The Silent Heart
Chapter Two
Parent of Contradiction
- mirage -
With the apartment so dark Christopher's expression of extreme disagreement looked like anger, and Ed's sprawled form like a corpse tossed along the bed. Hohenheim went, slapping at the snow in his hair and dampening the shoulders and back of his dress shirt to the light switch and sparked the apartment's three bare bulbs to life. Where he had walked he left puddles, and Ed was melting into the sheet he had dropped the boy on.
The apartment was a two bedroom with no proper living room. It was a large open space with two attached bedrooms and lavatory. To the far right of the entrance was the humble kitchen, with a brief extension of wall to give it some seclusion. To the left was the modest table and chairs which had been included. That dinning set, in addition to the wrought iron day bed, and single dresser in the first bedroom, were all that were provided. Over the months Hohenheim had added and changed next to nothing, and placed only a small bookshelf and chair beneath one of the large front windows. After carrying Edward home under the anxiety anyone might see him and report him to the police, or worse yet, they would encounter a patrol while Edward had no identification and looked by all means apprehended with a struggle, he was seeking the first appropriate surface to set the boy, and that was the day bed.
"I haven't seen him in a while," Hohenheim whispered, bringing his palm to his face with exhaustion.
"He's all wet," Christopher said, looking at Ed with an incongruous frown tensing his lips. "And he smells really bad."
"He was always so independent."
"You found him in an alley?" Christopher couldn't wrap his head about this. "Drunk maybe?" Neither of them smelled any alcohol. "Does he live close by?"
"Because he's always been so independent, even now I feel more inappropriate than I do helpful."
Christopher's expression sunk with disgust. "He should be thankful for any help he receives now." Chris pointed angrily to the bed. "He would have frozen to death over night." This was the truth. "He'll realize that." Christopher crossed his arms and gave a heavy sigh. He let his anger go and considered Ed critically. "You want me to help you with him?" Hohenheim could hear Christopher's agitation.
Christopher didn't understand what it meant to have family you wished you didn't.
"No, thank you," he said kindly.
Chris nodded and let himself out the way the boy often let himself in. "If you need me…" he stopped in the threshold and looked back.
"A bowl of warm water perhaps."
Chris gave a nod and left. Hohenheim returned his gaze to Ed now that they were alone. The barrier Edward had erected between them was strong even under these conditions. The mortar was wet when Edward was very young, but from the day it was built, it had been this way with his son. Edward held him accountable with the ferocity of a scientist, and he had schooled the boy to think such. With Ed more interested in blocks than chemical elements he had taught the boy that logic possessed a true man of science, and Ed saw no reason to grant him leniency.
Hohenheim stood and tentatively unclasped Edward's damp and soiled jacket. Edward didn't move when he spread it and slipped the right shoulder out. The right arm was gone. The left came free with no effort. "Edward." His voice was filled with sadness. "Look at what we have become." He grasped the bottom of Edward's shirt, freed it from his pants, and lifted it over the boy's head. The sight of Edward's chest tightened his throat. "My god," he whispered, closing his eyes on sight of it.
Scars consumed the right shoulder and disfigured Edward's skin like a disease crawling steadily inward. The right nipple was twisted awkwardly at an extreme angle, and the stump was not a clean dismemberment, but undulating surface of swells and sink holes as if it had violently been ripped away and Edward's skin had tried to accommodate.
Hohenheim turned his face down. He remembered his son's body from the summer when Edward would run about in the grass without a shirt. Edward and Alphonse had his skin and were easily sun kissed. Trisha found this adorable, and always took the boys outside.
Hohenheim remembered Edward's body from a clear summer memory when Trisha was outside watering flowers with the boys playing together in the lawn. Without warning she turned the hose on the children. Aiming careful of their faces she was delighted with their surprise, and laughing, had told Hohenheim that she did this often. As she explained sometimes the boys saw her coming, and began laughing, and other times they were not expecting, and became angry. She had a uniquely playful soul, and often, was her own comedian.
On this particular occasion she had ambushed them from behind, and Edward began yelling at her while Alphonse whined. Alphonse was not impressed with his soggy clothing, but Ed was already in his bathing suit and tossed his wet shirt off and ran down the lawn.
