"Do you think giving you a hug would give away too much?"
Tobias asks me, and I respond by saying,
"Probably, a hearty hand shake will suffice for now, though."
At that, Tobias smiles. Not a huge smile, but a genuine smile; one that probably not many people have ever seen.
"Alright, Tris. A hearty hand shake it is."
As Tobias says this, he puts his hand out to shake mine, so I try to reciprocate his actions as I am not very skilled or comfortable with shaking hands, which is clearly evident. Tobias must sense my discomfort, because he ends the handshake and says,
"After the ceremony, I want more than a handshake. Come to my apartment when you can."
He winks and walks off, leaving me alone. I start walking back to Christina and Will. As I am walking back to them, I see them kiss, so I figure that they want to be left alone for a while. I am just about to leave and go to Tobias' apartment, when Uriah runs up to me, a huge grin on his face.
"Hey Tris! My brother, Zeke, is having a party tonight at his apartment for all of the new members. It's at 8:00. You in?"
As Uriah asks me this, Christina walks up and answers for me.
"Yes, she is! Come on Tris, we have to go shopping, its already 6:00!"
I groan as Christina drags me towards the pit to get clothes for the party. I know that there's no point protesting about this, because she will just make me shop for longer.
"Ok, Tris. We are on a tight schedule, I can only allow one hour for shopping and then half an hour for makeup! Lets go!"
Christina says whilst dragging me in the first shop, which has dresses and shoes. As we are walking around, I find a black dress that I like. It stops at the knees, not too revealing, but not too modest, it is sleeveless and it is made out of silk. I go to the changing room to try it on. When I look at myself in the mirror, I like what I see. I look more 'noticeable', as Christina would say. I step out and I see Christina running around the shop looking for me, so I call out to her.
"Christina, I'm here!"
Christina turns towards me and sighs.
"I thought you'd done a runner."
"Unfortunately, I'm still here. On the bright side, I found the dress I'm going to wear to the party. What do you think?"
As I say this, Christina diverts her attention to the dress that I am wearing, and she squeals so loud that everyone in the shop looks at us.
"This," she says, pointing to the dress, "Is the perfect dress. It will really impress Four."
How does she know about Tobias and I?
She wiggles her eyebrows, only adding to my embarrassment. I'm sure that my cheeks are as red as a tomato when I say,
"What do you mean?"
Christina rolls her eyes and smiles as she says,
"Oh, come on, Tris! I saw you staring at him during meals, even at training sometimes. I think you'd be cute together, just so you know."
I'm sure that I get even redder as she says this, and I know that I need to leave before this gets even more embarrassing, so I say,
"I got to go. I'm going to go pay for this and these shoes,"
I say and pick up a random pair of shoes that look nice.
"I'll see you at the party, ok?"
As I finish saying this I run off to the counter and pay before Christina can fully register what I just said.
As I am running out of the door, Christina says,
"We'll talk about this later, Tris. You can't hide from me forever. We sleep in the same room, you know."
I sprint at full speed to Tobias' apartment, only stopping to knock on the door. When I do, Tobias opens the door and ushers me in, frowning.
"Are you ok? Why were you running?"
Tobias asks me, concern etched on his face as he sits down on the couch and motions for me to do the same. As I am taking my shoes off, I answer him.
"I'm fine, I was running away from Christina. If I didn't run away when I did, I would have never gotten away."
I can see Tobias visibly relax when he realises that I'm okay.
"Why'd you have to run away from her? She's not scary at all."
Tobias says, while laughing quietly to himself. I sit down next to Tobias and he holds my hand, rubbing gentle circles on the back of it.
"She is when she's shopping, and, I think that she is catching onto us and I didn't know wether you wanted to tell anybody about that yet."
Tobias pulls me into a hug, with his head on top of my hair, and whispers,
"Why wouldn't I wan't to tell people about us, Tris? I want to be able to show everyone that you are mine, and that I am yours. I want to be able to hold your hand, hug and kiss you in public without worrying whether anyone will see us. I thought that you wouldn't want to tell anyone about us because you are embarrassed by me or something."
As Tobias says this, I feel him smiling into my hair, and my heart melts. No one has ever said anything like that to me before, and it feels good. I look at the clock on his wall, and see that it is now 7:30, which means that I only have half an hour to get ready for the party.
"Tobias, I have to go back to the dorms and get ready for the party at Zeke's. It's in half an hour."
I am a about to get up, but Tobias pulls me back down, still holding my hand.
"Tris, you can get ready here. I'm sure that you don't really want to go back to the dorms to change, and I want you to stay here. I already got dressed earlier, knowing that you would be coming over. I'll wait out here while you get ready, and then we can go together."
Tobias says this whilst smiling. As I get up and go into his bathroom, I realise that I've never seen Tobias smile this much before; I love it. I remember Uriah telling me that at Zeke's parties, they always play Candor or Dauntless, which is basically truth or dare, a game that I heard about at school, but never actually participated in because nobody ever invited me to play because I was in Abnegation, and even if they did, I would have had to refused because it would have been too self indulgent to play a game. The only difference than the game that they played in school is that if you don't do the dare or answer the question, you have to take off a layer of clothing, excluding shoes or socks. With that knowledge, I decide not to wear the dress that I bought, and instead put a couple of Tobias' T-shirts on, just as a precaution. When I am ready, I walk out. Tobias instantly notices that I am wearing some of his clothes and says,
"I guess Uriah told you about Candor or Dauntless, then?"
I answer back,
"Yeah, although I don't think he told Christina, so this should be interesting."
Tobias and I are laughing as we walk out of his apartment, our fingers laced together, and walk towards Zeke's. I can't help but feel like tonight might be fun after all. Soon, we stop outside a door, which I presume to be Zeke's apartment. Tobias knocks on the door, and a very intoxicated Zeke opens the door and looks at our hands, which are still joined together.
