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He never shows me to anyone. Whether it is out of shame or jealousy I will never know nor do I care. What matters is that I’m his and despite the way he talks and acts around others, he hugs me at night and looks at me like I’m precious. He never says it but I can see in his eyes that he loves me.
I am just a rabbit, a toy of his from days long past, but I’ve been with him longer than anyone else. I don’t have a name and he never gives me one. I love him, I love him more than anything else in this world. I would do anything for him. But I am just a rabbit.
And sometimes I wish I was more.
---000---
It’s been dark for so long. I don’t know where I am and the only thing that comforts me is that I can sometimes hear his voice through whatever it is that I’m in. I want to see him. I don’t want to be alone. I want to be there when he cries alone. I can hear it when he breathes a little too sharply or can’t make that sob as quiet as he wishes it was.
---000---
Lately I’ve been hearing more and more of a new voice. I am happy because he is happy. I can tell by the way his voice sounds just a pitch higher than normal or the laughs disguised as snorts he sometimes gives. I am happy because he is happy. His happiness is all I will ever need.
---000---
There is light. The face looking down at me unfamiliar. Over this newcomers shoulder I can see him, now much older than when I last saw him.
“Hey, Levi, What’s up with this rabbit?”
I knew that voice. It had been around a lot recently. This was the person making Levi happy. My hate for the brown haired boy lessened slightly… but he was still holding me too tight.
“I thought I told you not to go through in my stuff, brat.”
He was there, gently taking me from this gangly awkward boy and holding me in his own hands. For the first time in years I could feel the constant thump of his heart at my back as he gathered me to his chest.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“He doesn’t have a name.”
I didn’t have one nor did I need one. I just needed Levi.
“What about-”
“He doesn’t need a name. He’s lived longer than you have without one.”
It was better that I didn’t have a name.
---000---
As Eren, as I’d eventually learned he was named, ran his fingers over my ears and back I decided that he was rather okay despite sometimes holding me too tightly. Eren did have the wonderful tendency to make Levi happy.
So I supposed he was alright... Even if he was a brat.
---000---
I notice that Eren never spends the nights with Levi and at first I think that it’s great. Ever since Eren dug me up from the box I had lain in for all those years Levi had placed me in the corner of his bed and I would often end p held in his arms by morning. Levi never said anything about it and neither did… But maybe that was just because I couldn’t talk.
Then I realize that Eren being gone is a bad thing, a very bad thing. Levi, always the silent sleeper, has started to groan and whimper in his sleep. I see his eyes move frantically under his eyelids and feel the cold sweat that comes off of him. More than once he wakes up screaming with fear in his eyes. From my place in the corner, inconspicuous, I see the worried looks the woman with the glasses gives him.
I realize I’m not enough to stave off the nightmares that haunt him anymore. His monsters are bigger and darker than shadows now.
---000---
We’ve moved to a small cottage in the middle of nowhere. Levi’s somewhere else in the house and Eren tells me that he’s busy. I hear screams. But they aren’t Levi’s so it doesn’t really bother me.
Another thing about Eren. He talks to me. Levi only talked to me when he was very young and soon grew out of it. It’s… nice to have someone that talks to me again. I can see why Levi loves him. Why he looks at Eren the same way he used to look at me.
---000---
Levi and Eren are gone… I don’t know where they went. The cottage is burning and everything is red and orange and hot.
They didn’t mean to leave me. I had flopped down the gap between the wall and the bed when Levi was sleeping last night. I watched as they searched around for me. I wanted to scream and tell them that I was right there as they left. I swear I hear Levi’s breath hitch in that way that means he’s crying. I wanted to get up. I wanted to let him know that I loved him more than anyone in the world. That I will always be his. But I am just a rabbit.
And sometimes I wish I was more.