Hohenheim remembered the wealth of life in his son's growing body: the fat in his small stomach, the healthy weight of his tiny arms, the pink sun burnt nose. Edward was healthy, and so much so it was hard to imagine him ever leaving his blossoming state. In the summer after heavy rains the far left of their yard would saturate itself into a grass swamp and Edward would run laughing through the water until fully exhausted and half coated in mud. That small, but resilient body of hope, seemed to have been beaten and stabbed into a different larger form as if someone had crafted Edward's childhood into adolescence like you would a ball of clay. What existed now had barely any resemblance to what existed then. Edward's new body was carved with life's hardships and stripped of the weight warm days and meals provided. Carefully Hohenheim drew his finger along the visible rib cage Edward flashed with each exhale and found it painfully violent. "What have you done to yourself?" he asked. Somehow out of the happy eager child he remembered formed the battered body of an angry young man. Edward was bitterly lean. His chest had widened, his hips disappeared, and it seemed almost physically true that to arrive in Germany, Edward had given up nearly everything.
A soft knock came and Christopher returned with a bowl of water. He was disturbed so little had progressed since he'd left, and looked wearily at Hohenheim. It was uncharacteristic of such a confident and educated man to flounder so blatantly. It made Chris nervous.
Edward's appearance was deceiving, casting his disproportionate and filthy body in a weak light. To Hohenheim, Edward's slender frame became impossibly heavy on the trek home, and out of breath he had dropped to his knees and let his arms collapse on top of the day bed mattress. Ed had hung like a cadaver since he was lifted from the alley, but the fall from a secure cradling grip suddenly startled him into a fight. Although incoherent, Edward knew in which direction he wanted to punch, and Christopher had rushed forward and pulled Hohenheim from the side of the bed when Edward's small left fist almost took out Hohenheim's face.
Hohenheim had slumped to his butt in a state of shock, but Christopher had responded and pounced on Ed the same way he would a wild drinking buddy. He pinned down which ever part of Ed tried to get up while swearing at the boy. Now with Ed motionless, Christopher didn't seem any less skeptical Ed would come to in a fit of wild aggression. He was hesitant to leave, and it was obvious.
"Hohenheim, are you sure you don't want me to help you?" Chris set the bowl of water down at the foot of the day bed. "I mean, you know I don't mind."
"Christopher although your company is a comfort I am afraid this is not your place," Hohenheim said softly. He pulled Ed's belt apart and tugged it off. "And although it seems mine, I am unwanted in it." This pained him, in a sadness he remembered only from being human.
"He won't be grateful for your help?" Chris asked, again becoming angry. Hohenheim was silent. He was unable to put his relationship with Edward into words. "You deserve more than that." Chris gestured angrily towards Ed. "What kind of person isn't grateful for help, huh?" Chris gestured again with a sharper more deliberate illustration of anger. "What type of person spits in your face after that type of effort, huh? What kind of son?"
Hohenheim stood folding Edward's belt slowly in his hand. The leather brought back memories. "A son deserted by his father," he whispered his confession. He looked down at the wet leather and smiled. "He's always been so bullheaded." He gave the belt a squeeze. "I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say he has been that way since birth."
In a farmhouse that seemed years away Hohenheim remembered pulling a young five year old Edward down the hall by his hand.
With just seven months from the last time he'd visited Edward and Alphonse had grown taller. Alphonse was not frightened of him, and Edward's vocabulary had exploded. Over breakfast he had tested the boy, asking all sorts of questions and receiving all sorts of answers. Edward showed human creativity and a form of severely handicapped logical deduction. Ed was curious as to where Hohenheim had been and looked at the things he brought home. He showed the boys feathers from one of the rarest birds, and explained how he had taken them right from its nest. He was currently studying what would become Entomology, because he was curious as to what insect life meant within the world, and also, for humans. It fascinated him that there were poisons which could be used as poison and poison which could be used as medicine. Inside a small box he had several species pinned down and Alphonse had tried to rip the bugs out. He succeeded in crushing a rare Lord Howe Island Stick Insect in his palm before realizing the bugs were dead. Alphonse broke out whining and wiped the bug's dust like remains onto Ed, who stood at his side. Looking shocked and disgusted, Ed began yelling at Alphonse in a way Hohenheim had never seen. Trisha explained this simply: the boys argue. "There are two of them" she said happily, as if that put it all together. "They talk to one another, and play together, you should see it."
