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Chapter Text

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Japanese Summer: 1・Suiting BGM: 1 2

When I was a child my father used to take me to the harbour on his days off. The century was still young but innocent it was no more. We used to sit on a bench on a little hill and looked down on the harbour of our capital city. Down there it was always a hustle and bustle. Countless people flood into each other, whirled around without touching their counterparts, walking off on their paths afterwards. The sounds of their wooden shoes could be heard up to our place, the never ending ups and downs of their voices. I will never forget this lovely mixture of men wearing traditional clothing but european hats.

Not far from this place an old instrument maker had his shop. Whenever the wind blew from the right direction, the plucking of the kotos he made sounded all the way to our bench. Thinking about my childhood I think of this place, the moments we, despised of summer's heat or winter's coldness, spend there together, while we became one with space and time. Never before and after I ever happened to feel an inner peace such as up there.

It was a place of change, of coming and going. In this harbour the huge steamships docked. If one travelled to us this harbour was the first thing the arrivals would see. In Taishou 2 [1], the first year of the great war – I was no more than 12 years old – the harbour basin was crowded with soldiers. They were shipped out into the world, to let them die for reasons I would not understand back then. For most of them it was a journey without return.

How did it feel for them, to travel out into an unknown distance? What hopes and wishes accompanied them? Were they scared? Or were they filled with joy?

Tokyo, just as well as Yokohama, already used to be cities of wild games and untamed life while preserving the charm of the countryside. Especially the older struggled to understand that the life they might have known had vanished due to the former Meiji reforms [2]. I grew up in a metropolis of two million inhabitants, touching the pulse of time. Up there on our hill though time seemed to stand still, as if someone had, just for us, stopped the course of the world.

Since then years have passed, yet the stories I have been told there, on said bench, have burned themselves irretrievably into my mind, stories from a distance, of travelled countries and met persons. He was an educated man, my father, he had seen more than most of those who lived with us ever would. Back then, in Taisho 2, still a child and of limited horizon, it appeared impossible to me that these things I held dear could ever change. I knew the years, I had already experienced them, yet I was far from understanding.

By now the war has long ended, the old instrument maker has moved away. There are no more soldiers to be seen. And also my father is no longer here.

“You must go”, Hanji whispers into my ear, so suddenly that she makes me jerk. Her voice carries the usual velvet-soft urgency. She is full of energy, but when isn't she? “You must go. Do you hear me?”

“I don't want to”, I mutter and close my eyes for a second, trying to fight down the uprising reluctance.

“You must.”

“Hanji.”

“Levi.”

With a soft sigh I clench my hands into fists. “This is not longer my world”, I say calmly. “And you should not be here.”

“Has it ever been yours?” She laughs, but the surrounding walls of the small garden house swallow it, since it does not resound at all.

“I don't know.”

“I suppose you have never left it in the first place.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“You've never given up your privileges, that's what I am trying to say. You were and always will be a part of the elite, just as I.”

“Leave me alone.”

“Oh, my dear, dear Levi”, she cheerfully continues. “You might dislike your destiny, but let me tell you, nothing lasts forever.”

YOU MIGHT DISLIKE YOUR DESTINY, YET LET ME TELL YOU, NOTHING LASTS FOREVER. THE SENSE AND PURPOSE OF THIS MATTER CAN IMPOSSIBLY BE REVEALED TO YOU BY NOW. JUST AS A FLOWER, LIFE UNFOLDS ITS BEAUTY ONCE IT BLOSSOMS, NOT DURING GROWTH. YOUR RELUCTANCE WILL FADE BEFORE LONG AND YOU WILL UNDERSTAND, HOW WE ALL WILL UNDERSTAND ONCE THE RIGHT TIME COMES ALONG. OR TO QUOTE GOOD OLD GOETHE: EVERY PLAY IS MERELY ABOUT THE PREDETERMINED FREEDOM OF OUR WILL COLLIDING WITH THE NECESSARY PATH OF THE WHOLE. YOU CAN CHOOSE TO GO WITH IT OR BE CARRIED AWAY BY FORCE, YET WHAT IS SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN WILL BE. IN THE END YOU WILL UNDERSTAND THAT ALL YOUR FEARS AND SORROWS WERE NEVER LEGITIMATE. WHO YOU ARE NOW YOU WILL NOT BE FOREVER. AND WHAT IS NOW IS ALREADY LYING IN THE PAST. DO YOU HEAR ME? LISTEN. EVERY SINGLE PERSON HAS HIS PLACE IN THIS WORLD. WHETHER YOU AGREE WITH IT OR NOT DOES NOT CHANGE ONE THING.

Silently I let my gaze wander through the dim twilight of the room, while I carefully try to listen. The sound of her voice has no origin. More than that it seems to come from inside of me.

“Instead of talking in riddles concrete pieces of advice would be more useful, don't you think?”, I say in a deep, sincere voice, but there is no answer. How typical of her. She always disappears when I need her the most.

Split seconds later I understand why. From outside I hear the silent, traipsing sounds of a woman. Little later the sliding door is opened and the face of my mother appears.

“Levi?” Her fingers clench around the frame of the paper covered wooden door. Brown, almost black eyes strike me. “There you are.” She sounds relieved. Reluctant laughter leaves her throat. “Out here in the cabin. I should have known.”

Instead of answering I look at her for a long time.

“Are you ready? Everybody is waiting for you.”

Without a word I look down my body. I am kneeling on the ground. Without any effort my hands rest on my knees. My body is covered under several layers of traditional clothes in plain, dark colours. Kimono. Hakama. Above all a haori. It is a night of formality and I have snuck out. I could not help it. It was either that or me running out into the night in an outbreak of deepest despair.

“Yes, mother.” My face does not show any movement. “I am ready.”

“Come join us.” With a loving smile she leans her head to one side. “Will you?”

“Everybody has gathered?”

“Yes. It is only you who is missing.”

“I am causing you trouble”, I state.

“It's not like that”, she replies. “But people asked for you.” She hesitates. “After all that's happened this year it is easy to be worried, isn't it?”

“Indeed it is. How is she?”

“Well, you know her.”

“She is angry.”

“Not angry. But she is not pleased either, as we all are. Come with me, Levi. Let us join the others.”

With a reluctant nod I turn away from her. “Go. I will follow you in two minutes. Just let me rest here a little longer.”

I can feel my mother watching me in this certain mixture of sensitivity and love that is so characteristic for her. Eventually she slips out of her shoes and enters the room. She kneels down next to me, carefully looking at me for a long time before she leans forward and breaths a kiss against my temples. Afterwards she raises and disappears into the night. Only the sound of her walking indicates her return to the main house. Motionlessly I watch er leave, before I close my eyes and take a deep breath to gather myself. After I have put on my mask for the evening I as well stand up and follow her.

The singing of the cicadas surrounds me like an all-infolding summer shadow. My wooden sandals I place next to the stone that leads to the entrance. One last time I gaze back into the garden, already swallowed by the nightly darkness. Only here and there I spot the light of a lonely lantern spending dim light, flickeringly broken only by the surrounding insects. One mosquito sits down on my neck and stings me. With a routined gesture I chase it away and enter the hallway, wooden and open to its surroundings. In a not so far away distance I sense the sound of human voices, incomprehensible still, just like a dream, yet cheerful and heated up by the weather and sake. With silent steps I follow down the hallway, passing closed sliding doors covered with the milk-white paper of my childhood, warmly enlightened by hidden lamps. The house is just as traditional as my family, a property of long history and tradition, build about one hundred years ago. When the first stone was placed here, Japan had still been isolated and locked away from the outer world. Since then change has ripped apart and washed away illusionary constants, shaping this country in a new form, taking, giving and sparing what could be removed.

I turn around a corner. The voices grow stronger. To my left side, just as long as the hallway I look into a huge hall, consisting of several rooms, joint by the removal of some sliding doors. Even the doors facing the garden have been removed, a natural decision considering the summerly hot temperatures. The floor has completely been covered with tatami. The wood is of dark, almost black colour and endlessly old. The breath of the past rests on the once crème coloured walls, turning into a deep grey. Through the opened doors I can see the lanterns in the garden. Even the wind shutters have been removed. From time to time a gentle breeze finds its way inside, only accompanied by the song of the cicadas.

As usual for these days there is hardly any furniture inside of the room. Forming a huge rectangular, the back facing the to the walls, are sitting the members of the host society, consisting of about twenty people. Every single one of them is known and familiar to me, since all of them belong to the family or work for us. My aunts, some distant cousins, my grandmother who seems to be as old as time itself, immortal, in contrary to the men of our family. Her laughter dominates the merry chatter of the others, covering us like a thin, transparent blanket. There are employees of the house and of our store, old friends of my father. Our trainee and protégée, Eren. Just as I they wear formal clothes; the men hakama and haori, the women kimono. Despite everything they act more informal than I had expected them to be. Some of them old a uchiwa called fan in their hands. In front of them I discover small wooden tables. Some carry drinks, some are empty. Here and there tea, sometimes sake. People exchange anecdotes and remember their shared past with the help of humour and laughter. No dinner has been served yet. They were probably waiting for me to join.

It is the 24^th of august. The year: Taisho 12 [3]. Today in one week my sister will get married and leave the paternal house; tonights gathering is dedicated to her and her engagement. Just like me she will accept the social role that is considered hers, since we both come from an old, overall respected family. One says that a human is born to choose his own way, or, as Kant once wrote: To have the courage of his own understanding.

Freedom, though, has never been our fate. Freedom – it is a word that did not even have a meaning for me until I grew into adolescence. I did not need it and even if someone had offered it to me, I would not have understood. I have been produced to continue the path, a path chosen generations ago. We wander at the head of our ancestors, the heirs of a long line. The longer this line reaches back, the more the avoidance of the same will be punished. I, myself, know this too well. Barely 22 years old, I have long left my youth years behind. The expectations of my family rest upon my shoulders. To disappoint them would equal a failure of my entire existence.

Once I step into the room the conversations die for a split second. Gazes, carefully taking care not to stare too obviously touch me, while the owner of these eyes try to establish an aura of indifference. They stare while not staring and their gazes strike me, even though I do not let it show. Only my mother looks over to me, a warm smile on her lips.

HER LOVE FOR YOU REMAINS UNBROKEN, Hanji says. IT IS UNCONDITIONAL, AS THE LOVE OF A MOTHER TO HER CHILD OUGHT TO BE. SHE COULD HAVE CUT YOU OUT OF HER LIFE AFTER ALL THAT HAS HAPPENED. SHE COULD HAVE CHOSEN TO HATE YOU YET SHE CHOSE NOTHING OF THAT SORT.

She is like a saint, I think and still I know that she, of course, cannot be what I wish her to be. She is just as much a human as I cam. She makes mistakes. She fails, just like me.

“Where have you been?”

I lower my gaze. Next to my feet sits a young woman. She wears a silk kimono in the colours of the fading summer, her hair carefully coiffed and decorated. She looks at me with a severe expression. There is no pride in her gaze. Her face equals perfect self-restrain. The place next to her is empty.

“Outside”, I say, indifferently replying her gaze. Mikasa is her name. Barely grown out of high school she is my younger sister.

“They have already asked for you twice.”

Without answering I sit down next to her. On the table in front of me there is a bottle of cold sake and a mug. With gracious movements which do not reveal anything of her hidden anger she pours me some and I drink. The taste shows the usual rich- and sweetness. Nodding toward the others from time to time who greet me with drunken wholeheartedness I let my gaze wander around. At the end of the room, not far from the tokonoma, there is still one empty seat. It is the only one.

“He hasn't arrived yet?”, I ask.

“Who?” She raises her eyebrows and makes a face, but not without sorrow.

“Nobody”, I say hastily and take a sip of my drink. “Forget what I've just said.”

She does not reply anything, but I know her long enough to be aware of the fine judgement mechanisms which might hold court over my current behaviour right now. I myself have not been able to fully comprehend that matter yet. Silently waiting I sit at the head of the host society, thinking, waiting. From time to time I gaze over to the place not far from my mother, which appears strangely abandoned considering the omnipresent cheerfulness. Officially it serves my father's remembrance, but I did not use to care for such things ever since. It all started three weeks earlier, during Obon [4].

It was an unusual hot day, so hot that even the salarymen on Tokyo's streets tore off their jackets in an unobserved moment, rolling up the sleeves of their linen shirts. With angry rays the sun had singed whatever could not flee during the day, and the night as well did not bring any ease. The air seemed to burn. Only from far away the wind brought shreds of the singing over to our estate, which filled the land during the festival of the dead. Holding a fan in my hand, supporting my head with the other, I was lying on our living room's tatami, looking up into the sky, carefully watching the moon, when noise in the entrance hall indicated that Eren had returned from his nightly walk. As usual he brought the post with him from the store and it appeared that a potpourri of letters had been sent to us – at least that was what he shouted through the whole house. With his usual temperament he flew at my sister, who snuck away with him. I had heard them both when I jumped up and ran after them, since I wanted to ask Eren some things that considered our business, things that had occurred during the day, but when I arrived at the genkan, I found myself all alone.

On the ground, though, I noticed a small envelope. Apparently it had fallen out and been overlooked afterwards. I, for one, took it and froze once I had laid my eyes on the name. Akayama Shogo was written there in sober letters. My father. It had been months since we had received a letter addressed to him for the last time. The inside of the envelope was of surprisingly plane nature, since it was only a telegram.

Arrival in Yokohama on 24^th. Sincerely, E. S.,

was everything that had been written there. I needed to read those few words several times to gain a certain sense out of them, and still they did not want to give up their mysteriousness. The return address stated the university of Heidelberg, which was, after I checked my atlas, to be located in southern Germany. Of course it was possible that my father had had contacts to his old research place during all these years, yet it seemed quite unlikely since he had never mentioned such thing in the first place. Uncertain what to think of this ominous message I therefore decided not to inform the rest of the family for the time being. Should an unexpected guest find his way into our home he should be welcomed with due attention. Until now though it seemed as if the telegram had been a misunderstanding or incorrect information. This strange E. S. who had contacted us was nowhere to be seen.

The sound of instruments brings me back to the here and now. Music starts, played on a shamisen by an incredibly beautiful woman wearing a black, skilfully ornamented silk kimono. The music starts slowly, in an almost shy manner, as if the notes would not dare to come out properly due to all those present. Yet once the first notes fill the room they increase in strength and expression. Shortly after a young woman joins her, not far from the host society at the head end of the room, in the little area in which nobody has been seated, and where she can unfold her elegance the most. According to her appearance and make-up she is merely a meiko, a geisha apprentice. To decide on her age is almost impossible because of the countless layers of make-up, but she can hardly be any older than Mikasa. Her kimono is of azure blue silk, her obi, decorated with a pearl string, set off in a complementary tone. The pattern reminds me of the sea, of the roaring waves and chilly foam. The thought alone refreshes me on this hot summer evening.

Once the music has started her limbs begin to move in the right rhythm. Her movements are flawless, her self-restrain almost reaching perfection. Once completely educated she will form a respectable geisha. With the help of a golden fan and her down to the earth long sleeves called furisode she tells us a story which is underlined by the shamisen player's singing, an old tale, yet, in contrary to usual, not a tale I am familiar with. The earthenware mug with sake resting in my hands I carefully listen to her music while my eyes drink up every of the meiko's carefully performed movements.

The song tells the story of a lonely wanderer, travelling through an never ending night. Lost in the woods he stumbles around, not longer able to distinct what originates from the real world or his mind. At the moment he starts to believe that he will not be able to reach his destination, he finds a cabin in the woods. It is inhabited. But the landlord does not want him inside, since he himself is still wandering in his very own night. Blind for the needs of his environment it takes its time until he can bring himself to truly care for the wanderer. Soon after a violent storm occurs, shaking both forrest and cabin. The two men seek shelter at the open fireplace and start a conversation that spins a line through the night, just as the moon in the starry sky. The time they have spent together eventually makes them realise that both their paths had been destined from the beginning to cross the other's one day and that both, since the day of their birth, have always existed in each other without knowing it. This knowledge releases the landlord from the ghosts of his past and the wanderer as well suddenly remembers his way. The storm ends and a new day begins. When both bid their farewell from each other, knowing that it will be forever, they are not griefing, because both have understood that they have never been truly separated and therefore cannot be separated in the future.

