Work Text:
Eren hadn’t always been deathly afraid of germs. No, it was a gradual process that kept getting worse the longer he wouldn’t admit that it was a problem.
It started off when his mother passed away. Afterwards, his father quickly fled the town and left Mikasa in charge. Mikasa’s form of coping resulted in busying herself with school and work. With no adult or dominant figure in the household, Eren (being the sixteen year old he was) lived off a steady diet of hot pockets and ramen.
Unfortunately for Eren, and most college students, his health took a turn for the worst. His immune system crashed due to the malnutrition and he began to spend days and weeks at the hospital just for catching a cold. Those days were filled with Mikasa berating him about not eating properly and Armin filling him in with what causes colds: viruses and bacteria. How they lived on every surface and since his immune system is so low: he must be sure to wash his hands as much as possible, keep the area around him clean and sanitized.
After a few weeks of this constant in and out of hospitals, Eren became used to the sterile smell of sanitizer and the general cleanliness of it all. (Despite the fact that it was disease-ridden.) He purchased his first bottle of hand sanitizer and clorox wipes. He spent the first day wiping down every surface of his house, with the help of Mikasa and Armin.
The first bottle was gone after two weeks. The next bottle was gone in 9 days. The next; 5. Eventually, Eren began to use up a bottle everyday – to the point where he had to upgrade his bottle size and begin purchasing in bulk in order to save money. Soon enough, clorox wipes weren’t enough to keep the viruses away.
Eventually, it wasn’t just surfaces he was afraid of, it was the humans, that were literally bacteria filled. Suddenly, his world became focused on these tiny microorganisms that lived on every little thing on this earth.
He would kill them all.
Eren realized it was a problem when one day, Mikasa opened the door to his apartment and proceeded to touch him. He ripped his arm away from her, basically accused her of murder, before dousing himself in sanitizer and jumping into the shower to scrub his body clean. By the time he was finished, his skin had been rubbed nearly raw, streaks of red lined his arm where Mikasa had touched him. After that, Mikasa never touched him again – without washing and sanitizing her hands in front of Eren.
After five years of living by himself, the fear of germs just increased to the point where he wouldn’t even leave his apartment. While the malnutrition for lack of proper food was no longer a problem; he now had a strong vitamin D deficiency, which resulted in – a poor immune system.
Somehow, he ended back to the doctors where they drilled into his mind that he need to go outside. He needed to consume dairy, eat some egg yolks, and for the love of god – sunbathe.
So that’s how Eren got to this point. Scrubbing at some bench in the park next to his apartment complex and 2 in the morning. Obviously, he wasn’t getting any sun at this hour, but he needed to get used to the idea of being in the fresh air before actually going out and breathing air with other humans.
It had taken him a whole week to actually reach the park, another to get the courage to scrub down the bench, and another two whole weeks of daily scrubbing to even sit on the bench.
So here he was, six weeks into his attempt to get used to the outdoors, scrubbing the stupid bench for the 104th time, using his second bottle of bleach. Thankfully, he got the idea to recoat the wooden bench with some sealant so it would be easier to clean and exterminate the disgusting bacteria. It was also a plus that it made the bench look super sparkly!
He could feel someone’s eyes on him as he scrubbed away at the microscopic creatures. It wasn’t unusual, there were usually a few bystanders that would walk through the park drunk or when they needed to have their nightly walk, but they usually ignored his presence. However, this stare felt strange and different, nonetheless the fact that he could feel the stare for the past five minutes.
Normally, he wouldn’t be bothered – getting rid of all these germs would be on the top of his priority, but he was curious as to who would be staring him for this long. For all he knew, it could be a serial killer!
He didn’t expect to see a handsome, albeit sweaty, stranger not only staring him down, but walking towards him!
“Hey brat, what the fuck are you doing?”
Eren jumped at the sound of the voice. It was deep and beautiful in a alluring yet frightening way. At the question, he continued his gaze at the stranger for one more second before turning his gaze to the 99.8% bacteria free bench.
“Cleaning?” Well, what else could he be doing? As if it wasn’t obvious with the two bottles of nearly empty bleach, wood polisher, and his two buckets of rags and scrubbers.
“At 3 in the morning?” The stranger questioned him.
Well, he did have a point. Who cleans at three in the morning? Eren does. And now he’s embarrassed because not only did he get caught, he got caught by some hot guy who happened to be jogging in the area.
“Y-yes? It’s cleaner here with everyone not here and my doctor says I need to be outside more often and I wasn’t going to sit anywhere else so…wait what the fuck, I don’t need to explain myself to you!”
