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Following the end of the Rumbling, it didn’t take but a few months before winter began whispering its way in to the local survivors’ fledgling settlement; cooler winds in the air, grayer clouds in the sky. They haven’t quite reached the point of snowfall – still a bit too early for that yet – but the unmistakable chill of late autumn has ensconced itself within and around the encampment that the old city now comprises.
In truth, Reiner hasn’t given much thought to the weather. Not beyond a surface level acknowledgment of the fact that it exists, and as such, further preparations will need to be made to ensure that the people will have enough to stay warm when it comes. But he’s otherwise been too busy to think much about the passing time – well, save for during the too-quiet nights when sleep eludes him and all he can do is think – and in the blink of an eye, an undeniable suggestion of the cold now waits on the horizon.
But as he sits on the ground in front of the dwindling bonfire, long after everyone else has left the circle and retreated to their tents, Reiner thinks he welcomes it. Cold weather certainly isn’t pleasant in the traditional sense, and with it comes a laundry list of logistical concerns in a world where accommodations and amenities are still being built from the ground up. Yet, there’s something about the fact that eventually…it will end. And after that? Spring. A new cycle for the world to turn over. The thought is uncharacteristically optimistic, and he knows it as soon as it crosses his mind. But then, he’s lived the impossible before, so maybe there’s at least a little something to it.
Something scuffs the dirt nearby, pulling Reiner back to the present. When he looks for the source of the noise, he finds one Jean Kirstein, standing just a few feet away. He has one hand tucked in his coat pocket, the other carefully balancing the neck of a nearly empty bottle and two small metal cups between his long fingers. And what a wonder it is that such a luxury managed to survive into the new world.
Well, alcohol does have its practical uses, to be fair. Emergency situations of all kinds call for it. But this is looking decidedly not like one of those.
Jean lifts the bottle and sloshes it, just a little, to draw attention to it. “Interested in some liquid warmth?”
With a soft snort, Reiner says, “If you’re offering.”
“Then you’re in luck.” Jean steps the rest of the way over and takes a seat next to Reiner, then presents one of the cups. The thing is dinged up, and in fact both of them seemingly consist more of dents and scratches than actual cup. “Not my finest service, I’m afraid, but it’ll have to do.”
Reiner shakes his head. “No complaints here.”
“Good,” Jean says as he pours Reiner’s, and then his own, before mashing the bottom of the bottle down a little ways into the dirt between them; presumably to keep it from wobbling or being knocked over on the otherwise uneven ground. “Now, I haven’t actually tried this yet, so…you’ve been warned.”
Reiner hums in amused acknowledgment, but says nothing as they clink their cups – well, they don’t clink so much as tonk – and take their respective sips. As far as whiskey goes, it’s not too bad. Definitely nothing to write home about, but it’s passable. And really, it’s hard to complain when there could simply be none at all.
“So, what’s the occasion?” Reiner asks, tilting his head to catch Jean’s eye. It’s far from the first time they’ve found themselves alone together in this way, but Reiner can’t help feeling particularly aware whenever they do. The threat of friction between them may be long dead, but the history they share is far from it.
Maybe this little meeting of theirs was incidental on Jean’s part. Maybe he had been planning to spend his own sleepless night by the fire, only to find Reiner already there.
But then, he did bring two cups…
Jean gestures vaguely toward the space around them. “It’s cold, that’s what.”
“True, but that hardly seems like cause for celebration.”
“Who said anything about celebrating? We’re both awake and we’re both cold. I’d say that’s reason enough.”
“Guess I can’t really argue with that,” Reiner admits, a small smile playing at his lips.
“Yeah, and you’d be wise not to, considering how generous I’m being right now.” Despite his words, there isn’t a trace of bite in Jean’s tone; then again, there hasn’t been in a long while. What at one time might have been a glare in Reiner’s direction, a genuine expectation of assent, is now a simple quirk of the brows and a playful little grin.
Reiner lifts his cup to take another drink as he chuckles, a light sound that reverberates ever so slightly through the metal.
“Well, consider me in your debt,” he says. Again. Or perhaps ‘still’ would be more accurate.
Jean waves his hand as if to dismiss the suggestion. “Just help me finish this and we’ll be square.”
Sure. Reiner can at least manage that. He lets Jean top off his drink, watches as he refills his own, and allows the crackling fire to speak in their stead. The flames dance like claws scratching at the cold, and cast embers to the wind.
And the silence between them isn’t tense, uncomfortable, like it once was. There will always be a weight to it, always a little something in the air whenever they happen to share it, but it's no longer something that Reiner wants to crawl out from under.
Maybe it’s because, for all of his quirks, Jean does make good company. He’s funny, he’s charming, he’s…well. He’s a lot of things, Reiner supposes.
