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Eren murmured something against his skin and Levi woke slowly, leaning into that familiar feeling. It wasn’t until Eren’s elbow started to dig into his gut did Levi finally open his eyes, squinting in the dark as Eren simultaneously tried to burrow against his chest and stick his elbow through Levi’s fucking ribcage.
“Eren,” Levi groaned. He was still half asleep; the most he could do to stop Eren from drilling a hole in his side with his surprisingly bony elbow was to roll on top of him, pressing Eren down against their sheets. It made him stop, for a second, and Levi took the opportunity to press his face against Eren’s neck, breathing against him and twitching when Eren moved and his hair tickled Levi’s nose.
“Levi,” Eren muttered, voice thick with sleep. “Levi get up, there’s something.”
Levi scrunched his eyes closed with as much force as he could, but it was no use. He was awake and he wasn’t going to get back to sleep until he figured out what Eren wanted.
“Something,” Levi repeated, eyes still closed. He breathed in the scent was wholly Eren, warm and clean and human, and for a minute there was silence, like Eren had fallen back asleep. It wouldn’t have been the first time Eren had woken him up by talking in his sleep, so Levi relaxed and let himself start to nod off again.
And then suddenly the elbow was back and Levi was on his back with Eren pressed down against his chest. Levi groaned and buried his fingers in Eren’s hair, fingernails scratching at the back of Eren’s neck. The warm mass of ridiculous mostly asleep husband that was pinning Levi down shivered, wriggling and whining in the back of his throat like some kind of puppy. Levi loved him.
“There’s somethin’. Downstairs.”
Levi blinked up at the ceiling as Eren wriggled all the way across Levi, flopping on the other side where he was almost falling off the bed. Then, as Levi twisted to blink at him, Eren started to shove against Levi’s ribs, trying to push him toward Eren’s side of the bed, where the bedroom door was.
“Eren,” he said, rolling over onto Eren’s side of the bed but making no move to leave. “Eren, what the fuck?”
“Thump,” Eren mumbled, following him like a slug to curl against his side and try to, ineffectively, push Levi completely out of bed. Levi tried to figure out what Eren was talking about, reaching for him with one hand while he rubbed the heel of the other against his eyes. He was so tired, he thought as he glanced at the clock. It wasn’t even four am yet and he just wanted to sleep.
“Thump,” Levi repeated quietly. “Eren, I don’t know what you’re-“
Levi cut off, realizing what Eren was talking about not because the other started to make sense but because, faintly, he could hear a noise from downstairs. It was, as Eren had put it, a thump, muted by distance. A chill crept down his spine, making him shiver as he turned to peer at Eren who blinked at him with hazy green eyes.
“Thump,” Eren repeated quietly. Levi swallowed, more awake than he was before at the prospect of a noise in the first floor of their house.
“Why do I have to go see what it is,” Levi muttered, rolling over to face Eren. Eren curled against his chest easily, moving even before Levi could reach for him, until his face was tucked against Levi’s throat and his arms wound like weights around his waist. Levi’s hands found their way into Eren’s hair again, brushing it back from his eyes as he leaned down to kiss his love’s forehead.
“You’re the husband,” Eren whispered. “You gotta do it.”
Levi stopped stroking Eren’s hair and pulled back, twisting to lean over him as the half asleep man blinked up at him. “You’re the husband too,” Levi argued, loud enough that his voice rang through the silence of the night. Faintly there was another thump from the first floor. Levi’s stomach tied itself in knots just thinking about going down there.
Eren’s face scrunched up like a child’s, a furrow in his brow that part of Levi wanted to kiss. “If I go down there and get killed, you’ll be sad,” Eren said, as if that made perfect sense. Levi could only stare at him for a moment, baffled by the leap of logic that took. While Levi stared Eren started to shove again, apparently reminded that they weren’t just cuddling and there was something spooky downstairs that Levi had to take care of.
Levi sat up, muscles screaming protest as his back popped quietly. He groaned at the feeling, swatting at Eren who was still fruitlessly trying to remove him from the bed. Eren’s hand knocked into his, half swat half accidental collision, and Levi caught Eren’s hand with his, twining their fingers together easily.
“Oh, and you’ll be throwing a party when I get killed by the possible murderer downstairs, huh,” Levi asked rhetorically. “I see how it is.” He bent over, kissing Eren’s knuckles, and then released his hand so that he could climb from the bed. Eren, who had been so intent on pushing him from the sheets just a second before, suddenly lunged, arms encircling Levi’s waist so that he was curled around him, keeping him stuck in be.
“Wait, wait, wait,” Eren said, voice too loud. It rang, alarmed and tense, through the cool quiet of their bedroom and Levi twisted to smooth his hand between Eren’s shoulder blades to keep him calm. “I don’t want you to die.”
Alarmed though he may be, Levi knew he was still dealing with a half asleep husband, which meant there was no making him see sense. Levi sighed, barely registering how exhausted he was as he tried to soothe Eren back onto the other side of the bed.
