Finally! You will get what I am talking about soon. Here's a bonus chapter. I know a lot of people have been waiting for this. I hope I don't disappoint. Enjoy.
A big thank you to divergentpanda46 for her proofreading skills.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT (Visiting Day – Zeke's initiation year)
NATALIE'S POV
"How was your camping trip?" I ask Max.
The boys went on their annual camping trip down to the dungeons last night. They have been home for a few hours, but I have been too busy to ask how it went.
"Mikey loved it. Uriah is fine until the ghost stories come out and Caleb took a book with him to read. I don't know why we keep doing this."
"If Mikey loves it then you should keep it up. I'm sure Zeke will want to be there next year, he always loved the adventure."
"Don't you think Zeke is too old for it?"
"Zeke is never too old for such a thing. Now if you asked him to water your plants while you were away on holidays, well, then he would fail miserably at that. But a camping trip in the dungeons, he loves that sort of thing."
"True. It would make it more enjoyable, I really missed him this year. Now, is everything organised for our guests?"
"Yes. As long as everyone arrives on time there shouldn't be a problem. What time is it?"
"11.30."
"Tris, I think that's enough help from you. Why don't you go up to your room and change before our guests arrive?"
"What am I supposed to wear? What's wrong with what I have on?"
"Just change your shirt. You have something on the sleeve."
"Damn, this is my favourite top."
"How can you see the difference? You are always in a black T shirt," Max inquires.
"Really dad? Don't you have a favourite shirt? Just because they all look the same doesn't mean you don't have a favourite," Tris responds.
"I never really thought about it," Max replies.
"I'm going to change my top."
"Stay up there and relax until everyone gets here. You have been such a wonderful help today," I say as I give my daughter a half hug as she leaves the room.
"How do you think this is going to go?"
"I think she will be happy to see him. I also think she is going to be shitty at me for not telling her he was here," I say.
"Can you blame her? I wouldn't be happy about it."
"I know, but I thought she would have seen him around the faction. At the very least I thought she would have seen him when they pulled that prank."
"You couldn't see anything properly from all the smoke. Even when they were in the dorm it was too hard to make out faces properly."
"Well, we will just have to wait and see. There is also the Eric situation. I don't know how she is going to react to him. Caleb I am certain will have a million questions to ask, but Tris…. I suppose it depends on how angry she is that we didn't tell her about Tobias being here."
"You know he has been asking around about her?"
"Really?"
"Yes, it seems our daughter used her full name when she first introduced herself to him. I felt sorry for the guy asking people if they knew a Beatrice."
"Oh dear, the poor boy. Isn't he in for his own shock today?"
"Are you sure we shouldn't give her a little warning?"
Just as Max finishes his sentence, the doorbell rings.
"Too late. That should be him now."
"Are you sure, Natalie? This could backfire badly on us."
"On me, you mean."
"No, on us. I agreed to this too."
"Just open the door, Max. What will be, will be."
"Four, good to see you."
"Thank you, sir."
"Stop with the sir. It's Max."
"Four, how are you?" I ask coming out from inside the kitchen.
"I'm well, Natalie. How are you?"
"I'm good. You seem in a good mood, no visitors from your past?" I smile trying to make him feel at ease. Today must have been stressful, with the pressure that Marcus might turn up. He has done such a good job of hiding his identity.
He just nods his head.
"Four could you do me a favour? I really need to have my daughter Tris come down and help me finish with a few things. Do you think you could go to her room and ask her to come down? It's the second door on your left."
"Of course," Four responds and walks towards Tris' room.
"This could end badly, Natalie," Max warns.
"Have a little faith, Max."
"Good morning!" Uriah calls out as he opens the door.
"Well, aren't you in a good mood," I say with a laugh.
"I'm out of the dungeons, I'm warm and about to eat lots of really yummy food. What more would I need to be in a good mood?"
"I don't know Uriah. What do you need?" Max asks.
"Is it true that Four is coming to lunch?" Uriah whispers. I can't help but to hide behind Max's large frame and try not to laugh.
"I think he might be," Max whispers back as he leans in towards Uriah. At this I can't help but laugh.
"What's so funny Natalie?" Mum asks as she enters the room.
"Nothing, I'm just being silly," I say.
"Please," Max scoffs. "We all know Uriah has a man crush on Four. Why deny it?"
"I do not," Uriah stands up straight and acts very serious.
