A/N: Hey, all. How are we feeling? It's been a tough week, so I thought we could use something a little more upbeat!
Eren
It boggles my mind why I get dinged as the "frat boy" when people like Jean Kirstein exist. Unfortunately, I'm stuck with him for my surgery rotation. He's the absolute worst. Don't get me wrong. He's a totally competent physician. He can rattle off the signs and symptoms of myocardial infarction in his sleep, and he's lightning-quick at reading X-rays and electrocardiograms. Even his bedside manner is solid. (He's weirdly good at dealing with middle-aged ladies who ask questions nonstop.) I hate to admit it: I'd put my life in his hands.
But what grinds my gears is when we go behind the scenes to talk shop. The second we take our lunch break, his basic compassion goes right down the garbage chute. He talks about patients as if they're petri dishes and body parts instead of human beings. "Yo, Eren. I had a chick with gonorrhea yesterday," he'll say, making a gagging face. "Apparently, no one ever taught her, 'Love is cleaner with a packaged wiener.'" Or maybe he'll point at the surgery board and remark, "Holy fuck, did you see that coronary artery bypass this morning? What a shitshow. Talk about dead-on-arrival."
Jean wants to go into plastic surgery. And to be clear, when I say "plastic surgery," I'm not talking about facial reconstructions that patients may need after a car accident or a house fire. Jean wants to do cosmetic procedures: facelifts, nose jobs, and tummy tucks. For him, it's all about the Benjamins, baby. He already has his eyes on two properties in Beverly Hills, and he always "jokes" about wanting to do Taylor Swift's Botox when she gets wrinkles.
Each to their own, I guess.
Except Jean always rocks the boat, calling me a "thrill-seeker" for pursuing emergency medicine. He also likes to rub in the fact that he'll be making double my salary. We always end up in heated arguments over our intended specialties. Jean thinks emergency medicine is too "quick and dirty," while I shit on how his brand of plastics makes society go backwards.
"Your mom was my attending when I was in the ER last week," he comments in the locker room. "Man, she was a real hard-ass. She chewed me out basically every day for the tiniest things. How the hell did you make it out of your childhood alive?"
I shrug out of my shirt and reach for my scrubs. "She's really good at seeing through BS," I answer. "Nothing gets past her."
"I wasn't BS-ing anything!" Jean shoots back. "I was doing everything by the book—"
"Jesus, if this entire rotation is just going to be you two having your stupid catfights, I might just drop out of the program," Reiner snaps, slamming his locker shut.
I have a ton of respect for Reiner Braun. He keeps his cool when shit hits the fan—which makes him well-suited to take on pediatric emergencies. Reiner knows how to make a toddler giggle. He can riff with sixth graders, and he can put up with a teenager's bullcrap. A ton of med students laugh off peds, thinking it's for softies, but kids have a way of crashing on you when you least expect it. And they're only one part of the equation. In the ER, parents can go ballistic, hissing and screaming at you when you're trying your best to do your job. Mom tells me that her worst nightmare would be a school bus wreck. Not only would she have to make some difficult triage decisions, but she'd also have to deal with an incoming mob from the PTA. But I'm confident that in a couple of years, Reiner can face this head-on without breaking a sweat.
As the three of us head towards the surgical ward, Reiner whacks my behind with the bell of his stethoscope. "Jaeger, what's that you got there?" he asks.
"What?" I say irritably.
"Someone chomped down on your shoulder," Reiner says, flicking at the collar of my shirt. "Damn. She must be a feisty one."
"Your back looked so fucked up too," Jean chimes in. "Did you bang the Wolverine or something?"
"Glad to know that you guys were checking me out while I was changing," I grumble, shoving my hands in the pockets of my white coat. "Not weird at all."
Some time ago, I sat Mikasa down for a serious discussion about her hickey habit. I'd been making her get up at 5AM because I needed her to hide the evidence on my neck. One of my residents had pulled me aside, reminding me about "professional appearances" in the workplace, so Mikasa found a cheap $2 concealer that matched my skin tone. "Listen," I told her as she grumpily smeared tan gooey muck across the purple blotches. "If you actually wanna get your beauty rest, cool it with the hickeys."
This was only a temporary fix because within a week, some chemical in the low-quality concealer made my skin break out, and from then on out, we decided to outlaw hickeys. Looks like we'll have to add bite marks to the blacklist, and I'll also have to talk to her about her nails.
Oh, and in case you're wondering, we've sidelined our Jar policy.
