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Levi finds him in the park, by the river. His arms are wrapped around his legs, his hands clenching on his calves, and his face is pressed against his knees – in a pathetic attempt at keeping the world at bay, behind the wall made of his members. His body is partly concealed by the tall grass grazing the goose pimps on his skin, but his white shirt is quite recognizable, a white stain in the nuances of green. Eren wasn’t really trying to hide; he’s far past this point – all he tries now is to buy some time: minutes, or even seconds of peace. He’s learnt through the years that there’s no point in hiding from him. What he seeks is a truce, a ceasefire, a moment away from the guilt and the pain. As soon as he distinguishes the sound of steps from the whispers of the breeze swaying in the blades of grass, he knows it’s Levi. He doesn’t need to look. It couldn’t be anybody else.
“I want it to stop.” He says, and it might be the hundredth time.
The steps don’t falter and soon he feels a hand against his shoulder, burning him through the cotton shirt he’s wearing. He tries to ignore it, but the attraction’s just as strong as it was on the first day, and all his body is already leaning towards Levi’s soft palm. He never knew how not to melt against the other man’s touch. Neither now, nor in the very beginning.
“Please. Please.”
The hand pulls him back and he’s forced to look at Levi. It was the last thing he wanted to do, because he knew how it was all going to end, how it always does: it only takes a glimpse of Levi’s face to have him break down in tears against the older man’s chest. Levi wraps his arms around him and holds him tight. It could be a cage, or the image of one, forged in the shattered dreams that he never had the heart to give up.
“I’m not letting you go.” Levi says, and Eren doesn’t know if the words are a promise or a threat anymore.
*
Eren met Levi when he was seventeen. Of all the ages he could have been, he had to meet Levi when he was seventeen. It’s not fair, Eren muses, his heart overwhelmed by a feeling akin to nostalgia, but not quite. Nobody is prepared when they are seventeen. His weapons had not yet been forged; he had no shield at his arm. He had nothing to fight or defend himself with against promises and heartbreaks, and no knowledge of life to keep him out of trouble. To be honest, just as any other seventeen-year-old-boy, he didn’t long for anything but trouble.
Life had been serene and joyful during seventeen long years. It had also been rather uneventful. That’s when Levi happened.
He was a blank page at that time, a blank page which wanted nothing more than to be written. Be it in blood. Be it in tears. I’m an anthology of heart-wrenching poems and frozen hopes now, Eren bitterly tells himself, and although it hurts, even if there’s so much war for so little peace, when Levi’s smaller hand is in his he thinks he couldn’t bear to have it any other way.
*
“I am trouble, Eren. I feel I should tell you. I know I’d better scare you away but I’m too much of an egoist to do that. I’m never letting you go. But anyway, you should know. I am trouble, and I am going to break your heart.”
Levi tells him that in a coffee shop, two weeks after the first time they meet. Wrapped over his teacup, his delicate fingers don’t tremble. Neither does his voice. He is thirty-two, and he doesn’t tremble, for there is no hesitation in him, just a fierce charisma hidden behind the mask of a Greek statue. Perfect, cold, full of dark promises behind white marble.
Eren blinks, and nods. At this moment, Levi is everything he has ever dreamt of, a beautiful figure of temptation speaking in riddles and using magical words of poisonous mystery. He wonders how on earth he managed to get his attention, how he got him to speak to him, and how long this will last. He thinks he is bound to make a stupid mistake sooner or later. Please let it be later, very later.
“I like trouble” he answers with a smirk, in a rather unsure attempt at seduction.
The truth is, he doesn’t understand, and the smile Levi shows him is a bittersweet one.
*
It all comes down to a fundamental riddle on the obscure ways of love. It’s an enigma Eren has already spent too much energy on trying to solve. It has drained him, dyed him, and even crushed him over the years, leaving him with no real answer but a full bag of torments he carries like a cross.
