"I just don't understand why it has to be every Saturday. Elycia is home from the Academy on the weekends and I just thought it would be nice for us to be a family when she's home." Gracia was tired of these arguments that she never won and that never seemed to go anywhere. Watching your husband get all prettied up every single Saturday to go out with some vague plans about meeting the boys was nerve wracking. Especially since he never came home before the following morning. It was obvious to her that he was having an affair. She had no idea with who. She had confronted him on it before and he always gave her back the same old lines. She was crazy. She was jealous. She was PMSing. How could she not trust him? Maybe she needed therapy. She was just afraid of him leaving because of what had happened to Maes so long ago.

"Don't give me that crap about keeping me here because of Elycia. She spends her weekends with her friends and I'll probably be back before she will. This is just more of your inane jealousy and I'm tired of it Gracia. Tired of it! Who dropped everything to take care of you and Elycia after Maes died? I did. Do you ever want for anything? No. All I ask in return is that you give me my Saturday nights with the guys and you shut the hell up about it." Tears welled up in Gracia's eyes. Maes had traveled extensively because of his duties in the military and there were of course times when he wouldn't be home for months at a stretch but he had never made her feel so alone. Not for the first time she wondered to herself if accepting Roy's offer of marriage had been a mistake. She had had misgivings when he initially asked her, the affection they felt for each other was platonic at best but she had accepted because she was lonely. The irony was not lost on her.

"Go. Just go." Her breath hitched and sped up, a sure sign that full-on sobbing wasn't far off. Tears began to slip-slide down Gracia's face. Roy started to speak, but Gracia didn't want to listen to anything else he had to say. "Just go. And tell your whore I said 'hello'." With that she turned on her heel and ran to her bedroom. Roy waited with his coat still in his hands until the echoes of the slamming door faded and quietly slipped out into the early evening air. It was time for his Saturday Night Special.

Cologne had been sprayed, hair neatly combed and braided, clothes had been very carefully pressed, and the apartment had been meticulously straightened. Dinner was simmering on the stove. But tonight something was missing. His little place was perfect, of that there was no doubt. He was perfect. He had triple checked his appearance in the mirror. On nights like tonight he even went so far as to ditch his customary plain black pants, t-shirt and boots in favor of something a little more dramatic. It could be very difficult to try too hard without looking like he was trying to hard. Everything was in place but that rush of excitement was gone. In its place was an unfamiliar feeling of resentment. Not that he had any right to feel resentful. He had known exactly what he was getting into from the start.

Keep breathing, that was the trick. Surprised to find himself once again in front of the mirror, he decided to dismiss his feelings and concentrate on something he could do something about. For the millionth time since arriving home at five o'clock that evening he picked up his eye-liner. Or as Roy called it, "guy-liner." It was the only admission to insecurity he was willing to make. The only time he really acted like a chick about this whole thing. Would his precious Roy think he was being silly by wearing it? Would he even notice? What if he didn't notice? What if he liked it? What the fuck did it matter anyway? Realizing he had a good ten minutes left until his … whatever he was showed up and that he was bored anyway, he applied the thick black gel with an artist's accuracy.

The waiting was the hardest part. He waited all week. He waited at work. He waited at home. Existence for him was at a complete stand still until Saturday at 7:00. It wasn't that he couldn't focus his attention and energy on other tasks, it was that he didn't want to. If he wasn't waiting for Roy, he wouldn't be thinking about Roy. He didn't want to not be thinking about Roy.

What the hell else could he do to kill five minutes? Looking around with that antsy anticipation not unlike a child waiting for Santa Claus, he spied some candles. Roy would probably call it gay, which amused Edward to no end. How more gay could you get that having sex with another man? How much time had that killed? Thirty seconds. Awesome sauce.

A firm, authoritative knock sounded making the nervous boy jump. He ran to the door and then waited a few moments, as if to say, "Oh, is it that time already?" He wasn't fooling anyone anyway, certainly not himself, and certainly not his lover on the other side of the door.

He could practically hear the smirk in the older man's voice as he rested his hand on the door knob. "Alright, Miss Prissy Pants, quit pampering yourself and open the door. I'm hungry." A long-fingered hand unhurriedly opened the apartment door. He lifted one brow and leaned his weight against the doorframe so Roy would have to brush past him into the apartment. He really had no shame.

"Was I supposed to make dinner?" Edward responded innocently. His lover rolled his eyes. "I can smell it, you twerp. Nice try, though. How's your brother?"

Edward looked up at him through perfect golden lashes. "Sorry, Roy baby, I'm deaf to all pleasantries until I get my kiss." Dark, bemused eyes rolled Heavenward in mock-annoyance. "God, someone's needy today. Fine, but just a kiss. I don't want you to distract me from dinner."

"Whatever you say, boss."

He tilted his head up, and as his lover-my, oh my, did he love having a lover- bent his head down, he evaded slightly to the right to land his lips on a pale, perfect neck. Tanned hands snaked up to tangle and twist in black hair.

