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I.
"This is the first day of my life / I'm glad I didn't die before I met you / But now I don't care, I could go anywhere with you / And I'd probably be happy”
The Red String of Fate. The fabled string that’s tied to your finger, connecting you to the one you’re supposed to love for lifetimes. You always hear about it in media, but you know it’s not actually real. Who in their right mind thinks a flimsy piece of yarn attaches you to your soulmate?
Definitely not Jean Kirschtein, that’s for sure.
Jean wasn’t even sure he believed in soulmates. Did he have a boyfriend? Yes. Did he love him? Of course. That’s all Jean needed to know; he loved Armin without all that love at first sight, deep meaningful soul connection crap.
In fact, he was celebrating 7 months with Armin when he was rushed to the hospital. They were on a date, sitting in their usual place at their usual joint, playing footsies under the table when something fell through the roof and hit Jean square on the head. He remembers Armin screaming and a really loud ringing noise before passing out.
“Hngh-” Jean moaned. Everything was uncomfortable, from the gown tangled between his legs to the bandages around his head.
“Hey, sweetie! You’re awake.”
Jean didn’t recognize the voice. He slowly cracked one eye open, wincing at the pain that shot through his temples at the light.
He tried speaking again but it came out as a gargled mess of incoherent sounds. His throat was dry.
“You were badly concussed. Out like a light for at least a week. The doctor was afraid he had another coma patient on his hands.” The owner of the voice offered him a cup of water, tilting his head back to help him drink it. Jean was grateful – he didn’t know if he trusted his limbs yet.
“What – How…?”
“Don’t try to talk, sweetie. Save your energy.” Jean could agree with that. “A pretty large rock hit you on the head. Somehow it got stuck up in the ceiling, and you were just unfortunate enough to be sitting under it when it finally unstuck and fell through. Got you smack dab on the temple.”
Just his luck.
Jean tried to snort, but the effort it took made it feel like his head was exploding, so he settled on a weak noise that could resemble a laugh if you were close enough to his mouth.
“Go back to sleep, hon.” Finally, the best idea he’d heard all day. He waved the nurse off as she patted his arm and was out.
He wasn’t sure how long he slept, but his head still hurt and his throat was dry again. Oh well, at least it was dark now.
He heard shuffling feet and low voices from just outside his door, and a steady beeping of his heart monitor let him know that yes, he was still alive despite the ache in his skull.
Maybe he’d try opening his eyes again. On the count of three.
1, 2-
Jean opened one eye on two. It didn’t hurt as much as before. He opened the other eye and slowly his room came into focus. He still couldn’t move his head much, but he did see two chairs by the side of his bed, a table with a few books and a bottle of water, and a large window that let moonlight stream in through the glass.
He knew the books had to be Armin’s. Who else would come see him? Armin would probably drag Eren along. Those two were attached at the hip.
A lot of people asked if he ever got upset that his boyfriend and roommate hung out so much. He supposed any normal person would be bothered by it – but Eren and Armin were childhood best friends, who was he to step in the middle of that?
Besides, he and Eren were bros. Bros don’t fuck their bros boyfriends behind their backs.
Jean brought his hand up to rub the sleepiness out of his eyes, stopping at the red string he saw tied around his index finger.
… Who the fuck put a string on his finger.
He weakly tried to untie the knot, dimly worrying about the circulation in the digit. The damn thing wouldn’t come undone. Jean tried slipping it off, clawing at the yarn with his fingertips. He even tried gnawing it off, his finger slick with his spit by the time he pulled his mouth away.
Nothing.
Whatever, he was too tired to deal with it. He figured it was just a weird thing his nurses did. Maybe they did it so they’d know he was alive and moving. Or something.
Jean let his hand flop back to his side. He went back to sleep.
-
“Good morning, sweetheart.”
Jean groaned at the voice, stirring from his dream. “What time is it,” he mumbled, sleep thick on his tongue.
“Early.” The voice – his nurse, he assumed – fiddled with the machines by his head. Jean decided to brave the light to see who had been taking care of him this past week. The sun filtered through blinds on the large windows, weak enough for Jean to open his eyes.
“’S not so bright.” He mumbled, his nurse laughing.
“I took the liberty of drawing the curtains. Didn’t want to blind you when you first wake up.” Jean stared up at her, short red hair pulled into a small bun at the back of her head. She moved around the bed to stand in front of the window, messing with his blankets. A halo of light formed around her. Warm brown eyes smiled down at him.
“Are you an angel?”
She laughed. “No, I’m your nurse. The names Petra.”
“Petra…” Jean repeated. How many pain meds did they have him on? “Don’t tell my boyfriend I called you an angel.”
She laughed again. “Don’t worry sweetie, I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“How doped up am I?” He asked.
“Pretty doped up.”
Jean hummed. Is this what being high felt like? Petra squeezed his arm before heading to the door, checking something off on the clipboard by his bed. “I’ll be back in a few hours. There’s a button on the side of your bed – push it if you need anything, ok?”
He moved to look at her leaving, nodding at her words, but his eyes fell on his fingers. The string.
“Oh, Petra!” He called her back into the room. Why would he need the button if he has the string?
“Yes?” She poked her head back into the room, her hand delicately gripping the doorway. Fingers curled around wood. Fingers with a red string attached to one.
“Oh, um. N-nothing. I thought… Nothing.” Jean stuttered. She smiled and continued her walk out of the room, Jean’s heart nearly stopping when she walked right through the string. Like it wasn’t even there.
What the fuck?
He fumbled with his stringless hand – the right one – and grabbed onto his phone, waiting for him on the bedside table. Should he call Armin? No, he didn’t need him thinking Jean was having a stroke, or something.
He went to Google.
‘why the fuck is there a red string on my finger’
“Red string of fate – Wikipedia.” Jean grumbled the first suggestion. He skimmed the article, growing increasingly more anxious. Soulmates? Attached to the person you’re destined to love, no matter time or place? He threw his phone onto the sheets, rubbing at the bridge of his nose.
No. He was just high. That had to be the reason.
He would stay awake, the meds would wear off, and the string would disappear like it hadn’t ever been there.
Jean left the phone in the sheets and glanced at the clock on the wall. 9 AM. It’d be a whole hour more before Armin could come visit him. Probably longer than that, because didn’t Armin have class today? More time for him to sober up before he had to face his boyfriend.
