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She stared out of the living room window like a cow at thunder. Literally. Outside, all hell was breaking loose. Hurricane gusts rustled in front of the glass, tore leaves with them and even hurled newspaper from the sidewalk up to the fifth floor. Thin branches pounded on the window as they flew by and set the rhythm of the gigantic raindrops that crashed against the window in the battle cry of the wind. The world blurred in the storm. Yet, she saw it clearly and distinctly; lightning raced across the night-black sky, craved from left to right, burst and hissed and dashed into nowhere behind the opposite block of houses. She gritted her teeth and counted silently.
Twenty-one, twenty-two –
Boom!
The thunder cut through her bones. She winced. Damn it, the thunderstorm was so close, as though it was lurking right in front of the window, just waiting to finally mock her. Window glass vibrated. Echoes rumbled threateningly through the walls of the old building. Floorboards creaked under her socks.
Then another lightning bolt shot across the firmament like an arrow that had been shot at her personally.
Enough! She pulled the curtains in front of the window and imagined what she can't see, can't see her, either. So the thunderstorm couldn’t find her anymore, could it? Hiding was a good idea, it just had to be, because that’s what she always did when the meteorological apocalypse broke loose. So far she had survived like this, then that should be the case this time, too!
Breathe.
Good, her pulse dropped a little below the life-threatening limit and allowed her to remember her typical anti-storm strategy. It looked like this: She defended herself against the blazing lightning with the curtains – check! - and additionally with all available light sources within her fortress. She peeked at the side table next to the sofa and switched on the brass lamp. Check! Now every light bulb was lightning, even in the kitchen and in the bathroom, although she didn’t even plan to get anywhere near the faucet as long as the world was ending outside.
After all, she never knew which line the 100,000 amps would shoot out of next to turn her into a crust roast.
Boom!
“Ieks!” Her squeak barely drowned out the thunder, so set about tackling part two of her strategy: Combat noise with rhythmic nose. Thought and done. Like a struck deer, she staggered over to the stereo on the shelf behind the couch. Normally, the thing trumpeted a playlist adapted to the neighbors’ nerve tracts, only that she lacked the patience for such jokes, at the moment. So she pounded the start button on the CD drive and found herself surprised. Oh, Metallica, how comforting.
She listened to Hetfield’s Sandman song and rubbed her eyes to dry them. Yes, tears rolled down her cheeks but hey, Armageddon ruled the city and she was alone. So it should be allowed for her to lose her composure for a moment. She could be tough again the next morning – provided she was still around; as a person and not as charcoal, which a sneaking lightning bolt had turned her into, or as a pile of ash after the whole house had burned down.
Did she get paranoid? Certainly. Did she care? No. Other worries plagued her.
Boom!
Damn it, she had to distract herself, otherwise she would have died of a simple heart attack in the end and she was honestly reluctant to do that.
“Relax”, she warned herself, straightened her shoulders to fool herself into courage. Her gaze fell on the overcrowded shelf, from which she plucked a Pratchett novel that was supposed to both distract and cheer her up. That’s exactly what she needed now; light, loud music and an excellent book. With that she would certainly survive the next few hours.
She convinced herself with a nod and stalked back to the sofa, plopped down in the upholstery and mumbled. A cuddle pillow landed on her knees, on the almost torn copy of Going Postal. “Everything will be fine”, she sighed as she opened the cover of the book, “everything will be –”
Dark.
Collectively, all the lights went out. In shock, she tossed her beloved Pratchett over the backrest.
Boom!
Thunder rumbled through the apartment like an avalanche and buried her in darkness. Panicked, she stared into the room, which showed itself in the flash for a split second and then immediately disappeared again.
Boom!
That couldn’t be true. Not now!
She clutched the pillow convulsively and was about to press it on her ears – or on her mouth to stifle the approaching scream – when her front door shook so violently that the pillow now sailed through the air and disappeared behind her into nirvana. What the hell?
Someone gave up the custom of knocking and preferred to hammer like a berserk on the wood, which provoked her enough to briefly forget about the thunderstorm. Perplexed, she gawked in the direction of the hallway, from which she was additionally terrorized by hand-operated thunder. Not much was missing until she thought she would see the guy from Shining break through, but the ax stayed away, so she dared to face the riot maker. With one jump, she swept off the sofa, slammed her shin against the table and yelped when the next lightning flashed. She probably competed with any werewolf in the horror flick with the scene.
“I should watch less movies”, she groaned, rubbing her leg before hobbling on to yell at the riot maker.
She felt her way through the darkness until she finally found the front door. She tore it open with a swing. And was blind. Bright light burned directly into her brain from her retina.
“What the hell!” She groaned and squeezed her eyelids close. “Have you recently been a member of the MIB or why are you flashing me, stupid?!”
The idiot snorted, “You should watch less movies, Mikasa”, and lowered the flashlight.
She blinked several times, hoping to see again at some point, but to no avail. The hall in front of her remained black.
“So the power went out here, too”, he said suddenly behind her. “Then the whole house got hit.”
She spun around, wondering how he could scurry into her apartment so quickly before she asked, “Power outage?”
His elegant paleness appeared in the light of the flashlight, so she could be sure that it was actually her neighbor across the hallway who was bothering her. “Yes, power outage, you nut. Otherwise I would hardly have come here with a flashlight.” He grinned arrogantly and of course looked devilish good again. One corner of his mouth jutted up, the other twitched. Out of his green eyes she was greeted with unmoved mischief and his shoulder-length, brown hair didn’t necessarily camouflage him as an angel of innocence. She didn’t recognize anything else, as he literally melted into the darkness in his black shirt.
“Smart ass”, she grumbled, more mildly than intended. She wouldn’t even have admitted it under torture, but yes, she was happy to see him. For many reasons, but primarily because his presence proved that there was someone else who had to deal with the bad weather front.
Although Eren didn’t seem to care, at all.
He pulled his shoulders to a shrug and grumbled, “As you mean. I didn’t want more anyway, so bye.”
Boom!
With the next clap of thunder, she slammed the door right in front of his nose. A reflex, she told herself, while pressing her back to the wood to block the exit, which definitely looked stupid and was also pretty dumb since Eren definitely towered over her by half a head and in terms of strength. Pushing her aside or standing clumsily in the corner wouldn’t have been a problem for him. Still, he didn’t do anything like that, but looked at her carefully like a criminal with the help of a flashlight, before mocking: “Could it be that you are actually glad to have me here?”
Something was wrong with the lamp! It made her cheeks boil.
“Bullshit!” The bastard scorched her vocal cords too, because she squealed way too high. “As if!”
“Really?” She could literally hear his arrogant grin. “I can leave, then.”
He pushed himself up next to her and reached for the handle. The scent of his perfume mixed with shampoo had enveloped Eren ever since she knew him. And she didn’t want him at all, had never wanted him. Not even after she heard his harsh voice in the hallway for the first time a good two years ago, watched him hauling furniture, and at some point saw those emerald green eyes that, within the blink of an eye, made you feel like you weren’t worth living in the same house as him. Or in the same country. No, this walking aloofness didn’t interest her at all.
“Go on”, she moaned and crossed her arms over her chest. Her legs stayed where they were and continued to push her against the door. Admittedly, what perhaps interested her a tiny bit about him was the fact that he never cared about her bitching at him.
Even now her words ricocheted off him. “Fine, I’ll leave”, he huffed and pushed the handle down. As if on command, her living room flickered under the weather-related strobe lighting. Eren’s teeth flashed in a wolfish grin. She shut her eyelids.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
“On the other hand”, she snapped after the thunder wave, “it doesn’t hurt if you stay. I was bored anyway, with no light and music, and with an empty phone battery.” That wasn’t entirely a lie, apart from the boredom part.
