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Every day starts around seven in the morning for Levi. Sometimes he wakes up before his alarm, manages to get a few minutes of simple lounging in the warm sheets before the other alarm clock of his comes to ‘wake him up’. The other alarm clock, though, was a four year old bundle of more energy than there was in whole of Russia taken together and comes with the ‘daddy, wake up now, I’m hungry’ default ringtone.
“Yes, yes. I got it, now get off.” He shoves Eren off from himself, before the little kid can abuse his bladder any more than he already did. “Brush your teeth already?” Levi asks the bump of blankets that was his son through a yawn, on his way to the bathroom.
“No! You weren’t up so I came to wake you up, daddy.” Eren’s head pops out from the jumble of blankets and the kid is smiling so widely, as if Christmas has come months too soon. Then again, the boy always looks like that.
Levi makes a small grunt to acknowledge the information and yawns once as he walks inside the small bathroom. First came morning pee, then teeth brushing and only then he took care of his son’s black hole of a stomach.
Mornings were hard.
…
“You got a call from the kindergarten?” Erwin asks over his lunch coffee. Somehow the man, Levi’s best friend, doesn’t seem all that surprised about the news. Especially because Levi got these calls at least a few times a month. “What did the little man do this time? Had a fight with Jean again?” As ‘last moment babysitter’ number one Erwin knew just as much about Eren’s arch nemesis as Levi did.
Levi sighs and rips open the top of a sugar packet. “No. Not a fight. The teacher said something about the brat not following the task right. I told her to fuck off and call me only when something serious happens.”
“I really hope you didn’t say exactly that to Eren’s teacher. The poor thing already has to deal with your ridiculous demands concerning cleanliness.” The blond had the look on his face of a father that already had too much to deal with and one of his kids just decided to play astronauts and got himself a broken leg.
“Oh fuck off, of course I didn’t. I’m not five.” Levi’s glare is ineffective and the man decides to just drink his coffee and pretend Erwin wasn’t around. “Said something about Eren not doing a task right or whatever. That kid’s not the sharpest tool in the shed, but he usually does what he is told, so I call bullshit.”
Erwin just shakes his head and hopes everything will turn out for the best. He’d rather not deal with a pissy Levi while the single dad tried to find a new kindergarten that was up to his standards.
…
The first thing that Levi finds once he steps inside of the room where Eren’s group stays in is his son, sitting on one of the benches with arms crossed across his little chest and a pout on his lips. When the child looks up and sees his father, the boy just stands up, quickly walks over to Levi and hugs the man around his legs.
Eren has only acted like this whole of five times in his short life and each of those times Eren wasn’t the one at fault. Though, that didn’t mean that there wasn’t a first time for everything.
Levi sighed and crouched down, placing his bag down on one of the small chairs next to the lockers. “What happened? Another fight?” he asked, tilting his head a little to be able to see his son’s face better. The child’s bottom lip was still sticking out a little in a pout and it would have been a little cute, if Eren wouldn’t look like he was about to cry any minute now.
“No.” the kid mumbled and looked Levi straight in the eye as he spoke, “Teacher said I can’t draw Erwin and Hanji in my family drawing. But I told her that they are family because you said so. And she said I need to draw my mom and dad only. But then I told her that I don’t have a mom and that I have Erwin and Hanji. But then she took my--” And it was there that Levi placed his hand on his son’s mouth, since the boy had started to ramble. And when Eren rambled it was hard to make the kid stop.
Now it was pretty obvious why the teacher had called him, though.
“Okay, okay. I got it. Let’s go talk with Miss Samantha.” Levi stood up, pulling out a napkin to wipe his hand clean from drool and snot. Then he picked up Eren and wiped the boy’s face clean, mumbling a ‘no need to cry now, Eren’ as they made their way back to the classroom.
…
“You know, I have to agree with Eren on this. She was, as he put it just now, a poopy head.” Erwin concluded while drinking his evening beer, the only one he was allowed to have. The man looked far too pleased now that he had heard the horrible tale from Eren about today’s happenings at the kindergarten. “I am pretty much like his mother anyway.”
“Ugly-ass mother.” Levi snorted over his own beer.
Since it was Friday and Hanji had invited the family of two over for a sleepover he could drink a bit and trust Hanji with not injuring his son for a couple of hours. And since Erwin wasn’t allowed to get drunk at all, then there was one more capable babysitter here to take over his fatherly duties and look after them all. Friends, what would Levi do without them? Probably spend money on shitty babysitters.
A piece of lego hit Levi at the back of his head and Hanji hissed at him from the other side of the room, “No swearing, Levi. I swear to god, it’s a miracle Eren is still innocent and adorable when he has you for a father.” She threw one more lego, missing on purpose this time. “Anyway, how dare they say we’re not family and some stupid woman who bailed on you is. Eren, my precious titan cub, mama Hanji is so proud of you for standing up to the evil kindergarten overlord.”
