Bite Me.

15.

Levi was worried. Not worried really, because he didn't feel anxiety. Not now, not ever. But there was a strange racing of his heart when he saw Eren on Monday morning. He wasn't talking to anybody and his lip was split and eyes sunken, dark circles around them. Had he been fighting with somebody, or was it Archer? But when he confronted his brother about it- only because he was curious, that was all- he replied that it wasn't him. This was quite a mystery. He had to get to the bottom of this somehow, without revealing that maybe there was some small ounce of his being that cared just a little bit.

Eren stared after his friends as they stormed away, thinking about the angry 'conversation' he'd just had with them. Mikasa and Armin had cornered him in the locker room and demanded that he explain what was going on, and why he looked like he'd been getting beaten up.
'Was that Archer?' Armin had pointed to his eye. He shook his head, being honest for once.
'Who was it, then?'
'I was just playing with May. You know how clumsy I am...'
'Eren!' Mikasa hissed, grabbing his arm and squeezing hard. 'Stop lying to us. We're your friends, you owe us that much. If somebody is bothering you, just tell us and I'll beat them up for you.'
'Nobody is!' He lied through his teeth.
'What are you hiding? I know it's something to do with that guy who thinks he's the king or something and his brother,' Armin glared at him, bitter now more than concerned for his friend.
'Just leave me alone!' Eren growled, shoving past them and ignoring their yelling about how they were not sticking around for his bullshit for a second longer. And now he was watching them walk away from him.
For the rest of the day, he found that none of his other friends would speak to him. How mature of them. Apparently they were also annoyed that he was hiding things from everyone. Clearly Armin and Mikasa had been slagging him off to them.
Great- just great. In the space of 10 days, his entire world had been turned upside down, sideways and then thrown into a tumble dryer for good measure. He had been banking on escaping to one of his friends' houses if things got really bad at home, but now he had nowhere to go. He dragged his feet as he walked home, procrastinating walking through the door as much as he could, not having anybody to hang out with until his mum yelled down the phone for him to 'get his ass home before she dragged him back by his hair'. And, he realised, it was all the fault of Levi. If he hadn't accidentally invited him to that party, he might never have had to stay away for the entire weekend and make everybody suspicious; he might not have been so lost in thought all the time and he definitely wouldn't be acting like an addict going through withdrawal symptoms. He kicked a stone across the street, watching it smack into a Ford Fiesta and create a small scratch. Thankfully, the owner was nowhere around, so he kept walking. The lack of motivation to go home and the weight of everything that had gone wrong and the lies he was telling slowed him down so much that he arrived home half an hour later than he usually would. His mum didn't even comment on this, understand exactly why he had turned up so late when usually he was a very punctual person. He sat down to dinner, which he could see was far more than she could afford. Clearly Mick had 'persuaded' her to buy all of this expensive meat. He kept glancing up at her and his sister as he ate to make sure that they were unharmed. They appeared relatively unscratched, if perhaps a little anxious.
'How was school?' Carla smiled at her son, putting on her best front of being perfectly fine with the situation.
'Fine,' he mumbled, not wanting to somehow incur the wrath of his uncle. Apparently he couldn't avoid this, as Mick demanded he answer the question properly.
'I had a great day and I really enjoyed all my lessons,' he replied sardonically.
'Don't take that tone with me,' Mick rose his gruff voice.
'He's had a long week. He was at a party last Friday and stayed with a friend for a few days,' Carla excused him, trying to wind the situation down.
'A party, eh?'
'Yeah. Guy from school.'
'Should've been home looking after your poor mother.'
That was the thing with Mick; once he was in one of his moods, he could find fault in anything. His opinions changed as quickly as his moods, edited to fit his temper. More often that not, he just wanted an excuse to hit somebody. Usually the best method of avoiding his fists was apologising profusely and bowing your head to him. But Mick had unfortunately hit on something of a nerve here.
'I do look after my mother,' Eren stood up, his jaw tensing. 'Do you look after her? Do you look after your wife or your daughter? Oh, that's right. You're too busy in prison to do any of that.'
Mick shoved his chair backwards violently, the loud bang making May cry, and lunged towards his nephew. He grabbed him by the front of his shirt and lifted him into the air, bellowing at him sentences that could barely be separated out into individual words. He rammed the boy against the wall, his head smacking with a dull thud and leaving a dent in the plaster. Eren's vision swum, and he could hear May screaming at her dad to put him down, and his mum crying. Mick slowly dropped Eren to the ground, where he crumpled, clutching the side of his head, feeling warm blood seeping onto his fingers. May saw this too and launched herself at her father, armed with a fork. He swatted her away, but she came at him again and again until he could stand fending her off no longer. He grabbed her by the hair and kicked her feet out from under her. She was silent for a moment, taking a few seconds to fully comprehend what had just happened. When she did, she began screeching in pain and crawled towards her brother. Eren looked from his complacent mother to his little sister. He grabbed May and pulled her into his arms, heaving himself to his feet.
'That's it,' he snapped. 'I've fucking had enough of this. Mum, I don't expect you to come with me, but I'm leaving. And I'm bringing May with me. Don't bother asking me to come back until he's gone.' He stormed out the door, slamming it hard and letting May curl up into his chest. He took his mum's car, not sure where he was going or what the hell he was going to do. He didn't have anywhere to go; his contingency plan had been ruined when he'd fallen out with all of his friends. No, there was one place he could go... It was probably the worst idea ever and he'd love to regret it, but it was at least somewhere Mick would never find him. Maybe it was more dangerous than his house, but it was his only chance. They'd likely tell him to get on the road anyway. They weren't exactly charitable people. But where else could he go? He had literally nobody else.