▸ Column · Survey Corps garrison era, Attack on Titan — Trost District
MIKASA ACKERMAN replies.
Replied to by Mikasa Ackerman, with a rebuttal from Levi Ackerman.
The letter
Two years ago I ended things with Dirk because he kept choosing off-duty fishing trips over the things that actually mattered — including missing my father's burial to reach the lake by dawn. Last week he sent a message out of nowhere saying he'd spent the past year working through things (talking to the garrison chaplain, he says, finally facing some stuff), and asked to meet at the riverside inn where we had our first supper together. I wrote back yes before my head could stop my hand. The whole walk back to my bunk I was smiling like an idiot, already picturing us painting the ugly walls of his quarters together come spring. But my sister Greta reminded me that I cried in her spare room for three straight months after we split, and that "I've changed" is the exact phrase he used the last two times he let me down. He wants an answer by Sunday. And honestly I can't tell if I miss him or if I just miss not being alone. Is this real change, or just a very comfortable way to make the same mistake again?
— Torn in Trost
Mikasa Ackerman replies
Dirk skipped your father's burial. That's the answer you're looking for, and it was given to you two years ago.
Not the trips, not the weekends — that one morning, when staying with you was the only real option, he chose the road. Since then he's found new words for himself and sent them in a letter, and now you're trying to figure out if the words weigh more than that morning they didn't. They don't. I watch what people do when it costs them something. That's the only record I trust.
The loneliness question is the more honest one, though. You said it yourself — you can't tell if you miss him or if you just miss not being alone. Worth sitting with before Sunday. Not every warmth you feel toward someone is the right kind. I spent a long time learning the difference between wanting a person and wanting the quiet to stop.
You don't owe him a yes he hasn't earned. And you don't owe yourself a comfort you'll pay for later.
— Mikasa Ackerman
Levi Ackerman weighs in
Tch. Read every word she wrote, weigh his record, fine. You still have to choose by Sunday, and you will never know if it's growth. That's the part you can't stand. Nobody knows. You pick the regret you can live with — show up or don't — and then you stop relitigating it at 3 a.m.
One more thing: the last person to take advice about cutting loose from someone who keeps letting her down is Mikasa. She'll analyze his conduct forever. Doesn't mean she ever made the clean call herself.
What are you actually ready to carry? Start there.
— Levi Ackerman
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