Chapter Text
It had been bothering Jean for roughly a month now. Ever since Thanksgiving, really. The sudden reminder that holidays were a thing that actually did in fact exist made Jean nostalgic for his mother’s cooking, for the sight of presents under the tree, for the warmth of a fire in his childhood home.
Which was probably why it suddenly occurred to him during the Thanksgiving feast that Eren would be experiencing none of that.
This usually wasn’t something Jean gave much thought to. Nevermind the fact that he was aware of what Eren had done for every holiday for the last five years of their academic careers; Eren was just always around, always loud and obnoxious and sometimes weirdly attractive (a newer factor which Jean was still trying to sort out, mostly by ignoring it’s existence) so he just always happened to hear what was going on with him. It wasn’t like he was trying to pay attention to Eren or anything. If people just happened to be talking near him while eating dinner, and Jean just happened to hear what they were saying, no one could blame him.
Which was how Jean became acutely aware that Eren would be spending this year’s Christmas holiday alone.
“I’ll be fine, Mikasa,” Eren was saying during the Thanksgiving feast, waving her off with a slight frown. “Your training camp is important. You can’t just not go.”
Jean could see the worry shining out of Mikasa’s eyes from where they peered over her red Gryffindor scarf.
He took a swig of pumpkin juice and a bite of mashed potatoes, trying to appear as though he wasn’t in fact eavesdropping on their conversation.
“And before you even say anything,” Eren suddenly cut in just as Jean saw Armin open his mouth, pointing a spoon at him accusingly, “you are not missing your internship because of me. And no pulling any Slytherin cleverness, either. I’ll know if you do.”
Jean felt a brief stab of sympathy for both Armin and Mikasa. He could tell they felt guilty, but arguing with Eren was like trying to argue with a hippogriff most days; it usually ended poorly for everyone involved.
“You could still stay with my grandfather,” Armin pressed quietly, taking a dejected bite of pumpkin pie.
Jean snorted, abruptly dropping his ruse and rolling his eyes. “Your grandfather doesn’t deserve to have to put up with that level of irritation for the holidays, Armin. Frankly, no one does.”
Eren shot Jean a glare, throwing a piece of his breadroll down the table at him half-heartedly. And probably only half-heartedly because he was well aware at this point that anything constituting an actual attack on Jean’s person would lead immediately to an all-out food fight in the Great Hall, which was an experience neither of them was particularly interested in repeating-- for the fourth or fifth time, Jean wasn’t really sure, he’d lost count.
Mikasa whipped her head around to level Jean with a look so furious he actually flinched back.
“It’s fine, guys. Really. I’m fine. I’ll be fine. I’d rather spend it alone anyway,” Eren said, shaking his head before abruptly changing the subject.
But Jean knew Eren well enough to know when he was lying, and the fact that he could tell how bad of a lie Eren’s statement was quietly ate away at something in Jean for the next several weeks.
---
“I’m not going home,” Jean said a week before the holiday break was to begin, walking –or rather, stomping—his way to their advanced potions lesson, face looking much like a dark and brooding storm cloud.
“Jean, that’s crazy. Your mother will kill you if you don’t go home for Christmas,” Marco quietly insisted from beside him, long legs easily keeping pace with Jean’s rapid angry stumbling.
“Yeah, well,” Jean mumbled uncomfortably, adjusting his books in his arms. “Too late. I already wrote her about it last night.”
Marco was silent for all of five seconds. Jean could almost feel the curiosity eating at him before he finally spoke up. “Tell me why.”
“I don’t feel like it.”
“You don’t feel like telling me why or you don’t feel like going home for Christmas?”
“I don’t—both, actually,” Jean spat, nearly tripping over his own robes in his haste to get to their shared class just so Marco would shut up about it, particularly in public.
Jean should have known better than to bring this up now of all times, really. Marco and Jean had been friends since their first year at Hogwarts, and if Jean knew one thing about him, it was that when Marco was curious about something, he did not let up until he had an answer.
And he was particularly good at arguing.