To hide his embarrassment and stupidity for even answering the question in the first place, he picked up a new bacteria-free rag and drenched it in bleach before scrubbing down the hard surface again. God, he could practically feel the bacteria jumping onto his skin, even though he was wearing long sleeves and gloves. It was disgusting, they were probably just thriving on every inch of his skin and no matter how hard he would scrub they wouldn’t fucking die.
Eren’s vicious scrubs suddenly halted as he saw the stranger swipe at his bench with a gloveless, bacteria infested finger. Not only that, the stranger then sat his disgustingly sweaty and diseased body onto the bench. His bench. His bench that he spent the past hour cleaning. The bench that was just infected with some stranger’s germs.
Words flew out of Eren’s mouth before he could even stop them. This was disgusting. An absolute nightmare. It wouldn’t have been that bad had the stranger literally had not been sweating. Seriously. Sweat and body heat is just asking for bacteria to thrive. No. No. This is why he had a high as fuck body temperature (as if he had a choice in the matter), where no matter how hot it was it wouldn’t be too fucking hot. Also the fact that he blasted the AC at all times to avoid sweat. Not only that. This guy was a stranger. And sure he looked clean enough, but how the fuck would Eren know when the last time he showered? Oh fuck, what if he was homeless? Homeless people literally never shower. They just give themselves sponge baths with some dirty ass bacteria jammed sponge.
God, this stranger was literally the worst human being. Eren threw off his gloves and face mask. How was he gonna sit there? No, he can’t. He should just take a shit ton of vitamin D supplements. Why did he even need to go outside when the amazing world of medicine was literally at his fingertips. He could just buy this stupid ass vitamin D in a goddamn gummy form and he wouldn’t have to deal with sweaty strangers. Even if they were hot.
Eren could vaguely hear the stranger saying something to him but he was far too disgusted to even comprehend what the guy was saying. Honestly, he forgot the guy was even there to begin with until the stranger stepped right in front of his face.
He stopped all words as he looked down at the guy.
“Woah – you’re short.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Okay, that probably was not the best thing to say to a stranger. This is why he didn’t have any friends outside of his current friend group. He did not have a brain to mouth filter (aside from the fact that he rarely if ever left his apartment.)
“I’m so sorry! I don’t know what came over me. It’s just... when I go on these rants I forget about everything and I’m soooo sorry! You’re really not that short. Maybe like three inches shorter? And I’m actually below average for a white guy in America so, really, maybe we’re just both sho–.”
“I’m sorry about sitting on your freakishly beautiful and clean bench. I’ll take you on a date as an apology.”
Wait, wait what? Eren stopped his apology to actually look at the stranger in the eyes. He could feel the piercing steel eyes stare him down as his blush began to blossom on his skin.
“W-wha.. What? I- I…” The brunette brought his hands to his face to cover up his embarrassment. “I don’t do dates!”
“It wasn’t a question you shitty brat. We’re going on Friday, you can choose the place. What’s your number?”
Eren peeked through his fingers to take a good look at the guy. Okay, he already knew the guy was handsome from afar but god damn was he a total babe up close. He was the type of guy Eren could only dream of dating. Then his eyes trailed down to the rest of the stranger’s body. He was wearing a tight fitting workout tee that practically hugged every single muscle along his torso. Then came the tight fitting running shorts that showed off his muscular thighs that made Eren, the germaphobe, actually want to lick the probably sweaty and contaminated thigh.
“You – you can’t just expect people to go on dates with you!”
“Sure I can.” The stranger’s face was stoic and showed very little emotions but his steel eyes were locked onto Eren’s own for the whole duration.
Eren couldn’t see any visible signs of lying, but then again he was very gullible. Except when it came to washing. If Jean told him he won the lottery, he would believe it. If Jean told him that it was fine, he just washed his hands twice before touching his cup of water, then no he would not, could not, will never, believe it unless he saw it with his own two eyes. And this is exactly why he did not date, no one would ever accept him for the way he was.
“B-but, why would you wanna date me? I just got mad at you for sitting on a bench! And I just told you I spent an hour cleaning it! Aren’t…” Eren finally broke eye contact as he gulped and turned to look at the floor. “Aren’t I freak to you?”
“Tch. I happen to like cleaning and I’ve been looking for the mystery person who has been cleaning this shitty bench for the past month.” Eren’s gazed jumped to from the floor to stare directly into the intense silver gaze of the stranger.
“W-what?” This was unreal. He had never met anyone ever in his life that appreciated his cleaning quirk, if you could even call it that. Maybe life style was a better word. Armin and Mikasa tolerated it because they had to. He hadn’t even seen his high school friends in months, although they did talk a lot online and through video games. But whenever he went out with them it was always ‘Do you have to wipe it again?’ or ‘Stop! You’re so fucking embarrassing, Jaeger.’
