Chapter 17
Before I know it my aunt is leaving and we both leave the visit lighter in heart. Caleb had stayed and was visiting with Tris more but I stayed at the table my Aunt had just left.
"Have you had your cheat for the day?" Eric asked as he sat down beside me.
I shook my head. "No I failed on the cheat day or cheat meals all together so far. Old habits die a bit hard I guess."
He puts two plates of chocolate cake on the table and sits beside me. "Then you can join me in having a piece." He hands me a fork.
I smile and nod. "Thank you."
We sit eating cake for a few minutes and I watch as Caleb and Tris come back into the Pit area and take the table across from us to have some cake too. Caleb smiles at me and from across our two tables does a mock cheers. I roll my eyes and laugh as he does too before turning back to talk to Tris.
"Are you sure he doesn't have a thing for you?" Eric asks frowning.
I shake my head. "I don't think so. We just became friends when he first went to Erudite. He sort of became Jeanine's protégé of sorts and he would have lunches with me at Headquarters or in her home. I helped him hide there." I say the last part quieter.
He frowns. "I didn't think he was…does Tris know?"
I shook my head "He hasn't told anyone I think. It wasn't something he liked talking about because he gave Tris a hard time for not fitting in with Abnegation. He wasn't proud of how he treated her because he already felt he had a home in Erudite. He could have gone here or there. She was always more Dauntless in spirit and he ridiculed her because he found himself superior. I think he was just jealous because she was sure of her place and he wasn't. He didn't know who he should be. He is where he belongs but it took him forgiving himself to let him see that."
"Why do you call her Aunt Genie? It's been bugging me all morning." He rolled his eyes and I laughed.
"Aladdin. I saw her as my Genie because she was setting me free and it was a play on her name. So she became my Genie and I became her Little Bird because even at 7 I was using Raven." I smile and eat some more cake as he nods and smiles.
"I can see it. I could hear your love for each other. You have to know how odd it was for me seeing her like she is with you. Growing up in Erudite, Jeanine Matthews is kind of known as the Dragon Lady. Her showing you emotion at all is beyond me. I didn't believe you Raven about what she was up to. But I never doubted you or hated you. " He sighs and looks at me in apology. "If anything I hated myself. One day if you want to know, I will tell you. But it isn't pretty." He held my eyes frowning and I nodded.
"Oh she can still be the dragon lady. She just has the other side too. Her and Silas didn't have the greatest examples of parents and just like with me you learn the behaviors that you are brought up in. She said when my mom placed me in her arms something that had been broken clicked back into place. I wasn't hers though and…it hurt her to be around me for a while. It hurt her more to be kept away, so when she found out I needed her or I wouldn't survive, she stopped fighting that part of herself." I smile at the memory of curling up in her bed and her reading me books and then as I got older I would read to her. I look at him seriously. "I don't need to hear about your past Eric. You aren't your past. It can shape us but it doesn't define us unless we let it."
"It was nice. I guess to see something more than bad memories and self-hate when I looked at her." He said softly.
"I am glad it helped then." I smiled and laughed as I saw a flash of red and yellow barrel towards me and leap out and launch his little body at me. I scooped the little 3 1/2 year old and held him close.
"Rayvn!" Astrid's little brother Jeff started placing sloppy kisses all over my face and hugged me.
"How is my doodle bug?" I ask him after I sit him on the table in front of me.
"I wan the sicle course like you Rayvn. But daddy said I couldn't touch the guns or knives yet." He pouted and I laughed.
"You still I have the wooden sword I made you?" I asked soberly.
He nodded and pointed behind is back vaguely as he spoke "Yes but Daddy, he said I couldn't swing the sward no more cause he wanted more babies. Mommy said that I should swing the sward more because I is a handful."
Eric broke out in laughter and Jeff looked at him with wide eyes and leaned in and whispered loudly to me "Is he a Giant Rayvn?"
I bite my lip to keep from smiling "Not the kind from the stories."
Jeff frowns "Is he mean?"