“That’s ludicrous,” Marco said reasonably. Ravenclaws, Jean had learned painfully over the years, were nearly always far too reasonable, Jean noted sourly. “You love your mother’s cooking. And you love wearing those obnoxious enchanted pajamas for the holidays. You know, the ones you’re too embarrassed to wear at Hogwarts? Remember?” he prompted, a glint in his eyes that told Jean he was in for some trouble.
Jean shushed him vehemently, face flushing as he grabbed the collar of Marco’s robes, pulling him down to whisper harshly, “Dude, what the hell. We agreed never to mention those again.”
“But the little dancing mistletoe is priceless!”
“Marco!”
Down the hall behind them Jean heard a loud sound of discontent. “Can’t you two please keep the PDA for when you’re in private?”
Jean whipped around to find Eren looking disgruntled. “We’re not—Marco is not my boyfriend, for fucks sake, Eren. Why do you always do this.”
Beside him, Marco nodded sagely. “Yes, Jean isn’t really my type. Besides, I have a girlfriend now, and I believe in upholding my commitments.”
Jean nodded, crossing his arms and turning to fix Eren with a smug look.
He was vaguely surprised to find Eren looked genuinely shocked by this information. And perhaps a little embarrassed. That part made something in Jean flare up with pride, feeling like he’d won something and yet not being quite sure about what that something might be.
“Oh,” Eren mumbled, “I, uh. Didn’t know. Congratulations?” he offered awkwardly.
Marco shook his head, smiling, always quick to forgive. It was one of the things about Marco that Jean found equally admirable and irritating. “It’s fine. No harm, no foul. But Jean here is painfully single, so there’s hope for you yet, Eren.”
Eren made a choked noise, mouth falling open as his face turned a shade of red as bright as his stupid poorly-knotted tie.
“Marco!” Jean hissed again, giving him a good shove. “That’s—that’s gross. He’s gross. You’re gross.”
“Yeah,” Eren said angrily, bumping into Jean with his shoulder roughly as he made a beeline past them. “Definitely gross.”
“I’m just trying to help, Jean,” Marco said defensively, watching Eren duck through the door to the potions lab with undisguised interest.
Jean felt mortified. “Can you, like, not? That’s just so—I would never want to—I mean he’s just, like—“ Jean made a disgusted face, waving his hand around in a flurry as if to wipe the very idea of it away.
Marco laughed, making his way toward the door of the classroom again. “You always say that, and I still don’t believe you.”
Jean groaned, rubbing a hand across his face roughly and following after him only when he was certain his face looked calm and composed again.
---
Later that evening as everyone was sitting down to dinner, Jean was both shocked and not shocked when an owl flew into the Great Hall and landed before him on the table.
The owl wasn’t so shocking. He’d been expecting that. His mother was bound to respond to his letter, after all.
The shocking part was the red envelope clutched in its mouth.
“Oh, no,” was all he could think to say.
Marco immediately snatched the letter out of the owl’s mouth. Jean watched him feed it a bit of food distractedly, feeling like he was having an out of body experience, his soul floating away to hang out somewhere above the table with all of the enchanted candles.
“I don’t want to open it,” he deadpanned.
Marco patted his shoulder reassuringly. “Of course you don’t. That’s only natural. Don’t worry, though. I want to know what it says, so I’ll go with you to open it.”
Jean noticed they had attracted a small crowd of onlookers—onlookers from a variety of houses, at that. Their little section of the Gryffindor table was always something of a novelty in the Great Hall, being that every house was represented during each meal there in some form or another. Tonight even Sasha and Connie had jumped ship from the Hufflepuff table to talk Quidditch with Eren and Armin, who rarely turned down the opportunity to debate strategy or the latest goings-on of the professional season. Particularly ever since Mikasa had been scouted by the Kenmare Kestrals for a possible position on the team as a beater upon her graduation.
That was the reason she would be missing Christmas with Eren this year, Jean thought distractedly. She’d been given an invitation to the team’s winter conditioning camp, and if she declined, it was implied she would likely lose her prospective spot on the team—an option Eren wouldn’t hear of, from what Jean had gleaned of the situation. Even if it meant Eren spent Christmas alone in a cold, drafty castle with no one but dust and house elves for company.
Jean swallowed, remembering why he’d decided on not going home for Christmas and determining to strengthen his resolve to see his choice through.
“Give me the damn howler,” he said resignedly, reaching for it.