The performance ends and I find myself in the same position than before. My hands still hold the earthenware mug. I cannot move. The song as well as its lyrics have touched me in a way I can hardly comprehend. The content seems strangely foreign to me yet familiar at the same time. The words show a certain truthfulness but something inside of me shields me from their deepest meaning. Is this not the purpose and use of tales? They empower people, since they show what cannot be real.

I lower my gaze and let the early months of this year pass in front of my inner eye, recapitulating in a short amount of time all the things that have happened to me. I remember everything that had to end this year. As if someone had pushed a very thin needle in my chest, my heart shrinks. To ease the pain I take a big sip of sake.

“Let the past be the past”, Mikasa suddenly says next to me. She looks at me from the corners of her eyes. “This is not longer your life, Levi. Times change, and this time of yours is over.”

“Maybe.”

“Definitely. You must acknowledge this year as what it is.”

We look at each other. My lips form a thin line. “A year of change”, I say.

“That is correct. You saw yourself what it brought to you, all your swimming against the current.” She nods towards the middle of the room. “Revolution is for farmers and dreamers, not for us. Over all those ideas and dreams do not forget your place in this world, Levi, I beg you. Who loses himself is lost.”

With a little breath I place the mug back on the wooden table in front of me. My expression is completely unmoved. Nevertheless my heart beats heavily, half in anger, half due to the urge to defend myself. But there is no sense in doing so. No matter what I tell her, she would not understand. She does not have the same attitude as I do, not the same education.

She was not there.

Mikasa, who apparently notices my inner monologue, carefully watches me. “You will not meet them again, will you?”, she asks and she cannot hide the sorrow in her voice. I do not answer her.

Nobody else arrived during this evening and therefore the empty place I had arranged remained this way. Quite sure that the telegram had either been a joke or a false delivery I let the festivities pass. It would be the last party that my sister would witness as a member of this household.

Around midnight the guests depart and return to their homes. As usual after such huge gatherings I remain alone in the grand hall. My thoughts are still running wild, and sleep would not be able to find its way to me in this condition anyway. My mother kisses me goodnight with her usual tenderness, and Mikasa joins her soon after. Only Eren leaves without a word. He and I, we both know why.

I sit on the ground of the wooden hallway that frames the rooms, separating them from the environment in order to protect the house from wind and weather. The wooden storm shutters have been closed already, but a last one, right behind me, is still open. Next to stands a hand high lantern, made from paper and wood, spending weak but warm light. The cicadas, tireless in their actions sing their always same song. From the cloudless sky the stars gaze down on me. It is hard believe that hectic and happiness have filled this house only hours prior, if one now considers the omnipresent calmness. My father has probably sat at this very place when he was my age, and his father before him. Just as I they looked out in the endless blackness infolding the garden to my feet, sensed the schemes of the carefully cut trees in the darkness while listening to the silent murmur of the water feature.

“Kami-sama”, I whisper and, before even knowing it, smile. Those are the moments in which I become one with the entire world and yet I know that this cannot last forever. My fight is not over yet.

MY FIGHT IS NOT OVER YET.

Out of the blue the urge to stand up and run away grips me, out into the night, far away from this house, this family, everything that defines me and forms me, but I know that this cannot possibly be the solution for my torment and therefore I remain. Instead I reach into the arms of my kimono. I take out a novel written by Mori Ogai – The Wild Geese - and open it. It is a small, used and often read soft-cover that accompanies me ever since I had enlisted myself in Tokyo University. Silently I begin to read but after a few pages my concentration rapidly fades.

There is a rustling sound in the background. In the beginning I do not attach any particular meaning to it, only after it lasts for a while I look up and in the direction from which it occurs. It appears low like from a far away distance yet it seems to be very close. I feel as if I am not longer alone. The presence of something or someone is growing inside of me. A few seconds later I notice footsteps on stone ground. They lack the typical wooden sound of traditional shoes.

My heart starts to beat faster. With furrowed brows I look out in the night, waiting for the unknown. Even though I do not expect any danger my body stiffens before I know it. Then, slowly, very slowly, a man's body appears in the night. He approaches from the entrance gate which I considered to be locked by now and does not seem to be aware of the fact that he has already been noticed. With the fascination of a child he steps in the middle of the garden, carefully, as if he knew about the unrighteousness of his trespassing. Only by now I fully notice his features, well-grown, broad shoulders and narrow waist, very slender yet not without strength. His body is covered by a western style suit, jacket, trousers and waistcoat made of crème white linen, as well as his shirt. The only colour comes from a red, maybe brown necktie, that graces the stranger's throat in a slim knot.

He stops and, as if he has noticed my presence, slowly turns around after hesitating for a brief moment. Only by now I can see an oval face that shows unusual – european? - features. His nose is of characteristic form. The light of my lantern throws shadows on his strangely pale countenance. Short, bright hair shines bright as gold in the weak light that surrounds us. When his eyes touch me I get frightened for a split second. They are of an intense blue colour, just like the kimono which was worn by the meiko earlier. The seem to glow in the darkness just like water on a warm day at the beach, endlessly deep yet always changing. I have never seen something like that before. Unable to move I stare at him and my mind goes blank. There is not a single thought I could think yet speak out loud, even though I am usually well known for my straightforwardness.

For a moment he watches me, and it feels as if a subtle flickering wanders all over his face. A weak, warm glowing glimmer seems to surround him, but once I look closer it disappears. Instead a thin smile appears on his lips, a smile that does not fit the situation.

Uncertain what to do my fingers clench my hakama's fabric. I want to stand up, but with a calm gesture the other asks me to remain seated. I do not know why but I obey even before I have fully processed what is happening.

“Please don't be frightened”, the man says and his voice sounds remarkably soft despite its deepness.

“You speak Japanese.” I mention it not without surprise.

“A little.” By now he fully turns toward me. His voice is lacking a real accent even though his pronunciation is not the one of a Japanese.

“Who are you?” It takes courage to ask this. His presence fills me with fear and yet there is something different, a feeling that I consider absolutely foreign. It causes me to remain calm. I could have fought him instead. I would have been able to do so.

The other bows shortly. “Please excuse my appearance to this late hour. My ship was delayed. Only hours ago I arrived at the port of Yokohama.”

“That does not answer my question.”

“My name is Erwin. Erwin Schmidt. I'm a linguist from Heidelberg in Germany and came to Tokyo for research.” Reluctantly he steps closer to me, his eyes wandering all over my face. “Forgive me, but could it be that we have met before somewhere?”

“You must mistake me for somebody else, Schmidt-san”, I reply. “For I see your face for the first time tonight.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Yes, I could be mistaken after all. See, I haven't slept properly in days. It is just – your eyes. I feel as if I have seen them before.”

I furrow my brows. “My eyes?”, I ask.

“Yes. They have something familiar and are of such unusual colour. But well, it must have happened a long time ago, if so. You sleep deep and calmly, I suppose?”

“Usually I do, yes.”

“I thought so. People tend to forget their dreams once they grow up. I myself am not much different.”

“I don't understand what you're talking about.”

“Very well.” He shows a smile, but it does not last long. “It is not important after all. Forgive me.”

Filled with mistrust I watch him. He is older than I am, probably a lot, but it is hard to tell. Thin wrinkles surround the corners of his eyes, but his gaze shows youthful eagerness. I guess he might be in his late thirties.

“So are you a relative of Akayama Shogo-sensei?”

“He's my father.”

“I see. It is a pleasure to meet you, Akayama-san.”

“Right back at you, Schmidt-san.” Mere politeness.

“Did he happen to mention me earlier?”, Erwin goes on. “I sent a telegram regarding my arrival, but I did not receive an answer. He once told me that his house would always be open for me and that I would be more than welcome.” A silent laughter leaves his throat. “I will live in the university's quarters, though, therefore there is no need to accommodate me. I considered it important though to inform your father about my arrival right away, since I owe him very much and he always cared for me. Sometimes one can forget politeness in such circumstances, right? We used to be friends, you know? We haven't met in twenty years. Can you imagine how eager I am to reunite with him after such a long time? How old are you?”

“I am about to be twenty two years old”, I say and he nods.

“I doubt you can imagine it then”, he replies casually.

“Maybe. But I am sorry to disappoint you”, I go on. “You missed my father in every way possible. He died.” The cheerful expression disappears from Erwin's face as if someone had blown out the light in his eyes. For a moment he stands in front of me, thunderstruck.

“He is dead?”, he whispers. Now it is me who nods.

“Last year.” I place my hand on my chest. “His lungs.”

“Tuberculosis?”

I nod. Why do I tell him that?, I wonder.

For a moment he does not move, stunned, surprised, obviously shocked. Eventually he lets his hands sink and he looks at me as if he had suddenly forgotten why he had come over in the first place. His knees are struggling to keep him up, it cannot be overlooked. I fight the urge to ask him to leave – how could I defend such a decision in front of my father? - and sigh. How he stands there, foreign in all respects, I pity him.

Silently I point to the place next to me. Muttering a thank you with a low voice Erwin approaches me and sits down. But his closeness makes me nervous. The interaction with strangers is nothing I am fond of or good at. His exotic appearance and the absurdity of the entire situation make it even worse.

Once he has calmed down he takes out a silver box with cigarettes, places one between a pair of trembling lips and lights it. He deeply inhales the smoke, blowing it out into the night afterwards.

“This is not quite how I pictured my arrival”, he whispers eventually and laughs, half cautiously, half bitterly, as if he had made a joke. His eyes though look weary and sad.

“So you knew my father?”, I ask. Somehow I want to keep the conversation going, yet I cannot even say why. There is something in the air.

“I studied under his patronage before he returned to Japan.” Erwin leans the head slightly to one side and for a moment he looks as if he was trying to remember a long forgotten dream. “But that was a long time ago.”

“Probably before I was born.”

“I suppose.”

“I see. You are a linguist you say?”

“A linguist and anthropologist. I taught in Heidelberg. Unfortunately I had to give up my position. A stroke of destiny, so to say.” He raises his head and looks up in the night sky, until he, not without a certain waggishness, gazes at me from the corner of his eyes. “Sometimes we can't influence where life sends us, right?”

“So you were a professor?”

“Only a doctor.”

“Of philosophy?”

“Yes.”

“So I shall call you Smith-hakase.” To my surprise we both laugh. The fear that has filled me in the beginning slowly fades. “But you look too young to have studied under my father”, I continue. “As far as I know he returned from Germany in 1900.”

“That's true. Yet I have given up ageing and therefore appear quite youthful.” He laughs once more and assures me afterwards that he is just joking. “The loss of my position though equipped me with the necessary freedom to travel abroad. A good research trip can form the basis of an entire academic career. Mankind's knowledge has multiplied several times during the past few centuries, but there is still so much to discover. Traditions, cultures, languages. Everything is changing, all the time, a never ending metamorphosis. With the reform of 1903 [5] the description of the Japanese language is almost back to children's shoes. We can never be finished.”

“So you plan to describe the Japanese language?”, I ask. He then falls silent, so lang that I start to wonder whether he has overheard my question.

“I don't know. Maybe. At least there is no end in sight.”

“So by now you just travel around?”

“That's right.”

“Without an end or goal in mind?”

“Possibly.”

“How unusual.”

“Not as unusual as one might think. Sometimes I feel as if I am desperately searching for something, but can't tell what it is. I don't even know why I bother to tell you, since this is probably more than you care to hear.” He takes out his notebook from the inner pocket of his jacket. With careful touches he opens it and notes something inside. Doing so he carries his cigarette between his lips.

“It's normally prohibited to smoke out here”, I say in a chilly manner. “The ash will soil the garden.”

Erwin looks up. He looks surprised over the sudden change of my voice's tone, but soon a gentle smile follows. “Be unconcerned.” He once more reaches in his jacket and takes out a silver box. As if he wanted to gain my trust by his smile, he thoroughly places the cigarette ash inside.

“What are you writing?”, I ask, after I watched him doing so for a while.

“Observations.”

“Like a diary?”

“No.” He pauses his writing and gazes to me. “Rather things that I have seen throughout my journey. After my return they will form the basis of my research paper, finally establishing me amongst my fellow scientists. A professorship does not grow on trees, you know? Such things need to be planned from the longhand.”

“I see.” My father once said something similar to me a couple of years ago, but I do not remember the exact tone. I was never interested in an academic career. I wanted to go out in the world ever since, and change it for the better.

The way he sits next to me, his cigarette gallantly resting between his fingers, I feel the urge to smoke myself, but I keep it to myself. Instead I watch him, eye his bright hair and the pale features. He looks like a ghost, humanlike and still strange. I try to remember how often I have seen a foreigner throughout my life, or spoken to one, yet even at university we usually stuck to our kind. The few I interacted with were hardly so noticeable as he is. Most of them had brown hair and brown eyes and therefore equalled my fellow companions.

“Linguist, you say?”

“Yes.”

“And my father taught you?”

“Indeed.”

“That's why you speak Japanese?”

Erwin nods. “Japanese as well, yes.”

“As well?” I raise my brows. “What else do you speak?”

“German.”

“Of course.”

He laughs. “Also Latin and old Greek.”

“Dead languages? Why so?”

“They belong to the curriculum in Europe if someone wants to attend university.”

“I see.” Carefully I nod. “Seems kind of useless to me.”

“Not at all.” Gently smiling he lowers his gaze and a certain love that is most likely dedicated to all those languages in the world sneak on his face. “You cannot think languages as isolated and outstanding. They reach out over continents and centuries and influence each other. Since most of them share the same roots it is sometimes even possible to say they exist within each other – only in different manifestations. So learning from the origin means to learn them all in a certain way.”

“Maybe in Europe.” I click my tongue. This may be sufficient for languages of huge continents, but not for us. We have been isolated long enough to give our language a proper uniqueness. “The Japanese language is different though.”

“Well”, Erwin gently shakes his head without looking at me, “I wouldn't say that. Even the Japanese imported a not to underestimating amount of its vocabulary from the Chinese. Not to mention the writing system. Just think of the Chinese readings that still exist.”

“You present your point of view quite openly”, I say not without anger. He is right and I feel embarrassed. “Hakase.”

“Always.” Again he smiles, but this time it looks strangely lost in reverie. I can barely tell what is going on in his mind.

“Are there any other languages you speak? Languages that are actually used nowadays?”

“French. English. A little bit Russian, but only rudimentary. And Japanese, as you might have noticed already, but I am far from perfect.”

“You are a well educated man.”

He does not overhear the sarcasm in my voice. He snorts in amusement; thereby his shoulders slightly move up and down in their crème white fabric. “Maybe. But the same may apply to the son of a professor like you are.”

“The main business of this family is publishing, Schmidt-hakase. We also sell traditional Japanese printings. Since my father's death it is my responsibility.”

“So you will most likely be skilful in calculating and reading, I suppose?”

“Maybe.”

“You attended university, you said?”

“Yes.”

“So you are also able in reading and writing classic Japanese?”

“Yes.” It is a subject I dislike to talk about, especially not to men who appear at the darkest hour of the night in the most mysterious manner. “After graduation I was supposed to travel, just as you are now, but the circumstances wouldn't allow it.”

“So, would you consider yourself well educated due to your degree?”

“You ask strange questions, Hakase.”

“Forgive me. I don't mind if you prefer not to answer, though.”

He looks in my direction and for a second our gazes meet. The bluishness of his eyes runs through me like thunder. How did the gods came up with the idea to give eyes such intense as these to mankind? Their colour looks chilly, and yet I feel as if they could melt ice easily.

“There are many things I do not know”, I say. “More than I believe to know. I am not as well educated as people might think, I suppose, just as you.”

“You see. My education enables me to work in the field I love. That is all. It does not mean anything.”

“If you think so.” A thin smile makes the corners of my mouth twitch, but they show signs of bitterness. “Tell this the farmer who cannot afford higher education for his sons, or the mine worker, sweating underneath the surface for our wealth. They will tell you different.”