This was not all that had developed. Alphonse had stopped eating vegetables, and Trisha said she wanted help with this. She said she had tried everything she could think of, and everything Pinako could think of, but Alphonse refused until they forced him, and then he cried. This was not the case with Ed, Ed ate everything, but Alphonse was becoming very picky. Fruitlessly Hohenheim tried to convince the boy to eat healthier, but children did not listen to reason, and Alphonse wanted none of this.
Trisha also warned him he had to watch what he said, because Edward was a sponge. "What do you mean by that?" Hohenheim asked, laughing with such use of the word.
"I mean, he hears everything you say and repeats it. I've had a horrible time of it."
Hohenheim found this rather improbable. "How so?"
"Any time we go into town, somehow, we always run into some form of profanity, and he picks it up. I can't get him to stop."
"Is the stool not working?" he teased.
She was washing the lunch dishes, and she smacked him playfully and repeatedly with the dishcloth for asking such a question. He mocked the stool and she splashed him with the sink water. After dinner she tried to fill him in on everything he had missed. She made them lemonade and they sat outdoors with the boys playing in the grass. She told him about things she had planted, things she had sewn, things the boys had done. Ed was learning to read, and Alphonse was faking it, memorizing shorts books Ed read repeatedly. She said since Alphonse had actually held one of them upside down and looked at the pages while reciting what he knew was written inside it. She said it was all she could to keep from cuddling him terrible.
While they were outside the boys broke into an argument and Ed smacked Alphonse in the face when he disobeyed Ed's instruction. Trisha sat up with immediate interest when Alphonse cried out a noise of mild pain. For a moment Hohenheim was not sure what had happened, the boys were standing along side each other with Ed looking hideously angry and Alphonse holding his cheek, before Alphonse broke into tears and clobbered Ed in the face with the toy he was holding.
"Alphonse!" Trisha called, sitting her cup down and marching quickly into the lawn. "You do not hit your brother." Alphonse began wailing that Ed hit him first, and Trisha arrived just in time to stop Ed from smacking Alphonse for telling on him. With Edward's raised hand trapped in her grasp Ed told Alphonse he was a stupid ass for telling on him.
Trisha turned around and looked at Hohenheim, and he saw her gaze of need. She was asking him to participate, and not just to participate, to lead.
Hohenheim stood up, feeling oddly comfortable with a role he could identify with. He had lived a long time and seen many harsh things in life. He believed he could be a good disciplinarian. "Let me take him," he said, sitting his drink aside.
"No Hohenheim!" Ed yelled angrily. Ed had stopped calling him any title referencing his father role and, two days ago, adopted calling him Hohenheim like the other town's people.
"Do not be so naive you think your mother is the only parent who can discipline you Edward," Hohenheim said, firming his voice to one of authority. He crossed the lawn calmly with his hands in his pockets. Alphonse stopped crying with the change in his demeanor and looked worried, but Ed seemed determined to stay angry.
"Honey," Trisha whispered, giving a small discrete shrug. "You have to talk to them like they're children. Or else they'll struggle to understand you."
Hohenheim did not think poorly crafted sentences meant greater understanding, and he took Ed's arm from her. Ed startled at once, grasping for the first moment, the depth of his predicament. He grabbed onto the side of Trisha's dress for comfort, but Hohenheim bent down and knocked Ed's grip away. "You and I will now go inside and have a talk."
Hohenheim left Trisha standing in the yard with Alphonse and took Ed inside by the arm. He was impressed with Ed for handling this with composure. Ed was extremely nervous with Hohenheim's new behavior, but kept silent. He looked back to verify Trisha was not coming several times, but did not argue until they were crossing the living room.
"This is stupid Hohenheim!"
Trisha said Ed learned the word stupid from town. Among other things Ed had learned when she went to buy mundane items like groceries were: horse's-ass, dumb-shit, dammit, and dang-it-to-hell. Out of all Edward's new vocabulary, she said she despised dang-it-to-hell, because she found it an unintelligible phrase rather than just a vulgar one. Hohenheim found this funny, and had laughed.
"It is easy for the culprit to mock the powers that cause him to reflect and abide," Hohenheim said, pulling Ed along. Since they'd left the kitchen Ed had stopped participating. He did not want to walk, deliberately took his time on the stairs, and by the time they were in the upstairs hall, was digging his heels into the ground. Ed had no idea where they were going, or what for, but was trying to make the travel hard on purpose.
"Edward, this is not how a man behaves," Hohenheim said with disappointment. Ed whined with this scolding. "You need to keep your head when you become frustrated, a scientist does not lose himself. You must find the constructive outlet."
