As soon as I rounded the corner, he had me in his arms.
"Oh god, it's so good to see you again." He whispers into my hair. I close my eyes tightly and wrap my arms around him.
"Same." I say quietly, and that's all that's said. We stand there like that for a minute, just enjoying the feeling of one another once again.
"I'm so sorry abo-"
"No. Tobias, don't even start. I wanted you to leave." I say, and he pulls away from me to look at my face.
He's smirking. "What?" I ask, puzzled.
"It's been 4 years since I've been called Tobias. If it were from anybody else, I would punch them in the mouth." He replies, the smirk still evident on his face.
"Well I'm glad I'm not just anybody else." I reply, smiling softly. He let's go of me and leans against the wall.
"So, has much changed?" He's not smirking anymore. I know what he's implying, and I know he doesn't mean to make me uncomfortable, but it does.
I shuffle my feet and lean my back against the wall, letting out a puff of air in the process. "Not really. Without you, I've done more traveling to other factions. In all honesty, the only good thing that's happened is that I've spent more time at Erudite. They've been really working with me, and I feel like I'm kind of going to miss them. Other than that, it's also been worse." I say the last part quietly, and look down at my shoes.
It's quiet for a minute, and I can feel him staring at me.
"I'm sorry." He says quietly, crossing his arms over his chest.
"No, I don't want you to be. Obviously you made the right choice coming here, and I want you to live a happy life." I turn to look at him. "I'm proud of who you've become."
He stares at me for a second before hugging me again. I wrap my arms around his neck, and pull him close. "I love you, Tobias."
"Love you too, Cryssy." He says back. I smack him playfully on the back of the head. He chuckles lightly. Ever since I was little I've hated that nickname.
"Um, uh... Crystal?" I hear Tris behind us.
I pull myself away from Four, and turn to face her. She's standing awkwardly in the doorway, looking anywhere but at us.
I chuckle softly. "Yeah, Tris?"
"Do you want to get changed? We were going to head down to the dining hall in a couple of minutes..." She says, looking between Four and I.
"Uh, yeah, sure. Oh! Tris, this is To-" I go to introduce him, but he squeezes my side a little. I turn to him, puzzled.
"Don't tell anyone my real name. That's a part of my life I want to leave behind. You can tell them we're siblings, but just not my real name, ok?" He whispers. I nod, and then decide against what I was going to say.
"This is Four. You already know him. Tris, can you keep a secret?" I ask, and she hesitates before nodding. I urge her closer, and once she's right in front of us is when I lean in close to her ear.
"Please don't tell anybody. But, Four is my brother." I whisper, and then pull back to see her face shocked.
"Oh... I wasn't expecting that. I thought-"
"What? That we were together?"Tobias inserts, smirking at me. I roll my eyes an softly elbow him in the stomach.
His hard stomach. "Holy shit, Four, what happened to you?" I ask, staring in awe at his stomach as I poke it with my finger.
He chuckles softly. "It'll happen to you too before the end of initiation. Speaking of which: I can't tell you guys what is going to happen. It's against the rules. Dauntless may not have a lot of them, but the ones we do have we listen to. Be careful, and be smart." And with that, he nods at Tris and pats my arm before heading on his way.
"I wonder what he meant." She says out loud, her voice trailing off.
I shake it off, and turn to her. I place a knowing look on my face. "I saw that."
She looks startled. "Saw what?"
"That. The look. You're into my brother."
She blanches. She seems afraid for some reason, and I laugh quietly. "Here, let's go get changed. I'm hungry anyways."
As we walk back into the room, I see it's almost full. There's about 20 beds in total, but they're more like cots with sheets than anything. Tris walks over to what I assume is hers, and sits on the edge where she starts lacing up a pair of boots. It's then I notice she's no longer wearing the Abnegation clothing.
"Tris, you look really good." I tell her once I've changed into my own official Dauntless clothing.
She smiles. "Thanks. You do too. Black is a good color on you. This is your bed by the way." She says, and tilts her head in the direction of the bed beside her. Christina and Will are on her other side.