“Probably. But it would be just as inadequate to assume their character from the way they make a living. There might as well be educated workers just as some seem to lose their education through university years.”

With these words he picks up his pen and writes more things into his notebook. Nobody of us speaks. In the meantime I reconsider his words in my mind and, even though silently, acknowledge the truth of what he just said. I thereby listen to the distant cicadas, until Erwin suddenly starts to laugh.

“Hakase”, he mutters and shakes his head.

“Does this name bother you?”

“It makes me feel kind of old to be called this way.” As if he had given up he closes the book. “At home we use different names.”

“But you are not at home anymore.”

“I am aware of that.”

“How did they call you there?”

“At university? Or at home?”

“At home.”

“They called me Erwin. Just Erwin. Schmidt is my family name.”

Carefully I try to pronounce his name, but fail. It is as if I am lacking the necessary sounds and letters for the correct pronunciation. A few more times he repeats his first name and I try again, but no matter what I am doing, something Japanese sticks to his name.

“Not bad”, he says eventually with the everlasting friendly smile. “You have an european tongue.”

“Is it decent where you come from? To call each other by the first name?”

“If one allows it, then yes.”

“How unusual.” Apart from my closest family members nobody has ever called me by my plain first name, not even my closest friends from university. But just as Mikasa had said earlier, those times are over and they will never return.

“You haven't told me your name yet”, Erwin says suddenly as if he just remembered something he had forgotten for a long time.

“But you know it”, I reply. “It is Akayama, just like my father's. Written with the kanji for red and mountain.” But Erwin only laughs.

“Not your family name. I mean your first name. What is it?”

“Is this part of your research?”

Another laughter, cheerful as the one of a child. “No”, he says, but it seems as if his gaze suddenly intensified. “But I'm naturally curious.”

His tone signalises me no danger and yet I cannot help myself. Heat rises in my cheeks. I turn away and lower my gaze. He is very straightforward, too much for my taste. I am not used to be interrogated like that. The environment I grew up in treasures tact. We even have a saying for it: Reading the air. Secretly I am longing for the dance of form and etiquette that has interwoven every human interaction since my childhood days. Even back then, in Ginza, we have not treated each other in such a careless manner. We rejected the rules of society but we developed our own. This man though completely seems to pass them. If on purpose or by accident is something I cannot tell. But how can I expect a stranger to know the complex rules of this society? His Japanese, on the other hand, is so precise and polite that there can only be one solution: He knows exactly what he is doing.

“Levi”, I say eventually and my voice equals a whisper. The heat in my cheeks rushes once the syllables, two only, leave my lips. I have introduced myself to strangers for countless times, but never before it has left me so agitated. “My name is Levi.”

“Written with the kanji for light and bringing?”

“Yes. How do you know?”

“I just assumed.”

He seems to like that. Obviously satisfied he rests his elbows on his knees, folds his hands and places his chin on them. Lost in thoughts he looks into the night, then to me. I can see mischievousness in his eyes. “So you are a bringer of light, huh?”

With a reluctant nod I agree with his statement, but my heart is beating heavily in my chest. Erwin seems to notice. After a while he takes out his pocket watch and checks the time. Whether it is made of gold or silver is hard to notice in the candle light, but it is remarkably beautiful.

“It is already late”, he says. Once more I nod. “I should go. Again, please forgive me my unasked appearance here.”

“Don't mention it, Hakase. But next time it might be better for you to come during the day.” If there is a next time.

“It must have been quite strange for you.” Smiling gently Erwin shakes his head.

“Rather unexpected”, I reply. “As if I dreamed the strangest dream.”

Erwin stands up. "Such things happen every now and then", he says and buttons his jacket. I nod, yet follow his movements only half-heartedly.

"As long as it lasts we know that we are alive.”

"Maybe." With a satisfied sigh he pushes his hands into the pockets of his pants and takes one last look at the garden. „Yet are you sure that we are awake? It seems to me that yet we sleep we dream. Do not you think the duke was here and bid us follow him?“ He then looks over to me, his lips twitching in an indicated smile. Most calmly he searches for my gaze.

"What is this?", I hear myself ask.

"Shakespeare. A midsummer night's dream." He turns around. "However", he says, "good night, Levi-san. It was nice meeting you. I'm sorry for your loss."

“It seems to be your loss as well.”

“It is. But whatever is gained one day must be lost. That's life, right? It's an everlasting circle.” With these words and a last smile he disappears the way he walked into my life only minutes before. Silently I watch him leave, unable to move. The slight aftertaste of a memory remains in my chest.

"Levi-san", I whisper mockingly. What a strange, strange man that was.

[1] 1914.

[2] After a 400 year period of isolation Japan opened up to the west, soon adapting new customs and industrialisation, modernizing the country within 50 years.

[3] 1923.

[4] Fest in order to celebrate the return of the dead from the other world. They remain for one week amongst the living, then return back. It is celebrated with dances, festivals and firework.

[5] The reformation of the Japanese writing system of 1903, changing from classical Japanese to spoken Japanese as the ideal of how a written text should be composed like.

Chapter Text

After I closed the shutters and locked the house I go to my room and take a yukata before I clean myself from the sweat and smells of the prior festivities in the bathroom. When I return to my room later, lying down on my futon with my hair still wet I only start to realise how exhausted I really am. A fragile sigh of relief leaves my throat. How glad I am that this evening is over. Even though my relatives do not show their hostilities openly – Eren is the only exception – I know, or rather suspect them to detest me secretly just as I detest myself. This thought has always created a feeling of anger and enmity in me that I can barely hide towards them. Their ignorance and self-righteousness is something I can hardly understand, yet appreciate. How is it possible that members of the same family develop such different world-views? Are the bonds of blood relation strong enough to stand such differences? Or will I secretly always judge myself that it had to come this way now and forever?

What is the right path? I know where I belong to – and still I have felt out of place as long as I can remember. Until a couple of months ago nobody would have guessed. Now they know and there is no way to undo it.

I let the palm of my hand rest on my forehead and bury my fingers in my moist and thick hair. Lost in thoughts my gaze wanders along the ceiling, only for a glimpse, then I close my eyes and await sleep, yet it does not come. My body is tired, every fibre is longing for rest, but my mind cannot be any further away from it.

I roll on my side, pull the sleeve of my yukata which shifts due to the sudden movement, back over my shoulder and open my eyes. It is a small room that I inhabit, or that inhabits me, I don't know. In contrary to most of those who live here, I, at least, have a room of my own and that alone is remarkable enough. It measures not more than eight mats, but fulfils my needs completely. Right next to the door is the closet, where I store away futon and other spacious goods during the day. Apart from that the room is barely furnished. There is a long drawn-out shelf, filled with books in several rows – I read a lot, end even while I attended university I preferred literature classes over business lectures -, a low desk not far from the huge, man high windows and a small, antique commode which used to be owned by my father, made of dark wood and probably older than the house itself. Apart from the books there is nothing that would allow any conclusions about my person. Anybody could live here. Should I die unexpectedly it would be easy to accommodate another member of the family in this very room within a couple of hours. This room suggests a certain exchangeability and even though I know that this is, due to my position within this family, not lining up with reality, it calms me down and puts me at ease. Remembering this, the pressure I had felt inside my chest during the whole evening suddenly disappears.

Now, to this very late hour, the room shines in the milky white twilight of the moom. Even out there it seems to be silent. Nothing suggests that only one hour before a strange visitor stumbled into my life. Whether it is the fest or his person that keeps me from sleeping I cannot tell for sure. Erwin Schmidt is what he called himself. Once again my lips silently form the unfamiliar name. Erwin Schmidt-hakase. To use this title for him feels, considering his foreignness, strangely wrong. Still, after a few times of trying his name it leaves my lips with a proceeding easiness and therefore I start to wander off the traditional patterns: Erwin-hakase. It sounds more familiar than it is considered appropriate for a man I have spoken to only once. Frankly he communicated his love for this way of being with one another, even called me by my first name and, apart from that, hardly treated me like a stranger at all.

Was it the friendship to my father which laid the roots of his sympathy towards me? Such things happen. People transfer their benevolence to members of their own lives, that's just natural. Whether we had met before is what he asked me. I doubt it. No, I not only doubt it, it is just plain impossible. Never before I went to Europe and it is probably his first time in Japan as well, since he mentioned for how long he had not met my father. Had he travelled this country before he would have certainly paid us a visit, just as he did tonight.

It is not that I don't look like my father, though. Probably, and it appears to me more than likely, Erwin was reminded of him by my appearance. That is why he felt so familiar with me, a feeling that transferred onto me as well.

Usually I would have asked someone like him to leave my the property, considering the nightly hour of his visit. This time, though, the urge faded rapidly. The presence of this unknown man filled me with an excitement that exceeded the surprising character of his appearance, a deep, moving excitement, that hasn't even quite yet faded. However, the conversation developed in the most natural way and was, apart from the ending, not displeasing, rather the contrary.

I picture his face, the linen, crème white suit, the bright blonde hair and the glowing of his blue eyes in the warm light of the lantern. Will he return? I did not ask for his address. And even though he mentioned staying at the university's quarters, there are too many schools in this city as if this information was of any help. While we conversed I didn't care whether we would meet again or not, but now a sudden urge to return to the veranda grabs me, knowing that he won't be there anymore.

With a deep breath I roll on my back and stare at the beige ceiling. Now where he is gone my head starts to fill with all kinds of questions towards him, as if he had wounded my mind in a way that made even my most secret thoughts flow out irresistibly, but not uncomfortably. In my head I pursue our conversation, enlace the exchanged thoughts into new impulses and suggestions, yet alone in this room it leads to nothing but restlessness.

Meeting him has left a deep feeling of awe in my soul, it is obvious, but why? Because of his exotic features? Everything about him appeared unexpected. I wish that he returns. Inside me accrues the knowledge that he is someone where I don't need to keep my secrets up, no masks, no walls of etiquette. His perspective is the one of a neutrally researching, his childlike curiosity, it will keep him from judging me. He will understand, not value my person. As he said before, life is an everlasting metamorphosis that is not ought to end. Some secrets only reveal their core once their time has come.

BACK THEN, YOU SAID, YOU DREAMED THIS NEVER CHANGING DREAM.

Yes. Back then I dreamed this never changing dream. It began when I had hardly outgrown elementary school and continued until this very night during the autumn of my enrolment. It was a dream that made my parents worry deeply about me. They feared for my health both physically and mentally. Trapped inside of my room during night there was no escape. Every night I became a prisoner of my self and insomnia as well as fatigue my steady companions until adolescence. The screams of my dreaming self could be heard up to the parental bedroom. It was not so much the content of my dream rather than the accompanying emotions that made me panic, and that I had to face in shear helplessness. The losing of control – can there be anything worse in the life of someone whose whole existence has been formed by everlasting self-restrain?

I awoke, as it seemed to me, to early, in the middle of a proceeding, yet never ending night. My room was covered in pitch black darkness. My body hidden underneath the heavy futon blanket I was filled by a feeling of deep trust and communion with the world around me. No matter what would happen nothing would harm me. A presence filled the room, so benevolent and loving it could only belong to my mother, right behind the door, where she was waking over my sleep, there was no doubt about that.

BUT THEN YOU NOTICED A FLICKERING.

But then I noticed a flickering. A shine, barely to notice, crawled into my room from the outside. It entered from the paper covered walls as well as from the small gap between the door and the ground. Even my closet started to glow.

I got up and silently approached the glowing openings of the house, only to notice that neither the window nor the door could be opened anymore. They weren't locked, yet they did not move an inch, no matter how hard I pulled and pushed them. Then, suddenly, a murmuring filled the room, the sound of exploding firework, or something quite similar, being fired in the same rhythmical way, turning my feeling of security into deadly terror. I could hear a voice talking in the distance, something like a prayer, but in a language I could not understand. Overwhelmed by the uprising emotions, doomed to endure whatever was happening to me, I withdrew myself into the corner of my room, where my parents used to find me, like a sleepwalker, in the morning of the following day. For four years I struggled through such nights. Then, from one of the other day, the dreams disappeared. Black, empty nights and cheeks covered in tears were all that remained. Where these tears came from is something I do not know until the present day.

WHY DID YOU NEVER TRIED TO REACT DIFFERENTLY, I ASKED. IF YOU ALWAYS DREAM THE SAME DREAM THERE IS NOTHING FOR YOU TO BE AFRAID OF. BECAUSE THE DREAMER DOES NOT KNOW THAT HE DREAMS, YOU REPLIED. TRAPPED IN THE VERY MOMENT HE IS UNABLE TO STEP BACK AND TAKE A LOOK AT THE BIGGER PICTURE. GHOSTLIKE HE WANDERS AROUND IN THE DEPTHS OF HIS SOUL, LOST, DOOMED AND DESTINED TO THE UNKNOWN.

My body lies underneath my futon's blanket, which rests on me heavy and warm. Outside it is still deepest night. I feel as if I had slept endlessly long, but I am not sure. Did I sleep at all? I might as well have woken and overthought, as it uses to happen every now and then, when something startles me in the deepest corners of my soul. For long, long years I haven't thought about this dream. Once it has been an ever present constancy in my life, but after it stopped so suddenly the memories started to fade as well.

“Will this night ever end?”, somebody sighs in the background. Suddenly wide awake I sit up and look to where the voice has come from, when, only a moment after, every tension fades.

“It's you”, I whisper and sink back into the sheets. I roll over on my side and support my head with my hand. On a dark red pillow at the low desk close to the window sits a young woman. Someone has opened the shutters; through the glass of the veranda falls the moonlight and covers everything in its milky white shine. Spread in front of her are laying countless books and sheets. A pen rests in her hand. Obviously she has stopped her writing for a break, since she looks up into the starlit sky, lost in thoughts. I cannot see her face.

“You could have at least knocked.” No reaction. Silently I watch her. A growing discomfort fills my chest. Eventually I sit up. “Are you watching the moon?”, I ask then, whereupon she nods, but without looking at me. She has placed one elbow on the table and supports her chin with her knuckles. Her chestnut brown hair barely reaches her chin. A slim body is covered by an airy, fashionable dress made of white linen. In her right hand, resting next to her on the ground, she holds the rests of a delicate pair of glasses. The frame has been bended and the glass shows cracks.

“Oy, Hanji”, I say and turn back the blanket, “can you even see anything without your glasses? We both know that you're actually as blind as a mole.” With these words I get up and step closer to her. “However, we have a full moon tonight”, I proceed, “that shouldn't be overlooked even by a four-eyes like you.” She doesn't answer. Instead she keeps gazing up into the sky. After I've reached her I sit down next to her at the table, but she turns away from me. Back, shoulders and hair are everything I can see of her. A sigh, more irritated than concerned, leaves me.

“How long do you intend to keep playing these games with me?”, I ask. “Since half a year you keep coming here, in the middle of the night while treating me like air. You're caving into my room, have at least the courage to face me, will you?” I reach out and grab her shoulder, but she pulls away. Heavily, as if she wanted to threaten me, she raises her hand and asks me to stop. Only reluctantly I lower my hand. “At least tell me what brings you here”, I insist. “Why can't you let things rest just like we all do?”

“Do you remember?”, she suddenly begins. Her voice tells me that she's smiling. “The day when everything began? We were finally complete.”

I shake my head. “To be honest, no, I don't”, I reply and look out of the window. In flawless beauty the moon covers wide parts of the sky. Usually I keep the shutters closed at night, since otherwise it would be too bright to fall asleep, but Hanji might have opened them. How come I didn't notice? “I can hardly remember anything. Sometimes I dream, but I don't know whether those are memories or not. They probably aren't.”

“Because you refuse to do so. You have locked away what has been, and thrown away the key.” Her smile fades. Instead anger now fills her voice. “How do you intend to end it all if you cannot remember who you are, Levi-kun?”

“There is nothing to end”, I say and lower my gaze. My fingers clench into the fabric of my yukata. “It's done, Hanji, it's over. We failed. You were with us back then. How shall I proceed and finish what has been a hopeless mission from the beginning? Just think of the price we've already paid. Look at my eyes. Whenever I look into the mirror I'm reminded of our failure.”