Ed was pressing his heels into the floor as he was pulled into his room. Hohenheim stepped over the toys Ed and Alphonse left strewn about, but Ed couldn't do so. He tripped on the plastic dinosaurs and began stumbling and whining. "I don't want to be in trouble!" Ed cried. "And Hohenheim I think you're—I think you're a dumb…dumb-shit!"
Hohenheim steered Ed alongside the twin bed the boys' shared and dropped Ed's arm. Immediately Ed looked up with worry and took to holding the bottom of his shirt.
"Edward, your mother says you're using bad words and hitting, and you've been told not to, so now you're going to be punished for it, do you understand?"
"I was already punished for that!" Ed whined, beginning a tearless cry and stomping his feet. "Why is Alphonse not in trouble too!"
"Ed, I am not debating the politics of your transgression," Hohenheim said firmly. He had been an eye witness. Ed was squeezing the bottom of his shirt and cringed deeply with the tone of Hohenheim's statement. Although Edward's vocabulary was not large enough to understand it, the boy was, as Trisha put it, smart as a fox. Edward knew the you're-in-trouble tone when he heard it. "Now..." Hohenheim paused, trying to find the path he was supposed to follow. He had set out to do what he had never done with his son, and it felt as if there were roadblocks everywhere. This would be the first time he reprimanded Ed and he would not admit, standing at the eleventh hour, he had mixed feelings about his fatherly duty.
He had promised himself he would swallow his unease regardless of Edward's behavior, and follow a code that would help Ed develop into a fine man. Trisha had said Pinako and some of the other mothers were concerned with Ed's consistent use of profanity. Although he was not sure who these other mothers were, he understood it was now the women, as a collective, who found his son's behavior worrisome, and he had to agree. Something more extreme than the stool Edward seemed to despise, but not fear, had to be done, and history told him this was it.
"When were you punished?" Hohenheim felt stumped. Did Trisha forget to tell him something?
"Mom did!" Ed whined out the word mom: Mooooom
"When?" Hohenheim asked, but Ed became confused and Hohenheim could see Ed thinking quickly, but struggling to answer. "When did mom punish you for swearing Ed?"
Ed pointed at his mouth with a significant expression of distress. "She put soap in my mouth!" Ed fell into a small dance of dread this was happening again.
Hohenheim began to laugh and promptly hid it. Trisha had told him firmly that things Ed did which were funny, but which were not supposed to be funny, he could not laugh at. "Yes Ed," Hohenheim said kindly. "But when did she do that? When did she put the soap in your mouth?"
"When did she put soap in my mouth?" Ed asked, bringing his fingers to his lips and covering them nervously. "I…I am not sure." Ed was unable to properly separate all days and months in his child's mind. "I am not sure! But she did!" Hohenheim fought a second laugh.
"And did you stop swearing? Did you use more bad words?" Hohenheim asked, certain this was not the case. That Edward's profanity continued well outside of today. Trisha was very attentive to the boys and she would not have made a mistake as significant as ordering punishment twice. "Are you still using bad words?" Hohenheim asked. Ed was silent, and stared up with wide guilt ridden eyes unwilling to confess. "And because you are Ed I have taken you to your room so you can be punished for doing so." Ed's expression caved inward with immediate panic and he looked about trying to spot the bar of soap. "Not with soap," Hohenheim clarified. "Today will be the first day you are punished like a man." Hohenheim brought his hands to his belt. He began unfastening it with a feeling of dread he tried to brush aside. He knew this day would come sooner or later and they couldn't neglectfully let Ed run wild.
Ed watched Hohenheim unfasten his belt with confusion before becoming exited. "Are we going in the pool?" Ed asked, giving a single eager hop. Hohenheim paused. Trisha had, while he was away, dug a small hole, lined it with a tarp, and filled it with well water. The boys loved it. They climbed in and out of it splashing each other, and bringing in any toy allowed so they were almost buried in plastic dinosaurs and blocks.
"No, Edward," Hohenheim said, sliding his belt off and folding it in half. "We're not going in the pool." He didn't exactly understand how Ed thought they would overcome a mathematical impossibility and comfortably fit in the small one foot deep three foot wide hole, but Ed was riveted with the idea and was smiling up with all thoughts of swearing forgotten.
