Chasing Summer

Let's Give This a Shot

Seven days until I was supposed to leave Shiganshina. Every day had been marked off the calendar with high hopes for the future. No longer would I be restrained to this town. I would be free to do as I please, to go where no one knew my name. I had been looking forward to this for so long, the light in the distance that allowed me to crawl forward through the darkness. That was until I met Eren. Now, every time I thought about leaving, I thought about how I would never see him again, or see that brilliant smile of his, or those enrapturing eyes. How could I leave?

            How could I stay?

            I had answers to neither question.

            I sat in the school library next to Jean, who was pretending to work on an assignment Ms. Brzenska had given us at the beginning of class. Even though there was only one week left of school, she never cut us any slack. Her motto was: Breaks don't exist on the path to success. Basically, she was the one high school teacher you couldn't wait to be rid of.

            As Jean mumbled something under his breath, I let my eyes wander toward the boy whose head was bent over a small red book. Eren had pressed the back of his wheelchair against the largest bookcase in the library. He was sitting in plain sight, yet I was the only one who looked his way. I watched his expression change as he read. One moment he looked intense, thoughtful, and the next he would smile and give his head a little shake.

            I liked everything about him, which made me groan in defeat and drop my head onto my folded arms, because I didn't know what to do. Since the night spent at Gayle's Peak, I had tested the waters. I had attempted (and failed) to flirt with him, which forced me to see that I sucked at it. Whenever he looked at me with those damn gorgeous eyes of his, I became speechless mush. I couldn't think at all. My brain more or less clocked out for the day, and said, "Heh, sorry man, you're on your own."

            Stupid, useless brain.

            "Eren is looking at you," Jean said.

            The second my head whipped up, Eren's shot down. It had been like this for the last couple of days. We were tiptoeing around each other, because we didn't know how to go about this. Petra had told me that he was hesitant to initiate anything because I was leaving town, so he didn't want to put himself out there to just be rejected. At first, I was grateful for this, but now, I wasn't so sure. I wasn't sure about anything anymore.

            Jean elbowed me. "Go talk to him."

            "I don't know how to talk to him," I confessed.

            "Ask him if he's going with us this weekend."

            At the end of every school year, Coach Smith threw something for the graduating class. Usually he did it in town, but since I was leaving Shiganshina after this school year was up, he decided to take us all into Trost, let us roam the city under his supervision as a farewell gift to me.

            "He's probably not," I said. "His dad is strict about this shit."

            "You missed the whole point. What you were supposed to do is go over there and use that to strike up a conversation with him. So, get going." He shoved me out of my seat, and I stumbled to the side before I regained my balance. I gave him a look, but he just waved me forward.

            For one miserable moment, I forgot how to walk, and then the cogs in my brain began to work again and my legs reanimated (Oh, that's how it's done. Yes, I remember now). I couldn't take my eyes off of Eren as I approached him. He was still looking down at the book he was holding, but I could tell by the small grin on his face that he wasn't reading anymore. What was he expecting me to say? What did he want me to say?