Ever since the teen rescued his sister and murdered a man at the fresh age of nine. he struggled with to control his emotions; the strongest being his anger. If that was not enough of a stress for him, he often encountered nightmares that enjoyed waking him up with his own screams, drenched in cold sweat. And as he approached his adolescence, much to his parents' fear, his episodes worsened so quickly to the point where both his neighbors and the school staff strongly insisted that the boy be sent to therapy.
It only took one appointment with the lady for her to recommend a few ways to dampen the strength of Eren's temper. Seeing his parents' enthusiastic smiles and breaths of relief, he could tell that they were impressed by his new therapist.
But with the methods that she had listed, the boy deemed them rubbish. If taking deep breaths, talking to someone about your issues (which, by the way, he couldn't even identify at times), and taking a walk were her conclusions, he might as well have just searched something on fucking wikiHow along the lines of "Anger Management 101".
His parents- his mother especially, however, being the desperate people that they were for a "cure" to Eren's anger issues, highly encouraged him to follow the woman's tips for years. He never really followed them, but he pretended to anyway, just for the sake of his parents' peace...
...except on one of the rare occasions.
"Eren," Carla Jaeger said calmly to the fuming 16 year-old across from her at the dinner table, "Do you need some air?"
Getting air every single time that I have a problem isn't going to fix it, he wanted to say. "I really need to take a walk, I'm sorry." He excused himself without waiting for a response and headed out the door in spite of knowing that his mother probably gave Mikasa 'the look' that communicated "Can you drag him back here please?"
And clearly, he was right, because there Mikasa was, bounding just behind his heels. "Wait," she started to say, "If this is about Jean-"
"When is it not about him?! He's a fucking idiot, Mikasa! I would beat him to a pulp if I could!"
"The thing is, you can't." That was his sister Mikasa, always blunt, yet undeniably correct at the same time. Eren couldn't even land a bruising punch on Jean. How much more effort would it be to have attempted to beat him to a pulp?
He ran a sun-kissed hand through his messy brown locks and furrowed his eyebrows. "Ugh, I know that, okay? Just give me some space. I'll be back in an hour or something."
"Well, alright. Just... if you need help, you know who to-"
"That isn't helping."
She gave him a playful smile before turning back to their home. Thank goodness that the sun was still setting, because if he had to admit, he didn't think that he would have lasted in the dark in spite of the street lamps.
Eren had reached farther than he had expected; he circled his neighborhood twice and eventually decided to enter the next area of residences.
Upon entering the entrance to the other district, which was resided by the richer part of town, the young boy felt a strong urge to go back. It felt like something was wrong.
Finding out what was bothering him so much didn't need to make him go too far into the residential area.
When he went to turn around the corner of one of the lines of houses, he heard a sound that was similar to the sound of flapping accompanied with the whimpering of a bird. It scared him to look, because what if the poor creature was being attacked?
What had told Eren to finally turn around the corner was the sound of a man yelling. The problem was, though, that he couldn't make out what the person was saying. He was pretty sure that it was French; he had gotten a taste of that when the Jaegers went on a trip to Europe to visit some family in Germany as well as taking a tour.
Although he was uncertain of the language, he knows what anger looks like. In fact, he is anger. That's really all he was known for: the kid who did a courageous act only to be overcome by a bad spirit or something, which he was not (and also another thing for him to fuss about to his "therapist", who didn't do shit).
"Excuse me," Eren approached the man, who seemed to be a tourist by the looks of his wear. Although he wasn't German himself, he knew enough from years of living in Japan to tell the difference. "I'm pretty sure that animal abuse is illegal here in Japan. Plus, it's really late, so can you stop that, please?"
Much to his surprise, the man bowed slightly, seeming to calm down, but immediately started yelling again. "Sorry, sorry! This owl - this beast is cursed! Do not approach it!" He shook the cage that held the small bird and it only fluttered to follow to pattern of the metal wires that held it. "See, it's pretending! But earlier it was going to bite me!"
"Well, fuck, dude, if someone shook me around like that, I would probably bite them too. I think you need to chill for a sec." Funny that he was telling that man that when he really couldn't do it himself, either.
"I am calm! It's just - this bird! I got him from a woman in the market yesterday and he turned into a human-"
"You're insane! If you only bought him to abuse him, you might as well return him."
"I'm not crazy," the man exclaimed, frantically shaking his head. "Here! You keep him and see!" He threw the cage onto the ground, leaving the bird rolling in its confinement.
Eren worried for the bird, whose eyes were closed. Carefully, he opened the cage and cradled the small, grey owl in his two hands, checking if any of the avian's body parts had been injured.
He frowned as he ran his thumb over a section of the bird's wing. He was clearly no doctor, but his dad had taught him enough.
Speaking of his father, Eren started to run back to his home. Could his dad fix the bird's wing?
"Hey mom and dad, can I keep him?"
"I don't know, Eren," his father Grisha said thoughtfully. "I really do hope that he doesn't turn into a human like the man said, but if I'm able to fix him, what happens to the owl will depend on what your mom says.
Of course, the boy looked to his mom pleadingly.
"I don't think that I'd mind. As long as you will be the one caring for him. You're turning 17 in a month, too, so I expect you to take responsibility, Eren."
The next morning, Eren woke up to see a sleeping and bandaged owl swaddled in his dad's old rags and towels.
It was shocking as to how the teen's rage had come back in more than a month. Typically, his anger went about uncontrollably more than once a week. In fact, there was so much improvement that Eren was permitted to stop going to therapy sessions.
At the last appointment with his therapist, the woman asked him how the methods had been working for him throughout the month. Never had she seen such a quick development in a client.
"Um, I don't really know if your methods worked," he said frankly, only to receive a look from his parents. He shrugged. If Mikasa could be blunt, why couldn't he? "I mean, a month ago, like I told you, I tried taking a walk but all that happened was that I found this owl - oh, by the way, I named him Levi - but anyway, I don't think that your methods were really that effective. I mean, an owl is easier to talk to than a human being. Plus, whenever I pet him, it's so calming; almost to the point where I think that I'm the one being massaged and stuff here."
"Oh? You do remember what I told you, right? Talking, walking, and breathing more calmly?"
"Yeah, but I talk more with Levi about things than I do with my own family now, I feel more relaxed around-"
"Does the thing that will help you necessarily have to be a human?"
"...oh. No, I guess not."
This is kind of like a backstory to my fic, 6-second Clips! You can choose to read this or the other fic first, it doesn't really matter :-)
Decided to write this because I received a lot of kind comments about my last Owl!Levi drabble! Hope this one is also enjoyable!