Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You’re finally driving far away from everything you once and always knew.

You left everything behind for a new beginning. Your past life, your old friends and acquaintances, and them. The reasons you’re even leaving in the first place. Your deceased mother, your ex and your so-called friends. You’ve been freed from the abusive hold your mother had when she died. The constant paranoia her words always gave you made you never want to leave the house. Everything was a problem and you even started fearing people. You were never allowed to go out with friends because she would think a “pretty girl like you would get snatched off the street.” She always controlled what you did; your hobbies, your meals—even going as far as putting you on a strict no-carbs diet when you were only 10—and not only that, she’d be damned if she ever let you use the internet without supervision. When she died, that was the first time you were finally able to do whatever you wanted.

You started going out a little more; hanging out with your friends a lot and you even got a boyfriend. Sometimes though, you wish you’d have stayed home. Pictures of his face flash through your mind and your grip on the steering wheel tightens. You shake your head, refusing to think of anything else about it. You’re moving onto your new life, no point in thinking of the past.

Staring up ahead, you spot the hill you have to drive over to be in view of your destination. Paradis Island. You got accepted into Paradis University after doing your freshman year online. It has the best program for psychology which is your major and it provided you with the start that you needed. For each second that you drive, the more your butterflies grow. This is the first time you’ve ever driven so far. To be fair, you’ve never been out of Liberio, your hometown, at all. You start feeling a bit anxious, but the cool wind that hits your face from the lowered car window is enough to calm you down.

After a seemingly never ending side view of trees and fields, you drive over the hill and you can see the vast ocean far up ahead. Your eyes grow wide in amazement and excitement. It’s your first time seeing the ocean in person. You nearly swerve off the road from how distracted you are. You’re shaky after that, but nonetheless, you still laugh a bit at yourself and keep going. From today and on, you start a new life basically. You finally feel free after so long. You did everything you could’ve possibly done to achieve this freedom.

You studied until you became cross eyed and skipped so many meals. You missed out on so many high school activities just to cram a couple extra hours in. You even stopped practicing piano for a while. But it was so fucking worth it to see that acceptance letter you desperately checked your email and mailbox for every morning. It was worth the nights you went through arguing with your mother about going to uni. It was all worth it for this view you see right before you and this feeling of joy that could never be replicated.

You’re so happy you could practically run out of the car full sprint to the island, you feel like you could even fly. You can finally find your purpose and see the world. Experience new things and new people instead of being stuck with the same crowd in that small town you lived in until you wither away. Everything you’ve dreamed of up until this moment is finally coming true. You can’t help but tear up at all the progress you’ve made. All the pain you went through could finally be worth it. Your escape, your freedom. No longer a slave to your old life, finally able to begin a new one. A new one with your own choices, your own way of doing things, your own way of thinking. Your own chosen future. This fresh new start was everything and more you could ever dream of. It’s all just up ahead that sunny horizon, a couple more miles away.

Everything is just up ahead over that huge bridge with the engraved words on the arch above that read “Welcome to Paradis.”

Chapter Text

Your keys jingle in your pocket as you’re walking upstairs with all your suitcases. Some of the elevators weren’t working and because of the limited ones being used up by a lot of other students, you decided to walk up the stairs rather than waiting forever for one to arrive. Not the best start to arriving there. You nearly trip and fall countless times, but you made it to the 4th floor. You heave from all the steps and the heavy bags and some students eye you weirdly. You try not paying mind to them and you try to control your breathing. You check your keys to see which number your dorm is and its room 440. You start reading the numbers on the doors and you realize your dorm is at the end of the hallway. You sigh, increasingly aggravated because you have to continue walking even further.

Walking down the hallway, you try your best to brush away your nerves, but your chest and mind weigh heavy with overflowing thoughts. You start getting nervous butterflies that make your stomach hurt as well. You’ll be sharing a dorm with someone you don’t know, and that’s killing you. What if they’re mean? Or a psycho? But what if they’re really nice and you’re just torturing yourself for no reason? Having a roommate wasn’t really ideal for you because of your anxiety, but being in a solo dorm meant you’d have to pay double the money and you didn’t feel like taking out even more money which you didn’t have.

