Unity

Chapter Twenty Five

"My head hurts," Eren slid up from under the covers and looked out the window and to the clock. It was only 5:32 AM. I sat up and looked at Eren wearily. He must be having side-effects from not drinking any alcohol for six hours.

"It's because you've gone cold-turkey." Eren groaned and rubbed his temples.

"I need a beer. Even a glass of wine would satisfy me," I sighed and looked at Eren with a tired gaze. I was going to watch him like a hawk until he could control himself and not drink.

"You know that you need to get out of your alcoholism." Eren nodded and coughed a couple of times before he replied to me.

"I know, I just won't be feeling very good for a while. My body's gotten so used to being dependent on alcohol." I nodded and looked up at him for a bit. He did look quite drained...

"Other than your hangover side-effects, how are you feeling?" Eren's expression changed to a more serious tone. His eyes drooped and not a single one of his muscles were moving.

"Honestly, I've been really depressed." I looked at Eren's face and noticed that it showed no emotion, through. Mikasa has always been the same way when she was depressed. "My psychiatrist prescribed me anti-depressants when you were gone. She said that if I didn't take them I might get to the point where I might kill myself. She made sure I took them but I've only felt worse." I peered down to where Eren's fingers and hands and noticed that they were trembling slightly.

"Why do you think you've been so depressed all of the sudden?" Eren shivered and pulled the covers back over him. He covered his feet with his hands and rested his chin in his knees.

"She said that I put too much on my chest and I need to talk about my feelings more." Eren paused and looked at me with all the emotion in him radiating from his eyes. "She says that I need to talk to you more about stuff other than work and how we're going to pay our monthly bills." I scratched my head and agreed with that. We haven't had a very personal conversation in years.

"Okay," I looked at Eren in the eyes sincerely. "What's been bothering you lately?" Eren gritted his teeth and turned his face away from mine. I could tell that something has been bothering him and I knew I wasn't going to get it out of him easily.

"Wait, Armin, first I want you to know that I saw that video of you getting beaten," I looked down at my hands and back at Eren. I knew that my face still probably looked beat up and the bruises would be there for a while. "It looked really, really bad, Armin. We need to talk about that first."

"No we don't. I got beat up almost every day in middle school. It's never fazed me. I'm fine." Eren looked at me sympathetically, but I tried to ignore it. "What's been on your mind?" Eren sighed and ruffled his hand through his hair.

"The last week's been hard. It's probably been harder for you, but it's been hard on me, too." I nodded my head. I know it's been hard for him. I kind of expected it to be harder on him psychologically. I think I was more mentally stable than Eren. I'm not trying to sound like I feel like I'm better than him, but it was true. Eren definitely had something up in his head that caused him to act the way he does. Of course he never talked about it and whenever I tried to, he would get mad at me. "I don't know about you, but I don't know how to deal with my problems so I end up doing things like drinking." Eren paused and held his wrist in one of his hands and the other one was tangled in his hair. "Before I met you, I did meth."

"What? You were like 13 years old!"

"I know. Some other orphan kid who's bed was close to mine got his hands on some and he got me into it." I stared at Eren in shock. He did meth? How the fuck did he do meth without getting caught by the people who worked at the orphanage?

"When did you stop?" 

"Mikasa found out and... well... do I need much of an explanation after that?" I shook my head but continued to look at Eren with a concerned look on my face. 

"H... How long were you doing it?" Eren looked like he was playing back memories in his head.

"About a year, maybe. Anyways, it didn't have much of an effect on me. Well, I was addicted to it, obviously, but psychically, I don't think I was on it long enough for any permanent damage." I brought my hand to my forehead and ran my hand through my hair. "But I really need to talk to you about what happened to you when you were gone." I gulped back a lump in my throat and looked at Eren through the corner of my eye.

"O-O-Okay," Eren put his hand on my back, but almost a split-second before, my whole body jumped slightly in the air from the shock of the warm contact.

"Are you-"

"Please!" my voice came out high-pitched and all too quickly. "P-Please... please don't touch me," Eren took his hand off of my back and rested it on his knees, which were brought up against the centre of his chest.

"Are you okay? I don't think I asked that." I looked down at my feet and looked at the socks on my toes. I'd changed them when I got home, so they weren't ripped and dirty. I'd also taken a shower whilst Eren had been sleeping.

"I'm okay now." Eren looked at me and then down at the bed covering. He'd been thinking for a long while now, but he opened his mouth and spoke to me.

"I just want you to know that you're really very masculine and you look nothing like a woman and I would never ever separate you from a group of cismen. I see no difference between you and them, and I don't know what got into my mind when I said that. I feel horrible." I peered up at Eren to notice that he looked very sincere. His tone of voice also showed me honesty within him.

"I've been with you for nine years. You've told me that so many times. Isn't it funny how when you say the opposite, it has a much more powerful effect?" my eyes darted around the room several times until they finally met his bi-coloured ones. "And isn't it funny that when you say this now, it feels more powerful than anything you've ever said concerning this topic?" I fiddled with my fingers and glanced back down at my feet, rejecting Eren's eye contact once again. "I don't know. Maybe it's just because so much shit is going on in our lives currently. I just wish-" I paused harshly and felt the thin rims of my wrist and waited for a long moment. It felt like a long awkward-silence, but to be real, it was only a brief wait. "I just wish we could be like how we used to be before and right when we got married. It was better." Eren stared at the side of my face because I was not turned towards him. I've never spoken so deeply about my feelings out loud like this, and it was bloody painful. I didn't know what to do or say, but everything I said was on the spot. Yet I still agreed with all of it.

"You're right." Was all Eren had to say. He's always been that way, though. He doesn't talk about much on a personal level and he really can only express his angry or happy emotions. It was never really in between, but I know that the emotions in between are there.

I've seen them before. 

And I think I'm the only one who has seen them before.

A/N: AYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

I'm sorry. This is a pointless authour's note. I'll just go write the next chapter now...