[Ereri] The Screams that Saved my Sanity

33-Free Me

(A/N if you have never heard this song and want to this is it ^ obviously I don't own it. Sigh. The lyrics fit okay?...well just the chorus and bridge...sigh...leave me be.)

-Levi's POV-

For the first four months or so Eren visited me everyday.
Every. Single. Day.
I would wake up excitedly and wait until the familiar voice of an aggravated cop to tell me I had a visitor. I loved seeing him but at the same time it was painful. It was painful to be inches away from him and not being to touch him. Sometimes I would put my hand flat on the glass that separates us, hoping that somehow it would magically disappear.
Obviously, it didn't.
He would tell me about his day and what was going on. He would tell me stories about Hanji (he was living with her at the time) and laugh when I would roll my eyes at the idiotic things she did. Hanji visited, too. Those were...interesting visits. Sometimes when he visited he would just sit there and cry. It was hard for both of us.

Of course there came a point where Eren wasn't there everyday.
Everyday turned into a couple of times a week and that turned into every other week until eventually I was lucky to see him at least a couple of times a month.
I wasn't mad.
I could never be mad at him.
Everything that's happened to us is my fault.

He had gotten a job and eventually moved to my house to keep it up. Of course I told him he didn't have to do that but he insisted. Because of his new (and surprisingly well paying) job he couldn't visit me often anymore. Sometimes I would wonder if he forgot about me.

What if he got sick of waiting and left? What if he never shows up again? What if he fell in love with someone else? What if he finally hates me?

These selfish thoughts plagued my mind every time I laid awake at night in my cold, dark cell.
The cell was actually a blessing.
Some inmates slept on a single bed in the middle of the floor.
Prison life is much worse for them. Sometimes I here people being beat up at night and sometimes worse. No one bothered me for the most part. At first, the bigger inmates would try to pick on me or swing a fist at me but I quickly made it clear that if they did that again they'd be missing all of their crooked, yellow, teeth. I became quickly known around the prison as another inmate you didn't want any quarrel with.

What if he fell in love with someone else?

Out of all of the doubts I had this was the one that popped in my head the most. This was the one I feared the most. If he left I understood.
If he hated me, I expected it.
But the thought of someone else holding hands with Eren, the thought of someone else participating in Eren's strangling hugs, the thought of someone else's lips on his, made my blood boil and my heart ache.
Regardless of what I told myself, I wanted Eren all to myself.

"So, what have you been up to? Have you gone to the movies, hung out with your friends...gone on a date?"
I asked him this once when we came to visit me.
His eyes widened in surprised, "Why would I have gone on a date?"
"I don't know...we're not exactly together right now...are we?"
I felt a pang of guilt as I saw the hurt in his eyes, "W-what do you mean? D-did...d-did you meet someone or something?"
"What? No! Of course not! It's just...I don't expect you to just wait for me for 3 years...I understand if you just want to take a break. Just...just so you have time to think. Just to think about what you want..."

He still looked hurt, "But I want y-you." I turned my eyes away from him, " That's what I want, too..."  I took a breath in.
He's not an object.
You don't own him.
You can't pretend like he's going to spend 3 years visiting your ass and not meeting someone else.
Someone better.

"...But I think right now it's for the best. I just want you to have time to think, okay? This doesn't mean I don't love you or I've met someone in this hell hole. I'll love you...even if it's not returned." I looked up at him again. I looked into his eyes. He looked back at me with sadness, and longing, and desperation.
But I also saw love.
He still loved me.
For some reason he still loved me.
One day you might be giving someone else that same look...the look that you gave me once.
"B-but Levi, I don't want too. I love you. I know I broke my promise...I know I can't be here everyday...but that doesn't mean I'm confused. I know how I feel."
I felt my eyes starting to sting, "Just for a couple of months. That's all I ask. If you still want to wait for me that's fine. Just...just do this for me...please."

I don't want you to hurt because of me anymore.

He furrowed his brows and I watched as he fought back the dam holding back his tears. He still looked horrible-maybe even worse than how he was at the hearing.
"Alright...I'll do it...but it's not going to change how I feel about you."
I don't know about that.
I nodded and he got up to leave, "I'll see you in a couple months then...I love you, Levi."
"I love you, too, Eren."
Then he left.

Those two months sucked.

One night I remember just staying awake and looking up at the ceiling for hours-maybe the entire night. I didn't cry.
I just felt empty and...lifeless.
I recalled the time in my life before Eren.
I remembered my shaking hands and bloodstained face.
I remembered smiling as I heard the screams of my victims.
I remembered staying awake just like tonight and crying.

Then I remembered everything that happened since he came into my life.
For once I didn't think about what I did to him. I didn't think about his tears or mine.
Instead I thought about his smile and his laugh. I thought about how he made me smile.
Me.
How he looked at me, how he hugged me, how he kissed me.
How he loved me.

...How he loves me.

There comes a point when you just lose track of the world around you.
When you can't tell imagination from reality or night from day.
You lose track of time and your thoughts.
You lose track of your feelings and emotions...
Feelings you don't miss as much as emotions.
"Feelings are fleeting. They're on the surface, but emotions are deeper. Primal. They linger."
But sometimes these emotions aren't missed.
Sometimes they cut too deep-too primal.
Sometimes you throw them out the door and slam it shut-locking it tightly.
It's less painful that way.
That way they won't linger.
Sometimes you do things you never did.
Sometimes you think things you never thought.
Sometimes you remember things you wouldn't have remembered otherwise.
In my case it was a song.
A song that I've only heard once in my life.
A song that previously irritated the hell out of me.
But tonight that song, I realized, described how I felt perfectly.

I licked my dry lips and quietly whispered the lyrics to myself.
The lyrics I really shouldn't have remembered at all.

"You make my heart feel like it's summer.
When the rain is pouring down.
You make my whole world feel so right, when it's wrong.
That's how I know you are the one.
That's why I know you are the one.

When we're together you make me feel like my mind if free and my dreams are reachable.
Ooh, oh, oh, ooh.
You know I never ever believed in love-
Believed one day that you would come along
Ooh, oh, oh, ooh.

And free me.

You make my heart feel like it's summer.
When the rain is pouring down.
You make my whole world feel so right, when it's wrong.
That's how I know you are the one.
That's why I know you are the one.

That's why I know you are the one.

That's how I know you are the one."

A/N

Yo
Wow.
Your guys' comments...
They're so nice...
Holy shit...
Dammit I can't even sigh.
See what you guys do to me?
Someone scream because I've gone insane.

Ha

See what I did there?

Anyway...
Thanks for reading.
Peace out.