Do You Think That While In A New-ish Relationship With Levi, That He Would Get Insecure And Would Pull

Do you think that while in a new-ish relationship with Levi, that he would get insecure and would pull away emotionally because of his abandonment issues? Kinda like self-sabotage to protect himself from future hurts like when Kenny left him?

Any headcanons are much appreciated!

//gn!reader

absolutely yes. though not just because of his abandonment issues.

in general, Levi isn’t a trusting person - his first instinct is really to assume the worst out of people - and that ironically goes double for someone he wants to trust.

you’d have to have known each other a long time for him to be willing to take that step and be in a relationship in the first place, but being in it in the beginning is different.

trusting someone with his heart and revealing his feelings are so exposing. it feels dangerous to someone who's had it hammered into him never to be seen as weak.

combined with him not being super capable of understanding his own feelings, and his inexperience early on in a relationship, he would find himself disarmed and confused a lot of the time.

it's not easy :(

so he would hold a new partner at arm’s length. he still doesn’t, and may never, understand what you see in him.

what he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt is that he wants to be by your side, but in fear of being reliant on someone else in any way, he can appear intentionally aloof and distant for a while. he's busy figuring out that you wouldn’t be smiling so warmly at him just to lull him into a false sense of security, that you don’t feel too intimidated to do otherwise, or really anything that would prove he’s as worthless at all this that he thinks he is.

and yes, self-sabotage. he can think that you haven’t seen him for who he truly is somehow, and once you do, you’ll leave; that he tricked you unintentionally and that’s the only reason why you want to be with him; maybe your motives are something as clinical as curiosity, or to find out his weaknesses to use against him.

those ideas are safe and make sense to him, because Levi has learned to expect to be hurt or abandoned in his life, and it affirms in his mind that he's not wanted by anyone for who he is. even though he wants badly to accept that maybe he does have someone now who really maybe likes and cares about him, that feels too good to be true to him.

so all that to say… the start of a relationship with Levi wouldn’t be hugely different than when you were friends. he seeks you out a little more, and does plenty of things for you (including+especially make you tea, acts of service love language hello). he's a lot more observant.

Levi would trust your words and reassurances, but he would find much more value in your behavior in return. when you seek him out, or remember small things in efforts to make him happy, or not being too forward with things he’s sure not to understand, like most forms of physical affection. in his mind, holding hands even somewhere private is really anxiety-inducing :(

his behavior when he is upset is hugely unhelpful too. assuming he has next to no romantic experiences and erroneous ideas of how one's “supposed” to work, his first instinct when he’s hurt is to shut down, brush it off, and avoid. not so much because he assumes you meant to say or do something that hurt him, but because it's pathetic and he associates emotional pain with abandonment. right away he invalidates himself.

so Levi has to be shown what a romantic relationship really entails. things that are obvious or come easily to others just wouldn’t to him. like reminding him that you can't read minds when you genuinely don’t know why he’s upset. anddd communicating, which takes him being the slightest bit vulnerable, which is hard for him too.

so at first, being in a relationship with Levi would be super difficult for sure with all his fears and misunderstandings :/ but he's loyal and passionate and always puts you first, too. it's like once you've earned his trust, there is absolutely nothing and no one above you to him.

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Ok but hear me out…

Levi and Farlan’s first meeting set to ‘fight for me’ from heathers the musical

I love the grumpy shortcake to death but I actually HC that Levi is the worst kisser at the beginning of a relationship.

no because you’re completely right. at the beginning of the relationship honestly expect levi to be bad (but just too pathetically cute) at just about everything. he’s got the passion. he’s got the looks that he doesn’t think he has. but he’s just a BABY

literally flash him a cute little smile - especially when you’re alone - and he blushes.

levi taking holding hands way too seriously. finds himself practicing WITH HIS OWN HANDS how to correctly link your fingers (how much bigger or smaller is your hand than his? (he asks himself)) or stroke your thumb in just the right way. he hates himself for it but he just really doesn’t want to mess up with you. he thinks he needs to be good at something to be good enough and it kills you.