Jean decided to stay off his phone, and avoid looking at his left hand by tucking it under the sheets. He grabbed a book Armin had brought – a collection of short stories – and got to reading.
He didn’t actually pay attention. The words went in one ear and out the other (or whatever the reading equivalent was). By the time noon had come and gone, and he had downed seven bottles of water, the pain meds had all but left his system. Sure, his skull ached but now he knew he wasn’t high anymore.
The damn string was still there.
Jean entertained the thought that maybe, just maybe, he had been granted a gift. A weird gift. A weird gift that doesn’t even do anything, not really – just shows you who you’re destined to love. But, according to Wikipedia, you don’t always end up with the one you’re supposed to.
Maybe whatever God that watched over him had given him this to make sure he’d end up with his proper soulmate?
Nah. Jean was a sap, but he wasn’t that big of a sap.
It’d go away, he kept telling himself. It’d go away.
Petra came and went a few more times, checking on his vitals and making sure he was comfortable. Her string extended far past the door, and Jean found himself staring after it. He wondered if Petra was with whoever it attached to.
“What’cha thinkin’ about?” She asked on her third round in the room. 2 o’clock.
“Mm… Nothin’.” Jean said. He didn’t need his nurse thinking he’d gone crazy. He was starting to think it.
“You seem so focused. I can practically see the cogs turning in your mind.”
Jean laughed along with her. “No,” he said. “Just waiting for my boyfriend to get here. Preparing myself for the whole ‘how could you be so careless, sitting under a rock that happened to fall on the place you always sit.’”
“Well, how could you be?”
Both Jean and Petra started at the noise. Armin had that effect on people – he was too quiet for his own good. He strode into the room and set his messenger bag on one of the chairs, leaning over to plant a kiss on Jean’s forehead. Petra smiled at them and excused herself.
Jean tried to force himself not to notice the string on his left index finger.
Was he expecting his to connect to Armin? Kind of, yeah. He spent all those hours thinking about it – how he loved the small blond, how comfortable they were together, how Armin always seemed to know Jean’s every grumpy thought.
It was hard to not notice his heart dropping into his goddamned ass when he saw his and Armin’s supposed love connections extend in different directions.
“Jean?” Armin’s voice was so soft, so gentle, and Jean didn’t even realize a tear had slipped from the corner of his eye until Armin wiped it okay. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” Jean grunted. “’M just loopy from the meds.”
Armin laughed then, a sound so light and bouncy. A sound he had fallen in love with.
Fuck it. Who cares if they weren’t soulmates destined to love each other or what the fuck else. He was with Armin, and loved him now.
Jean threw his earlier moment of weakness out the window and pulled his boyfriend down for a kiss. It was sloppy, and Jean definitely used too much tongue, but the red flush on Armin’s cheeks was worth the grossness of it.
“Missed seeing you like that.” Jean commented, smirking. Armin only flushed deeper.
“It’s only been a little over a week, Jean.” He said.
“Don’t care.” Jean pulled him down for another kiss, slower this time, barely breaking for air. It was Armin who broke apart, placing his palms firmly on Jean’s chest.
“Okay,” he said. “Clearly there’s something in these meds. I’m gonna sit in this chair, and you’re gonna keep it in your pants. Can you do that, Kirschtein?”
Jean pouted, but nodded, and decided that was a tremendously bad idea, so he settled for a small ‘okay,’ and let Armin sit in the chair nearest him. Jean watched him for a while; just watched how he reacted to the words in a book, gnawing on his bottom lip and squeezing his eyes when the characters do something ridiculous.
Jean felt like one of those characters. Not because he was doing anything ridiculous, but because of what happened to him. He got hit in the head by a damn rock that had lodged itself in the ceiling and then fucking broken through, landing him in the hospital. Now he could see the fucking… the god damn red string of fate. He felt like his life was a cartoon.
A nurse – not Petra – came by then to give him some food. A bland peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Jean wolfed it down, not realizing how starving he was. He looked at Armin looking at him, talking around a mouth full of peanut butter.
“What?” He said.
“You make me real proud to call you my boyfriend.” Armin joked, and Jean laughed, and he did his best to push his feeling of dread into the back of his mind because god damn it he loves Armin so why is a measly string fucking with him so much –
“Ah, I should get going.” Armin gathered his things in his arms, leaving behind a few books. “It wouldn’t kill you to read something other than memes, y’know.” He said, gesturing to the growing stack.
Jean swallowed the lump in his throat. “Not happenin’.”
He smiled when Armin kissed his forehead, swatting his hands away from his bandages and waving him off when he eventually left, taking his soulmate string that didn’t attach to Jean with him.
After a few minutes of silence, and Jean overthinking, he slammed the button on his bedside. A nurse came in a few minutes after.
“What’s up?” She asked. Black hair fell around her shoulders in waves, piercing green eyes boring holes into Jean.
“Um…” He clammed up. “I was wondering if I could walk around? My legs are getting really cramped.”
She smiled kindly at him, striding into the room to unhook him from his IV. “Sure, just don’t get lost.” The nurse helped him out of bed, handing him a pair of ugly looking flats to wear. Whatever, he didn’t want to walk around the hospital bare foot, anyway.
Jean spent the first few minutes alone stretching; his arms, his legs, his back, his shoulders. Everything that had stayed stationary for a week.
And god damn did it feel good.
He took his first hesitant step forward, and then another and another. Thankfully the whole head injury thing didn’t mess with his muscle memory. He slowly shuffled out of his room and into the hall, his eyes scanning his surroundings. The corridor was generally empty, save for the few nurses that passed him on their rounds, smiling gently at him.
He nodded to each nurse that passed him, feeling awkward in just his hospital dress. Each person he came across had their own strings, crisscrossing and heading off in different directions. One old lady shuffled past him, her string rising above her and through the ceiling. Jean could only assume where that went.
Maybe her soulmate was an astronaut. Or an alien.
Jean looked at his own string, extending far into the hallway and disappearing around a corner. He followed the red, weaving through nurses and around cleaning carts, eventually stopping in front of a set of elevators. He looked behind him – no one was around to stop him.
The elevator opened. His string went up.
Please don’t be an old person, he thought. That’d be the weird cherry on top of this weird day.
Jean walked into the steel box and punched the next floor up, watching his reflection as the doors closed. Wow, he needed to shave. And do something with his hair.