“Shit I need to get a job..” You mumble to yourself, remembering how broke you already are. As you’re rolling your suitcases, one of the wheels pop off. You blink and groan in annoyance and just drag it along, leaving a slight streak on the carpet. You shake your head, not caring enough to adjust your suitcase so it could roll on the other wheel.

You finally approach your dorm and you look outside through the window on the wall. Luckily, the university is near the beach so you can see part of the sunset next to the other dorm building. You got the perfect room. Since the ocean is right behind your building, you’ll most likely have a window in your room in which you can look out of. You could genuinely never get tired of looking out at the ocean. It’s so beautiful here and for a moment, your heart wells up from how lucky and happy you feel that you’re able to come here. Your anxiety melts away a bit and you face the door head on.

“Alright, this is it..” You take in a deep breath. You put the key in and you turn the handle to the door slowly.

You peek in and see that no ones there. You let out a dramatic sigh of relief and walk in fully, dragging along your suitcases. You walk around, quickly finding your room before you look around. You set your suitcases by your bed. It’s a cute room. It has a shelf mounted on the wall next to the bed, and a little nightstand with a lamp next to it. The lamp has a clear base with seashells in it which you think is absolutely beautiful. On the other side of your room, you have a working desk with a chair and the closet is at the foot of your bed. Your favorite part about the whole room is that you were right about that window. It even has a little nook under it so you can sit and read your books. You smile, thinking to yourself how excited you’re going to be to decorate it soon. You slip your jacket off and place it on the bed. You’re wearing one of you’re favorite outfits today. A cream colored babydoll shirt from Hollister that you thrifted and a pair of flared jeans with your black converse. You step out of your room and look around the dorm with wonder in your eyes.

The dorm room itself is really spacious and clean. For one, you’re grateful your roommate isn’t a pig who leaves trash everywhere. In the middle of the room, theres a big L-shaped couch with a glass coffee table in front of it. There’s a big TV mounted onto the wall as well. Behind the little living area, the kitchen is there. It has a pretty spacious island in the middle and whatever else a kitchen holds behind it. By the front door is what you assume your roommate’s room is at. You walk over to the kitchen and pour yourself a glass of water. You take a seat and scroll through your phone, deciding to wait for your new roommate to get here. Just then, the door slams wide open. You jump, nearly breaking your neck to turn to see who just came in.

“Jean Jean okay but what if they want to drink water? Like they have the emotional capacity to KNOW they can or want to drink water?” You see a really pretty girl in a ponytail walk in first. Strands of hair peak through the front. She’s around your height and a bit more leaner than you. She’s wearing a brown jacket, it leans off of her shoulder and you can see the white strap of her tank top peaking out. She’s wearing these super cute jeans with some kind of flowy design on the side paired with black converse, matching yours. She has a kind of bright expression in her face and a bubbly demeanor that could bring a smile to anyone’s face.

“Sasha, fish don’t have emotional thirst. They’re not sitting their questioning their hydration levels. Where the hell did you even come up with that?!” Jean you assume, walks in right after her. He’s way taller than her. Broad-shouldered, clean cut, and has a kind of confidence that’s almost attractive, especially in his words. His ash brown hair is a bit messy like he ran his hands through it a couple times, but it suits him really well. He’s wearing a plain white t-shirt with a plaid blue jacket tied around his shoulders. His jeans are baggy and have some random keychain’s attached to it that you can’t really make out from where you’re sitting. A pair of Jordan 4s peak out from under them. You immediately roll your eyes thinking about how painfully performative he is.

“OKAY OKAY BUT THINK ABOUT IT.” Sasha turns to Jean to face him fully, her hands splayed out. “We need air like fish need water, but what if the fish crave the water?” She looks at him wide eyed, impatient for his response.