Or maybe it’s because of Jean’s ceaseless efforts at putting all of their differences behind them. He never had to do that, and in fact, they really didn’t even have to keep getting along after the Rumbling ended – just enough to do their work in the new world: cordial at best. But he has, and they have. In ways Reiner never thought possible, the tension between them has begun to take on a new shape, something less spiky and painful to the touch. It’s not entirely gone, to be sure. It couldn’t be. But there’s obviously a reason they can stand to breathe the same air these days. There’s a reason they can make such easy conversation, sit next to each other at dinner, trade nightmares like stories. Be around each other at all.
Or maybe, Reiner is reading far too much into it. Maybe it doesn’t have to mean anything more than what it is, which is kindness and understanding. And maybe, just maybe, he should catch himself before he starts getting his hopes up.
“Hey,” Jean suddenly says, tapping Reiner with the back of his hand. Distantly, he wonders how much of his ruminating has been spent staring at Jean. Hopefully not a lot.
“Hm?”
“Look up there.”
So Reiner looks.
Above them, above the wide open horizon, is a pitch dark sky decorated by thousands…no, probably millions of stars that twinkle and radiate softly across the black. Reiner’s eyes dance from star to star before he can even think about it, catching on the brightest ones and connecting them into nonsense shapes with invisible lines. Though an uninterrupted night sky like this is certainly nothing new anymore, it is still a sight to behold. One he hasn’t often allowed himself to appreciate.
But…well, in truth, as he turns to say something in response, to say anything, Reiner finds himself far more interested in watching Jean’s reaction – his wide eyes as they dart back and forth across the expanse of lights; the way his mouth is parted in fascination – utterly taken by the view. He’s drawn his knees up loosely, crossing his arms over top as he just stares. Combined with how he practically glows in the warm firelight, he’s a sight to rival the magic of the stars themselves.
“It’s really something, isn’t it?” Reiner eventually asks, his voice low.
Jean nods, still watching the lights as something like the beginnings of a smile curls his lips. He points up again, this time at a little grouping of stars that seem to shine a bit brighter than the ones immediately surrounding them.
“I think those look like a cat.”
“Those?” Reiner tries to make it out, he really does, but… “It looks like a clump of stars to me.”
Jean scoffs. “Oh, come on. That’s the head right there, and the ears, and those are the legs. And the tail’s there.” With each part he lists, he points at the accompanying bits of the sky that apparently resemble the animal, and traces the respective shapes with his finger.
“Something like that,” Reiner concedes. Maybe he can’t quite see it, but he can certainly appreciate Jean’s enthusiasm.
“Okay, how about that one?” Jean asks, pointing again. “That’s definitely a person.”
“Oh yeah, with a big smile, right? I see it.”
“Yeah, see? There you go!” Jean’s excitement may be a little subdued, but it’s still so endearing that Reiner can’t quite fight the grin that tugs itself across his face, despite his best efforts. But Jean, unperturbed or unaware, continues. “And huge eyes, right? And like, a stick figure body. And another guy right next to it.”
“Now you’ve lost me.”
“I think you need your eyes checked,” Jean grumbles with a little shake of his head – though he doesn’t bother hiding the half-smile that accompanies it – not intent on defending his observations to someone who clearly won’t see it. After a moment, he slowly lowers his gaze and turns his head in Reiner’s direction, yet doesn’t quite meet his eyes. “Do you remember the first time we did this?”
“Watching stars? Training exercise, right? One of those survival drills in the woods. Last ones awake.”
Jean hums in assent.
Reiner can envision the night in question, almost vivid. They’d sat around a fire not unlike the one that burns in front of them now, their sleeping bags huddled up close so they could try – and fail – to keep their voices down as they’d attempted to spook each other with ghost stories, and made up legends about the imaginary lines in the sky. A night of many laughs, and a few secrets, too. Some shared; others left painfully unspoken.
It had been a lot of fun, right up until someone had thrown a boot – which somehow hit Jean right on the nose, mercifully not breaking it – and cursed at the two of them to “shut the hell up and go to sleep or that boot won’t be the only thing that smashes your face in.”
Despite the sea of confusion and sorrow those days eventually came to represent, it’s still one of a few bright spots in Reiner’s memory. A chance to be kids. The power of nostalgia, perhaps, but if Jean is bringing it up first…maybe it still means something to him, too.
“I seem to recall a few more dicks in those stars, though,” Reiner eventually says, unable to help himself.
Jean raises a finger. “I believe they were cock-stellations, Reiner.”
“Of course,” he laughs.