“I thought you cannot remember?”

I place my hands on the table. Slowly I start to let my fingertips slide over the wood's texture, just as I often did as a child while my father was with me. “I know the police report and what has been written in the papers.”

“It will come back to you, Levi-kun, no matter how much you fight or restrain it. It will come. All it takes is the right key. Once you have it, the doors will unlock by themselves.”

“The right key?”, I ask in the most bewildered manner. Neither the windows nor the doors here can be locked. Hanji starts to laugh as if she could read my mind.

“Yes, my dear. The right impulse at the right time at the right place. Once things have been set in motion it is impossible to stop them.” A bright, yellowish shine wanders over her face. It is a flickering, unstable light. “Do you remember your childhood dream? You told me about it once, back then during our afternoon meetings in Ginza.” With a sigh she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “We were so young.”

“We're still young.”

“Filled with bravery and joy. We believed we would be the ones to change the world for the better. Isn't that the privilege of the youth? To believe that we could make a difference?”

“Maybe it's just not within the abilities of one single person to be of influence.”

“Who knows. You don't believe in such things anymore. I notice it without even looking at you. It surrounds you, like an aura it surrounds you.”

“Do you think it was worth the price we paid?”

“That's what I ask you.” She shrugs. “I have not regretted what happened even for a second, since just as you I knew what I did it for. I rather wanted to stare into the abyss with my head up high than to live a life that wasn't mine, just like you. I don't understand why you of all people now chose the latter. Being so frightened doesn't suit you, Levi. Of course it is up to you to chose your path, but remember my words once you do.” She sighs. “If you haven't already.”

I nod. The feeling of discomfort burns deep inside my stomach, accompanied by a feeling of powerlessness that makes me uneasy. I try to ignore it.

“It's just”, I mutter and yet I cannot finish my sentence, since my voice breaks. “I just feel so displaced in this world. Everything seems to have come apart at the seams, and I don't know what to do to make it right.”

“It's because you've lost your path, dear.” She smiles once more. “But be unconcerned, since everything is already about change. You'll be alright. But what you have to do to get there is to open the door and walk through hell. Not the most comfortable solution, but the only.” She points at the door. “Open it.”

“I can't.”

“Why?”

“Because it won't move.”

“It won't? Really?” She snorts silently. “There are people who need your help, especially you. I will never again ask you for something, Levi-kun, but this is something you must do, alright?”

Without answering I watch her for a very long time. We are not in a hurry. We have all night, and the night will never end.

“I'd give my right arm to understand what you're talking about”, I whisper and my voice is not free of frustration. You laugh.

“Don't we all?”, you whisper. For a moment I stare into space, then, suddenly, the strength seems to run out of my limbs. I sink forward, until my forehead touches the table. I feel dizzy. If anyone had told me a few years ago that my life would have turned into this grotesque farce by now, I would have laughed at him.

My eyes only half-opened I slowly turn around and gaze towards the door of my room. As the countless times before a pale, milky gaze drips through the gap between door and ground. I pull a wary face and shake my head. I then carefully struggle on my feet and stand up, shaking. With steps, anxious not to make a sound, I approach the door until my finger eventually touch the white varnish that covers the door. Carefully I let my fingers slide over the wooden deepening that forms the handle and sink on my knees. Trying to keep my self-restrain I press my lips tightly together and take a deep breath. My heart beats heavily and up to my neck. Will this be one of those nights which let me wake up covered in sweat like when I used to be a child? How long will it take this time until I will find a chance to free me from this prison?

I shall open the door, that's what she wanted me to do. How can she not know that the door has been locked ever since, like all the other exists of this room? It would be her one and only request, she said, though.

I feel as if the intensity of the light intensifies due to my approach, yet I am not sure. I take a heart and pull. For a moment nothing happens but then, suddenly, the door begins to move. My eyes widen in surprise and my breath as well seems to stop for a second. Despite everything it doesn't open completely. After a few inches it stops and won't move any more, no matter how hard I push and pull. Swearing silently I try everything possible to open it any further but it feels as if it had, all of a sudden, got way too heavy to be moved. Thoughtfully I let my fingers slide over the white painted surface when the abrupt sound of human voices makes me jerk. Without doubt – they come from the other side. They sound artificial, as if played by a gramophone. Like a numb murmur, flowing like water, a slight crackling sound can be heard from time to time.

A feeling of curiosity overcomes me, making me forget the fear for a moment. My forehead leaning against the wood I press my right eye to the gap between wall and door and gaze, for the first time in all these years, inside. My lips slightly opened, my heart beating heavily, I let my gaze wander around. The ambience reminds me of the paper theatres of my childhood, called kamishibai. Without realising it a pale smile sneaks on my lips.

Before my eyes the scenery of the old kamigata-coffeehouse spreads out. Half antique store for used books of every sort, half café, located in the centre of Ginza, it was the place for intellectuals and discussion-loving students to gather and connect. It was a representative of the new Tokyo and incorporated equally Japanese as well as European architecture. We, who wanted to reform, not overthrow, found there the combination of the old and the new which we were so desperately longing for. In the end of the last year it burned down. I haven't been there since.

It is a huge, european-looking room with high ceilings. The walls have been lined with wood. Although the dark colour of the furniture the room appears inviting and bright. At the head end stands a man-high clocktower. The glass inlays that can be seen here and there as well the carvings decorating the furniture are entirely made in the style of the Art Deco. Behind an extensive counter, backed by countless bottles and liquors, stands a young man with moustache who serves coffee and cake. He is wearing a white shirt, but has rolled up his sleeves in order not to soil his clothes. His neck graces a black bow tie, his chest is hidden behind a black vest. The hair has been cautiously divided and combed with pomade. He appears so lost in his actions that he doesn't seem to notice me watching.

Not far from the counter, on a side table, stands a gramophone. Its wooden box is of the same dark colour as the rest of the furniture, while the top part is made of bronze sheet metal. From time to time the barkeeper walks over, cranks, places a new record on top, then returns back behind his counter. He only plays modern songs. Instrumental swing from America as well as popular interpretations of Japanese tunes.

The coffeehouse itself is well visited. Barely an empty seat can be seen. It must be around early noon. Most of the people here drink coffee from white, blue flowered cups and eat cake. Instead of old fashioned coffee pots there are modern copper frames holding bulbous glass balls, in which the hot, brown beverage gently waits for its consumption. The smell of roasted coffee beans, the perfume and aftershave of the visitors, of tobacco and the approaching autumn fills the air. I cannot help myself but to smile. This place equals a home.

At the table right next to the high, wood framed french windows, sits a young man. He wears a dark blue yukata with tiny blue points, furthermore a light blue and white striped hakama. On the table lays a black peaked cap. His feet are in geta. It is the uniform of the local university students. He probably enjoys the free time between his lectures. In his hands he holds a book of Schopenhauer, but instead of reading in it most concentrated manner he just leaves through the pages. On the edges there are several notes written with pencil. He is probably just trying to remember what he has read the days or weeks before. Black, short hair falls in a pair of narrow, squinted eyes. The latter are of usual, brown colour, and yet the realization hits me unexpectedly hard. This young man is me.

Again and again my eyes wander over the pages, but no matter how often I try to make sense out of these spun sentences, it doesn't happen. My thoughts are everywhere and nowhere at once. From time to time I gaze at the pencil notes written down on the edges, something I might have done when the temperatures were colder, my mind sharper, deeper. I have not come here to read, yet the reason for my coming here lets me, as usual, wait.

A young woman with short hair and a modern, black dress and apron serves me a pot of black tea. With a professional smile she places pot and cup in front of me, mutters the usual formalities and disappears with gracious movements back towards the counter. For a second I look after her, volatile only, even though she was, as far as I could see, quite beautiful. How humans could watch each other with this animalistic, wild expression in their gazes has been a mystery to me ever since. Women, as well as men, have never caused any deeper desire within my heart, could never hold my interest for longer than necessary.

The clocktower to my right hand strikes two. Silently I raise my gaze and watch the dial, as if I wanted to make sure that what I've just heard matches the actual time. In that very moment the entrance door is opened and the attached little bell starts to ring. One look is enough and I close Schopenhauer, placing him back on the table, next to my cap. A young woman, about two years older than I am, enters the café. She is alone and wears, in contrast to the fact that she is a university student herself, not her violet uniform but a white linen dress in European style witch matching shoes. A wine red hat covers her head. One can only guess her chestnut brown Eton crop underneath. On her nose, which is, just as the remaining features, of characteristic form, sits a fragile pair of nickel glasses.

Once she has stepped inside the Kamigata Coffeehouse she stops. A notebook rests in her left, a pencil in her right hand. Entirely lost in thoughts she notes down the one or another word, pushing her glasses back her nose in between, while muttering indistinctly. She holds a purse underneath her arm and all sorts of papers. Only when the door is once more opened behind her she looks up and around. Our gazes meet. My face entirely without any notable expression I raise my hand.

“Sempai”, I call for her and rise for reasons of courtesy. “I was starting to think you wouldn't show up at all.”

“Levi-kun”, she replies so loud that the remaining guests turn after us. She is all smiles, raising her hand to reply my greeting but forgets about the papers and her purse, which, due to her movement, fall down and scatter over the ground. She notices her mistake in embarrassment, starts to laugh and turns red, before she apologises to a coffee-drinking couple, crawls underneath their table, gathering her belongings. I, from a safe distance, watch her with raised brows, while I try not to let show how displeased I am about her behaviour.

Little later she places a pile of papers so abruptly on my table that my tea cup, decorated with slender blue flowers, starts to dance around. Afterwards she hugs me with an intensity that presses the air out of my lungs. “Oh Levi”, she shouts once more, “just wait what I've got to tell you, you won't believe me.”

“Damn you, Hanji”, I mutter, “let me go, you hurt me.” I free myself from her grip. “Apart from that you've let me wait for over an hour. I was about to get my stuff and leave.”

“Oh, really?” She points at my fully filled cup of tea. “I'd rather guessed you were just about to make yourself at home here.”

“That's my second pot”, I reply in a chilly voice, whereas she starts to laugh. “You better have a good reason to waste my time, do you hear me?”

“Not that you would have studied for your exams anyway”, she remarks and shrugs. “Such lack of effort, yet you naturally get the good grades, how unsympathetic.”

“Yes, we all know that's what people say about me, but who cares? It's not that I would depend on them anyway. So, your reason?”

“Or what?”

“Excuse me?”

“You said: 'You better have a good reason to waste my time' – but what if I don't have one?” She grins at me. “What happens then?”

“Jeez, Hanji.” Ignoring her I pull back my chair and sit down. Hanji follows my example.

“So, what now?”, I insist. Her excitement is something that I cannot overlook. She is even more agitated and nervous than usual. She reaches for my cup and moves it towards her lips. After taking a big gulp she places it back on my saucer. “This tea is of excellent quality”, she says with honest appreciation. “Such full taste and such strong aroma. What sort is it?”

“English Breakfast”, I reply with a matte voice and push the cup away from me. Her papers seem to cover the whole table, even my hat and Schopenhauer himself. She has pushed the little box with sugar so close to the edge that it is about to fall. To make sure it won't happen I take it and place it on another table. By one look at her face I can tell that she has barely listened to my words. With a mild smile I shake my head. The year is Taisho 10 [1]. In about half a year I will graduate from university. With about 20 years we have reached the climax of our youth.

“So”, I insist and click my tongue most disparagingly. “What on earth has taken you so look?”

“Oh, this and that, you know?” She once more reaches for my cup, but I pull it back before she can reach it.

“You are doing it again”, I say.

“What?”

“You're ligging.”

“No way.”

“You're doing it right now. How about you go and order yourself an own cup, or better: a pot?”

“How about you would go ahead and practice some of that socialism you keep preaching about?”

“Order something, sempai.”

“How cruel you are. It wouldn't kill you to treat your poor, starving artist friend to a cup of tea from time to time, you know that?” She folds her arms in front of her chest. “You act like one of these working class boys but we all know that your family is reach, right? It's not a secret.”

“Yours as well. Let me remind you of the fact that you are, apart from that, one year older than me. For that, you are the one who ought to treat.” I once more shake my head. “You're unbelievable.”

“Jeez, son”, an older man turns around for me – according to his accent he is from Kansai -, “get that sis' a drink, will ya? Do you really want to get treated by a girl? It won't kill ya and shut her mouth, gives us all some piece and quiet.” He laughs.

“If you want it calm don't visit a bloody coffeehouse”, Hanji replies and, filled by sudden outrage, slams her fist on the table, so harshly, that my tea pours over and some of the papers fall from the table. When our gazes meet for the next time, her expression has changed entirely.

“I'm going to treat you”, she says with a harsh voice. I sigh.

“You don't need to do that. But for heaven's sake, order something, it's terribly hot today – for all I know you probably haven't drunk anything the entire day.”

“No.”

I guess that this is not as much about the drinks as about her pride.

“I'm your sempai and that alone gives me the right to treat you, no, the duty! I will not let some arrogant uncle from Osaka tell me how I have to act as a woman. Have you heard?! I bet your name is Tanaka [2], you godforsaken peasant.” With a bold movement she waves at the waitress and orders another pot of tea, furthermore a second cup and two pieces of cake.”

“I'm not hungry”, I sigh underneath my breath but she refuses to listen. “Listen, you're making a fool out of yourself.

“And if so, it's none of anyone's business.”

It takes her a few minutes to calm down. Once the waitress brings our order, she grabs her fork and splits her cake in several pieces of different sizes. After a while she gazes over to me. “Eat, Levi-kun, it's your cake, I ordered it for you. Be a good kouhai and eat.”

“Thanks, but no.”

“Why?”

“Because I'm not hungry.”

“Well, that leaves more for me.” She shrugs carelessly. “But don't complain that you're such a slim fella, Levi-kun. How will you gain weight if you never eat?”

“I'm not that slim.”

Once more she starts to laugh. “Liar.”

“Anyhow”, I try once more, “what kept you?”

Talking to her is like herding a bunch of cats.

“Ah, yes, I forgot.” Her cheeks round from all the cake she has stuffed into her mouth she keeps munching silently. Only when she takes a big gulp from her tea and swallows she is at last able to continue. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ears and grins at me. “You remember Petra? She visited the same literature lecture with Nanaba and me.”

“Sure.”

“I once tried to set you guys up, right?”

“Yes.” The memory itself is enough to make me groan. She was a nice girl and yes, we might went out once or twice, but before long she noticed that there was a lack of interest from my side. The whole thing had been doomed to fail from the beginning.

“She liked you a lot”, Hanji goes on, “but it was not a surprise that the whole matter dissolved into nothing sooner or later the way you treat her. You must show more initiative, Levi-kun, or do you really want to die alone?”

I shrug. “I don't mind. I don't have any interest in such things.”

She moans in frustration and heavily slams the fork on the table. Once more the other guests turn around for us. “No interest?!”, she calls out and I close my eyes for a moment in embarrassment. My cheeks start to feel hot. “What rubbish, honestly, Levi!”

“But if I tell you.” With a sigh I lower my gaze. I have not come here in order to discuss my love life. Truth is – in my whole life I have never been attracted to anyone, at least not in a more than friendship-like way. Other things have always appeared more important to me. Hanji though, her mind works slightly different in those matters.

“But every one secretly longs for love and companionship”, she insists. “For the other half that completes oneself. For someone who reveals the best version of yourself, who frees the strength you would have never thought to be inside of you. Just as the spherical round beings from Plato's Symposium, you know?”

“Actually, I don't.”

“The myth about the separation of wholeness into two people, destined to search for each other until they are finally reunited?”

“Will you stop already?” I take my cup and place them at my lips. “I remember Petra. Now go ahead.”

“So cold.” She pulls a wry face and sighs heavily, but we both know that she's overdoing it, as usual. Her love for drama is surpassing. “Petra, though, belongs to this women's circle I've told you about.”

“That feminist combat group?”

“Exactly.”

