My body seemed to fly across the room as I made a mad dash to snatch the book out of Armin's hands.
But it was too late.
He had read it.
His face said it all.
"(Y-Y/N)... that..--"
"--Was something you weren't supposed to see!" I snapped, "Both of you!"
Mikasa's face was heavy with shock as she gazed at my trembling hand holding the diary. "That book... you... you said you hated werewolves!!"
My glare turned to Mikasa, who was slightly shaking.
"A person died!!" Armin cried out, making me look back at him.
"You said you hate werewolves, so why do you have something like that?!"
"How come you never told me this (Y/N)?!"
"Why do you have a dead person's diary?!!"
Shut up.
"Enough! Shut the hell up, both of you!!" I raised my voice, making it deeper and stronger.
The two fell silent, both with shock written all over their face.
Calm down (Y/N), calm down.
I glanced at Armin, his blue eyes swirling with emotions.
"Armin. If I tell you what's going on, promise me, you'll never tell a soul."
The blonde boy didn't reply for a little bit, but then he finally gave a nod. "I promise."
My gaze turned to Mikasa. "You too. Not a single word."
Mikasa answered almost immediately. "I promise."
After reassuring myself once more, I sat down with the diary in my hands. Thank god Petra is coming back late.
"I found this diary... when we were at the expedition."
"At Rose Lake?" Mikasa asked, frowning.
I nodded. "It was in the dirt, in the forest of our data collection range. I was taking notes when I slipped on the book and fell."
Armin nodded, eyeing the diary with curiosity.
"This diary.. belongs to a graduate from this school. Her name is Ilse Langnar. She was trying to find information on the history of werewolves, but she was killed when she had found the lead."
Silence. There was only silence after I explained the main story of it. Finally, Armin spoke up. "What was the lead? Where was it?"
I knew he would ask something like that.
"Where the lead is... I haven't an idea. But what-- no.. who the lead is..."
I paused, gazing at Armin, hoping to send a clear message. Prepare yourself.
"Dr. Grisha Jaeger."
Armin froze, his breath held in. He didn't move, not even a single twitch of his eye. Mikasa's eyes were wide, and her breathing shook.
I gazed at the two of them, wondering what their reactions were going to be.
The blonde boy started shaking his head, a hand going over his mouth. "What...? How...."
Mikasa's shocked grey eyes met mine. "Eren... does he..?"
I shook my head. "I don't think he knows. He still believes his father went missing and passed away."
Armin seemed to have regained control of his emotions. "But how? How can Dr. Jaeger be the lead of the history of werewolves?"
"Ilse explained that. Apparently, Dr. Jaeger is the anonymous writer of the werewolf origins book. She tried to go meet him to get an interview, but he was found dead in his home."
"That's all?"
I thought for a moment. "No.. there was a note by his body, Ilse wrote it down. I'll read it to you.
Hello, Dr. Grisha Jaeger
How have you been doing?
I'm sorry to hear that you were unfairly kicked to a mental hospital. It must've been dreadful.
So , I see you've started writing again.
Didn't we have an agreement?
I made you my allie, but you betrayed me.
How could you Grisha?
You already betrayed me once, and I was still able to forgive.
But you tried to betray me again.
I let you in the secret of our lives, yet you planned to expose it.
Take notice, that this will not be taken lightly.
Your punishment will be served.
Regards,
KAM
That's it."
Armin narrowed his eyes at my words, and Mikasa fell into deep thought.
"Who's Kam?" Armin asked, lifting his head up.
"I don't know," I partially lied. Armin didn't need to know what I remembered during the murder of my parents.
Mikasa stayed quiet as Armin began to think of a plan. "Ilse's lead has snapped, but we're still holding on a to a thread of the rope. We know someone who can very well be the last person linked to this."
"Eren?" Mikasa murmured, her eyes shining with worry. "But he has the mouth of a leaking bucket, it's just going to spill everywhere."
"Well, we don't need to tell him the whole story," Armin reasoned, "We just need to figure out how to bring up the subject of his father naturally."
"If we can just get a clue from Eren..." The pretty raven murmured, pulling up her scarf.
"We'll be taking one step closer to the truth," Armin finished for her.
I set the book down with a sigh. "You seem very determined to know the answer, Armin."
"The truth has been left in the dark for so long. People use werewolves as a story to scare children at night. I just want to know the truth. There's a chance werewolves aren't what we thought."
"Well, whatever happens, this diary must never reach the public," I said sternly, crossing my arms.
Now Mikasa was the one who spoke up. "Why do care so much about this (Y/N)? You despise werewolves from what happened in your past. But why do you want to keep this a secret so much?"
I took a deep breath. "Werewolves have been thought to be extinct for centuries. There's no need for me to stir up trouble with this story. I--"
"But they aren't," Armin cut off, meeting my eyes. "They're not extinct."
I tilted my head in confusion. "I know... I don't exactly have any solid proof... but I just know they aren't. They're still here, they've always been here. Small, quiet news that never reached the media, telling about stories how they befriended werewolves."
I looked at Armin in slight shock. He really has been doing everything he can to find out the truth.
"I know they might have bad past, and I also know that there might be bad werewolves out there... but... what about those who were born as a werewolf out of their own will..."
Armin trailed off, keeping the last sentences to himself. Suddenly, he turned to me. "But you've never been interested with the life of werewolves (Y/N). If you had secretly given this tip to the authorities, you would've been able avenge your parents' death. So why didn't you?"
