I laugh. Zeke just led us into another small moment of rebellion, probably without meaning to.
“How did you find this place?” Shauna says with obvious wonder as she jumps down onto one of the lower rocks. Now that I’m here, I see a path that would carry us up and across the wall, if we wanted to walk to the other side of the chasm.
“That girl Maria,” Zeke says. “Her mom works in chasm maintenance. I didn’t know there was such a thing, but apparently there is.”
“You still seeing her?” Shauna asks, trying to be casual.
“Nah,” Zeke says. “Every time I was with her I just kept getting the itch to be with friends instead. That’s not a good sign, right?”
“No,” Shauna agrees, and she seems more cheerful than before.
I lower myself more carefully onto the rock Shauna is standing on. Zeke sits next to her, opening his bottle and passing it around.
“I heard you’re out of the running,” Zeke says when he passes it to me. “Thought you might need a drink.”
“Yeah,” I say, and then I take a swig.
“Consider this act of public drunkenness a big—” He makes an obscene gesture toward the glass ceiling above the Pit. “You know, to Max and Eric.”
And Evelyn, I think, as I take another swallow.
“I’ll be working in the control room when I’m not training initiates,” I say.
“Awesome,” Zeke says. “It’ll be good to have a friend in there. Right now no one talks to me.”
“Sounds like me in my old faction,” I say with a laugh. “Imagine an entire lunch period in which no one even looks at you.”
“Ouch,” Zeke says. “Well, I bet you’re glad to be here now, then.”
I take the bottle from him again, drink another mouthful of stinging, burning alcohol, and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. “Yeah,” I say. “I am.”
If the factions are deteriorating, as my mother would have me believe, this is not a bad place to watch them fall apart. At least here I have friends to keep me company while it happens.
+++
It’s just after dark, and I have my hood up to hide my face as I run through the factionless area of the city, right by the border it shares with the Abnegation sector. I had to go to the school to get my bearings, but now I remember where I am, and where I ran, that day that I barged into a factionless warehouse in search of a dying ember.
I reach the door I walked through when I exited, and tap on it with my first knuckle. I can hear voices just beyond it and smell food coming from one of the open windows, where smoke from the fire within is leaking into the alley. Footsteps, as someone comes to see what the knocking is about.
This time the man is wearing a red Amity shirt and black Dauntless pants. He still has a towel tucked into his back pocket, the same as the last time I spoke to him. He opens the door just enough to look at me, and no farther.
“Well, look who made a change,” he said, eyeing my Dauntless clothes. “To what do I owe this visit? Did you miss my charming company?”
“You knew my mother was alive when you met me,” I say. “That’s how you recognized me, because you’ve spent time with her. That’s how you knew what she said about inertia carrying her to Abnegation.”
“Yeah,” the man said. “Didn’t think it was my business to be the one to tell you she was still alive. You here to demand an apology, or something?”
“No,” I say. “I’m here to hand off a message. You’ll give it to her?”
“Yeah, sure. I’ll be seeing her in the next couple days.”
I reach into my pocket and take out a folded piece of paper. I offer it to him.
“Go ahead and read it, I don’t care,” I say. “And thanks.”
“No problem,” he says. “Want to come in? You’re starting to seem more like one of us than one of them, Eaton.”
I shake my head.
I make my way back down the alley, and before I turn the corner, I see him opening up the note to read what it says.
Evelyn,
Someday. Not yet.
—4
r />
P.S. I’m glad you’re not dead.
ANOTHER YEAR, ANOTHER Visiting Day.
Two years ago, when I was an initiate, I pretended my own Visiting Day didn’t exist, holed up in the training room with a punching bag. I was there for so long that I smelled the dust-sweat for days afterward. Last year, the first year I taught initiates, I did the same thing, though Zeke and Shauna both invited me to spend the day with their families instead.
This year I have more important things to do than punch a bag and mope about my family dysfunction. I’m going to the control room.
