Authors Note: I am so sorry this took so long! I have the next chapter already typed up so it shouldn't take as long! I hope you enjoy this chapter and the shift in POV.

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Eren's POV

He could remember the first time he had seen her, the scared little girl shivering on a hospital bed. He wasn't sure why his father had brought him to meet her. After all he had an endless list of patients, what was so special about this one?

She hadn't spoken his whole visit and that had made him angry. When it had been time to go, he had gotten up ready to leave the uncomfortable situation when she finally spoke.

"Can you ask the nurse for another blanket? I'm cold." Her words had been soft, almost a whisper but he had heard them. He turned so fast he almost gave himself whiplash, and before he knew it he was walking towards her unraveling the red scarf from his neck and putting it around her own.

"That should help," he said with a satisfied gap tooth grinned.

"But I'll bring you a blanket from home tomorrow. The ones here smell like chemicals." With that he had left, knowing he would see her the next day.

Mikasa became a huge part of his life in a way he barely noticed. One day she was just someone who he kept company and the next she was an integral part of his life.

Growing up with her was always an adventure. Wherever there was trouble it was almost, Armin and Mikasa were involved, not always by their own choice of course. It was as if it was some unwritten rule, they were in this forever and nothing could change that. It was childish to believe this was true of course but growing up the thought of anything else was unthinkable.

He couldn't remember falling for Mikasa because that wasn't how it happened. He was an angry child and a reckless teenager, more than his parents could handle most days, yet her calming presence always kept him from going too far. When his mother got sick the summer of their freshman year he never even considered her dying. People beat cancer all the time right? His father was a doctor for fuck's sake! It was slow and painful. Years later he could still hear the monitors that often provided ambiance at his home, her shaky voice and sweet smile. If there was a person who didn't deserve a slow and painful death it was Carla Jaeger, but they all knew life liked to play sick games, he had seen it before after all.

Her suffering ended eventually and he remembered little of the actual day it happened. He remembered being dragged out of the hospital room by Armin and his grandfather, punching a hole through a wall, Mikasa's scowl as she bandaged his knuckles. It didn't feel real, it didn't feel possible because his mother wasn't supposed to die.

It rained on the day of the funeral as if the sky was crying all the tears he was too angry to shed, and as he stood under a black umbrella his friends on either side of him he felt nothing but anger. Explosive uncontrollable anger he wasn't sure at whom to direct. His father? His friends? His now dead and gone mother? The world?

He knew people always talked about how great someone's life had been once they were dead, all the good they had done and how they would be missed yet nothing that was said came remotely close to doing her any justice. He didn't speak. Couldn't find the words, instead placing a single white tulip on her casket before they lowered her.

They were meant to head back to his house once it was over but they stuck around, sitting under a big willow tree that overlooked his mother grave as he tried to grasp the fact that she was truly gone. Mikasa held his hands in her own and Armin spoke in soft soothing tones about things he knew were inconsequential. They were a team.

His father was alive but he might as well have died when his mother did, he was little more than the credit card in Eren's pocket, the food in the fridge and the Beamer in the driveway. His friends were the only thing keeping him from driving that same car into a lake.

Mikasa was like a bright light at the end of the tunnel, often sneaking in through his window spending the endless nights in his bed, Always innocent, not that his father would have noticed anyways, but she rarely slept either and having each other made the nights shorter somehow. It was on one of those nights that she had suggested seeing a therapist for his anger, he had scoffed about it at first, more than a little offended, but because it was her he had eventually conceded

He remembered thinking it was strange when the whole modeling thing had happened, not that she wasn't beautiful, it just didn't sound like something that actually happened to regular people, but when the acting had started he couldn't have been happier.

Prom night changed everything and even when it was the most cliché thing to ever happen to them he was glad something had finally changed. It was strange to love your best friend more than anything else, it was even stranger when you knew she felt the same way yet had done nothing about it.

Their friends had all seen it coming and after graduation as most had expected he had followed her to California where she could further her career. He hadn't minded, anything to see that smile on her face, anything as long as he was where she was.

Award shows, Hollywood parties and running into people he read about in magazines became their life. Sure he tried to be a normal college student with Armin and for all intents purposes he was. He spent time in class and in local coffee shops with the friends he made in school while Mikasa worked, yet when she landed the big one, the one that they knew would change her career from that one girl from that one movie that one time to a household name. It was some Young Adult novel, he had seen plenty of girls in his school holding it and when it hit the box office it exploded. His girlfriend's picture was suddenly the center of just about every magazine, his own making casual appearances, rarely was his name mentioned. She was often linked to other actors even when she made it clear she had a boyfriend but he knew that came with the territory.

It was his Junior year of college when he decided he wanted to go to medical school, the path hadn't even seemed like a possibility, after all the last thing he wanted was to end up like his own father, but this wasn't for him. This had nothing to do with him, this was his own path and he wanted to help those like his mother, those who needed someone at their worst. Armin graduated early and before he knew it he was getting married.

