kataang816: Hurrah for forgiveness! And yes, Roy is terribly needed. Ember hopes he can live up to the challenge that is dealing with Ed. Sometimes even she doesn't know. ;)

nuclearXsquid: Says Ember: "Woah! Spinny! Dizzy…" Anyhow, the spinning was tremendously fun, so she thanks you for that. Alas, there will be no mention of a bed. Sadness. And people thought the UST would be ending… But then that would be underage sex, which is bad. Yes, teenagers of the world. Don't have sex.

Bursting-Bubbles: Yes, suspense. *cackles* But now you need wait no longer. For now, anyway.

xLacrimosa: And Ember's getting addicted to reviews like yours. And it's an ickle firstie, too! Oh, happy day!

Stick around after the end, readers dearest. There's a little present for you all... a little "what might have been but wasn't" moment.

Chapter 10: Explaining

Ed dreamed.

He saw flashes of a white room, cold, clinical, and impersonal. His brother was sitting in the chair beside him, trying his hardest not to cry. It wasn't working, though, not when the brown-haired woman lying in the bed they sat watch over was clearly not well, burns everywhere.

He saw a house, a beautiful little house with a tree in the backyard. In his dream it wasn't beautiful, though. It was burning. He saw a little boy drag a slightly bigger boy out of the house through a hole in the wall. Then he saw that same little boy go back in, returning with a woman who clearly would not have escaped the fire on her own.

He saw that beautiful little house burn to the ground. He saw that little boy's beautiful little life shatter.

He saw another house, not nearly so nice. It was a plain little thing, just like the man who lived in it was plain. He had brown hair and brown eyes, and perhaps it was his plainness that made him think the two little boys who moved in with him had to be perfect.

He saw the man yell. He saw a not-so-little boy pleading with him, but the man was unrelenting in his criticism.

He saw the woman again, clearly dead this time. "Why?" she asked with a melodic voice that belied the blackened burns on her face. "Why couldn't you save me?"

The man appeared next to her. "What's wrong with you? Why can't you be good enough?"

Ed could not reply. He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out. His mind was blank. There was nothing to say, not to those words.

The two flickered back and forth, taking turns to be the accuser. Ed curled in on himself, clutching at his head and whimpering denials, but how was it possible to deny what he knew to be true? He wasn't good enough, he couldn't do anything quite right, and that wouldn't ever change. He hadn't managed to save his mother from the house fire, and he never could do anything well enough to satisfy the man who had served as a foster father. He was a failure, he routinely messed up, he was stupid and could never quite seem to get it.

The flickering became faster and faster, and the two voices, one high and melodic and the other lower and harsher, began to blend. As the voices became one so did the faces, blending until he saw the one face he couldn't bear to see hurling those accusations at him.

He could take it from the man; he had done so for two years. He could take it from his mother because he had let her down and he knew it. But now he saw the last face he wanted to let down, the face he knew he had disappointed time and again.

Ed shuddered and screamed as the faces blended and became Alphonse's face.

Roy knelt by the couch with a concerned look on his face as Ed continued to twitch and whimper in his sleep. This certainly wasn't a good dream, not at all, and it looked to be getting worse by the second. He was almost relieved when Ed sat bolt upright with a scream, just because it meant he was no longer dreaming. Almost. He couldn't quite manage relief, not with Ed shuddering and wiping his fearful sweaty face.

Unthinking, he wrapped his arms around the younger teen's shoulders, surprised when Ed clung to him, burying his face in Roy's shirt.

If there was one thing Roy Mustang was not used to, it was offering comfort to another. It just wasn't something he did often. He did know, however, that if Ed was clinging to him like a small child clings to a blanket or a stuffed bear it meant that Ed was in bad shape and really needed simple human contact. Normally he snarled if poked with a ten-foot pole.

Awkwardly he gently rubbed his hand against Ed's back, his other hand stroking through the blond's long hair as he shook like a leaf in a hurricane-force gale. Roy wasn't sure exactly what was going on, but if whatever had happened in Ed's dream had the normally guarded teen acting like this it must have been bad.

Finally Ed's iron grip around his waist began to loosen as Ed picked his head up and muttered an apology with downcast eyes.

"What happened?" Roy asked softly, effectively discarding Ed's needless apology.

Roy listened as Ed stammered and stumbled around the topic for a while. He listened as Ed spoke of a beloved mother who died in a house fire, and he listened as Ed spoke of a foster father who was anything but a supportive father. He listened as Ed haltingly explained the decision to leave that home and run off to an old family friend and her granddaughter. He listened as Ed briefly described the battle that had finally ended with him and his brother in the care of the family friend.

"I was never happier than when we got out of there," he finished. "Neither of us were ever really good enough for him. I think that's when I turned to music; it was about the only hobby I could pursue that he approved of." He shuddered once more before relaxing again. "I don't know why I'm telling you all this. I never even told Al everything that happened. I figured he didn't need to know my side of the story, since he already had his and it was bad enough."

