rewritten :D also, whoever asked me for my tumblr, its *deep inhale* levisbombassdick and yeah, you can tots talk about the story there idc
Levi POV
Dying. Dying. Dying. Dead. I'm dead. There's no other explanation.
I heard Hanje's footsteps approach me and anger flared in me.
Snap. Snap. Snap. I'm going to snap. Leave me the fuck alone. Now.
I wanted to yell at them, but I didn't have the energy since all of mine was currently being consumed in fighting through this hell. I wanted to snarl and growl and bare my fangs like the cornered and wounded animal I was.
I have said many not so nice things about Hanje, (hell, I say not so nice things about everyone), but one thing I can say about them is that they have handled my many withdrawal induced hissy fits very well. They didn't deserve to have my anger directed at them; I knew that. Sometimes…sometimes I just couldn't help it though. Call it lashing out when hurt, call it withdrawal anger, call it the monster inside me… I could no longer differentiate between them anyway.
My days were pain, pain, and more pain. I wondered how long I had been laying in Hanje's guest bed. It seemed like one second; it seemed like forever. With my body clock thrown out of the window, and the bedside clock destroyed when I threw it against the wall for daring to make light during a migraine, the only sensation of time passing I had was when I noticed the sound of Hanje and their boyfriend Mike banging in the other room. I assumed it was night when I heard that. I didn't keep track of days, though. I desperately hoped I was closer to making it out of this hell. Whether I made it out dead or alive, I no longer cared.
"I brought you some water" their voice was equal parts grating and soothing. I wanted to cuddle with them, cry to them, drown my sorrow in them, but at the same time I wanted to scream, punch them, and claw my way out of the room and into my dealer's room.
I reached out a hand blindly, feeling the limb shake uneasily. My hands and arms protested with a sharp, hot pain when I felt Hanje wrap their warm hands around mine and form it around the glass. I bent my elbow and prop myself up with the other on to drink it. The cool water ran down my throat and I felt the chill settle in my stomach.
I must be empty to be so sensitive to water. I wonder when the last time I ate was. I'm hungry. I'm always so hungry. I used to feed off of stimulants. I … I don't know how to feed myself anymore.
I peeked my eyes open and looked up at Hanje, who was standing with a worried expression by the bed.
I noticed something different about them.
Hanje cut their hair since the last time I had seen them.
I was immediately struck by how odd this thought was. I interacted with them every day for god knows how long. I just almost never opened my eyes, not because I didn't want to see them, but because I didn't want to face the light of day.
Their hair used to be longer, in waves down to the small of their back that they usually drew up in a ponytail. Now it was just past shoulder length, and they currently didn't have a ponytail. The weight taken off of the hair made it lighter, which allowed it to curl up more, giving Hanje lots of waves.
I licked my lips and tried to clear my throat. I looked into their warm eyes full of kindness and said my first words that weren't desperate cries for help in I don't know how long.
"Your hair is pretty." God damn my throat was scratchy. I looked down in embarrassment. I hated myself for putting them through this. I really did.
"Levi," their voice was thick, and I looked up. Tears welled in their eyes.
"Whoa, Hanje, you okay?" They nodded and wiped their eyes weakly.
"I'm so glad to see you looking better, Levi. You're becoming Levi again. Talking, noticing things, being nice… you know?" I really did a number on Hanje. Fuck me.
I collapsed back on the bed, throwing an arm over my eyes.
"How long have I been here?" I had to know.
"Three weeks."
"Jesus."
Hanje sighed. They walked closer to me and slowly moved the arm I had thrown over my eyes to my side. They stroked my face with gentleness I did not deserve.
"He can't help you now, you poor little gay boy." I could feel the smirk radiating out from them.
I realized it had been a long time since I had played with them or had any fun at all. They probably really missed that, and me, too. I suddenly felt very selfish.
I smiled for Hanje's sake.
"You need anything?"
"Food." I threw my arm back over my eyes and rolled back over, suddenly very exhausted.
I heard them leave the room, and knew they would return with something delicious, and a lot of it.
Since I had been abusing stimulants, which depress appetite, my brain stomach communications had gotten really messed up. I no longer had a "full" feeling. Just less empty. The first time I had the strength to eat while here, I had panicked when I couldn't feel myself getting full. I had eaten and eaten until I puked. There, curled up in the fetal position on the floor of the shower, letting the scalding hot water beat down on me and wash away the filth, I had never felt smaller. I was tiny, in that moment. Not 5'3 tiny, but even smaller. Smaller than anyone else. Smaller than a human being. Smaller than a speck of dust. There, I had wanted to cry. I didn't. As always, I refuse to cry. I can only cry when I feel safe, and I never felt safe.
Thinking about that dirty incident made me realize how dirty I currently was. I rarely had the energy to do anything other than moan in pain, so it had been a while since I had changed my clothes. They were grimy and sweat soaked.
