Sorry, took me longer than expected ^^;

I'm kinda sad... Quite a few people have added my story to their faves ot alerts (thank you!!) but did not review. It just makes me die a little bit inside for the simple reson that, uh, like I say, I wanna know what's on your mind about what I write. Oh well :D thank you very much for reading anyways! *purrs* And special thanks to all of you who have reviewed. Any constructive criticism is quite welcome, tell me your opinions.

Or just stroke my ego by telling me you're enjoying it =p (the reading of course, not stroking me!) Hey, NOTE: I didn't submit this to beta-ing, so expect one or two mistakes (I hope none too many).

Disclaimer: I don't own FMA. If I did, my name would be Arakawa-sensei (yesh, 'sensei' is really a part of her name. Lol xD not) And I'd eat noodles all day long.

***MANGA SPOILER SPOILER*** and I'd never let that happen to poor Havoc… =( so unlucky. *wheelchair squeaks in protest*

CHAPTER 5 – THE ART OF TEASING – part 1


"Big bro, do you think she's up yet? It's almost time for dinner."

Ed looked at his younger brother, trying to sound uninterested when he spoke. But he didn't.

"She'll come down when she feels like it, Al. Don't be a nag."

Al dropped the book he had in his hand and gave Ed a stern look, crossing his arms over his chest. Ed sighed and closed the book that he'd been pretending to read for a while now. He was really just thinking about her and her odd behavior, and how a part of him actually didn't really mind that at all.

"Okay, okay – fine. I'll go wake her up then." He let out an exaggerated sigh, as if he was bored or annoyed for having to wake her up – and go to her room.

So he walked out his study and crossed the corridor straight to her room. He hesitated, and he turned back to see his little brother reaching the first step of the stairs; but before Al descended, he made a gesture that clearly stated that Ed would be a dead man if he didn't knock before opening the door. At least, he'd be a wrenched one.

So he knocked, and waited a while for her to say something. Somehow, he couldn't make himself call out for her so he just waited. He heard a noise and leaned over the door to check if he'd heard her speak anything; but what he heard wasn't really her speaking. He leaned closer and closer over the door… what was that sound?

XXX___XXX___XXX

Twisting and twirling under her sheets was Winry. She was having what she would recall for the rest of her life as her most vivid, amazing dream ever. Years later, she would eventually tell Ed about it – the candles and the bed and the champaign; but of course, she omitted certain details.

She'd recall that dream especially when the moment actually came true, and she was inside the same room and lying on that same bed, with that amazing odor wafting from those lovely candles, making love to that same man… but that wouldn't happen for another four years or so.

Right now she was having her first extreme wet dream, if you'd like to call it that.

So she literally came to when she woke up. She was shaking and feeling this amazing sensation that started some point between her legs and very rapidly spread over the rest of her body. It ended so quickly though, she barely had time to process the whole thing, and just wound up gasping for air and sweating profusely.

She noticed that she'd been shaking and thrusting around the bed, so she forced herself to a halt. Her breathing was erratic and she felt slightly confused and flustered at what had happened; and while she was trying to figure out what the hell had been going on with that last dream (she'd had some others before that one and they seemed normal – automail and wrenches and pummeling Ed with them) she heard a noise. Well, a bunch of them.

The door was suddenly knocked open and Edward came yelping down with it, tripping and stumbling everywhere.

Clearly he'd not been expecting the door to just burst open like that.

So he stumbled through half the room and would have succeeded in standing still if it hadn't been for one thing. He had to dodge her bra, which lay right there in the middle of the floor. Messy girl… he fell flat on his face.

Quite a few things metaphorically hit her very suddenly.

He had been eavesdropping, or at least he was leaning over the bedroom door quite closely. He was lying there on the floor of her room, rubbing his nose and shaking his head a little. He was wearing a black tank and his blue boxers (A/N: hey, it was warm inside the house!), and he looked nice and hunky.

And she recognized the hot tingly sensation between her thighs that she'd had in her dream. She was… well, horny. Or so you could call it.

And she made such a curious face that Ed – who was backing away and raising his hands apologetically – stopped and just sat there. He dropped his hands when she spoke.

"… Hey there…" she said in a low, velvety voice. She looked different, she sounded different. She looked so darn appealing to him; like an aura was surrounding her.

"Um, hey. Had a nice sleep?" He ventured. "I, err, was supposed to get you for dinner so, um. Yeah. Dinner." He finished lamely.

