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Mikasa stepped through the door of their new apartment, her bad mood radiating from her as she kicked off her shoes and locked their door, a duffel bag with the last of her things from home slung over her shoulder. Her irritation flared for a moment when she saw all the boxes they still needed to unpack. She should be happy to be living with Eren. They'd been saving up for first and last month's rent and slowly accruing appliances for a year in preparation for this day, and now they were finally here, about to spend their first official night alone in their new place and she couldn't even cheer up enough to enjoy it. What was wrong with her?
Rather than dwell on it, she decided to tackle the living room. Their new IKEA couch was assembled and their craigslist TV set was enthroned on a folding chair until one of them could put together the TV stand they had bought (also at IKEA- Mikasa had a new appreciation for how her parents could manage to spend the whole day there) but everything else was still boxed up or waiting to be assembled, and she had mountains of homework, and Armin was getting on her case to record another YouTube video even though she was on hiatus for the move, and it was just too much. She was too overwhelmed. She didn't even know where to start with the boxes. Getting the books put onto shelves would take care of a huge chunk of the stack, but the shelves needed to be put together and she wasn't sure where Eren wanted to put them, and she didn't even have the floor space to assemble them. And she was hungry. Should she start on the kitchen so they could cook something? Did they even bring any food? Oh, gods. They needed to go to the grocery store, didn’t they? She sank to the floor, covering her face with her hands. She didn't know what she was doing. She'd lived in one house her whole life, with her parents, and now she was on her own, having to deal with all these new, adult things. She was going to have to pay bills, for fuck's sake, and she was so mad at herself because this was exactly what she had wanted since 10th grade and she should be fucking happy but she was just stressed.
The sound of a key in the lock distracted her from her downward spiral and she turned to see Eren coming through the door, a smile on his face and a pizza in his hand. "Hey, babe," he said. "You got out of class early!"
"Yeah," said Mikasa. That was something, at least.
Eren set the pizza on top of some boxes and crouched down next to her, beaming. "I thought I was going to have to wait another twenty minutes to see you," he said, kissing her forehead, his fingers threading through hers. She looked up at him, doing her best not to burst into tears. He frowned. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
She shook her head.
“No, you have to tell me,” he said. “If you make me guess I’m going to assume you changed your mind and you don’t want to- Oh, god. You don’t want to live with me anymore, do you?”
“No, I do!” said Mikasa, grabbing his arm. “I do!”
“Oh, thank god,” sighed Eren, rising and pulling her to her feet. He wrapped his arms around her waist and smiled down at her. She attempted a return smile, draping her arms over his shoulders and baring her teeth before letting her lips droop back down to her chin. “So then what’s wrong, helianthus?” he said, poking the corner of her pout.
Mikasa blushed. “It’s going to sound stupid,” she said.
“I doubt it,” said Eren.
Mikasa rested her forehead on his shoulder. “What if we, like, suck at being on our own?” she said. “Like… what if we don’t pay our rent on time and we get kicked out and then we have nowhere to go? Or, like, we forget the power bill and they turn off our power and then we’ll be known as the couple that doesn’t pay their utilities and they’ll think we’re dicks. What if I lose all my subscribers and no one wants my merch anymore and my sponsors drop me and I can’t pay rent? How are we going to afford rent if I lose all my subscribers, Eren? I don’t have a real job! All I have are fans!”
Eren went pale. “Fuck,” he said.
“Yeah,” said Mikasa, her fears confirmed. “Plus, I don’t even know where to start unpacking, but maybe that’s better because if all our stuff is still boxed up, it’ll make it easier for us to take all our things and go when they evict us.” A tear rolled down her cheek. “We’re going to have to go live with our parents, and then we’ll be in separate houses all over again.”
“I’m pretty sure if I had to move back into my parents’ house, they’d let you come, too,” said Eren. “They’re, like, obsessed with you. And my mom keeps crying about her empty nest.”
Mikasa began to cry in earnest. “That’s so sad,” she said. “I stole her son away from her. She must hate me.”
“Mimi!” said Eren, wiping the tears from her cheeks in a panic.
“I’m just scared,” she said. “And overwhelmed. And I probably ruined my makeup. Does it look bad?” She lifted her face to show him.
