Abbey Ainsworth.

Fuck. He hadn't thought of that name in over three years. If it wasn't for the number boy he probably wouldn't have thought of it for another ten.

But today is different. Today he has the time to sit in remembrance. He has time to reminisce about what was - even if the memories give him a heated inner core and a bad case of the Monday's.

Stretching his legs leisurely under the table and sitting further back in his recliner chair, he has no further duties that require his personal attention for a good hour. He was enclosed and cocooned by the safety of his dimly-lit office with the blinds half-mast. He was safe here to empty the trashy thoughts that seemed to have crept up on him out of the hazy mist of his youthful brain.

Abbey Ainsworth.

Eric lazily flops his arm down to the drawer on the side of the desk, pulling the secret cigarettes that he always kept there. In fact, they weren't really a secret, he would smoke if he wanted and wouldn't care for who's say so. But he liked to think for his health that it was his dirty little secret, and right now, there didn't seem any better time than to pull one, bite the filter and light the damn thing. It was a need, a must, and he's already blazing it habitually as the name seems to simper back into his brain again.

Abbey Ainsworth.

He couldn't really remember when they became friends back at Erudite. It just, sort of, happened…

She used to be in his class. Brown bob, skinny, and her teeth too big for her head. They hadn't even spoken in between the years, he didn't even really know she existed and treated her to that same effect.

Eric regarded her as any other little annoying girl and that boys didn't hang around with girls, they were disgusting, vile, whiners.

That's until they got put together randomly in biology.

He'd just turned thirteen and honestly, couldn't think of anything worse than having to discuss with her the ecology and evolution of life through frog dissection. Having a girl as his lab partner… he all but groaned as he imagined her freaking out or possibly hurling like Sandy Morrison. But she didn't.

In fact, she'd taken the knife out of his gloved hands, smiled up at him through her vented safety goggles and sliced the stomach open before the teacher even gave them the go-ahead.

It was in that moment, the little annoying girl with the brown bob and teeth too big for her head, professionally and enthrallingly slicing and pulling apart the frog's skin like she was a complete psychopath - It was in that moment he knew they would be the best of friends.

It only seemed to get better as the year passed.

She helped him cheat in his Math's test at fourteen. They had devised a unique tap of the foot in the silenced room, to which she swirled numbers on her back with a finger once he'd alerted her to his entrapment, sometimes throwing a coy smile over her shoulder when authority wasn't looking. Afterward, they ditched all further lessons and took to the biggest oak tree they could find.

It was her idea.

She climbed first, swinging her bright blue bag over her shoulder and tying her woolen knitted jumper to her waist, calling him "Chicken shit," when he didn't attempt to climb in the first instance. But to be fair, he was just trying not to look up her dress as she uncaringly climbed from branch to branch.

There, they sat for hours until their asses felt raw, talking nothing but utter nonsense and mocking over the nerdy freaks in their class. Soon, it seemed to become a regular thing, so much so, that one day they both carved their names at the top - No hearts or any other drivel, just their names. But she drew a smiley face…

At one point when they were fifteen Abbey never turned up for school one day. It wasn't like her, she always turned up and he couldn't understand why.

It wasn't like he could message her - he got his phone confiscated by his parents when it got reported they had prank-called Desmond Drip too many times in one night.

But in the one day, he'd never felt so lost. Not even his other friends shared the same sense of indulgent humor as they did, and it was a plain fact he'd clock watched the entire day until he could go looking for her.

He'd found her, eventually. She was at home, and she'd answered the door barely able to look at him.

"What happened to your face?" he asked, and she diverted her eyes to the floor. There was one specific eye blackened and shining as a massive indicator of injustice, and the mere thought and sight made his blood boil to an inhuman temperature.

He knew by the way she was looking indirectly to the floor, that nothing was alright in the life of Abbey Ainsworth. He knew this look, it was a look he did himself, one of loss of pride, but also something she'd been trying to hide.

"Sarah Mackey." The words fall from her quivered but rosy lips.

"Why?" He watches as her eyes well up, but she won't cry, won't allow herself to, not in front of him.

"Because she says I'm a whore for hanging around with boys."

He'd left her that evening having found the new knowledge of deep personal interest. He'd found Sarah Mackey's older brother by the bench of the south entrance the next morning and, quite frankly, beat the living shit out of him.

