Disclaimers: FMA not mine.

A/N: Edward's POV. (Any typos, please excuse.)

Oh my, what have we found in this chapter…? x3

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Thoughts That Refuse to Die

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I heard my brother mumble something, but when I looked at him, he was asleep. His thumb was in his mouth. It made my heart sink down low and made me forget completely where I was in my multiplication.

I rolled over onto my back. The cold floorboards gave me a shiver. The shadows danced on the ceiling, too. I folded my arms under my head and frowned, closing my eyes for a moment but not feeling sleepy at all. I instead peered up at the top of the room, watching the shadows move swiftly around, taunting me with their energetic playing.

It had worked for a while, but now that Al was asleep and I was the only one still working, it was back.

I squirmed.

I lost myself to the shadowy thoughts of my own mind. I could still feel Winry's lips and tongue moving on my ear, could still feel her hands moving around my stomach and hips and crotch. Every time I hugged her or held her close I could feel every curve of her body. Her lips were soft and warm and sweet and the looks she gave me sometimes made me get kind of hard.

I covered my face with my hands. I was starting to feel that way again, that way where my stomach twisted up in a wonderful sensation that made my heart leap and jump and my skin crawl with heated shivers. I wanted to get up and walk through the night up the hill to the Rockbell house so that I could see her again, because it was coming back with a malicious laugh and an overwhelming weight.

I heard Alphonse mumble again. I glanced in his direction, and then

one of my impulsive, bad ideas

hit me.

"Al," I whispered, sitting up on my elbows, my eyes wide. The second candle was burning wickedly. I nudged my little brother with my fingertip. He shifted and grunted softly.

I crawled towards him, shuddering with the genius of my idea and the utter stupidity and wrongness of it. But then my notorious inclination stabbed my common sense in the back and it tumbled downwards with one last echoing scream.

"Al…" I murmured, smiling at him with slit eyes as he rolled onto his back. He was out. He was out cold. I poked his stomach and his eyes opened so barely that I could hardly tell.

"Mnm…" he whimpered sleepily, and rolled his head from side to side. "Stop moving, you're stealing the covers."

"Sorry, Al," I said in a low husk, laying down beside him with my face inches from his, barely breathing for fear of waking him up all the way, staring at him and lying absolutely still, deciding to go along with him. He was closer to full sleep than he was to being half-awake, and I suppose that was my good luck.

"I'm cold, give me the blankets," he mumbled.

"Are your hands cold?" I said.

Sometimes it amazes me how I can be so evil, so completely iniquitous, while being so casual about it as well. I can just push everything away but my nonchalance, and not care and –

"Yeah," he said, drawing it out into one long, groggy sigh, his eyes shutting fully again. I was losing him.

"Let me see them, I know a secret place to put them to be warm, okay? And then maybe in the morning we can make some coffee and cocoa." His hands barely moved as his muscles relaxed further so I took them gently by his wrists and pulled slightly.

"Mm, make them warm, Brother, they're cold…"

Each word was separated by an inhalation or exhalation, heavy and drenched in slumber.

"I will, I will, trust me." I spoke slow and in a whisper, moving his hands even more.

I glanced to the candle, my heart racing, wondering what it would feel like if I were guiding Winry's hands like this. His tiny fingers sought the warmth I led them to and crawled with trance-like sluggishness into my boxers. They were incredibly warm and soft, despite how "cold" he claimed they were. My back arched in immediate response as he curled his digits, his knuckles brushing against my cock. I squirmed around, getting a little harder as I realized that somebody else's hands were in my fucking pants.

My eyes slit further and I bit my lip, resonating a sore aching throughout the left side of my face. Alphonse rolled over and nestled up close to me, clearly feeling even chillier.

"Secret place…" he murmured. "Really warm, Brother…how did you do that?"

