#small hints of

Love All Around

Reiner stared out of the window, keeping an eye on his no longer so little cousin and her new but long-time coming boyfriend. Not like it was necessary; they were good kids and he knew that, but he had nothing better to do despite it being Valentine’s Day. He was all alone, so all he could do was appreciate the fact that not everyone he cared about were as lonely.

Even if it did make him a bit jealous.

It was a new feeling for him. Not jealousy in itself; he had had plenty of that as a warrior cadet, but jealousy of love was new. As a child, he naturally hadn’t been interested in such things, and by the time he was old enough to be, he was already a warrior, destined, or so he thought at the time, to die young, so he’d been determined to not think of such things. The closest he’d gotten to slipping from that determination was his little crush on Kris- Historia, but that had been a part of his cover, just an act, really.

But now he was old enough for these things and knew that he was no longer doomed to die young, not automatically at least, so it was only natural that he was interested, wasn’t it? The problem was that, after all this time, he had no idea how to proceed or what to do.

Reiner lets out a sigh before turning away from the window, jumping a little in startled surprise when he notices Connie right beside him, also looking out the window.

“Damn it Connie, you almost gave me a heart attack!” he says, scowling at the younger man. Connie turns to him, his face blank as he says: “Didn’t know you had a heart.”

“…”

“…”

Well, Reiner knew he couldn’t blame Connie for that one, not after everything he had do-

“Gee man, it was a joke! Relax!” Connie interrupts his thoughts, hitting Reiner’s arm with his fist. It’s not a real punch, not by army standards, but he can definitely feel it. Laughing, Connie says: “You weren’t that serious back in the day, you know. You grew old!”

“Did not” Reiner says, with no real ire in his tone, hoping that his relief didn’t shine through. He was in good terms with Connie and the rest now, had been since their battle against Eren, but at times, he still felt doubt, and quilt even more so.

Wanting not to dwell on that, he said: “I just matured, unlike you.”

“Maturity is overrated” Connie counters with a wave of his hand, glancing out the window “But you don’t seem to be the only one. Those two are a thing now, right?”

“Yeah… kids grow up so fast.”

“You sound like an old man” Connie says with a laugh “Wanna go see if Jean’s up for a game of cards?”

“Sure”

They left Reiner’s room on the second floor and went down the somewhat creaky stairs. The first room at the end of those was an office, which was officially Onyankopon’s but was used by Armin way more, and something seen from its open doorway made Connie stop in his tracks as he was about walk past it, almost causing absent minded Reiner to crash in to him.

“What are-?”

“Shh!” Connie quickly shushes the blond, pushing him away from the doorway, out of sight, before peering in. Curious and slightly wary, Reiner does so too, spotting Armin sitting in an armchair in front of the massive bookshelf he loved so much, an open book in his hands but clearly forgotten. Just a step away was standing Annie, face as red as the ribbon on the present she was holding out for Armin to take.

“Um, what is that?”

“It’s a present” Annie answers, and Reiner quickly brings a hand to his mouth to muffle his laugh, noticing Connie doing the same. Armin blushes.

“I noticed that. I meant what for?”

Annie stares at him, like she couldn’t believe he didn’t know, and Reiner realizes just as she does, he can tell from the widening of her eyes, that Valentine’s Day wasn’t a thing on Paradis.

Rubbing his freshly shaven chin, Reiner loos forward to seeing how Annie would handle this. Would she blush and stutter? That didn’t sound very Annie like, but with how she was acting now…

Annie cleared her throat, and Reiner had to struggle to not snort out loud and give them away.

“Well, in Marley, and in some other parts of the world, in February 14th, which is today, we have a day called Valentine’s Day, when people give presents to their… um…” Annie’s face went even redder, and a pink tint started to rise to Armin’s cheeks as well as he caught on, smart as he was.

“Oh, I think I’ve heard of it from a war prisoner we had” he says, coughing, but Reiner could tell it was fake. Armin reaches out his hands to take the present “Thank you… and, um, sorry I don’t have anything for you.”

