Variant ▸ Divergent

CHAPTER ONE : MIRROR IMAGE

CHAPTER ONE :

MIRROR IMAGE — IMARA’S POV

--

Who am I, that the eyes that see my sin?

Would look on me with love and watch me rise again?

Who am I, that the voice that calmed the sea?

Would call out through the rain,

And calm the storm in me?

—Casting Crowns, “Who Am I?”

--

I know everything and nothing about myself. What I did majority of my life was under the supervision and guidance of others, doing as I was told and getting by day-to-day unnoticed. But I knew that there was more to this world than here... from the warm breeze in the palm trees to the dilapidated beach houses by the drought-stricken oceanfront. The walls surround the city we live in; they say it's to protect us but I know better... If it’s designed to protect us why would there be a lock on the outside? These thoughts constantly pester at me however dangerous they may be.

I envy the birds that fly over these walls before winter comes. They can leave when I can’t. Dauntless, the faction that governs above all other factions, wants us to believe we should fear freedom... and them... but with freedom comes consequence. Dauntless is the freest. Maybe that’s what draws me to them... their insatiable, undeniable affinity for adventure and freedom. Most of all, they are brave; they want nothing to do with fear. The days I take the long walks to school are most rewarded by watching the Dauntless-born swiftly stride through the air from the fast moving trains to the hard pavement. Sometimes I imagine what it would have been like to be born into a different faction like Dauntless and wonder if I would have fit. It’s hard to procure a feeling of doing something you've never done besides the exhilaration and the fast heartbeats from being touched by something unknown to your world.

My ‘world’ is abnegation. We live the simple selfless life and to put it simply: we neither waste nor want. Before the aptitude test, which either confirms or deny the faction in which you are born, you still live in your faction under its entirety. This means its rules and regulations. Today we, being the legal age of eighteen, are to take these aptitude tests.

My mother knew more about me in her short life than I ever knew about myself. She died when I was six, they say of a sudden brain aneurism. She always told me to never talk of myself, which was common for our selfless faction because it would be seen as boastful or narcissistic in manner, though she said it more often to me than to my twin brother Caleb. We look nothing alike and follow that with our polar personalities. She gave much attention to me, maybe it's because I look fragile— like I could break any minute and she wanted to be around to pick up the pieces. She would stare at me with a tender, concerning stare as she brushed through my long dirty blonde hair before putting it up in the trademark Abnegation bun.

Those were the only moments I would ever be able to catch glimpses of myself in the mirror, which were once a month. I hated seeing myself, so pale and lifeless; even my hair lacked its color. And the worst of all was the dull brown contacts that we all had to wear, these kind stayed on unless water was applied to the eyes. I can’t even remember the color of my eyes. Another rule by Abnegation included rejecting vanity. I think of my mother as I make my way to take the aptitude test.

Would she want me to stay even if my results are not Abnegation?

I’ve never considered myself selfless enough for Abnegation. But if I wasn’t Abnegation then what would I be? Erudite, Amity, Candor... Dauntless?