They Don't Think I Listen

Jean POV

Jean had his school things all packed up and waiting on the kitchen table when Marco arrived. "Okay. All ready to go."

Marco paused. "Um…go where?"

"The library. Duh. That IS where you guys go every Saturday night, isn't it?"

"Yeeesss…"

"Why are you acting so weird? Do you not want me to go or something?" Jean crossed his arms.

"It's not that. I'm just trying to process what's happening here."

"What's there to process? I can't want to go to the library?"

"It's certainly a new phenomenon."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Marco arched an eyebrow. "You are the same man who said, and this is a direct quote here, 'What the hell is the point of the library when all the information is online and I can access it from my own house, without having to deal with dumbass people?'"

"When did I say that? Like freshman year?"

"Three weeks ago."

"Oh." Jean grew quiet for a moment. He did vaguely remember saying that. "Well, a person is entitled to change their mind."

"Uh huh." Marco rolled his eyes. "I think you have no intention of going there to study."

"What else would I be doing?"

"You're going there to see a certain someone."

"What are you insinuating, Marco? Are you saying I shouldn't go?"

"I'm not telling you to do anything, except to stop being so defensive." Marco said, pulling on his coat. "You're a grown man who is capable of making his own decisions. Just know that there are people there who don't take distractions well."

"I won't be a distraction." Jean said, happily pulling on his coat. Marco was right. He only wanted to go so he could see Armin.

"Oh, and Floch will be there."

"Son of a bitch!"

Jean frowned immediately upon entering the library. "Son of a bitch." He muttered to himself. There, at the table behind the service desk, was stupid Floch.

"I warned you." Marco whispered. "You chose to come anyway so be nice."

"You ask a lot of me." Jean whispered back as they approached.

Floch's stupid eyes widened as he saw Jean. "What in the hell are you-ow!" Jean suddenly noticed Marlowe was sitting there because he elbowed Floch in the ribs…hard.

"Hello, Jean. Nice to see you." Marlowe said as Floch rubbed his side.

"Hey Marlowe." Jean replied. "I thought you worked Saturday nights."

"I am working."

"No." A familiar female voice said from behind Jean. He turned around in time to see Hitch pop up from behind the service desk and slam a pile of books down. "WE are working."

Jean's heart skipped a beat when Armin also appeared from behind the counter, setting down his pile of books gently. He smiled brightly. "Hi, Jean! This is a pleasant surprise."

Hitch raised an eyebrow. "Yes. It certainly is. I thought you hated libraries."

"Oh, don't you start." Jean groaned as he and Marco sat down at the table. He noticed a backpack on the chair next to his and knew it wasn't Armin or Hitch's.

"You're in my seat." A dull voice said from behind him.

Jean turned around to see Annie. He had known her long enough to know to get out of her way. "Oh, sorry!" he said, jumping to his feet.

"What are you scared?" Floch asked in a condescending tone.

"You're stupid if you're not." Jean replied, sitting down next to Annie.

"Annie's like five feet tall, what's she going to-OW!" Floch grabbed his shin. "Why the hell did you kick me?" He glared at Annie.

"Why are you talking to me?" Annie retorted. "We're here to study, not have a dick slapping contest." Jean knew who Marco had meant when he said there were people who didn't like distractions. "So, both of you, put your dicks away and shut up." Annie pulled out a book and started to read. The table grew quiet as they all got to work on something.

Jean was pulled from his focus by the ringing of the phone. Suddenly, Armin's voice rang out. "Sina Memorial Library. How may I help you?" Jean glanced at the clock and was shocked to see that an hour and a half had gone by already. He hadn't known he could be so focused with so many other people around. "Hitch, it's for you." Armin handed the phone over to her.

"Hello? This is Hitch." She answered. "No, Kyle. I told you, I'm not going out with you…ever. It's because you're a fuckboy, Kyle. An absolute fuckboy and I have no time for you." She looked at them and rolled her eyes. "Oh my god. I'm at work right now. I don't have time to talk to you. Actually, how did you even get this number? I didn't think you even knew what a library was. Hey, there's no need for name calling now, Kyle. How can I be a slut if I didn't fuck you…or any of your dumbass friends? Thanks for the free drinks though. Yeah, I'm hanging up now. Fuck off now, Kyle. Buhbye." She hung up and sighed. "I think that's my last time going out with a frat boy."

"I thought you were a lesbian. Why are you going out with guys at all?" Jean asked.

"Because they buy me things."

