"Hey Al, do you know what's wrong with Ed? He seems…more pissed off than normal." Winry twirled her hair around her fingers, looking with a concerned face at her big metal friend.
"What do you mean?" he asked, although he had noticed a change in his brother's behavior since they got to Resembool, too.
"Well…I know you two have only been here for a couple of days, but Ed just seems more antsy than normal. It's like he's extra jumpy or something…he's barely spoken to me, although that's not new." She rolled her eyes.
"Something must be bothering him…" Al said, his voice trailing off. "Aren't you fitting him with his new arm later? You should ask him then. Maybe in a one on one setting he'll be more likely to talk."
"Yeah, I guess…" Winry wandered off to get everything ready for the fitting. She had tried to seem nonchalant in front of Al, but it seemed like Ed was specifically upset with her, and she had no idea why. She had purposely not hit him over the head with her hammer when the two had shown up a few days ago unannounced, and she was being rather nice to him, anyways. Despite her efforts, he seemed to be avoiding her, and was constantly doing research or practicing his sparring. He hadn't spent any time alone with her at all, and it seemed like something was on his mind.
Once she had his new metal arm all ready to be fitted, she heard Ed shuffle in the workshop, the door closing behind him. "Hey, can we make this quick? I want to get back out there…"
Feeling disheartened, Winry replied with a simple "Sure thing."
Though these times were usually spent in relaxed silence, Ed seemed unusually uncomfortable during this fitting. He more or less winced at her touch, and answered straightforward 'yes' or 'no''s to her questions. She tightened the last bolt, and as soon as she was done he leapt to his feet. He was interrupted halfway to the door by a piece of metal barely clearing his head.
Her wrench hit the ground with an echoey clank. Ed turned, eyes wide. "Dammit, Ed. What's bothering you?"
Getting defensive, he replied with his usual "Nothing's wrong. Stop worrying!"
"Would you please tell me? You're being a jackass and I want to know why."
"I dunno what you're talking about, Winry."
"JUST TELL ME OR SO HELP ME I WILL THROW ANOTHER WRENCH AT YOUR HEAD."
"Ugh!" Ed said, exasperated. "What's making me mad is you!"
Winry blinked, lowering her wrench throwing arm. Her demeanor calmed at once. "Me?" she asked, confused. She went on in a sincere voice. "Whatever I did, I'm really, really sorry and if there's something I can do just tell me and-"
"No!" Ed practically yelled, still in 'loud' mode. He tried to level out his voice with each subsequent 'no'. "No, no, no, no. It's not you pissing me off. It's…" He flailed his arms about, outlining her frame. "It's…you!"
Winry cocked an eyebrow at him, with an incredulous and puzzled look on her face. "So it's not me but it's…me?" she asked confusedly.
"Yes! Exactly. It's not something you did it's just…" he took a breath, looking around at anything other than her. Winry laughed to herself, seeing him all flustered like this, but wanted to know where he was going with all this nonsense.
"Winry, do you know why I like alchemy so much?"
"Because you get to create cool weapons out of your auto-mail and travel the world and get in fights?"
"No! Well…yes, that stuff's great too…but what I meant was, do you know why I like chemistry and math and science?"
She pondered the question for a moment. "Because…everything can be proven? There's only facts, not beliefs?"
Ed finally looked at her. "Yes! That's exactly it! I like being able to solve problems and get definitive answers. Any question you have can be solved for and proven by a combination of math and science, using observed facts and numbers that can't lie. When there's something I don't know or can't figure out, I can't just rely on what people tell me or what they think is true, I have to confirm the truth for myself. Does that make sense?"
Winry nodded, her eyes wide. She still didn't know where this was going.
"So you can imagine, then, that I don't like when I absolutely can't figure something out."
"Well, yeah. You've always been like that. That's why you made such good grades in elementary school; you were so stubborn you didn't give up on anything until you finally learned it."
