Author's Note: Written based on this tumblr prompt by otpdisaster, "Person B making a deal to save Person A's life at the cost of all their memories together."

It's been tweaked for my purposes. I am not a medical expert so please forgive any creative liberties I've taken with the diagnoses mentioned within. My sources are: google. As the summary states, this is a story told in four parts, and backwards. Think Memento, but less jarring (hopefully).

Chapter titles are musical terminology left over from my days of being a choir geek.

Coda

(intimo)

His eyes fluttered open, and he took a moment to focus in the hazy grey light seeping through the window blinds. The woman next to him lay on her side, facing the door. He couldn't stop himself from carefully tracing the outline of a horribly beautiful tattoo left exposed by the bedsheets gathering at her waist. His fingertips tingled when they passed over the scarred areas, and he felt as if he could almost remember. She was like a butterfly in his blind spot: an enigmatic presence over his shoulder that he couldn't quite make out, but which he knew hovered just out of sight.

Dreams of amber eyes and golden hair seemed like they'd haunted him for most of his life, but he knew that wasn't right. His mind only transposed her image into places from his past he hadn't thought she belonged. Recently, though, Roy Mustang had been questioning things he'd taken for indisputable fact only weeks before. Before. It was a word he used commonly now when referring to the time prior to meeting Riza. How many mornings had he woken to find himself in her bed? He was losing count.

She startled him by rolling over. Her face rattled the bars of a cage Roy hadn't known he was trapped in.

"I know you want to ask about it." Riza's voice was melodic and soft in the early morning, but he knew she could also be hard and demanding. Roy blinked and reminded himself he didn't actually know if she could be hard or demanding. The assumption was only one among many rabbit holes he ran into when around her.

"Why did he do it?" Roy whispered.

She brushed a strand of hair from his brow. "My father wasn't a well man."

"I remember Master Hawkeye as being on the edge of madness, but to mark your back with such dangerous secrets… why?"

"Books can be stolen."

"Your skin isn't a page in a book, Riza."

"You already said that."

Roy frowned and took her hand in his. "I don't remember."

"I know, and I'm sorry."

"Have I asked you if my flames hurt? Did I at least do that?" He'd been saving this question, knowing the sadness in her eyes would flare when asked. He was right.

"You did." Riza fell into one of the thoughtful silences he'd come to expect from her. "I know you probably think poorly of yourself for the scars, but I'd like it if you wouldn't."

"Because you asked me to do it?"

"Yes."

"You asked me to burn you, and I asked you to kill me."

A tear escaped her eye even as she tried to smile. "We were never perfect."

"You said that already," he said through a smile.

"You've been wanting to use that line, haven't you?"

"A little bit, yeah." His grin faded as his thoughts returned to the deadly favors they'd asked one another. "Did we hate ourselves that much?"

"Yes."

"Since Hughes died, I've always thought I was alone in my guilt over what happened in Ishval."

"You weren't."

Riza's gaze was one he'd had to acclimate himself to. She always seemed to be searching him for something. Or perhaps waiting. No one looked at him with the same piercing intensity that she did, and it stirred his mind in a way that both confounded and exhilarated. With every answered question, she breathed air into a room coated with ash and sent the motes flying until he couldn't tell the floor from the ceiling.

Her alarm clock sliced through the quiet, and Roy watched as she reached over to silence it. He couldn't help but notice, again, the frayed patch of skin on her neck. This scar, at least, hadn't been seared into her skin by his alchemy. Riza Hawkeye's body was a patchwork of permanent marks detailing her years by his side. Years that, despite his most fervid efforts, he could not remember. When he'd begun the inquiry into his own past with her, the once hidden mental blocks made themselves known. Roy had torn through them like overgrown ivy, only to find a brick wall beneath.

"I'm going away this weekend." Riza's voice brought him back to the present. "It'll be several days."

"Where?" He knew it probably wasn't his business, but the question slipped free. Roy treasured the time they had together and coveted more. Being with Riza felt a lot like exposing the skin from which a bandage had just been ripped, but she made him feel alive. Somewhere in the wild tailspin she sent him into, he'd found security.

"Home."

He knew what that meant. She'd be visiting whatever remained of the Hawkeye estate - a place he remembered well - though, in his memories, Berthold Hawkeye never had a daughter. Roy's head began to throb. He'd been down this road before. She told him he could ask any question of her, and yet he found himself holding back. Certain subjects, like the cause of his current state, felt very much like a precipice.

"Take me with you."

Riza smiled and kissed his knuckles. "Are you in the habit of taking days off whenever you want now? Does no one hold Colonel Mustang's leash anymore?"

"Did I have a leash before?" The sparkle in her eyes faded, and Roy regretted the question. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ask-"

"Don't ever apologize. It's me who owes you." She sat up in bed and reached for the plain white t-shirt he'd tossed on her floor the night before. "I don't mind if you come, but, Roy-"

"I know it won't help. That's not why I asked."

Riza paused for a moment as she pulled the shirt over her head.

"I understand you've canceled all your appointments with the therapist." She turned to him. "Why?"

"Spying on me?" he chuckled before taking a serious tone. "I don't have amnesia, Riza. I think you know that."

Riza stared at him for an amount of time that might have made him uncomfortable in the past. "We'll leave after lunch," she finally said before leaving him alone in the bed.

The property wasn't nearly as run down as he'd expected or remembered. Apparently Riza had been taking care of her family home even in her absence, and he desperately tried to claw away at that brick wall he knew she hid behind. It was astoundingly surreal to know they had shared experiences in this house, but he couldn't remember one single detail of them. Even more bizarre was the casual acceptance he'd had of his blotchy past before meeting her. How long would he have been content to not look over his shoulder at the butterfly if he hadn't stumbled into her in front of the bookshop? The answer was terrifying. For the rest of his life.

Roy wandered the halls of the house and paused in front of a door he guessed must have belonged to a much younger Riza Hawkeye. In his mind's eye, this door hadn't been there. Not that he particularly remembered the expanse of wall, he just hadn't considered it. Now, as he stood in front of the door, it felt absurd to not have realized its existence. Of course, he still couldn't recall ever grasping the knob or walking inside the room that lay beyond, but the brick wall in his head itched. Somehow, it itched. He left the door in search of fresh air. His lungs felt sandy.

Riza didn't join him on the back steps until the sun began its descent. She sat next to him, threaded her arm through his, and laid her head on his shoulder.

"What are you thinking about?" she asked quietly.

"These last few months have been transformative, to say the least." Roy kept his eyes on the horizon. "There are things I can't believe I've forgotten-"

"You didn't forget them, Roy." Riza pressed her lips to his shoulder and whispered, "I'd tell you if you asked."

"I don't want to." He pulled his arm from her grasp and wrapped it around her waist instead. "As much as I can't recall, I know myself well enough. I have a feeling I know where the trail of questions will lead, and I'm not willing to seek it out if it means I'll lose you." His voice trailed off into a thick murmur. "I can't afford to lose you. Not again."

"You already said that," Riza said through a quiet sob.

"I trust that you'll keep our past safe and remind me of the important things." He pulled her closer. "Even if I can't remember the before parts, I know I love you." Roy finally looked over at her and swiped tears from her cheeks, but the eyes that stalked him through his dreams were full of them still.

"Love me like you do, then," she breathed before pressing her lips against his.