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When Hanji slides a gin and tonic towards him the second Levi sits down, he knows they’re up to something. So long as they’ve been… Well, Levi supposes friends is actually the best term for it, there has been the unspoken understanding that they went dutch on everything. The only time Hanji ever insists is on his birthday, and seeing as it’s a national holiday, Levi can usually avoid the whole interaction all together.
He doesn’t like when people buy him things. He doesn’t need it.
(He doesn’t need to be taken care of.)
Levi stares them down as he perches on what is a passably clean barstool, not even bothering with a hello. They’re past such basic pleasantries these days, if only because the times they see each other are sprinkled about the month. They’re both too busy for social get-togethers.
Which is the possibly the only reason Levi has kept everything with Eren completely under wraps.
“So,” Hanji chirps good-naturedly, tenting their fingers and smiling in a way that is positively predatory. They push the drink towards Levi again, this time with a very pointed look, and Levi eyes it with annoyance.
“So you know the deal. We pay for our own drinks,” Levi reminds them, folding his arms on the table as if that resolutely tells them he refuses to drink it. They roll their eyes.
“I put it on the tab. It hasn’t been paid for yet.”
Appeased, Levi takes the drink.
“You should let me pay for it. I owe you approximately ten birthday drinks, after all. Wasn’t that a part of the deal, too?”
“The deal is on my birthday, and we don’t go out on my birthday.” People have always lamented the fact that Levi was born on Christmas, but he loves it. He loves the fact that most people are too busy with their own shit to make a big deal over him and insist on things like parties and gifts.
“I think we should revisit the terms of that deal,” Hanji responds, matter-of-factly, and Levi would be happy talking in circles around a deal that isn’t going to change if it keeps them from reaching whatever they want to talk about. “But later.”
Damn.
“I wanted to talk about your performance last night.”
Levi pauses, glass pressed to his lips just before he manages to take a sip, and he carefully sets it back down on the table.
“You were there?”
Hanji doesn’t normally make it to his performances these days. They’re an artist, and they spend most of their days trotting across the globe, looking for inspiration or painting murals or… Something. They’d met at one of Hanji’s galleries, right after Levi had been “discovered.” Hanji had already been a big deal, and Levi had been contracted by his shiny new label and manager to play the opening.
They’d requested he play Green Day’s “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” and they’ve been a part of each other’s lives ever since.
He knows, if they can, they’ll find bootlegged recordings on YouTube, or request copies of the performances from Levi’s label. They always seem to know about every show and every piece he’s played since their last get together, and Levi might feel guilty if he didn’t check their website once a week to see which new paintings are up for display or sale.
“I caught an earlier flight and managed to make it.” Their grin turns positively wolfish. “It was lovely, as usual, but I was particularly fond of the encore.” Hanji sets their chin in their hand, looking at him with arched eyebrows, and he glances away, finally taking a lengthy sip of his gin. “Taylor Swift, huh?”
Levi remains silent.
“I don’t think anyone else noticed—you picked one of the lesser known ones, and don’t even get me started on how you even know it, I’ve been trying to get you into TSwift for years. They were all probably a little shocked that’s what you chose for your encore, though. It wasn’t particularly technical or impressive. Beautiful, of course, you can make Flo Rida’s “Low” sound like poetry, but I couldn’t help but wonder… Why that particular song?” Hanji tips their head in a way that would seem innocent on anyone else, but there’s a glint in their eyes that lets Levi know they’re anything but.
Levi sips his drink again.
“This slope is treacherous, this path is reckless…” Hanji sings softly. Their voice isn’t bad, but it’s not something Levi particularly wants to listen to.
It’s not anywhere near as good as Eren’s.
“How’s it going with the muse?” Hanji starts, picking up their own drink—something bright orange and blended. They never order the same thing twice, like routine frightens them. To anyone else, it would seem like a complete 180 in conversation. But not to Levi. Not to Hanji.
“Hmm?” Levi hums, sipping his drink again, as if he doesn’t know what she’s talking about.
“Your neighbor. The one that left you cute little notes.” Hanji doesn’t seem the least bit put-off by Levi’s playing at ignorance. “Did you ever talk to him?”
“I—“ Levi blinks, feeling thrown. “How’d you know it was a him?” Shit. He doesn’t remember saying anything in their emails, or their texts, or the phone calls Hanji insisted on. Their grin lengthens. If Levi wasn’t so accustomed to seeing it, it might terrify him.