“Not until you promise to let me hear what your mother said,” Marco insisted, leaning away from Jean’s reaching grasp.
“I don’t know if I want you to hear it,” Jean said, straining to reach for the letter.
Marco continued to move just out of Jean’s reach. “But I want to hear it.”
“But it’s my letter.”
“It might by yours by I am your best friend and I’m worried about you.”
“Bullshit, you’re just being nosey.”
“I’m being a concerned, if maybe slightly curious, friend.”
“Same thing!” Jean nearly hollered, making a leap for the letter, feeling a rush of triumph when his fingers connected with the red paper as he gave a hard pull.
Except Marco’s grip was equally strong, and the letter ripped in half.
Everyone around them froze, watching with growing horror –and perhaps secondhand embarrassment—as the paper reassembled itself on the table before Jean in a writhing mass of anger.
Jean swallowed, immediately resigning himself to the fact that this moment would probably be one of the worst of his entire young life.
“JEAN LUC ANTIONE KIRSCHTEIN!” his mother’s heavily French accent rang out across the Great Hall, stopping any and all conversation. “HOW DARE YOU DO THIS TO YOUR MAMAN!”
Jean had a brief, fleeting wish that the ground would open up and swallow him whole.
“I HAVE SLAVED AWAY AT THIS HOUSE FOR WEEKS TO GIVE YOU A CLEAN HOME TO COME BACK TO. I HAVE SPENT HOURS KNITTING YOU A NEW CHRISTMAS SWEATER, YOUR FATHER HAS REPAIRED THE HOLE YOU MADE IN THE WALL LAST SUMMER, I HAVE DONE HOURS WORTH OF YOUR LAUNDRY, AND I HAVE INVITED THE WHOLE FAMILY TO OUR HOUSE FOR CHRISTMAS DINNER.”
Jean was pretty sure he was dead. Though he was silently grateful his father had fixed the hole he’d managed to blast through the wall in a fit of rage the summer before. A rage that had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he had received a letter from one Eren Jaeger moments prior to its destruction, wherein nothing was contained on the paper but an enchanted drawing of an incredibly realistic spider that was spelled to look like it was jumping off the page at the viewer above the words, “Get rekt, horseface.”
Jean had promptly thrown it at the wall after screaming like a small child and set it aflame.
Much like he wished he could do to himself currently.
“AND NOW YOU WANT ME TO TELL THE ENTIRE FAMILY THAT MY SON, MY ONLY SON, WILL NOT BE IN ATTENDANCE FOR CHRISTMAS DINNER IN MY OWN HOME BECAUSE HE HAS DECIDED TO STAY AT SCHOOL AND STUDY? THAT IS A LIE IF I’VE EVER HEARD ONE, JEANBO, AND I WILL FIND OUT WHATEVER IT IS YOU’RE UP TO, MARK MY WORDS. IF YOU DON’T WRITE ME AN EXPLANATION BY THIS VERY EVENING YOU CAN EXPECT ANOTHER HOWLER BRIGHT AND EARLY TOMORROW MORNING!”
The letter adjusted itself, the sound of a throat clearing coming through. “And do give my love to Marco, he’s such a sweet boy.”
The letter then tore itself into shreds, dropping listlessly onto Jean’s abandoned plate.
Jean’s swallow was almost painfully loud in the ringing silence that followed. No one seemed to know what to say, and Jean wasn’t sure how to move or even breathe, really. He just starred uncomprehendingly at the pile of shredded paper before him, hoping time would stop and he would never have to face this level of embarrassment again in his life.
“I am so, so sorry, Jean,” Marco whispered into the quiet eventually, eyes wide with sincerity as his hand came up as if to touch Jean’s shoulder before flinching back uncertainly.
“S’fine,” Jean managed hollowly, swallowing thickly, because he was not going to start crying in the Great Hall from embarrassment right now, no sir.
Jean saw movement across the table from him and looked up to find Eren gaping at him open-mouthed.
Jean found himself unable to do anything other than stare at those wide emerald eyes as they searched his face and focusing on trying not to reacquaint himself with everything he’d just eaten for dinner, stomach clenching painfully.
“You’re staying,” Eren mumbled, eyes unreadable.