“Oh”, he said while moving away, “Boredom? That explains it, of course. You obviously didn’t have anything going on.” He inspected her from head to toe and made no secret of what he was talking about. She really didn’t look like someone who still had plans for the evening, in her black sloppy pants, the worn shirt and a hairstyle that you just called pigtail when you meant mop. As a bridge troll, she would have made a great figure.
Speaking of pants, Eren was wearing dark jeans, as she realized as he strolled further into the apartment. “As far as I’m concerned, I’ll stay. Nothing will drive me out of the door in that crap weather anyway, so I guess I can pass the time a bit, here.”
She didn’t look down on his ass. “Man, are you gracious.” Carefully, with short steps, she rummaged through the darkness and followed the beam of the flashlight, which Eren used – not to give her light, but to examine her realm under the magnifying glass. Quietly, he shone along the walls, over the barred bathroom and bedroom doors and finally over the bookshelf, as if there was a secret door behind it through which he could escape.
Meanwhile, she struggled with her toes folded. She probably looked like a rusty tin soldier, but she didn’t give a damn because her physical integrity meant more to her than her demeanor. Again, she didn’t really want to bump herself and certainly didn’t want to snap her little toe in front of the TV cabinet, which was just emerging from the shadows in the flash.
Boom!
Her heart beat against her ribs and she bit her tongue to stifle the outcry that would have embarrassed her in front of Eren and that would only have given him ammunition for new verbal tips, of which he had enough in his repertoire anyway.
Damn it, she was way too scared right now and urgently needed to do something about it. So she turned and stalked so highly concentrated in the direction of the next room that she even remembered her manners. “Do you want something to drink? I have water, iced tea and coke.” She made it to the kitchen unscathed, where luckily were hardly any tripping hazards. Only the table and chairs were dangerous, but they were far enough under the veiled window. Her destination was right in front of her, however, so she relaxed her feet on the linoleum and headed for the refrigerator. “If you’re nice, you might also get a glass of the cheap wine with a chocolate note. Every now and then it’s very tasty, I gotta say. Above all, you don’t get totally wasted.” She was sobered when she opened the fridge, from which a mild breeze was blowing towards her. She gawked incomprehensibly into the entrance of her gloomy cave. Oh yes, power outage. Sighing, she fished along the inside of the door to find the wine as quickly as possible before her few groceries could rot in front of her nose. “Ah!” She just felt the neck of the bottle when it suddenly slipped away from her. The refrigerator slammed shut. Light reflected on stainless steel.
“No wine”, said Eren behind her and cleared his throat. “for me. And you shouldn’t drink anything, either.”
“Because?” She wanted to know, drawn out.
“Because”, he imitated, “maybe lightning strikes the house, it starts to burn and then we have to get out of here without stumbling.”
With that, he had her. After all, the scenario wasn’t that far-fetched, was it? Thunderstorms were nasty and unpredictable if you believed so many reports. - Which she did. Otherwise she wouldn’t be a nervous wreck as soon as there was only a glimmer of weather in the sky.
“I’ll have coke.”
“As you wish.” After a shrug, she made her way to the pantry by the kitchen counter. Danger zone and chairs! “Can you maybe light up?”, she snapped.
Surprise, he did. A cone of light accompanied her to the cupboard, helped her to find the glass bottles, and guided her back to Eren, who she eventually reached out the coke to. Instead of a “thank you”, she received: “Don’t you have your own flashlight?”
“Sure, I just found it more practical to practice my bat skills. I would have been exploring the area with sonar in a minute, you know?” The answer seemed easier to her than her forgetting to buy batteries.
“You don’t say”, he murmured, clicking his tongue. His gaze wandered around the kitchen before laying down on her, even darker than usual. Shivers tipped over her spine as she craned her neck to face Eren in case he wanted to throw something at her again. But he refrained from doing that. Instead, he came up to her.
Irritated, she backed away until the countertop dug into her lower back without being noticed. Her alarmed attention was only on Eren, who slowly approached, cornering her. Unusual heat streamed into her bare arms. Only a touch separated them from each other. A deep breath would have been enough to brush Eren’s torso with her bosom, so she held her breath although she didn’t know why. Did she keep Eren’s personal zone or her own? It didn’t matter because he ignored them both as he leaned forward. Again, she dodged. She kept her distance as best as she could by leaning back and looking in vain for support on the countertop. The coke bottle obstructed her right hand, a nervous twitch obstructed her left. She bent convulsively over the wood until her back went on strike and her arms just gave in. Her elbows alone held her upright. But for how long? Her muscles turned into jelly as Eren’s face floated over her. His silhouette danced menacingly provocatively in the light of the flashlight, which she no longer knew where it was hiding, while he put his coke next to her. Cold glass brushed her upper arm and sowed goosebumps like ice flowers on her skin. She warned the treacherous hairs with a glance and only noticed seconds later that his free hand was wandering past her on the other side.
Trapped between the cold and the warmth of his arms, she gasped and caught this breeze from his scent and aloofness, and closeness, and closeness, and closeness. The distance was still narrowing. If she had moved even an inch, their bodies would have touched, which had to be avoided as much as possible. This was how her brain thought, wisely foreseeing sleepless nights. Her heart seemed to have a different opinion and would rather race as if it wanted to jump Eren right away. Be brave, brain!, she warned, and closed her eyes to collect herself. Immediately she tore them open again when something soft tickled her skin. Brown hair snaked over her shoulder. Eren’s face stopped next to hers. Hot breath flowed down her neck. “You know what, Mikasa”, he grumbled so unexpectedly deeply that a flock of bumblebees awoke in her stomach. “at some point you might regret your stupid comments.” He swallowed audibly. She did, too. “Maybe even earlier than you think. You’re driving me crazy with it.”
Click. Hiss.
Eren had grabbed the bottle opener from the hook behind her and plucked the crown cap off the coke, faster than she could process. A dull laugh gurgled in his throat as he drank and withdrew.
Centimeters stretched between them, to a half meter, to a whole, to so many that the lack of proximity made her shiver. Like ordered and not picked up, she stood alone in the kitchen and stared at Eren, who took the flashlight out of his pocket and sauntered into the living room, satisfied. He’s passing the time, she remembered, rubbing her neck. She could only hop that she would survive this time unscathed.
Boom!
The bumblebees had fallen into hibernation and were now lying in lumps in her stomach. For minutes she had been trying to digest his strange behavior without noticeable success. She didn’t really care about his quirks – actually. In fact, she had a lot to nibble on with this new one. She bit her lip.
Heaven, help!
Boom!
Touched by the thunder, she blinked and then peered through the kitchen door into the living room to find that Eren urgently needed a therapist. Like an oversized firefly, he whizzed through the room with the flashlight, shining from one corner into the next and obviously searching his mind. Hmm. In contrast to his cool demeanor, he behaved very strangely. Could it be that he went crazy in the storm, as she did?
She tilted her head to see his behavior from a different perspective. No, it didn’t look like weather-related insanity when he finally headed for the shelf. So focused that he forgot to look down below. He stumbled.
Hallelujah, she was happy! “That went bad, huh?” She snorted, but she hardly had time to laugh because a flying cuddly pillow hurled the oxygen out of her lungs. She took it positively. He could have knocked her out with the Pratchett novel, which he instead simply picked up from the floor and stacked on top of the others on the shelf.
“What a mess!” The books worried him. “Please put your stuff away and don’t build traps out of it. It’s dangerous!”
His tone of command annoyed her. “Stop crying! Where I scatter my things is none of your business, as long as you don’t plan to move in here!”
She braced herself for a comment in return but was amazed when it passed silently. Eren was silent, but actually dared to intervene in her household. Without being asked, he decorated the flashlight between two book spines and aimed it like a spotlight on the sofa.
