My eyes flutter open and when I realise I was actually asleep I sit up in an instance. Of course… I wasn't asleep, just unconscious… Shit I haven't passed out from drink for a long time… And I tend to be awake as soon as my body will let me. I must have been up late because there's a peak of light through the window… the window?
I can't believe how long it took me to realise, I'm in a bed. A double bed. With soft, expensive sheets.
Not, on a small top bunk, with loose cloth covering a thin duvet to cover me.
The door to the bedroom is open and when I see the sofa through it I remember what happened. I'm at Eric's? Just my luck, why did I even go to the training room drunk… oh god it was tequila.
"Fucking tequila…" I grumble to myself.
"So that's what got you so out of character." I jump out of my skin, my arms moving around me into a defensive position before I can realise.
"Nothing else ever makes me completely lose all rationality…" I say to myself, more than him.
"Well you did have quite a lot." He says pointedly, and I glance at my forearm and curse at the number of tallies. 16 units according to the bartender. I scratch the back of my head.
"Actually, that's kind of average for me… but then again I think two thirds must have been that god awful drink…" I mutter, once again berating myself. What even made me drink so much of it… ah… My eyes snap to him, dark grey sweatpants hanging low and a black t-shirt that left an inch of skin of his stomach exposed.
"… Why did you let me stay here Eric?" I ask him, meeting his blue eyes warily. It's obviously just us in his apartment, so he didn't take that woman home… then again that doesn't rule out anything they did outside his apartment… Stop thinking about it! I have no reason to be jealous!
Meanwhile Eric's eye's just sparkle, but I can see his wariness as much as mine.
"Why not take me back to the dorm?" I ask again, looking down at myself covered by his grey sheets.
"… I was drunk and…" He stops his sentence abruptly and I can see he almost slipped up. "… and tired as fuck. Like I was going to drag you all the way back to the dorm. Besides, maybe I like having you here."
I force myself not to react to his lazy smirk, or his slightly suggestive words, as I see my black dress on a desk next to a wardrobe. I push the covers back and realise I'm dressed in an extremely loose t shirt, hiked up to my thighs with the v neck sliding off my shoulder.
"…Did you change my clothes?" I question, fighting the strong blush arising my cheeks, in the knowledge I was failing miserably. He merely narrows his eyes, and his smirk widens.
"I couldn't leave you to sleep in that." He says, motioning to the dress. "I wouldn't be able to keep my hands to myself." I don't see his expression as my red blooms across my cheeks and I look away, just hearing his footsteps leaving to the other room.
"… not like that helped much anyway…" I hear him mumble just above a whisper, and I think he thought I couldn't hear.
After he goes back through the door, I let myself look around his bedroom, unable to keep my eyes from prying. It was a spacious room, walls of light grey with a dark wooden wardrobe and desk along one wall, and a window above the desk letting light hit the equally spacious bed. I stand, pulling the t-shirt back onto my shoulders as it hangs almost to my knees, and I'm completely reassured that my underwear still remains on. I know my mind is still processing, and though I tend to be good with hangovers and remembering… I know it hasn't hit me yet.
It definitely hasn't hit me yet. I ended up here whilst drunk and I can imagine very happily let him… do whatever exactly you could call his touches, before blacking out, sleeping in his bed, with just a t shirt, though luckily a very large one, covering me.
I can't possibly change back into my dress, I have a feeling that would be worse as though it doesn't show as much of my shoulders and collar bone it actually would show more leg and most definitely more cleavage. So, anxiously, I head through the door.
It's an open plan living room, dining room, and kitchen all in one, and an extremely large space. There's a peninsula of white quartz alike the kitchen table tops with four high chairs, behind which Eric stands finishing off two pancakes stacked on top of each other, with what looks like chocolate in the middle. My eyes are wide as I look around with curiosity, and his gaze falls on me. His jaw tenses as he swallows his last bite, and I blink unknowingly.
"Eat, drink that water, you can help yourself to the shower, I'll be back in a few." He says shortly before I nod as he heads to the door in his usual fast stride. As he says, I move to the kitchen and indeed have a few pancakes with golden syrup or chocolate spread on then, grinning at the typical Dauntless feel good food. I also down the pint of water he left purposefully for me, probably would've been better for me to have it last night but As I finish my eyes land on a door opposite the bedroom, and seeing the white tiles head inside.