I pulled the fabric of my neckline up to my face and inhaled. Yuck. Talk about an assault on the senses. The thought of putting on clean clothes didn't help when I realized how dirty my skin was. I would have to shower.
I sat up slowly, pulling off my shirt and leaving it on the bed where I knew Hanje would find it. I took my pants and boxers off at the in-room bathroom door and threw them onto the bed. As I stepped in the shower, I realized that besides the puke incident this was the only time I had ever felt my usual Levi sense of cleanliness. I allow myself one brief burst of hope and smiled just enough to feel the corners of my mouth turn up. Maybe I was becoming "Levi" again…
Eren's POV
I'm going to strangle him. I'm going to strangle that horse-faced fucker. I'll strangle him with his own mane.
I could Armin and Jean fighting through the walls again. There had been more and more of that going on lately. I didn't get. I didn't understand why a guy like Armin was with Jean. Ew.
I hear their room door slam open and heard them fight down the hall.
"So Marco isn't important to you?" Armin was suspicious of Jean and his budding friendship romance with another English major, a gentle freckled boy named Marco.
"For. The. Last. Time. Armin. Marco. Is . A. Friend." Jean was practically growling the words.
Bullshit Horseface. Mikasa caught you red handed. Own up and face Armin like a real horse.
Mikasa had been at the bar where she works, not working but taking a girl's night out with her friends Annie and Sasha, when she noticed Jean being awfully "friendly" with Marco. Yeah, Jean had been drunk, but that certainly didn't excuse his hand sliding "oh so accidently" up Marco's thigh. Later when his sister had come over to see Eren and their childhood friend Armin, she had given them all the details.
When Jean didn't come home that night, Armin had called him. Marco answered. Armin hung up immediately and spent the night crying in Eren's room, cuddled in between Mikasa and Eren for comfort. Jean pulled the, "Marco was just helping me out cause I was drunk, nothing happened" line but Armin, the keen guy he is, didn't buy it.
Jean left the apartment, saying something lame about needing some air. Armin stood next to the couch in the living room, looking at the door Jean had just left in shock.
"You okay, man?" I said stupidly. God, I was bad at this.
Armin turned toward me, tears welling in his eyes. He reached his arms out and I was off the couch and towards him for a hug as soon as I could physically get there.
"I lost him. It's official. He – he doesn't love me anymore." Armin clutched at the back of my shirt while little sobs shook his body.
And in the moment, the Who's down in Whoville say my hatred for Horseface grew three times that day.
"Fuck him and his horseface. He can ride into the sunset with his head shoved up his own ass." I bit out. Armin just cried.
"Are you angry with Marco?" I asked him softly.
He shook his head into my chest.
"No. I – I don't think Marco knows Jean already has – had – a boyfriend. I can't believe Jean would exactly advertise that fact to the guy he's wanting.
I picked up on the correction from has to had immediately.
"So you are for sure gonna dump him?" Armin nodded weakly.
"I won't be cheated on. If he wants Marco, he can go get him." I was so proud of Armin.
"Hell yeah. He's outta here. You put his ass in the stable, Armin." Armin barked out a single laugh and looked up at me with a smile.
"It's gonna be okay." He said weakly. "It hurts right now but it's gonna be okay."
"That's right buddy. It's gonna be alright."
"Can we play video games with some beer and Doritos?" He asked me.
"That's the best comfort I've ever heard of, bruh." I let him go to power on the X-box.
"Bruh." He said, trying to smile.
The fighting over the next weeks were intense.
Armin and Jean officially split. Jean moved his stuff from Armin's room that they had been sharing back into the room he was technically renting that we had been using as a spare bed for drunk friends and Mikasa. Jean finally admitted to having drunk sex with Marco. Armin cried. Mikasa punch Jean in the face. I cheered and wanted to join in but once punch from Mikasa had pretty much handled it. Jean told us Marco didn't know about Armin and asked us not to be mad at Marco. Armin had looked into Jean's eyes with such hardness that Mikasa and I were shocked as he said, "Marco was ignorant, but you weren't. I don't forgive you."
Jean had felt so bad that his rich ass had paid his share of the rent for six months, through the end of our current rent agreement.
After a couple weeks, Jean's stuff was gone and into his new place and Armin felt that he was ready for another person to move in. We talked at length about the kind of person we wanted to move in.
"Male or female?"
"Ehhh?" Armin had said. "Does it matter?"
"Well, ya never know, maybe the next guy who moves in will be your next boyfriend. Maybe he won't look like a barnyard animal, either." I joked. Armin laughed, and we both relaxed. Enough time had passed that we could joke like this now. I knew Armin must still be hurting, but I was glad he was getting better.
"Or maybe we ought to have a girl move in…maybe she'll be your new girlfriend!" Armin said. We chuckled.