“…Do you crave air to eat it or something? And they’re not even the same thing, respiration and hydration are completely different.” Jean looks at her dumbfounded.

“Heh… I mean sometimes… WHAT IF OXYGEN HAD A TASTE AND WE JUST CAN’T TASTE IT BECAUSE WE’RE SO USED TO IT?!” She gasps and immediately sucks in some air. “Maybe if we have the intention to taste it, then we will!”

Jean stares at her open eyed and completely distraught. He never thought someone could be so serious about something so dumb. He closes his eyes and starts rubbing his temples.

“What? Why aren’t you saying anything? Mad ‘cause I’m right about the fish?” She crosses her arms triumphantly and a smug grin is splayed across her face. “Though I was wrong about the air…”

“Just shut up before I get a fucking aneurysm.” He sighs and covers his face with his hands, taking in a deep breath.

“Okay, but you know it’s true! Fish can get dehydrated so how would that ever happen if they didn’t get the natural instinct to be thirsty?” Sasha places her hand on her hips as she raises her eyebrow.

“I’m not talking about this with you anymore.” Jean glares at her and pushes past her to set his bag on the couch. You clear your throat and both Sasha and Jean jump. Their heads snap towards you. Sasha’s eyes widen.

“OH MY GOSH I’m so sorry we didn’t see you there- OOOH ARE YOU MY NEW ROOMMATE?!” Sasha excitedly runs up to you to greet you. Your eyes widen at the rapidly approaching girl. She nearly collides into you when she reaches you.

“My name’s Sasha it’s so awesome to meet you!!” She grins as she shakes your hand enthusiastically. “Haha, it’s okay don’t worry. You were having a pretty intense discussion. My name’s Y/N.” You give her a nervous smile back.

“Nice one Sash, now you look like a complete idiot to someone you have to live with.” He walks up to both of you. “My name’s Jean, it’s good to meet you.” He smiles at you and extends his hand. You shake it and smile back. “Y/N, likewise.”

“Hey!” Sasha shoves Jean, causing him to stumble back and she walks around the counter to the pantry. She starts digging in there for something. “Always gotta be shoving me around..” he grumbles. You hold in a laugh to stay respectful.

“Okay but, wouldn’t you also agree that fish can get thirsty Y/N?” She lets out an “Ah-HA!” pulls out a sleeve of crackers and rips them open. One falls onto the floor and she quickly picks it up.

“5 SECOND RULE” She throws it in her mouth.

“Sasha that’s fucking nasty!” Jean grabs her cheeks to make her spit it out, but she already swallowed it. You start laughing as Sasha pushes Jean off of her with a cheeky smile.

“Hmm, maybe. Who knows?” You let out a sigh through your nose kind of guised as a laugh.

“HA! See?” She points at Jean. “She didn’t even agr- you know what whatever.” He sighs and takes out his phone. He sits next to you and starts doom-scrolling through random shit on Instagram. “Ignore him he’s a no fun grump. Let’s get to the interesting shit; where are you from, Y/N?”

“Oh, I’m from Liberio! It’s kinda far from here, but still a big city.”

“Shit no way! Some of our friends are from there.”

Your blood runs cold. You stupidly didn’t expect some people from there to go here. You squeeze both of your hands tightly so your shaking isn’t noticeable. Why are you thinking so hard? Liberio’s huge and definitely not the only high-school there? What could possibly even be the odds?

“O-Oh really? What are their names?”

“Reiner, Bertholdt, Annie… wait who else?”

“Porco and Pieck,” Jean chimes in, still not looking up from his phone. “Oh yeah! Those two, do you know any of them?” Sasha starts eating another cracker. She offers one to Jean and he shakes his head. She offers you one, but you don’t even notice because of the war that’s going through your head right now.

