The next couple of months rush by in a frenzy of work. With nothing but time on his hands, Levi focuses on renovating. Quickly slipping into some sort of routine, he begins his days with a celebratory cup of tea, during which he ponders which task is up for that particular day. Going on errands as difficult as finding a buyer for the kiln as well as the glass blower tools, through finding carpenters, and tea suppliers. Anything Levi can to get Eren out of his thoughts. Painting is the newest chore on the list to get completed, and Hanji is eager to help.
"This place will be so amazing when it's done," she says one Sunday noon. Levi thinks so himself. Though it's a bit hard to believe her while the whole future tea shop area is bare, and cold with humidity.
Washing off the old distemper from the walls and ceiling is an important affair to paint the room anew. Without it, the fresh paint will crack and peel off, yet that doesn't stop the preparational work from being a mess. It means having to scrub and wipe every bit of wall and ceiling while the old paint trickles onto the cement in whitened water rivulets.
"You keep on saying that," he says from the top of a former workbench, a dripping mop in his hands. He can't help a disapproving frown at his words. Every sound echoes in the empty room, making their voices sound strangely distorted. If it wasn't for the view at the sky on the other side of the windows, or the fresh air streaming through the opened door, the reverberations would remind Levi a bit too much of his years under ground.
"Only because it's true," Hanji replies, working on one of the walls. "I can't wait to see it when it's done."
"Mm." Levi first dunks his mop thoroughly in one of the two buckets next to him, then gives it a dip in the clearer water and stretches to tackle the next area of ceiling. The plaster has soaked up lots of water and breathes its chalky dampness into the air. The humidity is omnipresent and heavy, and has Levi sweating right after beginning with the work. He doesn't mind. Despite this whole procedure being such a dripping mess, it is absolutely amazing. It's good work. Necessary and muscle straining. It helps him stay calm.
"How are you keeping up?" Hanji asks.
"How are you?" he asks back.
She wipes some paint off her glasses with her sleeve. The action probably smudges the glass even more, but it doesn't seem to bother her at all. "Don't give me that. But thanks for asking. How's life?"
Levi gives his mop a small shake to drip off excess water. "Still there."
"How's living upstairs?" she clarifies. "Getting some sleep?"
Levi's mop hits the ceiling with a wet smack. "Sometimes."
Turning around to eye him, Hanji heaves a sigh. Her shirt is splattered with paint-tinted water, and yet the wall next to her remains mostly white. "What about last night?"
"Could have been worse," he answers flatly.
"When are you going to get yourself a real bed, Levi?" she asks, scratching her head.
"I don't need a bed."
Her eye roll is almost audible. "Yes, you do."
"How would you know?" he snaps. They've already had this discussion a couple of times this week alone, yet she keeps stirring it up. "Would you focus back on the wall?"
Dunk-splash-smack, goes his mop.
She sticks to her guns. "You'd sleep much better in one."
"No," he insists.
"Yes. And since I've got one, like normal people, I know better than you."
Levi shrugs, concentrating on a greying spot on the ceiling. "I never needed the one I had at HQ. Why the fuck should I get one now?"
"There's your reason," she says, beaming and eyes bright.
"What?" he demands.
"Do I have to say it out loud? Sex is much better on a soft surface. Well," she adds in a relenting tone. "For most people anyways."
He turns away from her. Dunk-splash-smack! "Good for you that you have a bed then. Leave me alone and go fetch yourself a Titan."
He knows instantly that these words were the wrongs ones, as always. He had not wanted to say them. All he wanted was to shut her up so he can clean his ceiling, and then the walls, so he can start painting them afresh to get rid of that cave feeling.
Still, the words are out now, and his guards shoot up, telling him to beware and to not react at all to whatever comes next. Because it will come. Hanji is Hanji after all, and she's already begun to cackle.
"Yeah," she snorts promptly. "Tell me how that works."
Levi shrugs and shoots back in the same offish voice as before: "You wish, don't you."
"How was it?" Hanji jabs, leering.
Silently cursing himself, he concentrates on scrubbing the ceiling. Why does he always have to talk? Why can't he just shut the fuck up for once in his life? He grits his teeth.
"Was he loud?" Hanji steps closer with obvious interest. "Was it good?"
Dunk-splash-smack!
"Levi." She stands directly next to him now. "You must tell me, I have to know. Is it hotter than normal? Does it feel different? Does it steam afterwards? You know down there?"