"It's okay, Uri," Mum replies. "I think half the men in this faction do. I know for sure the women all do. If they aren't talking about Four, then they are whispering about Eric. I've never seen such a reaction about a couple of transfers."
"Well if you had seen their fight you would be," Uriah comments. We all turn to look at him and you can see he is trying to hide his embarrassment. "What? It was an epic fight."
"That is true," I respond. "I was in the training room when it took place, both young men should be proud of their efforts."
"Where's Tris? Is she in her room?" Uriah asks but before I respond Uriah has already bounded towards there.
"This could be interesting," Max mutters as he moves towards the bedrooms.
"Where do you think you are going?" I call out.
"Shh," Max hisses as he puts his finger to his lips and starts tiptoeing towards the bedrooms.
"Has he gone insane?" Mum asks.
"No," I laugh. "I will tell you all about it later. Could you help me with a few things?"
TRIS'S POV
I hear a knock on my door and an unfamiliar male voice call out, asking if they can come in.
The door swings open and I am shocked. "Tobias!" I exclaim.
"Beatrice!" A just as shocked Tobias calls out.
"What are you … how?" I can't seem to get a full sentence out of my mouth.
Tobias quickly closes the door and moves into my room.
"I've been looking for you everywhere?" Tobias tells me. "But nobody knew anyone called Beatrice."
"I have always been called Tris. I, oh. I am so sorry. People must have looked at you like you were crazy?"
He chuckles a little and says, "Just a bit."
"What are you doing here?"
"I transferred."
"But I would have known if there was a Tobias who transferred."
"I changed my name. Long story. I go by Four now," he explains.
"Oh, you're Four? The Four?"
"Yes, why?"
It's me who can't seem to stop myself from laughing. "My cousin Uriah has been telling me about this Four who is a transfer. Actually, it's all he really wants to talk about."
"Hey Tris, did you hear who is coming to lunch today?" Uriah calls out as he opens my door.
We all stand there shocked for a moment before Uriah finally says, "you didn't tell me you knew Four. Why didn't you tell me?" I can hear the hurt in his voice.
"She didn't, I mean doesn't," Tobias says. "Natalie asked me to come and get Tris." He then turns to me, he is looking at me like he is trying to tell me something. "She said something about wanting your help."
"I doubt that," I whisper under my breath. She must have known all along that Tobias was here.
"We should go and see what she needs," Four suggests.
"Yeah sure," I say. Uriah walks out of the room and I go to follow when Tobias says, "Beatrice, I don't. I—"
"It's okay Four, I won't let your secret out," I say.
"Thanks," he sighs. I can see him visibly relaxing. "Um, do you think that we could, well, maybe. That maybe we could catch up, after. Later. I mean."
"Yes, I would like that," I tell him. I can't help but blush. Now it is his turn to not be able to finish full sentences.
We walk out of my room and follow the laughter that is coming from our lounge room. Obviously more people have arrived. That, or Uriah has tripped over his overly large feet again and is sprawled all over the floor.
It's actually both, Uriah is pushing himself off the floor as Amar goes to give him a hand but can't seem to walk very fast because of his laughter.
"I don't understand how you can be so coordinated in the training room but can't walk into a room without tripping over your own feet," Amar says with a chuckle.
"I'm concentrating when I am in the training room. If I don't then I am likely to get knocked out by Tris or Lynn," Uriah replies.
"Are they still beating you?" Tori asks, trying not to laugh.
"Yeah. They are so fast and they don't let up," Uriah tells her.
"Here's the little pocket rocket," Amar says when he sees me.
"You're talking about her?" Eric looks confused.
"Eric this is Tris and yes this is who I was talking about. Well half, Lynn hasn't arrived yet."
"But she's so tiny," Eric exclaims.
"If there is one thing you should remember living here in Dauntless, it is that size doesn't matter," Amar tells him.
"I don't know about that Amar," Tori smirks.
"What don't you know about Tori?" Mum asks.
"Amar was just trying to tell us that size doesn't matter," Tori explains to Mum.
"That depends what you are talking about?" Mum says. I am totally confused.
"I was talking about Tris and Lynn's fighting skills, Natalie. Get your head out of the gutter, Tori," Amar says.
"Like you have anything to worry about," Tori scoffs.
"Tori!" George lunges at his sister and puts his hand over her mouth.
"Okay enough of that," Mum says with a smile.
"I can't believe that you are telling me that Tris here can knock Uriah out," Eric says completely ignoring the other conversation.
