Swap Suey!
Chapter 1
A/N: I want to thank momtaku SO MUCH for helping me with the proofreading, the beta-ing (?) and with the summary because I suck. I also want to thank Dani for reading/hearing me when I told her about this story idea a while, while ago, it made me feel encouraged.
I dedicate this fic to every eremika shipper that just want to have a good time reading something silly and ns/fw. I hope you guys enjoy it and let me know your thoughts about it ;D
Armin was so done.
Eren and Mikasa were arguing every day for whatever the reason. Sometimes it was because she was kind of nosy, and sometimes it was because he got into another fight with Jean or with the idiots from their neighborhood. Sometimes it was just because they kind of seem to feel the urge to argue and they couldn't just be ok with each other.
Armin knew the reason for the phase they were going through - it was clear to everyone but them. He sighed as he went through the cafeteria.
"Hey Armin!" Sasha waved at him, "Have you seen Mikasa?"
"I haven't seen her since she and Eren argued this morning" he grumbled as he saw Sasha rolling her eyes.
The brown haired girl ate a whole boiled egg that she just stuck into a pot of mayonnaise and then muttered "Crap, I guess I'll have to go to see the witch alone after class."
Armin raised an eyebrow, "A witch?"
"Shhh!" she placed a finger on her lips and looked left and right, but most students were still eating their lunches and didn't even care about what Armin said. "Don't say that so loud" she scolded him, "Here, come with me."
The boy was grabbed by the arm while Sasha kept babbling, "Historia told us about a fortune teller that recently arrived to the town. She's a witch that uses some magical cards to tell you about your future. She also provides some spells and luck talismans. You know, she does witchcraft and-"
"Are you talking about magic?" Armin smiled. He didn't believe in magic or that kind of nonsense. Nobody could see the future, so that so-called witch must be nothing but a trickster.
"Yes, and she's legit! So Mikasa and I were going to see her this afternoon after music class. I need a spell so I can get… uhm, better grades, haha!" she giggled a bit embarrassed "And Mikasa… well."
Sasha smiled and shrugged.
"Ah, I see" of course he knew. How dumb and blind both his best friends were.
Mikasa was convinced that Eren had a crush on Annie, a girl with whom he practiced Mixed Martial Arts twice a week. And Eren couldn't stand Jean Kirschtein because the guy had wanted to date Mikasa since last year when he 'finally grew some balls' – according to Eren.
Worse yet, now that they were seventeen more boys were trying to approach Mikasa and that was starting to become a bit problematic for Armin's hot-headed friend.
"Hey, do you wanna come with me? Historia has riding lessons and you know that Mikasa is probably already pretending that she's studying like crazy in the library and she's just going to ignore everyone, including you and me," Sasha looked at Armin with big puppy eyes.
The blond boy didn't have anything to do after class and - even though he didn't believe in that crap - he was kind of curious about the witch thing. He thought he could do Sasha, Mikasa and other friends a favor if he discovered that the oh-so-called-witch was just a fraud. First he needed to catch any false move from that woman.
"Fine Sasha, I'll go with you… but please don't tell anyone I went to see a witch," he muttered. Damn, he was feeling so curious.
"But of course Armin Arlert! I know you're a guy of science!", she promised way too seriously, bringing her fist to her heart as she was some kind of soldier.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Mikasa's head fell on the book after she read the same line for the fifth time, unable to focus on what she was trying so hard to read. She breathed in the book's dusty scent.
It seemed that Eren was never going to see her the way she wished him to see her. He will always see her as a nuisance... The annoying mom friend as he even told her a few hours ago.
If only he knew that the last thing she wanted was to be his mom, come on, for god's sake!
She blushed as she stood up. She closed the book she failed to read and put it back on the blank space in the shelves next to her chair.
Armin had suggested she give Eren some space and she was willing to try that if it meant saving their friendship. Mikasa was certain she could not live with Eren by her side, so she would sacrifice her feelings if it meant keeping him in her life.
Mikasa was afraid that the boy she had always loved was growing apart from her. That he was going away. What could she do, besides giving him space? Besides giving each other time apart, so they could stop fighting and screwing everything up?
Did she… did she need to tell him the truth?
Eren, I'm in love with you.
Ha! No way. She covered her face. That could only made things worst and she was sure she would not even be able to speak those words at all.
"Mikasa… hi!" when she looked behind her, there was Jean. She offered him a small smile and greeted him back. He was always nice to her.
Jean followed her as she left the library.
"So… how are you doing?" Jean seemed uncomfortable whenever she looked straight at him.
"I'm fine, thank you" she lied, "How are you?"
