Chapter 7
—Tris
I sigh, sitting back into the wheelchair with the help of my nurse Julie and my physical therapist.
I was able to stand today without falling over.
It sounds like such a small thing, but I truly am so astounded and proud of myself.
Julie wheels me back to my room and has another nurse and herself help me back into my bed in the room.
My shaking limbs feel like jello as I wrap myself back in blankets.
I hate being constantly cold.
Just as I get comfortable, there's a confident knock on the door. Cara comes in, greeting me with a hug.
She's been visiting me as much as she can in her spare time. It's easier since I'm no longer in the ICU, and she works just two floors below me in the emergency room.
"I can't believe Bea is starting school already this year!" I remark, hugging my right knee to my chest as I chat with her.
Bea has been in a smaller Erudite school for two years now, but once children reach seven to eight years old the factions integrate all into one school with levels for their age group.
"I know! Ugh I feel old," she laughs and I smile. I roll my left ankle around, wiggling my toes to stretch.
Almost every day physical therapists have been coming in my room to help me with exercises with my leg to get it moving, and soon I should be standing again.
"Christina is suppose to have her baby any day now. She's over a week past due now," she comments and I am shocked.
"She hasn't had it yet?"
"I guess she's getting induced Tuesday unless she goes into labor before then."
I sigh, knowing the feeling of just wanting to hold your baby and no longer wanting to be pregnant.
I hope she goes into labor soon.
I wish I was able to be there with her too.
"She really hasn't been acting right, Tris. Like, I know it's not the pregnancy, and everyone keeps blaming her moods on the pregnancy."
I nod, remembering how even before she was pregnant she started treating me foully. It really goes back to after her wedding, and just after Thomas was born. Yes, she's always been able to get mad at me and be jealous, but this is different.
"She keeps saying the rudest things, then days to a week later she begs for forgiveness, then says something absurd again. It's like a constant cycle," Cara continues. "This isn't Christina. I'm really worried, Tris."
"Me too."
Cara and I know her inside and out. Will does too, but he is blinded by the fact that she is pregnant, and he thinks the pregnancy has caused her miscellaneous outrages.
It's been happening much longer than the duration of her pregnancy.
The Chris I know would get mad, but the current Chris had no question towards attacking me at visiting week, or saying rash things to her sister about the pregnancy Rose had no say in.
"I'm thinking she really could have bipolar depression or something. The fact that it's just getting worse, well, I don't know." I see the gears turning in Cara's head as she speaks. She's an Erudite trying to solve an unsolvable puzzle, and everyone is acting like the puzzle doesn't even exist.
"The way she snaps from extreme anger to being totally sorrowful and apologizing for everything, it's just never been her." I say and she nods in agreement.
"I keep asking her to see a doctor or a psychologist, just to have it documented, but of course, she refuses. I know it doesn't help that she's pregnant, and there probably isn't much she can do until after she gives birth and is postpartum for a few months, but starting now instead of later would be best. Will just is no help because he seriously thinks it's just the pregnancy. I don't know what's gotten into his head, but I don't know how he can't see this. I'm scared, Tris."
"The Chris I once knew was just really jealous, and it would make her really angry sometimes. This literally isn't that. I don't know why she is like turning everyone into public enemy number one in her mind. This constant survival instinct and extreme jealousy are two totally different things. Yeah, the jealousy is still there, but something has changed." I say as I see Cara thinking.
A loud beep interrupts her and I's thoughts, and a little square device on her hip lights up.
"I've got to go, I'm being paged to the emergency room. I'll see you soon, okay?" She hugs me quick and I say a brief goodbye before she leaves.
I sigh, laying my head back on the pillow and lacing my shaking fingers through one of the many thick blankets on my bed.
I keep finding myself constantly torn between missing my family and not wanting my family to see me like this.
I know they don't care, but I do.
I don't like feeling like this: going through withdraw.
How is it withdraw if I never chose to start addictive narcotics anyways?
Withdraw is always seen as a negative thing. Someone chose to have an addiction, then it got so severe they were dying, and then stopping the narcotic gives them withdraw. Ultimately, withdraw is what you're signing up for when you choose to start said narcotic.
Choose.
Choice.
Personal decision.
I never had any of those.
I didn't have a decision.
It never was my choice to be tied down and have an experimented version of oxycodone forced into my nostril.
Hell, normal oxycodone can't even be administered that way. Classically it's put in a vein.
And now, I'm forced to go through withdraw, and I never even chose to sign up for taking this narcotic.
It's not fair.
I smack myself mentally, pulling my thoughts away from myself.
It's selfish to be moping at a time like this.
Seven days ago I laid with Indy while Tobias went to a meeting, and that was the last time I saw him.
Yeah, I've gone months and years without seeing him before, but these seven days have felt like years.
When he called me that next day, he seemed rushed telling me that he wasn't going to be able to visit for a few days.
He said something along the lines of a lot of meetings happening, and how he's hoping things go well with the Bureau.
For I have no other activity to do other than lay here, I came to my own conclusion that the Bureau must have answered Chicago's request to meet in person about the scenarios that caused there to constantly be Bureau troops outside our fence.
Peter Hayes is in their possession.
What more do they want from us?