Hohenheim knelt down and took Ed's arm in his grasp to keep the boy's attention. "You are being punished for using words your mother has said you can not say, and because you are not listening to her I am going to chastise you." Hohenheim showed Ed the belt but these words meant nothing to Ed. Hohenheim realized, slowly, that he would have to clarify. Ed lived in a world where chastising did not exist because Trisha never physically reprimanded him. "You see…" he said slowly seeking a word Ed would understand, before realizing dumbly, that as neighbors to a woman with as strong a will and as potent a mouth as Pinako, there was no way Ed had not been exposed, at least in some way, to what life would have been like under Pinako's reign. With this thought Hohenheim smiled as if he'd discovered gold. "Edward, you're going to be spanked for disobeying your mother."
Ed understood this at once, and burst into tears Hohenheim was unprepared for. Ed brought his hands to his face wailing, and Hohenheim felt his jaw slip open. He hadn't even touched the boy!
"Ed, stop crying," Hohenheim ordered, giving Ed's arm a gentle shake. "Edward, no one has even touched you. I am requesting that you stop this unnecessary crying."
"What am I being spanked for!" Ed cried, dragging his hands from his eyes but leaving them on his cheeks. "I didn't do anything!" Ed began wiggling where he stood. "Why do I have to be spanked for this! Spank Alphonse for it!"
Trisha had told Hohenheim she felt Edward was impossible to punish, and Hohenheim felt guilty for assuming it was Trisha's gentle heart, and not Ed himself, that made this so. Now standing with Ed crying whole heartedly when nothing had happened, and seemingly unable to grasp why, he felt paralyzed. Certainly he wasn't expected to continue under these conditions. He couldn't punish the boy if Ed didn't understand why.
"Ed," Hohenheim said, adapting a stern tone. "I have explained to you why you are being punished; now repeat it back to me." He gave Ed a gentle shake to gain attention and Ed began sniffling. "Repeat what you have been told."
"For using bad words," Ed whined. "Ones mom said I couldn't say."
"And because you did so anyway, you should conclude, although I have explained to you, that you're being spanked for that infraction, understand?" Ed began shaking his head in solid disagreement. "You can cry if you feel you need to." Ed immediately raised his tone of crying and Hohenheim regretted his offer. He stood quickly and using the grip on Ed's arm turned Ed to face the bed. "Stand still."
Ed threw his hands back and covered his tiny backside. "No! Wait! No wait!" Ed cried, dancing with panic. "I am sorry! I said sorry!"
Trisha had not given instruction as to how he should handle apologies, so Hohenheim continued without her. "Saying sorry does not erase what you have done. You must accept the consequences for your actions. Now put your hands on the bed." Ed began shaking his head. Hohenheim made a mental note to ask Pinako just how she'd spanked the boy. Ed seemed to understand very clearly he didn't want it, and that it was his small rear which was the target. "Ed!" Hohenheim snapped, firming his voice. "Hands on the bed."
Ed threw his hands on top of the bed with Hohenheim's strengthened tone and pressed his face to it crying. "All right," Hohenheim whispered to himself. He gripped the belt firmly and steadied himself. Ed looked pitiful crying into the bed wearing a summer tee shirt over shorts and bare feet. Trisha had said when she tried to punish Ed he looked at her in such a way she lost all capability, and although Hohenheim found it unlikely Ed had these types of powers, and laughed when Trisha told him this, he was now coming to see how this could be true. Ed had already snuck a hand to cover the back of his shorts sobbing into the bedspread. "Ed," Hohenheim said, keeping his voice stern so no trace of his inner debate was heard. "If you do not keep your hands on the bed, one will become two."
"I don't want two!" Ed cried, lifting his head and stomping his feet.
"I said if you don't keep you hands on the bed." Ed quickly put his hands on the bed and Hohenheim told himself to stop stalling. He had seen this done for hundreds of years. The act was simple and easy to execute. He had done everything exactly as he should have up until this point.
Hohenheim laid his hand on Edward's back to steady the boy and brought the belt to Ed's small bottom. In comparison to Edward's innocence the belt looked like a monster, and staring at the leather while listening to Ed cry Hohenheim was forced to acknowledge reality: He was not going to be able to strike Ed. Be it the age, or the pretense, hitting the boy seemed unmanageable.
Hohenheim cast a frustrated glance toward the door. Trisha did not often ask for help with the boys, and he felt not punishing Ed was letting her down. He tightened his grip on the belt and swung it full force into the bedpost. It hit with a horrible crack. He would have to let Ed off with a warning.
