Chapter Text
Eren sat at his desk with his hood up and his head down. He was in a bad mood, to say the least, and didn’t feel like dealing with the world at the moment. His father had scolded him that morning for his tendency to pick a fight with anything that moved and had, yet again, compared him to his foster sister. He loved Mikasa, he really did, but it annoyed him just a bit that his parents had always seemed to like her more than their natural born son.
The boy tapped his foot on the floor and sighed, already wishing the first day of school would end. He slowly did the math in his head to figure out how long it would be until he could go home and sulk, and sunk further into his chair when he realized 2 o’clock was almost 6 hours away.
“Hey, Jaeger,” an annoyingly loud voice called from behind him. Eren attempted to ignore the voice, but snapped around when a cold hand touched the exposed small of his back.
“What the fuck do you want, Jean?” He asked the boy at the desk behind him.
Jean sneered. “You’re crack’s hanging out, dipshit.”
Eren felt his ears grow red and the stares of a few faces that turned his way, snickering about the classroom. He quickly pulled his hoodie down past his jeans and hid inside of it once again. A softer voice chastised Jean, sending apparent sympathy to Eren.
“Stop it, Jean. You’re being a bully.” Marco said, trying to suppress a smile. He knew Marco wasn’t all bad, but the term ‘bully’ and Marco’s attempts to keep his composure made Eren feel weak. The brunet was about to turn around and spit something back at Jean, when he heard a sharp pang come from the front of the room. He looked up from the hunter green of his hoodie to find a man standing in front of the class, clutching a small metal rod in front of the blackboard. Eren held back a scoff as he looked the man over; he was relatively short, but wore an expression on his face that Eren had never seen before. The man appeared to be bored and simultaneously angry as he looked over the small crowd of students. His hair was an articulate undercut with symmetrical charcoal locks that moved in unison as he tilted his head.
“It’s time for you all to shut up.” The man said in a deep monotone, setting the metal teacher's pointer down on the large desk in front of him. “I’m Levi Rivaille, your new history and theology teacher. I don’t like anything filthy or annoying, so don’t bother coming in my classroom if you are either of those. I also don’t allow screw-ups, so come to my class to learn, or find yourself a new class. Don’t expect an ‘easy A’ just because it’s your last year.”
Eren sat his head in his hands to stop his jaw from dropping open. This guy can’t be serious. Mr. Rivaille fiddled with his computer for a moment, then pulled up a power point onto the classroom screen. The title slide read in bold letters FAMOUS BATTLES AND TRAGEDIES OF WALL MARIA.
“Everybody get out paper and a pen. You’re taking notes.”
He’s fucking serious.
The class released a collective groan to accompany the symphony of shuffling papers, every single student peeved that effort would be required on the first day of school. Eren followed suit, albeit a bit slower than the rest, and lazily pulled a pen out of his hoodie pocket. He hadn’t even written the heading on his notes before the first slide had gone up. The words were small and packed through the whole slide, one measly picture of the original Wall Maria shoved into the corner of the screen. Eren groaned a curse in an embarrassingly loud way and began scribbling down the notes as slowly and sloppily as he could.
Jean whispered from behind him, keeping an incriminating tone. “Quit your bitching, fag.”
Eren felt his cheeks grow red and dipped his head down further, resting it against his desk. The cool, fake wood felt good on his hot skin. He wouldn’t let Jean get to him this year, not again. Jean was nothing, just another bully. That was all he had ever been.
Eren wished anyone who heard would just let it go, but Marco piped up again, trying not-so-earnestly to stop his friend. “Come on Jean, he’s just saying what we all were thinking.”
Jean scoffed, “You wanna make a noise like that, huh? Why don’t you ask Eren to help you? I’m sure he’d be more than willing to help you out.”
Marco giggled quietly, not wanting to give anyone the slightest idea that he would want that. However, Jean wouldn’t let up. “What do you think, Jaeger? Wanna make Marco moan?”
Ignore them, Eren. You promised Mom you would try your best not to fight this year.
Jean leaned closer to Eren and dropped an octave, attempting to put on a joking but semi-seductive façade. “Or do you want him to make you moan? Like a little whore, huh?”
Eren lost his calm almost as quickly as he had told himself to hold it and retorted, forgetting to whisper. “Could you please shut the fuck up?”
The class turned their heads to Eren once again, this time including the new teacher. Mr. Rivaille’s usual bored expression melted into an annoyed one. He spoke dryly. “I could say the same to you. If you haven’t realized, I’m actually teaching up here.”
Eren quickly tried to explain why he had spoken, but Rivaille ignored him and went back to his droning on the three different levels of the ancient military with a drop of the word ‘idiot’ off his breath.
Jean leaned back in his seat with a smirk, satisfied with his handiwork. Eren tossed him one more angered look over his shoulder and sunk the whole way into his hoodie, already done with trying to pay any attention to the class.
