Chapter Created By: RakaiaNovelette

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"It is not miserable to be blind; it is miserable to be incapable of enduring blindness"

I find it counterproductive to use a song you'd want to play forever as your alarm clock, because you'd never shut it off. But it's also a complete waste of time if you wake yourself up with a heart attack every morning because the sound of a tornado warning is the best way to wake yourself up in the morning apparently. So I change it up every day.

Today, I was woken up by my mother's favorite song.

Fuck.

I reached over to slam it off and my hand knocked the phone over onto the floor. I desperately wanted it off, but I was half awake and I still hadn't figured out if my eyes were even open or not yet.

So, I just leaned over the edge and placed my face in my palms, attempting to drown out the depressing piano melody with thoughts of yesterday.

-

Yes- it was true that I lied to Levi. I was actually very aware of all sorts of tunes that the piano is capable of. But since my mother listened to slower songs most of the time, my heart was wrenching the first time I heard for real- not just recorded.

Levi... he was changing a lot of things about me though.

I finally got the stamina built up enough to go crawling along the floor for my phone to turn it off.

I had today as a kickback. I didn't have any real plans to go anywhere, but a hot shower was always a good trick to waking me up further. And since I planned on having breakfast which makes me drowsy, the shower was due.

Dad was still working, he'd gotten accustomed to leaving me on my own after weeks of trying to get him off my back for a little privacy, but unbeknownst to me, still tried making it up by babying me on the days he was home. He literally checked to see if I got out of the shower okay, but when he was at work, I'd be lucky to get the call that he had to work late again.

"In case you haven't noticed yet, it's gorgeous today and we are going out!" Connie shrieked from the background. Even though Christa had the phone nowhere near him, I still had to hold mine away from my ear a little bit.

"Sorry about him," she chuckled. "So you're ready now? Well, we won't be there for like an hour. Wanted to give you a heads up. I just never see you outside of school lately and this was Connie's idea," she explained to me.

His ranting from far away was literally the only explanation I got as to what 'out' even meant. And technically, I was friends with only Christa these days. The others were kids I hung out with whenever she was around, I wasn't really sure about her faith in these guys...

"I just- um, sure fine. But is it going to be for a long time? I gotta-,"

"No worries, Eren. We'll be back even before sundown. I promise you, Connie's definitely not in charge of all this, we'll take care of you, alright?"

Damn, she knew just how to sweet talk. And I'd opened up my side with the fact that I had no plans, so I couldn't really talk myself out of it on the spot. I agreed reluctantly.

I sighed, holding the phone down over my knees and leaned over. Today I felt oddly heavy, and I couldn't place it. I really wasn't sure about going out, even if it meant distracting myself. I mean, sure Mikasa might be going according to Christa. And I really didn't want to fight with her. But I really wondered if that was what was bothering me. Well, it sure wasn't going to make things easier.

We wouldn't even get a chance to talk in private, I bet. I'll just have to play along with the innocent act and try and make amends through unspoken attempts (which kind of wasn't really my style).

That's probably how Levi likes to handle things.
Levi. Well, for being so different as we are, he's just so easy. Not really easy to be around per say; things just happen easily with him. When we argue, my words come out smoothly. When he plays, he draws me in without an ounce of awkwardness.

Even after he'd accepted being my guide, there was a part of him that wanted it, and he slowly realized what he needed to be for me without having to tell him.

But there was one thing that wasn't going to be so easy... I wanted to do what we did again. That came so easily. But it didn't come easily to Levi. He would much rather let it be in the past and let me realize that on my own without him having to tell me.

Approximately one hour of arguing inside my mind, and a round of chasing Titan out of my room so he didn't knock things down while I was gone, and there was a knock at my door.
I assumed it was Christa since she waited patiently instead of knocking several more times like others have done while I made my trek to the door carefully. "Come in!" I said at the bottom of the stairs.

She opened the door gently and I heard wisps of her dainty footsteps. "Hey Eren, everything okay?"

I shook my head instinctively, "No worries, just let me grab my phone."

She spun around, squeaking her shoes, "Oh, don't worry, I got it!" she went over to the coffee table where I had left it.

"Here you go," I took it from her and she led the way.

"So, where are we going, now that you've got me. I still don't know why you think I'd be so fun hanging out with all you guys," I asked her politely.

She just snorted, "It's a music festival, silly. We knew you'd love it and it's no trouble!"
"Music festival?"

