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It’s still raining, almost three days straight, now. At first, Erwin had held designs to power through it – there’s no way of controlling when it might rain beyond the wall, after all, it’s as good a time as any to practise and prepare. But after the sky had opened, new lakes forming in the grassy divots left by soldier’s feet and horse’s hooves, even Erwin had been forced to admit rare defeat. The earth is too thick to practice on, sliding out beneath them, the rain chilling them all to the bone in the early-winter air.
Levi is stubborn, however. Rain is of no particular bother to him. In fact, it’s still something of a novelty. He thinks Erwin might find it amusing; he catches him watching from his window, absently smoking as he watches Levi – the lone holdout – practice digging the talons of his gear into the damp trees, balancing on their slippery branches, feet flat, arms extended. The wool of his cloak soaks through to his skin, his fingers numb and red with the irritation of scratching into the tree trunks as he climbs. It feels good, though; clarifying. If he tires himself out now, he’ll sleep tonight, and he might even sleep well, so long as there’s a hot meal waiting for him, clean sheets, a bed that’s raised off the ground so he knows for certain the rats can’t get at him. He finally calls it a day when his boots have become so water-logged it feels like he’s walking in sewage, returning his gear to the shed with neat fastidiousness, collecting his wash-things and heading for the baths.
They’re empty at this time of day, blessedly. Not that Levi is particularly self-conscious. A body is a body, once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. Levi has seen many bodies – dead, typically, bloated in the canal that ran Underground, or worse, victims of other things, half-hanging limp against clay walls. He was surrounded by bodies down there, whether he wanted to be or not, the women who raised him, the men who visited them, the crush of the market on merchant’s day, holding his mother’s hand against the press of it all.
Levi turns on the spray, hears the rattling hiss of the pipes, and then the steaming water against his shoulders. He tips his head up to it, shuts his eyes. It’s quiet, here, in this tiled haven. It always smells like soap, the cheap mint wash most of the men use, the sugar scrubs they rub on their throats after they shave. Levi runs his hand up his arm, squeezes his shoulder, rolls it. Stiff, a little. The cold, the exertion. Tch, climbing trees like that, like he’s a child again, darting across flat-rooves, getting caught in other people’s laundry.
Levi works his fingers into the muscle in his shoulder, feels it stiffen more, if possible. He curses, slightly, spares some precious soap just to slick the way, grinds the flat of his hand into the space between neck and collarbone.
“Sore?” Erwin asks.
Levi does not startle, but his eyes flick upwards, stare at the ceramic tiles. He rolls his shoulder back, looks over it with the pretence of stretching his neck. Erwin’s dressed in a vest and slacks, hair still mussed from where his wax had been loosened by the rain.
“Don’t mind me,” he says, cheerfully. He sets a small bag carelessly in the sink behind Levi, examines himself in the mirror, tips his head left and right. “I hope I’m not interrupting,” he says, and he meets Levi’s eyes like that, reflected. Levi can see himself as Erwin sees him: a back of stiff, tense muscle, slender hips, ass red from the heat of the spray, thick thighs and wiry calves. Levi turns back to the pipes, shrugs, to show how little he cares.
There were no men like Erwin Underground. There was no one at all, in fact. Levi finds these kinds of things self-indulgent. That’s all it is. Sex is a thing you do for money, or else, if you’re a different kind of person, probably, for babies. There can be no pleasure when one person is scratching blood fever into the other’s skin with shit-encrusted nails, or shooting them full of wasting sickness when they come. And even if – even if that person is clean, even if they’re not lying, even if there’s not six of them holding you down in the sewage-soaked-stones of a fucking back alley –
Well. It’s a lot of trust for a thing Levi is able to do with his own hand, isn’t it?
“Are you going somewhere?” He asks.
Erwin taps a razor against the ceramic rim of the sink. “No,” he says, thoughtfully. “I have work to do, tonight. If I’m staying up late,” he continues, picking at a tub of cream, wetting it beneath the tap, “then I’ll likely be up late, tomorrow. I won’t have time to shave. And even if I did,” he says, working up a lather with a thick-tailed brush, “I like to be presentable when I work.”
Levi frowns, despite himself. “Why?” He asks the wall.
“Because,” Erwin says, like it’s a simple thing. Levi can hear him spreading the foam along his throat, the slight tightness to his voice that comes with lifting his chin. “It’s no good trying to work if you’re dressed for play, is it?”