I walk through the Pit, dodging tearful reunions and shrieks of laughter. Families can always come together on Visiting Day, even if they’re from different factions, but over time, they usually stop coming. “Faction before blood,” after all. Most of the mixed clothing I see belongs to transfer families: Will’s Erudite sister is dressed in light blue, Peter’s Candor parents are in black and white. For a moment I watch his parents, and wonder if they made him into the person he is. But most of the time, people aren’t that easy to explain, I guess.
I’m supposed to be on a mission, but I pause next to the chasm, pressing into the railing. Bits of paper float in the water. Now that I know where the steps cut into the stone in the opposite wall are, I can see them right away, and the hidden doorway that leads to them. I smile a little, thinking of the nights I’ve spent on those rocks with Zeke or Shauna, sometimes talking and sometimes just sitting and listening to the water move.
I hear footsteps approaching, and look over my shoulder. Tris is walking toward me, tucked under the gray-clad arm of an Abnegation woman. Natalie Prior. I stiffen, suddenly desperate to escape—what if Natalie knows who I am, where I came from? What if she lets it slip, here, surrounded by all these people?
She can’t possibly recognize me. I don’t look anything like the boy she knew, lanky and slouched and buried in fabric.
When she’s close enough, she extends her hand. “Hello, my name is Natalie. I’m Beatrice’s mother.”
Beatrice. That name is so wrong for her.
I clasp Natalie’s hand and shake it. I’ve never been fond of Dauntless hand-shaking. It’s too unpredictable—you never know how tightly to squeeze, how many times to shake.
“Four,” I say. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Four,” Natalie says, and she smiles. “Is that a nickname?”
“Yes,” I say. I change the subject. “Your daughter is doing well here. I’ve been overseeing her training.”
“That’s good to hear,” she says. “I know a few things about Dauntless initiation, and I was worried about her.”
I glance at Tris. There’s color in her cheeks—she looks happy, like seeing her mother is doing her some good. For the first time I fully appreciate how much she’s changed since I first saw her, tumbling onto the wooden platform, fragile-looking, like the impact with the net should have shattered her. She doesn’t look fragile anymore, with the shadows of bruises on her face and a new stability in the way she stands, like she’s ready for anything.
“You shouldn’t worry,” I say to Natalie.
Tris looks away. I think she’s still angry with me for the way I nicked her ear with that knife. I guess I don’t really blame her.
“You look familiar for some reason, Four,” Natalie says. I would think her comment was lighthearted if not for the way she’s looking at me, like she’s pinning me down.
“I can’t imagine why,” I say, as coldly as I can manage. “I don’t make a habit of associating with the Abnegation.”
She doesn’t react the way I expect her to, with surprise or fear or anger. She just laughs. “Few people do, these days. I don’t take it personally.”
If she does recognize me, she doesn’t seem eager to say so. I try to relax.
“Well, I’ll leave you to your reunion,” I say.
+++
On my screen, the security footage switches from the lobby of the Pire to the hole hemmed in by four buildings, the initiate entrance to Dauntless. A crowd is gathered around the hole, climbing in and out of it, I assume to test the net.
“Not into Visiting Day?” My supervisor, Gus, stands at my shoulder, sipping from a mug of coffee. He’s not that old, but there’s a bald spot at the crown of his head. He keeps the rest of his hair short, even shorter than mine. His earlobes are stretched around wide discs. “I didn’t think I’d see you again until initiation was over.”
“Figured I might as well do something productive.”
On my screen, everyone crawls out of the hole and stands aside, their backs against one of the buildings. A dark figure inches toward the edge of the roof high above the hole, runs a few steps, and jumps off. My stomach drops like I’m the one falling, and the figure disappears beneath the pavement. I’ll never get used to seeing that.
“They seem to be having a good time,” Gus says, sipping his coffee again. “Well, you’re always welcome to work when you’re not scheduled to, but it’s not a crime to go have some mindless fun, Four.”