Parker's POV

After making up with my brother, we make our way to the mess hall, for dinner. Despite having eaten only a few hours earlier, I'm already starving from the run. Tobias helpfully carries my tray over to his usual table. About ten minutes later I hear the chair next to me be pulled back, and I am surprised to see Eric drop into the seat. He had clearly been spending that time working out his anger as his T-shirt was drenched in sweat, but despite this, he still seemed very pissed off. His big frame clearly didn't fit the table and he looked somewhat out of place as he seemingly dwarfed the table and even more so the chair he was sat at. A bit puzzled as to why he chose to sit next to me when he never eats with the rest of Dauntless, especially when we initiates are in here eating. I don't say anything but look over to my brother who is sitting across the table from me and one look at his face tells me he is just as confused as I am. We sit there in silence, not that we had been talking before Eric came along, as I struggled with not spilling any of my dinner down me. After a while I see Tobias stand up and take his empty tray over to the bins and then proceed to walk out of the mess hall. I carry on eating my dinner, though I think you could barely call it eating, as I am only half way through my food. A few minutes later I still haven't made that much progress with my meal, as the beans keep falling off my fork when I try to eat them, I notice that Eric has now finished his own meal, but is still sitting at the table. At first I am confused as to why he hasn't left given he has finished when it dawns on me that he is waiting for me to finish, and not wanting to be a burden a tell him, "You don't have to wait for me to finish you know, and I very much doubt you want to be in for longer than necessary" he doesn't say anything for a while, he just looks at me curiously before muttering "It's fine". It wasn't so much that I was uncomfortable with him sitting there, in fact it was quite nice that I wasn't left alone to eat my dinner, but I really didn't want him to be wasting his time waiting for me when I'm sure he has more important things to do, but I do not argue and just try to eat my dinner as quickly as possible. However the cast makes that virtually impossible, and when I am done ten minutes later, the mess hall is virtually empty except for people who have just come in from afternoon shifts or the cleaning staff. I stand up once I am done and I see Eric do the same but before I can take my tray, he has grabbed it, and has put it in one of the bins, "You really didn't have to, I can do it myself you know." I tell him, but I am still very grateful.

"As much as you would like to think you could carry that tray, you and I both know that you wouldn't be able to lift the tray without something falling to the floor, given your injuries" he says, nodding to my hands, "And as funny as that would be for me to watch, I am sure it would be embarrassing for you, so I thought I would save you from yourself" I try to come up with some sort of counter argument, I can't and I can hear him laughing at me. "You won't be able to come up with a reason for me not too, then why try"

"Fine, but don't think I am going silently," I tell him somewhat defiantly.

"Yeah sure," he says and amused look on his face, and just can't help but smile back. We both walk out of the mess hall before I make my way down to the initiates' dorm, weirdly happy but I can't seem to explain why. When I get into the dorm room I see Tris sitting on her bed clearly upset and I have a sneaking suspicion it has something to do with what happened in her fight against Myra this afternoon. "Hey," I say approaching her.

"Hey," she responds.

"I see you are not with Christina and that lot, where are they anyway?"

"They went to go look at the shops, I think Al wanted to get a tattoo as he thinks it will make him stop crying or something like that, but I'm not so sure."

"And you would rather sit in here by yourself than go out with them? You okay?"

"I'm just thinking about initiation, I am going to get cut aren't I?"

"Hey, you don't know anything for certain yet," I tell her sympathetically

"Yeah I do, I can't bear to hit anyone, you saw my fight with Myra today, we didn't even hit each other once, and even if I could bring up the courage to hit someone I would be too weak to actually do anything to them, not to mention the fact that I am useless with a gun, I didn't even hit the target once, and according to Will I should have hit it even if it was by accident"

"Well, you are right that it is not going great at the moment but all you need to do is practice, we've only been here to days and we've got a few weeks before stage one is complete you have lots of time to improve, plus, you don't know how the Dauntless-born are doing do you"

"Hmm maybe you are right"

"I am sure you will be fine Tris, listen I am going for a shower given nobody else is here, you wouldn't mind wrapping a towel round my arm, it's just I am not supposed to get it wet and I can't exactly use my other hand at the moment" I ask her showing my bandaged left hand. She agrees to help me and ten minutes later I am on my bed, letting my hair dry naturally, not being bothered to even attempt to use one of those hairdryers in the bathroom even with Tris offer of help.

The next week passed without too many hitches, mine and Tobias' have grown closer and our relationship is stronger than ever, we haven't had any fights. The weeks have passed in a very similar manner; each morning I would wake up, sometimes with the others, sometimes before. After breakfast, I would go for a run with Eric, and if he had a meeting I would just watch the others train, usually with guns. And then after lunch, I would go on another run before watching the others fight. They were getting better, especially Tris. Speaking of Tris, we were getting closer and were becoming good friends, however, I didn't get on with the others much, as I usually eat with Tobias or occasionally with Eric if Tobias is not there. It's not that I don't like Christina and that lot, I just don't spend much time with them, I usually shower after dinner so nobody is in the dorm, and then I am usually up and eating before them. I got my mother's book back, I woke up early again one morning and walked into the training room, where Eric was setting up punching bags, I found it sitting on my usual bench. I am sure Eric was the one who put it there as he would have had to have seen it when he came in, however I didn't say anything.

sorry, its been so long since an update, school is getting pretty heavy with all the controlled assessments i have to complete, and it doesn't help I'm missing school so much. but anyway hope you liked the chapter and i promise to update soon and as always thanks to everyone that reviews, favourites and follows the story, it means a lot to me.