The side of Levi’s lips twitch. “If you say so,” he tells him, working the soap against his skin. And for a while, the only sound is the running water, the lather, bare feet on tile, metal on ceramic, the scrape of the blade against Erwin’s throat.
He hears Erwin turn off his running water. “Would you like some help?” He asks, levelly, as if he’s commenting on the weather.
Levi wipes water out of his eyes. He thinks he leaves too long a pause; it belies his stupid confusion. “What?” He manages to ask, forgetting himself. He turns to stare.
Erwin is dabbing a towel along his chin. “You look sore,” he says, as if that’s self-explanatory. “It’s unsatisfactory, if it’s going to affect your performance.”
Unconsciously, Levi cups his shoulder. The rain batters against the windows. The pipes leak. Levi can’t quite understand him. Is he supposed to apologise? “Help?” He queries instead.
Erwin puts down his towel. “I’m quite good,” he continues. “There’s a skill to it, you know.”
The spray is beating against his back. Hot water drips off his hair and into his eyes; he blinks it away. Erwin’s hands, he thinks. What would that even feel like? He examines him, quickly – clean nails, freshly shaved, hair soft on his brow. A white vest with no stains. He wonders what it would be like to be touched like that, to have his palms running all along his back. Levi remembers other times people have touched him: familial, like when his mother would cut his hair. There’s a word for that. It’s not – it’s not about sex, no, it’s – it would just be –
Intimate, he thinks. It would be intimate. He can imagine the sex. He doesn’t know what the intimacy would feel like, doesn’t have a point of reference.
He clears his throat. “If you want,” he says, like he doesn’t care at all. Of course, this is not intimate for Erwin. He feels embarrassed, suddenly – not because he’s ass-naked and dripping wet, but because it’s stupid, pathetic even, to make such a – a fuss, over a simple thing. An offer between friends. Although, they are not friends, really; Levi doesn’t have any. Perhaps this is what soldiers do, he thinks. Close quarters, open showers, perhaps it is a common enough thing for a man to lay his hands on another man in friendly solidarity, easing stiff muscles.
Erwin reaches past him, arm over his shoulder, and shuts off the spray. Levi stares up at him, feeling – not cornered. He doesn’t feel cornered at all, even though there’s only wall at his back, and Erwin is a big man in every sense of the word. He feels himself swallow. Erwin smiles. He puts two hands on each shoulder and gently turns him around, faces him against the wall, his feet slapping on the tile as he stumbles into position.
Levi feels very small. He is very small, of course, but he rarely feels it. He’s stronger than near enough every person he’s ever met. Erwin’s hands, when they’re spread like this, span the length of his shoulders from tip to nape. He squeezes them, once, twice. “Relax,” he says. “This doesn’t work if you’re not relaxed.”
Without the spray of the shower, Levi is naked. Really naked, actually naked, acutely aware of it, of Erwin’s vest and slacks, of his large hands, the slight warmth coming off his torso against Levi’s bare back. He runs his thumbs along the curve of Levi’s neck. There’s water dripping, somewhere. It’s, uh. Erwin’s running his thumbs against his skin. There’s dripping water. It’s cold, without the spray, it’s – it’s cold, but he’s warm, too. His skin is prickling, goose-pimpling.
“There,” Erwin murmurs, halting his thumbs in their exploration. He pinpoints a mark, wheedles it with his forefinger. “Do you feel that?”
Levi curls his fingers into fists. “Yeah,” he says, and it sounds croaked, so he tries again. “Yeah,” he repeats, louder.
“Mmm,” Erwin says, approvingly. “Apologies,” he tells him lightly, and slides his forearm along Levi’s collarbones, holds him still as he works his finger into the muscle. Levi – shuts his eyes. His chin droops over Erwin’s arm, bending, stooping, even.
“Ah,” he hears himself say, just one gasp.
“Is that good?” Erwin asks him, quietly.
Levi reaches out his hand and braces it against the wet tile. The hair on Erwin’s arm tickles his nose. He smells like aftershave. Sandalwood. He doesn’t know how to answer.
“These look raw,” Erwin says, conversationally. He drags the tip of a finger along the places where his gear’s cut into his skin. “You should visit med-officer. Fetch a salve. Levi,” he says, sternly, “that’s an order, you hear?”
Levi nods, once, afraid that if he moves any more – he doesn’t know, what he’ll do. “Yes, yeah,” he gets out.
“Good,” Erwin says approvingly. He slides his arm off of Levi’s collarbones, sets each on each of his shoulders, works the muscle with his thumbs. “We can’t afford to lose you, Levi. You’re far too valuable.”