“You’re asking the wrong person,” said Eren. “I always think you look beautiful.”
“Just, like, is it smeared?” she said.
Eren swiped beneath her eyes with his thumbs and showed her the black streaks. “I think I got it,” he said.
She sniffled, her lower lip trembling pathetically. “My makeup wipes are packed up and I don’t know where they are,” she said. “And I’m hungry. And we don’t have groceries.”
“We have pizza,” Eren reminded her.
“Oh. Yeah,” said Mikasa, brightening for a second before her face crumpled. “We don’t have a table to eat it at.”
Eren started to laugh.
“What?” said Mikasa, frowning through her tears.
“I just love you so much,” he said. “It’s going to be fine. We can eat the pizza anywhere. You’re not going to tank your channel. And if we need money, we’ll figure it out. We’re not alone. We have a bunch of friends and family nearby. Zeke would totally pay our rent.”
Mikasa blinked. “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” she said, wiping her cheek.
Eren cupped her cheeks and planted a kiss on the tip of her nose. “Plus, you’re PMSing,” he said.
“I am?” said Mikasa, mentally doing the math. “Oh, shit. I am.” She sniffed. “I need to unpack my tampons before that starts. Also, when we go to the store, can we get candy?”
“I always buy you candy when I go to the store,” said Eren, watching her to make sure she was really done crying. She noticed him looking and shot him a brave smile. He grinned. "Now, come see what I got done this afternoon.” He grabbed the pizza and dragged her behind him down the hall. "Come on. I’ll show you."
He opened the door to their bedroom and opened his arms wide. "Tada!" he said.
Mikasa’s mouth fell open. “You unpacked our room?” she said.
“Yup,” said Eren, plopping down on their bed and opening the pizza box. “I thought we’d both feel a lot better if we didn’t have to sleep on the floor and shit.”
Mikasa looked around. Eren had put her disassembled bed frame back together and dragged his mattress on top of it, then made it up with their new sheets and the duvet his parents had gifted them and their old pillows from home. The cat plushie he had given her their sophomore year of high school perched on top it all like a king. Their new IKEA dressers were against the wall, and he'd hung the framed drawing Jean had done of the two of them back in 10th grade above them. Her tarot decks and rune stones and other religious paraphernalia were neatly displayed on a small book shelf with his small collection of souvenir keychains hanging from a peg board above it. “Wow, Eren,” she said, glancing at him with shining eyes.
"Open the closet, babe!" he said, bouncing on the mattress a little bit.
Mikasa looked inside. He'd hung up all of her dresses and lined up all her shoes beneath them, leaving a little room at the end for his one suit and handful of dress shirts. The shelf space above the rack was occupied by his old Pokemon cards, a box of photos, a bin full of art projects Ryu had gifted them, and two flat boxes containing the kimono Kasumi's cousin, Kiyomi, had given them when they went to Hizuru with Armin the summer after senior year, with spare sheets and blankets taking up the remaining space.
Mikasa turned around to look at him, amazed. “I can’t believe you did all this while I was in class.”
"I can move any of the furniture if you don't like where I put it," Eren said, swallowing his mouthful of pizza and beaming at her. His lips were shiny with grease, but it only made his smile brighter.
“It looks perfect to me,” she said, coming to join him on the bed- their bed, because they lived together now. She couldn’t stop the giggle that bubbled up in her throat.
“What?” asked Eren, beaming at her, drinking in her pink cheeks and sparkling eyes as he tore off another bite of his slice.
Mikasa shook her head, smiling from ear to ear. “I just love you, my dark knight,” she said. “I feel so much better now.”
Eren swallowed his pizza and scooted over to her, kissing her so hard that he knocked her back into the pillows. “I love you , helianthus,” he said, kissing her one more time before pulling back to gaze at her with a happy sigh. Mikasa reached up to stroke his cheek with her knuckles, enjoying the coarse scratch of his stubble and the fact that she had such a hot boyfriend. A hot boyfriend who was practically on top of her. She glanced down at his junk. No. This wasn’t the time to get distracted.
“I guess we should probably eat and keep unpacking,” she said, cupping his cheek for a moment before hoisting herself to a seat and grabbing a slice of pizza. Her eyes darted to his crotch again. “We can find a way to reward ourselves after.”
