School Projects Suck

I really, really hate school projects.

I don't even hate them because it's a bunch of unnecessary crap that I could care a less about; I hate them because I always get paired with people whom I don't want to socialize or collaborate with. The only times I've ever been lucky is when I'm paired with somebody that cares equally or less than I do. Unfortunately, Armin Arlert is not one of those people. He's the type of person that would do extra credit for an assignment that is already extra credit. He's a really annoying person.

"Annie!" I hear somebody running up behind me. "Wait up!"

From the light footsteps and painfully optimistic voice, it's pretty easy to guess who it is, so I keep walking.

"What," I spit out without looking at him.

He jogs up beside me, and in between pants, he gasps out, "The assignment—I got… I got a head start on the assignment, so I was wondering if you wanted to look over it, and maybe we could make some progress on it today?"

He's so hopeful. It's almost sad.

"Looks good," I say, "but I'm busy today. We'll look at it tomorrow."

"But you said that yesterday…"

"I did, and I'm saying it again today."

"Annie, please…"

I feel my eyebrow start to twitch. "Jesus Christ, are you going to follow me home everyday?..."

"I don't want to…" he mopes, "but you're leaving me no choice, Annie."

"Here's an idea: if you're so inclined to get the assignment done and have it be perfect, then why don't you just do it yourself?"

I can see his morals being tested from the corner of my eye. "Because that's deceptive."

"Who cares?"

"I care."

"Why?"

"Because education is important, Annie."

"Is it?"

"It is."

I groan. "Has anybody told you, Armin, just how annoying you are?"

When I say this, I don't think much about it; but when I see him wince, I start to feel a small inkling of regret. I know that Armin is bullied by some of the other kids at our school, and while being called "annoying" probably isn't the worst of what he has been called, I know that whenever one of these derogatory words are aimed at him, it probably reminds him of his lacking social status.

"Yes," he says quietly, "but I'm not trying to be… I just really want to get this assignment done. It will have a big impact on our final grade, too."

I laugh. "You really think this one measly assignment is going to screw up that 120% overall course grade you probably have?"

"No," he hesitates, "but if we don't complete it, it's going to turn your D- into an F."

I grasp my backpack strap a bit too tightly, stopping in my trek. I turn to glare at him, but he avoids my gaze like the coward that he is.

"Mind repeating that?"

He sighs solemnly. "…Annie, do you know why Mr. Smith paired me with you?"

For the first time during this stupid encounter, I feel like I am losing control of the conversation. Armin looks increasingly scared of me, but that doesn't keep him from shutting his damn mouth. I really wish he would, too.

"I know that you had to repeat a grade last year, Annie, and I don't want you to have to repeat another. I know you have it in you to succeed if you just apply yourself. I know you can do it."

He gives me this big smile that is meant to be encouraging, but if anything, it just irritates me further. Seeing his smile is similar to the sensation of when you're on the road and the sun is shining directly into your eyes, but you don't have any sunglasses, and you can't look away otherwise you'll crash into somebody. It's a pretty terrible sensation.

"I'm not a charity case," I warn. "Besides, the only reason you want to help me is so you can have the glory of saying you 'fixed' me."

"That's not it, Annie," he frowns. "That's not it at all…"

I sigh and pinch the bridge of my nose. We stand in silence for awhile, and though I hear Armin shuffle a few times, I know that he has not moved an inch.

"How much?" I ask.

Armin blinks. "What?"

"How much do I have to do for you to leave me alone?"

"Well…" he scratches his cheek, "I was hoping you would be willing to do half of it, but since you said you were busy today…" he trails off. "…If you just work on it with me a little bit today, I'll do the rest of it later. I would say we should reschedule for tomorrow, but I'm going out of town for a few days. Does that sound fair to you?"

I stare at him. He's smiling again in that uncomfortably cheerful way. The offer he made me is more than fair; in fact, it's pretty obvious he's overcompensating for my dead weight. I'm sure other people take frequently advantage of him in similar ways, so I wonder if he really does believe that this is fair, or maybe he's just not confident enough to point it out. He probably knows I'm lying about being busy, but he's just too afraid of confrontation.

"Fine," I agree.

