~ Husband!Levi wears his wedding ring like armour. He’s not flashy. He didn’t want some expensive band, and he didn’t want to make a big deal about the ceremony. But that ring? He touches it constantly — when he’s thinking, when he’s irritated, when he misses you. It grounds him. If he has to take it off for work or training, he keeps it in a tiny cloth pouch tucked inside his inner jacket pocket, and he checks for it twice before putting his gear on.

~ Husband!Levi remembers every tiny thing about you, especially the things you forget. He knows your coffee order, your shoe size, what side of the bed you prefer, and exactly how long your bad moods last when you’re sleep-deprived. You’ll mention craving something in conversation, days later, it’s in the fridge. You’ll complain about a headache, he’ll hand you water and your preferred meds before you even ask. He doesn't make a show of it. He just...pays attention

~ Husband!Levi doesn’t verbalize “I love you”, but when he does, it means everything. He’s not careless with words. He’ll call you “brat” or “woman” or “pain in my ass,” but when it comes to the real thing, he doesn’t waste it. He says “I love you” on nights when the world feels too heavy. When you’re curled up in bed, when you’ve had a terrible day, when you’re not even looking at him and he can finally say it without being overwhelmed by your reaction. It’s always low, always gruff. Sometimes it slips out when he’s holding you too tight. Other times it’s whispered when he thinks you’re asleep.

~ Husband!Levi is physical, not in a lustful way, but in a grounding way. He needs to touch to believe you’re real. When you sit beside him, his hand will automatically land on your thigh. When your cooking, he’ll press a kiss to your shoulder. If you’re standing together in silence, he’ll brush his fingers along your arm or let your pinkies link. You once asked him if he even noticed how often he touched you. He stared for a moment and said, “Not really. Feels normal.” And that’s the thing with Levi, touching you isn’t supposed to be showy. It’s instinct.

~ Husband!Levi is surprisingly soft when you're sick or injured—even if you're being a stubborn brat about it. You could be sneezing nonstop, wrapped in a hundred blankets, claiming you’re “fine,” and he’ll just frown and say, “Bullshit.” He’ll monitor your temperature, feed you soup (homemade or not, he makes sure it’s hot), fluff your pillows, and glare at you if you try to get out of bed. The only time he ever truly panicked was when you got hurt badly once, he didn’t say much then, just held your hand until you came to, knuckles white from how hard he gripped you.

~ Husband!Levi doesn’t believe in grand romantic gestures, but you’ll never have to ask for flowers. He brings them anyway. Not for show. Just… when he’s thinking of you. He’ll come home after a long day, toss his coat on the chair, and hand you a small bouquet without saying anything. Sometimes they’re wildflowers, sometimes fresh lavender, sometimes from a stall near work. He acts like it’s no big deal. “Don’t make it weird,” he’ll say as you smile and coo over them, cheeks turning pink. But he likes seeing them in a vase on the windowsill. He glances at them every time he walks by.

~ Husband!Levi doesn’t smile much, not with his mouth, anyway. But with you, his whole face softens. His voice drops a little lower. His brows relax. His shoulders ease. You tell a bad joke, and while he doesn’t laugh, his lips twitch and he shakes his head like he can’t believe he married someone like you. He stares at you sometimes when you’re not looking—long, quiet stares filled with so much weight it knocks the breath out of you when you finally catch him. “Why are you looking at me like that?” you ask, grinning. He shrugs. “Just… still figuring out how I got this lucky.”

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He watched you a lot. Enough to know that you were always late for breakfast, trained yourself to the bones even on your off days, volunteered to help around with anything you could, and were particularly good at mending clothes. He knew you liked eating with Hange almost every night, and it was the part of your day he enjoyed the most. On each of those nights he followed the two of you into the mess hall, sitting far enough that Hange wouldn’t get the idea of asking him to join, but still giving himself the appropriate distance to observe you. To commit to memory every little detail he could, how you ate, how you sat, what you talked about, if your nose also scrunched up at the disgusting taste of the tea everyone but him was subjected to; any information he could gather before the sound of your laugh warmed his chest enough to make him leave.

Truthfully, he could have kept that stalker-ish routine going for ages, and he fully intended to; being able to keep his distance while still getting the smallest doses of you seemed like an ideal arrangement in his mind.