“Mmmm,” Eren agreed, cramming the remainder of his own slice into his mouth, barely chewing it before he gulped it down. “Maybe we can reward ourselves all over the apartment.”
Mikasa licked her lips, glad they were on the same page. “Every time we finish a room, we can fuck in it,” she said.
Eren’s head fell back, his eyes fluttering shut. “Oh, god, I can’t wait to unpack,” he said with a grin, reaching blindly for Mikasa's hand. She stacked it on top of his and laced their fingers together. He squeezed, then shifted around so they were side-by-side. "What room should we do next?" he asked as Mikasa took her first bite of pizza.
She tilted her head. "I'm not sure. Do you have any ideas?"
Eren's eyes lit up. "I was hoping you’d ask. Okay, so I'm bigger so I'll move around all the furniture-"
"I can move furniture," Mikasa protested, looking down at her arms. They were trim and toned from years of MLA training with Annie.
"Mimi," Eren sighed. "I didn’t say you couldn’t. I just want to do it because I want to impress you."
"Okay, I’ll just watch and admire," Mikasa surrendered. Eren rewarded her with a kiss to her knuckles, then continued laying out the next steps of his plan.
"I’ll move the furniture, like I said, but I need you to put together the rest of it because- well. I could do it, but I also needed to take several screaming breaks when I did the dresser today because it was so annoying." He rubbed the back of his neck and shot her a sheepish grin. "You're more patient with that kind of shit than I am."
Mikasa's eyes widened. "Do you think the neighbors heard you screaming?" she asked.
"No, no, I screamed into a pillow," said Eren, thumping the one behind him. "We're all good!"
Mikasa exhaled with relief, then frowned. "There isn't space to put together the furniture," she pointed out. She could feel her earlier tension creeping back up. “We need the furniture assembled so we can put stuff away on it, but we can’t assemble the furniture because the stuff’s not put away.”
"I can move all those boxes, no problem," Eren said, flexing his bicep and waggling his eyebrows at her. “They just need to be stacked better. It’ll be easy.”
Mikasa squeezed his arm. "You're so strong," she cooed, biting back a giggle when Eren blushed.
"Anyway," he said, flexing for her again, "I'll put away the kitchen while you do the bookshelves and everything else. Then I'll put them all where you want them and we'll unpack your books. That's, like, half the living room boxes, at least, and most of the rest is our DVDs."
"That's a really good plan," she said, leaning back against the headboard and nipping off another bite of pizza. “Okay. Let’s do it.”
“Sweet.” Eren leaned back against the headboard next to her, resting his cheek against her temple. They lapsed into silence as they ate, the pizza disappearing slice by slice until they found themselves struggling through the last two pieces, stuffed to the gills and prematurely sleepy.
Eren yawned. “Mimi? Can we actually get into our pajamas and cuddle for a little bit before we unpack?” he asked, playing with the hem of her t-shirt.
“Yeah,” said Mikasa. “I need a cuddle. I’m still feeling kind of meh.”
“Just sit tight. I’ll get our pajamas,” said Eren, abandoning Mikasa to go to their dressers.
"Eren?" Mikasa asked.
He shot her a crooked half-smile over his shoulder. “Yeah?"
She looked down at her knees, drawing a circle on one of them with her fingertip. "Is it okay if I still sleep in your shirts sometimes even though we live together now?" she asked, peeking up at him from beneath her eyelashes. “I mean, I know I said I liked to borrow them because it was the next best thing to sleeping next to you, and now I will be sleeping next to you… I mean, I understand if you want your shirts back. You can say no.”
Eren's mouth fell open with a harsh gasp. "Why would you stop wearing my shirts when they're all right here for you?" he demanded, gesturing at the drawer, disgusted that Mikasa would ever consider sleeping in her own clothes. He dug one of his shirts out and tossed it at her. "That one's so soft! Borrow it! Help yourself! Any time!" He hunched over the dresser drawer. "Can't believe you'd stop wearing my shirts just because we moved in. What kind of upside down nonsense- bah!" Eren grumbled to himself,
Mikasa giggled, bunching up the shirt and snuggling it against her cheek. “Thank you, dark knight," she said, her eyes sparkling.
