Edward doesn't forgive himself for committing the ultimate taboo of alchemy until he is thirty years old.
By then, only his automail leg remained to remind him of his sin. Alphonse had regained his body, and Edward his arm. Even the house that they'd once burned down as a symbol of their resolve had been rebuilt, and as Edward and Winry raised their three children, the home echoed with laughter. The bloody visages of the past were replaced with warm family dinners and chasing half-dressed children down the hallways. (Their only daughter, Sara, had never liked pants.)
Their lives had moved on, and the past was far away. But whenever Edward remembered Alphonse's wasted years, trapped in a metal prison, unable to sleep or eat or feel, a surge of self-loathing would overwhelm him. But Winry had always been the best at relieving his aches in his automail, and sure enough, she was the best at calming Edward's inner turmoils as well.
Although they'd been married for over a decade, Edward still didn't know what she saw in him, but whatever it was, he was thankful that she did. The life that they'd created together was more wonderful than anything he could have ever imagined while he'd languished in his wheelchair after condemning Alphonse to hell on earth.
Not long after his eldest son, Theo, celebrated his eleventh birthday, Theo decided that he was old enough to make breakfast for himself and his two younger siblings. It was a rare weekend that both Winry and Edward could sleep in. Winry didn't need to run off to an emergency surgery, and Edward hadn't stayed up all night grading papers, so the two had curled up next to each other and slept soundly. They'd long since come to terms with each other's sleeping flaws: Edward snored and Winry hogged the blankets. But that was easily cured with Winry shoving him every time he got too loud, and when they slept close together, she couldn't steal all of the bedding.
Edward was dreaming about Xing. Every time he visited Alphonse and May, Xing fascinated him, and he often imagined that after Lucas grew up, Edward and Winry could go travelling together, exploring the corners of the world side-by-side. So, Edward was sleeping soundly, dreaming about finally making Ling pay off his enormous food bill, when the Xingese royal palace caught aflame.
Shaken, he awoke with a start, thankful it was only a dream.
But the acrid muskiness that had overwhelmed his dream hadn't dissipated. All sleepiness fled from his bones, and he rushed to wake Winry.
"Huh?" she murmured.
"Something's wrong," he said. Her eyes shot open.
"Do you smell that?" she asked, and he nodded. They didn't bother with slippers as they raced out of their room, immediately checking on the kids. But they found only empty beds.
Edward jumped down the stairs, skipping the last four steps. As he reached the bottom, he spun on the banister, twisting his body to propel it forward, and dashed into the kitchen, Winry just a step behind.
A fire had broken out over their stove. It crackled over a half-melted pan and through their apparently flammable countertops. (Edward would be having a long talk with the salesman who'd convinced them to buy these supposedly flame resistant counters, though he'd mainly gotten them because that made them Mustang-proof.) The flames licked towards the ceiling and oozed into the entire kitchen, filling it with an acrid smokiness. Its heat radiated all the way to the doorway, and much to Edward's horror, his eldest son hovered over the fire, dumping a bucket's worth of water over the stove. But it wasn't working. His other kids milled aimlessly, too busy watching Theo's failure to even notice their parents' entrance.
"Theo!" Edward yelled, and Theo jumped. "Get away from there! All of you!"
Theo abandoned his post and ran towards Edward and Winry, his younger siblings dutifully following behind.
"Take the kids outside," Edward said. Winry grabbed their hands, creating a chain of four, and led them away from the house. Edward wasted no more time and grabbed the baking soda, thankful for his chemistry phase that he'd abandoned when he'd discovered his father's alchemy books.
Edward covered his mouth and nose and began liberally throwing it onto the fire, which ate it up happily, still sizzling through the countertops. Luckily, it hadn't spread beyond the one corner of the kitchen, and Edward choked down a cough and emptied the baking soda over the heat.
Finally, the flames began to flicker down, and when it had all but died, he grabbed the nearest towel hanging from the oven to pat out the rest of it.
He stared at the kitchen, still in disbelief, and then hacked up some more smoke. After double-checking all of the heat gauges and making sure that the remnants of the charcoal weren't in danger of reigniting, he checked on his family.
"What did you do?" Edward asked, striding over to Theo, unable to keep the anger from his voice. Now that he was sure the house wasn't going to burn down (again), he could guess well enough what had happened. On his way out, he'd noticed the baking materials over-turned on the kitchen table. No doubt someone had tried to make breakfast (probably pancakes from the looks of the ingredients), and that someone was Theo, Edward was certain.
"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to!" Theo cried, his soot-stained hands grabbing onto Edward's pajama pants. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"
Tears pooled at Theo's eyes, and though Sara and Lucas had finally been calmed by Winry, they started apologizing too, nearly hysterical.
All of the anger flooded out of Edward, and he kneeled so that he was eye level with Theo. He pulled him into an embrace, and he could feel Theo sobbing into his shoulder.
"It's okay," Edward said, rubbing circles into his back. "It's okay." At some point Sara and Lucas joined the hug, and then moments later Winry became the other piece of bread in their Elric family sandwich.
There would be a time to chastise Theo for his wrongdoing, but it wasn't now. Because he recognized that look in Theo's golden eyes.