Ed screamed and bolted into Hohenheim's legs. "Dad!" Ed cried, wrapping his arms about Hohenheim's thigh. Ed was frightened by the sound and violence of it. "I am sorry!" Ed confessed, sobbing out his words in large choking breaths. "I am sorry!"
Hohenheim tossed the belt onto the bed and lifted Ed to his shoulder. "I bet you are," he teased, stroking Ed's back with Ed crying heavily and hanging on tight.
Trisha appeared in the doorway a second later, hands over her mouth, looking horrified. Hohenheim broke out laughing at her fragile expression. "Trisha I…" He meant to explain he couldn't complete the deed, but his laughter interrupted him.
"Oh my god," Trisha whispered, rushing forward and taking Ed from Hohenheim's arms. "He's only five year's old Hohenheim, how could you." She looked terrified what she heard was the belt meeting Edward's body. She clutched Ed intently, locking his head into the crook of her neck and patting his back as confusion began to dawn. Edward's cries were not those of pain, and a perplexed expression rippled across Trisha's brow. Edward was crying and clinging to her with all four limbs, but he was not behaving as if he were injured. "Edward?" Trisha called to him, stroking an investigatory hand down his body, but he was unhurt. She looked up with confusion. "Darling?" Then she began to scold. "How can you laugh. He's only a child." Trisha returned to a quick rhythmic patting on Ed's back. "This was hard for him."
"But I didn't," Hohenheim said, indicating the belt on the bed with a laugh. "I couldn't do it Trisha, you were right. He takes the strength right out of you." That was how Trisha had said it, whenever I try, he takes the strength right out of me.
"What?" Trisha asked, stroking Ed's head when Ed began rubbing it into her shoulder and collar bone crying exaggerated and muffled statements to them. "Not even once?"
Hohenheim shook his head. "I hit the bedpost." He was not overly proud of this. Trisha looked to the bedpost with surprise and Ed leaned back in her arms to face her.
"Mom?" Ed was sniveling and wiping at his face. "Mom?"
Trisha stroked her hand down Ed's head and pressed her nose to his. "Okay now Edward," Trisha whispered, nuzzling Ed's nose with her own. "No more tears sweet boy." She coaxed Ed's head back to her shoulder with him calming and then looked from the belt back to Hohenheim. He offered an elaborate shrug.
"I didn't have the heart."
"Hohenheim, you won't believe the words coming out of this boy's mouth," Trisha said, sounding troubled. Hohenheim was supposed to be the dominant parent, the one capable of harsh punishments suitable for boys. "I've tried everything I can think of."
"So he told me." Because Ed wasn't looking Hohenheim allowed himself to chuckle and Trisha sighed with exasperation.
"Maybe you're going overboard with the belt darling," Trisha said, cradling Ed and swaying gently. "Two weeks ago Pinako spanked him for putting bugs down Winry's dress and she didn't use a belt." Trisha pointed to the belt. "She was able to do it." Ed instantly began protesting his memory of this event but they ignored him.
"A boy deserves a belt," Hohenheim said firmly. This was what he had been told, and what he had witnessed growing up and living over the decades. It had changed from a whip, to a flog, to a strap, to a belt, but it was the same. Boys needed the crack of leather. "I can't use my hand like a woman."
Trisha lifted an eyebrow and the corner of her mouth jumped up in that tiny smirk he loved so much. "Well big strong man," she teased. "Since we can't really consider this a success, I guess you should hide the evidence." Trisha indicated the belt with a little twirl of her finger before carrying Ed to the door. "Before your pants fall down that is."
"How did he loose his limbs?" Christopher asked, shaking out Ed's jacket. Hohenheim considered the question while beginning on his son's fly. "Well, I mean...if that's private..."
"Yes." Hohenheim slipped a finger into Ed's pants and plucked upward. He confirmed a second cotton with relief, and carefully separated Edward's leather pants from the damp underwear before pulling them off.
"When he comes to, if the plumbing is still acting up I can help you bring up enough hot water for a bath," Chris said.
Hohenheim gave Christopher a kind smile. "Do you have any work you should be doing now Chris?" He tossed Ed's pants to the floor. "I don't want to keep you, and I promise, I am plenty capable."
"I know but…" Chris glanced anxiously toward Edward feeling uncomfortable with the boy's foreign presence. "I feel weird leaving you with him, you know?"