"She'd be able to knock you out as well," Zeke says as he joins the party. "Hi Cuz."
"Hey Zeke," I say returning his hug.
"So Zeke and Uriah are your cousins?" Four asks.
"Yes. They are," I answer. "You asked Zeke if he knew a Beatrice, didn't you?"
Tobias just nods.
"That means that Four must be—" Uriah starts but I quickly cover his mouth.
"What is he trying to say?" Zeke asks.
"Never mind," I say.
"But Tris—"
"Uriah!" Mum calls out. "I need some help from you right now."
"Can't Zeke help you?" Uriah mumbles.
"Uriah," Dad warns.
"Okay, I'm going."
"Why is everyone standing over here?" Lynn asks as she joins the party.
I just tilt my head at her.
She starts to laugh. "Uriah fell over the invisible rope again."
"Does he do this a lot?" Tobias asks. I need to keep remembering to think of him as Four. He obviously doesn't want people to know his real name and I don't want to slip up. Not until I at least know why.
"All the time," Zeke answers. "It's been going on since he was a baby. I think Mum must have dropped him on his head."
"Hey! I heard that," Uriah shouts from the dining table. Mum has him setting the table with Mikey helping. We will probably all end up with two knives and no forks or the other way round with them setting the table.
Four and Eric must think we are all crazy and wonder what they have got themselves into.
"Lynn have you met Eric and Four?" Zeke asks.
"No but Uriah has told me a lot about Four," she laughs.
"You, too?" I say.
"You have to be joking," Eric says.
We all just look at him confused.
"There is no way that either of these girls could take me down," Eric scoffs.
"Want to test that theory?" Lynn snarls.
"Okay, okay. I don't think we want that to be happening anytime soon," Dad interrupts. "We want to keep our initiates alive Lynn."
"They are really that good?" Eric asks Zeke.
"They are really that good. Amar has been training them," Zeke replies.
"And unlike some, Ezekiel, they take their training very seriously," Amar says.
"Don't call me that. Only Mum can call me that."
"Ezekiel," Aunt Hana walks over to us, "I think it's time we get started on lunch."
Amar is laughing at Zeke over Aunt Hana's head. Zeke gives Amar a rude hand gesture that gets him a slap from his mum. We really are a little crazy.
I look over at Four and he looks a little uneasy.
"Are you okay? I know we must all seem a little crazy to you," I say.
"It's fine. I'm just not used to this kind of thing," he replies.
"Oh right, Abnegation must have been a lot different than here in Dauntless."
"You could say that."
"Well, I hope you are enjoying it more here," I say and I can't help but blush after I have said it. Why do I have to keep blushing? This is embarrassing.
"I do. More now," he says with a small smile. I can see his ears turning pink.
Tarni walks into the room and when she sees everyone she squeals and runs back towards her room.
"Who was that?" Eric asks.
"That's my sister Tarni," I say. "I'll go and get her."
I walk into Tarni's room and she is throwing clothes off and running into her wardrobe. "What are you doing?" I ask.
"Did you not see who is here for lunch?" she asks.
"Who?"
"Four and Eric are here," she replies like I'm an idiot. I shake my head.
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"They are going to be the most eligible guys in Dauntless Tris," Tarni replies, like it is the most obvious answer in the world.
"You're ten, Tarni. What do you need to get changed for?"
"They are only six years older Tris."
"And you expect them to wait until you are old enough? Are you crazy?"
"Don't ruin it for me, Tris. Can't I just dream?"
"You should be sitting with Uriah," I say. "I'm going to go eat. Take your time. Maybe they will have aged enough to ask you out by the time you get down to lunch."
"Not funny, Tris," Tarni calls out to me.
I get back to the table and there is a seat between Four and Zeke or a seat next to Eric. I would rather sit with Four and Zeke. I sit between the two, feeling really small with Four being so tall and Zeke being so broad.
"Is Tarni okay?" Mum asks.
"Yes, she felt she needed to change her clothes," I reply. I would love to blurt out that she is trying to impress Four and Eric but even I draw the line at embarrassing my sister like that. Zeke or Uriah maybe, but not Tarni.
"I swear that kid has too many clothes," Dad grumbles.
"She gets it from her grandmothers," Mum says.
"She does not," Grandma Annora replies.
"Please," Mum scoffs. "You have more clothes than Tris and I combined."
"That's because you won't let me take you shopping, either of you. At least Tarni likes to shop with me."