Unbidden, the unwanted memories return at her words, spurring images of Eren hurrying back to his own quarters after he left Levi's bed, leaving behind a trail of steam. Sickened by the implication, Levi grips tighter to his mop until his knuckles turn white. Bile rises in his stomach, filling his mouth with saliva. He swallows it down.
Despite the disturbing thought and new inner turmoil, he smells triumph concerning his current situation. He stares down at his friend, who looks like she's on the verge to bursting with curiosity. Her eyes appear bigger than her glasses, her cheeks are glowing. One hand clutches a mop's handle to her chest, the other one reaches towards Levi. It's clear, she misses the Titan experiments she ran during the war, and it's the perfect chance for Levi to turn the tables to his own favour.
"Why?" he deflects cooly. "Does it normally steam when they take a shit?"
For a moment there is no reply, and then Hanji explodes. "Damn, what a good question! I never asked. Why did I never ask, why didn't I even think of that? I should write it down. Levi! Where is your notebook?"
"Storage room," he grunts, feeling relief flood his chest as she takes the bait. She rushes off immediately, letting the mob fall right where she stood. New ideas won't keep her distracted for too long until she starts poking again, Levi knows that. The peace will probably not last more than a few minutes, but at least she will be occupied for a little while. More than enough for Levi to rebuild his defenses.
Listening to her scribbling down notes in the back room, he lowers his mop and frowns at the window front without seeing the sun lit street, swallowing once more. Steam would have meant he'd hurt Eren without knowing, or wanting to do so. Is that why Eren fled once Levi was in the shower? Was he seriously hurt?
Levi recalls that night again. Eren's strong body against his own, and greedy hands. Heat and stormy, needy kisses. Pleas, filled with his name. Eren's fingers drawing warm, soothing lines on Levi's lower back.
Frightened, big eyes trying their best to evade his own the next morning.
How could Levi have come from never needing anybody since his early teenage years, to needing Eren like he needed air? Every time he closes his eyes, Eren is with him again, haunting him day and night. All Levi can see is green. Sparkling and shadowed, gleaming and excited, furious and kind. Stunned and lain bare. Eren's eyes are everywhere and it's too much.
Levi pinches the bridge of his nose until spots dance behind his eyelids, and takes a deep breath. Nearby a nuthatch sings and flutters away.
Take me with you, Levi thinks to the unseen bird.
By the time Hanji emerges from the Titan zone, Levi is back to attacking the old paint.
A few weeks later, Levi buys resurfacer, and black outdoor paint. After borrowing a set of gear from the Survey Corps weaponry, he spends a good part of his week with mending his house's facade, and refreshening the shopfront. He finishes the repairs as the first early heat wave starts burning down on the community. Fleeing the merciless sun, he goes inside to continue his renovations there. He has shelves to mount. A staff department to set up. A tiny restroom to restore. A floor to even out and panel, because a bleak stone floor won't do for a tea shop.
Levi never had to do any of these things. Yet it's oddly comforting to learn every single step. Witnessing how this place takes more and more shape with every day fills him with an odd feeling of satisfaction. It's an interesting experience to create, for once, instead of destroy. Of course destruction is inevitable, yet even that will end in something new. It's almost cathartic too. Thus Levi tears down old cupboards, and dismantles the plumbing in the former storage room. He smashes the old tiles in the tiny customer bathroom, and sledges down a dividing wall he has no use for in his shop.
With the summer heat seeping through the thick stone walls, Levi sweats like a madman, even inside the sheltering shadows. He trudges up the stairs to his flat each night, feeling like someone plunged him into a steam room. Especially the afternoon sun that blazes through the windows is doing its own part in making him sticky. Levi seeks the exhaustion wilfully though, eager to make sleep take him out the moment he'd sit down on a soft surface. It's not completely working. Eren still won't vacate his mind. His presence lingers everywhere.
He's there when Levi wakes up with an inevitable short flash of wondering where the Exploration Team is now. Eren's touch is ghosting through Levi's mind with every shift in his leather chair. His radiating warmth is missed whenever Levi shivers, fighting the cold that seems to seep through the thin blanket, even long after blackberry winter has passed.
He's there whenever Levi showers, has always been there since that night, making Levi hurry to get clean, to shorten each shower as much as he can. He's there whenever Levi makes his tea. The colour and the taste of the Gunpowder reminding him of Eren's eyes, and the unused china in his cupboard confirming that he's got no one to share it with anymore. Even Levi's neglected chessboard seems to judge him whenever he spots it, chiding him for what he ruined.
