Armin's grandfather owned a small bookshop on the corner of the high street of the little town that Eren lived in. He was the only person that worked there, and Armin himself was too young to help out, which meant he was often reasonably busy with it's management. Usually, this fact didn't impact Armin at all because he was at school. Eren and his mother would pick him up and walk him to the shop, and he'd sit on a little stool by the window and read for an hour and a bit until the shop closed at five. However, given that it was now summer, and school was over, there was a problem. Seeing as Armin couldn't very well sit in his stool by the window and read all day, Eren's mother had said that, as a favour to his grandfather, they'd look after him over the summer. Eren often wondered why Armin didn't live with his parents, but he never asked.

He thought that this summer would be the most exciting one yet. He'd been told that Armin would be round almost every day, and Mikasa only lived across the road, so she could visit whenever she liked. He had been looking forward to all the fun things the trio would do together, but by the time it had gotten to the first day of the summer holidays, he had decided it was far, far too hot to do anything but lay on his bed in his underwear, no matter how many times his mother told him to get up and get dressed.

He was lying on his bed staring at the ceiling when he heard a light knock on the door, followed by his mother's soft voice. It was muffled by walls and wood, but he was pretty sure she said something like, "You can go on in, it's fine. He's awake."

The door creaked open slightly, and a timid Armin peaked through the crack. "Hiya Eren," he greeted.

"Hi Armin," Eren replied, still looking at the ceiling.

"Can I come in?" Armin's vibrant blond hair had been pulled back into a ponytail to keep the heat off his head and neck. Two stubborn locks framed the sides of his face. Eren had always thought he looked like a girl when he tied his hair back, but a lot of the boys in Armin's class liked to tease him about looking like a girl anyway, so he never said anything.

"Yeah," he answered, "but it's really hot in here."

Armin chuckled. "It's really hot outside too." Eren groaned in response, and the smaller boy opened the door and entered his room. He paused for a moment, then said, "You're not dressed."

"Oh for the love of-" came his mother's voice once again, her head peaking around the doorway, "Eren Jaeger, I told you over an hour ago to put some clothes on! We have company!"

"Armin doesn't mind," Eren was too hot to yell, but normally he would have raised his voice. "He knows it's too hot for trousers today."

"I'm wearing clothes today, Eren," Armin mumbled. "It's bad not to do what your mummy says, so you should, um, get dressed too."

"Thank you, Armin," Eren's mother entered the room and ruffled the smaller boy's hair. "See, Eren? Why can't you take a leaf out of Armin's book and do what you're told?"

Eren groaned once more. His mother folded her arms and tsked. "It's too hot to get dressed," he told her.

"Eren, I'm only going to ask you one more time-"

"It's too hot to get dressed!"

Something in Eren's tone must have alerted her to the fact he meant business, because she just sighed. "I'll leave you boys to play then. Eren, next time I see you, you better be dressed."

The brunette made a slight grunt, but didn't answer, and his mother left the room, true to her word.

"So," Armin said, sitting himself down on the edge of Eren's bed, "what do you want to do?"

"Nothing."

"But-"

"It's too hot to do anything!" Eren whined, sitting up to meet Armin's gaze. His friend sighed, and looked around the room.

"I could read to you?" he suggested finally.

Armin was a much better reader than Eren was, and was the best in his class at things like science and literacy and numeracy and everything except PE. Eren wasn't in Armin's class; he and Mikasa were in the one next door. Armin had always been better at reading though, because he'd been reading with his grandfather for a long time.

Eren liked the sound of Armin's voice, so he pointed to the book he was reading with his father, which was lying on his desk, and told him to go ahead. He drifted in and out of sleep as Armin told him tales of far away worlds and knights who slayed horrific monsters and people who lived in fear of being eaten. He stumbled on quite a few of the words, but Eren didn't mind. His eyelids would close and then drift open to find Armin at a completely different part of the book.

They carried on like this until lunchtime, when Eren's mother came back upstairs with a tray laden with sandwiches and a jug of freshly squeezed orange juice. She wasn't very pleased that Eren hadn't gotten dressed, but she didn't say anything about it and left, rolling her eyes. The doorbell rang while the two were eating, and his mother called up to them, "Boys, Mikasa's here!"

Her footsteps were heavy on the stairs, and it wasn't long until her shadow fell upon the two, who were sat on the floor, eating. Her dark hair hung loose around her face, and she was clad in a pretty shirt and a bright skirt. She said, by way of greeting, "You're not wearing a top."

Eren replied with, "I'm not wearing anything. It's too hot for clothes."

Mikasa nodded, and appeared thoughtful for a moment, before grabbing the bottom of her skirt and pulling it off.

Armin covered his eyes. "What are you doing?!" he asked, panicked.

The girl discarded her skirt, throwing it onto Eren's bed, and sat crossed-legged on the floor with them. "It's too hot for clothes," she told him, before stealing one of Eren's neatly-cut-into-square slices of sandwich, and eating it, despite his loud protest.

Author's Note: This is my summer challenge. I have literally nothing to do all day long, so I sat down and decided I was going to write a drabble fic with one hundred chapters. The snk fandom is always in need of a pick-me-up, so I humbly present to you a collection of short stories about kids being small and having fun in the summer even though it is too hot. They're meant to be about seven, and I set this au in England (since the story actually takes place in Europe plus I'm English so it's easier for me?). The cover is a work-in-progress and will be completed when I next have access to a tablet, and finally, this fic will probably update several times a day since there is only a few weeks between now and September and I want to get this done.

(ps I take prompts so please leave some)