It's simple, with a shower on the larger side and a rectangular sink with mirror. I stand there admittedly stupidly for a good half a minute, the same nervous feeling in me. What am I doing here? If my mind were working properly, I'd have been out as soon as he'd left. In fact, am I still drunk? That could explain it… oh shit.
It seems curse words will be even more abundant, as I swear a good number of times under my breath as I catch the dark marks, four, though two kind of merged together on my collarbone, another slightly lower, and one at the base of my neck. I have no way to explain them to anyone, nor do I want to fabricate a story that has me hooking up with some random dauntless. What the hell got into me last night, we didn't even kiss but this?!
"Here." I must have subconsciously registered Eric coming back, and he hands me some folded clothes, the tags ripped off in his hands, dark eyes lingering on my exposed décolletage. My mind connects and realises what was distracting him as he finished his pancakes.
He leaves, closing the door behind me and I undress, jumping in for a quick shower. I don't wash my hair, which is still wavy but tamed, and put on the clothes he left for me. I scowl at myself as a blush dusts my cheeks as I dress in the black lace underwear, somehow exactly the same style as I usually wear as he must have seen when he (un)dressed me, but am glad when I pull on some black full length leggings and a chunky black turtleneck jumper, fully covering my neck. I head back to the living room, where he sits on the sofa.
"Come here." He says curtly, and I dare not do anything but.
"I'm going to assume you understand the fact you stayed here is to remain quiet." He says as I stand before him.
"Of course." I say, and I stare at him, his pale skin a contrast his dark clothing. "Do I assume correctly that that includes last nights events as well?" I ask boldly.
"How much of it do you even remember?" He asks, and I tense slightly as I remember his hands all over me, his lips on my neck, and even his words. So fucking cute… only I can touch you like this… I shiver.
"All of it." I say honestly. I'm already feeling like I want to sprint from my stupid attempt of talking, when I know we both know that "we" shouldn't mean anything, and doesn't. At least nowhere near now. I hurry to change the subject. "Thanks for the clothes… do you know the time?"
He glances at his watch. "You were only out a few hours really, it's almost nine." He says, and I can't believe I hadn't notice the darkness under his eyes. He mustn't have slept at all if he was up before I was. "The rest of the initiates will probably still be asleep, they were all out last night. Training starts at one."
I'm glad as I see the understanding between us, whatever it is that's happening, it's not something to talk about. I nod, before turning nervously with my dress folded in my arms, walking out the door.
It's not long before I reach the dorm, and sure enough everyone's still in bed. Though a couple are awake, they're awake with they're eyes closed trying to go back to sleep, so I quickly put my dress away before sitting lightly on Lily's bedside. She's still in her tight high waisted black jeans and silvery crop top, and she winces as she opens her eyes.
"…Ugh…no…" She grumbles and I smirk, standing to get a few glasses of water. When I walk back I shake her and get her to sit up, before helping her hold the glass as she drinks it protesting. I do the same with Beth and Jay, then actually force Ben to drink it, before going back to Lily.
"How are you even awake… you drunk so much what the hell?" Lily moans as she slowly grabs some clothes and I grab a towel to cover her knowing she's going to shower.
"I can drink a lot, and I can deal with it well in the morning. To be honest I got nowhere near my cut off point yesterday… I just mostly had shots that's all." I tell her with a slightly smug smile on my face.
"What was your tally? I finished at 18" Jay says.
"I only had 9, but I only remember the two shots at the beginning and a cider…" Lily mumbles dejectedly.
"You had four tequila shots in a row, I handled your fifth." I tell her and she nods vaguely before jerking up.
"In a row? Wait how did you manage six in a row without throwing up?" I shrug.
"I got eight. Darn it there's no denying it I'm such a lightweight." Beth moans.
"Fuck you beat me Jay. 15." Ben says.
"And you Avery?" Jay asks and I smirk towards Ben.
"16."
"What? No way! How the hell?" Ben starts but I ignore him as I move to the shower room to help Lily and Beth who follows us.
"Initiates, yesterday was guns, today you get knives." Four introduces simply, and there's a couple of very obvious groans.
"You should be happy, we went easy on you. We know every single one of you was out last night, but Lauren took the gun range for the Dauntless-born, though they will be joining us half way through for combat drills." Eric says sarcastically, before glaring firmly at Ben who seemed to have the worst headache of all- somehow through all that he accepted a slightly dodgy drink from an unknown person - I scoffed at him and shook my head when he said so.