"He's not a complete stranger." Hohenheim gave Chris's shoulder a reassuring squeeze. "He'll be fine." He took Ed's jacket from Chris's hands and offered a subtle glance toward the door. "So will I." He gave Chris the smile he'd introduced himself with. "I promise."
"Okay," Chris said, appearing uneasy. "Just get me if you need me."
"Of course."
Hohenheim locked the door after Christopher and dropped Edward's jacket on the back of the chair. Before the water could cool he brought a rag and began washing Ed's chest. There seemed no reason to hurry and he let his hand glide slowly over the new form his son had taken. He remembered Edward as an infant, small enough the boy could barely manage sitting up. At that age he bathed Edward in the kitchen sink where Trisha washed the garden's vegetables. Once Ed began crawling they moved to the upstairs bath tub, and from there, with Ed splashing and playing he would read aloud to the boy when he was home. Trisha always selected nursery rhymes, and he always selected science. When Alphonse was born she would kneel alongside the tub holding Alphonse upright next to Ed and give him her famous half smile which taunted silently for him to read the rhyme about the four mice living inside a shoe.
Between those memories and this night there seemed ten lifetimes of events. There was a distance that was as real as the wall Edward had built between them. Trisha and the children seemed so insignificantly blissful they were imaginary, and yet here was Edward, a mere decade past, as real as if he had always existed at this age and with this body.
Hohenheim washed until the warm water became soiled. He wiped in long strokes down Edward's chest and about his neck. He washed under the boy's arms, down his thighs, and scrubbed the alley filth off Ed's remaining knee. With the chill in the room Edward was breaking out in goose bumps and Hohenheim left quickly for clothing. He didn't bother to search for anything which might fit. He chose a thick sweater he often wore while traveling and dressed Ed's top half quickly. He brought wool pants and took Edward's underwear which had been soiled with alley water and melting snow, and carefully fit the boy with new pants.
Edward was a child in adult clothing and there was plenty of extra to spare. Carefully Hohenheim tucked down the edges and tried to roll the unused fabric together. Humans were frail, caught illness easily, and died even faster. Although it seemed improbable something as nameless as disease would catch Ed, this was Germany, and disease was besting many people.
The day bed was fit only with a single pillow and fabric mattress. Hohenheim stripped his own bed of a thick quilt and sheet and doubled them over Edward's twig of a body. Since the bath Edward's expression seemed to be growing tighter. The boy's forehead was knitting with anxiety and Edward's mouth was pulling open slowly as if to scream. Hohenheim studied the change thoughtfully, but Edward wasn't moving and he hadn't made a sound. Although chloroform wasn't strong enough to keep him out indefinitely, Edward seemed exhausted beyond fair health, and it seemed probable he'd trapped himself in deep sleep.
Carefully Hohenheim released Ed's braid, rinsed the bowl, placed a cloth on Ed's eyes, and left to wash the boy's clothes in the kitchen sink. The grime from the alley floated free of the leather almost immediately, but the smell was lingering. It took close to an hour before Edward's articles were casted over the chairs of the only table and dripping to the old wooden floor.
Hohenheim left the kitchen, and the sound of his soft footsteps in the silent apartment, after remaining mainly still for so long, brought Ed's first movement. As if launched back into consciousness, Ed's head seemed to snap abruptly in the direction of this slight noise.
"Who's there?" Ed rasped, voice tight with fear and apprehension. "Identify yourself." Ed's voice was low and heavy as if with a cold. Hohenheim could see Ed's twisted expression of concern about the cloth on his face, and he hesitated to answer. Ed would recognize his voice. "I said who's there?" His silence was not reassuring to the boy.
"You're safe," Hohenheim whispered.
Ed flinched. There was a voice in the darkness, and even though it was expected, it held a sudden and powerful authority. Hohenheim's presence broke into existence all at once, in close proximity, and at a formidable height. "I brought you in from outside." Hohenheim kept his voice unrecognizable. "I found you on the street." He kept his statements simple and direct, because he felt Ed would appreciate this. Ed was waking up with a head full of nearly useless Amestrian knowledge, and Hohenheim knew from experience that would make Europe difficult.
