Pairing: Eren/Mikasa
Setting: Modern AU; Set in an ER when they are early college aged
Rating: T (Strong Language)
Words: 2974
Notes: I had no idea what to do for this prompt at first, but then I thought of Eren doing some ridiculous stunt and ending up hurt for it and here you go. I also know I'm a sap and don't write them fighting often but that is a key part to their relationship and something I did feel would come into play here (don't worry there's still plenty fluff xD)
October 7th - Hardcore
There was nothing more miserable than spending a Saturday in the ER waiting room. Eren just wanted to walk right out those automatic doors he came in and get back out into the sunshine of his weekend but that would be a little bit difficult when he couldn't actually walk. He looked down at his leg, propped up across a few of the waiting room chairs, and bound by the temporary cast the EMTs in the ambulance had put him in. It was weird to look at; it was swollen up to his knee with big purple bruises coming in and a few cuts they had cleaned up in the ambulance. It wasn't like it hurt all that much, at least when there was no pressure on it, but it was pretty gross to look at. Regardless, it wasn't how he wanted to spend his Saturday; it was the last thing he wanted to do on his Saturday.
He turned his head too look around the others in the room. There were a few parents with kids, an old guy who sounded like he was coughing up his lungs every six seconds, a teenage girl with her arm in a sling sitting next to her mom, someone in the corner who looked like he hadn't slept in ten years, a college aged guy with a broken nose, a various few people who looked about as miserable as he was but Eren's favorite was the guy who had his arm stuck in some kind of metal tube.
Eren turned to look directly over his shoulder. "Hey, Mikasa," he whispered to the black haired girl sitting next to him. "How drunk do you think that guy was to pull that one off? Well, not pull it off I guess."
The only response he got was Mikasa's narrowed eyes glaring at him before she looked away again.
Correction, there was nothing more miserable than spending a Saturday in the ER waiting room and having one of your best friends pissed off at you. He sighed and turned back around. She had been angry since the ambulance got there, and in the ambulance, and for the hours they had been sitting here waiting to be called in. At least once Armin knew Eren was okay he chilled out a little bit but Mikasa barely showed any sympathy, just anger.
Okay, so it was his fault. He probably shouldn't have jumped his bike off the relatively high stone wall and onto the pavement that might've had too much dirt and small rocks on it causing his bike to skid out and the full impact landing on his leg. Yeah, Mikasa specifically told him not to do it but it was Mikasa, she always told him not to do things that he was gonna do anyway. So okay in this case, she was right…like she normally was.
"C'mon, Mikasa, this is boring enough, please talk to me," he tried again, leaning his head backwards till it hit her shoulder. It didn't work; she didn't even look at him this time. He groaned and pulled his head back up. Jesus, she was not gonna make this easy was she?
Granted, Mikasa was the one who was on her knees next to him the moment he fell and she was the one sat by his side in the ambulance and the one who gave up her Saturday willingly to keep him company in the ER when Armin had to go to work and when no none of his other friends there really showed any interest in spending their day in the hospital with him. So yeah, she was pissed at him, but she was still there with him.
"Do you think if I told them my dad was a doctor here they'd they me in?" Eren asked, glancing over to see if she was gonna speak to him now.
She still didn't look over at him. "Maybe if he wasn't out of the country this weekend but I doubt getting a page that his son is in the ER wouldn't make any of this process any easier on you."
Well, she had a point; his dad would probably give him some lecture about not being reckless and still make him wait in the ER to teach him a lesson. "At least I got you to talk to me."
Mikasa looked over at him and if looks could kill, he would be long gone. "Is this a joke to you, Eren?"
He felt the familiar twitch of annoyance flicker in his body. "Obviously not," he said gesturing down to his leg. "It's not like I'm having a grand ol' time myself sitting in the ER on the weekend with a possibly broken leg and my best friend not talking to me but just scolding me instead. Excuse me for trying to make the best of it."
"The best of it," she scoffed. "You jumped your bike off a five foot ledge. You're lucky it's only your leg that's broken and not anything else and after I told you not to do it, but no, you never listen to me."
"Maybe I'd listen to you if you'd stop treating me like I was your baby brother and not your friend you've known for God knows how long anymore. I can take care of myself,I don't need you breathing down my neck all the fucking time!"
"Well, obviously you can't because here we are waiting to see if you get to wear a cast for the next six weeks."
