Chapter Text
The dark ebb of the ocean lapped at the girl's ankles, the crimson hem of her dress dipping into the salty water. Beside her stood a dark, tall figure - dressed head to toe in black, black slacks and suit to match. A slither of white peaked out of his blazer, broken by the loose tie slipping from his collar.
It was dark. Pitch dark. And, if not for the constant flow of the waves on the shore, Mikasa's senses would have been completely numbed, blinded by the stillness.
It was lucky she didn't need to see, didn't need any sort of illumination to visualise his face. Each detail of each feature had been stamped into her mind, a haunting comfort marked within her for all eternity.
Eren's arm wrapped around Mikasa's neck, holding her in a loose headlock from behind. He sighed against her hair, burying his face into the crevice of her neck and resting there.
"I'm scared, Mikasa," he breathed from behind her. It was haunting, the way he spoke.
Haunting to hear him; Eren Yeager, afraid.
Mikasa sucked in her breath, arching up from the bed without giving herself the time to properly wake up. Her hand reached beside her, the act instinctive as her palm grazed against the stiff bedding beneath her.
Where was he?
She blinked in the light, allowing her eyes to adjust to the white cracks of sunlight peeking through the wooden slats of the window. For it wasn't her room - heck, she couldn't even remember the last time she'd slept in a room that was her own.
And it wasn't his room, either. Well, not by ownership. Mikasa had awakened, for the second night in a row, in Eren's bed - a makeshift bedroom designated for him in the cabin they'd been taken to. The cabin they'd been sleeping in, for the past two weeks.
Levi's orders.
Mikasa had lost track of time, rubbing her eyes to try and guess what day it was. She'd been disconnected from the world since she'd been taken there, locked up and confined to the generous space of a hundred square metres, give or take. Location, unknown. She could have been in timbuktou for all she knew.
"Eren?"
The rap on the door made Mikasa's back straighten, the call of his name making her feel like a convicted criminal. It was a sensation close to when a child is caught for a misdemeanour, expecting the punishment of a parent.
Not that Hangë's voice ever had anything convicting in its tone.
She was nothing like Levi.
"He's not here," Mikasa called out, clearing her voice as she pulled up the covers over her body instinctively. She felt her face grow hot at the sound of her own voice, resounding out in the empty room. Eren's room.
"Mikasa?" Hangë hesitated against the door, sighing. "Ah. Okay."
Mikasa held her breath until she felt Hangë leave, her silent-springed footsteps slowly growing further and further away.
Dropping her chest, Mikasa threw back the covers from her body, flinging her legs over the side of the bed. She was wearing a tiny pair of shorts, and a white, see-through cami. It was October, and yet the air still felt hot, pressing down on Mikasa's skin incessantly as she leaned her head down to her legs, gritting her teeth in embarrassment. She was sure Hangë and Levi knew what was going on between Eren and her. Certain, even. And yet, to be found in his bed in the morning was beyond humiliating for her.
And yet, no sensation would come close to what permeated in her body above all else.
Frustration.
Months had passed since the fateful night of the academic dinner. Since Mikasa had fallen desperately into Eren's hands, falling just as much as she had let herself into his grasp. Time had blurred since then, the nameless meaning of what existed between them silently driving her insane.
Whenever she reached out for him, he was always hiding somewhere.
He was never close enough.
And that was the case that morning, as Mikasa woke up for the fifteenth night in Levi's cabin. She hadn't put up a fight, when Eren had told her she'd be taken there. She understood, deep down - knew that for the both of them, it was safest to stay hidden. But deeper down, there was a part of her that wanted to kick down the walls and escape, taking Eren with her and returning to Paradis, back to the time they didn't have to fear for their lives.
Back when they thought that all their troubles had been taken care of. When her problems haunted her in dreams, the dawn of reality not yet broken.
Mikasa blinked hard as the bedroom door creaked open, exposing Eren's eyes from the slitted opening. Seeing Mikasa awake, he jolted up - swinging the door open quickly before shutting it behind him. Mikasa scanned him, up and down - raising her eyebrows at his white tshirt and black jeans. It was weird to see him in anything other than all black, and yet, she was more focused on the fact that he'd changed into a completely new set of clothes since she'd been asleep.
How much more had he gone and done, whilst she'd been sleeping?
