Rediscovered Love

Chapter 8

Karen's POV

I awake to my cell door being left wide open. Surely Jeanine wouldn't have left it that way? I start towards the doorway and poke my head out. There isn't even one guard down this corridor. My stomach churns with nervousness. I head towards Jeanine's office. Hopefully I can find her there, and she'll be able to explain this. Sure, it would be nice to not have guards around, but it is abnormal.

In a few minutes and after many flights of stairs, I reach Jeanine's office. The silvery door is closed. I see a matted face with dirty blond hair look back at me. We both glance down. I gaze at the doorknob, and my reflection looks at my hand as it nears the door. The knob spreads an icy coldness through my palm as my fingers wrap around the doorknob like a boa constrictor. No one has touched this knob in a while. Still, I turn it only to have it reveal a nightmare.

Right in front of me sits Jeanine. She's perched on her desk, as she always does out of habit. But sitting on her is Elizabeth. The two of them are embraced in one another. Their lips even hug in a violent frenzy, and they don't seem to notice my presence in any way.

I can't think. How could Jeanine claim to love me, only to turn around and show the opposite? An invisible tennis ball jams itself in my throat, turning my cries into ugly chokes. This is all just a process of love and hate, of hate and love. And it's only an ever-changing pattern.

I should learn to follow neither. Perhaps that would make everything better. Maybe that would truly resolve our problems. I need to learn to let go, because it's been five years and Jeanine has changed as much as I. She doesn't even love me anymore. I wonder whether she ever did. Or if it was all an act of manipulation.

My heart drums faster and faster with every thought as I panic more and more. Elizabeth and Jeanine are still in their fiasco. My head throbs.

Then everything stops.

I sit up to darkness. The lights of my cell are off. It must be the middle of the night- curfew hours. I'm still in my cell. The door is closed. There must be at least one guard outside. I'm shrouded in my blanket; not in Jeanine's office. She's nowhere near, and neither is Elizabeth.

~~~~~

I stay awake through the rest of the night. My mind wanders as thoughts and questions pour in. It never occurred to me that Jeanine actually might be cheating. What if this is all an act? It wouldn't explain her sacrifices in taking care of me. I squeeze my eyelids together as hard as I can. Why do problems from the past need to come back?

"Why are you so frustrated?" A silky voice asks. Jeanine. I never even noticed how the door in front of me opened-- how she slipped in. I open my eyes. Light greets me, along with a few dark blotches. Within time Jeanine's figure becomes more defined, a dark blue wrapping her beautiful curves. She bends over with pursed lips, brushing a strand of hair away from my eye.

"I'm fine," I say in response to her question earlier.

"What were you thinking about?"

I take a quick breath. "Nothing." Jeanine's brows furrow, ever so slightly. Her distant, happy eyes are now more focused. Why did I have to say that?

"Karen, I want us to be together; I am not cheating on you!" Jeanine says looking straight into me.

"It's been five years..." I look away. "...I don't know what I was thinking."

A long silence follows. I glance at Jeanine as she stares back, with something between realization and curiosity plastered on her face. "Did you pursue a relationship with any of the factionless?"

"Well I couldn't if I was too busy thinking of you." I bite my lip. Jeanine smirks. If I had to love anything at all, it would be you." Her hands find mine and their simple touch lifts me up like a sprouting daffodil. Jeanine holds my palms with hers. They're soft and cold unlike mine, which must be rough.

"Do you not love your faction?"

Jeanine chuckles, "Of course. I love our faction."

"So why exactly are you here?" I ask. Jeanine's smile fades. I know this is about work when coldness replaces it. Her eyes are the ones that are avoidant now. She gulps, then averts her gaze from the ground and at me.

"I don't want to use you, so I came to ask about the boy you tried to escape with." Jeanine's hands rise to my shoulders, and press at them with eagerness. "Is he a divergent?" Her eyes search mine for an answer.

"I- I don't know. We never discussed it." Then it occurs to me. She wants to use him. I imagine an insane Jake, with a brain too mangled to function. He lashes out at everything near him in an anger. Dauntless guards beat him daily. Or he's calm. Almost too serene to the point where his prefrontal cortex is too damaged, and he cannot make any decisions for himself. That Jake might as well be a wall. I can't let either become a reality for my friend.

"Please don't use Jake, Jeanine." I hold her. I'm afraid she'll slip away without understanding me and in frustration use him anyway. That will probably happen. Instead, scorn flashes across her face. It's barely noticeable, like her smiles in public, but it was there. Now annoyance replaces it.

"If he tests positive-- I don't want to use the one I love most," Jeanine says with one last hug. Soon I feel her slip away. No. This can't be how this meeting ends. I have to advocate for my friend. I still owe him.

"Wait. What are you working on now? Do you really have to go through with this Jeanine?" I whisper.

"You of all people should understand what the Divergent Project is really aiming to do. Has being factionless allowed you to forget?"

I thought she would say 'problem', not 'project'. I sigh. "Jeanine," I whine like I'm seven. She shakes her head.

"Perhaps we will discover a way to preserve peace because of him."

"Jeanine, anyone but him!" I whisper in one last attempt to persuade her. That's a lie. I know I'll keep trying. Jeanine steps away without even noticing it. She makes her way to the door, and before I can say anything else, she leaves without considering a single word.