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Marriage has always been a dominant preoccupation in Reiner Braun's mind.
As a child, his mother Karina told him again and again that love could solve all problems and transcend all constraints. "It's because I love you that I want you to be able to see your father again and for us all to live together. That's why I push you to excel as an apprentice warrior," she sang. "It's also for love of country that you honor Marley by seeking to become one of its strongest weapons."
Reiner didn't have many interests at that age, and the fires of love weren't among the few things that piqued his curiosity. He sometimes told his mother that if love was that strong, his father should come and join them in Liberio.
This often angered the woman. After a few slaps in the face, he finally understood that the subject was not one to be exploited.
From that early age, love took on the role of divine magic, moving mountains and guiding humans to the greatest feats. Love animated the Warriors, for their devotion to their homeland was unwavering. Love animated his brave family, who worked hard to produce children who were obedient and successful in their duties. Love bound honorary Eldians to virtuous Mahrs.
Sometimes, despite Reiner's best efforts to make her happy, she cried. As unhappy as a day without sunshine. Reiner soon realized that it was love all over again, and stayed late at her bedside to hear her desolations. "My child," she announced with eyes filled with regret, "My dear little Reiner, people are never complete until they love. Your father's absence is digging a hole in me that can only be healed by his return to me."
"But Mom, you mustn't be sad if you can't do anything." He replied in his high-pitched voice.
"I'm doing my best. I'm training you to become an honorary Mahrs so I can bring us all together. But, it's so hard sometimes..."
Reiner would then lower his eyes in deep thought for a few seconds, then emerge from it with hard resolve. "I'll do my best to win so we can see Dad again."
Karina then smiled, "Remember that you have to excel, don't you Reiner?"
"Yes, Mom."
His mother often repeated this adage at his bedside: "Two people who love each other are two people who are fulfilled and satisfied." And Reiner listened with big ears to all the maternal advice provided for him.
"Do I need to love?"
"Always. You can't be loved if you don't love."
"What if I choose to live without love?"
Karina paused. As a victim herself of the ravages of this powerful feeling, she only wanted to tell her young son what she believed to be true.
"Then you'll die alone."
Reiner was gullible. "I don't want to die alone..."
Karina's voice was still nasally, moralistic. "Then try to hold on to things. Especially those that bring happiness and fertility to the motherland. The rest can be put off until later. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Mom." Reiner had finished, hiding his nose under the comforter, frightened by the monster of death and loneliness he felt leaning towards him.
No one wants to die alone, everyone wants to serve the greater good. The two notions went hand in hand, so Reiner associated them.
---___---___---___---___---___---___---
Training brigades. A place of fun, of hard bodywork. Of lies tying reality into rambling threads. Reiner had few memories of this period of his life, except for a patchwork of things here and there, scattered and sullied by his mental disorder.
Laughter that went up in smoke, the vapor of his memory and that of the cigarettes some people smoked on the sly. Reiner had committed this little crime among many alongside other boys of his age whose names had disappeared.
The poor, undernourishing food due to the restrictions. The boys's dormitory filled with young guys seeking to join the girls's. Mikasa and her brute strength. Ymir and her arrogance.
Historia. Or Christa, as she called herself in those days. She was a flower of beauty, a ravishing magnolia that had numbed him with the nectar of her charms.
Now that he was feeling better, his mind had reconciled enough notions to remind him of his obsession with this young girl. Sometimes, he found himself understanding why Ymir wouldn't let him get close to his protégée. He'd acted all clingy towards the poor girl, who clearly wasn't interested.
And then there was Jean. A boy who had encircled his senses. A handsome soldier with the air of an ill-domesticated cat, who didn't parade fine principles or false promises for the good of mankind. He wanted to live out his existence comfortably, untroubled and unattached, but had one of the biggest hearts of any young man in the brigade.
A heart whose rhythm absorbed Reiner's.
Their story had unfolded between the wide brackets separating them.
First the shyness, the stigma surrounding such feelings towards a man. Then liberation when they joined the Survey Corps, where they shared some good times, though these were short-lived. Soon enough, Reiner had to leave this handsome stallion, for in a fit of madness he had revealed his own nature and that of his mission.
Jean had hated him for a long time.
---___---___---___---___---___---___---
Between those scattered childhood moments and the present, many things had happened. Among other things, the obliteration of 80% of humanity still resonated through a ruined and exposed world. Rumbling had crushed civilizations and cultures in its path, but had at least succeeded in temporarily erasing racism and the visceral hatred of eldians. In this new world, where Reiner lived from day to day, people were rebuilding their lives and getting to know each other regardless of race, origin or native language.
He had achieved the title of Ambassador for Peace through his involvement in stopping the cancellation machine and the murder of Eren Jaeger. His protective role had extended from his homeland alone to all humanity; he was the shield of a twelve-armed knight fighting against hostility.