That disastrous morning with Mom and Levi should've been a cautionary tale, a reminder to be rational, responsible roommates—but it seemed to have, if anything, the opposite effect. Those guardrails we put up in the first month of living together toppled, one-by-one. We reshuffled the rules of the game. It was now a contest to see who would break first, and we were trying to push each other over the line. Our objective was no longer avoiding sexual tension at all costs. Instead, we were kicking things into high-gear.
We started playing this ping-pong game with forehead kisses. Before leaving in the mornings, I'd sneak into her room to peck her brow, and as I brushed my teeth before going to bed, she'd slip into our small bathroom to get me back. Things started escalating from there. I'd run a hand up the back of her shirt when passing her in the kitchen, maybe giving her ass a squeeze after getting a beer from the fridge. She'd float from her perch at the table, bringing along her laptop and books, and we'd work pressed up next to each other on the couch. Occasionally, her hand would brush against my inner thigh.
One day, when we were walking up the stairwell together, I pulled her towards me, and I kissed her on the lips. We intensely made out for about thirty seconds before I broke it off suddenly, continuing up the stairs, whistling.
I had lost the first battle—but I won the war.
The second the door to our apartment clicked shut, Mikasa had me by the collar of my sweater, dragging me to her bed. And since then, we've been fucking on the daily. We alternated bedrooms for a while, and when that got old, we moved to the shower for a change of setting—but we decided to double back to dry land after Mikasa slipped while trying to balance on one leg. (Friction was not our friend.) Luckily, I caught her just in time, but had I hesitated for even a second, Mikasa would've slammed her tailbone against the drain. The couch, the dining table, the kitchen counter—you name it, we've probably done it there. I know: it's bad. So bad to the point where we've gotten a noise complaint from our next-door neighbor—as well as our downstairs neighbor.
I mean, we've talked about this, ish.
"Hey," I said one night when we were laying together.
"Hi," she replied.
"We've been doing this, like, a lot."
"Yeah," she said, propping herself up on her elbow.
"Do you think this is a bad thing?" I asked. "Not that I don't enjoy it, of course."
She was quiet after this. It was a no-brainer. No shit, it's a bad thing! We've been flying in the face of every single one of our earlier precautions. The Jar is literally collecting dust, abandoned in some kitchen cabinet. Also, it's empty. We used all the proceeds to pay for last month's utilities (against Armin's advice). The terms "Connie's third nipple" and "Levi scrubbing a toilet" haven't seen the light of day in ages. And on my end, I feel like I'm barreling towards the point of no return. Zeke's right. I never cross that boundary, so I'm trying to skid to a stop, digging my heels into the ground. But we've hit max velocity, and I just don't have enough room to brake properly.
"I hope it's not a bad thing," Mikasa said finally. She paused for a moment before adding, "Do we need a label for whatever's going on?"
"It might be helpful," I said, shrugging. "That way, we're on the same page."
"Okay."
"Yep."
Another silence.
"Why are you so quiet?" she asked.
"I was waiting for you to come up with something," I replied. "You've got the fancy vocabulary, being a writer and all."
"That's a tall order," she remarked. "Also, I didn't realize we needed a high-level thesaurus for this. I thought we were just gonna pick from the usual word bank… like friends-with-benefits or…" Her voice trailed off, and she broke eye contact, turning over onto her back.
"Or what?" I prodded.
"Levi calls us 'fuck buddies,'" she said quickly.
"So... that's the label we oughta use?" I asked, chewing on my lower lip.
She was suddenly flustered. "I mean, we're not exactly dating… right?" she blurted out.
"I guess not," I said, staring up at the ceiling. Maybe this was for the best. "'Fuck buddies' it is, then."
And we left it at that.
"Hey, Jaeger," Jean's snivelly voice brings me back to the present. He sidles up to me. "So there's this chick you keep bringing around to events and stuff. She wouldn't happen to be a girlfriend, would she?"
"Yeah, Eren. I've been wondering about that too," Reiner adds, clapping me on the back. "Good going, man. She's a catch."
"What? Mikasa?" I sputter, totally caught off guard. "No, she's my roommate!"
"So you're not dating," Jean clarifies.
"Nope," I reply briskly.
"Well, she's cute. You should give her my number," Jean says smugly.
"Trust me, she wouldn't be interested in you," I shoot back, a little too aggressively.
"Woah there, buddy!" Jean throws his hands up in mock fear. "Easy, now. Down, boy!"