then the time comes and his hands get clammy from nerves. “disgusting” he says. poor levi

the first time you do kiss, he definitely asks to do it because of consent (he is traumatized). he asks to do anything the first time. “can i put my hand here?” and it’s not even your THIGH it’s your KNEE😭 he’s precious.

he would keep his eyes open like a freak at first, with your lips just barely making feather-light contact, because he wants to see. he wants to admire. levi is a careful person, an intense person, and a doting one. he cherishes your first kiss like it’s your last.

one could say it’s amateur to move his lips less and just press against yours, but he wants to savor the feeling, too. your softness, the indents from whether you have the tendency to bite your lip when you’re nervous, the shape of them. which side of your lips curl up first when you smile into it. brushing his thumb over the indent of your dimple (if you have any).

so that’s to say he’s barely kissing at all and feeling it out more than anything. he’s very bad at it. no subtext there at all /s.

it’s easy to mistake levi being flustered for levi being annoyed. he just gets crabby because he registers it as showing weakness. but you know how he feels.

puts off sleeping in the same bed for like. months. not out of lack of desire but he’s pretty much convinced he’ll be bad at it. he’s NERVOUS. what if nightmares? what if it’s hot, but you’re cuddling him and he doesn’t want to move away?

levi would watch you in your sleep. not in a perverted way. but, like that he’s free from the possibility of being embarrassed, caught admiring the details of your face that others would not think twice about. levi feels in poetry but speaks in crass one-liners and retorts. it’s true.

in reality, sleeping next to levi means being clung to by him at any given moment. except when you’re awake, because if he senses so much as a shift in your breathing, he’s awake first. however if you tend to cling too, then everyone is happy.

he sleeps restlessly, though. levi has never known a moment of peace in his life, sleep included. he’s eerily silent. like. corpse silent, but he squirms and wriggles a lot.

i’m sorry i couldn’t have gotten more off topic. YES YOU’RE RIGHT

sometimes i forget how reading is just. marvelous. just an absolutely fucking endlessly joyful activity. i’ll go about my life and not read one single book for months and be like why am i morose! why am i so apathetic! what is missing here!!!! and try to look for whatever it is that is lacking and never find it anywhere and i get so tired and sad and angry, and then i’m finally like i’m gonna stop everything for a couple days and read a really good book bc i don’t care about anything else. and suddenly i get motivated to work bc i know i’ll read when i’m on break. i get more creative. i want to watercolor again and bust out the shameful fabric stash with all my unfinished sewing projects. god even my dreams get more vivid!! what the fuck! and i’m like here is the magic i was looking for, why did i ever think i was going to find it anywhere else. it was always here!!!

"Give 'em here,"

"Hm?" Levi hums distractedly, briefly glancing up at you from his desk. A solid stack of paper rests on the dark wood, one he's been slowly working through for more than an hour. Eyes flicking back down to his current page, he grimaces, fingers tightening on the pen. Black ink continues across the page in a tight, stiff scrawl.

You approach his side, dragging your fingers across the smooth, recently polished mahogany. Unlike Erwin's gargantuan desk, his is a more conservative workspace, kept mostly clear besides whatever he's currently working on, a small candle in the far corner and the occasional steaming cup of tea. Sliding the white pages to the side, you take their place, plopping down onto the hardwood. Plucking the pen from his grasp, it quickly joins the pages by your hip. You reach out, miming a grabbing gesture like an eager child, "Your hand. Gimme."

“Are you really so needy? Already?” He sighs, leaning back in his chair. Running his fingers through his bangs, Levi glares up at you. "I still have 20 pages to finish."

"Nope," you say with a firm pop. "I've noticed you taking little breaks. Stopping to try to stretch your fingers. Give it here."

“Weren’t you supposed to be reading?” His eyes flick toward the office’s couch, your book resting closed on the middle cushion. “Couldn’t keep your eyes off of me?”

You smirk, “How could I, with you hissing in pain over here.” You wiggle your fingers again. “I think I even heard you whimper a few times. Now gimme.”

Eyes narrowing, his fingers twitch from where they're resting on his thigh. “Is this just some shitty excuse to hold my hand?”