At this exact moment, you want to throw yourself out the window in your bedroom. Literally just what the fuck WERE the odds and why did they just fuck you over in the worst way possible. You sigh and stuff your face in your hands, your white headband falls forward. Pieck is here. Your ex best friend. A year older and always made that known to you, kind of like an extremely toxic older sibling except she was just completely and utterly fake. She gave you such a false sense of friendship just because it was your first time being open to have a friend. You met her in your sophomore year when she was a junior. She was part of your first friend group and it couldn’t have gone more wrong. She fucked you over in more ways than you could count, one of the major times being sleeping with your boyfriend. You don’t even want to think of it all right now. You also know of the other people she mentioned, but you’ve never really spoken to them during high school. Only Pieck. You shut your eyes tightly for a moment, contemplating what you should say to Sasha and you decide to just be vague rather than lie.

“I know of all of them actually, but Pieck is the only person I really knew. We didn’t exactly get along, but it’s alright now I guess,” you shrug.

“Ohh, that’s fine! Me and Jean aren’t really close with her and Porco, but the other three are in our friend group. You’ll probably only see Pieck and Porco when we’re all fully grouped up together somewhere.” Jean nods along with her.

You sigh out of relief. You start thinking of random scenarios where you could possibly see Pieck and you hope that she wouldn’t blurt random shit out in front of that whole group of people. Seeing that you’re visibly stressed, Sasha starts thinking of ways to change the subject. She pops another cracker into her mouth (big part of her thinking process).

“Oh oh! I forgot to ask, what’s your major Y/N?” She leans over the counter.

“Oh, I’m taking psych. I wanna be a psychiatrist. Something about what goes on in people’s heads is pretty cool to me,” you put a loose strand of hair behind your ear. Sasha’s eyes widen and she slams her hand on the table. Jean flinches and looks up at her for a second, furrowing his eyebrows at her in a way that’s like “what the fuck are you doing?” She quickly swallows before talking.

“OH MY GOSH! AWESOME I AM TOO! Wait, are you a freshman then? I didn’t see you here last year.”

“Oh no, I’m a sophomore. I transferred here from going online. Shit was a pain and I kind of craved human interaction, you know? People talk about how they wish to be online or homeschooled forever, but that shit gets boring real quick and lonely as well.” You shiver thinking about how isolated and bored you always were. Your only source of entertainment was going on long walks and endlessly doom scrolling on TikTok.

“We’re also sophomores! And damn I can’t imagine!” She winces. “I think I’d die if I was online. The parties here are so much fun and there’s a lot to do around the campus.” She munches on another cracker. She realizes she’s gone through the whole sleeve by now—only two left—and she makes a kind of pouty face which you think it’s adorable.

“Speaking of parties, Omega’s having one tomorrow night as some start of the year type shit.” Jean looks up from his phone and shows Sasha some message thread.

“OHMYGOSH YESSS!!!” She grabs your hand. “YOUR FIRST PARTY Y/N!” She runs around the counter to you and Jean and peaks over his phone to see more details.

“Omega? Like as in Omega Tau? Isn’t that a fraternity here?” You rest your face on your hand.

“Yeah it is!” Some of the guys in our friend group are in it.” She suddenly gasps and starts choking on the cracker she was eating.

“Jesus Sasha finishing chewing before you talk!” Jean starts slamming his hand on her back. She coughs up the piece she was choking on and you grimace, laughing it off.

She wipes her mouth. “Sorry hehe. Buttt, you should totally come with us! We can introduce you to our friend group, you seem really chill!” She smiles kindly.

You take a moment to think about it and your anxiety starts to well up. She already mentioned that Pieck would be there if the whole group was going to be somewhere and you really really didn’t want to see her already. You’re already just a bit hesitant with Sasha and Jean, though most of that anxiousness is gone. You can tell they’re really sweet people. But just how many people are in this group? And a party too? You haven’t gone to one since junior year of high-school and you knew damn well that shitty little high-school parties were definitely NOT the same as college ones.