Eren is also there when Levi tries new tea for his shop, nodding quietly at Levi's opinion, and laughing softly when Levi thinks it's awful. He's there when Levi cleans; he always took care of the cobwebs and bugs without any comment on either side. Eren easily went up onto his tiptoes with a duster so that Levi wouldn't have to fetch a chair. One one occasion he even went so far as to lift Levi up onto his shoulders for an abnormally high ceiling.
His presence permeates the silence, and it is too loud. Too empty. Silence with Eren has always been good, harmonious even. They used to talk so much through little gestures, looks, and with body language. By the end Levi could almost smell it in the air, what Eren was thinking, could feel his general mood. Words were completely unnecessary up to a certain point. It also made what was said far more important. Every word, and the tone of Eren's voice forging a connection to something stronger. Perhaps that's why memories of Eren's presence keep on coming back to Levi, persistently sneaking into his daily routine.
First it's only little sounds: a deep contented hum during tea time, a kind laugh at something crazy Hanji says or does. Gentle whispers of Levi's name into his ear out of the blue that nothing, not even physical work, can stop. The words keep on coming. Soon they evolve into whole sentences in Eren's voice, forming a familiar routine from when he would comment on Levi's days before everything went awry.
Maybe it's his age that makes Levi respond to them after a while, that makes these moments turn into whole unspoken dialogues.
"Why 'Sparrow'?" Eren's voice asks one day.
Because 'Teashop' sounds meaningless after everything I've put into this place, Levi answers mutely. Because of how I met Isabel. Because of where I come from. Because sometimes at night, I want to fly away; to follow you wherever you are now. Because if I was a bird, I surely wouldn't be anything grander.
Because I know we must let go of what we love, Levi concludes with an ache in his chest.
With the actual renovation part of the downstairs floor coming to a foreseeable end as May comes to a close, the detail work begins. Not having too much faith in his own artistic skills, Levi hires a scribe to work out the details of his tea shop's name. Meanwhile he starts to narrow down his decisions on product lines, displays, and general aesthetic choices.
He supposes he shouldn't be surprised when he soon finds himself in yet another argument with Hanji, this time about selections. They debate for a whole Friday evening until Hanji falls asleep, mid debate. So it's only natural that she continues with it on Saturday morning. Sitting at Levi's kitchen table, she fidgets with a piece of buttery, crunchy toast, gabbling on like the birds outside.
It's when her voice assumes a dangerous intensity, that Levi intervenes. He's had enough. "Let's settle this once and for all, shitty glasses. I will not sell any fucking coffee."
"Why are you so against it?" Hanji asks for the umpteenth time. "It tastes good, it wakes you up, and it soothes my nerves. Plus the scent is nice."
Levi indeed likes its scent, but he certainly won't admit to that out loud. Not with Hanji breathing down his neck, staring at him with an enthusiasm that reminds him of her former Titan lectures. Instead he sighs, preparing himself to explain, yet again. "It's vile. It's bitter tasting,"
"Tea is bitter too," she interrupts him through a bite of bread, spraying crumbs everywhere.
"Only because you buy the shittiest stuff out there and brew it wrong," he retorts. "How many times have I told you to not let the leaves sit in the water for an hour. It's like you're setting out to murder it. Tea needs attention."
"Oh, bullocks! Yours tastes just as boring." Hanji pulls a face to make her point.
Despite his efforts, Levi's indignation gets the better of him. "How dare you."
Completely unaffected by his outburst, Hanji shrugs and continues indulging in her piece of roasted breakfast toast. "Trust me. Coffee is a wonderful idea. You will get more customers with it."
"This is my place. I'll do with it whatever I want. And please," he growls as he notices the mess near his foot, "will you desist from littering my floor with bread crumbs?"
"Fine!" Hanji shoots back. "Ruin yourself! I'll sit by and watch, alright? Drinking coffee! Like the rest of us, who aren't a total nutcase."
"That's rich coming from you," Levi mutters.
Looking utterly pleased with herself, she grins. "I know. It should give you something to think about."
Levi scowls. As much as he'd like to say otherwise, Hanji has got a point. He knows several soldiers who don't like tea, and prefer coffee over everything else. Yet therein lies the point. If he starts selling coffee, he'd come to be known as "that coffee guy". Which would be awful. Additionally, he can already see the coffee bags slowly but surely pushing aside his carefully selected tea cans, until in the end they would be all that's left from his initial idea.
Trying to only consecrate the tabletop, Hanji crunches on her last bite of toast.
"Add coffee, and it wouldn't be a tea shop anymore," Levi admits eventually. "I will not run a coffee shop."