“That should be fine”, he said to himself and sipped his coke contentedly.
Right, there was something. She remembered the bottle in her hand and the opener Eren had recently used to fool her. Exactly. She shouldn’t draw any other conclusions, should she?
“Idiot”, she mumbled and put the opener on the bottle cap. With all her might, she pushed the thought of What if . .? aside, as she fought the lock. Her fingers tingled so badly that it took three tries for the thing to give in. Hiss. Carbon dioxide rose and ebbed as she took a sip, then another, and then another. She didn’t notice how dry her throat was until she was drinking. And she wasn’t thirsty at all.
Smacking, she let go of the neck of the bottle and suddenly felt pretty stupid. Why was she brooding, when it was clear anyway that Eren was only here to pass the time? And why had she been lounging in the cold kitchen for what felt like an eternity, even though a warm, small room was waiting next door in which she could distract herself? Unfortunately, without novels and music.
“Tell me”, she thought about it and gradually went into the living room, “do you have any idea how long we will be stuck without electricity? If the whole city is immobilized, it will take a while, right?” A desperate breath covered her voice. She quickly disguised it with serenity. “I’m just asking about all that, because I have stuff in the fridge.” Her thumb flew over one shoulder as though Eren needed a hint as to which refrigerator she could mean.
“If the whole city is immobilized?” He echoed with a raised eyebrow.
His facial features stood out again from the pale skin, because thanks to his flashlight construction, it was finally bright enough to see at least a little of everything. “Didn’t you look out to check?”
Was he serious? The apocalypse was lurking out there! During her last daring spying maneuver out of the window, she really had other problems than looking for signs of life in the human world. “No.”
Eren didn’t need to know anything more. Her disturbed relationship with Thor was absolutely none of his business.
Boom!
She twisted her pupils against the ceiling, mentally shouted: “Why?!” And clenched her free hand so as not to make it twitch treacherously. After a deep breath, she leveled her vision again and stared all the more violently when she saw Eren.
The curiosity of a typical neighbor has long been evident on his face.
He eyed her bluntly and frowned, behind which at least one questionnaire was waiting to be processed.
Demonstratively, she sealed her lips with the coke bottle, drank, continued to drank, swallowed, drank, swallowed, thought about whether she could chew glass in the case of an empty bottle, drank and choked on air. She writhed coughing and tried not to die by patting herself on the chest.
Eren grinned gleefully, but said nothing, instead, contrary to expectations, continued their conversation: “The city didn’t suffer the outage. Our house did.” He went to the curtains and peeked through. Was he tired of life? “The lighting bolt has probably hit a line or something. The caretaker will probably take care of it tomorrow. The problem will be resolved by Monday, at the latest.”
She rattled, “Monday?” Almost two days with nothing more than praying for sunshine? Keep calm, Mika! If Eren had sensed her fear of thunderstorms, he would definitely have walked off with his flags waving to mock her. She didn’t grant him the point, so she played the worried housewife again. “By then, all food will be rotten.”
“Oh, please”, he huffed. “now relax. You will be able to cope with having to dispose of a few frozen pizzas. You don’t have any more than that.”
He looked so incredibly convinced that this time her neighborly instincts awakened. She barely peeked over one shoulder at the refrigerator compartment, which was under the normal refrigerator – behind a separate, opaque door – and then stared at Eren searchingly. There was a mixture of knowledge and horror, and caught in his eyes but definitely not an X-ray vision. So she asked, “How do you know what I’ve frozen, huh?”
One, two, three seconds later, he grumbled: “I saw your purchases, very simple.”
“When did you see them?” Her brows grew in a skeptical line as she wondered if anyone else was playing a game here.
It was Eren’s turn. “Every now and then”, he crunched, “I just see them when we meet in the hallway.”
“Really?” She persisted, took a step towards him and was thievingly happy to be able to push him into the corner this time. Purely verbally. “I can’t think of when I would have run into you after shopping”, she whispered provocatively.
He moved closer to the window and growled like a trapped weasel. “Then use your brain! How else should I know what you are storing in the freezer?”
“Well”, she pestered just for the fun of it, “maybe you don’t have hobbies so that you sneak around the house as a hallway ninja and secretly peek into your neighbors’ shopping bags?”, she grinned. Eren lowered his eyelids and silently admonished her, but she kept joking. “Or are you lurking like a secret agent in disguise behind the peephole and -”
Eren jerked the curtains aside. Enter, thunderstorm!
Boom!
It took all her body control not to dive back into the kitchen. She stood there rigid as a stick, clutching the empty coke bottle and inwardly pleading with all sorts of gods for mercy when a network of lighting bolts sprouted in the sky. They flickered brightly from the outside into the living room and looked for her, felt over the furniture, along the walls, the floor, scanned every square meter, except . . four? Her attention rushed to the spot the storm couldn’t find: the couch was hidden in the spotlight of the flashlight and remained undisturbed. Only angel choirs could have expressed what she felt at this discovery, but she could do without that. It was more important to reach the praised sofa landscape as quickly as possible.
Boom!
She dashed straight through the living room, avoided the coffee table, made a jump and finally dived into the safety of the upholstery. She blew like she ran a marathon.
“If someone observes you and your facial acrobatics, one might think that you have gone crazy”, Eren scoffed as hatefully as ever that she almost felt uncomfortable. Normality calmed down. Not just her, but him too, because he was already strolling calmly from the window into her chosen safety zone.
She ignored him for the time being and lolled her back against the armrest to the end of the world. Seldom had the couch seemed so comfortable to her as it did at that moment – but not so small, either.
Eren took a seat at the other end, but there was no more than a meter between them, which was theoretically not bad but made her practically aware that they had never sat together anywhere. So far, their meetings have tended to fall into the category of showdown: two duelists in the hallway. Ready for film, in defensive poses between flying scraps of words. The only thing missing was a dramatic harmonica.
“Why are you smiling?”, he wanted to know after a sip of coke. “What are you thinking about?”
“About us.” His eyelids widened. She waved it off before his eyeballs could roll out. “About our meetings, I wanted to say. When I think about how it usually went, it seems rather strange to me to be sitting here with you, now.”
Eren sorted his face. “I see. And which of our epic encounters are you talking about, exactly? The discussion about my doormat?”
Scruffy cork and indefinable decorations popped in her memory. “That was just ugly”, she etched.
A growing frown line contradicted her, but Eren halfway changed the subject, “Or do you mean the debate about the cobwebs that you adamantly said were closer to my apartment door and were therefore in my”, he chuckled, “area of responsibility?”
“Hey”, she interjected. “You were the one who measured with a ruler.”
A crater developed from the fold. Eren snorted. “Incidentally, it turned out that I was right. Nevertheless, you refused to pick up a broom.”
“Because”, she dragged on, looking for an excuse.
“Because?”
Found! “Because there was still a spider in the web and I didn’t want to break the peace, very simple.”
“Oh man”, he rubbed the bridge of his nose. “You’re so annoying sometimes that I really don’t know why-” A point on the wall suddenly claimed his interest.
“Now, stop crying”, she grumbled, “you’re just pretending to be the innocence of the country.” To prove it, she swung her leg on the sofa and rolled her pants up to her knee while mentally patting herself on the shoulder for having picked up the razor before the storm. She definitely didn’t need nicknames like Chewbacca.
In the dim light there wasn’t a single stubble, but there was a thriving bruise on her shin.
The wall became uninteresting. His attention was now devoted to her again. “What did you do there?” He muttered and leaned forward.
Alarmed, she waited to see if the scenario from the kitchen was repeating. Nothing happened. Eren stayed in his corner and made no move to get too close to her. She eagerly ticked off the stitch in her chest as a relief, before she grumbled: “That was you! Because you”, she used quotes, “knocked earlier, I crashed into the table.”