"Let me be clear, we will be judging you on how much you suck, a hangover shouldn't be any hindrance, and since you all went drinking, it can't be unfair." Eric states "Get going!"
Meanwhile, I'm over the moon. In comparison to the Ben, I'm almost completely fine, just the ever so slight sluggishness of the day after a night out, but barely noticeable. Lily seems to have a light headache, but Beth and Jay are alright, they mostly had beer and cider, not really headache material. Plus, we're doing my favourite activity.
I play with my weaker persona, I start with right hand throws which I'm supposedly still "new" to, but merely aim for the bullseyes I imagine in my head, hitting each mark be it the shoulder, inner thigh, or ankle.
I slowly make my way into more consistent thows to around the heart, but only actually hitting bullseye once or twice. Though it's easy compared to what I do in private training, which involves neatly lining up six knives in a row, it still relaxes me to have the metal slide between my fingers. It's so sharp many of the other initiates have cuts from where they nicked their own skin, but to me it just emphasizes my control. I sound cocky, arrogant, confident, and I am. Though only when stationary, I still haven't managed that complete accuracy when moving or at angles.
"Everyone stop!" It's Eric who yells, and I scan the room warily, because he sounds pissed. It's easy to spot the difference, the Dauntless born have come down from the shooting range and stand by the side of us throwing, but there's a tanned figure with messy brown hair standing apart from them.
"What makes you think you can break the rules, runt?" Eric growls, and Leon looks away unsure.
"It was just a joke, Eric. She throws so off to the right she's miles of the target." He says but there's an obvious nervous tint to it.
"And that gives you the right, how?" It sounds like a threat, and Leon doesn't have a reply.
"Stand in front of the target." Eric says.
"What?"
"You heard. Now." Eric growls before Leon quickly walks in front of the target, his eyes wide. Four seems to walk up to Eric, in a routinely manner, but Eric waves him away.
"…Amity. You two seemed cosy yesterday. How would you like to help out Leon?" Eric's voice drips with sarcasm as he stares at me, and though I can't read his eyes, I know he's first of all testing me, second of all acting on jealousy. But I can't stop the magnetic pull that leads me towards him.
"If you don't flinch or move Leon, I'll let you off." Eric says, a threatening stare in his eyes. He picks up six knives from the table. "You're good with knives, aren't you, and we wouldn't want you to be bored, so how about we step this up?" I just look to him with questioning eyes, as he takes my shoulders and moves me back, so I am back at 25m. It's 10m further back than what we throw at – 15m, which is as far as we learn. The only thing that helps me is that he's given e heavier knives, but the distance is obviously much further.
He steps back, but quickly moves the knives so I'm throwing with my right hand, with a quick smirk at me as he know I'm still better with my left.
"In succession. I don't like to wait." He taunts, and I quickly get into my position. The tension in the room could be drawn with a knife, as all the initiates, Four's and Lauren's eyes are on me, but the only one's bothering me are the bright blue ones next to me.
Right, I have to throw them slightly higher. I won't be used to throwing with more power, and I can't rely on power getting the heavier knife those 10 more metres. I adjust my stance to tilt higher, so that I don't have to aim higher with my eyes, that would just be a pain. With a deep breath in, I throw with the exhale. As soon as it hits the target not flesh, I'm already launching the next, and the next, and the next. I aim low to around his ankles and to the sides of his legs to feign lack of power, then go for one high above the shoulder shot to feign aiming too high in consequence. I can't have Dauntless born thinking me too much a target, I got enough of that from Kasper. But with the last one, I take a quick glance at Eric, and know he won't be satisfied with these complete "misses" as he will call them. So with my last knife, I aim for his long hair, heightened a good couple of inches with hair products, and let the knife fly horizontal rather than vertical and let it slice a good centimetre of his hair.
To his immense credit, he really didn't flinch, he didn't even bat an eye, but after the last throw he steps away then feels his hair in disbelief. There are a few cackles from the Dauntless born, but I pay them no heed and just turn to Eric expectantly. There's a small smile of his lips.
"Good. Let's move onto combat!"
But I don't smile back.
At dinner, I'm ambushed straight away by Mark and Leon.
"The hell Avery?" I turn to him, prepared with an anxious, worried face biting my lip slightly as I turn.