I just really hope everything is okay.
I've been dying to hear news. I know the whole thing is being kept quiet, but I just need to know.
I constantly worry for my friends and family.
Whatever decision is made impacts them directly; impacts the whole city directly.
I jump when I hear my phone buzz, the vibrating sound filling the entire room. Turning my head I see that it is Shauna, and I use my shaking hand to try and grab my phone.
I bite my lip, my hand shaking badly as I try to wrap my fingers around the device.
I hope everything is okay.
Maybe she has news.
Is something wrong?
Does she just want to chat?
I get the device in my grasp for seconds before it drops to the ground.
"Shit!" I curse, throwing my head back on the bed as I listen to the buzz continue then stop from below my bed.
"How the hell am I suppose to live my life and care for my family if I can't even pick up my damn phone?" Tears of anger stream down my face.
The room is silent for a few seconds before the buzzing starts again.
How the hell can you still picture having another child if you can't even hold a phone, Tris?
How are you suppose to safely carry a child for nine months if you can't even do one simple task?
Why are you creating these impossible dreams for yourself?
"STOP!" I scream at the phone buzzing on the ground, and also at the thoughts in my head.
"Fucking stop," I sob, knowing the phone has stopped making noise.
Now I'm just talking to myself.
I clench my hands into fists, trying to slow the shaking.
It's not going to work, Tris,
It never does.
I throw my head back again, holding my shaking hands to my head as I try to slow my breathing.
Slow down, Tris. I hear Tobias in my head. Slow down.
I feel my chest shaking with my whole body as I breathe. Pinpoints of pain travel down my leg as I cover my eyes with my hands.
There's such bigger things happening in the city right now.
And here I am, having a panic attack because my hands shake so badly that I can't hold anything.
I'm not sure when I fall asleep, but at some point, I do.
I don't dream.
When I hear the door opening, I feel as if I had barely closed my eyes for a second.
I moan, moving my hand to my face and blinking.
"Hey baby," I feel lips press to my forehead as my vision slowly clears.
"Tobias?" I mean to sound excited, but instead his name comes out as a question.
"It's me, sorry I haven't been here in a while."
I press my lips to his, my hands on his cheeks as one of his hands lays on top of mine.
"Is everything okay?" I ask as he sits back into the chair. He picks up an old radio from the table next to my bed and busies himself with it while he speaks.
"The Bureau agreed to meet Mark, Josh and an amity representative to talk about removing Bureau troops from Chicago's fence. The three of them left five days ago, and we haven't heard from them since." A static sound comes from the radio as he doesn't look up when he speaks.
"Deep down I know everything is fine, and it's just that our cellular ranges don't work outside of the city, but at least a letter or message or something would've been nice. Even the person who we had drive them hadn't returned yet, and I'm just stressed about not knowing what's happening." The faint sound of music comes through the radio as he raises an eyebrow from the sound.
"Have the Bureau troops at the fence changed at all?"
"Nope. No more, no less. I don't think they even know that we sent people to the Bureau." The music comes through more clear as he becomes satisfied and sets it back down on the table.
He laces his fingers in mine, pressing his lips gently to my hand. I raise my eyebrows at him, causing him to lightly laugh.
"I've missed you. I promise I'll bring Thomas with me as soon as I can. If I wasn't just at a meeting in Erudite, I would've brought him today."
I nod, focusing on our laced hands and how his thumb brushes over the back of my shaking hand.
I roll my ankles, my muscles getting painfully stiff.
"Can you help me up?" I ask him. He knows I've been doing physical therapy, but he hasn't actually witnessed me standing since I've been in the hospital.
I really just need to move because of how stiff my muscles are.
"Of course," he says, standing and moving the blankets off of me.
"When do you get the stitches removed?" He asks when seeing my unwrapped leg.
"I think tomorrow."
He nods and a new song begins to play in the background from the old radio.
I swing my legs over the bed slowly, then grip his forearms for support. He helps me pull myself up as I hold onto him for dear life.
I find my balance, relaxing slightly as I move my hands to his chest.
"You're a pro at this, huh," he chuckles, still holding me tightly in caution.
"I wouldn't call myself a pro. Naturally being this unbalanced does take some kind of skill though," I feel his grip loosen slowly as he realizes I'm not going to fall.
He smiles, pressing his lips to my head as we slowly sway to the music playing.
I smile at our closeness, missing his touch and his comfort. His hands loosely wrap around my waist as mine lace behind his neck. I am so much shorter than him that my arms barely reach.
The music is soft in the background as we sway just off the rhythm, not having a care in the world.
Him and I have always been good at staying strong, no matter what life throws at us.
We never will loose each other.
I am his, and he is mine, and it has been that way all along.
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Hey you! Thanks for reading!
Real quick causal authors note. I've had this chapter in mind for a long time, and each time I've thought of it I've always heard the song in the background be For Now by P!nk. I didn't include the lyrics because 1. I'm not that author that does that, and 2. It's not really like a Fourtris song and the lyrics don't really match their current relationship, and 3. You can imagine it to be any song you would like, that's the fun of reading. I ain't gonna tell you what song it is, but this is what I heard it as while writing (((:
Okay, see you next Friday!
All the love,
Kat