"Awe, Hitch. You're pretty enough, I'm sure plenty of lesbians would buy you drinks." Armin patted her on the arm.

"You're right, Ar. But I enjoy using my beauty to con fuckboys out of their parents money."

"A worthy cause." Jean smirked.

"You have problems." Marlowe rolled his eyes and turned back to his work.

"Shouldn't you be doing some real work instead of sitting on your ass for two hours getting paid to do your homework?" Hitch retorted, crossing her arms.

"Oh, leave him alone." Floch said.

"You stay out of this or else."

"Or else what-ow!" He turned to glare at Annie.

"Shut up." She said flatly.

"Stop kicking me-SON OF A BITCH!"

"I said shut up."

Jean thought it was hilarious that out of everyone talking, the only one she was kicking was Floch. Just then, the phone rang again. "Sina Memorial Library. How may I help you?" Armin answered. "No, Kyle. She's not going to talk to you. No, I don't think she's playing hard to get. She just doesn't want to talk to you. No, Kyle-"

Hitch seized the phone from Armin's hand. "Fuck off, Kyle. Don't call here again." She slammed the phone down. "Fuckboys." She groaned.

"That's what you get for going out with them and leading them on." Marlowe shook his head.

"It's not my fault that these men only seem to think women are there for them to put their dicks in. Am I right, Annie?"

"I'm not a part of this." Annie said without looking up.

"Well, I think-" Floch started.

"Literally no one cares." Hitch interrupted before the phone started ringing again. "Oh lord."

"Sina Memorial-No." Armin said. "Hush now, Kyle." He hung up the phone.

Jean couldn't help but start laughing. "Did you just tell him to hush?"

"Well, swearing at him wasn't working." He shrugged.

The phone started ringing again and Hitch groaned. "He certainly seems desperate, doesn't he?" Marco commentated.

"I'm going to kill this kid." Annie said through gritted teeth.

"Why don't you just let the phone ring?" Jean asked.

"We're obligated to answer." Armin sighed. "It could be our boss."

"It's not." Hitch sighed as Armin answered the phone again.

"Sina Mem-Lord give me patience." He looked towards the ceiling for a moment. Jean didn't think he'd seen Armin this exasperated in a while. Armin put his hand over the receiver. "Hey, Marlowe, I have a job for you. Make him stop calling." He held out the phone.

Marlowe huffed, pushed his chair back, and grabbed the phone from Armin's outstretched hand. "Look, dude. You're clogging up my phone line here with your incessant calling. So knock it off. She's not going to talk to you, so you're just coming off as a desperate, annoying, little puissant. Yeah, everyone here has been making fun of you."

"Savage, Marlowe." Jean grinned.

Marlowe ignored him and continued. "No, I don't feel sorry for you. You should have seen her coming from a mile away, given how she played all of your friends. You're pretty pathetic if you fell for that. Well, you can complain all you want, I AM the supervisor. Yeah. I'm not kidding you. So, look, we're all getting pretty tired of how disruptive you're being. This is a library after all, people are here trying to work. Yes, there are. That's sort of the purpose of the library. Wow, she wasn't exaggerating about how stupid you are. Yeah, well this is it, dude. We can't have you continuously calling all night. She's not going to talk to you. She was scamming you for free shit. She doesn't even like men. Yeah, so look, if you call here again, I'm calling the cops. Yes, seriously. Yes, I am 100% serious. I will report you for harassment if you call again, and I have a dozen people here who will act as witnesses. Yes. Would you like to speak to them? I can put you on speaker phone. No? I didn't think so. Goodbye now. Have a good night." He handed the phone back to Armin to hang up. "Jackass." He muttered.

"Do you think he'll stop calling now?" Marco asked.

"He better. I wasn't kidding about the cops."

"Are you really a supervisor?" Jean asked.

"Yes."

"In the loosest definition of the term." Hitch added.

"Shut up, Hitch."

"Why do you keep picking on him?" Floch demanded.

"Are you fucking Marlowe or something? Why are you defending him so much?" Hitch shot back. Floch's face turned beet red and he turned around. "That's what I thought. And you're not special, Marlowe. Oh boy, you get to lock up at night."

"You know what-" The phone started ringing, and Marlowe snapped. He stood up and seized the phone before Armin could grab it. "I wasn't fucking kidding about the cops, asshole-oh. Hi, Eren." He deflated and his voice went flat.

"Give me that." Armin said.