This time, Mikasa also looked at me, waiting for an answer. It seemed that she was also extremely curious to know my answer.
I don't know...
"Ilse.. lost her life trying to find the answer. If I had given the tip, then her struggle, her death... all of it would've been in vain. And the authorities... if they found that werewolves still exists, then there would be total chaos everywhere!"
Mikasa lowered her gaze, her hand on softly tugging her scarf. I glanced at Armin. "But I know you were right about one thing."
The blonde boy raised a brow in question.
"That somewhere in this damned world, there are those who were born as a werewolf out of their own will. I don't want to be the person to take innocent lives, human or not."
I stared at Armin straight in the eye.
"And if what you said was true... that werewolves still exists in this planet...." I gulped, a frown on my lips. Mikasa looked up to meet my gaze.
"Then if this diary makes it out to public... this time, their extinction will be definite."
***
Armin and Mikasa kept their word. They never talked about the diary, nor ever mention the topic.
Levi and I have been hanging out a lot more lately, spending time after school to study together or have a drink.
But even so, whenever I wasn't studying or hanging out with Levi, I found myself sitting down at the side of the building with Annie.
We'd chat lightly, insult some teachers together, talk crap about the school and stuff. I found myself enjoying her company more and more.
My grades were slowly rising back up, my friendship with everyone returned, basically, life was going great for me.
Sure, there'd be times where I pulled several all-nighters to study, or my usual quarrels with Petra that always ended up with us apologizing to each other, but other than that, life was good. And I hope, it stays good.
I sighed, closing my diary. Yes, I started writing a diary.
It was actually Annie's idea for me. She told me, whenever I was feeling stressed or that I had so much emotions in me, and no one was around to listen to me, I should write it down.
Whatever I needed to get out, just write it in a book.
"It's not just writing words. You're writing down your emotions. Let them pour out on the paper. Whatever's in your head, write it down. I promise, it'll make you feel a lot better."
Annie said that's how she coped with hard times, when there wasn't anyone to be with her. When she was going through hell, and she only had herself to rely on.
I think she was a bit happier when I said that I'll be there if she needed a shoulder to lean on.
I placed my diary in my desk drawer, locked it, and placed the key in a small fake pot plant that had a secret space if you lifted the plant up.
It was still early, so I had no need to rush getting ready for school.
Finals were only a few days away, and I had already prepared beforehand.
One week of absolute torture. Studying every single day, pulling all-nighters, drinking coffee, reading books.. damn I hate finals.
After that, the first graders will head off to their one month expedition, and we the seniors will have their graduation ceremony and prom night, with us second graders as their guests.
Prom.
Dancing.
Party.
Crap. I don't do that shit. And aren't you supposed to have a date to go to prom?
I scoffed. No way in hell.
I got up from my chair and headed for the bathroom, getting ready for school.
***
Armin's at it again.
He's been slowly trying to get Eren to talk about his father for months.
Yes, it's been months. It's been over a semester. Actually, we're finishing up the year. It's been that long.
As I heard the conversation over Eren and Armin, I had a feeling this time he was going to get something good out of it.
"Hm... I can't wait to go see Ms. Falida again. That, and I also need to get a few things from her," Eren said, eating a chip.
"Things? You left stuff with her?" Armin asked, tilting his head curiously.
"Yeah." Eren chewed his chip, swallowing and taking another.
"Why?"
The emerald-eyed boy placed the chip in his mouth. "Well, I didn't exactly leave it with her, my dad did."
"Your dad left something with Ms. Falida? Do you even know what it is?" I couldn't help myself to not ask the question.
Eren looked at me. "No idea. I just remembered Ms. Falida saying something along those lines to me years ago. Now that we're nearing legal age, I just want to get my all of my stuff from her."
He looked at me and Armin for a second. "You know, it's kind of sad considering the fact we never got adopted."
We nodded together, realisation finally sinking in. Despite the fact that we're happy with our lives, we never did get the chance to grow up with a mother and father.
Eren spoke up out of nowhere. "Hey, you wanna know something cool?"
"What?"
"I know you all say I have a shitty memory--"
"--But you do," Armin cut in, chuckling lightly.
Eren narrowed his eyes, slightly glaring at Armin. "Even though you claim I have a shitty memory, I still remember something my dad said to me once."
I cleared my throat. "Which is?"
Eren smirked, pride gleaming in his eyes. "He said, he's going to build and perfect his medical centre, and he also plans on becoming a writer!"
Armin's eyes shone at the word 'writer', his attention falling on completely on Eren. "Writer? Write what?"
"Hah! You're such a nerd Armin," Eren laughed, smiling afterwards. But he continued anyway, "He didn't exactly say what he was going to write, but I vaguely remember him saying it's going to be more than one book. And he was going to make it a bestselling!"
The brown haired boy looked away sadly. "He never did managed to make that dream come true before..... he left for work and never returned."
"We should all visit our family when we go back home," I added quietly, glancing at Armin.
His blue eyes was shining, and clearly, he needed to share some news with me. I could already point out a few things that clicked with Eren's story and Ilse's diary, but now is not the time to start talking about it.
Patience is everything.
.
But I was wrong.
There are some things that I wished I had done sooner than before.
Some things, I wish I could do the first chance I got to, so that I wouldn't be living in regret, as I am today.