It was strange to watch your best friend walk down the aisle, he still felt too young to consider it but he could tell everyone was thinking it. He and Mikasa had been friends a lifetime; she was in the spotlight now, why not?

Their life started changing before they even realized it, Armin left back to New York, law school on the horizon and suddenly he spent most days alone. Sure he had friends from school but it was like he was lost in a life he was no longer sure he had chosen. His father checked in every few months and he skyped with Armin and Annie often but his girlfriend was often missing in action. She had endless shoots and events to attend now that she was a big name and while he sometimes tagged along he didn't exactly enjoy it.

His anger and despair caught up to him that winter, most people were celebrating the holidays with their family and while he was accustomed to not having his parents around he thought it would be like old times. While Armin was gone he and Mikasa should be spending time together, they should be enjoying their cozy family of two. Instead promotion took her overseas for Thanksgiving and while she had promised she would be around for Christmas she got a call the night before about a party she had to attend.

"I have no choice Eren. It's a work thing, the movie is doing well and they want me to meet directors while they are still interested in me. I won't be out all night, and we can just open presents when I get back or tomorrow morning." She hadn't looked up from the bracelet she was fastening and he felt as if she was speaking to him as if he were a child who was getting his favorite toy taken away for misbehaving instead of a grown man justifiably upset about the situation.

"It's not about that Mikasa. This is Christmas Eve. We are a family and yet you don't seem to care." That finally caught her attention and she looked up, her silver gaze meeting his own.

"Don't start with that."

That had been the beginning of the end, even if he hadn't seen it right away, even if his brain had told him things would get better eventually he just had to give her time. He graduated the following year and got accepted into multiple medical schools, he had his pick but this was all eclipsed by the fact that Mikasa had been nominated for an Oscar. He had been ecstatic for her at first, but before long it only pulled them further and further apart. He didn't attend the show, desperate to not be seen as an accessory in her life, and before long he stopped going to just about anything that had to do with her life in the lime -light.

He knew it wasn't right, heard it often from Armin how he was letting her slip away but in his own eyes she was only slipping away because she wanted to leave. They were visiting Annie and Armin the following year, Annie already round with pregnancy when Armin told them they would be the god parents and when Mikasa had to fly back home early because her shooting schedule had been moved up he was a lot more upset than Armin.

Their family always came second, their life always came second and she wasn't even the person he had fallen for all those years ago. His anger grew and the more she pulled away the more he resigned himself to losing the last piece of his family he had left. If he could lose his mother, this was just another piece he would learn to live without.

Leaving had been horrible, he could still remember the tears in her eyes, how sharp her voice had been as she called out after him that he was quitting and she should have seen it coming. He hadn't gotten far from her apartment before pulling over, the sorrow consuming him once more.

A week later his plane landed in Baltimore and he was desperate to start anew. John Hopkins was world renown and he knew he was lucky to have gotten in, knew he was lucky to be attending at all because his father could afford it but he chose to ignore that, at least for the time being.

He threw himself into his work and saw little outside of the walls of his classes and his apartments, he tried dating a few times, adverted his eyes from the tabloids and tried to steer clear of social media where he was sure a few people were sure to eventually post something with her name in the headline. Armin was their only connecting factor and Eren steered clear of any conversation that would lead to her. A year passed before he knew it and before long he was a second year medical student. When Armin called him about the party Eren could hardly believe Abby was already turning one, he had seen her over his summer holiday and she was growing so fast, it had almost slipped his mind that she would be there but if he was being totally honest she never truly left his mind.

Taking the last flight was his only option, classes were still in session and he couldn't just take a day off. Armin had sent a town car for him and the day before party was already in full swing when he pulled up to Armin's house. It was so like their friends to have a party the night before their child's birthday Eren didn't question it. Walking into the familiar home he felt at ease, waving at a few of his friends and stopping to chat with Armin. He knew the minute they were in the same room, he couldn't explain it even to himself but his eyes flicked up and met her own. Shrugging off his coat easily his voice he did not raise instead speaking to around him before he had excused himself and headed over to her, almost like a magnet he simply couldn't stay away even when he knew he should. His eyes roamed up and down her body as he moved and he couldn't help but wonder if she had changed in ways that his eyes were missing, she was still the same girl he had seen almost a year and a half ago and yet that seemed like a totally different life time, surely she too must feel it.

He spoke but it was clear when she didn't hear him and when she finally speaks its as if he exhales for the first time since he left her presences. Their conversation was short, nothing is really said and before too long they are both making excuses to move on. He found himself on his best friends deck exchanging stories with no real consequence and before he knows it she is gone. Probably for the best he wanted to think but his mind already wanted more, the self destructive part of him is already counting down the seconds until they spoke once more.

It's hours later already checked into his hotel that he can't take it anymore, phone in hand he dials the familiar number and sends a text he is sure he might regret later. It only takes a few minutes but eventually his phone light up and his smile widens as he reads the words on the screen.

SMS: Mikasa

Old habits die hard, I guess that goes for both of us. Hello Eren. It's been a while.