He needed to be presentable if he was about to meet his soulmate, right?
The doors opened, but the string still extended above the ceiling. He let the doors close again and went up to the next floor.
A doctor joined him at the floor after that, but quickly got off. Jean started to think that his string just kept going up, never ending, until finally the doors opened on the 5th floor, four floors above his.
He stepped out onto the linoleum, the sole of his shoe squeaking. He cringed at how loud it was. Everything else was dead quiet.
Great. My soulmate is an old person on their death bed.
He followed the string past the nurses’ station – no one there – down the main corridor, passing rooms left and right. The only sound seemed to be the gentle beeps of heart monitors. No sneezing, no snoring, no nothing.
Just as Jean was giving up hope, his string disappeared around a doorjamb. His heart stuttered and he practically tripped over himself with his nerves, but it was now or never.
Jean paused. Now or never.
He could turn around. He could go back to his room and wait to be discharged and live happily ever after with Armin. He didn’t need to know who his soulmate was – especially if they’re stuck in this dead end hospital ward.
But Armin had a soulmate, too. And he wasn’t it.
With a sigh, Jean continued. He briefly thought about knocking on the door, but dismissed it and continued in anyway.
It was a private room. Only one bed, only one person. Jean’s eyes trailed from the end of his left index finger, where his string started, and followed it across the floor and up onto the bed, where it ended.
It tied around a dark finger. The finger attached to a dark hand, freckles splattered on the knuckles. The freckles continued up, up, up onto a dark arm where it disappeared into a sleeve. Jean looked everywhere but the persons face; at the thick woolen sheets, the machines by the bed, the various screens that displayed their vitals.
Jean dropped his eyes to the persons – his soulmates – chart. He closed the gap and took hold of the clipboard.
Marco Bodt.
Coma patient.
His eyes shot up to look at Marco, and his stomach twisted. Not in a bad way – well, he supposed it could be bad, because this boy was beautiful. Dark freckles dusted all over brown cheeks and nose and Jean was certain if Marco was in the sun there’d be more. His eyes looked dark and bruised, like he hadn’t slept in years. Jean snorted.
His hair was parted down the middle and had been cut underneath, almost like Jean’s. He assumed his mom was keeping his hair trimmed, hoping he’d wake up one day and be happy for not looking like some kind of long haired hippy.
Tubes had been shoved into his nose to help him breath, and the right side of his face was burned and scarred. His right arm had been chopped off just below the shoulder.
“Jesus,” Jean muttered, half expecting Marco to wake up at the noise. “What happened to you?” He wondered out loud.
“He was in a car crash.” Jean jumped at the voice, the clipboard with Marco’s information falling from his hands. He turned to look at the person in the door, his own tawny eyes meeting electric blue ones. Jean took in his cropped blond hair and light blue scrubs, covered with a brilliant white lab coat.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.” He said, extending his hand. “Erwin Smith. I’m Marco’s doctor.”
Jean took the doctors hand, squeezing it with a shaky grip, afraid he would be scolded for being up here. “Jean Kirschtein.”
“I know.” Doctor Smith smiled. “I’m also your doctor. I specialize in head trauma.” Jean flushed, but the doctor continued speaking. “I went to your room to check up on you. Petra told me you were finally awake and forming coherent sentences. When I got there a nurse told me you were stretching your legs.” Doctor Smith moved to Marco’s bedside, checking on his IV. “I’m not sure why, but I had a feeling you’d be up here.”
Jean swallowed, staring pointedly at Marco’s index finger. Did he somehow know? Or was it just one of those weird coincidences? “So… how long has he been here?”
Doctor Smith looked down at Marco, a somber expression crossing his face. “Four years,” he said. “He was sixteen when he first came in. The crash killed his parents and left him in a coma.” The doctor sounded almost… sad as he pushed some stray hairs from Marco’s forehead. “Marco was one of my first patients after I started my residency here.”
Jean nodded, watching the doctor’s lithe fingers on Marco’s skin. A very distinct and very sad feeling settled into his gut. Marco was only a year older than Jean. His soulmate had been in a coma while Jean was skipping school and stealing his older brother’s alcohol for his friends.
“Will he ever wake up?” Jean struggled to find his voice.
Doctor Smith was silent for a minute. “I hope so.” He said finally, voice barely a whisper. The two of them stayed like that, staring down at the slow rise and fall of Marco’s chest, until the doctor spoke again. “Do you know him?”
“No,” Jean said, scrambling for words. He couldn’t tell his doctor the truth, not if he wanted to get out of the hospital any time soon. “I just… happened upon his room. Saw he was young.” Jean let his voice trail off.
Doctor Smith scrutinized him for a moment. When he decided Jean’s answer was truthful enough, he turned from Marco and started toward to the door. “Well, let’s get you back to your room.”
Jean gave Marco one last look, before falling into step behind his doctor.
-
When they were finally back in his room, Jean crawled into the bed, suddenly very exhausted.
“Tired?” Doctor Smith asked him, quirking one bushy eyebrow.
“Yeah. Didn’t expect walking to take so much out of me.”
The doctor chuckled, checking things off on Jean’s chart. “You’ll be back to the original Jean in no time,” he said. “But I do want to keep you for another few days. Just to make sure nothing goes wrong with your injury.”
Jean nodded, briefly noticing that he could actually move his head without any shooting pain. That’s good, right? Jean settled against the pillows and let his blankets be pulled tight around him and jesus when did this bed get so comfortable –
“I’ll let you get some rest.” He heard Doctor Smith say, his voice growing dimmer as Jean slipped from consciousness.
Jean isn’t sure when he dozed off or how long he slept, but he woke up to the dim afternoon sun, shining dully through the blinds on his window. He groaned, turning his head away from the light, trying to catch the last remnants of his dream.
dark freckles, whisky colored eyes, and the most beautiful laugh to ever grace my ears-
“Hey, you’re awake!”
Jean’s eyes shot open, falling on blue oceans just in front of him. “Armin,” he said.
“Yeah, it’s me.” Armin said, tilting his head in his hands. “Did you forget?”
“No, I just- what time is it?” Jean yawned and rubbed at his face.
“Noon-ish. You’ve been asleep since I got here, mumbling something about freckles and a boy named ‘Marco’?” Armin lifted his voice at the end, turning his statement into a question, and smiled at the flush on Jean’s cheeks. “Are you dream cheating on me?”