He’s just touching him like it’s nothing. More than that – he’s standing at Levi’s back, his very vulnerable back, and Levi is letting him. He continues to massage Levi’s shoulders, humming slightly, taking great care to work loose what he describes as liquid between his muscles. “You’ll feel better for it,” he tells him, before he leaves. He slaps him on the shoulder, brotherly, maybe, camaraderie. “You can help me tonight,” he says. “Consider it payback, yes? Although, get those burns seen to, first,” he warns. “I don’t want to hear you haven’t had them looked at, now.”
He collects his bag and leaves Levi there, standing naked, cupping the place Erwin’s hand had slapped. He realises, he’s hard, achingly so. He takes himself in his fist, squeezes once, shudders. Decides he’ll ignore it. It serves no one to – not even to pretend. Erwin is his Commander. And he’s a comrade, supposedly. And only Levi wants to confuse things, in his pathetic, lonely way. He turns on the cold spray.
Later, dressed down in his linen civvies, he sits opposite Erwin’s desk and goes through paperwork. It’s still raining, almost to a point that Levi is bored of it, of the constant smell of damp wool that the recruits carry around, antsy from being cooped up indoors. Erwin’s poured himself a brandy, which Levi declined, talking through shipment lists and coordinating training runs out in Maria. Even Erwin seems to get sick of it, after a time, leaning back in his chair and pulling out a box of his cigarettes. Levi resists the urge to roll his eyes.
“Again?” He asks.
“Mmm?” Erwin looks at him, distractedly. “Again what?”
“I saw you smoking, earlier.” He doesn’t say, when you were watching me, but it’s implied. Erwin seems to remember, nodding.
“You saw that, did you?”
Him watching? Of course. Erwin balances the cigarette between his lips, strikes a match, cups the tip to help it ignite. He waves the match in the air to extinguish the flame, leans forward to throw the matchbox on his desk. Leans back, inhales. He breathes smoke out through his nose, then plucks the thing from his mouth, holds it between his forefinger and thumb. Levi realises he’s been staring. He blinks, turns back to the papers in front of him, but doesn’t read the words. He’s thinking about Erwin’s lips, foolishly, pressed around the end of that cigarette.
He feels light-headed, again. Perhaps – perhaps he’s getting some kind of fever, rolling around in the rain like that.
“Do you smoke, Levi?” Erwin asks him, calmly.
Levi lifts his eyes. “No,” he tells him. “Filthy habit,” he explains, with only a slight sneer. Erwin nods, like he’s understanding. He stands, cigarette between his teeth, peels a book of the shelf, like he’s looking for something.
“So you’ve never smoked,” he says. He holds the book open in his palm, dragging two gentle fingers down its pages as he searches for some answer to some question, Levi doesn’t know what. The cigarette is still smoking between his lips. His thumb is scratching absently at the pages, teasing them open. “Not once,” he says, and leans back against the shelf, takes another, pointed, inhale.
Levi does not like this kind of thing, saying one thing and meaning another – he prefers when people speak plainly. He does not think Erwin is talking about smoking. “That depends on what you mean,” Levi says, flatly.
Erwin shrugs. “You were very tense, in the baths,” he says, lightly. He seems to be hiding a smile. “I just wondered if you – “
And he plucks the cigarette from between his lips, exhales smoke in a careful ‘O’.
“ – ever smoked,” he continues. “It might help,” he suggests.
“I told you,” Levi tells him, coolly. “It’s a shitty habit. Dirty,” he continues. “Getting… ash, everywhere,” he says, eyeing him as he sheepishly tips some ash against an old mug on the shelf. “Coughing in your sleep. Yellow-stained teeth. Tch,” he says again, and folds his legs, pulls the papers onto his lap and pretends to read, “filthy.”
Erwin turns down the corners of his mouth, rolls his head like he’s considering. “Well,” he says, and clears his throat. “Some people have a preference, no?” He holds the cigarette in the ‘V’ of his fingers, raises his brows slightly when he meets Levi’s eyes. He waves his hand when he exhales, flicks more ash into the mug. “I mean to say,” he continues, absently, “some men prefer cigars. Others prefer drinking. Some like both. Some abstain from… iniquitous behaviour altogether,” Erwin says, with a twitch of the lips. “What would you say you are, Levi?”
