Truth (a Divergent Fanfic)

Epilogue

Hey guys, so I know I said I was done with this book and these characters but you were asking for an epilogue with Julian in it, so... here it is!

Hope you like it, and sorry for the wait,

Rae x 

*****

“It felt so sweet, it felt so strong,

It made me feel like I belonged,

And all the sadness inside me,

Melted away like I was free,

I found what I'd been looking for in myself,

Found a life worth living for someone else,

Never thought that I could be, I could be, happy.” ~ Happy, Marina and the Diamonds

*****

That was six years ago. There have been quite a few changes to our lives during this time, but Callie and I have stuck together through anything. I guess when you’ve been through that much with someone already, you form a bond that’s impossible to break. In any case, ours is.

Julian is five and three months and the sweetest kid anyone could wish for. He looks a lot like me and nothing at all like my attacker, and for that I am eternally grateful - I’m not quite sure I could love a child that had the face of my nightmares. He has my eyes and my hair and Callie’s sunny disposition. She loves him to bits, just as I do. 

Around his neck, he wears a locket. Inside it is the photo that Callie found of his namesake, the smiling job interview Julian, ready to make a change. We thought that he should wear it, instead of deciding which one of us should. Hopefully, it and the stories we will tell him of our old friend will help our child to become a good man.

I sit at the side of a stream, dangling my feet in and letting the cold, fresh water sparkle over them. It’s refreshing and it tickles and I laugh. Julian, sitting across the brook from me, laughs also. I can hear his delighted squeal as Callie picks him up and perches him on her shoulders, straddling her neck. She runs about with him and I can hear him shouting, laughing - he is happy, I think.

After Julian was born, we had to move away from the city for political reasons. We’ve joined a small village of outcasts and retired rebels to the west of the big cities and organisations. It’s quiet, but that’s okay. It’s peaceful, and although not much happens, that’s okay too; I think I’ve had enough drama in my life. It’s nice to just be with the girl I love and our child. It’s nice to be able to relax.

A girl with bedraggled blonde hair and smudges of dirt across her cheek pokes her head out from behind the trees. “You seen Jules?” she asks, her voice clear and her words more articulate than you would expect from a six year old. That’s Alice, our next-door neighbour. She’s Jules’s best friend and they’re practically attached at the hip. I’m glad. I would give up everything to make sure Julian has a happy childhood, and never experiences even half of the pain I had to.

I point her in the right direction and she runs off playfully, only stopping to show me the frog in her hands, which is no doubt what she is going to show him.

Callie comes back out of the woods, and dips her hands down into the water to splash it up at me. I shriek, and stand up indignantly, but I fall. Now I’m waist deep in the sparkling clear water, and boy is it freezing. I flap my arms, squealing, and Callie - that pig - just stands there laughing, her hands folded across her chest. So I reach up and pull her down. She tumbles in towards me, screaming just as I did. As she falls, the splash she creates makes me even wetter, so that now I’m soaked from head to toe.

I shiver and try in vain to wring some of the water out of my hair, but shake it out when I realise it’s futile. Callie comes closer and presses her forehead to mine. My breath still hitches - even after all this time, I still can’t quite believe she chose me. She brushes a straggled strand of wet hair from my face, tucking it behind my ear. And then I kiss her. And she isn’t expecting it, so she stumbles backwards and falls again, this time with me on top of her. Through the crystal clear water, I can see her perfectly. It took me a while to learn how to open my eyes underwater, but I can say now, looking at Callie, with her frizzy tangle of hair floating celestially around her face that the time and the pain was completely worth it. I kiss her again through the water, and it’s as heavenly as she is. The bubbles of her breath tickle me as I draw back and I have to rise to the surface because it’s making me laugh.

As she too breaks through the surface, we’re both drenched and laughing. She takes my hand in hers and raises it to her mouth. I link our other hands, and our rings clink. They’re a matching woven silver, a tradition in our new home, a gift from each of us to the other. And they’re beautiful. 

  

Zero of our magic has been lost - and I doubt it ever will be. I love her and she loves me, and that’s enough for the both of us.