Jean felt his head nodding without his consent.
Eren looked like he wanted to say something else, and Jean was suddenly so terrified by what that might be that he found himself leaping up from the table and storming out of the hall in record time, Marco belatedly chasing after his hurried footsteps.
“Jean—“ Marco tried, rounding a corner and following him towards the stairs.
“Not now, Marco.”
“But—“
“I want to be alone for a bit,” he said tiredly, turning to give Marco a pleading look.
Marco looked at him a long moment before stepping forward to give Jean a brief but firm hug, which Jean returned.
“I really am sorry,” he said into the fabric of Jean’s robe. “I shouldn’t have pried.”
Jean shook his head, pulling back. “It’s fine. Really. I’m just gonna go… write a letter, I guess.”
Marco flashed him a wan smile. “You really are a good person, you know.”
Jean shook his head before turning towards the stairs. “Nah. More like an idiot, really,” he said over his shoulder as he began to climb.
Marco didn’t argue with him, instead calling after his retreating form, “It’s going to mean a lot to him!”
“I don’t know who you mean,” Jean said disinterestedly, his disembodied words echoing down the corridor.
---
Jean went upstairs to the common room, which was blessedly empty around dinner time, and promptly fell in a graceless heap onto the couch in front of the fire.
He proceeded to wallow in self-pity for the next half hour, a skill he had perfected into an art form by this point in his life, conjuring little black paper butterflies and setting them fluttering morosely into the fire.
Eventually, though, he mustered up what little emotional reserves he had left and pulled out some parchment and a quill because he definitely didn’t want a repeat of this evening to occur first thing in the morning.
He stared at the blank white of the paper, letting the crackling of the fire calm him as he tried to decide how best to present his case. He’d originally given some dribble about how he wanted to stay over the break to focus on his studies, which, looking back on it, was a lie Jean was sure most anyone could see through. Jean hadn’t really cared about a majority of his classes his first five years of schooling, and he wasn’t shocked to see his mother was less than willing to accept a complete turn-around out of the blue in his sixth year.
Well, probably best to just be honest at this point, Jean thought. Which was a good plan, generally speaking. The problem was that Jean was rarely good with honesty, particularly where being honest with himself was concerned. He rubbed his forehead absently, feeling a headache coming on.
“Bollocks,” he muttered, finally putting pen to paper and deciding to hell with it, he’d just write whatever came to mind.
Dear Maman,
I’m really, really sorry I upset you so much, but I’m seriously not coming home for Christmas. I have a good reason, though, I really do! Remember that Eren kid who I’m always talking about yelling about? The one I got detention in second year for dueling? And in third year for messing up his potion in class so that it would smell like troll snot? And in fourth year for telling him he was being a prat and so he set a swarm of angry bees at me? I was still not in the wrong about that by the way, but that’s not really the point.
See, he’s kind of having a rough situation right now. He’s an orphan, dunno if I told you that before, but his parents have been gone for years now, and he’s muggle-born besides. He usually spends Christmas at his friend Armin’s house with his sister (remember Mikasa, the one with the really pretty hair?), but this year his friend has an intern position with the ministry over the break and his sister has a training camp with the Kenmare Kestrals (she got scouted, can you believe that???) so they can’t be with him for Christmas. That means Eren has nowhere to go over the break and I don’t really feel right leaving him here by himself. I mean, he’s an idiot and I know he’ll just sulk the whole time. So I’m gonna stay here and make sure someone is around to bother him if he gets too mopey. But NOT because we’re really friends or anything, I just don’t feel right about it, and you raised me better than that and whatever, right?
So please don’t be mad at me. I love you very much and I really will miss being home, but this is important. I promise I’ll come home for Christmas next year no matter what. Tell dad I said thanks for fixing the wall, and that I’m sorry again for that. Also please don’t send me another howler, either, it sort of opened in the Great Hall and I may not survive if it happens again.
Oh, and Marco sends his love and says he wishes he could have some of your amazing gingerbread cookies this year, he misses them.
Love,
Jeanbo
Jean squinted at it briefly before stuffing the letter up and sealing it, making an immediate trek to the owlery before he had a chance to reread it or change his mind.
