emergency exit.
jean kirstein x fem!reader, modern a.u.
summary; there are three emergency exits on this airport. jean knows you can leave but decides to stay beside you. warnings; hurt/comfort? lowk the same as most of my other fics, which is to say that there is no context or worldbuilding in here, NOT PROOFREAD,might be a tiny bit confusing a/n; i was going to write something fluffy but i also needed to get things off my chest hehe. enjoy! taglist; @holding-infinity-and-a-book , @jeanscremebrulee , @mrsnobodynobody , @hopeless-anti-romantic-again , @berrijam , @happxme , @cherrypieyourface , @imgayandshesanime , @moonmalice , @raazberry , @kivernova , @potaho3frog , @xakilicious , @gojo-ana , @ppushable , @zombiefiedskeivy , @candleofhappiness , @alt—er—love , @1ovede1uxe , @sevriizy , @toscapaeron , @whoevenisjessica , @simone-tb , @mrsryuguji , @memoriesofahandkerchief , @mxhemmings-l , @jazfartz2
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You have this recurring dream - youre alone at the airport.
Nothing is odd, nothing peculiar that could count as horror happening off the corner of your eye, no; everything is perfectly normal. Its perfectly sane. You stand in the middle of the airport. Your hand has gone numb - or maybe its the reality of your hand that you aren't able to feel - around the handle of your suitcase, and people walk all around you. Some in the rush, the others are more leisurely in their pace, making the former group a little more than annoyed at their state. Businessmen with nothing but their cross bags and kids crying in the distance.
But that's the thing. Its perfectly normal. It makes you shudder, maybe in your dream or in your reality, because you're all alone.
Leaving has always been an easy task for you. You're all too familiar with running away, not from tough conversations but from physical places. You leave no proof, no trace, you try to keep everything as tidy as you can, checking all your drawers and cabinets to see if you’ve packed everything like practiced routine, and no, leaving is not the hard part. The part that you cannot stop noticing, is that you're alone. You have no-one to say goodbye to, no-one that will hug you and say, maybe unconvincingly, that they’ll try to keep in touch. No-one to call out on that pleasant lie because at least it means that they’re thinking about it, they're thinking about your presence or lack thereof in their life.
No. you're all alone in the airport, looking for a way to go back home, not knowing where that is, and not willing to find out.
You don't know how to explain it. A quiet and almost all-consuming acceptance stills your mouth when you do try to reason with your own mind about the dream bothering you. Its not even a nightmare - which almost makes it worse - because its not scary. Its just too present, too important. Leaving has never been hard for you, no, because you’d been born looking for an exit, trying to map out the best route to open the next door on the front of your hand, your palm becoming a map of all your past efforts to flee rather than the future that you could be promised. You sit there, a little too dumbly, on the floor of your apartment, tracing the same lines on your hand for the nth time.
The rug is slowly slipping from underneath you. Jean’s knee brushes yours; he claims he needs more space for his legs as they stretch under the coffee table that now sits decorated with a half-eaten pizza and some leftovers from an over-cooked batch of pasta from the day before. Marco chews on the crust of his own slice, and Sasha grumbles about their long legs taking up too much space with her mouth full of food. Connie and Eren sit with Mikasa on the couch, discussing something that Connie is showing them on his phone. Armin sits in front of Marco, engrossed in an almost comical conversation about the lore of mario kart.
You're a little too aware of all of it. You're all too aware, also, about the fact that you sit separated from your friends a little too easily. There's space on either side of you as you sit at the shorter sides of the coffee table. Jean sits to your left while Sasha sits on your right, followed by Armin, and no-one sits beside you. There's no space to, but you’re sure if you moved a little to the left, someone would be able to squeeze in. The air is the only thing that caresses your shoulders, empty and a little stale, and in your head you try to map out the steps it would take for you to get out of this, though you're not really sure what it is you're running away from.
The floorplan goes like this: your back takes support of the legs of the armchair behind you. As mentioned and noted, Sasha and Armin sit to your right, in order. Jean and Marco sit to your left, in the same order, their back also resting against the foot of the much larger couch behind them, on which Mikasa, Connie, and Eren are sit, all with their legs to themselves. There is one door to your right, a little ways behind and diagonal to Sasha’s back. There's the door of the balcony - you can see the tv glowing from someone else’s far-away apartment - glass windows that are left a little ajar to let the wind in. those are to your left, some distance away from the couch. The door to your room is the one that's the farthest away; you’ll have to take a short turn to reach it’s handle, which is a small hurdle that presents itself as too big. Your best option would be the balcony and it’s promise of fresh air, despite the lack of privacy. The route has already been cemented, and you shift in your rather uncomfortable seat to make sure the rug beneath you doesn't let you slip further.
Sash takes the last slice of pizza, much to Eren’s dismay. Its a small argument that's akin to two siblings, and you're sure that in some other life, they really were, but right now you think of how your knee is against jean’s at an odd angle, and how it both makes you want to leave faster and also stay longer.