Levi thinks about Erwin’s hands against the skin of his shoulders. He thinks about how he’d trailed the red-raw tracks left by his gear, rubbed at them softly, soothing the skin. Levi’s always known what sort of man he is. For as long as he’s been able to know, he’s known, he’s the kind who likes to think of stubble-on-jaws, flat chests peppered with wiry hair, broad thighs, a cock between them. And now, Erwin asks him. What would you say you are, Levi? There’s an answer. He doesn’t know how to give it.
He stares down at the pages in his lap, Erwin’s neat cursive blurring. He’s not reading it. “I like cigarettes,” he admits, and looks at Erwin after he’s said it. “What,” he asks him, “is that surprising?”
Erwin shakes his head. “No,” he says. “I suspected. But – it’s a filthy habit, you say?”
“Yes,” Levi agrees, evasively. “But that’s not – limited to cigarettes,” he says carefully, fingers leafing through the pages just for something to do. “I like the smell of the smoke,” he explains. “I like the rush, as much as anyone else. But smoking, drinking, gambling. It doesn’t matter what the habit is. It’ll always be…” he trails off, realises what he’s saying, how stupid he must sound. He clears his throat again. “Yes, well,” he tells him, and sits up a little straighter, brushes his hair out of his eyes, shakes his head. “Well, they’re all expensive habits,” he decides. “It’s all more risk than it’s worth.”
“I see,” Erwin murmurs. He snaps the book shut, lays it back on the shelf. “So you’ve never smoked,” he clarifies. “Not even once?”
“No,” Levi says, shortly.
“Not even – not even as a practise,” Erwin presses. “Y’know. Sometimes teens – they’ll steal cigarettes, pretend-like. Experiment.”
“Erwin,” Levi tells him, pointedly, intently. “I’ve never smoked.”
It’s not judgement, Levi thinks. Erwin tilts up his chin, sets the cigarette between his lips, inhales deeply, exhales slowly, watching a spot on the ceiling, ankles crossed. He stays like that, for a time, squinting up at the rafters.
“Well,” he says, eventually. “Would you like to?”
Would he like to? Levi watches him, leaning casually against the bookshelf. He thinks about Erwin’s hands on his shoulders. Stiff, he’d said to him. You’re so very tightly wound, Levi.
Levi doesn’t answer, but he sets the pages back on the desk, fingers feeling strange, numb-like. Erwin takes this for what it is: an assent. He places himself between Levi and the desk, leans forward slightly, looks down at him, smiles. He holds out the cigarette between his forefinger and thumb.
Levi takes it. He tries to copy, like how Erwin had done it. Places it between his lips, inhales. He feels a rush as the smoke tickles him – but he doesn’t know where to put it, whether he needs to swallow it, breathe it out. It kicks in at the back of his throat, makes him cough viciously, back of his hand pressed to his mouth, eyes watering. He expects Erwin to laugh at him, stares up, viciously. It was a trick, he thinks, it was all a trick, a joke at his expense. Erwin never meant anything by it, he doesn’t want to – to touch Levi, at all, he just wanted to watch him flail around like an idiot.
Erwin takes back the cigarette. “Ah,” he says, “perhaps some practice is needed, then.”
“Fuck,” Levi coughs, choking. His cheeks feel red. He doesn’t allow himself to feel embarrassment.
“Easy,” Erwin tells him. “Let me show you,” he commands. “Open your mouth.”
Levi blinks up at him. “What?”
“Half the hard part is breathing it in,” Erwin explains. “Let me breathe it for you.”
Open your mouth. Levi feels something thready in his throat, a stuttering pulse. What does he mean? He wants Levi to – to open his mouth, let him peer inside. To breathe air inside him. “I – “ he starts, fumbling. “I don’t understand,” he says, feeling foolish.
“Here,” Erwin says, quietly. “Like this,” he says, and lets his mouth hang open, slightly, demonstrating. He has straight white teeth, a pink tongue.
Levi relaxes his jaw, slightly, unsure of himself. He feels his lips part.
“That’s it,” Erwin coaxes, earnestly. “Remember to breathe.” He blows smoke, slowly, over Levi’s upturned face. Things become immanent. They feel hazy. He realises he’s shut his eyes, has to peel them open, is almost surprised to see Erwin’s face so close to his, but it’s not unwelcome, it’s not –
“Did you like that?” Erwin questions.
Levi’s mouth feels dry. He nods.
