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You said I killed you. So haunt me, then.
- Emily Bronte.
-0-
Once Eren dies he becomes nothing and everything all at once.
Nothing in the way he does not have a form— he isn’t tangible. But everything in the way he is spread out everywhere— it’s like he’s energy, he can push and pull, in a sense.
He can see everything and everyone… and he chooses to watch her.
Mikasa.
There aren’t words to describe her— but even in the boundless, bodiless state he’s in— he can feel it. She feels warm and soft and welcoming and like everything good bundled up into one.
If there is a heaven for him, she is it. If it’s true a god is out there making everyone— then she is the product of all of God’s divinity. If he is sin, she is redemption. If all he has is hate— then all she has is love.
And that’s exactly what she did— love. He was dead and far gone from life and Earth and her world but even so she continued to love him, and still he couldn’t quite understand the way in which she did it. Loving him was just a fundamental truth to her, as if there was no question about it. No doubt.
As if to say, “Of course I love him, what other option would there be?”
And somehow, Eren was here to witness how she cared for him, but never being able to give anything back to her because all he was the audience. There to see how things play out, but not play a part in it himself.
One might think that the state in which he found himself may be much better than any other version of afterlife that other religions foretold. Hell — being one example.
At first glance, one might even think this is his glimpse of heaven. To come home to her in death, like how he always wanted to when he was alive.
It was anything but that. This was his punishment, Eren knew. To have a front row seat to the way he ruined the woman he once loved— no— still loves— and all the consequences that come after it.
-0-
The first time this was made clear to him was when she buried him.
Of all places— she knew exactly where he should lie forever. All the times he had fallen asleep under that tree when he was a kid, still innocent and untainted, just barely knew of anything in the world, without a true care in the world, enough so to where he could just sit under a tree and the light breeze and sounds of the leaves being blown and the tree swaying was enough for him to drift off.
The same tree where he first dreamed of her.
And there he would lie for the rest of eternity. Under the tree, in an endless slumber.
There wasn’t a single thing he had ever done to deserve it, but she had given it to him anyways. She always did. And even in this afterlife he was still baffled and couldn’t understand how someone could do that for him— could love him, knowing that in this lifetime, she would never get anything in return.
She brought about so much confusion in him— such a lack of understanding— which quickly turned to desperation.
Another foolish assumption from Eren was to think he couldn’t feel pain when he didn’t have a body. Wasn’t pain something that only accompanied a physical form? A burden people are forced to carry when brought into a world with a form made of flesh and bones?
The universe was not so kind. Never had been. He was harshly reminded of this when he saw Mikasa cry.
Mikasa, ever since her parents had been killed, had trouble showing strong emotions. She became serious and stoic and it was never her choice, just something that happened. Cause and effect, if you will.
But in moments of extreme weakness— the emotions would slip out.
The first time he ever saw it was when she had only spent one week at his house, after she started living with his family.
Before she ever became part of the family, Eren’s mom had always tucked him into bed and given him a kiss goodnight. Now that Mikasa was there and slept in the same room with him, once Mrs. Yeager arrived for nightly kisses, Mikasa was of course included.
But one day she arrived with a hair brush and told Mikasa she would brush her hair before going to sleep, and only after a few strokes, the small, quiet girl had tears streaming down her face endlessly. Then it turned to whimpers— then to sobs— then to wails.
Eren watched how her small hands gripped onto his mother’s clothes after she had pulled Mikasa into a hug. She held on with such strength despite the fact that her entire body was trembling— as if her life depended on it— and that sight scared him.
He decided at that very moment, at the age of nine, he despised seeing that girl cry, even when he still had hardly known anything about her.
They stayed up all night holding her.
Later on he found out that her mother used to brush her hair before bedtime, and when his mother had done the same thing to her, the familiar feeling finally set her over the edge. It allowed her to finally cry out in pain over the death of her parents.
But those were once in a lifetime moments— especially once she had become older and no longer a child— tears were rare from her. Any emotion was rare from her.
And that's why he knew how much he had fucked up when he told her he hated her, and tears pricked her eyes and the noise she made when she choked on tears disgusted him, and made him want to tear his insides apart. He had always despised seeing her cry— and now he was the cause. He was the source of her pain and her suffering and he probably has been for most of her life, he thinks. He was everything evil in the world and probably hand crafted by the devil himself and how dare he even stand in the same room with someone like her.
He would probably go to hell for just what he’d done to Mikasa in that moment alone.
But instead he found himself endlessly drifting after death, instead having to be a spectator to what Mikasa did with the memory of him, and the pain it brought about, and it couldn’t be clearer that this was a version of hell he had never anticipated.