Teasing, you knock into his knee with your own. “Like I need to ask?" This.. this whatever it is between you might be new, but it's nice. It's refreshing. Something easy while everything else seems to be difficult. "No silly! I’m going to give you a hand massage!”

His nose curls up, brows drawing tight. At his thigh, the digits in question curl into the fabric of his thigh. “A what?”

Holding your hand out, palm open in askance, you try again. “It’ll help. I promise.”

“Fine.” Finally his hand falls into yours. It's stiff, the digits held firm and tense like those of a wary animal.

Patting the back of his hand, you cheer exaggeratedly. “There you go! That’s a good boy!”

He clicks his tongue, “Don’t praise me like i’m some fucking cat.”

“Then don’t act like one.” Twisting the back of his hand to rest on your thigh, you interlace your fingers loosely with his, rubbing your thumb firmly into the meat of his palm. “Relax.”

With a sigh, he does, if only a little bit. Still, his shoulders are tight, eyes locked onto where your hand is wrapped around his, following the firm press of your thumb into the meat beneath his own.

“You have such beautiful hands,” you murmur, torn between watching your work and watching him watching you. Suddenly, you feel warm, anxious excitement prickling along your spine. You'd gone into this so confidently, you can only hope that it actually helps. “Have I told you how much I love your hands?”

His lips curl, a filthy smirk peeking up along the edges. “My fingers, yes. Loudly.” His fingers loosen, curling to press along the back of your hand.

"Ha," you snort, happy to see him a bit more relaxed. Stretching his hand out flat, you glide your fingers along the length of each of his digits, one after the other. They pop a little bit, small airy noises.

"You take such good care of your hands," you note, twisting it to press his palm to your thigh. He has callouses, that's for sure, rough little patches at the base of each finger. There's little knicks too, white lines of thin aged scars. A particularly deep one is gouged into the length of his pointer finger, right along the outer edge. Still, his skin is soft, you tell him as much.

He shrugs, swallowing heavily and watching you follow along his fingers, pressing heavily into the skin. "Just like to keep clean. You know that."

Huffing, you reply, "I'm pretty sure everyone on base knows that." Even his nails are pretty, perfectly trimmed without even a single bit of dirt beneath them. Even the cuticles have been pushed up. Dragging the tip of your finger along the perfectly smooth rounded edge of his nail, you note, "I'd love to paint your nails. It'd be like a good old fashioned sleepover."

Levi hums, eyes heavy. His hand is no longer stiff, relaxed completely into your grip. "What's that?"

You gasp, "A sleepover? You don't know what a sleep over is?"

His lips thin, somewhere between a frown and a scowl. "I didn't exactly have a normal up-bringing, remember."

"Oh," you breathe. Sometimes it's so easy to forget that his missed out on most normal childhood experiences. "Don't let Hange ever find out. They'll go on a whole rampage."

Levi rolls his eyes, "I'm sure. So what is it?"

"Hmm," you struggle, "It's sort of like a girl's night?"

He replies slowly, not quite understanding, "Girls..night?"

"Boys had them too!! And there were mixed ones! They were fun!" Hand still working against his, you trace your fingers along the boney lines on the back of his hand, watching the skin shift as you press into him. "It's like... pillow fights! And painting each others nails!"

His brows scrunch up in confusion, eyes distant as he tries to imagine the experience. "That sounds...fun."

Excited, you continue, "There were games too! Truth and Dare! Oooh and spin the bottle!"

Levi's eyes widen in horror, no doubt recognizing those as games the younger scouts play, often under the influence of heavy amounts of alcohol. "Hange would go on a rampage," he agrees solemnly.

Pressing his palm down into the meat of your thigh, you push into his first knuckle. It pops, loud and resonant, beneath the press of your thumb. Levi tenses, hissing at the uncomfortable sensation.

Heedless, you continue onto the next, earning another loud pop. And another. And another, until all five joints have been released. “It’s such a shame that your hands been bothering you.”

His shoulders dip in a long sigh, eyes fluttering closed. “It’s really not that big of a deal. It’s fine.”

Flipping his hand back over, you tug at his forefinger, quickly pulling the length to pop it. “You’ve been holding your fingers weird for awhile now. How long have they been hurting?”