“I didn’t,” they respond in a sing-song. “But thanks for confirming it for me. So you did talk to him? What’s his name? What does he look like? Does he play any instruments? Have you kissed yet? Why didn’t you tell me?!”
Levi’s eyes shoot frantically around the hotel bar, knowing full well how capable Hanji is of drawing attention to themselves. He feels foolish, falling for the oldest trick in the book, and then sighs heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“He’s just my neighbor. Can’t we leave it at that?”
“You really expect me to believe that a boy who got you to listen to Taylor Swift, who got you to learn and play a Nicki Minaj song on piano, who has brought more life to your performances since that first year I’ve known you is just a neighbor?” Hanji stares at him like he’s an idiot. “Don’t insult me.” They don’t look insulted. “He might be your neighbor, but he’s not just that. Can I get a name, at least? An initial? If I promise on that mural I just finished in Hong Kong that I won’t track him down?”
It’s quite an intricate mural, and Hanji has been working on it on and off for the last three months.
He sighs again, sips his drink, and looks towards the bright, warm light of the hotel lobby with disinterest.
“Eren.”
Hanji hums, satisfied for the moment, lips wrapping around the straw of their drink, looking contemplative.
“So Eren is the name of the boy you play Taylor Swift songs about.”
He gives her a put-upon glare.
“It’s just a song,” he bites, perhaps with a bit too much force. True, Eren is the reason Levi has heard… Far, far more Taylor Swift than he had ever imagined he would. That particular song had just stuck in Levi’s head for some reason, and then he had played it, almost without meaning to. That was almost the norm with his encores these days—the song would always be something completely random, completely different, and completely in the moment.
But it was just a song. He doesn’t need Hanji turning it into some Gatsby green-light bullshit, like they feel the need to do with every little thing that seems significant.
“Okay.” They sip their drink again. “Whatever you say.”
Levi glares at them over his gin, and then switches to the aforementioned mural in Hong Kong, knowing that they’ll be ecstatic to spend the rest of the evening talking about it.
Whatever keeps the conversation away from Eren.
*
He’s not even a little buzzed when he gets back to his apartment that night—doesn’t let himself get drunk anymore, really. Doesn’t like the way it makes him feel, the way it takes control out of his hands, the way it makes it seem like all of his troubles are gone when really they’re just buried deep under a hazy cloud. It’s been years since he’s let all of his inhibitions go like that, but it’s also been years since he’s had to nurse a hangover, so there’s that.
There’s music buzzing in his head as he pulls his keys from his pocket, some generic hotel music that had been playing low in the bar. It had been a little too jazzy for Levi’s personal tastes, but he’s not exactly unfamiliar with twisting a song into what he wants it to be.
He’s thinking of the large cup of tea he’s going to make himself, of the shower he wants to take (he hates bars, because it doesn’t matter how nice they look, they are always fucking filthy), and of maybe trying to turn this ear worm into something useful.
So he doesn’t expect the way Eren is sitting against his door, head pressed back so his face is turned towards the ceiling, eyes closed. Almost like he’s asleep.
It reminds Levi of how young he is—not as young as he looks a lot of the time, but still young. Going on 24, if Levi remembers correctly, which isn’t… Horrible. Not that Levi has any reason to be thinking about how young or old Eren is, he just… Does sometimes.
Just how sometimes the sight of Eren draws Levi to a standstill, and he just looks, and thinks stupid things about the way the dust-bunny infested light beams play off Eren’s cheekbones or how the absurdly dim light in his hallway casts long, beautiful shadows all over Eren’s body, making him seem ethereal.
Stupid shit like that.
He blinks back into himself, taking hesitant, slow steps as if approaching some sort of stray animal rather than an acquaintance. Is Eren even just an acquaintance anymore? Sometimes Levi feels like the kid knows more about him than Hanji…
He must be asleep, because he doesn’t so much as twitch as Levi draws closer and closer. It’s not a surprise. It’s well past one in the morning, and Levi knows he’ll hate himself for it tomorrow—he always does—but he can never manage to part ways with Hanji before the odd hours of the night (or morning). He’s resigned himself to that fact, at least.
“Eren…” He kneels down, reaching out but hesitating before his hand makes contact. Then he shakes his head, feeling stupid. He’s touched Eren before—what Hanji said doesn’t make anything suddenly different. Still, when his hand lands on Eren’s shoulder, it’s gentle and hardly there, like there’s nothing tethering Levi to it.
