Chapter 12
Sunday, 30.11.14.
The day had finally arrived.
I drove out there with Rivaille, who had borrowed his grandparents car, and we parked the car on the already filled parking lot. The others were waiting for us at the entrance, standing there with all our gear packed and ready.
Mikasa, who had been calling and texting me all morning, came running towards us when we were in sight.
"Idiot!" She exclaimed before hugging me. She then proceeded to hit my shoulder. Twice.
"Ow! What was that for?" I said, even though I knew damn well. She had been worried sick, not knowing where I had been.
I had fallen asleep at some point on Rivaille's bed, when I had told Mikasa that I would be coming home.
"Where have you been?" She demanded to know, and my eyes flickered from her to Rivaille.
"Eh, after the coffee house, we went to Rivaille's place to practice the songs … I accidentally fell asleep. I'm sorry I didn't text you,"
"Just … Don't ever do that again," She scolded me, before walking back to Connie and Armin. We followed after, though Rivaille gave my shoulder a quick nudge.
"What was that about?" He asked annoyed.
"I'm sorry, but … " I hesitated, looking down at my feet while walking. "I can't tell her yet,"
Rivaille stopped me completely.
"Wait, what? Are you too embarrassed to tell the truth?"
My cheeks blushed, as I raised my head to look at him.
"I-I don't know, I j-just … "
"Unbelievable," He interrupted, sighing loudly.
"Hey, wait, – "
He had already started walking again, cutting me off.
"Whatever, Eren,"
My heart dropped into my stomach when he said that, and we entered the building in silence.
It hit me immediately, and I was overwhelmed by the sight. The stage was huge, and even more at the area where the audience were supposed to be. It was already filled up with people. I could see their mouths move as if they were talking, but the loud music playing was covering all other sounds. The bass from the songs was making my heart beat in the same rhythm, and I instantly felt a part of it all.
I was ready.
We had gotten our own little area backstage, where we could sit while waiting for our turn. The show hadn't even started yet, but all the bands were already here. We were 12 in total, so it was going to be a long day. Armin was sitting on his chair, face buried in his hands. He was nervous, that much was clear, but no one could help him ease it, so we let him be.
Mikasa was leaning back in her chair, arms tightly crossed over her chest. She looked at the other bands with a scary look on her face. A few that had noticed her, looked right out terrified. I couldn't help but hope that they would intimidated enough to drop out of the competition, even though I knew that it would never happen. Still, I was allowed to dream.
Rivaille was standing with his guitar, cleaning it inbetween the strings, not focusing on anything else than that. I had been standing at my own guitar, though I just wanted to walk over to him. I wanted to talk to him, to see if he was okay. If he was nervous, or excited, or … angry at me?
He had seemed annoyed with me outside, but I doubted that he was actually mad about me lying about the reason to be at his house yesterday …Yet, I still wondered if he was.
But that wasn't enough to be angry about, right? I mean, we had only known each other for, what? 3 weeks? Less?
And suddenly I was sleeping in the same bed as him, kissing him, touching him … Yeah, I had accepted the fact that I liked him, even though he was a boy, but that didn't mean that everything was moving too fast for me to keep up.
The promise I had made him yesterday could not be just yet.
As far as the others knew, I had wanted Rivaille out of the band. I had only agreed to have him in the band so that we could win this. They did NOT know how much time we had actually spend together. Or how my every thought had started evolving around him … Or how my fingertips were burning just to reach out and touch him again –
"Hey Eren!"
Connie grabbed my shoulder to turn me around.
"Let's go check out Jean's band!"
That's right, I had totally forgotten about Jean and him being in another band. I had also forgotten about the fact, that it had been because of Jean that Rivaille now was here.
Rivaille had only been in the band for less than 3 weeks, yet it felt like he had been with us always.
Had it really only been a few weeks? I looked over at Rivaille, and felt how my stomach tensed up in a strange, yet wonderful feeling.
Butterflies.
I hadn't known this guy for very long, yet I was head over heels falling for him.
How did that happen?
"Sure, let's," I nodded, and we walked through the passage between all the bands. I was just as curious as Connie, to see what kind of band Jean was in now, who he had left us for.
It didn't take long to find him.
He was standing in the middle of his band's area, surrounded by the other members. He was too busy giving some sort of pep talk to actually notice us standing behind him. This gave us a fair amount of time to observe him properly. And what we saw was definitely not a sight for the eyes.
He was wearing too tight white pants, and only a leather jacket over his torso, making his upper body visible for anyone to see. His hair was laid back with too much gel, making him look like the huge douchebag that he really was.
We didn't have to say anything – Connie and I just had to look at eachother before bursting out in laughter. I threw my arms around my stomach, bending over. It was just too much.
"What the – "
Jean turned around to finally notice us.
"Dude, you look ridiculous!" Connie exclaimed, removing tears of laughter from the corner of his eyes.
"Yeah man, I'm actually kinda happy that you left. Then you wouldn't have made our band the laughing stock," I laughed, trying to straighten my back again.
Jean had looked surprised at first, but now he seemed a bit more relaxed again.
"Oh, it's you guys," He placed his hands on his hips, looking rather self-satisfied even though we had just mocked him rather heavily.
"I'll be looking forward to beating your asses tonight,"
"Hey, that's our line!" Connie laughed, giving his arm a little nudge. Connie was clearly not noticing the tense atmosphere between the three of us.
I sighed, before sending Jean a smile as well.
"Bring it on,"
"Oh Eren, I will. Annie here has been playing bass since she was 10. Bertholdt practices the saxophone everyday, and you'll just have to wait to hear Krista's angel voice,"
I looked around at the people behind Jean, quickly recognizing them as our schoolmates.
