#maybe a tad bit angry but mostly salty

[lemonduckisnowawake]

Me, today: I will not get angry about people slandering Jesus. I will not lose my temper seeing yet another post throwing His character in the garbage as some politically woke or politically conservative people pleaser. I will not stab my hand with a fork when I see people poking fun at his friendships as homoerotic - *sees a post like that and slowly steps out of the internet*

No seriously. I am shaking the screen and BEGGING people to remember that even though Western Christian traditionalism has deep, *deep* wrongs, There Are Literal People Dying And Being Tortured Because Of Their Faith In Christ In The Modern World. And the way I see people making light of faith and outright mocking it or "dumbing it down" to appeal to their own moral worldview is sometimes kind of painful

[pickalilywrites]

Half

Request:  Could you do one with Erwin and Levi? I have a feeling you've been asked this before, but all I want is a totally platonic, non-shippy interaction between the two because I love their dynamic. They're both so brutally honest, almost rude to each other, but it's very clear they respect the hell out of the other. So could you? :) If not that, then maybe a Mikasa/Sasha story?

Word Count: 1,653

She likes to pay attention to how her friends eat. She can lie and say it's because she cares about them getting the proper nutrition everyday, but it's really because she's monitoring how much food she can pilfer off of them. Take, for example, Armin. He's really easy to steal food off of because he's always spacing out. Even if he does notice he's nice about letting Sasha sneak a bite anyway. Jean's more of a stickler about food, whining whenever she tries to sneakily take a piece of meat although occasionally she'll manage to haggle him for a vegetable instead because if she dips it in meat sauce it's relatively scrumptious. She never thinks about taking anything from Eren because he pretty much inhales whatever is on his plate as soon as he sits down. Historia used to give her food back when she went by Christa but she looked too much of a robot for Sasha to take any food without a clear conscious after she revealed her true identity. She has to fight Connie for any food off of his plate but he'll sometimes claim that he's full some nights and give her his leftovers, which she's always thankful for. Mikasa's kind of tough to judge. Most of the time she'll smack Sasha away as soon as she reaches out for even a grain of rice. Sometimes she'll catch Mikasa in a good mood though and the stoic girl will pretend she doesn't see her food being smuggled away from her. And now? Well…

"I don't think she's eating," Sasha suddenly says to Connie and Jean over dinner.

"Who?" Connie asks.

Jean is unsurprisingly the one who figures out who Sasha is talking about first. He's had an eye for Mikasa since the first day of training. "She means Mikasa."

"Yeah," she says. "Mikasa's never been one to wolf down her dinner like Eren or anything but I've noticed that she hasn't eaten very much at all ever since Eren and Historia were kidnapped."

"That's probably why," Jean mumbles, picking at his food a tad sullenly. It's no secret that he's pretty jealous about Mikasa's close relationship to Eren.

"Shouldn't she be eating more then?" Connie asks through a mouthful of mashed potatoes. "It's important that she keeps up her stamina. She can't possibly save Eren on an empty stomach. And Captain Levi did order us to eat up."

"She doesn't really like the captain in the first place so why would she even listen to him?" Sasha says, lowering her voice so that no one overhears her. She's pretty sure she's far from the captain's favorite already and she doesn't want him to dislike her anymore than he already does.

Jean stands up suddenly. "I'm going to talk to her."

Connie snickers, not even trying to hide the fact that he's laughing at his friend. "Are you sure that's a good idea?" he asks. "Most of the time you end up a blabbering mess in front of her."

He sits back down, crossing his arms across his chest like a disgruntled child. "What? So you're going to try to talk to her because that's a better idea? You'd be even worse than me!"

"Yeah, you can be kind of annoying," Sasha says without thinking.

She's never seen Connie look so shocked or offended. "You think I'm annoying?"

"Maybe I should go talk to her," Sasha says hurriedly, hoping to make Connie forget what she had just said but the way he looks at her tells her that she's not letting her off the hook anytime soon.

"Yeah, because you're a much better option than any of us," Jean snickers. "You're probably the one she likes the least because of all of the food you've stolen from her during our training days. Maybe that's the whole reason you want to talk to her in the first place. You're hoping her mood will make it even easier for you to get food from her." His chin rests on his hand and he smiles at Sasha smugly as if he's figured her all out.

She'll admit that that's the reason why she noticed in the first place. It's been so easy to steal food from Mikasa these past few days but she's insulted that Jean can't imagine her genuinely being worried for her comrade. Angry, she stands up. "I'm going to talk to her," she says, glaring at Jean.

