Pursuit of Happiness

7. Alone with the letters

  Every single morning, Mikasa Ackerman tends her backyard garden. It's just a modest, serene garden surrounded by beds of colorful flowers in orderly rows. Flowers of all kinds, from chrysanthemums to roses to hyacinths to daisies to camellias. Aside from brightening her home, her flowers also enlivened her spirits. She continues to shower her love and care on the budding flowers by watering them and feeding them high-quality fertilizer. It's as though she thinks of them as her own "plant children." Indeed, she is passionate about them. Since her early years with her late mother, gardening has been her favorite hobby.

Mikasa smiles at the thought of her mother. Debris of fond and vivid memories with her mother crosses her mind. Even now, Mikasa could picture her mother in a long white dress, smiling sweetly at her as she demonstrates planting the young girl's first flower with her gentle and angelic voice. Her father had just returned from a trip to a neighboring town and had given her a large straw hat. When Mikasa went with her mother to the garden, she wore it so that the sun wouldn't bother her.

"Mikasa, Mom and Dad love you."

She dropped to her knees on the grass, as hot tears streamed down her face. She sobs loudly, letting forth a profound longing for her deceased parent as her mind replays loving memories of them as her lungs struggle for air.

"Mom, dad, I miss you."

Mikasa, who had been curled up in a ball thinking about the past, sprang to her feet as she heard two knocks on the front door. The familiar knocks she expected to hear each morning at 9:30. She swiftly wipes her tears away and takes a deep breath to steady her breathing to avoid her breathing from becoming stuttering as she makes her way toward the door. She could still taste the saltiness of her own tears.

The door opens to Mr. Postman (as Mikasa calls) with a silly-looking mustache standing in front of the wooden door; a bunch of letters is within his grip and his other hand holding a brown-wrapped package. He was a man in his mid-fifties, dressed in a khaki uniform with his obvious bulging stomach, and mustache that are neatly and weirdly styled.

The door swings open to reveal Mr. Postman (as Mikasa refers to him), a man with a mustache that looks ridiculous, standing in front of the wooden door. He is clutching a bundle of letters in one hand and a parcel wrapped in brown paper in the other. He seemed to be a guy in his mid-fifties and was dressed in a khaki uniform. He had an obviously protruding stomach and a mustache that was neatly and oddly groomed.

"Heya, Good Mornin', Miss Ackerman! Ehh, What's with yer eyes? Ya Cryin'? " Mr. Postman asked with a rowdy voice of his.

Mikasa rubs her eyes once more. She could still feel the puffiness in her eyes. "I'm fine, Sir. Just having some sort of nostalgia."

"Ya miss yer mates? Lookin' at the letters, They seem to miss ya too!" Mr. Postman pushed the bunch of letters and the package toward her. "Ya should join the fun with them, Missy!"

Mikasa was the only member of the squad to settle alone in her hometown after the war and start a new chapter of life. As a token of appreciation for her honorable service to her country, Historia has bestowed upon her the gift of a pleasant cottage located close to the city. In the meantime, her comrades Armin, Annie, Jean, Reiner, Pieck, Levi, Gabi, and Falco were doing something that they could never have accomplished while serving in the military before: they were traveling outside the country.

In the meantime, Mikasa lives in her own bubble world, where she goes to Eren's cemetery on top of the hill once a week and cleans it up, embroiders and sells her exquisite handmade crafts at the nearby busy market in the city, grows various of flowers in her backyard that is healthy, and cooking.