"Why? How do you know it's for you?" Marlowe asked.

Armin made a face. "Who the hell else would Eren be trying to call here? YOU?" He took advantage of the look of surprise on Marlowe's face and seized the phone.

"He has a point." Hitch laughed.

"That's enough out of you." Marlowe sighed, sitting back down. "I don't need it from both of you."

"What's up, Eren?" Armin asked into the phone. "Ok, slow down so I can understand you. What happened? Her mom called you? Why would her-is she okay? She doesn't know. Okay, well let me get my phone and I will try. Yes, I'm at work. Of course Marlowe's not doing anything."

"Hey!" Marlowe exclaimed, making Hitch giggle.

"Yeah, I know. Hitch had some guy that kept calling, clogging up the phone line. Yeah. Yes, dude. I've got it from here. Ok, I'm hanging up now. Bye. Yeah, I'll let you know."

They all stared at Armin as he hung up the phone. "Is everything okay?" Marco asked.

"I have to go." Armin said.

"What? You can't go." Marlowe proclaimed.

"Oh, shut up, Marlowe." Hitch groaned. "Boohoo. You have to do some work for once instead of getting paid to sit on your ass." She turned to look at Armin. "You go on and don't you feel bad for putting on your timesheet that you worked your full shift."

"He can't do that!" Marlowe objected.

"Oh, like you don't game the system every time you come in? You're gaming the system right now!"

"She does have a point." Floch said.

"Dude! I thought you were supposed to be on my side."

"I'm just saying, you are kind of the pot calling the kettle black here." Floch shrugged.

"Uh oh. Marital discord." Jean smirked.

"Why do you have to leave?" Annie asked Armin, cutting off the brewing fight.

"I guess Mikasa's mom hasn't heard from her since last night. They had a fight. Mikasa left and now she's worried."

"So she called Eren?" Jean raised an eyebrow.

"She's deperate. She tried calling me." Armin held up his cell phone. "It's likely she tried calling here too but couldn't get through for the same reason Eren couldn't."

"The fuckboy." Hitch said quietly.

"Exactly. Anyway, I have a couple ideas of where she might be, so I'm going to go look for her." Armin said as he pulled on his coat.

"Why can't you go look for her after your shift?" Marlowe asked.

"You better watch yourself, or I'm going to tell Nifa what you do and get your keys taken away." Hitch crossed her arms.

"Nifa won't believe you."

"Yeah, but she'll believe Armin." Hitch put her hands on her hips, a position she assumed when she knew she had played her trump card.

"Shit. Armin is Nifa's favorite." Marlowe looked down.

"Duh. Armin is everyone's favorite." Annie said.

"Even Floch's." Hitch grinned wickedly.

"Shut your mouth, you damn succubus!" Floch yelled.

"Yeah, I'm leaving now." Armin said.

"I'll come with you." Jean said, standing up.

"Oh. You don't have to."

"I want to."

"I bet you do-OW!" Floch glared at Annie, who just quietly returned to her book.

Jean quickly pulled on his coat, grabbed his stuff and followed Armin out the door. He could hear Marlowe griping and Hitch telling him to shut up before they were outside, and he couldn't hear anymore. "Do you think Mikasa's okay?"

"Oh yeah, she can more than fend for herself. All this came about because she has this habit of retreating whenever she gets in a fight with the people she loves. She hides away and beats herself up over not agreeing with them and causing a fight. This happened a lot with Eren."

"I could see that."

"And she tends to go to the same couple of places. So, we can rule out her bedroom since the fight was with her mom."

"So, where else is there?"

"I'm going to check the science building first."

"The science building? But she's not a science major. How does she know the science building?"

Armin just looked at him. "We're friends. We spend a lot of time together. Anyway, there's a cozy little lounge that she likes there. If she's not there, we can check the student union building. There's a little alcove she likes."

"If she goes to these places after fights to hide from everyone, how do you know where they are?"

"Because I'm her best friend and she's mine. We know each other." He shrugged. "Everyone always thinks of it as me and Eren, or her and Eren. They always seem to forget that there's a third dynamic that doesn't involve Eren at all. Contrary to popular belief, our world doesn't revolve around him."

"I didn't think you knew about that."

"No one ever thinks I know about the gossip. They don't think I listen. But just because I'm quiet, it doesn't mean I'm deaf. And anyway, if you wanted an accurate description, Eren's world revolves around us. He doesn't really know how to function without us. Why do you think he's such a mess? And why he's been so nasty?"

