Chapter Text
I made my excuses and left
“So, you’re really gonna do it today?” Hanji asked, sipping whatever ungodly beverage she had in her red plastic cup “You’re really gonna ask him out today?”
“Stop asking that, before I rethink my plans, four-eyes!” Levi hissed, clearly uncomfortable in every possible way. It was the end of the semester, and as per usual, parties were held all around town to celebrate the end of yet another semester of college. Normally, Levi would have never attended any of those. He hated being surrounded by sweating people that were too drunk for their own good. Actually thinking about it, he just hated being around too many people in general. While he certainly didn’t mind the company of his few close friends (one of which just happened to be Hanji, as much as that fact had made him question his life choices more than once), he just as certainly could think of about a thousand places where he would rather be right now.
“Don’t you even dare rethink your plans! It took me long enough to convince you to do it!” she claimed as she shoved another red plastic cup in his hands. The smell of cheap alcohol was disgusting and it reminded Levi of hand sanitizer rather than an enjoyable drink.
“I can’t believe I’m actually about to do this…” Levi mumbled as he took a large gulp of the rum and coke that he was just handed. The cup was sticky from poor preparation of the drink and he scrunched his nose as the dark, ice-cold liquid assaulted his taste buds and throat with the sharp taste of Ethanol.
“Believe me, when I tell you that this CAN only end in a good way! You just gotta look at it like this: Once the night is over, you’ll have yourself a boyfriend, aaaand you might even get laid as well” Hanji smirked as she winked at him.
“If you ever even think about me ‘getting laid’ again, I will personally end you with my bare hands.” Levi grumbled as he shot her a glare. He hated how open and nonchalant Hanji was with things like that.
“If I got a dollar for every time you’ve threatened me like that…” she laughed, knowing Levi far too well in his opinion “But seriously, you’d need to be blind and deaf not to notice how much you’ve been pining over Eren and how much he’s been pining over you.”
“I still have no clue how you even got the idea that he’d be interested in me,” Levi scoffed.
“It’s all about the looks, shorty! Said it before, and I’ll say it again, it’s all in the eyes,” she grinned as she motioned to her eyes like a lunatic to emphasize what she just explained.
“Whatever, I don’t even know where he is right now.”
“Huh. I don’t know, he’s gotta be around here somewhere…” She trailed off, looking around the room “Go ask your sister, she’s his personal babysitter.” Hanji said as she emptied her drink “I’m gonna get another drink. Want one, too?”
“Hell no. You’ve poisoned me enough already and I don’t want another one of your deadly concoctions.” He shot her a glare as she just shrugged and went off to the drink table that was set up in one corner of the room. This was already the third drink that she had given him, and Levi just hoped that Hanji would never be a barkeeper. The drinks she made for him were truly awful and way too strong. Now that he thought about it, she might have done that on purpose, as she knew that Levi would probably never actually do what he had planned, if he was sober.
People, who didn’t really know Levi, always saw him as a quiet but very confident guy. And for the most part he was just that, but when it came to one certain green-eyed man, he was anything but confident. Levi had first met Eren in his second year of college. Eren was the best friend of his sister Mikasa and when they both got accepted to the same college as Levi, his circle of friends rapidly expanded as he was unwillingly dragged into almost every activity that Mikasa, Eren and their friends had planned. Of course it just so happened that Levi’s own friends, Hanji and Erwin, got along perfectly with the new group of people which left Levi with little to no choice but to join and go along with it.
As much as he hated it at first, he grew to enjoy the company of the others’ just as much over time. However, it had been Eren that occupied most of his mind whenever the group of friends met up. At first, he was just annoyed by the chaotic, bouncy, and energetic boy that was Eren Jäger. But soon enough, the annoyance shifted into actual interest and mutual friendship as he watched Eren grow mentally over the last year and a half. They actually grew quite close and Levi considered Eren to be one of his best friends
But of course it would have been too easy for Levi if it just stayed that way.
He couldn’t remember the day or event when he realized that he found Eren to be way more interesting than he expected. Interesting on a level that was definitely not friendship–level anymore. Levi denied the feelings for Eren that kept building up inside of him, until he could no longer deny it: He was head over heels in love with Eren fucking Jäger.
