Yourself

A place in shambles holds our hearts

The next day seemed to never ending, Pieck remained with Galliard after his first transformation and Leda didn't have choice but to patiently wait for meeting with Reiner at 6. When it was right about time she quickly brushed her hair and threw on something warmer and headed to the main square where she was supposed to see Reiner

Whole day before the walk with Leda, Reiner was nervous. He got to work much earlier than usual in order to try to escape earlier, but at the end he spent the whole day thinking over Leda's words and Gabi's words about flowers.

If I bring flowers it's like... a date. It's not what we agreed about and.. what if she would be embarrassed or simply didn't like them? - Reiner was thinking while dragging his feet in the direction of his home.

No, it's a bad idea. She might take it wrong. Might dislike it.

As he was thinking of the idea of bringing her flowers, the mere memory popped up in his memory.

Berthold was always the shy one, especially when it came to girls. Not that Reiner was the confident one, but surely not as awkward as Bert - in truth, Reiner was just better in hiding it. If Reiner easily kept composure in front of girls, in most cases, Bert was all pale and sweating and looked as if he would faint any moment, and if some girl complimented him for being tall, the poor boy would fall silent for a day. Reiner used to pick Bert up at this, but in fact he felt absolutely the same way being embarrassed at any attention.

Bert fell for Annie and once he told his big secret to Reiner, Reiner decided as it's his duty as a warri... as a friend, to help him out. Somehow, their two "clever" minds decided that Bert should approach Annie with some flowers and knick-knack the two of them found during weekend off in Trost. This story ended up with Bert not confessing and Annie mocking him for those few flowers. Bert never confessed to Annie and threw that knick-knack away in the lake which wasn't far from their barracks.

Reiner stopped in the middle of the street. His memory played a bad joke on him with bringing up exactly this memory. Standing still, Reiner brushed his temple, wincing. He closed his eyes for a moment to brush this thought off.

No, please, not now.

When he opened the eyes again, having managed to tackle the wave of memories, which he secretly considered good ones, he felt a few seconds long frustration, as he didn't understand where he was. Mind cleared and he recognized the street, which was just two streets away from his house. He carefully looked at the sides, checking whether anyone was staring at him and his weird behaviour. Noone seemed to even pay attention. So Reiner finally brushed the thought of flowers off and routed home.

No for flowers for sure, if she won't be in mood... just better without them.

Why do I even think about them? We are friends. - he convinced himself the whole way home, the whole time home, the whole time he was changing into something more presentable. Not that he had big choice - his modest wardrobe consists simply of the things which were allowed to be wore in the military facilities or something which was already only for handy-work at home or sleep. So basically Reiner was choosing which of his few shirts was whiter than another.

Once again he scolded himself for worry for such an unimportant thing, but he just wanted to look at least a little less pathetic than he feels most of the time. Maybe that would help with confidence, he surely needs it.

His mother was doing something in the small backyard, so he just let her know that he's leaving. When he closed the front door behind him, almost bumped into small figure of Gabi.

Gabi threw an evaluative look at Reiner. She grimaced in a way making it clear that she's not approving it.

"You shouldn't wear it" - she said with a sigh.