Hello! I wrote this story to celebrate Rivamika Week 6 for the day 6 of the Tarot Card Prompt "The Hanged Man". Kind of an angst story so yeah, I have warned you.
Hope you like it!
He walked under the cloudy sky when the snow fell like drizzle on spring. His two brown boots helped him walking on the snow when it could sink him and made his fingers froze to death. Both of his hand covered in a pair of thin old gloves had tucked into his jacket pocket, saving them from the cold that could freeze his heart – or he could say that his heart already did. His world was never been any better since that day – that time when he lost his life over and over again.
His two legs brought him to the same place over and over again, every year, every time when the snow fell to the earth as the sign that winter had come. He never knew why he always stood there, looking into the frozen river with the big tree on its side – or probably he did not want to know, or maybe he knew, but he tried to forget. The hands in his pocket clenched every time his eyes fell onto the river, teeth making uncomfortable sound and eyes shutting down.
The snow that fell from the sky started turning his raven hair on top of his head into white, made him looked like he had grey hair like an old man when he was only in his mid-thirty. He did not want to leave nor stay neither. The contradiction between what his brain told him to do and what his heart whispered him to do made him dizzy like there was something screaming inside his head. He wanted it to stop. He wanted it to stop bugging him and drive him mad.
The raven walked down the road to the river, standing in front of the old cherry blossom tree that had no leaves in the winter – except the last leaf on top of the tree. For the first time in this day, the guy took his hand from his pocket and caressed the branch when he could find a scratch that made something like a name on it. He could tell that the scratch started to fade away from the last time he was here. This place was always been the start point and some ends of his journey. He just knew when everything ended, it would back here again and again.
The cold wind that made those black cats on the road shivered to dead, flew away the last leaf on the tree and took it away to nowhere. He lifted up his head and saw the leaf started to look smaller and smaller until it was gone.
Then he smiled bitterly, trying to hide the feelings that would started to eat himself. And for the many times – he was already tired to count – Levi was alone again.
The war was over, people said. Those titans that roaming around outside the wall were gone with no trace from any of them. People were celebrating what they achieved that day. After a very long time got haunted by those human's threat that lived outside the wall, people started to believe that they could reach what they called happiness, or we could say as the safeness. The feelings of being free was the exact phrase to call what they always wanted to archive every time they saw how hopeless people inside the wall.
What left behind was only the history that would be told from one to another, from old man to his grandchild, and from the year to another. History was always written on the book. A book that was going to tell everyone everything on the other time. It could be manipulated or changed by someone intentionally, or not, depend on how they were told by older people.
Actually, the one person known as the Humanity's Strongest was against the idea that people would get their freedom until the end of the world. That was not immortal, the limitation existed, and that was how he pictured those threats that probably would occur a few years from now.
Being a stubborn man like always, Levi was sitting alone in the top of Wall Maria, looking to the sun that started to sink at the West. After a few years being the centre of the crowd, he was never get used to the idea of him being the hero or the one of many who had participated in the war and ready to sacrifice his life for the humanity. That was just, not his part of being included in some big parties with loud music and people cheering like there was no tomorrow.
"Captain."
Levi knew who was calling him without having to turn his head. He could recognise the voice easily like a piece of cake. People might not know why but they did.
"Stop with the honorific, Mikasa. Everything's over," The Captain turned his head to the girl who stood behind him with her expressionless face like always. "And nobody's here."
A few steps brought Mikasa to him and let her sit by his side. The silence that was really familiar between them never made the tension became awkward. They loved the silent as much as they loved each other.
"What will you do after this?"
"The war is not over. This is just temporary and people will start to make another war with other different causes. People are really mad for sure. It's only the beginning for them to know what their world is, what is inside, and what is outside. They don't even know what will happen if they walk a hundred miles from here to the outside. What they know is we win this war, for now, but not for tomorrow. Everything's going to happen in a blink of an eye."
"You're not answering my question."