“It’s nothing. An ache, if anything,” he shifts uncomfortably in his chair. As you tug at another one of his fingers, he grunts. “A couple weeks.”

You switch your grasp, pinching your fingers together and pulling along the lengths of his own, no longer popping them, merely soothing the sore muscles. "Do you think it's gear aches?"

He grumbles something under his breath, low enough that you can't really catch it. "I'm not some fucking brand-new cadet."

As with most physical activities, using ODM gear hurts at first. The constant grip strength makes your hands ache, burning with red hot pain as muscles build and callouses form. New cadets complain constantly about the pains, dubbing them 'gear aches' and constantly whine to the medical staff for lotion to sooth their hands until they can adjust.

"It's not just new cadets," you note with a hum, "Sometimes scouts complain about them after training particularly hard."

"I never even had them when I started out," Levi clicks his tongue. "Izzy had them pretty bad though. Had to find some lotion for her."

"Find or steal?" The glower you get in response is answer enough. You smooth your thumb along his palm, repeating your earlier actions and working the digit hard enough into his muscle to earn a grunt. "Of course you didn't get gear aches. Is there anything you're not immediately perfect at?"

Levi purses his lips, but you cut in before he can speak, "Ah ah, no self deprecating."

He grumbles something very quiet under his breath.

"What was that?"

He responds quietly, barely audible. "I'm shit at paperwork."

"It's just something new. You'll get used to it eventually." Levi's hands are so small, his palm wide and the fingers long and thin. The skin is pale enough that you can trace the blue lines of his veins, where they twist and curve along the back of his hand and across his palm. Dainty. His hands are dainty, graceful yet somehow still masculine. "Okay.. so it's not gear aches. What is it then?"

You can barely catch it, but Levi's eyes flicker towards the stack of papers by your thigh. At just the same time, your fingers catch a rough spot on the side of his middle finger. A callous. It seems to be newer, up towards the top of the digit, near the first joint. Wait a minute..

The realizations strikes you so fast, you can't help but blurt out, "It's the paperwork!"

Levi scowls, fingers twisting into your palm. He looks shy, ducking his head down. "It's fucking useless anyways. Why do those pigs need to know every time someone on my team scrapes their knee? Or fucks up their uniform in training?"

You stiffen your shoulders, pitching your voice low in a rough imitation of Erwin. "Levi, cataloging our mistakes is an important measure to prevent them going forward. A mere scrape during training could equate to a loss of-"

"-Stop. Shut the fuck up," Levi cuts you off with a small laugh, "That's such a shitty imitation of him."

You're happy to see him smile and the sound of his laughter has your heart doing somersaults in your chest. You pat his hand softly, "You don't need to stress so much about it. Most of it just ends up decorating some tiny little storeroom in the basement of headquarters. Erwin might glance at some of the more important ones, like incident reports- but the higher ups don't really care.

The fingers of Levi's free hand disappear into the inky blackness of his bangs, frustration oozing from his features, "If they're just going to end up in some musty-ass storeroom, then why the fuck do I have to fill out 50 fucking pages every week?"

"If you're lucky some higher up might even use the pages to wipe his ass," you chirp, enjoying the resulting snort. "Us scouts are scrutinized pretty heavily, ya' know. Sometimes I think Erwin is just desperately trying to keep us funded."

Levi frowns, "And so he's, what? Overloading them with useless nonsense?"

"Maybe? I certainly wouldn't put it past him. Something you're actually bad at is relaxing. Just take breaks every once and awhile. You don't need to do it all in one sitting." At some point during the conversation you'd stopped massaging his hand, instead merely fiddling with the lengths of his fingers. "Did the massage help?"

Levi grunts, "Yeah." His finger pat your thigh. "It was nice. Thanks."

"They don't ache anymore?" His hand is still limp and heavy, warm against your thigh.

"No." His hand rises, fingers stretching cautiously. "Feels kind of fuzzy, actually."

"That's good. I'm glad." You expect him to scoot you back to the couch so he can get back to the paperwork, but he doesn't. He just sits there, not wanting you to move. "If I had some lotion it probably would've been even better."