With him, old friends. Old enemies. Notions blurred in his poorly constructed mind. Connie Springer, with whom he'd go out for a few drinks, Armin Arlet, with whom he'd share long philosophical discussions of regret and change. Annie, as lonely as a breeze in the middle of the night. Sordid, sarcastic, reserved. Sometimes she and Reiner would find themselves in a quiet place, embracing without saying a word, without any ulterior motive. Only looking for a missing warmth, a third piece lost in the bloody conflict. Forever.
They had dedicated a flowerbed to him, a large rock on which they engraved his name with their own hands and knifes.
"We've got to let them go." Captain Levi had commented one evening. Reiner had missed the meeting, and his old captain just knew where he would find him.
"It's so hard. It's not fair to you if I cry at his grave, but it's not fair to him if I forget." Reiner had replied, tears stretching down his cheeks.
"The hole will never close. The pain will stay for years." sighed the old soldier, "Everyone has the right to cry who they want, that's not the point. But I don't think that sweet boy would have liked you torturing yourself so much."
"You don't have to force yourself to call him that.... I know what he meant to you, you don't have to pretend to like him."
Levi had then considered his former soldier with his iron eyes. "I know the difference between the man and his actions. I, too, miss controversial figures."
The confession seemed to stop time, and Reiner had to take several seconds before re-entering the conversation. "When I was a kid, I thought love was a boon and a pride to parade around with. Now I know it's a curse."
"You won't be able to stop yourself from loving."
"Why?"
"I would know, dumbass."
Captain Levi, whose looks recited entire paragraphs. Reiner held a deep respect and pity for him; this man was all that remained of the Survey Corp's old, crumbling dream. He was bound to his chair now, his strength diminished by the lack of limbs needed to hold his weapons, old, cornered. But his gaze reflected the eternal steel of his old blades, and he hurled words at Reiner more striking than the wounds he had inflicted on him in the past. He'd become a moralist and a tea salesman, much to his credit.
"Don't go scattering your heart all over the place again, Braun. You'll go back to being a puppet of the middle ground." He tossed as he and Reiner trailed behind a walk in the refugee camp.
"I know Cap- Levi... Thanks."
"By the way, Braun."
"Yes?"
A pause, then this. "Love is necessary to be a part of humanity, so don't go imagining that striving to avoid it will spare your suffering."
"Captain?"
"Go get him."
"What are you talking about?"
A look. Reiner instantly understood the innuendo and couldn't help looking away, his heart titillated by the mere thought of the individual.
"What am I talking about? You know very fucking well." He added before sighting once again, "Fuck your puppy love... You two need to grow up."
---___---___---___---___---___---___---
"Reiner? Oh, Reiner? Are you fucking deaf?" The warrior was jolted from his reverie by the sound of a light clatter. The sun struck his numbed senses. "I can't believe... What a teddy bear you are when you make that face."
"Me, a teddy bear?" Was all he replied, striving to smile at the person facing him. "I don't think so, Mr. Kirstein."
"When I get you out of your daydreams, you always make this face, as if I'd told you I was pregnant." Jean remarked with a smile at the corners of his lips, "I think it's cute."
"Meanwhile, imagine my surprise if I found out I had been with a woman all this time."
The two men laughed in unison, then Jean reached for the bottle of red wine sitting on their table to serve them.
"I did understand that my masculinity was having an effect on you," Jean continued with a smirk, "I've practically converted you."
Reiner ran his fingers around his glass, delicately lifting the red beverage, "Ah, I converted you too..."
"True." Replied his lover, raising his glass to his lips. A short silence passed as they shared a look heavy with meaning.
A few peaceful moments passed gently between the two men, who both seemed to be waiting for something. Reiner could feel a different substance in the air, like something imminent, a last-minute surprise. Was Jean planning something special? He hadn't heard.
A surprise, then?
Reiner wasn't very good at receiving surprises. More simply, he wasn't very good at receiving.
His whole life before the Rumbling could only be summed up as a constant effort made towards the people around him, seeking some kind of recognition, some usefulness to his presence within the social circle. He had played himself dirty tricks on Paradis, mimicking the soldier, breaking his brain, all for a few approving glances.
He'd never seen anyone give him anything he didn't have to do. Even his relationship with Jean had begun because of the former warrior's earlier displays of strength.
In reality, he made no effort to offer himself anything. Priority was always fixed on others; their thoughts, their gestures, all made Reiner dance to their desires.
He'd been trying to erase this bad reflex ever since Jean had exploded in front of him a few weeks earlier, screaming between insults that he'd have to learn to let himself be loved if he didn't want to disappear again behind the screens of a billing personality.
But the gestures coded by years of lies remained tenacious. Fortunately, Jean knew how to get his feelings out of him when he needed them.
And to think that, without him, he wouldn't even be here.
"Stop looking at me funny like that." Jean finally enunciated, breaking the silence, "You want to tell me something, don't you? I've been feeling it since earlier."
"..."
"Come on..." Jean commented, watching his lover lower his eyes to the wooded floor of their hotel.
"It's just that I feel like I shouldn't. I mean, you know how I am sometimes. It's my old reflexes..."
Jean sensed in these words that the tone was no longer one of jokes and teasing. "Is it something that comes from a deep part of you?"