"What's the point of answering your question? We're still bonded by this after-war-event and how do I know what will I do after all of these?" He gestured to the wrecked district at the Wall Maria where they finally took down the Beast Titan not so long ago. It was absolutely ruined. The buildings were flat with the ground like they were never existed.
"We still have much time helping those people to rebuild the district and we don't know how long it will take us to be here. Maybe a week, a month, a year, or maybe until my body rotting into dust until there's no bone to remember. I don't have any times to think about what will I do and what I want to do. Just let it happen. I don't really care."
"Levi, what do you want to do after all of this?" Without giving Levi any chances to continue his speaking, Mikasa increased her tone by asking him the similar question with the other one she did.
His eyes were looking to the sinking sun where he tried to spot the detail on the surface of the glowing thing that never die. The birds flew quickly to come back to their nest before the dark blinded them. Speaking of birds, Levi was always been captivated by those flying creatures that flied freely on the sky. They were free. The freedom was always been their motto. He wanted to be the one. He wanted to free himself from everything that caged him in his own mind.
And with some hesitance, he answered her.
"I... I want to go far away from here. I want to live in a small cottage beside the river with a little garden in front of it. I want to die there. I want to sleep silently on my old days. Closing my eyes and forget everything that happened in my life before."
Mikasa's comfortable laugh reached his ears and made him turned his head towards her. He saw how Mikasa closed her eyes and how those wrinkles showed on her forehead. He was really glad that the only girl that could take his heart away was on his side now, laughing sweetly like those shy princesses in a story book he once found in the city.
"You're so stubborn."
He shrugged his shoulders and put his one leg on his chin. "Well, thank you. I get that a lot."
"You're not going to ask me something? Or maybe ask me where will I go after this." She chuckled and placed her head to his shoulder, feeling the heat of his body spread to her.
Levi smiled to himself.
"That's unnecessary. Without asking you I know you will go with me."
"You know me so well."
"Yes I do, Mikasa. I do."
After a few months of hard-working helping to rebuild all the districts and balance the economic issues – and other things of course – the Survey Corps was officially dismissed and every soldiers who wore the sign of Wings of Freedom on their back was ready so say goodbye to the place they once called home. The one and only place they were willing to give their lives to. No one could express what they felt that day when one by one started to walk on their own paths. There were only a goodbye and cries that ended the last 'expedition' of their own.
Not really different with Levi and Mikasa. A few days after the dismissal of the Survey Corps, they decided to get married and surprised all of the ex-members of the Survey Corps (Levi told Mikasa not to tell anyone – because he said it would be bothersome to invite many people – but she was trying to be a good fiancée, so she told everyone by giving them a letter of her marriage). Their wedding was not that kind of fancy wedding with high budget. Theirs only a little party with close people gathered on the backyard of their little cottage which Levi always wanted. Kind of hard to find one, but he did. A little cottage beside the river with no house around it and surrounded by forest. Like how he always imagined it to be.
Two years had passed and they – Levi and Mikasa – lived happily with their new life. They usually went to the city when they needed something for their supply or just took a walk around the city. If they were lucky, they sometimes met their old friends like that day when they met Eren at the Capital. Surprisingly, Eren told them he was called to the castle to be a soldier. But Eren was being Eren, he rejected the offer and became a worker of a little bakery in the Capital (of course he made a few commotions and got fired a few times).
Even though they already got married for two years, they did not want a baby for now. They just wanted to live by themselves from now without having any one to disturb their silent, happy life. Their married life was unusually went well, even though Hanji did not approve them at the first time Levi told her that they would move to a place far from the wall (because she always thought maybe one day she would get an invitation of one of their funeral because they always tried to kill each other).
