If you know the song You Could be Happy by Snow Patrol, you'll catch some of the lyrics here. You could listen to it while reading this.
"I thought we agreed to never leave each other? That was the promise, asshole."
"I'm sorry," the other man said, and Levi imagined how tears would form in Eren's green eyes.
He was a crybaby, his Eren. A very determined crybaby.
"Sorry doesn't make up for anything, brat. Get your ass back here."
Levi pulled at his telephone's cord, one of the few things in his house that wasn't caked with dust. He wouldn't be surprised if he got up from his sitting position, and saw an outline of his body on the wall he leaned on and the floor he sat on.
He didn't know how long he had been waiting there.
"Levi, forget about me."
At 26, Levi wasn't sure if he was supposed to be experiencing signs of high blood pressure, but he was. "Forget about you? You think I can do that? You think it's that easy? You're pretty fucking cruel, you know that?"
"Please, Levi. Please just… move on."
The words rang in his ears. Move on. As if he hadn't been telling himself to do just that.
"I can't."
"Yes, you can. Stop imprisoning yourself. You could be happy, Levi."
"You took away my happiness, Eren. I can't be happy," he spat back.
"Then do the things you've always wanted to do!" Levi imagined Eren's face scrunching into an angry expression, like it always did whenever he thought someone was being stubborn. "No one's going to hold you back anymore."
"I would much rather be held back if that meant you coming back."
"I'm never coming back, Levi. I'm never ever coming back. You know that."
Levi swallowed down the lump in his throat, hating the words he was hearing. "I saw you yesterday. I saw you in the bookshop we used to go to. I saw you."
"I wasn't there."
"It seemed so real…"
"It wasn't."
Rivaille felt tears graze his cheeks, but he didn't try to wipe them off his face. It would be pointless.
"Eren, you were the good in me. You were the good thing in my life—"
"But I'm ruining you now. Because of me, you've become like that. Have you even seen any of your friends lately? Hanji? Petra? Irwin, Auruo, Erd? If I'm the good in you, why the fuck are you ruining your life because of me? Stop holding on to hopes that I'll be coming back, Levi, because I'm not. Because I can't. So please, please just let me go."
"I can't…"
"You can. Put down the phone. Let me go."
Rivaille pressed the receiver into his ear even harder, shaking his head. "No."
"Please. Please, just… stop this. Accept that I'm gone and move on. Stop waiting for me because I'm never coming back. Stop hurting yourself because it hurts me, too. I thought you loved me?"
Of all the things that had changed, this was one Levi knew hadn't. "I did. Still do."
"Then set me free. Set yourself free. Put down the phone." Eren sounded so sure, sounded so strong to Rivaille's ears. His voice had a finality in them that even Rivaille couldn't counter.
He didn't try to hide the traitor sobs that escaped his lips as he slowly removed the phone from his ear, but it didn't go far. Halfway back to its holder, he brought it back up and pressed it to his ear.
He was met with silence.
He put the phone back on the holder and pulled it back up, still, the line was silent.
The whole place was silent.
If anyone saw him right now, they would probably think that he was going nuts. At this point, he could almost think the same. Not that he cared what other people think. Not that he ever cared.
But Eren was right; he had to move on. He had to step forward, and he did just that. Rivaille got up, staggered a bit, but he got up. He looked around his empty apartment, void of any other life form, and noted that it had been like that for months, maybe even years. He just refused to accept the fact that the other life form, Eren, was gone for good.
He needed to fix his life, just like what Eren would have told him in reality. He needed to get a move on, he needed to accept that he was gone, but the world was still spinning.
Spinning so much that it almost made him dizzy.
His apartment was in its worst state he'd ever seen, and he had to fix that, because the Rivaille Eren knew would never let his living space look so much like a junkyard. He needed to fix things.
He needed to get rid of the dead atmosphere that Eren left behind. He needed to bring the place back to life, if he couldn't do that for the person he loved.
He started with his telephone, reconnecting it to its socket.