They say love is blind, and for a time it’s true. At first, you don’t see what is wrong. And when you catch the first little glimpses of something that makes you feel unease, like a smear of black paint in your favorite painting, you close your eyes and with that you can comfort yourself a little while longer in the heartwarming security of the thought “it was just my imagination”.
But maybe love is not blind; maybe it is only short-sighted. Maybe love is not able to see the stains because they are in a corner of the painting that is too distant for them to be anything else than blurry. Maybe as time goes by, you grow the courage and the curiosity to bring yourself closer to the stains, or maybe it’s because they spread on the canvas, making it darker and somehow scarier.
But there comes a time when you see.
And the question Eren can’t find an answer to is this: does love mean that you can accept everything?
It is a rather easy thing to say and an even simpler thought to admit perhaps, but the truth is that nobody wants to love bad people. More than that, the last thing you want is for the people you care for to be bad people. You don’t want them to hurt others, to rejoice in their pain. You don’t want to love monsters, and maybe it’s because all the people you love are sorts of ramifications of yourself, like the extension of your roots, and they sometimes reflect what you are really made of. So maybe it really is for a selfish reason – Eren doesn’t know.
Maybe it’s what he is so afraid of. If he can’t bring himself to stop loving Levi, does it mean that he is a monster too?
*
He begins to get it four months later, in the same coffee shop. He has officially been dating Levi for one week, and he still can’t believe his luck that the older man accepted his clumsy confession. He is young, and this thing that fills his chest, he doesn’t know how to call it yet, and he knows it might be too soon to be anything else than a crush but it’s so big and it takes so much place that it could be this infamous feeling beginning with an L – but even the words are scary, so for now he avoids them. He is disoriented, because it feels like having been handed something beautiful and fragile but like not having the right knowledge or tools to take care of it.
Eren understands that something isn’t exactly right when a strange woman – or is it a man? - with heavy glasses takes a seat at their table and starts feeding casually on Levi’s blueberry cheesecake, which Levi abandons with a disgusted face. Eren doesn’t know how to react, but as Levi doesn’t look surprised, he figures the person is just some acquaintance of him and leaves it there, happily taking the role of a spectator, waiting to be introduced.
“So that’s what you’ve been doing lately. He’s cute, Levi! I didn’t know you had a thing for cute!” They say, and the tone of their voice makes Eren cringe. Falsely enthusiastic, invasive, sharp.
“I didn’t either.” Levi answers with the utmost calm, while the other one loudly drinks in Levi’s teacup. The drink doesn’t seem to be quite to their liking, considering the rude face they make.
“Well, some things you still like bitter, I see. Did you intent on keeping it secret?”
“Oh, come on, Hange. Does it look like a secret to you? I have nothing to hide to the Commander, you know that.” Levi says, without looking at Hange, while he takes his teacup back and puts the teaspoon on top of it, a subtle way to imply he won’t touch it anymore.
“Erwin is not going to like this.” Hange answers after a while. Levi averts his gaze from his cup and glares at them.
“No, he probably isn’t, I’ll give you that. But you know what? You may be his designated successor, but he and I go way back. He’s not going to like it, but I think Erwin will know that it’s his time to do something for me.”
“Ow… Aren’t you romantic, Levi? I didn’t think you had it in you! Where’s the lunatic and cold son of bitch I’m used to? Have you stopped being a loyal soldier? Have you lost your respect for the Commander?”
“Don’t give me that, Hange. You know I respect him. You know I’ve given my life to him. But even I have my needs, my dreams.”
Suddenly, he turns to Eren, and looks at him with tenderness.
“And I’m sure he’ll let me fulfill them.”
He turns to Hange again. “Now, you can leave us. I don’t think you had anything important to tell me today. Tell him I hope he’s having a blast with you.”
Hange doesn’t answer immediately, their glasses shining, their lips sealed – and with each second of silence the uneasiness grows in Eren. Levi’s hand finds his thigh under the table, and he realizes he had stopped breathing.
Hange glares at him, then at Levi. And what they finally say takes Eren by surprise.
“Why are you always his favorite?”
“You already know why. Because I’m the best.”
