Chapter Text
“Are you busy?” Levi rolls onto his side making himself more comfortable while cradling his phone on his shoulder. He flips a page on his text book. He could swear the words were swimming on his book, making everything blurry and those images of CT scans were starting to have colours. ‘Oh wait those were PET-CT. Yeah that’s supposed to have colour. I’m fine. I can keep going’. It didn’t matter how much he told himself. He couldn’t even half believe it. He was fucking tired and he should really rest. Somehow he kept studying or trying to, since his cousin had interrupted his studies with a phone call.
“Yes” The monotone response was received with a huff from the other side. The book made a soft thud when he flips the cover to close it. He rubs one of his eyes and looks around, looking for his cup. He knew it had to be somewhere. He spots the treasured item on his desk serving as a paper weight for the moment. He stretches and grabs it.
“Actually busy?” He takes a sip. ‘Not bad, still warm’. He starts looking for the article that had made him go look in the book for extra information. He founds it stuffed under his notes.
Scratching his ebony hair while speed reading the paper he answers her again. “Yes” She hums at his response. He had a hint that she isn’t paying the conversation that much attention, much like himself. If he had to go by the noise on the other side of the phone, he would assume that the fact that he was speaking in a low tone wasn’t helping.
“Okay, so you can go to my apartment and garb the bag that’s in the kitchen that has my extra lenses?” He sighs, pushing his hand further onto his hair and slightly pulling it. ‘This shit isn’t making sense’. He opens the book again searching for the page he wanted.
Suddenly he stops reading. The finger that was following the sentence frozen in place. He focuses on some random place on the wall and gave more attention to the phone call. Trying to make his point clear and get back to his neurotransmitters as soon as the call was dropped. “I’m really--”
“Thanks. Bye. I’ll text you the address of where I am” He takes his phone from his ear. He stares at it. Looks at his screen going from the incoming call screen, with the clock counting the time. To his main screen, with a random photo he had found on the internet, and going back to black. He stays there looking at it, like a monkey that can’t understand what the object on his hand was. ‘Fuck. Mikasa’
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Against his better judgment, he went to Mikasa’s apartment on the nice side of the city. One tube ride after he reached her apartment. The bag was on the place she had said, he grabbed it and left her house. Since he was there he couldn’t really say no to one of those stupidly expensive coffee’s he liked so much. So with a steaming coffee on one hand and Mikasa’s bag on the other he walks to the tube once again. While waiting he checks his e-mail and replies to his professor about his thesis.
The place Mikasa was working today wasn’t that far from her apartment and he really couldn’t phantom why she had called him. She should have people that did that shit for her - with the being a famous photographer and shit. She was so going to pay for another coffee and a bag of custard doughnuts. He enters the place, apart from the guy at the entrance that gives him a questing look when he walked in no one seemed to notice his presence.
The place was exactly what he had expected. High ceilings and pristine white walls with large French windows. The rooms filled with art that was more expensive than what his PhD was currently eating away on his bank account. Crystal chandeliers and high end furniture, making the place look like straight from the 18th century. Most of the original furniture was pushed to the sides leaving space for clothes and other things used in such a production.
The rooms actually being used for shoots were even more beautifully decorated. Polished furniture and the perfect lighting for the pretty topping of stupidly tall and attractive people. Attractive people dressed in clothes that could pay his apartment rent for, at least, a month.
He tried not to be too bitter about it. About all the money he was currently surrounded with when he was barely making it each month. He had made his choice and he loved what he was studying. He would never change it for the sole reason of making more money. The money would eventually come, probably once he was done with his studies and was actually working full time on a lab or something. Instead of being just a writers assistant and a student.
After searching for a bit he found Mikasa on one of the rooms taking some pictures of a single guy in a black suit and red tie. The guy was standing near one of those white rimmed French windows, slightly leaning on the back of a chaise-long. He looked like he wasn’t even paying attention to the commotion around with. Like there wasn’t a person in the room solely dedicated to take photos of him, let alone everyone else. He was focused on the window, just like he was admiring the sky. He heard the snap of the camera’s shutter a couple of times. Then the guy moves. He walks around the chair and leans on it once again. He is now looking down, his copper hair obscuring most of his face. More photos. He starts to slowly lift his head. He looks straight at the camera first serious and then giving the sexiest, cockiest smirk Levi had ever seen.
“That’s it. Give me more” The guy huffs at Mikasa’s approval and proceeds to push his hand onto his hair messing it up on the most perfect way. The shutter is heard once again a couple of times. Levi can’t take his eyes of the guy while he moves and poses. He didn’t really know what they were trying to sell but he definitely wanted to buy it. He would probably have to sell one his kidney to do it, though. Especially considering that his bank account was nearing on the zeros.