Because in all the confusion of why she was still capable of loving him, tenderly and thoughtfully enough to bury him under that tree, placing his head in the dirt so delicately as if she was putting him to bed— came desperation and anguish afterwards— all in response to the way she had collapsed on the ground after burying him.
When she killed him, she didn’t cry. When she showed Armin his head and he wailed she still remained calm and there hadn’t been a single tear. Even on her way to Paradis, to arrive at the destination she believed was where Eren deserved to be forever, her eyes hadn’t even gotten glossy.
But then when she had stood over the pile of dirt of where his head was and stared emptily— she broke. The seemingly everlasting calmness she had presented herself to everyone with, had cracked and crumbled apart, and now, all alone, with no one to see her or hear her— and to Eren’s dismay— she screams.
The scream is piercing and it’s blood curdling and it’s like the world stops for a moment. All of her pain was embodied into that scream and there is so much emotion in it that it sounds like the end of all things and feels like death in his ears. Eren doesn’t even have ears— Eren isn’t even alive — and he somehow has never heard anything worse and never felt more repulsed in his entire existence. The feeling wasn’t directed towards her, it was directed towards the whole circumstance of the events that were unfolding before him.
She had screamed out in pain and then the tears wouldn’t stop. Her body was shaking and trembling and she could barely keep herself up and she couldn’t quiet herself and it looked like she was having her soul ripped from her body.
And Eren couldn’t help her. All he could do was watch. She was alive and he was dead.
She cried and cried until there was nothing left. Her body just laid there on the grass after everything that just happened and she was so still even Eren questioned if she was alive for a brief moment. There wasn’t any light in her eyes.
He wanted to hold her and comfort her and kiss her and fix her. She was broken by his doing— so he needed to mend her. The desire was so strong he felt like he might just manifest himself back into existence.
But he didn’t. He still remained in this endless limbo of not existing but still feeling and maybe that’s why he was still even here in the first place, he wondered. Most of all though, he was angry that someone like her had to love someone like him. Even in death he was still hurting her and she was still loving him.
She laid there for hours watching the clouds go by. And Eren didn’t have a body, but he felt like he laid there with her.
Together, in different forms and different states of existing, they laid there and watched the sun fall and set into the horizon and saw how the sky darkened and the stars began to appear in the sky, one by one.
Then Mikasa slowly got up and walked away— leaving him there, under the tree where he once slept and would forever be.
-0-
Over the passage of time, which he had no way of keeping track of besides watching Mikasa’s hair grow longer, he watched the way her life moved forward in constant motion, and how stagnant his existence was in comparison.
He watched as one day she carried a small tombstone in one hand and a bouquet of flowers in the other.
Eren had watched her earlier at the florist in town and how when she bought the flowers. The flowers had been meticulously chosen by her, asking the florist the meaning of every single flower so she could choose the ones she thought fit best. Meanings such as I’ll love you forever, and I’m happy to have met you, and other things that made Eren ache, were held in her hand in the form of flowers.
In her other hand, the tombstone, which Eren could not read because her fingers were covering the fine writing.
So instead he studied her as she walked towards the tree on the hill.
Her hair was long enough now to where it reached the base of her neck, and fell in her face. It reminded him of what she looked like in the other universe, that other version of them— where they had run away together.
It was amusing to watch her blow the strands out of her face, all she was able to do since both of her hands were occupied, and as the wind persistently blew them back.
Mikasa, on the other hand, was not amused and made a face of surrender.
She seemed to be happier today, he thinks. He feels what feels like smiling, but he didn’t even have a physical form to prove it.
As long as she wasn’t crying, that’s all that mattered.
When she finally arrived at the tree, she placed the flowers on the ground gently and then carefully set the tombstone right above the place where she had buried his head some time ago.
The words that were on his tombstone were now openly on display, and Eren saw them.
Here forever
Rest peacefully
My most beloved
My dear.
How can you tell if you’re crying if you have no eyes? No water to pool up and blur your vision and stream down a face you don’t have?
Eren doesn’t know how but he feels like he was crying. It burned and was a hot, flaring kind of burn that made him feel like his whole existence was throbbing.
He wanted to cry out to the universe asking to be forgiven. He wanted to come back to her. Beg the same God that crafted Mikasa and all her wonder to have mercy on him and give him life.
The desperation consumes him because why? — Why did she have to love him? Why did Eren have to be so bad and she had to be good? Why did all of these words she’s confessing to him in death have to go unsaid while he was alive? Why why why why why —
She began to talk.