A few millennia later, the high pitched squeaks of the school bell sounded the change of classes, and Eren quickly pulled his book bag over his shoulder and made his way to the door, trying his hardest not to be noticed by either Jean or the teacher. However, a quick hand grabbed his shoulder, sending a shiver through his body. He turned around to face the top of his teachers head, and quickly backed away to get a full view of the man’s face. Eren had a bad feeling Mr. Rivaille didn’t appreciate being looked down on.
Eren opened his mouth to explain his behavior, but was interrupted by a hand in his face. “I don’t care about you’re reasoning for speaking out. I don’t care if you curse, hell, more power to you. What I do care about is idiotic students that interrupt my class. Don’t do it again, got it, Jaeger?” The man was a good few inches shorter than Eren, but his agitated voice boomed darkly into the teen’s skull, making him feel smaller.
Great, he already knows my name. He thought, nodding silently.
Levi lowered his hand, but held the cold stare. Eren mumbled something about being late for Statistics and turned toward the door. His teacher called to him as he walked across the threshold. “Tell you little friend Kirschstein to keep it quiet, too, alright?”
The boy hesitated for a short moment before replying coldly, “He’s not my friend.” Levi raised his eyebrows and watched him walk out the door, the boy’s fists clenched and pulling his skin white.
Levi shrugged and went back to his new desk to prepare for his next class, shuffling papers and straightening their stacks. He couldn’t fend off the idea that the Jaeger kid was going to be ‘that one student’ for the rest of the school year. He shuddered at the thought.
Out in the cluttered hallway, dodging the oncoming traffic of hurried students, Mikasa fell into step with Eren and looped an arm around his shoulders. “Karla texted me,” she said with her ever-present nonchalant tone. Eren limped his head onto his shoulder and loosely caught her gaze, barely attempting to look interested. “She told me about the fight you guys had.”
Eren groaned. “Yeah, and?”
Mikasa pulled her arm tighter and pushed her head against Eren’s. “I just don’t understand why you continuously butt heads with her. Grisha, too. You know you can’t ever win an argument with them.”
“It’s not my fault they don’t try to listen to my reasoning. All they care about is me doing exactly what they say, no matter what.” Eren whined, annoyed by the situation being brought up again.
Mikasa’s charcoal eyes rolled as she turned to take off down another hall. “You can’t use that excuse forever, Eren.”
“I can sure as hell try,” Eren started, but Mikasa had already disappeared into the hoard of students. Embarassed, he fixated his backpack strap and went on toward his class and the rest of the horrific first day of his senior year.
# # #
After walking home along with Mikasa and narrowly avoiding sweating to death in the late August sun, Eren was greeted by his father rocking in the ancient chair on the porch, already off of work and covered in gray paint. He made his way up the now dry and presentable steps of the old porch, eyeing his father wearily. “How come your home already?” he asked.
His father stopped rocking and walked with Eren and Mikasa through the front door. “I took off the rest of the day. I didn’t have any more appointments, and I felt Hanji could handle whatever might happen. Besides,” Grisha pointed at the porch over his shoulder with his thumb. “The porch needed repainted anyway.” Eren nodded, but still felt a bit perturbed. Hanji Zoe was quite the skilled doctor, that was for sure, but Eren wasn’t sure if it was exactly wise to leave such a…passionate woman in charge of a clinic all by herself.
“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Mikasa stated. She and Eren set their backpacks down on the floor next to the door mat and made their ways to the kitchen.
“Hey, kids.” Karla called from the sink, in which she was washing and peeling potatoes. “How was the first day of the last year?”
Eren couldn’t stop a small sigh from escaping his lips as he perched a seat at the little breakfast bar across from his mother. Mikasa followed suit. Karla paused her potato pealing and looked at her son. “What happened?”
Eren bit the inside of his bottom lip, immediately regretting the sigh. He contemplated passing the whole thing off as him just being tired, but knew Karla Jaeger wasn’t one to let such things go. “It…it was nothing.”
This time, his mother sighed. Now Grisha was standing in the doorway, arms crossed as he eyed Eren. Mikasa stayed silent and watched her adoptive brother with interest. “Don’t you tell me you already broke our promise, Eren. Not on the first damn day of school.”
Eren instantly turned defensive. “I didn’t! It wasn’t me!” The brunet waved his hands rapidly in front of his face, desperately trying to dissolve his mother’s suspicion.
Karla released a strangled breath and smiled. “Thank god. I was going to wring your neck, boy.” She said, picking up her activity again.
“Then what happened?” Mikasa asked, keeping a solemn face. Eren felt weighed down by her gaze and knew that she suspected something. Mikasa cared too much to just let it go.
He looked into his lap. “Just some jerks in my class.” He said softly, trying not to bring it to Mikasa’s attention. It didn’t work.
“Who?” She demanded her dark eyes full of anger. “What did they do? I swear if it was that asshole Jean I’m going to strangle him.”
“What happened?” Grisha asked from behind them. Eren slowly turned to his father, avoiding eye contact. It was easier to avoid Grisha’s gentle gaze than Mikasa’s enraged one.
