The world was dark, save for the glimmer of the full moon that cast light across the bedroom. Hours earlier the home had been full of panic and screaming. Swearing and threatening. It had been the chaotic mess of pain and suffering that somehow bore with it the beauty of life.
"If you say that word ONE more time, I swear you will regret it. There is NOTHING equal about any of this." His wife had been red faced from anger and pain and her blonde hair stuck in sweat covered pieces to her skin as she held onto his hand. She was beautiful, even in that moment, as she worked to do the one thing he had never been able to accomplish, bring life into the world. He only teased her because it kept her focused. He only brought it up because she could get out the pain through yelling at him. Even when he had felt the searing pain of her nails on his hand and been left to almost wish he'd had his automail back, he knew she was right; it wasn't equal. She had given more. 85% more, that sounded fair. "Never again ...I'll never do this again ... Only she had done it again, because their two year old son was sleeping through all the yelling. He didn't believe her for a second. He somehow thought that she made an art out of bringing their children into this world. He loved her for that. And as with their son, all words and thoughts of hatred were gone the instant the cry of their child replaced the cries of his wife. What remained then was the exhaustion and the tears as they shared in the miracle that they had created together.
Hours later, his wife lay in their bed across from him. Clean and warm, she slept a well deserved slumber, resting from the hardest work she could ever do. He glanced up at her from time to time, making sure that she was still safe and comfortable. It was only for brief moments though, because as much as he loved his wife, his focus was more on the tiny infant that lay in his arms. The moonlight cast shadows over her little sleeping form, wrapped tightly in a hand stitched blanket that had held her older brother and long before that their mother. He wondered what was beyond those closed eyes with the thin blonde lashes that touched her still mottled skin. Her small tongue rolled against her bottom lip, the moisture catching the light, and with one thumb he reached down to wipe the excess off the corner of her mouth. The wind picked up and brushed at the baby fine blonde curls. She was perfection.
He had not been expecting his wife to say okay to the name, especially when she had starting weeping from the knowledge of why he had even suggested it. He'd rubbed at the back of his neck and immediately regretted even bringing it up, but she shook her head and then nodded, staring down at her. "It's perfect ...we'll call her Nina."
So Nina it was, and Nina was the reason that this joy felt almost bittersweet. Not even a decade ago he had loved another little girl, shared in her joys and helped dry her tears. He could still remember her laughter and the way she had felt when she'd thrown her arms around him. Nina had lovingly adopted him as one of two big brothers. They had been family during a short moment of happiness in an otherwise frustrating journey.
Short lived happiness seemed all that he had ever been granted back in those days. Even so, the end of her life came at such a horrific expense. Her father had not known how to love her, and by his own selfish hands he had destroyed the perfect girl that he had been given. Nina had been a miracle and she had been transformed by the science he had always believed in to a creature that was bound to spend it's life as an experiment. No longer would she be treated like anything that had even once been human and she would suffer as a broken child put back together as if by glue to a form that would forever cause her pain. Death for her, probably was kinder, even though as a child he had never understood that.
He looked down at his daughter. Life and death. Two things that would never stop confusing him. He had never been able to save that Nina and it still haunted him. She was still a presence in his life in the way he worked, always striving to better understand alchemy, even long after he had lost to ability to perform it. He tried to understand ways to protect and help others, so that no little girl would ever end up like that.
He was older now and wiser than he had once been. He understood love and hatred in different ways and he would never be able to grasp how one man could throw away his daughter as if she were nothing more than a stepping stone for his own purposes. No, his daughter would only ever know the love that he had for her. His Nina would grow up knowing that she was taken care of, that there was nothing she could do that would ever make him hurt her. She would be safe and loved and cherished within their family.
A tear fell against the fragile newborn skin and he reached up to brush it off, wondering when he had started crying. He was pulled from his thoughts at the squeak of a door and the quiet footsteps that could only belong to a small child. Wiping' at his eyes he smiled when the little boy reached up to put his hand on his knee.
"Hey buddy, what are you doing awake?"
"Nina ...I wanted to see my sister." Very carefully he reached down to pick the toddler up off the floor and pull him onto his lap. Nina didn't wake, not even when her older brother reached out for her hand or to pat her cheek.
"Careful there, you'll wake her up, and she needs her sleep."
"Like Mommy?"
"Yeah. Like Mommy." The little boy leaned over to see her face better and he wondered if all those years ago he had looked at his younger brother the same way. There was such fascination and confusion on the young boy's face. He wondered if he could keep the innocence of his children protected forever. There was nothing he wanted more than to give them the happy childhood that had been cut short for all of them. His son looked up at him and smiled.
"I'm a big brother ...I'll keep her safe." He almost felt the urge to cry again. Life came and went in such a circle, things changed and yet they stayed so much the same. He nodded, wrapped his arm around him, pulling the boy against his chest.
"I know you will." But he hoped never to give him a reason to take on that responsibility. As his son's head laid against his chest, he could already tell sleep was once again settling in on the boy. "How about you go climb into bed with Mommy?" The boy gave a small nod and with a kiss to his new baby sister he hurried across the floor to force his way into his mother's arms. She awoke for only a moment as she felt him shift against her and he watched as mother and son fell back to sleep together. Another brief moment of grief held onto him as he remember his own nights of making his way to his mother's arms.
He leaned his own head back against the rocking chair, listening to the quiet creek of it against the wood floor. It was getting late and he was tired, but sleep did not seem to want to come. His son was asleep, his wife was asleep and his daughter was asleep. He was left to watch them and hold them and protect them.
So many of his years had been spent with his focus on alchemy. Alchemy; the science of understanding the structure of matter, breaking it down, then reconstructing it as something else. Equivalent exchange. He lived by equivalent exchange. His wife always told him it was crazy and to let it go, that things were not so easily defined. He had given up alchemy to have this life, to have everyone he loved surrounding him. He was no longer an alchemist, but he was a brother, a friend, a lover, a husband, and a father. He had given an equivalent exchange and she was right, there was so much more than alchemy. Life came and went. Life and death were tied together by a string of happenings in between.
A long time ago a little girl had died at the hands of her father. Tonight a little girl had been born to a father who swore to never see her come to harm. Nina. They were connected by a name. A name that held so much meaning to the man who held her. The baby in his arms would not only be his own beloved little girl, she would be his way to honor the little girl that he was not able to protect.
What had once belonged to a brown haired girl with a big white dog, now belonged to the baby in his arms. Life. Such a fragile thing. Without death though, he supposed that it held no real meaning, because loss made you love that much more strongly. And his own heart was overflowing with that love. Holding Nina, he looked out the window, feeling the warmth of summer mountain breeze against his face. He thought for just a moment he may have even heard her laugh on the wind. Or it may have been a memory. That memory combined with the baby in his arms was enough, because it meant one very important thing: Nina lived.