MERRY SHITSCRAM

I MEAN MERRY CHRISTMAS.

OR HAPPY HOLIDAYS. WHATEVER YOUR PREFERENCE IS.

So it's only been about three centuries since my last update. Now it's 12:39, I'm between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and I don't care enough about sleep to not post this new chapter that is probably going to take me at least an hour and a half to edit and post. But it's the season, and if you've been sticking with this story for this long, with all its emotional wreckage and my whiny, attention-whoring author notes, you deserve a gift for your efforts.

So here's a new chapter to ruin your life even more.

I'm finally caught up with the canon timeline in this story (for the most part) and hopefully it'll stay that way. I was supposed to be writing new material for further chapters all through this break between updates. Instead I attempted to start 3 new projects that have gone nowhere. So... I should probably be a little more dedicated to this. It's the longest fanfiction I have ever written as it stands, and it's going to be even longer.

How the hell am I going to finish all of this?

All of that aside, I hope you're all having a nice holiday. It's been kind of disappointing where I am, since it's sixty degrees in late December, it has been raining and foggy all week, and THAT IS NOT OKAY. ALL THAT RAIN AND SHIT COULD HAVE BEEN SNOW. CLIMATE CHANGE IS RUINING MY LIFE.

Ugh. Let's move on to self-promotions and forget I was ever angry at the weather.

Follow my tumblr at the-angstiest-author. If you want to make a fan post for this story, please tag your work with "fic: the monsters inside us" or "fic: tmiu." I'm tracking both, so whichever one you use, I'll probably find it somehow.

Merry Holidays, losers. Thanks for dealing with me for this long.

Story time.

I was in love with Levi Ackerman.

I never would have let myself believe it before that night. I had believed for so long that whatever was going on between Levi and me had been purely physical, possibly chemical, maybe even the result of my own emotional desperation. Even months after realizing the truth- that there was no way in hell my feelings for Levi were platonic- I still didn't think that they would go any further than that.

Things changed that night in Rhea Square.

I was in love with Levi Ackerman.

Hearing the truth about where Levi had come from had made me die a little inside. But, at the same time, it had brought something to life. Something I hadn't known was still inside me. It had been shut down a long time ago, but never destroyed. It was sleeping in me, dormant and waiting for the right chemical reaction to reanimate it.

And then I was in fucking love with Levi fucking Ackerman.

I thought that I only felt the way I did because I was alone when we reconnected. I was even more alone during the liver surgery summer, when we had first met and this whole disaster had started. Then when I saw him again, my memories came rushing back to me and I jumped at the chance to be close to him, to be close to anyone at all who knew me so well and understood me somehow. It didn't matter that he only knew me because he had been paid to take care of me once upon a time.

But if that was true, why didn't I want Armin or Mikasa in the same way?

It took until Christmas Eve to realize the truth. And by the time I did, I was on the verge of passing out and hadn't been able to think too much about it. The next morning, however, was an entirely different story.

I woke up feeling too hot under my covers. I wriggled my arms free to push them away and found that a thin coating of sweat was clinging to my bare chest and face. After a few solid minutes of staring at the wall across from my bed and waiting for my vision to adjust, I felt conscious enough to move my covers away from my slowly toasting body. I tried to remember what the hell had happened the night before that had left me feeling the way I did. Then my hand brushed across my crotch. The feeling of physical contact on my hard and alarmingly sensitive dick made me wince. Then it all came rushing back to me. Fuck, not again, I thought cringingly.

I had imagined myself lying in bed, and my window had been open, moonlight seeping in and beckoning me towards it. I had climbed out onto the roof, and the snow had been unbelievably soft, not cold or melty, more like cotton than tiny particles of ice. Levi had been standing in my front yard, throwing snowballs at my window. I had jumped off of the roof to land in front of him, we had ripped each others' clothes off and he went down on me in the snow.

I pulled my hands away from my throbbing dick, spread myself out over the mattress like a starfish and sighed. This was way worse than I had initially thought.

I laid still and flexed my fingers and toes, trying to encourage my blood redistribute itself throughout my body. In the meantime, I tried to reason out how the hell everything had gone downhill so fast. It had been okay at first. Then August had happened, then this shit. Maybe if I had just stayed in denial the whole time, nothing would have happened. But I hadn't been able to do it. Levi had drawn me in too far for me to back out.

I loved him too fucking much.

Suddenly someone was knocking on my door. "Eren?" a familiar voice called. "Are you awake yet?" I couldn't place it at first, but when another knock echoed into my room, I remembered. It was Christmas morning. My dad was trying to wake me up.

FUCK, it was my DAD.

I didn't even have time to answer before the door swung open. I pulled my blankets up and rolled over as fast as I could to avoid at least some of the impending embarrassment. The last thing my dad needed to see on Christmas morning was me splayed out and stiff, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers. I tried to look like I was still sleeping, but he'd seen me moving and didn't fall for it. Either that or he had planned on barging in and traumatizing me awake in the first place.

My dad burst into the room and leaned over me, shaking me violently and shouting excitedly into my ear. "Good morning, Eren!" he exclaimed. "Wake up! It's Christmas! Come on, wake up, lazybones! Merry Christmas!"

I cried out in panic and started flailing under the covers. "D-Dad!" I shouted. "Stop! I'm awake! I'm awake!"

He didn't stop, but he did start laughing at the expression on my face when I rolled over and started swatting blindly at his hands. He took them back, busy laughing himself unconscious while I sat up with my knees to my chest. I piled the covers over any residual morning wood that I might have had.

"Alright, alright, sorry. I had to do it." My dad grinned vibrantly at me and ruffled my already horrendous bedhead. He didn't seem to be bothered by the fact that I wasn't wearing a shirt.

"Merry Christmas, sport."

I sighed as irritatedly as I could, but a smile crept onto my face at the same time. "Right, I know, Dad. Merry Christmas to you, too."

"I want you to come downstairs. Mikasa made French toast for breakfast, and it's fantastic. You have to come down and have some before it gets cold. I'll give you time to put a shirt on," he added with a smirk.

Ah, there it is. "Okay. I'll be right down. I just need a minute."

My dad nodded and started towards the door. He stopped halfway through, turned back to me and said, "Thanks for texting me last night, by the way."

It took me a moment to remember what he was talking about. Then it came back to me. "It was nothing, really," I replied. "Just doing what you asked. You're welcome anyway, though."

Dad smiled at me one more time before leaving the room and pushing my door not-quite-closed. I rolled out of bed in a second and dug through my dresser to find a shitty old sleep shirt and a pair of sweatpants to cover up with. I stepped out of my room and into a cloud of amazing smells wafting up the stairs. I rushed down into the kitchen to see a few plates set out on the table, already a little messy from my dad and Mikasa taking a few samples of my sister's handiwork, and what was probably an entire loaf of bread soaked in egg, milk and pumpkin pie spice.

"Oh my god, how much of this stuff did you make?" I asked. "You trying to feed an army or something?"

Mikasa turned toward me and scoffed, but crossed the kitchen to give me a hug anyway. "Merry Christmas to you, too, Eren."

"This stuff smells amazing." I strode to the table, looking for something to do but almost completely sure that I was too late to help out with breakfast. Which, strangely enough, I felt kind of guilty about. "Is there anything I can help out with?"

"There isn't much left to do," Mikasa answered. "But you can make some hot cocoa, if you want."

I seized the opportunity. "Sure. Do you want to do the weird flavor thing with it? What should I add?"

We settled on nutmeg, then I assisted Mikasa as much as I could while she made the drinks the way only she knew how. All the while we were taking bits and pieces off of the toast, which was just as delicious as my dad had hyped it up to be. We eventually got around to actually sitting down for breakfast, but even that didn't last very long, since my dad wanted us to get to the living room and see what he had left us under the Christmas tree.

There were a few boxes of varying sizes waiting on the tree skirt for each of us, including a few bare cardboard packages sent by relatives who lived too far from us to contact us in any other way or at any other time of year. We unwrapped a few basic presents first. Mikasa got a few shirts, a pair of skinny jeans, a stupid cardigan that all of us knew she would never wear, and a small arsenal of gift cards from people who didn't have any better ideas. The last box she opened didn't have any names on it other than hers. It was small, compared to some of the others, but its contents must have been packed inside with a vacuum sealer. The package just about exploded when Mikasa ripped its seal of tape away.

"What... no way." she murmured as she dug items out of the tissue paper. First there was a set of gunmetal earrings in various shapes, then a discordant assortment of pins that must have come from a thrift store, a copy of Life Is Strange and a pair of bright orange socks that had little fox faces printed on the toes. The last thing she took out was a pale grey shirt with words scrawled across the front in splattery black ink. I'm not a psychopath, I'm a highly functioning sociopath.

"It was a little awkward walking into Hot Topic to get some of this stuff," my dad said nonchalantly, "but as far as shopping experiences go, it wasn't too bad."

"You even knew about the socks?" Mikasa blurted out in disbelief. My dad smiled and shrugged, and my sister shot across the room to give him a gratuitous hug, leaving me to wonder why even I hadn't known that she had wanted a pair of fox socks for Christmas.

I had gone through most of my presents, and they weren't much different from Mikasa's. Clothes, gift cards, a few video games from people who were considerate enough to think of the titles I liked. At the bottom of it all was own box with no labels but my name. There was no question anymore as to who it had come from. I tore it open just to kill my anticipation quicker. Sitting inside was a dvd collection of John Hughes films, Bioshock Infinite, my own set of specialty socks (Rainbow ones. Yeah, fuck you too, Dad.), and at the bottom of it all, another Sherlock shirt, this one black with I always hear 'Punch me in the face' when you're speaking, but it's usually subtext printed across the chest in stylized white typewriter text. It was carefully wrapped up in a navy-and-white plaid flannel. I reached in to unearth it from its tight packaging. The material was soft, probably from the same thrift store Mikasa's pins had come from. The shirt stirred up a sickening longing in the pit of my chest. I knew another flannel that was a lot like this one.

"Again, I have that comment about Hot Topic..." my dad casually mentioned.

I lowered the shirt and flannel and looked up at him, a heartened smile on my face. "Dad..."

"Wow. You really like it that much?" He seemed surprised.

I dropped my gift on the floor and went to the couch to hug him, the same way Mikasa had. "But... rainbow socks? Really?" I added when I let go.

"Hey, I'm trying to be as supportive as I can." I slapped him on the arm and went back to my hoard of presents while he laughed at me for the second time that day. I couldn't keep from smiling, though. A Christmas spent being ridiculed was a hell of a lot better than some of the ones we'd had in the past.

"Don't forget, you've got some things here, too!" Mikasa pointed out. And she was right. A few of our relatives had sent gifts for our dad in addition to the two of us. Most of them were ties. (Which was stupid, because my dad rarely even wore ties to work. Who the hell dresses up to work in a pathology lab?) But as he reached the end of the mailed-in boxes, Mikasa dug one more package out, one that had been hidden in the deepest recesses that could be reached behind the tree, and pushed it towards him.

