I rose early, blinking at the clock. Sunlight had partially answered my question, but the clock confirmed it was after eight. I suppose we were taking it easy today.
I padded to the kitchen, beginning to fry up some eggs and boiling a pot of coffee for Edward and I. I smiled at the thought, eyes directed to the ground. To the feet I was crossing.
I uncrossed them, resting the heel of my right on the toes of my left. Simple, again, but something about it brought a smile to my face.
Dragged footsteps rose my attention to somewhere outside of myself. I turned, watching Ed stride out of his room, dressed in a white tee and blue boxers.
"Morning," he yawned, shuffling a hand through his hair.
Another reason to smile. "Good morning," I replied, turning away to tend to the eggs.
I pushed them around a few times, some part of me surprised to keep this smile on my face for so long. It must be a world record.
I nearly laughed at the thought, fingers of my free hand curling in anticipation. I noticed Ed lean against the counter beside me, felt his stare even before I heard him speak.
"What're you smilin' for?" he asked, looking in front of himself as he did so.
I simply shrugged one shoulder, flipping over a spatula-full of egg. It sizzled in response, from the bacon grease I had left inside.
"I'm just... Happy," I replied, my eyes curving.
Ed gave a smile as well, brushing his bangs from his eye.
"I'm glad," he told me, the sound of my name sounding... Not so painful.
Heat tinged my face, and I bowed my head a little, sure the blush was running across the deer-spot like trail of freckles that dashed across my nose.
"Thanks, Ed," I replied.
He nodded once, and his head leaned back, nearly hitting the top cupboard. He grinned at the coffee pot. "And you made me coffee too!"
I smiled, nodding quietly. "That's right."
Ed relaxed, shoulders lifting and clicking at the deflation. He looked over to me, holding my curious stare.
It was as if time stopped. I felt myself become a bit weightless, looking into his eyes. Seeing his smile increase at one corner, and seeing his bangs swing a little as he tilted his head to one side.
"Good morning!" Alphonse exclaimed, jolting me out of the trance.
I jumped, the shock nearly forcing the spatula from my hand. I held on tighter, focusing on the eggs a bit more.
"Mornin', Al," Ed replied, obviously amused at my fear.
I tried to swallow down my heartbeat, letting the spit sweep through my throat and my chest, never alleviating the jackhammer of my heart.
"The train doesn't leave 'til 11:30," Al was saying, "so I figured we could take a look at the map and see where we're headed towards next."
"Sure thing," Ed replied, voice a tiny bit muffled due to his lips against the coffee mug. I blushed a little, heat dusting my cheeks, but I wasn't sure why I was blushing. Was it...
I blushed even harder, barely hearing Al's voice. Was it truly because I was thinking of Ed's lips? Am I that childish?
Butterflies erupted in my gut, and I couldn't help but smile even more.
The sound of my name cracked my reality. I looked up, seeing Ed with his hand in his jaw, a melting smile on his face.
"What'cha thinkin' 'bout?" he asked, teasing me.
I blushed harder than before, red running across my cheeks. He just grinned wider, leaning forward, and I reached out, flicking his nose.
He flinched back, both hands covering the spot I had flicked, muffling his shout of surprise.
Al and I giggled.
Al was the first to bring us all back to reality. He looked up from his book, momentarily watching Ed eat and me fake my way through breakfast.
"We're hitting up Wellebley, right?"
"Yeah," Ed replied, standing and stretching out his lower back with his hands on his hips. "That should be our last stop."
Al unrolled a huge map, something I had only seen a handful of times in the month-and-a-half I had been traveling with the Elrics. The soul in the suit nodded, responding to Ed's statement and looking down at the map as I exchanged smiles with Edward. He looked down, to the map, and with a larger smile I decided I wasn't worth staring at anyway.
Al unclicked a pen, circling the town he had just questioned. "It's only a few stops away," he said, and part of me wondered why they even needed this worn down map at all. The destinations, the pathways, they all must be memorized by now. Paths and stories I couldn't retrace or recite, even if I wanted to.
The light chatter that had been floating around me suddenly died down, and I focused enough to see golden eyes looking at me expectantly. Like a reply should be falling from my lips at any moment.
Ed smiled, eyes closing. "Never mind," he said, and he straightened, hand slipping away from the map. "We'll leave in a little bit."
And that was the end of the conversation. When we were on the train, I thought of another conversation, a discussion we'd never had before. I just thought of the Homunculi, and the underlying fear I had been hiding from the beginning rose up. Creeping and crawling over my stomach, the back of my neck. As trees passed by, I could only wonder how long they would survive. How many rings were inside each trunk. How, if we cut ourselves open, how many rings would be inside of us, at the end.
It had been quiet for almost a week now, the loss of the amulet still pulling at us.
I could only hope something would break through soon.
_____
It's rare that people talk to themselves. Usually it's from stress, though that would be implying I knew anything about people at all. He remained staring downwards, murmuring something to himself. He perked up, noticing I was noticing him. And Ed's face grew a bit pale, voice asking me if everything was alright.
I nodded a little furiously, returning the question back to him. And he matched my nod, as strange as it was.
"Just thinking out loud!" he replied, grinning enough for his eyes to curve.
I matched his smile. Of course. That makes sense.