He gives Eren a gentle shake, hand pulling back so that it’s barely skimming the material of Eren’s t-shirt. Like if Eren stirs, he can draw his hand back and pretend the touch never actually happened.
But Eren doesn’t seem to stir, and Levi has just resigned himself to having to give Eren another shake when Eren’s eyebrows furrow, eyes pinched together too tightly for him to be asleep, body twitching, and Levi jerks back so hard he’s surprised he doesn’t find himself at the far end of the hall. As it were, he ends up about a foot and a half away when Eren groggily opens his eyes, jaw cracking around a yawn as he stretches until he’s sitting more than slouching against Levi’s door.
“Eren,” Levi repeats, his voice firmer now that he knows Eren can hear him. “Why are you sleeping outside my door?” It doesn’t make sense. His apartment is literally five minutes away—less, if he doesn’t wait for the elevator and runs down the stairs, instead.
Rubbing his eyes, Eren looks up at him, and Levi has to turn his glare to the wall because he’s never seen Eren sleepy before, and he can’t do it. Not tonight. Not after that ridiculous conversation with Hanji. It’s messing with his head.
“Why are you getting home so late?” Eren grumbles in response, still waking up. “I thought you went to bed at like, nine.”
Levi glances at him, unamused.
“I was out,” he answers simply. “Now: why are you sleeping outside my door? Don’t make me ask a third time.” Levi loathes having to ask a second time, but Eren is clearly still half-asleep so he supposes he can give the kid some leeway.
“Sexiled,” Eren explains simply, blinking back into awareness.
“Excuse me?”
“My sister has a “guest” and not-so-directly asked me to not be there.”
The dork. He makes air quotes with his fingers and everything.
“You don’t have friends?” Levi asks with an accusing raise of his eyebrow, and Eren stares at him with a small frown settled on his lips.
“Aren’t we friends?” He sounds a little wounded, voice laced with trepidation, like he doesn’t really want Levi to answer it. Levi’s eyes widen infinitesimally, and he looks at Eren and realizes he doesn’t know the answer. Are they friends? Is that what this is?
Instead of saying anything, Levi goes to unlock his door, using his knee to push Eren’s body out of the way so he can get the door open.
“Not that I don’t have other friends,” Eren babbles as he scrambles to stand up, but his whole body hasn’t seem to gotten the memo that he’s awake now and he stumbles. Levi reaches out to steady him on instinct alone, and Eren flashes a grateful smile at him. “But you live just three floors up, and your couch is really comfy, and…” he let’s that one die, along with his smile, something flickering in his eyes that Levi thinks is familiar but doesn’t completely understand.
“If you drool on it, you’re buying me a new one,” Levi threatens, voice dead serious, but Eren laughs anyway. He holds the door open, and Eren steps past him. He enters Levi’s apartment like he lives there. He even has a designated spot on Levi’s shoe wrack, has his own hook for his jackets when he has one. Knows which of the three light switches to use to get the recessed bulbs in the living room to turn on, and where Levi keeps his kettle so he can put on water for tea.
Levi watches him from the doorway and wonders when Eren carved out such a place for himself here. When he became as familiar in Levi’s space as tea and his piano.
Like he’s meant to be there.
He sighs at himself, shaking his head, and shuts the door behind him with a strange sense of finality.
Stupid Hanji, he keeps thinking. They always have to go and fuck everything up.
Eren is in the kitchen, the cupboard that houses Levi’s several canisters of tea leaves open, his hand paused in the air as he debates which one to make.
“It’s late. If you want to sleep, I suggest an herbal. Camomile, maybe.” So long as Levi has been making tea for Eren, he has yet to discern what the young man prefers. He seems to enjoy every cup that Levi hands to him.
“Camomile…” Eren mumbles, eyes scanning over the names inscribed on the tins. “Honey Vanilla, Peppermint, or just regular?” He looks at Levi curiously, and Levi responds with a single-shouldered shrug.
“Whichever one you want.”
“Yeah, but which one do you want?” Eren looks at Levi like he’s being ridiculous, and while it makes sense that Eren would make him tea as well, for some reason it hadn’t occurred to Levi. He looks at Eren, barefoot in his kitchen, wearing a t-shirt that’s a little too big and sweat pants that hang a little too low, arm stretched up and looking back over his shoulder at Levi with a little smile on his face, and…
It’s too much. It tightens something deep in Levi’s chest cavity, something he hasn’t humored in years, since he was younger, and bright-eyed, and less cynical.
Much like Eren himself is.
