For Nathan.

Thank you for being my Jean.

Jean wasn't the smartest or strongest of men. He never really thought of himself as noble or heroic—he was a realist, after all—but he had guts when it counted and he could pull a few miracles out of his ass every now and then.

When he'd first laid eyes on Mikasa Ackerman he'd felt his heart jump into his throat, his ribcage squeeze his lungs. It had been their first year in high school and she had walked right past him in the halls ethereally and as cliché as he knew it was, he'd felt his entire world slow down.

She was beautiful, that much was obvious but it wasn't what held him so enraptured, so breathless—no, what held Jean enslaved was how she moved, the subtle grace with which she stepped, the way the crowds he had to shove through every morning parted for her instantly, unquestioningly, a queen amongst commoners.

Dully he saw that he wasn't the only one watching her, other boys eyeing her with the same glazed, stupefied look he probably wore—but of course she'd have a horde of morons watching her; because the effect she had wasn't at all common, not a bright or popular aura, nothing like the girl-next-door type bit—but the kind of girl who'd chew you up and spit you out, the kind of girl who'd shake up even the coolest cats, the kind of girl who'd claw your heart out and leave her mark on you to remember until you were an old man.

The dark mysterious heroine he found in his comic books and video games but never in real life. The kind of girl that would most definitely never give him a chance, the realist within him warned.

But Jean could try to make miracles happen every now and then.

He'd tried to call her but his voice hadn't really worked for a second—his brain had hardly been working—and he'd word vomited the broken thoughts that had been ringing in his skull, making her pause and turn mid-step.

"Hey, ah…I haven't seen you before…" She'd given him a very unflappable look and he'd swallowed, the force of her entire focus on him making his hands shake. Be smooth. Confident. Debonair. Give her your most devastating look. He smiled, hoping it looked cool and composed. "You have pretty black hair."

Fuck.

She blinked at him, her dark eyes curiously blank and mystifying and he half-wondered if she'd even heard or seen him at all. "Thanks."

No. Wait, shit, I screwed up, his mind screamed but all he'd done was stammer and stumble after her, flustered and blushing and—cool guys don't blush.

But she'd kept walking, slipping farther and farther away as the crowds thwarted his attempts to go after her. He'd slumped against the wall, felt like withering right then and there. How the hell was that smooth Jean? He kept watching her as she reached the front doors, until she caught up with Eren—of all the douche bags it could have been—and he'd touched her hair so carelessly, so flippantly, muttering something at her with his stupid face.

And his stomach had never felt so knotted.

He'd never had a woman affect him so strongly—except for maybe Christa but who wasn't affected by Christa?—and even as time slipped by Jean discovered that no one else had ever been able to enchant him the way Mikasa Ackerman had.

It was months later that Jean had had another chance to try to impress her. Another chance to be cool.

"Ackerman," The teacher snapped at Mikasa, breaking Jean from his day dream, walking over to the back of the classroom where she sat at her desk.

Where Jean sat behind her and watched her like the desperate, love-sick fool he was.

"Why aren't you writing anything down?" The teacher—Levi, or some crap like that— murmured, scanning her empty hands. "Don't you have a pen?"

She set her jaw. "No."

He arched a brow arrogantly, glaring at her, and Jean huffed a little. How dare he. "Why not, Ackerman?"

Because I have it, Jean remembered.

He fumbled for a few seconds, burying his hands into his jacket pockets and scrabbling, rummaging through gum wrappers, erasers and crumbs until he found it. He'd seen her sitting at the library earlier, watched as she'd cracked several books open and spread them over the table, pale fingers twirling a blue plastic pen, pale pink lips parted, her small, sharp white teeth chewing at the very tip.

And the bell had rung and she scrambled to stack and stuff everything into her bag and she'd left before he could offer to help her carry it all—when he'd spotted her bitten pen forgotten on the wooden table.

And if Connie had called him a creep for possessively pocketing it he'd stoutly ignored him.

"I lost it." Mikasa answered after several moments.

Levi pressed his lips into a thin line. "Do you know the consequences of coming to class without proper—"

"I've got her pen." He leaned over his desk towards hers, swallowing thickly, reaching forward to clumsily place it on her scarred desk, her hair inches from his cheek. "You left it at the library this morning." He felt his voice drop several notches, her nearness leaving him breathless.

Her hair smelled like flowers. Fresh and cool and intoxicating.

Just the way he'd imagined it would.

She looked at him from over her shoulder, her face a breath away from his, blinking a little owlishly. Slowly, her fingers curled about it, giving him the faintest of smiles as she pressed it back to her soft lips, her nod small. "Thank you, Jean."

She knows my name.

Say something cool, Jean, she's looking at you, now's your shot.

He felt himself flush. "Yeah."

A small frown scored her pale brow—and before he could recover he heard Connie speak up from the front of the class. "Jean's trying to score."

Jean scowled. "Connie, I swear to—"

"Sit down." Levi snapped, and Jean obeyed weakly. "Morons, all of you."

"I don't think teachers are allowed to call students names." Connie continued.

"Shut up, Springer." Levi sat back at his desk.

"Yeah, can it, Springer." Sasha taunted, mimicking Levi's clipped tone, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "Do you know what the consequences of disrupting the class are?" She arched a brow playfully, arrogantly.

Connie gave a cry of betrayal and as the rest of the class erupted into conversation and laughter Mikasa twisted in her chair, slipping him a small note.

It took Jean several minutes to comprehend that Mikasa Ackerman had slipped him a note and when he finally managed to clumsily unfold it, her prettily scrawled words leapt out at him.

I owe you one.

He flushed intensely, swallowing, watching her tuck a stray slip of black hair behind her ear as she slid him another glance.

"Are you okay?" She murmured discreetly, making sure the teacher was still preoccupied with Sasha and Connie.

"Y-yeah."

"Your skin is very flushed."

Shit. "I…felt a little feverish this morning."

"Oh."

Silence enveloped them. He shifted.

"What kind of shampoo do you use?" He blurted.

She gave him that curious look again. "I don't really stick to one. Whatever is in the shower is what I use."

He bit the inside of his cheek. "It always…looks very shiny." And soft.

"Thanks. Are you sure you're okay?"

He nodded. "I'm fine." He lied.

You noticed me. You remembered my name. You slipped me a note.

I'm fucking fantastic.

Jean was sitting alone at lunch picking distastefully at a salad when he saw Mikasa sitting across the lunch room, surrounded by her usual group of Sasha, Eren and Armin. She looked up at the same exact same second he did, their gazes touching, his skin heating up as his heart pounded.

She frowned a little, looking away as she stood and Jean cursed himself. Shit, she's going to think I was watching her. She's going to think I'm such a creep. How do I backtrack from this?

And he'd been much too preoccupied with his whirlwind of thoughts to notice that she was standing in front of him with a small bowl and water bottle on her lunch tray.

"Mikasa?" His voice cracked as his spine snapped to attention.

"You still look feverish." She slid the tray towards him. "You need liquids."

"Ah, thank you…"

But she was already walking away, tugging up her scarf with a pale finger.

She didn't know that he only looked feverish because he was blushing. She didn't know that reason he was blushing was because he'd been caught looking at her. She didn't know the reason he was eating a salad was because he'd forgotten his lunch and he detested cafeteria food, would rather eat cardboard because it probably tasted better.

And, he thought as he lifted the spoon to his lips, she'd never know that the watery soup she'd slid him was the best fucking soup he'd ever tasted.

A/N-itty bitty thing. Tried to keep it as close to the prompt as I could.

Don't think I did that much at all.

There are going to be quite a few time skips so I hope it'll all make sense.