The new house became the old one, consisted of two people who loved each other dearly. Of course Levi and Mikasa once had that kind of big argument which made her ran off from the house to the city and stayed with Eren for a few days. Honestly, the problem was so simple that a toddler could even solve it by itself. And Eren was being the densest person in the world, he had no clue about what he had to do to calm the tension between the married couple. Until the third day of Mikasa's departure, Eren found his little house's door broke down when the one and only his idol stormed into his house and begged Mikasa to come home.
They were both surely a stubborn people. The strongest people in the world united under the same rooftop for how long they did not know – but the wished for the eternity. No one was going to give up when they were in a heated argument. Being a hot-headed person made Levi and Mikasa sometimes lost their temper and went mad like those who struggle as a homeless person. But, they were just trying to be themselves. That was the only way of them to express their feelings without having to turn back their heads to hide their rose cheeks.
Love was one of many things that toughen their relationship. With each love spread from one to another, the bond between their hearts got tighten and people could assumed that nothing could separate them. They believed and trusted each other like what they did on the battlefield when they trusted their lives in each other's hand.
And, that was them. They always said, we're happy, and they really did.
But that one ended a few months after their third anniversary. One day, Levi found Mikasa passed out on the floor with blood came out from her mouth. He did not know what to do except brought her to Hanji who lived at Wall Sina. He still remembered that day when he begged Hanji to wake Mikasa up with rage on his face.
She woke up, for sure, but he did not really listen what came next from Hanji's mouth. She said something about sick, ill, short life, dead, or whatever came from Hanji's wide mouth was brought him down like he was casted away from a cliff and hit the ground, broke all of his bones in instant. He lost it. Levi just hugged Mikasa with so much force and promised her a long life like he did when he said his oath on their wedding day.
On a snowy day a few months after Mikasa started to lose some weight and her skin looked paler than he ever saw, she asked Levi to bring her outside, sitting under the big tree called cherry blossom with their names carved on it that grew in front of their house. Of course Levi declined her wish. The weather is too cold outside, he said to her that time. But she begged him for her dear life and with some hesitance, he granted her wish.
"The tree already has its leaves fell off and it's only covered in snow." Mikasa uttered her thought when she looked up to the leafless tree.
Levi had Mikasa in his arms, hugged her from behind to collect the heat to warm her in his embrace.
"I want to watch the cherry blossom when it blooms with you like we did last year. Just a few months from now."
He hugged her tightly.
Mikasa's hold on Levi's hand got tighter and woke him up from his caged mind. She was curled up in his arms with a little sob made a terrifying melody for him. "Please, Levi, don't forget me. Please, wait me here, in our little house. Please, remember me."
And his world fell down like a rain in a rainy day that occurred once a year. His heart clenched while he promised his heart to her. I promise I will always be here looking for you. I will always waiting for you to come back.
And then, she just smiled while a streak of tears fell from her right eye before she finally closed her eyes for the eternity. There was no goodbye. There was no farewell. There was only a short 'thank you' and promise between the two hearts that got separated.
That time, Levi could not remember anything after. His vision got blurred and his body went limp and he really did not know what happened to him. What he remembered was how hard he cried and how he begged the God to bring her back to his arms. And after that, his world became black and he lost all of his senses like he was sucked into a black hole.
When he got back his consciousness, the first thing he knew was that everything was still black. He was floating on something like a water. But it was all black. And again, he begged the God, asked Him to make him sleeping for forever. It did not matter if he would not wake up again and back to the world because his world had been taken away. The idea of him waking up was an unnecessary thing to hope this time.
"Mister, are you okay?"
And he opened his eyes. Eyes widen when he found himself laying on the cold ground under a grey sky. The first thing he recognised was the old cherry blossom tree like what he had in front of his house standing sturdy beside him. He looked around and found a few weird building with antic architecture on his right side, about one hundred metre from where he was laying.
What the fuck?
He really cursed under his breathe. The weird surrounding around him made him dizzy like he was crashed by a carriage contained of woods. He did not even remember that a place like this was ever existed, not in the Sina, Rose, Maria, or somewhere else.
"Mister?"