Another recurring dream; the image of some sort of black tar that transfers onto whoever touches you. The disgust of it sits deep into your bones, always leaving you at the end of your worn-out seat, balancing yourself on the edge of a knife that you seem familiar with. You're worried that this might also be a dream, that Jean might find the tar stuck to his knee and get up with a repulsed scowl. Its knocking into your skin a little more now, a touch more urgent.
Your eyes leave the fingers that have been drawing numbly on your palm and meet his.
It traps you. A little more into knowing jean and your budding friendship with him, you realized how much you’re being contradicted. His gaze always seems to lock you into place, as though this reality is the only one that he’d prefer to see you in, not bothering to get lost in the hopes of your shape turning into someone new. Its all opposite to how you’d always been convinced you needed to be - entirely someone else, and entirely somewhere else to achieve it.
You wonder if he knows your escape route, your plans to withdraw, because he looks at you and its enough to draw you into being right where you are.
He nods his head towards you in silent question. Are you okay? The conversation has drifted away from him, but he does nothing to chase it.
You breathe in deeply. You cant find it in yourself to quit looking into his eyes, so you nod once with a small smile and prepare to get up.
The balcony door will welcome you. You will remain alone at this airport you've uncaringly created for yourself, covered in black tar. You don't want anyone to see you, knowing they wont come to say goodbye for the last time.
Your escape is successful. You note the change in the air, the lifejacket placed upon your shoulders. Despite your relief, you have been followed.
He doesn't say anything. Maybe he knows not to, and it terrifies you to be known so well. You look down, then up, your eyes naturally mapping everything out. An exit there, maybe for someone else, another exit that takes the shape of another balcony in a different building altogether. You can hear your friends - because that’s what they are, at the end of the day, although you're isolated and alone at the airport, they're your friends even if they wont come to say goodbye - are laughing, maybe arguing, maybe both, and the noise becomes itself, travelling through the small opening in the balcony. You're near enough to make out the blurry lines of their voices, but far enough not to be hear by them if you speak lowly enough.
“What's on your mind?” you're being asked. Jean’s shoulder is against yours. What was is about the tar? Was it on him now? He doesn't seem bothered by it. He knows how to trap you but he does it well, without force, and never for his advantage. His eyes are on yours, searching. For what, you're not too sure of, but you give him an answer because you're alone at the airport, trying to reach home.
“I have… this dream.”
He hums, laying down the path for you to continue softly.
“I'm standing at an airport. I don't know where I’m going. Everything is normal.” your pauses are short and comprehensive. The least words to say. “But it feels incomplete. I'm waiting for someone to say bye to, but no-one comes, and for… for a bit-” is this too vulnerable? You don't have a choice to not be, “-i cant remember who I'm looking for, but then it feels okay. I feel fine because I’ve… I’ve been told there's no-one for me. No-one to say goodbye to, yknow? No-one to… do that whole thing with. I wont see anyone later, or keep in touch with, and um… I’ve been trying to be okay with that. I have been okay with that, for the longest time-” your sentences stretch into a longer string, refusing to stop, almost by itself, “-I have been okay with it, but I sometimes realize I don't really have much to show for myself, not really much to leave behind, not much to… become something significant. I don't know. I don't know what I'm saying.”
All of it is too honest. You're aware of how he’s shifted closer to you, his warmth seeping through your skin, making it’s comfortable way into your bones. “And you don't know where you're going?” he asks. There’s nothing but patience that colours his voice, low but present.
“Nope.” you say. You want to shrug, but your shoulder is too comfortable against his.
He thinks. Takes a real minute. Your hands are still on the railing, your back facing the balcony door. You're not sure what your friends are talking about inside, but it cant be too important without jean there to witness it - they're not the type of people to leave someone out.
“Did you take everything? Passport, boarding pass, all your clothes?” he asks. The seriousness in his tone makes you blink.
Eloquently, you mumble a, “huh?”
He has a soft, almost sad smile on his face. “I hope you have fun. I’m going to miss you. Call me when you land, okay? And please don't get lost on the airport.”
Ah. a similar smile paints your lips. At the airport, now, your hand that was still against the handle of your suitcase comes up to punch his shoulder lightly. “I wont get lost.”
“You cant tell the difference between right and left without doing the hand thing-”
“-that's just so I can be sure!”
“Of course. Yeah, no-”
“-do you want me to get lost there?”
“You know what, be my guest. But promise you’ll call me when you do.”
“So I can entertain you for free, yeah, okay.”
He breathes out a laugh at that. A very real one, and you're on the balcony again, you're about to miss your flight but its okay. One last conversation wont hurt, not when he’s asking you to call him if you get lost - a very real possibility - so he can help you find your way back.
“Sure. entertainment. Here i am, worried about you getting lost in another city,” his smile is widening with each word, shaking his head at the end of this statement and you're afraid that this is all too real, that he’d actually come to say goodbye to you, to let you leave but to do it safely, knowing he’s still with you.
“Worried is a strong word.”
“Its apt.”
“Okay.” your voice comes out softer than you mean it to. You lean a little more into him. His hand rests on yours, catching yours under his. The map of your hand lays stationary, trapped contently.
Somewhere, you hear a plane taking off and another one landing.
