Roman Holiday

There You are Again

It had been a couple days since Bertolt had met Reiner, and the former hadn't seen the latter since. He didn't know why, but every day that Reiner wasn't there Bertolt would be incredibly anxious. His knee would bounce up and down as he stared at the door, and his handwriting was quick and messy.

Of course, it was a troubling affair to know that he was brooding over this. The boy was arrogant, cruel, and was rather unapproachable. He knew that this guy, this absolutely absurd guy, was trouble. Bertolt was the complete opposite of Reiner, and maybe that was why he was so drawn to him. Maybe Bertolt was simply curious of a new kid instead of the same thing over and over again, but he had to push that one as irrational because there had been plenty of new students and yet, he usually never talked to them after they were settled.

Seeing the seat empty once again, Bertolt sighed and sank down into his own. Could it be possible that Reiner had already transferred to another school? Was it possible that Bertolt was the cause of that? Said boy sank lower into his seat as those thoughts swam around. Normally things wouldn't bother him like this, but it was really getting to him now.

With a few more students in the classroom already, the door opened to reveal Reiner with an annoyed expression once more. Bertolt resisted the urge to smile at him and ask him to sit by him. He's not my friend. He doesn't like me.

Bertolt's thoughts were getting darker by the second, and so he got up, pasted a smile on his face with a few sheets of paper in his right grip. He held them out to the blonde man after walking to the back of the room. Slowly, and painfully, Reiner looked from the papers and up to Bertolt's face.

"Oh great, you're still here." he said sarcastically. "What the hell is that?" Reiner asked after a moment, smirking a bit when Bertolt's face moved into a blank face and irritated eyes. Why did I want him here again?

"These are the notes from the last few days, since you weren't here." he told the other boy, still holding them out to him.

"Yeah sorry, I was meeting with my probation officer to see if I had beat anyone else up for annoying me. I hadn't though, of course." Reiner informed with a mocking smirk. "Yet."

"Just take the notes please." Bertolt told Reiner. Reiner faltered a bit at the attitude he had gotten from the seemingly kind boy.

"Why are you being nice to me? Haven't I made it clear that I don't want you around me?" Reiner asked lowly.

"Like I said, I'm doing it because its my responsibility. Do what you will with them, I made an extra copy for you so you don't have to worry about returning them. Not that you would anyways." Bertolt said before turning to walk off.

"You're really getting on my nerves, you know that right?" Reiner asked. Bert just turned with a smile.

"I try." was all he said, sitting in his desk and tuning out everything else. Bertolt wasn't normally one to associate with someone that acted like that. He would usually shy away from trouble, but there he was trying to provoke it nearly.

The day went by rather quickly, and the group found themselves eating lunch together in the courtyard of the school. Bert didn't mean to, but as soon as he caught a glimpse of Reiner, his eyes followed his every move like a magnet. Don't think that this went unnoticed of course.

"I heard that he got arrested the other day." Eren said while eating some chips. Jean snorted at him while leaning against Marco who was leaning against a tree. "What is your problem, horse?"

"I'm not a horse! And if you're so mesmerized by that kid, why don't you just go suck his-"

"Jean!" Marco scolded before it got too serious. "We talked about this, did we not? You don't talk like that." Jean rolled his eyes as soon as Marco turned away. "I could practically hear you roll your eyes, Jean."

"What can he say? The horse has some hay." Ymir threw in.

"You're really not helping the situation, Ymir." Armin said in response. She rolled her eyes at him.

"Come on Jean, if I whip will you neigh neigh?" Eren taunted, earning a slap to the back of the head from Mikasa. "Hey! Bert, she's being mean to me." he pouted, bringing Bertolt out of his trance with Reiner. Bertolt smiled softly.

"Mikasa, can you please stop hurting my brother? And Eren, stop provoking Jean before he tries to hit you too." he said softly, almost timidly. Everyone loved Bert, and they all gushed about how cute and innocent he always was. No one could be mean to him; except for Reiner.

"Could you stop fucking staring at me? It's creepy as hell." Reiner said, suddenly appearing in front if Bertolt. Bert hadn't actually been looking at him when answering Eren, so he wasn't aware of his presence.

"Hey, man, chill out. He probably wasn't even staring at you, just lost in thought." Jean said to Reiner. None of them had actually learned his name yet.

"Really? Because he sure has been a real pain in my ass lately." he responded irritably. Bertolt looked at the ground sadly.

"I'm sorry." he told the man quietly, feeling bad instantly to know he had caused him trouble. He didn't know why he felt bad now, he had basically been taunting him before. Reiner stiffened when he hear the words come out of the tall, awkward boy's mouth.

"Ah, c'mon man. There isn't a need to be mean to my brother. He doesn't mean any harm." Eren said with a sad look, he always hated when people were mean to Bertolt. He knew how sensitive he could get.

"Brother?" Reiner asked, mildly intrigued now as he inspected the situation. He could see the resemblance.

"My family adopted Eren when his parents died." Bert explained, sending an apologetic glance to Eren who shrugged it off. It didn't bother him that much anymore. "Most of us have, or had, siblings in this group at one time or another." he added.

"Yeah, Ymir is my sister, Mikasa had a brother named Levi here who graduated a year or two ago, Bert and Eren, Jean had an older brother. We're all one big family." Marco said while putting his arm around Jean almost to emphasize him saying Jean was family. The two-tone haired boy just kind of deflated a bit.

"Alright." Reiner said after a moment or two. He had never seen so many people get along in one place.

"Jean, your brother was like super hot. How come you look like the barn yard animal?" Eren asked. Jean had the look of death in his eyes, but Marco held him back with a nervous chuckle.

"I happen to think that Jean is handsome. You really shouldn't be so mean to him." Marco defended.

"Well, you would say that seeing as how you're always taking it up the ass from him." Ymir said with a smirk, making her twin brother blush and his eyes widen.

"I'm going back to class." Marco said after a moment. Everyone kind of slowly turned to look at Reiner, who had seen the whole encounter.

"I'll just go then." he said, not entirely sure if he was supposed to have seen that.

"Wait!" Bertolt said as he started to walk away. It was loud for him, but hardly anyone heard him. But alas, Reiner stopped and turned to look at him. "Come to church Sunday. We'd love to have you." he said with a smile.

"Right, because that's totally what I want to do on my days off. Sit on a hard bench listening to someone scream at me about God for an hour and a half." he deadpanned, making Bertolt's smile drop again. He sure did seem to do that a lot, didn't he? "I'll think about it, alright? Jeez." Reiner said before shaking his head and walking away.

Bertolt smiled to himself. Finally.