The conversation naturally wanes there, and the silence they fall into is once again companionable, scored only by the crackling fire and gentle breeze. In the quiet, Reiner almost finds himself tempted to sink back into the memory, in all its roseate warmth. Because for that brief moment in time, he’d almost been able to believe that his biggest concerns were slaying titans and keeping up with his friends; that he, too, was in the dark about the truth of the world outside the walls. Maybe in some ways, he still was.
But that’s the thing about memories, no? The way they stick in the mind is often more honest, more revealing, than how they actually happened.
Several minutes pass before either of them speak again, and Jean is the one to do it: he leans into Reiner’s side for a moment and says, “I’m…glad we’re doing that again. Glad we can.”
When Reiner’s heart skips a beat, he wonders if Jean can feel it.
He isn’t sure which part is more surprising: the sincerity, or the sentiment itself. Unless he simply hadn’t noticed, Jean isn’t drunk. Far from it. Probably barely even buzzed at all – not from that cheap, watered-down whiskey of theirs, if Reiner’s own experience with it is anything to go by.
“Me too, Jeanie,” he returns simply, holding on to the last threads of his nonchalance as he lightly nudges Jean with his shoulder.
To his credit, Jean doesn’t even complain about the nickname. He does, however, gently shove Reiner’s side a second time. And very briefly it seems like he is, in fact, trying to start something, some kind of shoving match or similarly unserious form of protest. But instead…he just remains leaning against Reiner, like it’s the most normal thing in the world; as though there aren’t mountains of history between them that should make it impossible.
Maybe Jean is just cold. That’s certainly the most logical explanation. Why else would he do it? The wind has mostly died down, but a chill still lingers in the air; one that bites at the skin and seeps through their clothes. Reiner can’t blame the other man at all for wanting to absorb a bit of warmth from someone who already runs hot.
But…surely he can dream? Would it be so wrong? To imagine, for just a little while, that the man who saved him from himself had intentions that went beyond merely keeping him alive for the sake of finishing a fight; that Jean had truly wanted him to live.
What’s one more impossibility?
Ever since that stubborn hand caught him and refused to let go. Ever since the man with a heart much too big for his own good looked at Reiner, and saw the man within the monster; reaching into open flames, twice, in order to drag him out of hell. It’s only natural that Reiner would reach back and come away with love held tight in his fist. In hindsight, he’s sure he could’ve come to that conclusion a long time ago.
He thinks, on some level, he already had. It’s not as if he’d never considered it – there’s a reason so many of his campfire secrets remained just that – but things were very different then. Those few fleeting fancies during his time on the island, of a boy with a sharp personality and a sharper face, always transformed into an anger he couldn’t yet process and a guilt that overpowered all of it.
Well, maybe they weren’t just fancies.
Reiner could turn right now, set his fingers along the cutting edge of Jean’s jaw, and connect their lips in a blaze of passion that would banish the cold to the furthest corners of the earth, if only for a moment. And wouldn’t that be something? It would, without a shadow of doubt, spell the end of their reforged friendship. But he could do it. He could. It would be honest. And isn’t that the better choice? The choice he’s promised himself to make for the rest of his days?
…Not this time.
More than ready for that train of thought to come to a halt, Reiner lifts his mug of bitter-sweet amber and takes a final sip. Although it prickles warmly at the back of his throat, it does little to dispel the evening frost or his traveling mind. Then again, between the two of them, he knows that Jean has more of a taste for the stuff.
By now, the bonfire’s flames have simmered into little more than blackened, ashy hunks of wood, pulsing with a red hot glow. Reiner realizes then that he hasn’t really been keeping up with maintaining the thing since Jean’s arrival.
He’s been plenty warm the whole time.
Slowly, he tilts his head back and sets his eyes to the sky again. The stars haven’t changed, of course, but as he looks this time, something catches his attention that he’d failed to notice before: right there, practically staring him in the face, is a string of stars that stands out among the rest. Perhaps it’s the power of suggestion, seeing what he wants to see, but he finds himself unable to ignore it.
“Look at that,” he murmurs, gesturing to the sky. “Does that look like a hand to you?”
“Oh, so now you see something,” Jean teases. He angles his head, trying to put the picture in place. “Yep, definitely a hand. Reaching, maybe? And I think…”
He pauses then, shifting his jaw and squinting; it’s not clear to Reiner whether Jean is genuinely still concentrating on the shape of the stars, or if he’s hesitant to say what’s on his mind.
Regardless, Reiner chooses not to press for it. There’s something about the uncertainty of it all that makes him feel like no matter what Jean says next, this moment is fragile, and Reiner would rather hang precariously in the balance than shatter it.
Jean’s voice is quiet when he eventually says, “I see another hand next to it. Reaching right for it.”
If Reiner’s heart skipped a beat earlier, he thinks this time it fell out of rhythm entirely. And this time, Jean had to have noticed.