"Unless, of course, you're gay." Armin said, completely seriously. An awkward second passed before we both burst out laughing.
"I'm straight, my friend." I believed it, too.
"Still, I think we ought to have another guy move in." He said. I looked at him. "Not for romance or anything," he followed up quickly, moving his hands around frantically. "A girl over here constantly would be different you know. I wouldn't want any other girl besides Mikasa, and she's rooming with Annie in the dorms this year, ya know."
"I can't see how she stands them when she doesn't have to." Only freshmen were required to live in the dorms at Maria University, and Mikasa was a junior just like us.
"Alright, male. Only students?" Armin asked.
"I don't see why we should limit it to only students." Armin nodded.
"They have to be gay friendly, of course."
"Of course. I'll slip in a gay reference somewhere and see how he reacts."
"Maybe write that I broke up with my boyfriend and that's why the room is open?"
"If that's alright with you, Armin."
"I woudn't have brought it up if it wasn't."
We finished the conversation up a few hours later. I'm not going to lie, I was pumped. I downloaded a renter app and punched in my information. I scrolled through the list of people.
Looking 4 place to call my own. 420 friendly only bi – Next
Quiet, clean guy looking for a place with my girlfri- Next
Party Anim- Next
I sighed going down the list until I found one that was different.
Will take whatever.
Just those words.
I hummed.
What does "whatever" mean? Why so short and simple? I clicked on it and read through the profile.
Levi. 25. Clean. Don't smoke, don't care if you do. Don't drink, don't care if you do.
Interesting. I clicked the message button on his profile.
Levi POV
It had been about two weeks since the withdrawals had stopped. I was itching to get out just as bad as Hanje and Mike were itching for their personal space back.
"You two know you fuck all the time, right?" I said to them one morning after frying up some crispy bacon and making pancakes to a golden brown perfection. Mike ran a restaurant and so he was around the kitchen all day, meaning when he got home, he preferred to do anything else. Hanje was the main cook at home, and they liked to find 'alternative' ways to cook things, like blowtorching the shit out bacon. Ever since I had gotten well enough to cook, I had started doing it.
"It's constant, like fucking bunnies." I said as I served the food to them.
"Constant?" Hanje looked at me wide-eyed.
"Yes." I said, ignoring the look Mike was giving me.
"Even right now?" Hanje whispered, looking at Mike, who was sitting beside them with his coffee and food.
"Especially right now, babe." He wiggled his mustache at them and I scowled.
"Damn you must be bad cause I feel nothing right now." Hanje took a big bite of pancake after drowning it in an ungodly amount of syrup.
"I'll show you how bad I am, baby." He leaned in and stole a sloppy kiss from Hanje. They tangled their fingers into his hair and tugged. He gave a gentle moan and I cleared my throat. He pulled back from them.
"Can I fucking help you, Levi?" He asked.
"Don't fuck in front of me after I made you breakfast."
"It's awful food, Levi. Awful." He said, taking a bite of a perfectly cooked, fluffy pancake.
"Excuse you my food is more delicious than the souls of children." I gave him a hard look. "Which I know you must consume regularly in order to survive living with them."
They snorted and he shrugged.
"What can I say? I love them." Mike said, and leaned in to Hanje again.
"Love them somewhere else. I'm trying to eat my delicious food, you shit head."
"How bout you move because I want to fuck them on this table?" He shot me a look. They giggled and clapped their hands.
"It's been so long since you fucked me on the kitchen table!"
"Done. Done. I'm leaving. I'm finding a place to go where they don't fuck like crazy and season their food with chemicals from-"
"I didn't mean to! Geez! Season a steak with iron filings once and no one trusts you alone in the lab anymore."
"Still leaving!"
I was sitting on a bench in the park, just breathing in the air and ignoring the constant raw ache that had been lodged inside me for a hit. I wondered if it was now a permanent fixture in my life. I sighed. Only time will tell.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I checked the screen. A notification.
It was a message from an app that I had even forgotten I had downloaded. It was a roommate search app I had downloaded when I thought I could get away from Kenny's basement, before I had blown all my money up nose. I had put my information into it, checked *looking for place to live*, and then forgot about for weeks.
Why the fuck is someone messaging me through that shitty thing?
I opened it
Hey, so are you still looking for a place to move in? My best friend and his boyfriend and I moved into this apartment near our campus early this year and now they've split up. (I'm really happy, I hated Jean tbh). We have place for one more now. I saw on your info you were looking around downtown, but the campus area isn't too far from it, so…
So some college kids want a roomie? I laughed sarcastically but then stopped when I read the next part.
….hit me up if you're interested. P.s. Jean's a stupid rich kid and he paid his – your- share of the rent for the next couple months when we asked him how we were supposed to pay rent without his share.
i love hanje tbh