My dad looked stunned at first, then smiled. "Did you get this for me?"

Mikasa grinned like a little girl in a toy store. "Yes. Now open it!"

"You didn't have to do that," Dad said dismissively, but he tore the paper off the box anyway. The cardboard behind it was taped shut. He ripped that away as well, and the second he did, a plethora of tiny plush shapes exploded out. My dad started picking them up and sorted through them to find out that they were small stuffed toys, all of them shaped like different microorganisms.

"Merry Christmas!" Mikasa said with a cheery grin.

My dad laughed. "Don't you think I see enough of these things at work?"

"Well, now you can take them home with you," my sister replied optimistically.

He sorted them out, and managed to name every single one in the box (common cold, anthrax, chickenpox, mono, white blood cell, and a water bear). He picked up the last one, a stuffed bone cell, and I glared at my sister for a second, wondering if it was supposed to be some kind of sick joke. But my dad didn't seem to catch on, so I forgot about it.

My dad unearthed a card from the bottom of the box. It was homemade, like something that a child would bring home from school. Mikasa had used all sorts of gel pens and stickers on it in an effort to make it look presentable, but she was no artist. My dad told her it was beautiful anyway. He read it out loud, and it was about then that the guilt hit me. I hadn't gotten him anything.

It was strange. He knew me pretty well when it came to getting me presents, but I hadn't been able to open them in front of him in years. I never felt bad about leaving him out of the fun before. Mikasa started giving him small things every year once she was old enough to consider it, which was the best she could do when she had no actual job. She'd been doing it for years. It had never made me feel inadequate before. But now...

"They're holding a few events in the city today," my dad said all of a sudden. "Do you guys want to go? I have the day off, so I'll be with you anyway. What do you say?"

"Of course!" Mikasa replied right away. And I had no choice but to agree.

Three hours later, we were in central Sina, sitting in a little French restaurant for lunch. The place was decked out in tinsel, garland and lights, complete with a tree and a bunch of probably-empty wrapped boxes sitting beneath it. We all had menus and drinks, and the day had gone pretty well up to that point. We had piled into the Highlander and Mikasa had used her phone to browse through the city's tourism website on the drive there. I sat with her in the backseat and shared the screen, and the both of us conferred with my dad about what sounded like things we would all enjoy.

We settled on a stage adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol that would be put on in some theater or another. It wouldn't be starting until five, so until then, we would wander around the city. Mikasa had wanted to go ice skating in a rink in Asteria Park, which was only open at that time of year. My dad had his doubts about how well I would be able to hold up. So did I, but I was pretty sure that with enough persuasiveness, Mikasa would be able to get us there and get me into a pair of skates.

But before any of that could happen, though, we needed food. So here we were.

"The waiter is taking a pretty long time," Mikasa pointed out after a minute of silence.

"It does seem a little busy," my dad replied. "They're probably short-staffed or something."

"Do you think they'll be much longer?"

"I don't know. Maybe."

"Well," Mikasa said with finality, "I have to, um... go fix something, so if he comes back, I'm going to order a smoked ham sandwich with sweet potato fries."

"Right. Where is that on here?"

Mikasa pointed it out on his menu, he nodded and she left for the bathroom, cramming something into the sleeve of her shirt as she walked. My dad and I both knew exactly what she was trying to hide.

"It's not like we're strangers," I said once she was out of earshot. "She could have just said that she needed to change her tampon."

My dad snickered in response. "No, she couldn't. It's way too embarrassing to for her to tell her dad that her body is going through a natural female process. It doesn't matter if he's a doctor."

"What is the thing with girls and periods, anyway?" I asked. "They get so defensive about them."

"Probably because it gets turned into a social judgement. If a girl is on her period, then other people automatically assume that everything she says and does is going to be moody and irrational."

"Huh. She seemed okay to me today."

"Me, too. But don't be surprised if it doesn't last. I know how hormones work."

"How much do you know about this stuff, anyway?"

"Enough to have pissed your mother off time after time."

I had to laugh at that, even if mentioning my mom so lightly stung a little. "I guess it's Mikasa's turn to be pissed off, then."

"I guess it is." He smiled. It was shallow, though. It was impossible to miss the wistfulness in his voice. He might as well have said My little girl is growing up and getting her period and there is nothing I can do about it. Thankfully, the waiter interrupted, and I didn't have to think about it anymore. We ordered a few sandwiches and enough sweet potato fries and garlic yogurt sauce to render a golden retriever obese.

My dad resurrected the conversation once the waiter was gone. "Eren, I need to talk to you about something."

At the sound of those words, my heart sank and my fingertips went cold. Whatever he meant by that, it couldn't have been good. Sentences like this were usually followed by either bad news, a lecture or a serious discussion about my plans for the future. I didn't like suffering through any of my three options, but I was stuck in a restaurant with nowhere to go and no excuses to save me.

"What is it?" I asked, trying to sound like I was not thrown into a state of panic.

My dad looked down at the table for a second, took a breath and folded his hands on the tabletop in a way that told me this discussion is about to get extremely serious. My brain replayed the drunken disaster that was Jean's pool party back in July, and I worried briefly about whether or not Mikasa had told him about it before he finally said something else. "It's about Levi."

Okay, it doesn't involve anything illegal. At least I don't think it does. "What about him?"

"Nothing much. I'm just a little confused is all."

And so was I. "What is there to be confused about?"

"What is the, er... the situation between you and him?"

I actually sighed out loud this time. Oh, nothing much, Dad, I just realized last night that I'm madly in love with him. "There is no situation. There's nothing going on between us. He's just an admin of the support group, and we're all friends."

"Are you sure that's it?" I nodded, and then he said, "You texted me a lot later than I thought you would last night."

And with that sentence, the feelings of dread returned. "Oh. About that..."

"Did something happen?"

"N-no!" I said quickly. "Not... anything bad, anyway. Armin had to talk to Annie and Reiner about something, so he went home with them, and then I was sort of stuck where I was. Levi drove me home afterwards."

"At twelve-thirty at night?"

I froze, unsure of exactly how much he knew. "Well, he... I..." My dad's brow furrowed, and I decided I had no choice but to tell the truth. "I didn't think to ask anyone else for a ride, so he offered to take me home. I remembered that I had to call you when I got back, but my phone was dead, so he let me charge it. Then we were sitting around for a while, and it somehow came up... there's this little outdoor mall near where he lives." I unearthed the name from yesterday's memories. "The... Rhea Square Mall?"

"I've heard of it. What about it?"

"He told me that on Christmas Eve, the stores stay open until midnight, and he hadn't been back there in a while because he doesn't like going alone. So we drove there together, walked around for a while, and then he took me home when the stores started to close."

"Hm," my dad mumbled pensively. "So... he took you out on a date?"

"It wasn't a date, Dad!" I defensively replied. "We... we just went out to the mall and wandered around. And I... I might have held his hand for a little bit, because it was cold and it was late... I was just really tired... and not thinking straight, so I..." I had to stop, because the more I said, the worse it all sounded.

My dad looked amused, but only until I stopped talking. As soon as my mouth was shut, the concern was back in his eyes. "Are you thinking about getting serious with him?"

"N-no," I stuttered, feeling more than a little embarrassed by the hesitation in my voice. "I can't. He doesn't want me like that. It's just... It's never going to happen."

"That's not the way it sounds to me."

I looked him in the eyes, and his expression made me shudder. "I don't know what to do."

"You need to think this through," he said definitively. "There's a lot to consider. Like the difference between your ages, first of all."

"I have been thinking about it, Dad," I said desperately. "I haven't been able to stop."

"He's a lot older than you, Eren. I know you'll be seventeen in March, but I'm not sure exactly what the legalities of your situation are."

I wasn't quite sure that four years constituted a lot, but any age gap could be considered a lot when there could potentially be a legal age of consent in the mix. "I know. And I've looked it up. Apparently people as young as sixteen can get married, as long as their parents give consent." My dad's aggression seemed to deflate a little, and I felt the need to add, "Is that going to be an issue? Is it because of the... the gay thing?"

"No, Eren, it has nothing to do with that," my dad affirmed, trying to sound as sure as he could. "It's just that he's an adult. A young one, maybe. He could probably be my son, if I had been irresponsible enough. But I still don't know if you're aware of what you're getting yourself into."

"But isn't that what love is like? You never really have any idea."

As soon as the words are out of my mouth, the table fell silent. My dad stared at me, like he was a deer and I was a pair of headlights. A second later, the entire world came crashing down over my head as I realized what the fuck I had just said. I had let the word love slip out of my mouth without even realizing it.

"Fuck," I croaked as I let my head fall forward onto the table.

Meanwhile, my dad pressed his hands to his forehead and dug his fingers into his hair. "Oh my god," he murmured exasperatedly into his palms. And then, just like that, he was laughing. I looked up from my sleeves to see him trying to push his glasses back into place and hide his smile behind his hands. Eventually he gave up and beamed in my direction, chuckling the whole time. "You are in way too deep, Eren."

I sighed and responded, "I know."

Mikasa then decided to come back to the table. Dad and I stopped talking, and she started up a new conversation. Our food came a few minutes later, and none of us mentioned Levi again.

Christmas Day, as a whole, was pretty great.

I hadn't been to Sina in a long time. I hadn't gone for the sole purpose of being there in a long time, anyway. I'd passed through for a few excursions, like short outings with my dad or trips for Mikasa's tournaments. It had been an even longer time since I had seen Sina during the holidays. I had forgotten how enthusiastic the city would always get about the season. It was probably all a display to draw more tourists in and attract people to their vast shopping district, but still. I couldn't get over how pretty it was.

Everywhere I looked there were lights. Massive, ornately decorated fir trees towered in store windows. The light dusting of snow over city left everything with a soft, sparkly finish. Sure, it was gross and slushy in most places, but everywhere it hadn't fallen on the ground, the aesthetic value remained. The city put a lot of effort into looking nice for a few weeks out of the year. Sina wasn't the Rhea Square Mall, but it came in as a close second.

Mikasa dragged us to the skating rink, just as I had expected she would. By some miracle, I managed to stay on my feet for a whole hour before I decided I was too tired and my dad pointed out that we would have to get moving if we wanted to get to that A Christmas Carol show on time. I didn't want to walk because of Mikasa's genius ice skating idea, so Dad agreed to let us take the subway instead. We arrived with just under an hour left before the show started, so we still had time to wander around in the nearby shops beforehand. I enjoyed the show, which is saying a lot for a guy who really doesn't give a shit about theatre. We picked up dinner afterward at a small sandwich shop that was way more crowded than it should have been, then went home.