Jean stammered, his mouth agape. “What? No- Wh- Why would you-?” The light tinkling of Armin’s laugh interrupted Jean, his face an embarrassing red.
Calm down, Kirschtein. Just because you know who your soulmate is doesn’t mean you’re cheating on your boyfriend. Stop overthinking things you anxious bastard.
Jean stared into the deep blues of Armin’s eyes, willing his heartbeat to slow.
Marco isn’t awake to interfere with your relationship. And, for all you know, Armin’s soulmate is probably halfway across the world writing a book in Paris or something like that-
“Hey, the lazy ass is finally awake!”
Jean flicked his eyes to the open door, his roommate standing in the frame with a bottle of water in one hand and a candy bar in the other. He smiled at Eren despite himself, happy to see the familiar olive face and annoying grin. “Hey,” he croaked.
“Man, I was really starting to think you’d slipped into a coma.” Eren said, Jean flinching at the word. “The apartment is lonely without your constant bickering, buddy.”
Jean rolled his eyes, not believing his friend for a second. “Yeah, I’m sure you really miss me beating your ass in every video game we play.” He watched Eren stride over to the bed, dumping his vending machine haul down by his feet before moving to sit next to Armin. Jean looked back to the door, expecting to see Eren’s string mingling with his and Armin’s.
He didn’t see anything.
Worry flooded through him as he thought, maybe, his mind had made the whole thing up and he was never given this obscure ability – but, no, his was still there. Red as ever and creeping further into the hospital.
Wait.
He should still see Armin’s though, right?
Oh.
Jean forced himself to look at his friends.
Oh.
Their hands were twined on the arm rests of their chairs, fingers pressed against one another in a reassuring squeeze. This wasn’t an unusual gesture for the two best friends, but the red string between them was short and complete and oh god Jean was dating his roommates’ soulmate and his boyfriends’ soulmate was his fucking roommate –
And then they smiled at each other, and Jean felt his heart in his throat and his stomach in his ass.
He knew Armin had had a crush on the brunet before Jean asked him out, but he also knew Eren was too oblivious to notice any feelings the small blond harbored for him. Armin must have known that, too, so he accepted Jean’s offer and they’d been dating for almost a year and it was blissful and they were happy-
But couldn’t they still be happy? Couldn’t Jean ignore the pressing guilt on his shoulders and move on?
He watched Eren look at Armin; the way his eyes roamed every inch of the small face, the greens of his eyes blazing with an intense fire, the way his mouth quirked upward when Armin laughed.
And he watched Armin look at Eren; his blue eyes twinkling at Eren’s voice, his nose scrunching up when the brunet said something embarrassing. A look that oozed absolute love and adoration, a look he had never seen directed at himself.
He decided, no, he couldn’t ignore the pressing guilt and move on.
Jean was mostly silent for the rest of their stay. Eren would try to incorporate him into the conversation, and Armin would take breaks to ask him if anything was wrong, Jean always saying he was just tired. Which was true – he had exhausted himself.
Anxiety was his job and overthinking his specialty.
He knew, logically, there was no way he could be guilty – how was he supposed to know Armin and Eren were soulmates? – but anxiety didn’t work on logic.
So he turned his head when Armin went to kiss him goodbye.
When Jean was alone again, his thoughts travelled a few floors up, to where Marco lay in a never ending sleep. He briefly wondered how the freckled boy would kiss, before his face heated up and he was embarrassed he even let his mind wander that far.
Then again, it was his mind. Who would know what he was thinking?
So he indulged himself.
He and Marco were in his hospital room, Jean standing in the doorway and Marco sitting up on the bed. Marco smiled at him and stood, on wobbly knees, to stride over to the door, hand resting on the doorjamb on the side of Jean’s head. He imagined Marco’s eyes would be brown, chocolatey and so deep you could glimpse the depths on his soul in one glace.
And intense. Especially as Marco leaned into Jean’s space, their noses bumping and lips brushing together. Marco smiled and laughed, light and airy, before bringing their lips together in the softest and sweetest way Jean’s mind could imagine.
Jean melted into the imaginary touch. He was butter under Marco’s freckly fingers when he brought his hand from the door to Jean’s right arm, rubbing up and down the length of it. Goosebumps popped up on his skin, and he moved his own hands to wrap around the other man’s waist. They stayed like that for a moment, perfectly content with their sweet moment, but Jean’s mind spiraled and soon his hands were moving to cup Marco’s ass and –
Too far.
As Jean pushed the image from his head, he realized he didn’t even know if Marco was gay. Could whatever God that had done this to him be cruel enough to make his soulmate both in a coma and straight?
Jean shivered at the thought. He would face that problem when he came to it – if he came to it.
“This sucks,” he muttered, pushing the woolen sheets off his body. He slipped out of bed and pulled a robe around his gown, shoving his feet into the ugly blue flats he had been given. Jean grabbed one of Armin’s books as a last minute thought and shuffled out of his room, heading for the elevators.
People read to someone one in a coma, right? Jean thought. I think people do that.
By the time he made it up to the coma ward, the sun was just beginning to set beyond the hospital windows. He walked by some nurses, not making eye contact and trying to look like he belonged in a ward full of comatose old people. They either didn’t notice him or care enough to ask what he was doing, so Jean continued undisturbed to Marco’s room.
The door was open, just like the last time he wandered through, and Marco was laying in the same spot, same peaceful look on his face.
Jean didn’t know what he expected – he knew Marco wouldn’t have moved – but he didn’t expect everything to look the same. Not even a hair was out of place on Marco’s head. He felt like he was stepping into a painting, a picture perfect copy of the last time he had been there.
“Alright, buddy,” he mumbled, grabbing a chair on the wall and pulling it to Marco’s bedside. The legs scraped against the linoleum, loud and jarring in the otherwise quiet room. Jean sat in the cushioned seat and let the quiet settle, the only sound being the steady beeping of the heart monitor. Jean stared at Marco, mapping out the constellations between his freckles.
His eyes trailed from a lonely freckle on Marco’s cheek, through a cluster of freckles by his eye socket, to three more freckles that almost curled around his eye. Jean took his time looking at those four freckles, soaking them up and memorizing them, deciding that simple little constellation would be his favorite.