“Good,” Erwin says, softly. “May I?” He’s holding out his palm. Levi doesn’t understand what he means to do with it, but he doesn’t care. He just nods again, twitches slightly when Erwin lays it against the back of his neck. His thumb strokes his ear. He sets the cigarette back between his lips, inhales there, just above Levi’s face. Some of the ash crumbles off the tip. He feels it tickle his nose. Filthy, he thinks, absently. He would like to be filthy for Erwin, he thinks. Or, he would like Erwin to make him filthy.
Erwin’s thumb draws back along Levi’s jaw, catches his bottom lip. “Open your mouth,” he orders, gently. His thumb is insistent, this time. It holds him open, smeared against his tongue, the lower row of teeth. “Breathe,” he instructs, as he exhales, blowing a line of smoke directly into Levi’s mouth, against his tongue. Levi breathes. He thinks he does it wrong. It hits the back of his throat and disappears, just makes him cough, a little.
“Shh,” Erwin soothes. “Next time will be better. Practise, Levi,” he tells him. He reaches up a knuckle to buff one of the involuntary tears from Levi’s eye, just where some of the smoke has irritated him, is all. His eyes feel red.
“Better,” Levi agrees, and turns up his chin, like a baby bird, opens his mouth without being told.
“Good,” Erwin rewards the easy acquiescence. He lifts his knee, sudden, and braces it on the seat of Levi’s chair, between his thighs. The chair creaks. Levi’s breath hitches. “Easy,” Erwin murmurs, stroking his jaw. “Tight fit,” he remarks, and watches Levi’s face, and knocks his knee forward, and Levi feels something pulse behind his eyes. He swallows, throat bared. He doesn’t know where to put his hands; he just grips the back of the chair, heart beating a cavalry charge.
Erwin rolls his knee as he leans down. Levi’s fists tighten on the chair; he skirts away his eyes, feel the flush rise on his chest, panting.
Erwin smokes again, just regarding him like that, slowly. He exhales over Levi’s face. It draws the flush further up his throat, Levi sinking deeper into his chair, thighs spread by Erwin’s. There’s sweat on his brow.
“Commander,” he tries.
A hand cups his chin, fingers in his cheeks. “Shh,” Erwin says again, earnestly. “You don’t have to.” He leans forward, inadvertently drives his knee between Levi’s thighs. “If it makes it easier, I mean,” he tells him.
Levi can’t help it. Fuck, he can’t stop it. He rolls his hips forward once, twice, thinks it’s subtle enough that Erwin might just think he’s squirming in his grip. Pleasure swans through his gut, like a hook behind his navel, and it doesn’t fade when he stops; it just simmers there, like a bubbling that starts in his belly and pushes the flush further up his throat, until he knows his cheeks are red with it, too. His heart is beating in his ears, his pulse threading his whole body to a steady beat. Touch me, he thinks, desperately. He goes limp, totally – touch me, he thinks again, eyes half-shut, mouth hanging open, open for Erwin. He’ll open all of himself for Erwin, if that’s what he wants. He dreams Erwin’s hand slips lower, braces on his thigh, squeezes, the way he had squeezed his shoulders. Slip beneath his shirt, rub a thumb against a nipple. He’ll lower his head to Levi’s neck, press kisses along his shoulder, behind his ear. Good, he’ll say, and his breath will smell like fresh smoke. Thank you, Levi.
He makes a noise, a pathetic sound, like choke. Erwin’s nails dig into his cheeks, reflexive. “Like I say,” he tells him, and Levi thinks he sounds a little breathless, “you’re so tightly wound, Levi,” and he shifts his stance on the chair, accidentally presses against him as he leans closer, dips his head so their noses are close enough to scrape each other. “This time,” he says, “try and take it in. Swallow it,” he tells him. “Can you practise?”
Levi blinks up at him. He tries to work up enough spit in his mouth to swallow, finally manages, stiff.
Erwin stares at him, enraptured. He licks his bottom lip, the inky black of his pupils swallowing all of that blue, turning it into thin ring. “Breathe,” he tells him, and sucks on the end of his cigarette. He leans closer. His eyes to Levi’s, even – Levi’s been this close to people before, of course. When he’s driven knives into their guts, when he’s closed his fists around their throats. His chin brushes Levi’s chin. Levi’s pulse thumps in his ears.
Erwin’s fingers press, insistently, at his jaw. Levi’s mouth falls open. Swallow, he remembers. He needs to… he must…
Erwin blows the air into Levi’s mouth. He takes it, through his nose, down his throat. Swallow, he thinks. Erwin is still breathing smoke past his lips. His fingers must feel it, Levi realises, the heavy thudding of his pulse. Levi’s mouth is dry. He can’t swallow.