It wasn’t until one damning night that he decided this restrictive mindset had to change. He saw you walking with another recruit, late, and alone. He couldn’t properly hear whatever wildly amusing conversation you were having from where he stood; regardless of that, he could still clearly make out the faint sound of your laugh accompanying it. 

The small scene was enough to break him from his ridiculous self-imposed prison. Levi didn’t want to allow himself to indulge in his desires for you. He didn’t feel he deserved to be with you in any capacity further than working alongside each other. Despite that, the idea that someone else could come in and take from him the possibility of a chance with you was much more mortifying than his own insecurities and concerns.

From that alone, he made the decision to allow himself a sliver of your time. And so, the very next day you were graced with your first private conversation with the captain, if you could even call it that.

He approached you after you were done with training, standing against a wooden beam trying to steady your breathing, hair messy, and sweat coating your forehead. 

“Your stance was horrible today.” The abruptness of his presence and his comment caught you off guard.

“What?” You looked at him with a puzzled look, processing whether he was actually addressing you or not.

“During training. You were terrible.” He explained, his tone maintaining its harshness despite your confusion.

“Oh. Yeah, I guess so, I’m out of my element today.” You explained plainly, a half-smile tugging on your lips both at the bluntness, and the fact this was probably the first time he came up to you alone.

“And yesterday as well.” 

“Right.”

“You’re not sleeping well.” More of a statement than a question, the dark circles you've been sporting this week probably gave it away.

“I've been having a hard time with it, yes.”

He gave you a firm nod, pursing his lips together in thought. 

“I’ll come find you tonight, I have a tea for that.” He turned around the moment he finished without a second look, not giving you an actual chance to accept or refuse.

Since then, the two of you started a small routine. He’d look for you after dinner and guide you on a brief walk to the top floor of the main building. A teapot and two cups already placed on the window ledge in the back of the room, with a singular candle lit close by; he hoped that the minimal amount of light would make his intense gaze less noticeable. 

It was supposed to last only for however long you were struggling to sleep but continued far past those days. Most times he wouldn’t talk, only listened; he’d let you rattle on about the day if you pleased, indulging you by participating in idle gossip.

“I can reprimand them for that. I trust you’re aware.” He’d slip in when you shared a little too much about the escapades of some recruits, forgetting for a moment he had recently become your superior. 

“Well, this is all alleged. Maybe I didn’t hear it right. This tea is great by the way; is it a different kind?" A blush creeping up your cheeks while you attempted to change the subject, looking at him with a sheepish smile that begged him to forget your prior information.

It took a few weeks, but he started contributing with topics of his own little by little. An opinion, a small anecdote, a complaint. Slowly chipping away at the facade of mystery and harshness that used to be all you got from him before. A part of Levi worried that the more you learnt about him, the less interested you’ll be, but the enjoyment he got from your small interactions vastly outweighed that concern.

A year into meeting you, Levi had grown accustomed to having you near him, even if for brief moments. He enjoyed your company and physically couldn't continue hiding it from you. He still kept enough distance to make his ever-growing feelings unknown to everyone else, and didn’t properly confess anything to you, but his advances grew slightly bolder. 

Your nightly routine changed a lot from how it originally started. Moving from ten minutes of sipping tea in a semipublic space to secluded meetings in the dead of night. Going as far as sneaking you in his private quarters when he came back from travels you were not part of. 

Being away from you became the key that pushed your connection forward. Every time he came back, he wanted to have you around for the night, and he needed the certainty that you wouldn’t be interrupted; the reassurance of it enabled him to make these encounters last for hours.

He sat in a wooden chair next to his desk, beckoning you closer with a simple command. “Show me what happened.”

“You can’t see the bruise with my uniform on.” You argued with a stifled laugh; you had complained to him about a minor injury you sustained recently, something insignificant that happened while he was gone.

“Then change.”

You stared at him bewildered.

“Do I have to do it for you?” His stern tone didn’t falter; it would’ve seemed like an order more than playful teasing, if it wasn’t for how relaxed he looked.

“You returned as tactful as ever, I see.” You laughed, amused at his actions. You made your way to the bedroom, missing the smirk on his face.

You returned to the room in a thin nightgown that made Levi tense at the sight, hands tucking into fists on his lap before relaxing again. His hand sprawled on the back of your right thigh without question once you stood in front of him, pulling it closer to properly view the wide bruise on the outer side of it; purplish hues going from your mid-thigh to the bottom of your glute. 

“This is nothing to you?” It came out softer than he intended. Thinking of you being hurt when he wasn’t around, no matter how little, lowered his guard. 

