Title: Blank State of Mind
Author: drummerdancer
Verse: First Anime/CoS
Characters/Pairings: Edward, Alphonse, mentions of Winry and Alfons
Word Count: 587
Prompt 266: Tabula Rasa
Rating: K+
Summary: If he closed his eyes, he couldn't see.
If he closed his eyes, he couldn't see.
If he closed his mind, he couldn't think.
If he closed his mouth, he couldn't breathe.
And if he closed his heart…
—He wasn't here.
Edward laid very still on borrowed sheets, his eyes shut, his mind empty, his mouth tight. Breaths through his nose: In—out, in—out, in—out. Nothing. He thought of nothing. Nobody was home, nobody was going to break his concentration. Nobody was going to rob him of this chance, this fleeting moment, to pretend that he wasn't here, that the things around him weren't real and that he wasn't a universe away from where he truly wanted to be.
He pretended he was in Resembool, outside in the grass, his hair down and tangled on the ground underneath. It was mid-spring, when the wind in Resembool was just this side of cool, but the sun was out and overhead, heating his skin as he lay spread-eagle on the hillside below.
He pretended his limbs were back, flesh and blood and whole. He would wiggle the fingers and toes, delighting in how natural the tinglings were before relaxing them and closing his eyes against the sun. Winry'd be pissed about it at first, not having anything to fix, but Ed was sure after awhile she'd be happy too.
There would be footsteps that approached him, on his right side, the sound of bare feet against blades of grass waking him from his lull.
Al would be there, staring down at him with his mega-watt smile, no sign of armor anywhere. Of course, Ed never could picture his brother's face right; it'd been what, seven years since that night? But his roommate had an uncanny resemblance to Al as a kid, so most of the time, Ed simply improvised using Alfons's face.
Al would plop down beside him, taking his right arm in hand as he felt the blood beating beneath the surface.
"We really did it, huh brother?" he'd say, his voice quiet, and Ed would nod his head against the earth, his voice hushed as well.
"Yeah, Al. We sure did."
They wouldn't say anything after that, or at least, Ed could never find the words to say more. They'd spent what felt like half their lives chasing this dream, and now that they had it…what more was there to say? So they'd sit out there, laying in the grass, and wouldn't say anything, just enjoying each other's company.
Al would have to leave in awhile, but until then, Ed kept his mind very empty, a blank slate of nothing, as he let himself pretend.
If he could only stay like this—eyes shut, mind empty, mouth tight—forever, Ed knew without a shadow of a doubt he'd be happy for the rest of his life. But there was a fourth thing, one in which he couldn't do, that prevented him from ever achieving that.
For he couldn't stop his heart forever, no matter how much he wanted to.
Edward opened his eyes, and a world of grey and brown encased him once more. He wasn't on a grassy hillside in Resembool; he was on stiff bed sheets in Munich. And his brother wasn't by his side; there was no one there, just a lonely desk with sheets of circles and scribbles scattered across its surface.
Edward closed his eyes again, but the moment was lost.
And he feared that perhaps he, too, would be lost forever as well.