For the second time, the voice that called him made him turned his head towards the voice and how terrified he was when he found the one who called him was a little child around six years old with a weird dress decorated in ribbons and looked like someone he knew dearly.
"Mikasa?"
The little girl tilted her head.
"How do you know my name, Mister?"
Like struck by one hundred volt lightning, Levi's body went rigid. "What are you doing here in this kind of weather, Mister? You can catch a cold."
The hair, the eyes, the movement, the expression, everything was looked like her. The way she tilted her head to the left when she was confused, how she blink her eyes when she curious about something. He might be the only one who knew those secrets of his lover. She was the one and only who did that in some occasion.
He jumped and hugged the little child tightly, let his tears fell from his face. "Mikasa, it's me! I don't know what the hell is happening but it's me! I'm so glad we meet again."
Unfortunately, with so much force, the little girl pushed himself far away from her. Levi's startled face looked at the girl threatened face and made his blood stopped flowing for a moment.
"I – I'm sorry, Mister. I don't know what are you talking about. I'm here just want to help you."
The little girl who, accidently, had the same name with Mikasa he knew made him kneeled on the snowy ground with his head focus on the snow between his knees. The little girl absolutely brought back the memories of someone special in Levi's life who already – gone. Those memories flooded in his mind like they were trying to consume him in his own imaginary. The picture of Mikasa was everywhere in his head and he could see her smiling in front of his face like those beautiful days back then when everything was alright.
"I found you when I was playing. I don't know whether you die of just sleeping." Mikasa was standing in front him, black eyes looking through his eyes. "Do you hungry? I have food at home."
Levi's foot brought him walked behind the little girl unconsciously. He did not know why he agreed to accept her invitation even though he had no idea who was the little girl and where he was right now. The little light in his heart just told him so.
His surrounding was totally blew his mind. The very weird buildings and strange atmosphere made him shivered like a little child trapped in his little imagination on the snowy day. Without realising it, both of his hands were trembling really hard because two reasons; the cold and the other one could be the nervousness of him being in some place he did not even know.
"Now is the 13rd century, 1267, when people called it Middle Age Era." The steak he ate almost chocked him to death. He did not know what the fuck was happening and how could he had been here, four hundred years after the last time he opened his eyes. All of these, might had been only a dream, an illusion made by his unconsciousness. Mikasa's death probably took a big role on his sense and he thought he might be crazy because dreaming this kind of stupid thing.
Without knowing anything and hoping to get up from his weird dream, Levi wandered along the way with no direction after the little Mikasa let him sleep for a night as a guest. He slept, and he did not dream. He woke up, and found himself in the same time, same situation, same surrounding, nothing was different. Mikasa in this time was a daughter of a famous noble who controlled the economic side. And Levi could know by seeing how she dressed with those expensive looking dresses. People in this time had a very different style from his own time. Woman tended to wore different style of long dress with many ribbons and another accessories on it while men only wore a simple suit with high-knee boots like what they did in his real time. Levi tried to adapt with the new environment, and finally he knew that it was not only a strange dream.
Walking, walking, and walking, he spent his days on walking alone from a city to a city, from a country to another, and from somewhere to nowhere. He already tired counting how many moon he had seen and how many seasons rolled in front of his eyes. War and war and war never left his eyesight every time he stomped to a new land. People were really crazy and his mind-set did not change after all.
Until that time, accidently – and he did not know how – he came back to the city when he first opened his eyes. The old cherry blossom tree that was so familiar with him was standing strongly beside the river. He finally realised that at this place, was where his house, his real house, stood solidly a many years ago. It was gone and changed into a solid street and left no trace at all.
"I guess you really love this tree, don't you?"
He turned his head and found Mikasa smiled not so far from where he was. Closing his eyes and tried to calm his heart, he took a deep sigh and smiled at the figure who resembled his Mikasa, his love.