I shrug "Am I nice?"
He thinks for a minute "Sometimes you aren't bery nice." He looks over to Eric and holds eyes with him then breaks out in a smile "Jeff" He says and holds out his hand.
Eric smiles and raises an eyebrow at him but takes his tiny hand in his huge one "Eric."
Jeff jerks his hand up and down in two massive shakes and then lets go and wraps his arms around my neck and hugs me and closes his eyes "You don't sneak and help me sleep anymore Rayvn. You taught me to fight the shadows men. What if they come back? I might forget the words to the songs."
I sigh and close my eyes and smile. "You know your sister should not send toddlers to do big girls jobs dammit."
I heard a gasp behind me and smiled without opening my eyes "Like not sending her baby brother to get me to sing another song. She is very lucky I don't send you home with …" I grin…"There once was a man from nantucke…"
A large hand is clamped over my mouth. I look and see it is Eric but he is laughing "I can't in good conscience let you even try and complete that."
I smirk into his hand and he releases as I laugh. "I don't even know anything other than the Nantucket part. No one has ever completed it." I look at Jeff who has moved his head to my chest and is looking up at me with his baby blue eyes.
"Please Rayvn?" I growl at unfair use of cuteness.
"Damn blue eyes." I mutter. "Fine, keep your head there ok?" He smiles happily and snuggles in between my breasts and Tris and Caleb move over. Tris smiles and shakes her head.
"They learn young don't they?" She jokes.
I shake my head with a smirk. "You have no idea. This one likes to play the bongos and fluff me." I hear snickering from Astrid and Hec behind me. Eric is looking at Jeff and smiling softly.
"Now Rayvn." Jeff commands me imperiously.
I tweak his nose and he closes his eyes but then says. "Up, walk, up."
Eric chuckles "Is he always that bossy?" He asks Astrid as I stand with him.
She nods sadly "My mom got really sick after she had him and only Raven could get him to calm down. Mom still is sick but has been doing a bit better. Raven became his mom for almost a year from the day he was born, she has been there through it all. My mom still has issues connecting with him because Jeff sees Raven as his mom now. And if something happens my Dad has filed to give her custody." She answers quietly.
Tris watches me smiling and I pass by Eric who smiles too but I am locked onto Jeff's face. I would be lying if I said I didn't see him as my own son too. But I feel like the worst person for stealing a woman's child.
I start to sing a soft melody hearing the music in my head and sway slowly back and forth. I had already felt his breathing evening out as soon as I stood.
[Come Away With Me, Norah Jones]
Come away with me in the night
Come away with me
And I will write you a song
Come away with me on a bus
Come away where they can't tempt us
With their lies
I want to walk with you
On a cloudy day
In fields where the yellow grass grows knee-high
So won't you try to come
Come away with me and we'll kiss
On a mountaintop
Come away with me
And I'll never stop loving you
And I want to wake up with the rain
Falling on a tin roof
While I'm safe there in your arms
So all I ask is for you
To come away with me in the night
Come away with me
By the time I am finished he is asleep, long since and I kiss his forehead and turn to their Dad. He is smiling sadly at me.
"Hello Frank, how is Isla?" I ask quietly.
He sighs "Tired but good. It is getting better. Without either of you there she has to deal with things but every day we take it step by step. He misses you the most though. I wasn't sure if I should bring him, if it would do more harm than good. Then he said the damndest thing and said it wouldn't be brave to not go. So here we are."
I smile and smooth the little boys blonde hair from his face. "Well I thank you for bringing him for us. Did you enjoy your visit? Were any of your old friends around?"
He nodded "Yes, but I have been longer in Amity than I was here so it isn't the same. It was good to see their kids and them mine though."
I lean over his head and smile as I place a kiss on his forehead and he smiles and sighs "Pour faire la chose utile, de dire la chose courageuse, à contempler la belle chose: qui est assez pour la vie d'un homme. To do the useful thing, to say the courageous thing, to contemplate the beautiful thing: that is enough for one man's life. Remember that DoodleBug."