I had been a lot more active on Christmas Day than what I was used to. I fell asleep on the car ride back to our house, and Mikasa had to act as a crutch in order to get me into the house. As soon as I was inside, I brushed my teeth, stripped my clothes off and collapsed into bed.

I made sure to thank my dad before doing any of that, though. I had never felt a need to do it before, and I wasn't one hundred percent sure why I was doing it now. He hadn't done something like this with Mikasa and I in a long time. In fact, I was having a hard time remembering the last entire day he had spent with us. Still, I thanked him. I felt like I had to. That didn't change how much I meant every word that I said. I told him that I appreciated the time he'd spent on us more than he could ever guess. Then he made some kind of jibe about how I having Levi there would have been icing on the cake, and I said goodnight to him and left as disgustedly as I could.

My cell phone still had a decent amount of battery life when I checked it, despite not having been charged since Christmas Eve. I also happened to be thinking about Levi before I fell asleep, as I usually did. Call it Christmas magic, but something strange occurred to me as I was getting comfortable on my pillows. Before I knew it, my phone was in my hand and I was scrolling through my contacts to find him. I pressed call. His phone rang four times before he picked up.

"Hello?"

"Happy birthday."

"Eren?" was the first thing Levi said. Then "Oh my god, you remembered." was the second.

I couldn't stop myself from smiling, even though he couldn't see it. "Yep."

"But... how...why?" he stammered. He sounded stunned. He really hadn't thought that I would remember.

"Because I care, Levi," I answered flatly, trying to sound like I wasn't boiling over with joy. "You're not the only one who does that around here."

"Oh." His voice sounded the same as it always did, but I could practically hear him starting to smile. "Th-thanks, brat."

"You're welcome," I said triumphantly. "So... how was your Christmas?"

"Merry, I guess," he replied. "I didn't really do anything. And Erwin wouldn't let me work today. He insisted that I needed a break, so I stayed home and spent my time on essays."

Well, that answer was disappointing beyond belief. "Wow. That's..."

"I know how it is. You don't have to sugarcoat it."

"Are you... I don't know, okay with how it went?"

"Yeah. I don't really give a shit about how my holidays go anymore. Besides, four-eyes will probably drag me into something later this week anyhow."

"Did anyone do anything for your birthday?"

Levi paused for a bit, as if he needed the time to remember. "A few people. Everyone on my nursing team wished me a happy birthday. So did Hanji, and Erwin gave me the day off. Then you called. So that amounts to... seven people?"

I laughed, shortly and sadly. "Not bad."

"Yeah. It's something," he said. I couldn't get past how tired he sounded, in spite of what he had told me about getting more sleep.

"Are you sure you're okay, Levi?"

"Yes, Eren. I'm okay," he insisted. "Are you? You sound a little sleepy."

"I'm okay. Just tired, I think."

"Then get some sleep. I'll be seeing you soon. Okay?"

"Okay."

I had to end the phone call then. If I hadn't, I might have stayed up all night talking to him. I had to pass out for at least a little while if I wanted to be stable the next day.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to pass out for very long before my phone starting ringing.

I was already fast asleep in my bed when it happened. My room was dark, and my phone lit up the space in the corner of my dresser where it sat. Half-conscious, I fumbled for the switch on my bedside lamp and flicked it on before reaching for my phone. I'd be damned if I would sit in the dark and talk on the phone. I picked up my phone and answered the call.

"Hello?"

"Eren, I need help."

It was Armin on the other end. He sounded breathless. "Whoa. Armin, are you okay?"

"Y-yeah, I-I'm fine. I think. I'm not sure."

"You don't sound fine."

"That's because I don't know if I am," he quipped. "Listen, something's just happened. It's not bad. At least I don't think it is. I have no idea. I just really need your help. Like, now." He was talking too fast. There was no way that there was nothing wrong.

"Whoa, whoa, calm down, Armin," I said gently. "What's wrong? What happened?"

"Eren..." he murmured, and the line was quiet for a long time before he said anything more.

"I think I'm in love."

He might as well have told me he'd been hit by a submarine and I was talking to a ghost. That probably wouldn't have been even half as surprising.

"Y-you're... what?! With who?"

"I-I know how it sounds, but... I don't know how else to explain it. I've just been feeling so different lately. It's been going on for weeks, and I couldn't keep ignoring it. Not after last night, and..."

"Armin, who are you in love with?" I cut in fiercely.

He had to stop for a while longer before his answer finally came out.

"Annie. It's... it's Annie."

"Annie?!" I repeated. All of a sudden, I was wide awake. "You mean tiny, blonde, angry-and-silent-all-the-time Annie? We're thinking of the same Annie, right?"

"Eren, we don't know anyone else named Annie."

"I know, but... Annie? Seriously?"

"Yes, Eren, I am serious! Now, just..." He paused for a second and quieted down. "Please, just listen to me for a minute."

I nodded, then realized he couldn't see me. "I'm listening."

"A lot of things have been happening to me lately," he started. "A lot of things. Most of them were with the support group, and the people we've lost so far... you know. And Bertolt was a really harsh blow for everybody. I mean, this was his and Reiner's last year with the group anyway, but... they were so important. They were the goddamn adhesive that keeps this group together. They were going to become admins next year. Then we lost one, and now the other is struggling to keep it together-"

"I know. Get on with it."

"Okay, okay. So, through all of this stuff, Annie has sort of... I don't really know how to put it other than she's attaching to me. Like, when I first joined, she would barely talk to me-"

"She didn't talk to anyone."

"Eren!"

"Sorry." I wasn't.

Armin sighed and started up again. "Anyway, she was super close with Reiner and Bertolt. After I knew her for long enough, they sort of... I don't know, let me into their group within the group. Reiner probably would have done it anyway, but I think that Annie somehow beat him to it. That was back in November. It happened while you were in the hospital. Remember?"

I groaned. "Don't remind me."

"So I've been close with them since then," he went on, ignoring me. "And then, when everything started happening around December, and things started going to shit for Bertolt, he and Reiner started spending all this time together, so Annie turned to me, I guess. And we've just been together a lot more since then." He stopped for a second and sighed. "You and I both know that she doesn't like people. She told me herself, but for some reason she's let me get so close to her. It just makes me feel... This sounds so stupid, but I can't find any other way to put it. I feel special. It's amazing knowing that she chose me."

"What happened last night?" I asked after a second's pause.

"Well... first of all, it's never happened to me before, so bear with me, okay?"

"Oh my god, Armin, did you fuck her in Reiner's neon?"

"What?! N-no! No," Armin sputtered defensively. "Nothing like that. She just asked me if I could have Reiner take me home, so we could have some time to talk. It was supposed to be between him and me, but it was okay for her to be there, since she already knew what it would be about. It was just emotional stuff, really. He's in a lot of pain, and he needed me to listen for a while. We drove to Annie's house, and we hung around there for a while. We were there for about half an hour, just talking things over, the two of us in a kind of group hug around Reiner. Then her dad came around to remind us that it was late, and I had told my grandpa that I would be home around eleven, so we had to leave her there. Reiner went out to start the car, and then... we were standing there in the doorway. Neither of was saying anything, and neither of us moved, and I... I didn't want to move. Then I said goodnight to her, because I didn't want to keep Reiner waiting, but then she... she came close to me, and she whispered in my ear, like she did at the party. She said Goodnight, have a merry Christmas first, and that was all I thought it would be. So I tried to draw back, and she stopped me."

"What else did she say?"

"She didn't say anything. She just got really close to me. Her hand was right on the back of my neck, and Jesus Christ, Eren, I felt like I was on fire. Then she whispered, 'Thank you for doing this.' And... I wasn't even thinking, I just... When she let me pull back, I touched her face."

"You touched her face?" I deadpanned. "Oh, you filthy bastard."

"Shut up! It was just a stupid thing I did on impulse, but it was romantic, okay? I... I was standing in the doorway, hand cupped around her face, just like in the movies. And I could have kissed her, Eren. I totally could have. And... I wanted to. I-I have wanted to. I've wanted to kiss her since November, when you asked me if I liked her, and I just said yes! It just slipped out, and then I thought it over and it turned out to be true! I... I think I..."

I had to stop him there. Armin sounded like he was on the verge of tears. "Love is a pretty heavy term to be throwing around, Armin. Are you sure that you..." I almost choked on the word as I said it. "...love her?"

"It's been months, Eren. And it's only been getting worse. If that's not what it is, I should probably start taking pills for it."

Neither of us said a word for what felt like forever. I had nothing to say to that. I felt like enough had happened that day, but apparently the world still wasn't done playing with me. Now my best friend was convinced that he was in love and I felt like I had been hit by a truck. It took what must have been a solid hour for me to figure out that I did have something to say. The only problem was that I had been trying to keep it quiet at all costs. Armin would be the first person I hadn't told on accident. I was coming out to him, in just about every sense of the term.

Whatever. He had told me how he felt about Annie. He deserved this much.

"Hey, Armin," I said cautiously. "I-if it makes you feel any better, I... I feel the same way, too."

"You... what?" Armin murmured, sounding as if I'd just told him I was pregnant. "Who is it? Is it me?"

"It's not!" I said, laughing. "I-it's not you."

"Then who is it?"

"I... listen, I want to tell you, but... just this once. And you have to promise not to laugh."

"Okay. I promise."

"And you can't tell anyone that I said this to you."

"Just tell me who the hell you're in love with, Eren."

"Okay, okay. Fine. It's..."

Here it goes. You can't back down now.

"It's Levi."

The line was silent for an unbearably long time before Armin finally choked out his response.

"Levi? You mean LPN Levi?"

"Yes."

"The admin of the support group?"

"Yes."

"The one who was your nurse last summer?"

"Jesus Christ, Armin, we're talking about the same person."

"B-but..." Armin sputtered. "But you... what? Y-you're... what?"

I sighed into the phone. "Yeah, that was what I thought when I figured it out, too."

"Eren, you never told me you were gay!"

"I-I'm not gay, Armin," I shot back, somewhat unsteadily. "At least I don't think I am. Levi is the first guy I've ever... felt this way about. The first person of any gender that I've felt this way about, really."

"I... wow." I didn't want to think that the revelation of my own sexual ambiguity had rendered Armin speechless, but the empty airwaves between us definitely told me that it had.

"Are you still there?" I asked nervously.

"Yeah, I am, I'm just... thinking," my best friend replied. "I just don't understand. How long has this been going on?"

"No idea," I did my best to answer. "I started feeling, um... things for him back in August... at least that was when I finally started taking them seriously. The whole... love thing... I only figured out last night."

"What spurred that so suddenly?"

"This whole thing that happened last night after you left with Reiner. I could get into it, but I'm kind of tired and it might take a while to-"

"Eren, did you sleep with him?!" Apparently, now it was Armin's turn to have his mind in the gutter.

"No!" I snapped. "Holy shit, no!"