And Reiner knows better. Of course he does. He knows it’s not possible for Jean to have intended the statement in the way he heard it. Surely not. He knows the ache in his chest is unfounded.
Still, he looks back toward the sky, determined to see what Jean sees. And if he squints, if he tilts his head just right…it’s there. No doubt about it: a second hand, fingers splayed as if ready to latch on to the first. Reiner has never been a believer in signs from the universe, but right now, he’d be willing to reconsider. He attempts to catch Jean’s eye, but the other man turns his head toward the fire just before it can happen.
“I see it,” Reiner whispers cautiously, heart pounding with the admission.
“Yeah?”
Reiner hums. Then he dares to search for Jean’s gaze again. Dares to wonder.
Would it be so wrong?
And finally, finally, Jean turns his head, wide amber eyes meeting Reiner’s with an expression that he can’t parse. Or maybe he’s simply afraid to try.
They’re so close now. Close enough that the air between them is shared – in a literal sense this time, rather than any of the metaphors Reiner had previously ruminated – and their noses could touch if they weren’t so aware of each other.
Reiner can’t help but notice it when Jean’s gaze flicks briefly to his mouth, and then back to his eyes. It’s as though time has frozen, and yet simultaneously, the moment could break with one errant heartbeat. But then Jean leans in and closes what little remains of the gap between them, and the world seems to start spinning again, if perhaps a bit too fast. The kiss is quick, almost experimental; as though Jean, too, is trying to gauge how far this can go. His and Reiner’s eyes meet again, and now, Reiner wants to heed the words of his impossible hopes.
He leans back in and gently cups Jean’s cheek, bringing their lips together once more. It might not be the fiery ardor from Reiner’s little fantasy, but it doesn’t have to be. Because no matter the form it takes, it’s something far better – it’s real. Honest. A glimpse of something he’d once thought unattainable. And he feels that affirmed when Jean wraps a hand around his wrist and reciprocates in kind.
From there, it’s a battle to leave no space remaining between them, to make as much contact as possible. Reiner snakes his arms around Jean’s waist and pulls him closer, ever closer. In turn, Jean runs his hands up along Reiner’s shoulders, threading fingers through the short hair at the back of his head.
It’s only once the kiss begins to deepen, once the taste of peace is more than just a speck on the horizon, that Jean pulls away, working to catch his breath.
And then, as the moment freezes in place again, ice cold fear surges through Reiner’s veins; all of this was a mistake, wasn’t it? He knew better, and yet…here they are. He doesn’t want to submit to that fear, to let go now that he’s finally allowed himself to reach forward, but he can’t help feeling like he should have minded his concerns before they inevitably came crashing down.
Is that what’s going to happen?
“Jean?” he eventually says, voice low and careful.
“Sorry, I…” Jean hesitates, his mind obviously moving a mile a minute. “…is this okay?”
There are layers to that question; countless things worth peeling back and examining with a critical eye, a neutral heart. Reasons that it shouldn’t be, that it can’t be. Reiner knows it’s more than he deserves. He knows it would be asking so much more from Jean than would be fair, or right. And maybe they should stop, maybe they should think about those things more closely, but…
Well. Reiner has asked himself the question so many times already; how wrong the pursuit of happiness could be if someone has already opened the door for him and pointed the way in. Maybe now is the time to find the answer.
“More than okay with me,” he assures, and even dares to push a few stray hairs back to their rightful place behind Jean’s ear. “But only if you want it.”
“I do,” Jean laughs, almost incredulous, before his expression returns to something more subdued, traces of apprehension and hope written on his face all at once. “I…I do. Do you?”
There’s a version of this moment in Reiner’s mind where he laughs at that question, because of course he does. There’s a version of this moment where he explains all the reasons why, all the complicated tangles of emotion that culminate into one. There’s a version where he simply kisses Jean again, hoping to express all of those thoughts with a single action.
Reiner reckons he could spend all night and then some explaining why the answer is a resounding, unshakable yes. He reckons there isn’t anything Jean could ask of him that Reiner would deny.
But instead, he decides to simply repeat, “I do.”
Jean laughs again, something light and yet full of so much meaning all the same, and Reiner really feels like a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. It wasn’t the only one present, but it’s a start.
And of course, it’s not that simple; it can’t be and never could have been. Problems are not magically solved with the power of love, or whatever it is they’ve found in each other. A storybook romance was never in the cards for Reiner, even with all his youthful wishes, and that much hasn’t changed.
But…that doesn’t mean it’s pointless to try. To hope. To dream of something better. In this world, that’s all there is; a conclusion he could never have come to without the one who showed it to him in the first place. And right now, that person – the brightest star in the sky – is reaching for him, offering to guide his way through the dark once more.
And maybe– no. No more of that word.
Reiner knows.
It’s time to look up.