“It looks worse than it is.”

His hand carefully grazed the bruise, hiking up the edge of your gown in the process. You shivered at the touch. Goosebumps covered your skin, and it did not go unnoticed by him. “Does it hurt?”

“No. I think this helps.” You humored, not bothering to hide your enjoyment of his treatment. 

“I’m sure it does, brat.” He smiled, small, but enough for you to notice. His hand still caressing your leg despite his response.

It took Levi five years to make his feelings for you properly known. But it’s not like you, or others, hadn’t suspected them before that. Despite keeping the matter private, much like most things about him, sometimes he struggled to adequately hide that he had a soft spot for you.

He never outright said he cared about you, never properly held you, but all the things he did do, they proved to be more intimate and sweeter than any regular courting could ever be.

For your first birthday after joining the Corps he went out of his way to gift you a treat from a bakery in your home district. It became a tradition that he fulfilled every year since; he’d go as far as getting it for you in advance if an expedition took place around the date, just in case one of you didn't make it back after.

In your second year, after an expedition where two members of your graduating class were tragically lost, he sneaked you into his quarters every night for a week—Both Erwin and Hange knew but they didn’t say word of it—he’d lay you down next to him, let you cry out your grieve for as long as you needed to, and patiently waited until you grew tired enough to sleep to get some shut-eye of his own.

“I’ll never get used to it, will I?” Your voice was barely above a whisper. 

“No.” While your eyes were glued to the ceiling, Levi’s gaze was fixed on you. His expression was unreadable as usual, but he was completely tormented, wishing he could take this hurt away from you.

“Am I being weak?”

“You’re being human.”

“That’s a yes.” You smiled, attempting to joke, yet the humor in your voice didn’t reach your eyes. Tears fell down in a stream, and Levi had to try his hardest not to reach out and wipe them off your cheeks. “I just—” Your voice broke. To him, the sound evoked a feeling adjacent to being stabbed. “I feel I should be stronger than this. I shouldn’t be surprised over what I signed up for.”

“You’re not surprised; you’re hurt.” Levi chastised, shifting his position to look at you properly. “You did your job, you don’t have to be strong now. Now stop this nonsense of acting like it's shameful to grieve. At least don't do it with me.” 

You didn’t say anything—instead looking back at the ceiling while your hand found his arm, curling up to his side when the tears started burning your eyes once again.

He didn’t try to hold you, but he didn’t pull away. Even after you fell asleep. 

In your third year, when Erwin told him he’d be pulling you out of his team to make you a squad leader, he became sick almost immediately. The notion that you would no longer be under his supervision, that even if you went on the same expeditions as he did, he’d have to wait until the very end before he could know if you were still alive. It circled his head all morning and gave him a headache so outstanding he had to dismiss himself from training that afternoon. 

“What do you think?” Erwin ended the silence that persisted since he broke the news. 

Levi stared absentmindedly. “I think she’ll be a fantastic leader.”

“Is that it?”

“Are you asking for my permission?”

“No, I simply respect you enough to ask for your opinion.” 

“Unless you’re willing to put my preferences above what’s best for humanity, don't ask for my opinion on what you should do with her.”

“Because your preference would be to retire her immediately?” Erwin prodded, with no real expectation for Levi to speak up. It wasn’t the first time he brought you up, and it wouldn’t be the last if Levi kept refusing to trust him with this information. “You don’t have to answer that. I understand you want to avoid telling me what I already know.”

Following your change in rank, the order of retreating met Levi with a wave of asphyxiating dread rather than relief, one that didn’t dissipate until he was able to spot you on your horse, still breathing and in one piece. These concerns were never brought up to you or anyone else for that matter—despite Erwin being aware and willing to speak with him about it if he could just be honest—even if his fear of losing you and not being able to do anything about it grew stronger with every expedition, he kept his worries regarding your well-being private. You always returned; he had no reason to discuss anything he felt. If you were alive and well, he’d be able to mask his love for you for a while longer.

It wasn’t until your fifth year as a member of the Survey Corps when his ‘while longer’ ended. When he had to come to terms with his fears, and his feelings.

He kept his composure as best as he could while going through the list of those dead and missing with Erwin, watching other scouts load bodies into carriages, though he’s sure it did not go unnoticed how tightly he was gripping his gear while he waited for every name to be read. Even then, after all bodies were loaded, the trek to the walls started, and confirmation that you were not one of those lost received; his heartbeat did not return to a healthy rhythm. He needed to see you.

