Only a few chosen ones manage to write good stories in a short period of time, and I'm not one of them. What was I trying to achieve? I don't know either lmao
Now back to working on Adamantine!
Happy birthday again, wife!
Fine china is for the rich
The sun is close to bordering the line of the horizon, and Captain Levi lifts his gaze off the paper work he is signing to frown at the clock perched above the door of his office. It is already past his usual tea time, nine past six, and she has yet to arrive with a tray in hands and tea set placed smartly on it.
No sooner than he casts his eyes back on the white sheet before him and his pen leaves dark trails of ink on its smooth surface, the door opens and her light footsteps reaches his ears, composed and careful, but there is no china tinkling on the metal of the tray accompanying them. Dotting the I of his name with a little more force than necessary, the man puts down his pen, leans back on his seat, presses his lips together firmly and lets his annoyed glare find her dark eyes, letting her know he isn't happy in the slightest.
Mikasa stands across from him, behind two cushioned chairs with a cardboard box tucked under her left arm, and the way she looks back at him says she doesn't feel bad at all for not bringing his tea in the right time. "Sorry for being late," Levi snorts at her words, and she continues as if he had never interrupted, "we went to town today."
"Oh?" The eyebrow he raised infuriates her, but she is as good as he is in masking her thoughts and the effects his actions have on her. "And you think that's an acceptable excuse?"
She sets her jaw, teeth gritting together, and shifts her weight. "I think it is."
That definitely is the answer he was expecting from her. So defiant. "And pray tell me, why the hell do you think I should accept this shitty excuse?" Mikasa holds his angered stare as she steps forward, the box now in her hands, and Levi moves away the document to the side so she can place the object she brought along where the paper sheet once was.
After pulling back a chair and sitting on it, she silently urges him to open it with a wave of her upturned palm. Levi keeps his wary eyes on her as he reaches for his letter opened hidden within the depths of the drawer to his right, and runs the blade on the cheap tape that keeps the lids closed, tearing it in half. His movements are stiff as he lifts them and removes the top layer of parchment paper protecting the contents, hands freezing at the base of the box when he catches a glimpse of what is inside.
He retrieves the first cup from a fine china tea set from the box, the porcelain painted in white on the outside, two thin strips of gold circling it, and its inside painted black with four dragons drawn in golden ink. Wordlessly, he takes out one of the accompanying saucers, a large black ring followed by a golden one and the center white, the same golden dragons imprinted around it. The whole set is black and white with gold linings and figures, by far one of the prettiest tea sets he had ever seen, and somehow it makes him think of her dark hair, fair skin and fire in her eyes.
"I figured you might like it," Mikasa explains in a soft voice, tone slow and hesitant as if fearing his reaction. Levi turns the cup in his hands carefully to take its features from every possible angle, and she worries he will get eyestrain if he doesn't blink soon. Finally he shifts his gaze away from the fine porcelain in his grasp to look up at her, and with a slight shrug she adds in a quieter tone. "Happy anniversary."
Levi swallows thickly and places it inside the box afraid it might break in his hand. "Thank you for the gift, Ackerman," he almost adds that it is lovely, it really is, and quickly says as he closes the lids, "but I can't accept it."
All her bashfulness dissipates, back straightening as her fingers curl around the arms of the chair and she leans away from the backrest. "Why not?"
He pushes the box towards her and keeps his eyes focused on anything that isn't her face. "This obviously cost you a lot of money, I don't want you to waste it on me."
"I'm not wasting it!" She says firmly, sliding the box back to him. "I wanted to give you something for our one year anniversary, so I did." Defiant.
He forces the box back in her direction. "I didn't get anything for you."
Push."I don't care." So defiant.
Push. "Just return it and take your money back."
"Why don't you just take it!?" Her hands curl in a fist and they slam down on the tabletop, the china inside the box clinks and shakes, and Levi has his palms pressed around the cardboard surface as if to shield it from the strength of her blow. "Why are you so hesitant!?"
The words die in his throat and he shust his mouth tightly, sitting back down on the seat he hadn't realized he shot up from to better protect the tea set from her angry outburst. Slowly, he exhales through his nose and allows his hands to fall flat on the tabletop, muscles itching to hold onto the cardboard box for a while longer just in case she decides to slam her fists down again. Levi is sure, though, that every move he makes won't go unnoticed by her, and soon she can start questioning why a china set is making him so agitated.
Surely, there is no way she knows about the first tea set he bought, the one he gave his blood and sweat to purchase. No one knows about it, no one knows why he holds his teacup by the rim to drink his tea; no one knows anything of his past besides the fact that he used to live in the streets. If Erwin doesn't know these details of his life, then she certainly doesn't, but even if she knows it is unlikely that she will make fun or even pity him.
Levi swallows past the lump in his throat and clears it as he shifts and occupies his hands with organizing the lonely paper sheet out of the pile of work to be done; the soldier sitting across from him can easily tell that something is bothering him, but she, as always, wisely chooses to not comment on it, giving him the freedom to speak whenever he desires. "Firstly, I'm going to ask you to lower your tone," he says calmly, and Mikasa slumps back into the chair with a huff. "No one knows that there's something happening here, so I'd thank you if things remained like this just for a while longer."
She nods her head in understanding; good, he thinks, and briefly picks the right words to say. "Secondly, happy anniversary. I should have gotten something for you, but alas thought you would think it was unnecessary." He hears her scoff and a light smirk tugs at the corner of his lips. "Even the toughest of soldiers have a heart; maybe I should have considered it."
Mikasa hums, "What's up with the touching speech?"