"That's for Abbey!" he let bellow from the pit of his stomach once he'd dropped him. But it also earned him a matching black eye amid the chaos - that he wasn't too pleased with. It didn't matter though, as when he went to see Abbey later on that day, they matched…

Her smile beamed from ear to ear and strangely she threw her arms around his neck for thanks. It was their first ever hug… but it wasn't their last.

At sixteen, Abbey's hair was long. She'd filled out perfectly and she sported breasts, whereas he sported half-decent facial hair for once. But they still acted as if they were thirteen, name-calling, jinxing, free-hits.

They had their aptitude tests at the beginning of the year, and Eric was unsurprised to find that he wasn't Erudite after swiping the knife in the fear simulation and easily obliterating the dog. They weren't allowed to say what they got, but it didn't mean he hadn't the insatiable urge to ask Abbey. They settled for: "Not Erudite" instead, and that's the way it stayed.

Eric's father passed halfway through that year from a sudden heart attack.

The news was delivered to him after being escorted from their English class by their main professor and he was sent home accordingly. She turned up later that night, she didn't say anything, didn't have to. He saw she was already aware of the news. Instead of offering her condolences, Abbey pulled him into her arms, his face in her peppermint hair, her nose against his neck. He couldn't figure out how long they stood like that, but it was a long time. But it was enough, being with her at that moment was enough…

Then one day everything changed.

Abbey found him after class and jingled a cigarette in his face, well, what he thought was a cigarette. It was not until they were back at their tree within the ruined cities wilderness that he actually found out it was a joint.

They smoked that shit till their lungs burned and eyes bled.

They practiced blowbacks and he'd burnt his lip. She tried to teach him to blow rings but he Just. Simply. Couldn't. However, that didn't matter, they laughed highly for what seemed like hours at practically nothing. And it was the best time of his life.

Laying softly on the small pit of earth beneath the tree, watching the branches sway in the light breeze as the moon decided to make an appearance. He remembers it being a full moon, the dewy blue haze settling upon them softly and deliciously cool - that eventually he felt cold fingers slide over the back of his hand, placing themselves entwined with his.

The breath practically hitched in his throat and he'd froze, but it didn't stop him from turning his head and noticing the way she was looking at him. When their eyes met she'd smiled softly and chastely said:

"You're my moon."

Before slowly turning her gaze back up towards the tree and the sky and whatever else she was looking at. However, he didn't, he allowed him a few extra minutes to take in her never-noticed-before features. The gradual slope of her nose, the puckered lips, her long lazily blinking eyelashes as she was pooled by a pillow of her own chestnut hair framed around her head. It was in that moment, he realized how beautiful she was and wondered why he'd never seen it before.

They held hands in silence until midnight.

Eric's life came to a blazing, sharp, gut-wrenching, panicky ball of nerves when Abbey's parents invited him to dinner. He'd spent the whole day of the Friday panicking. He'd gone home and changed between four shades of blue before finalizing on something parent-worthy but utterly, boringly, blue... But what got to him the most was how he couldn't really figure out why this bothered him so much…

Of course, he'd met her parents, but briefly. And usually, it was because they were in trouble or he was coming to see if she was home. It was never formal, however.

All night he put on his best behavior and told them stories about himself, how he was doing in his classes, things he liked and didn't like. But in his side-view, Abbey just smiled at him from across the table as he spoke. He would almost say it was as if they were the only people in the room and his gray eyes would hold hers for moments far too long.

Till she slid her foot up his leg…

And continued to do so through dessert, earning him a temporary cough and marks in between his fingers from his own nails.

At seventeen, they had one year left to the choosing ceremony. And this seemed to pain Eric more than he would like.

He hadn't told her about which faction he was planning on joining after Erudite. He was far too broad and significantly provoked in the Erudite navy uniform with his great height and strong jawline. He wasn't in the slightest muscular, just athletic, but better built than the average men he'd seen milling around. But it wasn't just that…

Eric wanted more. He wanted freedom. He wanted power. He wanted to be Dauntless… But all those things he wanted with Abbey. However, the unknown faction of her choice was simpering on the fine edge of earth shattering heartache.

However, he could never find the right words to tell Abbey appropriately, even when every inch of him screamed him to out it. And when he felt that perhaps he had stumbled upon them and was about to let them slip, she turns and smiles at him, holds his hand, plays with his hair. It's like she knew what he was thinking.

At break, with his head in her lap and under the familiar oak tree. She lazily picks the petals from a flower. Nipping the petals softly, letting them flutter past his head, while he stares between her face and the puny white monstrosities of flower spawn. Then unexpectedly, she meets his eye.

