The first month was easy.
Or at least, that’s what you told yourself.
People fought all the time in the Scouts. Arguments happened. Tempers flared. You and Eren had known each other for years. Longer than most friendships survived.
A stupid fight couldn’t ruin that.
It had started over a mission.
It always came back to missions.
“You don’t get to decide everything yourself, Eren.”
“I wasn’t deciding everything myself.”
“You nearly got yourself killed.”
“I completed the objective.”
That had been the wrong thing to say.
The second the words left your mouth, something in Eren’s expression changed.
Like everything he’d sacrificed amounted to luck, like every scar on his body was luck, like every person he’d lost was luck.
“You think I don’t know what I’m doing?”
“No. I think you’re reckless.”
“And I think you’re scared.”
The words struck harder than any punch.
The argument had spiraled from there.
Years of frustrations neither of you had spoken aloud suddenly found voices.
He called you controlling.
You accused him of never listening.
He accused you of never trusting him.
By the time it ended, both of you were shouting.
Neither of you remembered who walked away first.
Only that neither came back.
Months passed, neither apologized.
At first everyone expected it.
Mikasa kept glancing between you during meals.
Armin tried awkwardly steering conversations.
“Will you two just get over yourselves already?”
So eventually people stopped trying.
You learned how to exist without Eren.
Or at least you learned how to pretend.
You stopped looking for him in crowded rooms, stopped saving the seat beside you, stopped turning automatically whenever you heard laughter that sounded like his.
Because no matter how much distance existed between you, Eren was still Eren.
And every now and then you’d catch a glimpse of him.
Talking strategy with Hange.
And every single time, your chest tightened.
Not because you hated him.
That would’ve been easier.
Unfortunately, you still cared.
The mission announcement came during breakfast.
Commander Hange spread a map across the table.
“We need a small team to investigate abnormal Titan activity near the southern districts.”
Hange pointed at several markings.
“The route is narrow. Dangerous. We need experienced soldiers.”
“Eren Yeager will accompany the team.”
Across the room, Eren froze too.
For a brief second your eyes met.
Months of distance condensed into a single moment.
Then both of you looked away.
“Wonderful!” Hange said, completely missing the tension. “Everyone looks thrilled.
Levi looked like he wanted to leave the planet.
The ride out was miserable.
He rode near the back of the formation.
Every conversation felt forced.
Every silence felt worse.
The absence of your friendship hung over everything.
At one point Jean muttered:
“Then stop talking,” Levi replied.
Levi looked at both of you.
His expression immediately soured.
The first real conversation happened two days later.
If it could even be called a conversation.
Most of the Scouts were asleep.
You sat outside the camp, staring into the darkness.
You already knew who it was.
Eren sat several feet away.
Not beside you. Just nearby.
The distance felt intentional.
For several minutes neither of you spoke before he decided to break it.
“You still stay up too late.”
Your grip tightened around your canteen.
The familiar criticism almost felt normal.
“You still talk too much.”
The sound surprised both of you.
For a brief second, the months vanished.
Silence settled again. Heavy and uncomfortable.
“You could’ve apologized.”
The words escaped before you meant to say them.
“You turn everything around.”
“And you act like you’re always right.”
The fragile peace shattered instantly.
Months of resentment erupted.
“You stopped talking to me.”
“You never came after me.”
“You never came after me either.”
The words echoed through the darkness.
Because both statements were true.
Neither of you had been innocent.
Neither of you had tried.
The realization sat between you.
You didn’t have an answer.
The attack came the next afternoon.
Exactly the kind Hange had warned about.
The formation broke apart.
ODM gear screamed. Orders were shouted. Chaos erupted.
You spotted the Titan first.
Instinct moved before thought.
Pain exploded across your shoulder as you slammed into a tree.
The Titan missed him by inches.
Everything happened quickly after that.
But your shoulder wasn’t right.
The moment the adrenaline faded, pain hit like a hammer.
Someone cursed, someone else called for supplies.
And suddenly Eren was kneeling beside you.
“What were you thinking?”
The question came out harsh.
“What were you thinking?”
His hands shook slightly as he inspected the injury.
“You could’ve gotten killed.”
The irony was so ridiculous you almost laughed.
“You say that like it’s unusual.”
For a second neither of you moved.
Something else appeared underneath.
The kind he never showed.
The words hit harder than the injury.
Because suddenly you understood.
The reason this fight had lasted so long, why it hurt so much, why seeing him with everyone else felt wrong, why neither of you could let go.
You had never stopped caring.
Not once and neither had he.
That night neither of you slept.
The conversation happened naturally.
For the first time in months.
“I was angry,” Eren admitted quietly.
“You made me feel like you didn’t believe in me.”
“Every time you run into danger, I think maybe that’s the time you don’t come back.”
“You make it sound easy. Like you’ll survive because you always do.”
Eren didn’t respond immediately.
When he finally spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.
“That one day you’ll get hurt because of me.”
Neither of you looked away.
For the first time in months there were no walls left. Just the truth.
