AN: Thank you all for the reviews and follows. I hope you enjoy.
It's been almost three months now since Tobias died, and things were slowly returning to some sense of normalcy. Even though it still felt like time was measured by our time with and without him, I felt like both Declan and I were making progress in our therapy. Declan still didn't talk much about his father with me, but he had started to open up more with Eric, and the two of them were becoming very close. I didn't love Tobias anymore, which is something I had come to terms with once I realized I never even knew him at all, but I had to find a way to work through my anger at him for the choices he made.
After meeting with Max and hearing what their investigation had uncovered, I realized why Evelyn had fought so viciously to remove myself and my children from her life once her son was dead.
I was reeling with what I'd learned about my ex-husband, and I appreciated that Eric was still around. Things with us had become distant, even after I'd explained to him that Dustin and I were just friends. He couldn't seem to wrap his head around how a person who I was just friends with felt brave enough to kiss me, and I had no real explanation for him. I'd continued my appointments with Dustin, and he'd apologized to me for the kiss. I felt that Dustin and I were in a good spot, but the tension between Eric and me continued to build.
I wanted to fix this with Eric, but I didn't know how. The kids needed his friendship, especially Declan who had missed Eric after a two night break from spending time with him and had begged me to have him come over for dinner like normal again. Tonight after I got Jewel down in her crib and Rowan fell asleep in his toddler bed barely two pages into me reading his favorite book, I found Eric's large frame laying with Declan in his twin size bed talking to him about Tobias. I had explained to Declan as best I could that his Daddy had died trying to protect him from a bad person, and now Eric was explaining as best he could that Dauntless was working on arresting all of the bad people that influenced his dad's decisions.
I was avoiding further conversations with Eric because I was afraid that our inability to figure our own shit out would impact the children who have grown to love and depend on him, especially after hearing Declan ask Eric if he was always going to keep his family safe now that his Daddy was gone.
I walk away from the room and go into the hall bathroom to splash some cold water on my face. The tears are once again flowing, and I feel like the world is closing in on me. For a moment, I am in Tobias's fear landscape, in that little box with the walls that dare to crush him. When Eric appears in the doorway, I turn away from him, and I hear him take a deep breath, but he doesn't touch me.
"I'm going to head out." He says and I just nod, keeping my back towards him. A few weeks ago, he would have pulled me towards him and talked me through it, but tonight I hear his footsteps heading down the stairs and out of my apartment door.
Things were definitely strange between us now, and I hated it. I missed how our friendship used to be, before lines became blurred and feelings got involved.
I think back to the day that Eric dropped into my tattoo chair, looking much like the angry leader I remembered from my initiation days. We had already begun to build the friendship we now have, but it was certainly in its beginning stages when I carefully asked him if he wanted to talk about whatever it was that was bothering him that day.
I knew all about his off and on long term relationship with a Dauntless born named Sammi, and she had once again broken up with him during one of her public outbursts. Eric loved Sammi, but he hated the drama that a relationship with her brought him, and for the first time in our young friendship he completely bared his soul to me. He was tired of the back and forth in his relationship, and it had begun to impact his job. Right before he had headed to me, he was pulled into Max's office and given a stern lecture on the importance of keeping up appearances as part of the leadership duties he swore to uphold. Dauntless was a loud and fast faction, and public spats between its members weren't unusual at all, however very public arguments between a leader and his significant other reflected poorly on the leadership offices. Max didn't hold back, he told his youngest leader to go home to his girlfriend and figure it out before it brought more embarrassment to the leadership team.
Eric came to me instead.
We were barely anything more than a tattoo artist and client back then, I dare to say that Dustin and I are currently closer than Eric and I were before that conversation, but something about the vulnerability Eric had showed me when discussing his predicament moved me. Eric obviously cared deeply for Sammi, and at one time he had wanted their relationship to work, but when he was faced with a literal choice in turning one way to make his way to their shared apartment, or to the tattoo shop to talk to me he chose me. He was done with being humiliated by her, and he was done with the relationship.
He had planned to go talk to her that day, and for some reason I decided to invite him over to have dinner with my children and me afterward, if he wanted. I was only two weeks past my own humiliation and heartbreak of Tobias leaving me, and the invite to Eric was just to give him a friendly place to land after what I knew would be a devastating conversation with his partner. I never thought in a million years he'd actually come to my apartment, and we continued our conversation without any type of definite answers.
Surprisingly, he showed up.