"Well...does he know?"

I swallowed convulsively, trying to drown the knot that was tightening in my throat. "No, he doesn't. Of course he doesn't. Why would I tell him something like that?"

"Because if you feel that strongly about him, he should probably know."

"First of all, I have no idea how strong it actually is," I protested. "And second of all, if that's the case, then why haven't you said anything to Annie?"

Armin paused, then admitted, "Good point."

"So what do we do now?"

Another pause. "I have no idea, Eren."

"I don't know about you, but sleeping it off seems like a pretty appealing idea right now."
"I guess you're right," Armin said. "We should get together and talk about this sometime, though. When we're both actually awake."

"Are you busy tomorrow?"

"I don't think so. Rose Community has two weeks off for the holiday break, so I'm at home pretty much twenty-four-seven now."

"You could come over here, if you want."

"Sounds good. It'll be nice to see something other than the inside of my own house."

"I'll see you then, okay?"

"Okay," Armin said definitively. "Goodnight, Eren. Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas."

I hung up, placed my phone on the dresser and fell asleep before I could even remember to turn my lamp off.

Just as he had promised, Armin showed up on my doorstep the next day. And, just as he had promised, he spent the next two and a half hours in my basement explaining to me everything that had happened between him and Annie over the past months that I had apparently been missing.

There wasn't much that he hadn't been able to clarify over the phone. Most of it I had already inferred from what he had told me. Annie was selectively social, and apparently she had selected him. From July onward he felt driven to be with her as much as possible, to prove that he was worthy of her affections and whatever other shit he wanted to do to indirectly proclaim his love for her.

If it even was love.

There hadn't been much of a precursor to what he had told me the night before. All I had seen of Armin's actions toward Annie were normal friend stuff. Maybe a little touchier than normal friend stuff. Then again, I had figured a while back that Armin was a little more tactile than most people. That wasn't to say I wasn't totally okay with it, since Armin was probably the one of the best cuddlers I had ever met in my life.

Touchiness aside, I still wasn't convinced that he was sure of what he was saying. He had told me before anything else that he had never felt this way before, which I took to mean that he had never been in a relationship before.

Also, it took me six months of pining over Levi to figure out how deep my feelings actually ran. So how the fuck had Armin figured it out so fast?

Probably because he wasn't trying to run from it like I was.

"But how are you sure that it's love?" I asked him for the eighty thousandth time that day.

"But how are you sure that it's love?" I asked him for the eighty thousandth time that day.
"Because it's not just physical. It's emotional," he explained for the not-eighty thousandth time. "I wasn't attracted to her the minute I saw her. I was more drawn. She let me get close, and things went from there. I was friends with her first, then... other things happened." He blushed a little.

I stared at him for a second and said, "I'm still not convinced."

Armin looked offended. "Why not? I've explained it, like, ten times!"

"Because this is all sounds like it happened way too fast."

"I already told you, it's not love at first sight. I've been friends with her since June."
"I'm not saying that it was. It just sounds to me like you suddenly woke up one day and realized you wanted to kiss her face."
"That was not how it happened!" Armin protested, then shied away and continued, "It was a gradual thing. I mean, I always thought she was kind of pretty, but I never fantasized about her or anything. I never wanted anything romantic, but then... I started thinking about her all the time and always wanting to be with her, then when you were gone in November I wanted it even more. It got so bad I started texting every day, just to hear from her."

I nodded, not really listening to him ramble. "Honestly, that just sounds like friend stuff to me."

"If it's just friend stuff, then how come I don't want to make out with you whenever we're together?"

I shut up right away. He had a point.

"I just don't know, Armin. You never mentioned it before, and I can't take it seriously this fast."

Armin sighed. "Fine," he surrendered. "Maybe it isn't really love. I have no idea what it is. But as long as I have to put up with it, I can talk to you about it, right?"

"This might have been easier if you had talked to me about it before it got this far."

Armin scoffed. "Whatever. Anyway, I was thinking," he added coyly. "we've been talking about me this whole time. How come you haven't said anything about Levi?"

Now it was my turn to start blushing. "Because you were the one who called me!"

"But you said you were in love too," Armin and his stupid hard drive of a memory pointed out. "I spent this long talking about why I think I am. I think I deserve at least a little explanation."

I took a deep breath and definitively said, "I don't know why."

I might as well have told Armin his puppy had died, because the expression on his face would have been the same. "Are you fucking kidding me?"

"No," I insisted. "I swear to god, I don't know how the hell any of it happened."

"Okay, let me get this straight," he scoffed. "You just spent two hours refusing to believe that I am in love with someone, and now that you have a chance to tell me about your take on the topic, you can't even explain why you think I'm wrong?"

"No, that's not it, it's just..." I scrabbled for reasons inside my head. "I don't know. I had no control over what I was feeling, and-"

"And you think I did?"

"No! I just feel like this sort of thing shouldn't be so... I don't know, straightforward?"

Armin simmered down and shrugged. "Well, everyone's experience is different, I guess."

"I guess," I agreed. "Maybe mine just happens to involve a shitload more confusion than yours. I mean, I didn't even know I could be attracted to guys before Levi."

"Yeah. How did that happen, anyway?"

I shuddered internally. I should have known that question was coming. "I'm not sure. Maybe I was just always like this. I've been able to find guys attractive, but never been attracted to one before."

"But you're not just attracted to him," Armin said. "You said you love him. In fact, you've done it twice now. So why?"

I stopped talking and keeled over on the couch, letting myself deflate in Armin's lap. "That's exactly the problem. I shouldn't be."

Armin didn't have much to say with me after that. Netflix came around to save us, and the rest of the day dissolved into a marathon of poorly made horror movies and platonic cuddling on the couch.

At the very least I didn't have to talk anymore.

Before the whole tragedy with Bertolt had gone down, the Youth Cancer Support Group had planned on making winter break one long chain of group meetings. Then people's plans and other complications got in the way, and the week-long singularity of YCSG had to be cut down to one informal get-together at Beans on the twenty-seventh that only about half the group could come to. Connie and Sasha were off on their respective vacations. Reiner was out of commission, and so was Annie. Then Marco informed the group that he and Jean would have to leave that afternoon if Marco's family was to make it to the ski resort before nightfall.

Long story short, support group contact was cut down to a meeting that started at noon.

My dad had driven us there, then went out to run some errands. He told us to text him when we needed to be brought home, if we needed to be brought home. Then he left us to our own devices.

I headed for the table where the support group had gathered. Hanji wasted no time in springing out of her seat to greet me.

"Hi, Eren!" she squealed, crushing me in a hug. "Thanks so much for coming!"

"M-my pleasure," I croaked. She let go of me, and I grabbed the first open chair that I saw.

"Hey, brat," the person beside me said as soon as I sat down.

My head whipped in the direction of the voice, then a hot, energized blush began creeping into my cheeks. I had somehow managed to sit down directly next to Levi.

"How's your holiday been so far?" he asked.

"Fine," I stammered in reply. "More than fine, actually. My dad's home for a few days, so I've been able to spend a lot more time with him. Which is a nice change of pace." I smiled a little at the mention of it. I was so fucking proud of the fact that my dad was home for once.

Levi returned my smile as much as he could. "Really? That's awesome."

"Has Hanji dragged you out to anything yet?"

"She has, actually. Last night she tried to get me to go out to a club with her and a bunch of her friends from Sina. I think it was just because she needed a designated driver." He smirked, and I laughed.

I gave the coffeeshop a quick once-over. Mikasa hadn't come to the table with me, and I was starting to wonder why. She had gone to the counter, ordered a couple of Beans's "holiday special" drinks, and now was apparently enthralled by the chalkboard menu on the opposite wall. As I watched, Hanji got up to pester her. A few seconds later she dragged my sister over to the table, drinks in hand. Mikasa shoved one in my direction, then glanced around the table. There were two empty chairs left. One was next to Levi, and the other next to Jean. She glanced warily at Hanji, then sighed and settled in the one next to Jean. He didn't look at her as she sat down, but I could see him bristling as soon as he sensed her presence.

Even to someone as un-perceptive as me, it was still obvious that there was a ton of tension between them.

The meeting progressed pretty normally from that point onward. We sat in our circle, sipped our drinks if we had ordered any, and bitched to each other about our problems. As it was, there weren't many problems that we weren't already aware of. Marco brought up how he was a little disappointed that his illness had kept him from seeing a warm part of the country when he probably needed it most, but that was the worst of it. Armin never said that he was in almost-love with one of the groupies who wasn't there. Levi never said anything about the Christmas he had spent alone. I never said anything about Christmas Eve, Rhea Square Mall and how that night had rocked my entire existence. And above all, no one even made an obscure reference to Bertolt or what had happened to him. I guessed that it was most people's natural instinct to avoid dredging things up when they caused pain. Sad that it wasn't an instinct that I was born with.

Marco's mom texted him after the first hour of the meeting, so he and Jean said their goodbyes and left together. After that, there wasn't very much for us to talk about. We decided to adjourn the meeting where it stood. Mikasa sent a text to our dad, and I did the same just in case he didn't get the first message. Armin called his grandpa, who happened to be at a book club meeting nearby. He was gone within the next ten minutes. Not much later, so was Hanji.

Levi, Mikasa and I were the only ones left at the table. None of us were talking. Our cups were empty, and a tension hung like a thick fog over all three of us. Mikasa's eyes stayed glued to her phone.

"Has he answered yet?" I eventually asked.

"No," was Mikasa's only reply. I shifted in my chair and glanced over at Levi. He was staring off into the distance. I had the vague feeling he was doing it for the same reason as why Mikasa had fixated herself on her phone. The two of them wouldn't have sat in such close proximity for this long if there had been any choice in the matter.

A second passed, and Levi's eyes wandered over to me. I startled a bit, caught up in the idea that he had felt me staring at him. The feeling passed, and I said, "Hey, um, not to be rude, but... is there any reason why you're still sitting here with us?"

"Of course there is," he replied. "You're still here, and you can't go anywhere until your dad shows up. I'm not gonna leave you two stranded here."

"Oh," I murmured and went back to staring at the table. I felt the toe of a sneaker nudge my ankle under the table. I glanced over at Levi again, and caught the faintest flicker of a smirk pull on the corner of his mouth. My heart fluttered, then my phone buzzed in my pocket. I shuffled it out to check my inbox. On the other side of the table, Mikasa's message tone chimed.

"It must be Dad," she said. She unlocked her screen, read his message and frowned. I soon found out that we had both been sent the same thing.

Dad: The lab was short-staffed today. I was called in for an emergency. Can't come right now. So sorry! Can anyone give you a ride home?

I put down my phone and turned to Levi. "Listen, I know I've asked you way too many times before, but-"

"Your dad's not coming, is he?"

I breathed out and dropped my gaze to the floor. "No." Dead-on as usual, Levi.