I swear, it looks like he is about to implode with giddiness. His smile is so big that it makes his azure eyes start sparkling. He really is a weird kid.

"Thanks, Annie!… Um," he quickly collects himself, "where would you like to go to work on it?"

"Let's just go to my house," I suggest.

He stiffens when I say that, scratching his cheek again. "Y—Your house?"

"Is there something wrong with that?"

He quickly shakes his head. "N-No!" he blurts out a bit too loudly. "I mean, that's perfectly fine. I'm ready when you are."

He smiles at me again. I really wish he would stop doing that.

We walk to my house in complete silence. It's refreshing, actually. With all of the intuition Armin has, I'm glad he realizes that I'm the type of person who prefers avoiding conversation when it's possible. Maybe he really is just making a fuss about all of this because he thinks it is necessary. I don't know. What I do know is that this unpleasant situation will be over shortly, and after that, I won't have to speak with Armin again. What a relief.

When we enter my house, he timidly glances around. My father is rarely ever home, and I don't meddle much with the housekeeping, so the inside is pretty much a dump. There are dishes overflowing in the sink, garbage bags piling up beside the door, fast-food bags covering the kitchen counters, Chinese takeout from yesterday on the dining room table, and there is a big pile of dirty laundry beside the basement steps. I really should get it washed because it's starting to stink like shit.

"Y—You're house is nice, Annie," Armin comments.

"You're a bad liar."

"I'm not lying…"

"Yes, you are."

Armin gets really nervous when we approach the doorway of my room. When I enter and clear some of the excessive garbage from the hardwood floor, he remains awkwardly standing there in the hallway. It's as if an invisible wall is keeping him from entering.

"What?" I ask.

"Oh, um—" he clumsily wanders into my room, glancing around as if somebody is going to attack him, "—it's nothing, sorry."

When I sit on my bed, I wait for him to follow suit, but he remains standing, looking noticeably clueless.

"What are you doing?"

He jumps at my voice. "S—Sorry," he then yelps out, planting himself on the uncomfortable floor and hastily opening his bag.

"You can sit on my bed, you know."

"O—Oh, I'm okay, thanks though."

Armin seems to relax somewhat when we start working and the assignment begins to distract most of his nervous energy. He still periodically glances around as if somebody, or something, is going to attack him. We actually make some decent progress on the assignment. I was tempted to slack and let him have his fun, but, believe it or not, it's one of the easiest assignments I've ever had to do. Armin outlined just about everything that he could within it, so all I had to do was fill in the blanks; and even then, he made all of the answers extremely obvious.

"I'm going to get some water," I announce.

Armin, amidst his intoxication of education, blinks a few times before he recognizes what I said. He then nods. "Okay."

When I make it to the doorway, I pause. "Would you like some, too?"

He looks up, genuinely surprised that I asked. "Oh, um, no thanks," he replies with a shy smile.

I get the impression that Armin is the type of person who is too bashful to admit that he is a human being and abides to the basic principles of thirst and hunger. I have a feeling, too, that if he was stuck in a desert and dying of starvation or thirst, he would still be too demure to ask for help. He really is spineless.

"Here," I say as I place a glass of water beside him.

He stares at the glass with even more surprise than when I asked him about it. "O-Oh, thanks, Annie!"

As I suspected, within about three minutes, his glass is completely empty. We continue working at a steady pace, only speaking when it's absolutely necessary. I start to get distracted, however, when I notice that behind golden blond there is a discolored blotch of purple. When I comb his hair away from his jawline, he immediately flinches and attempts to pull away.

"Don't move," I order.

Maybe it's because Armin's scared of me, or that he's concerned I could hurt him further, but he remains deathly still. I then notice that a large, swollen bruise traces his upper jawline. It seems that he's been using the length of his hair to cover it. I only noticed it when he was bent over, engrossed in the contents of his work.

"How did this happen?" I inquire.

He laughs restlessly, timorously avoiding eye contact. "I-It was just a stupid accident. Don't worry about it."

"Don't bullshit me," I snap. "How did it happen?"

His face becomes uncannily somber, fake smile dropping altogether. He continues writing something down, but I can tell his mind is wandering elsewhere. "A senior wanted me to write a paper for him."