God, she was infuriating sometimes; Eren couldn't even keep the anger from rising up. "Oh, so that's what we're gonna play. Mikasa was right and Eren was wrong. The story of my fucking life."
"Maybe if you'd listen to me for once then you-"
"Then I'd what, Mikasa? Be so thankful to you for making sure I lived in a bubble and never got to do anything fun. Ever."
"No, Eren, that's not what-"
"Eren Jaeger?" The sudden and unfamiliar voice made Eren jump. He looked up to see a nurse with a file in her hand looking out into the waiting room.
"Right here!" Eren waved his arm to make sure they didn't by pass him; that was all he needed was to wait here longer.
The nurse had a wheelchair already and brought it right over to him. He pushed himself up, shifting his body forward as best he could. The nurse had a firm hand on the wheelchair so all he had to do was just slid himself from one chair to the other. He saw Mikasa walk around to the other side of the chair reaching out to help him but he shot her a look.
"I'm fine." It might've come out harsher than he intended and he knew he shouldn't fight with her when really he was at fault, but he was already too irritated to care. He slid over with ease, until he hit his bad leg on the wheelchair when he sat down. Eren tried to mask the pain that shot through his body but he knew Mikasa, who was now walking beside the nurse as she pushed him, saw right through it. She furrowed her brow in concern but kept her words to herself if she had any.
He tried to see if he recognized any of the doctors or nurses hurrying all around them down the halls but his dad worked in a completely different department of the hospital, and Eren tried to not frequent the ER if he could avoid it. The nurse turned him into a usual hospital room with the examination table, a few chairs, sink, counter, cabinets, health posters, the usual works.
"Can you get up there yourself?" the nurse asked as she stopped the wheelchair parallel to the table.
"Yeah, I got it." Eren wasn't sure he had it though looking at the examination table that was a quite bit higher than the wheelchair. He stood up from the wheel chair, balancing on the leg that wasn't bound in a cast before turning to hop up onto the table. He tried to swing both his legs up onto the crinkly paper that covered the cushions which didn't even pretend to be comfortable, but his bound up leg didn't move quite like he wanted it to. He braced himself for it to hit the side of the table but Mikasa's hands caught his leg first bringing it carefully up on the table for him.
"Thanks," he muttered, trying to not look at her directly as to not feel guilty for yelling at her earlier. It's not like he didn't have a reason to be mad, she knew how much he hated her babying him like that; even still, he didn't like to be the one to upset her when he knew she was just worried about him.
"I see you fell when you were riding your bike is that correct?" the nurse asked, flipping through her clipboard.
"Ah, yeah, that's correct." Out of the corner of his eye he could see Mikasa sit down on the chair closest to the table while he pushed himself back to be able to lean up against the hard pillow of the table.
The nurse placed her clipboard with his file down and moved over to the examination table to start what Eren knew was the preliminary routine. He did what she asked of him as she checked his breathing, his heart rate, his blood pressure, made sure his other limps weren't hurt, checked for internal damage, basically just poked and prodded him until she was satisfied.
"The doctor will want to look at it and probably get x-rays to see if it's broken or not," the nurse said, picking back up Eren's file as she headed to the door. "It's probably going to be a long wait though so I suggest you make yourself comfortable. I'll be back to prep you for x-rays when the doctor's done with you."
Great. It wasn't like he didn't expect that; his dad was a doctor, Eren was very aware of how long they took for everything, and then add on x-ray prep, x-ray done, x-ray results, and packaging up his leg? He would be lucky if the sun was still up when he left this place. He rolled his head back against the wall before he looked over to Mikasa. She was sitting in the chair, reading, or pretending to read, one of the posters on the wall.
"You can leave, you know. No reason for both of us to be stuck here all day," Eren said though the thought of sitting here all day and alone was already enough to bore him to death.
Mikasa was leaning against the armrest of the chair, her chin propped up on her hand. "I'm not gonna make you stay here alone. You'd be bored out of your mind. Its fine, Eren."
At least he knew she knew him well enough. "Yeah, so you can scold me more. Right." It wasn't that Eren didn't want her here; he'd really rather have her here than most anyone else but it didn't change the fact he was still mad at her attitude.
She sighed, her hand falling back into her lap. "I don't want to scold you. I'm not your mother."
"Well, stop acting like it then." He crossed his arms against his chest looking over to her. "Yeah, I might not have thought the jump through but, Jesus, you've been pissy with me since it happened. I don't need it from you and my mom when she gets home."