Levi sighed and leaned in over the table, drawing closer to us both. "Listen, brat." He glanced pointedly at Mikasa and added, "You listen, too. Because I think you both need to get this message. As unbelievable as it might be to the two of you, this support group is one of my highest priorities. It's important to me, and the people in it are important to me. That includes you. I care about this group, and I care about you guys. You don't have to be terrified of asking me for help, especially when you're backed into a corner like this. It's my job as an admin to be here for you guys when you need me. Now, what was it that you were going to ask me?"

I didn't even need to answer him. Mikasa seething in the chair next to me made it clear enough what would come next. I picked up my phone and sent a quick reply message to my dad.

Me: Its okay, we have a ride home. See you tonight

With that, the three of us left Beans for Levi's green Soul. We were quiet on the ride back to my house, like we had been at the table in Beans, only it was a different kind of silence. It was comfortable, or about as comfortable as any situation that involved me could be. Mikasa kept to herself in the backseat, and Levi had left his who-knows-how-old iPod plugged into the stereo and on shuffle. I leaned my head against the window, listening to the soft melody of some indie rock song that I didn't recognize.

In a few minutes, Levi had pulled into our driveway and shifted into park. He turned to look at me. "Hey. Did you fall asleep, brat?"

"No." I sat up and turned to him. "Just relaxed."

By then, Mikasa had already opened the backseat door and started climbing out of the car. "You should probably get going," Levi pointed out.

"Yeah. Probably." I undid my seatbelt, went for the door handle and stopped. There was something I had forgotten. Something important. "Wait. Levi?"

"Yeah?"

"Could you come in for a little bit? It's important."

He sighed and glanced at my sister, who was already halfway to the front door. "I don't know how good an idea that would be."

"It'll only take a minute. I promise."

Levi took a second to think, then said, "Fine." He turned off the car and climbed out.

Mikasa had already unlocked the door and disappeared upstairs by the time we reached the house. I stopped at the front door and turned back to Levi. "You want to come in?"

"That's okay," he replied. "I can wait here."

"Okay. I'll be quick." I left the front door open and ran upstairs to my room. The bag was sitting somewhere in there. I had left it unwrapped, still in the little gift bag that had been handed to me when I had bought it from some random store in Sina. I hadn't had the time to make it look any nicer. But I had finally remembered it, conveniently when Levi was with me. I found the bag sitting in the corner, next to the place where I wedged my writing notebook. I snatched it up and dashed back to the front door.

"What's that?" Levi asked when I reappeared, the bag held tightly in my hands.

"You'll see," I answered. I held out the bag toward him. "Just open it."

Levi's eyes went blank for a second,then they widened as a smile broke out on his face. "Are you serious, brat? You didn't have to-"

"Just shut up and open it!" I insisted.

Levi sighed and took the bag from me, his smile still lingering on his lips. He dug delicately through the tissue paper, and the first thing he took out was a necklace. It was a single pendant hung from a black leather cord; a shark tooth wound up with silver wire.

"Merry Christmas," I said.

Levi looked up at me, as if he were waiting for me to say more. The bag was too big to be just a necklace. He started digging through it again, and sure enough, there was one more gift waiting for him. It was a white tee shirt, but weathered until it looked like recycled paper. A black ink-splatter silkscreen of crows taking flight decorated the front.

"And happy birthday," I finished.

Levi didn't say a word to respond. He stood deathly still in the doorway, glancing back and forth between me and the necklace and shirt he held in his hands.

"I'm sorry if the shirt doesn't fit," I added nervously. "I didn't know what size you are, so I sort of guessed."

"Thank you," Levi murmured.

My heart spazzed out for a second, then stopped. "Huh?"

"Thank you so much, Eren," he went on. "You have no idea how much this means to me."

I stared at him as he carefully refolded the shirt and placed it back in the bag, layering the necklace on top of it. I hadn't known what he would do when I gave them to him. Probably thank me, since it was customary. Then I remembered everything he had told me on Christmas Eve. I had no idea how long it had been since the last time someone had remembered to give him two presents for December twenty-fifth.

"You're welcome," I said weakly. "I was just thinking of you."

"Then thanks for that, too," Levi replied. He looped the handle of the gift bag over his wrist, and before I knew it his arms were around me and I was being hugged.

I held him close to me, clinging to him until he started to unwind his arms and pulled away. My heart raced uncontrollably in my chest. He stood back a bit, still unbearably close to me, gazing at me with a look on his face that was almost like the one I had seen in Rhea Square. Almost. This one was a little different. It was more hopeful.

I took a breath and tried to speak. "Listen, Levi, I..."

I could have said it. He was there. He was listening. It would have been so easy.

Levi, I love you.

"I'll be here if you need me, too."

Levi's fingers tightened on the bag, his eyes misting up the longer he gazed at me. "Okay."

I love you.

"Okay."

He turned away, and I watched him walk through the snow and back to his Soul. I wanted to lean out the door and shout it to him. I love you. I wanted him to hear it before he drove away.

But I didn't say anything. He didn't hear me. So I watched him disappear down the street, shut the door behind me, and hated myself for not being able to speak up when he would have listened.

It wasn't just my cancer that was killing me anymore.

The rest of the winter holiday passed by a lot faster than I was expecting it to.

It shouldn't have been all that surprising, since it was only one week out of fifty-two others in the year. Still, I wasn't prepared for the days to slip past me so quickly. Mikasa was available most of the time, and even my dad on a few days. We went on a few outings together, usually to the Ermich mall to see a movie. I probably saw more movies in that week than I had seen in the past three months. Granted, one was taken up by a hospital stay, but I was still counting it.

The days that weren't spent with what was left of my family were spent with what was left of the Youth Cancer Support Group. The members who were willing to come out of their shells and socialize, anyway. That mostly included Armin, Marco, and Jean. Marco's family came back from the ski resort after three days. As soon as they returned, Marco managed to drag Jean out to Atlas Park with us one day. Armin convinced me to come and hang out with him and Annie more than once. That went exactly how I thought it would- quietly and kind of awkward. Also, her dad. I met him the second time Armin had caught me, when we had to take her home and wound up spending an extra hour at her house. Michael Leonhart was pretty cool. Also strangely okay with two boys being alone with his daughter in her room (which, I should mention, was tiny and absolutely covered in band and anime posters). I figured that was because the last two boys she had last let in there were both flaming homosexuals, and the ones she was currently letting in were unassuming little cancer twinks.

Awkwardness aside, the gathering of days was a fun one. That was probably why I woke up one morning and suddenly came to the tragic realization that they were all gone, and it had magically become December 31st.

The rest of the details came back to me slowly over the course of the morning. Jean was hosting another party. My dad would have his own function to attend in Sina, so he would be away for the night. Nicole was back at Jean's for winter break, so she would be bringing people over. Also, alcohol. That was a factor I would definitely have to take into consideration.

Unlike the last time someone in the YCSG had thrown a party, Mikasa would be coming to this one. Even with all the messy-breakup shit that had gone down between her and Jean, she still wasn't going to pass up free food and an excuse to supervise me and Levi at all times.

Levi said he was going to Jean's party. Did I forget to mention that? Because the group chat message went something like this.

Seabiscuit Scumbag Kirschtein: Guys. New Year's Eve party at my place. Parents are in LA for the weekend. It's gonna be huge.

Stonnie: Im in.

Potato Queen: YAAS 8D

Coconut: Sounds fun. What time does it start?

HellPN: Nicole already gave me an invite. I am so gonna be there!

And about twenty messages later,

Levi: I'm free that night. I'll drive Hanji.

HellPN: Levi wtf i have a car! youre not my dad :P

Levi: I might as well be.

Me: My dad is out of town, but I'll find a way there.

Then the conversation with Mikasa went something like this.

"I saw you replied to the groupchat."

"Yeah. You going too?"

"Yes."

*insert definitive turn-and-walk-away here*

That was on the twenty-ninth. At least I thought that was what day it was. Mikasa had started to lose track too, for probably the first time in her life.

Most of the thirty-first went to sleeping at random intervals and preparing myself for the night ahead of me. I made a mental checklist of things I had done wrong at the first party that I had to remember not to do at this one. For instance, if there's beer, don't touch it. Don't go into the kitchen alone, or wherever else the alcohol might be stashed. Always stay with the group. Don't get drunk again. Don't make your ex-nurse become your current nurse all over again. Don't kiss your ex-nurse when the ball drops. Don't go home with your ex-nurse and fuck him at four in the morning, no matter how bad you want to.

The last few reminders I might have added on a bit of a whim.

That checklist was the only thing that let me feel safe enough to let the Arlert Accord drop me off with Armin and Mikasa in front of the Kirschtein estate at seven-thirty PM on December thirty-first.

As far as Jean and Nicole's joint parties went, this one was infinitely better than the first, probably due to the fact that I had been to enough of Jean's parties by then to know how they operated. That was why we had shown up a little late, when there would be a good number of people in the house to get over the initial waves of awkwardness that always permeate parties before enough energy builds up to make them fun.

Armin ran ahead to ring the doorbell. I followed him, just a tad slower, and Mikasa lagged behind the both of us. She had her on reasons for doing so. I'm not one to go dragging anyone's breakup into any situation, recent or not, but... it was totally because of the breakup.

The door opened and Connie was standing there. His face drew up into its usual inebriated grin. "Hellooooo, friends! Get in! The party's just getting started!"

"I would hope so, otherwise we showed up on time for nothing," Armin said humorously as he stepped inside. He looked back at us. "Well, I'm going to the kitchen. Jean said he took out the chocolate fountain and they're using it tonight!"

"You have fun with that. We're going to scope out the rest of the group first," I replied. Armin nodded and dove into the crowd, disappearing almost instantly. I felt Mikasa bump up against my back. Her hand slid to my elbow and took hold of my arm. I glanced back at her before I started fording through the sea of people.

The entire Kirschstein house had been set up like a well-furnished nightclub. There were balloons and streamers taped just about everywhere. Music echoed off of the expansive walls, and the place was packed with people. Without the pool and patio to cut down on the congestion, there was barely any room to walk without bumping into something, knocking over someone's drink or grinding awkwardly on some stranger. Moving through the crowd was devastatingly slow, but we eventually searched out our friends in the chaos. They had claimed Jean's bedroom as their gathering place, mostly because that was one of the few places that hadn't been invaded by other people.

Marco, Jean, Annie and Sasha were sitting smashed together on the end of Jean's bed, engrossed in probably one of the most intense games of Mario Kart that I had ever seen. Mikasa and I looked at each other for a second. Nobody seemed to notice us. Then someone from out in the hallway ambushed us from behind, shoved us into the room and screamed, "HI GUYS!"

After staggering to regain my balance, I turned around to see Hanji behind us, bouncing excitedly on her heels. The red cup in her hand assured me that she had already been enjoying Nicole's rich-girl-with-connections hospitality.

