The next morning my back is stiff from sleeping in the chair. I stand up and extend my arms and legs one at a time, trying to regain some feeling. When my legs are stretched out enough to walk, I go to breakfast. There is a heavy atmosphere of fear. I look over at the initiates. Most of them are sitting in silence, playing with their food. Most of them have never seen an act of violence like that, I tell myself. I frown as I remember the first time I saw something like that. Eric was fighting Gabriela during initiation. He easily pinned her, and punched her in the jaw, knocking her unconscious. Our instructor declared him the winner, but he kept hitting her. They pulled him off of her, and I watched them carry her away, moaning from the pain of several clearly broken face bones.
I finish off the last of my breakfast and start to wander around the compound. Today the initiates have the day off, which means I really have nothing to do. I could hang out with Lauren and Zeke, but I remember they were planning on taking some of the Dauntless-born initiates out to the zip line, and I quickly dismiss the idea. There is nothing that could make me throw myself off of that huge building.
I decide to spend my day drawing with Tori. I haven't done it for a while. I used to all the time as a boy, and even when I first came here for a while. It was a way to help me express my emotions without hitting someone in the face or cutting up more practice dummies.
I go over to the tattoo studio and find Tori reading in the back. She looks up when the bell rings. "Hey, Tobias!" she calls out. She is the only one who still calls me by my real name. I smile and wave at her. "What can I help you with?" she asks, closing her book.
"I was hoping we could um, draw?" I ask sheepishly. An impish smile crosses her face.
"It's going to cost you," she tells me, and pulls out two drawing pads and a box of sketching pens.
"So what's bugging you? You only come and draw with me when you have a problem," she asks, starting the base of her drawing.
"Oh, you know, the usual: Eric, my lovely childhood, and the initiates," I tell her, starting on my own.
"And by initiates you mean…"
"I think you can guess who I mean," I tell her, a little more coldly than I should have. She drops her pens and turns to face me.
"Tobias, if you're talking about the Abnegation girl, forget it. She's dangerous. Trust me," she snaps.
"What's so wrong with her that I can't get to know her a little better?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.
"I can't tell you, but stay away from this one. Why not go for Lauren?" she asks, returning to her drawing. Her eyes start to focus as she puts in the finer details on her drawing.
I snort. "Yeah, and maybe one day Zeke will forgive me for taking her from him. Never going to happen," I say, absent-mindedly doodling.
"True, I suppose," she says in the dreamy voice she gets when she gets lost in her own artistic world.
"Look, I didn't say I like her or anything. I just want to talk to her more, understand what makes her tick, friend stuff," I tell her. I look down and realize I have been doodling Tris's face. Maybe not so much friends…
"Please, Tobias. I am happy you finally show some emotions to others, but not this one," she says and goes to the back room, my cue to leave. I get up, taking my drawing with me. I'm not sure what I'd do if anyone ever found it. As I leave I glance over at Tori's sketch. She has drawn a pair of eyes, with a towering city in the left and a plant in the right. I know this sketch; it's the one she drew to put in her brother's grave, the one she slipped under my door after the simulation during our initiation. It's her way of recognizing a Divergent. I grab the sketch and rip it up.
I run back to my room and slam the door. No, she can't be…she's so small! She has such determination, such passion! I realize it's these very characteristics about her that prove to me she is like me: Divergent. It's why she couldn't stay in Abnegation, why she…No, I tell myself. It's a stupid drawing; the only way to prove it is to wait for after the simulation. I hold on to this small sliver of hope as I sleep that night. I dream, not about Marcus or my past, for the first time in years. I dream about the eyes in Tori's sketch.