---
The next morning, Jean received an owl from his mother as he was sitting in the Great Hall for breakfast. Thankfully, he’d been so anxiety-ridden that he’d barely slept, and very few others were up at this hour to see his look of sheer relief upon discovering the owl was not in fact carrying another howler. The poor beast was, however, laden down with two rather sizable packages and a note.
He tore the note open, feeling cautiously hopeful.
Dear Jeanbo,
While I am still not pleased to hear you’ll be missing Christmas this year, I can hardly stay mad at you. I’m proud to have raised such a fine, caring young man. I am sure Eren will be grateful for your company, and though I have often heard you protest to the contrary, I know you’ll also enjoy his. But NO MISCHIEF, do you hear me? If I get a call from the school one more time I will never make you another homemade treacle tart again.
Jean paused here to swallow nervously. He did love his mother’s treacle tart very much. He wasn’t so sure the school would never call her again over his antics, though.
There are two packages attached to this. The red one is your Christmas present. The blue one is a box of cookies, as well as your favorite Christmas pajamas, because I know how much you love them. Please give cookies to Marco and tell him I miss him too, and that he’ll have to visit you over the summer if he wants more!
We love you, Jeanbo. Be a good boy.
Maman
Jean groaned, opening the blue box to find that she had indeed sent him his mistletoe pajamas. He flushed, quickly extracting the cookies before slamming the lid on the box again and standing to make a beeline for Gryffindor tower. He would just have to hide them until it was safe to smuggle them back home.
He found himself whistling pleasantly as he greeted the Fat Lady’s portrait, cheerfully shouting the password as he walked into the empty common room.
If nothing else, the comfort that he wouldn’t be receiving another howler was something to celebrate.
---
The rest of the week seemed to pass by in a blur, which was no real surprise considering how many tests and practical exams were scheduled right before the start of the holidays. Jean spent most of that time stressed to the max, barely sleeping when he wasn’t reviewing for exams with Marco and Armin or practicing the practical application of spells with whoever happened to be available.
He pointedly ignored Eren the entire time. He couldn’t tell if Eren was irritated or relieved by that notion, and frankly Jean wasn’t sure how he felt about it, either. But the two of them never seemed to be able to ignore each other for very long, and by the time they arrived for their Defense Against the Dark Arts class on the last day of classes before break officially began, something about their getting paired up to practice shield charms seemed inevitable.
“This bites,” Eren muttered, scowling at nothing in particular as he lined up across from Jean.
“Yeah, well,” Jean bit out, a noticeable lack of heat behind his words. “I’m not exactly thrilled either.”
Eren looked at him a long moment before finally shaking his head, holding up his wand questioningly. “You want to shoot first or shield first?”
Jean’s eyes narrowed. Never, in their entire academic career, had Eren ever offered the option of which position he would take first. Their interactions tended to go more along the lines of one of them declaring they would shoot first, while the other argued that in fact they would be going first, at which point things would escalate until a professor had to intervene.
This was entirely too suspicious. Too nice. Too cordial.
“I dunno, you pick,” Jean eventually answered with a careful shrug.
Eren’s eyes slit themselves into a glare, mirroring Jean’s. “I’m giving you the option this time.”
“And I’m giving you the option back.”
“Yeah, well what if I don’t want to pick?”
This was beginning to feel familiar. “Then I guess we’ll be standing here all day, Jaeger.”
“Bollocks. You’re just trying to be like, nice or something.”
Jean felt his ears turn red. “Yeah, so maybe I am. What of it?”
“Well, you can’t be nice, obviously.”
“And why the hell not?”
Eren looked thrown off, faltering briefly before raising his chin. “Because I was being nice first.”
“Oh my god,” Jean groaned, rubbing at his forehead. “Are you actually twelve?”
Eren’s fist clenched around his wand, his teeth visibly grinding. “You know what? Fine. I’ve changed my mind. I am definitely shooting first.”
“Oh? What happened to being Mr. Nice Guy?” Jean taunted, raising his wand to ready a defensive spell. If there was one thing arguing with Eren had taught him over the years, it was that being braced for a fight was always a good idea.
“What can I say? You bring out the worst in me,” Eren shrugged before sending a tripping jinx at Jean’s legs.