The corners of his mouth twitched. “Oh, I’m sorry.” He was lying, the grinning idiot. Nevertheless, he did something that could be interpreted as a well-intentioned gesture, even though he broke every rule of distance. Before her instinct set in, he grabbed her leg and placed it atop of his. She pulled it away. He pulled it against him and firmly fixed it with one hand whole holding the bottom of his coke on the bruise with the other. Again, the cold glass caught her unprepared. But this time, she didn’t tense up but even relaxed under the slight pressure. Wonderful! Why hadn’t it occurred to her to cool her bruise? Maybe because it didn’t really hurt? Or because she was stupid? It had to be, because otherwise she would hardly have denied herself this pleasant feeling.
She slumped against the armrest, enjoying herself, and indulged in Eren’s benefit without even asking herself how she actually earned it. She just didn’t care about the answer, as her mind was bathed in bliss right now. After hours of fear of the thunderstorm, the only thing that counted was the peaceful seconds that slipped past her like condensation on glass. She dreamily observed a drop that rolled down the neck of the bottle, overcame the label, bundled up with others and finally pearled on her calf. She was ticklish there. But not for long, because the drop had already disappeared. Eren caught it with the thumb of his free hand and rubbed into a damp breath of nothing. She stared spellbound at the fingers that clung to her leg with ease before she realized what was going on. Only when the swarm of bumblebees awoke to new life inside her stomach did her mind summarize the situation: Eren touched her.
This isn’t good. Don’t let it happen!, her brain snapped.
Shut up!, her heart roared and she agreed with it.
Eren was just sitting at the other end of the sofa, cooling her bruise. What was wrong with that? As long as he didn’t get close to her, there was no danger of embarking on something that she would regret tomorrow. Or? With a sigh, she blocked out the brawlers. Even Eren was silent. He bit his lip while his gaze searched hers for an answer, even though she wasn’t asking a question. Instead, there was emptiness above her belt. She only concentrated on what was happening below, because it suddenly became exciting.
His fingers cramped, calmed down, and went back to her leg. They carefully circled the bruise to catch another drop of water and then trailed back to the calf. Coolness turned to warmth as he left a second damp trail on her skin. He gently drew a path to her knee, which he covered with the palm of his hand, after moment’s hesitation. Heat shot up her leg, spreading to her foot and then like lava from the heel to the back of her knee and over it. She automatically stretched herself so that the current heat could flow unhindered. Eren used the gap between the cuffs and the skin and slipped under the fabric.
She held her breath as his hand went straight on. Fingertips danced towards her, slowly approaching her, creeping up to the inside of her thigh. A tingling sensation chased the tough, discharged in goosebumps all over her body and concentrated violently in her center. She gasped for air. Her gaze raced over Eren, his tense upper arms, the protruding muscles, the trembling Adam’s apple, his chest, which was moving unexpectedly frantically. His lower lip was gradually turning white as he was still holding it tightly in a bite.
This was exactly how she imagined him when she had to think of him at night.
She was lying on the couch, stuck somewhere between reality and fantasy. Images from every dream in which Eren had ever played the leading role flickered in her mind’s eye. She saw him panting over her as he sunk into her, saw him groaning below her as she rode them both to climax, saw him bite his lip as she . .
Her mind was an asshole and suddenly turned itself on. Don’t imagine anything, stupid cow! He’s just passing the time. Remember! You never really get to him. Not the way you want it to be.
Startled, she blinked herself into the here and now until the dreams burst and she finally clattered into reality. Eren’s fingers on her thigh suddenly felt wrong, so she stopped him with a firm grip. “Ho, neighbor, the fuck are you doing?”
“Hm?” It also took him a moment to find his way back from wherever. He shook his head and stared at her like a kid whose hand had just been shooed out of the cookie jar. “What?”
She sat up and pushed his hand out of her pant leg. “I asked what the fuck you’re doing.” She pointed to his fingers, which twisted painfully slowly and seemed to get hotter by the second. She honestly hated herself for banishing the warmth from her thigh to her calf.
“I beg your pardon?” Eren looked seriously irritated. “I thought -”
“What did you think?”, she snapped. Attack was the best defense. “That it would be somehow appropriate to fondle me, to pass the time? I realize that you’re only here because of the power outage, but that’s really no reason to use me as a distraction from boredom. Ouch!”
Fingernails clawed her calf. The bottle shook and pierced the bruise. Out of reflex, she kicked his chest and pushed him away.
Boom!
Suddenly, there was the thunderstorm again. Lightning flashed behind her; in front of her looks that were in no way inferior to the force of nature. Eren stared at her as if it was a matter of setting her ablaze as quickly as possible. “What did you say?” His words crackled through the living room. “How did you get that shit?”
Congratulations Mikasa, you saved yourself from disappointment!, her brain rejoiced while the wailing of her heart echoed from a corner, Did it have to be? Couldn’t you have turned him down nicer? Or even . .
To escape the noises, she fled. Sighing, she fished a blanket off the backrest and pulled it over herself, which was about as effect as drawing curtains as protection from a thunderstorm. Still, she had no other choice. Running out and burying herself was out of the question at the moment due to the weather, and apart from that, she didn’t want to run into Eren if he stormed out the door. She didn’t doubt he would, as upset as he was. Bye bye, neighbor. Farewell to skirmishes in the hallway. I will miss you, Eren.
But she was wrong. Eren was not someone who simply ran away while there was still a need for clarification, but someone who sought confrontation. He rummaged through the blanket until he found her face and grumbled: “I asked you something! How did you get this bullshit?!”
Boom!
At the sound of thunder, she pulled the blanket closer over them and suddenly barricaded Eren in her hiding place. His forehead slammed against hers, but she didn’t care. It would have been fine for her to just lie knocked out on the couch until that damn night was over, but of course she wasn’t granted that much luck. She stayed upright, forehead to forehead with Eren under the blanket, which was not at all breathable. Heat built up like a sauna and steam poured into her face.
Wait. Steam? No, steam didn’t smell like coke. Eren’s breath, however, did. And it went amazingly fast, considering that she was the one who was the most excited, of the two of them. Well, he was the madman instead.
“Now talk!”, he ordered.
She hated orders, no matter who they came from. “Don’t yell at me!”, she snapped back. “It’s true what I said. You admitted yourself earlier that you were only here to pass the time!”
“Mikasa.” His voice trembled and was so firm at the same time that she thought her name would knock her over, which was nonsense, of course. Words didn’t hit you that way, but hers had definitely moved something, because Eren shifted at a distance. “You moron!” He tensed and burst backwards out of the blanket.
Left alone, she crouched under it and tried to understand when the mood had escalated and, above all, why, but she lacked the oxygen for such complicated questions. So she plucked the blanket off her head and took a breath when the world was already dawning. Lightning lit the living room and traced Eren’s face in front of her. The blow hit her, followed closely by a well-dosed tirade of ranting, which he threw at her. “Do you seriously think I hadn’t found anything better to pass the time with? After all, I could just go somewhere where the electricity is still running, instead of throwing myself here with a pain in the ass, who’s scared of a ridiculous thunderstorm!”
When Eren rushed off the sofa to build himself up to personified anger in front of her, she got scared that she automatically switched to defensive mode. “Pah!”, she argued. “No way! I’m not afraid of thunderstorms!” The lie came unexpectedly easily from her lips, so she allowed herself an arrogant smile that should convince him once and for all so that he would never talk about her embarrassing secret, again.
Eren smiled, too. Ice-cold. The room temperature dropped and a chill ran down her spine that almost froze the couch under her bum. She nervously slid from side to side in the upholstery, just about to wrap herself in the blanket again.
