if I have no past, I have no future
so why do I keep looking directly ahead of me?
I don't know what I've done, or what I will do . . .
But somehow I know in this abnormal heart of mine,
I do it all for you
# # #
The fitness room echoed. Mikasa's gloves struck Levi's mitts with a competent violence. Mikasa brought her arms in, homing her focus.
"What, exactly, were you trying to say about Eren's nature?"
Three times Mikasa hit the targets. She snapped her arms to her chest.
"You spoke too harshly," she said. "It's not like what you said."
Mikasa moved strength down her arm. Levi saw the arm muscles take it and surge it from her hands. Two fist-sized explosions crushed the targets.
Levi said, "Do you want to know what it was that I saw when I met Eren for the first time?"
Levi caught the kick Mikasa administered. Balancing on the left foot, Mikasa dug the right knee in, deeper. Levi held her off. Both resisted, working to overcome the other.
Finally, Levi shoved Mikasa aside. They reset.
"I saw an unhinged heart," Levi said. "So in my opinion, the world's not wrong."
Mikasa opened her mouth, speechless. Her fists smashed the mitts, rattling Levi's hands. "How can you say that? He trusts you."
Levi took this as a sign to stop. He slipped off the mitts. Mikasa let her hands down.
"It was said one day, Eren would end up as either a savior or the devil," Levi said, "and that future is fast approaching. It's almost here. And in the years I've known Eren, the truth of his disposition has never been revealed. Nothing's pointed to a clear answer. So, I still don't know what we'll see."
Mikasa watched him. She didn't move at all. Levi looked at her. He saw himself when he saw her. He set a hand on his forehead.
"But the Eren with the power to make his own choices is gone," he said. "When I look at that face now, all I see is an imposter."
Levi let his hand down and walked across the room. Mikasa followed. Levi hung up the mitts, and Mikasa unstrapped her gloves. They spun damp towels across the backs of their necks.
"I let things get out of hand. I've been slipping. Even so, I still want to get the 'true' Eren back."
# # #
The room was quiet, carpeted, making it quieter. Lavender oil diffused the air. The room's qualities relaxed and soothed. Even the cushions of the sofa were astonishingly soft, sinking Eren into the seat, enveloping him in a comfortable padding, slackening each part of him.
Doctor and patient sat across from each other.
"Go ahead and take your medicine," said the doctor. She sat in an upholstered armchair.
On a small side table, next to a glass of water, was the medicine laying in an open wrapper. Eren used the water to swallow two tablets. In ten minutes, he would melt into a drowse and imagine scenes which he would sluggishly tell the doctor about.
"Let's continue our discussion from last time." The doctor read over a notepad. She placed the tip of her pen below her previous writing and recorded the day's date. "Last time you were telling me about a recurring dream you've been waking up to. You can't remember what it's about aside from the outline of a person sitting near you. Is this correct?"
"Yeah." Eren heard his own voice behind a large white wall. "Every morning when I wake up from that dream, I always have the same feeling of emptiness."
The pen scratched writing onto the notepad. The writing seemed to go on for a long time. Then the pen stopped and Eren put his eyes on the doctor.
"The last time we were together, you said you believe Mikasa is the person from your dream."
"I—" Eren rammed the heel of his palm to his head, trying to remember. "I can almost see it. It's just — there. At the edge— of my—"
"Have you considered the possibility that your confusion might be distorting how you remember your own dreams?"
"Distorting them?"
"There's a photograph I'd like to share with you." The doctor inserted a photo between her fore- and middle fingers and gestured. Eren rose from the couch and approached and took the photo into his hands. Still sitting, the doctor watched him. She smiled warmly. "Do you recognize the woman in the photo?"
"No, I don't recognize her."
"Look closer."
Eren bent his head. Nothing in his brain alerted him to a loosened memory. "There's nothing," he said.
"Is that so?" The doctor uncrossed her legs and crossed them again. She gave him a kind look, wanting nothing more than to help him. "The woman in that photo," she said, gently nudging his memory, "holds a special place in your heart."
# # #
In town, the streets were crowded with foot traffic. People swarmed in a droning hum. Swirls of uplifted dust hung around their rising and lowering feet. Eren and Mikasa followed the street. The sun was at the top of the sky. Eren and Mikasa's shadows were flat circles. The day was perfectly cool, even under the constant sun.
"These are the items I'm supposed to buy." Eren showed Mikasa a handwritten list.
She put a finger on the paper. "Why don't we start here?"
"Or . . . why don't we walk around a little?"
Eren shoved the list back into his pocket. He started on a directionless journey, making sure Mikasa stayed right along with him.