He fidgets, and needs to get out of the kitchen. Needs to be near his piano. It always helps him calm down and clear his mind. His music has always, always been good for that.
“Regular,” he mumbles, and then tries not to walk too quickly into the living room. Doesn’t want to raise suspicion, or make Eren think that he’s running away from him.
Because that’s fucking ridiculous.
Even if it is true.
(Fucking ridiculous.)
“Wow, so surprised you’d go with the boring choice,” Eren teases from the kitchen, and Levi can hear the ting clang of the canisters as they hit the counter too loud. Normally, he’d yell at Eren not to be such an animal and to respect someone else’s property with a certain amount of decorum, but he remains silent. If he opens his mouth, he’s not quite sure what’s going to come out. “I’m going to have peppermint,” Eren continues to hum, and Levi collapses on his piano bench, running a hand through his hair. The song from the hotel bar is gone from his head, replaced by something a lot more imposing, and he runs his fingers across the keys experimentally, searching it out.
“Oh.” Eren’s entered the living room, but Levi doesn’t turn to look at him. A cup of tea, set neatly in a saucer, is placed on the rim of the piano. If Levi was a messier player, he would abhor keeping liquid in a place where it could so easily be knocked into the innards of the piano, but he knows he’s careful. Even when his hands feel like they’re shaking with music (is that what this is this time?), he’s always careful. “Are you going to play?”
“Is that all right?” Levi replies cooly, letting Eren knows that he fully intends to play even if it isn’t.
“Obviously.” He can practically hear the eye-roll in Eren’s voice. Which is good, because he still refuses to look at him. “I love listening to you play.” For a second, Levi wonders if Eren will share the bench with him, hopes for it and against it simultaneously, but Eren takes his normal perch on the couch, instead, setting his tea down before folding himself on the arm, so that he’s just in Levi’s periphery. “Know any lullabies?” Eren’s voice is lilting, playful, and Levi teases out something just as light and bright on the keys to mimic him.
He wonders if Eren notices.
He wonders why he even does it.
“You live with your sister?” Levi finds himself asking, still not having committed to playing anything. He tries a few more keys, testing out the melody in his head, and then adjusting it.
“Uh, yeah.” Eren’s voice is surprised, which makes sense. They don’t normally talk about things. They drink tea, Eren listens to Levi play piano, and Levi feels like he knows Eren—like Eren knows him—but the truth is he knows nothing about him. That it doesn’t matter how right it feels to have Eren there, dressed down, comfortable, like he belongs, when Eren is still practically the same stranger who was leaving notes under his door all those months ago. “Kind of. It’s her apartment, but dorming is really expensive, so she letting me crash on her couch until I graduate. It’s not the best situation, but… It works.”
Levi winces with sympathy. Eren sleeps on a couch every night? It makes his back ache just thinking about it.
“What are you studying?” Levi knows he’s a grad-student, but… That’s it. He thinks with wry amusement about how he’d thought he’d been so clever, keeping his life, his profession, his fame, from Eren, but the truth is that they’d been keeping these things from each other. Neither of them had ever asked—Levi, because he simply didn’t do such things, and Eren, possibly because he never thought about it (or perhaps felt he wasn’t allowed the liberty).
“I’m actually getting my teaching credentials,” Eren responds, voice lazy like he’s answered the question a hundred times. Levi assumes he probably has. “But I got my degree in computer science.”
“You’re going to… Teach computer science?” Levi asks, and can’t help but sound skeptical. Eren snorts.
“Probably not. But my dad—” Eren stops, and it’s strange for Levi. Eren usually rolls forward, words tumbling out of him faster than his mouth can keep up. He’d thought maybe there were no dams to keep them back, no blocks. Clearly, he was wrong.
Instead of pushing, he changes the subject. After all, he’s not a fan of people trying to pry out the things he hates talking about.
“What’s your last name?”
“What is this, 20 questions?” Eren laughs. “It’s Jaeger. Why? What’s yours?”
Levi hesitates, the small, twinkly, nothing he was playing falling silent as he debates whether or not to answer the question.
Then again, it’s not exactly like there are many famous pianists named Levi. All Eren really has to do is type Levi and piano into google, and he’d find out who Levi is.
“Ackerman.”
Eren makes a strange noise, and Levi’s eyes flick to him, but he doesn’t say anything else.
“Are you going to tell me what you do, then?” Eren asks, and Levi grins a little bit, doing a loud flourish with the keys.
“I’m sorry, but that’s all the time we have for questions tonight.”