“Guess I should get to the book, huh? Don’t want to seem creepy, just staring at you.” Jean said, his voice light. He looked down at the thick paperback in his hands, the green cover staring up at him. He remembered Armin telling him about it – something to do with a group of teenage boys stuck in a giant maze and there are monsters beyond the walls but they’re supposed to run in the maze and then a girl gets sent to them and she helps save the day. Or something.
Jean opened the book, the cracked spine bending easily, and began reading. His voice was too loud, echoing off the walls and reverberating through the tiny room, and Jean was certain you could hear it clearly down the hall. But it’s not like he could just stop now, half way through a sentence. That’d be too weird.
So he kept on, his voice level. It eventually settled in every corner of the room and Jean grew comfortable with the volume. Occasionally, in between pauses, he could hear Marco’s gentle breathing beside him.
“Jeez, that’s a lot of words.” Jean closed the book after finishing the fourth chapter. He stretched out his back and arms, fighting down a yawn. “Havin’ fun there?” He asked absentmindedly, smiling down at Marco.
The sudden and loud beeping next to his head jerked him out of his chair. He swore, stumbling to the other side of the room, willing his heart to stop beating out of his chest. One of the monitors by Marco had spiked, an almost flat line turning into a few jagged wavelengths, before flattening again.
Jean stared at it. Did he break something? Was something wrong?
“Everything okay in here?” He turned to the familiar voice. “Oh, hey Jean!”
“Petra,” Jean said, breathless. “What’s that machine for?” He pointed to the one that had gone off.
Petra walked around the bed to inspect it, briefly writing something down on the papers by his bed. “It monitors his brain waves, telling you whenever there’s activity in his brain – like, if he’s dreaming for example.”
Jean’s nerves settled and he unclenched his shoulders, relief swelling through him at the news Marco wasn’t dying.
“Did it scare you?” Petra laughed, walking back over to Jean.
“Yeah,” he mumbled. “Hey – what are you doing up here?”
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that question?” She stared at him, her gaze hard, before melting into a smile. “I’m covering a shift for a friend. Bit his tongue so bad he needed to see a doctor.”
“Poor guy,” Jean said, Petra nodding in agreement, before continuing. “I’m just… reading to Marco.” He gestured to the book, now thrown open on the ground. Armin was gonna kill him for treating his books like this.
“Do you know Marco?”
Jean shook his head, his ears going red. “No, I- I found him. Yesterday. I was wandering and I found his room and I don’t know… I wanted to read to him.” He expected Petra to make fun of him, or patronize him, or something – but she just kept smiling at him. Jean started getting uncomfortable under her gaze, fidgeting from one foot to the other.
“That’s fine, sweetie. Don’t look so nervous. He must have liked whatever you were reading to him.” She turned away to pick up Armin’s book, dropping it in Jean’s hands. “Or your voice,” she added slyly.
Jean blushed.
“But it’s getting late. You’re getting discharged tomorrow, so make sure to get rest.”
Jean’s eyes widened in shock. “Really?” he asked, but then replaced his shock with a sarcastic smirk. “Yay. I get to go back to working my ass off.”
“It doesn’t get any easier.” Petra joked, before leaving the room. Jean gave Marco and his dream machine one last glance before following her out.
-
He was finally out. His stuff was in a bag slung over his shoulders, Doctor Smith’s careful words fresh in his mind.
Don’t do anything that will exert you too much. You’re still healing. If anything happens, anything at all, don’t hesitate to come back here.
Like he’d willingly sleep in one of those beds for another week.
Jean stood on the sidewalk, soaking up every last ray of sun he possibly could. He felt like he hadn’t felt the sun in years, despite it only being a week or so.
The first thing he noticed was the mess of red. Sure, the strings of fate he saw in the hospital had been a lot but this was… overwhelming. They crisscrossed every way, tangling together and tugging on one another. Some extended above the clouds, and some dug underneath their feet.
Well, at least he knew now that Hell actually existed below them.
His own string still led deep into the hospital, tied to a frail boy stuck in a hospital bed, likely to never wake up.
He tried not to let his thoughts linger on that for too long.
“Jean!”
He turned to the voice – maybe a little too quickly, based on the momentary dizziness that washed over him – and saw a familiar head of reddish-brown hair bounding his way.
Sasha enveloped him a great hug, her face digging into his chest. He wound his arms around her smaller body, breathing in the scent of her shampoo and body wash. And, unsurprisingly, bread. You get that when you work at a bakery.
“Hey, Sash,” he said. “Where’s Armin?”
“He couldn’t make it. Apparently had some big test. He sends his regrets.” She said, her voice muffled still by the fabric of Jean’s shirt.
He peeled away from her, worry settling deep in his gut.
Don’t let it get to you, don’t let it get to you, don’t let it get to you-
“Come on,” she said, grabbing his hand. “Connie and I will drive you home.” Sasha led him to the old beaten up truck her boyfriend currently waited in, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel to some old rock song.
Jean could see his two friends were attached by their fingers, their string tightly wound around one another. No surprise there.
“Hey!” Connie’s smile was bright when Jean lumbered into the car after Sasha. “Glad to see you’re alive, dude.”
“Glad to be alive.” Jean said, only slightly breathless after the mini-climb. He settled into the worn leather and let Sasha buckle his seat belt for him.
“Where to?” Connie asked sometime later, already pulling out of the hospital parking lot. “Wanna get a burger? I’ve heard some scary stories about hospital food.”
“Yeah, and Hannes has really missed your wallet at his burger place.” Sasha added.
Jean managed a weak laugh, but his attention was trained on the side of the hospital – on a little window a few floors up, the string attached to his finger disappearing somewhere behind the glass. He watched the window fade, his string stretching the farther they got. As they turned onto the main road, Jean was afraid it would break, and he’d lose Marco.
Not that it would matter, he barely knows him.
“So?” Connie’s voice brought Jean back from his thoughts. How long had they been talking?
“I kinda just want to go home.”
“Home it is.”
-
Turns out ‘home’ wasn’t a good distraction – at least not from the thought of soulmates, and how apparently his best friend and boyfriend were exactly that.
“I’m so glad you’re home,” Armin said, a soft smile pulling at his lips. “We’ve missed you a lot.”
Jean grimaced. We. Armin and Eren are a ‘we’ now.
“Everything ok?” Armin asked. Jean looked down, into his boyfriend’s worried eyes, guilt gnawing at his heart. He didn’t even know if it was from the soulmate debacle, or if it was because he was being an ass.
