7 Days.
Tris,
Your name is everywhere. It has been for the past week. Everyone is talking about how you saved everything. I've tried to avoid everyone as much as possible, especially Tobias. I can't bear to look him in the eye, especially as I know with every moment that he's wishing that I'd have been the one to walk through that door. I know I need to tell him what you said to me. But right now I can't face him. I know it's pathetic that I owe such a small thing and can't even manage that.
9 Days.
Tris,
I still hear your voice in my head, over and over.
Caleb, give me the backpack. Give me the backpack or I'll shoot you in the leg and take it from you.
What goes through my mind when you tell me that? I'll tell you, Tris: a barrage of conflicting thoughts. I don't want to feel pain; I don't want you to shoot me; I don't want you to take it from me; the belief that I need my redemption; the first little bit of doubt that I can actually do this; my history, a long line of cowardice; the belief that maybe you're just superhuman and that's why you're still alive; the idea that if you did it, you would make it.
I don't exactly know which thought it was that made me hand over the backpack. I like to think it wasn't my own weakness, but my belief in you.
12 Days.
Tris,
I finally got up the courage to speak to him today. Tobias.
To tell him what you told me: that you didn't want to leave him. I could see from the way he looked at me how angry he was, the look of contempt on his face. I don't blame him for that. I deserve every little bit of hatred that Tobias has for me.
Now I have paid off the only thing that you asked of me, the tiniest thing compared to what you did instead of me. It doesn't make me feel any better. I don't owe you anything, but I owe you everything.
16 Days.
Tris,
I don't write the dates. I mark time I don't deserve.