Waiting Four You

Chapter 30 (Tobias)

I will apologize now. I have some weird obsession with writing about rape. Like it seems to happen at least once in everything I write now, even if it's mentioning something that happened in the past. I'm sorry if the last chapter triggers anyone. There will be mentions later about it having happened.

"If it makes you feel any better, two of her assailants are injured. Both of them I recognize from the footage with the towel," Zeke tells me. I know his prior statement was correct, but I am so angry that this happened. I want the initates who hurt her to pay.

I sigh. "Thank you."

Zeke nods at me, and I head into the room.

As I look to the bed, Tris opens her eyes.

"Tobias," she greets me, but her usual spirit just doesn't seem to be in her voice. She sounds empty.

I notice that Mia is in the corner keeping an eye on her. She turns to me after Tris speaks.

"So that's your real name," she tries to joke. It seems strained like something more is bothering her than just what happened to my fiancée.

"Thanks, Mia," I say gesturing to the fact she brought Tris into one of the private infirmary rooms. They're usually kept empty for the leaders, but the last time any of us used them was before I even arrived in Dauntless.

"You know these rooms are also set aside for leader's spouses," Mia comments. "I think fiancée is close enough since most of Dauntless doesn't even get married."

I thank Mia again, then turn back to Tris.

"Are you okay?" I ask her.

She looks so forlorn, but I don't know what to do. I don't know what I can possibly do to help her.

Tris motions me over to her, so I sit on the bed next to her. She hugs me to her.

"I am now," she says, but there's still that undercurrent of something I can't quite place. Sadness? Fear?

"Now that Tris is awake, I need to ask the two of you a couple questions so that I know if I can do a test now or if I have to wait a few weeks. I'm hoping to be able to do it now because we don't actually know how far the other initiate got before Zeke arrived."

I nod unsure where this is going.

Tris seems just as confused as I do.

"Have the two of you been sexually active with one another?" Mia asks bluntly.

Tris blushes heavily, and I am sure my face mirrors hers. I nod slowly. Mia is Tris's doctor right now, so we can't lie to her.

Mia then turns to directly address Tris. "When was your last menstrual cycle?"

"My last what?" Tris asks confused.

Mia pinches the bridge of her nose as if she's stressed. "Didn't you have sex ed in school?"

I answer for Tris. "Abnegation children aren't allowed to take that class because they believe it creates curiosity about sex, and both curiosity and sex are considered selfish." My face gets hot each time I say sex, but there's not exactly any other word that I could use that would be any less embarrassing. I thought I would have grown out of these tendencies for embarrassment by now.

Mia groans in frustration. "The Abnegation and their stupid..." She trails off. "Sorry, it's just frustrating."

Tris gives her an apologetic smile. "I wish they let us know more too."

"Your menstrual cycle, more commonly called a period, is the time period where you bleed for anywhere between three to seven days every month."

I get extremely confused at that. How can someone bleed for days on end every month?

Apparently Mia sees the confusion on my face.

"It's a normal part of being a woman, Four," she says. "You'll understand when you actually see Tris go through it when you live together after initiation."

Tris looks thoughtful as if she's trying to remember when she last dealt with the situation Mia just described to us.

"About two and a half weeks before choosing day, I think," Tris finally replies to the earlier question. "What does that have to do with anything?"

Mia laughs lightly. "You know, I never expected to have to explain this to a sixteen year old." She pauses as if trying to figure out the right way to say whatever it is that she plans to explain. Although when she does explain, I finally understand what kind of test she wants to do. Personally, I'm not really sure what I want the outcome to be.

After Mia draws some of Tris's blood, she tells Tris to come back in a week to find out the results due to how long the machine in Dauntless will take to analyze the sample. If it comes back negative, she'll have to do another test three weeks later because of what happened tonight.