I nod. “You mentioned that she wanted to introduce you and Nanaba at some point, yes.”

Hanji joins me with nodding. The excitement in her face is domineering. Again and again she swallows big bites of cake, chewing so hastily that I wonder whether she tastes anything at all. She opens her mouth to proceed, but doesn't manage it to finish her sentence.

“Well, aren't those our dearest sempai?”, a well-known voice sounds behind me. Like out of the blue two hands are placed on my shoulders. Before I even know what's happening I whirl around, looking at a young man of my age. He is only slightly taller than me and quite slender. A pair of grey eyes grinningly watches me from a heart-shaped face, only framed by short, slightly wavy, dark-blonde hair. Next to him, her wild hair bound together to a pony-tail, dressed in a navy blue, plain high school uniform, stands a girl, all smiles. I can feel my face going all pale within split seconds. I jump from my chair.

“Farlan.” I cannot hide my surprise. “I thought you were still in Russia?”

“He returned only yesterday!”, shouts the girl. Her name is Isabelle. In her free time she uses to help out in one of the surrounding coffeehouses – that's how we met her. Farlan, though, studies one year underneath me at the same university. Although born and raised here, his Japanese is always accompanied by the slight touch of his Russian origin, whenever he opens his mouth. Nevertheless I struggle to consider him a foreigner. Why should I? He has spent most of his life around here. And even though my family doesn't know anything about him, he is my best friend.

“It's good to see you, sempai”, he grins and places, with a smile I reply in a volatile manner, his arm around my shoulders, before he gently pulls me close. “How long have I been gone? I've truly forgotten it at some point.”

“Too long”, I reply and Isabelle agrees with heavy nods, “about three months, I guess?”

“Should be about that”, Farlan replies.

“Your grandfather's funeral can impossibly have taken so long”, says Hanji in the background and pushes her emptied plate to the side in such a rough manner that it almost knocks my cup from the edge of the table. “What have you been doing to pass your time?”

“The funeral took place in Petrograd, do you have the slightest clue how long it takes to even get there?”

“Why did you even have to travel so far for a simple funeral?”, Isabelle asks the sullen tone that is so typical for her.

“Because he was the head of my family.” Farlan sighs. “Apart from that I could use my spare time for all sorts of useful things, as you guys might have noticed. Correspondences – as well as research.”

Hanji and I raise our brows. “Research?”, we ask simultaneously.

Farlan nods, grinning, heavy with meaning. He lowers his voice and moves closer. Before he continues with his speech, he carefully lets his gaze wander across the room. “I could smuggle in some books that are worth translating.” He pauses for effect. “Some not so legal books if you understand what I mean.”

“Farlan”, I whisper and notice, how my eyes slightly widen in surprise. “Do you mean political books?”

Biting his bottom lip he replies my gaze, still grinning all over his face. “You bet your wealthy boy's honour, my friend. That stuff translated in time and published anonymously and people will die to get them. Just think about the profit we could make. We could address a bigger audience and also sell more copies of our paper.” He slams his hand on the table. “We could be just as important as the Dawn.”

“What kind of books did you bring?”, I ask and Farlan, after some hesitation, leans over and whispers some foreign-sounding words in my ear. After he has finished I raise my head and look at him as if struck by lightening.

“Honestly?”, I whisper. “How did you manage to bring it here?”

“Don't ask”, he says and begins to laugh.

“Which one is it?”, Hanji now asks as well. “Come on, Farlan, tell me, tell me!”

Once more Farlan whispers into other people's ears and once more a face turns all white. When Hanji's gaze strikes mine, she breaks out into a nervous laughter after struggling silently for a while with herself. “Oh good lord”, she manages to stutter under her breath, “what a shame that we have to publish it anonymously. That could have been our legacy.”

“So it is decided?”, Farlan asks filled with hope. Both Hanji as well as I nod.

“Reunited for like five minutes and already dropping such a bomb”, Hanji laughs. “You're always good for a surprise, Farlan-kun.”

I take my cup and drink calmly, yet truth is, I am more than excited. “But we must be careful not to let down our guard, no matter how lucky we might feel right now. We need to be watch out.” I clear my throat and let my gaze wander back and forth between the others.

“What's that supposed to mean?” Farlan furrows his brows.

“We had some uninvited visitors during the past couple of weeks”, Hanji replies in my place. She takes the hat off, lets her fingers ran through her hair and folds her arms in front of her chest with a deep sigh. “Mainly caused by your correspondences from Russia, even though they were quite popular amongst our readers.”

“From whom?

“From above.” I place the half-emptied tea cup next to me. Isabelle, who barely participates in our conversation, pulls it close to her. Her fingertips carefully slide over the white porcelain.

“Police controls?” Farlan's voice is not lacking surprise, but I nod.

“Yes. I don't know why, but apparently they are keeping an eye on us. Since you've been gone they kept crawling around as if they were only waiting for us to make a mistake.”

“They suspect us to violate the press law”, Hanji adds and pushes her glasses back up with the tip of her index finger.

“These stupid dogs.” With a sigh Farlan leans back and pulls a face in unhidden disgust. “They are even worse than Yakuza. Protected by the state, that's what they are, but that's all.” He shrugs. “But if they don't find anything they'll move on sooner or later.”

“Jeez, Farlan”, I hiss and need to pull myself together in order not to raise my voice, considering this unasked presentation of ignorance. “Did you forget everything while you were in Russia? We need to keep a low profile. If they get us, we're done, it's that simple. We'll might as well be forced to leave university.”

“I do know that myself”, he replies angrily.

“How are we supposed to change society for the better, when we rot away in prison? Not to speak of the consequences for our families.”

“Oh, Levi.” He rolls his eyes. “What's it with you and your family? Worst case is – you rot in jail, fine, good for you. Do you know what will happen to me if they convict me of committing a crime? They'll throw me out of the country and I can spend the rest of my days digging potatoes from the mud somewhere in Siberia.”

“What are you talking about?” I raise my hands. “Why should they do something like that?”

“You don't have the Japanese citizenship, right? You're the son of Russian migrants”, Hanji says and Farlan nods.

“That's right.” He takes a deep breath and piercingly looks at me from across the table. “Though inn contrary to you I have apparently asked myself the question whether our mission is worth the highest possible price or not. I, for my part, can answer this question with a 'yes'. As long as you let your family dominate your actions you'll never be truly free. Grow up.”

“Don't tell me what to do.” I'm about to forget myself. “You were the one who travelled to Petrograd for a frigging funeral, don't you dare to judge me.”

“Boys, please”, Hanji sighs in a low tone, even before I can open my mouth for an answer. “Think about our higher goal. Stop fighting, will you? This is neither the right place nor the right time. People are already staring at us.”

“It didn't bother you before, did it?”, I growl without looking at her.

“Do you want us to get caught? We don't even have the slightest clue what kind of people are amongst these guests.”

We stare at each other, the eyes squinted and the faces sincere, neither of us willed to give in. Just because we are dear to each other doesn't mean that there are no arguments, rather the opposite. A sudden silence fills the air, and the conversation breaks up from every possible side.

“Fine”, I mutter. “Now, where Farlan's back we are, at least, complete again. It was simply impossible to do all the writing simultaneously to all the studying. From now on we'll be able to act in a more flexible manner.”

“When shall we four meet to talk through the details?”, replies Farlan.

“Friday”, I say yet Hanji as well as Isabelle shake their heads.

“I can't”, says Hanji.

“Why?”

“She's writing a column”, it bursts out of Isabelle. “For the Purple Lily.”

“There'll be a business meeting on Friday”, Hanji agrees.

“For the Purple Lily?” Farlan furrows his brows. “Isn't that this women's magazine?”

Thereupon Isabelle sighs and disparagingly clicks her tongue. “She writes over the women's international fight for freedom, Farlan.” She supports her elbows on the table and places her head on her hands. Her eyes sparkle in sheer admiration. “About how women are denied the access to education and work. Or about how women are helplessly exposed to men's violence over and over. Such things. It is a great magazine of high reputation and an honour to be chosen! She could change the life for all of us Japanese women.”

“Is that true?”, I ask hastily and turn towards Hanji. She blushes and nods. This is probably what she had wanted to tell me all along before Farlan interrupted us.

“For heaven's sake, if women want to work, then let them work.” Farlan shakes his head. “Exploitation will always be exploitation, no matter what gender. Why do they make such a fuzz about that? I don't get it. If you ask me, it would be better not having to work at all.”

“You're only scared that this other magazine will now get more attention than ours, since you cannot contribute more of your Russian correspondences, so calm down.” My lips twitch in amusement. “If she wants to write, let her write. I just wonder why you won't work for us, that's all.”

“Because we write about class struggle, not about girlish ballyhoo.”

“We write about equality and solidarity”, Isabelle hisses and bops her elbow into Farlan's side.

“Which applies, no matter what gender we are dealing with”, I add.

“However.” Hanji, who is obviously embarrassed by all this unasked attention, casually tries to change the subject. “Saturday, 10 o'clock sharp in the morning, usual place?”

“Fine”, I answer, yet the others don't. “Farlan, Isabelle, how about you?”

Once more I don't receive an answer. With a sigh I turn around for them, but once I look in their direction my breath stops suddenly. Their chairs are empty. After blinking several times I look around the room. Only now I notice the fact that it has become strangely quiet. The music has long faded and even the chattering of the surrounding guests have fallen silent. One look more and it turns out that we're all alone.

“Hanji”, I whisper, “what's going on?” Yet when I gaze over to her she has already turned away from me. I cannot see her face. Motionless like a doll she awaits something I don't know. Her glasses which she had been wearing only seconds before, rest in her right hand. A strange feeling spreads around my belly. What is the meaning of this?

My heart starts beating so fast that I break out in sweat underneath my arms. Reluctantly I stand up and slowly approach the coffeehouse's entrance, but when I place my hand on the doorknob and try to open it, it doesn't move an inch. Before I know what happens fear overwhelms me.

For a second I close my eyes, hoping, that this is nothing but a dream and I will wake up any second, but nothing of that sort happens. When I open my eyes for the next time I find myself in a tiny chamber.

I notice a brass bucket in the corner, furthermore a wooden, plain pallet serving as bed. At the facing wall someone has pinned the first page of a newspaper with a pin needle. The air tastes old, the smell of vomit and faeces are omnipresent. Only through a small window in a narrow door that cannot be opened, matte and milky light can find its way inside. I feel dizzy. When I place my hand on my forehead the skin burns like fire. My throat, dry as the dirt to my feet, is longing for water. My limbs feel numb. I must be severely sick.

I can barely see in the darkness, yet something in me already knows there is no escape. With tightening fear I reach out my hands in the dim twilight, until my fingertips reach the wall facing the bed. Searching for a way out I carefully feel it, increasingly hasty, increasingly nervously, while I fight for air with deep breaths. The walls are high, to high for me, and it appears, I know that they're not, as if they spread out endlessly around me. I feel as if I'm going to choke. I will die, here and now, it's only a matter of time, I know it, I will never again see the sun or walk on the face of the earth. The room is burying me and I'm scared.

My heart feels as if it would stop beating any second. An all-domineering panic keeps me going. Sweat pours down my forehead, but I don't wipe it away. Swearing silently I stick to the wall, until my fingers find the corner in the end of the room.

It's the moment when the screams start to fill the air. They could be female, but I'm not sure, apart from their height they don't sound human at all. From far away they eat themselves through the wall, deafened by the rooms in between, but not losing their pain. Somebody out there is fighting for her life.

I can hear the voices of men occasionally. They shout at her, in a rough and domineering way that can only be heard by men, but they are too far away as if I could understand a single word they're saying. From time to time they laugh, and it doesn't sound friendly at all. It doesn't matter what they say. The way they say it already reveals the true meaning of their words. Eventually the screams break and the voice falls silent, apart from seldom sounds of whining. It's so weird that I shiver from my spine.

“Hanji”, I manage to say between two breaths, “you miserable cunt, don't leave me hanging here now. Where are you?” My voice begins to tremble. “Where are you? Where are Farlan and Isabelle? Why won't anybody talk to me?”

Several times I let my fist slam against the door. “Bring them back!”, I shout wholeheartedly and with an urgency that I have never witnessed within my voice until the present day. “You hear me?! Bring them back or I'll kill each and everyone of you, I swear!”

But nothing happens, The door is neither opened, nor will the whining stop. Feeling weak all of a sudden, I kick the door for one last time, then sink to the ground. My forehead leans against the door, my lips gently touch the wooden surface, covered in sweat. “Send a doctor”, I whisper, knowing that nobody can hear me, “I'm dying in here, please, please send someone, anyone.”

My throat tightens and I start to sob, once, twice, but I'm to tired to keep going. As if made of lead weight, I struggle to walk over to the bed on which I break down. Only when I watch my hands with feverish eyes I notice that the sleeves of my white dress shirt are covered in blood and torn. I wonder whose blood it might be but don't know. My jacket is missing as well. Has it been lost? Has it been locked away? Did I even bring it with me when they brought me here? I cannot remember. The only thing I desperately wish for right now is a glass of water and the knowledge what happened to my friends. A hand full of rice, maybe, even though I'm quite sure I would only be spitting it out again right after eating.

I can't stand it any longer. If I don't find a way out right now I'm going to lose my mind. My head is buzzing from heat and the lack of oxygen in this dry air. Then, suddenly, the screams start again, more intense than before. Like needles they find their way in my body and mind. A low, crying sound leaves my lips. I mutter their names again and again, then, before I know what's happening, I'm back on my feet, slamming my fists again against the door made of steel, filled by sudden rage that fills every of my movements. Again and again I scream the same names, their names, with an intensity as if the world would stop spinning if I cannot know them by my side.

Then, suddenly, the door disappears underneath my hands. I stumble a few steps forward but there is only endless, black nothingness spreading out in front of me. Fighting for breath, my eyes wide and fearful, I look around, secretly expecting someone to intensify my pain, but for a shear endless amount of time nothing happens. Only the thirst and the heat in my cheeks seem to fade. Carefully, endlessly slowly, listening for every potential sound, I turn around and freeze, because you stand in front of me.

, BECAUSE I STAND IN FRONT OF YOU.

Your back is facing me. You are wearing a plain, white linen dress.

HER.

Her back is facing me. She is wearing a plain, white linen dress. Short, chestnut brown hair, not longer than her chin frames a face of characteristic features. There is a pair of slender glasses resting on her nose but only one shoe on her feet. I click my tongue.

“What the heck is that supposed to mean?”, I ask her and step closer. “Only one shoe? Have you forgotten how to dress on your own? How can one single person be so terribly organised as you?” I hesitate. “No. How can one single person that is so terribly organised as you manage her way through life? Probably one of the last mysteries on earth.”

Normally she is the first one to break out into laughter over such monologues of mine, but today she remains unmoved. With furrowed brows I keep approaching her. “Oy”, I say and notice the feeling of fear slowly filling me, “what's happening here? Where are we?”

But once more I don't receive a reaction. In the meantime I have positioned myself behind her. She must know that I'm close and yet she doesn't seem to notice. In fact she acts so different from her usual temperament that it starts to feel kind of weird.

“Hanji?”, I whisper and reach out for her, only slowly, since my intuition tells me to flee, to find a way out of here, but where? How? And apart from that – isn't she Hanji after all?

My blood flushes through my veins. Endlessly loud my breath rattles through my lungs.

In the moment in which my fingertips touch her shoulders she whirls around and screams at me, an unformed, raw, animalistic cry, terrible in every imaginable way.

I'm breathing heavily and my heart beats as if it wanted to be cut out of my chest and thrown away. I sit on the ground, my back facing a wall. The smell of tatami fills the air. A yukata is covering my sweaty body, but has loosened during the past hours so much that the sleeves have slid down my shoulders. With trembling fingers I reach out for it and pull it back up. This way I remain, shivering of fear, awaiting my feelings to fade so much that I can feel human again. It takes a few moments to understand that I am in my room. From time to time pictures, half unknown, half familiar, like fading memories, light up before my inner eye, fuelling my fear. But right now the danger seems to be over. With a sound of relief I let the back of my head sink against the wall and gaze over to the window.