This was the most stressed he ever felt trying to find you after an expedition. Deep down, he could feel something about today was different, as if you not being okay was something he could physically feel. And it didn’t help the fact that it took him so long to spot you; carriages and horses already on the move to safety without him being able to catch a single glimpse of you. 

Every second that passed he could feel his body tense further, cold sweat reaching his palms, a knot tight in his throat that only got tighter the moment he saw you. That sickening feeling of dread he thought he had grown used to crashed down on him and threatened to finish him right then and there. He spotted you being carried by Miche when he made it past the wall. Your body limp in his hold, your inability to even keep your head up made Levi assume the worst and had him rush in your direction before he even realized it.

He got off the horse calm and collected, as if his heart wasn’t threatening to rip itself out of his chest. His relief upon seeing you were still breathing was immediate, yet short-lived as he paid more attention to your injuries. Your left thigh and arm were bandaged. There was blood all over you, dripping from your nose, your mouth, and the seams of the binds on your wounded limbs; you must’ve been hurt close before the order to retreat was given.

It made him sick and brought a vile sting to his eyes, a sensation he had long forgotten.

“She’s okay.” Miche assured him, smiling lightly at how Levi was frowning at you as though telepathically reprimanding you for getting to this state. “Nothing’s broken, but she’s weak. She couldn’t keep riding.”

Levi nodded firmly, not trusting himself to speak right away. He reached under your body, taking you in his arms with little protest from the other man. “I’ll take her. I don’t want her in a carriage.”

“She’d be laying down.” Miche pointed out yet still took a step back once Levi had a solid hold on you, not really wanting to interfere. 

“She’d be alone.” 

Miche nodded, holding back his reaction at what the captain was displaying, and promptly retreating to his horse; more than ready to get back and tell Erwin about this little interaction. 

You were conscious enough to hear the conversation, although far too drained to register the worry behind Levi’s tone let alone comment on it. You had half a mind to realize he carried you back to his horse, helping you on it before getting behind you. He took a hold of the handle and took off in a slow ride, while his left arm went around your waist, keeping you tucked back against him.

One of your hands went to his forearm, giving it a small squeeze to show your acknowledgement before relaxing again.

“Are you okay?” He questioned quietly. Not that anyone would be able to hear him past the sound of hooves against the ground and the many murmurs of civilians watching them pass by. 

You turned your head enough to look at him out of the corner of your eye. The concern written all over his face almost made you forget the waves of pain crashing through you. You nodded, small, before letting the back of your head rest on his shoulder; the tiny action having wasted the remainder of your energy.

“Liar.” He murmured against your hair, the touch of his lips against your scalp so fleeting you could only assume you imagined it. 

That night Levi had been more consumed in his own thoughts than he would have appreciated. You were out most of the ride back to the base; the only thing keeping you upright was his firm hold on you that didn’t falter once. He spent that time wondering what happened, how did you injure yourself, did somebody help you, did you have to drag yourself all the way to your horse and pretend you didn’t feel so bad until it was inevitable?

He imagined every single heartbreaking scenario his brain could come up with, images of you crying out while you bled in the woods flashed through his mind, torturing himself with the idea that maybe you had been near him, maybe you even called out for him and he didn’t hear it, trying to find ways to blame himself for your poor state.

He woke you gently once you made it to the base, helping you off the horse and onto your feet, guiding you to wrap an arm over his shoulder to steady yourself when you were unable to suppress your limping. Everything was a blur for you, every step you took forgotten when the next one happened.

You could remember briefly smiling at Hange when she approached the two of you, catching some of their conversation, and Levi whisking you away before you could manage a goodbye.

“You really busted yourself out there.” You chuckled at her comment and winced immediately after, a stabbing pain reaching your ribs, the mixed noise making her laugh. “You’re okay?”

You nodded, not getting the time to answer before Levi interjected. “She is.” He stated, adjusting his grasp on your hip when you clutched your side.

“Right… I’ll get one of the scouts to take her to the infirmary. Erwin wants to talk to us.” 

“No.” Levi spoke up before Hange could even attempt turning on her heel. “I will take care of it, and I’ll go to his office after. Tell him I’ll only be a moment.” He kept walking without another word, not giving her any time to make a comment on his behavior.