He is frozen in place when those grey eyes lock onto his own. The guy smiles, bites his lip and looks at him through half lidded eyes. “Perfect.” He hears the shutter go off a few more times in a row. Mikasa then stops to look at the last set of photos. “Take five.” She fidgets with her camera while talking, Levi notices the way the guy relaxes his posture. Although the raven is looking at Mikasa now, trying to get her attention. He can still feel those eyes on him burning a hole on the side of his face. “I need to get my other lenses anyway.” She murmurs. Mikasa turns on her heel, phone on her hand.
“Looking for these?” He says lifting the bag and walking up to her.
“Ah! God, took you long enough”
“Is thanks out of fashion?” He delivers the bag anyway. She rolls her eyes and calls one of the girls. She starts walking out of the room with the brunette girl in tow. “You owe me coffee! And doughnuts!” He yells after her. She dismisses him with a wave of her hand.
“I’ll buy you coffee”
“What? I--” He is so distracted with following Mikasa’s steps with his eyes that he doesn't even notices a person approach him. But not just a random person – no, this was pretty-eyes guy. He looks up (Yes, he had to look up – stupid tall people). “I--”
“I’ll even buy you doughnuts” Levi looks back to where Mikasa should be, noticing that she was nowhere that he could see. Was he cheap? Was he poor enough that the prospect of people buying him coffee and doughnuts sounded like a good idea?
“No you aren’t” A second voice says. Levi quickly scans the room looking for the source of the other voice. It belongs to a blond young man that is stretched on a sofa that had been pushed to the side to give space for the shoot. “You still have work, no running off like last time. Do you know how long it took me to find you?”
“Three hours…” The other mutters. Obviously having heard this multiple times, if the look on his face was anything to go by.
“Three hours, Eren!” The blond says with a high pitched voice. “I’m not even sure how you managed to go to the other side of the town in so little time! I was this close to call the hospital asking if they had a dumbass there.” He hadn’t taken his eyes off his phone, but that didn’t make his speech any less threatening. “I was thinking what I should tell his mother. ‘I’m sorry ‘mam I’ve seemed to have lost your son in Singapore. Please have this magnet from there as an apology’? I mean that magnet would’ve be more useful, but then again you are kind of her only son so…” He moves his hands as if weighing the situation. The pretty-eyes huffs in response and says ass under his breath. “I’m a busy person I don’t have time to search for your ass, Eren”
He rolls his eyes and promptly ignores the blond, turning once again to him. “They have tea and fruit down stairs” He gives a questioning look to which Levi replies with a shrug. Actually tea sounded really good too. They leave the room but not without Mr. pretty-eyes first declaring to blondie that he is going downstairs so that he wouldn’t have to "search for his ass".
They walk side by side in a strained silence. He wants to say something (anything) but once again his social grace leaves him to dry. Once they are in the room near the entrance the guy serves him a mug of tea. Only breaking the silence to ask if he wants milk and sugar (No. Yes, one) “Soo, where do you know Mikasa?” He finally breaks the silence after way too much time in Levi’s opinion.
“She’s my cousin. And you?” ‘And you???’ He wants to bang his head on the wall – repeatedly. He wants to go home and hide from the world and never talk to anyone ever again. He decides on just taking a big gulp of his tea, if his mouth is full he won’t spill shit out of it - probably.
The brunet laughs. ‘Of course he would’. “From work” He gestures around him in a self-explanatory manor. Levi drinks another big gulp after a jerky nod of his head. He looks casually around the room, or at least he hopes he looks casual and not he is trying to run away. He ends up giving up and focuses on his shoes. “Sorry for the lack of doughnuts, but models don’t really eat them. Straight to the hips” The brunet mocks, easily laughing at his own joke. When Levi hears the sound he looks at up, startled by how perfect it sounds on his ears. He smiles albeit strained, his laughter really contagious.
Silence.
“Eren, my name.” He coughs and squeezes his mug a bit tighter. His fingers going white on the tips from the force. “I mean, I’m Eren”
“Humm, Levi” He takes another mouthful of tea. On the corner of his eyes he sees Mikasa approaching them along with a pretty petite blonde. He focuses his gaze back on Eren, looking at the way he stares at him. Envying that smile, he so easily steps in.
“So, Levi--” He stops when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He looks at the offending appendage, his scowl melting when he meets Mikasa’s mostly black irises. “You ready for me?” He asks smiling and placing a hand on her waist, giving her a sort of side hug in the process.
“Yeah, and I brought you a hot girl” She eyes the small girl while patting him on his shoulder. “Christa. Eren. The guy I told you about.” The cute girl smiles and politely extends her hand to him, which he takes.