"Right. Well…that's exactly my problem. There's something I can't figure out and it's driving me insane."
"Okay…well, I still don't see what this has to do with me…"
Ed sighed and paced the length of the room, trying to figure out how to word what he wanted to say. "I know how to explain animals' behavior. They act on instinct, pre-coded information they inherit genetically from their parents. Humans are a little more complex and experience different emotions than animals…" Ed kept walking but was quiet for a moment. Winry waited patiently for him to continue.
"But I can even explain most human emotions. Dopamine is a chemical that is released to make you happy, and a reduction in that can make you feel sad. Hormonal imbalances can make someone upset easily or get mad quickly…even attractions to other human beings can be explained with science. Your heart beats quickly when you're near someone you're attracted to because of neurotransmitters releasing adrenaline, and so on. But then there's something past an attraction for someone that makes no sense when it comes to chemicals in your brain…" Ed took a deep breath and stopped where he was, turning towards Winry.
"It's a feeling I have about another person that I just can't figure out! It makes them stay on my mind all the time, even when I'm doing something completely unrelated to them. When we're apart, they fill my dreams and make me feel such a physical ache in my chest that it gets hard to breathe. I can't eat, I lose focus, I worry about them constantly and the thought of losing them just makes me want to…it makes me want to die. I'd do anything to protect them, and when I think of them being with someone else I get filled with such a ridiculous amount of jealousy I want to punch something and…" He paused, lacking the words he wanted.
Winry's heart was fluttering. "It sounds like…it sounds like you're talking about love, Ed."
"Yeah, I suppose that's the word people use. But love doesn't make any damn sense! There's no biological reason for it to exist. There are no known chemicals that cause that deep of an emotion. And there certainly is no explanation for the hugely contradicting feelings it causes. Because, while I feel all this pain and angst when I'm not with the person that I…that I love, when I am with them it's like…the complete opposite. I get happy for no reason, I'm filled with such a warm feeling it's as though I can do anything, when I'm near them it's like there's electricity between us that's so strong it nearly takes my breath away…it's as though every bad feeling I've ever had is sucked away and as long as I'm with them, nothing bad could ever happen again. And even though it goes against every fiber of my being, when I'm around them it's almost like I could just accept how I feel without the need to understand it because it just feels so…right."
Winry's eyes were open wide, but Ed couldn't read them. Looking straight into them, he said "Winry, I love you, and that scares me."
She gasped, but he went on.
"It scares me because I can't explain my feelings no matter how hard I try. I care about you so much, but I always act the wrong way around you, because I'm trying to avoid how I feel. I could never admit how I felt to you before…you're beautiful and smart and funny and generous, and I can't explain why, but I love you so much I just couldn't keep it to myself any more. This is terrifying to me because I have to just accept how I feel without explanation, knowing that you would never return the feeling to a jackass like me. But…I had to get it out anyways, before it ate me alive."
He stopped talking, but his words were still spinning around the room as he tried to catch his breath. Winry was in shock at what she just heard, and had to steady herself by placing a hand on the table. Ed took her silence as confirmation to his statement, and silently turned to face the door.
Winry's voice stopped him.
"You know what I don't understand?"
He looked over his shoulder but his eyes stayed glued to the ground, unable to look at her. "What?"
"How a genius like you could be so stupid."
"Hey!" he yelled, forgetting his embarrassment and turning to face her. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Winry laughed, her cheeks a soft pink. "It means that love isn't supposed to be explained by science or math." She took a few steps until she was right in front of him. "And it means that I love you too, you idiot."
Feeling bold, with the sweet words Edward had said running through her mind, she went up on her tippy toes and kissed him right on the lips. Surprised, yet ecstatic nonetheless, Edward kissed her back enthusiastically and wrapped his arms around her waist.
For now, he was able to take Winry's advice, and felt no need to explain this weird feeling called love that he undoubtedly felt for Winry. He was content just enjoying the moment, and letting the warmness of her embrace encompass him.