Of course Hanji found out. That woman had to be some sort of supernatural psychic; Levi was sure of that. And of course she wouldn’t stop trying to get Levi to confess his feelings to Eren. At this very moment, he had been sure that Hanji was just going crazy. She should have known that Levi was the last person on earth to confess his feelings to anyone or even talk about them at all. But Hanji being Hanji, never let that go. So here he was now, three drinks in at a college party and about to finally ask Eren out after his supposedly best friend kept pestering him with that idea for over a month now.
Levi had never asked someone out. In fact, he was usually the one to turn down any offers he got from men and women alike. Yes, he had his fair share of one-night stands, but that was just to ease physical desire. He never grew emotionally attached to any of them, because his mind has only been rotating around one singular man all this time. The desire to have anything close to the sheer physical contact he had with his one-night stands, but with Eren, was immense within him. But Levi wanted more than that. He wanted so much more. He was longing for those shitty green eyes to be the last thing to see at night and the first thing to see in the morning. He was longing for the feeling of that shitty smooth and silky hair in between his fingers, the scent of which Levi could only imagine. He was longing for every last bit of Eren, his body, his warmth and maybe even his presence in this life of his for the rest of said life, if Levi even dared to think about that.
Damn this cheesy shit, Levi thought to himself, as he realized his mind had drifted off to Eren again.
As much as Levi dreaded the thought of exposing himself by telling Eren about his feelings for him, something deep inside was longing for the tall brunet and he could not ignore it any longer. And this longing feeling was beginning to drown Levi’s anxiety of exposing himself. Maybe Hanji’s drinks were kicking in, maybe it was his true desire for Eren; Levi couldn’t tell. He could tell though, that the longer he waited, the more it was killing him on the inside. He needed to get this over with.
Levi looked around the crowded living room of someone’s house, trying to make out a tall man with broad shoulders and long brown hair in a loose bun. But much to his disappointment, said man was nowhere to be seen.
“Hey Mika, have you seen Eren anywhere?” he asked as he approached his sister who was currently chatting with Armin, Eren’s bosom-buddy, and Sasha and Connie. Those two were also part of their friend group. Sasha and Connie started out as best friends, much like Levi and Eren. However, at some point they realized that there was more between them than just friendship and so about three months ago, at the end of November, they announced their relationship to everyone at one of the many gatherings the small group of friends held. Though it had been obvious to everyone that the two had something for each other (no one was surprised; in fact Hanji even had bets going on with Jean, Marco and Annie for when they would finally admit it to themselves), seeing Connie and Sasha in their seemingly perfect relationship let the spark of hope that he could have something similar with Eren, light up into a small flame, just big enough to make him go through with his plan.
“Not for the last 20 minutes or so,” Mikasa said with a questioning look of curiosity. She was similar to her brother in many ways, one being not to ask too many questions, as she knew that she probably wouldn’t get a satisfying answer anyway.
“I think he went upstairs with Floch or something like that,” Armin added to Mikasa’s answer.
Levi could feel his heart sink into his stomach. Of course he went somewhere with that idiot. Floch Forster was a guy who shared some courses with Eren. Levi knew that Floch had high interest in Eren and while he did not exactly know why, but Levi couldn’t stand the redhead at all. The things Levi had heard about Floch from other people had only solidified Levi’s negative opinion of him.
Levi felt as if the floor was pulled out from under his feet. While he was down here, debating with himself about whether it was a good idea to open up to Eren, Floch was probably upstairs with the man he loved, doing the very thing Levi had planned to do tonight. He felt sick at that thought.
Without saying anything, Levi left his sister and his friends behind, making his way across the floor, sticky from spilled drinks, to the staircase. Thoughts were circling around in his head in an increasing speed. There were good ones and bad ones and unfortunately, the bad ones were slowly but steadily taking over.
Eren’s way out of league for that idiot! He thought to himself if I had done this shit earlier, this wouldn’t have happened!
He mentally smacked himself in the face for waiting so long to tell Eren his feelings. What if he had admitted all of this earlier? What if he had been honest from the point he was certain of his feelings? All the what ifs that were rampaging through his black–haired head weren’t doing anything good to his state of mind. Images started to manifest of Floch being closer, to him. Of that bastard kissing him. Of that asshole getting to hear the words Levi so desperately longed for: I love you.
