"I love you, Marco."
Silence.
Jean sighed. It hurt. He had fought too many battles for too long and everything ached. His ribs bore purple bruises where the straps of his 3DM gear dug into his flesh. How the hell did Hanji and Erwin and that shortarse Levi manage like that for so many years?
The wind toyed with his hair, playfully flicking it the way he so desperately wanted Marco to. It was a cool breeze—one that had come from outside.
"I brought you flowers," he ventured. "Foxgloves—you told me they were your favourites, because when the wind blows them they look like little church bells. I remembered that, see?" Jean held the bouquet up to the breeze. If the delicate pastel flowers really were bells, they would have tinkled.
The man (Jean had brought down six titans so far, and he no longer thought of himself as a boy, seventeen years old or not) sat down on the grass, which was still damp with early-morning dew. He gently laid the flowers on Marco's lap.
Marco said nothing, just stared at him impassively with those granite-grey eyes Jean had always loved to lose himself in.
"You deserve better than me," Jean said quietly. "I'm an idiot, Marc. Such a moron."
The foxgloves swayed. The blackbirds in the tree overshadowing them sang their songs, oblivious to the hell beyond the walls. Still, Marco would not say a word.
"I like your freckles," Jean said suddenly, if only to break the silence that had descended. "I know I always said they were goofy, but I think they're cute. Really." He absently picked at the grass blades between them. Tears pricked in his eyes, and he savagely blinked them away. He hadn't cried since Trost, and he wasn't about to start now. "I should have told you that before. I'm sorry, Marco." His voice cracked like ice at the first breath of spring. "I'm so sorry."
Marco's headstone stared back at him, cold, impassive and silent.
A/N: I'M SO SORRY