"Hanji!" Mikasa exclaimed, sounding almost relieved. "You're here!" I glanced over to Jean's bed. Everyone in the room was staring at us. At least we had gotten their attention.

"Of course I am. Nikki invited me personally," she said, though I was pretty sure it wasn't true. Also I was pretty sure she wasn't close enough to Nicole to be calling her Nikki. "I'm not going to turn something like that down. Levi is here too... somewhere. He drove me, but I'm not sure where he is right now." She looked around the room, as if she expected him to be there.

"I heard about the chocolate fountain. He's probably-" I said before I was cut short by a small but heavy weight hitting me squarely in the back. I spun around only to feel an arm snake around my waist and squeeze. Hard. Annie's head weaved under my arm and turned to grin wickedly at me. Mikasa then pulled her away to give her a hug.

"Happy New Year to you, too, Annie," she said brightly.

I walked into the room and was met with first Sasha, then Marco. Jean stayed by his bed, still guarding his controller. "'Sup, Jaeger?" he said coldly.

"Not much," I replied with just as much flippancy. "You saw me just a few days ago. I thought you would know what's up."

"I don't pay very much attention." He glanced over at the space by the door, where Mikasa was still being chatted up by Hanji and Sasha, then Marco thankfully blocked his view.

"So, Eren, you have any resolutions this year?" he asked, tactfully sitting down between Jean and me. "I'm making a point of asking everyone."

"Masturbate more often and be way less honest," I replied.

Marco laughed. "Seriously, Eren. Is there anything you want to do?"

"I don't know," I said with a shrug. "I really think that whatever there was to improve about myself, joining this disaster of a support group has done most of it."

"Awww, Eren," Marco said, his smile so bright I felt like I should have been going blind. "Do you really think that?"

"I don't know why I shouldn't," I replied, his smile spreading to me. "It's true."

"Well... I'm sure the group feels fixed by you, too." He leaned towards me and affectionately nudged my shoulder. "I know I certainly do."

I could practically smell Jean angrily smoldering next to us on the bed.

Sasha (predictably) left for the kitchen and Annie pulled Mikasa back to the end of Jean's bed to take up her controller again. Mikasa settled down towards the headboard for pretty much the same reason I had Marco as my shield. The peace didn't last, since Hanji came crashing down on all of us as soon as the game started up again. Mikasa managed to calm her down and keep her still enough for the others to finish their race. Then, a few minutes later, Sasha and Connie came back up to the room. Armin was trailing behind them, talking to a certain someone who I hadn't even been thinking about until he walked in.

"Hey, four-eyes, have you already been hitting up Nicole's stash? She's keeping that shit in the freezer for a reason."

My head whipped towards the doorway and my eyes fixated on Levi standing there, wearing tight black jeans, and, just like nearly every other time I had seen him, that same green plaid flannel. I'd never seen him wear the shirt underneath it before. The I recognized the ink splatter crows and realized he was wearing the one I had gotten him. As if that weren't enough, the shark tooth necklace was layered in between the flannel and shirt, resting directly over his heart. I curled my knees into my chest and melted a little inside.

Levi walked into the room and leaned over his colleague, who was currently sprawled out on the bed. "I asked you a question, Hanji," he said forcefully.

The HellPN flopped over on her side and tossed back, "I don't know, have youuuuuuuuu?"

Levi stepped back and sighed. "Christ, I can smell the Jager on your breath from here." His eyes roved down to the end of the bed, straight to where I was sitting. "Oh. Hey, Jaeger."

"Does she smell like the vodka Jager, or do you think we've been making out?" I immediately felt the need to ask.

"The vodka. Nicole's keeping it in the freezer in the garage. Among other things," he quickly explained. He shoved Hanji aside to make room for himself on the bed (not much was required). My spine tingled a little as the mattress behind me dipped under his weight. "Now, if I remember correctly, the last time you were at a party where alcohol was served, you drank yourself into a five-hour coma."

"It's not going to happen again," I declared. "I'm going to be a lot more careful this time. I swear it."

"Right. I'll remember you said that when I'm feeding you dixie cups of water and you're convulsing on the bathroom floor."

"I-I said..." I started indignantly, but when I noticed the slight smirk on Levi's face I stopped mid-sentence. I wasn't going to start an argument with him now.

"How's your holiday been? You know, since we last talked," he asked as I was handed a controller and a new race started up.

"Fine," I replied. "Most of it's been taken up by either stuff with either my dad and Mikasa or people from the group. It's nothing out of the ordinary, really. Just less work involved."

"Hm."

"How was yours?"

Levi looked at me for a second, seeming disillusioned, as if he couldn't believe I was asking him such a stupid question. "Well, I've been sleeping a lot more than I usually do, which is something."

I remembered what he had told me on Christmas Eve and knew I shouldn't pry much more than that. But after only a moment of silence I couldn't resist. "Did you do anything interesting?"

"I worked," he said flatly. "It's always an interesting time, seeing what kinds of medical trouble people can get themselves into. Erwin offered to host an office party for us, too, so I went to that. It was pretty fun, I guess. He invited all his colleagues and the entire nursing squad. You'd be surprised how familial a bunch of doctors can get in the right setting."

I hummed in agreement. "Erwin does seem like he could be someone's secondary dad if he needed to be."

"He definitely can. In fact," Levi said, leaning in towards me as if he thought the others might be listening, "I think he overpays me a little just because he knows I need the support."

I laughed a little, and my kart slid off the track and plunged into the abyss. Then the laughing turned into an uproar of rage and a long string of curses directed at the stupid fucking goddamned Rainbow Road of death why the hell did anyone think that this stupid track was a good design. Then everyone else was laughing, and I collapsed backwards onto the bed and Levi pulled me toward the pillows before I could hurt anyone else who was playing the game.

He laid me down, and I totally could have pulled him with me and stuck my tongue in his mouth right then. I wanted to. But I didn't. So the party kept progressing.

The whole fiasco was exactly the same as the first Kirschtein party I had been to. People got progressively drunker as the evening wore on, including Hanji, who we tried to keep out of Jean's room in order to avoid getting molested. Nicole had decided to keep her contraband alcohol (this time an assortment of cheap wines and various brands of rum and vodka) in the spare refrigerator in the garage, and she and Jean were serving as denizens of the booze in order to keep out anyone they deemed too young. But, as many of the YCSG predicted, it didn't work all that well, and almost everyone was totally hammered within about two hours. I still found the chocolate fountain that Armin had been so excited about (that it turned out Jean actually had) and managed to get a taste of random bite-sized snacks dunked in the flowing melty goodness before people started sticking their nasty drunken tongues into it and holding each other's' heads under the stream.

While we weren't watching the others give themselves permanent liver damage, we were waiting around for Reiner to show up. He had replied to the group chat and said he was interested in going, but after the first hour there was still no sign of him. We took turns scouting out the crowded house, waiting at the door, asking whoever was willing to answer if they had seen a massive blonde dude who might have looked a little sleep-deprived, but nothing came up. Still, we didn't give up until Jean received a text from him at almost nine, which he had to show to the rest of us in order for anyone to believe what it said.

Reiner: Sorry I can't go tonight. Im really not feeling up to it right now.

Reiner wasn't up to going to a Kirschtein party. It sounded ironic to me, since he was one of the reasons I had started going to these stupid gatherings in the first place. And he had been able to get to the YCSG Christmas party. He had been just fine there. It didn't make sense that now he suddenly wasn't able to come to another one.

I tried to put the thought out of my mind and focused instead on the group that was actually there.

The party gained more and more momentum as the time crawled towards midnight. The drunkenness got louder and rowdier, though the cops still had yet to show up. Jean's room remained our safe haven for when things outside got too energetic. Still, I wanted to spend as much time as I could in the thick of things. The noise, the drunken screaming and the thundering bass that rumbled in the floorboards of Jean's living room had just as much value as the safety of his quiet, isolated room, if not more. They were sensational. They reminded me I was alive. So I wanted to feel them, hear them, be there with them for as long as I could be.

Someone decided to put Dance Central into the Xbox for the massive living room tv and see how well drunk people could do at choreographed dancing. Then, in another room, someone else put on the Dick Clark New Year's Eve special in order to avoid missing the countdown to midnight.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, Levi started disappearing.

I barely noticed it at first. I figured that he was doing the same thing as the rest of us, venturing out to take part in the epicenter of the party scene, even if it didn't seem to be in his nature. Everyone needs to have fun once in a while, I rationalized. He must be out there somewhere.

Then, at about eleven, he came back to Jean's room and this conversation happened.

Levi walked into the room.

I said, "Well, look who finally decided to show up."

Levi looked at the clock on Jean's dresser. "Have I really been gone that long?"

I thought I had offended him somehow. "No, not really."

He walked over to the bed and sat with me, disregarding the three other people in the room. "Good. I don't want you guys to worry."

I shifted in place a little. "Really?"

"Really what?"

"You think we're going to worry about losing you when we're all in the same place."

Levi stared at me for a long time, then got up from the bed and disappeared again. I immediately jumped to the conclusion that I had said something wrong and berated myself for all of the two minutes that it took him to return to Jean's room.

I thought that something was off about him, but I chalked it all up to being late. Levi might have claimed to be used to being sleep-deprived, but I had no idea what that actually meant to him. Half an hour later, though, it happened again in the living room.

I accidentally pushed Levi up against a wall, the people around me not realizing that I was there, and me not realizing that Levi was in front of me.

He said, "Whoa, there."

I replied, "Sorry."

I noticed that he was giving me a sultry look through his lowered eyelashes. Or one that I thought was sultry, but was probably just him being half-asleep.

"Fancy seeing you here, brat. What are you doing down here?" he asked.

"Nothing, really. Just wandering," I answered.

"And you just happened to wander into me?"

It took me until then that I realized he was speaking about half as fast as he normally did.

"The crowd kind of shoved me in your direction."

He laughed. "They must be temperamental or something. It must have taken a lot of shoving to get you this far."

I was close enough to him to feel the warm brush of his breath against my face. And the smell. It had taken me a while to notice the strange, bitter tang that filled the air when he spoke, but I caught on eventually. It took even longer for me to realize what it meant.

"Levi, are you drunk?" I demanded.

All of a sudden, his face turned pale. His expression fell, and he stared up at me.

"I'm sorry," he said.

I stared back at him for a while, then sighed. "It's okay."

"I didn't mean to do it..."

"I said it's okay. Just come back to Jean's room with me. I'll let you explain there. Okay?"

"Okay," he said.

Then I wound my arm around his, he let me keep it there and I pulled him up the stairs and back to the support group's quiet space. The room was empty when we got there. I sat him down on the bed, and he fell back against the pillows. Unable to resist, I settled down next to him.

"What happened out there?" I asked gently.