"Maybe next time," he replies. He shuffles in his seat, scootching forward several inches so his knees knock the inside of your thighs.

"Next time?" Your surprise is doubled when his other hand falls into your lap, palm up with back pressed to the fat of your thigh.

His eyes ask the question that his mouth doesn't and your fingers immediately start kneeding into the meat of his palm.

Next time.

Hey, I'm so sorry to bother you and hope you have time for this: can you give us some Dyslexic Peter Parker? There's not a lot of representation for the community and I think it would be cool. Maybe Tony finding out Peter's dyslexic on a lab day? Up to you! Also, please tag me, thank you!

@justpeterparkerthings

I don’t have any personal experience with dyslexia and I did a bit of research before writing this, but I’m sorry in advance for any mistakes or inaccuracies.

Peter loves books – he just doesn’t like reading.

As long as he can remember, he’d always had trouble reading. The words in front of his eyes would stumble across the page, making absolutely no sense to him, and he spent more time figuring out what that word is supposed to be than paying any attention to what he was actually reading. It took him ages to finish a page, and by the time he got to the next one, he’s already too frustrated to continue.

His parents caught on to Peter’s troubles quickly and did their best to help him. They would spend hours with him simply reading his favorite books, calmly correcting him and rewarding him afterwards with reading an extra bed time story. May and Ben took over once Peter moved in with them, making sure to always practice reading and writing (Peter’s second grade teacher sends them a note that he seems to have more trouble with writing than the rest of the kids in his class). There’s a bit of progress, but not enough that Peter could read a sentence without stumbling over at least one word.

Over the years, the practicing kind of moved into the background. When Peter turned from kid to tween to teenager, spending hours with your aunt practicing how to read and write instead of playing video games with your friends – or go patrolling as a superhero – becomes less and less appealing. Peter knows he’s smart, he soaks up literally everything once he hears it, so the entire dyslexia thing is even more frustrating. Whenever May asks if he’s done his daily reading, Peter just nods, kisses her cheeks and jumps out of the window to do his Spider-Man thing before she can sniff out the lie.

Besides, he’s getting by just fine. Ned reads the texts out loud whenever they’re studying together. Peter listens to podcasts about anything he finds interesting or watches videos on YouTube. He adapts, only slightly panicking whenever he has to take an exam and read the questions, but after an embarrassing conversation with Mr. Harrington, all his teachers suddenly developed the habit of reading the questions out loud before everyone is allowed to start.

Plus, Tony loves talking.

At the beginning of the internship, Peter had been so nervous. He can lift a building off his shoulders and land a plane while standing on the plane, but he can’t read properly? He can’t tell that to his life-long idol! So, naturally, Peter keeps quiet about it. And it works, because like already stated, Tony loves talking. When he explains an engine or a new update, it’s almost impossible to stop the mechanic. Besides, FRIDAY can always help out.

So, really, there’s no way Tony would ever find out.

Oh, the famous last words.

When Peter enters the lab, he’s exhausted. Not physically (that almost never happens anymore), but mentally because Mrs. Warren had them write a mock-essay for college applications and no matter how much Peter concentrated on it, the words just jumped all over the page, letters switching places every other second, making the seemingly simple task of writing so much more difficult. He’s more than ready to just sit down, tinker around with a circuit board or something and listening to Tony tell him anything, to be honest.

However, that’s not what’s greeting him. Instead, Tony sits at his bench, staring intensely at the holo-screen in front of him, FRIDAY written on top of the file.

“Hey,” Peter says, stepping next to his mentor. “Is something wrong with FRIDAY?”

Tony throws him a quick smile as a greeting before turning his attention back to the screen. “Well, I’m about to find out. There might be a bug in here somewhere, I’m not sure. She was acting up a bit.”

“That could just be her personality.”

“Believe me, I know. I programmed her.” Peter snorts as Tony points towards the printer in the corner. “Grab the sheet for me and read out what’s written on it, would you? I’ll be typing away.”