Al's helmet clicked, as he went back to reading. He was the only one who could decipher books endlessly on the train, not having to deal with motion sickness. How Ed could sketch on a train was above me.
I finished shaking my head, shaking my thoughts away and opening tired eyes to look at my skirt. I bunched up a hand, fisting fabric that mirrored the night sky.
Look at me, trying to be poetic.
I smiled bleakly, and after a few moments, sleep gathered me up in its arms.
_____________
I didn't dream, just experiencing that small black space, feeling like I was half-asleep and half-lucid until I heard a voice. Consciousness came to me like I was floating back up to the surface of water, air coming back as my eyes cracked open.
My vision was tilted, seeing a skewed Alphonse with an empty seat next to him. My head was resting against something—a firm but warm shoulder. Ed's voice was speaking softly, telling a story that vaguely sparked memories into my half-asleep brain.
Al's head shifted to look down at me.
"Hey," I heard him say. "She's awake!"
"Hm?" Ed's voice was right beside me again, and I could feel his face inches away as he turned. "Oh, yeah." he said quietly, almost as if I could still be asleep. "She is."
I blinked, eyes dry as my mind came back to me. Ed was so close— the shoulder I was resting against was his! I pulled myself away, feeling my brain swim in protest as I sat up.
"Sorry." I said, raising a hand to my forehead. "How long was I sleeping?"
Ed just shrugged the shoulder I was against, giving me a face I couldn't read. "Not too long. Maybe an hour or so?"
Alphonse nodded. I put my face in my hands as I whined. "An hour?! You should've moved me off of you!"
"Ah," Ed waved a gloved hand. "Figure I should use parts of my human body while I still have 'im."
A dark part of my mind connected that statement to something ELSE. A blush ran across my face, and from the corner of my eye I saw Ed's face turning red as well.
"What?" Al asked us.
Ed seemed to snap out of his embarrassment, looking up before shaking his head. "It's nothing, Al. We got a few more hours until Albupow, huh?"
Al nodded and Ed replied, speaking about time to kill as he stretched his arms out, one of them almost bumping into a passing food cart. Ed immediately retracted his arm. "Oh, sorry."
With the cart stopped, the Alchemist turned to me. I looked to the cart, then to him, remembering the LAST time this happened.
"Don't..." I said, watching a mischievous grin slowly take over Ed's face. I leaned forward, voice rising. "Don't you dare!!"
"Excuse me," he turned to the employee, who had been waiting on us. "I'd like your—"
I clamped my hand over his mouth, feeling his smile against my skin as I spoke for him.
"He'd like your least expensive item, please."
Ed took my hand away from his mouth, holding me by the wrist. "Just give me that bottle of champagne and we should be good." he told the worker.
The employee put down the roll of bread, crouching to go beneath the cart.
"Are you trying to get me drunk?"
Ed grinned at me, the expression almost suggestive. "Hey that's not a bad idea."
"I can't believe you, Edward!"
The State Alchemist just laughed, quieting down to thank the employee as she handed him the bottle of champagne. He exchanged this with more money than it costed, and I leaned forward, pressing my forehead to his shoulder in defeat.
My body jumped as I heard the cork pop out beside me, a squeak of metal sounding as Al caught the projectile, preventing it from hitting the person sitting in front of us.
"Thanks, Al." Ed said. "Don't know how to aim these things yet."
I just sighed. This just might be a very long two hours...
_____________
When time proved to be on my side and passed quickly, I found myself chatting with Alphonse. Talking about something more than cat breeds and cuisine dishes. He told me of his last memories, the last time he was in flesh and felt something real. He remembered the current of Alchemy sweeping him away like the ocean's tide, he remembered reaching for his brother's hand as he was deconstructed.
He became lost, like his body. Subjected to Truth and all it gave him.
Alphonse smiled, and I found a hollowness inside him that I hadn't seen before. Usually, I avoid eye contact, but this... This was something that hit too close to an inner-wall.
"I mean,"―He raised both hands, fanning his arms out in a loose shrug―"I don't have to use circles of Alchemy, and Brother feeds my body that's by my gate." His hands relaxed, bunching up his loincloth. "It's not much of a trade off, but..."
But it's something... The words hung between us, Ed's light snoring the foreground.
I'm sorry. I wanted to apologize. To do something other than stay silent. But I laid the notion to rest, knowing whatever I said was worthless. He deserved a better friend. Both of them did.
That's what I told myself, and that pain is what brought the smile to my face. I reached over, placing my hand on Alphonse's giant gloved one. He looked down, then looked to me. Expecting some sort of speech; some type of spoken emphasis to my action.
I gave him a small word of hope. Saying how Ed was sleeping right now, so his body must be doing pretty well!
Alphonse returned my smile, and the train kept bumping along. Bringing us closer to a new destination, a new town with hopefully new answers.
I tried to hide my disappointment, when things turned up empty. I tried to avoid the mirror, when we settled down for the night and Ed took the bed on the right. I tried to hide it all, masking my own face in my pillow, the mattress supporting my stomach and legs and the arms tucked underneath what I was burying my face in. I molded a new wall, a softness to this one. And gradually, very gradually, with an Alchemist snoring beside me gently, sleep gathered me in its arms and took me away.