“And I didn’t fucking expect you to be fucking beautiful either, so just give me your number you shitty ass brat.”
If Eren thought the previous statement was unbelievable, this had to be a joke! This extremely hot model stranger liked cleaning and didn’t mind him being obsessed with it. And oh my god, he called him beautiful. Eren could feel the heat literally radiating off of him.
“Fine. I’ll give you my number.” Eren sighed as he sat on the bench and rested his forearm against his head in order to cool down from the embarrassment.
Wait. Bench. Stranger. Stranger sat on the bench. The bench he was sitting on right. Fucking. Now.
“Nonononono.” Eren shouted to himself as he flung himself off the bench. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
His hands fumbled into the small front pocket of his jeans to pull out a small travel size bottle of medical-grade hand sanitizer. He flipped the cap off and immediately squirted half the bottle in his palms and began to rub every millimeter of exposed skin. Fuck. Was it on him?! Jesus. He could feel the germs crawling all over his body, this was disgusting.
Oh god, was it on his clothes? Staring at the bottle for a split second, he decided to squirt the rest of it and continue to rub his arms down, pulling up the sleeves and rubbing at his skin until it was a slight pink. One. Two. Three. Fuck, nope he still felt the disgusting creatures crawling on his skin. Four. Five. Six. Okay. It was a little better, but he better do it one more time just in case. Seven. Eight. Nine.
Feeling slightly better and less contaminated, Eren realized that the stranger was still there. He immediately dropped his hands and tucked the now empty bottle of hand sanitizer in his pocket.
“Sorry… I was a little distracted…” His cheeks began to burn in embarrassment. There was no way this guy still wanted to go on a date with him after that little number.
Taking a peek to look at the stranger, Eren’s eyes widened. The guy was smiling! It was a look of pure adoration and it made Eren practically melt.
“Shut up and just give me your fucking number.” The raven pulled out his iPhone and started tapping away to the contacts app. Eren stared slightly in disgust, so many germs live on cell phones. Was he going to make him tap in his own numbers? Oh god, touch screens literally harvested germs.
After a few seconds of silence, Eren realized that the guy was waiting on the number pad screen. He waited a few more seconds before realizing that the stranger wasn’t going to make him touch the phone, he was waiting for him to say his number. With a huge sigh of relief, Eren spouted out his number.
“Okay. I just texted you, check your phone right now so I know you didn’t give me a fake number.” The stranger said abruptly.
Sure the guy was a little aggressive, but honestly Eren needed someone who forced him out of his comfort zone a little. Armin and Mikasa were a little too accepting of his germaphobia and practically allowed the disorder to manifest itself. A little flustered by the harshness of the man’s voice, Eren whipped out his phone to show the guy the screen before he even had a chance to take a look.
“Good boy. Unfortunately, I have this shitty thing called work.”
Eren’s eyes widened and for the 100th time in the past whatever minutes his face began to flush. God, who knew being called a good boy would be such a turn on.
“I’ll see you Friday, brat.” And with that, the stranger turned to leave.
Eren stood there for a few seconds watching the guy's back muscles flex as he walked away from him before he remembered that his bench was contaminated and needed to be disinfected immediately.
Whipping out a new pair of gloves, he was in the process of tucking his right hand inside when the stranger suddenly turned around.
“Your name?” The raven asked. Eren took this time to briefly examine the man’s face one more time realizing that yes, this extremely handsome guy is asking him out on a date.
Suddenly feeling giddy at the prospect, a huge grin split upon his face.
“Eren, my name is Eren.”
The look on the guy’s face was endearing. His eyes widened and the stoic face flinched at Eren’s smile. It looked as if he just witnessed a UFO sighting or that he had just spotted a legendary creature. He mumbled Eren’s name beneath his breath before he turned and left with a stream of curses.
After the guy left, Eren giggled to himself and wondered what would Armin think before diving back to scrubbing the bench.
One hour later after scrubbing his bench to perfection and sitting on the bench for 15 minutes. (5 more minutes than the last time.) He was finally safe at home.
He placed his bucket of supplies in a drawer outside of his apartment door before stepping into his place. He pulled out his keys, phone, and wallet and placed it on the table near the door entrance. Eren peeled off his contaminated clothes with a clean pair of gloves before immediately placing it into his plastic laundry basket that was next to the door and closed the lid. Taking off his shoes, he grabbed a pair of clorox wipes and wiped down all the rubber areas, including the soles. He spritzed some 99.9% rubbing alcohol on the top of the shoes and proceeded to move through his apartment. He quickly tossed the rubber gloves in the trash and did a quick sweep of the room to make sure his apartment still looked spiffy and clean.