I'm all alone. Only the matte moonlight falls, in its pale, whitish beauty on the in contrary strangely dark desk. Slowly I struggle on my feet, then approach, as fast as I can, the window and pull it open. It happens effortlessly. Several times I open and close it, then I turn away and repeat the same at the door. But only when I gaze into the hallway lying behind, noticing that there is, in fact, nothing but our hallway, the fear finally disappears.

I dreamed, I wonder, but suddenly it lights up again, the feeling of fever and nauseousness. I fall on my knees, only managing to grip the paper bin and face it underneath my face before it's too late. Under heavy cramps and choking sounds I throw up several times, my fingers desperately clenched around the bin's edges. Only when I can be sure that I spit it all out, I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and sink down on the tatami, entirely exhausted and trembling. My cheeks feel wet. Carefully I reach out for them with the tips of my fingers. When they are finally moistened by humidity I realise that those are tears, my tears.

Erwin, I think for a reason I don't understand and it feels slightly inappropriate, these tears are shed for you. Nevertheless the thought remains present, within my inner ear, after this mysterious odyssey through time and space, through my mind, through every single imaginable dimension of this earthly existence. With a sound of desperation I close my eyes and give myself away to fatigue. “Erwin”, I desperately whisper these two strange syllables into the night. “Erwin.”

Chapter Text

“So, how about you, eh?”

We are having breakfast. We, that are my mother, Mikasa, Eren and I. The place is a small chamber not far from the kitchen. Even though it is still early in the morning, we have already removed the shutters. From time to time a fresh breeze finds its way inside the house and the glass wind chime that someone once has attached to a log above the garden front starts to dance. Clear and cold as ice its sound fills the air. It reminds me of seasons far from the humid Japanese summer heat and the thought alone is enough to refresh me, if not in the real world, at least on my mind. The girls wear traditional clothing. Plain aprons protect their kimono of the housework's dirt and prove that her hands have made these precious dishes nurturing us now. Eren himself is wearing the black gakuran of the local high school students, I, myself, plain trousers and a white shirt.

“So, how about you, eh?”

Taciturn as seldom before I sit in front of the low dinner table, eying my breakfast. There is a bowl of rice, miso soup, a flat plate with a grilled piece of salted salmon, pickled vegetables and tea. The bowl of rice is resting in my left hand, a pair of chopsticks in my right. My gaze, draped in inner clouds, carefully watches the tiny, reddish pickled plum resting in the middle of my rice, waiting to be eaten by me. A simple but traditional dish of patriotic nature, since the resemblance of the Japanese flag is not a coincidence.

“So, how about you, eh?”

Two days have passed since the fest. Of course I have not heard from the linguist since. No visit offered me his return, not a note from his hand arrived at this house. From time to time I wonder whether this strange meeting has actually taken place, or only on my mind, a simple foreshadow of what was already waiting for me later that night.

The pictures of said night, the scene in Ginza, the screams from the distance, friends from a long outlived past – emotions I had believed to have forgotten and presumed memories would not let me alone. And even though sleep devoured me right away once I had sunken onto the floor back then I could hardly find any rest. Since then I feel as if waking, during day and night, while my strength fades. There is something inside of me, pushing me, keeping me up, relentlessly, chasing me whenever a moment of silence approaches my soul at night. Sometimes it is, for a brief second only, as if I am losing my mind. But then I remember what is or what I believe to be and the fear disappears.

“So, how about you, eh?”

Somebody touches my shoulder. I twitch and look up. Three gazes are resting on me. To my left sits Mikasa. Despite the early hour she is already fully dressed, her hair a beautiful flower of a hairstyle, forming a thick knot. The summer-like colours of her kimono let her appear pale and graceful. With slightly furrowed brows she watches me. She might be careful not to let her inner emotions show outside, yet I can still discover the sorrow about me in her eyes. Eren though, on the right side, ignores me. His face hard, equalling a mask, he silently eats his meal. The dark hair falls into his eyes and partly covers his gaze, that has been dominated by anger and determination since childhood days.

“Levi?”

It is my mother talking. With a gentle smile she watches me. She lets the chopsticks in her hand sink, until they rest on the edge of the black lacquered bowl.

“Yes?” My voice is a mere whisper. I clear my throat.

“What are you up to today?”

Only by now I realise that the others are already done with eating. It is only me who has not even yet begun. As if thunderstruck I must have sat here staring into space, lost in thoughts, detached from this world, without even noticing. Who has not awakened yet wanders through the world as if dreaming. Happiness is offered to those who can fully rest in the present moment, that is what the Buddha Shakyamuni once said.

“The usual”, I reply, while trying to gain back my self-restrain. I take the plum with my chopsticks and eat, while not noticing the sour taste at all, before I proceed: “We expect a delivery of new books today, of which I will take care of. As far as I know they have not yet been added to our catalogue. Eren?”

He nods without looking at me, but remains silent. I gaze him with a severe expression, but then I turn away and start eating my rice. Our togetherness has not always been dominated by such awkwardness, but now, since it has established itself between us, it appears even more insuperable.

That way we finish our breakfast.

It is Mikasa who is so kind to clean up the table from plates and bowls, whereas Eren, once he has finished his tea, jumps up and disappears toward the genkan. Silently I look after him, before I get up myself, taking my leave for today, stepping in the hallway.

For one last time I go up to my room, take the key of our shop from its usual place and a thin hakama which I put on, then walk back downstairs. I have only stepped into my geta – on such hot days it can be seen quite often, that strange mixture of western and Japanese clothing -, sneaked out and am about to close the door behind me, when suddenly somebody calls my name. I hesitate and turn around, discover my mother in the hallway and, once more, step back inside.

She has taken off her apron. Her hands folded in front of her body she looks at me. Sweet mildness shows in her eyes. The smile on her lips is as flawless as ever, yet I feel as if I can discover a certain melancholy in her expression.

“What is it?”, I ask reluctantly, but she only watches me.

“Are you alright, my love?”, she replies. “You didn't act like yourself for the past few days now.”

“Oh really?” My eyes twitch, while I turn around, suddenly robbed of all my tender feelings for her. “You've been telling me this for the past six months now, give me a break.” That sounds harsher than intended, and shame rises in me right away. With a sigh I close my eyes and turn towards her. “I am sorry, mother. But do tell me, how have I been acting in your opinion?”

“Tired.” She hesitates for a brief moment. “And sad. Especially the latter.”

We look at each other, uncertain what would be the right thing to say. Occasionally I look over to the door, as if the answer to her question was waiting outside and not in me.

“I dreamed”, I finally say and she understands right away.

“Is that so?”

I nod.

“Your childhood dream?”

“Yes.”

With a sigh I bite my lips and fight a fight with myself before I eventually proceed. “And other things. Other people.”

“Whom?”

“It's not important.”

“Levi.”

“It would upset you.”

“Levi.” She shakes her head and shrugs. “I am your mother. Tell me, about whom was that dream of yours?”

“It was about them.”

The smile fades from her lips. She knows who I am talking about. Carefully I eye the ground to my feet. “It feels longer than only half a year.” A sight leaves my throat and I cannot prevent it. “Not to know what-”

“What happened to them?”

As if she has given me a sign I raise my head and stare at here with slightly opened lips. “Yes”, I whisper and need to fight the fact that my throat tightens due to her words. “To know whether they're alive and well would already be enough.”

“Maybe it would be.” She lowers her head slightly, as if thinking about the pros and cons. “But it seems as if your fate has drawn a line underneath such matters, doesn't it?”

“Indeed it has.”

My gaze lowered I stand in front of her and cannot help myself. Out of the blue the feeling of guilt and shame overwhelms me with an intensity that makes my cheeks turn red. My intentions had been most honest and sincere, yet in the end it did only one thing, and we all know that: I dishonoured my family, those people whose flesh and blood is the same as mine, whose fortune and misfortune is connected to mine in an inseparable way. And even though I do not care so much about most of my blood relatives and what they might think of me, I would not be able to go on if she lost her faith. I love her as much as a son can love his mother. I respect and honour her.

“Come here, Levi-kun”, she says tenderly and waves her hand at me. Only reluctantly I follow her invitation. When I stop in front of the stairs that lead up to the hallway, she steps down and pulls me into her arms. Tightly she hugs me. I let it happen and close my eyes. For a moment only I feel as if the heaviness that has been resting on my shoulders for the past months disappears, as if the darkness sneaks out of my heart for split seconds only.

When she releases me, she takes my face into her hands and eyes me carefully.

“You know that I love you, right?”, she whispers with a smile. “Whatever happens, whatever you do, nothing will ever change this, right? Don't you ever forget that.”

I indicate a nod and lower my gaze once more. My cheeks feel hot. Such openly showed emotions have always been something I could not deal with, but she knows me well enough to understand my behaviour.

“Good”, she says and the smile on her lips increases. She leans over and breaths a kiss against my cheeks. “Now go. Sell books and form the world's minds.”

My family owns several book stores, yet the department in Ginza is the biggest. Not very broad, but of surprising length, it is the home of a small workshop. Sometimes books are printed here, bound into linen, repaired or made according to our costumers wishes, mostly high quality single pieces with suiting prices. The location of our head store is good, but in contrary to the european architecture that surrounds us our place is of traditional design, equipped with narrow shelves, in which books pile up underneath the ceiling. Heavy clothes, printed with Japanese characters, work as doors, and there is wood, wood as far as the eye reaches. On the first impression the store appears quite small, but appearances are deceiving. We cover a broad section of western and asian literature. Apart from that we also buy and sell antique books for reasonable prices, something that has given us quite some popularity amongst local university students.

Carrying around several papers and books I step out of the storage. Only recently we have received a larger delivery, but up to now we were simply lacking the necessary time to put them away. Careful not to bump into anything I pass Eren, who, a dust cloth in his hand, stands in one of the corners, cleaning. He does not look, and same goes for me. He has exchanged his high school uniform with the simple plain clothing of a clerk.

I pass the narrow entrance and take the books with me. I have hardly passed the door when the humid hot air strikes my face, carrying the scent of summer. I smell the aromas of the surrounding restaurants, notice the scent of people who pass me. The streets are a hustle and bustle, extending up to the horizon. It is late afternoon; everybody is on his way to grab a short snack. I look at children, running around between us adults, some hardly wearing any clothes, others in striped yukata, wooden geta covering their bare feet. There are businessmen in suits, their leather bags tightly pressed against their chests. Women, some of them wearing working outfits, some apparently only going for a walk, carrying around a huge umbrella made from wood and paper, and, finally, the broad mass of male, working people. Sometimes I feel as if I could see a white linen suit showing up in between and my hearts stops beating for a second, but no familiar face ever accompanies it. I let my gaze rest on them, then, when someone packed with udon passes me on his bike, I turn to the display and place one book after another where it belongs, silently, still, filled with an inner calmness, which makes the noise around me disappear.

From time to time the one or another costumer enters the shop passing me, and I mutter the usual phrase of welcome. Usually I take care of them, but I know that Eren has worked here long enough to do it by himself by now.

When said man leaves our shop a few minutes later, carrying a small paper bag in his hands, I smile, since it means that we all got what we were secretly wishing for. Once he has disappeared I return to my work. A high quality edition of Natsume Soseki's works catches my interest, several books, as good as new. They certainly belong together, since their design matches each other. Their back is made from black linen, the cover pages though from thick paper of crème colour, covered with a print of red magnolias. I guess them to be about ten years old.

I put the remaining books aside and open the first volume. The paper itself is thick and heavy, gone yellow in some parts, but does this only add value in my opinion. I notice the scent of old paper and a printing ink that is hardly used anymore nowadays. A volatile smile appears on my lips. Natsume Soseki – I read his novels when I was only attending middle school. His stories influenced me as barely any other. They, in the first place, made me notice the splits of social injustice within this society. The way he approached this unresolved conflicts between wish and duty have always felt as if he had written them for me only. Gazing at these words now I feel as if hardly anything has changed since then.

For a moment I hold the book underneath my nose and breath in the smell of a long lived past.

“What are you doing there?”

My gaze wanders over to the shop's entrance. Eren is standing there, watching me. His has folded his arms in front of his chest. His brows are furrowed, and I can see wrinkles on his forehead. Scepticism shows on his face, but there is something else in his eyes. It is contempt. We stare at each other and I let the book sink. His does not address me with the demanded respect, but is rather talking down on me. Even though we both act as we would not notice it, we know.

“What does it look like for you?”, I reply in an irritated manner, trying to overshadow my emotions by severity, since I know that this moment could escalate easily into a real fight.

“Not like work.”

I do not answer. A certain tension starts filling the air between us, a load of unspoken words, judgements, accusations. I feel as if someone has stopped the time, but the roaring and talking of the people in the background reminds me that this is not the case. For a brief second I think of the dreams that haunted me during the past nights and start to shake internally, as if the ground underneath my feet would collapse.

Right in this moment a group of young men walks by. I only notice them from the corners of my eyes, but something about them is different enough to catch my attention. Without realising it I turn around and look after them. Some of them wear the uniform of my former university, others, though, simple, plain western suits. A sound of laughter reaches me, joyful, self-confident and of characteristic easiness. It belongs to one of them, he walks behind his friends, dressed in a light brown suit. Dark blonde hair falls into his face, curly, though only slightly. Bright skin shimmers in the light of the sun. He is involved in a conversation with his neighbour – he as well seems to have foreign roots – but I watch them in awe, since I do not understand a single word. A few moments after I realise that they are conversing in Russian.

The book by Natsume Soseki, held tightly split seconds before, slips from my hands and falls to the ground. A sudden emptiness fills me. With huge, widened eyes I stare after them.

“Can it be?”, I whisper tonelessly, unable to stir. “Is it possible, that-” I shake my head in disbelief. No. It is impossible. Just as me and the others, he-

“Levi?”, Eren's irritated voice sounds behind me, and while this repeated lack of respect would usually have left me angry, I do not care at all this time. He has to address me twice before I turn around to him.

“Take over”, I order him, and the tone of my voice makes it quite clear that backtalk is no option.

“But-”

“Damn it Eren”, I jump at him, “for once in your life do as you're told.”

With these words I leave the books behind and wand to follow the others, only to understand that they have already been devoured by the crowds. It does not stop me. Instead I turn around my heels and run after them, follow them with rapid steps into the direction they had taken earlier. It is running upstream, and not only once I almost bump into passing people. When I eventually do not know anymore where to go, when I already believe them lost and stop, looking around silently, the crowds suddenly tear open like clouds on an autumn day, revealing the group I was just looking for. They stand in front of a small takeaway, facing me with their backs, and seem to discuss whether it would be a good idea to enter the place.

For a moment I stare at them, motionlessly, my lips slightly opened, before I approach them with a heavily beating heart, a few steps only, before I raise my voice.

“Farlan?”, I say, but not without a certain uneasiness, then hold my breath and wait, when the addressee turns around, slowly. He looks in my direction, in the manner people do when they do not expect to be called. His gaze strikes mine and he turns pale.

“Levi”, I hear him say, a mere whisper, filled with disbelief. Then, as if suddenly he remembers the fact that he is not alone, he says something to his companions, who leave him alone then. It happens so fast that I hardly know what is going on. We walk at each other, slowly in the beginning, but faster and faster, as if we both would not trust our eyes and ears, but then, before I know what is happening, we fly into each others arms. Only now, when I feel him close to me, it turns real. The smell, the warmth, the shape of his body, it is it, it is him, and he is standing right in front of me. I put my arms around his shoulders and pull him close to me, heavily, as tight as I can, and he does the same.

“I can't believe it”, I struggle to say, but my voice breaks due to the uprising emotions. We hold each other, clinging onto each other like someone drowning is clinging to a piece of wood, for a long time, and only slowly, very slowly, we let each other go. Wordlessly, because what could we have to say?, we look at each other and I discover tears in his eyes, tears that he tries to blink away once his gaze touches me. He grabs my face with both hands, as if he wanted to make sure that he was not dreaming, then reaches for my shoulders and presses them gently.