They strolled and entered shops and looked and exited those shops to enter new shops and look and exit. They went inside a bakery, a bookstore, a shop of old needless knickknacks. They visited a clothing boutique and Eren found a hat and put it on Mikasa's head and said it made her look mysterious and sophisticated. Mikasa wrapped a shawl around him and it blew out an odor of warm wool and untouched newness. Mikasa appraised it. She said it made him look safe and cozy. They returned the items to the racks and exited.
Mikasa walked toward an old inconspicuous shop at the corner. It was lonely and out-of-the-way. The door was locked. The windows were barred and tinted. After climbing the front steps, Mikasa moved to grip the doorknob.
"You have to ring the bell," Eren said, and pointed. Mikasa grabbed a thin rope attached to a bell mounted a foot above their heads. "Wait," Eren said. Mikasa paused, her hand poised to pull the rope. "Do you have any idea what kind of shop this is?"
"Do you?"
"Yeah, I do."
Mikasa pulled the rope. The clapper jerked, pealing out a thin ring. A few moments passed. The door opened from the inside. A dim room and an old man cradling a cat welcomed them. Mikasa stepped inside and dimmed with the dim room. Eren waited a moment before stepping and stopping in the middle of the doorway. Stretching his neck inside, he looked around, never setting a foot indoors. The little shop smelled of paint, elderly flesh, and something rough and wild and mammalian.
"Are you looking for something in particular?" the old man said. The cat slept, lazy and content, in his arms.
Mikasa scanned the walls. The store offered an incredible variety of items. Racks and hooks were lined with all the paraphernalia a woman, a man, or anybody could ever desire. Mikasa spun on her heel and exited. Eren stepped aside, feeling the wind of her passing.
"Thanks anyway," Eren said to the old man. He wedged the door shut and followed Mikasa the way they'd come. They walked on the dirt street for some time. It was silent. Mikasa kept her eyes trained ahead. A glow of heat clung to her face. Eren peeked sideways at her.
"Stop laughing," Mikasa said.
"I'm not laughing."
"You are."
"Was there nothing interesting to you? Not even the—"
"Eren." Mikasa was blushing. "We've wasted enough time. We should start on the list."
They split up to save time.
Eren leisured through the town. He came to a flower shop and let his eyes roam. A bed of flowers grew outside the window. Eren paused. A light breeze whispered the flowers and he could almost hear a murmur of tiny frail voices speaking to him, telling him a thousand stories. Soft humming tensions in the petals absorbed him. A nostalgia possessed him. It felt like a sad past.
The florist came outside to ask Eren if he needed assistance. He didn't, but wondered what kind of flower he was looking at. She told him what kind of flower it was. They watched the blue flowers together as the breeze swept them into a silent tune. The florist could've told Eren the symbolism of such a flower. She didn't. Instead the florist asked for his name. Eren told her his name.
"You look a little lost," the florist said.
"I'm just taking my time."
"I didn't mean it like that. Sometimes when a person's taking their time, they can look a little lost. But what I meant was, you look a little . . . lost."
By the time Eren reunited with Mikasa again in the middle of town, an hour had passed and she was carrying two crates on either shoulder while Eren came up empty-handed. Mikasa lugged both crates down.
"This should be everything on the list," she said.
"You were only supposed to get half." Eren shoved his hand in his pocket. He removed the crumpled ball of paper. "The list was here in my pocket. How could you know what was on it?"
"I memorized it when you showed me."
"Everything?"
"Let's check to be sure."
They matched the items to the list. Everything had been collected and organized. This made Eren feel useless and incompetent. He wanted to apologize. Instead he raised his hand and showed Mikasa the flower he'd been holding.
"Where'd you get a flower?"
"The florist down the street gave it to me," Eren said. "She said it's a pink camellia." He swept Mikasa's hair away and slid it behind her ear. Mikasa felt it with her fingers, trying to see by touch how fine and lovely it was.
"The florist also invited me to meet her later tonight."
"Did you accept?" Mikasa only held her eyes to him, her face unreadable, still touching the flower, seeing it that way.
"I didn't give a reply. I figured it'd be off limits, considering my situation."
Mikasa finally put her hand down, letting the flower alone. "There's no reason to tell anyone."
"What do you mean?"
"It can be a secret." Mikasa hauled one crate onto her right shoulder. She hauled the next onto her left. The flower remained hooked behind her ear.
Eren thrust out his arms, feeling incompetent again. "I can—"
"To ensure your safety," Mikasa said, "I'll follow at a distance. So if you want to meet that woman tonight, go back and give her your answer."
"I didn't think you'd say something like that."
"If I had the chance to lead a normal life, I would take it. This may be your one chance to feel what that's like. Are you just going to let it slip by?"