Eren glanced over his shoulder at her, his cheeks flushing for a moment before he ducked his head over the drawer and grabbed a fresh shirt for himself. "You're so cute," he mumbled. "I like it when you wear my clothes."
Mikasa giggled again, quickly changing into his shirt and laying down while Eren stripped down to his boxers and pulled his new shirt over his head, then climbed back onto the bed with her. He slid his arm beneath her neck and pulled her against him, humming to himself as he settled his lips against her forehead and let his soft kisses set the rhythm for his aimless tune. Mikasa squeezed him, idly stroking his back, melting into his warmth as his humming solidified into the melody of “My Girl” by the Temptations. The last remaining pillars of tension in her back and shoulders crumbled away as they settled into a quiet, dreamy trance, wrapped in each other's arms as her sense of time wafted away and all she knew was that Eren was warm and solid and he was hers. She yawned and snuggled deeper into his arms, Eren’s yawn following shortly after hers. “It’s way too early to go to sleep,” she mumbled, making no effort to get up.
“Yeah,” said Eren, his voice drifting. “We should at least unpack the bathroom so we can get your tampons and your makeup wipes and take showers.”
“What do you mean ‘showers'? You want to bathe separately?” Mikasa asked, pulling back to frown at him.
“No, of course not,” said Eren. “Are you insane?”
They eyed each other for a moment, then Eren began to chuckle, rolling onto his back and pulling Mikasa on top of him. He smiled at her. “Also, don’t forget if we unpack the bathroom, we get to fuck in it after,” he said, patting her ass.
“That’s a very good point,” she said, drawing coy circles on his chest.
“Okay,” said Eren, muffling another yawn. “That settles it. I don’t want to take a nap anymore. I want to set up our apartment.”
Mikasa laughed, stretching forward to kiss him. “Okay,” she said. “We’ll do the easiest job first so we can get to the good part faster.”
“Kitchen next,” said Eren. “That’s the second easiest. Screw my original plans. We’ll do it together so we can get it done quicker.”
“Do you think we can get the living room done tonight, too?” Mikasa asked, catching a lock of Eren’s long, dark hair around her finger and twirling it. “I think we should make the most of this time before my period starts.”
“I think we’ll have to do the living room tomorrow,” said Eren. “But I’ll give you a freebie if you’re still horny after the kitchen and the bathroom.”
“That’s so generous of you,” said Mikasa.
“I live to please,” Eren grinned. “Now get up. We have a bathroom to unpack.”
***
“Unpacking is pretty fun,” said Mikasa, leaning back against Eren’s chest as she squeezed toothpaste onto her toothbrush. “I’m kind of looking forward to tomorrow.”
"Can you believe we finally have our own place?" Eren said, nestling against her. "Like, we’re going to go lay down in our bed in our bedroom, and we just unpacked our dishes and our coffeemaker and our cups, and just, like, we're really, like, living together ."
A happy thrill bolted up Mikasa's spine. "Being together will be the default now," she said, finally articulating the exciting thought that had been bubbling inside her from the moment their rental application had been approved, before her anxieties had bogged her down. "We don't have to make plans to see each other anymore, because we know we'll always see each other at home.”
"At home," Eren sighed, turning his head to press his lips to her temple. " Our home."
Mikasa twisted around and lifted her face to his and he met her for a kiss, then turned to look at their reflections. "I know it's dumb," he murmured, "but I could never really see my life past 19, you know? Like, I could make plans for it and daydream about it, but I couldn't really picture it, or whatever. Like, it didn't seem real. But... Now I'm 19 years old, and we just signed our first lease, and I can finally see my life rolling out in front of me like… I don't know. Like a red carpet. And I just know I'm going to get to marry you, and I'm going to start practicing law, and we're going to have some kids, and we're going to fight and we're going to make up and we're going to go on trips and we're going to spend weekends doing nothing at home and we're going to just… have our entire lives. You and me. Together." He buried his face in Mikasa's neck, looping his free arm around her waist and pulling her tighter against him. She reached up to stroke his dark hair, pausing when she felt hot tears dampen the shoulder of her- well, technically Eren’s- t-shirt.
"Wait. Eren, are you crying?" she asked with a soft chuckle.