"You could say that."
"You don't have to share it if you're not a hundred percent sure..." Jean added, moving closer to the muscular man in an effort at intimacy, seeking to create some atmosphere capable of helping him express his needs.
Jeean had finally got the hang of it, understanding as these difficult moments unfolded that Reiner needed no more than a listening ear and a hand on his shoulder.
These moments when everything seemed to stop were like shadows haunting Jean's mind. Sometimes, they brought good news; Reiner had once sunk into a heavy, shy mutism, leaving Jean alone, confused as to why he was actly this strangely. Turns out he just didn't know how to tell Jean a few simple words; a sexual request, nothing more.
But sometimes, the news brought by this mood was much darker.
Sometimes, wounds had to be touched. Open old scars, rip out surgical sutures. Cauterize a bloody wound, in the dead of night, hearing the cries, the distress of Reiner plunged into his torpor. Plunged into an ocean of hurting memories.
Sometimes, you just had to look at the gangrene growing in their bodies. The sins crawling deep, deep in their bones.
Jean wasn't a fan of suicidal talk, reminders of their horrors and other bloody memories. He preferred to drown it all out and start afresh, to tell the truth. Only...
Some didn't have the luxury of being able to do that.
"Reiner, do you trust me?"
He answered without hesitation, "Yes."
"Then take your time and express yourself."
A short silence followed.
Reiner shoved his hands into his pockets. "Don't make fun of me."
"I promise I won't."
"Promise promise?"
"All right, Reiner, we're not twelve anymore," his lover laughed softly, "Don't worry. I'm here to listen to you. I can be a pain in the ass sometimes, but right now I'm here for you."
"Well... I'll go for it then."
"Go for it."
"I'm going for real!" He exclaimed.
"Yeah!" Jean smiled.
"Yeah!"
Jean let a bubble laugh out of his throat, "Come on, let's end this!" He commented, not knowing that these few words would be the leverage needed to finally move Reiner's heart.
"No, I don't want it to end..." he began before swiftly pulling his hand out of his pocket. In the hollow of his fingers, an object sounded against the table. "I want...!"
His words were now like war cries, something to give himself courage. Jean was struggling to keep up with the change in mood, but wasn't complaining about finding a positive atmosphere again.
"Come on, big boy."
"I want...!" He repeated, his eyes glistening with embryonic tears. His lover felt his heart drop into his stomach. Again, a radical change. What could be going on in there?
He reached into his pocket, pulled out Reiner's hand and squeezed it gently, "I'm here, Reiner. Take your time."
A click.
Reiner looked up at him, all composition restored despite an emotional expression. His hand cleared the space, revealing a small, shiny object. A golden circle.
"I want to marry you."
...
...
Jean felt his pulse quicken, his breathing miss a breath. Shit! It was...
"So stupid!" He shouted before leaving Reiner's side in a strange panic, leaving to gather for something in another room, cursing dramatically into the air. Leaving Reiner alone.
Alone in total incomprehension.
What...?
What had just happened ...?
But soon Jean reappeared in the doorway, rushing towards the former warrior. Without warning, Reiner was confronted by a small cubic object which Jean slammed on the table, breathing heavily.
At that point, Reiner was about to collapse from desperation. Why, just why?
Why had he been so naive? To think, to even BELIEVE that someone like Jean could tolerate someone like him-
He was too rotten for Jean. Of course he didn't deserve to marry such a wonderful person. In fact, he didn't deserve to marry anyone at all.
So- so goddamn stupid. Stupid, stupid, useless-
A little click occured. Reiner lowered his gaze to find Jean's little box opened and, in the middle of it...
Wait.
"Well, at least we know each other's jewel taste." Commented Jean.
...
"Did I got your size right? Your fingers always felt big, so I got a really large one."
...
"Hey, are you blocked?"
...
Jean slowly went up to take Reiner's hand and deposit, right in the middle of it, this little golden ring.
It took a minutes for him to wrap around the idea.
Reiner gazed at him, unsure, "Is this what I think it is ?" He said as he examined the shiny object between his fingers.
"You bet."
He heard his heart make a hopeful sound, "Then... Why is it stupid?"
"Oh- because we both bought rings. We could have saved some money if we didn't!"
Reiner's face came alive once more, "Then, then...! Is that a yes ?"
"... Oh shit, I didn't even respond!" Jean exclaimed, facepalming himself, "Yes! Fucking yes motherfucker!"
"You want to marry me?" He added in disbelief.
Jean smirked, "Who else, big oaf? The mailman ?" Reiner's look made Jean and "I prefer my man blond, muscled, and who's name starts with Rein and ends with -er."
Reiner couldn't help but take his lover between his arms, crushing him inside his love-powered force, "Jean!"
"Yeah, that's me!" He yelled, smiling as he, too, ran his arms around Reiner's back, "Your montherfucking futur husband. Be prepared, 'cause I don't know anyone as annoying as me."
"You're not annoying" claimed Reiner, letting a smile slip through him, "Well, maybe a little."