Sacrifice

Chapter Nineteen

Showers. The Gladers actually got to take showers. Many of them cheered as the hot water hit their bodies. In the Glade they would normally scrub themselves down with water and the soap that was provided for them in the Box, but they never had a place to take a real bath. This was the first time any of them had been properly clean in a long time. 

Claire and Teresa were taken to a separate bathroom where they could get clean. Once they were done they saw that fresh clothes had been laid out for them. Claire put on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved blue shirt. 

"Okay, spill it," Teresa said to Claire once she put her black shirt on. 

"Spill what?" 

"Don't think I didn't see you and Newt cuddling earlier." 

"Oh...that." Claire felt her face getting hot. 

"I mean, I sort of figured something was going on between you two." 

"How?" Claire asked. 

"Oh please, anyone can see the way he looks at you with those big puppy dog eyes," Teresa said. "And you're feelings are written all over your face." 

"They are not," Claire denied. 

"Whatever you say," Teresa teased. "But tell me when did things..progress." 

"Progress?" 

"I'm just saying, you two were barely holding hands two days ago." 

"Well, if you must know, when you and Thomas were in the Pit and we were getting ready to leave the Maze, I had a moment alone with Newt and...we kind of kissed." 

"What does 'kind of' mean?" Teresa asked. 

"As in mouth to mouth." 

Teresa gave her friend a mischievous grin. 

"What, like you don't want to do the same to Thomas?" Claire said, turning the tables. 

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," Teresa said, blushing. 

"Oh come on, it's obvious." 

Both girls were laughing by the time a woman came to collect them. They were taken to a long room where medical supplies and examining chairs were set up. The boys were already there waiting for them. Teresa was put in a seat with open curtains around it. Claire was a few seats away with Newt directly across from her. 

"What is that?" Newt asked his doctor, who was preparing a needle with some kind of medicine to inject Newt with. 

"Protein, potassium, vitamins, pretty much everything you've been deprived of out there," the doctor answered. "Just try to relax." 

Newt glanced at Claire, she gave him a small smile that instantly relaxed him faster than any drug ever could. For some reason, he could't stop looking at her hair. In the Glade she almost always kept it tied back, now it was down and her blonde curls reached down a few inches past her shoulders. He had forgotten how beautiful her hair really was. 

Then a woman in a lab coat walked by them. 

"Good evening, Dr. Crawford," the man examining Thomas greeted. 

"Good evening, how are the new arrivals holding up?" 

"Everything looks good." 

"Wonderful," Dr. Crawford said before turning to Teresa. "You must be Teresa." 

A man approached Thomas and tells him to come with him. As Thomas walked out of the room, he looked back and saw Dr. Crawford draw the curtains, blocking Teresa from view.