"Ymir, I didn't know you could sing?" I asked rather surprised when seeing her standing behind Krista. Before she could even open her mouth, Jean stepped in to asnwer for her.
"She joined because of Krista,"
I raised an eyebrow.
Just adding people to make the band look better, had a clear downside to it. I knew that Ymir didn't sing nearly as well as Krista did, even though she weren't bad.
But I had to admit that they looked impressive. And the fact that they had a saxophone in the band gave them a huge advantage, and I had to admit that it gave me sweaty palms. This didn't look good.
"What the hell?" Connie exclaimed, and I turned my head in time to see him hitting Sasha's shoulder. "You're betraying me?!"
She looked just as surprised as everyone else, as she lifted the chocolate bar in her hand.
"But … They gave me food … "
I couldn't help but smile by that comment, but it didn't seem to humour Connie just as much. As they started to bicker, I thought it would be better to leave them to it, so I went back to our own band area.
Armin had left to the restroom apparently, feeling nauseous. He had been escorted by Mikasa, who was probably going to hold his hair back if he was going to puke.
Levi was the only one left to watch out for our stuff, leaning up against the wall behind some of the boxes. He was probably trying to avoid people looking at him, by hiding behind our gear. His short build allowed him to seem less visible, but I still managed to spot him when getting there.
"What are you doing?" I asked, trying to hold back a laugh as I stepped over a bag to get over to him.
"I need to concentrate," He answered , seemingly annoyed. I raised an eyebrow, trying to fit myself into the tight space between Levi and the boxes that separated us from the rest of the bands.
"Brat, what are you doing? You can't fit in here," He protested, trying to push me away by placing his hands on my chest. Even though what he had just said, I noticed how his eyes flickered when he touched me.
Did I really have such an effect on him? If I had, now would be the time to find out.
"You never now until you try," I said, sending him a cocky smile. He rolled his eyes, but didn't try to object anymore. Instead he pressed his own body against the wall to make room for me and at the same time trying to avoid making any physical contact with me.
"Is something wrong?" I asked, looking down at him. He lifted his head a bit to meet my gaze, yet his eyes didn't look as friendly and welcoming as mine. Quite the opposite, actually.
"No,"
As silence followed, our eyes fought.
"Are you really going to pretend that you aren't mad?"
Levi sighed, closing his eyes for a few seconds as he gathered his thoughts.
"I'm really not, Eren … Just forget about it,"
I bit my lip, wondering if I should try to push him even further. As I felt a sting shoot through my bottom lip, I didn't notice how Levi had placed both his hands behind my neck, before he was pulling my head down to force a kiss on me.
Very surprised, I pushed myself away from him, hitting my back against the boxes behind me.
"What are you doing?!" I yelled, as my whole face flustered. I covered my mouth with the back of my hand.
"Oh, so now you're suddenly shy? What happened to last night?" He said, crossing his arms over his chest. His eyebrows furrowed as he looked at me in a mix of anger and perplexity.
"I never s-said – " I stuttered, as I tried to collect my thoughts. "This is getting way out of hand … "
"Yeah yeah, you never agreed to this. Well, guess what? You kinda did,"
I looked at him confused.
"What are you talking about?"
"Yesterday, when I asked you how you wanted this to be. What was your answer?"
I breathed in, as I tried to remember what had happened the day before.
"I … I said that I wanted to be together with you?" It sounded more as a question than a statement, as I wasn't even sure.
"Exactly. You wanted to be with me … Well, this is how it is. Kissing while waiting to get on stage, telling your friends about us … That kind of thing,"
"So you are mad!" I exclaimed, finally understanding. "You're pissed that I lied to Mikasa!"
He rolled his eyes dramatically.
"Of course I am, you brat! You told me something, and then you tell Mikasa something entirely different! It's bullshit!"
I couldn't stop myself – the laughter just came out. It was impossible to hold it back.
"Hahahah!" It bursted out and I bend over to minimalize the cramping that occurred in my stomach.
"Are you aware of how much you sound like a girl right now?"
He hit me at the side of the head mildly, but luckily my laughter was too contagious. Soon he was laughing with me, his arms wrapped around his stomach as well.
"Y-Yeah, I guess you're right," He chuckled, smiling. "Sorry,"
I pulled him into a quick hug, burying my face into his black, soft hair.
"It's fine," I mumbled, before releasing him again. "Let's just get this over with, okay? Then we can talk afterwards,"
He nodded in agreement, and we went out together to see that no one had come back yet. After 10 minutes of waiting, we spotted Connie running back to our area.
"Guys!" He exclaimed as he finally reached us.
"They're gonna use our old songs!" He finally spat out, after a long moment of trying to catch his breath.
"What?!" I moved a hand through my hair, trying to stay calm. "But … We wrote those together … And they're so good,"
Connie nodded and our eyes met for a long moment, as we both realised what this meant. Levi was left out, looking at both of us for answers.
"What's going on?"
I shook my head.
"Nothing. We just … We have to beat them. Whatever we do, they can't win over us!"
I clenched my hand into a fist, as fire breathed passion into my eyes.
I had to win over Jean, even if it was the last thing I did.
Oh well! I'm sorry it took so damn long to upload this, but I didn't feel that it was right, somehow ... And no matter how many times I kept re-writing it and analyzing it, it just wouldn't fix itself.
But here it is, I hope you'll enjoy! The next chapter is already written and ready, and I plan on posting it in the new year! But but but ... If you review, favorite and follow this story, maybe I'll give you a special Christmas treat and upload Chapter 13 on Christmas Eve! Now wouldn't that be a great present?
Stay lovely xoxoxoxo