“It is you”, I hear him say, “it is really you.” I can only nod. His self-restrain then disappears and he breaks out in tears. Once more he steps closer, lets his forehead sink against my shoulder and cries like a child, shivering and sobbing, as I have had never witnessed on him before. Like this we remain, and I eventually hug him tightly, until he calms down.

“Please”, I say in a low voice, “let's go somewhere else.” The people are already watching us.

Slowly we walk down the broad road, but nobody of us even says a single word. It would be the easiest to just visit one of the local bars, but we both are not in the right mood. My head is booming silently, as if it was bursting into pieces any second. I do not feel any hunger. Every bite would be one too much in this moment.

Farlan seems to feel similar. His hands hidden in his pockets, looking toward the ground, he wanders next to me like a ghost. He is still as pale as if he had lost every drop of blood in his veins.

“I believed you dead”, he suddenly whispers, sighs and closes his eyes, as if he could not bear the thought. His lips form a thin line, and once more he looks as if he was about to cry. “If you just knew where I've been searching for you both, Levi, for six months.”

With a moaning sound he shakes his head and I as well cannot help myself from sighing. I understand his suffering, since I had felt completely the same back then. How would I love to tell him that I scoured the whole city after that fateful night, but I cannot. I do not want to lie to him.

So we remain walking next to each other, silently, but not uncomfortable.

“Do you know what happened to Isabelle?”, I ask eventually, and Farlan nods.

“She's alright. She was with me that night, so nothing happened to her.”

“Good.”

We stop in front of a row of shops.

“How about Hanji?”, he says. “Do you know about her?”

“Hanji?”

“Yeah.”

I look over to a grocery store, hardly five meters apart from us. She is standing there, as always wearing her white dress, examining the apples in the display. After a while she notices my gaze and looks over to me. With a smile she places her index finger on her lips. She then folds her arms, a mischievous smile on her lips, and, dancingly, steps back. Once more I look to Farlan, once more to her – but by then she has already disappeared.

“Levi? What is it?”

“I don't know what happened to her”, I whisper and take a deep breath. “Let's go.”

“Wait.”

But I do not listen to him, just walk down the street. It takes some time until Farlan has caught up with me. He places a hand on my shoulder and turns me around. But when we look at each other again, he gasps and steps back.

“Levi”, he whispers, his voice shivering. “What happened to your eyes?”

I lower my gaze and remove his hand from my shoulder. “Dunno. They were like this when they released me.”

“But-”

“Let's go.”

“Now wait, Levi. Don't you remember where we are?”

“No, I don't.” I hesitate. The uneasiness remains. “Well, kind of. Ginza.” I shrug. A certain restlessness fills me, making it hard to catch a clear thought. Again I turn to go, but once more Farlan grabs my shoulders. With gentle tenderness he lets his fingertips slide over them, then points with a nod of his head in the opposite direction.

“Follow me”, he says friendly, “there is something I want to show you.”

I look at him, dominated by reluctance and displeasure, while he replies my gaze with an expression that secretly asks me for my trust. In the end I step down, with a deep sigh, and let my head sink.

“Fine”, I mutter, “where are we going?”

“Just wait.” Farlan starts to grin. “You'll see.”

Without a further word he leads me through the masses. From time to time we turn left, then right, but most of the time we simply follow the road. I struggle to keep up with him, since my thoughts keep wandering off. When we stop suddenly, I almost run into him. We find ourselves in the middle of a narrow road, not far from the main road. From the distance I can still hear the street noise.

“This is it.”

Finally Farlan lets me go; as if he had wanted to make sure that he would not lose me he had laid his arm around my shoulders. He points toward a row of houses located right in front of us. One is hidden behind a scaffold, covered with white cloth. Farlan gives me a meaningful look, but when my face does not reveal any reaction to his presentation, he shakes his head.

“You have no clue, right?”, he mutters. Carefully he looks at me. This street looks just like any other. A row of houses, all similar to me, quite new, almost western. Nevertheless I cannot get rid of the feeling that I have been here before, that this place is more familiar to me than I know it.

“What's behind the cloth?”, I ask eventually. Instead of answering, Farlan steps closer, looking around carefully to make sure that nobody watches us. When he can be sure he pulls the cloth back, points me to follow him, and disappears. As if struck by lightening I watch him, unable to move, as if an invisible force was holding me back. Only when Farlan's head once more appears behind the cloth, and his looks pierce me in the most judging manner, I gain back control over my limbs. With only a few steps I have followed him and sneak, just as careful as he before, through the narrow gap between cloth, scaffold and the neighbouring house.

With a grinding sound my wooden shoes force their way into the lose ground. The surface is so soft, that I struggle to find grip. With my hand I support myself on the wall of the neighbouring house. Farlan, standing a few meters away from me, observes my struggle with a self-confident smile. A second afterwards he turns away, places his hands in his hips and has a look around. I follow his example and carefully eye the surroundings, filled with distrust. Then, before I know what happens, a sound of surprise leaves my lips.

I had expected that we would sneak into the building that was actually hidden behind the white cloth, but to my surprise we stand underneath open sky. Like a foul tooth that once has been ripped out there is a hole between the surrounding houses. The ground is uneven. Rests of wood lie everywhere, burned to black coal. At the corners of the house there are uneven, higher parts, where, at least I suspect it to be so, walls might have stood once. I can still see rests of the floor plan, here and there covered by dirt, sometimes easily to be seen, sometimes hardly to be noticed. Looking closer I discover art deco ornaments on the bigger pieces of wood. In between glasses, most of them broken, salt shaker, plates, forks and knives, once silver, but now shining matte in the bright sunlight.

As if the wall had given me an electric shock, I pull my hand away and press it, clenched to a fist, against my chest. After a few seconds I open it and look at my palm. It is pitch black and smells like soot. Most of the surroundings as well seem to be covered with it.

“Kamigata”, I whisper tonelessly, and my hand starts to shake. I once more form a fist and let it sink, before I raise my gaze and look to Farlan. “You brought me to the old Kamigata Coffeehouse.”

“I was starting to worry you would never get it.” The self-confident grin has disappeared from his face. What remains is nothing more than a melancholy twitch around his lips. I approach him, careful not to cover my naked feet with dirt. “It is hard to believe that this is everything that will remain of us”, he then says.

“Sometimes I feel as if my memories have dissolved into smoke together with this place.” Our gazes meet.

“A lot of stuff has happened here, that sure is right.”

“When was the last time we met here?”

“The night of the party.” Farlan shoves his hands into his pockets and starts wandering around. From time to time he touches the sooted remains, pushes them back and forth, turns them around. He seems to be deeply lost in his thoughts.

“The place was almost bursting of people”, I say without knowing where the words come from.

“Yeah, we hardly got in. It was incredibly hot, but nevertheless we forced our way inside. The orchestra was sitting over there, I believe.” He points into one certain corner.

“The music was roaring.”

A laughter leaves Farlan's throat, half cheerful, half melancholic. “You even danced, man!”

“I was forced.”

“That doesn't change a thing.”

We look at each other and grin. “We've been complete, back then”, I then say and Farlan nods.

“You, me, Isabelle, Hanji.”

“Petra and Nanaba.”

“Our hearts and political ideals as red as our blood.”

“Only like blood?” We chuckle, then fall silent.

“Do you remember when we met here for the first time?”, I ask after a while of silence.

“1920. We both were in the same class. The metaphysic discourse of the european enlightenment era. I ran into you and Hanji when you studied here.”

“And you just grabbed a chair and sat down.” I nod. “Yes, I can remember.”

“You had the meditations of Descartes with you.”

“And you the Critique of Pure Reason by Kant.”

We laugh, but it does not last long.

“This is where everything began”, says Farlan.

“It ended here as well. Like a circle.” I turn away, my face bitter. “Considering that we read Kant, Descartes and Schopenhauer we were quite full of ourselves and convinced to know how this world works.”

“Don't you believe that anymore?”

“I have no idea what I believe.” With these words I turn towards Farlan, and all of a sudden an outburst of anger fills my chest. It is directed to no-one in particular, but Farlan, being my companion in this very moment, is destined to take a hit. The joy over our reunion now fades into the ambivalence of the past six months. “I know that we challenged our fate and burned our fingers. I know that I am still lacking the memories of the probably most important night of my life, and that they're most likely so terrible that my mind decided that it might be better if I never again had to look at them. I have no idea who I am right now and where my path is headed, all I have is this empty day to day routine in our shop, god knows what for. That's what I know. What do you know, Farlan, huh?” I click my tongue, while he is just staring at me with a blank face. “Go ahead and tell me, tell me with that self-confident attitude of yours that once has been so dear to me.” With a deep breath I kick some black piece of wood aside. “My family had enough to suffer during the past two years, it's not up to me to make it worse. I've already done enough, that's for certain. My sister's engagement has almost been dissolved due to my actions.”

Surprised by my sudden outburst Farlan raises his brows, but apart from that he remains silent. “Oh Levi.” He rolls his eyes and steps closer. “We were striving towards a larger goal. There are no half-assed attempts, you knew that just as I did. You are either in or out. Of course there are sacrifices to be made, that's just natural. You've tasted the consequences once and now you're backing out? What is it with your and your family, huh? I suppose it will never change.”

“My family is what defines me”, I reply angrily. He does not understand the obvious. “They will still be there once you all have disappeared, and believe me, you will. It's just how things work. People meet, then they depart” I try to gain back my calmness, and slowly the anger fades. “No matter how hard I try to overcome them, I can't. That's one more thing I know now. You can get out of your family, but you can't get your family out of you.” I fold my arms in front of my chest. “It's over, Farlan. We failed. Wouldn't it be the most reasonable thing to admit that instead of repeating the same mistakes over and over again?”

“So you don't want to get back there? We were hardly even finished translating.” I can hear anger rising in his voice, but I only shake my head.

“No, I don't. At least I think so.” I shrug. “To be honest, I'm not sure. Part of me wants to go back, part of me doesn't. I haven't decided yet what's best. Apart from that I thought you and Isabelle dead as well, so don't pressure me. This here happened quite unexpected, for me as well.”

“Levi.” He once more grabs my shoulders and pulls me close. I avoid his gaze. “Listen, do you really think it happened by chance that we met again? You followed me, didn't you? If you really intended to abandon this all you might as well could have ignored me, but you didn't.”

“Let me be.” I free myself from his grip and step back. “I wanted to know if you're alright. If you're alive. If they left you alone, back then. That's all. Where were you, anyway?”

“I disappeared for a while.” Farlan half-heartedly shrugs, then takes one glass from the ground which is still in perfect condition. Carefully he eyes it, as if he could see our shared memories reflecting in the cold surface.“ Had they'd found me they'd thrown me out of the country. I would be spending the rest of my days digging potatoes from the mud somewhere in Siberia.” He laughs, but it is just for show. “It's that simple. But they didn't find me, and they couldn't destroy you either. And now we're back here, where it all began. Isn't that a sign? It mustn't be an end, that's for sure. Think about the translation – we can just continue where we stopped.”

“I don't know whether I want that to happen or not, Farlan.”

“Think of the sacrifices we made.”

“That's exactly what I'm thinking of. That's all I'm fucking thinking of, day in, day out, it's sickening. It's done. I'm done. Where is this supposed to lead us, Farlan?”

Now he looks at me as if I am overseeing the obvious. “Into freedom?”

“Do you really think we will be so lucky for a second time? No, Farlan, next time we'll die, believe me, we will. In contrary to you I've been to the verge of death and back, so don't you judge me for changing my mind, listen? Don't you dare judge me.”

Silence fills the air. I don't know what else there is I could tell him. We used to be best friends, but right now he feels strangely unknown to me, and I guess he thinks the same. We used to be inseparable. What happened? The same as usual, I think. Life.

“I know that you're healthy and alive”, I say in a short tempered manner. “That's enough. Goodbye.”

“You turned bitter.”

“Maybe. Guess that's what people call growing up.” A smile approaches my lips. “Understanding that we are not the ones to change the world, but to live in it. Maybe you should consider the same.”

I want to leave, but I do not get far.

“Wait.” Farlan's voice shows a determination that makes me stop. Steps sound behind me in the dirt. Split seconds later he pushes a thin card into my hands. When I take a closer look I realise it has some address on it.

“That's how you can contact me”, he says in a slow voice. “Maybe you will change your mind.”

“I don't think I will.”

“You're scared.”

“And you're not?”

“Of course I am. You've been through a lot, Levi, too much, maybe, I don't know, nobody does, we're lacking details, but who cares. I'm sure you went through hell, and who wouldn't be scared afterwards? But I beg you, Levi. For our comrades. If we give up now they paid for nothing.” He pats my shoulder. “Just think about it, alright? Give me a call – I will tell Isabelle about you. The offer stands. And Levi?”

“What?”

“It's good to see you.” He smiles at me and his eyes, half water, half stone, begin to sparkle. They make me remember my friendship toward him, the feelings of loyalty and trust we shared. Whatever it is, suddenly, my held up guard slips right through my fingers.

“It's good to see you, too”, I say, while I slowly understand how lucky we are that our paths have crossed again. “Just let me think. I'll come back at you, ok?”

“That's the spirit.” He laughs, once more pats my shoulder, then leaves, sneaking once more through the white cloth out onto the street. He leaves me behind with the ghosts of my past, and for a moment I am not sure whether he was not one of them as well.

“Will you accept his offer?”

She is walking next to me. A red hat graces her head. The white dress gently dodges around her legs with every step. She carries a bag under her arm, a notebook and a pen in her hands. The glasses on her nose reflect the light of the sun.

“Only when you accompany me”, I reply in a laconic manner and she laughs. Whether she laughs with or over me I cannot tell.

“You knowing about me is already enough, dear. There are certain things that are better kept a secret.”

“If you say so.”

“Oh yeah.”

“Talking from experience, huh?”

“Very funny.”

I am on my way back home. It is almost six in the evening. The sun is about to sink behind the horizon. Glowing deeply red the cloudless sky extends before us. Even though night is approaching it is still incredibly hot. From even the smallest park the singing of the cicadas sounds over to us, yet there are still so many people on the streets that it can hardly be heard. Some of those who pass us carry a fan with them, longing for fresh air.

Eren is not with me. When I returned to the store to pick him up he had already locked the door. I am aware that he will try to make me pay for my behaviour. It used to be different, but not anymore. Back then he knew his place. Just as I did six months ago he has forgotten about his in the meanwhile.

“Hey”, Hanji goes on next to me. No matter how hot is is, she does not show it. She writes some things in her notebook. “That foreign guy who appeared in your garden recently-”

“Erwin-hakase?”

“Erwin?” She snickers, and I can feel my cheeks turning red.

“Schmidt-hakase”, I add hastily.

“He just came out of the nowhere and talked to you?” Her hazelnut brown eyes meet mine. I can see unhidden curiosity in them.

“Yes.”

“NEVER!” She waves her hands up and down as if she could not believe it. “Just like that?”

“If I tell you.”

“But how did you talk?”

“In Japanese, of course.”

She gasps for air. “He speaks Japanese?!” Her excitement forms a strong contrast to my severe face. As usual, she does not hold back her feelings, pours them out into the world. I, on the other hand, talk in a low voice.

“Yes, he does.”

“Fluently?” She seems to walk closer and closer next to me. In the end our shoulders touch. They feel cold. “I mean, you could actually talk to each other without having to search for the right words constantly?”

“Yes.”

“What about?”

I furrow my brows. “What?” I sound irritated. In my thoughts I am already overthinking the conversation that will most likely take place during dinner. I would prefer it to take Eren aside and explain everything to him, but I know that it would not work. He would not understand. Apart from that he is not in the position to demand explanations from me. I am still the head of this family. My father used to supervise him, now it is me. It is as simple as that.

“What were you talking about?” She does not give up.

“Everything and nothing.”

“Well, thank you, Levi-kun, now I know just exactly as much as 10 seconds before. That man sure has travelled far. Don't tell me you didn't find anything to talk about.”

“Linguistics.”

“Excuse me?”

“We talked about linguistics, and other things.”

