CHAPTER 4
I see the bomb explode next to Tobias. I run over to his side. He is lying in a growing pool of blood coming from his mangled arm. He looks up at me, but doesn't seem to be able to see me. I say his name, trying to get him to look at me. His breathing becomes ragged. I scream his name, starting to sob uncontrollably. My tears drip onto his face. His eyes start to close and his breathing almost stops. I scream louder. He looks at me one more time, then goes limp. I am screaming so loudly that I think that my head might explode. Just like the bomb that killed Tobias.
I wake up from the horrible dream screaming at the top of my lungs. I see Tobias next to me, and I stop yelling his name. He is trying to calm me down, but I just keep sobbing into his chest. I can not stop the flow of tears, the shaking of my body. Tobias holds me close, kissing my forehead. I look up at him, into his icy blue eyes that always calm me when I see them. I eventually calm down completely. I sit on the edge of the bed, Tobias's arm around me, rubbing my shoulder.
"What happened?" He wants to know about my dream. I don't know if I can tell him about it without breaking down again. I decide to just tell him.
"We were in the abandoned town, and you got hit by the bomb. You were dying, and I was trying to keep you awake, but it didn't work," I say, my voice shaking, a tear slipping down my cheek. Tobias pulls me onto his lap. I wrap my arms around him.
"It's ok, I am still alive. It was just a dream," He says soothingly. He leans down and kisses me softly. I run my hands through his hair and pull him closer. We stay like this for a while until I remember that we need to get ready.
"Come on, we need to get ready and eat." I tell him after I pull away from him. He pouts and acts as if he was crossing his arms. He realizes what he is doing and frowns. I just sigh and get off of his lap. He gets up follows me into the kitchen.
"Do you just want to eat here?" He asks. I nod and look through the cabinets and refrigerator. We rarely eat here, so we don't have much food. All I see is bread, and some milk and butter in the refrigerator. Perfect. Tobias grabs the bread, and puts a few pieces in the toaster. I get two glasses from the cabinet and fill them with milk. The toast pops out of the toaster, Tobias gets it out and tries to spread some butter on them. He ends up knocking one of the pieces off the counter and on to the floor. I grab the bread from him and butter it. We sit at our small table and eat in silence. After we finish we shower and change our bandages. We sit on the couch, not knowing what to next.
"What do you want to do?" I ask Tobias. Since the war, we have not needed to work. They shut down all the jobs. It's not like we have anything to spend money on anymore. So we have nothing to fill the empty hours of our days.
"We could go to the training room," He suggests. I nod, and we get up and walk there. I am still not used to seeing people staring. I just want to scream at them. But that would not make a difference. We just keep walking until someone appears in front of us.
"So, I heard your boyfriend got his arm blown off. Now I see that is true."
"Go away Peter." I forgot he was still in the compound. I thought he was on my side. I guess not.
"Are you scared of me now that your boyfriend can't protect you?" Asks Peter in a snarky voice.
"He can still beat you to a pulp," I say. Tobias grabs my hand and squeezes it. I shouldn't have said that. Tobias is in no condition to fight anybody right now.
"Oh really? I'd like to see that happen," Peter says. After he finishes talking, he lunges at me and slams his hands into my shoulders, knocking me down. I hit my head on the floor of the pit, and can not move. I can only open my eyes. All I can see is Peter staring down at me.
He turns to Tobias, who looks scared. He knows he can not win against Peter. Peter swings a fist at Tobias. He hits him in his injured shoulder. Tobias screams and falls to his knees, holding his shoulder. I whimper, not wanting to see him in pain. I can't do anything to help him. I never should have lied about him being able to fight. Peter kicks Tobias in the stomach. He falls onto his side. Peter his about to kick him again, but Tobias grabs his foot and pulls it, making Peter fall on his back. I can hear all the air go out of his lungs.
Tobias quickly gets up and comes to me. I don't think I can get up. I hope I didn't get another concussion. Tobias helps me sit up. Everything gets blurry, and I get extremely dizzy. I can barely move. There is no way I will be able to walk. Tobias grabs my waist and pulls me over his shoulder. He starts to walk to our apartment, but I can feel myself slipping off his shoulder. He can not hold me properly with only one arm. I just wrap my arms around his waist, my face pressed into his back. I hear Peter shouting something about Tobias being a coward. I wish I had just killed him during the war. He doesn't deserve to live.
