Blue and White - Levi Fanfiction

Ch. 98 - Whispers in the Dark

"Alright," Hange had said, "everyone try and get some rest. We head out at dawn."

When everyone had congregated back into the camp, bedrolls were handed out and everyone started to head to sleep. I couldn't be completely sure of who exactly had been able to get to sleep, but everyone at least had tried to. Most of us were light sleepers anyway, what with being soldiers, but Levi was especially so.

Knowing this, when Levi and I were given our bedrolls, I set us up a bit away from the others so that we could have some modicum of privacy. We stayed close enough so that the flickering light of the dying fire still reached us, though its warmth did not. But this was fine: I was certain we'd spend the night holding each other, which would keep us well warm enough.

Because we were going to share the same bedroll anyway, we were able to double up on the padding set beneath us, and the blankets laid atop us, and so were somewhat more comfortable than we would've been if we didn't. Not that it mattered much; it only meant we were more comfortable as we didn't sleep.

I was certain of very few things in this life of mine right now. One of them was that Levi would simply have a hard time falling and staying asleep, especially tonight. And so would I.

For Levi, I'm sure the reason that he couldn't sleep was the same as mine. It was still rather hard to believe that he was even here, in my arms. But he was. It'd been well over a month since I'd last seen him, much less been able to hold him, speak with him, kiss him. Updating him on the goings-on at the base and in our family just wasn't the same as being able to tell him about it.

That was how much of this evening had been spent, after I'd changed his bandages and well after I'd made him have his dinner. I'd simply been talking, filling him in on everything that he'd missed. I included all the little details that I'd neglected to mention, either by accident or because they'd simply escaped my mind, but also the larger things, the events that I'd already told him about in my letters.

He did not mind, not one bit, from what I could tell. In fact, I might even have been so inclined to say that he enjoyed it. Talking was simply not one of his strongest suits. But he'd always been good at listening.

Before Hange had made the call for us to head to bed, we'd sat together, seated beside one of the wagons, and he'd listened to me ramble on and on and everything and yet nothing at all, while we gazed up at the moon.

The moon gazed back, beautiful in its crescent shape, resplendent in its glow. I'd glance over every so often, to gaze at him sidelong, to appreciate the way that the moonlight danced on his features. Only once did he catch me; I'm certain he knew exactly when he was looking at me, just as I was always somehow hyper aware of each instance in which he looked at me, but only once did he do something about it.

When he caught my eye and turned his head to look at me, I was already expecting it, and so I wasn't embarrassed. I didn't waste the energy on blushing, on being suddenly shy under his gaze. There was no point in that.

Instead, I smiled at him, and I trailed off. We lapsed into a calm, comfortable silence then. This - the familiar silence that came with just being - was something that I'd missed. I figured that I'd missed everything about Levi. I just hadn't realized how badly I'd missed each and every part of living with him, loving him, and being in his life, until I got them back.

I hadn't realized just how much I missed holding his hand until he'd taken my hand earlier.

I hadn't realized just how much I missed kissing him until I had done so, even with the bandages separating us.

Similarly, I hadn't realized just how much I missed just sitting quietly with him until now. This was something that simply escaped my mine whenever I thought about being with Levi, but really, some of my favorite moments with him were spent just like this: looking at him, speaking no words save for those that were conveyed in our eyes.