"Dude, you're pressed," Reiner says, laughing.
"Fuck off, you guys," I grit out, stomping ahead of them.
But a question has been nagging me for days: Do "fuck buddies" kiss each other's foreheads every night before bed?
Mikasa
The quality of Gabi's work has been slipping. Of course, since it's Gabi, "slipping" equates to a couple of typos here and there. All else considered—the sophistication of her literary analysis, the structure of her arguments, the evidence that she's harnessed—she still sets the curve for the class.
In lecture, I've noticed that she and Falco have migrated from their usual front row seats to the back rows. They used to listen with rapt, unwavering attention, but nowadays, they break their focus every couple of minutes to whisper and giggle over something on their phones. When the three of us gather at the cafe, I definitely feel like I'm third-wheeling at my own office hours. The generational differences are also evident. Being twenty-four, I consider myself on the border between "millennial" and "Gen Z," but their chatter about TikTok has made me realize that I lean more towards the "millennial" end.
"Mikasa, I'm tempted to write about how this meme parallels that Uncle Tom's Cabin scene," Gabi says, showing me a Twitter screenshot. "I'm trying to provide commentary on how—"
"Don't even bother," I reply.
"Mikasa, hear us out. It's brilliant if you think about it," Falco argues, and Gabi throws her head back, laughing.
Gabi teases out a braver, more outspoken side of Falco. It shows in his writing. His essays used to tread lightly, exceedingly cautious of uncertainty and overly self-flagellating when noting the limitations. Falco, you're remarkably attuned to the vulnerable spots of your argument, I wrote to him once in a feedback email. But when it comes to acknowledging these weaknesses, you tend to overdo it. You end up eviscerating your own viewpoints. If you seek to advance the scholarly conversation, you'll need to write with more confidence.
But I've noticed a new steadiness to his writing. He no longer embrittles his points with clunky, uneasy phrases like "it may appear that," "it is conceivable that," and "possibly." He sticks to his guns. His sentences are no longer slack hypotheses dangling from a raggedy thesis. They're now bulletproof assertions, densely-packed with conviction.
One day, Gabi texts me, asking if we could meet up one-on-one.
"You've lived here for almost four months, yet you haven't walked across Brooklyn Bridge?!" Gabi exclaims, handing me a steaming hot macchiato. "Here, we can walk towards Brooklyn to get warmed up, but the magic happens when we turn around and go back towards Manhattan. No offense to Brooklyn, but the Manhattan view is so much better."
Smiling, I hold the Starbucks cup close to my chest, letting it warm my fingers. Eren would pounce on that statement.
We head towards Brooklyn on the pedestrian walkway, occasionally jerking aside when a rude biker whizzes past. Gabi isn't her usual chirpy, outgoing self. She trudges along with her hands shoved into her coat pockets. Something's brewing on her mind.
"So, Gabi," I say, sipping from my coffee. "What's going on?" She didn't even have to ask for my order. Weeks of office hours have taught her that I drink cold-brews during warm weather, and after September wraps up, I cycle between macchiatos and flat whites. She got the soy milk right, and she even asked for a sprinkle of cinnamon over the foam.
"This is probably gonna be a really awkward conversation," Gabi mutters. Her cheeks are already rosy from the chilly autumn winds, but they turn a couple shades redder. "I need advice."
"About what?" I press gently.
"Mikasa, sorry if this comes off as really weird and overly personal, but you're the closest thing I've ever had to an older sister," Gabi says. "Like, I'm tight with my older cousin, but he's a dude, which means I can't talk to him about these things."
If there's one thing I've learned from working a newspaper job and conducting interviews, it's the importance of staying quiet. People have a way of filling in silences on their own, so I don't say a single word—and in due time, Gabi follows up.
"I haven't lost my V-card yet," she blurts out. "And look, I know. It's lame. I'm so old, like I'm a freshman in college, and usually, people have this shit figured out already, but I just never bothered to in high school! But I think it's gonna happen soon, and I'm kinda freaking out."
"Wow," I say after a long pause. "Okay, for the record, I'm not your TA right now, got it?"
"Yes, absolutely."
"First question. How old are you again?"
"Seventeen!"
"Gabi, that's not old at all. If anything, you're young for a freshman."
"I skipped a grade in elementary school. So did Falco, actually."
"Makes sense," I reply. "Well, if it brings you any peace of mind, I didn't lose my virginity until I was… eighteen. Yeah, eighteen. Like the summer before I started college."