“Yeah, I’m fine. I just need a shower.” He ducked away Armin, avoiding a kiss that would have landed on his chin, and hurried to the bathroom.
Jean did his best to avoid people for the next few days. He stayed in his room until Eren left for work, and told Armin he was just out of it – he’d be fine soon, he just feels weird, he just needs space.
Armin stopped trying to get him to come out after the third day. He’d come by before his classes began, and after he got off work, checking on Jean to make sure he was eating and bathing, but never expecting more conversation than a grumbled ‘hello’.
Every time Armin left, the same guilt screamed at him from his mind. He knew he was being cold, and he knew Armin didn’t deserve any of his bad mood.
On the fourth day, after everyone had left, Jean dragged himself out of bed and into a cold shower. I don’t deserve heat, he thought. He wolfed down a dry bowl of cereal and made his first steps outside since he got home.
He didn’t know where to go – his boss decided to graciously let him go while he was trapped in the hospital – but he knew he couldn’t stay in his apartment any longer, unless he wanted his guilt to drive him insane.
He briefly thought about finding Armin on campus, to apologize, but the thought of coming to terms with his guilt settled uneasily in his stomach, and decided to avoid it for now. Jean looked down at his left hand, at the blood red string tied to his index finger, pointing him in the direction he knew he should go.
He began walking, barely stopping at crosswalks unless there were cars, until he found himself in the waiting room of the same hospital he had been dying to get out of. Nurses walked past him, people paced nervously, doctors roamed from room to room – nothing changed since he had been discharged.
Jean made his way to the elevators, ignoring the glances he got as he chewed anxiously on his lip. He stepped out on the fifth floor, the corridor just as quiet as the first time he had been there. The walk to Marco’s room was shorter, the directions already burned into his mind (not to mention the string that led him there was ever-present).
“Hey,” he choked out the words as he saw Marco’s still body, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest. “I didn’t bring anything to read today.” Jean took the seat next to the bed, folding his arms over his chest. “Really, I didn’t even think I was going to come here again.” He stared down at Marco, at the little constellation of freckles by his eye.
“What do you sound like?” Jean wondered aloud. “Do you have a deep voice? A lisp? Can you roll your R’s? I can’t.” He let the steady beeping of Marco’s heart monitor answer for him.
“Do you have any family? Do they still visit you?” The thought of no one visiting Marco clawed at his chest, replacing his guilt with an overwhelming sadness. Then he got a thought, his eyes sparkling as a smile tugged on his lips. He leaned closer to Marco, as if the closer they were the better he’d hear him.
“I’ll visit you,” he said. “Every day. Rain or snow or sunshine. I… You can’t be alone…” He let his words trail off, his voice quieting with his last statement. “You shouldn’t be alone. I’ll read to you, or draw you, or use you as my personal sounding board, Marco.”
Something about saying his name out loud sent a shiver down Jean’s spine. “Until you wake up. Hopefully soon.”
He didn’t know how soon ‘soon’ was, but after an hour of quietly scrolling through his phone, Jean decided he should leave before Eren noticed he was gone.
“This was fun,” he joked, standing from the less-than-comfortable chair and stretching his limbs. “See you tomorrow, buddy.”
-
The next few weeks weren’t as melancholy, and Jean stopped locking himself in his room. He even apologized to Armin, but he still couldn’t act normally around the blond, especially not when he and Eren were in the same room.
Maybe he was being childish – no, he was definitely being childish. He just wished Armin was angrier at him, maybe start a few fights, so he wouldn’t feel as guilty when they inevitably broke up. But his boyfriend was infinitely kind and understanding.
Jean still spent most of his free time in Marco’s hospital room; drawing, reading, or just simply talking. He liked when he drew, because sometimes he would draw Marco, and how he might look if he were awake, and that meant Jean got to stare at his freckles for the day without feeling weird about it.
On a particularly hot day, Jean was sat in his regular chair, reading a news article out loud when a knock sounded at the door.
“Hey,” Jean snapped his head up to see Petra, a blue popsicle in her hand. “Thought you might want this.”
Jean flushed a light red, pocketing his phone before standing up. “How’d you know I was here?”
Petra snorted. “You’ve been coming here for weeks, Jean. Nurses like to gossip in between patients.”
Jean’s flush grew darker, but he accepted the popsicle with a mumbled thanks before returning to his seat.
“Don’t you have a job to be getting to?” She leaned against the doorjamb, eyeing him curiously.
“Not currently.” Jean sunk further into his seat.
“Well, have fun, kid.” Petra sighed, turning to leave.
“What do they say about me?” He asked around the blue mush before she could leave.
She turned around, a small smile pulling at her lips. “They think it’s cute you visit your boyfriend daily.”
Jean coughed, shocked at her words, the popsicle nearly falling out of his hands. “He’s not- I have a- We’re not-“
“You and that blond boy are still a thing?” Petra asked, crossing her arms. Her smile had turn into somewhat of an accusatory glare.
“Yeah… Yes.” Jean said, trying to sound more sure of himself than he actually was.
Petra stared at him, her gaze hard. When Jean shrunk in on himself, she softened her look. “Shouldn’t you be with him, then? Not reading to a comatose boy that may never wake up?”
Jean didn’t answer.
“What was his name? Ar… Aaron?”
“Armin.” His name felt like poison in Jean’s mouth.
“Does Armin even know this is where you come every day?”
“He… doesn’t ask.”
Petra sighed. “Listen, Jean… I don’t know much about your relationship with Armin, but if it were me…” She didn’t finish her sentence. “You’re headed down a rocky road, Jean. Your boyfriend cares about you. Show him the same care he’s giving you.”
Jean bit the inside of his cheek, tears stinging the backs of his eyes.
A pager on Petra’s waist beeped. “I gotta go,” she said, eyeing the message. “Oluo bit his tongue again.” She pocketed the ancient technology, giving Jean one last look. “Just choose your words carefully.”
Jean listened to her soft footsteps in the hall, until he heard the elevator open and close in the distance, and it was silent again.
“She’s right,” he muttered, crumpling the popsicle plastic in his hands. “I could be cheating on Armin for all he knows and he just… lets me be an ass.” Jean stared at Marco, watching the way his hair fluttered with the open window. The movement almost calmed Jean.