"I want to show you something…" Abbey's cheeks ignite, and a million things run through his head. Had he missed something? Nothing usually gets by him.

She pushes him to sit and he drawls "Okkkay," unsurely.

Abbey blushes as she looks to the floor again and Eric hides his embarrassment for her.

She shrugs off her cardigan and slowly, her dainty fingers work at the buttons of her white shirt, painstakingly leisurely. All he can seem to do is stare with his Adam's apple bobbing repeatedly as he tries to swallow the saliva that's decided to form quicker.

She throws off her shirt and sits in a white lacy bra in front of him with her milky skin exposed. He tries his hardest to keep her gaze but he can't help the momentary acts of defiance his eyes seem to make.

"Wh-" Eric tries to talk with his jaw slack, but she hushes him quickly.

"Shh." She shuffles closer on her knees. "Don't ruin it." Slowly, she moves forwards, her eyes searching each of his and he stares back with the same passionate glint that he sees beginning to form in hers.

She kisses him.

His first kiss.

Her lips were hot and lusciously soft against his own, and he let his eyes close along with hers.

She bites at his bottom lip while pulling away slowly. He was surprised at first, but smiles when she tilts her head back to roam over his face briefly, maybe checking if he was possibly still breathing.

"Chicken shit," she says. "You're supposed to kiss me first."

"You're not exactly conventional." And she kisses his smile. This time he opens his mouth a little and she responds instantly, sliding her sweet tongue to search out his, hands sliding round to the back of his head and through his hair. He grips at her waist and pulls her forward, sliding a hand up her back and finding the lacy material of her bra, mentally trying to figure out just exactly how he's found himself in this scenario and whether he's the most luckiest son of a bitch on this planet.

"Take it off," she practically purrs, moving back a little to catch his reaction.

"What if someone sees us?"

"What if…" She shrugs. And like a classical school-boy, he fumbles for about five minutes trying to figure out the stupid clasp and can't fathom why it won't naturally move the way he wants it to. She merely giggles, and with a special superhuman ability – unclasps it with one hand.

Eric doesn't want to look out of courtesy but just can't help it. Perfectly pert, untouched skin sits before him, the nipple hardened and tempestuously pink.

"I want you to touch me, Eric." And he didn't need telling twice. The soft skin sits pleasantly against his palm as he lightly squeezes. Abbey leans in and kisses him again, pushing him further and further backward until he's almost lying flat and she hovers over him.

That day she tells him.

"I think – I think I love you…"

But he doesn't say it back, and she doesn't appear to be disheartened. She knows him too well to be put off by his uniquely restrictive mind. To be honest, he didn't even really know what love was, so how could he say it? Was this love?

Abbey had always been more openly emotional in front of him to some extent, she was a blunt girl when it came to him. Apart from physically showing emotional attachment, they'd never really talked about it…

But not only that, she didn't know that he was planning on choosing Dauntless next year. That's where his mind took him and it would be unfair to whisper the sweet nothings to her if he had no plan on staying.

Being with Abbey here was ultimately pleasing too, but he was so sure she would pick Dauntless. She had all the strengths and cunning, and if he was going, she would be going too. He could feel it, he knew it, no doubts.

Things became serious the day before the choosing ceremony.

Abbey shows up at his parent's place and is shown to his room by his mom throwing the door open unexpectedly. "Thank you, Mrs Coulter," Abbey says sweetly and smiles while stepping into his room.

Eric throws the book he was reading to one side and takes a minute to take in her appearance. She's sodden, walked there in the rain.

"I wanted to see you… before tomorrow, in case…" She shivers.

He signals for her to sit on the bed and throws her his towel. Her damp, flattened locks lay limp by her face. She looks pale, almost frightened.

"Don't, we shouldn't say…"

"That's not the only reason why I'm here. Lock the door," she talks very seriously and he complies - with a little sense of hesitation. She holds her hand out as the lock clicks and sighing lightly under the unknown, he walks over and holds it. "Lie down with me." Her eyes appear watery, hazy and he wonders what exactly is going through her mind right now. He moves, but she stops him. "Without your clothes."

"Are you sure?" He wasn't going to detest.

"I've never been so sure."

He would like to say that it was the most perfect sex anyone could have for their first time, but he would be lying. They were a giggling set of fools, clumsily roaming parts of their bodies that he'd never thought he would have the delight of seeing… or feeling. He'd made her squirm uncomfortably on their first try and he pulled out apologizing only to be dragged back with Abbey's natural stubbornness.