"Was it a boyfriend?"
I shudder a little. "I didn't think of him as a boyfriend. He definitely wasn't right for me, especially given the fact that he thought Lithuania was the name of an STD."
"Mikasa!" Gabi chokes. "Why?!"
I shrug, wrapping my coat tighter around me when a cold breeze whips across the bridge. "I just wanted to get it over with, but that's just my personal take on sex and virginity. Let me ask you this. Are you comfortable doing it for the first time with Falco?"
"This might be TMI, but…" Gabi shuffles forward a couple of steps, gathering her thoughts. "I can't believe I'm talking to my English TA about—"
"I'm not your TA, remember? At least, for the time being."
"Right, right, sorry. But we've done all the stuff before going all the way, if you get what I mean. Like, I've seen… it. You know, his... thing." Gabi looks like she wants to swan-dive off of the bridge and let the East River carry her into the Atlantic. "Mikasa, I'm sorry. This is a lot to ask of you—like, I'm literally making you cross professional boundaries and put your job at risk to hear about… my issues!"
I can't help but laugh. "Gabi, chill. It's totally fine," I say, patting her shoulder. "We're just two friends sightseeing and getting coffee. Thanks for remembering about the cinnamon, by the way. That's sweet of you."
"It's only sightseeing when our backs are turned on Brooklyn, just so you know," Gabi replies, her shoulders relaxing slightly.
"You'd really get along with my roommate," I sigh. "I'm serious, your dispositions are so similar. I feel like you two would be on the exact same wavelength—that is, until you guys discuss this Brooklyn Bridge matter. Then, you'd be like oil and water. Maybe oil and water, along with TNT and a detonator."
"What do you mean?"
"He was born and raised in Brooklyn."
Gabi's eyes widen. "Oh, yeah! That super sexy heart-throb who brought us my essay when you forgot it that one time! Are you still in denial about him? What was his name again? Eren, right?"
"I thought we were talking about you."
"I still ship it," Gabi says impishly.
"Watch it, Braun."
"Not sorry," Gabi says breezily, and I glare back at her. She shrugs before continuing, "But yeah, I've been having a lot of firsts with Falco. He's dated girls in high school before, so he's got a lot more… experience. Which is nice because honestly, Mikasa, I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing right now. He leads, and I follow, and it's just so weird."
"I bet. You're probably used to being behind the wheel, huh? Do you trust him?"
"Totally," Gabi says. "It's all new and weird, but it's also so… I don't know how to describe it. It's also really easy being around him. You've seen me in school mode when we do office hours. I'm always like, 'Go, go, go!' Always worrying about grades and rec letters and internships and law school, you know? But I feel like I can come up for air when we hang out."
I can't help but smile. "I don't think I've ever dated anyone who makes me feel that way. All my college relationships were really surface-level. Honestly, 'relationship' is too generous a term. Wow," I remark. "I've really only had flings here and there."
"Sorry, one sec," Gabi says. She cups her hands around her mouth. "WHADDUP, REINER! OVER HERE!" she yells, waving, and she grins at me, pointing down the bridge. "That's my cousin. He runs here on the weekends. Thank God it's an outlet for him. Otherwise, he gets so grouchy 'cause of med school."
Several yards ahead of us, a muscular guy with cropped blond hair is jogging on the other side towards Manhattan. "HEY, GABI!" he bellows back, his voice crisp and clear over the traffic beneath us.
"Wait a sec," I say, blinking. There are two other guys running with him. Sure enough, one of them is Eren, and he's leaping in the air like an idiot, waving his arms to catch my attention. I start laughing, and I wave back. "Well, speak of the devil."
"Also, Mikasa, that other dude is checking you out," Gabi says, elbowing me. "I forgot his name, but Reiner told me that he's gonna be one of those sell-out doctors."
"I think that's Jean," I reply, squinting for a better look. Confirmed: it's Jean, Eren's classmate who always sneaks glances at me whenever I show up to med school events. "He's nice, I guess. Can't say he's my type though."
"Yeah, too bad he doesn't have a man-bun and pretty eyes."
"Seriously, Gabi?"
"Sorry, can't stop!" Reiner yells as he passes us. "We're trying to hit a certain pace time!"
Eren gives Gabi a high-five as he runs by and adds, winking at me, "Bribe her if you want a better grade!"
Jean tries to smile at us as he jogs past, but he looks like he's on the verge of fainting, hardly keeping pace with the other two.