"I guess I'm trying to make it up for not getting you anything."
"The Captain Levi? Trying to fix his mistakes?" She snorts lightly, "That's unlikely."
"Just as unlikely as you being sarcastic." He agrees, and then fixes his stare on the cardboard box. "I really can't accept this, though. I know how much a fine set of china like this one costs; you could buy something nice for yourself."
"Like what?" She asks as she places her arms on the tabletop and rests her chin on them. "A dress I'll never wear?"
"Like a dress you'll never wear." Levi nods his head and sighs, hands pushing at the box again. "Take it, I don't need it."
Mikasa sets her lips in a thin line whilst she ponders, dark eyes focused on the leader of her squad, the very same man she meets with in dark corners at night, and notices the light stress crease between his eyebrows, the way his hands linger on the box for a second longer, the way his half lidded eyes try to conceal things from her. When his hands are finally a safe distance away from the tea set and his gaze has focused elsewhere, she breathes out through her nose and sits up straight once more, ready to test her hypothesis. In an excruciating slow pace, she pulls the box closer to herself, watching as he lets his eyes flicker in its direction before forcing them to look away, and the fingers of the hands he has resting on the table loosely curl inwards toward his palm.
The chair skids back on the rough carpet of his office as she rises to her feet, china set within the cardboard tucked once again under her arm, and she gives him one salute that he dismisses. "You know, Captain, they say I'm a terrible liar, but I guess they haven't seen you lie yet." He scowls at her back, but the girl simply tap two fingers to the box and waves goodbye, never turning around to face him. "Meet me in the kitchen tonight."
It is way past his bedtime and Levi is in a foul mood. Mikasa, the one responsible for bringing him his tea that month, didn't dare to show up again after she left and didn't even cross paths with him again. She is punishing him, he guesses, and he should leave her waiting all night for him, pay back with the same coin, and he would have left her there alone by herself in the kitchen if they didn't have an important strategy practice on the following day, so the sooner he gets this over with, the sooner they will be in bed, and both of them will be in their best condition.
When he pushes past the closed doors, Mikasa has tea brewing in the corner of the counter, and is currently setting aside two cups and saucers from her mostly black and white tea set. He resists the urge to sigh loudly at her stubbornness (he knew from the beginning that she wouldn't return it to the shop) and simply chooses a seat to take, fine porcelain is placed before him, and he is left alone as the girl resumes preparing the tea.
Peppermint, the rich smell permeates through the kitchen, and he recalls the time when she had confessed that this one kind of tea was the only one that could soothe her senses when she was just a child that didn't want to sleep early, it was also her favorite. And then he asked her which ones she had the chance to try, and he was amazed at the number, so high for a girl so young, but he should have guessed, her mother was Asian and without a shadow of a doubt a lover of tea.
His whole life Levi had only had a few, so when she had asked him the same question – out of respect only, because she never really cared for what he had to say then, and her mother had taught her good manners – he gave her a vague answer, mentioned two kinds and shooed her away as soon as the warm liquid was poured into his cup.
Black and green mostly, though he has a preference for the former, the latter is just fine, and he itches to have a taste of white tea. Oolong, chamomile, pu-erh, honey bush, yerba mate, rooibos; you ask and he can name every kind of tea by heart with unfocused eyes and a thick tongue, fingertip usually tracing the rim of the cup in his hand. There is always that far away look in his eyes whenever the subject is brought up, and he sometimes berates himself for getting touchy over it.
When finally Mikasa is back, she has to snap him out of his reverie, and Levi places down the cup that he has been analyzing for the past couple of minutes with what he believes is a mumbled apology that stumbles out his lips. He likes it when she catches up on his actions but doesn't comment on them and simply tilts the tea pot, letting the thin green stream fill his cup, and shifts away to pour some for herself, leaving him to his thoughts for only a brief moment.
He turns to her, because even if he's not really in the mood for tea anymore, she stayed awake and prepared it all from scratch, went out to pick the right leaves, washed the new china set, boiled the water, prepared and poured it, and he appreciates every single time she brews his tea, every time she places the saucer and the cup before him on his desk; he appreciates it that he now can have it on a regular basis and that no more delicate porcelain snapped in his hands.
Her lips are pursed as she blows at the tea, directing gentle wafts of air forward; they dissipate, and he catches her gaze through the momentary mist that settled between them, his digits burning on the porcelain. "Levi," she says quietly whilst she lowers her cup, and he does the same for his hands won't stop shaking. "Breathe." He scowls at her again, and she cracks a smile, the exchange is over with that, and the cup is now midway to her lips.
Her fingers, he notices, are curled around the wing of the cup, like one should, like the rich and classy people do, and he chooses to hold it the way he always had, because he was never one to feel intimidated by other people's finesse, but the fact that the other half of their affair could drink her tea and hold her cup so confidently told him that, maybe, he wasn't good enough to try and live the rich life.
So he picks his cup by the rim, and Mikasa, the one with slanted eyes and straight dark hair that she inherited from her mother; Mikasa, who can fly and slay titans with grace and efficiency, and perhaps a little bit of temper; Mikasa, the one that will one day take his place and lead her own squad; Mikasa, whose touch left trails of fire on his skin, whose kisses left him breathless, simply smiles at the gesture and watches intently as he sips her favorite tea for the first time.
And he knows she accepts him the way he is, with all his quirks, cleaning habits, and unvoiced worries and insecurities, and he knows it isn't the way he holds his cup that is going to end their relationship – his foul mouth will.
"This tea tastes like shit," he confesses in one of the most impassive tones he can muster, and the fine china in her hand almost snaps under the strength of her grip.