A/N: Thanks for reading. Let's pretend the movie never happened. Are you pretending yet? Okay, good, now pretend that this happens...
Res Oblata
Last time Winry had come to visit, she greeted Alphonse with a hug, a kiss on the cheek, and a hand through his hair.
A man met her at the train station. This man was too tall for her to muss his hair. She could not reach his cheek, and immediately after hugging him, her heart leapt into her throat and began fluttering around like a panicked bird. He squeezed her ribs so hard, lifted her feet off the ground and pressed his unshaven cheek to her temple.
No, this could not be Alphonse Elric. It had only been six months since her last visit, when she came by to celebrate his thirteenth birthday.
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"It happened in the spring," Izumi explained as she watched the four sizzling salmon fillets in the skillet. Winry carefully arranged and rearranged the silverware in front of each chair. "You certainly noticed, didn't you?"
Winry looked toward the stairs up which Alphonse had just disappeared for a shower before dinner. "How could I not?" she asked.
Izumi chuckled knowingly under her breath.
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They had a tradition to which Winry had held almost religiously over the six visits she had had with Alphonse. On the first evening of her visit, Winry would creep down the hall from the guest room to Alphonse's room. She would knock gently, and then slip in. They would then dedicate the rest of the night to reacquainting and updating, and before dawn, Winry would tiptoe back down the hall to her room.
The sun had set on her first day in Dublith, and Winry could not bring herself to leave her room. Already, her knees began to shake at the thought. Her heart fluttered once more as she tried to ignore the telltale signs of arousal. She laughed at herself, at how ridiculous she was, getting hot and bothered over the thought of just sitting and talking with Al.
Perhaps if they did not sit on his bed, in the dark. Perhaps if she had not caught him staring over dinner. Perhaps if he were still a sweet, squeaky-voiced thirteen-year-old and not this broad, solid, tall—
Winry threw back the cover on her bed and crawled in.
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The old clock in the hall, a Curtis heirloom, was pounding out eight o'clock by the time Winry made it downstairs, showered and dressed. Izumi and Sig were seated at the table, eating eggs and ham over the morning paper.
"Winry," Izumi greeted. Sig nodded in her direction.
"Good morning," she said, mustering brightness. "Sorry I'm up so late."
Izumi looked at Winry over the rim of her coffee mug. "Late night?"
This was a joke, one that Izumi cracked dryly every visit, and before this one, it had been funny. Winry went rigid and looked from Izumi to Sig then back again. Sig remained focused on the local news. Blushing furiously, Winry slid into an empty chair and began poking her eggs with her fork. "Not really."
"Oh?" Izumi replied, her voice echoing in her mug. When Winry looked up, Izumi was reading the paper.
Winry noticed that the first section of the paper, mostly national news, was folded in front of the fourth and empty chair. Alphonse, as he did every morning, was toiling in Izumi's adolescent garden. He would join them for breakfast late then leave to take a shower before his morning session with Izumi.
Winry knew how terrible the situation was going to be when the front door opened quietly, and two heavy, socked feet padded into the room. She managed to keep her eyes down until she heard the feet of his chair scrapping the floor. She immediately felt guilty.
Of course he would come in wearing a sleeveless undershirt. Of course he would be slick and glistening. Of course his shoulders were golden brown and dusted with freckles. And, of course, he was ignoring her.
"Good morning, Al," Winry hazarded, smiling.
He unfolded the paper and sipped his coffee. "Morning."
And that was all.
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Winry decided she was being ridiculous. What was she so afraid of? It was Al! Al, for goodness sake! She closed her eyes and told herself that, on the count of three, she was going to come out from behind the corner where she was hiding in her nightgown, walk up to the hall bathroom where Al was gloomily brushing his teeth, and tell him that he was just being plain silly.
On the count of three, Winry told herself. She closed her eyes and willed the numbers to pass through her mind silently. But when she looked back up, the bathroom light was off and Al's bedroom door was just slipping closed.
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Winry planned to seize breakfast. She sat in her seat, waiting for Al to enter, and then she would force him into a conversation about anything, and then he would feel stupid for being awkward and aloof in front of his teacher.
At least that was the plan. Al did not come to breakfast.
"It's Wednesday," Izumi said when Winry mentioned that Al must be hungry, having missed breakfast and now lunch. "On Wednesdays, Al volunteers at the children's shelter."
Winry could picture Al ladling out thin broth to a pack of small, shiny eyed, malnourished children. And she thought as she sat anxiously at the table, only Al could make doing his civic duty this frustrating.
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When Al was late to dinner, Winry stormed up the stairs in a huff. Before she could slam the door to her bedroom behind her, Winry heard her name being called from the stairwell. She paused and turned.
"Yes?" she replied.
"Come here," Izumi called.
Winry obeyed and padded her way, following the grey-blue path of the hall rug. At the landing, she looked down at Alphonse's teacher, standing with one hand on the railing and one foot on the second step. The fire from the kitchen stove cast shifting, flickering light across her face.
Winry could imagine any one of many bits of advice coming from Izumi at that moment, and she knew each of them would make sense and apply perfectly and make her feel terribly childish.
"What's the hurry?" Izumi asked.