Roy had listened silently to all of Ed's explanation, and when it was finished he still could not think of anything to say. In no more than ten minutes he had been told the secrets of Ed's past; what could he say to that?

In the end he did the only thing he could do, and wrapped his arms around Ed once more, this time until the blond fell asleep again.

When Ed woke up the next morning he realized he was on a relatively comfortable couch in an unfamiliar home. That was enough to make him sit up quickly despite the comfort surrounding him. Looking around, he noted that someone had tucked a blanket around him while he had been asleep. Frowning as he wondered who it had been, he swung his legs over the edge of the couch.

Only to yelp in surprise as his foot met something soft and squishy and most definitely not a floor.

Looking down slowly, somewhat afraid of what he would find, Ed discovered that it was Roy he had inadvertently stepped on. Instantly he yanked his feet back up onto the couch and hugged his knees into his chest. What was he supposed to do? Why was he in Roy's house, and why was Roy here on the floor instead of sleeping in a bed?

Really, it all boiled down to one question. What had happened the night before?

Ed almost groaned out loud when the answer finally came to him. It had been October 3rd. In a lost daze, he had been wandering aimlessly as he normally did when he needed to think alone. But that had changed when he saw Roy. He was taken in and…

Oh no. He had told. He had told someone about what had happened. He had never told anyone everything he had told Roy. So why the hell had he opened his mouth?

Even worse, he had fallen asleep on the dark-haired teen's couch and proceeded to have a fucking nightmare. Wasn't that just perfect.

He couldn't stay. Ed had royally screwed up, and he knew it. He had opened old wounds and salt was waiting for them just around the corner unless he ran like hell and hoped Roy didn't remember.

But Roy would remember. Despite the older teen's somewhat dim persona, he was a genius with a very good memory. There was nothing for it. He would have to run and avoid the older teen as much as humanly possible.

Carefully avoiding Roy this time, silently thankful that stepping on him last time had not woken him, Ed quietly wrapped the blanket around Roy's sleeping frame and tiptoed to the front door, silently slipping away into the early morning.

Ed had walked halfway home when he realized with a curse that he had forgotten his phone, leaving it lying there on a side table by Roy's couch. There was no point in going back for it; Roy would return it to him later and going back now would only mean Ed could not possibly avoid him and any conversation about the night before. And so he continued homeward, feeling cold and small and afraid. It was only a matter of time before this latest stunt of his blew up in his face.

END CH. 10

And now for the moment you've all really been waiting for...

Bonus: What Might Have Been (a Christmas present for those who, like Ember, believe the UST needs to end more quickly)

Shortly before Ed turned onto his street, he heard a shout. "Ed!"

The blond teen froze. He knew that voice, and he had been hoping against hope that he wouldn't hear it. He couldn't turn around; that meant facing Roy. But he couldn't continue walking, either. He was frozen in place, waiting for a reaction from the older teen.

Roy walked up to him. "You forgot your phone," he said, his face expressionless. Wordlessly Ed took the phone, slipping it into his jeans pocket. What did Roy want? Was that all, or was he going to want to talk?

Roy certainly didn't leave him hanging for long. "Listen," he continued. "I know you're freaking out right now. You probably don't want to talk about what happened yesterday, and I can understand that. I just wanted you to know… you don't have to talk until you're ready, all right?"

Ed stared at Roy, speechless. He had been so terrified that everything he had laid out in the open would be trampled on mercilessly. It seemed as if that was no longer a possibility, and Ed wasn't sure how to conduct himself now that he was a little safer.

So confused was he that he didn't even realize he was reaching out until the older teen had enveloped him in a hug.

It was no wonder that he had told, not anymore. He would have done anything for a little of the comfort this embrace brought him. Ed knew that he should shrug away from Roy's loose hold and walk off, but he couldn't bring himself to do anything but cling to Roy's shoulders and bury his face in the shirt in front of him.

He was a little puzzled, though, when he felt Roy's fingers under his chin. The confusion was lost when their eyes met, as was every other thought that had happened to be going through Ed's mind. There was nothing but a pair of dark eyes filled with emotion. Then their lips met for the briefest of moments.

Roy pulled away fairly quickly, worriedly searching Ed's expression for a reaction of some sort. Clearly he had put just as much on the line as Ed had done the previous night. What Roy didn't know was the same thing that Ed hadn't known: Ed had no intention of trampling over what Roy had laid bare in front of him.

Smiling, the younger teen reached up and brought their lips together once more, relishing the contact for a few sweet moments before reluctantly pulling away and walking the rest of the way home as Roy turned around and did the same.

There hadn't been very many words between the two of them, but they had reached an understanding all the same. They were in this together, and they would stand as equals.