No More Wishes (Cheating!Reiner X Bertholdt Fanfic)

Part 3

Bertholdt loved memories.

Those small fragments of cherished times that he recollected brought him tremendous comfort. To him, immersing himself in his treasured memories was equivalent to wading into the tide of the past, the water of time swirling around his ankles. Gentle and refreshing. Perhaps those were his two most favorite things in the world - the ocean, and his memories. To him, they were an escape to his bleak and agonizing surroundings.

His teenage years were the best years of his life. Amidst his struggle to make friends and his challenge to communicate with others in spite of his stammering and sputtering, he was somehow comfortably at ease, free from the worry of adulthood, free from taxes and bills, free from the misery he was enduring through his relationship.

Interestingly enough, it was also the time period where he and Reiner had begun dating.

It would've been stupid, in hindsight, to think that there could possibly be any other scenario where the two didn't end up together. They were inseparable, and each other's most trusted confidant. The notion of someone else replacing the other was unfathomable to both of them. Having shared similar backgrounds and a close childhood friendship, it wasn't all that difficult to perceive a future where the friendship blossomed into something more passionate. All from their naive childhood professions of love and promises for marriage to Reiner's actual proposal, everything seemed inevitable, almost like it was set out in stone.

Perhaps that was why he had such difficulty breaking away from it.

It had always been like this, and whether the stress of conforming to everyone's expectations for this relationship to succeed outweighed the comfort of knowing nothing could deter them from this path had eluded him all these years. And yet, it was still painfully present in his life.

Bertholdt had always wanted to live up to others' expectations and prevent becoming the center of disappointment and mistrust. It was every human's craving - to be accepted and included by society. But it had always felt like a magnified weight on his back. The ravenette had figured from an early age that he was...different, to say the least. He was demure and bashful, while other boys were outlandish and reckless. He had been weak and lanky, whereas other his age where building formidable bodies. He could never find anything desirable or appealing in his body or character, and Bertholdt had been quick to assume no one else did, either.

He was just 14 when he began to loathe himself.

It was strange at first - being disgusted with the very body you grew up in. Bertholdt suppressed those emotions for quite some time, pretending that everything was fine, hoping to trick his own mind with his semblance of calm. Despite the facade, however, the thoughts of self-abhorrence and contempt swarmed inside of him, flooding his mind, unprovoked, at random points in the day. It swallowed him in sudden repulsion, feeling sullied and dirty. Like all his shameful mistakes were imprinted on his skin, crawling up to his neck, in full display for everyone to see.

In order to hide, he'd locked himself in his room for days on end. Bertholdt took frequent baths, scrubbing his skin roughly, as if there was some unerasable impurity clinging onto him. As if he could rip off this godforsaken skin he'd been confined to. Topping it all off, talking to people had become an inescapable fear. He'd dread having to walk out and converse. Bertholdt soon found a twisted solace in punishing himself, and even the smallest mistake or imperfection was something that he would intensely scorn himself with until its repercussions. That is to say, he began to torture his mind and body for being unable to fulfill others' expectations.

The only person who noticed when he began to cut himself was Reiner. In fact, he was the only one who noticed these well-hidden changes in him from the beginning.