"You're still in bed?" Eren spoke, walking over to the bed as he closed the door behind him. He knelt to Mikasa's eye level, gaze flicking between her wide eyes, worry seeping through his own slitted gaze. Mikasa had grown used to that worried gaze, its presence creeping up onto Eren's countenance stronger with each day that had passed them. What puzzled her, however, was the fact that that worry only came about when he looked at her, as if it were her in some sort of grave danger.
She knew the situation well enough. And she knew, by Eren's nature, that he'd never let himself worry about his own situation for even a second. Call it pride, call it stubbornness. Deep down, Mikasa knew he'd forever choose to worry over her than over himself.
And sometimes, she realised how consuming it could be for him.
"Why, should I have left?" Mikasa bit her lip, tugging at the edge of the bedsheet as if to cover herself. Her instinct was keeping her there, refusing to return to the tiny room she'd been told was hers in her time in the cabin. It wasn't like there was anything specifically wrong with her room. It was just the same as Eren's, right next door, too. It was evident they'd once been the same room, his and hers - split into two with a thin, wood-panelled wall down the middle.
Eren's hand grasped onto hers reflexively, the movement quick and unexpected. He held tight onto her wrist against the bedsheet, making her incapable of hiding.
"Quite the contrary," Eren smirked. "You should just move your stuff into this room, Mikasa."
She blinked, processing what he meant before shaking her head.
"Are you serious? What will they think? And Levi, God knows what he'd say..."
"You really care what they think?" Eren scoffed, lowering his head against Mikasa's leg. He rested his forehead against her skin, breathing against the bedsheet before planting a kiss on the tender flesh of her inner thigh. "Well, whatever you do. Keep sleeping here. Without you here, I can't..."
He swallowed his words, looking up to her with the innocent gaze of a boy caught paralysed by fear. Mikasa looked down at him, her face at first glance indifferent. It was only Eren who'd learnt how to discern those little changes, the ways her eyes softened into slits trying to hide the way her words made her feel. The way the corners of her lips tightened when she was trying not to say exactly what was on her mind. The way her hand gripped onto the cover, making his eyes flick down at her slight movement.
Her feelings were a sacred gift, one only he was able to peer into.
"You can't...?" Mikasa swallowed, peering down at Eren's head against her. Her palm cupped his cheek, letting him rest against her hand and she stroked the length of his jaw.
"I sleep better if you're here," Eren murmured, his words vibrating against her skin as she cradled his face.
"I see," Mikasa muttered, biting her lip. She couldn't help her lips from softening, her smile a craack of light in the walls of a dark tunnel.
"But if you want to leave, by all means..."
"Be quiet," Mikasa sighed, grasping Eren's hair in her fist and raising his head to face her. "You know I'm here for the same reason."
The bed creaked as Eren reached over her, pressing his thumb over Mikasa's cheek as he kissed her, his breath soft against her lips. His soft tresses of hair brushed her neck, making her shudder as she leaned her head back against the pillow and letting his lips travel down to her jaw. It was always the same, the feeling that filled Mikasa's chest when he kissed her. Feeling him close to her, within her grasp, was all it took to calm her agitation, settling her nerves and reminding her that everything would be alright.
Everything would be fine.
"Speak softer, Eren."
Mikasa's back pressed back against the kitchen wall, her oversized black hoodie hiding her body. It was 2pm, and yet it felt like early morning when she'd finally quit Eren's room, following silently behind him as if she were an intruder in the very house she'd been made resident of.
"What, you want me to whisper?" Eren flicked his head back at her, scraping his hair back with an elastic. He was boiling a pot of water, preparing coffee as if it were an appropriate time for breakfast.
"No, just..." Mikasa sighed, realising how stupid she sounded. She didn't know why she felt so on edge in that house, but it was a feeling that hadn't left her since she'd arrived at the start of the month. In fact, as time went on, she felt her anxiety rise - the sensation of always being watched pressing on her in a way she didn't like at all.
"No one's sleeping," Eren sighed, turning to face Mikasa as he brought two mugs towards the wooden countertop between them. He turned back, reaching his arms up to open a cabinet in search of the sugar. "Don't tell me you're scared of...?"
"What? I'm not scared," Mikasa said between gritted teeth, looking down to the floor. Her bare foot traced the crack in the wooden flooring, her body swaying from side to side. "It's just..."