We reach the apartment as I am just about to fall off Tobias's shoulder. He drops me on the bed and collapses on the floor in front of the bed. I can see straight now, and my dizziness has subsided to a dull throbbing on the back of my head. I do not think the fall caused too much damage. Just a few bruises. I jump up and run to Tobias's side, and see that he is not moving, and his eyes are closed. His breathing is ragged, and he is clutching his shoulder, blood seeping from between his fingers. I wonder how badly he could have gotten hurt if Peter only punched his shoulder and kicked him in the stomach. I pull off his shirt to find blood showing through the bandages over his stomach. I try to peel them off, but he starts to moan. He is obviously in a lot of pain. Carrying me all the way back to our apartment while he was injured wasn't a good idea. He might of really hurt himself. I continue to pull off his bandages, trying to ignore his groans. I see why he is bleeding. The barely healed cuts on his stomach were reopened when Peter kicked him. His shoulder is much worse. His stitches are torn, and he is bleeding all over the floor. I start to panic. I don't know what to do. He can't walk, and I can't carry him to the infirmary. I have to get help.
"Tobias, it's going to be okay, I going to get somebody to come and help you," I say in a soothing voice as I brush his cheek. He reaches up touches my cheek, smearing his blood on my face. I heave him up onto the bed, which was nearly impossible, considering he is twice as big as me. He is still moaning half-consciously as I get up and run out of the door. I make sure to lock it so nobody, meaning Peter, gets in. I go to the only place I can think of. I reach to the door of Christina's apartment and knock on it vigorously. It opens and Christina gasps as she looks me up and down. Tobias's blood is smeared on my clothes and arms. There is a bloody hand print on my cheek where Tobias touched me.
"What happened?" Christina asks, pulling me into her apartment.
"It's Tobias, Peter attacked him. His stitches got torn, and some of his wounds got reopened. I couldn't bring him to the infirmary," I say, panic making my voice shake. Christina immediately runs to get medical supplies from her cabinets. She has been volunteering as a nurse ever since we came back to Dauntless. She always keeps medical supplies at hand in case anything bad happens.
"Come on let's go," She says, putting all of her things in a bag. We run back to my apartment, people staring at the blood on my clothes. When we get there Tobias is right where I left him: laying on the bed, clutching his still bleeding shoulder. I can see by the look on his face that he is in great pain.
"Hey, Christina," He says, grimacing. I guess he regained full conciousness. We run over to him, Christina pulling various items out her bag. I help Tobias sit up. He lets out a pained sign and grips my shoulder tightly. Christina wipes the blood off his shoulder.
"Wow, what did Peter do to you? This looks really bad." Christina asks, inspecting his shoulder.
"He just punched me, and kicked me in the stomach," Replies Tobias. He is still grimacing.
"Well, I guess that could do some damage, considering your wounds were barely healed." She says. She picks up a cloth and hands it to me.
"Here, clean his wounds on his chest." I sit on the bed next to him and gently wipe the blood off of his chest and stomach, trying not to hurt him.
"Why did you come here, instead of the infirmary? And how did you even get here if you were hurt?" Questions Christina.
"Peter pushed me down; I hit my head, and was unconscious for a few minutes. When Tobias finally got away from Peter, he came over to me and picked me up because I still couldn't walk. This was closer so he brought me here. I didn't know that he badly injured until he collapsed, bleeding everywhere." I say, as if Tobias wasn't sitting right next to me. I dab at a particularly bad wound on his stomach. He winces and looks at me. He takes the bloody cloth from my hand and brings it to my face. He wipes his hand print from my cheek, a pained smile on his face. It quickly turns into a grimace as Christina starts working on his shoulder, cutting the stitches with a pair of scissors.
"Do you even know what you are doing?" Tobias asks in a strained voice.
"Do you want to go to the infirmary?" Christina asks, annoyed.
"Do you think I could walk all the way there right now?" Tobias asks, mocking Christina's tone.