“I can't believe it.” She starts to laugh, loudly. I gaze around, but none of the passing people seem to take any interest in my crazy companion. I am more than fine with that. “That's just too good, no, unbelievably. Levi, did he tell you where he learned to speak Japanese? Where is he from?”

“He's from Germany. Apparently my father taught him when he lived there.”

“Oh.” She sounds disappointed. “So he might as well be quite old, huh?”

“Maybe.”

“How old?”

“I don't know.”

“Well, guess then.”

I give her an annoyed moan. “I have no idea. Maybe in his mid-thirties or so.”

She lowers her head and starts to think. “Well, if that's the case he has started his university career remarkably early, when he's only in his mid-thirties.”

“He might as well be older”, I say under my breath. “As I've already told you, I don't know.”

“Did you-”

“He said he has already met me, or so.” I do not even know why I tell her, but the words just burst out of me. She freezes and raises her brows.

“What's that supposed to mean?” With a rapid movement she closes her notebook. I shrug.

“No idea. He said I was strangely familiar to him and that he has the feeling as if we have already met before. In the past.”

“In the past?” She laughs again. “Why not? Maybe you've just forgotten.”

“No.” I shake my head. “Believe me, he's someone to remember. His hair was blonde, his eyes blue. And he was tall as a tree.”

“As Farlan?”

“No. More intense.” With these words I look up to the sky. “I've never seen anything like that before. Hair like gold. Eyes like water. I felt as if he was staring right into my soul.”

“But-”

“For fucks sake, Hanji.” Giving a sound of displeasure I close my eyes and fold my arms while walking. “What do you want from me anyway? Aren't you busy or anything?” I nod towards her notebook. “With your column, for example? Apart from that you could have talked to Farlan today, that man's sick of grief and sorrow. Turning me into your secret keeper – what the hell is wrong with you?”

“Oh come on.” She places the notebook in her handbag. “Let me be your companion, your emotional support. So much has happened and will happen, my dear, you will need it, believe me.”

“I'm getting along.”

“Oh?” She grins at me and I have to bite my bottom lip in order not to yell at her. Acting this way she annoys the hell out of me.

“YES.”

“Well, if you say so.”

We reach a bridge, broadly built, from heavy, lacquered wood. People are everywhere. On the streets I can see bicycles, cars, busses – and more people. Everybody is on his way back from work and we are amongst them. It is the natural course of the world.

Before I know what is happening I stop. Hanji proceeds a few more meters, then notices that I am missing. She turns around and walks back to me. In the meantime I turn to the railing, roll up the sleeves of my shirt and support myself with my forearms. Silently I let my gaze wander over the river. Countless boats pass. Most of them have, considering the fading daylight, already lit up their red lamps. Here and there I can see men climbing around the boat decks. There are people of every age strolling up and down the promenade. Some of them wear western clothes, but most of them have already changed into more comfortable traditional outfits. A child with a peaked cap runs after something that, from the distance, looks like fire flies. In between I notice the scent of water, the surrounding restaurants and car gasses. Humid and warm the summer air flows into my lungs.

Next to me Hanji lends over the railing, so far that her belly is resting on the warm wood. When a sudden blow of wind grabs us, it almost tears off her hat. Struggling she manages to keep it on her head, but almost falls down into the river. Instead of getting frightened, though, she only starts to giggle.

“You'll never learn”, I mutter.

“It won't kill me to fall into water, Levi-kun.”

“As long as you manage it to get out again. I won't be the one to save you.”

“I know, I know.” She continues giggling. It takes her some time, but in the end she calms down. For a while we stand next to each other in silence and watch the boats underneath us.

“Back then we walked over this bridge almost every day”, she says eventually and I nod.

“On our way to university, yes.”

“You remember.”

I smile. “Yes.” But it feels as if this was an earlier life, not this one.

“We were making plans for our future. We wanted to conquer the world, get out of here once we graduated.” Her smile fades. “How sudden things can change. It is incredible.”

“Do you see the row of houses over there?” I point with my finger at a couple of buildings not far from us. “They're new.”

“Yeah.” Hanji folds her arms in front of her and lays down with her entire chest on the railing. Her legs wriggle playfully in the air. “They were built right after the war, right?”

I nod.

“They're pretty to look at, with their modern western-style architecture, don't you think?”, she proceeds, and her voice shows a certain fascination. “The red bricks are really fashionable. I bet the biggest earthquake would not be able to bring them down.”

“It seems as if the old buildings are more and more disappearing.”

“But they're still around. It's easy to get that impression if one is as much in Ginza as you are.”

“No.” I weigh my head back and forth. “The city is changing. Look at these houses. Where are the old ones, huh?”

“They might have been torn down.” Shrugging. She turns to me and searches my gaze. The wind, by now only a soft breeze, plays with strands of her hair, sticking out underneath her hat. “Times are a changing, there is nothing we can do about that. It is the easiest to just go with the flow and change as well.”

“How unusual of you to say.”

“I did go with the flow, Levi.”

“You did?”

“In my way.”

Together we look at the red lanterns underneath us. Without replying anything I think about her words. But the longer we stand there like this, the more my fingers clench into the wooden railing.

“But do we really do that?”, it suddenly breaks out of me. “Are we really changing or just being pulled away by the circumstances?”

“The truth might be somewhere in the middle. Japan opens up to the west with an insane pace, that's out of the question. After all these hundreds of years of isolation that is certainly not a bad thing, if you ask me. Would you've had the chance to read Schopenhauer during university otherwise? I doubt it. Or Mori Ogai? By now I would most likely be married already.” She starts to laugh, but the sound of her voice makes my stomach turn upside down. “The world is open for those who know how to ask for it. Even for you.”

“Shut up.”

“How, do you think, did I get my column? Do you think success just happens to women?”

“And what did it get you? Remorse. Suffering. That's it.”

“It brought me so much more.” I can tell that she means it.

“Things are different now.”

“Are they? Maybe it is just you who has hanged.”

With a sound of joy she stretches her limbs. Her cheeks shimmer reddish in the light of the sinking sun. In contrary to me she appears happy after all. To watch her like this feels like a memory from days long past.

“Do you think changes are necessarily good?”

“Why not?”

“They can also have negative consequences.”

“That may be. But the final conclusion can only be drawn once you're on your deathbed. Before that an incident is neither good nor bad. Terrible things can happen to you, but in the end they can also lead you just where you wanted to be all along. You never know. You haven't finished your journey yet, so don't worry.”

“Are you sure?”

“Not just sure, Levi-kun.” She grins at me and tenderly pokes my nose with her index finger. “I know.”

“Hanji.” I push her away. Even though it is still remarkably hot, her hands feel cold.

“As I said, don't worry. Things will happen their way, whether you like it or not. Some things are just too big for us.” She gazes up at the darkening sky.

“So what can I do?”, I whisper, a bitter smile approaching my lips, shaking my head. But Hanji just spreads her arms, like in a dream.

“Close your eyes and go with the flow until you reach the shore.” She laughs. “Everything else appears rather stressful to me, to be honest.”

“I just believed I'd had more time.” I think of the store, of all the duties and responsibilities that are resting on my shoulders, now and forever.

“Didn't we all? It happened so suddenly. They caught us off-guard. I myself often struggle to believe that all of this this really happened.” She raises her hand, waiving it up and down, then shrugs, cheerful as usual. “Could also be a never ending dream, who knows for sure?”

“The world didn't wait for us.”

“Nobody did. Yet here we are!”

“Yeah.”

With a satisfied grin she slides down the railing. “Oh Levi”, she calls out and reaches out her arms to the sky. “I'll never forget how we danced with each other back then.” She starts to laugh and takes up a dancing posture. “A heartbreaking waltz, beautiful and bittersweet at the same time. I felt as if I was walking on clouds. Nobody had even guessed you to be a dancer, but you could dance, and you were remarkably skilful.” With these words she starts to pirouette. Somehow she manages it to avoid the passing people. Nobody even comes close. Silently I watch her and cannot help myself, suddenly the sound of music reaches my ear from a far away distance. “You held me so tightly in your arms as nobody has ever done before.” She points to her hips. “No matter which girl will end up with you, she'll be a lucky bride.”

“For heaven's sake.”

“What is it?”

“That music.” I look around, searching for the origin. “Don't you hear that music? Somebody is playing a waltz.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Laughing whole-heartedly she turns on her own axis, until she eventually loses her balance and stops. Completely out of breath she returns to me. “There is no music to be heard far and wide.”

Carefully I keep up my guard. “Just listen”, I hiss and point in an undefined direction. “That's clearly a waltz.” But Hanji once more only begins to giggle. “An accordion.”

“I can't hear anything.”

“Then you're either deaf or even dumber than I thought.”

“Woah, Levi, rude.”

But instead of replying I turn away from her and look down the river, searching for something that could cause the music. But nothing of that sort can be seen. Again and again my eyes wander back and forth, but without success. In the end I lower my gaze with a heavy sigh. The world became mysterious to me back then, it is just a matter of fact. Such episodes are simple reminders to show me how different my life has become from what others would consider to be normal. I close my eyes, lean forward and let my forehead sink against the railing. From time to time it cracks underneath me, caused by the heat. I look aside and towards the newly built houses across.

“The earth has been very calm during the past weeks”, Hanji says next to me.

“Maybe.”

“No, seriously.” She gives me a meaningful look. “Can you remember the last noteworthy earthquake?”

I think about it, then shake my head.

“Such things happen”, I say and straighten up. “No reason to get all excited. The earth is always moving somewhere, if not here then somewhere else. A small quake in Yokohama can hardly be felt here anymore.”

Hanji laughs. “Yeah, that's true.”

“So why should it be different this time?”

“You're right.” With a slight nod she looks over to me, smiling. “There is no reason to be worried.” She folds the arms behind her back and turns fully toward me. “I'll accompany you back home”, she announces with a broad grin. “Do you remember The Wild Geeze by Mori Ogai? You wanted to lend it to me.”

“That was ages ago.”

“So? I decided to come back to it now.” Her smile intensifies. That way we stare at each other for a sheer endless time, until I, in the end, turn away from her with a sound of disapproval.

“You want to see him, am I right?”, I say and remove my hands from the railing. She blushes.

“No”, she says hastily. Too hastily.

“He doesn't live with us.” I shrug. “To be honest, I don't even know where he is, or if he'll ever show up again. He was more interested in my father than me. Apart from that he's not some zoo animal that somebody can watch whenever he pleases, do you hear me?”

But there is only laughter sounding behind me.

“Was he really blonde and blue eyed?”

But there is only laughter sounding behind me.

WAS HE REALLY BLONDE AND BLUE EYED?

I do not want to talk about it and leave.

About half an hour later I arrive at my parent's house. It is already dark. Here and there someone has turned on the lights, a warm shimmer in the blackness of the night. Pictures such as these bring back the feeling of my long outlived, but wonderful childhood. I pass the narrow door and reach the main entrance only a few moments later. But when I want to open it I find it locked. For a moment I feel nausea rise in me. Several times I jar the door, but without success. With loud clattering sounds wood crashes into wood, while my nausea turns more and more into nervousness, then fear. But eventually steps sound in the hallway. Seconds later someone unlocks the door and opens it. Mikasa's face appears. She looks even more severe than usual.

“There you are”, she says in a tone that means trouble. “Everybody's waiting for you.”

“What happened?”

But instead of answering my questions she leaves me, heading to the living room. With brows furrowed in distrust I look after her. Only then I close the door behind me, place my shoes in the genkan and follow her, barefooted and with rapid steps.

Everybody has already assembled in the living room. They sit around the small table where we use to have our meals. My mother is facing me, while Eren has turned his back towards me. Mikasa, on the other end, sits down again. Once gaze is enough and I know that something terrible must have happened. Carefully I close the door behind me, but it does not help. While my mother remains unmoved, Eren turns after me. In the shine of the electric light his eyes sparkle in burning anger. He only looks at me for a moment, then once more turns away. With a subtle gesture Mikasa asks me to sit down, and I follow her invitation after a brief moment of hesitation. What follows is silence, so cold and piercing that it sinking its teeth deeply into my soul.

“What happened?”, I ask, unable to bear the silence any longer.

Eren snorts. “Shouldn't you know yourself?” Our gazes meet, and for a moment it is undecided whether we would reach for each others throats right away. I have enough of his attitude.

“No”, I reply in the most self-restrained manner, but my hands, resting on my knees underneath the table, clench into fists. “But I suspect you will have the kindness to inform me?”

“Who was that guy you met today?”, it suddenly bursts out of Mikasa. She looks at me with an expression that makes me startle. Silently, unable to answer, I look back and forth those two, until sudden realisation hits me. That bloody brat.

“A friend of mine”, I answer with a blank voice.

“What kind of friend?”

I hesitate. “From university. I hadn't seen him in a while and was worried. Today he happened to pass our store while I was sorting some books, so I followed him. It was not an arranged meeting.”

“From university, you say?”

“Yes.”

“He was Russian”, Eren says suddenly. “I heard them speak.”

“He was born and raised in Japan”, I reply bitterly. “He's no different from us.”

“So it is true?” My mother raises her brows in a mixture of sorrow and grief. Even though she tries her voice can not hide the sound of accusation and outrage. I nod.

“Yes.” My lips form a thin line. Silence moves into the living room. Eren, shaking his head in barely withheld anger, lowers his gaze. Mikasa, next to me, again and again caresses the fabric of her kimono with her fingers. Mother seems to stop breathing for a moment. Then, suddenly, she jumps up and leaves the room. Alarmed by the strength of her emotional outburst, Mikasa follows her outside. Shortly after I as well rise and head towards the door. But the sound of Eren's voice holds me back.

“Don't you have no shame?”

“I could ask you the same.” I turn at him. Eren is standing in front of me, approaching me in rapid movements. I search the trust and love of our childhood days in his eyes, but in vain.

“Why?”

“Do you even realise how you're talking to me?”

It would be easy for me to show him his place – he has always underestimated my strength. A snort leaves his throat. “Do you think I'm dumb? Of course I know who I'm talking to you.” He laughs, but there is no friendliness in it. “I'd honour you if you'd deserved it. But after what happened six month ago you can consider yourself lucky that we're even talking to you, Levi-san.”

Before I know what happens I have reached out and grabbed his collar. Heavily I pull him close to me. He does not fight back. Instead a mocking grin is written all over his face.

“What's that supposed to mean?”, he manages to say and reaches for my hands. “Go ahead, go and hit me, meet our expectations, just as all the years before. Free the perpetrator who lives in your heart, you'll feel better afterwards.”

“I am not a perpetrator”, I growl, but Eren does not even seem to hear me. “You have no idea what you're talking about.”

“Of course I do. Only a criminal would selfishly act for his own good, willingly stain and sacrificing his family name and everyone who wears it. Do you even know, what I'm talking about? You betrayed our trust. My hate is your pay. It doesn't need me to tell you, though. You're not worth the dirt underneath my shoes, and you know that, big brother.”

“Shut your hole.”

“If they'd only kept you there. I would be the head of this family now and the situation entirely different.” He laughs. “Did you never think about the fact that it would be better if they'd just let you die there? Why on earth did you have to recover? You of all people. Nobody had expected it, and nobody'd asked for it either.”

My fingers, tightly grabbing the white fabric, start to shake. I can feel my face flushing in hate. Right now, in this very moment, I would do anything to silence him, but I do not want his accusations to become true. At least not entirely.

“I said you should shut hole”, I struggle to say.

“Or what else, huh? Will you beat me up, in the house of your very own father, criminal that you're apparently not?”

How I would like to do so. But I do not want to give you what you are so obviously asking for. I am not the monster you are trying to make me. My intentions were pure, my goals sincere. Everything you have is your love for tradition and obedience. You've seen nothing in life. You know nothing. And you haven't been there.

I push him away and step back. Eren stumbles a few steps backwards, but soon finds his balance.

“You don't understand”, I say and notice to my own surprise that my voice has started to shake, sounding like cracking branches, matte as dust.

“I understand perfectly well”, with a last gaze he passes me and leaves through the door. “That's the problem.”