"Goood... afternoon!"
Mikasa nearly tripped over herself, slipping back against the wall as she heard Hangë's voice flood the room, as if she'd summoned her into existence.
And, of course, right behind her followed him. Levi, with that eternally pissed-off look in his eyes, his face, his posture... He brought that same air into the room with him, every time. Disappointment. Frustration.
No, Mikasa wasn't scared, per say. She was more... How to put it?
Deeply disconcerted.
"Hm," Eren hummed, turning his gaze down to the sink as he rinsed his hands with water, shaking them dry in the air.
"Someone's cheerful!" Hangë mocked, beaming as she usually did. Mikasa wondered whether she was genuinely in a constant state of joy, or whether she was on some type of psychedelic drug. Perhaps it was the only way she could deal with being Levi's assistant, constantly by the side of someone at the polar end of her high spirits.
Whatever Hangë was on, Levi could definitely use some of it. The short, brooding man stood beside his assistant, with arms crossed across his chest, eyeing the countertops with eyes slitted in study. Mikasa panicked, inspecting the surface in fear that he'd find something. A used napkin. A stain. Or, God forbid, a crumb. She'd grown used to their daily cleaning schedule, keeping the cabin like a showroom, instead of the wooden hut in the woods that it was.
"Oh, Mikasa," Hangë said matter-of-factly, making the girl flinch. She pushed the centre of her glasses up the bridge of her nose, cocking her head in curiosity. "I noticed you haven't been sleeping in your room. Is there something wrong with it? Your bed, perhaps?"
"I-" Mikasa started, sucking in her breath and digging her nails into her palm. She was swaying, feeling the blood rush to her face quickly - and she was sure that Eren had noticed, probably containing his smirk by the second. "How did you-"
She could feel Levi's eyes on her already, his next victim of inspection. Beady, snarky - as if it was Mikasa who'd turned Eren into some kind of rabid creature.
Guilt - and embarrassment, were eating her alive.
"She broke into my room, actually," Eren said simply. "Didn't you, Mikasa?"
"Huh?" She raised her voice, stepping forwards towards Eren and glaring hard. She ground her teeth. "No? You freak, what are you-"
"Enough," Levi sighed, walking over to the counter and leaning his elbows on the countertop. He winced, as if touching the surface would make him contract a disease. "Lower your voices. I believe I made it clear what would happen if we're found here by the wrong people."
Mikasa bit her lip, crossing her arms and fingering the zipper of her hoodie. She was close enough to reach out, grab Eren and shake him hard for the way he'd embarrassed her. But she didn't have the guts, not in front of them. Instead, she kept her eyes fixed forward, glaring at a fly hovering on the wood-panelled wall at the other end of the kitchen. It was the only way she'd be able to stay quiet.
"If we're found, it'll be Mikasa's fault," Eren sighed, as if declaring a tragic piece of news. He shook his head, holding his temples in his hand and peering at her with one eye. "After all, she doesn't know how to keep her-"
Mikasa couldn't keep herself still, couldn't control herself from the instinct to kick him in the shin - hard, before waiting expectantly for his reaction. She'd had an inkling regarding what he'd been about to say, something she'd never dared expect him to say out loud. She held his gaze as his eyes widened with excitement at her reaction, his usual amusement to see her angry making her even more irritable. Stepping forward, her eyes slitted menacingly as she gritted her teeth.
As Mikasa raised her arm, she felt herself grabbed by him, Eren's hand on her forearm, pinning it back against the wall - rendering her incapable of doing anything other than grunt against him.
For a second, she'd forgotten people were watching. Eren, on the other hand, could have been well aware for all she knew. He didn't care for things like embarrassment. Propriety. That, and self control - Mikasa had come to the conclusion long ago that those two human qualities simply did not exist within him.
Eren laughed as his hand pressed down on Mikasa's wrist, smirking before his eyes widened at something. It was her collarbone, peeking through the top of her hoodie. He paused for a second, before zipping it to the top in one quick, smooth action. Mikasa blinked, looking down at her zipper and opening her mouth, about to speak.
"What did I say," Eren sighed, looking to Levi and raising an eyebrow. He held her arm tight against the wall, stopping her from reaching for the zipper he'd pulled up. "She's uncontrollable. Sorry."
"Children. Both of you." Levi winced, moving from the counter and looking away, facing the opposite wall. "I'll deal with you later, brat."