“Eren.” she says. Her voice is soothing and he had forgotten how much he had missed hearing it and he continues to ache, anxiously anticipating what she might say next.
She paused for what felt like eternity.
“I know you probably can’t hear me,” she hesitated. “But I’m going to talk.”
Eren listened.
“Armin told me about how you were seeing past, present, and future memories all at the same time ever since that award ceremony so many years ago. And it made me think of when we went to Marley for the first time and the entire time you weren’t all that there… like your mind was somewhere else.” She frowned.
“You left the day after and then you never came back. The next time we saw you you had done terrible things.” Her eyes were beginning to tear up. “And you know how the events played out.”
Eren felt like he winced.
She then reached her hand out and ran her fingers over the words imprinted on the stone.
“Anyways… I don’t want you to be remembered for all the bad things you’ve done,” she said. “That’s why I didn’t put your name on your tombstone— too many people associate all the wrong things with it.”
She was smiling now. “I hope you don’t mind.”
Of course he didn’t mind. What he couldn’t understand was how she could love him this way despite it all. Love him enough to continue to keep him safe even in death. Anyone could find that tombstone and they wouldn’t know he was Eren Yeager— they would just think the only thing memorable about this stranger in the dirt was that they were loved.
That’s enough.
“And do you remember when you asked me that question? What I was to you?” she asked, now sitting on her knees with her hands in her lap, directly in front of his grave.
He thought back to that night in Marley— he had been miserable the whole time, memories of different lives stirring through his head, horrifying fear and guilt of what he was going to do constantly making him want to throw up, as if that would allow him to stop feeling it. Stop feeling all of it.
In a moment of desperation, as if begging the universe to see if fate could be changed, he asked Mikasa what he was to her. It was stupid and reckless and now that he’s dead, they both know what would have happened if she had said something different— he was so vulnerable in those moments, that there was hardly anything holding him back from just saying fuck it to everything and the world and their future and taking her hand and running .
She had answered family. And at the time, it had only confirmed everything he already thought about his fate— which he both regrets, and doesn’t, at the same time.
“I wish I had been more precise. I told you the truth but I don’t think you got it that day.”
She let the silence hang there before beginning to talk again, as if she was trying to decide how she would verbalize whatever she would say next.
“You’re everything to me— my peace, my happiness, my stress, my sadness, my home. You’re all the good and the bad in my life— and I loved all of it.” She spilled. Tears were forming and falling down her face.
“I loved you.” Her voice quavered. “I love you.”
She cried. She put her hands in her face and whimpered softly. This cry was nowhere near as violent and painful as the first one. She was still hurting— but it was a hurt she was used to by now. It was a familiar pain to her.
But to Eren this wasn’t familiar. He wanted to thrash about and scream and let his voice reach her. To yell out to the whole universe that he loves her too . He wanted to have a body and hold her with his arms and hold her face with his hands and kiss her with his mouth. To say I love you in any way possible— if words won’t reach, then his body will. Anything.
Mikasa was wiping her tears away now. She sniffled and then choked out a half-hearted laugh.
“I’m sorry for crying.” She whispers.
Don’t be. Don’t apologize for something that isn’t your fault, he thinks. Why can’t she see that he is everything wrong in the world, and she should never have to be sorry for anything when it’s always him?
“My most beloved is what you are to me.” She stated, as if it was a fact, while touching the red scarf wrapped around her neck. “You always will be.”
Then she abruptly stood up and before leaving, uttered a See you later, Eren .
If Eren had a body, it would feel like the wind was just knocked out of him. He’d be lying on the ground choking on spit and gasping for air because there wasn't enough in his lungs.
But he had no body. Instead it was just a feeling — surging, dull pain— all around him. How could he feel pain in this state?
It didn’t make any sense.
And even in his formless, intangible state, he wished to be freed. Freed from whatever imitation of hell this was— having to watch Mikasa, the one he wanted to hurt the least after everything— hurt the most over him.
This was his hell. He deserved it.
He ran circles in his mind around his constant recurring thought— Why?
Why did someone like Mikasa, beautiful inside and out, deserving of so much, and has earned everything in life, continue to hurt over him— someone so putrid and disgusting, the world’s devil, he who deserved nothing but continued to take, and above all— Eren Yeager, a man who was dead and six feet under.
Why give so much love to someone who cannot give anything in return?
He wondered if she knew that Ymir moved on because of her. That Ymir freed every single Eldian from the curse of the titans just because Mikasa was capable of loving the way she did, so selflessly, killing the very person who she loved knowing she would end up like this afterwards— alone.
He’ll probably be here forever wondering why someone like that could love someone like him, he thinks.