"It's been ten years and you come back to this place. I thought you were gone too far away place." The smiled on her face made his heart clenched again and again and it started to hurt his chest. It's not her, it's not her, he declared to himself. "Isn't it weird we always meet at the snowy day?"
She was growing into a lady with short black hair in a long elegant dress. She walked like a princess and she talked like someone who existed in the past.
"And you're not getting older. What kind of medicine you take?" Mikasa said jokingly with a smirk on her face. And that was a hurtful truth. Levi was not a stupid person. After ten years wandering around the world, he found out that he was still the same, no wrinkles showed up on his face.
The first time he found out about this was when he lived with an old lady who had a little grandchild and stayed in the rural area. He watched the little child grew up into a teenage boy while the old lady started to lose her ability when she became older. But not for him. He stayed young. He stopped to grow up. And that freaked him to a new level.
But that was the only nightmare he found in his new life. He could not feel any pain. Once, his finger got hurt when he chopped vegetables for the dinner. Blood spurted from his finger but there was no pain he felt. Another time, he got crashed by a carriage when he walked crossed the street. Broken bones and concussion, but he could not feel any pain. And that time, he knew that he was a monster living as a human.
He was immortal.
"It's good to be like you. You can be looked so young even though you're not."
No, it's not good.
He could not remember how many days he spent with Mikasa and how much the strange girl could resembled the real Mikasa. All about her was the same with the one Levi knew. Her favourite colour, her favourite things to do, and how she pictured the world around her. Honestly, Levi could not find any different between the two Mikasa. And he started to love her like he loved his Mikasa. Even though he shall not.
On the second Thursday of the December 1278 when the snow fell like a storm, Levi lost his world for the second time. The rebellion of the society demanded for the better economic state brought the death of the noble family when people got their proposal rejected by the head of the noble family. Mikasa's parents died in a blink of an eye but she succeeded to run off with Levi's help. They ran for a miles of two until her heart pierced with a hot bullet shot from behind and made her heart stopped for forever. She died in his arms for the second time and there was no goodbye, like what they did before.
And his world crumbled like a cookie got stomped by a little child.
When he got back to the old cherry blossom tree beside the river many years after the incident, he found himself sitting under it with snow touch his head. Mind wandered nowhere and foot brought him to a new place he could not even to pronounce. He never knew why but every time he started his own expedition to prove that the earth was a ball as a loner, he would come back here, to the place – he told himself – he was belong.
The second time he met another Mikasa was on snowy day, at the same place, at the same time, but a different story. Two hundred years from the last time he saw Mikasa died for the second time, and his appearance was still the same.
"Mister, are you okay?"
And he found himself in the same situation when he turned his head and discovered a little girl with raven hair dressed in a simple dress woke him from his daydreaming. A loud sigh and bitter smile produced from him as a symbol of disappointment and a relief.
"What's your name?" He asked the little girl even though he already knew what would be the response he got when that tiny little mouth of hers started moving to produce a sound.
"Mikasa."
Both of his eyes were closed slowly, left him thinking about his life. His different life.
Little Mikasa lived as a traveller, a loner traveller. She had explored the world with her two strong legs alone, with no direction and no place to come home. Started at the age of eight, she wandered along the way for two years and did not even care where the road would brought her. Had no parents to accompany, they died on the accident when the ship sank in the ocean, leaving Mikasa behind. Strangely, she said that she woke up at the shore, she walked and walked and walked until her legs brought her here to this city.
Levi decided he would be the one who would guide little Mikasa wherever she wanted to walk. The little girl needed someone who would stand by her side like what she did to him in the past. They spent their entire lives walking around the world and met so many people who Levi never knew would be that kind or bad. Everything was different when he spent his hundreds of years walking alone without socializing with people. She was here, and he was too. They learnt everything together as she started to grow and come into her twenties.
"You're not getting older."
The second time he met her, and he still heard the same sentence coming from her mouth. He knew why, but she did not. You have to eat healthy food and start to exercise more often to be like me, he said jokingly at her while she caught it up as a serious answer.