Levi gazed up at the ceiling for a long time before he gave me an answer. "I didn't think about it," he murmured. "I didn't want to think about it."

"Think about what?"

Levi's hands went up to his forehead and tangled frantically into his hair. "Anything. I didn't want to think about anything. I didn't want to remember... I wanted to stop feeling like..."

He was choking on his words, sounding almost like he was in pain. I cut him off, just to make him stop. "What don't you want to remember? What's wrong?"

"I... my dad... fuck..." he mumbled, and then I remembered. His dad had died of alcohol poisoning. That was why. He had told me himself.

Besides, drinking isn't really my thing.

"Oh god. Levi..." I murmured worriedly. I tried to pull one of his hands away from his hair, but he brushed it away.

"It was that question. Just... just that stupid question. You asked it, and I started thinking... agh. I'm sorry. I overreacted."

That stupid question. The one I had asked him. I was just curious. I hadn't meant anything by it, only wanted to know what he had been up to lately. I hadn't meant to remind him.

"Levi, I'm sorry. You don't have to be, so stop apologizing."

My ex-nurse stopped where he was and stared up at me, his eyes wider and more innocent than I had ever seen them. He took a few deep breaths, trying to steady himself and fight the intoxication that was probably clouding his brain. I tried to put my hand near his face again, and this time he let me brush a few wayward strands of hair out of his face. He rolled over onto his side and buried his face into my wrist. "Eren..."

The way he said my name sent an involuntary shiver down my spine. "How many drinks did you have?" I asked cautiously.

"N-not sure," he said. "A glass of wine... maybe two... then one of these mixed things this girl was handing out..." He drew back from me and stared blankly ahead. "I think that was it."

"Wow. Your alcohol tolerance is really shit."

He started laughing then, which I had little to no idea how to handle. "Pfff... shit..." he mumbled blearily before rolling onto his back again. "You're really funny when I'm sloshed, you know?"

I smiled, an action which was now beyond my control. "Good to know. Think you can make it until midnight?"

"I think so," he replied drowsily. "I think I'll be okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay."

He then miraculously sat up and propped himself up against Jean's headboard. Armin walked into the room, noticed the two of us sitting on Jean's bed, smirked and said nothing. A few of the others gathered in the room after him, bringing with them a small wealth of leftover Christmas cookies. Not much later, Mikasa burst into the room with Jean in tow.

"Guys, the ball is about to drop! You need to get out here or you're going to miss it!" she shouted. I could only guess that she and Jean had somehow made up over the course of the night before the group swept me and my drunk ex-nurse out into the hallway.

Mikasa's frantic proclamations turned out to be true. The television in the living room had been changed from the Xbox games to the Dick Clark special, and half the party had gathered around it, some people already counting down, even though there was still more than a minute left. I stood on the balcony of the upper level that looked out over the expanse of the living room, Levi at my side. Connie had somehow gotten a hold of some party poppers and noisemakers, and he made a production of handing one to every single present member of the Youth Cancer Support Group. I stuck the little plastic kazoo-thing I was given into the side of my mouth and wrapped the popper string around my fingers. The countdown was down to thirty seconds. It wouldn't be much longer until the new year started.

"Hey, Eren," Levi said quietly.

"Yeah?" I replied.

"Do you have any resolutions this year?"

Twenty seconds left until the new year.

"I don't know."

"Why not?"

"I can't think of anything that I want to change."

Ten seconds left. The people in the living room were starting to chant along with the countdown.

"I can think of a few," Levi said.

I turned to him, eyes wide. "Like what?"

He glanced over at me, and my nerves shivered in response.

Five... Four... Three... Two... One...

Noise exploded in the living room and rattled the house as the glowing fiber-optic ball hit the end of its run. The entire party was screaming.

"HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

The party didn't last very long after the ball dropped. It climaxed for a little while. The music that steadily thrummed in the background doubled in volume and people screamed and danced around Jean's living room to ring in the New Year while Jean was gripped by legitimate fears of a police intervention. The chaos only lasted so long, though. Within an hour, everyone's energy was starting to run out. A decent number of the guests left, and I hoped that nobody would die in a horrible accident on their way home. I didn't know how much my hoping would do, though, since judging by what Levi had told me the alcohol had been flowing pretty steadily that night. Those who didn't leave passed out in random places. I wasn't sure which group would include Hanji and Levi this time around, but I had a decently educated guess.

"Levi!" Hanji called out in the hallway outside of Jean's room at some time near two in the morning. "Leeeeeviiiii? Where is you?"

"In here," my ex-nurse grumbled into a pillow he had dragged to the end of Jean's bed. I sat on the bed next to him, his head next to my feet and his feet about level with my shoulder, silently wishing that he had chosen my face over a sack of polyester fluff.

Hanji stumbled through the door, which was still open for some reason. "Levi, I wanna go home now. I'm tiiiiiired."

Levi picked his head up and glared at her. "I can't."

"What?" Hanji whined. She made her way to the bed and leaned over him. "But I don't have my car. Or my keys. And everyone is leaving." I was pretty sure the members of the support group were never meant to see the admins like this.

"Hanji, I'm serious," Levi deadpanned. "I. Can't. Drive. You."

"Why?"

"Levi's drunk, Hanji," I explained quickly. The entire group had gathered in Jean's room again, and I wasn't sure who knew and who didn't. "He can't drive anyone home."

"Levi... what?" She stared at me with her head cocked, then asked "Levi's DRUNK?!" a little too loudly for my tastes.

"Y-yes," I said in a stage whisper, hoping she would somehow get the message. "You're both gonna have to crash here. You can find a place, right?"

"Nicole and her squad of bitches took up both of the guest rooms," Jean cut in, not surprisingly, since a host is generally supposed to know what the fuck is happening in their own house. "Hanji can probably find a place to squeeze into. The support group's going to be in here, so if you want to join us, Levi-"

"I'll find another place," Levi said shortly before leaning in towards me to whisper. "Get me to a bathroom. Now."

No further explanation was needed. I nodded and started for the doorway, Levi close behind. I covertly grabbed the sleeve of his flannel as we left so I could tow him in his slow, drunken state to the bathroom that I had passed out in a few months earlier. It was in a completely different state than it had been at that first party. There were notes written all over the mirror in lipstick, mostly New Year's wishes and other stupid shit, along with a mess of empty plastic cups and some random girl passed out in the shower stall.

Levi lunged for the toilet as soon as it was within striking distance. In one fast, fluid motion, he threw back the lid, pushed his bangs away from his face and started retching madly into the porcelain bowl. Acid, alcohol and half-digested food spilled out of his mouth so violently that I was scared his convulsions would rip him apart. I wanted to comfort him, but he didn't seem to be in the mood. I kept my distance until the sounds of splattering vomit started to soften.

"Are you okay?" I asked once he looked like he was able to breathe again. My only answer was the sound of another wave of puke hitting the water. I knelt down behind him and tentatively placed my hand on his back, right above where I remembered his tattoo was.

Levi coughed and sank towards the ground, still clinging to the rim of the toilet bowl. "Ugh, that was disgusting," he croaked. His eyes wandered lazily towards me. "I'm sorry you have to see me like this, Eren."

"I told you to stop apologizing," I reminded him gently.

"Whatever. Just get me a tissue, or a washcloth, or... someone's panties, I don't give a fuck. I just wanna get this nasty shit off my face."

Luckily I came across a roll of paper towels under the sink before it came down to panties. I ripped a few off, soaked them with cold water and handed them over to Levi. He wiped away whatever traces of vomit might have been there, threw the paper towels in the trash, slammed the toilet lid shut and flushed the evidence. He tried to stagger to his feet, I tried to help him, and he tried to push me away. In the end, I had to hold him steady against the sink and keep his hair out of his eyes while he ran more cold water over his face and through his mouth in an effort to combat the hangover we both knew was coming.

"That was the grossest thing I have ever tasted," he said once we were finished.

"Think of it this way. It could have been projectile diarrhea."

Levi snorted, and I swear the smile he gave me right then could have cured me on the spot.

"Hey, you think Seabiscuit keeps extra toothbrushes in here?" he asked. "I don't want to let vomit residue destroy my teeth all night."

"Yeah, let me check." And, sure enough, he did. "It looks like someone sabotaged the toothpaste, though."

Levi glanced at the open tube that someone had smashed in their drunken stupor and the thick, crusty puddle of white in front of it and visibly shuddered. "It's fine. It's still usable, I think."

I wasn't sure if it was because he had just puked his guts out or if Levi always brushed his teeth with the fury of a thousand angry hornets, but that was how he went about things. Once he was done, he cleaned his face off one more time and drained a few Dixie cups' worth of faucet water before he started towards the door.

"Where are you going to sleep?" I asked once we were out in the hallway.

"Don't know," he replied. "I was thinking I would go downstairs, maybe find a spot on the couch or in the basement. People are passed out all over the fucking place. There are pretty much no boundaries."

I wanted to agree with him, but the thought of him having to sleep on a table or, god forbid, the floor that people had been spilling things on all night made me nervous. Maybe his clean freakishness was starting to rub off on me.

"But what if there isn't anywhere left?" I said, totally pulling the excuse out of my ass but sure that Levi wouldn't be able to tell the difference. "There were a lot of people who never went home. It's probably packed down there."

Levi stared off into the distance for a second, then sighed. "Yeah, you're probably right. But where else am I supposed to go?"

"Well, you remember what Jean said."

"I know, and I said I didn't want to."

"Why not?"

"I... I'm not good with sleeping with large groups of people."

I didn't think that Levi was up for telling me why. "Right. Okay. Well, there's... there's..."

"His parents' room is still open, right?"

I started at the suggestion. "Levi, are you serious?"

"Why not?" he asked like a confused kindergartener.

"Jean specifically told us that their room was off-limits. No one is allowed in there. He and Nicole can't have people fucking up their parents' personal stuff."

"I'm not gonna touch anything," Levi declared. "Just the bed."

"Fine," I said in surrender. He nodded and turned to stagger off down the hallway. I went back to the bathroom. The passed-out girl changed positions while I brushed my teeth with the same brush Levi had used, and I tried not to think about how I was indirectly making out with him. The lights in the house were starting to go out by the time I got out of the bathroom. I turned to start towards Jean's room, but I somehow found myself looking over my shoulder, in the opposite direction. Towards the Kirschtein's' room.

I was feeling just as tired as everyone else at the party, and I wanted to get some sleep as soon as I could. But even more than that, I wanted to know that Levi was okay. I had left him to work things out on his own. I knew he was able to handle it. He was a grown-ass, twenty-one-year-old man. Who was drunk, and who I also had uncontrollable feelings for. So, against what was probably my better judgement, I went to the master bedroom to check on Levi.

