#original works

He wanders back into his room wrapped in a towel, his hair still tangled and wet, and sees the outfit that his mother has laid out for him. He sees before him a sky blue button up shirt and grey dress pants that he's never seen before. They seem to be an odd material, like that of a canvas or an old couch that a cat has scratched to hell. He doesn't enjoy the idea of wearing those pants, but he knows he can't argue, so he begins to dress himself in the outfit his mother picked for him, already dreading the thought of wearing this for the next hour or so.

He grabs the damp towel he had hanging around his hips just a moment before and begins to dry off his hair as best he can. After finishing with that, he heads into the bathroom yet again and grabs his mother's comb and tries to comb through the rats nest that is his hair. He goes through it again and again, undoing knot after knot until he looks into the mirror at the finished product.

He sees himself standing there with washed hair and no grit or grime to be seen, and he doesn't recognize himself. I mean who is he without the dust on his face and the dirt caked under his nails? Without the sunken eyes and the hard set look of stubbornness. He doesn't know who that person is in the mirror, and it unsettles him to think about.

As he's standing there staring at himself, spiraling into his own mind yet again, his mother appears behind him and squeaks, “Oh, sweetie, you look absolutely spotless!” Eren turns around, and looks at his mother and sees that she, too, has changed her outfit. She had clearly gotten up early and bathed beforehand so she already looks shiny and spotless like a brand new coin, though her outfit is much worse for wear. District 12 doesn't have much in terms of supplies besides coal and other minerals, so the clothing isn't much to be seen.

Her dress is a simple one. Cream with blue and white flowers littering the fabric, a tie at the waist and it has a modest neckline that's littered with buttons going down to the waist of the garment. Eren absent-mindedly wonders if they work or if they're just there for decoration. “Thanks mum, you look really nice too.” Eren steps forward to hug his mother tightly, burying his head into her neck. He never used to be able to hug her like this, but all of a sudden, in the middle of summer, he had a growth spurt and his whole body decided to grow a full 5 inches. Now he's as tall as his mother, if not a few inches more.

He inhales deeply, trying so desperately to calm himself, and he's comforted by the smell of sugar and vanilla. He's brought back to a time when he was far younger, when his father wasn't so angry and his mother not so timid. Eren was sitting in the back of the bakery with a sketchbook and charcoal in his lap. He wasn't very good at drawing, but it always kept him occupied when he was a child. He was watching his mother make scones for the window display, and he remembers so vividly the smell of vanilla and sugar, mixed with warm summer air that passed through the open windows of the small kitchen.

He's sitting quietly, sketching indecipherable images in charcoal and listening to his mother hum a melody to herself that he's heard so many times before. It made him feel safe, and oh so happy, in a way he has never felt since. He still hums that song to himself when he's feeling scared. It's an old covey lullaby taught to her by her father, a song she's not allowed to know. She would sing it to him when he was a baby, all fitful and restless, and still does so all these years later.

When he had nightmares of Journey that woke him up in the middle of the night, or his father beat on him and left him with scars that he knew he couldn't explain away- whenever that happened, she would scoop him up in her arms, stroke his hair, and she would always hum that same tune. ---