He thought maybe he got cursed by the God for all of his sins in the past. Again, for the third time, he had Mikasa died in his arms when an unfamiliar disease destroyed her body day by day. A high fever, a chronic cough with blood-tinged sputum, night sweats, and weight loss made her trapped under Levi's care for about a whole year until she died on a snowy day in the far away land.
The third time he met the little Mikasa was only thirty years after the dead of the second. He met her on the snowy day beside the old cherry blossom tree which he knew very well. This time, she was a child born in a rich broken family with her father was a drunk-hard who liked to hit her. Her mother declared the divorce paper to her father and Mikasa lived with her at the downtown.
When she met Levi, she was separated with her mother when they were looking a supply in the city. She asked the same question when little Mikasa found sleeping Levi under the tree with snow fell to his nose. They became friends. Once a week, Mikasa and her mother went to the city and she met Levi at the different place. He taught her how to do hand-to-hand combat when he knew that kids at her place liked to bully her.
That happened only for seven years before she died by committing suicide a week after her Mum died by a really weird cause – and Levi thought about how Mikasa's father killed her. This time, Levi did not watch her closed her eyes in his arms, but he watched her burnt into ashes without closing his eyes.
The fourth time he met her, she was a six years old princess who live in a big mansion and tried to run off because her mother forbid her to play outside in the snowy day. He found her hiding behind the old cherry blossom when those servants from the big mansion yelled her name. I'm lonely, she said to him.
Levi brought her home after he promised her that he would play with her when she needed. She nodded, and he became her personal servant for twelve years old before she got killed when the feud between royal families peaked.
"Thanks for protecting me all of this time." Her smiled on that noon brought the pain that Levi could not even felt anymore came back for a few minute. The title of 'servant' which he hold was just a title when he could not protect her.
That time, Levi saw the world as a hell for him.
The fifth time, she was mute but still smiled on every occasion like how Levi always pictured herself. She died at the age of twenty eight when she gave her life to save a little kid from falling debris during a war.
Levi noticed something weird every time he found Mikasa's dead from time to time. She never lived a longer life. The longest lifespan of Mikasa that he knew was the fifth when she died at her late twenties. He felt like a looser when he remembered the time he promised her a long life on his wedding day, but the fact was, he never fulfilled his promise.
But sadly, all of them, no one knew who he was. No one remembered him.
The sixth time was the worst for him. He woke up when a little girl tapped his shoulder when he took a nap under the old cherry blossom tree. The first question who came out from Mikasa's mouth was always the same over the years with the same tone and the same expression.
"My grandma said my mother named me after a woman who willing to give her life to safe humanity when the war occurred a long time ago."
Mikasa in this period lived as an ordinary citizen who had a full care under the country when the World War I occurred. She had her old grandmother waiting for her in her simple house who always welcomed her by her cheap yet delicious home-made food.
She lost her grandmother when she reached the age of nineteen. Her tears wet Levi's shoulder when he just hugged her tightly, eased the pain in her heart of losing her love ones. That time, Levi's promised her his protection and his presence to always by her side, until one day in his history, beside the old cherry blossom tree, everything changed for the first time.
"Who are you, Levi?"
With some hesitance, he answered her.
"I'm Levi."
She took a step closer to him and asked him the same question.
"You're still the same like when the first time I saw you. You're not getting older like I do and I can't spot any wrinkles on your face even though I observe it closely every time. Who are you, Levi?"
He took it as a warning. Mikasa in this period was smarter than the other Mikasa before. She probably realised why he did not get older and lived without any changes in his body like she did. Giving her the truth was only made things getting more complicated and exactly, she would not believe what would come out from his mouth.
"You're not going to answer me, Captain?"
His dream was over, he thought that time when she called him by his old honorific which people in this time would not recognise. Eyes widen, breathe hitched, and sweat fell from his forehead.
