Chapter ▪ Six

Eric

It definitely wasn't my plan to go this far with her.

The plan was to get her close to me, to make her fall for me to finally give Four what he deserves. I keep on telling myself, that she doesn't mean anything to me, that I could simply let go of her and tell Four, what kind of secret she is hiding. But I can't. Not even after what happened before.

I'm not upset or angry with her. It seems, that I just don't care enough about what Four or others will think about me. Just in case he plans on letting others know about this little incident.

I haven't seen Tris since last evening. She probably stayed with Four over night, but I pretend to not care much about it.

It must be around ten in the morning. I enter the training room and Four is the first person to be in my sight. There is something, that disturbs me about the way he watches Tris during the exercise, how he tries to help her. But there is no other option but leaving it the way it is right now. I turn around to take a look at the other initiants. The most of them improved their fighting and created their own personal technique, which is always a good thing. I remember back when Four and I were initiants, our style of fighting and techniques used to be similar. It's something, that annoys me this very day.

I lean with the back against the wall and I couldn't hold back a yawn. I didn't sleep well last night. Then I notice Four helping another initiant, far away from Tris and I move toward her. With her fists she punches against the punching bag. She is not weak, but she isn't one of the strongest, either. She turns her head around for a second, probably looking where Four has gone. After seeing me, she looks away immediately.

"Very clever." I say as I cross my arms, standing right next to her. She still doesn't look at me. "Making me the asshole was probably the easiest way out."

"Honestly ..." Her right first hits the punching back one last time before she turns her head to see me. "You are right. It was the easiest way out. But I didn't mean to make it look like this."

"Oh, you didn't mean to? That's great." I say quietly, making sure she understood my sarcasm. My arms are still crossed as I look down to the ground.

"Look, I'm sorry. I understand when you are angry —"

"I'm not angry, Tris." I interrupt her. She looks into my eyes in surprise. I know, she expected me to be, but I'm being serious. "I just wanted to talk to you."

She hesitates and her eyes wander to the other side to see Four, probably making sure that he's not watching us. "You're provoking him."

"Of course, I do. For fun." I say with a quiet laughter at the end.

"This is no fun, Eric." she sighs. "He wanted to tell Max about it, but I told him to not mention it in front of anyone."

"I don't care. He can do whatever he wants to do."

Before she can say anything, I feel someone pushing me to the left and it makes me taking half a step aside. I don't need to look at that person to know, that it's Four. His sore eyes meet mine and I'm annoyed by the fact, that he is trying to protect her from me for no reason.

"I'll take care of her." he says, now standing between Tris and me.

Again she just looks at me without saying anything. I didn't even expect her to do so.

"Good." I say with a smile and my eyes remain on hers for a while, before I turn around.

I hear the knocking on my door, but I don't feel like letting anyone inside. It's either Tris or Four — why would Four want to enter my apartment once again, so I guess it is Tris. I knew from the beginning, that she could not let go. Not from this problem, and not from me. I lay on the couch and enjoyed the silence until I hear her knocking once again. I don't know why, but I suddenly feel bad for ignoring her, so I get up slowly to open the door.

"Can I come inside?" she asks. She wears her blonde hair open and I secretly like it when it falls down her shoulders just like right now. She follows me inside as I take a seat on the couch again. I look at her. The way she walks and sits down next to me, I've seen it before.

"I'm sorry for the things, that happened." she begins and she looks right into my eyes. I don't say anything. I once told her, that I'm not upset, that I don't care about what Four will think now. "I can't do this anymore."

She leans forward, bracing her elbows on her knees, now looking down to the ground.

"You feel sorry for him, don't you? Now that he's playing the good boyfriend you actually care about him." I didn't mean to sound that way. My tone is harsh, as if I would want to make her feel sorry for me, instead of him. It's not like that. Or is it?

"I always cared about him!" she protests loudly.

"Really?" I ask and I look at her as she turns to see me as well. "I didn't notice that."

She leans back and sighs in frustration. "That's not really helping, Eric."

"Who says I wanted to help, Tris?" I say her name just the way she said mine. Maybe to tease her or maybe just for fun. I don't even know it myself. She stands up, obviously pissed about what I just said. I wait for a little while and stay on the couch before I finally get up. I can't let her go just like this. I don't want to make her feel sad once again. I guess I finally have to admit, that I actually do care about her.

"Wait, Tris. I didn't mean it. I know it's —" I stop by looking at the door. I didn't hear she opened it and I didn't expect Four to stand right in front of us now. He probably wanted to talk to me and it makes me wondering what else he heard now, beside me saying that I didn't mean it.

"Four?" Tris voice sounds shaky. She looks at me and back to Four, whose eyes are wide open, being more than just surprised.

"Four!" I repeat his name with a tiny laughter. This situation is somehow amusing me. "You wanted to pay us a visit?"

"Tris, what is going on? Why are you here?"

"I ... it's not ..." she begins to stutter and looks at me, as if she expects me to help her. The way Four looks at me reminds me of my actual plan — I have Tris where I wanted her from the start. I can easily give Four the pay back he deserves.

"Isn't it obvious? Use your head." The smile on my face remains as I look at Four. I notice how I more and more start to enjoy the look on his face.

"Fuck you." he says and his eyes turn down to Tris. "Both of you."

He turns around to leave. I see Tris starts moving, wanting to follow him, but before she could take step forward, I stand in her way, closing the door behind me. "You're not leaving."

"Why?" she begins to cry, tears running down her cheeks once again. She raises her hand to whipe them away, looking down to the ground, like she usually does, when she doesn't want me to see her crying.

"Because I don't want you to go." I admit, again the tone of my voice seems harsher, than I wanted it to be. With her greyish-blue eyes she stares at me. I see how she expected something else, another maybe not so friendly answer.

Before I could make a move or say anything, I feel how her body leans against mine, her arms wrapped around my body. My arms move around her body as well and I listen to her crying into my chest. I know she is confused and is not quite sure what to do. I saw it, when she entered my apartment and when she saw Four standing in front of my door.

After a while she looks up and takes a step back. Again she whipes away her tears. "Can I stay tonight? I really don't feel like seeing anyone else right now."

I remember her asking the question before. I look into her eyes and nod without saying anything. Then I lean down, pressing a kiss on her lips, but I don't know why I just did it. Because I know, that it's just making it harder for her instead. The plan was to show Four what I am able to do, that I have the power to hurt him. By doing so I didn't notice how much it harmed Tris as well and I feel sorry for her once again. But I'm not going to let that show.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: The drama, I can't let go of the drama! Even for me this story is getting interesting. And I have to apologize for the fifth chapter! I wasn't really concentrated while writing it and there were so many spelling mistakes, I think. I'm really sorry about that. I hope this one is way better. Leave a nice review if you liked this chapter! I will try to update asap! The next one will be longer, I think. This got kind of short, but I hope that you don't mind! Have a nice day!