Mikasa winced at the impact of that word, the only thing Levi ever called him. Sure, she'd always felt Levi suspicious of her - but it was never a feeling as harsh as how he was with Eren. Mikasa knew well enough that Levi was a sort of father figure for Eren. After all, it had always been him to catch him when he was about to fall - always him there to save his ass when he ran into situations he clearly hadn't thought out beforehand. Since the death of his parents, he'd only ever had Levi. Of course, that didn't change the fact that he was a pretty lousy replacement for a father - more of a tough-love mentor than anything else.
Eren had given Mikasa a run down of what had happened after he'd left Paradis, nearly 7 years ago. And she knew it had been Levi by his side, the only blood-member left of his family. Albeit extended. And yet, Mikasa couldn't help but feel a little bad when she heard Levi treat Eren with such... force. She'd watched the two men fight countless times in those fifteen days enclosed together - fights which more often than not became physical. And whilst Eren was almost twice Levi's size, she'd found the latter surprisingly nimble, capable of doing a lot more damage than what he looked to be worth.
Eren had told her he'd been the Shiganshina's prized human-weaponry, after all.
Not that she completely understood what that meant.
And she feared just as much to stumble into a situation where she'd have to find out.
"Eren," Hangë reprimanded, tutting her tongue. "Let that poor girl go. You're such an animal."
"See?" Mikasa hissed, glaring up the glimmering eyes holding her hostage. She kept her gaze on his, holding her eyes there for a little longer than she'd intended. It was addictive, meeting his eyes when they glimmered with that excited, daring look of his. Biting her lip, she coloured as she realised Hangë was still there watching, lingering behind Levi who'd already walked out the door.
"Anyways, Eren. Meet us outside in five. We need to speak to you."
Mikasa felt Eren's grip slacken around her wrist, his shoulders dropping as his eyes widened, realisation flickering in them briefly.
"Uh huh."
Hangë's ponytail swished behind her head as she left the room, quickening her pace to follow after Levi. They were headed for the front door, perhaps taking the matte-black sports car parked outside. Totally inconspicuous for a secluded cabin in the middle of a forest. Right.
"You're insane," Mikasa growled as Eren let go of her, letting her smoothen out her clothes. "And why did you zip my jacket?"
"You talk about being embarrassed," Eren grunted, leaning against the wall and looking her up and down with arms crossed. "I saved your ass."
"Huh?" Mikasa cocked her head, looking down at her hoodie's zipper before reaching for it with two fingers. "What do you mean?"
"Leave it," Eren smirked, grabbing her raised hand and lowering it to her side. "Before I go, I need to tell you something."
Mikasa blinked, suddenly forgetting all about the zip of her jacket.
"Okay?" She shrugged her shoulders, shaking her head at him with a raised eyebrow. "So?"
"I may need to go away for a while."
Mikasa straightened her back, arching towards him. "No. Not even the slightest chance."
"Listen, Mikasa," Eren sighed. He slipped his fingers through hers, gripping her palm. "Please, listen."
Mikasa dropped her chest, exhaling slowly.
"Not now. Not yet. I don't know when. It's just-"
"Before you continue," Mikasa interrupted, biting her lip. "I need you to tell me why we're here."
"You know why we're here, Mikasa," Eren said through gritted teeth.
"No, I don't. I know it's to do with... With Jean." She winced as she said his name, a name she'd thought she'd have been able to forget. "Someone's suspicious, right? Suspicious of us? But what's waiting out here going to do? We can't stay here forever, surely?"
"Exactly," Eren sighed. "Someone's suspicious. It's just that, that someone isn't just... one person."
"Huh?" Mikasa blinked. "What, his family? Relatives?"
"His organisation," Eren stressed, gripping harder onto her hand, his voice pleading. "We hadn't calculated how many of them were left."
The room was silent, save for the faint dripping of water from the kitchen tap.
"Oh."
"Don't worry. We'll sort it out."
"Uh huh," Mikasa breathed, her gaze phasing out towards the floor. She didn't sound convinced - far from it, in fact. Her mind was trying to calculate how serious the situation was. How many people could be after them, anyways? Five? Ten? How many people made up a whole organisation, hiding in Marley? She blinked, her heart rate quickening. An entire organisation, targeting them? It didn't sound possible. Or maybe it was just that she didn't want it to sound possible.