What was more thrilling was the fact that they could've been caught. However, they were lucky on this night, his mother had left them to their own devices. He did think that perhaps she maybe knew why Abbey was here and that was the reason she had let them be. Eric guessed he would never know and for in that moment – didn't care either…

Abbey gets called to choose before him, throwing him a long look before fixing a sturdy gaze towards the bowls of factions.

Eric can't help the nervous shifts and racing heart as he waits somewhat patiently, his mother's hand lightly laying on his knee for small comfort.

"She's a smart girl," his mother tells him. "And I know how close you two are but you have to do what's right for you, not for others…" At the time he didn't think too much of it, but his mother had openly predicted their fate.

…Abbey chooses Amity.

Every inch of skin on him is ablaze as he watches her make her way to sickening pink and yellow. looney nut-jobs. She looks utterly lost and tries to look back for him but is pulled into one of the open seats with the Amity faction. Abbey smiles to other members, but it's not her usual, he should know, he knew her better than anyone else. However, he didn't expect this, never knew which way her heart was taking her.

If he'd thought about it hard enough, the signs were there: Their oak tree, the outdoors and love of flowers, hate of violence with Sarah Mackey, the relaxing smoke they took together under the moonlight and hugging him obsessively for the last three years.

He'd always classed it is a warped sense of Dauntless, never Amity.

His blood burned with a sense of betrayal. It felt like she had lied all this time, but he knew she hadn't and that he couldn't truly be mad of her choice in all respect. The anger was more at himself for feeling how he did towards her, and for the main element – he'd have to let her go.

The last time they saw each other, he shared an expressionless look towards her watery eyes as they parted ways on their journey to their new factions.

Dauntless was his new home.

Sighing as he pulls himself from his lost thoughts, he once again curses Four for his untimely reminder of Abbey Ainsworth and wiggles the mouse of the computer to check the time.

11.50AM

Eric clicks his tongue on the roof of his mouth in annoyed anticipation that he would have to deal with this onslaught of deliverance. Amity would be arriving soon. Their trucks dirtied and thick tiered tires crunching the broken concrete of Dauntless instead of their plush fields, laden with the hippies of Amity and batches of produce for the glutinous warrior faction.

Just fucking dandy.

Every vertebra clicks as he stands, his room washed with the smell of a chain-smoker and an awful temper for inconveniences. He doesn't bother to pick up his phone, but he attaches his gun to his right thigh and an A4 page of the checklist he will no doubt develop a headache over.

The walk from his office to the warehouses isn't long, and he's never bothered by anyone. No one now would dare talk to him when he was in this mood, nor even make eye contact, and that was the way he liked it these days, a far cry to how he was in Erudite.

He supposed the behavior was always there in a way. He spat at the youngsters and she would laugh. He would fetch the ball from the moat and she would stay by the shore and dry. He would physically beat anyone that touched his Abbey and was always rewarded by her smile.

Eric shakes his head vigorously; he's not going back down that road again. That was a hell of enough for one day.

"So glad you could join us, Eric." Max stares out to the trucks rolling up in front of them. "I had a feeling you might not even turn up."

"Is that a sense of sarcasm I'm hearing?" Eric places his hands behind his back and imitates the strong look towards the truck, unbothered by the small questioning glance to his rather unusual passive state. "Let's just get this done."

The few subordinate Dauntless soldiers run a-mock as they divert the trucks to their certain bays. The heavy beeping and shouting drowning out even the deepest of thoughts as the gassy smoke from the exhausts back-fire and smolder the burning oil towards his nostrils.

Eric has stood here and overlooked this arrangement fifty times over, and as far as he was aware everything was working out the way it should before him and he didn't feel the need to intervene.

…Until one of the trucks stall and the backdoor unhinges, sending bags of produce tumbling out the back and smashing onto the floor, spilling ungracefully across the lot.

"Fuck," Eric mutters and Max sends him an incredulous look, unmoving from his position. "Fine. I'll go then."

Eric closes the gap brutally with his swift stride and arms himself for the onslaught of abuse that he's going to send the clumsy Amity packing-with. The Amity and Dauntless alike in the nearest vicinity move hastily in retreat and he doesn't bless them with even a small act of acknowledgment.

Instead, he grips the door handle of the red rust-bucket truck and yanks on it with limited grace. "You want to tell me what the fuck-"

He stops mid-sentence.

