((Haha so they were supposed to do dat sex thing in this chapter but it didn't happeeeen. It's actually less sexually charged than the first chapter, but we'll get there, I promise. Some Marco POV as well this time around.

I tried my best to avoid grammar mistakes/repetition but there might be some left, let me know.))

(The Morning After) The Night I Realized I Love My Best Friend

Marco Bodt was standing up on the bottom part of the bunk bed he shared with Jean Kirschtein. His head and shoulders poking up next to his sleeping friend. Marco watched him sleep, enjoying the peaceful expression on his face for a few short moments before shaking his shoulder. "Hey, Jean…" He spoke in a soft voice. The blonde teenager, mouth wide opened, snored loudly and rolled over, turning his back to Marco.

He gave no apparent sign of waking up anytime soon. Marco shook him again, more firmly this time.

-"Hey Jean, wake up."

"AAH!" Jean gasped, visibly startled. He sat up like a bullet, the covers falling to his lap. His hand instinctively reached to the thumping heart in his chest. He glared at Marco, wiping the trickle of drool on his chin with the back of his free hand.

"Shit Marco, don't scare me like that!" Marco smiled gently, tilting his head to the side. "Hehe…Sorry. You were going to miss breakfast though…" Jean frowned. "Come on, get up." Marco added, before dropping back down to the floor. Jean sighed and started breathing normally again while he took a quick look around the room. He rubbed his eyes with his fists and then noticed that almost everyone had already gotten changed and put on their trainee uniforms; Eren, Armin and a few others were already walking out the room.

Jean was a heavy sleeper, it was not the first time Marco had to wake him up after he had slept through the morning bells; it had been a while, though. They had recently begun their second year of training, the daily routine had gotten ingrained into them. Jean would usually wake up a few minutes before they even rang. Jean wasn't surprised that he overslept this morning, though. After all, he had not fallen asleep until he had looked out the windows and noticed the sky growing paler and the stars fading away.

The reasons for his lack of sleep quickly returned to him, he swallowed nervously, brushing the thoughts out of his mind. He turned around and jumped out of his bunk in one swift move, landing a few feet down on the wood planked floor. Jean and Marco both knelt next to their bunk bed, to the clothing drawer they also shared. They pulled out their folded uniforms in unison and stood back up. Marco's was always folded more neatly than Jean's for some reasons.

Jean was not thinking about such things this morning, however. All his thoughts at the moment were focused on not letting himself get caught staring at his friend as he had done the night before. He made sure to turn his back to Marco as they both slid out of their pajama bottoms. Jean kicked the piece of clothing off his foot in one quick move, and then pulled one leg of the white trainee pants up, and then the other. They fit snugly up to his slightly protruding hipbones. He made sure not to turn around until he had finished buttoning them all the way up, while trying to get dressed as quickly as possible. He only prayed that he had appeared as casual as he would have on any other morning.

He couldn't possibly have noticed Marco looking him up and down discreetly as he dressed himself, biting his bottom lip, brows lightly furrowed and eyes narrowed with guilt. He couldn't help himself but stare at Jean's youthful but powerful legs, the few seconds of his naked tight buttocks, then his toned back and finally the blonde hair he wanted to run his fingers through so badly. Coincidentally, the same thought happened to cross their minds at the same time: Maybe he didn't actually notice anything?

Jean turned back around, they had finished getting clothed, so they began putting on the 3DMG straps since they would be needed this morning. As they continued getting ready in silence, they left the other's thoughts filled with doubt without realizing it. Marco finally spoke up as he finished tightening the straps around his right thigh in one swift pull. He sounded like his cheerful normal self: "Let's go, or there won't be anything left to eat." Jean smiled back at him, as he finished lacing up his boots. "Pfft, I'm the one who was waiting for you, you know!"

They walked out the sleeping quarters together and in direction of the eating hall. Jean's eyes had always made him look older than he really was, but this morning, it was particularly bad. He caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror; dark circles under his puffy, tired eyes, and stress wrinkles between his eyebrows aged him even further. He mentally shrugged it off, continuing the short walk through the hallway.

They sat at the usual table. Jean bit into a bland piece of bread without really caring to taste it. It was dry. Butter, with the lack of space to raise cattle within the walls, had become a rare commodity and was only enjoyed on special occasions. That is, unless you were rich, held a high rank, or both; neither of which could be said of the young trainees who had yet to pull their weight for humankind's survival, so dry bread it was.

Jean's companions' antics didn't necessarily bother him more than usual. He had even tuned out Jaegar's ramblings which usually bothered him even if he sat a table or two away from his. He spaced out, chewing mindlessly, mind half blank with fatigue, and half filled with thoughts of the previous night.

Marco was rather quiet too. Jean got pulled out of his stupor when Connie grabbed his sleeve and shook his upper arm roughly. "Hey! Jean! Tell Sasha to stop being such a selfish bitch!" he screamed as he glared at her. The girl across the table was laughing, half chewed food showing through her opened mouth. She shrugged as she stuffed another piece of bread in the space that was left. Jean hadn't even realized she had just emptied the serving basket by helping herself to a third piece of bread while Connie still hadn't had seconds. Jean waved his hand dismissively without a word, as if to say"I'm not in the mood this morning guys" He took another bite of his breakfast in silence.

He wasn't sure if he was imagining things, or if Marco also looked more tired than usual. "He probably couldn't sleep because I freaked him out…" Jean thought. "I'm such an idiot…Oh god…I'm such a piece of shit." Meanwhile, the freckled teen split his second serving of bread and handed it to Connie while looking at the clownish girl next to him with a mock angry face. "Now now, that's not very nice Sasha. That's it, you're not getting my leftovers tonight." The brunette's face turned into a perfect imitation of true despair. "WHAT?! NO MARCO, YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" She pretend cried loudly, her scream was too much to handle for Jean's fatigue headache. He pushed his plate and got up, "I'm done."

"Man, what's up with him?" Connie asked, a frustrated pout on his face as he watched Jean walk out. Marco shrugged as he finished his juice in one long swig, following Jean from the corner of his eyes until he was out of sight. He shrugged noncommittally, still smiling. "I don't know. He's probably just tired."

The truth was that Jean was not the only one who had spent a long night awake. Marco had heard him shuffling and turning and moving, the bed frame cracking under him as he shifted from one side to the other. Marco had almost convinced himself that Jean was just having nightmares. Or that he was too sore to sleep. Or it was just a random bout of insomnia…Right?

Marco had laid on his side, one arm under his pillow, staring at the wall next to him with his dark brown eyes wide opened. Sometimes he turned and laid on his back, staring up at where Jean laid, barely more than an arms length away. He caught himself lifting his hand up, grasping at air before letting his arm fall down on the mattress. He sighed. He tried to understand what he was feeling.

Did something really happen? Was it all in his head? "What's wrong with me?"s and "Am I imagining things"s littered his thoughts repeatedly through the night. Deep down, a voice he tried to shut down, without success; a voice telling him that Jean's erection, that bulge he couldn't get out of his mind even if he tried, had indeed been all for him. That they had shared the same feelings as they looked into each other's eyes. Marco had drowned his face in his pillow, squeezing it tightly. "Damn it!" He felt ashamed that it felt so wrong. Or rather, he felt ashamed that it felt so right.

Marco yawned as he, Sasha and Connie walked out the barracks and joined Jean and the rest of the 104th for another hard day of training.

End of chapter 2