"Yeah," he admitted. "I'm just so happy." His weepy laugh shook them both, making Mikasa giggle as she cradled his head against her shoulder.
"I love you, dark night," she whispered.
"I love you, helianthus," he murmured into her neck before straightening to look at her in the mirror, his eyes red and his cheeks shiny with tears. He managed a feeble smile. "I guess you've really got me whipped, babe," he said, swiping the back of his hand across his face.
Mikasa turned around and got herself up on the bathroom counter, reaching for Eren. She brushed his hair from his forehead with gentle fingers, then wiped away his tears and replaced them with kisses. He closed his eyes, relaxing beneath her lips. "You know, you make me so happy," she murmured, kissing his forehead. "I was in such a terrible mood when you came home, but you showed up and made everything okay again." She cupped his cheeks, studying him. He pinkened as her eyes wandered across his face, her gaze caressing him. “I just can’t believe that you’re real,” she breathed.
“Stop it,” he said, bashfully.
“I won’t,” she said. “I love you. I thought meeting you was the best day of my life, but you just keep raising the bar.”
“I’m not that great,” he said, looking down at his hands on her thighs, one of them still holding his toothbrush.
“You are to me,” she said, and Eren buried his face in her shoulder again.
"Oh," he mumbled.
“And you were right when I was freaking out earlier. Everything will be okay. Even if we didn’t have friends or family nearby, we have each other, right?”
Eren nodded, pulling back to meet her clear eyes with his red-rimmed ones. "You'll always have me," he said.
Mikasa took his cheeks in her hands and pulled him down to her, kissing him with minty lips. "Look at us. What a couple of crybabies," she said.
“Yeah,” said Eren, the corner of his mouth quirking into a sheepish smile. He put his toothbrush in his mouth and began to brush. Mikasa followed suit. They both spat at the same time and then smiled at each other, showing off their gleaming teeth. “Ready for bed?” said Eren.
“Let me pee first,” said Mikasa, pushing him out the door.
When she had finished, she went into their - their- room and found Eren sitting under the covers, waiting for her with his laptop on his lap.
“Armin loaned me his Lost boxed sets,” he said. “Wanna try the first episode?”
“Sure,” said Mikasa, waiting next to the light switch as Eren slid the DVD into the slot. Then she flipped off the lights and came to snuggle in next to him. “This is my side of the bed?” she said.
“We can trade,” said Eren, moving to get up. She put her hand on his chest, stopping him.
“I like this side,” she laughed. “It just feels kind of cool. This could be my side of the bed for the rest of our lives.”
“Wow, yeah,” said Eren, settling back down, unable to stop the huge smile that had spread over his face. The rest of their lives.
The light from the laptop screen bathed his face as he opened the media player and the DVD’s start menu came on. Mikasa rested her cheek on his shoulder, watching him start the first episode. She was already starting to doze off by the time Jack found the beach, her head drooping onto Eren’s chest. He chuckled under his breath, pausing playback to see if she would wake up and tell him to turn it back on, but she just turned her face against him and mumbled, “It’s over already? I liked it.” He stroked the back of her head, pressing a kiss into her hair, and yawned, shutting his laptop and very, very carefully shifting to slide it to the floor next to the bed, doing his best not to disrupt Mikasa. She threw her arm over his stomach.
“Where are you going?” she muttered, more asleep than awake, trying to haul him back.
“Nowhere!” he said, depositing the laptop on the ground and scooting them both back towards the center of the bed and down onto the pillows, sliding his arm under her and kissing her on the forehead.
“I love you, dark knight,” she slurred, nearly gone for the night.
“I love you, helianthus,” he whispered, wrapping himself around her, his body immediately sagging as a wave of well-being rolled over him. He yawned again, and tugged the covers a little higher.
“Kitty,” said Mikasa.
Eren craned his head around, squinting through the darkness, and spotted the plushie poking out from behind Mikasa’s pillow. He grabbed it with another yawn and tucked it under her arm. A small smile tickled her lips and then she was out for good, her mouth going slack and her breath settling into a soft, even rhythm. He stared at her as his own eyelids began to droop, his thoughts turning sluggish and his body relaxing, pleased in a distant, half-awake way as he drifted off knowing that from now on she would be the last thing he saw before he fell asleep.