“Here,” Erwin says, voice low, crackling. “Let me help.”
Levi’s eyes are near shut. He’s shivering, he realises, these little tremors all up and down, little sparks in every place where Erwin’s body touches him, intentionally and accidentally. He thinks this must be a dream. He doesn’t know how else to feel so good. He’ll get it right this time, he tells himself. He pulls open his eyes to watch Erwin’s face; they’re so close, he can feel his own breath where it’s caught by Erwin’s skin, pressing back against him. He slides his thighs further apart, takes in a deep breath through his mouth. Erwin’s lips twitch upwards, just slightly, his eyes glassy, shining. He buffs Levi’s hair off his brow with his wrist.
“One last drag,” he tells him.
Levi lifts his chin, opens his mouth. Swallow, he thinks, breathe. Erwin blows the smoke. It catches inside his nose, the back of his throat. Let me help, Levi remembers him saying, and watches it, feels it; Erwin’s hand, cupping the back of his head, the thumb which scratches at his throat. His eyes, intent, soft, unflinching. He leans closer, if possible. Levi – thinks he understands, what this is. He blinks at him, even as Erwin shuts his eyes, tilts down his chin, locks the smoke in the gap of Levi’s mouth with his own, lips to his lips. It’s a kiss, he realises, although his body figures it out before him, heart scattering in his chest, back arching, toes curling.
His eyes shut. He feels the press of Erwin’s tongue, slipping inside him, rubbing. He doesn’t know what to do – there’s a tangible mix of heady embarrassment and panic, frustration, that Erwin has given him this, this – this, and he doesn’t know what to do, how to take, how to respond in kind, to make sure Erwin feels the same shivers all over, from the tip of his head down to his spine. He doesn’t know where to put his hands. He hears himself make a soft, breathy sound, involuntary, ugly. Erwin swallows it. He doesn’t know where to put his hands. I don’t know where to put them, he thinks, and curls one of them in his own hair, as if to ground himself. Touch me, he thinks again, as Erwin opens his mouth wider, pulls in air to breathe, and kisses him again, their mouths clamped together, all spit and tongue.
Levi relinquishes. He lets his shoulders go soft, his legs splay open. The chair creaks. He tucks his hands behind his back, and lets himself be kissed. It’s his first kiss. It is, he thinks, in that distant, mild way, filthy. He whimpers. It’s the kind of sound he’d make when he’s hurt, curled over to hide his injuries, like a cat. Even then, he’d – only alone, would he allow himself to make a sound like that, so helpless, vulnerable.
Erwin breaks away, slowly, his teeth caught in Levi’s bottom lip. He drags him up, releases him, and Levi chases his lips, still needy. “Wait,” he breathes, tips up his chin, tries to pull him back down. He wants more of it, of all that touch. He needs to get it back.
A hand cups his cheek. “Shh,” Erwin says, softly. He thumbs at Levi’s swollen mouth, fucks it inside, lets him suckle on it, a poor substitute. “Thank you, Levi,” he says, honestly, and presses his forefinger in alongside it, spreads his cheeks, rubs the pad of his finger against his gums. Levi lets him, just sits there shivering, feeling – very present, and not present, at the same time. Liminal, he thinks.
He takes his knee away from between Levi’s legs. “Oh,” he says, mildly, looking between them. Levi feels it – aside from his hardness, undeniable, straining the linen, there’s something else. A warmth, a cooling. He’s been leaking. He’s stained the pants. “Tch,” Erwin says, lightly, and pulls his fingers from Levi’s mouth, spit-soaked, a line of saliva linking the ends of those clean nails to Levi’s tongue, “messy boy.”
Levi’s breath cracks. He feels his brows knit together, upwards, flush rising on his face. He cups himself, with his palm, to hide it, as if he can take it back, take any of this back. What level of – level of desperation, stupidity, sheer loneliness –
Erwin kisses him again. Levi thinks it’s hungrier, this time. There’s an anger to it. Or at least, it feels like anger, but everything feels like anger to Levi. There’s probably a better word. When he pulls back, he takes Levi with him, tugging him up on weak feet. He sits back against his desk and Levi falls against one of his thighs, snug, between his legs. He gasps, again, Erwin’s hands on his shoulders, back, ass.
“Go on,” Erwin whispers, earnestly. He kisses him, chastely, this time. “You can do it, if you want.”
Levi wants.