Clearing

Chapter 5

warnings for this chapter: mild violence

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A week after what I had started to mentally refer to as "the infirmary incident", Jean was released from observation, and returned to training.

I had completely lost track of time after everything that happened. When he had sat himself down at the table in the morning, I had jumped so hard that I had inhaled a sip of the water I was drinking and broken out into a coughing fit. Armin had patted me on the back as I had spluttered, trying to regain my breath, my eyes watering.

Eventually, the coughing had stopped, and I had taken another sip to try and clear my head and my throat. Eren had looked at me like I was having a stroke, and Mikasa had clamped her lips together to stifle a grin. Sasha put her hand on my shoulder, but I didn't miss the suggestive smile on her lips.

Jean, however, raised an eyebrow at me and deliberately looked me up and down, causing a furious flush to heat my face. I had wanted to run away or hide under the table, but that would make everything blaringly obvious. If I hadn't seen to that already.

Thankfully, Armin had noticed my discomfort and lessened it by moving on to ramble about his new favorite subject: leaf structure.

"What the fuck, Armin?" I looked at him incredulously. "Leaf structure?"

"Yeah!" He waved his fork at me, this time showcasing the piece of lettuce he had pierced on it instead of trying to permanently blind me. "They photosynthesize!"

"Photo-what?" I scrunched my eyes shut, not prepared for a biology lecture at eight thirty in the morning. "Can't you talk to Hange about this? I'm sure they'd love to discuss the ideas of photosynthe- your plant thingy, and how it might apply to titans."

"They use the sun to make food." Armin bounced slightly in his chair, ignoring my comment and turning towards me. "How neat is that? I think it'd be cool to be a plant."

"You've lost your mind." I sighed, but I couldn't help smiling.

My eyes flicked over to Jean despite myself, and I saw him propping his chin up on his hand, watching me intently. He grinned when he saw me glance at him, and I jumped again, not expecting him to be looking. The movement caused my knee to hit the underside of the table hard, and I winced.

Armin paused his rambling to look back at me, his hands in the air like he'd been trying to draw out some diagram for me. Knowing him, that's probably exactly what he had been doing.

"Are you alright?" He asked, lowering his hands. "You're acting strange."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm fine." I said, turning towards Jean and shooting a glare at him. His grin widened.

Armin glanced between me and Jean before looking over at Marco. I watched, more than a little confused, as silent words seemed to pass between the two of them. Marco nodded, and Armin resumed his lecture on whatever the hell a chloroplast was.

Thanks to Armin's leaf discussion, the rest of breakfast had passed reasonably quickly. So had most of the day, until we moved out into the field and had to pair up for training. I had turned towards Armin, who was my usual pair for things like this, but the little cretin had ran off and paired with Marco.

Everyone else had paired with their usual partner, so that left me with...

Armin, you little shit.

He grinned mischievously at me, and immediately turned away to face Marco, who had the same devilish look on his face. I stuck my middle finger up at both of them, and Marco snorted, clapping a hand over his mouth and trying hard not to laugh as he looked back at Armin.