“And the humblest! Okay, okay, I’ll leave you two alone. Bye, Eren! See you soon!”
And with that, Hange takes off. Eren doesn’t dare to ask, but the questions are there.
*
He said he was the best.
And Eren now knows it’s true.
*
After this thing with Hange, Eren knows he probably ought to ask the questions that have started to pile up. They are growing heavier and heavier on his chest, and it would surely relieve him of some weight – but he’s not quite sure the answers wouldn’t be even more unbearable.
And then it’s only the beginning of their relationship, and everything is new and bright and beautiful. Eren revels in the way Levi makes him feel. He didn’t know, didn’t even dare to hope someone could complete him the way the other man does. There is a very old and powerful magic in the way Levi’s hand on him turns all his body electric. He thinks about it all the time, when he sits at his parents’ table for breakfast or at his cram school when he studies for his next exam. The ache to touch and to be touched is always there – especially at night in his bed but oh, not only then. They have kissed and brought each other to the edge, but he craves for an even deeper connection.
He will graduate from high school very soon, and he has yet to figure what he will do after that. For now, all he wants is to be Levi’s, and how crazy is that?
It turns out that he doesn’t have to ask his questions at all.
It takes him by surprise when Levi finally tells him.
“Eren, I’m one of the Wings of Freedom.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You should really look more at your mom’s newspapers.”
*
It’s not that Levi is cruel, Eren reminds himself. At least not to him. Levi doesn’t take any particular pleasure in hurting him, doesn’t savor the pain on his face nor feast on his tears, but neither his pain nor his tears stop Levi from doing it either. Eren used to think Levi had no choice, but he has had time to grow out of this naïve idea.
He used to confront Levi, full of overused theories about right and wrong and how Levi was obviously a good person forced to do bad things. It seems it was ages ago, as if each year they went through had been a century. When Eren looks at what they have now, all he sees are the shaky and dusty ruins of the castle he had once build with his own hands, using his affection and expectations as cement and stones. What is left of it now isn’t worth the pain of trying to salvage it, for it has already crumbled away.
He began to realize it was a lost cause when he was almost twenty and ending his second year of art studies at university. He had tried living with his high school friend Jean for a while, but after a year the latter had made him understand that he needed the place if he wanted to be able to bring back girls and not have to pay motels anymore. Eren hadn’t fought back at that time, knowing that an expulsion from Jean, with Armin and Mikasa both being in different parts of the country for their studies, meant that he would have to settle in Levi’s place, at least for a while. By the time Eren discovered that Jean had merely been repeating the words Levi had put in his mouth, but that he’d been relieved not to have to endure the goosebumps that Levi’s friends’ constant watch gave him anymore, the illusion had already been revealed.
He had then started to share Levi’s apartment, and it had been impossible for Eren to ignore Levi’s whereabouts any longer. It’s not that he hadn’t known before, just that he had preferred to focus on the time Levi was with him and not God knew where, doing Satan knew what.
It had been a rough week, and Eren's heart was already on the edge when Levi disappeared for the night, coming back home at five in the morning. Eren was waiting for him on the couch, facing the door, in a spot that couldn’t be avoided, prepared to have a real talk with the older man, ready to present him with an ultimatum. However, Levi’s eyes met Eren's as soon as he stepped in, and words crossed neither his lips, nor Eren's.
Levi went through the living room with an unreadable face and went straight to the bathroom without bothering to close the door behind him. Eren followed him, stopping at the threshold of the light blue tiles. By the time he stepped in, Levi was already washing his face, his lean body bending over the sink. He had stripped along the way, tossing his shirt in the laundry basket, and Eren's heart stopped when he noticed that Levi hadn’t come home alone.
Indeed, Levi had come home with ghosts. They had taken the form of blood covering his arms and chest. The dark stains drew frightening shadows on his skin and this abominable pattern shook something inside Eren, as if triggering a latent bomb that had been waiting a long time for its hour to explode.
“You love it, don’t you?” He suddenly snapped with a voice full of bitterness and anger.
