Here's two drabbles: One I wrote independently, the other was a commission from zudilo on tumblr. Both are HeiEd, and one is one sided Edwin.
Every day, he walks in the door, shoulders slumped, head bowed. He hangs up his coat, removes his shoes, glances at his flat mate, leaves the room. It's a routine Alfons memorized months ago. To the average onlooker, it's identical each time. But Alfons knows better.
Alfons knows that on the days his ports are aching, the coat drops to the floor, barely rescued at the last minute by a grasping left hand before making its way up to the near side of the coat rack. On days of heat, the shoes slid of seconds faster, due to the meandering he must've done during break time loosening the laces. Time that, on cold days, is spent huddling arounds any heat source, desperate to warm the mechanical limbs that suck away all heat.
But on the worst days, the ones where heat doesn't play a part, his shoulders never make their way high, head never looks up in greeting, coat clung to for longer then necessary. It's those days that Alfons wishes he could gather the other man up in his arms, hold him, protect him from the demons that chase his mind.
But Alfons is a coward. Instead, he looks down at his research as the man walks into the solitude of the other room, he pretends not to hear the broken sobs that make their way through thin walls.
One would think that dying would give you courage.
But it does not.
There was the first! Here's the second.
"C'mon, Ed, you have to eat something." Winry pushes the plate of food on the bedside table towards him.
The scraping noises gives him goose bumps, and he shudders, turns over, and curls into a tighter ball.
"Ed. It's been nearly a week. You can't keep living like this." Winry's hand touches his shoulder gently, and begins a futile attempt to turn him around.
Ed can't tell her anything. He can't tell her how he isn't trying to avoid living, he just cannot physically be anymore. Everything tastes like ash. Every movement, even breath, is thousands of knifes, stabbing at his vulnerable flesh. More then anything all he wants to do is die and let it end.
"I can't." His voice is raspy and cracking from lack of use. "Winry, I can't."
"Sure you can." The bed dips as she settles herself next to him. "It's just-" Her voice cracks, and she pauses. "One day at a time." And she lies down next to him.
It's at that moment that the wires connect in his head, and he realizes exactly what she came to him for. Like a fire has been lit under him, he sits up and pushes himself away from her so fast that he hits the headboard. The speed sets his head spinning. "I can't- I can't-" he chants, clutching at his head.
"Ed-"
"No!" he yells, and Winry freezes. "I just-" And the floodgates open. "He died. In my arms. And he didn't tell me." Ed lowers his hands and stares at them. "He was dying. For months and months and months- And didn't- fucking- tell me." His hands clench into fists. "I loved him," he chokes, "and he died on me. In my arms. You can't-"
"Ed, I-"
"And then," he continues, raising his voice to talk over her, "the damned Gate opens up and drags me here before I even bury him. And-" He chokes again, and punches the bed. "Alphonse-"
"We're looking, Ed, I told you." Winry sits up and crosses her legs, leaning towards him. "He's probably just out looking for you still."
"You can stop." His voice drops to a whisper. "Stop. Alphonse isn't here. He paid himself as toll at the gate to bring me back."
Silence. Then "No... It can't..."
"Alphonse is dead. He's everything and he's gone. And Alfons-" Tears begin to pour down his face. "I loved him, and he died in my arms. You can never begin to imagine-"
"I can!" And she rams into his side, pressing her face into his shoulder and staining his shirt with her tears. "It's happening right now! I'm holding you, and you're killing yourself-" Her sobs become too much for her to speak around, so she just clutches him.
Too spent to push her away, he buries his face in his hands and descends into the depths of his own sorrow.
Gah. Writing this stuff makes me emotional.
Now I'm going to go work on an Edwin oneshot based on "slamming", but romantically angsty, unlike the Royai one, which was solely romantic.
Wryder