Jean cast a shield charm, shaking his head. “Weak, Jaeger.”
“Shut up, Kirschtein,” Eren glowered, heat infusing his voice as he shot a rather powerful bat boogey hex at him.
Jean felt it hit hard against his shield but played it off like it was nothing. “Six years of dueling and that’s seriously the best you’ve got?”
He saw Eren’s posture shift into one of practiced ease, his stance squaring off into something far more serious as he cast a mighty stupefy at Jean’s chest.
But Jean felt no fear, no regret or apprehension, deflecting the spell with a powerful shield charm, his own stance moving to mirror Eren’s. Jean lived for this kind of interaction between them, the sort of fighting where he was completely assured that Eren would hold absolutely nothing back; that if Jean managed to win, he would have really beat Eren at his very best.
Not that Jean won often. He didn’t care about the outcome nearly as much as the rush of adrenaline he was currently experiencing. It was all about the fight, the back and forth, knowing he had pushed Eren to this point and knowing that no one else seemed to be able to bring out this side of Eren in quite the same way.
It felt like it lasted hours, but it was probably only minutes. Still, when Jean and Eren were suddenly jarred out of their concentration by the sound of clapping to find the entire class watching them with varying degrees of shock and awe, their Professor running up to them to say what a fine example of exemplary students they had become, Jean was more surprised to find that Eren was grinning at him.
He was even more surprised to find that he was grinning back.
---
“Are you absolutely certain?”
“For fuck sake, Marco, I will be fine. Now go,” Jean said, shoving Marco toward the doors of the train. “You’re being ridiculous.”
Marco gave him a vague pout before Jean gave him another exasperated shove. “I promise. I’m seriously gonna be fine.”
“You have to promise to write me and let me know how it’s going, then.”
Jean rolled his eyes.
“Promise me, Jean, otherwise if I don’t hear from you I’ll worry you’ve killed each other off in a classic fit of childish rage.”
Jean snorted, cracking a smile. “Fine. I’ll write you at least once. Just get on the damn train and have a good Christmas, alright?”
Marco flashed him a smile, nodding. “Ok. Bye, then. Happy Christmas.”
“Yeah, yeah. You too.”
And all too quickly the train was pulling away in a mess of shrill mechanical grinding and steam, leaving Jean feeling momentarily bereft and alone with his thoughts as he watched the engine pull out of sight.
Jean had only stayed behind for the holidays once before, in his third year. Mostly just to see what it was like.
It hadn’t been fun.
He turned away from his memories to find a small handful of other students also standing on the platform, feeling himself stiffen when he realized one of them was Eren.
Nope. Not gonna say anything. Not a damn word.
So of course Eren looked up at him as though he’d called his name, their eyes meeting instantly.
Jean huffed, looking away before starting the trek back up to the castle alone, determined not to spare Eren any mind until tomorrow at the very earliest. He walked until he found an empty cart that was presumably hooked up to a thestral, though Jean couldn’t see it. He clambered up into the cart, waiting for it to begin taking him back to the castle.
Thestrals were weird. Kind of creepy. Jean had seen drawings, before. He wasn’t entirely sure they were even real, or that they looked the way the drawing had depicted them.
Curiosity began to eat at him after a moment, and he found himself glancing around to make sure no one was watching. He gingerly moved to the seat on the cart closest to the reigns, feeling awkward but also a bit reckless as he reached forward to touch what he wasn’t sure was even there.
He jumped slightly when his hand made contact with something soft, cool to the touch but not quite cold, and he found himself stroking seemingly nothing, though his hand felt soft fine hair beneath his fingers. The body beneath his hand moved, and Jean felt the cart shift slightly as the creature seemingly readjusted itself.
A smile broke out on Jean’s face, and he reached further forward to give the creature a pat that was a little more firm, hearing a strange sound in response that sounded almost pleased.
“They prefer to be touched near the base of their wings, you know,” said a voice from behind Jean. He pulled his hand back as if burned, whipping around to find Eren standing not too far away from the cart, looking at him curiously.
Jean’s immediate response to being caught in a vulnerable moment was of course to lash out.
“How would you know what they like? What are you, some kind of Care of Magical Creatures expert?” he spat, watching as Eren crept forward, coming up near the front of the cart and reaching out a hand, stroking at the empty air.