"Listen," Eren shook her hand softly, making her gaze snap back up to his. "In the meantime, Levi has a plan."
"Yeah?" Mikasa breathed, sucking in her breath. She felt like she could cry, looking into those eyes which moments ago had ignited something wholly different within her. Reality was suddenly dawning on her, the severity of it having laid dormant inside of her those past two weeks.
"We need to go back to Paradis. Soon."
"We can?" Mikasa's eyes widened, her body perking up. "When?"
"In the next week," Eren sighed. "But look. There are going to be rumours. Suspicions. Especially from the fraternity."
"Hm," Mikasa nodded, "I guessed so. Besides, isn't someone new meant to be leading the fraternity now?"
Eren stayed silent, failing to meet her eyes.
"I mean, haven't they elected someone? Now that Je-"
"They elected me, Mikasa," Eren sighed. "Last month."
The tap kept dripping, fading in slow motion as Mikasa's heart skipped a beat.
"You...?" Mikasa scoffed. "But you're..."
"Right," Eren shook his head. "Obviously that wouldn't be a good idea."
"So who's leading instead of you?"
"I have no clue." Eren looked down, staring at Mikasa's hand in his. "But I need to find out. Most of all, I need to find out how much any of them know."
Mikasa blinked, her breath hitching in her throat.
"Or, at least, how much they think they know."
"Hm," Mikasa nodded. "Okay. But we can go back to classes, right?"
"Yeah. There's just one thing." Eren let go of Mikasa's hand, looking into her eyes and drawing both hands to her cheeks, brushing her hair out from the front of her face. "Now listen. This was Levi's idea. For our safety."
"Y...Yeah?" Mikasa stuttered, feeling her face grow hot. It was when he kept his face so close to hers, fixing his eyes on hers like they were exchanging glances of their souls. It made her dizzy.
"We need people to think we're together. That's the only way our... situation with Jean will make sense."
Mikasa opened her mouth and shut it, mouthing empty words as she felt her face grow warmer in Eren's palms.
"Right."
That word, so dismissive and unsurprised, had come from a place far from her heart, the complete opposite of what she'd wanted to say.
To think we're a couple?
So, what are we, then, if not together?
"As far as anyone knows, Jean had a thing for you, right?" As he spoke, he traced lines down Mikasa's strands of hair, brushing locks behind her ear. "But, when you rejected him, he felt humiliated."
There was a remnant of anger in his voice, commanding the words from his throat.
"And then?" Mikasa breathed in, sucking sharply.
"And then," Eren murmured, grazing his thumb against her jaw, "Jean and I had a fight. The regular fist fight over a girl. That's what people think already, anyways. And we need them to think it was that simple. And, because I won, it would only make sense that Jean was humiliated." The way he spoke was bordering on the personal, his gritted teeth producing a hiss as he enunciated each word.
"And so, he had to leave..." Mikasa mouthed, whispering.
"Exactly. And the best evidence we can give people is that we're together. That Jean had reason to leave, out of sheer embarrassment."
"Okay," Mikasa nodded, sucking on her bottom lip. "That could make sense."
"We can discuss it better later, okay?" Eren nodded, looking out the window to the driveway. He was distracted, Mikasa could tell. And not only by the fact that Levi and Hangë were waiting outside for him. No - Mikasa knew well enough that following their orders wasn't something that weighed heavy on his mind. There was something else, a fear he wasn't telling Mikasa about. And she could feel it, lingering between them in silence.
"Wait," Mikasa snapped, grabbing onto his wrist before he had time to back away. "Tell me. About why you're leaving."
"Oh," Eren sighed. "It's nothing. It won't be until later. It's just I..."
"To Marley, right?" Mikasa choked. Her throat was closing up, the words hesitant in her voice.
"Mikasa..." Eren grasped both her hands, holding on tight. "It won't be like last time."
His voice sounded as sickly sweet as a promise, much too similar to a promise that had once been broken.
"Promise me, Eren."
His eyes shot through her body like diamond-edged daggers, their violent green tint shimmering in the soft sunlight shining through the window. They hid something, something she'd never quite been able to peel back completely.
It terrified her.
"Do you doubt me?" Eren's eyes winced from the sun, refusing to break eye contact with her. "I promise."
But it wasn't enough.