“You sure? It’s just I’m not used to all this really. I haven’t even fully toured the campus and I don’t wanna be a bother to you guys.” You scratch your head uncertain.

“You’re just overthinking.” She takes your hands in hers. “You seem like a great person Y/N. I want you to be there, don’t doubt yourself and think you’ll be a bother. I’ll be there with you at all times so you don’t have to worry about a thing.” She smiles.

“Thought you were gonna break out into song with your cheesy ass,” Jean laughs.

Sasha kicks Jean’s leg and looks back at you. He lets out an ouch and he rubs where she kicked him.

“If you ever want to leave or if someone makes you uncomfortable, just tell me. I’ll kick their ass and we can leave alright? You’ve got me.” You smile at her, grateful for her enthusiasm and reassurance.

You nod your head. “Alright yeah, I’ll give it a shot. But if I see Pieck, I’m gonna want to leave to somewhere else. I don’t wanna have to deal with her,” you sigh. Sasha and Jean exchange a glance, not sure whether to ask what happened between you both. She decides not to, that you’ll tell her when you’re ready.

“Alright, great! It’s gonna be so much fun!! But for now, Jean can you get out of here?Me and Y/N have to bond for a bit and there’s no room for horse faces like you.” She sticks her tongue out at him and you giggle. Jean glares at Sasha and bumps her in the head with his phone. “Ow!” She rubs her head.

“Yeah yeah, I’ll leave. But before I go, let me get your snap Y/N. I’ll send you some shit about Omega later and where it’s at on the campus.” He hands his phone to you.

“I can do that myself, Jean.” Sasha rolls her eyes and crosses her arms. Jean just waves her off and her jaw drops offended.

“Oh um, I kinda deleted snap last year, but I’ll redownload it later. I remember my user still hold on.” You take his phone and type in your username. You press add and hand his phone back to him.

“Alright perfect. I’ll see you guys later, nice to meet you Y/N.” He smiles at you, getting up to leave. He’s about to walk out the door and then he stops. “Also Sasha, fish still don’t need to drink water,” he sighs, shaking his head. “THEY DO. Now leave.” Jean rolls his eyes and shuts the door. You hear his footsteps begin disappearing down the hall.

“Okay we have a LOT to go over today.” Sasha turns to you. “Come with me to my room!” She grabs your hand and you get up. You both start heading to her room. Your chest starts bubbling up with excitement and anxiety. First day at the university and it’s going decent. You’ve already made two friends, but one of the people you never wanted to see again is here as well. And if that wasn’t enough, she was conveniently around the same group of people you have to hang out with. You can only hope for the best now, but you hope everything will be okay. So much for a fully fresh start. At least you don’t think it’ll be that bad.

Sasha opens the door to her room. You both walk in and you marvel at it. It’s decorated from head to toe with posters and figures. Basically your dream room. Her desk has a record player and it has a little tack board full of photo booth pictures and polaroids. Under it hangs her polaroid itself. Her bed is pushed against the corner and her closet is horizontal to it. She jumps on her bed and you sit on it as well. She motions for you to scoot up to her to get more comfy and you do.

“Ah! Wait wait” Sasha gets up and grabs her laptop from her desk. She slumps back into bed with you and opens it up. She opens Netflix and reaches over to her drawer under her nightstand. You peer over to see her rummaging through a drawer full of food.

“Before we start a mandatory moviethon, pick one. Savory or sweet?” She shows you two options: a bag of chips and a chocolate bar. You look down at the two choices and you feel like they’re more important than they should be. Sasha is staring at you intensely, awaiting for your response. Your eyes narrow in decision making and the choice lights up in your head like a lightbulb.

“I think I’ll do savory.” A slow grin creeps up her face. “Right on the money! I wanted the sweet one after those crackers.” You both laugh and start deciding what movies to watch, learning more about each other and what you guys like as you make your choices. Maybe Paradis wont be so bad after all.