“I help Professor Hanji take care of them sometimes,” Eren said evenly, wringing another pleased sound out of the creature.
Jean felt at a loss for what to say, finding himself speaking without conscious thought as he asked, “How? I mean, you can’t even see them unless you’ve—I mean, unless—“
Eren turned to level him with a look that was far too lacking in heat for Jean’s liking. His eyes seemed curiously empty as he finished Jean’s words for him. “Unless I’ve seen someone die?”
Jean nodded, feeling completely out of his comfort zone. This wasn’t a conversation he ever imagined he’d be having with Eren. He wasn’t even sure how to have this kind of conversation with Eren.
Their interactions were strictly of the argumentative sort. This was verging dangerously into territory that left Jean feeling vulnerable somehow.
“I saw my parents die. Well, my mom at least,” he said simply, like it was nothing. Like he hadn’t just dumped a huge fucking emotional thing in Jean’s lap like he was supposed to know what to do with it.
“Why are you telling me this?” Jean eventually managed to ask in a strangled voice, feeling too frustrated and confused and strangely raw to try and play some kind of game.
“I don’t know,” Eren said, voice still even and calm as he turned to face Jean fully. “Why are you staying here for Christmas?”
They looked at each other for a long time, neither willing to give any more than they’d already given. Jean felt like one wrong move could possibly mess this up, and he wasn’t even sure what this was.
After a moment when he realized he was shivering and that the cart still wasn’t moving and neither was Eren, he finally sighed, rolling his eyes and patting the wooden seat beside him. “Well, come on then. Get in.”
Eren’s eyebrows shot up into his hairline, clearly thrown off guard. “Uh,” was all he seemed to be able to say.
“Look, I’m freezing my arse off out here, so if you’d like to continue having a conversation, I’m going to need you to get into this damn cart so we can get back inside.”
Eren seemed like he was half convinced Jean was playing some kind of trick on him.
“For fucks sake, just come sit down and –I don’t know—tell me more about thestrals or something,” Jean huffed, crossing his arms irritably.
“You want me to come sit with you,” Eren said slowly, disbelief evident in his voice, “and tell you about thestrals?”
“Sure. Why not. I don’t know shit about thestrals. You apparently know all the shit about thestrals. Come sit the hell down so we can go inside and you can talk to me about whatever you want for all I care.”
Still looking like he was expecting a surprise jinx at any moment, Eren cautiously stepped up and into the cart, sitting down with Jean as though braced for a fight.
The cart, blessedly, rumbled to life and they began moving towards the castle. Jean pulled out his wand, casting a warming charm on his robe before putting his wand away. He found Eren watching him intently.
“It was because I wanted to,” Jean finally said, pulling at the beanie on his head and shoving it further down. “To answer your earlier question, I mean. I’m staying because I wanted to.”
Eren looked at him unreadably, eyes dark, before he finally huffed and leaned down in his own seat. “To answer your question, then, um. Same. I told you because I wanted to.”
Jean nodded, feeling like they’d reached some sort of truce. “Good.”
“Yeah. Good.”
“Plus someone had to be here to argue with you. I mean, you’d fall out of practice otherwise.”
Eren snorted, rolling his eyes. “Right.”
“So, uh. Do you have any actual plans for the next two weeks? Because I have no idea what the hell to do and I’m kind of open to, um. Suggestions?”
“Well,” Eren said, mouth quirking in a way that set Jean’s blood rushing, because he knew that look and it often spelled out his favorite kinds of trouble. “There’s always quidditch. Unless you’re scared I’ll beat you again, that is.”
Jean’s eyes narrowed, mouth splitting into a wry grin. “I will make you eat those words, Jaeger.”
“Just try it.”
Jean snorted before sneezing suddenly. “Ok, I will make you eat those words after I’ve had something hot to eat and drink. Otherwise I’ll just be a flying popsicle at this rate.”
Eren laughed, loudly and abruptly, startling them both.
They looked away from one another, faces red from more than just the cold.
Jean privately thought he might be able to get used to being the cause for Eren’s laughter, memorizing the way his eyes had glinted with mirth moments before for later private consideration, but said nothing further.