That first night was awkward to start, he had never been around young children, and my kids, especially Declan, were still dealing from their father's sudden absence. Rowan had just started walking, so he was everywhere and into everything, and Eric marveled at how quickly I could pivot from making dinner in the kitchen to rescuing Rowan before he managed to pull something I thought he couldn't reach from him. Eric began moving things out of his reach, and in response Rowan began climbing on Eric instead. I tried to grab my toddler before it made Eric uncomfortable but he stopped me, instead encouraging Rowan to play with him, and inviting Declan over too.
That first visit was all about distracting Eric, so I purposely didn't talk about my own situation, but when he left that evening I knew a major shift in our friendship had occurred. I told Eric he was always welcome at our home, and I never imagined he would actually take me up on the offer but he showed up on our doorstep two days later with pizza in hand and a nervous grin, asking if we had eaten dinner yet.
It took me a few weeks to tell Eric I was pregnant, and he was the first person besides Tobias I had told. That particular night was a rough one for me, and Eric could tell something was off for me as soon as he arrived at the apartment that evening. It was the first time he had helped me to put the boys to bed, and once they were settled he sat down at the kitchen island and asked me what was wrong.
I let everything out that night. Earlier that day, I had received a notice on our door that we were to move within seventy-two hours since we were currently occupying a leadership apartment without a leader in residence. I'd tried to contact Tobias, to ask if there was anything he could do to prevent us from having to relocate, but he refused any communication with me. A phone call to Max's assistant was fruitless as well, since the head leader understandably had more important things to do than worry about a messy separation involving one of his own staff. Unlike Sammi, I was very quiet and private about the struggles in my marriage, and through Eric I had found out that Tobias had simply asked for a new residence without going into detail about our separation. The day before I received the eviction notice, Max had asked Tobias if there was any chance of reconciliation, and Tobias had advised there was none, so the housing department had no choice but to send me the eviction notice.
I'd also received divorce papers that day from Tobias, in which he alleged that not only had I committed adultery, but that neither our sons nor the baby I was carrying were his. Reading those words were a shock, it was like the punch in the face I'd received during a fight with Peter in my initiation class that had sent me to the infirmary unconscious.
That emotional conversation was how Eric learned of my pregnancy, and he'd finally heard all of the sordid details of my now pending divorce. Not only was Tobias alleging I had cheated on him, he went so far as to name Eric as the potential father of all of my children. I expected the reclusive leader to run and hide from the entire faction, instead he pulled me into a hug and asked if him being around so much lately was adding fuel to the fire. I told him I didn't care if it was, I was not going to let my soon to be ex-husband dictate who I could spend my time with since he had decided to completely remove himself from mine and my children's lives.
The day after that difficult conversation with Eric, he had gone to Max on my behalf and filled our head leader in on the details that Tobias had omitted of our pending divorce. Max presented Tobias was a simple offer – he could make the apartment Max had given him as a temporary residence his full time residence so not to uproot his children, or he could force us to move. I was surprised when I heard that Tobias chose to allow us to stay, but I later learned that Max's disgust upon learning of what really had transpired between Tobias and me was apparent when he made the offer to Tobias, and Tobias had taken the high road to avoid any further disappointment.
Besides, he didn't want to give Max even more reason to be suspicious of his unusual behavior.
I fall into a fitful sleep that night, thinking of Eric, and dreaming of Tobias. When I wake the next morning, a realization hits me – Tobias would have left our faction with or without his mother's influence. The signs were there throughout the entirety of our marriage, and I chose to ignore them. Even though he was a leader, he openly balked at the decisions our faction made regarding the patrolling of other factions. He always held fast to our Abnegation roots, and outside of the large tattoo he had gotten to cover the scars that crisscrossed his back, courtesy of his abusive father, he had never embraced the Daunltess lifestyle. When he left me, I had found so many of his journals that he'd hidden deep inside of our shared closet. It was obvious he had forgotten he had stashed them there, and even though I knew I was invading his privacy by reading them I did so anyway. He had left me without answers, and this was a close as I could get to being inside of his head. In the journals, he went into further details about things he had discovered during his time in the faction, simple leadership decisions he had allowed his paranoia to turn into these huge conspiracies. Tobias was brilliant, but he also was increasingly paranoid and wary of his chosen faction, and that chance meeting with his mother after his father's funeral was the tipping point in an already tumultuous relationship with his chosen home.
He could have been an amazing Dauntless, instead he transferred here to be as far away from his father as he could, and once his father was dead he no longer had any reason to hide within the pits of our faction. He was going to live with the only parent who he believed loved him, with or without me.