Suddenly, he grabbed hold of it. He pulled her off the sofa by the wrist and before she could even react, she slid after him on her socks, spun past him, was braked and eventually stumbled head-on against the pane of glass.
Boom!
Thunder vibrated under her palms as Eren pressed her fingers flat against the window and held them there. She squirmed hectically. Skin squeaked on glass, her voice through the living room, “Hey, what’s that supposed to mean? Let go of me, please!” A lightning bolt shot east in front of her, cutting open the sky.
“Twenty-one, twenty-two”, he counted next to her ear.
Boom!
The hair on the back of her neck was ready to flee, but it was trapped just as much as she was. Only her breath escaped and wet the pane.
“Funny”, he scoffed. “For someone who isn’t afraid of thunderstorms, your pulse is racing suspiciously fast.” To prove it, he clutched her wrists until she felt the telltale throbbing in both arms and she was sure that all polygraphs in the country were sounding the alarm right now. At least the human behind her reacted, because he was having a great time.
She swallowed every bit of humor and choked out, “Where - ?”
“Oh, Mikasa, where do I know?” He scoffed and then hissed like the cursed snake in the tree of knowledge. “Everyone in this house knows your fear, you idiot. And do you know how? Because everyone’s ears bleed as soon as the slightest sign of a storm appears in the sky.” He savored the moment in a cleverly placed pause before he had her full attention. She listened intently. “It’s always funny when you turn up the music like a naive brat who thinks she can hide in the noise.”
Caught, she thought and said nothing, didn’t move a millimeter in the stupid hope that Eren would just forget her presence. This plan failed of course, like her previous one. Because Mr. Neighbor did not take his eyes off her for a moment, watched her reflection in the glass and waited for a movement while he provoked her. “So silent?”, he grinned. “I didn’t even know that’s possible for you.”
She used plan B, pressed herself convulsively against the window and achieved nothing, except to get herself further into Eren’s clutches, who neither intended to loosen his grip on her joints nor made any other move to give her an escape route.
“You’re mean”, she heard herself whimper and would have loved to push herself off the fifth floor. “So you knew from the start and you came here because you wanted to make fun of me? Is that how you pass the time?” She sounded hurt.
Eren breathed in so deeply that his chest brushed her shoulder blades, and then snorted: “Now finally stop rattling on a sentence I said on a whim! Otherwise you don’t put every word on the gold scales, so why now?”
As a prisoner, she succumbed the urge to defend herself. “Now, listen”, she whined. “I can probably rattle on whatever I want, especially since it’s your fault that I am going crazy here! What’s wrong with you? Did a lightning bolt catch you while showering? Why are you playing up yourself like that? Was there a short circuit in your pear that made you forget how to behave, as a master of aloofness? A tip from me; touching other people is actually not your thing!” The words gushed out of her unfiltered. As if infected by the storm, she shot everything at him that had been brewing in her in the course of the evening. And she just didn’t care, after all, she was right!
Up until the moment Eren moved closer to her and dampened her conviction with his hard chest. She immediately forgot to breathe, but her heart did its best to keep supplying her with oxygen. It eagerly pumped blood into fibers of her body that had hitherto been completely strange to her, and into her ears, so that she could hardly understand what Eren chuckled. “Master of aloofness?” He shook his head. Fun turned serious. He fixed her at the window with an iron face. “You”, he announced then in a menacingly low voice, “consider me aloof?”
Thunder rolled through the night and her pulse quickened to the beat of the pouring rain. “Of course!”, she groaned, trying to stay strong – although the body on her back was clearly stronger if she believed the tense muscles. Concentrate, Mika! “You are even the king of aloofness! Even when you moved in, you repelled me with a stupid saying and whenever I met you afterwards -” She rammed her teeth into her tongue.
“What happened then?” Emerald green eyes looked at her like they did when they first met, and suspiciousness sparkled in then as if she were an alien in his fortress of aloofness. His look was similar to that of yore. She remembered. She’s been obsessed with teasing him ever since, and God was her witness -
Boom!
Thanks. - Her witness that she hadn’t left out anything to regularly upset Eren because it was simply fun and she was convinced that she had found someone in him who shared this fun. Damn it, she’ll admit it, from the first moment she wanted to get closer to him. Not just physically.
Broken was the dream, now.
“What happened then?” He repeated more emphatically. “Have you decided to give in to your inner princess in disguise in order to beat me with my own weapons? Did you think I would be tempted by a neighbor who stands up to me, who regularly stuns me, who I never know what nonsense she would present to me next? Did you think I couldn’t resist you like this?”
Her tongue pucked. She let go of it and licked her lips, which admittedly didn’t give the impression of resistance. Her stomach became the scene of a battlefield. Bumblebees shot wildly. God, she didn’t know what to feel anymore. The thunderstorm drove her insane, as did Eren’s upper body, which was sending the most contradicting signals behind her. He snuggled up against her with a heat that might originate in anger – or maybe not.
“If that was your strategy”, he continued much more mildly, bowing his head to hers until his hair tickled her cheek, “if you wanted to arouse my interest . .”
The event in her innards drowned out everything as his breath brushed the crook of her neck. Warmth floated over her skin as he breathed the ultimate attack: “In that case . . congratulations, Mikasa, because here and now . . you won, after this unexpected power outage.”
A lightning bolt whistled past unnoticed and somewhere a confession was waiting to be discovered, but even neon advertising on the opposite building would not have caught her eye, as she had long been stunned by his words. She closed her eyes and let his scent daze her, as well. Eren suddenly gave off something that that awakened her fighting spirit. “Won?” She took a deep breath. “And what’s the price?”
He didn’t make it that easy for her. “That depends”, he whispered dangerously close to her skin, “how high your stake is.” His lips casually stroked her earlobe and sent shivers of hot and cold from the nape of her neck, which felt addressed by this tiny touch, to her center.
Her brain was holding flashing warning sighs, but her heart swept them away, pounced on her brain, and spun away with it. Only she was left behind, who had to decide whether she wanted to take the risk of embarrassment, which would inevitably result if Eren simply dropped her again. She had a lot to lose; her pride, her apartment – and the harmless banter with her neighbor.
On the other hand, if Eren was really serious this time and she just put him off out of stupid fear, she would have never forgiven herself.
She put everything on one card: “Then I want to see what you have to offer.”
For a split second, he stiffened. His jaw was tense and she thought she was going to be ridiculed again when he opened his mouth a crack. Instead of mockery, she met an unfamiliar smile that disappeared down her neck. Soft lips crept down from her ear, nudging her until she voluntarily tilted her head to give him enough space that he didn’t even want.
While kisses wandered down her shoulder, Eren moved seductively closer. His heartbeat pounded behind her, raced, faltered like his breath, which suddenly dried up as he sucked on her collarbone. She winced from the sweet pain, clutched the glass, but he appeased her by placing his hands on hers and intertwined their fingers. He caressed her thumbs tenderly as he increased the suction and greedily tasted her. An enjoyable hum vibrated on her shoulder and sowed goosebumps from toe to fingertips. She clawed at the window again. This time, Eren released her. He followed the raised hairs on her arms up to her neck, stroked the pulsing spot after a final kiss and whispered with satisfaction, “That would seal it.”
As if in trance, she nodded. At that moment, she would have made any pact with the devil, as long as she could enjoy Eren’s closeness any longer. He listened to her by sending his fingers to wander again. Inch by inch they crept down her back, dived under her shirt and snaked up, again. He stopped at her shoulder blades and reeled: “No bra . .”
It took her moment to understand what he meant and felt she had to justify herself. “They are uncomfortable at home”, she said choppily, staring at her T-shirt, which suddenly made her feel really naked. She then realized that she had little more to hide and became nervous. “Do I need one?”, she stuttered.