Rough words and fast movements always caught Roy off guard. Want you, need you, missed you, love you, God, I want you. Hands went everywhere. That kid had always been good with his hands, though he supposed at some point he should stop calling him that, even if it was in his own head. Did it really matter? He was already going to hell for corrupting the boy in the first place.

"I'll tell her I'm going on vacation." He surprised himself by saying. The playful, sinful, wonderful, hands stilled on his chest. Edward quirked an eyebrow. "I'll just put dinner on the table." He said, choosing to ignore the older man's outburst and gently push him away. Turning away, he walked over to the oven and pulled out what looked to Roy like chicken teriyaki, his favorite. "Al his fine, but still hurt that you didn't make it to the wedding. Everyone missed you." It was highly doubtful to Roy that necessarily everyone had missed him there. "Everyone?" He responded. "Seriously? You look lovely in white, Winry, sorry for murdering your parents." He stopped when he saw the look his boyfriend was giving him. This night was not going how he had intended at all. "Anyway, I was being serious earlier. I think a romantic getaway just the two of us is just what we need. Oh, we'll have to be discreet of course. Don't look at me like that, it's a good idea."

He could read the confusion on his young lover's face. The hope. Then, of course, the skepticism. "You'll tell her you're going on vacation. Without her and her daughter. Wild weekend, just the boys, eh? Tell her you're going fishing."

"Well, why not?"

He shrugged. "Oh, alright. This better not get out though, it could ruin your career Mr. General. Just throwing that out there."

"Well, if it does you can say you told me so. And we can run away to the East and live quietly as has-been alchemists and adopt orphaned Ishbalan children and light paper lanterns during the harvest festival."

In a relatively clean workshop in a quiet valley with quiet people, a quiet man with hair in a long ponytail sat back on his workbench and let out a loud sneeze. "Someone must be talking about you," a wizened little old lady told him while handing him a tissue. The young man smiled. "Probably another nosy townsperson spreading rumors about Winry being pregnant." He rolled his eyes. Didn't people have anything better to do? Al considered that their own lives must be quite unsatisfactory if they spent so much time discussing him and his new wife. He smiled again. "I mean," he continued, "why else would two people who are deeply in love want to get married unless the poor sap in question had gotten his young lady knocked up?"

She was not given to fits of emotion. She was definitely not given to crying fits. But, sitting in the doctor's office the tears just would not stop for anything. I'll give you a moment alone. The doctor had said. She just couldn't process. She wanted to have been married for a while. There was so much left still to do, so many places to see... What would Al say? Did Al even want kids? Two orphans raising a baby. He would probably want to name it Ed. Did she even like the name it Ed? What if it was a girl? Edwina? Oh, God that's a terrible name. Please let it be a boy. Inexplicably Winry started laughing through her tears.

Elicia Hughes was pissed off. She had literally exhausted all of her resources. Not a single friend in Central was able to have her over for the weekend. She was reduced to shopping around downtown until stores closed. She was not looking forward to going home.

Mommy, please don't cry... Please don't cry...

Her earliest memories as a young child. She was "Mom" now but the line was the same. Reluctantly she said goodbye to the shop girl at La Femme Boutique and started walking home.

Try as she might she could not find it in herself to feel pity for her mother, trapped in a loveless marriage with an asshole who refused to divorce her because it would negatively impact his military/political career. The only time she enjoyed being home was when she "accidentally" called her step-father Colonel because it pissed him off so much. Not the for the first time she wondered how her father could have been best friends with such a skeez. She reasoned that "the Colonel" had changed drastically after her father's death. She remembered one fight in particular with Roy, a right screaming match in which she had insulted everything from the stupid way he fixed his hair to his ridiculous state issued uniform. "I don't expect for you to think of me as a father but I do expect a certain amount of respe-" "Good! My father showed my picture to everyone! You don't even have a picture of me and you make my mother miserable so just shut up!"

She had thrown flowers at the wedding.

Gracia looked up as the door quietly creaked open. Could it be? But no. It was just her daughter, looking resigned. Elicia steeled herself. "Hey Mom! I missed you so much! How are you? Where's the Colonel? The house looks great." It was all coming out in a rush, talking, talking, talking to fill the void. Completely ignoring her mother's tear-stained cheeks.

A metal arm reached across his lover and picked up his bedside clock. 3am already. Wonderful. He set the clock down. "Roy." Nothing. "Roy." A little louder. "Sugar dumpling. Wake up. You need to get home." A pale hand rubbed the sleep out of black eyes. Roy sat up slowly and repeated Ed's earlier motion, checking the clock. "3am? Fuck it. I'm sleeping over. If you-know-who calls I'm too drunk to walk home and I'll see her in the morning. Maybe."

"Your funeral, General."

"Whatever. Good night."

"G'night," the blonde responded, "love you." Oh, shit.

Black eyes snapped back open.