can reach Christina’s wrist. She grabs his forearm. Al pulls her up, his face red with frustration, and I run forward to help. I’m too short to do much good, as I suspected, but I grip Christina under the shoulder once she’s high enough, and Al and I haul her over the barrier. She drops to the ground, her face still blood-smeared from the fight, her back soaking wet, her body quivering.
I kneel next to her. Her eyes lift to mine, then shift to Al, and we all catch our breath together.
CHAPTER TEN
THAT NIGHT I dream that Christina hangs from the railing again, by her toes this time, and someone shouts that only someone who is Divergent can help her. So I run forward to pull her up, but someone shoves me over the edge, and I wake before I hit the rocks.
Sweat-soaked and shaky from the dream, I walk to the girls’ bathroom to shower and change. When I come back, the word “Stiff” is spray-painted across my mattress in red. The word is written smaller along the bed frame, and again on my pillow. I look around, my heart pounding with anger.
Peter stands behind me, whistling as he fluffs his pillow. It’s hard to believe I could hate someone who looks so kind—his eyebrows turn upward naturally, and he has a wide, white smile.
“Nice decorations,” he says.
“Did I do something to you that I’m unaware of?” I demand. I grab the corner of a sheet and yank it away from the mattress. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we are in the same faction now.”
“I don’t know what you’re referring to,” he says lightly. Then he glances at me. “And you and I will never be in the same faction.”
I shake my head as I remove my pillowcase from the pillow. Don’t get angry. He wants to get a rise out of me; he won’t. But every time he fluffs his pillow, I think about punching him in the gut.
Al walks in, and I don’t even have to ask him to help me; he just walks over and strips bedding with me. I will have to scrub the bed frame later. Al carries the stack of sheets to the trash can and together we walk toward the training room.
“Ignore him,” Al says. “He’s an idiot, and if you don’t get angry, he’ll stop eventually.”
“Yeah.” I touch my cheeks. They are still warm with an angry blush. I try to distract myself. “Did you talk to Will?” I ask quietly. “After…you know.”
“Yeah. He’s fine. He isn’t angry.” Al sighs. “Now I’ll always be remembered as the first guy who knocked someone out cold.”
“There are worse ways to be remembered. At least they won’t antagonize you.”
“There are better ways too.” He nudges me with his elbow, smiling. “First jumper.”
Maybe I was the first jumper, but I suspect that’s where my Dauntless fame begins and ends.
I clear my throat. “One of you had to get knocked out, you know. If it hadn’t been him, it would have been you.”
“Still, I don’t want to do it again.” Al shakes his head, too many times, too fast. He sniffs. “I really don’t.”
We reach the door to the training room and I say, “But you have to.”
He has a kind face. Maybe he is too kind for Dauntless.
I look at the chalkboard when I walk in. I didn’t have to fight yesterday, but today I definitely will. When I see my name, I stop in the middle of the step.
My opponent is Peter.
“Oh no,” says Christina, who shuffles in behind us. Her face is bruised, and she looks like she is trying not to limp. When she sees the board, she crumples the muffin wrapper she is holding into her fist. “Are they serious? They’re really going to make you fight him?”
Peter is almost a foot taller than I am, and yesterday, he beat Drew in less than five minutes. Today Drew’s face is more black-and-blue than flesh-toned.
“Maybe you can just take a few hits and pretend to go unconscious,” suggests Al. “No one would blame you.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Maybe.”
I stare at my name on the board. My cheeks feel hot. Al and Christina are just trying to help, but the fact that they don’t believe, not even in a tiny corner of their minds, that I have a chance against Peter bothers me.
I stand at the side of the room, half listening to Al and Christina’s chatter, and watch Molly fight Edward.