Eren could only giggle and squeal when he was pulled into a bear hug by his ‘last moment babysitter’ number two. “Hanji huuuuurts.” The boy laughed, his voice muffled by Hanji’s boobs being squished in his face, probably. “Hanji mamaaaaaa!”
“Your son has touched my wife’s breasts more than I have, Levi.” Erwin notes, a small smile on his lips as he watches Eren squirming out of Hanji’s hold and running off in a sudden game of chase. “Any other man would have felt threatened.”
Levi turns his head to stare at his best friend, face clearly pulling the ‘are you high’ look perfectly. “Eren is four, you wig wearing moron.” He soon has to hold his bottle up in the air, away from the aforementioned four year old as the child climbs in his lap in an attempt to escape from Hanji, who was now pretending to be a zombie.
“Ultimate defense, daddy wall!” Eren pokes Levi’s chin and waits for something to happen. When Levi doesn’t do anything, just blink down at him, the kid huffs and quickly runs over to Erwin to do the same chin poke. “Wall daddy fell, gundam Erwin to the rescue.”
Unlike Levi, Erwin plays his part excellently.
…
Levi is once again in a meeting with Eren’s teacher. It was the same issue as last Friday and he was pretty damn sure that he had taken care of this already. Calling him back again for the same stupid thing seemed just pointless right now. Especially when Eren wouldn’t budge on his own version about how his family looked like and which people were part of it.
“Mister Ackerman, we talked about this last week as well and I was under the impression that something like that won’t repeat in the future. However, Eren once again refuses to do his tasks correctly.” The teacher rummages through the pile of drawings and pulls out Eren’s, handing it to Levi. “He was asked to draw his mother this time, for mother’s day. And yet…”
Well, this time Levi understands why he was here. Erwin sure as hell wasn’t something that should be drawn when talking about mothers. He supposed this was entirely his fault since Eren must have heard him and Erwin talking. Or maybe this was all Erwin’s fault for being too much of a mother in general.
Damn kid and his super hearing.
At least Eren wasn’t swearing left and right. Yet.
…
Hanji falls out of the chair from laughing too much and Ewin lookes like he wants to frame the drawing after the two of them heard the whole story. So much for understanding friends and a peaceful lunch break.
Levi just sighs and drinks his coffee to wash down the taste of overcooked chicken that he had for lunch. “Yeah, yeah, laugh all you want, you farts. I had to have a talk with Eren and had him promise to draw Hanji next time.” He reaches out for the vanilla pudding he had saved for dessert.
“I love Eren. That kid is precious and must be protected at all costs.” Hanji wheezes as she tries to get back up on her seat with the help of the table. In the end she just lays down on the table surface and decides to stay like that – so much easier than sitting. “Our child is a gem.”
“Don’t say our child. It sounds like we’re in some kind of a threesome. Ew.” Levi throws a glare at the embarrassment that was one of his best friends and gets back to tearing open the pudding package. He mentally makes a reminded to pick some up for Eren when they go shopping this evening.
Erwin, who is now neatly folding up Eren’s drawing for safe carrying, just smiles. He, personally, saw nothing wrong with being thought of as mom and wondered why the teacher was so opposed of this. It was entirely because of him that Eren had learned to eat porridge and boiled carrots, after all.
…
“Daddy, do you have paper?” Eren is hanging from the doorknob of the door leading to Levi’s home office. The kid had been sniffing a little and running a fewer that morning, so Levi had decided to stay home just to be on the safe side. Previous experience with a sick Eren was plenty enough to take precautions.
The man glares at his son, long enough for the kid to let go of the doorknob at least. “Why do you need paper?” He asks while rummaging through his drawers for some copy paper to give away. “If you’re cutting it up then you better clean up after yourself.”
“I’m gonna draw. For you, Hanji and Erwin.” Eren is already making grabby hand motions for the paper and grinns when Levi passes a small pile of sheets over to him. There were already colorful marker stripes decorating the kid’s little fingers.
“What will you draw?” Levi is just itching to reach for the tissues he kept on his desk and clean off the ink. But decides not to do anything right now, since there will only be more later on. Ah, the life of a parent was marked with ink and food stains on every surface available.
Eren blinks and just grins wider. “A family picture, since teacher took my old one. It will have me and daddy. And Hanji and Erwin. And two houses cause one is ours and the other is theirs.” The kid looks thoughtful for a second and then nods to himself, as if he had finally come to an important decision. “I’ll also draw some cats. Cause I like cats.”
Levi feels himself smile a little as he watches his son run out of the room. He may be a single father and it was a bit hard sometimes, but his two best friends were always there to help him and make sure that Eren grows up well.
What more could he ask for?