Work Text:
Year 844
The first night she didn’t sleep at all. She could tell Eren was watching, so she curled her back and faced the wall until his breathing evened out. Then she sat up, drew her knees to her chest, and let her tears fall between them.
The second night she bothered to try. But with darkness came images so loud she scrambled to the corner of the room and pulled the curtains aside, hoping the moonlight would get rid of them.
On the third night sleep came in bits and pieces. Unable to fight it off any longer, Mikasa drifted in and out of restless slumber, slamming her eyes open with a gasp every hour, until finally, it wasn’t so hard to keep her eyes peeled.
“Mikasa.”
She startled to her left. She hadn’t even noticed Eren stir. But he was fully awake, legs dangling off his bed, his wide eyes blinking at her.
“Haven’t you slept?”
“A little,” Mikasa replied, sinking her face deeper into the scarf around her neck.
“I know you’ve been pretending.”
Mikasa wasn’t sure what to say to that, so the air hung in a heavy silence that only grew harder to bear each time they blinked at one another.
At last, Mikasa said, “It’s hard.”
“Are you getting nightmares?”
She nodded.
“If you want, I can wake you up when you start to have nightmares. Mom says it’s not good that you haven’t been sleeping.”
“But when will you sleep?”
“Don’t worry about me, I’m wide awake now.”
Mikasa shuffled uncomfortably, not entirely sure how to reject such outright kindness but sure she would not be able to sleep. When she didn’t respond quickly enough, Eren urged her, “Go on, lie down,” with that fierce determination Mikasa was becoming so familiar with.
So Mikasa lay down, and she closed her eyes. And she tried to sleep. Only this time, she was far too aware that she was being watched, and it became too much an effort to even pretend.
“I can’t,” she admitted after several minutes, eyes flying open.
“Thank goodness,” Eren scratched the back of his head with a guilty chuckle. “I was starting to get bored.”
His honesty got a surprised almost-laugh out of Mikasa, which got a wider, more confident smile out of Eren.
“Hey, wanna play a game?”
Mikasa sat up. “A game?”
“Yeah, my friend Armin taught me.”
Before Mikasa understood what was happening, Eren crossed the room and slid onto the foot of her bed, holding his hands out in front of him, palms facing up. “Hold your hands out like this.”
Confused but intrigued, Mikasa did as she was told.
Eren turned his own hands down facing the opposite way and hovered them right over hers. “Now, try to use your hands to slap mine.”
Mikasa’s eyebrows furrowed. “Like this?” Too slow, she slid her hands out from under his and attempted to slap them down, but Eren jerked his arms back, so Mikasa stumbled forward, elbows falling onto the bed.
Eren laughed softly, but his laughter held no traces of mockery or jest. Just kindness. And patience. “The trick is to use the element of surprise. Here, let me try.”
He scooted a little closer and held his palms up. Mikasa turned her hands over, placing them a couple inches above his. “You always want to go when the other person least expects it, so that–”
Mikasa felt a sharp sting on the back of her hands. “Hey!”
Eren laughed. “See?”
Though it really didn’t hurt at all, Mikasa shook her hands out and scooched closer to Eren. “Again.”
On they went, taking turns to slap each other’s hands, until suddenly, Mikasa’s hands came down too hard, and an actual yelp fled Eren’s lips.
Her eyes widened as he rubbed his hands together, wondering out loud, “How the hell did you get so strong?”
“I’m sorry.” Mikasa’s voice was barely a whisper.
Eren studied her. “It’s all right, I know you didn’t mean it.”
“Are you okay?”
“Huh? Yeah, it’s no big deal, really.”
And Mikasa remembered a time, not too long ago, when she’d been careless around her mother, and spilled some of her most expensive wine on a scarf she’d been working on for days, effectively and permanently staining it. Mikasa had been reduced to a puddle of tears and apologies, a mumbling, pathetic mess.
