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Reiner wakes up to the feeling of a dry tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, cigarette smoke tickling his nostrils: trying to open his eyes, he finds himself sweating as he sits up straight, unnatural heat colouring his cheeks as if he were coming down with a fever. His lower lip is chapped, voice still asleep deep down his throat, so much that he has to clear it before even thinking about speaking up.
He’d dozed off with his back against the tree, arms crossed, head tilted forward. Slight twinges of pain stab him in the back, awkward posture fully responsible for how tired he still feels.
Beside him is Porco, flicking a cigarette on the ground, where there’s enough space for one person to sit: several burnt-out ones are littering the soft sand they’re sitting on, standing tall like little stepping stones connecting them, from one side of an imaginary rift to the other.
“Where are the kids,” he grumbles, words slurred by sleep, though he finds the answer with a slight turn of his head: they’re playing in the water, barely reaching their ankles, the trousers of their uniforms rolled up and shoes abandoned somewhere Reiner can’t see.
Porco points to the small group anyway, the line of his arm lazy, no words to support it. Then, it drops, hand sneaking back into his pocket.
“Sorry, I fell asleep,” tries Reiner, doing his best to make proper conversation with him. The sun is setting, painting the sea in an uneasy shade of dark orange that tries desperately to look like blood, pooling around the kids’ legs and trying to lure them in.
“You should’ve stayed behind to get some rest.”
Looking down, Reiner follows the little cigarette trail up to Porco’s leg, lighter almost falling from his pocket. He fights the urge to lean forward and take it, for a reason he can’t really understand- a yawn interrupts his train of thought. “I don’t mind. They wanted to go for a stroll before leaving.”
It’s not often that they get to enjoy all the things the world has to offer: sometimes, missions are so short and successful that they’re granted one whole day to themselves, exploring the various cities and villages conquered by Marley. Anything to gain every little bit of trust from the younger, more impressionable soldiers.
“I could’ve done that. Why didn’t you tell me?” asks Porco, turning his head to look at him: Reiner notices immediately the bags under his eyes, the line of his mouth twisted by guilt.
“We’re not exactly on good terms.”
The words take quite a while to get out. Talking about them as two people who share something is never easy: Reiner can’t really say where he stands.
There are good days, sometimes, when they talk quietly without tipping the balance too much: Porco cracks a joke, Reiner snorts at the harshness of it- he’s a very practical person, dry, but funny in his own way. When it’s Reiner who jokes around, instead, there’s more silence, because it’s a very different brand of humour, but Porco laughs anyway: it’s a low, quiet chuckle that barely lifts a single corner of his mouth, but it’s there. Reiner remembers every single time he’s seen it.
On bad days, way more frequent, Porco is disgusted by him: if the mood is particularly sour he might even act brash on purpose, glaring at him from the other side of the room, rolling his eyes whenever Reiner answers a question, talks to someone else. Those are the days when Reiner ignores him, lets every single snide comment slide, welcoming them, in a way.
Sometimes Porco even hates him on bad days, those when he acts like Reiner doesn’t exist at all, and they hurt the most.
“It depends on what day it is,” he sighs, pushing the cigarette butt into the sand and watching it drown, wiping his hand on his trousers. “Today’s a good one.”
Reiner huffs a weak chuckle: sometimes it feels like Porco could read his mind.
The thought sends unpleasant shivers down his spine.
“I wish I knew about it earlier,” he comments.
Today’s not a good day, or a bad one, or even one of those in which Porco hates him: when Reiner turns to look back at him, he finds Porco biting down on his lip, deep in thought, in that imperceptible window of time between trying to look up and actually doing it.
On these days, the special ones when nothing makes sense and Reiner lets himself get swept away, Porco grabs him by the shoulder, the wrist, the hand, leads him to the closest place they can find; if it was an impulse born of frustration, and anger, and resentment, then it’s in the past.
Now, the rough, harsh kisses that Reiner secretly yearns for have changed slowly, grew up, lost their teeth.
Waves are crashing on the horizon, following the sound of Gabi’s loud laughter, carried to him by the wind. “We should probably go get them.”
Porco nods, refusing to try any harder. When he stands up, he stretches just like Reiner- another confirmation that he’s been sitting here for a long, long while. As they walk towards the water, Reiner wonders why he didn’t wake him up.
He’ll ask him next time, on one of those good days.