Tether, 𝙚.𝙮𝙚𝙖𝙜𝙚𝙧

𝗖𝙷𝙰𝙿𝚃𝙴𝚁 𝚃𝚆𝙴𝙻𝚅𝗘

YOU don't bother with the light switch and make a beeline for the queen-sized bed situated in the center of your hotel room after shrugging off your jacket. It falls to the floor, but you don't pay any mind to it as you collapse onto the bed, sprawling out on your stomach. Your calves dangle over the edge, but you can't bring yourself to scoot up more to get your entire body on the mattress.

Your mind is racing with thoughts, scrambling to process everything that'd happened tonight. You realize that you'd given Levi Ackerman multiple reasons to want to fire you. He'd caught you looking at him during meetings and probably found that as highly inappropriate and unprofessional conduct. Then you'd gone and spilled your drink on him and lied to him about how drunk you really were. Finally, you'd thought running your smart mouth before him had been a good idea — in what fucking world is that a good idea?

You forget Eren's in the room with you until you feel his fingers brush against one of your ankles. You don't budge, but wait curiously to see what he does — you can't see him since your face is turned the other way, but you can feel him. Feel as his hand gingerly picks up your ankle and his fingers begin undoing the straps of your heel. Once he pries it away from the sole of your foot and drops it to the ground, his fingers return to your skin and he runs them over the welts that the straps left behind, gently massaging you.

You finally pick up your head and look up at him over your shoulder. The room is predominantly dark, but moonlight seeps in through the balcony door where only a sheer curtain is drawn over it.

With the help of the dim lighting, you see Eren standing by your bedside, focused on massaging your foot. You feel guilty that he's helping you and roll over till you can scoot yourself up to the edge of the bed and sit with your folded legs pressed to your chest. You reach down to get the heel on your other foot off, but Eren rests a hand against your bare knee, stopping you.

"Ssh, let me." He reassures before shifting his attention to your other foot and working your heel off.  It easily comes off with the help of his deft fingers.

"Eren, you don't have to . . ." You tell him, watching him sink down onto his knees before you to have a better angle to massage your feet with.

"I know." Is all he says, leaning forward to press a gentle kiss against your shin. Just that barely-there gesture sets your body aflame and you lower your feet over the edge of the bed until you can scoot your body down too. Eren makes space for you as you join him on the floor. His arm slinks around your waist and drags you around until you're sitting between his legs, back to his chest while he's leaned back against the bed frame.

It's kind of stupid what you're doing considering that there's a whole ass queen-sized bed in the room, but neither of you care.

You rest your head back against Eren's chest comfortably and allow your eyes to close. Your mind jumps to Jean and how he'd similarly tried to hold you like this to him in the club. Back then, you'd made the mistake of reminding him that the two of you shouldn't have been doing that because of your delicate friendship. Even now, you know Eren holding you like this is complicating things, but you don't want a repeat of what happened with Jean. So, you quell the alarm going off in your head and relax against Eren.

"Did you end up ordering that nail polish for Kaspar?"  You ask him softly after some time.

"No." Eren's chest rumbles just as softly behind you. "I knew you weren't in the right mind to make a decision about it, so I'll wait to order it until you can properly look into it yourself."

"I thought you have to place the order by tomorrow morning so that you get free shipping?"

"I don't care. I'll pay for shipping. Just take your time to actually research into it."