“I’m not going to die,” Levi muttered, tugging at Eren’s arms. They started to retract, but only very reluctantly. “You were the one to bring up dying, you ridiculous, clingy-“
“Stay,” Eren interrupted. His eyes were still a cloud of forest green, long lashes keeping them shadowed and dark as Levi managed to nudge him back onto the pillows, arms curling sullenly under the comforter. “Stay, Levi, please.”
Levi’s heart clenched and he dragged a hand through his hair, stuck between a rock and a hard place. “I’ll be right back,” he muttered. He knew if he didn’t check on the noise now he would never get back to sleep, no matter how much Eren worried. He reached over, kissing the corner of Eren’s lips before he crawled off the bed and stumbled to his feet. Eren made a small noise of protest, but a second later the sound from the first floor echoed out again, small, muted, that dreaded little thump. Levi looked at his husband and sighed, padding on quiet feet out of the bedroom and into the upstairs hallway, where the door to his office and the spare bedroom were closed.
The stairs weren’t lit very well, since there generally wasn’t any reason for them to go downstairs in the middle of the night, but Levi knew their house well enough to get by. He crept down the steps slowly, stomach turning at the thought of what could be downstairs. It was probably just a cat outside or something stacked poorly in the kitchen, he knew that, but the darkness mixed with the expression Eren had worn as he left made him nervous. But the first floor was quiet as he stepped off the stairs, the kitchen counters clean and the living room empty. He craned his head around the railing, back where Eren’s studio office was, only to realize it was as empty and quiet as the rest of the house.
Which left the outside of the house, he realized with a curl of dread. He glanced back through the kitchen, padding through it reluctantly, to where the sliding glass door was in the dining room. Through the window it was pitch black, the faint light from the clocks on the stove and microwave not casting enough light to see anything by. Levi swallowed as he got closer to the door, until he was right in front of it.
Anything could be on the other side, he thought, chest tight with something that tasted like bile on the back of his tongue. And then, on the tail end of that thought; oh, stop being a scaredy cat.
He flipped the light switch for the porch and then immediately bit his tongue on a scream. The raccoon sitting on the bench, scratching its back against the edge of their deck table froze, staring at him with the same kind of surprise Levi was staring at it with. Levi blinked, the raccoon twitched, and after another long, tense second of staring there was a faint creak from the stairs behind Levi that had him whirling. Behind him, through the thin glass of the porch door, a small thump sounded as the raccoon bolted, knocking the uneven table leg against the deck floor.
Fucking raccoons, Levi thought, heart racing. He staggered away from the glass door, appeased with the knowledge of what the fuck the thump was, and made it to the bottom of the stairs just as Eren got halfway down. Eren jolted in surprise as he swung into view, flinching with wide sleepy eyes until he realized it was Levi.
“Hey,” Levi muttered, hopping up the stairs until he could reach for Eren. Eren slumped down into his arms, trusting Levi wouldn’t drop him, and Levi stepped up to meet him, to hold Eren against him more comfortably. Levi kissed Eren’s face, humming as Eren clutched at his back. “It’s okay, it was a raccoon; I’m fine.”
“Fucking raccoons,” Eren muttered, already sounding drowsy again. Levi had always been jealous of the easy well Eren fell to sleep once they curled together, but it did make for a good chance to watch Eren sleep, to study the twitches of his face and press kisses against his temples and cheeks when he couldn’t squirm away and retaliate. Insomnia would never be fun, but since Eren had come into his life he’d at least never had to suffer through lonely nights again.
“Come on, you cowardly husband,” Levi whispered, nudging Eren back up the stairs. “Let’s go back to bed.”
“M’not a coward,” Eren protested, awake enough to be offended. Levi bit his lip on a laugh as they crested the stairs and Eren staggered through their bedroom doorway and flopped forward onto their bed. Levi followed more slowly, pushing their door closed behind him in case the raccoon came back, and then rounded the bed to climb in on his side.
“You made me go check what it was,” Levi pointed out. Eren peeked at him with one eye, sulking visibly as he reached for Levi to drag him back against the line of his body.
“I’m tired,” Eren whined, dragging Levi until the comforter was hunched around them awkwardly. Eren didn’t seem to mind, since their new position put him in the prime spot to use Levi’s chest as a pillow, which he did, wriggling down to kiss Levi’s collarbone absently. Levi smiled tiredly down at Eren’s head, wondering what he’d done to deserve this kind of life. Something incredible beyond words, probably, because he couldn’t imagine being happier than he was right at that moment.
“Then sleep,” Levi told Eren, curling sideways and down so that he could kiss the top of Eren’s head. Eren kissed his chest again, more of a mumble of lips against skin than a kiss, and was asleep again before Levi could huff out a quiet laugh.
Levi followed his husband back to sleep shortly after, but not before he dragged a hand down Eren’s spine, slow and careful in an effort to savor the man in front of him. He had to get up in less than three hours, but that didn’t matter now. “I love you,” Levi told Eren quietly, words barely a breath.
“I love you too,” Eren mumbled back, still asleep. Levi smiled and closed his eyes, squeezing his arms around Eren and feeling Eren’s arms close tighter around his waist in response.