"Whose bed-" I begin to say, but am cut off.
"It's mine. Hi. My name is Al." The guy from the roof introduces himself. He's even taller in person.
"Oh, uh, hi. My name is-"
"Crystal. Yeah. You're kind of the buzz around here. Only our first day and you're already famous!" He says, and sits down on his bed. He's wearing the black shirt and a pair of black jeans.
I begin messing with my hair, pulling it up into a high pony tail. "Yeah, why is that?"
"You're the first jumper. According to the Dauntless born that's a major thing here. It's basically a prediction of who the bravest is. It certainly won't be me, that's for sure!"
I frown. "Why not? I didn't think I would get a title or anything, I just didn't like that Eric guy singling people out." I tug on my hair, making sure it's nice and tight. Even in a pony tail, it goes down to my shoulder blades.
"Well, either way, until something else happens to someone else, you're the cats meow around here."
Christina chokes. Tris and I turn to her, shocked. Will walks over to her quickly and pats her on the back. "Are you ok?" He asks worriedly.
Once she gets herself under control, she starts laughing. This just makes me even more confused. "What?"
"Did you really just say, 'cats meow'? Who even says that anymore?" She gets out, and then starts laughing again.
I scoff, and then turn back to Al. He's blushing a little bit. "C'mon. I'm hungry." I state, and then follow the rest of them of the small room into the hallway.
A couple of minutes later, we reach the dining hall. It's massive. There are multiple tables throughout the room, and a large corner was full of counters lined with food. I guess it's basically a buffet here everyday.
Since it's past 6 o'clock, it must be dinner time. We walk over to the food and grab trays, where I put some grapes, a banana, and something brown with bread covering it on my plate. The others get their food, and I look around for a table.
I see Four sitting on the end of a table. The space across from him is completely empty, and there's an empty seat beside him. The only problem is that Eric is on the other side of the empty seat, and the leaders are beside him.
I take a deep breath, and start walking. I place my tray beside Four, and slip into the seat. He glances at me from the corner of his eye, and smirks. I raise an eyebrow at him.
Tris, Christina, Will and Al sit on the opposite end if the table, with Al across from me and Tris across from Four.
"So, how do you like your new room?" Four asks me, taking a sip of his drink.
"It's fine. Tris got me a good bed, and Al is beside me." I reply. Tris pops a strawberry into her mouth and looks down at her tray.
Four raises an eyebrow. "Al?"
Al nods his head at Four. "I'm Al. Nice to actually say something to you, considering I saw you earlier but didn't say anything."
Four hums in response, and takes a bite of his cheese sandwich.
I look down at my tray. I gingerly reach my hands out and pick up the brown, bread wrapped object. "What is this?"
"It's a hamburger. Didn't you have those in Abnegation?" Will asks. He takes a bite of his.
"No. It's beef?" I ask. He nods.
"Don't worry. It won't kill you. It's actually pretty good." Four whispers in my ear.
I look up and see Tris has one too. She's staring at me, urging me to try it and tell her if it's safe or not. I let out a sigh.
"Together?" I ask her.
"Together." She says back, and with that her and I take a bite of the hamburger.
It's not that bad. The beef is juicy and the bread isn't dried out. "This is good."
I hear a snort from beside me. I turn to look at Eric, who is smirking at his own food.
I swallow the burger, and then put the rest down on my tray. "I'm sorry, is something I'm doing amusing you?" I ask him, raising an eyebrow. I feel four knock his knee against mine.
Eric raises his head and straightens his shoulders. He looms over me, which is kind of intimidating me right now. "What was that, initiate?"
I didn't back down. Though, inside I was terrified. "I said, is something I'm doing amusing you?"
He seemed impressed, and then it was gone from his face, once again. I've noticed he doesn't like showing emotion. He turned back to his food. "That was your first time eating a burger, right? Your reaction was interesting, that's all." And with that, he turns back to the leaders and continues eating.
"That was weird." Al whispers to Christina, and she nods.
We finish eating in silence, and when we are done, we spend some time getting to know each other better. Christina and Will actually have a lot in common. I'm predicting that they're going to get together.
