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It’s a beautiful summer day, and the members of Levi’s squad (sans Levi himself) find themselves lazily scattered about under a big oak tree.
There's enough of a breeze to make the branches above them sway back and forth, groaning with every moment, every leaf rustling and dancing in the warm summer wind. They sit under the tree to enjoy the shade; the sunlight that peeks through the gaps of the branches is shy and soft on their skin.
It’s a brief moment of respite before they report to the capital for a meeting; Hange’s orders.
Eren lies in the grass, his elbows propping up his torso's upper half, ignoring the feeling of the grass blades tickling his arms.
The group is eating fruit together, and the smell of citrus is strong, despite the breeze. Sasha’s laughter fills the air, and juice is all over her hands.
“Sasha, you still don’t know how to peel oranges!” Connie exclaims, wiping juice off his arm. He sits next to Sasha, and it’s virtually impossible to not get caught up in her mess.
“Technically, it’s a mandarin,” Armin says.
“I don’t care what it is,” she responds as she’s pressing into the skin of the fruit a little too violently, “I’m just trying to eat it!”
Before Sasha can take notice of what she was doing, her thumb completely penetrates the mandarin, sending nectar everywhere– some of it shooting directly into Jean’s eye, who, unfortunately, is also sitting next to her.
He screams, and everyone laughs.
While the rest are concerned with Jean’s dramatics, Eren watches as Mikasa punctures the skin of the orange fruit with a slow and deliberate pressing into the top of its body.
A mandarin, they had called it. Similar to the orange in its shape and color– but its skin is less thick, and its taste less tart.
Mikasa loves them.
During one of her many visits to Paradis, Lady Azumabito had taken it upon herself to explain the history of the fruit. She was always eager to prove to them how great the Oriental clan and the nation of Hizuru had once been. She explained how oranges themselves arrived on the island through the amiable actions of the Oriental clan over a century ago, but once the island had been isolated from the rest of the world, it was of course impossible to share with its inhabitants the evolution of the orange– the mandarin. In the infamous one hundred years Paradis had been self-contained, mandarins had been propagated to every other nation but them.
One could wonder if her incentive to share something as useless as a fruit with the residents of the most dangerous island in the world was merely a desperate attempt to seem trustworthy enough to be entrusted with the island resources– or if it came more from a place of kinship that she might have felt towards Mikasa– a direct descendant of their once mighty shogun.
Mikasa did not particularly seem to care either way– she enjoyed the fruit nonetheless.
She has always loved sweet things.
(Eren has always found it endearing).
Historia also took notice of how Mikasa liked the fruit (as well as the rest of Levi’s squad), and one day, she had some of the seeds the Hizurian group had brought planted on her farm.
“That way, whenever the trees grow and bear fruit, you can all come and have some whenever you like!” she had said then.
Eren will not live long enough to ever see the trees bear fruit, but in the moment, he had smiled in response to Historia’s kindness anyways.
Grounding him back in the present, Mikasa peels the first piece of her mandarin away from the rest, and to his surprise, extends it out to him.
He notices how much easier it was to peel than the orange. The parts that make up the orange are so compact– the skin tighter, and the pieces having no distinct separation from each other, making it difficult to separate one part from the other properly. It’s like its existence rejected the idea of being shared, completely unlike the mandarin. So supple and pliable, so easy to take apart, like an invitation to be shared, as if it was made for that very purpose.
He knows that she knows Eren has a mandarin of his own, tucked away in his pocket, waiting to be eaten.
She has offered to share hers with him anyways.
“Do you want one?”
Her voice is soft and quiet, spoken low enough under the laughter and chatter of the others that only he can hear her.
Eren looks at the piece of fruit in Mikasa’s hand, and then at her. Though they are sitting next to each other, neither of their bodies are facing the other– rather, they are directed toward the center of the group. But when Mikasa offers him a piece, her head is turned and angled down towards him, and he mirrors this, turning to look up at her– their profiles now facing each other.