He took you to his quarters, helping you out of your stained cloak and muddied boots before starting to undo the soaked bandages on your limbs. He seemed unaffected by the sight he was met with, the gashes and lacerations covered in dried blood were nothing he hadn’t seen before; but the fact that they were on your body, it brought a shake to his hands he was completely unfamiliar with and he thanked the heavens you were too busy scrunching your eyes together at the stinging feel of him cleaning the open wounds to notice it.

You don’t know if you talked, if he asked you anything, you don’t think so. The only thing you committed to memory was the feel of hardened hands touching you in the softest ways imaginable, guiding you to his bed when he was done and easing you into laying down. He caressed your face before he moved away; the way he looked at you a mixture of longing and thinly veiled restraint.

He left almost as soon as he laid you down, knowing that if you said anything, if you made even the slightest sound, he’d discard his meeting altogether to lay next to you. 

Levi came back less than an hour after with a thick bag under his arm, having raided your room before coming to gather anything you might need. He was being exceedingly obvious today; he knew more than well his friends no longer needed a heartfelt confession to know exactly why he had been so special to you in the past five years with how he's behaved, but for once he couldn’t care less about that matter. 

He found you just as he had left you, now asleep with your mouth slightly agape. Your messy hair tussled all around was the only indication that you moved while he was gone. He pulled a chair next to the bed, not wanting to risk waking you up; ready to patiently wait until he could get you out of your filthy, blood-stained uniform. Your change of clothes and a clean set of sheets awaiting next to him already.

He doesn’t know how long you were asleep for, but it continued through enough hours for him to follow suit at some point.

He vaulted out of the chair when you woke up with a loud cry; the sound was completely gut-wrenching. 

“What happened? What’s wrong?!” He grabbed you by the shoulders with a desperate pull, his eyes searching for yours. The sting of tears threatening to break free he felt earlier returned with a vengeance when you coughed up blood, tears streaming down your face. 

“Talk to me, angel. Please.” He begged, hands reaching for your face, wiping your tears. You didn’t speak, didn’t explain what was ailing you, instead your cries became louder, deafening. 

Levi could feel his heartbeat hammering in his chest, and before he could do anything, more blood came out of your mouth, then your nose, then from your wounds, white bandages drowned in the crimson red liquid. He couldn’t find the words; he didn’t even know what to do. He frantically moved around the room, searching for anything to wipe the blood with, to apply pressure and stop this someway.

Before he knew it, his own eyes were welled up with tears as he desperately tried to stop you from bleeding out, the sound of your crying overwhelming him completely. 

“You’re going to be okay. You’re okay.” He repeated like a mantra, the room spinning around him when he looked at the pool of blood under you. He wiped his tears with his forearm. His heartbeat grew louder, and the sound of it seemed to echo through the room.

You wouldn’t stop crying, and God, you wouldn’t stop bleeding, it was futile to try. Your hands went to his shoulders, bringing him closer to you while you sobbed hysterically. 

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what to do.” He wrapped his arms around you tightly, crying onto your hair, hopelessly clinging to you. “I can’t do anything. Please forgive me, angel. Please.” He wept, his grip tightening the quieter your cries became; your energy depleted the longer you kept bleeding. 

“Don’t leave me.” It became uncontrollable; he felt completely out of himself, the sound of his thunderous heartbeat, the feel of your blood on his hands, the pain in his chest crushing him further and further. “Please don’t leave me.”

“Levi?... Levi.” He woke up with a jolt to see you standing above him, mind completely fogged by the images his brain came up with. His eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness of the room, looking around the now empty bed then back to your fragile frame. 

The glow of the moon coming from the window was the only source of light, but it was enough to see you properly; not in tears, and not bleeding out. Instead, you were looking at him with a puzzled expression, an arm cradling your midsection as you tried your best to stand upright.

“Are you okay? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I’m—” He closed his mouth before continuing, rubbing his eyes before he looked at you again, a slight wet feeling coating his fingertips—was he crying?—it was just a dream. “Don’t worry. Is something wrong?” 

“I wanted to get out of all this blood. But I could barely make it a few steps past the bed.”

He hummed, burying his face in his hands for a moment, trying to regain his composure. “I’ll help you.” His eyes found you again, narrowed. Going over every inch of your body to make sure nothing was out of the ordinary, to prove to himself that you wouldn’t randomly start bleeding out in front of him. He debated telling you about his dream, telling you about how worried he was earlier and how the stress of his concerns was swallowing him whole right now, but that would mean delving into a conversation he’s unsure he’d be good at. Maybe he’ll need to practice it.