In response, she stretched her arms over her head while she was sitting on the bed, which caused the top she was wearing to rise dangerously over her bellybutton.

She got up and began stretching her whole body right there in front of him, yawning and grunting as she relieved the tension on her muscles.

If he was ever so stunned that she hadn't wrenched him for waking her up from her seemingly nice dream (or so it had sounded like to him), he was even more stunned to notice that she wasn't wearing anything apart from that short tank top of hers and these really cute panties. He tried not to notice they were a nice shade of pink and suited her hips perfectly; and they were small… his cheeks felt very hot.

"So I guess you 'heard' me dreaming huh?" she leaned over to look him straight in the face, but had to actually crouch since he was still sitting on the floor.

He didn't really know what to say. "Uuuh, I did? I guess I did. I did! Oh, err, sorry? I guess… yeah, I mean, sorry for that. I didn't mean it."

She giggled at his reaction. She had no idea why she was feeling this way. She needed to taunt him, to tease him, to provoke him, to play with him… hmm, yes, he'd be her own little play toy, something to be amused at and with. The mischievous thought pleased her and an involuntary sexy smirk crossed her lips. His confused look almost made her feel sorry for what she was now thinking of doing to him. Her little boy toy.

"So, I guess you heard me call your name?" she asked, leaning closer. He, for some reason, leaned backwards, away from her face. He frowned and shook his head in a negative response.

"You didn't?" She sounded disappointed. "Here, I'll show you what I sounded like just before I woke up. Wanna hear?"

He wasn't sure whether he was breathing or not anymore. His head twitched and it looked like a nod. He really wanted to yell at her and shake her shoulders and ask her what the hell she thought she was doing – but he couldn't. There was that part of him that knew what she implied and wanted to see it. So he just sat there and nodded feebly.

She drew even closer to him, so close he could smell her hair – it smelled of strawberries. That made his heart thump wildly and in an erratic beat, which only worsened when she spoke.

"I went like this: … Oh, Ed… mmmh, yes… yes, that's it. Faster, come on… ohh, Edward!"

Her voice was low and husky as she mimicked her own words and sighs and moans. To emphasize her point, she bit her lips and licked them a little, and she moved her hands over the front of her top and over her bare legs, as if her hands were actually his hands moving over her. She was exaggerating a little, but the look on his face was just priceless.

He was just about any shade of red you can imagine, visible even in a room with such poor illumination – the only light came from the lamp in the corridor. She gave him a large smile, her provocative look fading away almost instantly; as if she was actually trying to look innocent, as if nothing had happened, as if she'd only just shown him this really cool pebble on the riverside.

The bulge he painfully felt inside his boxers begged to differ; that was NOT, by any means, an innocent 'performance'. He grabbed the bulge instinctively, trying to cover it up. He kept opening and closing his mouth, searching for words, and nothing came out – he had no idea on how to react. That hidden part of him that thoroughly enjoyed that little display screamed inside his head – 'kiss her, you stupid!'

"Oooh, what do we have here…?" she asked playfully, noticing his protective gesture and pointing at his groin. He snapped when her hand came dangerously close to him; and he ignored the voice inside his head, since it was making him think of a whole bunch of crazy stuff about his friend/girlfriend that he really didn't want to hear right now.

"Wha- Winry, what's wrong with you?? Have you gone nuts?"

She was teasing him, and he didn't know how to react. So he backed up again, almost jumped back; and he felt the wall against his back.

He was trying to think of what to do; what was she trying to do? That was definitely a side-effect from the bump to her head, so was he really supposed to yell at her? Or was he supposed to… to correspond?

The daze inside his mind began to fade after she suddenly made a serious face and then dropped her head. She crossed her arms against her chest as if trying to brace herself, and asked, in an almost inaudible voice:

"Ed, I'm sorry but… but, I've been thinking – are we…were we a couple?"

He tilted his head to his right, and again his mouth moved up and down but no sound came out besides a choked "Ah". Well, they had sort of kissed before, and they (actually, she) had told him that she liked him. A lot. She had said – and he had agreed that he felt the same – that she cared about him more than she cared for any other ordinary friend. That she felt something different for him, something stronger.

So, long story short: they could be considered a couple, a very awkward one but still, a couple… right? He'd never conjured the courage to tell her he loved her, or to give her a full kiss in the mouth, or to hold her in his arms in a more intimate way; he wanted to very badly but he just didn't have the courage… he still felt a bit awkward whenever he thought of her as his lover and he was sure she felt the same.

