Crack of Sunlight (Ereri/Riren)

•~Chapter Four~•

That Monday when Eren stepped foot into the shop, he was greeted by the familiar scent of green soap, the sharp sound of tattoo machines, idle chatter, a new face, and of course Reiner's booming voice.

"Hey, Eren! Haven't seen your face in a while. How goes it?"

"Pretty good," said Eren with a small smile. It was his general answer for anyone he hadn't seen in the past few weeks, and it was only really a half truth. "You?"

"Same old, same old. Hey, this is my cousin, Bertolt." He gestured to the tall guy in the corner nearest the door, the source of the buzzing. He was hard at work on some guy's shoulder, who nodded a 'sup' at Eren. He was concentrating so hard there was a sheen of sweat on his wrinkled forehead and he didn't seem to hear Reiner.

"Yo, Bert!"

The buzzing ceased and Bertholdt's head snapped up. "What?" he fumbled, earning a chuckle out of the three others in the room.

"This is Eren," Reiner said. "The one I told you about."

"Oh, hey," said Bert before he got back to work. Reiner rolled his eyes.

"He's a workaholic," he muttered. "But he's a nice guy. Talented, too." Reiner gestured at a new frame leaning against his desk with a colorful piece of artwork inside it. "And a nerd."

"You said he's your cousin?" Eren asked, glancing back at the guy. Eren saw no resemblance between Reiner - blond-haired and blue-eyed with fair skin and strong bone structure - and Bertholdt - dark-haired, skinned, and eyed with more delicate features and a subtly curved nose. The only mild similarity was the size - they were both at least six feet tall.

Reiner snickered. "Yeah, but he was adopted. Didn't even know he was into tattooing until about six months ago. I told him I'd hire him when business picked up, and then when you and Levi went AWOL, I needed more help so I contacted him and he took the job right away."

Eren scratched the back of his head in mild guilt. "Well...what about Petra?"

As if on cue, the front door swung open and Eren swiveled around to see said redhead stride through the door. She'd shaved the side of her head to reveal a new tattoo on her scalp - intricate lettering of something in a language Eren didn't have time to recognize because he was being enveloped in her gentle arms.

"Hi, Eren," she said with a smile. "It's great to see you again."

He patted her back and laughed a bit. "Yeah, you too."

They got to work after that. Petra busied herself setting up her station for her first customer and Reiner started Eren on a new project.

"How good would you say your interior design skills are?" he asked, leading the teen to the back room he'd already spent so much time in. On the opposite wall of all the boxes were stacks of frames, some containing art, others pictures, most empty.

"I dunno...on a scale of one to ten, maybe a...five?"

"Then I guess we'll have to put our heads together," Reiner said. "I'd say I'm about a five too, so between us we should make a tentative ten." He chuckled. "I wanna redesign the walls," he explained. "I've had all of this artwork sitting at home forever. When I hire an artist, I request art they wouldn't mind me putting on display. Last time I pretty much chose everything at random 'cause I was in a hurry to get it done so I could open the place up. I figure a change of scenery might be kinda nice, y'know?"

Eren nodded and studied the stacks of frames, absently wondering how much of it was Levi's.

"I think we have quite a lot to work with, including what's already hung up. And Alex...if she wasn't already busy with work, I'd ask her to come in and help you. Her eye is impeccable when it comes to stuff like this. Unfortunately..."