Past doesn't matter (Levi x OC x Erwin) AU/modern +18

Chapter 35: Is this...the end? Pt. 1

I am not like that, I never wanted to be, but it happened because I was too stupid and inexperienced to interpret the signs in time and draw a line. Now I'm caught between two men who both have feelings for me and who will undoubtedly fight each other as soon as the truth is out. In the end, it's me who loses everything, no matter what Erwin promised.

"I ... cheated on you ..." The words that were like stones in my heart finally came over my lips after a hard, endless inner war, but my voice was barely more than a whisper as those sharp words rolled from my lips.

There was a moment of silence. Levi stopped moving and that was when I knew. I knew he had heard me and I knew there was no going back anymore.

But instead of being yelled at or a violent push from his lap, I suddenly and unexpectedly felt two warm hands on my cheeks that gently turned my head in his direction. I had avoided looking him in the eye all the time. I knew I couldn't bear to see the anger, disappointment, shock, and sadness in his eyes, but when our eyes met I saw confusion.

Levi tilted his head slightly to the side, studied my face contorted with grief and shame after speaking the words that were to change my whole life from now on.

"Cheated on me? What do you mean by that? Did you fuck something up? I know you can come up with very stupid ideas, but whatever you did, it can't be that bad, can it? "

Levi just doesn't understand ...

He sure thought I had made a stupid decision like the one when I set a trap for Petra, but how should he know what I really meant?

In a fit of a renewed flood of guilt and endless grief, I put both hands over my nose and mouth, stifled my breathing in the hope of being able to suppress the swelling flood of tears, but it was too strong. Even though the sobs remained silent, miserable short breaths into the palms of my hands, the pain and the sting of my tears burned like acid, while silent, hot drops traveled their way over cheeks and fingers, following the gravity lead towards the floor.

"Please calm down, darling. It hurts me to see you like this. Please tell me what's going on. Let me help you. I'm sure we- "

"No! We can not! You just don't understand it! I cheated on you! I lied! All the time! I told myself it was nothing serious, pretended that it was a one-time mistake and would never happen again, but I was wrong! It happened again, and again, and again! I can't anymore... Please deliver me ... It hurts so much ... I can't take this anymore. Please ... make it stop."

Levi's inability to read between the lines broke me. In an outburst of anger and despair, I roared the bitter truth in his face, and I no longer felt his hands on my cheeks but watched them sink into his lap, trembling.

"What? What do you mean? Tell me you don't mean what I think. Say it!" Levi raised his voice when he finally seemed to understand how serious the situation is. But it still hurt so bad ...

That he forced me to explain, again and again, to repeat myself, again and again, each time my heart ached more and I now believed that Levi had his hand tightly closed around my beating heart and squeezed harder and harder until I could no longer breathe until the pain became so much that I couldn't feel anything else, but this.

Too big, too engaging, too numbing was this unspeakably great ache that everything else was suppressed.

Under loud sobs and a never-ending flood of tears, I grabbed his shirt in pure despair, held it so tightly that I feared I would tear it apart.

I need him.

I need him so much that the thought of losing him made me die a little every second. And it's my fault ...