Levi could feel a lump forming in his throat as he pictured Eren and Floch doing whatever. But at the same time, he felt that he had no right to be mad or jealous. After all, he was the one who couldn’t bring himself to be honest with Eren. He was not Eren’s boyfriend and Eren could, of course, do whatever he wanted. Eren probably would have never wanted him anyway and maybe Eren would be happy with Floch. Levi cringed as that name ran through his mind once again. No, Levi thought, that shithead would only use Eren. It was well known to most that relationships with that shitty redhead tended to be quite toxic, Eren just had to know that as well. Levi could never forgive himself if Eren got hurt in the same way that Floch’s previous partners had been.
As he reached the top of the stairs, Levi felt like he was about to have a breakdown from all of the things going through his head at the moment. The thoughts in his head became darker and more suppressing. It all felt like a suffocating darkness lurking above him. Levi felt sick from the upbuilding ache somewhere inside of his torso. This couldn’t be happening. He had had countless chances and opportunities to go for it, to tell Eren how he felt. But he had always been too fucking anxious and scared of rejection; scared of ending the precious friendship that they had. And now that he could finally bring himself to use an opportunity to go for it and open up to Eren, some obscure idiot got to the man first. He had got to the one person Levi had been longing for for so long.
There weren’t many rooms on the upper floor. Levi hastily opened one door after another.
He saw what he’d been dreading to see behind the third door he had opened.
The world came to a halt for Levi. Though it had probably only been seconds, it felt like painfully long hours, as he was standing in the doorframe and observing the scene in front of him. Eren was sitting on the bed and Floch was sitting next to him. He was close to him, with one hand on Eren’s thigh. Both of them looked up in surprise, or rather in annoyance in Floch’s case. Bright green eyes were staring at him with an expression Levi could not decipher in his current state of mind. No one said a word. The silence was not awkward, it was suffocating.
Levi felt all of the confidence he had worked so hard on to carefully buildup, vanish within a fraction of a second. He felt his world crumble around him and the sharp pain in his chest and his stomach twisted in a way he never experienced before.
He really felt like he was breaking. Breaking apart.
It felt like he was suffocating and drowning at the same time, like he suddenly forgot how to breathe. For months he had dreamed of having Eren to himself. About having his love to himself. His warmth, his touch. He had dreamed about how it would feel to kiss Eren, to show him how much he cared for him and loved him, only to receive the same love and care from him in return. All those dreams were crushed to dust within a second just by the mere scenery that he was facing right now, proving that they were just stupid egoistic dreams of his after all. Nothing more.
It was almost ironic that such a simple scene like that, one in which he wouldn’t, under normal circumstances, even properly perceive, if it wasn’t Eren, would have the sheer power to crush him just like that.
He could feel tears welling up in his eyes, but he wouldn’t give either of those two idiots the satisfaction of seeing him and his heart break apart. No, he thought to himself, he definitely wouldn’t. He would cry once he got away from this hell of a place. Maybe then, but not here, and not now. He swallowed harshly.
“Excuse me,” was all that he could get out of his throat in a rough, almost silent whisper, with his voice on the verge of breaking. He turned around in an instant, not wanting to witness Floch probably doing what Levi had been wanting to do for what felt like forever: confessing his feelings for Eren. And anything that might have happened after that.
Levi debated if he would have even had a chance if he had just brought himself to talk to Eren 30 minutes earlier. Probably not he thought to himself and decided to go. Just to get away from this. Just fleeing from the mess that he was, knowing that he would not be able to run away from this mess that his heart and mind were right now.
Levi never thought he’d be the person to listen to melancholic songs about love and loss when he would eventually experience a heartbreak. But right now, he felt the need for that. And the song he was putting on as he walked out of this house that just became his personal hell into the cold, end of January, air, happened to fit his mood just fine.
“I walked into the room,
Imagine my surprise:
You were sitting close to him,
Staring in each other’s eyes.
Each of you looked up,
But no one said a word.
I felt I should apologize,
For what I hadn’t heard.
A silence filled the room,
Awkward as an elephant,
In the crowded court of your love,
I was now a supplicant.
And clumsy as I felt,
At stumbling on this theft.
To save further embarrassment,
I made my excuses
and left."