Ed was stiff, concerned with his surroundings and slowly licking his lips. Unlike Ed's unconscious self which regarded everything, including his own safety, with indifference, things changed drastically with Ed's conscious. Hohenheim knew Ed's first concern would be his location, but that the fact he was weak, unable to move, and in the care and home of an unknown man, would not be lost on him. He assumed Ed would be polite and rather docile until he could learn more about his surroundings, or gain enough power to at least coordinate himself. It was dangerous to do otherwise. Ed did not know what type of person had assumed him, so Hohenheim kept silent. He was not going to offer more information then that Ed pressed for. All things considered, he had not had a chance to collect his own thoughts yet. To even form an opinion on what Edward arriving here truly meant. He was not eager to rush things, and he knew, like him, Ed had an intuition for danger, and he posed none.
"Where am I?" Ed asked again, unsatisfied with the original answer.
"Safe."
Edward managed a slow and reluctant nod of acceptance. This answer reveled nothing. Hohenheim took a step closer but Ed physically jerked with unexpected anxiety and he stopped. "You don't have to be afraid," he whispered. "I will do you no harm."
Ed licked his lips again and said nothing. His silence lasted so long Hohenheim worried Ed had drifted off. With Ed barely moving, and his eyes covered it was impossible to tell. Hohenheim considered approaching the bed again, but Ed cleared his throat and interrupted him. "Thank you." The struggling tone of Ed's voice had not improved. "For your hospitality stranger." Ed licked his lips.
"You should sleep." Hohenheim returned to the kitchen for some water and carefully approached the bed. Ed was incredibly nervous with his advance. "I've brought you something to drink." He lowered the cup to Ed's lips. "This is water." Ed opened his mouth the slightest bit but seemed incapable of raising his head. "Can you move?" The thought Ed could not move brought a concern Hohenheim didn't realize he could own. It was a vicious form of immediate panic, as if he had misdiagnosed an equation he should have known how to read.
Ed bristled with this question and swallowed roughly. "You brought me here?" Ed asked, avoiding the question.
"Yes."
"I…don't seem to have…much strength at the moment," Ed confessed uncomfortably. "I apologize."
Hohenheim slipped his hand beneath Ed's neck and lifted the boy's head. Ed waited, with calm experience, until the rim of the cup touched his lip. He didn't try to sip as Hohenheim thought he might. "Please drink," Hohenheim said, lifting the glass with extreme care. He watched the water level advance until it slid onto Ed's bottom lip and over it into the boy's mouth. "You may need it." Ed emptied the cup slowly and for a moment fought to catch his breath.
"When you found me..." Ed paused to clear his throat. "Was I alone?"
Hohenheim set the cup on the floor. "Yes." He tucked the blankets carefully about Ed's neck. The temperature of Ed's skin felt too low. Even an area as protected as the back of Ed's neck was cold. "But it's late I am afraid. Please get some rest. I am right in the next room if you need to call me." Ed gave a small nod and remained silent.
Careful of his movement Hohenheim stood and retreated to the first bedroom. It was unlikely Ed might recognize the sound of his body, but once understood, that sound would be as panic rising as his voice. It was doubtful Ed knew where he was. The reality of this world, and Ed's addition to it, was going to startle Ed into action. Hohenheim felt certain this was true. Healthy or not, Ed would react violently to the news the same way Hohenheim had, so delaying it was paramount. Germany was not a kind place to the naïve, and Hohenheim found Ed's lack of assertion concerning. Ed should have tried harder to secure his location and should have sought means to contact support. This was the most logical course of action when waking injured in a stranger's home. He expected as much from the boy. Ed's lack of action implied a wound to interfere. To stop Ed from functioning Hohenheim imagined a sore almost the width of the boy's torso pulsing with heat and agony. If he had not bathed and dressed the boy, his curiosity and concern would have kept him up until morning.
Instead Hohenheim climbed into bed and hoped Edward's exhaustion was simply the state from his travel. With any luck something as trivial as the speed in which he hit the ground had caused his poor coordination. If not, attempting to calm Ed from the shock of his surroundings was going to prove more complicated than Hohenheim would prefer.
Well my friends, that was chapter two. It went by quick, right? So far you've only had a glimmer of Germany. These first two chapters build a bit of a base of life back in Resembool, but we won't stay there. Ed will wake up, and then he will meet this new world. How do you think that will go?
Please leave me a review! If you're following this story – I really appreciate it! – but please let me know why. Your opinions are important to me!
Also, as a disclaimer this is NOT a HohenheimxEd piece. It is parental only, developing the father and son bond. Just wanted to put that out there.
Chapter 3: Guten Tag, will be posted 1/18/13. See you next Friday, enjoy your week!
