Why are you constantly escorting me places?” I say. “Isn’t there a depraved activity you’re supposed to be taking part in? Kicking puppies or spying on girls while they change, or something?

I know some things--I know that I'm not alone, that I have friends, that I'm in love. I know that I don't want to die, and for me that's something--more than I could have said a few weeks ago.

Color fills her cheeks, and I think it again: that Johanna Reyes might still be beautiful. Except now I think that she isn't just beautiful in spite of the scar, she's somehow beautiful with it, like Lynn with her buzzed hair, like Tobias with the memories of his father's cruelty that he wears like armor, like my mother in her plain gray clothing.

Are you asking me to undress, Tris?' A nervous laugh gurgles from my throat. 'Only ... partially

I am better off doing as abnegation taught me: turning away from myself, projecting always outward, and hoping that in whatever is next, I will be better than I am now.

Insurgent, he says. Noun. A person who acts in opposition to the established authority, who is not necessarily regarded as a belligerent.

I would rather be dead than empty