There was something gnawing inside of her, something unspoken. And it was beyond fear, beyond the simplicity that word could grasp within her. It was all the more terrifying, the sensation to repeat what had once been.
And it would always be there, she feared.
"Don't think about it," Eren looked to the wall beside him, avoiding her gaze. Inside himself, he felt sickened. Sickened that all he could do was distract her, avert her mind from the inevitable. Sickened that the promise he made to her depended on his life, the only factor that could break that very promise he'd hoped he'd never have had to make again.
"Sure," Mikasa scoffed, looking to the same point on the wall that he was fixed on. "It's that easy."
She flinched at the sound of the car starting outside, the sound following of a door slamming.
"I need to go, Mikasa."
She sighed, her chest dropping. She couldn't face him - not yet. There was something within her that wouldn't permit it.
His hand was still on hers, slipping up to her wrist and pulling her towards him. He held onto her head, his palm wrapping down to the back of her neck and embracing her close against his chest.
"I'll be back soon. Wait for me here."
His voice whispered against her skin, the sensation haunting. It was like each time he spoke could be the last, the feeling frighteningly fleeting. As if he existed in a dream, not in the reality she'd tried to come to terms in those past few months they'd spent together.
"As if I have anywhere else to go."
As if I'd ever want to leave your side.
The sensation of his body parting from hers felt like the ripping of a limb from one's body, the sensation sharp against Mikasa's skin. She sucked in her breath, watching him as he stepped back. His eyes lingered on her only for a moment, before turning to the door. The sun glimmered around his silhouette, the light creating a halo around his head until he stepped out the door. He was still there, lingering in the memory of Mikasa's sight. Like a hallucination. Like he'd never been there at all.
It was like each moment could have been the last.
The house was silent. Too silent. The sun was starting to set, darkness dawning earlier and earlier as the season crept deeper into Autumn. Mikasa hated to be alone in the cabin - hated those infrequent times she found herself forced to entertain herself in the silence of the small space. Her phone was dead: she'd left it to die, after the day she'd discovered there was no signal in that damn cabin.
She'd wondered. If something happened to her, would anyone find out?
If someone really was after them, after her... What would they do to her, if they found her there?
She had a feeling it would be much more sinister than what she'd lived through when Jean was still alive.
His organisation. It sounded too serious, too heavy a thought for her to visualise. He was that important, was he? Mikasa was aware of the dynamic between the Kirstein family and Eren's. She knew, both from her memories and the vague mentionings Eren had given her, that it had been Jean's family to hire the assassins who'd killed Eren.
Could it be possible, that ending the lives of two measly hitmen when her and Eren had been children - an act of self defence, had led to this? To hiding in fear, almost seven years later?
Kicking her legs off the sofa, Mikasa sat up. She'd been lying there for the past hour, staring up at the dirty skylight on the ceiling and listening out in expectation of the sound of the car backing up into the driveway. Where had they taken him, anyway? Levi and Hangë had only meant to speak to him outside, hadn't they? She hated the thought that they were hiding things from her, acting as if she were too stupid to understand what was going on.
She had ears. And she had the brain to deduce the situation as much as one could with the measly explanation they'd given her.
She felt encaged, like a bird held behind bars.
Sighing, Mikasa stretched out her arms, wincing her eyes at the final slit of sunlight peering through the gaps in the window. Sunset - and it wasn't the usual, orange glow of the Summer sun. The light was harsh; blinding. She hugged her body, standing up and tiptoeing towards Eren's bedroom. Standing between the two doors - Eren's, and her's, she hesitating opening the door to her right. She could visualise it - the neat, tidy space of 'her room'. Her suitcase was still on the floor, she remembered - unopened. Untouched. And she'd vowed to keep it that way, until she knew when she'd leave.
Next week.
Knowing the end of that time in the cabin was near gave her a strange sense of a calm, a rational sense of peace broken by the reminder of Eren's words. Rumours. The fraternity. Their peers. University seemed like a far-away memory, a place she'd attended only in a dream.
With what face, with what courage, would she return to that world? The world where she'd morphed into another, spending the duration of her first year in the skin of someone else? In the skin of another version of herself. A creation of her simple boredom, the girl who'd let herself become entangled in the world which had somehow been connected to Eren's.
It wasn't her. And yet, even then, that life had led her back to Eren's.
