You Know What They Say About Freckles?

Part Four

                "So how did it go, Levi?" Hanji asks from Levi's living room, perched in front of his coffee table. She's on her knees, sketching out plans for robotic dog legs on a large piece of blue paper with white pencil markings all over it.

"What, the date?"

"Yeah. I did a little research on him while you were gone, did you know that there are thirteen different Eren's in this area? They're spelled differently, though. There are four that are spelled with two A's in the front and an O before the N. How does your Eren spell his name? One of the Eren's was convicted with a charge for child pornography."

"I don't think it's the same Eren, Hanji."

"You never know."

"The date was fine," Levi says, changing the subject. "But why are you still here?"

Levi, finally home, drags his hands through his hair, ruining all of the work that Hanji had put into it. It falls down into it's usual position, bangs over his undercut, though some hairs refuse to be tamed and fly astray. Levi doesn't care too much, though, because it'll be all fixed by the time that he gets around to taking a shower.

"I like it here," Hanji says, switching to a different pencil, now placing black lead scratches over her plans.

She must've been here the entire time that Levi was gone - once Hanji gets set on something, it takes brutal force to pull her away from it. And if she's been working on her robotic dog legs ever since Levi left for his date, then there's no doubting that she's probably been working on it the whole time.

Levi's just arrived home, though he's had enough time to not only peer over Hanji's shoulder and see what she's working on, but he's also had time to prepare himself a cup of tea. He actually didn't make the tea - Hanji did, and he was lucky that she hadn't drank it all before he arrived. It's dark outside now, so Levi can only assume that he's been missing for a while.

"How long have I been gone?" Levi asks, standing behind Hanji as she works. He holds his tea hesitantly, knowing that if he doesn't have a firm grip on it, Hanji will end up knocking it from his grasp, or worse, the cup itself will break and Levi will have to clean up an even bigger mess - emotionally and physically. Levi loves his teacups, he feels a little betrayed when one of them breaks in his own hands.

"About two hours, maybe?" Hanji says, distracted by her dog plans. She has a laptop open beside her, and she types away furiously, doing research. Levi can't read what it says on the screen from where he stands - fuck, he really is old - but he has a feeling that it wouldn't matter if he could see it. Hanji often uses very technical terms in her Internet searches.

"Hanji?" Levi asks, trying to get her attention.

"Yeah?"

"Do you think that you could help me prepare for another date?"

Levi can tell that he's hit a button. Hanji's head whips backwards, a huge, open-mouthed smile forming on her face. She shoots up, dropping her pencils and knocking her laptop back.

"When is it? Tomorrow? Levi, we have to go shopping, you need a new outfit! Is it a themed place? Maybe we should dress you up as a knight, did you know that-"

"No, Hanji," Levi holds his hands up, pushing her away from where she was getting just a little too close to his face. "It's this weekend."

"Even better! That gives us more time."

"We're going on a picnic."

"A picnic?" she gasps, "Who's making the food? Is it you? I hope not. I've eaten your food before, Levi, and I'm sorry, but it's not that good."

Levi narrows his eyes at her. "Well, fuck you, too."

"I said I'm sorry!"

"Is that supposed to stop me from feeling bad?"

"Yes!"

Levi rolls his eyes. He and Eren had decided on the picnic idea just as Eren had stopped Levi, telling him that they were at his house. It was a pretty nice house, though it was hard for Levi to judge it too intensely due to the dark sky and the fact that he was a little more preoccupied admiring Eren's face. He'd tried to count the freckles again, but couldn't finish before Eren had turned away and started heading up the driveway to his front door.

But, he did manage to get to the number thirty - it's the amount of freckles that reside on Eren's cheek, in the cluster that Levi had kissed. Levi has a feeling that he miscounted, though, because Eren kept moving his head and blushing.

Levi honestly can't wait until he can see Eren again. He'd managed to steal Eren's phone number from him, which gives him hope that maybe he'll hear his voice again before the weekend rolls around. The weekend isn't for another three days, but Levi feels like that's too long to be separated from someone so attractive, someone so pleasing to be around, someone so angelic.

"Where's the picnic going to be?" Hanji asks, slowly lowering herself back down to the ground to clean up the mess that she'd made.

"The park down the street," Levi says, setting his tea down on the edge of the coffee table, in the only corner not covered by Hanji's immense amounts of paper. Normally he'd be upset at her lack of organization, but he can't bring himself to be mad, especially not after he's gotten nearly two hours of pure euphoria.

"The one that I ran into Erwin at?" Hanji asks.

"That's the one."

"Oh, Levi! That's perfect. Can I come with you?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"It's a date, Hanji. You can meet him later."

"But what if I want to meet him now?"

"I don't give a shit what you want."

Levi walks over to head into his kitchen, and he glances back to see that Hanji's pouting. He shoots her the middle finger and walks away, hearing her cry out in protest as he turns from her.

Levi's still not too sure who Erwin is, or why Hanji's so preoccupied with making his dog robot legs, or if Erwin is even aware that she's doing it for him. But he'll let her have her fun, because she's letting him have his fun. Hanji could, essentially, ruin his date if she wanted to. She's smart enough. She's talented enough.

She seems to understand, though, that Levi felt something click when he met Eren. Levi's not normally one for grabbing strangers and asking them out on dates, but Eren was different. Eren was beautiful. He had freckles and legs and fingers and tanned skin, he had a laugh that drew Levi in and locked him in place. It's almost as if he's chained to Eren, because Levi's positive that if he lost Eren now, a part of him would break. He hardly knows Eren, but he truly feels like there's something different about him.

Maybe Levi's finally going insane, though. It's about time. He's old, isn't he?

But maybe as long as he can be with Eren by his side and an eccentric Hanji in the room over, he'll be fine with being insane. And old.