“That’s not fair! You got to ask all of them!” But Eren is laughing again, and the sound is so bright and full and loud, like it would drown out even Levi’s most intense playing. Levi has filled his apartment with music time and time again, and yet it never reached the places Eren’s laughter seems to find.
Levi lets the last notes fade completely, lets the only sound be Eren’s laughter, and when he finally falls silent too, the room is too warm and Levi’s chest feels too tight and he starts to play again. Soft, and gentle. If Eren wants a lullaby, Levi is sure this will suffice.
Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Eren close his eyes, smiling peacefully. Like he’d been waiting for Levi to get past all his nothing playing, to this. The main event.
But once he builds to the body of the song, Eren’s eyes open.
“Hey. I know this song.” He sits up a little straighter, and their eyes meet for just a second. Levi has to glance away. “Have you been listening to more Taylor Swift? You don’t have to, you know. I appreciate it, but I know she’s not really your thing.”
No. She’s not. Not in the slightest.
Levi wishes that meant he could stop fucking playing her songs, though.
“You can hear it in the silence, in the silence. You can feel it on the way home, way home. You can see it with the lights out, lights out. You’re in love… True love.” Eren’s voice is, obviously, much deeper than the original singers. It’s untrained, Levi can tell, but the raw talent there is good. Natural. Deep and buttery, the kind of tone that belongs to a serenading lover in a fairy tale.
Levi wishes he knew how to ask Eren to accompany all of his songs with his voice. He normally will sing a line or two, and then fall quiet and just listen, which… Is normally what Levi prefers. If someone started singing at one of his concerts, he’s pretty sure security would throw them out and ban them from returning.
When Eren stops singing, Levi stops playing, and Eren makes a protesting noise.
“Don’t stop. Did my singing bother you? I won’t do it again.”
No. Don’t say that.
Levi swallows, tries to keep his hands steady—doesn’t want to go jangling the keys with unsteady, nervous fingers.
“It doesn’t,” Levi says shortly, staring at the keys. “I can…” Why is this so difficult? “Start over.” He presses a single key—the first one, the first note, and lets it hang. “And you could…” He plays it again. “You could sing. If you want.”
Eren is too quiet, and Levi is too terrified to look.
Maybe it was too much. Maybe, somehow, Levi said too much without really saying anything at all. Maybe Eren has decided he would rather sleep on someone else’s couch, or even someone else’s floor, but not Levi’s.
But then Eren is there, settling on the bench beside him, pressed too close for Levi to play properly but he… He doesn’t push Eren away. He should. He absolutely should.
But he doesn’t.
Levi starts again, properly, and Eren breathes deeply beside him. There’s tension in his shoulders, like he’s nervous, and the thought amuses Levi. After all, Eren has sung for him dozens of times. He wonders what it is about this moment that makes it so different.
“One look, dark room, meant just for you.”
His voice starts hesitant, like he’s suddenly unsure of the words, even though he had once proclaimed (rather proudly) to know all the songs on the album. Levi had snorted with disbelief, but Eren had threatened to prove it and Levi hadn’t wanted that.
Or maybe he had. But it had felt like something he should reject, not welcome.
Much like Eren himself.
He gains confidence with the chorus, and by the time Levi is circling back around, his voice is steady, even. His pitch holds, surprisingly—a natural, like Levi had always thought—and he wonders what Eren could sound like with a little fine-tuning, a little training. He wonders if he would like it more or less. Wonders if he would miss the raw way Eren sings right now in this moment.
“—and for once you let go of your fears and your ghosts. One step, not much, but it said enough.” It suddenly feels like Eren is looking at him, but Levi doesn’t glance to check. Keeps his eyes on the keys, even though his fingers are sure. He knows what he’s playing, but Eren’s look feels too heavy.
“You kiss on sidewalks, you fight and you talk.”
Regret swells up in Levi’s stomach. Why is he playing this song? Why had he asked Eren to sing along?
“One night, he wakes, strange look on his face.”
Levi slows the tempo without meaning to, not hesitating so much as suddenly dragging the moment out. Eren false starts the next lyric once, gives a little laugh, and then adjusts easily.
“Pauses, then says—“ Eren shifts his weight, leaning into Levi’s arm, and Levi’s breath catches tight and painful in his chest. “You’re my best friend.”
The urge to look at Eren is almost undeniable.
Levi closes his eyes instead.
“And you knew what it was.”
(“So Eren is the name of the boy you play Taylor Swift songs about.”)
“He is in love.”
God dammit, Hanji.