“Nice to meet you, Eren” The girl smiles again. She has an aura of happiness around her. He looks back at Eren, his attention on the blonde girl. His smile genuine – eyes crinkling, a dimple on his left side. Mikasa pushes them away, steering him (and the cute girl) onto the next room. They start walking while engaged on some easy conversation, not really noticing that Mikasa and Levi stayed behind. The small girl asks Eren something and he easily answers. He smiles once more. The cute dimple making another appearance.
“Thanks, by the way. Here.” It wasn’t doughnuts, but it was a bag with an extra-large chocolate cookie complete with smarties. “You should get out of the house more often. You’re starting to gain mould.”
“Eww. I get out often. I don’t need you bugging me” He takes the bag of her hand and eyed its content. Deciding if he should indulge on his treat at this moment or wait for a while until he is with the peace and quiet of his own thoughts. He closes the bag. He isn’t that desperate. “So, now that you don’t need me anymore I’ll be going. If you need anything else, don’t call me.”
“I totally did you a favour. You needed the fresh air” She smirks and winks. He glares at her and turns way. Without looking back he flips her off while walking way. “Bye short stuff”
“Bye bitch-face.” He starts for the door, discarding his empty cup on a random table. When he is on the corridor he looks to the side.
When he was looking for Mikasa he had seen this room, it is packed with hangers filled to the brim with various clothing items. On the side it has a few high chairs that were empty when he had looked moments ago. Eren is now sitting in one of them playing with his phone, a brunette girl hovering over him applying some kind of product on his face. Cute blonde is on the side trying on some clothes with the help of some guy.
He is about to walk away and go back to his books and thesis when Eren locks eyes with him. He waves, not really caring that he was making the girl’s work that much harder. When Levi doesn’t wave back, like he was (probably) waiting for, he walks over. The girl must have been used to her patrons to just randomly start walking, because without missing a beat she walks along with him. Applying more of that stuff to his face.
“Where are you going?” He huffs like Levi owns him some sort of excuse. Now that Eren was that much closer, he could see that the girl was applying some sort glitter on his neck and cheeks.
“Home” The one word response doesn’t put out his smile. Levi is starting to wonder if it was a permanent feature. Maybe he had to smile so much to sell so much crap that the smile had stuck there. And now, even if the brunet was upset there would be a smile there, much like the permanent glare he seemed to wear.
“Why?” Head lightly crooked to the side. “Stay.”
Levi looks to the side, not managing the weight of his gaze anymore “I have stuff to do” ‘I can’t do this.’
“Can I see you again?” Levi eyes the girl and looks to the side once again. ‘Can’t you see I’m not good? That I’m not like them?’ He knows of his many flaws, unlike what most people think. He knows he can’t express himself right. He is blunt and awkward at best on his interactions with other people. He is crap at comforting people and touching is still kind of a hit or miss thing with him.
He had, had multiple crushes on the past. He even tried dating. His flaws had always made things hard, but somehow manageable, when there was effort on both parties. The problem was that all relationships eventually reached that point and he couldn’t (and still can’t). It wasn’t like he hadn’t try it – he had. His first try was the most unromantic way possible. On a party with a random person that had thought he was hot enough to pull onto an empty room. He was drunk but had still managed to feel the hands on his skin leaving a greasy path. He reacted punching the guy on the nose and had ended with blood on his hands. In the morning he couldn’t even remember the person’s name. He had blamed is inability and slight overreaction on the alcohol once sober.
The next time he blamed his preferences. That feeling like worms crawling under his skin made him push the girl off the bed. Girls weren’t his thing – they weren’t attractive to him. That was his excuse. On the third time he blamed his feelings – if he was in love it would be different he was sure of it. It wasn’t. So he stopped. He stopped putting himself in that sort of situation. It was just easier to not date at all than to have to deal with that.
Even now making a simple comparison with that girl, he could tell how inadequate he was. She or anyone else could give whatever Eren wanted. He couldn’t. He stops his train of thought. He didn’t need this right now. “I need to go home” He pulls his cardigan tighter to him and looks to his shoes. He tries to keep his expression under control and he knows he is failing, but at least if he keeps his head down he won’t notice anything.
“Okay. I get it.” He raises both hands in a sign of honesty. “But I- Look. I just don’t know a lot of people here and it would be great to hang out with some people out of from work, you’know?” He tightens his jaw and closes his eyes slowly. There’s a lump on his throat. He doesn’t get it, he still nods that he does. “Yeah, and you seem like a cool guy you’know?” He doesn’t know – he doesn’t want to know. He wants to leave. He nods once again that he does though. “So can we have dinner?”
