Chapter forty
Ed walked into the living room to find Granny sorting wires. Daddy was asleep upstairs and Ed would let him. He had stayed up with Ed for a long time and he didn't take naps in the middle of the day. "Hi, Granny!" Ed said, looking up at her where she sat.
"Oh, hi, Edward. Did you get some sleep?"
Ed nodded. "Mhm. Daddy's still asleep. Where's Al?"
"He went on a walk with Den and Rolf together with Riza. I guess they'll be back in an hour. I can fry you an egg if you're hungry."
Ed grinned. "Yes, please! And with cheese and ham and on top of a slice of bread! And can I please have two? Otherwise I just get hungry again."
Granny looked at him curiously. "Isn't that an awful lot of food though?"
"Don't know. I always eat more than Daddy, but I just get hungry otherwise. And Daddy says it's fine because I don't put on any extra weight. He thinks that my metabolism is a bit different after what happened. Al says I eat nearly as much as I did when I was fifteen."
"You do, huh? But you feel fine otherwise?" Granny looked concerned as she slid off the stool she was sitting on.
"Uh-huh."
"Hm." She walked to the kitchen and Ed followed her. Once inside, Ed went over to one of the kitchen chairs and climbed up. He watched Granny as she began preparing the food. "Granny? Why don't you like Daddy? Is it because he has killed people?"
"That is a very complicated matter, Ed. But, yes, that is part of it."
Ed felt sad at that. "You know, that's not nice of you. Daddy only stays in the military so that he can make this country better. That's all he wanted."
"That may be, Edward, but it still doesn't change what he's done."
"That's why he has nightmares too."
Granny turned around and looked at him sternly. "He does, huh?"
Ed nodded. "He cries in his sleep and calls himself a monster. He didn't want us to take his name because he thinks it's a burden. I don't think he feels like he deserves anything or anyone. Monsters don't think like that. Ticklemonsters do. Daddy's gonna give Ishbal back to the Ishbalans and he's gonna make this country a democracy and that is why he stays in the military."
Granny grunted. She did that a lot.
"You blame him for what happened to me, don't you?" Ed said, looking down. "It wasn't his fault! He tried to get me safe! He just didn't know that Lillian and Grant were military and working together!" Ed felt a few tears run down his cheeks. "They were the ones who t-tortured me! Who didn't let me eat or drink or sleep! They are the ones that make me scream at night! Not Daddy!" Ed couldn't stop crying loudly now. He just wanted Granny to like Daddy because Ed wanted to have both his families together and Granny and Winry were the only ones left of his old one besides Al.
Granny moved over and tried to hug him, but Ed didn't want a hug, he wanted to make his life fit together! He pushed Granny back. "I don't want a hug! I want you to get along with Daddy because I don't wanna choose between you!" Ed said.
"What's going on?" Ed heard Daddy say all of a sudden. He had come downstairs without Ed knowing it.
Ed was crying and angry at the same time, because it had been five days and Granny still didn't like Daddy. "WHY WON'T YOU JUST LIKE EACH OTHER?!" Ed shouted. Ed was stressed because if they didn't get along, then that parted his old life from his new one completely. Ed felt so pressured by the fact that everything and everyone had changed.
…And that Ed didn't belong here anymore even if Granny and Winry loved him.
Because he didn't belong with the old parts of his life, because they had grown up together with the old Ed and just like Ed, they couldn't change back.
Ed didn't fit.
And it was crushing him all the time.
And so Ed just jumped off his chair and ran out the kitchen door. "I'LL BE BY THE HOUSE!" Then he ran out the front door and towards the burnt ruins of his old house, his tears flying around him.
Roy immediately turned to run after Ed, but the old woman grabbed his wrist and held him back. "He doesn't want to see us before we've sorted things out."
