ALMEI WEEK IS HERE!
Man it took me forever to come up with a way to answer this prompt. Big thanks to my little sister who managed to finally help me figure this idea out!
The first thing sensation that Al got was dull shock.
He stared at the shining metal, now stained with a splash of red. Then his eyes moved to the source of the red, a single drop rolling away from the rest and splashing on the surface of the table.
He continued to stare as more drops joined the first.
Then, slowly, he held the bleeding finger, squeezing the tip so that the drops came faster and faster.
Then he grinned, a tear slowly rolling down his cheek.
He was bleeding.
He, Alphonse Elric, was bleeding.
Over the past four years, Al had seen more blood split that he wanted to see in a life time. He had seen gross injuries, men and women die. He had had to be cleaned out of blood. An array drawn in blood had been his only tie to life.
His looked nothing different from the rest. Red, somehow looking darker the bigger the small puddle of blood on the counter grew.
But it was his.
This blood was his. From his body. It had spent its life circling around his body, bringing oxygen to all the living cells therein.
His blood.
The tear rolled off his cheek and hit the table near the blood. It was proof. Proof as real as the lungs expanding and deflating in his chest. Proof as real as the heart pounding in his chest, sending even more blood to his finger where it would be emptied out on the counter.
His blood.
It was then that Ed had come in, seeing his brother's tears before he saw his blood. He had been alarmed and asked what was wrong, unprepared for the laugh and wide grin. Even less prepared for the sight of the blood and Al's happy exclamations of "Brother I'm bleeding!"
Ed had patiently grinned back at Al once he understood the reasoning behind the reaction, then wrapped the bleeding finger up.
He didn't pay the finger much attention the rest of the week or so that Ed made him keep it wrapped up. Winry didn't let him cut tomatoes after the incident, even though he protested that it was an accident, not that his body wasn't ready to do it. He had been sitting down the whole time for crying out loud.
He managed to ignore it in the rest of the pain of rehabilitation though. Every day he was walking and lifting weights as much as he could possibly stand. Winry worried that he was pushing himself too hard, but Alphonse was most definitely an Elric — pushing yourself too hard came with the genes.
He didn't remove the bandage until he was helping Winry clean the dishes (she was at least letting him help with that, though he had to lean against the counter and sit down if he was feeling the slightest bit woozy). The absorptive material would only become water logged and soapy, hindering and annoying him. He loved sensations, he really did, but some he could completely do without.
When he ripped it off though, knowing that that would be less painful than trying to do it slowly, and saw what lie beneath, he had to stop and stare.
There was a nice half an inch long scar across the tip of his ring finger. It was still red, not quite faded to pale barely noticeable white. He stared at it. A scar. He had a scar.
For some reason, the very first thought that came to his mind was the urge to run (well, hobble slowly step by step) up the stairs, pull out a sheet of paper, and tell Mei about it.
He had received the Princess's letter two days ago, the second of its kind. She had to have sent the first very shortly after returning to Xing, and he responded within a day or two, excited to have heard from her. He hadn't expected to miss her as much as he realized he had when he received her letter.
Her response had arrived two days ago, playful and entertaining as she was. He had spent most of yesterday pouring over every word, laughing at some of the jokes she had made in it four or five times and reading parts of it out to everyone in the house. She had written both letters in Xingese and must have gotten someone else to translate the letter on a separate piece of paper into Amestrian. He was glad that she had chosen to send both copies though. He loved looking at the shapes and forms of the Xingese characters. Her handwriting was beautiful.
He had only started the responding letter, not quite sure what to say. He wanted to be just as playful with her as she was being with him, but at the same time didn't want to sound foolish. He already told her about how he spent most of his days, which he hoped wouldn't bore her.
He could tell her the whole story about cutting his finger and then Ed finding him later crying and laughing over the fact that he was bleeding, scaring Ed pretty bad. She'd find that funny. Then he could explain how it scarred and how excited he was that he had gotten his first scar since getting his body back. She would be able to understand that. He might even tell her about how the last time he had cut his finger he had been ten years old and believed that a few drops of blood would be enough to bring his mother's soul back from the dead.
No, he wouldn't tell her that part— "Al?"
"Hmm?"
"Are you alright? You just started staring at your finger. Is something wrong?" He blinked and looked at her.
"What? Oh no, I was just… I got a scar. Look."
"Why is that so shocking?"
"Well… I haven't been able to get them for the past few years."
"Right!" she said, then smiled at him. Ed's response was perhaps more enthusiastic, and he confessed that he was terribly glad that Al's first scar back in his body had been from something as simple as a mishap cutting tomatoes. Al couldn't disagree with that one.
He did tell Mei about his scar though, eventually deciding to omit anything about the last time his finger had bled. He finished off the letter with some cheery words about feeling better and better every day and mailed it.
He fully expected to forget about the letter and his scar, but Al found that more often than not in his quiet moments, walking Den, lifting weights alone, sitting out on the porch just getting fresh air and feeling the sun on his skin, his thoughts always seemed to wander back to the letter.
Had she gotten it yet? Did she like his story? Was she at all interested in hearing about how he spent his time? What would she think about the scar that had by now faded to a white line?
His heart leapt inside his chest when Ed came back from the post office about three weeks after posting the letter and announced that he had gotten a letter from the bean-girl. He scrambled towards the table as best as he could, finally wrenching it from Ed's hand after a quick tussle.
That's wonderful Alphonse! I'm so happy for you! It must be so exciting to be able to see proof of your physical body. It's not just something you can feel, but it's something you can see. Feeling is great, but sometimes it's nice to be able to see things with your own eyes. I'm sure you have more of an appreciation for feeling than most people though. I don't know anyone else who would spend an hour outside in the rain and then enjoy being miserable when you got a cold afterwards.
I really do think it's wonderful, Alphonse.
Al probably ended up reading the words ten times, just soaking them in.
She understood.
Somehow, she understood. She knew how much that meant to him. Even something as stupid as that, cutting his finger slicing tomatoes. She understood.
The rest of the day was spent grinning and as soon as he was strong enough, Al insisted on walking to get the mail every day.
A few more weeks passed before he got another letter, and this one he read even more times. He carefully preserved each one as they began to come more and more quickly as better contact established between the two countries.
By the time two years had passed and Al was traveling to Xing in person to meet the Xingese Princess he knew he had fallen head over heels for, he had a thick stack of letters carefully stored waiting in his suitcase, a smile on his face, and a scar to show her.