Annie brushes a strand of her hair behind her ear just to have something to do with her hands instead of just fiddling with them awkwardly.

“That’s alright; it’s not why I… um…”

Reiner presses his hand tightly against his mouth, muffling his laughter. If anyone would’ve told him when he was a child, or even just a few years back, that he’d one day see Annie be a blushing, stuttering mess in from of a man, he would’ve laughed it off with a wave of his hand, and yet, here they were. Life was full of surprises, it seems.

Out of nowhere, there’s a whistle, and it takes Reiner a moment to realize it came from Connie. By the time he does, Annie and Armin’s heads have already whirled to their direction, their eyes locked at the doorway.

“Aaw, you guys are so cute!” Connie coos. Reiner doesn’t exactly disagree, but he’s smart enough to keep his mouth shut, helped immensely by Annie’s narrowing eyes as her dagger like glare hits them.

“Get out!” she hisses, face still red from the earlier embarrassment, or perhaps from being seen by them, Reiner can’t tell the difference. He doesn’t use much time to wonder about it, either, instead grabbing Connie by the collar and hurriedly jogging off, away from Annie’s wrath. They sneak in to the kitchen, closing the door behind them just to be safe, before looking at each other before bursting out in to laughter.

“Dude, did you see their faces?” Connie manages to say from among his laughter “Totally worth getting caught!”

Thinking of the pair’s startled expressions, Reiner can’t help but agree. Still, he hoped that if Annie wanted to kick some ass for this, she’d target Connie because he was the one whistling… but he was probably having too high hopes there.

“I think I’m a little jealous” Connie says out of the blue, getting a disbelieving look from Reiner. Understanding it’s meaning, the shorter man glares “Not about Annie- no offense to her of course, but c’mon, it’s Annie! I meant about having someone in general.”

Okay, Reiner thinks, that made much more sense.

“I think I can relate” he says, briefly wondering if Connie would be saying the same thing if Sasha was still around, but forcing the thought out of his mind. She was gone, unfortunately, and that was that. “But if she’d be here, I’d at the very least still have Jean to hang out with on days like these; he probably hasn’t gotten over his hopeless love for Mikasa.”

“Bet Jean can too, so let’s just find the Horseface and have him join us in our miserable little club of loners.” Connie says, pulling a deck of cards from his pocket “After that, we’ll be all set.”

Reiner nodded, thinking where the man might be. Usually, around this time of the day, he could be found from the office, discussing whatever had been on the newspaper with Pieck and Armin, but the duo hadn’t been there, so they’d probably finished for the day. In that case, Jean was either out for a walk, or killing time in the living room by reading some cheap romance novel, which the man insisted was “studying the outside world culture”, before he’d have to leave for his part time job. Not that any of them would’ve needed those; being considered heroes had its benefits, but most of them had gotten jobs just to have some kind of routine in their life. The only ones without one were captain Levi, retired with all his injuries, and Armin, keeping himself busy by learning whatever he could about the world by constant visits to the libraries around and just going out and talking to people.

“He’s probably in the living room, parked in that worn out, old arm chair that he likes so much” Reiner says, and Connie snorts.

“Could be; that thing is basically his throne by now.”

They head to the living room, and sure enough, Jean is right where they expected, sunken in to the soft, wine red fabric the chair is veiled with, a book in his hands. But what they didn’t expect was that he wasn’t alone; right there, squeezed in to the same chair, body pressed against Jean was Pieck, head leaning against the man’s shoulder as her eyes skimmed the same pages as his did. On her lap was an open box of chocolates that she occasionally picked a piece from, putting it either in her own or Jean’s mouth, never taking her eyes off the book. And neither did Jean, who simply opened his mouth when he saw the treat coming.

Connie and Reiner stare, blankly, before the later mouths “since when?” to the former, who just shrugs, just as clueless as the blond. He didn’t bother making their presence known, thinking that these two probably wouldn’t be bothered by their teasing the way Armin and Annie were, so it wouldn’t be fun.

“Oh- ok… does that hurt? Is there anything I can do to help as that doesn’t look healthy” she asked