"And?"

"I didn't," Armin answers, his voice becoming very quiet. "…So he punched me."

"Who was it?"

"I—It's not that important, Annie."

"Yes it is," I say. "Who was it?"

Armin, in a very reluctant manner, admits to me the person responsible. It's a senior at our school who is about to flunk out because he skips most of his classes, which doesn't really surprise me. Armin's face is filled with a lot of shame, and though he tries to blink them back, a few tears streak down his cheeks that he quickly wipes away. He lowers his head the best he can so that his blond bangs cover his eyes, but as resourceful as he is, he isn't the most subtle of people. Be that as it may, I can't help but gain a small amount of admiration for Armin, knowing that he was unwilling to submit to such a pathetic lowlife with the knowledge that he would probably be hurt thereafter. It turns out that this squirt does have a little bit of courage.

"Do you want me to take care of him for you?" I ask.

Though I'm not trying to embarrass him, I see his face vibrantly flush. "T—That's not necessary Annie, I—"

"—I don't mind," I interrupt, "I actually enjoy fighting. It's fun to me."

Even though he insists that he doesn't require my assistance, I have already made up my mind. I let the subject drop after a few more of his feeble protests, and after his reddened face begins to discolor, we resume working and continue to make progress. While this work is exceptionally easy thanks to Armin's due diligence, it's still extremely boring. I can't help but let my mind start drifting away from the material in front of me.

"Hey," I halt our work again.

Armin curiously looks up at me.

"You weren't willing to help that boy, but you are willing to help me. How come?"

His eyes wander back down towards our assignment, spinning his pencil between his fingers. "Well…" he begins tentatively, "it's because I think you're a good person, Annie." He pauses thoughtfully, biting his lip. "I don't think that boy will grow up to be a good person, though. There's something about him that unsettles me."

I laugh emptily. "You really don't know me well enough if you think I'm a good person."

"No," Armin says, smiling at me softly, "but I'd like to if you would let me, Annie."

After Armin and I complete our assignment, I would assure that the senior boy didn't bully Armin, or anybody else, again. Acting the part of an innocent girl, he didn't believe me when I said that I was going to hurt him if he didn't stop hurting other people. He eventually agreed to stop attacking other people when I broke his nose. Stuff just happens like that with me. I can't help it. Thankfully, the boy is too embarrassed to admit that he got beat by an unassuming girl for me to ever be held accountable for it. The helpless girl gimmick pays off, sometimes.

I still speak with Armin, but I'm starting to think I should stop. I get this weird warm feeling in my stomach whenever he gives me that stupid smile he always does. It really is a stupid smile, but on certain days I find that I don't mind it so much. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. He's trying to get me to socialize with his friends, but there's this dark-haired girl that doesn't seem to like me too much. I can't say I blame her. Armin's other friend, this intense brown-haired boy, is really adamant about me teaching him to fight. Maybe it will be nice to have someone to spar with every now and then—if he can keep up with me, that is. I don't know. Maybe Armin and his friends aren't so annoying after all. Maybe it will be nice to actually have friends again. I can't help but miss Reiner and Bertholdt on occasion, but it seems like they're really enjoying their new home, so I'm happy for them. They'll probably meet some new friends and forget about me, but maybe with these new friends of mine, I'll forget about them, too. If we mutually forget each other, then nobody will have to be sad.

Lastly, I have to admit that it's really nice to have someone genuinely believe that I'm a good person. Even though I can't believe it myself, Armin says it at least once a week, and maybe if he keeps saying it, I'll eventually believe it, too.

Oh, by the way, my grades have gotten better and we received a perfect score on that assignment. I guess Armin was right about applying myself. I really wish that warm feeling would go away, though. I'm starting to get worried that it's something stupid like love. I would really, really hate that.

Hey all,

Thanks for reading! I've been writing some one-shots to practice writing while I simultaneously work on a novel. I tried to take a bit of a unique take on Annie's character during this while keeping her character true to form. Out all the SNK universes I've dabbled with, this one is potentially my favorite. Also, I don't own any rights in regards to Shingeki No Kyojin, but I wish I did. Hajime Isayama is one talented bastard, after all.