"I know who you are the first time I saw you. I thought – I thought I might be crazy that time I found you under the old tree we spent our time with. I don't know what was happening when I woke up and found myself as a baby in nowhere. And – And I found you sitting on the snowy day and I knew that you were there, you arealways there waiting for me. You're really waiting for me, Levi."
For the first time in forever, he hugged her like he hugged his real Mikasa from many years ago. And for the first time too, he felt how his heart beating so fast and felt the feelings of relief. After hundreds years of his life, he finally found her and she finally found him at the same place they once called home.
They meant for each other, both of them remembered how people in their era would say something like that. Levi might call it as a bullshit because at that time he knew that nothing would last forever. But now, hundreds years after he declared his stupid way of thinking, he started to slap himself about not believing that phrase he used to hear.
But, things would never be the same anymore. There might be something to sacrifice.
"Levi, I lo –"
"No, Mikasa. Please, don't." He cut her before she completed those three little words that he had been dying to hear after a long period of his journey. He pulled himself away from her and kept the distance between themselves.
"What –"
"We can't, Mikasa. We definitely can't."
Anger and disappointment built up and Mikasa fisted her hands strongly. "What are you talking about, Levi? So, after all of these, you still want to argue with me and make things more complicated?"
"Things will get more and more complicated if you say those words."
"Elaborate."
Levi took a deep breath and threw his back until it touched the old cherry blossom tree. He did not want to say it yet he had to say it. Sooner or later he knew he had to be in this kind of situation when everything seemed so wrong. Maybe he finally understood the reason why he lost his sense of knowing what pain was anymore.
"You will get old, but I'm not. You will start to have your bones in pain on your old day when I stay healthy. You will your vision get blurred when you reach your certain age when I don't need any glasses to help me to see something because it's unnecessary. You will grow old together with your husband and kids, and grandchildren, while I wander like a mad man who doesn't recognised by the time and you –"
"But you're my –"
"You will die, but I'm still alive."
He cut her sentence with a simple sentence that stuck on his tongue for a long time. It might be really hurtful to say, but it had to be said. With that, there was no sound produced between them except the cold wind blew the last leaf on the old cherry blossom tree that year.
"Levi, let me be by your side until I die, please. I want to grow old with you even though you can't. I want to close my eyes in my old day for the first time when the last person I see will be you."
Mikasa had begged him for her dear life, like the one she did before she died hundreds years ago. The last time she begged, he granted her wish on her final moment, but now, things looked much hard to even grant that wish.
"Six times I watched you died in front of my eyes has enough to turn me into a mad man who begs God to give me my death. For hundreds years, I begged Him to kill me in the most painful way because I don't want to see you die again. I can't see you die for the seventh time."
The painful feelings was surrounded Levi and brought him into his breaking point. The tears would not come out although he wished it to felt down on his cheeks like a stream.
"I tried to kill myself for how many times I don't fucking remember to stop this non-sense nightmare and it hurts me every time my legs bring me here again and again to see the smaller figure of yourself waking me up from my sleep."
He chocked in his sobs.
"I want you to live your life, get married with normal man with better attitude than me, and have a ton of children running around in your house so it feels more alive like you always want in your life. You will be a good mother – I'm sure about this one – and have your children love you more than I do. Then your son married to a girl from far away land and get their daughter as your grandchildren and –"
And with that, she kissed his forehead, whispered the final goodbye before she left him on the snowy day. She ran as fast as she could without turning her head. Levi did not even call her name to make her turn around and he just let her go, ran far away from him. He knew he had hurt her and being a complete jerk. But he knew too that was the best option for both of them.
He was just like a ghost. People would come and go and forget him because he was an unreal creature. He was not died but he was not alive either.
And finally, after one thousand and forty nine years of being unable to feel anything, a streak of tears fell from his right eyes.