(A part of him wishes she would lean down even closer– maybe even whisper the question into his ear, and close the friendly gap between them.)
Eren thinks of the fruit in his pocket.
He does not need Mikasa to share with him.
He wants to have some of her fruit anyway.
Slowly, he takes the piece from Mikasa’s hands– their skin touching when he does, and Eren can’t help but be painfully aware of the contact.
He mutters a “thank you” that he hopes only she can hear– though he is not quite sure as to why he thinks this– before plopping the fruit into his mouth.
Not being able to shift his gaze elsewhere, Eren’s eyes are still on her, while Mikasa’s attention has returned to her mandarin. He watches as she takes a section of her own and brings it to her lips. She bites it first– sharp teeth penetrating the body of the fruit– and then sucks the nectar out of its flesh.
He is completely taken by her as some of the juice escapes from the corner of her mouth and almost reaches her chin– before she takes her spare hand and wipes it away in one swift movement.
Eren wonders what it would be like to kiss her at that moment– drawing the conclusion that it would taste slightly tangy, but mostly sweet– just like the citrus they were sharing.
And as quickly as he thinks this, another thought takes its place— he is hit by a wave of guilt, and maybe even shame. The feelings bite at him for turning something innocent like eating fruit, into something so unchaste.
(Too often he feels like there is something inherently wrong with him— that in the face of innocence he is sinful, and in the face of purity– he taints it.)
Eren forces himself to look away, telling himself to taste the same thing in the same moment– to steal looks– to chew two parts from the same whole in bliss— is enough.
He closes his eyes and allows every other thought to wash away, letting himself be overcome by his surroundings.
The sound of the heavy branches moving above them.
The warm breeze brushing against him, the way the sunlight kisses his skin.
The grass under his body.
The sound of laughter and conversation between the people he loves.
The scent of citrus, the taste of ripe and tender fruit on his tongue.
Eren does his best to slow down time around him by feeling everything individually, savoring it one piece at a time, just like a mandarin.
If he could stay in this moment forever, he would. To selfishly keep everything and everyone here with him– to forever repeat this summer day.
To forever feel this feeling of peace he can never hold onto long enough.
Eren is trying his hardest not to fall asleep during this meeting.
The meeting Hange has them all summoned to is anything but interesting, and hardly even necessary– it isn’t even a formal one– just them and the volunteers, all gathered in a small room. They were discussing the logistics of some technology, and if he was being honest, the meeting really could have been just between the volunteers and Hange and Armin– because the rest of them were spectators to the conversation.
He looks over to Sasha and Connie who are trying their best not to distract each other, but ultimately failing, and Jean who is scolding them every five minutes like he’s their mother– but Eren knew he wasn’t paying attention either.
Eren sits towards the back, in one of the only two chairs in the room, while Mikasa sits in the other. Between them is a simple square wooden table.
With his drowsiness getting the better of him, he slowly slumps forward in his seat, torso closing the distance between him and the table to properly lay his head down. He finds that when he does, where Mikasa’s hand is placed on the table is directly in front of his line of vision; he’s close enough to see the pink in her knuckles and smell the faint scent of citrus on her fingertips from the mandarin they shared earlier.
Suddenly, he feels compelled to touch her hand– so he slides his hand under hers with quick but delicate movement– leaving her fingertips resting in his palm.
Up until this point, Mikasa has been paying attention to the meeting– or at least, appears to be. But in the periphery of his vision, Eren sees how she turns to look at him, obviously aware of what he did– she says nothing, only watches him.
Now particularly aware of her gaze and presence, he begins to feel a little shy, and so he chooses not to look back at her but instead feigns interest in studying her nails– as if there was something eye-catching there, hidden in her nail beds. Eren takes notice of how she has cut them, short but shapely, and how small her fingers are in comparison to his.
He also realizes he’s beginning to feel a little silly.
Mikasa eventually turns away, her gaze centering back on the discussion before them, but never takes her hand back from him.