Eren swallowed to collect himself. She did the same. This was the first time since they’d known each other that none of them knew what to say. Obviously, they had reached a limit that they couldn’t easily cross. They were still able to stop and dismiss this situation as macabre fun, only to then withdraw separately at the usual distance.
But . . did she want that? Did he want that?
Their eyes searched each other in the window glass and met for a silent agreement. They looked at each other, didn’t blink, came to an agreement. He nodded and found his self-confidence again. He brushed under her shoulder blades and followed the path of the missing bra. Fingers went to her ribs, wandering over each one as she stretched against the movement. Eren pulled her close until she leaned against him. Their heartbeats ran a marathon. She felt it like a drum roll in her back and waited impatiently for the next step. Then, finally, he reached the base of her chest. His thumbs circled timidly over the skin, crept up painfully slowly, lured her body and gave her this pleasant pull when her sensitive bumps hardened. She writhed under hot hands and winced at the first real touch. Eren gasped and forgot all restraint, massaged her breasts and caressed the exciting tips, rubbed them with his fingertips, pinched carefully and chased electric shocks directly between her legs with the next lightning.
Above them, the sky was turn into a thousand pieces and for the first time in years, she didn’t care. For her, only Eren counted, and he counted the seconds breathlessly. “Twenty-one, twenty-two -”
As the thunder started, he grabbed her hips and spun her around.
Boom!
His mouth crashed on hers. Dizziness intoxicated her when he immediately deepened the kiss. He wasted no time, parted her lips with his tongue and kissed her indignantly. She fell back a step and he caught her. As a true gentleman, he held her bum, pulled her close and pressed their pelvis’ against each other. She felt his urgent excitement and groaned.
Lightning flashed. Thunder rumbled. Rain pelted. Something was brewing in his eyes. Crystal clear eyes clouded when he demanded in a deep voice, “Come with me.”
She followed him. The ground turned to jelly under her feet as she swayed in the diffuse spotlight of the flashlight. In front of her the couch protruded like a ring out of darkness and it gradually dawned on her why he had looked so meticulously for a place for the lamp. If her brain had still been active, it would certainly have protested, but at the moment it was bobbing in the auditorium and was just as fascinated by everything that should followed, as she was.
Eren took off his shirt. Defined muscles presented themselves in exactly the right places and she couldn’t resist drawing along them with her hands. From his firm stomach, over the hard chest, to the shoulders. As if hypnotized, she caressed his neck and felt the racing pulse before she buried her fingers in his hair and lured him to her. He leaned forward and she thought she heard “Finally” before their lips met again. This time, it was she who deepened the kiss uninhibitedly. It tasted like coke, cravings and unspoken words. She still understood what he wanted when he pushed her hips just far enough away to get to the ribbon of her pants. He neatly untied the bow without breaking the kiss and tugged the fabric over her bum until it fell down on its own. She stepped out of her pants legs and came up to him again. He received her with a throaty sigh and glowing hands on her panties, kneaded her buttocks and rubbed their pelvis’ together like in a damn indecent dance. His hardness hit her most sensitive point. She groaned again, lost the kiss, but he pulled her back with a nibble on her lower lip. His lips were so soft that she wondered how the rest of his skin would feel against her own. She she tore herself loose for a moment, pulled the shirt over her head, hurled it into the darkness and immediately wrapped herself back to Eren to melt on his heated chest.
“This is so fucking right”, he breathed into her ear and ran the tip of his tongue down her neck.
Shivers ran all over her body. She nodded frantically. Eren purred contentedly and pulled tight on her immaculate shoulder. Surprised, she straightened her back, felt a supporting hand beneath her neck and was startled when another wandered between her legs and pushed the panties aside, He dipped into her unhindered, waited a blink of an eye until she willingly snuggled up against him, and dipped a second finger into her. A fuse popped deep inside her.
“I have in the bedroom -”, she tried to say but stopped panting. She was short of oxygen and about twenty letters of the alphabet were missing. “Nightstand.” She showed what she was on about by feeling for the clear bulge behind Eren’s jeans and then immediately started to fumble the buttons. Her hands trembled with his when his own appeared between her legs to push her panties off. He frantically helped her open his pants, quickly snatched a condom out of his back pocket and kicked the jeans on the floor, pushed them away and then took off his shorts.
She held her breath as her gaze fell on his center.
Eren lifted her chin and looked her in the eye. “Dare saying anything wrong now”, he warned with a playful undertone.
“I for sure won’t bother with such little things now”, she teased and almost choked on her heartbeat when he smiled.
“Your mouth is really driving me crazy”, he whispered. “Now kiss me, finally.”
Her lips naturally found his, while something totally unusual spread through her; the feeling of having done everything right.
If Eren wasn’t bothered by inappropriate jokes and still wanted her naked body, there was no need for any doubt, was there? No. Certainly not.
So she let herself fall, sank into his arms, and followed him to the sofa. He turned them so that she ran against the upholstery and had to sit down. He stopped and leaned down, kissed her demanding and opened her thighs. Breathlessly, she enjoyed the growing goosebumps under his fingertips, leaned back and threw her head back when his thumb hit her clit and at the same time, two fingers slid completely into her. Her hips took on a life on their own to set the pace but Eren slowed his movements as soon as she pressed against his hand. Foil tore and she looked up.
A corner of the condom wrapper hung between his teeth. He blew it aside and grinned at her. “I’m running out of hands.”
Without hesitation, she crawled on her knees and snapped the condom, tugged it out of its foil and moaned harder than before, when his fingers hit a spot that clouded her mind. The living room blurred before her eyes. She blinked hastily and leaned against him, scraping up what was left of her self-control and picked up his inviting erection. She pulled the condom over it and swayed when he thrust uncontrollably into her fist and she imagined being filled by him.
With a hoarse sound, Eren freed himself from her grip, grabbed her joints and pressed her in one flowing motion onto the couch until she came to lie under him. Immediately he moved up, spread her legs and kneeled between them. His body hovered over her like a distant dream that she captivated with greedy eyes to memorize every detail.
Defined muscles accentuated his biceps, the tendons of his shoulders, the masculine chest, and the flat stomach that rose and fell with excitement. She looked pleadingly in the eyes that had looked at her no less interested. Unlike her, however, Eren seemed more patient. He broke eye contact and released her arms, which she couldn’t move because of the tension anyway, leaned back and transformed her into pure wax under his hands. They carefully trailed over her sides to her breasts, playing around them carefully at first, then tightened more and more until she could hardly control herself, reared up, lolled in the touch and longingly lifted her pelvis. Eren drew in a sharp breath and held her by the waist, but his patience was also at the limit now. Restlessly, he moved into position, grabbed his dick and circled her entrance with it.
“Ready?” He asked in a thick voice, propping himself up with one arm next to her head.
The pressure in her middle grew immeasurably with the need to finally feel it inside her. She nodded frantically and wrapped her arms around his neck, dragged him into a breathless kiss, opened her mouth and whimpered excitedly as his tongue slid into her at the same time as his cock.
A billion amps shot through her body when he completely consumed her. Her skin crackled, her abdomen burned so wonderfully, and something exploded in her head before she threw it back and moaned.
Eren struggled to maintain control. He just let out a “Fuck” while waiting until she was completely ready. Then he pulled back and thrust.
His rhythm accelerated from the first deliberate movements to absolute licentiousness and managed to let them see stars within a few minutes on this thunderstorm night. Lightning and thunder were finally forgotten when the world rushed by, in a wave of orgasms.
She woke up wrapped in the blanket, which she no longer knew how it got around her body. She rolled on the sofa and groaned in agony as the rays of the sun poked her eyes like needles and sewed her lids together. In search of protection, she burrowed deeper into the blanket and disappeared to the hairline, hoping to be able to indulge her daily world pain in peace. But far from it.