"Yeah, on the other side of town. It starts in two hours so we were gonna grab dinner first. I didn't consider it a surprise, but I also didn't want to tell you until we got here. Jean said you might not like crowds...?" she trailed off, hoping I wouldn't be too spooked with her light tone when putting it probably.

I was about to reply, when I thought of how big the city actually was. "Wait, the other side of town? Wouldn't that take-?"

I was cut off by an engine running and Ymir shouting from the open window, "What are you two girls doing chatting on the porch still?"
My limbs froze and my eyes widened. It hit me why I haven't told Christa. Well, it was simple- I'd been a hermit on the weekends for the past three years.

-

Mom had her guard down as we were on our way home and she didn't realize that I had once again left my seat belt off. She was going on about the song on the radio.

"It's only a few weeks old, I knew I'd get you to hear it soon!" she squealed. "Eren, I've never really been into new kinds of stuff like you, but I just love these lyrics!"

"I'd be able to hear them better if you'd let me. Just chill mom. It's so new that they're probably going to play it into the ground for the next few months until you're tired of it. Don't worry, we'll hear it a bunch more times," I waved her off.
She turned off of the highway, heading into town.

It was dark out, but we were only fifteen minutes from home and the roads were pretty clear and empty. She practically dove over the seat to pinch me in the ear. I dodged her with ease. She may have been able to pull that stunt on me when I was a kid, but I've learned over time which moves she uses.

That mischievous glint in her eyes and on the corner of her mouth were a dead giveaway. "If I have to pull your ears off in order to get you to listen to good music, I'll try until you're thirty my boy. That's a promise."

there was no humor in her voice, she seemed dead serious. I didn't know for sure whether that was because she was so tired, or if the song really got to her that much. She had the tendency to exaggerate on material things like movies, sports, dancing, or music and get really into them.

"I hear ya, I hear ya," I rolled my eyes.
We listened to a few more lines before she muttered. "It has a good chance at being my favorite. We'll just have to see, won't we?"

We still hadn't moved and Ymir gave a single, short playful honk directed at Christa. "Oh baby! I'm kinda starving over here! Bring the third wheel by the hair for shit's sake."

There was no verbal response, but Ymir shut up. "Hang on a sec," she became serious, turning to face me and I felt her close. "Eren, is everything alright?"

"Uh-um," I stuttered. How was I going to handle this? I mean it wasn't like I'd sworn off cars forever. It just hadn't occurred to me that I'd be comfortable ever again in one seeing as how it was a car that killed my mother.

Confusion and uncertainty wandered through my bloodstream, making me a bit too stiff to move on my own. She grabbed my arm. "Come on, let's go," she tried cheering me up, unaware of what had freaked me out.

"Really? I was kidding you know," Ymir called again. "He can't walk on his own?"

"I guess he's nervous," she answered. "Eren, is it too many people? Is that what you're worried about?"

I had enough control to shake my head no.

"Okay, you still want to go?" she pressed.
I nodded my head silently. Working my hardest to get a straight face on before the others worried about me too.

"I'm sitting next to Ymir and you can have the passenger seat, is that alright? Say hi, guys so he knows who's here!"

"Hey man!" Connie said from the backseat, along with a mumbled hello from Jean, Marco, Mikasa and Sasha.

"We got an eight-seater, loaned from Ymir's grandmother." Christa explained. I practically willed myself into the seat, tensing up my arms so that they didn't shake. Christa had let go of my arm as she'd slid into the center of the front seat. My robotic movement got the car door closed.

"You haven't had dinner yet, right?" Mikasa sounded like she was in the far back seat, trying to be polite as well.

I shook my head, "Uh-uh. I'm hungry too. Where are we going?"

In response, Ymir put the vehicle in drive and started going forward.

I may have jumped a little too hard when we started moving. Not only was the shock of going somewhere without taking myself  a complete disaster in my nerves, but I also heard each sound it was making.

And then there was the fact that I was in the very same seat I would have been in that same night.

There was no stopping my rampaging breaths.
"Woah, dude! Calm down," Connie was sitting behind Ymir and leaned over. I held onto the dash in front of me as he spoke. I couldn't stand the thought of having all their eyes on me in such a closed off space. I'd never thought of myself as a claustrophobic... but there was still a difference between being in a small space that wasn't moving and secure to the ground, and this seeming death trap.

"St-St-Stop!~" I could barely manage to get out. I wasn't panicking that badly, but there was no way I was going to let these guys see me like this for one more minute.

"Eren, are you okay?" Mikasa demanded. "Ymir, stop the car!"

