The life of Jeanine Matthews

Work

The sun was etching through the light blue blinds as I was awoken to birds chirping and the other side of the bed still slightly warm. I rubbed my eyes and saw my wife at the dressing table applying her heavy but subtle make up ready for the day. She was truly beautiful with or without it. I let out a small yawn that caught her attention and she came over to me smiling. She gave me a peck on the lips and sat on the edge of the bed.

"Jean." I muttered whilst she rubbed my hand.

Jeanine just let out her beautiful soft laugh and gently nudged me to let me know that it was time to start the day. I loved mornings like this, the time before she puts on her perfectly composed mask and headed to work, when I got to see the part of her that was only for me. I really didn't want to get up but when I looked at the clock and saw that it was eight, I knew I had to.

I all but fell out of the bed and crawled into the bathroom as Jeanine went back to applying her make up. When I finally came back out of the bathroom Jeanine was doing her hair and had pulled up another chair at the mirror so I could begin to get ready. I wasn't a big fan of make up but just like Jeanine I had to. It was crucial that we looked presentable as Faction leader and the Faction leader's assistant. I began to apply it just as my wife finished curling her hair. It was short but not too short that you couldn't do anything to it.

Whilst I completed my make up, Jeanine went to the kitchen to make three cups of extremely strong coffee; only one was for me. Some could argue that she had an addiction and that was probably true, but could you really blame her? She had already finished her first cup by the time that I made my way into the modern kitchen. I sat down at the table opposite her and grabbed my tablet to pull up today's agenda and news.

I instantly moaned when I saw that it was the biannual faction representative meeting. I had almost forgotten about all the stress that it had put Jeanine through the past month. She could tell by the look on my face and the noise I had just made what I had just seen.

"Yep, it's today." She said with a sarcastic excitement.

I hated these things so I couldn't even begin to imagine how shit they must be for her. Every meeting entailed the following: seeing Andrew Prior who left her alone and friendless, seeing Marcus who was still pissed off about her affair with his late wife a decade ago, trying to control the insane Dauntless and getting insulted by Jack whilst Johanna attempted to calm everyone down. I as an assistant wad forced to sit next to Jeanine with my mouth shut without having a go at anyone who was annoying her. Marcus didn't need an assistant as they were Abnegation so Andrew helped him with everything that he would need, and Johanna bought along a few different Amity every time as she was only a representative and they believed in making decisions together. Jack had an assistant that was rather cruel to me, sometimes the Candor took honesty a little too far and to be honest we were lucky if Max and his various protégés even bothered to show up. For the most part I got along with the Amity.

Eventually we got up to clean our teeth and then got our bags to leave. Jeanine had about three bags that were all bursting with papers and folders ready for today's meeting. I offered to help but she just waved me away and we began the short walk to the main section of Erudite Headquarters. We never spoke on the way and you could see as we walked Jeanine's face and posture began to become more statue like. I hate that she had to do this. Everyone likened her to a machine, and they all believed that she was cold and emotionless, she was exactly the opposite of this. We turned to each other and gave each other one last smile before exiting the lift and becoming engulfed in the bustling halls of Erudite.

We eventually reached Jeanine's office and Jeanine caught up on a few emails before we had to leave for the meeting. Thankfully, Erudite always hosted so it was only a few floors down in the conference rooms.

When it was time, we collected our things and ascended down the glass stairs. You could tell just be looking at her that Jeanine was tense. We entered the room five minutes before the meeting began so that we could greet everyone since we were the hosts.

When people began to enter, I gave Jeanine's hand a quick, reassuring squeeze and we began to greet everyone. As expected, the Dauntless were late. Today's meeting was fairly normal, the Abnegation wanted to do more for the Factionless and Jack voiced his honest opinions on how stupid he thought the idea was. Jeanine and Johanna quickly ran over Erudite's and Amity's current arrangement of Erudite supplying inventions for farming etc. Max came bounding in twenty minutes late through a window. Andrew and Jeanine death glared each other, and I tried my hardest to keep my mouth shut whilst I passed documents to my wife and gave Jack's assistant Candice my best glare. Once it was finally over everyone exchanged fake and forced pleasantries and left.

Once they were all gone Jeanine let out a massive sigh and I took her face and kissed her quickly. I was so proud of the way she could hold her self together in these situations. We both knew that the rest of the day was pretty tame, so we weren't bothered too much by the remaining six hours we had left of mandatory work. Jeanine would often stay later then that but since we got married and moved in, she doesn't stay as late. She now had something to come home to. It made me happy that I had such a positive impact on her life.