Timeline: Can't remember if I mentioned this, but Chapter 50, 51, this chapter, and a few others beyond are all occurring eight days after the night at the junkyard, or seven days after the kiss in the hospital, if you guys like to think of the time after midnight as a separate day. This is relevant because in later chapters a minor OC refers to the day the Elrics and Rockbells came back as 'the other day' because he's an older person and the days sort of blend together more, while in actuality the Elrics and Rockbells came back to Resembool four days prior to the 'day' it is right now (in this chapter). I just wanted to be perfectly clear about that.


Ed laid facedown on the bed that was his cell in the room that was his prison. He was half expecting a parade of clowns and cheerleaders to come bursting though the door to present him with the Amestris's Biggest Asshole Award. He kept asking himself what had been going through his mind, and the answer was definitive and always the same: Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

And now Winry probably hated his guts.

Damn, damn, damn!

Idiot!

How could he have let his temper take control of him like that?

All he'd really been able to figure out of his actions was that after being so scared that she was gonna die, Winry had turned on him and embraced the enemy. He'd just wanted her to hurt the same way he had been hurting.

Someone knocked timidly on the door. Al probably, to lecture him. Or Granny Pinako, to bring dinner because Winry had refused to enter his room.

"It's not like you'll go away if I ask," Ed said to allow the person entrance. They opened the door, but Ed didn't look up. This pillow seemed soft enough. Maybe he could just stick his face in there and suffocate himself. Would that actually work? He was half willing to give it a try. "What do you want?" he asked the person who had come in.

"Ed, I brought you dinner. Are you hungry?"

Ed froze for a moment. She'd come back? Willingly? Why?

Maybe now she was ready to do the screaming-and-cussing-and-throwing-wrenches angry routine.

Ed didn't say anything in response to her question—he just waited.

But she didn't yell, or cuss, or throw wrenches at his head, even though Ed knew he deserved it. She set the tray down on the little table beside the bed, then knelt beside it, so that her voice was at his ear. "Ed? Are you mad at me?"

He lifted his head and frowned at her. "Mad at you? What for? I thought you were mad at me!"

"Well, do you want me to be?"

"No. That's a stupid question."

"Then I won't be," she said simply, as if that was that. "So, are you mad at me?"

"I was the one who called you that… name. I should be the one in trouble here. Why're you just letting me off the hook?" Ed was apparently unable to get past the fact that he wasn't in trouble.

"Because I don't want to be mad. And especially not over something so stupid. There are plenty of other things to be mad about."

Ed stared at the headboard with his chin resting on the pillow. "Like what?" he joked.

"Like what happened at the hospital that first night? Actually, the real thing I'm annoyed about is the fact that you haven't brought it up yet."

Ed frowned and blushed. Yes, he remembered that all too clearly. He didn't know how to address it, or if it had indeed actually happened. It would be pretty awkward if he'd brought it up, only to find out it really had been a dream!

"I don't know what you're talking about, Winry."

She tugged his earlobe. "You're blushing. See how pink your ears are! You can't really mean to tell me you don't remember?"

"I don't know what you're talking about. All I remember from that night is that I had a lot of really weird dreams because of those painkillers. I have no idea what you're talking about."

Her eyes dampened and she looked downward. "I guess maybe you really don't remember."

By her tone, Ed could be sure that that hadn't been a dream. Damn! He just kept making things worse and worse! "Winry… I…"

"Just forget I brought this up, Ed. I know I'm not making sense right now."

"No, it's not that, it's just… I do remember."

"You don't have to lie to make me feel better, Ed. I can tell you have no idea what I'm talking about. Please, just forget about it, okay?" She stood up to leave.

"Winry, wait." Ed sat up painfully and grabbed her wrist, stopping her as she turned to leave.

"Ed, don't do this!" She just wanted to get away before she really started crying!

Ed refused to let go of her hand, though, and he matched the force of her pulling away with the force to pull her back. There was a short tug-of-war between them, until Winry lost her balance and stumbled onto the bed and landed on top of Ed.

"Oof."

"Ow."

"Oh, sorry! I forgot you're still hurt." Winry tried to get up, but Ed stopped her by draping his arm around her waist.

"You're not hurting me that much. Lie here a minute with me, Winry." He closed his eyes, smiling serenely.