Levi’s body became stiff while hearing Eren’s words and he stayed silent for a while, his eyes wearily moving to meet Eren's in the mirror. He didn’t turn himself to face him, but somehow his glare seemed deeper through the glass, as if piercing Eren's very soul.
“It’s just who I am, Eren. It’s who I grew up to be. It’s all I’m good for. There is no other path for me, and I don’t want there to be.” He finally replied in an adamant tone.
While Levi’s upper body dived again towards the sink, exposing the lines of his lower back to the younger man, Eren looked down at his own hands. They were shaking, and the color had withdrawn from his olive skin. Turning back to their bedroom, he calmly sat on the bed, his body paradoxically absolutely serene and unyielding, while his mind was desperately falling down and searching for something to hold on to. For the first time, Eren was realizing that Levi couldn’t be saved, because he wasn’t in need of a rescue, and because he didn’t want one. Maybe he had been wrong all along, maybe Levi wasn’t a good person to begin with, maybe the world wasn’t so Manichean, maybe life wasn’t black or white but declined on several tones of red and maybe Eren had mixed his passionate carmine with Levi’s bloody crimson.
When Levi joined him in the bedroom, he was naked. He looked at him in the eyes before switching off the light. Who is he? wondered Eren while he opened his arms at his lover in the dark, founding himself once more incapable of fighting his longing. Who have I fallen in love with? was what his mind kept repeating while Levi’s lips found Eren's. Is this man a monster?
Is he going to devour me?
When Levi entered him, Eren understood he had already been devoured.
*
“Who were they this time?”
“A man who had tried to fool us.”
“Did he have a family?”
“Yes. Two kids.”
“Do you feel guilty?”
“I think he had it coming.”
“…”
“…”
“Don’t you think that maybe he was a good dad?”
“Maybe he was. But he was a terrible gambler, a terrible mole, and a pathetic attempt at a traitor. Maybe he was a good dad. But he sure as hell wasn’t a good person. You know, there isn’t a good reason for anyone to come close to us. The underworld, it doesn’t turn good people into bad ones. You must already be bad to come to us. You must lose yourself first, before you fall. Good people don’t sell drugs. Good people stay out of trouble. Good people certainly don’t mingle with us. What I think is that there is no one good surrounding us.”
“Then what am I?”
“Mine.”
*
He knows Levi never meant for him to see. To guess was one thing, - a line smudged on the edge -, but to witness was another, like an ugly crossing-out in his story.
This is how it happens. They’ve been living together for the better part of a year and Eren knows, yes he knows that he probably shouldn’t but he’s happy, he can’t believe his luck that Levi’s eyes haven’t stopped looking at him, that his hands haven’t gone make music from other warm bodies, that the kid he was and still is somehow is still enough.
But tonight, he is lonely and cold, and Levi’s not there to warm him up. The scent he’s left on his pillow is not quite enough, the imprint of their mattress feels empty – too deep, somehow. Eren doesn’t know why he feels the way he does, why Levi’s absence is so much sharper tonight, like a knife cutting through his gut, but suddenly he can’t stand it.
He takes off and goes to this part of town where he is not supposed to go, to this bar he was told never to enter. The lights are dim, the people scarce, the glances he receives are cold. Something in his blood is desperately urging him to leave, but his feet are determined to take him to Levi. Behind the bar, Hange looks up at him and screams at him with the excitement of a mad person.
“Eren, welcome! I thought you’d never come see us! What a brave boy you are.”
They point towards the back, to an ominous door with a private sign.
“He’s right there. A little bit busy I’m afraid, but I’m sure he won’t mind.”
Eren’s not quite as sure, but he goes anyway. Behind the door is a corridor and it’s even darker than the inside of the bar. The place is scary but, for what he can see, it’s pristine. There are several doors, but only one of them has light coming from under it. Eren reckons that if he starts thinking, he won’t do anything, so he doesn’t: he just goes to the door and slowly opens it.