"Tea shop, coffee shop, who cares? You want to know something? I had an idea tonight." She speaks around licking her fingers free of crumbs. "Why not make this place into a café instead? You could sell cake too. And cookies. Heaven knows, it would satisfy your compulsive, and highest ranked classified need of bringing joy to this world."
"Oh, fuck off," he grumbles. The need is not compulsive. Okay, maybe it is. Sometimes. Most of the times. Always, admittedly, and oh, fuck it, it's not even the issue here.
Being finished with her toast, Hanji now pitches into her tea. "Seriously, Levi. Even with the tasting corner bar top, the place downstairs is too big for a small shop like you plan to have. You still could sell tea, no one says otherwise. But you also could provide a retreat and feed people. You're much more a caretaker than a businessman anyway, and you know that yourself. You've got more experience with taking care of people than most too."
"Tch." The idea is ridiculous, so utterly ridiculous. A café never was his dream, and it's something so entirely different.
Then again, dreams can be deceitful that way and wrong. Mostly the unplanned things, the surprises in life, are the best. Levi certainly never gave the idea of letting someone into his heart another thought before it happened, and while Eren had been there, it was the best time of Levi's life, war or not.
His thoughts drift further away in that direction, and his heart skips a beat. A café.
Suddenly he is whisked back to a cold and dark winter's day when they were spending their time in one of the Wall Districts in preparation for an excursion outside the walls. Eren dragged him into the freezing night to lead him to a coffee place a few roads down from their base.
"Rumour has it, it's the best place in this area," he said, his voice bubbling with an excitement that Levi hadn't been able to resist.
They drank tea that night, exceptionally good tea Levi has to admit. Eren's eyes lightened up as he chewed on a piece of shared cinnamon roll with cardamom that tasted just as heavenly. The mere memory is so strong that Levi can recapitulate the taste and the scent of comfort and complete satisfaction. The place had been cosy too. Could he really make his own version of that place back then?
Once the thought takes root, there's no way in stopping it from expanding and taking shape within his imagination. The shelves he's installed could still hold tea cans, china, and further supplies. He could keep the name of the shop as well, only make some minor adjustments before the scribe paints it onto the window front. He even could go from having no food whatsoever for days, a legacy of his past, to actually offering it, selling it.
Looking at the town on the other side of his kitchen window, Levi tries to remember everything from that day. One and a half years have passed since then, and even with the bright sky outside, it feels as if it all happened yesterday.
Wooden floor, almost like the one he's already installed downstairs. The scent of oily wood polish, fresh coffee, and grassy tea paired with the sugary scent of baked goods. Simple, plain china. Small tables, scattered over a big room. Copper counter. Paintings on the walls. Private nooks with a pair of armchairs to huddle within for extra privacy and comfort.
Life was still good that day, so very good. Eren was there, smiling and laughing, and asking Levi something about their next mission. It wasn't but a month before Levi lost everything meaningful to him on one single, mist-covered day.
"What do you do now?" Eren asks again, looking pale, sounding tired whilst standing on Historia's balcony, feeling much too far away.
The nuthatch flutters onto the windowsill and chirps, bringing Levi back to the here and now.
"You know how to make coffee, four-eyes?" he asks. His voice is slightly scratchy and distant, but fortunately Hanji either doesn't notice, or lets it pass.
"Of course, I do," she responds with a snickering undertone. "Who doesn't?"
"Can you tell a good coffee from a bad one?" he challenges, determinedly not looking at her to conceal how much he needs her help.
She shrugs. "I think so." Her eyes squint at him for a second and then widen in shock. Levi suspects they'll pop out of their sockets any moment now. "I convinced you, didn't I?"
Keeping his voice calm, he lifts his teacup. "Maybe."
"Yes!" Hanji fist-bumps the air with such boisterous joy that Levi can't help but let it affect him a little bit. Despite his intention to stay expressionless, a small smile fights its way out and once it's there, it remains stuck.
"Well, this is a first," she cheers, visibly holding herself back from smashing her hands onto the table in joy. "It calls for a celebration!"
"Later," Levi insists, standing up, and collecting their empty plates. "Let's search for some decent beans first."
"Wonderful!" Gulping down her share of Levi's definitely neither boring, nor bitter tea, Hanji jumps to her feet, aiming for the door. "You will not regret this, Levi. I know it."
We'll see about that, he thinks, swiftly hurrying after her to escape the ghosts of his memories. Now that she has left her place at his dinner table, they keep on pressing back into the kitchen like thunderclouds condensing over a blue sky. Suppressing a snort over Hanji's excitement, Levi decides he can tend to the dirty dishes later.