Al is actually a nice guy, and we get along with him nicely. Four doesn't say anything the entire time.
I turn my body slightly to face him. "So... Anything exciting happen to you in two years?"
The group goes quiet, waiting for his response. He tenses up, and looks at me. "I'd rather not talk about that stuff in public."
I can tell that has created an awkward feeling between him and the others. "Oh. Ok." I tell him, turning back to my food and picking up my banana.
"Uh, what about you? We don't really know a lot about you and Tris, actually." Will speaks up, breaking the tension.
Tris swallows her food. "There's not a lot to know about me. Crystal and I became close friends a couple of years ago, and my father is on the leader board for Abnegation. You know how we were raised; it's how everyone was raised." She finishes. Al nods his head, and Christina rests her head on her hand.
"So, nothing exciting happened, like, ever?" Christina asks.
"Well, not exactly." I say, and put the peeled banana back down on the tray. "I mean, it wasn't exciting, but it was definitely out of the ordinary for the usual Abnegation person."
"Like what?"
"Well... Um..." I trail off. I wasn't sure if I wanted them to know. It had been a thing that was special between Tobias and I. He was the first to know and encourage me about it, and then when he left, I showed Tris. She took his place, and I feel like it was our special little secret.
"C'mon, tell us!" Al urges. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Eric lean a little closer to me, probably to hear better.
Tris looks at me and smiles. "Go ahead." She says, and I smile back.
"Well, my dad..." I pause. Marcus. It causes me to tense up, and underneath the table I feel Tobias place his hand on my knee, reassuring me. I take a beath, and continue. "My dad was big in Abnegation. He would have the, uh, privilege of traveling to other factions, and, nine times out of ten, he would take another Abnegation citizen with him to also represent the faction. Um," I pause, my eyes flicking over in Tobias's direction, "most of the time I would go with him, or he would have my other family member go with him."
"So? What's exciting about that? I've done that before." Will says, placing his elbows on the table.
"Well, if you'll let me finish you'll find out what I did at the other factions."
They were all quiet. Even Eric had turned his head slightly in my direction.
"So, as I said, I would go with him to other factions. My favorite one, though, was Erudite." Will smiles at that. "Erudite people were interested in me, and as you know, they're known for their thirst of knowledge. Well, the first time I went to Erudite, I had been 12. I don't know why, but for some reason I had this song stuck in my head and had been humming it. Little did my dad know, but while he was in meetings with Erudite, and I was left in the waiting room, a group of people would come and ask me to sing for them. They were testing the different vibrations of the human female voice."
"Wait, you sing?" Christina asks, raising her eyebrows. Eric scoffs beside me.
I clench my jaw, and turn my head towards Tobias. He looks unamused, but his face says 'I can't do anything about it'.
"Yeah. Well, it's been a while. The last time I sang for Erudite was almost 2 months ago. That was when my dad found out and-" I stop. No way could I forget that night, and just thinking about it was terrible.
"And what?" Will asks, his curiosity getting the best if him.
"And, I don't like to talk about it." I finish, and take a bite of my banana. Tobias squeezes my knee before removing his hand.
"Oh. Ok. Well, then, will you sing for us?"
I almost choke. I swallow the banana, and look at Will. "Are you serious? No, sorry, but no. I quit singing a while ago."
He looks disappointed, and I really am sorry, but I'm done singing. I decided that after that night, 2 months ago.
"Alright, well, I'm done eating. I think I'm just going to head on back to the room, an get some sleep. Who knows when we have to get up in the morning." I say, and stand up with my tray.
Tris and Tobias stand up as well, and I'm surprised when Eric does as well. I walk over to the dispenser, and dump my food before placing the tray on the dirty dishes pile. Before I'm five feet away, Eric is beside me.
"8 o'clock." He says to me, and then walks ahead.
I stop walking, confused. 8 o'clock? What does that-
Oh. He just told me what time we have to get up tomorrow. Well, I wasn't expecting that.
Maybe he's not such a douche after all.