There’s a guy tied to a chair. Eren can’t tell if he’s already seen him: his bloodied face is barely recognizable. Everything is swollen, and his skin has been painted in red and purple. Levi’s next to him, his back facing the door – facing Eren, but Eren would recognize that undercut anywhere.
“That’s it, we have all the intel we needed. You can end him”, says a bald man that appears from the shadows in the corner of the room.
“Whatever is best, Commander Pixis.”
Levi comes closer to the man in the chair and the poor guy whimpers. Eren didn’t think the man could still whimper in his state, but then his eyes catch the glimpse of the knife Levi’s holding and Eren feels like whimpering too. Levi puts the blade on the man’s neck and his voice is gentle when he says:
“Don’t worry, you’ve been good to us and I will make it quick.”
The knife cuts his throat and Eren gasps. The sound is loud, and suddenly Levi’s eyes find his – and they’re as sharp as always and Eren can’t – he can’t –
He flees.
He runs, he can’t think straight, he has no idea where he’s going. The way back towards the street is a blur, Hange’s voice and words a murmur in his ears. All his senses are off, his heart beats like crazy, or maybe it has stopped beating altogether, he doesn’t know, but it’s not working anymore. He doesn’t stop when his feet hit the road, he just runs, and runs, and runs.
The streets all look the same, the bystanders and their empty faces seem to laugh at him and he is laughing too, and crying, and screaming, and he knows he will never be able to forget. What he has seen can never be unseen and it will eat him alive, will scorch his skin and drown his lungs. He will never be happy again because he will never be able to forgive himself for allowing the joy now that he knows, now that he’s seen, now that it’s printed on his eyelids.
He runs until he can’t anymore. He doesn’t know where he ends up, doesn’t know how long he stays there before Levi finds him, when his black car appears at the corner of the street. Levi parks his car next to him and Eren consider running again but all his strength has left him – like a blown-out candle. Besides, Levi is too quick getting off the car and Eren has barely the time to blink before he sits next to him on the sidewalk.
Eren opens his mouth – he’s not sure what he’s going to say, but his words die when Levi’s arms take him by surprise. The embrace is tight and desperate and Eren can feel the slight shaking of his lover’s body – that body that is always so strong, so unyielding.
“I’m not letting you go” Levi murmurs in his hair, close to his ears. Upon hearing those words, Eren’s barriers fade away; his hands grasp Levi’s shoulders with desperation and anger. There is something dark growing in his heart, something hard and hurtful; something undeniable which could never be put into words, for it is too shameful and sinful.
The unbearable truth is that Eren was afraid Levi wouldn’t find him.
*
It usually looks like this: at whatever hour of day or night, Levi’s phone rings three times. Levi doesn’t rush to unlock it, but he inevitably does. He then calls a number – not always the same, Eren can tell by the number of times he has watched.
His first words are always the same: “I surrender my heart.”
The phone calls are usually short, with what Eren figures are instructions precise.
“Whatever is best, Commander.”
Eren has never met that Commander, not knowingly at least. He guesses at some point they must have crossed paths; he must have come to see who he was – but they never officially met.
Levi’s last words too are always the same: “Yes, I will. You know there is only one thing I ask in return.”
*
And he knows, he knows, that he can’t leave Levi, he can’t let go.
So most of the times, he closes his eyes, he turns of the sound of the world, he chooses the other way. What a happy life it would be if he could just forget, if he could believe that Levi were just another workaholic man in a capitalistic world. He would be able to enjoy all the good times they share without the monster of guilt eating up his insides.
He knows he belongs to Levi. He knows Levi belongs to him.
Must he be the light, then, if Levi won’t stop being the dark?
*
There’s one of those times when he thinks he can’t take it anymore, when he actually thinks to get in his car. He drives aimlessly for a few hours across town, watching the mundane world continuing his course without a though. He sees lovers, walking hand in hand, innocent and sweet and pure, he sees trembling first dates, a kiss in an shaded alleyway – it is a sunny evening of late July and the weather is warm, a good day for love – a cruel one for heartbreak. But when does his heart not break nowadays?
