Ice cream tastes really good.
We're all together in the mess hall for dinner. It's a loud room, full of opinions and debates, sharp words flying left and right. I want to take part, but ice cream first, talk second.
Mara stares at her plate with discontent. Syl looks at his the same way. What's the matter with them? This stuff is fabulous!
"One thing I miss from Dauntless is the cake." Mara sighs.
Syl nods. "This dessert sucks."
I look at them like they grew six heads.
"What?" Mara asks. "Never seen a girl mourn over her cake before?"
I burst out laughing, and quickly slap a napkin to my face to avoid losing the precious frozen dessert.
"Attractive, Justine." She jokes. "I'm sure Xavier found that real sexy."
He's the guy I called hot yesterday trying truth or truth. I feel my cheeks get hot at his name.
"Nah. Spitting out ice cream is a real turn on." Syl jokes. "Didn't you know."
A redheaded girl who was originally Abnegation comes to sit near us. My muscles tighten.
"Hey Codie." Mara says, with a warm tone.
I look at girl. She wears her hair in the bun associated with her faction. Still tied to old ways.
"Stiff," I mutter under my breath. The girl looks at me, then away again.
Mara turns to me, and uses a pretend scolding finger. "Now now. Lets play nice, Tina."
I glare at her.
The Stiff sits down next to Syl.
"I apologize for our rude friend." Mara says. My insides churn. I am rude. I have to get used to hearing the truth. "How you doing tonight?"
The girls shifts uncomfortably in the seat. "Fine, and you?" She questions back. What a monotone conversation.
"Well, we don't have any Dauntless cake here, so Syl and I've been pretty bummed."
"You can say that again." Agreed Syl.
"I'm sorry about that," Codie answers, and she sounds sincere. Like my friends problems actually bother her, too.
"Damn you Stiffs." I say, "Always putting yourselves behind to put others ahead. It's unnatural."
Syl looks at me with disgust, and Mara just looks shocked. Codie tries to open her mouth to say something, but I go on. These are words I've always wanted to say, and here I am. Able to speak my mind.
"No one is truly always selfless. It's an act, it's all one big giant lie. And they don't accept liars here." I spit at her. "So you might as well go join the factionless, since your little Stiff family isn't going to take you back once you fail our initiation."
Mara's hands grab my arms, and she looks straight in my face. "Stop being a bitch, why don't ya?"
Syl tries to put his hand on the girl's shoulder, but she flinches away. Typical Stiff reaction.
"I'm not Abnegation any more." She tells me, a bit more fire in her voice then I'd expect.
"Whoah, a bit feisty for a Stiff, huh?"
"I told you, I'm not Abnegation anymore. Why do you think I left? Hmm?"
I can't answer that, because I have no clue how to.
"I'm shocked you don't understand my question, being that you came from Erudite."
She uses the same ammunition I used against her.
"I understand it perfectly fine, I just don't know the answer."
She smirks, satisfactorily. "S'what I thought."
I look down to the black marble floor and try to tune out the world. I catch a few phrases, exchanges between my two friends and the Stiff, but I don't comprehend. I speak my mind and this is what I get. This is what I get for honesty.
When I look up at the table again, my ice cream is a melted puddle of soup. It doesn't look so fabulous anymore
oooh Justine is getting saucy! Stay tuned, next time I update you're going to meet the love interest :)