The rest of the day passed in a blur. Cleaning up the mess took a surprisingly long time, as the ash had collected all the way from the counter to the staircase. The countertops were lightly toasted but otherwise usable, though they couldn't salvage the pan or the baking supplies that had been left out. All things considered, it could have been a lot worse, though it wasn't exactly how Edward and Winry had foreseen their lazy day off.
And then Winry and Edward had to have a serious talk with Theo about breaking the rule about never cooking without adult supervision.
When Edward and Winry finally fell into bed that night and cuddled up against each other, they both seemed to finally let out the breath they'd been holding all day.
"I think I aged twenty years," Winry said, leaning her head against Edward's shoulder.
"Yeah."
"Hm?" Winry asked. "What's got you all quiet?"
Edward didn't know how to even begin. His mind had spent the day running in circles, trying to deal with his strange cognitive dissidence, as he tried to reconcile two incompatible ideas.
Winry twisted so they faced each other, "You know that you can tell me anything, but if you don't want to, you don't have to." Honestly, Edward was the luckiest guy in the entire world.
Sometimes when he met up with old friends, they would tease that Edward had lost his spitfire, tamed by domesticity, but that was the complete opposite of what had happened. After all, Winry had never exactly been a pushover herself. They smoothed each other's rough edges, and sure, they were lucky they didn't have any close neighbors, because everyone in their family was loud, but Edward knew that being Winry's husband, being a father to Theo, Sara, and Lucas, made him a better and happier person than he could have ever imagined. It was worth a bit of good-natured ribbing.
But sometimes talking about his feelings sent him fumbling, much like his confession to Winry at the train station so many years ago.
"I don't really talk about this anymore," Edward began slowly. "But I've always hated myself for what I did, and I couldn't ever forgive myself for my mistake."
"Forgive yourself for what?"
"For trying to bring back Mom," he said quietly.
"Edward…"
"I know, I know," he said, pushing himself upward, so he leaned against their headboard. "But how could I? It was completely my fault! It's always been my fault that Alphonse had to spend all those years in the armor."
"Edward…"
"I know," Edward said, but it didn't matter what Winry or even Alphonse told him. That one ultimate sin was his own. "But I just… I think I just…"
"Yeah?"
"I think I just did," he said, recognizing it as truth as the words spilled out. "I think I just did."
Winry scrunched up her nose like she always did when she was confused. Edward thought it was adorable and liked kissing it, but now was probably not the time.
"The accident this morning," Edward said, pausing to see if Winry had made the connection yet. "It was a serious thing that Theo did and it put all of us in danger. But even though it was bad and it was against our rules for him, I'm not really mad at Theo, you know? I mean, he's only eleven. He's just a kid."
Understanding flickered in Winry's eyes.
"Can you imagine?" Edward asked. "Theo performing human transmutation? It's laughable: he's a child. What could he possibly know about that kind of stuff?" He shook his head with a wry smile. "I couldn't reconcile the two sides of my brain. Because how could I excuse Theo for what he did -just because he was a kid- and still be so angry about what I did as an eleven year old.
"Gosh, sometimes I can't even believe the things that we did when we were their age. By the time both of us were Lucas' age, we were essentially orphans."
Winry leaned her head back onto his shoulder, "I know. I can't imagine Theo or Sara or Lucas caring for themselves. They're still so small and helpless. Of course they're getting older and growing up but still: could you imagine Theo becoming a State Alchemist in a year and a half?"
Edward shuddered, "Don't even say things like that."
Winry snuggled against Edward, as they took advantage of weather that wasn't quite warm enough to make sleeping in close quarters sticky. But Winry kept shifting, and Edward's mind wouldn't quiet.
"They'll never have to experience what we did," Edward whispered.
"Thank goodness for that," Winry said.
"Is it wrong?" Edward asked. "To find some kind of peace with it. It was still my fault. My idea. My initiative. My circle. And it was my choice."
"Theo's the one who wanted to make pancakes," Winry said quietly. "It was Theo's idea, Theo's batter, and Theo not watching the oil close enough. Even though Sara and Lucas wanted pancakes, it was Theo's responsibility. But he made a mistake. It's what people do, especially kids. We don't always have great judgement at the age of eleven, and maybe you'll think I'm crazy… but I think it was really messed up of Truth to punish a few kids trying to see their mom again."
Edward made to respond, but Winry put her finger over his lips.
"Don't argue with me tonight. I'm right this time," she said.
The day's excitement took its toll and soon after, Winry fell asleep, her breathing evening and her tense expression loosening into a light smile. But sleep still evaded Edward.
His beautiful wife had already begun her nightly sprawl across the bed, but her head rested in the nook of his elbow. Not entirely comfortable for Edward, but he could do with a little numbness in exchange for feeling her body rise and fall next to his.
Winry's presence had been a constant in his life for many years, but years before he'd ever wake up intertwined with his wife, the first thing Edward saw when he woke up every morning was a suit of armor, unable to even smile at his brother. From the moment Edward had activated the human transmutation circle, self-loathing had been his constant companion.
It felt treacherous and wrong to finally make peace with something so horrific. But when he looked back on the days following the transmutation, for the very first time he could imagine himself in Mustang's shoes.
Staring down a child who'd made a mistake.