“They just…” Eren paused for a long moment and drew in a long breath. “They just teased me. Called me a couple names.” Karla’s lips pressed into a hard line. “I got mad and yelled at them in the middle of class. I’m pretty sure my new teacher already hates me.”
Mikasa hardly paused for a second. “Was it Jean?”
Eren pulled his attention back to his sister and mumbled a weak confirmation. Mikasa released her breath and hopped down from her seat. “He’s fucking dead.”
Grisha took this as his chance to intervene and held down Mikasa’s shoulders and pushed her back into her seat. “Calm down, Mikasa. The last thing we need is you being wanted for murder.” Eren normally would have smiled at his father’s attempts at cracking a joke, but for some reason it didn’t feel like a joke this time. Mikasa crossed her arms and breathed heavily through her nostrils.
“I can’t just let that bastard get away with this,” she whined, clearly more upset than Eren was. Mikasa was usually the calmest and collected person Eren knew, but when it came to him she lost all of her collectiveness. He had a hard dealing with Mikasa’s passion for his own wellbeing, since he had stopped caring a long time ago.
Eren patted his sister’s shoulder. “Thanks, but it’s really alright. I’m fine. I’ll just ask Rivaille for a seat change.”
Grisha furrowed his eyebrows. “Rivaille?”
“My new teacher. He’s new to the school, too. History teacher.”
“He teaches history?”
Eren furrowed his eyebrows. “Yeah, why?”
His father cleared his throat, then pushed up his glasses and spoke calmly. “I was just curious. But Eren, do you really not want us to do anything about this?”
Eren shook his head. Grisha nodded sternly and retreated back to the porch, leaving Eren at the mercy of his hotheaded sister and mother. Karla dropped her peeler in the sink and trotted over to Eren. She gently held his head in her arms and stroked his soft brown hair, cooing into his ear. “You’re so strong, Eren. Don’t let them get to you. You’re so much better than any of them, and we love you no matter what.”
He let himself be babied by his mother for a few more moments and then pulled away, feeling awkward with Mikasa watching. “Really, mom, I’ll be fine.”
Karla pressed a soft kiss to her son’s hair and returned to the sink. “I believe you, Eren.” She quickly dropped the subject for Eren’s sake and turned to her daughter. “Mikasa, do you want to help me with dinner? You’re a lot stronger than me and I need someone to mash these potatoes.
Mikasa’s anger diffused almost immediately as she joined places with Karla and retrieved a masher from the utensil drawer. Eren nodded and retreated to his room. He pulled off his sweaty hoodie and tossed it to the cluttered floor as he jumped into bed and whipped out his cellphone. He leaned over to his bedside table and clicked off the light, deciding a nap was well-deserved after he sent a text asking his best friend, Armin, how his first day had been. He nestled in the pillow and attempted to shut off his brain, but thoughts of the day buzzed around his head like angry hornets. Jean’s horse-face repeated his insults over and over again.
“Quit your bitching, fag.”
He squeezed his eyes tighter and willed his thoughts to travel elsewhere. Out of the darkness behind his eyelids, his new teacher’s face slowly came to light. He wondered what kind of man Rivaille would turn out to be; he surely couldn’t have a personality limited to ‘bored’ or ‘annoyed’. He wondered if he would need to explain his situation to him the following morning, or if the man would even allow him a seat change. Maybe he would have to just switch out his classes.
Sometime in the midst of his constant worrying, Eren drifted off to sleep.
# # #
Eren slowly awoke sometime later and peered at is alarm clock with bleary eyes. It was already past eleven, and he had most certainly missed the dinner his mother and sister had made. He sat up and stretched, scratching his messy bed head, and checking his cellphone for messages. No new texts. The cool night air flitted through the open window and brought a chill to Eren’s skin. He pulled his hoodie back on and trotted down the stair to the kitchen. He slowed to a halt when he saw light from the kitchen pouring into the hall and heard his mother and father speaking in harsh whispers. He pressed his back up against the wall next to the huge opening of the kitchen and listened to his parents’ conversation, straining not be caught.
“I really don’t want to just let it go,” Karla said softly, choking on her breath. Eren could tell immediately that the woman was cry and his heart sank. It took a lot to make Karla Jaeger cry. “I just can’t stand him hurting like this.”
“I know, dear,” Grisha muttered. “But we can’t do anything unless Eren wants to himself.”
Eren suppressed a surprised gasp with his hand. They’re talking about what happened earlier! He inched closer to the gap and snuck a peek at his parents. His mother was pressed against his father’s shoulder, her hand covering her mouth and wet sobs erupting from her throat. Grisha placed a soft kiss in his wife’s hair.
“Why are those boys so mean? What did my baby ever do to them?” Karla cried. Eren squeezed his eyes shut and tip toed back to his room. It killed him to know that his mother was suffering because of him, when he himself gave up on caring. If only he wasn’t the way he was…
The boy switched the light off once again and crawled back under the thick covers, blocking the moonlight from his eyes. He cried quietly in the darkness until he fell back asleep.