"I don't honestly know what goes on in Jaeger's head. I always just assumed he had a circus in place of a brain."

"That's mostly the ADHD."

"Oh."

"No, he grew angry because he felt like she was leaving him…leaving us. Eren's always thought of us as a unit. Then we got into college and everything changed. Eren's not really good with change. And since his mom died and he dad checked out on being a parent, he's been even worse. He's terrified of being left alone, but he's going about it the completely wrong way."

"I'd sure say so." Jean muttered.

"It's like he forgot that he has other friends. That there are other people who care about him. And it's not that Mikasa DOESN'T care. She does. She still loves him. Buy why should she have to put up with his shitty behavior? That's even more damaging to her."

"She deserves more than him."

"She deserves more than how Eren is behaving right now. Eren can be amazing. He's passionate and kind and loyal as all hell. He will jump into any fight, no questions asked, just to have your back. He's…incredible. But not right now."

Jean grew quiet as they walked into the science building. Thinking on it, he could vaguely remember Eren being the way Armin had just described, way back in high school. He was brash and loud and annoying, but Eren could be a good friend. "So, when do you think he'll pull his head out of his ass?"

"Soon, I hope." Armin led them up the stairs. "Unfortunately, I think it's going to take something big to get him out of his own head."

Before Jean could ask what he meant by that, they walked through the doors at the top of the stairs, and there on a couch sat Mikasa. "Oh, thank goodness." He breathed.

"Miki, here you are. You have everyone worried." Armin closed the gap as she stood up and wrapped her in a tight hug.

"I'm sorry." She murmured into his shoulder.

"Would it have killed you to send your mom a text saying that you're still alive? She's been going crazy."

"My phone died." She said, pulling away.

"She called Eren."

"She did WHAT?"

"She was desparate. She thought you might be dead in a ditch…or possibly doing hard drugs in a whorehouse. You know how your mom gets." Armin shrugged. Jean felt like an intruder to this conversation.

"I guess." Mikasa looked around and gave a slight wave to Jean. "Hey, Jean."

"Hey, Mikasa." He gave her an awkward wave back.

"Miki, where did you sleep last night?" Armin asked. When Mikasa wouldn't make eye contact, Armin's face grew disappointed. "Don't tell me you slept here. Mikasa, we talked about this."

"I know."

"Then why didn't you call me?"

"You know how I am."

Armin sighed. "Where are you planning on sleeping tonight?"

She shrugged. "I'm not ready to go home yet."

Jean felt the need to interject at this point. "You know, you're welcome to crash at my place."

"Really?"

"Yeah. We can head there now."

"Okay."

Armin seemed to sigh in relief. "Then, I should head back to work."

"You definitely shouldn't. Let Hitch work Marlowe half to death for once. It'll be hilarious."

"Yeah, I guess." Armin smiled. "I do have some homework I should get a head start on."

"That's the spirit." Jean grinned. "Never thought I would be encouraging you to do homework, but if it gets you to blow off work for once, then okay."

"Alright, stop encouraging Armin to make bad decisions." Mikasa smiled. She grabbed her coat and put it on before slinging her backpack on her shoulder. "Let's get out of here." They descended the stairs and walked outside. Mikasa grabbed Armin's hand and squeezed it. "Thanks for finding me."

"Always." Armin replied, squeezing her hand back, before leaning forward and giving Mikasa a kiss on the cheek. "We'll talk tomorrow."

"Okay." She smiled, before Armin started walking off towards his dorm. She and Jean started off towards his car.

Jean smiled at her. "A co-ed sleepover. Whatever would my mother say?"

"I don't think I have the right parts for you."

Jean shrugged his shoulders. "Not all of us decided to play for just one team." He winked at her.

"Oh geez." She playfully shook her head.

"Besides, you've always had the right parts for me." He playfully flicked her hair.

"Settle down there, Kirschstein. Or I might have to find somewhere else to sleep." Mikasa swatted his hand.

"No worries, Ackerman. I gave up on you a long time ago. You're my friend, nothing else. And besides, I've got my eye on someone else." He turned and looked back. In the distance, he could just see Armin disappearing over the rise of a hill. He felt a little sad that Armin hadn't looked back.

Mikasa looked in the same direction. "Well, if you really want him, you're going to have to make the first move. He wants you, but lord knows he won't do anything about it."

"I'll keep that in mind." Jean said, looking at her. "But in the meantime, let's get out of this cold."1