"That doesn't matter! I'm his father and his bodyguard!" Roy said, panicking slightly. "AND HE JUST RAN OFF WITHOUT HIS SHOES ON! HE CAN GET CUTS AND FALL OR BREAK HIS LEG OR HAVE A STRANGER HUNT HIM DOWN AND KILL HIM! NOW LET GO OF ME OR I SWEAR I WILL HIT YOU!"
"Then we go after him and follow him at a distance. We're in the countryside after all, it's a lot more peaceful than the life you're used to." The woman spoke grumpily and then moved to walk past him, but Roy was quicker than her. Soon he had slipped his naked feet into his shoes and was running for the ruins of the Elric house, Ed's shoes in his hand.
And so Roy caught up to Ed one third of the way over to the burned down house and called out for him. "Edward! Stop, we'll talk, but don't run off like that!" Roy put his hand on Ed's shoulder, making him stop as he could no longer keep running.
Roy turned him around and saw the tearful fury of his son. Ed was sobbing. Roy kneeled down, stones digging into his knees as he was only wearing his boxers and undershirt. "Ed, please, you have to stop running off. I'm both your father and your bodyguard, which means that you scare the hell out of me every time you do that times double." Roy put the shoes down on the ground beside him.
Ed looked at him slightly angrily, but then he just threw himself at Roy and slung his arms around his neck. "I just want you to be friends! I need you to! I don't fit otherwise!"
Roy had noticed the inner turmoil the boy was going through these days, especially as it worsened his nightmares considerably. It made Roy relieved that they'd be going home to East City tomorrow so that Ed could hopefully be relieved of the constant tension. It was a rather good thing that the Rockbells were getting a new customer in tomorrow night who was going to get his automail surgery.
"Everything's grown up without me, Daddy! I need new connections because the old ones were to the old Ed, but I'm not him! And Granny and Winry are my family, but they belong to the old Ed too so I need you too to belong!" Ed sobbed, his cheek pressed against Roy's. "I'm wrong, Daddy!"
Roy just held Ed tightly. "Ed, I'll talk with her, but I've done a lot of things that she may not be able to forgive. After all, I'm the one who came here and convinced you to join the military. And I've killed a lot of people. In a way I'm a criminal and if that is how she sees me, then she's allowed to."
"But you were ordered to, Daddy!" Ed cried. "You're not evil!"
"That's how you see me, Ed. What I've done will qualify as evil in many people's books. It's just how it is, Ed. I'm sorry, but this is what I've been talking about. The military and the civilian world are sometimes so different that it hurts."
Roy hated himself for this. Ed and Al didn't deserve to be dragged through the dirt like this. Ed was a pure and innocent child and Roy was filling his life with darkness, pain and cold shoulders.
God, I am despicable. What right did I have to take them in? I'm a human weapon for god's sakes! I'm selfish and cruel and I shouldn't have done this because now I can't let them go. Once they get reacquainted with life outside the military, they are going to have to face the reality that their father is a mass murderer and what —
Ed kissed his cheek. A simple, soft sign of affection. "I love you, Daddy," was all Ed said as he returned to the hug. "Because you're still the best Daddy in the world no matter what."
Roy felt so goddamn conflicted. He loved those boys to bits, but he didn't deserve them. Or their love. Was he really just hurting them in the long run?
But there was no way in hell that he would leave them. He'd live until he was a fucking hundred-and-fifty years old if that was what it took to keep that promise.
He just hated that the boys got stuck with him of all people. That they have ended up loving someone so undeserving of their love as himself. They finally have a father that they trust and love, and it's a damn dog of the military. The mass murderer who got them in this mess in the first place. But he knew that the boys gained something from him even so: they got a chance to get Al's body back and they got a father who loved them. And they needed one.
It just shouldn't be me…
But it was. And that meant that he would do all he could for his boys no matter what. They deserved at least that.
And so Roy squeezed Ed even tighter. "I love you so, so much too, because you two are the best sons in the world."
So now I just have to make friends with the scary one metre lady…