I couldn't talk for a minute. I had to clear my head of the image of Winry before I prodded his hands lower until one of his fingers was brushing my head, the other my balls. I inhaled slowly through my nose, my brows furrowing.

I didn't know what to say to make him go on, so I said, "It's really warm…just…play with it a little and it'll get warmer…"

My stomach muscles tensed up as his sleepy hands tried to grab onto me. I bit the inside of my lip and fought a squeak as he squeezed just a little too hard. I squirmed around, trying not to kick him. He rubbed his hands on me like one would rub two sticks together to make fire, his palms moving rapidly on the sides of my dick. It was a few minutes of my silence, his gentle, warm hands, and my stifled squirming at the feel of somebody playing with me, before I think he realized what I wanted. In his dream I think he found it differently than what I was thinking, but he found my notion and he shared it.

His fingers curled on me tight and he moved his hands all around, up and down my shaft and my balls and my head, tight and warm and tiny and particular.

I squeezed my eyes shut and thought, Those are Winry's hands, think about that why don't you?

I tried to picture her, her eyes half open and her lips parted, her hair falling over her bare shoulders, tried to hear her gasping my name; Alphonse kept stroking me, kept tugging and rubbing and squeezing, and for a second I thought with horror if he was awake and knew what he was doing.

I pushed that away with thoughts of Winry again.

I thought of how it felt to feel her hands on me, whether it was entangled in my hair, on my skin, or around me tight; I thought of the feel of her lips and her breath and her teeth, the way she looked at me and the way she tasted and sounded and felt with her body pressed against mine; I thought of what it would feel like to touch her breast, or her crotch, or her thighs; I wondered what it would taste like to kiss down her body and I could feel my cock getting stiffer and stiffer and stiffer as I thought of the way she'd squirm and pant and say my name. The more I thought the more I wanted to and the more that I wanted to the more that I knew that we had to do this. I needed to touch Winry and she needed to touch me. We wanted and needed to get closer. I wanted to show her how much I loved her, and doing all that would show her as best as I could.

That's when something weird happened, something that I was not uninformed of, thanks to books, but something that I really hadn't felt before – not surprising.

But it felt good.

My whole body had this unison shudder, sending me hunching forward. My bruised stomach sent waves of pain up with the trembling, and I felt muscles moving as it happened. Down there. Beneath Al's hands and in other places.

I pulled away with a sharp breath, rolling into a bookshelf and causing a few books to topple out and land on me. One landed on my face (ow), one on my stomach (OW MY BRUISES), and one on my crotch (ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow). A few others landed around me with a loud clatter of book-covers. I sat up on my elbows and looked towards Alphonse, startled, panting, my body feeling weak and hot but fucking good, and found him out cold again, lying there with his arms limp out to the side, face tucked into his shoulder.

I sat up all the way and moved the books off my abdomen and lap, and felt my throat clench up. The front of my denim pants was slightly damp and my gaze started to blur with unwanted tears. I stared at Al, crossing my arms on my chest and slouching forward against my knees, my brows furrowing.

My common sense caught up with me as I recovered from my climax.

I'd just taken advantage of my little brother because I was horny and wanted to be touched by Winry.

I got up and blew out the candle. I walked to the door and threw it open, wiping at my eyes as I stumbled into the dark hallway.

"Disgusting, you bastard," I mumbled to myself as I went to get a drink of water. When I looked out the window into the night, I found my gaze trailing up the hill towards the Rockbell house as I sniffled pathetically.

There was a light on in a window on the second floor of the house further up the hill. My stomach pinched up again. Maybe tomorrow…I could show Winry how good it felt. But that night, I decided to go to sleep before my thinking problem could kick in and I'd never fall asleep.

On my way past the den as I shuffled towards the stairs I stopped in the threshold and gripped my glass of water tighter. Al was still asleep.

Innocent.

A victim of my stupidity.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled, and then climbed the stairs to go up to my bedroom.

I haven't slept in my own bed in weeks. Maybe months.