I had no idea if it was even stopped or not, my equilibrium was practically nonexistent. I fumbled with the door handle anyway as they continued shouting. Luckily I wasn't wearing a seat belt again...

"Tcha, shhh," I panted through my teeth, my hands and knees hitting the asphalt.

Not caring where I was, not caring that I'd scared them and probably made everything worse. This entire mess had come out of nowhere and I had no time to prepare for it. I had no room to rationalize anything and only focused on being out of that thing and on solid ground again.

My breathing didn't slow down and tears started forming as a result of added frustration at myself to top everything else. I was vaguely aware of someone's arms wrapped around me.

"Does he not get in vehicles or something?"

"That seems like the only thing that went wrong, I'm guessing."

And then there was the voice that drowned out all the others and caused a skip in my heartbeat when I heard it.

"Eren?"

-

"Someone had gotten me into my house again. It was a few minutes to get to my front porch, but I recognized it as being mine, so I'd noticed how far we drove as a result. I couldn't even make it two minutes.

I identified Mikasa on the couch next to me and Levi had reached us just in time to lead them to the door. He was currently setting a cup of tea on the coffee table in front of me.

"Really, I'm- I'm fine," my voice had gotten back to normal. I matched it to the clock I heard on the wall. Three seconds breathing in, three seconds exhaling. A routine.

"I can see that," Levi mused. "You look a lot better than you did ten minutes ago. Drink this. It'll help."

I had a more urgent thought. "Is e-everyone still here?" It had been quiet for a minute, so I wasn't sure. Titan was sitting on my lap though, and he usually didn't come out for lots of people.

"We told them to go on ahead," Mikasa said. "I'll text them in a bit. They understand."

"Yeah," I breathed out heavily. "I'm sorry. Guess I won't be going with you guys. I just. I didn't know..."

"I remember now," she leaned away as she thought to herself.

"You always wanted to walk everywhere we went, and never said why. You did tell me about... the accident though. I should have known."

I hadn't heard Levi leave yet, but he kept quiet.
"Thanks," I said, reaching out for the tea to hold onto it and took a beep breath. "It never really seemed like an issue to me either, so it's okay. I just, never thought about getting in a car again. Maybe I thought that it was my last time, and that thought was subconscious. I don't know. But all I do know is that I hate making a scene. I mean, I at least know you're not suppose to jump out of a moving vehicle! That was so stupid."

"Eren, no. Stop. We get it! I mean, nobody has that problem specifically, but we know how you much feel." she rubbed my shoulders. Shit, I felt babied so much right now.

I wanted to flinch away like I typically would. But I was already struggling with knowing how to be around Mikasa right now. I didn't want to upset her more.

"Do you want to be alone?" Levi spoke up. He was by the hallway, probably leaned up against a wall since there were no chairs over there.

'Hmm," I heard Mikasa beside me. She removed her hands. "Which reminds me. You weren't even invited. Why were you at Eren's house on a Saturday?" she tried to not sound so hateful in front of me, I could tell.

But I'd just realized that, too.

"I.. um,"

He stuttered? Levi was nervous about something. My ears perked up.

He spoke directly to me, his voice bit lower. "I was going to invite you to this music festival I've been planning to see tonight..."

I smiled and faced his direction fully. "That's what I was doing actually."

"You were gonna go?" Mikasa inquired, slightly irritated.

"That's where all of you were going?" he was confused.

"Yeah," she answered.

"Well, I guess the three of us won't be going obviously," I murmured.

"I guess. I was gonna try and take a cab with you to the festival, but..." Levi trailed off. I stiffened again.

"Clearly not the way to go," he finished quickly.

"Then that means I have no business here. Didn't really want to go alone, so I'll just head home and let you two hang out."

I heard him take a few steps and reached a hand out. Mikasa beat me to it. "Wait! You don't have to go," she wasn't even trying to hide her reluctance.

"Huh?" I wondered what she was playing at. At first she thought of Levi as nothing that should be affiliated with me. Hell, she even saw us kissing and flipped out. Now she was offering to leave us alone together? "You really don't have to-,"

"You're leaving?" Levi seemed to be equally confused.

"Yeah," she sighed. "You were going to invite him. Obviously you knew what he likes more than I thought. I'll give you a chance."

My face caught on fire. If I tried to bring up the fact that she shouldn't be agreeing to a nonexistent relationship, that might scare Levi off again. I kept quiet and let her leave after giving me one last hug.

He and I were alone in the quiet house once more.

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