Tarni enters the room now dressed in a dress and it takes everything in me not to laugh a little. Lynn looks at me and she is trying to stay straight faced as well.
"Is that a new dress?" Shauna asks Tarni. Lynn just rolls her eyes.
"It is. I went shopping with the grandmas last week and they helped me pick it out," Tarni replies.
"It is super cute," Shauna exclaims.
"Can we not talk dresses?" Uriah grumbles.
"But I thought you would like that subject, Uriah?" Lynn teases. She is always calling him a girl.
"Well, it's debatable who is going to wear the dress," Zeke says.
"Hey!" Uriah calls out to Zeke.
"What?" Zeke says as he laughs at Uriah.
"How's initiation going for you kids?" Gramps asks. "I hear that I missed a great fight between the transfers the other day."
"You should have seen it, Gramps," Uriah starts to explain. "Four absolutely beat the crap out or Eric, it was a total blood bath."
I look across and Eric is staring daggers at Four. I look at Four and he is returning the glare. It feels like there must be a lot of this when they are involved.
"Well I'm sorry I missed it. Usually we don't get such great fighting between transfers," Gramps replies to Uriah.
"Just wait till our year," I tell him. Trying to get the focus of the boys. They look like they are ready to rip each other across the table.
"Yes, I will be excited to see you all fighting. It is going to be great," Gramps says rubbing his hands together.
"Enough fight talk," Aunt Hana says. "I hear that Tarni had a special assignment last night. Did you enjoy it, Tarni?"
"I did. Although Grandma's friend brought her granddaughter, too, and well, the girl was just rude. Her name was Rose and she just acted like she was so much better than me. I really just wanted to punch her in the nose."
"You are going to be worse than Tris," Caleb says.
"Hey, I've never punched anyone in the nose," I say.
"Only because someone is always there to stop you," Caleb says.
"That's not true. I have wanted to hit you plenty of times and I have stopped myself," I say.
"Probably should have hit him," Zeke whispers in my ear and I can't help but laugh.
I hear Four snicker he must have heard it too.
"Back to Tarni," Hana says. "Did you pick up the package?"
"Yes Aunt Hana, we got the ice cream," Tarni tells her.
"Thank goodness. I thought you were going to tell me you lost your temper and we didn't get the ice cream."
"Ice cream?" Eric asks.
"We have dauntless cake. Candor have ice cream. Every year since Grandma chose she has snuck out of the faction at night and gone to see her friend in Candor. They swap cake for ice cream," Caleb tells Eric.
"Is it safe to do that?" Eric asks.
"I haven't been caught yet," Grandma Annora gloats.
"Probably helped you were a leader," Caleb scoffs.
"I don't see you complaining when you are smearing it all over your cake," grandma counters.
Caleb can't seem to think of a comeback, so he keeps his head down and keeps eating.
"What does Erudite have?" I ask.
"What do you mean?" Eric asks.
"We have cake, Candor has ice cream. What does Erudite have?"
"Oh, um, fizzy drink," Eric says.
"What is fizzy drink?" I ask.
"They have drinks that have flavouring in them and bubbles," Tori tells us.
"Bubbles?" Uriah questions.
"They use a carbonation process and it gives the drinks bubbles," Eric replies.
"Doesn't sound as good as cake," Uriah says.
"It's not," Tori says dryly. "Why else do you think we all came to Dauntless?"
"We do get a lot of Erudite transfers, usually," Gramps says.
"What about you Four?" Eric says. "Which faction were you from again?"
I see Four's fist clench under the table and I move to put my hand over the fist closest to me. His hand is so much larger than mine and it takes me back to four years ago when we first held hands. I see him start to unclench his fist and he wraps his hand around mine as he takes a large breath of air in.
"That is enough," Mum says slamming her hand onto the table. Making most of us jump. "I will not have this from our top two initiates. You have both chosen Dauntless and you will start acting like it. We are all a family. You are brothers now. You need to have each other's back, not trying to stab each other in the back. If you don't like this then you can leave. Go to factionless for all we care. Eric, you lost one fight. Get over it. Do you think we judge you just on whether you have won or lost? No, we don't. We look at how you fought, we look at how you deal with losing, we also look at how you deal with winning. So, suck it up, both of you. Now, who would like some cake?"
With a round of cheers, Mum gets up from the table and Dad goes to help her.
"Are you okay?" I whisper to Four.
He gives a slight nod. Still holding tightly to my hand, he only lets go once we have been served cake and he needs his hand to use his spoon.