"Ed, you're being weird."

"I know. Shh."

"Why?"

"I'm enjoying the moment."

"Oh." She was quiet for a minute, watching his face. Eventually Ed opened one eye and looked at her with a smirk.

"Did I scare you?"

"Sorry?"

"When I told you about the dream where you shot yourself. Did I scare you?"

"I… guess… I mean, you kind of dumped a lot on my mind that night."

Ed was quiet for a second, staring past her shoulder at the ceiling. "I'm sorry."

"For scaring me?" She chuckled. "You're forgiven."

"No," he corrected, "I'm sorry for not having the guts to talk to you about it. You said that was a better reason to be mad than the other, right? Well, I'm sorry."

"Oh." She paused. "Well, you're still forgiven, I guess. Mostly because I can't find it in me to be mad, but I guess that's as good a reason as any."

"Good, then I won't feel like a hypocrite when I do this." His automail hand was already around her waist, so his flesh hand was free to reach up and pull her face down to his.

When they broke apart a few seconds later, Winry's hand went up to his forehead. "What's gotten into you? Are you running a fever or something?"

"Was I that bad?" He smirked.

"No," she said quickly, her voice dipping in a way that said, 'Quite the opposite!' "It's just that I wasn't expecting… that… It's just that I figured, knowing you, I would have to, um, initiate…"

"'Knowing me'? What's that supposed to mean?"

Winry was blushing magnificently. "I'm so embarrassed that you're making me say this, but I'd always figured that if the time came, I would be the one to kiss you first."

She'd actually thought about this? And here he'd been thinking he'd be lucky if she didn't reject him! "Why you? You think I'd be too scared to do it?"

"Well, clearly not." She tugged his earlobe once. "I just think you're too indecisive about personal stuff like that. I knew I'd have to force you into a decision if I wanted you to make one."

He caught her hand after she'd pulled his ear, then brandished the ring, which still smelled vaguely of jewelry cleaner. "And how is this not the decision I made?"

"That might mean something, Ed, but it could mean anything. You could claim it's your decision, but it only passes by a hair's breadth."

Ed closed his eyes, scowling slightly. "This is complicated."

"Sorry?" She didn't really know what to say to that. "I guess I just overthought it."

"Yes."

There was a lull in the conversation then, but the silence wasn't awkward. They were just enjoying the moment together—though neither could deny that their hearts weren't beating a mile a minute.

Presently Ed opened his eyes, realizing that if he didn't he would soon fall asleep and he didn't want that. He noticed that Winry was biting her lip, and she seemed to be holding back tears and failing spectacularly. "What's wrong?" he asked with a little catch in his voice.

"I… it's nothing. I'm being stupid." She scrubbed them away. "It's not my fault, after all."

"What are you talking about?"

"Well, at first I was thinking I wanted to ask you about the scar I saw on you that I promised I'd ask you about later. But then that got me thinking about the battle and Eli and his little sisters and—well, I guess you didn't get to see the picture, but the girls are so beautiful, and they have precisely the same eyes as their mom, and he said his mom was dead and I just—just got overwhelmed I guess."

"Breathe once in a while, Winry. You're scaring me." She took a loud, sarcastic breath. "Good," he said, just as sarcastically. "Now explain to me why it's necessary that you cry over someone else's misfortune? Someone who you don't even know? And who tried to shoot you in cold blood less than an hour ago?"

"He's a little kid, Ed," said Winry, trying to keep her tone inoffensive so they wouldn't have the same argument as earlier. "He doesn't have anywhere to go and he's stuck with two little sisters to take care of and no one who loves him or anything and he's just trying to do what makes sense right now. He has even less going for him than you or I did when we lost our parents, Ed. And I feel like it's my fault. It's like with Scar… in the alley, you remember."

Yeah. All too well, after that dream he'd had in the hospital. "I guess I see what you mean, Winry. But please don't compare yourself to Scar. It's true that there are… similarities, but it's the differences that really count. Winry, you didn't kill him, and even if you had it would have been completely justified. Erlich was no benevolent doctor, saving your life. If he hadn't died, we probably would have."

"I know all that already. It's what I'm telling myself. But still, the similarities… It's too much. That's why I couldn't send him away, and why I was so insistent to Grandma about letting him and his sisters stay with us."

