Chapter 56: A week later
Tris's POV
"Yes, sir, I'll arrange a truck to pick up your family immediately." Tobias holds up a phone to his ear, and he puts two fingers up to show he needs two trucks. "Yes. Of course. Where should they pick you up?" He grabs a pen and a sticky note from our desk, and he scribbles an address on it. He slides it over to me, and I quickly type the information into an email and hit send.
"Yep. We'll be there soon. Alright, there will be a room up stairwell B that will have other people moving in it. You will have to show up with your family there to fill out some paperwork, and the people there will fill you in on the rest. Okay, goodbye sir." Tobias hangs up the phone.
"I can't believe that we're doing this. We don't seem like the community-service type people, do we?" I ask Tobias. He shakes his head.
"Tris, this is not community service. This is helping people get out of Chicago and rebuild the world. But, it was worse before. So we're fixing it." He says, as he leans in closer to me.
"I see. So, community service?" I ask him again, trying to see what he thinks of us.
"I'll kiss you if we just let this go." He tempts me. I roll my eyes and push his chest.
"No! You can't get away with that. Now answer my question. Do we seem like community-service type people?" I repeat myself. I want to know, because I don't think we seem like community-service type people.
"No. No we don't. Now can I kiss you, or aren't you done?" Tobias asks me. I roll my eyes and smile mischievously.
"Maybe just for a second." I say, pulling his collar close. We kiss for a few moments, and it's fun just being together for a few moments of our lives. Then the phone rings. Tobias has to pull away and look at the caller ID on the phone's screen. He picks up the phone.
"Ugh. This sucks just a little." I say, upset that we don't have much time together. We never do, but sometime I'd like to just be together.
"I know," he mouths as he picks up the phone and puts his arm around me. "Hi, I'm Four. Can I help you?" He asks the phone.
After the serum hit the agency and Tobias stopped the war in Chicago, people have been moving out of Chicago like crazy. They come here and we fill them in on "what's been going on in and outside the city". And the people already here have started to just get back a few things, like skills they previously had, knowing what foods they like, and new names. Tobias and I are helping out with whatever stuff we can, and that's often just little things like Tobias drives trucks into the city and fixes computers while I help out nurses and other people in need. Mostly kids.
"Three trucks? Are you sure? That's a lot of people." He warns the caller. Nonetheless, he holds up three fingers as well as grabs a pen and scrawls an address across it . "Okay. You have to go up stairwell B when you get here, and the people there will fill you and your guests in. Okay, bye." Tobias hangs up the phone.
"Now, I wanted to ask you to dinner tonight. Would you do me the honor?" Tobias asks me all formally.
"No!" I say sarcastically and kiss him.
"TRIS! TOBIAS! SHAUNA!" Christina comes screaming and scuffling down the hall. Shauna looks up from her work at the desk next to Tobias' and mine. "Eww, were you…" Christina asks us if we were kissing. I shrug. "Well, future advice, get a room! In other news, Tris! He's… he's awake." Christina smiles like a crazy person.
"Who?" I ask, worried if she's finally lost it.
"Uriah. He's awake." She pants happily. Shauna starts wheeling herself out of her desk. Tobias hates watching her try to maneuver herself in that terror chair, so he just grabs the wheel chair's handles.
"Thanks," She says to him.
"So, what happened?" I ask immediately. Christina goes off into a story quickly, making large gestures with her hands.
"Zeke just punched him in the shoulder like a good brother and told him to not die. I don't know what's not to understand." Christina beams.
"So what does he remember?" Tobias asks seriously.
"Everything! Its like the memory serum didn't hit him!" Christina smiles madly, and she bursts into Uriah's hospital room.
Uriah still lies in the bed, but some color has come back to his face. Zeke sits in a chair directly next to his bed, and there's an empty chair next to him. Hana sits on a chair on the other side of Uriah's bed. Tobias and I come to the side of the bed that Hana is on and Christina takes her seat next to Zeke and Shauna does, too.
"Hi guys. How's it going?" Uriah smiles weakly when I walk up to the side of his bed. He looks different than the first day I met him, but a good different. I remember him that day, his smile goofily looming over his face, as it is now.
"Uriah!" I throw my arms around him and wrap him in a hug. I squeeze and he moans in pain.
"Oh my God, I'm sorry." I pull away. Christina sits down in a chair next to Zeke.
"Naw, it's fine. Just a few burns won't kill me." He looks to the sky and brings his fist up, shaking it. "Try your hardest, God! I'm still here, Goddammit!" He screams and shakes his fist harder. I laugh, but the other people in the room don't seem to get his humor.
"Okay, that's enough, Uriah." Hana scolds him, as she reaches for his hand.
"So what's to eat? Because I'm not eating more Jell-o than I have to, even though it's delicious." He announces. I never would have guessed that he'd want to eat. But I guess even people just out of comas still eat.
"We'll get you some cake, Uriah." Chris says, smiling broadly. He returns the smile.
"Thanks! Cake, as my first meal awake! Who would've guessed?" Uriah smiles and laughs happily, and Chris pulls me out to get some Dauntless cake. We swing by the baker who noticed how many people in the Bureau like foods from the Factions and decided to open a bakery.