I'm about to turn around and watch their figures grow smaller and smaller as they run towards Manhattan, but Gabi clamps a hand on my arm. "Nope, don't you dare! Not until we get to the other end!"
"Ugh, fine," I mumble, letting her drag me forward towards Brooklyn.
"Aww, look at you, Mikasa!" she says, grinning. "It's like running into Eren made your daaay! Even though you already see him all the time 'cause you're apparently just roommates."
"You're relentless. Can we talk about you and Falco?"
"So... how much does it hurt? The first time?" Gabi asks immediately.
We start off with some mythbusting. I confirm her fears that, yes, sex can hurt the first time, but I stress that, no, she won't be "bleeding buckets for days on end" afterwards—or, at least, she shouldn't be. "Uh, you should go to a hospital if that happens," I say. When Gabi blanches, I quickly add, "I'm pretty sure that won't happen, though. Like 95% sure. Tell you what—this might be a better question for Reiner, who's actually in med school."
I admit that it's probably going to be a clumsy experience riddled with awkward moments, but I assure her that they'll be laughing about it the next day. I emphasize protection, recounting a harrowing pregnancy scare that Levi still brandishes as joke material. The concept of a morning-after pill, to my surprise, is news to her.
"That's a thing? Plan B?" Gabi gasps.
"They didn't teach you that in sex-ed?" I ask, shocked.
"Well, first and foremost, West Virginia public schools call it 'family-life education,'" Gabi corrects me. "And apparently, the golden rule is abstinence-before-marriage only. Oh, hey, are you ready for this?" We've reached the end of the bridge, and we're standing in Brooklyn—Eren's home turf. Gabi makes me cover my eyes with a hand, and she spins me around. "You ready?" she asks. "Take a look."
And there it is, Manhattan in all its glory. The sun is setting, basking the clouds in a pinkish glow, and the evening skyline is coming alive, high-rise windows blinking with light. Sleek and modern, the One World Trade Center stands confidently before us, while in the distance, its weathered elder, the Empire State Building, looks on proudly. This has been the dream since I was a little girl living in SF.
"Told you so," Gabi says, putting her hands on her hips. "Brooklyn has nothing on Manhattan. Eren's dead-wrong."
"Yeah, you weren't kidding," I say breathlessly.
Gabi has exhausted her list of questions and concerns, so as we walk back over the East River, we watch the sunset continue its spectacular descent towards the horizon. But when we hit the midway point, she stops and turns to look at me. "Hey, Mikasa," she says. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it, Gabi," I reply, smiling. "Take it at your own pace. Falco seems like the right person, and well, it's really different when you're with the right person, as opposed to a meaningless hookup."
"So… like when you actually have feelings for somebody?"
"Yeah," I say, after stewing on this for a moment. "I guess you can put it that way."
A/N: Sorry. A lot of this chapter was Kar, yours truly, just shamelessly thirsting over our SNK boiz. Like… imagine Eren, Reiner, and Jean walking towards you in a hospital corridor in scrubs and white coats, clipboards in hand, stethoscopes around their necks. Fuck, I might need CPR. Mouth-to-mouth? Actually, not sorry. Guilty as charged. So here's the plan. I'm going back to school in September, and I'm pretty sure that I'll be swamped. However, I still wanna write this story, so I'm thinking about releasing updates a little more slowly, which will give me a chance to stockpile material, and when school starts up, I can still update throughout the semester! That being said, I think I might need to dial down a bit, maybe limit myself to a chapter every two weeks or so. I hope that's okay with you all!
Also, a quick little reflection about Levi's scenes last chapter—especially that bit about the pain meds. I dunno, this has been a great chance for me to think back on an issue that's been near and dear to my heart: opioid policy in the US. I've worked closely with a number of substance rehabilitation programs in the past, and this fic has been a chance for me to not only digest and process what I've learned over the years, but also take a second stab at writing post-accident Levi. I kinda let him off the hook in WUARD. I mean, training for a half-marathon after getting hit by a car? Laughing. My. Ass. Off. I shied away from digging into the long road that comes with physical rehabilitation and pain management, largely because we were nearing the end of the fic, but these issues are important to me, and I'd like to better represent that journey. So yay, HTC's a chance to do things right!
Also, wow. There's been a ton of super duper uplifting comments in my various inboxes, and thank you so much you all. It's clear that you've taken much time to craft your responses and thoughts, and that just means so damn much to me. I have the best fucking readers, and I'm so lucky to have you guys!