Amaranth

Chapter 13: Dead Roses

It was the Monday after Homecoming, and Mikasa's head was spinning. Over the weekend, she had spent a lot of time analyzing -probably over analyzing- her kiss with Annie on the previous Friday. In the end, she determined that maybe she cared about Annie a little more than she originally thought, but that kiss was definitely the alcohol because she knew she definitely didn't have that much confidence sober.

Mikasa got out of bed and ate somewhat slowly. She was dreading seeing Annie again because she knew it would be awkward. She silently hoped Annie had forgotten about it and would just act like she hated her again.

After eating and finishing getting ready for her day, Mikasa put her shoes on and yelled for Eren. "Coming!" he assured her as he sprinted down the stairs, using the railing to skip over the last 3 steps.

"Hurry up, or I'm leaving you behind," she told him coldly.

"Okay, I'm good," he said as he looked up, realizing Mikasa had already left the house, "Damn it."

When Eren finally caught up to her, she slowed down, so he could keep up with her easily. "I didn't think you'd actually leave without me," Eren complained as he rolled his eyes.

"When have I ever made an empty threat?" Mikasa asked as she snickered.

"....Yeah, okay. You make a good point," Eren agreed as Armin met up with them on the walk.

The group accidentally met up with Annie, Bertholdt, and Reiner outside the school, and the two groups kind of mingled. Reiner, Bertholdt, and Eren started talking about football while Armin listened intently. Annie and Mikasa, however, silently and mutually agreed to avoid each other like the plague.

It's not that Mikasa regretted kissing Annie, quite the opposite. She was afraid she might end up doing it again, and she didn't know how welcomed that gesture might be. Instead, she decided it was best to just avoid the blonde as much as possible.

When they entered the school, there was a group crowded around some of the lockers. "We're gonna have a hell of a time getting our stuff for first," Eren complained.

"Yeah," Mikasa agreed as they pushed through the crowd. Annie laughed as she wished them luck, turning to her locker that was in a slightly different direction.

She easily grabbed her things as she walked towards the group still surrounding the lockers. What the hell? Annie thought to herself as she heard murmurs from the crowd. She then saw a blur run past, and she noticed they ran to the bathroom. She didn't think anything of it as she pushed through the group, wanting to see what everyone was buzzing about.

When she finally broke through the circle, her heart stopped. Eren and Armin were staring at a locker that had sharpie all over it. The surrounding lockers had multiple photos of them, and the images were enough to make Annie sick.

On one of them, a picture of her and Mikasa kissing. How anyone got a picture without her noticing was beyond her, but that was even the most disgusting thing there. Surrounding it were images of dead, bloodied bodies. The image itself was vomit inducing, but the most sickening thing, to Mikasa, was the sharpie written around the pictures.

Murderer, dyke, orphan, she read through them slowly as he jaw dropped, Whore, slut, bitch, kill yourself, why are you even here, no one likes you, how could you do something like this.

"Whose locker is that?" Annie asked as she pointed to the one with the most words on it.

"Mikasa's," Eren muttered, his voice was layered in rage.

Annie swore her heart dropped into her chest. If these things were true, she knew who did it, and she was enraged. "Fuck it," she whispered to herself as she turned on her heel and walked to a specific room for a specific person.