Mikasa wasn’t wrong when she put ‘ here forever’ on the tombstone.
Here forever, orbiting her, and wondering why she does the same with him.
-0-
No matter how many times Eren tried to keep track of how many winters had passed, in an attempt to know how long it had been since he died, he failed. It’s like he was forbidden from noticing time and how it passes while in this nothingness.
But Mikasa’s hair continued to grow longer. It was well past her shoulders now, and it seemed she had no intention of cutting it.
Today it was pulled back into a ponytail.
She looked beautiful, and it reminded him of how she had her hair when they were younger. Black, wispy hair always framing her face just the way it should, shining in the sunlight.
Today was another one of those days where she brought flowers. By now he had memorized all the meanings they had. They laid there, right next to his tombstone in the grass, and she sat next to them.
And Eren watched.
Today was also another one of those days where she wouldn’t talk. Sometimes she did, sometimes she didn’t. While he was a little disappointed to not be able to hear her voice, he appreciated the fact that she wasn’t talking and felt relieved— because most times she talked, she cried.
So what they did instead was just sit there, Mikasa peacefully leaning against the tree and Eren remaining there next to her. They were coexisting, and that was enough for Eren in that moment, just to exist next to her in quiet, even if she didn’t know he was there.
He noticed how she had this distant sort of look— he eyes were locked on watching the sky but they weren’t focused. But she looked peaceful. She was probably thinking about something nice, and it made him happy to see her be that way.
Eren cherishes every smile Mikasa wears on her face, every chuckle, every smirk… the moments in which she shows good, genuine emotions are moments he wants to always hold close. He prays that one day they’ll outweigh the bad moments— because those cut much deeper.
He will most likely never recover from the very first day he was put to rest under the tree, and how she broke down. He never saw Mikasa like that while he was living— and he hopes to never see it again while dead.
Seeing her heal— that’s what he wanted more of. A Mikasa who is happy to remember him instead of hurting. He doesn’t want her to hurt over him anymore. In moments of weakness and selfishness, he would have said he didn’t want her to move on. But after all of this, after having to endure this punishment of watching her suffer time after time of visiting his grave, he wonders if he can even relate to that side of himself anymore.
Even if he deserves to hurt in the afterlife, Mikasa shouldn’t have to suffer in the name of his punishment.
He was sure of that.
“Eren,” she then said, in the way she always does, breaking the silence. His name always carried so much weight when it came from her mouth. “Everyone will be coming to see you soon.”
She looked down towards the small tombstone and placed her hand on top of it. She let her fingers gracefully drag across the top of the stone feeling the curve and the rough edges.
“Aren’t you happy?” she asked him, expecting no response. She went quiet again. Her question was left suspended in the air, a question that she would never hear the answer to.
He was. This was the first time his friends were coming to visit his grave. They had all grown and changed but they still wanted to see him despite everything. He had been able to see them too, but they kept themselves busy and scrambling always and they reminded him of busy little ants— while Mikasa was a butterfly. Much more tranquil— a being that enjoyed a simple existence— which Eren appreciated. Eren wanted that.
He had always wanted that. A simple life with her— to be able to come home to her— to have his days full of just loving her and being with her and living blissfully.
And in another life, that’s what they had.
A cabin that they called their home, surrounded only by mountains and trees and flowers and it’s like they were the only two people to exist in the entire world. Some days Mikasa would wake Eren up to soft kisses on his face, and other days, vice versa. They’d lazily get out of bed and make coffee, all while Eren would have his arms wrapped around Mikasa’s waist, head tucked into the crook of her neck. Then after breakfast they might go down to the nearby river and fish, or maybe chop wood, or tend to the laundry… really anything they did, they did it together. They’d read books, make art, chase each other through the field, pick up new hobbies. Eren learned how to carve wood into small little figurines and Mikasa finally got to pick up on her old hobby of sewing from when she was a child. She made dolls of them and embroidered countless amounts of fabrics. At some point they even adopted a stray cat that was persistent on following them home one day after they caught a fairly big fish— and then it just never left. They would also watch the sunset together, and sometimes they wouldn’t want to go back inside just yet so they’d look at the stars. It tended to end with them holding each other and so closely pressed up against each other that there wasn’t any space left between them— all under the pretense of being cold— and yet neither ever offered to go and get a blanket.
And they would love each other.
While at first, loving each other had always been in the form of taking care of each other. That’s how they had first learned to love, ever since the day Eren wrapped that scarf around Mikasa and took her to his home. But in the context of war, how else can you love someone besides take care of them? Besides protecting them and praying they lived to see the next day? This was how they had lived the past nine years of their life, and this way of loving was all they knew up until this point.