“What would you do?” He asked him. “Well, Jean,” he imitated how he thought Marco would sound. “I would stop being such an ass to the guy who has stuck by you the last year.”
Jean sighed, his voice returning to normal. “Yeah, you’re right.”
Jean left the hospital once he was sure he wouldn’t run into Petra. He walked with purpose – a resolution to apologize to Armin and start anew set in his mind.
Marco won’t wake up any time soon, and some day when Eren and Armin get married and I’m giving my best man speech I’ll apologize to Eren for dating his soulmate, and then live the rest of my lonely life with the stray cats in my neighborhood. Yeah.
He was confident it would all work out. Armin would accept his apology and insist Jean doesn’t need to buy him fancy stuff, but Jean still would because he feels horrible for being so distant, and they’d go on dates again, and do regular couple stuff.
Jean walked into his apartment with a smile, his mouth forming words to ask Eren if he knew where Armin was, but he stopped.
Just in front of him, he saw unruly brown hair mingled with a tuft of blond, olive arms hugged tightly around a blue sweater.
“It’s okay,” he heard Eren whisper into Armin’s skin. “He loves you, Armin, he’s not doing anything stupid.”
Armin sniffled, a quiet sob escaping him. Jean felt his guilt punch him in the stomach.
“The offer to beat him up is still on the table, you know.” Armin somehow managed to laugh at Eren’s words, his small frame shaking.
“Hey,” Jean said. Armin jumped out of Eren’s arms, his eyes red and puffy. Eren turned to look at him next, his glare scathing.
“Jean –” Armin wiped at his tears, doing his best to force a smile on his face. “Eren and I were just, um,” he struggled to find the words.
“Talking.” Eren interjected, moving from the couch to stand behind Armin.
Armin nodded, wringing his hands nervously.
Jean opened and closed his mouth, searching for his voice, but a tense silence fell over the three of them. The words he was so confident about earlier – I’m sorry, I’m an ass, I love you, I hope you can forgive me – now caught in his throat.
“I’m gonna go.” Eren broke the silence. “I think it’s time you two talked.”
“Yeah,” Jean muttered, kicking his foot into the carpet. He avoided looking his friend in the eye as he left, not bothering to lock the door behind him.
-
Another week went by.
Jean sat in the chair by Marco’s bedside, his butt now firmly imprinted into the fabric.
“I broke up with Armin,” he said into the quiet. The words felt weird coming from him – it was the first time he had spoken about it out loud. “I didn’t want to do it, but…” His sentence trailed off, the conversation from a few days ago still fresh in his mind.
“What’s his name?” Armin asked.
Jean stared at him in shock. “What?”
“His name, Jean. I know you’ve been hiding something – someone – from me.”
“Armin, baby, it’s nothing like that! I’m just… I needed some time to myself, after what happened.”
Armin scoffed. “You’ve been using that excuse since you got out of the hospital.” He chewed on his lip, the inner workings of his mind going even faster than normal. “The hospital…” A thought dawned on his face. “Marco. In that dream, you were mumbling about someone named Marco.”
Jean fell silent for the third time that day.
“God, Jean!” Armin cried, walking to the kitchen to put distance between the two of them. “How long have you been seeing him?”
Jean tried to follow. “No, Armin, that’s not it –“
“Then what is it, Jean? Because I’d really like to know.”
Jean gnawed on his lip. He couldn’t just tell Armin the truth, that he had very well fallen for a boy in a coma that he’d never even spoken to – but he couldn’t let Armin think he had been cheating on him. He couldn’t ruin his friend’s trust like that.
“Armin…” He started. “It’s really nothing.” He set his jaw and did his best to keep eye contact. “Marco is someone I met at the hospital –“ Armin started to interrupt him. “– But it’s not what you think! He’s in a coma! He’ll probably never wake up, I just wanted to read to him, so he wouldn’t be so alone –“ Jean didn’t realize he was crying until he tasted salt.
Armin searched his face for any sort of lie, any inclination that Jean was making this story up. After a moment of heavy silence, he walked back over to Jean. When Armin’s hands moved to wipe Jean’s tears, he could only cry harder.
“I think we should take a break.” Armin whispered. Jean grabbed onto his left hand, ignoring the string that led through the door.
Jean nodded, not trusting his voice.
Armin didn’t say anything else. He gave Jean one last sad look, before gathering his things from the couch and leaving.
“Eren made sure to get all of Armin’s stuff out of the apartment while I was asleep.” Jean sniffled. “It’s better this way, I know.” He rubbed his hands over his face. “But, man, breakups suck.”
“I bet you’ve never had to break up with anyone.” He said to Marco. “I know I was nowhere near a relationship when I was sixteen.”
Jean thought about Marco in high school, in a relationship. Then he thought about him in a car crash, and his significant other giving up on him, because Jean had been his only visitor in two years, and his heart ached for an entirely different reason.
After a moment, he moved so his elbows rested on the hospital bed, his head in his hand. His eyes travelled over Marco’s form, lingering on the burns and scars on his right side. Jean reached out with his left hand, the one attached to Marco, and brushed his fingers over some of Marco’s burns.
Without breaking contact, his fingers moved to Marco’s lips, tracing their shape, before moving to his collarbone and eventually down to his hand, twining his fingers with freckled ones.
This close, Jean could barely see the red string.
He tightened his grip on Marco’s hand. Truth be told, he thought it’d be more extravagant the first time he made contact with his soulmate – maybe he’d see sparks fly, or butterflies would erupt in his chest – but it felt regular.
Natural.
“Please wake up soon, Marco.”
-
“Hey, haven’t seen you around here in a while.”
“Yeah, I had to get a job, especially after I got the bill for my lovely stay here.” Jean smiled at Petra. She was sitting at the nurses station for the coma ward, the first time he’d actually seen someone there.
She snorted. “Told you it doesn’t get any easier.” She gave him a once over, taking in his form. “You look better, Jean. Happier.”
Jean blushed under her scrutiny. “Thanks,” he said.
“Did you and Armin…?”
“We broke up,” he cleared his throat. “It’s been a month. I’m mostly over it.”
Petra gave him a look, something that reminded him of when his mom was feeling sappy, a look that said if you don’t leave I’m going to give you a five minute long hug.
“If you’ll excuse me, I have a bedridden boy to go see.” He used Marco as an excuse to get away from Petra before she could make it around the desk.
