Hay Bales

Eren has heard many different sounds in his fifteen-year-old life - birds chirping, branches breaking, babies crying - but the one sound that he desperately desires to hear, the one sound that he craves to know with his entire core, is a sound so simple, a sound not so easily achieved.

That sound is Corporal Levi's laugh.

Rumor has it that he's never emitted such a noise in his entire life, but Eren can hardly believe that. Everyone has laughed before, even if it was for just a second. There had to be something that gave even a man of such high military status the giggles, and Eren was making it his personal mission to find out what it was.

On a rainy afternoon, after the horses had been brushed and fed, Eren sat in the stables and began devising his plan. If he was going to get his Corporal to laugh, he was going to have to think of something clever, something out of the box. While running his fingers through his dampened hair, he started to talk himself through some of his ideas. "The Corporal doesn't really talk about very many things other than cleaning and training," he muttered. "What kind of joke would that even be? The floor's really dirty today, sir! Uh, that's not funny at all. He'd probably just tell me to go and mop it up, or something."

With a sigh, Eren rested the back of his head against the tall stacks of hay bales. Coming up with something funny enough to make Corporal Levi laugh was going to more difficult than he had originally anticipated. Not only that, but it was going to have to be a once in a lifetime only sort of deal. If he ended up failing on his first attempt, that would be the end of it. He wasn't going to get another chance.

The rain had stopped, started, and stopped again by the time Eren felt the need to get up. His head was starting to hurt, and there were chores that still needed to be done; like cleaning the horse stalls.

As he made his way over to the tool shed and picked up one of the scooper shovels, Eren began to feel like he was falling into an emotional slump. If he could make his Corporal laugh, he would be the happiest soldier within the walls. But maybe it was pointless. Maybe the rumors were true, and maybe, just maybe, Corporal Levi didn't laugh at all.

He didn't want to believe that. He really didn't want to believe that.

Shuffling back to the stables with a bit of a slouch, Eren nearly had a heart attack and a half when he saw that the very same man who had been on his mind all afternoon was standing just outside of the gate. He straightened his posture immediately, rushed over to greet him, and uttered, "S-sir! What brings you all the way out here?"

Before responding, Eren noticed that his Corporal had been looking a tad sour-faced. Was he having a rough day? Well, that made the two of them.

"I came to check up on you," Corporal Levi said, sounding mildly disinterested. "How's the progress coming along?"

The progress? Which one? The progress of his chores, or the progress of his plan to make him laugh? Actually, whichever one his Corporal was referring to, the answer the still the same.

Lifting his scooper shovel for Corporal Levi to see, Eren ultimately gave him a dramatic sigh, and said, "To be honest, sir, it's been kind of a crappy day."

Initially, Eren's superior had given him no reaction to his statement whatsoever, which ended up making him feel like he'd said something he shouldn't have. Calling his day crappy? Was he crazy? Did he want to have more chores assigned to him?

But then, there it was.

If Eren hadn't been paying attention, he would have missed it. He thanked his lucky stars for having such a strong adversity to distractions, because in that flickering of a instant, with his scooper shovel still raised and his shoulders slightly tense, the sound that he had sought after for so incredibly long had finally been heard.

And it was absolutely flawless.

Even though his Corporal had only given him a snicker, it was far more than anyone else had ever received. It made Eren feel something that no one else could compare to. It made him feel special. He was a soldier of a much lower rank than his superior, but he'd been blessed enough to witness that split second of release, that faint moment where Corporal Levi had allowed his concrete walls to come crashing down in light of just a little bit of comedy.

And the amazing thing was, Eren hadn't even been trying to make him laugh. Unintentionally, he had delved directly into one of Corporal Levi's guilty pleasures: witty puns and bathroom humor.

"That was a good one, Eren," the Corporal sighed, turning his heel to the soldier who was still statuesque and stunned by what he had unknowingly done. "I didn't know you had a humorous side to you."

As he watched his Corporal casually stroll away in favor of returning to the headquarters, the delicate drip, drip, drips of drizzling raindrops started to speckle the ground beneath his feet, signaling that another spell of rainfall was on its way and coming. Eren didn't mind it if he got soaked. All he could seem to care about was what had just taken place and how pleasant and refined the sound of Corporal Levi's sudden laughter had sounded.

Was it so wrong of him that he wanted to hear it again?

In a daze of both bliss and bafflement, Eren mindlessly leaned the majority of his weight against the handle of his shovel scooper. Without his Corporal knowing it, he continued to peacefully stare at him until his embroidered uniform wings were no longer in sight. A humorous side? Huh.

"Yeah," Eren breathed. "I didn't know I had one, either."

Hi there! Chappy here! :D

I'm back with Day 2 of Ereri Week! Today's prompt was "Laughter", and gosh, I had tons of fun this! I hope you all enjoyed it! (:

As always, thank you so much for taking the time to read! It means the world to me!

- Chappy