But now that they had run away from all of that— and it was just them— what was stopping them from discovering other ways to love? Especially physical love.
While hesitant at first, held back by the pent up anticipation of years of almost’s and could be’s that never progressed due to their certainly always unpleasant circumstances, once they finally overcame that obstacle, there was nothing that could stop them from wanting more.
Touch. It’s like it binded them. Constantly touching each other as if the other could disappear at any moment— which wasn’t necessarily false.
Constantly intertwined, as if they couldn’t get close enough to each other. As if holding hands, kissing, making love, wasn’t enough. As if their souls were searching for a way in which to become one.
But that wasn’t possible.
And the distance between them— the separation— the distinction— had never felt stronger than it did when Eren’s four years were up.
Their fantasy was over. The dream that Eren had escaped to and brought Mikasa along with him had reached its end. It felt like an hourglass that had finally let all the sand fall to the bottom.
Eren’s death was inescapable. Perhaps he had been born to die.
But Mikasa had been born to love.
And that’s what this was all about, right? Ymir had waited 2000 years for Mikasa’s love to save her and everyone— above all, Eren— had been her pawns, so Mikasa could make her choice.
Her choice to save the world. Free Ymir, the people who inhabited whatever was left of Earth’s population, and in a sense, free Eren. Mikasa, the girl with the world in one hand, her heart in the other.
She could only save one.
And so, she kissed him goodbye simultaneously in every timeline they occupied. Every path taken leading to the same place— every choice made ending with the same consequence. With a swing of her blade, she discarded her heart and now held the world with two hands.
“Aren’t you happy?” her question echoed through his thoughts.
Why, even after all that has happened, did Mikasa still ask for the happiness of others? When did she get to be happy? She had given so much to the world and all the world did was take and take and take— until she had nothing left to give.
He never got to give her anything in return. He wished to be given the chance, no matter how foolish and unrealistic it was, knowing he would forever be dead and she, still alive, and separated by the laws of this reality.
And as fate would have it, Mikasa had been wishing as well.
“I wish I could meet you again,” she whined, a tear rolling off her cheek. It was almost childish in the way she said it, such an innocent request, yet she knew it couldn’t be granted. She let her body become limp and she slumped against the tree, her scarf sliding its way off her shoulder.
Maybe the universe was kind, and Eren had been wrong once again. Or maybe a god truly did exist, and with whatever divine hands it made Mikasa, it had mercy.
Or perhaps, there just wasn’t an answer to everything in life.
Because in that moment, their wishes had not only been aligned, but heard— granted, even. And just like how their souls had never been close enough despite how much they touched, their souls had become one.
For a very brief second, their two existences had phased into each other. They aligned— through the wish.
Eren knew because he felt it. He felt her, soft, tender energy and how it blended with his energy. The calm to a storm. He wondered if she felt it too.
But after that, Eren didn’t return to the state he was previously. Before he was an inexplicable nothingness, no form to him. But now—
Now he was everything. He was the sky, the clouds, the ground, the flowers, the tree, the air. He existed everywhere and in everything, somehow.
He was a bird.
He was every bird. He saw through their eyes and felt through their body. Perched on trees he had never seen and overlooking places he didn’t recognize, flying through skies unfamiliar.
It all came to him in flashes and immediately like how memories once did through paths back when he was alive. Despite that, whatever he was experiencing here wasn’t overwhelming like that. It just existed all at once and that was possible because Eren existed in all of it all at once as well. It didn’t make sense but it did at the same time.
Through one bird he saw a boat that would soon be approaching a nearby port. On the front deck there were people gathered, looking onward.
Through another, he saw Mikasa. The perspective of her was different this time— he was used to always being right next to her, and now he was in the sky above her. He could notice that her position or demeanor hadn’t changed from before this... transformation happened.
The scarf was still there, halfway fallen off of her neck.
And maybe only through divine intervention, Eren knew that this was his chance to finally give in return, instead of take. His opportunity to heal her instead of hurt her.
A shot at completing a promise he had made a long time ago, while still alive.
Through the form of a bird, something that felt real, something with a body, he flew down and picked up the scarf and wrapped it back around her neck.
It was an indescribable feeling. To see her react, and show emotion, and smile, all in response to something he did. He was able to reach her, even in death. He didn’t care if she even knew it was him or not. All this time, he had been wanting to get to her, and now he finally did.
An attempt at loving her the way she loved him.
And there he was, finding redemption through her. Healing through her. Living on through her. Given form, through her.
And then there she was, with a smile on her face— as if she knew it had been him all along.
He hoped she knew.