His eyes that had been closed, snap open. He raises his head. He can’t really avoid the look of astonishment that settles all over his face. On the corner of his eye he sees that the brunette girl stopped doing her job as well, makeup brush comically inches away from Eren’s face. The girl squints at him trying to squeeze the bullshit out of Eren. Levi wishes he had half a brain to do the same, but he just stands there, frozen in place.
“My card. Call me.” He hands Levi a mint green card. When Levi doesn’t move to take it, he grabs the raven’s wrist and turns his palm up. Lightly places the card on it. He curls Levi’s fingers around the card and releases his wrist. His hand falls to his side, card in place.
The brunet turns and walks back to his chair, like nothing had ever happened. The girl follows him, but not without staring for a bit at Levi giving him a once over. She ends up shrugging and walking over to Eren to finish his makeup.
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He’s sitting on the tube. The card is still on his hands. The left corner is a little crumpled from the way he worried it between his fingers for the last 10 minutes. He looks at it and sighs. ‘Why did you did that?’ He can’t go through this one more time. He has done this before and it always goes the same. It’s the definition of insanity to do something multiple times and expect different results.
He would call him. He would answer the phone on the first few rings, uncertainty on his voice. Once he would hear Levi’s voice he would laugh and dismiss his uncertainties. He would talk. He would talk more than it would be necessary. They would arrange that dinner – as friends. It would be awkward at first. Filled with nervous laughter and small talk about the weather, for lack of something better to talk about. He would make it better though. Levi would eventually relax and be himself. They would joke around and laugh. Drink way too much wine.
They would leave the restaurant. Maybe walk around for a bit – to lighten their head from all the wine. On a dark corner Eren would pause. Levi would too, looking at him expectantly. He would pull Levi closer, closer. He would drown him in feelings. He would make him high, feeling like nothing else. Levi would want more, would want to pull him closer too. They would kiss and it would feel right. So right.
It would make him forget the other times and he would believe it too. He would believe that, those other times were just that, other times. That it was the wrong person, the wrong time, not enough feelings. That he wasn’t broken. He would be happy, everything would seem oh so perfect.
He would wait. They always did. Levi would have plenty of excuses. Eventually the excuses would run out or he might even feel like he was ready and it would be different. That he could push himself to do it this time. He would kiss him and every patch of his skin would feel like it was burning. Like it was too much - and it was. He would push and pull on his clothes, exposing his skin to the cold air. He would kiss his lips, neck, and then skin. Mouthing sweet nothings. He would say how perfect he was and how good everything was going.
It was a high and every high had its down. He would fall on the reality of the situation hard. The feeling of hands on his skin that had once felt so good were going to start to be too much. ‘Stop’ Disgusting. He would feel claustrophobic. ‘I wanna stop’ He was suffocating and he could feel the taint every time he would trace his skin. ‘Stop’ Levi would push him off of him, while shaking his head. ‘Why are you stooping? Please, let me…’ Like a wild animal he would try to tower Levi once more, and just keep going.
‘STOP’ He would scream and push him away breathing hard. He had learned not to punch them. The blood would only make him feel more disgusted. He would look at him like he was crazy. He would look at him in such a way. The look of complete lack of understanding. ‘Get out’ he would say quietly, the loudest he could. He never could do it and this time it wouldn’t be different. It wasn’t the person, it weren’t their feelings, nor was it the time. It was just him.
The smile on his lips was bitter. “I can’t” He whispers to no one in particular. He almost misses his stop and hastily leaves the train on a haze. He hadn’t register anything from his trip. His body feels like steel - heavy, cold and empty. On a fit of rage he stomps to the closest bin, crumpled card on his hand. His hand overs over the bin. He breathes through his mouth slowly.
“…”
“…”
“…”
He stuffs the card on his pocket and leaves in the direction off his apartment.
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His body was heavy, the right kind of heavy, now. The heavy you would get when you pushed your own limits and your body recoils from the exertion. He is sweaty and he needs a shower like no tomorrow. He walks to the kitchen looking for a glass, filling it to the brim with cold water. He downs it in two large gulps and looks over at his apartment studio. He peels his shirt and throws it on the basket near the washing machine.
He walks to what had caught his attention. The green card on the right corner of his white board above his desk. If someone would had guess through looks alone, they would say the card has gone through a lot. Left corner raised, and discoloured. Crumpled all around, followed by flatting it against the board with clear tape.
He slides his fingers through it feeling the rumples of it. He caresses the left corner once again. He closes his eyes, still feeling the card underneath his fingertips. ‘It would have been nice’ He decides to ignore the part of his brain that screams ‘for a while’.