"Oh," Winry said, a little surprised. "I wasn't meaning to hurry, I just—"
"Good," Izumi interjected. "Impatience doesn't benefit anyone."
Izumi turned and disappeared into the kitchen.
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Al was moving around in his room. Winry had him cornered. At least, she would have him cornered if she could work up the nerve to go into his room and corner him. Winry counted and recounted the five floorboard slats between the tips of her bare toes to the stained wood of Al's door. She could feel her heart thudding behind the plain, linen décolletage of her sleeping shift. Winry imagined the pulsing making the front of her nightgown flutter.
Pulse. Flutter. Pulse. Flutter.
"I know you're out there, Winry," Al said from within.
Winry leapt back from the door, clapping her hands over her sternum as though to silence the treacherous muscle within.
Once the blood in her ears had quieted, Winry hesitated outside the door, waiting for Alphonse to invite her in. She could hear the cicadas outdoors, the settling of the house around her, the creaking of the floorboards beneath her. Al shifted on his mattress and the springs sang.
Winry breathed a long, bracing sigh. She placed her hand on the doorknob and turned like the universe turns the world.
Click. Creak.
"Hello."
"Hello."
Moonlight poured into Al's room like powdered milk. His blue bedspread looked like a landscape covered with snow, knees like mountains and piedmont ankles. Winry had not realized that she closed the door until he felt herself leaning back against the chilly panels.
"Al," Winry began, still pressed against the door.
"What?" he replied sourly, looking at his big, wide hands resting in his lap.
If she ignored the stubble and the baritone, Winry thought Al still looked thirteen. He slumped his shoulders and pouted just the same. His hair stuck out at funny angles – a telltale sign of Al's nervous tugging.
"Look, Al," she continued, "I don't want you to think –"
"No, I know," Al cut her off, his voice still bitter. He looked at her briefly out of the corners of his eyes. "I know it's weird. Everybody's made that really clear. But I don't like it any more than you do."
Before Winry could stop herself, even think to stop herself, she was sitting next to Al, closing her fingers around his. "Oh, Al," she said.
He snatched his hand away. "I'd understand if it scares you."
Winry grabbed at his hand again, more firmly this time. "Stop calling yourself it, Al. And you don't scare me. You couldn't scare me if you tried."
Al looked at the floor off to the side of his bed. He could scare her, he thought. He would not even have to try. If he told her about the dreams he had been having since she'd arrived, if he told her what he was thinking when she climbed off the train, if he told her what he was trying not to think about at that very moment. Oh, yeah, she would be scared.
"You can't treat growing up like it's a disease," Winry said, taking her hand back. She set her palm down on the bedspread on the opposite side of Al's shins and leaned.
"Easy for you to say," Al grumbled. "You got to do it in six years. I got a week. One week. I ached so bad the whole time, I couldn't even walk. Sensei let me out of training though. That was nice."
Winry laughed quietly through her nose. She was glad now that she was here.
"I didn't know what to do," Al continued. "I kept growing out of all my clothes. Sensei gave me a pair of Sig's pajama pants eventually." Al began toying with the frayed end of a drawstring. How, Winry wondered, could this have frightened her? It was just sweet, little Al. Well, sweet, at least.
"I said goodnight normally, and said good morning like this." Al snorted. "I sounded like me just the night before."
"You're still you. This is you." Winry started to lay her hand over Al's again, but he snatched it away.
"No, it's not!" he snapped, throwing the covers off his legs. Al rolled off the bed and stormed over to the window next to the bed. "I don't know what this is, but it's not me," he grumbled, turning his back to Winry. "Maybe it would be, in a few years, but not now."
Winry stood up from the bed and paced over to the window. Quietly, she touched Al's arm. He snapped his gaze over to her, and the combination of the moonlight and tears made his eyes incandescent.
"I thought I was done," Al murmured.
"Done with what?" Winry asked, taking a step closer.
Al sniffed loudly and looked out the window at the still, icy summer landscape below. "Living in a body that's not mine."
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Winry woke up before dawn, when the air was still sleepy and thick. She looked to her right where the rolling meadow of Al's back lay close enough to touch, close enough to release her eager pioneer fingertips onto the uncharted countryside. The ribs of his undershirt stretched and contracted like wood grain, like Winry could count each one and know exactly how many times Alphonse had been immolated on the alter of his brother's greatness.
Winry pressed her trembling knuckles to her mouth. When she was certain her voice was steady, she leaned toward Al and touched his shoulder.
"Al," she said quietly. He stirred and cracked an eye up at her. "I'll see you at breakfast."
"'Kay," he replied and slipped back to sleep.
Winry stood up from Al's bed and pulled the sheets back over him. She lingered for a moment, listening to Al's breathing, the wind through the house, and the quiet chime of the rose-colored shards of her heart hitting the hardwood floor.
She swallowed a throat-full of tears and smiled at Alphonse, curled up like he always used to do. She wished silently that Edward were there. She wanted to slap him and hug him and tell him that Al was all right. Alphonse was with her now. She would look after him.
The irony hit Winry like a wisp of smoke, and she laughed. It was funny that she would think, just as Ed had thought, that Al needed protecting.