Immediately, Peter’s heart skips a beat and then starts thundering in his chest that he’s sure Tony has to hear it. But the genius isn’t paying attention, his eyes already flying over the holo-screen again. With somewhat shaking legs and trembling hands, he walks to the printer, taking the piece of paper and looking at it.

Like he already predicted, none of it makes sense to him. Any normal text would bad enough right now, but subject-specific text about programming of all things?

It’s impossible.

Peter has absolutely no idea if what he’s reading is right or not.

Which mean Tony will notice.

And then he will find out about his dyslexia.

And then… then he will kick him out, right? That’s the only realistic scenario.

“Buddy?”

After all, how can Peter claim to be the protégé of one of the greatest minds alive when he can’t even read properly?

“Kid, everything okay?”

Tony will be so disappointed in him. And all the compliments he gave him, all the times he called him smart and clever – surely, he will take them back now.

“Peter?” Finally, Peter breaks out of his panicky thoughts, whirling around to Tony who’s looking at him a tad concerned. “You okay?”

He wants to say yes. He wants to tell him that everything is fine and normal and that he shouldn’t worry. But the knowledge that he can’t stop this cuts off all the air, the whisper at the back of his head that keeps telling him that Tony Stark, his idol, is about to never speak again with him, is turning into an ear-piercing scream.

Tony pulls his eyebrows together and walks over to him. “What’s going on? Don’t tell me it’s such a bad diagnosis, Doc.”

Peter still can’t answer, his eyes starting to burn from staring at the man in front of him unblinkingly. He’ll never get to see him this close again.

“Peter?” Tony asks again, putting a hand on his shoulder.

The word stumbles out of his mouth before he can stop it. “Dyslexia.”

Tony blinks. “What?”

Well, it’s now or never. “I have it,” Peter confesses. “I’m dyslexic.” Tony is still staring at him with an expression he can’t quite place, and before he can even think about what to do, his mouth is moving again. “I-I can’t read. I mean, I can, theoretically, but- The words, they just- And this is- I can’t-“

“Peter, breathe,” the man suddenly interrupts him, shaking his shoulder a bit, causing Peter to finally draw in some air his lungs so desperately demand. Tony waits until Peter took two more breaths before he continues. “You’re dyslexic?”

“Y-Yeah. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry?” Peter honestly doesn’t know what to say to that. Isn’t it obvious? Apparently not, because Tony shakes his head. “I can already say that whatever is running through your head is wrong. First of all, I’m not mad. I don’t know why you might think that I’m mad, but I’m not. Okay?” Not fully believing him, Peter nods. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because… it’s embarrassing. And I feel stupid.”

“Peter Parker, you’re a lot of things but not stupid.”

“Two weeks ago, when I chased that one robber, you said something different.”

“That wasn’t stupid, that was reckless and I should’ve used that word.” Tony gives his shoulder another squeeze. “Hey, look at me.” Somewhat reluctant, Peter does and he’s met with a warm, genuine smile. “This doesn’t change anything, okay? You still are and always will be one of the smartest living beings I’ve ever met. And the fact that you filled all that brilliant brain of yours with so much knowledge without reading a lot? That’s even more impressive.”

“I’m good at remembering stuff I here,” Peter says, suddenly feeling like he needs to humble himself because he’s not used to such honest, straight-forward compliments. “And you talk a lot, so that’s easy.”

“Ah, finally someone who enjoys hearing me talk besides me.”

The chuckle escapes from Peter’s mouth before he can stop it.

“There, that’s better,” Tony mumbles. “This isn’t the end of the world. Or the internship. In fact, this is a new beginning because you will get so many voice mails from me, you’re gonna start to regret ever meeting me.”

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

“Oh, I accept that challenge.”

This time, the chuckle is a full laugh, and with it the weight that has been crushing him every time he had to lie to Tony about this finally lifts off his shoulders. Maybe this really isn’t a disaster. Maybe this can turn out okay.

“Do you need a hug?” Tony asks, sounding way more upbeat now that Peter finally laughed. “You look like you need a hug.”

“No, Mr. Stark, I don’t-”

“Too late.”

And before Peter can stop it (yeah, like he would even want to stop it), Tony crushes him in a hug.