There were two high-grade $1,000 air purifiers in his apartment complex running on high-power at all times, so he felt okay to breathe freely and with out a face mask. He briefly worried about the amount of dust that would have quickly collected in the three and a half hours he left the apartment but decided that the dust would have to wait.
Eren made his way to the restroom where he took off his boxers and placed it in the laundry basket assigned to the bathroom. He closed the lid firmly before heading to the sink to wash his hands.
He turned the left handle all the way so the water was running at full force. The brunet waited a few minutes for the water to become hot and once he saw a small amount of steam he pumped the soap container three times before starting to scrub. The water was burning his hands but he welcomed the pain. It was as if the hot water was cleansing away the disgusting bacteria, since bacteria could not live in extremely hot environments. (They liked the middle ground where it was warm and humid, disgusting.) After three minutes of intense washing, he turned off the faucet with a small paper towel that he grabbed from the rack next to his sink. Wiping down the handle with extreme care. Turning to his right, he pumped one, two, and three squirts of hand sanitizer into his palms, the coolness of the liquid soothing his throbbing red hands.
Finally, he felt clean off to grab a new towel from the closet and hang it on the shower rack. Turning the shower completely to the hottest possible setting he could physically handle, he stepped in and began to scrub.
Exactly 90 minutes later (It took him 30 minutes to clean himself off the first time, but he did it a second time just in case, then a third time because it was just better that way), a very pink but very clean Eren stepped out of the restroom and rushed to put on a set of freshly laundered clothes.
His mind tingled at the thought of dust but he was so extremely exhausted all he wanted to do was sleep. Tucking himself into bed, he urged his body to sleep.
Dust.
Dust mites.
Dust mites everywhere.
After exactly 3 minutes of lying down, Eren flew up from the bed and took off the sheets and tossed them into the laundry basket, before huffing up the laundry and throwing them into the washing machine. With another set of latex gloves, he brought out his clorox wipes and began to scrub down his whole apartment.
Finally, after almost two hours of intense scrubbing, he finally deemed his apartment clean enough. Eren peeled off his clothes and went into the bathroom to take another piping hot shower.
It was now 6 A.M., once he finally finished placing his freshly washed comforter on the bed. He was exhausted and his skin still tingled from being rubbed raw too hard in a short amount of time.
But to him, all that extra time had been worth it. He felt comfortable, safe, and clean. Once tucked nicely into his fluffy freshly laundered sheets, he tried to sleep but found his mind recalling the events that happened throughout the day.
The new logo he began to design for his freelance work, and how he completely annihilated Jean at Overwatch. Just as his mind finally began to shut down and he remembered.
The guy in the park. The exceedingly handsome man that asked him on a date and had his number.
Eren's eyes shot open and he ripped the comforter off his body. Eren jumped out of bed and grabbed his phone from having wiped it down three times since he walked through the door. Tapping the screen it unveiled two texts from an unknown number.
Levi, but you can save my number as “Husband.”
Color began to rise up on his face the moment he read the text. Levi, that was an interesting name and it suited the man. But Eren had to admit, husband would sound a lot better. (Granted, if he was husband material, he would not get upset if Eren sprayed hand sanitizer on him at all times. This would need to be tested.)
Oi, brat. Where the fuck do you wanna go Friday?
Oh god. Where did he wanna go? He hated dining out. It was literally the worst. A freaking cesspool of germs waiting to enter his system and crawl on his skin. There was always Sasha’s, (Sasha opened up a diner recently with Connie) but he didn’t really want to bring a first date there. His whole gang was always there and if he decided to show up with a stranger rather than the multitude events they always had at the diner, they would surely get upset. But he couldn’t trust anywhere else. Sasha didn’t care if he brought his own utensils and plates. She also didn’t care that he had to wipe down her table and chair three times before even thinking about sitting on it. She also let him bring his own water and allowed him to see his food being cooked via facetime. She would facetime all the way until it was finished on the pan, where she would walk over to his table and allow him to pick the serving off of the pan and onto his plate.
Also, what kind of cleaning product did you use on the bench? I’m curious to how you made that shit sparkle.
Eren almost dropped his phone onto his face. (Which he would never because despite how many times he could wipe the damn thing, it was still not clean enough.) Levi was curious about his cleaning habits, not disgusted by it.
This handsome, albeit shorter, man who wants to go on a date with Eren also enjoys cleaning.
Eren’s face began to boil from embarrassment and disbelief.
Levi was going to be the end of him.