Another year passed and he was wandering along the way like what he used to do. He left and he was back again sixty eight years later after the last time he met her. Like always, when his legs brought him here again and again, but now, the sun was shining brightly in the sky and there was no white thing covered the road. Very unusual, but he knew that something might be happened and for now, he might the only one who knew what would happen.
"You built a house beside the river." The old lady with a grey hair and face covered in wrinkles just smiled at the young man who stood beside her. She was her. The one and only. "It could be dangerous, you know. You disrupt the waterways."
"And you're still the same. Talk too much like always." She chuckled with a cough or two.
"You look really happy." Levi sat beside her wheel chair on the bench in front of the minimalist house. His eyes never left the reflection of the blooming cherry blossom tree on the river when the sunlight gave the colour to make it more colourful. The sun almost set down and the orange light turned the clouds into something like an orange-flavoured candy floss.
"I've never been this happy before."
"I'm glad you're happy."
She lived a long life this time. Eighty seven years old and had three kid and bunch of grandchildren. Her husband who was a veteran soldier from the World War I proposed her two years after the war ended. She replied with a 'yes' and they got married not so long after that. Unfortunately, her husband was gone when she was seventy five because of his lung cancer. But she tried to live happily like what he wanted her to do.
"I was going to invite you when I married. But sadly, I didn't know where you were." In her old age, her smile still made Levi fell in love with her. No matter how old and how ugly she became, he never could take his eyes from her.
"I'm sorry I'm not there."
"Don't be. That's fine."
The wind blew the cherry blossom to the sky and fell to the river. It was really warm and Levi never felt this warm before. It felt like there was a blanket covered his body and made him wanted to sleep and never woke up. The birds that flew in the sky made a melody that made his eyes closed, like a lullaby a mother sang to his son before he went to sleep.
"Thank you for always waiting for me on every snowy day at the same place and sorry for making you bored with this place." She laughed and small smiled showed on Levi's face. "When I closed my eyes that day, I know you will be here and be the one I see before I close my eyes again and again."
"That's my oath to you." He replied, eyes still closing.
Mikasa took a deep breath and blew it slowly.
"You granted my last wish on that day even though many years had passed." Levi opened his eyes and found Mikasa stared at him with her signature smiled on her face.
"I can finally watch the cherry blossom blooms with you again, Levi. I'm very happy and I can't explain this feeling. You make me this happy and this is the best thing I can ever ask. How about you, Levi? Are you happy?"
He reached for her weak hands and hold them tightly. They looked into each other eyes and felt the familiar feelings that had gone for a long time came back again. This time, his smiled matched her like what they did on their wedding day.
"I've never been this happy before."
For the seventh time, she slept and never woke up anymore in his arms but he did not feel any remorse or sadness. He just hold her until the sun sank at the faraway place. His arms would never felt tired to hold her even though million years had passed. He would be the one who hugged her tightly on all her final moments, he promised himself and Mikasa.
And at the end, he chose to take a little rest.
Snowy day never felt this good before – albeit he never found any comfort in cold. Modern era made him became like a history teller when he saw every thing's development from time to time. It was just amazing for him to see the old carriage changed into an expensive good looking car which had the same price as thousands of cows at the farm.
His legs brought him to an old bench in front of the old cherry blossom tree and watched the kids playing happily on the frozen river. With his more developed brain, Levi knew how to play the thing they called 'ice skating' and surprisingly he had talent for that. Every noon, those kids would ask him to teach them how to play it. Four kids in count and one of them was the one who could made the smile on his face got wider and wider.
"Mister Levi, you look very happy today." The little girl with raven hair and had her body wrapped in brown winter jacket asked him while she ate her beef sandwich for lunch.
Levi smiled sweetly and met her eyes. It did not matter for him anymore if he would life for the eternity or he had to see people who passed him every day rot when they could not against time. He believed to himself that everything would be fine as long as he could see the love of his love smiled beautifully like what she did on their wedding day.
"Yes, I am."
He ruffled her hair and replied what he said. "I'm very, very happy, Mikasa."