I'll Make You Bleed

Put on a Happy Face (Reiner POV)

**written by: blueTshirts** 

8:18 PM 

"Do you even know how long a horse dick is?" Jean says as he glares at Connie for making another horse joke.

"Do you even know how long my dick is?" Connie replies, taking a hit from the joint we've been passing around. Sasha starts to giggle from the floor and Connie points at her. "Don't answer that."

Everyone starts laughing and Connie shuts up in defeat and passes the blunt to Jean beside him. I lean back into the leather couch feeling a nice weightlessness that comes with a subtle high. I still feel pretty self aware as of now but I'd made Bert to promise before coming here to not let me get too far into the booze or the grass. I don't want this weekend to turn into a sob session. I'm constantly worried whenever someone asks how I am.

"So Reiner," Armin says from his position on the floor next to Annie. He's completely sober; he hasn't even looked at a beer since he got here, and neither has Annie. It's a little odd. "How's the gym? Still enjoying it?"

My heart sinks. You mean, how's life been since I impulsively dropped out of college and started working full time at the same gym I've worked at my entire life? And how I'm worried that I've wasted my life because I have no goals and that possibly the only good thing in my life, Berthold, might leave me once he realizes that I'm a complete piece of shit? Honestly, I've had better days. "Good, pretty good, just kind of same ol'," I say nonchalantly. Haha, no depression here. "How bout you? Still nose deep in the books?"

Armin kind of laughs, "Yeah, it's been pretty cool, but mostly busy, I barely sleep enough in a day."

"Yeah, I hear ya," I mumble hoping someone picks up the conversation for me. Bert massages my shoulder gently with his arm resting on the back of the couch. As much as my fucked up mind is telling me that I don't deserve someone so sweet, so thoughtful, so intelligent, and so considerate, at least Bert is there to tell me that I'm wrong. No matter how many times I make him say it, Berthold never seems to get tired of telling me that he loves me and that he's never leaving me.

All I have to do is try to believe him.

"Are you still working at the library?" Marco asks thankfully.

"Yeah," Armin says, "I love it, it's honestly amazing."

"Man, I bet you I'd be rich if I got paid for being at the library, I think those books see me more than Jean does," Marco says.

"True," Jean grunts.

"I mean, at least you guys are still in school," Eren says jokingly. Although, no one laughs. We all know Eren had to drop out of school after his brother's arrest. Eren was in Pre Med like Marco, he was excited. We were all excited to start college after High School, and boy has that changed.

"Any thoughts of going back?" Marco asks Eren. The room remains silent. The blunt is passed along until it gets to Eren.

He shrugs. "I don't know, the public image of the Jaeger name isn't great. I can barely go to a movie without someone asking if I'm related to Zeke."

My worry about anyone finding out that I'm miserable at the moment turns to guilt. Eren has been through so much this year. He's lost almost everything, and yet he's still trying. I feel almost pathetic being in the same room with him.

"And how is the case going?" Marco asks. The tension in the room rises and we all make panicked glances at each other.

Mikasa jumps in to protect Eren. "You don't have to answer that."