Be My Salvation (Ereri/Riren)

VI

Ugh, sorry about the wait again. Working on two stories at once is hard, lol, but I'm doing the best I can. Thanks for being so patient, guys ♥

Above is essentially what Eren's cat looks like, though with darker eyes just to provide a visual :3

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Eren was temporarily dumbfounded in silence. How did Levi figure it out so quickly? He briefly wondered if he should lie about being the one behind the gift, but decided against it almost faster than he'd thought about it - he wasn't particularly keen on the idea of getting caught up in a needless lie, and he'd already concluded not to deny it were Levi to put the pieces together.

"How'd you know it was me?" he asked after a moment.

Levi crossed his arms. "Please. You're the only one who's made any kind of effort to talk to me, and the only one who might know I play the violin is the one I share a room with."

That was more words and personality Eren had seen out of him in a few seconds than he had in several weeks. Suppressing his surprise, he pressed his lips together. That meant Levi knew he'd snooped through his stuff. Guilt swelled in his stomach and he dipped his head.

"I'm sorry," he mumbled.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Levi take a couple small, lazy steps forward. "Can't exactly be pissed if you used your damn wish on me," he muttered. "Even though it makes zero sense."

The brunet snuck a short glance up at the other. When their eyes caught, he found himself unable to look away. He drew in a silent, deep breath to buy himself time to come up with the right words. In truth, he wasn't entirely sure of that reason himself, but he owed Levi an explanation.

"If you're in a place like this...it means you've lost a lot. I know what that's like, and Petra is already letting me keep my cat..." He punctuated the sentence with a small shrug and directed part of his attention to scratching behind Lucy's ears.

The dark-headed boy relented, moving just a few more steps in and sinking to the floor several feet from Eren, crossing his legs but keeping his arms securely over his chest at the same time. He sized the boy up for a moment, any and all traces of skepticism and confusion wiped to revert his features back to their impassive state.

"You know nothing about me," Levi said. The statement wasn't particularly bitter, but Eren internally cringed anyway. He was right, and Eren had no right to snoop through his things in the first place.

"I know," Eren mumbled back.

"So what was the point?"

Eren ground his teeth together. "If you don't want it, I'll just take it back," he muttered. "Save you the trouble..."

A thin brow lifted by a minuscule amount. "Trouble?"

"Of asking these questions that I have no answers to."

That ended the conversation, but not what little of a 'relationship' the gesture sparked. It was odd at first, how much Eren wanted to talk to Levi more after that and, despite the way the conversation ended, how easily Levi seemed to accept it as if he felt the same way.

That same night, Eren finally mustered up the guts to whisper a 'goodnight' through the dark silence of their room.

"Night, kid."

To that, Eren frowned. Kid? He can't be that much older than me...

Levi's attempts to get answers about the violin out of Eren came in subtler attempts, but Eren saw right through most of them. They didn't speak often, but as the sunny, thunderstorm-y days of a couple weeks went by, their conversations became more frequent; Eren still found himself reluctant to speak, found the stone in his chest to be seemingly sharper on some days whereas on others, it almost seemed non-existent; he still refrained from speaking when he didn't have to. Aside from Petra, though (and of course Lucy), Levi was the one he was most comfortable around - not nearly comfortable enough to tell him a whole lot, although he could tell Levi was in the same boat.