He walked you to the bathroom, arm stretched out for you to hold onto through every step. “You look terrible.” He murmured, helping you stand in front of the small tub. 

“Aren’t you sweet.” You laughed dryly, slowly loosening your grip on his forearm to let him stand back.

You and Levi stared at each other willfully, both waiting for the other to take the next step. 

“Can you do it alone?” He asked while reaching for the top button of your shirt, undoing it slowly, waiting for you to form a response, groggy and restless voice adding something new to his usual stoic tone. 

You wanted to object, tell him he didn’t need to continue. But you were sure you’d end up falling face first on the floor at some point if he wasn’t holding onto you. “Maybe I could.”

“Sure.” He muttered, gaze focused on where his hands started to undo the rest of your shirt, a deep frown covering his features at the side of fresh red bruises covering your left side. 

He carefully undid the bandages on your arm to slowly slide off the shirt. You didn’t care to watch his movements; you couldn’t look away from his face, how concentrated he was, how troubled he seemed over your wounds. It made you smile, both that and the pink tint of his cheeks when he exposed you further. 

If you knew him less, you would’ve asked him to kiss you right then and there, but by now you knew well his only answer to that would be questioning if you were concussed.

Levi kept himself from speaking. Too focused on the crushing weight in his heart over the sight of your bruised and battered frame, a weight that grew more draining the more of your clothes he got rid off. 

His mind also trotted over the idea of kissing you. He thought about it every single day, but now more than ever he wished he had done so before. That way he could pepper every single inch of your body with small soothing kisses now and it wouldn’t be strange, there wouldn’t be a possibility of you freaking out, because by now you would’ve been used to his affections. 

If only he had been braver about it before. 

He desperately wished to hold you tenderly in his arms, to caress your skin and kiss you senselessly, trusting that every bit of his devotion would help you forget about the pain you must be feeling.

“What happened?” He helped you stand above the drain, squeezing your hand before letting you stand on your own. He soaked a cloth before he started carefully scrubbing your arms, trying his best to not pressure the slash on your left arm into bleeding again.

“It was my stupidity. One of my scouts was kicked off his horse, and a titan was going to grab him, and I— It was impulsive. I threw myself at them and I didn’t realize another titan was coming. It was a big mess and I wasn’t thinking clearly.” You yawned between your sentences, watching him with tired eyes, following his hands whenever he bent to dampen the cloth and settling back on his face when he returned; his eyebrows furrowed at your anecdote. “I couldn’t tell you exactly what happened, I just know I flew through more trees than I would like, and when I finally got my cables to stick to something I was hanging two inches from the floor and looked like this.”

Levi stayed silent for a moment, trying to picture the situation, as if that helped him in any way. “How did you get on your horse?” 

“Miche found me. I would have only been able to drag myself until I found someone. It’s hard to lift this leg.” His grip on your waist tightened at the notion, his eyes now meeting yours to avoid staring at where he scrubbed on your chest, ever-present frown adorning his features.

Levi saw the images of your explanation vividly in his mind; he could clearly see you dragging yourself out of the woods in fear that you wouldn’t make it, as if it actually happened, as if he had been present. It was completely nauseating. “I’m sorry.” His hands stopped, both settled firmly on your hips, indifferent to his proximity and your bare skin.

“For what?”

“I could’ve been there.” 

One of your hands reached his bicep, tentatively caressing him. “Don’t do that.”

He pursed his lips together; he knew it was ridiculous to upset himself over something he had no control over, and yet he couldn’t stop. He stayed silent, instead opting to watch you get closer, your hands rubbing up and down his arms to ease him. The delicate body he’s grown to yearn for standing less than an inch away from him, laid bare for his eyes only.

“I’m supposed to be taking care of you.” He murmured, tense muscles taut under your touch as it rose up to his shoulders then back down to the front of his chest. 

“I know, but you seem to be more troubled than I am. I may need help getting up, but you’re looking at me like I’m dying.”

“I just don’t know what to do with myself.” Levi let himself get closer, his hands hesitantly moving to your back. “Seeing you like this.”

“I’ve been hurt before.” Your tone was confused, and he hated that it urged him to continue.

“Not like this. Not when I’m not around.”

“I thought you didn’t care if I was not by your side.”

“I lied.”