Eric must've have smoked too much tobacco and daydreamed far too much to be imagining her blushing down at him from the wrecked material seats of the truck.

Abbey.

It was her, he was sure of it, albeit a little more mature and magnificently filled out to the svelte of her curves. It was her.

Abbey's hair was still chestnut, her eyes still green and flecked with hazel, her adorable pout, and perfect nose. But she had bangs, side-swept bangs that were the only difference.

"I'm really sorry…" She begins and he wished he could have said anything other than:

"Abbey?" The word was so out of character and soft that he didn't believe he'd even said it. He naturally pulls his features into his usual frown, but the eyes are less intense, it was all about the eyes.

He physically hadn't said her name in years, it was all mainly in his thoughts from earlier. Fuck, he hadn't even thought of her since - until today…

Abbey's face is a maze of assumptions as she mulls over exactly who's standing in front of her. Slowly, but surely, disbelief arises. "…No way…" She whispers under her breath and his skin prickles at the sound. "Eric?"

He takes a small look around him to make sure no one's really paying attention before shifting closer. "What are you- why are you here?"

And as casually as ever, she laughs, smiling that familiar smile he remembered so well. "What does it look like?" He could bite his own tongue off for his stupid questions and stupid face so pitifully brimming on a long-lost hope.

Abbey slides down the seats and roams over his attire, curling her nose up a little and probably taking in the thick tattoos swamping his neck along with the piercings above his brow and multiple ear pieces. "Wow, Eric, you look…huge…like…really big…" Her eyes light up as she talks and expresses each word specifically. "Buff."

She looks pretty, too fucking pretty at this moment in time and every inch of him is trying to suppress the urge to grab her by the arm and take her all the way back to his apartment and bite at her skin and relish all the ways that he missed that knotted feeling at the pit of his stomach.

"You know me, full of surprises…"

"I heard you got ranked really highly… a Leader… Wow, look at you…" She rubs his arm and he thinks perhaps she doesn't know how offensive that would be if it were anyone else, but he lets her anyway.

Eric breaks the intense study he's performing over her appearance and directs a sharp look to the Amity standing around. "Well, don't just stand there, clean it up!" he snaps and Abbey shifts beside him, turning fractionally to do as he says. "Not you." He should say something else, something casual. However, he's somewhat out of practice. "You haven't changed a bit…" Good one.

"You certainly have. I mean, I barely recognized you. It's been-" She peers off in thought, her lips pouting slightly.

"Three years."

"Somebody has been counting…" She devours him with her eyes and he's actually nervous… nervous… he is never nervous. But he supposes every monster has their weaknesses.

"I, er, have been thinking about you…" Eric practically whispers, breaking any personal contact with her. "-because of the deliveries and Amity, and I knew you were-"

"I've been thinking about you, too." She stops his murmuring and lightly touches his arm again. "I hoped I'd get the chance to see you again."

His expression must ask the question 'why' as she answers anyway.

"I want you…" She hesitates for a split second. "I want you to come to my wedding…"

What. The. Fuck.

"No!" Eric spits the word venomously, a heat running from the base of his spine and blanching onto his neck. "Don't be stupid, you're not getting married."

"Erm, yes I am… In two weeks."

Eric knew she couldn't possibly love her fiancé; he wouldn't be enough for her, no one ever would be. Only Eric was meant for the girl. - This girl of all his firsts. This girl that spent far too much time clogging his mind today and sculpting his childhood.

The possessiveness was beginning to peak under the new assault of jealousy and lust. He would rip any person that would touch his Abbey, from limb to limb and enjoy himself while doing it.

"No," he says gruffly. "No I will not come to your wedding and you're an idiot for thinking so…" He leaves the words to linger in the air and it physically hurts when her face unravels in absolute surprise at his outburst and brutal honesty.

"Have I… done something to offend you?" She shrugs with her palms towards him in great apology, but it's not enough.

Eric beats down the eloping misery and turns away from her, feeling her eyes burn into the back of his head and the ripping sensation in his chest.

Loudly he snarls, "I hope you have a very happy life together."

This was not what he planned, not what he wanted to say, but the monster that was him couldn't bare her anywhere near him anymore. Not with those hideously exposed revelations.

Abbey will not marry another man… not while he still breathed.

He just needed time to figure out how. Marking his own words, he'll fucking stop her from devoting herself to someone else. He had the power swaying heavily in his favor and contacts heavily primed in Amity to help him do so.

Mark my words, Abbey Ainsworth will be mine.

A/N

Thank you for reading. :)