The malicious laughter of some birds pecked at the silence and something rattled somewhere. She perked up her ears and listened, opened her eyes and suddenly forgot the noises as she spied her body. She was naked.
Like Dracula out of his coffin – just not as elegant, much faster and significantly more naked! - she sat up and inspected the full extent of her discovery. She carefully lifted the fabric, blinked, and at least found a pair of socks on her feet. Which didn’t necessarily improve the sight.
Naked stayed naked. That couldn’t be denied, but at least it could be explained by the clothes scattered around the living room. Her shirt was dangling on the bookshelf, her pants were crumpled under to coffee table and her panties seemed to be on the run as they almost made it to the front door.
“Hm”, she said while she was waiting for her brain to work, which slept longer than usual today. She yawned heartily, drowning out the gradually louder chirping of birds from outside.
Suddenly, she realized.
“Holy-!” The images of the previous night reached her as if a projector had been placed directly behind her forehead. First, she was herself fighting the thunderstorm, then she saw Eren – in the hallway, in the kitchen, in the living room, in front of the window, on the sofa, on the sofa, on the sofa!
A tone escaped her that she could just as little interpret as the emotions that rained down on her from all sides: joy mixed with shame, satisfaction with the fear of having made a mistake.
“Did you just have a stroke?”
She startled. Her gaze shot to the kitchen and met Eren, who was leaning in the door frame, claiming: “If your face has to perform like this every morning, you will be wrinkled damn early, Mika.”
She noticed abundantly that her facial features were actually derailing. But who was surprised? After all, her bare flesh was hanging on the couch while Eren presented himself in full gear in the daylight. And as long as she didn’t know what to make of the previous night, the current dress code seemed both unfair and embarrassing to her. So she quickly wrapped the blanket in a makeshift tunic and sorted her facial expressions from something to stubborn. “The W-word is taboo, get it?” She countered out of habit, although there were more important things to discuss. “Threatening a woman with wrinkles in the morning is not an option!”
Eren’s face moved, too. The corners of his mouth twitched suspiciously, but for the first time since they’d known each other, his grin didn’t seem provocative at all, but unusually satisfied.
“Everything’s the same as before, huh?” He said that so relaxed that she wondered if had accidentally sniffed one of the cleaning products in the kitchen cupboard.
The desire to do the same grew in her, as she didn’t feel relaxed at all. Her nerves stretched like wire ropes until she couldn’t take it anymore and the question of all questions fired right into the room: “What was that here, last night?”
“Sex”, was the answer.
“Thank you, Doc”, she grumbled. “I actually meant, was that an I-got-my-neighbor-laid thing? Do I always blush as soon as I see you in the hallway? Or do we make a tradition out of it and repeat that in the event of power outages and storms? Then we should, however, determine whether both must apply at the same time. If one is enough -”
“Mikasa.”
“- we could run into each other quite often in midsummer for the purpose of the thunderstorm season, but -”
“Mikasa . .”
“- in winter there are dead pants. At least until a snow chaos, like last year, breaks out and the power lines are immobilized. Perhaps the whole thing was -”
“Mikasa.”
“- also just a spontaneous thing, which would be perfectly okay, I think, on the one hand, but on the other hand -”
“Mika!”, Eren finally stopped her.
Her mouth snapped shut and almost got dusty, it was so dry. From nervousness? Of course! After all, until a few hours ago, she had assumed that she would never get close to Eren. Especially not that close. What if that was a one-time affair? Should she have made it clear that she wanted more than just a little rendezvous? Would she have had to resist to be interesting to him? Would she have -?
“I can hear the gears in your head rattling this far”, he sighed theatrically and ran a hand through his hair. His gaze trailed aimlessly around the living room, grazed her and suddenly became serious. “Calm down, okay? If you want to discuss the details, we still have enough time. Fully wake up first.”
Oh, she was awake. Her thoughts were already jogging in all possible directions without knowing where she was going. They stumbled at Eren’s words: “For me there is nothing left to clarify.” He shrugged. “What happened, happened.”
Although the thunderstorm was long over, she felt as though she had been struck by lightning. Had the bastard just checked off last night as nothing? So easily?
She stared at him in disbelief as he strolled to the window and calmly opened it, completely freezing her in shock. Cold morning air flooded the living room. Street nose rustled in the distance. Birds whistled. Eren, on the other hand, stretched himself extensively in the sunshine before he started moving again, wandered past the sofa and disappeared behind her.
Since she couldn’t twist her neck like an owl, she just kept staring at the window and wondered whether she should throw herself or Eren out before the situation got really uncomfortable. The idea fell into obscurity, however, when the shirt fluttered from the shelf onto her skull.
“Get dressed, otherwise you’ll get sick”, she heard the prince of darkness demand.
She pulled the shirt off her head and actually slipped into it, imaging that she was arming herself against Eren, who lurked like a shadow in the background. Footsteps approached. The back of the couch creaked as he leaned on it.
She hurriedly grabbed the pants from the floor and put them on, too. Nevertheless, she felt naked – and defenseless exposed to her neighbor, who had just made it clear to her what he thought about their night together. How stupid was she to just let herself go without knowing where it all ended?
She could no longer bear herself, her stupidity and especially Eren, who eyed her indefinitely and apparently wanted to say something. But she didn’t give him the chance for ridicule and instead fled straight to the bathroom. She slammed the door behind herself. According to the proverb, another one opened in the meantime. Great, Eren left the apartment. She should have expected that, only the optimistic part of her had obviously hoped for more.
With slumped shoulders, she shuffled to the sink and fished the toothbrush out of the mirrored cabinet, which she didn’t even close again, to not having to look at her stupid disappointment. She would have laughed in the face of anyone else, saying that they shouldn’t act like that, but she graciously spared herself the know-it-all advice. To do this, she tortured herself with a toothbrush, shooed it from molar to molar and asked herself whether she could smash the brain cells in which certain moments were stored with a targeted hit through the roof of the mouth. Probably not.
Sighing, she rinsed out her mouth, but her head remained full of thoughts about what now? Sooner or later, she would run into Eren after all, so she should think about how to deal with it. Confrontation or Resignation? Although, she already knew the answer.
Giving up was out of the question as she was attracted to this bastard like a moth to light. But how did she get to him without burning her fingers again? Definitely with oven gloves! In a figurative sense, of course, which meant: she would keep her clothes on until he was ready to get close to her, not just physically.
The decision was made, so she straightened her shoulders, headed for the bathroom door and almost ripped it out of the frame, with fresh motivation.
“Make coffee!”
She slammed the door again and stared at the wood from the inside. Could she have rammed the toothbrush too deep into her throat? There were no other options. At least none that explained why Eren was still in her apartment. He had left minutes ago. Assuredly. She heard that. Still he was there, no?
After a few seconds of gawking, she realized that she couldn’t check this with an X-ray, so she only had one choice. She opened the door again. Indeed. Eren was waiting for her in the living room with crossed arms and one foot tapping.
“You will be able to make coffee, won’t you?” He grumbled in a way that tempted her to slap and kiss him right after. “Is that too much to ask? I don’t think so, after I waled down to the bakery.”
She hissed perplexed. “What?”
Eren’s foot sped up to hummingbird level. His arm jerked forward and pointed to the coffee table. “I got some buns. From the bakery down the street. For breakfast. Any questions?”
Her gaze followed his finger pointing and found a paper bag that smelled seductively of warm buns. She was so dazed by the sweet smell and Eren’s unexpected presence, that she couldn’t help but stalk into the kitchen. Directly towards the coffee machine, followed by a fresh breeze of his scent. She peeked to the side and watched him tampering with the cupboards. “Where do you have your plates?”, he wanted to know.