The Kirschtein's bedroom was about twice the size that any rational bedroom should be. The thing could have been a house all on its own. The only thing missing was a kitchen. There was a floor-to-ceiling wardrobe, a set of chairs with a small table in front of a bookcase loaded with medical crap I couldn't be bothered to try and name, a door to a private bathroom, a sliding glass door to a fucking second-floor balcony, and a little alcove that led to two more walk-in closets. At the other end of the room, an unreasonably large bed was situated between two expensive-looking nightstands. There was a small lump of a person lying on top of it. He hadn't even bothered with using the covers.

I made my way over to the bed. Levi sprawled on his back, the entire upper half of his body sinking into the massive pile of unnecessary throw pillows by the headboard. His eyes were closed, his face blank and peaceful.

"Levi?" I whispered cautiously. My only answer was the soft, breezy rhythm of his breathing. I knew he was probably sleeping, but for some reason, I still felt the need to make sure he would be okay for the rest of the night.

I lowered myself down onto the edge of the bed and put my hand on his shoulder. "Levi, are you awake?" I whispered again. Still, no response. He was definitely asleep.

I could have left him then. And, logically, I should have. But I didn't. Instead I found myself sitting there for I don't even remember how long, feeling absolutely fascinated by him. I was transfixed by every flutter of his eyelids, every strand of hair scattered across his forehead, the gentle rise and fall of his chest. I went down on my elbow to get a closer look. Levi didn't seem to care that I was sitting there and observing him like a creep. He just went right on sleeping.

I reached out to him and gently brushed a wayward strand of his bangs away from his face. Then, in the biggest lapse of judgement I'd had thus far, I was leaning in. It was like the first party, when we'd been outside, and he was sitting next to me, and I had first seen the true colors in his eyes. But this time, I wasn't drunk. This time I knew what I was doing. I knew exactly how bad an idea it was. And I did it all the same.

I carefully lowered myself next to Levi on the mattress and braced my arm above his shoulder so my face hovered above his. I tilted my head to the side. My lips brushed his. Just a little lower... just a little...

"Eren?"

I barely heard the soft, sleepy murmur. I might not have even noticed it if I hadn't felt his lips moving against mine and his breath on my skin. I gasped and jerked away from him, startled, waiting for him to sit up and slap me in the face for whatever the hell it was that I had just tried to do.

But nothing happened.

Levi looked up at me with his eyes half-closed. He seemed a little bewildered, if anything, but nothing else. I shifted uneasily on the mattress. "Yeah, it's me," I said.

Levi never said anything to respond. Instead, he grabbed me by the arm and pulled me down towards him. I collapsed on top of him, and before I knew it one of his arms was around my ribcage and my head was resting on his chest.

"L-Levi?" I whispered in surprise, but I never got an answer. His breathing had evened out again, and he wasn't responding. He was fast asleep.

I thought about untangling myself from him and going back to Jean's room. I seriously did. But it didn't last long. It quickly got replaced by Holy shit, he's touching me. Holy shit. Holy shit. Holyshitholyshitholyshitholyshitholyshitholyshitholyshitasdfghjkllmfnirmjkoongjnk.

I quickly got lost in the gentle warmth radiating from Levi's body, the rise and fall of his breath and the soft, distant beat of his heart. I could hear it just below where my head landed. It was a strong, steady sound, and there was something undeniably comforting in it. It sounded like him. I felt my own pulse speeding up, my heart palpitating as it tried to match with his.

I took a deep, calming breath and draped an arm across his waist. It didn't seem like I would be leaving anytime soon. And, no surprise, I didn't want to.

I closed my eyes and fell asleep to the sound of Levi's heart beating beside mine.

When I woke up on New Year's Day, I was in a daze. I was lying on my side in some insanely soft, comfortable bed, but I couldn't remember where I was. Too much had happened the night before, and I was feeling too hazy to remember it and get out of bed at the same time. I could only choose one or the other. So I stayed down and stared straight ahead while I tried to collect my bearings.

Nothing would come back to me as I was lying there. I did notice, however, that the room I was in was very well-decorated. Whoever owned it must have hired a professional or something. It must have cost a fortune to...

Fuck, I'm in Jean's parents' room.

With that one detail everything came rushing back to me. The party last night. Levi was drunk. Midnight had passed, I saw him throw up, I tried and failed to kiss him, and we had both passed out in here.

Something warm was pressed against my back. There was an arm around my waist.

I rolled over, more roughly than someone who feared that another person was sleeping beside them should have, and came face to face with Levi. I gasped, then choked on the sudden inhale. If I made too much noise, I might wake him up. Not sure what else to do, I stopped and waited for something more to happen.

I stared at him for what felt like hours. The whole time, his eyes stayed closed, his breathing steady, his arm wound loosely around me. Once I had convinced myself that he wouldn't spring to attention if I moved again, I carefully untangled myself from him. I separated from him and moved cautiously away from the bed, and Levi rolled limply onto his back, apparently too knocked out by his hangover to wake up and bitch me out. It wasn't until then that I suddenly worried about having had another sexy dream while he was sleeping next to me, or, even worse, having stabbed him with my morning wood while I was asleep. A quick look down assured me that nothing of the sort had happened. I breathed a sigh of relief and left the room as quietly as I could.

It was around nine in the morning, and a few people were wandering around the house already. I was one of them. I made my way through party shrapnel and people passed out in random places to the kitchen. The smell of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls was drifting delicately through the lower level of the house. I walked in to see that Jean had somehow managed to isolate the area of any wayward guests. He was at the stove with Marco, delegating cinnamon rolls to Mikasa, Sasha and Armin.

"Morning," I mumbled.

Mikasa was the first one to respond to me. "Happy New Year, Eren."

"Annie and Connie aren't up yet?"

"No," Armin replied. "Annie tends to sleep a lot as it is, and Connie was dicking around until almost four AM. It was annoying." He sighed and took a sip of hot cocoa.

I traveled over to the stove. "Thanks for breakfast. How are you keeping the others out of here?"

"Nicole knows that she screwed up with the alcohol again," Marco answered after Jean deliberately ignored me. He handed me a cinnamon roll on a leftover paper plate. "This is how she's paying Jean back for whatever damage was done to the Trost High crowd."

I hummed thoughtfully, then went back to the counter and ate my cinnamon roll in silence.

"Where were you last night?" Armin asked when I had come back from getting my second roll.

"Huh?"

"You never came back to Jean's room. Where did you go?"

"Oh. That." A flush of heat traveled up the back of my neck as I took a bite of cinnamon roll. "It's... kind of a long story."

"I'm not going anywhere for a while, Eren."

I glanced over to the stove to make sure that Mikasa had been completely distracted by her conversation with Sasha, took a deep breath and said, "Levi was drunk last night, and I slept with him." Armin's eyes turned into blue frisbees, and I quickly corrected myself. "I-I mean... I didn't sleep with him, I just slept in the same room as him. He got drunk, so he couldn't take Hanji home. And you know that the house was running out of space, with people blacking out left and right, so I told him to go to Jean's parents' room-"

"But that room is always off-limits!"

"I know, but it was better him than some other wasted moron! He went to sleep in there, and I was worried about him, so I went to check on him, and he kind of... grabbed me in his sleep and pulled me down next to him. So I stayed."

Armin exhaled slowly and raised his eyebrows. "I'm just glad that you two are getting somewhere," he said. "I mean, you're sleeping together already." He grinned wickedly at me.

"We are not getting anywhere, and we don't plan to," I shot back. "And if that's the way you're going to put it, then you basically slept with Annie."

Armin's cheeks blushed at that, and he stuck a cinnamon roll in his mouth to shut himself up.

The rest of the morning was awkward, to say the least. The rest of the YCSG wandered in over the next hour. Hanji was the last to arrive, and Levi came in not long before her. He staggered into the kitchen and sat down at one of the barstools without speaking to a single one of us.

"Morning, Levi. You alright?" I asked tentatively.

"I'm fine," he replied. "I just need a glass of water. Maybe some black coffee."

Hanji stumbled in almost immediately after him and collapsed onto Levi's back, obviously in the throes of one serious hangover. Jean quickly dug up a bottle of Tylenol and Marco gave Hanji a dose, along with the same water and coffee that Levi had been served. I glanced back at my ex-nurse from time to time, still just as worried as I had been the night before. He was nowhere near as bad as Hanji was, but I could still tell he was in pain. He never said anything about it, though. He just finished draining the two cups he had asked for, then got up to leave. I stopped him by the door.

"Levi, do you... do you remember anything about last night?" I asked.

"What part?" he deadpanned. "Trying to drink my feelings? Showing everyone what a fucking lightweight I am? Puking my guts out?"

"N-no, um..." I stammered. He doesn't remember, I thought, disappointed. But, a second later, I thought it over again.

It's probably better this way.

"Was there something you wanted to tell me?"

I shuddered. Levi was still standing there. Hanji was already in his car, and he was staring expectantly at me, waiting for me to say something more.

"No," I murmured finally. "Happy New Year, Levi."

He smiled slightly, and a laugh slipped out of him. "Happy New Year to you, too, brat." He pulled me in for a hug, and I did my best to push the memory of last night to the back of my mind.

"Drive safe," I said softly as he closed the door.

Armin's grandpa came to pick us up at noon, right on schedule. It was late enough for everyone to be awake and functional enough to see us off, but early enough for us to get out of cleanup. My dad was home when we got back, and the rest of the day was spent talking about everything that had happened. However, as most party stories go, there wasn't much to tell when we left out the parts that involved alcohol.

The storytelling session didn't last long, so eventually it dissolved into us going our separate ways in the house. I fell asleep early because, as usual, activity of any kind had left me exhausted. That led to my waking up early, since that was what normally happened when my sleep schedule finally balanced itself out.

It wasn't even eight in the morning when Armin called me.

I knew that he, out of all of our friends, was the most likely to get up at some ungodly time of the morning. He was never one to waste daylight. But expecting anyone other than himself to be up at that time of day was definitely a new low for him.

Still, I picked up the phone when I saw his face light up on the screen. "Armin, why the hell are you awake?"

"Eren," he said. He sounded breathless. Something was wrong.

"What is it?" I asked, my heart in my throat.

"Is Mikasa with you? Are you on speakerphone?"

"No, why are you asking?"

"Because this is important. Really important. She needs to hear it, and I don't want to have to make this phone call to her, too. I don't want to have to say this twice."

"Then I'll tell her," I promised. Worry was creeping into my thoughts. "What is it."

"Reiner just called me last night." A pause. Armin's breath shaking. "His melanoma has started spreading again. It's in his lymphatic system now."

His words slammed into me like the front car of a train. "What?" I choked out, even though I had understood him the first time, even though his words were echoing over and over in my head.

"He's dying, Eren."

Armin's voice was so weak. My throat felt like sandpaper. I couldn't speak, even if I wanted to.

"Are you still there?"

I hung up. I didn't want to hear any more.