As we walk there, I see David sitting on a couch, hold ice to his nose, which he just had surgery on. He doesn't remember trying to kill me. He doesn't remember most anything. So I don't talk to him, and I forgive and forget. He's tried to talk to me, but I've kindly found something else to do. I don't react to seeing him, and Christina and I walk up to the bakery counter calmly.
"A Dauntless chocolate cake, please." Christina orders a cake for all of us to split.
"Oh, is that gentleman friend of yours awake?" The old, sweet baker comes out from behind the wall to his kitchen.
"He's not my 'gentleman friend', Frank. He's just my friend. And here is $4.50 for the cake." Christina pulls out her wallet and starts counting her change. I cock my head in confusion. Since when did she know the baker by name?
"I thought they were $5.00 each." I say this as a statement, but it's really a question.
"50 cents off for my best customer! Here you go, Christina." He hands her the cake and she hands him exact change for the cake.
"Bye Frank! See you tomorrow for my croissant! Tell Mia I said hi!" She waves a little as she lifts the cake from the table.
"You know the baker?" I gawk at her.
"And his wife. Sweet people, they are. I've been meeting new people, too." Christina tries to nudge me with her head, and we both laugh. Tobias, Johanna, Cara, and I have been trying to coordinate the reconstruction of society. We've met a lot of people, and we've helped a lot of people.
I open the door to Uriah's room and Christina walks in. "Uriah! Cake." She sets the whole thing on the table in front of Uriah, which gets him excited that it's all for him. Then she starts to cut it, and he loses hope as the pieces get smaller.
"This is amazing." he chews for a little and swallows. "So, what else has happened while I was out? Did global warming end? That'd be a convenient truth, you know?" Uriah jokes as he shoves another bite, or handful, of chocolate cake into his mouth.
"No, global warming didn't end. But the war ended in Chicago and everyone's memories in the Bureau were erased. So don't talk about stuff from… before." Christina warns him.
"Okay. Will do. Has anyone gotten pregnant yet? I've been waiting for some news on," Uriah points to Tobias and I, "... that." he says.
"You weren't supposed to mention that!" Tobias looks angry, like he told Uriah something that I wasn't supposed to hear about.
"What?" I ask innocently.
"I meant to tell you…" Tobias mumbles.
"Meant to tell me what?" I ask again, lost on the subject.
"I meant to ask you something. I was going to ask you tonight." Tobias almost growls at Uriah. Uriah smiles smugly.
"And the thing was…" I try to get what ever Tobias is trying to say out of him.
"Beatrice Prior," He gets down on one knee and reaches into his pocket. He pulls something out, but I can't see it. "I know you hate stuff that's unbelievably cliche, but I have something to ask you." He uncovers the thing in his hand. "Will you do me the honor of listening to my stupid question?"
"Depends on how stupid it is." I say, playing hard to get.
"Will you make me the happiest man on the face of the Earth and marry me?" He asks me. He looks scared, like he's unsure that he should ask me this.
"Just on the face of the Earth?" I tease him.
"If you say yes, it might be the whole universe." He smiles a little, but doesn't get up from the ground, where he has a giant diamond in his hand. A diamond ring. It's huge.
"Then, maybe." I smile mischievously.
"Did I twist your arm?" He asks me, a smile starting to form on his face.
"Just say yes already!" Chris interrupts us.
"Yes, Tobias Eaton. I will most definitely marry you." I kiss him, and after I lean forward to whisper in his ear.
"But, for what it's worth, we were already married to me."
"I know. Who would've guessed life would have panned out so good for us?" He kisses me again. Based on our rocky start, I didn't think we'd ever have any time. I never thought I'd have the time to fall in love with Tobias, but it turns out you don't need to take time out of your life to fall in love.
Everything is starting to go right for me. And I know it's all because of the Factions. They guided me in my decisions.
I told Christina the truth about Will, how I killed him, and she forgave me. Candor taught me that sometimes even the hardest truths to tell need to be told. I let go of the anger I felt towards Caleb because of how sorry he'd been, and we forged a brother-sister relationship. Amity taught me that sometimes all people need is a second chance at life, a second chance to make peace with the wrongs they caused people. Abnegation forced me to risk my life for everyone around me and the people I loved, and Abnegation taught me that some risks are worth taking. I fell in love and just agreed to marry Tobias, and I wouldn't even know his name if I hadn't been brave enough to dare and fall in love with him. And lastly, Erudite taught me to just give myself the chance at a happy ending, and maybe if I play my cards with enough cleverness, things will end up where they should be.
Even though I'm in a factionless world, with people who would never categorize other people that way, I can't escape the factions. They surround me in the things I do everyday, the things that make me me. The factions may have been a cruel thing that forced people into special places, but they don't force me to do anything.
I am Divergent, and every day, I am peaceful. I am smart. I am truthful. I am selfless. I am brave.
I am Divergent, and these categories do not fit me perfectly. But life goes on, as imperfect as life is. And I can deal with that.