The walk to Marco’s room was familiar and practiced, Jean barely even needing to think about where he was going. Red strings crisscrossed in front of him, almost making an obstacle course if he weren’t able to walk through them. Just before he walked into Marco’s room, he heard a flatline from a few doors down, followed by a loud wail and a chorus of muffled sobs.
He watched an older couple walk out of the room, the woman clutching onto a small teddy bear as sobs wracked her thin frame. The man – her husband, Jean assumed – wiped her tears as his own streamed down his face.
More people shuffled out of the room, but Jean didn’t stay to see who was crying and who wasn’t.
He hurried to his chair, an uneasy feeling settling deep in his gut.
“Sorry I haven’t been here in a few days,” he said to Marco’s ever sleeping body. “I got a job at the library, and for some reason learning the Dewey Decimal System is really kicking my ass.” He fell onto the chair, a sigh escaping him.
“Hey,” he said a few seconds later. He briefly wondered if he had gone insane – talking to Marco like he’d respond. “What do you think will happen if our string breaks? Or if it gets untied?” Jean stared at Marco’s pointer finger. Nothing bad will happen, right?
Jean reached out and grabbed Marco’s hand, moving it so he could see the knot situated on the string. With gentle fingers, he pulled on the loose end, half expecting it to just fall through his hand. He didn’t expect to get shocked, but he pulled his hand to his chest when the string burned him.
“Ok, note to self: never try to untie the string.”
Jean inspected his finger for damages. When he was satisfied with the even coloring of his skin, he pulled a sketch pad out of his bag, flipping to the most recent drawing of Marco.
He stayed for a few hours, finishing at least three drawings before calling it a day. There was still a dull ache in his finger from where he had been shocked, but it was quickly fading as he made his way out of the hospital’s main entrance.
Jean fished his phone from his pocket, sending a text to Eren.
be home soon. want anything for dinner?
Before Jean could pocket his phone, he noticed something pulling on his finger – his left index one, to be exact.
His heart pounded. The string wrapped on his finger had never moved before.
Jean stared, watching to see if it would move again, but after a full minute of nothing he wrote it off as a simple muscle spasm.
Slightly disappointed, he dropped his phone into his bag and continued his walk through the parking lot. He thought, maybe, Marco had woken up and that was the universe’s way of telling him. It wasn’t until he got to the crosswalk that lead to the main road when he felt the tug again.
He lifted his left hand to eye level.
The string tugged.
And Jean was running.
He ran back through the parking lot, narrowly avoiding a moving car, through the hospital’s lobby and to the elevators. The whole ride up he was bouncing on his heels, the tugging string physically moving his finger by his side.
Marco woke up. Marco woke up and he was finally going to meet Jean, and Jean would be able to see what color his eyes were, and hear his voice, and –
“Jean!”
He heard Petra’s shocked voice when he ran by the nurses station, but he didn’t stop. He didn’t stop when a doctor walked past him, in the opposite direction. He didn’t stop when he watched a nurse walk out of Marco’s room.
He didn’t stop until he burst through the door, panting, his chest heaving with every breath he took. Jean nearly ran into someone’s back – broad, and clad in a white lab coat.
The doctor turned around, a smile on his face when he saw Jean.
“I thought I’d see you here.” Doctor Smith said, effectively hiding Marco from view.
Jean opened his mouth to begin talking, to ask Doctor Smith to see Marco, but someone beat him to it.
“Doctor Smith?” A voice came from the bed. Marco’s voice. It definitely wasn’t as deep as Jean expected – it was soft, light, music to Jean’s ears.
The blond doctor moved from his spot on the floor. Jean’s heart stuttered in his chest.
He had been seeing Marco every day for the last two months, memorized his freckles, the lines on his face – but he had never seen his eyes before. They were brown, like Jean expected, the color of hot chocolate on a really cold day. The same color as the soil beneath the grass. The color of home, of comfort.
Jean took another step into the room, afraid that if he got too close Marco would vanish and he’d wake up from a dream, to find Marco still unconscious.
“I dreamed about you.” Jean watched Marco’s mouth form the words, his angelic voice dancing around the room, but he was sure he didn’t hear him right.
“What?” Jean managed, his own voice small.
Doctor Smith cleared his throat. “I’ll give you two a few minutes. But I’ll need to speak with Marco privately after.”
Marco nodded, and Jean thought his knees would give out at the smile on his face. Doctor Smith moved behind Jean, shutting the door to Marco’s room for the first time in who knows how long.
Jean forced his legs to move, just enough so he could make it to his chair before he collapsed.
“Who are you?” Marco asked.
“Jean. Kirschtein.” Jean looked back at Marco, taking in every breath he took without assistance, every flutter of his eyelashes – and Marco looked back, his brown eyes roaming over every inch of Jean’s lanky frame.
“Jean,” Marco repeated his name. “Do we know each other? I’m worried I may have forgotten some things over the last four years.”
Jean laughed. “No, we don’t know each other. I, uh,” he looked away from Marco, a blush spreading over his cheeks. “I was in the hospital for a head injury about two months ago. I found your room one night and I… started reading to you. Then I just started visiting you when I got out.” He was sure Marco would laugh at him any second now. “I didn’t want you to be alone, I guess.”
He waited for the laughter, for Marco to tell him to get out, to let Jean know he was creepy – but Marco’s smile only grew wider. Jean couldn’t help but smile too.
“I’m sorry, I know I probably sound like the creepiest person on the planet –“
“No! No, you’re fine. Not creepy at all.” Marco laughed. “I think I would be creepier, dreaming about you and all.” Jean forgot Marco had even mentioned that.
“Tell me about it.” He said.
Marco moved around, crossing his legs under himself beneath the blanket. “It was really weird. We were in Trost – but it wasn’t this Trost. It looked like something out of a history book, to be honest. Like we were in the past… And we were soldiers, which was really weird to me because I’ve never wanted to join the army or anything.” Marco chewed on his bottom lip. “We were living inside these big walls, because humanity was being hunted by these things called… Titans, I think? Anyway, we were training together, and we were friends.” He looked at Jean and smiled. “We were going to protect the King from the titans. But then I think Trost got invaded and I… I woke up.”
“Hmm,” Jean breathed. “You’re right, you’re the creepy one.”
He couldn’t hold back his smile at Marco’s laugh.