{Attack on Titan | xReader One Shots}

{Armin x Reader} | {A Thousand Paper Cranes}

{This is for AttackonFanfiction's November contest}

~ crane one ~

You wadded the square paper up in frustration, tossing it to the side of the room. The instructions in the small pamphlet besides you showed, clearly, how to bend each fold and place the folds in the right areas, but you couldn't get the folds right. You placed two fingers on your temple, taking deep breaths. You had to fold a thousand. His birthday was next week and you needed to finish making the cranes. You tried so many times, folding, unfolding, creasing, ripping - nothing produced an object like the one displayed on the piece of paper. Why couldn't you do it? Why couldn't you make one of the most simple of paper-creations? With an exasperated sigh, you picked up another square and began again.

~ crane two ~

A single, sloppy crane sat, on its side, in the briefcase beside you. The thing took you six damn hours to get the folds correct and another two hours to make a crane that actually looked decent. The rosy pink paper bird was the result of your determination. You had another square in front of you; one more glance at the directions was enough to get you started. Your fingers bent the pale yellow paper, creating one fold. Carefully, you aligned the edges so they were even and ran your finger over the crease. You hastily unfolded the parchment, happy to see a perfect fold. Again, you folded the paper as the directions instructed you to. Again, you smiled happily and occasionally, curse with resentment. Soon, you ended up with a slightly misshapen creature; into the briefcase it went.

~ crane thirty ~

God, you hated origami. It was always the same process over and over again, never changing. You had gotten used to creating the paper birds and soon, your briefcase was littered with the things. Colors upon colors, paper upon paper, wings upon wings. At first you were obsessed, but the obsession soon faded away as the process became tedious, dragging along until you felt like pulling your [h/c] strands out of your scalp. But you couldn't stop. You had 970 more to make. 

You could do it. You would survive.

Hopefully.

~ crane 250 ~

By now, if it weren't for the fact that there were only 5 days until his birthday, you would have probably committed suicide. Your briefcase was filled with so many colors and cranes that it hurt to look at it. It hurt you to continue making the cranes. Already, you had earned 16 battle scars all over your fingers - they throbbed, aching in protest. But you ignored their internal pleas. You would persevere. 

For him. For him. For him.

You unwrapped another packet of square paper, momentarily gazing at the floral patterns adorning them. The sound of your blood screamed in your ears as you slipped a square out. 

Just 750 more to go.

~ crane 500 ~

You almost jumped out of the window with joy when you saw 250 marks on your mini whiteboard (one mark = two cranes). You erased the contents and wrote the numbers "500-1000" using the thick side of your black Expo marker. At the bottom, in small letters, the words "2 more days" informed you of how much time you had left. The joy you had left as quickly as it came. To complete all one thousand cranes, you were now required to work into the night, depriving you of all sleep and rest from work and his present. 

Sometimes you thought you tried to hard.

But this was important. He was important. You had to perfect his gift. You just had to or else your world would come crashing down and your soul would forever wallow in the depths of your failure.