# # #
After her checkup, Historia lied in bed, the color gone from her face. Her sleeping face was exhausted and suffering, her hair laying open and loose around her head. The light coming through the window hit her gold hair, making the sight of her tragic and beautiful. A hatted man with no presence or purpose drew the curtains closed. Historia's loose hair darkened with the room, the window covered now. The hatted man went out. Soundlessly he shut the bedroom door. In the living room, the doctor, a squat man with thin gray hair, was packing up his equipment. He carried two bags, one in each hand.
"Your visits take a toll on her," said the hatted man. The cap on his head was tugged so low his eyes were hidden. "I don't see the purpose of your checkups." Even his voice was the general voice of any man from anywhere, making him nobody at all.
Turning, the doctor said: "I don't see the purpose of a person like you, either. You hide your face from even the mother of your own child, ashamed and humiliated by your own existence." Each word was meant to strip the man of his flesh. Nothing could pierce a man who did nothing for himself but breathe and make blood. He stood in the living room, tall and impassive and silent, giving the impression of a wholly inferior being.
The doctor jerked his bags off the floor. "An insignificant man should stay silent." He walked out the door and the man followed, entirely subservient and inferior. Outside, a carriage waited. The doctor struggled to mount the carriage step. The nameless man took him under the armpits and hoisted him inside.
The doctor grumbled. He sat down and pulled his collar off his throat where his sweat was pooling. "Make sure Her Majesty stays warm. When she's up and moving again, give her a good meal."
The man nodded. The coachman urged the horse forward, dragging the carriage behind them. The wheels turned and bumped along. Birds flocked the sky in countless shadows. The man watched until the horse-drawn carriage was a descending black mark on the horizon. Then he returned inside and went into the bedroom and added a blanket to Historia's covers and, with his palm, attentively felt her sad, pale face and went to the closet, grabbed another blanket, and added it to the layers. Then he went into the kitchen and began to cook a warm meal.
# # #
The sky had let down a short cold rain. The hills and trees glistened coldly with the pink evening light. Eren sat by the window, looking at the world, trying to understand it. He hadn't heard anyone come in, so when Armin began talking, it was like being hurtled out of a deep dead sleep, with no memory of how he got where he was. He swiveled his head, feeling like everything was slow and deep underwater. He saw Armin's face and tried to focus on him.
"How are you feeling?" Armin said.
"A little spaced-out."
"Have you remembered anything about Mikasa?"
"No, not yet."
"Is there something on your mind you want to talk about?"
Eren moved his teeth on one another. He drooped his head. He shook it.
"I get the feeling you want to talk about something."
Eren said nothing. But Armin knew Eren wanted to talk about something.
"I heard you and Mikasa went into town. Did something happen?"
Eren raised his head. He looked out the window again. The pink had deepened to a red honey-glaze. "I met a florist and she invited me to share a drink with her. I'm supposed to sneak away and meet her outside the flower shop."
"Isn't that a little risky?"
"Mikasa offered to come along. I'm waiting for her to come get me."
Armin went to the window and leaned next to it. "You're frustrated," he said.
"Frustrated? About what?"
"Mikasa probably believes it's the noble thing to do."
"Noble? I don't care about what's noble." Eren raised his voice. There was emotion, and something familiar. "You're right. I'm frustrated," he said. "I want her to say, 'don't go meet that woman' or 'please remember me.' Even if it's selfish, I want her to say things like that."
"Eren . . . Do you have any idea why you might feel that way?"
"That's because—" Eren trailed off, concentrating on the horizon. Two red suns expired in his eyes.
"What you yearn for is Mikasa's attention," Armin said. "If there's something you want to say to her, just say it."
There was the small sound of men's shoes tapping down the hall. It grew louder and then Mikasa strode into the room, wearing men's clothes and a wide-brimmed hat. Under the hat, her short boyish hair hung in her eyes, and she appeared androgynous and handsome.
"Are you ready to go, Eren?"
"Yeah." Eren got up from the windowsill, stuffing his shirt into the back of his trousers. He walked in shoes that were of the same style as Mikasa's. He stopped in front of her and they evaluated the other. Then Eren walked to the door. Mikasa turned. She took him by the arm. He went totally still and loose.
"Your suspender." Mikasa slipped her fingers under the strap, untwisting it. Eren felt her hands contacting his back, explicitly. The small hairs on his neck and arms prickled and his mind submerged in a foot of water again.
"Mikasa," Armin said, still standing by the window. "Even with that disguise, people could recognize you."
"I'll hide my face, then," she said. "You can cover for us until we get back?"
"As long as you don't stay out too late," Armin said. "The Military Police will start to ask questions."