Annie was woken by rays of sunlight shining through her window, their warmth melted the ice and water trickled down the pane. Her cheeks were not damp from cried tears, which was odd considering that nearly most days she would wake in that condition after having been crying in her sleep. The tears were usually triggered by a bad dream about her mother or father. She never understood it, because she rarely cried when she was conscious, without good reason of course. As she sat up and rubbed at her eyes she felt peaceful, that feeling was completely alien to her. The feeling was nice while it lasted but unfortunately it was short-lived. The blonde soon started to panic: it was Sunday and she had to work. She had been blessed the previous night after returning home to find out that her father had already passed out; it meant that she was able to have a nice long bath and then go straight to bed without any trouble. What time was it now though? She couldn't afford to be late, considering she didn't even show up yesterday.
Judging by the strong rays of sunlight that had managed to melt the ice, it was already well into the afternoon. She was supposed to be there in the morning. Annie pulled back her blanket and stepped out of bed, her father had smashed her alarm clock a few weeks back in a drunken rage of his, so all she had to rely on was a cheap old watch that she needed to find ASAP.
"No…" she muttered upon finding the watch, she ran a hand through her messy blonde hair, and suddenly felt sick with dread. It was already well past noon. How did this happen!?
"You're fired." her manager said in a blasé manner, the snobby woman did not so much as look at her.
"What?" Annie couldn't believe what she was hearing. She had literally just run all the way to McDonalds, only to be told she was fired. She couldn't be fired, she needed this job.
"Look, you heard me. You didn't bother turning up yesterday and you are extremely late today. This is also not the first time you've been late, is it Miss Leonhardt?"
"It won't happen again, ma'am." Annie felt herself start to shake.
Her manager turned to her, "Yes, you're quite right," she scoffed, "It won't because you're fired. I would give you another chance but I've already had several complaints about you being rude to customers. There are simply no more allowances I can make for you."
The blonde knew there was no reasoning with the woman. She had been a bitch right from the start and Annie saw red. She ripped off her apron and threw it at her manager which caused the older woman to gasp; the hat was next to come off and Annie stomped on it. She could vaguely hear her manager shout after her as she made a run for it out of the restaurant, it was something about her behaviour being unacceptable and that she was banned. It was true that she had been rude to a few customers, but they had deserved it. They were being rude to her in the first place and she simply could not hold back her temper. She really needed to work on her patience.
Annie ran down the street with tears streaming down her face, not caring at the looks she was receiving from passers-by, she was just so angry and upset. She wasn't exactly even sure where her legs were taking her, however, she was certain that she wasn't going home. The wind was bitterly cold against her cheeks that were wet from freshly spilt tears, the temperature was enough to freeze them and create small ice crystals on her eyelashes. She wanted to find warmth, and so she just kept running. Eventually she came to a stop outside a familiar house. What had brought her here? She wondered. Annie wiped away any evidence that she had been crying. She slowly walked up to the door and reality suddenly hit her in the face. She felt like turning back, because lord only knew what had brought her to Armin Arlert's house.
Am I forgetting what happened yesterday? Of course Annie hadn't forgotten. The slim, blond-haired, blue-eyed boy had been on her mind pretty much non-stop since then.
Annie brought a hesitant hand to the door and knocked once, half hoping no one would answer. It didn't take long for the door to open.
"Oh! Annie? Nice to see you dear, I gather you are here to see Armin?" Armin's grandfather greeted her, she could see the surprised look in his face. Annie simply nodded, she felt terribly awkward. She wished it had been Armin who had answered the door.
"Come in, come in, you'll catch a death if you stand outside any longer." the old man took a step back so that Annie could come inside. He closed the door behind her and then called upstairs, "Armin! You have a guest!" his grandfather then left to go into the kitchen and Annie was left standing in the hallway alone. She remembered it was custom to remove her shoes while in Armin's house so she did just that while waiting for the blond to appear. When she heard footsteps on the stairs she turned to look up and saw Armin, whose eyes were wide.
"A-Annie?" he stopped halfway down the stairs, he could feel his face heat up ever so slightly. "What are you doing here?" Armin was completely stunned.
Annie shrugged, "I...I don't really know." what exactly was she doing there anyway? Something inside of her had led her to see the boy.
Armin raised his eyebrows and walked down the rest of the stairs, he came to stand beside her, "W-well...do you want to come upstairs? I was just finishing my homework."
"Okay." Annie was suddenly reminded that she had a ton of homework to do. She hadn't even started any of it, and there was Armin, just finishing his. Of course that was expected, he was such a good student after all.
Armin felt his heart thrashing against his chest. It looked like Annie wanted to spend time with him, just like he had requested yesterday evening after spending the day at Winter Wonderland with her. Or maybe something was wrong? Maybe Annie was here for a different reason and she just hadn't told him yet? Whatever it was, Armin couldn't help but feel ecstatic, but also somewhat nervous.
Annie hesitated at Armin's bedroom door. She noticed that all of his books and papers were sprawled out across his desk. He was without a doubt going to get an A grade on all of that work. He was going to graduate top of the class and go to college and become really successful in life. Annie on the other hand was probably not going to achieve half of that, but then again, all she wanted at the end of the day was to be as far away from her father as possible. If she could accomplish that at least, she would be happy.
Armin stood near his desk and looked back to Annie who was still hovering at the door, "Y-you can come and sit down." he offered, realising that she felt awkward.
"Where?" Annie scanned the room, there was either a bean bag, or his bed.
"Well, Eren usually sits on that bean bag there..." Armin directed his eyes towards it.