"Well, of course I know what I am doing. I was the one who put your stitches in in the first place. Now stay still, this is going to hurt a lot," says Christina, bringing the scissors back to his shoulder.
"Wait, what are you-" Tobias begins, but starts screaming as Christina starts to take out his stitches. He grabs my shoulder again and squeezes it so tightly it hurts. But I do not stop him. It stopped him from screaming; he is just whimpering and gritting his teeth now. Christina finally finishes and puts the bloody scissors down. She presses another cloth to his shoulder to stem the flow of blood.
"So, I had to take out the stitches because they were too damaged. I will have to replace them. It is going to hurt a lot, because I don't have any sedative. I don't any time to get it. Unless you want to risk bleeding to death for comfort?" She says. She sounds so serious, so unlike her usual bubbliness.
"No, just go ahead and do it. I can take it." Tobias replies. Christina pulls out more supplies, and I turn away. Usually, I am not very squeamish, but the sight of Tobias mangled, bloody shoulder unsettles my stomach. I put my hand on his knee, trying to comfort him. He just looks at me, a worried look on his face.
It takes Christina about fifteen minuets to stitch his shoulder back together. Tobias clenches his fist and grits his teeth the whole time. I rub his back and whisper in his ear, trying to calm him down. When Christina finishes, she cleans up his shoulder and puts disinfectant on it. I wrap him up in bandages again. Christina puts all her things back in her bag and gets up to walk to the door. I get up and walk after her. When we get to the door, I stop and hug her.
"Christina, thank you so much. I don't know what I would have done without you." I say, pulling away from her.
"Oh, it's no big deal. Tobias should be fine now. Just do what ever the doctor told you, and stay away from Peter." She tells me. I just nod.
"Oh, I was wondering if you wanted to hang out sometime. You have been with Tobias every second since you got out of the infirmary. And I want to see you some before you leave on your mission." She says. Is she implying that I am not going to come back from the mission? And how can she think that I would leave Tobias alone?
"Tris, I know he needs you to help him, but you need to get away from him sometimes. I can send the guys over to keep him company. They have been wanting to see him." She says. I start to calm down. That does sound nice. Getting away from the stress for a while. I am sure Tobias does want to see his friends too. I nod, telling her that I think that is a good idea.
"Good, how about tomorrow? I can bring the boys over here, and we can go back to my place and hang out with all the girls," She states. I nod again. She waves at Tobias and says good-bye as she walks out of the door. I walk back over to Tobias and sit down next to him. He falls back onto the blood stained bed. He lets out a pained sigh. I jump up and grab the painkillers the doctor gave us.
"Here, sit up so you can take these." I tell him. He just groans and continues lying there. I stuff some of the pills in his mouth and pour water in his mouth and all over his face, trying to get him to swallow. He spits the water in my face. I scream and jump off bed, dripping water on the bloody floor.
"Gosh, you didn't have to be so harsh, I would have gotten up," Tobias says, annoyed.
"Well too bad. Now, do you think you can get up so I can clean up everything?" He groans again. I help him sit up and put another shirt on. He shakily stands up, and, with my help, walks over and collapses on the couch. I go back to the bed and strip off the sheets. I just throw them out, deciding that they are not salvageable. I grab some cleaning supplies and start scrubbing the floor.
It takes about a half an hour to get the blood off of everything. After I am finished, I fall on the couch next to Tobias, where he is exactly as I left him. He looks at me and smiles a little.
"Do you feel better now?" I ask.
"Yeah. Hey, what was Christina talking to you about earlier?" He asks.
"Oh, she was just asking me to hang out with her tomorrow. She said I was spending too much time with you." I say moving closer to him. He puts his arm around me.
"Well, I am kind of getting tired of you." He says jokingly. I gently slap his arm.
"Well, Christina was going to send over the guys to keep you company. Me and the girls are going to hang out at her apartment."
"Sounds good," he says, yawning. I snuggle up next to him and we eventually fall asleep.
IMPORTANT: I don't know if I should write it in Tris's and Tobias's POV or just Tris's. If nobody gives me any feedback, I am going to do it in just Tris's.