Eren’s blinking is beginning to slow down, and he knows he’s losing the battle against his eyelids to stay awake. In an attempt to keep his consciousness from slipping, he begins rubbing his thumb over Mikasa’s knuckles, back and forth in a repetitive motion.
Within moments he realizes this would do anything but keep him awake because the feeling was incredibly soothing– and he can already feel the voices of the other people in the room drifting further away, and his eyelids getting heavier…
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
He does not remember at what point he fell asleep.
What he does remember: the feeling of his skin touching hers.
Eren does not wake again until the meeting is over, when Mikasa is gently shaking his shoulder and softly saying his name to wake him up, their hands no longer touching.
When Levi’s squad is finally released from the meeting, the hallways of the building are painted orange from the setting sun.
As they walk through the halls, Mikasa passively listens to Armin, Connie, Sasha, and Jean all discuss dinner. She takes notice of Eren’s lack of participation.
He has become a lot quieter recently– and she wishes she could pinpoint when it became that way. Sometimes, it feels like he's not quite there with them, like his body is in one place, but his mind elsewhere– and he’s always so tired.
Mikasa notices the bags under his eyes, how sunken in they’ve gotten, and how drowsy he’s been as of recent. He says he’s sleeping at night, but she does not believe him.
He’s also gotten skinnier, and she knows he’s eating less– but he denies it every time she asks him about it.
She can still see the shape of the mandarin he picked earlier in the day in his pocket.
She knows he won’t eat it.
(Recently she’s developed a habit of sharing her food with him– because even if Eren says he is not hungry, if Mikasa offers to share with him, he will not reject it. These days, it gives her peace of mind to see him eat.)
She’s asked if he’s sick. If he’s doing too many titan experiments, working himself too hard. Too many times she has pressed him for answers, for some kind of confession to not being well– if she can figure out what is wrong, she can find a way to make him better.
The problem, however, is that he will never admit to anything being wrong.
“Mikasa, really, I’m okay,” he always says.
She does not push any further.
Maybe it’s all in her head.
Maybe he’s just growing up, and he is no longer the lively, angry boy she once knew, with fire in his eyes and fists clenched so tightly his knuckles would turn white.
But, despite all things, he is still Eren– and she still loves him.
(She cannot shake the feeling that sometimes, it does not reach him).
Hours have passed since the sun set behind the walls of Paradis, leaving nothing in its wake but a dark, empty, blue sky– not even the moon. Eren is alone in his room, and the only light is the steady yellow hue of a nearby candle, melted wax dripping down the sides.
He’s dreading the inevitable– another sleepless night full of dreams that will let him drift off long enough to tease him, before turning into nightmares where the only escape is consciousness. Putting the candle out means it’s time for this vicious cycle to begin, and he isn’t quite ready for that yet.
Next to the candle is Eren’s uneaten mandarin, still just as orange and ripe as it was this morning. Eren stares at it from atop his bed, with such an incredibly intent and focused look, that one might think the lifeless object could stare back.
He frowns.
Eren’s appetite has escaped him these days, and he will most likely end up not eating the damn fruit. He would just give it to Mikasa, but he knows she will immediately ask why he hadn’t eaten it, and it would upset her.
Maybe he will just watch it wastefully rot on top of his bedside table in some kind of cruel way.
And then he rebukes himself for this thought– because it seems sadistic– and prays this isn’t his nature.
Trying to rid himself quickly of his previous train of thought, he recalls the events of the day. He thinks back to the sweet taste of citrus and the warm summer sun. The sound of chatter and laughter. The hard wood of the chairs in the meeting room. The shape of Mikasa’s face and the feeling of her fingertips. Her love for mandarins that he finds so endearing. The fact that he will never be able to look at an orange or any of its variants without thinking of her.
The overwhelming thought of her.
Before he can get carried away, Eren promptly reaches out and snuffs out the flame of the candlelight, letting himself be encompassed by darkness. He then turns to face the other side of his room, where there is nothing to look at and obsess over but the empty wall, and resigns himself to another restless slumber.