Ed pulled himself out from under her and sat up. "What?"

"Oh… right. I didn't tell you about that, did I? Yeah, I begged Grandma to let him stay with us, and she's the kind of person who couldn't have lived with herself if she'd said no. I take it for granted sometimes that Grandma's so giving, but it's part of the way she is."

Ed gaped. "He's staying here! With us?"

"Yes, Ed," Winry said patiently.

Ed made some unintelligible spluttering noises, then wisely sealed his lips and stared at her.

"Ed, say something. You're making me nervous."

"You invited the spawn of a crazy, would-be murderer into the house to live here, and the eldest of them has already made it clear that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and you and Grandma are apparently completely okay with it. What am I supposed to say?"

"Ed, don't call them 'spawn,' they're children. Little kids who've lost their parents and need a place to go. Eli came to us desperate and attention-starved and at his wit's end, with a gun that didn't so much tell us 'I want to kill you' as much as it told us 'I need help.' Now, Ed, can you honestly tell me that there's a reason you don't want them here, other than the fact that Eli did something stupid because he'd just lost his only surviving parent and had little siblings to take care of and didn't know what else to do?"

Of course she would word it so it sounded like his own story—how could he refute Eli's reasons when she laid it out like that?

Ed pouted. "I don't like kids."


Hey, random question for you guys! When writing that phrase, do you write "hair's breadth" or "hare's breath?" A hair is very thin, therefore its breadth is very small, and a hare is a small animal, therefore its breath is also small. So which phrase do you use when writing? I know most people don't differentiate between the difference between "breadth" and "breath" when they're speaking, so I can never tell which one it is. When I used that phrase in the chapter, I said "hair's breadth," because it seemed more logical at the time I was writing and I didn't want to think too hard about it, but I would like to know what you guys think.

Well, yes, that was the anticipated fluffiness I promised last chapter--hope you enjoyed it! This chapter also serves the plot purpose of explaining why Ed's not as much of a grouch towards the Erlich kids in later chapters as maybe you'd expect him to be. Actually, it's not that Ed's forcing his feelings, but Winry pretty much has him wrapped around her finger at this point, so he forces himself to have an open mind and lets the kids earn his respect in their own ways.

Anybody wondering about the pronunciation of the Erlich kids' names? I've had no one ask me about it yet, but just for reference: Meta = long 'e' like meet/meat. Joli = Jolie minus the 'e.' This actually has some meaning! Joli/Jolie means 'beautiful' in French, but the 'e' makes the word feminine, so the adjective only applies to girls when it has an 'e' on it, and only to men when there's no 'e.' The fact that Joli has a "boy's" name, and the fact that she has red hair while the other Erlichs are blond, are both references to the isolation that Joli has suffered under practically since birth. She was only three months old when her mother died, so while six-year-old Meta and nine-year-old Eli were old enough to be 'ignored' without much happening in consequence, Joli was the child that still had to be paid attention to, so she got some serious resentment from her father for that dependency. It's hard to tell, when we first meet Joli in the story, that she has problems, but there are references to issues that Joli has--Meta mentions that Joli does not sleep through the night because of nightmares, for example. These are yet more hints that Joli has developed some deeper psychological issues that will have to be dealt with as she ages. And yes, she will age!

I have already got planned a sequel to this fic (if and when I decide to wrap it up) which will start off two years after this fic, (or one if it continues long enough; I want Ed and Winry to be seventeen, so if this one continues for a really long time, the sequel will pick up where this one left off--the point is, there's a scene already written in my mind for Ed's seventeenth birthday.) Anyway, this sequel idea will put some consideration into how the Erlich children grow up in Resembool after... well, a lot of stuff is already planned to happen that I can't go into but which I promise you will explore first, Meta's and Eli's future, and second, Joli's psychological issues.

Another real interesting point while I'm chattering about the Erlich kids--I think you'll find Meta to be very interesting! At first it seems like she alternately hates and is afraid of Ed, but later on we start to get this feeling like Meta has grown to idolize Ed (and to a lesser extent, Al), comparing Ed's past to her own and trying to be like him in some ways. It's all vitally interesting to me--I hope I get some reviewers as entertained as I am by human psychology to comment on the relationship between Meta and Ed.