Mikasa bit at her bottom lip as she watched him; it was a trait Eren knew she had when she wanted to say something but was holding back for some reason.
"C'mon, just be out with it. If you're staying, we're gonna be stuck here for a long time." It was pretty clear she didn't want to say what was on her mind with the way her eyes had dropped to the floor and normally Eren would have just brushed it off but he was not getting stuck here with her in a mood.
She looked back up to him but she didn't look angry anymore, just sad. "Do you know how hard it is to watch you constantly not think about things that end up hurting you? To watch you fall and see you in pain? I was worried about you. So worried that it made me mad you always do this to yourself, and then I have to just sit and watch you hurt yourself."
Eren felt guilt in the pit of his stomach; he hated seeing her upset and hated it even more so when it was his fault. He never really thought about how his actions made her feel, he just figured she got annoyed for doing things when she wouldn't do them, but that clearly wasn't the case. She was worried about him to the point of making her upset; he really should know her better at this point.
He held an arm out gesturing for her to come over to him. Mikasa looked up, her forehead furrowed as she looked at him in confusion. "Just c'mere," Eren said, gesturing to her again.
She stood up to her feet and sat on the edge of the table next to him, the paper crinkling under her weight. He pushed himself up off the back cushion to sit up next to her; he wasn't sure what to do now she was here though. Sure he had known her for years now, but Eren wasn't always good with words, especially when it was his own stupidity that got them here in the first place. He instead put his arms around her waist and pulled her into him.
He could hear her breath hitch in her throat as he rested his head on her shoulder. He wanted to tell her he was sorry for making her worry and then getting her even more upset by yelling at her but apologizing was another thing that didn't come naturally to him either. Judging by the way she leaned her head against his, she was sorry too.
Eren supposed that was the nice thing about having someone so close to you; sometimes you didn't need many words.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket causing her to reach in and pull out the phone. "It's Armin," she said, pressing the screen so the text message would pop up. "'Hey, I just wanted to see how things were going. Granted with Eren it's probably difficult no matter what. Let me know'," Mikasa read aloud.
Eren snorted as he read over her shoulder. "Some friend he is."
Mikasa looked over at him, probably to say something like well Armin was right but she stopped short, her face close to his. He felt her warm breath on his lips, her face much closer than expected when he turned his head. Her dark eyes were wide as she stared at him, her mouth opening liked she was gonna say something but she closed it again. Eren became very aware of his arms still around her warm body, the top of her red scarf brushing against his chin.
There were very few people in the world who put up with Eren like Mikasa did; Armin probably, and Eren's parents. She was always the one who fought at his side, the one to make ambulance rides, the one to talk sense into him when he didn't want to hear it, the first one there for him every time. He hated the way she babied him, because he didn't want to be her little brother; he just wanted to be on the same level. He couldn't imagine his life without her though.
He wasn't sure what it was, or what made him do it, but the next thing Eren knew his head was tilted down until he pressed his lips against hers. He felt her gasp against him, but quickly melted right into him.
The door creaked open causing Mikasa to jump right off the table, leaving Eren breathless still sitting. He snapped his head to see who walked in the room.
"I'm sorry, was I interrupting something?" the doctor said with a sly smile. She was dressed in scrubs and a long white jacket, her brown hair pulled up in a ponytail, brown eyes looking out behind her glasses.
"Ah, no?" Eren said, his heart still pounding in his chest. He had no idea what happened there but he did know he wasn't a big fan of the doctor's timing. He glanced over to Mikasa who had taken her seat again and was looking at anywhere but him, her cheeks red.
"Don't worry, I won't tell," the doctor said, closing the door behind her. "I'm Dr. Zoe, I see you took quite a fall there."
"Yeah," Eren answered looking away from Mikasa. "Just being stupid."
Dr. Hanji leaned over his leg, scribbling some notes on her clipboard. "Well, we'll need an x-ray for sure but judging by the bruising and swelling, I think I can tell what's going to come from this. Ready for a long afternoon?"
Eren glanced over at Mikasa, who was just barely looking at him. He felt a smile tug at his lips as he remembered the way her mouth felt against his. He wasn't sure if it was because he was smiling now of if something triggered in her too, but despite her still red cheeks, he saw the smile on her lips too.
"Yeah," Eren clapped his hands together looking back at the doctor before a glance back to Mikasa. "Let's see where this day goes."
