Dauntless

Chapter 19

I woke up the next morning before anyone else, I got dressed then went downstairs to breakfast. Only a couple of others were awake, mostly transfers kept awake by the knowledge of their parents being absent on visiting day.
I rubbed my eyes, would Michelle turn up today? Probably not, she's amity, and as much as they say they're friends with all the factions, they definitely don't approve of dauntless.
I sat down with my hot chocolate and my muffin, and started eating. Then someone sat down next to me.
"Joe!" I said, and I smiled at him.
"Good morning! Sleep well?" He asked. Setting his food down next to mine.
I sighed,
"Yep, but I got cold. So I woke up early." I lied. The truth was, I couldn't stop thinking about what had happened with Rico.
"Cold?" Joe raised his eyebrows.
"My covers fell off during the night."
Joe snorted, and carried on eating.
"Why are you up? Or is it just coz of visiting day." I asked.
"Nah! I wake up this early every morning now." He replied. "Workout!" He said, flexing his muscles. I laughed at him. He was muscly, but he'd only been working out for about a week, so they were hardly anything special.
"What!! Compared to before, I'm fit!!" He exclaimed.
"You are so in denial!" I laughed.
I stopped when something caught my eye behind Joe's shoulder.
It was Rico. He walked away down a corridor, he didn't look over.
"Zoe?" I turned back to Joe.
"What?" I asked.
"Do you want your muffin?" I guess he'd had to repeat that.
In reply I stuffed the remainder of the muffin into my mouth. I chewed it slowly and swallowed it, Joe was just watching. I swallowed it all and gave a sigh of satisfaction.
"Sorry, what did you want?" I asked, smirking.
Joe glared at me.
"I hate you." He replied, then he got up to get himself another muffin.

+++

"Zoe!" I heard a call behind me. "Zoe!" I turned around.
"Mum! Dad!" I ran towards them and hugged them immediately.
"Oh I have missed you so much!" My mum said into my shoulder.
"I've missed you too." I replied. We pulled away.
"So!" My dad clapped a hand on my shoulder, and I felt strangely uncomfortable with it there.
"How's my little fighter? Were you top of the ranking?" He asked.
"No, Zack was first, I got third place."
I looked up at him, and my heart beat quickened at what his reaction might be. But I never found out.
"Hello, you must be Zoe's parents?" I looked around, Rico was standing beside me, shaking my dad's hand.
"Yes, hello! Are you Zoe's instructor?" My mum asked, shaking his hand.
"Yeah, my name's Rico." He replied
Butterflies erupted in my stomach, my parents were meeting Rico, what would they think of him? What would he think of them?
"Zoe is excellent, she tries very hard and is almost perfect at every subject we have trained for. The only reason she came their was because Zack and Ella showed more precision in gun shooting." Rico explained.
I was grateful that he didn't mention the incident with Mino.
But as always, my father found the weak spot.
"What do you mean by almost perfect?" He questioned.
"Well, it's nearly impossible to be perfect at everything, Zoe is doing extremely well to be at her level." My throat expanded with gratitude, and I felt Rico's hand slide unnoticed onto the small of my back.
But my dad wasn't finished.
"She can't shoot a gun? Why not? Zoe-"
"Christian!" My mother scolded. Usually my dad was called Chris, so this change got his attention immediately.
My mother gave him a warning look. To ease the tension, Rico continued,
"Zoe is exceptional at knife throwing though."
"Is she?" My mother asked, an impressed look on her face. "Where did you learn to do that?" She joked.
I laughed.
"Throwing darts at the pictures of my enemies."
My mother laughed at me and even Rico and my dad managed a chortle.

+++

My parents left early in the evening, and I walked with Rico around the compound, not sure where we were going.
"Your parents are nice." He said. I laughed lightly.
"Thanks. My mother, yes. My father," I paused, "my father is the typical dauntless man."
Rico nodded, everyone knew what that meant. It meant proud, brave, strong, not held back by the bonds of family, always having the pressure of wanting to do him proud.
"My father was like that as well." Rico said.
"Most dauntless dads are."
"Yeah. It's sad though. Because most dauntless families are really close, they joke they laugh. But then there's the scary, strict father. If I ever have kids, I want to be a good dad."
"Yeah, me too." Pause. "I mean not a dad obviously." Rico burst out laughing, it was hearty laugh, a good one, one that I hadn't heard before. And it was contagious, so almost immediately after, I cracked up and we were rolling around on the floor with each other.
When we had calmed down, Rico looked at me, then suddenly he lifted me up and slammed me against the wall. His lips crashing onto mine.
It was an empty corridor, so we were free.
I wrapped my legs around his waist and tangled my fingers in his short hair. The kiss was passionate, unlike our first kiss in the infirmary, this one was needy, like we were pouring our life and soul into each other.
His lips trailed across my jaw line and I looked up at the ceiling, drawing in a breath. He pressed his lips to my collar bone and he lifted me away from the wall.
Without taking his lips away from my skin, he opened a door on the opposite side of the corridor and we entered. It was his bedroom.
It was cosy but dark, a double bed in the centre, and few personal belongings.
He dumped me down on his bed and jumped on as well so that he was on top of me. He pulled off his t-shirt and I ran my fingers along every tattoo he had. The dauntless fire leaping up his rib cage. Patterns and pictures that I didn't have time to work out what they were.
He pulled off my top and gently grazed my stomach with his lips.
I shivered, I was in pure heaven.