Emergent

CH12-'What you did was an act of selfishness'

I catch my breathe and look at what Four is doing. He is looking out of the door which still isn't closed.

"Do these doors close?" I ask.

"No" he replies blandly.

I get on my feet and look out of the door to see what has caught his attention so much.

"What are you looking at?" I ask out of curiosity.

"Everything" he replies after a while.

"Like, the city?" I ask.

"Yeah... just at the layout and the buildings and stuff" He sighs.

"Four, are you okay?" I ask.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" He says rapidly whilst looking away from the city and at me.

"What about you, Tris? Are you okay?" He asks.

"Fine" I shrug.

"How long do we ride the train for?" I ask impatiently.

"Until the end of the line, then it will go back to where we jumped on. We can just do that, if you want. It doesn't take long" he smiles and I nod.

"I saw you today. In the cafeteria with Peter" he admits.

"Oh" I groan.

"What was he saying?" He questions.

"Insulting my father" I say and a tear appears in my eye.

I wipe my eyes with my bare hands and Four tries to comfort me.

"Hey, don't cry. It's okay" he smiles.

"Is it though? Everything's a mess right now" I sigh tearfully.

"I'm not going to say that it's okay anymore because it obviously isn't. I've been through what your going through now. You just have to deal with the problem in front of you and carry on with your life" he smiles and strokes my cheek carefully.

I look at his hand stroking my cheek at the corner of my eye. He removes his hand awkwardly when he catches me looking and registering what is happening.

"Thanks" I smile.

"No problem" he says as calmly as possible.

***

We arrive at our last stop. This time, we get off normally as we press the stop button on the train.

I step off and so does Four. The train leaves and we watch as it turns a sharp corner.

"Thanks, for today" I smile.

"My pleasure" he laughs.

We walk towards the steep steps and begin the trek down them.

We finally reach the bottom and my heart is in my mouth.

"Can you take it from here or do you want me to..erm..walk you home?" He blushes.

"Are you blushing?" I laugh.

"No!" He protests.

I raise an eyebrow and he nudges my shoulder playfully.

"I'll leave you to it" He says awkwardly.

"Okay, bye" I laugh.

"Bye" he smirks.

We walk in opposite directions and I can't stop smiling.

When I arrive at my doorstep, I knock on my door twice and my mother almost immediately answers.

"Oh Beatrice, I was so worried!" She says and pulls me into a hug.

"Mum, I just went out" I say calmly.

"With who? Why didn't you tell anyone? It's 7 o'clock" she sighs, half with relief, half with disappointment.

"I didn't think I had to tell anyone" I reply.

"Who were you with?" She asks concerningly.

I pause for a second.

"Just a friend from school" I say.

Which isn't a lie. Four is a friend from school.

"Okay but next time, please tell your brother or me or even your father because we were worried sick" she huffs.

"We?" I ask just as Caleb enter the room.

"Beatrice!" Caleb gasps.

"Where have you been?!" He says with shock in his tone of voice.

"I was just out with a friend!" I shout, sick of all the interrogations.

He pauses for a second, holding a newspaper in his hand. He looks at me in despair.

"Look at this" he says as he passes me the paper.

The headline is:

'Stiff, Tris Prior and Truth Telling Peter caught in heated argument in school cafeteria'.

I pause in shock and wonder who published it. There was a photo of Peter and I 'arguing'. It was placed underneath the headline with the caption 'Things started getting tense!'. Next to me, sat the dauntless-borns.

We weren't even arguing, I only said one sentence to him and all of a sudden i was involved in a 'heated argument'?!

"What even is this?" I say angrily.

"I only said one thing to him!" I sigh.

"What did you say?" My mother asks.

"He was insulting dad and his career so I said, don't you dare speak about my family. That's it! That's all it was. The rest of the argument was Peter and the daunt-" I explain before suddenly pausing.

"The dauntless-borns" I say slowly and wait for her reaction.

"What were you sitting with dauntless-borns for?" My mother asks extremely calmly.

"They're my friends" I reply.

"Okay but just make sure you don't do anything you will regret" she smiles and strokes my cheek, just like Four did to comfort me.

I thought my mother would go crazy for me even socialising with dauntless-borns but she was fine with it.

Caleb looks at me in disappointment when my mother leaves the room, which is the kitchen.

"How could you do this, Beatrice-" He begins.

"My name is Tris" I hiss.

"What you did was an act of selfishness" he sighs.

"So I'm selfish for defending my father?and so what if I was? Maybe I want to be selfish! You know, sometimes, thinking about yourself before anyone else can help you through a lot of situations" I argue.

He does not reply so I walk towards our grey couch that is placed in the living area. I take seat. I look out the window and sulk until Caleb comes and joins me on the couch.

"Sorry" he apologises.