He wonders. Could he have had all that? Did he have all that?
And can he forgive himself if he did? Can he forget?
The sun begins his descent in the sky, and he sets his course towards Mikasa’s house in the suburbs. They don’t see each other that much these days, now that she’s an accomplished interior designer living with her soon to be husband – what a pain that the guy who finally got to her heart had to be Jean. At least she came back after getting her master’s across the country, and they always manage to see each other when Armin gets a few weeks off his law firm abroad.
He knows getting there is dangerous, that he will be on the brink of a terrible downfall. He knows the moment he starts talking, he will never be able to stop – it will first be like an earthquake, shaking all of their foundations, and then like the tsunami that follows soon after, devastating and leaving nothing behind. He knows he won’t be able to come back.
When he parks the car, it takes him twenty minutes to get the courage to open his door, but he has only the time to take two steps before the door opens on Mikasa, as she runs through it towards him to hug him.
“Eren, it’s so sweet of both of you to come and surprise me!”
He doesn’t get it at first, but he holds her tenderly, that almost sister of his, and looks up and – of course. Levi’s there, in the shadow of the threshold, his face unreadable like most of the times – but not to Eren – not anymore. He sees the determination, the anguish, the desperation, and the certainty.
And Eren’s relieved – he’s fucking relieved to see him here. He feels himself let out the breath he had kept since he buckled his belt. He tucks the ugly feeling away and proceeds with the masquerade for one evening longer – to everyone he knows, Levi’s a financial accountant, something boring and secure.
On the way home, Levi’s the one who drives. At some point in the evening, the weather has turned sour and the rains fall steadily on their car, the only sound with that of the engine and the occasional flashing lights. Eren explodes.
“Can’t you let me go?”
“No, Eren, I can never let you go.” Levi’s voice does not falter.
“What do you want from me? I’ve already given you all I had.”
“I’m one of the bad guys, remember? I’m not interested in your salvation.”
“But you love me. You must want me to be happy.”
Levi’s eyes narrow and his jaw turns sharper, the only sign that the words have had their effect. He stops the car on the sidewalk, doesn’t tun off the engine but ranges gear to neutral and sets the hand brake. They stay in the silence for a few eternity-like minutes, and the sound of the rain and the engine is deafening – Eren thinks his heart is going to stop, that this could be too much, but then Levi turns to him and asks:
“But could you be happy without me, Eren?”
Eren closes his eyes shut, taking the blow as well as he can. It’s not fair, because the real question isn’t even about happiness. Eren can’t be anything without Levi. Anything at all.
Sometimes, he thinks that the link that bonds him to Levi is made of barbed wire wrapped around his neck, making each single breath barely bearable. Every time Levi turns into a Wing of freedom, the wired sinks deeper in his flesh, but whatever happens at this point, Eren never stops bleeding.
His whole being silently shouts his surrender when he unbuckles himself and crashes his lips desperately on Levi’s.
“No, never, I can’t, never, please, take me home.” He says between breathless kisses.
*
The first time they make love is the night following Eren's high school graduation ceremony. They haven’t talked about it before, but Levi has made some comments about how even he had some principles, and how depraving a high school student wasn’t one of them.
Levi makes it right. He invites him to a good restaurant, lets Eren drink a glass of white wine that he can feel warming up his stomach and brings him to his place for the first time. Eren doesn’t have the time to look at the decoration before Levi brings him to his bedroom and pins him up against the door. Eren doesn’t complain.
For their first time, Eren has thought they would take things slow. He has expected nakedness, and maybe touching, but when he finds himself with Levi’s body exposed under his own, covered by a thin layer of sweat that makes his skin shine under the softened light, he realizes that this is nothing his imagination could have really prepared him for.
This is when Levi kisses him with a sense of desperation that leaves him breathless and begs in his ear:
“Take me, I want to be yours.”
And Eren stops thinking altogether and just feels.