"Fine too!" his lips were showing a big smile. Way too big, "W-well! I just wanted to ask you if y-you would like to go to the cinema with me?"
Mikasa blinked.
"Sure" the word escaped from her mouth, but she didn't regret it at all. Spending time with nice people was all right, wasn't it? It could help her feel better, "When do you want us to go?"
Jean's eyes were so wide that anyone passing by would think that his eyeballs were going to leave their orbit. "Ah! How about this Saturday evening?"
"That's fine, do you still have my phone number?" she remembered that they had to do a group project back in October along with Bertholdt, so they exchanged their data.
"I do," Jean admitted, blushing lightly.
"Nice, can you give me a missed call?" she asked while she took her phone out of her bag. Jean's face went pale, but he called her and she saved the contact information without realizing how the boy's heart cracked a bit "Alright. Sorry Jean, I'm late for my class, so I have to leave now. Bye and thank you!"
"B-bye Mikasa…"
Fuck, she had deleted his number.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Eren kicked the ball with force but no direction, so it missed the goal.
"That was awful, Jaeger" the coach groaned, "You can't be a center-forward if you miss nine of ten shots."
"It's not my day" he muttered as he sat down on the bench, along with his teammates.
"It's not your month" the coach replied sourly, "Come on Springer, it's you turn. Get up and shoot!"
"Look and learn from the football genius, Eren", Connie whispered and blinked to him before running to the kicking point.
Aaaand he missed his first shot.
"You guys are crap…" the teacher grunted.
Wow, he was always so encouraging! Eren was sure this coach was one of the reasons they haven't won an important match this year. Besides the team being arranged like shit too.
Of course he himself wasn't the best player around, though he was a hard worker and he's been improving through the years. Some of his teammates were definitely better than him, like Reiner, but they couldn't do much as a team if half of the boys were discouraged by the person that was supposed to motivate them to do their best and to train them properly.
Fuck this guy.
"You seem distracted", Reiner said next to him, "Are you okay, Eren?"
Besides arguing with Mikasa almost every day lately, yelling at her like a brat this morning and seeing her sad as a result – since he's such an asshole - he guessed he wasn't.
Armin was right when he told him that if he was not going to be nice to her, then he should take a time out until he could stop behaving like a brat whenever she was around.
"I'm having some troubles with someone," he replied while staring at the grass, "but we're going to work this out" at least, that's what he hoped.
"Braun, it's your turn now! You better not fuck it up like your awful mates!" coach Shadis threw the ball to the big and hefty guy.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"I tried to convince Mikasa to come with us but she said she didn't feel like going to see the witch anymore" Sasha explained to Armin once they left the school grounds, "I can bet she was afraid of whatever the woman could tell her regarding her love life."
Or – Armin thought - maybe she realized that the witch was not going to tell her anything useful because, come on, magic didn't exist?
Sasha bought three cups of ice cream and gave one to Armin. She ate the other two in the way to see the witch's place.
When Armin stopped by the front of the shop he blinked a few times, confused.
"But this looks like a nice antique shop. I thought we were going to go into a gypsy tent or something," he commented to Sasha as he followed her into the classy shop. It even looked expensive.
Inside, there were two dark-haired women that looked similar. One of them was reading an old book and writing in a small notebook, while the other was slowly spinning in a chair.
"Ilse," the woman on the chair kept spinning as she called the other one.
Ilse stopped writing, closed the old book she's been studying and looked up at the clients.
"Welcome, how can I help you?" she smiled at them.
Armin and Sasha exchanged glances and Sasha cleared her throat as she came closer to the freckled woman at the counter.
"Hello. Uhm. We came to see the… the fortune teller from here? The witch?" she said in a little voice and with an awkward smile, "Is that you?" After all, Historia told her the witch was a cute freckled woman.
Ilse's face went a bit pale as she shook her head.
"I think you guys are not in the right place. There's no witch here," she said with a nervous giggle.
"Who sent you here, kids?" the other woman, who kept carelessly spinning in her chair, finally spoke. She stole a glance at Ilse and then looked straight at the teens next to the counter.
She already knew who sent them, but whatever.
"It was Historia," Sasha responded, seeming a bit scared.
Armin realized that the woman had freckles and a tanned skin tone. She looked younger than Ilse but seemed to be the boss. He wondered if they were related.
"My name is Ymir," her voice sounded a bit bored and tired. She looked at them with certain disdain, especially at Armin, "I'm the witch, what do you two want? Quick, come closer. I don't have all day."
Huh? But she was just spinning in her chair like she didn't give a fuck about anything, Armin thought.