My friendship with Eric had shown me a different side of leadership. He was younger than Tobias by several months, earning him the title of the youngest Dauntless leader, and while his position was just as stressful as Tobias' he handled it with a quiet grace. He balanced his work and personal lives almost flawlessly, where Tobias would come home and bury himself in "work", Eric would come over and play with my children while I made dinner. Some nights, he sent me straight to the couch while he cooked for us, especially as my pregnancy with Jewel had progressed.
I missed our friendship, and the easygoing way we would interact. I missed laughing with him until our sides hurt, I missed hearing about his day, I missed him just dropping into the shop to hide for a few minutes from the chaos of his day.
I missed him.
I had almost forgotten my early morning appointment with Dustin, who was coming off of a rare overnight shift and had selected the unusual nine AM time slot. I'd picked up my phone to text Eric when the ringing of the bell over the door of the tattoo shop got my attention.
"Tris, your appointment is here." Tori shouts from the front of the shop and I drop my phone into my purse, "By the way, I'm taking the phone off the hook. Those stupid fucking initiates won't stop calling, and I'm over their shit. Don't they have to train?"
I walk towards the front of the shop and smile at Tori, "I think they have a random day off, Eric mentioned it last night. Sorry, I should have warned you." I reply and she makes a face at me, "Come on back Dustin."
He drops into my chair and pretends to snore, eliciting a chuckle from me.
"Rough night?" I ask and he wryly chuckles from where his head is buried in his arms.
"Just nonstop crap. Lots of troops are being sent in and out of the faction, so we have to be on our A game." He replies, "And I probably am not supposed to be talking about that stuff, so pretend I never said any of that."
He takes off his shirt and lays stomach down on the chair, and I pick up on the shoulder piece we had recently started.
"How about you let me take you to dinner tonight?" He asks when I am changing tattoo guns.
"You know I can't just conjure someone to watch my kids out of thin air, I need some lead in time." I reply and he turns his face towards me.
"What about Eric? He's at your place almost every night. Think he would mind if you grabbed dinner out?" He presses.
"Are you doing this to just get under his skin?" I ask, turning fully to face him.
"Why would I be getting under his skin? The two of you are just friends, right?" He asks.
"Dustin, it feels like you keep pressing that point, especially with that kiss out of nowhere." I reply.
"Like I said when I apologized for the kiss, I was out of line to do that this early into things with you and me. But as far as Eric, I do tend to push that point because I sometimes feel like he's the biggest obstacle in taking things with us to the next step."
"What's the next step?" I ask and he smiles at me.
"For me, I'd like to take you on an actual date. Not just a casual lunch in the cafeteria, but a date where I can cook for you, and we can talk without an audience, and maybe we can get to know each other outside of forced interactions in this shop."
"You can cook?" I quirk an eyebrow at him.
"I can definitely cook. I also clean, do dishes, fold laundry, and do whatever else you'd like."
"Sounds like you're interviewing to be someone's nanny." I laugh and he joins me.
"Shut that shit up and tattoo me, woman. Why don't you text the nanny you have to see if he minds watching your kids while I make you dinner before you get started?"
"I'm totally going to tell him you called him my nanny." I reply and Dustin laughs louder.
"Come on, text him. Let me spend some time with you."
"I'm still thinking, leave me alone." I reply with a blush and begin tattooing him again.
"Tris, real talk here, if there's something up with you and Eric you'd let me know, right?" He asks.
"Eric is an important part of my children's lives, and a good friend to me. Even if I thought that I wanted something more, it would be dangerous to jeopardize his place in my children's lives just to satisfy a curiosity." I admit, surprising both me and Dustin with my candor.
"That's the most you've ever said about this." He remarks.
"I've given it some thought. Does it bother you?" I ask.
"No. It gives me hope." He grins at me.
We keep talking, laughing and flirting and it makes the session fly by. On his way out, he asks for a hug, which I give him and he says he will text me later. I can hear Tori chatting away with her own appointment, and I dread the lobby full of initiates, milling around looking for the latest ink to make them fit into their chosen faction.
I check my phone and see tons of missed calls from the daycare and Eric and many missed texts from Eric. My stomach drops when I read the latest, telling me he's in the infirmary with all three of my children.
"Tori, I have to go – the kids are in the infirmary." I say breathlessly and she immediately looks up at me.
"Go. I'll get Bud or Lauren in here. Seriously, move. Text me updates." She calls out as I rush out the door.