Annie suddenly had other ideas, "How about you get another chair so I can sit at the desk too?" she definitely wasn't thinking straight and her pale cheeks tinged pink.
"H-huh? Oh, sure! J-just wait a second." Armin left the room to get a second chair before the blonde could change her mind.
He returned a minute later and placed the chair beside his own. Armin sat down and Annie approached the desk slowly, strongly regretting even suggesting that she sit there.
She didn't utter a word as she sat down. Annie was so close to the blond boy that she was brushing against him, she wanted to be considerate, so she decided to move her chair slightly to the side so that he would have space to write.
"You don't mind that I finish this, do you? It won't take long, I promise." Armin asked her, because he would drop it in an instant if she wanted to do something else.
Annie shook her head, "It doesn't bother me, just continue." after all, she had turned up at his house uninvited.
The blond boy found it extremely hard to concentrate on algebra with the girl he had a huge crush on staring at him. He tried hard to fight back the blush that was on his cheeks as he rattled his brain for the answers he knew would have come easy to him, if she wasn't in his bedroom, sitting right beside him, and staring at him relentlessly with her beautiful harsh blue eyes.
Annie hadn't realised that the simple action was causing him so much trouble. She couldn't help but admire his features, it was then that it dawned on her that he was very good-looking. He had one of the cutest noses she had seen in her life.
Eventually, Armin managed to solve all of the problems in his math book and closed it. "Done" he turned to her and smiled. The blush was still present on his cheeks as his eyes met hers. Annie suddenly felt those butterflies flutter inside her stomach again, his eyes were just so large and deep.
"Did I...", Annie paused feeling slightly uncomfortable, "ever thank you for helping me out with my studies before?" Armin blinked in response and Annie realised that she hadn't even had the common decency to do that. She was awful. "Well...thanks. It really helped me get the principal off my back. He was threatening to contact my dad..." Oh. She had said too much, she hadn't meant to bring up her father.
"Oh...w-well it's no problem, any time..." Armin looked down to his desk briefly and then looked back up to the blonde girl, "Hey, Annie...what's your dad like?" Armin was really curious, but he worried about her reaction to the question.
Annie had a sudden flashback of the last time she was in Armin's bedroom, when he had asked her about her parents and the topic had gotten onto her mother. This time it was her fault, though. Why had she let her father slip into the conversation? She wanted to slap herself.
"I don't want to talk about him." she said it firmly and diverted her gaze slightly away from Armin's eyes. Annie tucked her hands under the sleeves of her hoodie and folded her arms across her chest.
"I heard him yesterday..." Armin admitted and Annie's heart skipped a beat.
Her blue eyes shot back up to meet Armin's. She didn't say anything, and tried her best to read his facial expression. Did he know anything? Had he put the pieces of the puzzle together? "Don't give it a second thought." she muttered after several moments but Annie knew with that brain of his, he had probably given it one thousand thoughts and drawn one million conclusions. This was it. She was going to lose him. There was no way he would stick around and deal with her shitty problems.
Armin furrowed his brows, he wanted to reach out to her, but she had folded her arms tightly across her chest as if to put up a barrier between them. All he wanted to do was hold her hand to comfort her. "Annie, I really care about you...please, believe me."
He was reading her mind again, but how could she be sure of what he was saying? "Armin, stop." Annie raised her voice slightly, but she felt something cold trickle down her cheek. No...I can't cry, not right in front of him. It was too late, because the tears were already streaming down her face.
"A-Annie, what's wrong?" Armin was worried and Annie saw the panic in his eyes. Why was she crying? Had he said something wrong?
"I got fired." she hadn't intended to open her mouth, instead she had planned to stay silent, but somehow the words had made their way out.
"O-oh..." that was very unexpected, and slightly off topic, "Um, what happened? If you d-don't mind me asking." this time Armin really did reach out to her. He wrapped his gentle fingers around her forearm, only hoping she wouldn't slap him away this time.
"It was the bitch manager." she felt Armin's touch but refused to budge from her defensive position, however, this time unlike last, she did not make an attempt to push him away. After all, after yesterday she saw little point in trying to get rid of him, she didn't mind his touch. She enjoyed it. "I just really needed that job." Annie added quietly as she downcast her view. She didn't know why she was telling him all of this.
Armin tried to soothe her by softly grazing his thumb over the same spot on her arm and caressed gently with his fingers. He didn't know what to say to make her feel better, he felt pathetic. It was probably the first time he had been in a position to do something, but all he was able to do was sit and watch her tears while he felt his heart breaking.
"Annie..." he whispered softly. He wanted to be able to make her smile more than anything. She was so beautiful, even when she was crying. It was then that it suddenly hit him. Of course, why didn't I think of it sooner!? "Annie, if you need a job, I can ask my grandpa if it's okay for you to work at his bookshop. In fact, I'm sure he'd be happy to hire you!"
Annie's eyes widened and there was a long pause, "Are you being serious?" she blinked and felt her heart beat escalate, it was as if it was going to burst from her chest. Annie watched Armin smile and nod his head in confirmation. She was speechless for a few moments, "Armin, you don't know how much this means to me."
The blond boy really didn't know how important it was for her, and Annie wasn't about to tell him the details. She felt so overwhelmed with gratitude at that moment and the feelings she was experiencing were foreign to her. That warm-hearted smile, the pure kindness, the sincerity in his eyes... at that moment she realised what she was experiencing must have been what people call love. She knew it, she was falling in love with the boy and there was nothing she could do about it.