The realization settled slowly between you.
Something far more dangerous.
Something that had been growing for years without either of you noticing.
Or maybe noticing and refusing to admit.
“I think we’re both idiots.”
You couldn’t argue with that.
A smile tugged at your mouth.
The first one he’d seen in months.
Like he’d forgotten what it looked like.
Then, slowly, he smiled too.
Things should have been easier after that conversation.
That was the annoying part.
The months of silence were over.
The tension that had followed both of you around like a storm cloud was finally gone.
So everything should have gone back to normal.
Instead, somehow, it got worse.
Because now you and Eren were speaking again.
And apparently neither of you knew how to act.
The first sign something was wrong came the next morning.
You woke up to find your shoulder aching from yesterday’s injury.
What was surprising was opening your eyes and finding Eren sitting nearby.
The second he realized you were awake, he looked away.
“You should still be resting.”
“Good morning to you too.”
Then he handed over a canteen.
Jean noticed immediately.
The man survived purely through gossip and spite.
By midday he had narrowed his eyes at both of you at least six times.
By dinner he finally snapped.
You looked up from your food.
Jean pointed dramatically.
“You were avoiding each other for months.”
“We’ve always been weird.”
“No. This is different weird.”
Across the table, Connie nodded.
“You both keep staring at each other.”
Unfortunately Eren had chosen that exact moment to look at you.
Both of you immediately looked away.
The entire table erupted.
The worst part was that they weren’t entirely wrong.
You had started noticing things. Small things.
Things that had always been there.
You just hadn’t paid attention before.
Like how Eren rubbed the back of his neck whenever he was embarrassed, how he frowned when he concentrated, how his hair constantly ended up in his face, or how his laugh sounded different when it was genuine.
The observations arrived one after another.
And apparently Eren was having the same problem.
Because every time you looked up, you caught him looking too.
The mission continued, several more days, several more things to do.
Several more opportunities for things to become increasingly unbearable.
One afternoon your squad stopped near a river to refill supplies.
Most of the others wandered off.
Leaving you and Eren alone.
The universe seemed determined to make this happen.
You crouched beside the water.
“Your shoulder feeling better?”
Somehow it felt more awkward than the months you hadn’t spoken at all.
To your surprise, Eren laughed.
“I was thinking the same thing.”
“At least we’re suffering together.”
For some reason that made both of you smile.
The next few days became easier.
You started riding beside each other during travel.
Started sharing observations during patrols.
Started falling into old habits.
Because every time you forgot yourself, every time you relaxed around him, there was a moment.
Something that reminded you things weren’t the same anymore.
Like the evening he pushed his jacket toward you when the temperature dropped, the way he instinctively stepped closer whenever danger appeared, how his attention seemed to find you in every crowded space.
You noticed all of it. You always did.
It happened near the end of the mission.
The moment neither of you could ignore anymore.
The squad had stopped for the night.
You sat against a tree watching the stars.
Actually beside you this time. Close enough that your shoulders nearly touched.
For a while neither of you spoke.
The silence wasn’t uncomfortable anymore.
“You know what Jean said earlier?”
That immediately sounded dangerous.
“That’s not specific enough.”
“He’ll have to narrow it down.”
“He said everyone figured it out except us.”
“What exactly did he think we’d figured out?”
Which somehow made it worse.
The silence stretched before he finally looked over. His expression wasn’t nervous or uncertain, just honest.
The same expression he’d worn around the fire a few nights ago.
“I don’t think I stopped missing you.”
Eren looked away briefly.
The confession landed softly.
Yet somehow hit harder than shouting ever had.
“I’d see something and want to tell you.”
His voice was quieter now.
“Then I’d remember we weren’t talking.”
You stared, unable to respond because every single thing he was describing had happened to you too.
The words escaped before you could stop them.
Eren’s eyes widened slightly.
“I hated not talking to you.”
The truth felt strangely easy now.
Something shifted in his expression.
Something that made your chest tighten.
Neither of you looked away. Not this time.
Slowly, Eren moved closer.
Not enough to touch just enough to give you the chance to stop him.
The night around you seemed to disappear until there was only him.
And the realization that this had probably been happening for years.
Long before either of you noticed, before the fight, before the silence.
A rare expression on him.
“You know,” he said quietly, “for someone who’s supposed to be smart, you took a really long time to figure this out.”
Then immediately shoved his shoulder.
The sound warm and familiar.
The sound you never wanted to lose again.
And when he leaned forward this time, neither of you hesitated.
No dramatic declarations, no grand speeches.
Months of anger, years of friendship, feelings neither of you had understood. All of it finally settling into place.
When you pulled apart, Eren rested his forehead against yours.
A smile still lingering on his face.
“We finally stopped being idiots.”
“We’ll probably find a new way to be idiots.”
His laughter echoed through the quiet camp.
And for the first time in a very long time, everything felt right.
© SleepyKina 2026. Do not steal, translate, feed my work into AI, or repost on any other platforms other than tumblr.