She lifted her head and locked her eyes on his, frowning, determined to get an answer. Louder, she asked again, "Well? Are we a couple? Are you my boyfriend, or not?"

That sounded a bit more like the Winry he knew, but that still wasn't quite her. He had made up his mind about not taking any sort of advantage of her while she was in this condition. (A/N: haha, he thinks she's fragile, the dummie. Wrong!)

So he replied: "Sort of. I don't know… I just… I just came to call you for dinner. So get dressed."

He stood up and, still covering his bulge, began to leave.

"Wait!" she called after him. He wasn't going to turn, he was going to leave and take his embarrassment and anger with him; but for some reason he turned around. He nearly choked when he saw she had her back turned to him and was leaning over the floor to pick up her suitcase. He was staring right at her ass!

"Tell Al I'll be there in ten minutes, 'kay?" She asked nicely, in a too-innocent-to-be-honest kind of voice. Wow. Totally mood-swingish.

He just managed to splutter, and after a few seconds he gained the strength to pull himself away from the door and towards the bathroom.

He just really needed to go there before he went downstairs to help make dinner…

As for Winry, she was having strange thoughts running amok inside her head – like covering Ed with cinnamon and syrup and… well… and other stuff. The hotness from before was emerging again, but she valiantly ignored it.

So with those random thoughts on her mind and after finally getting dressed for dinner, she went downstairs. She'd thrown on a dark denim skirt that stopped just two inches above her knees, a black tank top and a short white shirt casually thrown over it, unbuttoned. While descending the staircase she heard the doorbell – and Ed (who had put on a pair of baggy khaki cargo pants) moaned in annoyment as Al told him to open the door.

He opened, and in came two blond young men; one of them was about Ed's height, and the other one was somewhat short– he looked young.

Ed groaned in annoyment and rolled his eyes as the two boys came in; they looked like siblings, since they had the same wheat-colored hair and sapphire blue eyes. The oldest one was carrying a large bag in his hand, but Winry couldn't tell what the content of it was.

"Yo Fletcher…" Ed greeted the youngest with a handshake, and then nodded at the oldest one. "Russel."

Al stepped in from the kitchen, greeting the other brothers; Fletcher especially. Winry thought they seemed like good friends, but there was something fishy going on between the older brothers.

"Alphonse!" said the one called Russell, "Your brother seems to have improved his manners somewhat."

Ed groaned again and made a face. "What, you thought my manners were bad, you mad-haired herbologist?"

"Haha! I'll take that back. But I see you've grown quite a bit since we last met, haven't you? Not such a bean sprout anymore, are we?" Russell continued to tease, even though Fletcher was elbowing him discretely in the ribs.

"Yeah, you just wait and see. I'll grow even taller than you, Tringham."

"Right. Keep trying, Elric…"

Winry scoffed as she descended the last step of the stairs, so they boys would notice she was there.

Ed made a sour face and crossed his arms over his chest. Winry had met the Tringhams once before briefly, and Russell clearly couldn't stop hitting on her, which had proved to be quite aggravating.

"Ah! Hello, Miss Winry." Russell greeted, and bowed theatrically. He then stepped forward to grab her hand, but Ed sort of cut in the middle and scoffed.

"Kitchen…" he growled. He threw one quick glance at Al – who had been animatedly greeting Fletcher – that clearly meant "explain".

Thank you for reading ^^ review!

Okay, I know the Russell thing might be a bit overused, but I don't recall ever reading anything with him in before. And originally I was planning on using Hohopapa (Hohenheim), but it turned out soooo uninteresting that, well, I decided to use these two anime characters (even though I don't really like the idea of using anime chars but whatever).

A CONTEST!! If anyone can guess what's inside Russel's bag specifically, you'll win a prize (YOU HAVE TWO GUESSES ONLY!). I donno what prize, but maybe a feature in one of my later chapters - if you're a girl or a boy, doesn't matter, you'll make a random appearance doing something crazy to one of the characters. Or something like that xD You might even become a character (if only shortly) - just gimme your OC if you want and I'll make it happen somehow =3 tell me your guesses in your reviews.

(well, if all of you try and don't succeed, the one who gets closest or who reviews first gets to feature if you want to)

Note: to all of you who would like to go for a good laugh ('cause it seems people found it funny) go check my FMA deviations on DevArt (they're just collages with manga panels and me writing crazy stuff in there). If you wanna see them, send me a private message xD one of them envolves... condoms XD

Next Chapter: Ch.6 - A Bumpy Dinner