You couldn’t help the weak laugh that left your lips, looking away from him as you tried to retrieve your composure. 

“Are my worries amusing to you?” His gaze narrowed, not in his usual scowl—in dismay.

You shook your head, a hand coming up to caress his face, looking at him with nothing but utter reverence. “I’m more than appreciative of your worries. But I do find it humorous that I have to come back like this for you to say these things.” 

The time seemed to stand still between you. Patient, as always, you waited; letting him find the words he’s been struggling to muster. He hated how difficult this was; to expose feelings he has been certain of for years. “Sit, we need to wash your hair.”

You sighed, hands dropping from him with a small nod. He helped you sit in the middle of the tub, kneeling down on the floor next to you, holding onto a small water pitcher with trembling hands. 

You closed your eyes at the feeling of water slowly dripping onto your scalp, finally relishing in a soothing feeling. “Don’t look at me when I say this." His voice was low, unusually unsteady, despite being completely certain of his words. "I’m terrified of losing you.”

Your lips pursed together, trying your best to keep yourself from turning your head; wanting to indulge him if it meant being able to hear what he had to confess. “Why?” You asked quietly, eyes stuck to the water falling from your shoulders, bloody and muddy dark streaks slowly disappearing, becoming clearer the more his fingers helped brush water through the thick locks of hair.

Silence lingered for a moment. The only sound being the slow rush of water, and Levi’s deep breaths. He could do this, if there’s someone he could say anything to, it was you. So why did his chest ache this much?

“I’ve belonged to you from the moment I met you.” Levi’s voice came out ragged, broken. His hands softly brushed through your hair, moving back the strands that fell on your face. He cleared his throat, trying to regain some semblance of control. “And I don’t know what will be of me if the only reason I hold any hope for the future is no longer with me.”

You couldn’t help meeting his gaze, lips parting and closing with suppressed praises. To hear something that gentle, romantic, out of the very lips you’ve wished had graced yours long before today; it could’ve been enough to push you through every day of your life from now on. 

The way you were looking at him was his undoing, a softness he did not deserve, and that he could only ever receive from you. He watched you uneasy, his throat running dry, unsure of what he was even waiting for. “Please say something.”

Words evaded you completely, too stuck on repeating that sweet confession over and over again in your head. Instead of coming up with some clever poetry of your equal feelings, you did the one thing you knew no amount of prodding would make him do. 

Your hands slowly reached for him, cupping his face to bring him closer to you. And you waited, for a moment; not wanting to miss how he relaxed, how he gave in. Only then did your lips meet his with a tenderness that made Levi’s stomach flutter. 

One of his hands went to the back of your neck, long fingers twisting into your hair, keeping your lips flush against his while he inched closer to you. His free hand gripped the back edge of the tub, his body looming above yours, completely trapping you under him. 

The kiss was searing and all consuming. As if you were trying to pour into him every unsaid word; as if Levi was trying to make up for every single moment he wished your lips had been on his. It grew desperate within seconds, teeth clashing and noses bumping while both of you tried to absorb each other’s oxygen.

It’s only when you tried to wrap your arms around his neck to drag him down did you break away, wincing at the sting from a gash on your bicep.

Levi immediately tensed when you stopped. “I’m sorry.” His voice was breathless, a small whisper followed by him pulling back, softened gaze raking over you to make sure he didn’t hurt you. 

“It’s my fault, I should’ve waited until we were laying down.” You quipped, instinctively reaching out for his arm to keep him somewhat close. 

He laughed, openly, warm. “That might’ve ended worse.”

A comfortable silence fell in the room after your chuckles died down. Both of you staring at each other with the sweetness of two madly in love idiots. All flushed lips, red cheeks, and stupid smiles.

—

“And then what happened?” Erwin asked while flipping through pages of planning, the words he had written already mixing together from how long he had been staring at them, and how late it already was.

Miche stood by the window, looking out to the empty grounds below them. “I told him she’d be lying down in the carriage, probably more comfortable.”

“Mhm.”

“And he argued she’d be alone, very solemnly.”

“He did not.” Erwin dropped the papers, turning on his chair to meet Miche’s gaze, the other man already snickering to himself.

“He did, and then he just took her away. And I’m completely certain he kissed her hair when they got on the horse.” Miche whispered the last part, as if he was sharing the most confidential work information he could ever manage to get his hands on.

“In front of everyone?” Erwin stared at him dumbfounded, imagining the scene he described before letting out a quiet laugh.