Her cold glance made the boy nervous, Ymir could tell.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Eren was taking a nap in art class when he felt a tickle on his head and scratched his head by reflex, but he got to touch something metallic and cold.
When he looked up he found Armin awkwardly smiling at him with one hand swiftly going into his pocket, while in the other one he was holding a scissor.
"Armin, what were you doing?" Eren asked with a sleepy voice.
"I almost let my scissors fall on your head, sorry"
Eren slightly squinted his eyes, but then he just let his head fell on the desk again. It wasn't like he could have died or something. These scissors didn't even had a sharp point.
"You're not going to finish your art assignment?" Armin asked before his friend started to laze around again, "The teacher is going to scold you and will give you a poor grade."
"I know, but I don't feel like doing this, ok?"
"Right…" Armin nodded and kept working on his own art assignment. He was doing some kind of montage of sea creatures. The background was painted with blue watercolor, "The girls told me something interesting this morning. Something concerning Jean and Mikasa," he whispered to Eren.
Armin could see one of Eren's green eyes and a frown on his demeanor.
"If he finally asked her out, then it's none of my business," he said immediately.
"He didn't exactly ask her out. I mean, he just invited her to the movies," the blond boy kept working on his assignment, "And she accepted his invitation."
Eren squeezed his fists, but pretended a smile.
"Well, at least she will confirm that he's a boring horse-faced idiot."
"She doesn't exactly think he's a boring horse-faced idiot, Eren," Armin corrected him, "She actually thinks he's pretty nice."
"Huh? And how do you know that?" Eren sat up straight and looked at Armin with disbelief.
"I asked her and she told me. Sometimes you just have to ask people and you'll get some answers, you know?"
The brown-haired boy snorted. He put his head on his hand and looked at his piece of shit art assignment, and he started to pour red paint all over it.
Armin kept that in mind when later he found Mikasa in the library studying for literature assignment. He sat beside her. She greeted him with a side-smile but just kept reading. He looked at the red scarf she had left on the table. He could see some black hairs here and there, tangled on the fabric.
"Armin, what are you doing?" she asked as he saw him taking some of her hairs from the scarf. What the fuck.
"I just need some hair samples to look at under the microscope that are not mine," he said simply, throwing the hair strands into a small plastic bag, "Unless you want to give me some fresher samples. I brought the scissors. Or I can just pull some out, but that hurts, haha."
"Oh, no, just keep those," she said as she touched her hair on reflex and let out a sigh, "So… how was your art class?"
"You mean, how's Eren, right?"
Mikasa's face reddened. "Don't be like that, I want to know about you too."
Armin smiled warmly at her and came closer to her.
"Well, I'm making my assignment related to the sea, while Eren's is all about rage, I think."
The girl nodded, "I guess it is okay for him to let all the rage he has about everything to flow. Art is good for that, at least that's what I've heard." Maybe she could try it too.
"Yeah, especially when he's angry because Jean invited you to the movies."
"W-what?!" Mikasa's eye widened, "He found out and he is… angry about that?"
"His assignment turned from piece of shit to sea of blood really quickly after I mentioned him that, can you believe it?" the blond boy stood up, holding in a devious smile the best he could.
Mikasa's shook her head. She looked confused.
"Well, I have to go right now back to the lab. See you next Monday, Mikasa! Or… maybe sooner." He said while waving back at her, finally letting his devious smile take his lips.
The girl blinked. Armin was acting weird. What was with that smile?
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
It was like five or six in the morning on Saturday when Eren felt the urgent need to pee. He slowly opened his eyes and couldn't see shit because it was still dark, but something felt odd. His room didn't look like always.
Well, maybe he was having a lucid dream. Still, he needed to go to the bathroom. Or, maybe not? The last time this happened to him, when he was like seven years old, he thought he went to the bathroom but he wet his bed.
Nah, that isn't gonna happen again, he thought.
When he came out of the bed he felt a bit of cold on his shaved legs.
His shaved legs.
Shaved… legs. What the fuck. And why was he wearing a nightgown?
Wait. He could also feel some weight on his chest he had never felt before. He touched his chest and find out he had… boobs?!
He grew boobs, what the fucking fuck was happening?
"Damn, I need to wake up, this is such a weird dream" he said aloud, trying to convince himself, but his voice sounded like the voice of a girl.
It was the voice of a girl he knew, so he covered his mouth. It came right from inside him. It sounded a bit different from what he was used to hear, but it was Mikasa's voice still.
What a weird dream.
Feeling dizzy, Eren decided it was better to came back to bed. He closed his eyes tightly and wished to actually wake up soon so he could go to the bathroom before his bladder explode.
Also, this dream was so odd he just wished it could stop already.