He looks at Levi’s fingers when Levi takes them in his mouth, entranced, as each little lap of Levi’s tongue and the hollowing of his cheeks when he sucks on them goes directly and painfully to his groin. But then Levi lowers his hand to reach behind his back and Eren watches the delicate fingers slowly disappear inside Levi and for a second he’s scared that his brain has just exploded and will never be whole again. Levi’s eyes are closed and his mouth is open and Eren is afraid but it doesn’t seem to hurt him at all. On the contrary, as the movement of his hand becomes harder and harder Levi seems to grow unsatisfied and needy, and soon all Eren can hear is Levi’s hushed and chocked voice, and all he’s saying is “Eren, Eren, Eren.”
Levi’s other hand comes to stroke him a few times before guiding him into him as he withdraws his fingers. Eren loses himself immediately. It’s far from perfect, but perfect isn’t what he wants anyway. It’s his first time and, engulfed in the unbelievable tightness of Levi, he doesn’t manage to stop himself from coming hard and fast, moaning in Levi’s ears, his body shuddering and coming apart. It feels like both heaven and hell in the same time, like something addictive, something you find yourself unable to turn your back to. It feels like Levi.
He slowly begins to pull out, his mind too blurry and high to think of something else to do, feeling a little sheepish for not having made Levi feel half as good as he did, but Levi’s voice freezes him on the spot.
“Don’t move. Don’t go. I don’t want you to leave me.”
He searches for Levi’s eyes, finding nothing but affection and longing in them, and a deep and darker light that he isn’t sure he understands, but he sees no trace of disappointment or patronization. Levi knows Eren just gave himself to him.
He uses one of his elbows to support him and reaches for Levi’s groin with his free hand, unsure of what to do, just trying to repeat what he knows feel good on him, coping with the awkwardness of this new angle. Levi’s soft sighs and his visible battle to keep his eyes open to look at him makes Eren feel so unreal and lucky, amazed by the fact that he has Levi in his arms, that his red cheeks and uneven breathing are his doing. It doesn’t take more than that to make him hard again.
The second time, he finds that he can last longer, and that if he tries to move in different angles, he can find a place that makes Levi mewl every time he hits it. He lets Levi touch himself, his hand replacing his own, unable as he is to concentrate on two movements at the same time, and he can feel Levi’s hand against his stomach move at the same pace than his thrusts. When he feels the older man suddenly tighten around him in spasms and a hot liquid splatter on his chest, he comes for the second time inside his lover.
They take a shower together in silence after that, washing each other’s body with reverence and only stopping to exchange kisses that Eren finds more intimate than before. When they go to bed, just after Levi switched off his bed light, Eren whispers “I love you”. It’s the first time that he says it since the child he was stopped writing these words for his mother to find, and when Levi’s body sleepily nuzzles up against his own, he thinks he has his answer. The future never looked so bright.
*
Eren doesn’t know, but Levi thinks of him when he washes his hands and tries to dissolve the crimson red tainting his skin in the water, and he hears him say his name every time he pulls the trigger. He holds the thoughts of him closely each time he cuts, slits, guts. He thinks of his sun-kissed skin each time he sees, or inflicts, pain. His emerald eyes, his smile full of teeth, his bad puns, his voice, his tantrums, his tears. Their happy moments – and they have them too, they have them still and he knows it doesn’t make it easier, he knows it but he can’t let go.
There is not a minute when he doesn’t have Eren's name, or face, or voice, or hands in his mind, or when he doesn’t feel his whole body screaming with the need to be by Eren's side. There is not a single moment of peace and Levi endures it, embraces his longing with all his will, because this pain means that he’s living, that he has something to treasure, someone to come home to, to belong to.
Eren doesn’t know, because he fell asleep first, but Levi stayed awake a long while after that. He looked at him with his half-closed eyes, taking in the sight, carving it in his mind, careful of every detail.
Eren doesn’t know, but Levi cried that first night. There was no sob, no sound, just slow and quiet tears wetting his cheeks, falling on the curve of his neck, drying on their way to the sheets.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” He whispered, and his voice was trembling.
“But I love you too, I love you, and I’ll never let you go.”
End.