"I'm so sorry Leon, thank God I'm such a bad thrower!" I say worriedly. He seems taken aback slightly, before carrying on, but with noticeably less heart.
"Yeah, look at my hair! It's disgusting!" He says, and I can tell he's digging for more apologies.
"I'm so sorry, but it still looks great, I promise." I put in the nervous compliment, and all of a sudden his grinning. Some men are so simple. It was easy enough to tell his advances at the start of last night were more than just a little fun, but I have no interest in them. True, I may have basked in them in my wish to ignore the blonde leader who'd caught my attention, but if Leon ever makes any non-alcohol influenced advances, I won't lead him on. There isn't much point to it really, I have nothing to gain. Lily herself noted it at lunch, which to be honest is how I put two and two together, but now he's here before me, I can tell.
"How about as an apology, you eat dinner at my table?" He asks, and I smile, though wishing to avoid as much social interaction as possible, it would be good to scope out any potential threats, though both Mark and Leon don't seem the Kasper type at all.
"Sure, I'd love that." I agree, and head with him as he beelines to his table after getting food.
"Guys, this is Avery, the girl who was throwing arrows at my head earlier." Leon introduced me and I bite my lip apprehensive.
"I'm really sorry, I promise!" I repeat, and his table laugh it off and I sit down next to Leon.
"Well, this is Mark, obviously, then there's Raven, Kray, and DT." Leon introduces.
"Nice aim you got there, maybe he'll shave it all off now!" Raven a girl with stark black hair, pale skin only marred by a thin scar along her cheek and a nose piercing, says jestingly.
"Hey-"
"It'll do wonders with the chicks!" Kray, a girl with orange and pink short hair adds, an obvious cheesy wink as a side. DT just laughs, who alike Leon has tan skin, but much darker long hair.
I spend the meal talking, slowly adding more of my actually personality so I don't have to constantly act nervous in front of them, that would be a pain.
"I still can't believe Eric did that though, I mean even he was out getting some last night, couldn't he loosen up or choose someone else for the tradition?" Leon complains, and I suddenly jerk into the conversation.
"Yeah, that silver hair… maybe I could go silver…" Kray says to herself and I bar the image from my mind.
"What tradition?" I question, and DT answers me.
"Apparently they choose an initiate to throw knives at ever initiation. A tradition for the trainers, though I've never heard of getting an initiate to throw as well." That would explain why Four went up to begin with.
"Speak of the devil." Mark mutters and I follow his line of sight and sure enough Eric has just walked in. I watch his eyes search the hall and settle of my usual table, and frowns. Fuck, I have a feeling I won't be in a good place with him if he sees me sitting here next to Leon. I can't even pass it off anymore, Lily told me Leon was actually making moves on me last night. I know I said he had no right to be jealous… and he doesn't, and I know I'm irritated by him giving me actual uncertainty about whether I'll meet my target, when straying means hurting someone with no reason… but why do I feel like I'm betraying his trust?
I try to duck, but I can't stop it as his eyes glue to me. His forhead has a thick frownline, but I don't force myself to look anything but indifferent.
When I stand to leave, I don't see him walk past me, but I hear his voice.
"10." It's fast, but I hear his voice clearly, and I continue my walk out arguing with myself.
I don't even remember what I did after dinner, I think I just wandered the hallways, but all I know is that when it came to 10, I was at the foot of the stairs up to the training block. I climbed them carefully, unsure of what I would meet. As I look in, sure enough , in sweaty training gear, his arms glistening as the punch at the high swinging punching bag. I pause for a long moment, before he stops and turns, looking for the clock. His eyes meet mine and for that split second my heart stops, as I ready myself for what was to come.
Once again another chapter, I hope everyone enjoys it! I'm planning a bit of an obstacle in Eric and Avery's budding relationship, as so far she's been quite submissive about all his touches (she obviously just can't resist XD), but the whole jealousy thing has been pulling at her, so we'll have to see what happens! I've figured out how I'm going to pace their relationship, as it's going pretty fast at the moment considering it's been a month of physical training, Eric's already VERY handsy, and I have to get the rest of initiation in, because in my mind instructor/initiate relationships aren't actually illegal, but the whole of Dauntless treat it as such. Anyway thanks so much for reading, I hope you've enjoyed this chapter and I will try and get the next one up as soon as possible! Review please