I carefully lay him in his father's large arms and Frank puts I hand on my cheek. "I hate to remind you Raven, but you do remember the papers I filed right?"
I nodded "I said I would the moment you put him in my arms and if it comes to it then I will. But I won't give up on Isla until her heart gives up on her."
He nods and smiles "It makes me feel better knowing he has a home Raven, if the worst happens. Both my girls better take care. And can I say thank fuck you are done with Shane."
I hear snorts and laughter all around and I smile "I believe you just did." I gasp playfully. "What will Amity say?"
He snorts "I believe Johana will fucking rejoicing with me. That woman has the patience of a saint. But I swear she was contemplating smuggling in the gelding tools in a bag and snipping Shane's tackle and bait right off if she heard him talk to you like he did one more time. That was before we found about all the crap going on now. He ran from me earlier. Just almost pissed himself and ran when I saw him. My friends said they will keep an eye out though."
He turns and kisses Astrid's head and shakes Hec's hand, then surprisingly Eric's. He turns back to me and debates. "Stay away from it Raven, please? I know they have been offering but just stay away from it. I can't go through watching you get caught up in that again."
I blanch slightly and nod. "I don't plan on accepting the invitations." I say simple.
He nods "Thank you." He turns and walks out and I let out a shaky breath and Tris motions for me to sit.
I sigh and take a seat but resume eating my cake. She pulls it away from me and raises her eyebrows. "Spill."
I take a deep breath and shrug. "Remember that thing that Peter was wanting to take me to. Well they aren't the only place to do that in Dauntless. The other is more private and they have been slipping me invites here and there. I toss them or burn them."
She slumps and rubs her face and Eric gets close to me his body facing mine and letting his fingers brush my thigh. "Mind running that by me?"
I swallow at the cold fury I can already see building behind those grey eyes. "Prize fights. I had my first invite before I even put on the first scrap of black, for the dauntless ones that is."
He leans back confused. "There are other faction prize fights?"
I tense and nod. "Not everyone started out a Candor or Erudite or even Abnegation. Dauntless-borns have transferred out. But when they do go they get restless and it isn't as easy to give up. I told you that Peter trained me to be brutal in the most brutal way possible."
His voice took on the tone of quiet fury. "Please tell me that he was not taking you to these fights and going against others?"
I nod and hold his eyes. "At first he was taking me. But then I took myself."
Tris gets Eric's attention, looking worried because I really did go off the deep end. "She hasn't been to one in over a year though. It was like getting an addiction out of her system almost to get her to stop. They underestimated her or belittled her but wanted her to keep coming back. Four scoured the city sometimes to find her. She would disappear for weeks because she was going between locations."
I sigh, forehead furrowed. "Not exactly my proudest moments. But the last bender went on for a month or two. I hurt a guy bad and I saw my reflection in a broken window as I had just mangled this kid. I didn't like what I saw so I walked away. That night I walked away. But then Four also found me that night and we got into an argument because he started demanding I leave. Of course I was going to leave but then he started going all…" I wave my hand in the air" Fourzilla..."
"Fourzilla" Tris and I say at the same time and laugh at that. Eric shakes his head and looks less furious but not much.
"Yeah so I stomped back in there and took one more match but did a pressure point win just because I wanted to have the last word. It's pretty fucking addicting though. Especially if they are run correctly and it is about skill. Those are the ones I sought out but not everyone there is about that. That last guy I fought was one of those and I lost it. He couldn't have been maybe a few years out of his own transfer initiation to Erudite. I found out who he was and made sure I approached him to apologize, he did the same thing and he is doing pretty well for himself in Erudite now. He doesn't fight but still trains and works out and he chose to dedicate himself to things that could benefit his faction of origin." I shrug and look back to Tris she pushes the cake back to me but Caleb looks at me.
"Raven can I talk to you for a second?" Caleb asks me quietly.
I look to Tris and she frowns at me and shrugs. I look back to him and nod and he gets up and walks away a bit and I follow.