Halcyon Days

Remember (Part II)

Jean lets out a contented sigh as he collapses onto the sheets, sticky with sweat and completely worn to the bone. Catching his breath, Jean glances at the heaving chest of the young man next to him, appreciating the swathes of tanned skin on display. Jean doesn't really know him, but he isn't one to turn away from the perfect view of sinewy muscle and attractive dusting of freckles down the boy's chest.

Bright green eyes stare back at him, and the boy shoots him a sly grin before slipping out of Jean's hold and off the bed.

"You're good, mate," he chuckles in a heavily accented voice scratchy from use, and slowly runs a slender finger down Jean's arm.

Jean raises a brow.

"You seem to like my eyes a lot. Why's that?" the boy asks boldly, "I remind you of someone?"

Jean freezes, but then he shrugs the hand off before rolling over.

"No reason," he mutters, not elaborating.

There is a quiet scoff from the boy as he gathers his clothes, sparing Jean a quick glance before leaving the room.

Jean basks in silence. He's tired and really just wants to sleep, but the heavy stench of sex and alcohol in the air makes his cringe. He usually doesn't do these kinds of things. This— This is just an isolated incident. Something he wants to file away and never think about again. He curses himself for his weakness to slender, tanned, brunettes and green eyes.

He can't hold a stable relationship for more than a month, but having one-night-stands leave him weighed down with self-loathing and guilt. This isn't any different. That boy had been willing enough — a spunky Australian exchange student with such dazzling green eyes that goddammit — but for Jean, he was nothing but a replacement.

Cruel as it may sound, Jean isn't going to lie to himself. He's done enough of that already.

It's difficult, and Jean knows that he isn't dealing with things as healthily as he should. Even before Mikasa found him; before he'd regained his memories, Jean had always felt that there was something not quite right about himself. He'd get the most violent nightmares throughout his childhood, and wasn't spared from the panic attacks that accompanied them.

Jean isn't going to lie. He's happy he remembers the incidents those 2000 years ago, but it doesn't mean that he hasn't once wished that perhaps everything might have been better if he'd just remained in the dark.

He wonders how his younger self managed to make sense out of the recurring dreams of people, places... monsters that probably made no sense to him as a child. But now? Everything is just so... strained. Jean isn't exactly certain of when the uneasiness started to creep up, but he is certain that it has to do with the torrent of memories that just won't leave him be.

Things are beginning to become increasingly awkward with his present family, even with Mika. Jean loves them, of course he does, but sometimes he thinks back to his mother in the past and wonders what happened to her.

He had died while out on an expedition — his skull crushed between the teeth of an aberrant-class Titan. It was neither a significant or heroic death. In fact, looking back now Jean can't help but agree that is was ultimately utter stupidity that brought upon his downfall.

Jean wonders how his mother must have taken his death. Was his body even found? It could have fallen into a bush somewhere, or maybe a tree? Perhaps twisted into those disgusting spheres of rotting, half-digested corpses the Titans regurgitated?

Bile builds up at the the back of his throat, and Jean swallows hard.

He forces himself to think of something else, and as expected, his mind conjures up a hazy image of a certain green-eyed man.