Both Jean and Connie are startled. "Right now?" Connie asks.

"Yep!" she says, taking her dinner with her.

She can feel their eyes following her as she sits down across from Mikasa. Both Armin and Mikasa look up. Armin looks surprised but Mikasa looks like she couldn't care less that the bubbly hunter had taken a seat at her table.

"Hi, Sasha," Armin mumbles, forcing a smile on his face. He's probably hurting as much as Mikasa is, Sasha realizes, but at least he's not starving himself. Then again, his gloomy presence is most likely not helping Mikasa in the least bit.

"Jean wants to talk to you," Sasha says to Armin. She doesn't think she can handle both Armin and Mikasa at the same time and Armin has gotten along with Jean despite their differences. Maybe Jean could help him snap out of it while she talks to Mikasa.

Armin points to himself, startled. "He wants to talk to me?" He glances over where Connie and Jean sit and the two boys just stare stupidly and blankly back at him, more interested in watching Mikasa rather than the blonde genius. "He doesn't look like he's expecting me."

"Trust me, he does," Sasha assures him, waving him off.

He looks at her doubtfully but eventually does get up and leave, much to her relief.

When Mikasa sees that she's alone with Sasha, she sighs but doesn't say anything.

"Hi, Mikasa," Sasha says cheerfully. She usually counts on her chipper attitude to lighten the mood but she feels as if making the atmosphere around Mikasa less gloomy is an impossible feat. "Are you enjoying dinner?"

Mikasa picks at her food, moving around her plate with her fork. "It's okay," she responds.

Sasha notices that the food does look like it's been nibbled at a little bit but it mostly just looks as if Mikasa just pushed it around her plate a lot. The meat is cut up and spread apart making it seem as though it's been mostly eaten but Sasha suspects that Mikasa has only taken a bite of it at the very most. "The potatoes are good," Sasha says, desperately to talk about anything. "I mean, they're a little salty but they're better than usual."

"Hm."

"And the meat isn't dry this time!"

"Hm."

It's so frustrating talking to her. It's like talking to a tree or something, some sort of object that you know is alive but just can't or won't interact with you no matter how much you talk at it. "Come on, Mikasa, you've got to eat something. Armin's eaten more than you at dinner than all of your meals combined today and that guy eats like a mouse!"

"I've been eating," Mikasa says stiffly but the way that she avoids Sasha's gaze shows that she's lying. "I'm just not particularly hungry right now."

Sasha sighs. "Look, I know you miss Eren," she says quietly. She was hoping to avoid talking about Eren altogether but it seems like the only way to talk to Mikasa is to speak about things directly instead of beating around the bush. "We all miss him but not eating isn't going to help us get him back any faster."

"This food just tastes like garbage," Mikasa mumbles under her breath. She sounds like the captain for a second but Sasha decides this thought is best kept unsaid.

"It's better than nothing. If you don't eat, you won't be at your top form. Your movements will be sluggish and your reactions will be slow. You don't want that, do you?"

"Hm." It's the same response but the way she says it is different. She's fiddling with her food again but she actually looks like she's contemplating the thought of eating it instead of just picking it apart on her plate to make like she ate something. Sasha takes this as a sign of improvement even if the progress seems miniscule.

She's not really sure what else to do at this point but she has an idea and begins to tear her meat in half and then slapped it onto Mikasa's plate rather messily. Sasha ignores Mikasa's confused expression and sits back, a smile on her face. "Go on! Eat it. You can half of my meat. You can't not eat food that someone gives you! That'd be rude."

Mikasa's a little speechless for a while but then a grin spreads across her face. "This is supposed to be half?" she asks, stabbing the meat with her fork and bringing it up to inspect it closer. "This is more like a quarter of your share."

Sure enough the slab of meat on Sasha's plate is a whole lot bigger than the portion on Mikasa's and Sasha can't help but feel a little bit embarrassed. "Well, I factored in the pep talk from earlier when I was splitting it up so what I gave you is generous enough," she mumbles.

"Hm," Mikasa says again, but she nibbles at the beef that Sasha had given her. She's by no means happy right now but her expression is less blank than it was before and Sasha is happy to see Mikasa making an effort to eat her food.

By the end of mealtime Mikasa's plate is pretty much cleaned off. It's probably the first time Sasha has been happy about food that hasn't gone to her. She's not thinking of sharing meals with anyone again anytime soon but, damn, sharing her food feels pretty good.