It had been fate.
Pushing the door ajar, Mikasa let herself through into Eren's room, pacing to the mirror above the oak dresser. Pressing her palms against the surface, she poured her face over the mirror, peering into her eyes. She looked tired, sickeningly so. Looking at herself no longer made her flinch, but sigh. Her hair had grown long, sweeping down her mid-back in wavy, unruly tresses, and her bangs had grown out months ago, sweeping at the sides of her face. She looked for a brush, opening the top drawer of the dresser instinctively, as if she were still in Eren's apartment.
Eren's apartment.
The months she'd spent with Eren now seemed like a dream, the never ending period he'd told her to stay, to remain another night, until those single nights turned into weeks, into months. Until she'd slowly started to leave her things at his, slowly moving out her items from her college dorm into his apartment in silent cognisance. She'd felt safe, there - a sense of safety she'd only ever felt when they were kids, spending hours in the library of his childhood home. And yet, it had been different. Sleeping beside him, waking up to him sleeping at her side, reminding her that he was there to stay, that she didn't have to fear for him to leave her ever again.
His top dresser drawer had been made hers - and now, she found herself opening the drawer of the oak dresser, expecting to find her hairbrush sitting there at the top. She paused as she realised her mistake, holding onto the tarnished silver handle and peering down at the contents of the drawer. There was a stack of papers, envelopes made of brown sugar paper, held together by a thin, red elastic band. Mikasa looked over the stack indifferently as she began to shut the drawer. Until she noticed the familiar writing of his, the way he wrote the letter 'k' - detaching the root from the other half of the letter. Mikasa pulled the drawer open fully, wincing to make out what she'd initially thought it to be written on the papers. Mikasa. Her name, written in red ballpoint pen over the top envelope. Fingering the elastic band over the stack of letters, she pulled out the stacked pile - pulling at the elastic to reveal her name fully. Mikasa. Pulling at the envelope, she let it free from the elastic, setting it on the table. The next envelope, sitting in the pile beneath it, was just the same. Mikasa. This time, her name was wobbly, the writing irregular but still decisively Eren's. She was frantic now, pulling the letter out of the elastic. Behind it, again, was her name. Untying the elastic, Mikasa let the letters fall to the floor, scattering silently. Mikasa. Mikasa. Mikasa. The floor was littered in the brown sugar paper, her name written in red on each envelope. The familiar k, its root detached from the rest. Letters. To her. Written by him.
Mikasa held her breath, squatting down on the floor to pick up the envelopes. She turned one over, fingering the seal at the back. She noticed that the envelopes were all irregular-shaped, not the kind you'd buy in a store. Hand made - sealed with some sort of sticky glue. Still sealed. How long had they been sitting there, unopened? Mikasa fingered the seal, thinking to open one. What did they say? When had they been written?
Why were they there, in Levi's cabin?
The sound of a thump from outside shook Mikasa awake from her thoughts, her hands working instinctively to gather all the envelopes into her arms. Setting them onto the dresser, she lined them up and tied them with the elastic, shoving them neatly into the drawer and looking at herself once more in the mirror. Her face was red, as if she'd been caught doing something forbidden. Why did it feel forbidden, opening that drawer? She sighed, leaning over the mirror.
"Breathe."
The thump from outside stopped, the noise seemingly nothing of importance. An animal, Mikasa figured - right, probably a racoon. She heard them all the time, sometimes scurrying in the attic of the cabin. They were in the middle of a forest, after all. Before turning back to leave the room, Mikasa hesitated. The silver zipper of her hoodie glared at her, the memory of Eren's act taunting her in her mind.
Taking it in her fingers, she zipped it down - peeling it from off her shoulders and sucking in the air through her teeth. She wanted to curse him, just as much as she wanted to thank him in hindsight. On her collarbone was a red bruise, a purpling mark in the shape of his mouth. She wasn't surprised. She'd grown used to waking up and seeing them there in the months she'd lived with him.
"That animal..."
She thanked him silently, smiling at the thought. He'd embarrassed her, alright. But at least he knew well enough to hide some things from Levi and Hangë.
Maybe he did care to protect her from mortification. To some extent.
Smiling, Mikasa brushed a strand of dark hair behind her ear.
We have to make people think we're together.
His words, now that she recalled them, made her wince. Make people think?
What, like that was so far from the truth?