“There”, she said and nodded in the direction of the cupboard on her right. She ran on autopilot and filled the machine with water. Before reaching for the coffee powder, she pinched the back of her hand to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. She wasn't. She was clearly awake, tinkering in the kitchen, preparing coffee and no longer understood the world when Eren reached out and gently trailed her collarbone. Immediately, her skin tingled under his fingers and asked for more, which of course contradicted her plan to keep her clothes on.
Fortunately, before she could act like a hormone-controlled teenager, Eren kept her distance. “They are good to look at”, he said, taking two plates out of the cupboard.
She suddenly became aware of what he was alluding to. Out of reflex, she felt the area he had touched and regretted not having inspected the hickey in the bathroom mirror. Unmistakable evidence that his lips had wondered down her neck hours ago, his hands all over her body until she couldn’t take it anymore and . .
She frantically pounded the button on the coffee machine, foolishly imagining that she could divert the heat of her cheeks onto it. That didn’t work. Her head was probably glowing like a red light bulb, but the machine’s lamp stayed off.
Then she remembered a not entirely unimportant detail. “The power went out.”
Plates rattled behind her. “That’s right”, Eren said in a tone that dogs wouldn’t have liked, but found his masculine vocal cords again: “Oh, the problem will probably be resolved soon.” He was a bit too convinced and she listened with a raised eyebrow. “The caretaker is guaranteed to be here. Until then, you should take care of the coffee machine to be sure no water runs out. I’ll set the table for a while. Eating in the living room is more comfortable than in the kitchen, isn’t it?”
After this speech, he rushed out of the kitchen and left her standing because he obviously believed, she was brain amputated. Okay, her thinking skills may have been failing in the last few hours but her IQ was still above that of a toast slice. So she wanted to know what was going on and followed her favorite neighbor. In the living room, plates were frantically rotating on the coffee table. No sign of Eren. The door slammed shut, her jaw dropped. He did not . .?
She darted after him, tore the door open and caught him in the hallway in front of a hatch built into the wall. Now it was getting absurd.
“Do you have -”, she began.
“No”, he replied and opened the metal door.
“Yes, you have -”
“No.” His gaze tried to tie hers so she would ignore his hand.
Nice try. She kept her eyes on his fingers. “No shit, did you really – last night?”
He flipped a toggle switch. Click. “No.”
Behind her all the lights came back to life and the CD drive purred, ready to use. This confirmed the suspicion. “You!” She complained at length and stomped towards him. “You took out the main fuse in my apartment! Apart from the fact that it is forbidden to play with it, according to the rental agreement”, she took a breath, “are you dumb? What is that? Why are you doing this to me when you knew I was going to freak out?!”
Eren took a breath, too. Then he chuckled like a sadistic bastard while he closed the metal door again. A metallic echo echoed through the hallway, accompanied by squeaky soles as he overcame the last step between them and built himself up in front of her. She backed away, but was held by the waist. Of course, she resisted by pressing her hands against his chest. It was as hard as a human wall, Eren’s heartbeat throbbing noticeably behind it. Warmth crept from his body into her fingertips. Her resistance melted and she caught herself at the thought of tearing his shirt off to snuggle up to him like a cat against a heater. Stop, stop, stop! Concentration! She was angry and he should kindly notice that, too. So she activated any reserves of strength and increased the pressure until she almost managed to push herself away from him. But only almost. He pulled her close again with ease and bowed his head. Lips floated down and breathed in front of hers, “Relax, thunderstorm goat. How else should I get in your apartment?”
She wanted to say something. At least she opened her mouth but Eren sealed it before the syllable with a kiss that brooked no argument. Regardless of the casualties, it took her breath away and she couldn’t help but let herself in as her mind said goodbye like a rocket into orbit.
Possibly the house was on fire because she was getting hot as hell and the anger fizzled out into nowhere. The ground turned into lava. Her knees were boiled soft and gave away, but Eren’s hand saved her, slipped from her waist to her buttocks, grabbed and lifted her so high that she had to wrap her legs around his hips. In one flowing movement, he whirled her against the wall and fixed her body with his. He pressed himself against her, not only making her feel the cold wall on her back, but above all the growing heat in his groin area. She vaguely remembered any resolutions she recently had, but which she would now have justifiably said were completely irrelevant. What counted was Eren, her, that seemingly endless kiss and the desire to repeat last night.
“Mom, what are they doing?” The voice of a six-year-old boy from the upper floor was like a bucket of water for their hot spirits. Startled, she bit Eren’s lip and opened her eyes. He stared at her, not less surprised.
Abruptly they stopped the smooching and peeled off their limbs until they were breathing hard and could say a “Good Morning” to the troublemaker and his mother, Annie. Annie smiled one of those uncanny omniscient smiles, but said nothing and continued to walk downstairs with her son by the hand.
While their steps faded in the hallway, she gathered up the tatters of her newly burst resolutions and slipped past Eren to get away from his aura. She had just learned all over her body, how seductive that guy was. A mere kiss was enough to suck the mind off her head, which was honestly impractical since she was darned to be mad.
“So you planned all of this yesterday, to come into my apartment?” She scoffed after their neighbors were finally out of earshot. She peeked over the banister to make sure no one was spying on them before she turned back to him. “What kind of stupid scam is that? You could have just visited me, idiot!”
He raised an eyebrow. “Really?”, he mocked. “And then you would have let me in, because we were so normal to each other until then?”
The counter question wasn’t bad. She couldn’t think of an answer spontaneously.
Eren did the talking. “Mikasa”, he said forgivingly. “Be honest, you would have thrown me off like you did when all your purchases were scattered in the hallway and I offered to help you drag the unhealthy crap into your apartment.” A reproach flashed briefly. Eren blinked it away. “Madame Unapproachable, however, found it more appropriate to start a discussion of false friendliness that had ended in a comparison with favoring the Mafia. I quote”, he cleared his throat and clearly swallowed a laugh. “If I let you help me, at some point you will ask me something too, until we are eventually stuck in a vicious circle of hyped niceties. So let’s stop here and now to save ourselves the embarrassment.”
She dodged him and stared into the past on that day. “Oh.” She nervously rubbed her forehead, behind which the thought spread that, theoretically, she was not entirely innocent of their distant relationship. “That . . um . .”
Eren made a dismissive gesture. “That”, he emphasized, “was the moment I knew that I definitely had no desire for ordinary neighborhood relationships.”
She hardly dared to ask and therefore just mumbled: “But?”
A finger under her chin directed her attention to him until their eyes locked. He looked her straight in the eye and after a nerve-wracking deep breath, confessed, “I don’t know. But I’d like to find it out before the next thunderstorm.”
That embarrassing silence spread between them like a cheesy smack in which the characters pondered what to do next. However, she didn’t need any time to think about it, because she was sure what she wanted from Eren anyway, and was therefore grateful for the clucking from the kitchen, which broke the silence and kept her from gossiping too quickly.
“Coffee is ready”, she distracted and pushed towards the front door.
Since nothing moved behind her, she peered over one shoulder at Eren, who was watching her expectantly and with a twitching brow. Sighing, she stepped aside and made an inviting gesture. “Would you like to come in and have breakfast with me? I just happen to have fresh buns in the house.”
The arrogant grin finally crept back onto his lips as he set off and sauntered past her. “If you really want me to. But only on one condition.”
She clenched her fist on the doorknob and doubted her sound thinking. Why did she do this idiot to herself? Ah, yes. The jerk was exactly what she needed – the one she could be with, without having to act like a different person.
“What condition?”, she snapped.
Eren whirled around and grabbed her waist again. “We have breakfast in bed”, he whispered hungrily in her ear. She swallowed – and slammed the door behind them.
Boom!