Oh, my sweet girl, her mom had cooed, after being cross with her for all of 3 seconds. It was an accident. It’s no big deal, honey. Really.
“You wanna learn another game?”
Mikasa blinked tears out of her eyes. For the first time, she thought of her parents and felt something more than just crushing pain. She nodded, not yet trusting herself to speak.
But if Eren thought anything of her inability to form words, he didn’t show it. He simply pulled her covers over his lap and kept talking. “This one’s called rock, paper, scissors. Have you heard of it?”
The next morning, Carla Jaeger woke with the sunrise, as she did most mornings. The past four days, however, she woke with a heavier heart, a reminder that the world was cruel for more reasons than just the monsters roaming outside the Walls. Grisha was still asleep, having retired to bed later than usual last night, locked away in his study. She took note of the rise and fall of his chest, the way his eyelids fluttered with slumber.
That was one.
Moving quietly so as not to wake him, she slipped out their bedroom and padded down the hall, gently pushing down on Eren’s door handle.
The past four days she’s opened this door to find Eren fast asleep, and Mikasa in a trance, awake but not fully there, eyes slowly blinking like they were coated in molasses. The little girl they’d all chosen to take in had watched her parents be killed, had almost been kidnapped, then had killed someone herself, with nothing but a knife and her two hands. To save her son, the way he’d done for her.
That was two and three.
Carla had cried the night Grisha brought them back, after tucking them into bed. Children should not have blood on their hands. Children should not have to fight for their lives.
She’d scrubbed them both clean. Wiped the blood from under their nails, got rid of their clothes, told them they’d never have to see anything from that night, ever again. Eren, putting on a boastful show of bravery, had told her it didn’t matter to him. That the men had deserved to die, that they were going to do horrible things to Mikasa, and it wouldn’t haunt him that he did what he had to to protect her.
Carla burned every article of clothing he wore.
Mikasa, refreshingly, went along with just about anything Carla asked her to do. She stripped her clothes off, let Carla brush her hair. The only time she’d hesitated was when Carla asked for the scarf, her fingers reflexively tightening around the fabric.
“Do you want to keep it?”
Mikasa met her eyes, not saying yes, not saying no.
“You can hold onto it,” Carla nodded encouragingly. “It’s all right.”
And then Mikasa had nodded, almost imperceptibly, but certainly there. Carla felt a rush of affection so strong and sure, she’d wanted to crush the child to her and promise her the world.
But she was traumatized and fragile, and Carla didn’t want to overwhelm her. Nor did she want to make promises she wasn’t sure she could keep, at least not until she talked to Grisha and Eren about it first.
Upon returning to the common room, however, Carla watched her husband stoop to Mikasa’s level and speak to her, his tone calm as usual, but gentler, softer, his hand coming down to pet the top of her head. She watched how Eren kept his eyes on her, how he rushed forward to accommodate her. You can sit here, he would say. There, this one can be yours.
Carla knew there was no discussion to be had. Overnight, their family had grown from three to four, and that was that.
On Mikasa’s fourth morning at the Jaeger house, Carla pushed the kids’ door open, thinking she would see the little girl once again, still awake, haunted by the memories of what had happened to her. Only this time, neither of the kids were in their usual positions.
Eren’s bed was empty, sheets thrown haphazardly to the side in typical Eren fashion. He lay on Mikasa’s bed instead, shoulder to shoulder with the girl he’d killed for. And Mikasa, for the first time since arriving to the house, found a deep sleep, her breaths even and heavy.
Relief and gratitude flooded Carla’s veins, and she was grateful for the support of the door handle to hold her weight. One day, she supposed, she would have to be more concerned about these two sleeping on the same bed. But today, they bore the innocence of children, the trauma of soldiers, and together, they’d found the peace of sleep.
Carla closed the door and let her forehead fall forward on it. A tear fell down the bridge of her nose.
This world was cruel. But please, she thought. Please, please, please, she hoped the day came where she would have to argue with them to sleep in separate beds.
(The day never came.)