor and had to wear black and white. And if you were severely athletic, or acted high, or were high, you were placed in Dauntless and had to wear black.

Only God knows how I got Dauntless.

I mean, yes, I was pretty athletic, but that was it. I wasn't a risk-taker, or very loud in general, and I tended to let people beat me up, either physically or verbally. There was no way I was cut out for the faction that awaited me.

The large building came into view. I kept my head down, trying to blend in with the crowd. As I walked up the steps, I discreetly observed my surroundings. The Amity were playing a hand game. The Erudite were sitting in the shade, studying. The Candor stood in a tight circle, gossiping. The Abnegation were sitting under a tree in silence. I sat next to the building's front doors and regretfully waited for the bell to ring.

I used to enjoy school. Not because I had a lot of friends and was the school's most popular student. I didn't have many friends and I was practically the school's screwup. But I had one friend, a best friend, named Tobias. We were as thick as thieves. Nothing could separate us.

Until the day he moved away.

We were twelve years old. Tobias's mother had just died giving birth to his stillborn sister, and his father, Marcus, got a new job in Chicago, which required them to move. It was raining, and I was sitting on my front porch with my raincoat and rain boots, watching as the workers filled the moving truck. The furniture was covered with plastic so it didn't get completely ruined. Tobias walked out of his house and towards me.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," I said.

He rocked back and forth on his feet, his hands shoved in his pockets. "We don't have much time."

I was holding back tears. I couldn't believe my only friend, my best friend, was moving away. We needed each other. We couldn't bear to live on our own.

"Please," I begged him. "Don't go."

He looked down. "I have to," he said.

"I can't live without you," I said. "You're the only one who cares about me."

Tobias dared to look directly into my eyes. He looked at the brink of tears. "I'll come back," he assured me. "I'll find you one day. This isn't the end. I promise."

I jumped up from the steps and pulled him into a tight hug. We stood like that for a few minutes, hugging in the rain, when Tobias's father yelled for him. He had to go.

"Bye Beatrice," he whispered.

"Bye Tobias," I whispered. He pulled away from the embrace first, walked towards his father's car, got in the back, and drove down the road until he was a speck in the landscape without looking back once. I just stood there, in the rain, finally allowing myself to cry.

But, Tobias hadn't kept his promise. Because, there I was, five years later, without him. Every day was worse than the last, and he hadn't had the decency to at least send me a damn card. He broke my heart in a way it could never be fixed.

All of a sudden, I heard a bunch of talking and screaming and laughing, much louder than the current environment. A band of people dressed in black walked down the path and sat on the steps in front of me, oblivious of my presence. Like they are every day.

"I'll give you twenty bucks if you do it," a boy with dark hair and tan skin said to a boy who looked exactly like him.

"Do it! Do it!" a girl with wavy brown hair chanted. She was sitting in the lap of a boy with blond hair who started laughing at her enthusiasm.

"Uriah Pedrad, you will not be doing such things," a girl with strawberry blond hair said, shaking her pointer finger at him.

"You should know me by now, Marlene," the boy addressed as 'Uriah' said. "I won't back down from a challenge, no matter how suicidal it may be."

"Okay, okay, let's take a vote," the girl with wavy hair said. "All in favor of Uriah going through with the dare, raise your hand."

Everyone raised their hand except for the boy with blond hair, 'Marlene', and a tall boy with dark hair and dark blue eyes.

"What? Will!" the girl with wavy hair said accusingly.

"What?" the boy with blond hair asked. "As funny as it would be, I don't want Uriah to die."

"Thank you," Marlene said. "I can't believe all of you. Especially you, Zeke."

The boy who looked like Uriah raised his hands defensively. "Just because we're related doesn't mean I love him." Uriah slapped him.

"Ouch," a girl with shaved brown hair said. The girl sitting next to her with blond hair laughed at this.

"What do you think, Four?" Marlene said, turning to the boy with dark blue eyes who had his arms crossed across his chest. "You didn't raise your hand."

Four didn't say anything at first. Everyone stared at him, awaiting his answer. Finally, he replied, "Honestly, I want to see him try." Zeke laughed and gave him a thumbs up. Marlene glared at him.

Uriah jumped up and fist pumped the air. "MAJORITY RULES SUCKERS!"

Before anyone could say anything else, Uriah crept along the path to the group of studying Erudite. All of them were too involved in their books to notice him. He walked up to one of the boys, pulled his blue shirt up over his head and started whacking him with it. The group in front of me burst out laughing except for Marlene who looked horrified and Four who had a ghost of a smile on his face.

Then Uriah threw the boy's shirt up into the tree where he couldn't retrieve it and sprinted back over to the stairs. The girl with wavy hair fell out of Will's lap, dying with laughter. I had to admit; it was pretty funny. Especially the shocked/confused/horrified/hurt/angry look on the half-naked boy's face.

"Dude," he said to Zeke in between pants. "You owe me twenty bucks." Zeke rummaged through his pocket, retrieved a crumpled up twenty dollar bill and handed it to Uriah with a look of approval.

The bell rang. I stood up, grabbed my bag and stood by the door so the people on the steps could walk in first. None of them spared me a single glance. It didn't matter to me. I just wanted to stay hidden. Because when I stayed hidden, nobody saw me. And when nobody saw me, nobody cared. And when nobody cared, I could live my life the way I was supposed to, the way I wanted to be.

On my own.