Hello everyone! Thank you to everyone who left me a reviiew last chapter! They always make me super happy, but sorry for the wait, I've just been super busy with stupid school.

I hope you really like this one! And for the super EdWin fans (which is pretty much everyone who reads this :P) I know you'll love this chapter.

And Netrew, don't worry about it. Just get a profile whenever you can. :)

Ed slowly pulled himself from off of his mattress and instantly noticed something out of place. As it was the end of May, every morning, bright and almost blinding sunlight shined through his bedroom window. However, this morning, there was no light coming in except for the yellow light coming from one of the lamp posts outside the house.

Another thing that didn't sit well with Ed was the fact that he didn't feel anywhere near well rested, well he never did since he seemed to need much more sleep than the average human (1)but still. Ed reached his hand out blindly onto the floor in an attempt to figure out what time it was.

CRACK!

A large bolt of lightning illuminated much of the darkened room following soon after by a roar of thunder that shook the house slightly. Ed threw the covers off of him and walked towards the window.

"Just perfect…" Ed muttered to himself. "Just what I needed. A freaking storm."

'Storm' seemed to be a bit of an understatement for the torrential downpour outside that had almost reached biblical proportions. Sheets of rain were falling down from the grim, murderous-looking black storm clouds while loud claps of thunder followed after deadly-looking bolts of lightning that lit up parts of the bleak sky.

Ed looked at his cell phone, which had been hanging limp in his hands as he studied the terrifying weather outside, and flipped it open so that the time would become illuminated.

5:35 A.M.

Ed let out a small groan once his tired brain was able to comprehend the time. It appeared that the violent storm outside had woken him up.

Wonder if it woke any of the others up…

After poking at Terry, and earning a grunt before he returned back to his heavy breathing, Ed opened up his bedroom door and walked down the hall to check on Kyle and Sammy. Ed was surprised that Kyle wasn't already at his bedside asking Ed if he could stay the night in his room once he saw how horrid it looked outside; Kyle always got shaken up whenever there was a huge storm outside like tonight.

But when Ed entered Sammy and Kyle's room, Ed found them both deep asleep and blissfully unaware of what was going on outside. Ed stayed in the younger two's room for another moment, enjoying the fact that they both seemed to be sleeping peacefully without the slightest hint of nightmares, before he closed the door, crept across the hall, and went back into his bed.

After much tossing and turning and attempting to block out the loud booms of thunder, Ed conceded defeat on trying to get back to sleep and sat back up against his bedroom wall so he could think.

"…When are you going to tell them?… They have to know…"

Ed ran his fingers through his loose, long locks as he let out a small sigh of annoyance. Winry was right; he did have to tell his friends about Al. It wasn't like they weren't going to just not notice if him and Winry disappeared for a week or two without telling anyone. No, Ed was sure as Hell his friends would notice if they left.

"They'd probably think we ran away to Vegas to get hitched or something stupid like that." Ed mused with a small smile.

Once he had said this, a small picture of Winry standing in a fancy white dress and veil in the middle of a grassy plain popped into his head, causing Ed to blush furiously. He then had to shake his head like a dog trying to get water out of its ears so he could rid himself of that mental picture.

No, Ed could not even begin to think about his love life or lack of it when he was in the middle of this family crisis.

"How should I tell them?" Ed whispered to himself.

Scenario after scenario ran through his head where Ed would possibly tell his closest friends that he had a secret brother but none of them seemed plausible at all.

Maybe I should just get it over with it and tell them point blank. No pussy-footing around the matter. Just spit it out.

Ed tilted his head back slightly, causing the back of his head to bump against the cold, hard wall.

"Ugh…I can't think when I'm this tired."

Ed let his body fall onto his side on top of his blankets. After laying in a near fetal position for almost five minutes, Ed reached out for his phone again. After checking the time again (6:07 A.M.), Ed went to his phone book and let his finger hover over the call button once it had reached Winry's name.

Should he call her? Maybe, but not now. He'd call her once Ed was sure that she was awake and perhaps, if the weather persisted, ask her for a much needed ride to school. But until then, Ed would continue lying on his bed, extremely busy with his own thoughts.

"Thanks Win!" Ed yelled over the roaring wind as he gratefully crawled inside of her truck.

"No problem." Winry said as she adjusted the windshield wipers to their fasted setting before she started driving down the street.

"Hey." Ed said after a few minutes where the only noise was the low buzzing of the radio, the squeaking of the wipers, and the pounding of the rain on the windows.

"What?"

"I think…I think I'm gonna tell the guys today."

"Really?" Winry asked while turning towards him.

"Yeah. Why not. I mean I do have to tell them eventually. Why not just tell them now so we don't have to keep talking around them."

"True, I can tell that they know we're hiding something from them."

"Yeah, they probably think were secretly dating or something." Ed said, not thinking, with a smile before he realized what he had just said.

The comfortable silence that had once filled the car was now replaced with a thick awkward silence. Ed searched his mind quickly for a new topic to change to before the silence became too unbearable.

"Yeah…I bet that's what they think. Ha." Winry said softly, finishing the sentence that sounded a lot hollower than it should have been. "I bet they spend most of their time giggling and over analyzing every little thing we do."

"Heh, yeah. I bet." Ed said quietly while he continued to search his blank mind for something new to say. Why did Winry have to continue talking about his? Was she going to continue until Ed made some kind of move or what?

"I'd like to see their expression if they found out that there wasn't anything remotely like that going on between us."

"Remotely?" Ed asked, turning to look at her.

Why was this bothering him so much? Well of course he understood why he was bothered by all of this uncomfortable non-relationship talk but why was he so unbelievable bothered and annoyed by Winry's tone. It sounded as if she thought that he didn't care about her in the slightest. Didn't they already have this conversation? Didn't Ed already explain in this very car why he could be her boyfriend right now?

But then again…didn't she also explain how they could be together? Didn't she say to think about what she had said? It had only been five days ago but it felt like a lifetime away now.

"Y-Yes. You made it quite clear that you didn't want to be together-."

"'I didn't want to'?" Ed asked angrily. "Where the Hell did you get that from? 'Cuz I hope you realize that if could be together with you, I would."

"Well you have an odd way of showing it." Winry growled as she parked in the nearest place she could find by the front doors.

With anger bubbling up in his stomach and a completely blank mind, Ed unbuckled his seat belt faster than humanly possible, crossed the space that remained between him and Winry, gripped onto her shoulder, and kissed her.

It wasn't as romantic as last time and it certainly wasn't as gentle, considering that Ed was gripping onto Winry's shoulder tightly with his automail and he had put a bit too much force into the kiss, causing his lips to hurt after a moment of two but he didn't break it, not yet. Not when there was still uncertainty in Winry's mind over how he really felt for her. After another moment or two, Ed let go and moved back to his seat.

Ed turned to face Winry, whose face was now fire red and her eyes open wide in a mixture of disbelief and pure shock.

"Don't say that. Don't say that I don't want to be with you. Never…" Ed said as he felt his heart rate increase along with the extreme heat that was rushing up to his face.

Without another glance towards the flushed teen, Ed grabbed his book bag from the back seat and jumped out of the car and into the pouring rain.

Ed tried to ignore Winry for the rest of the day. He found it particularly hard to do that when she sat down next to him in their first exam of the day. They didn't say anything or even look at each other, Ed even went as far as to try and not brush her at all. Unfortunately, every now and again, when one of them was adjusting a paper or had dropped a pencil, one of the two would bump, causing both of their faces to ignite and send alarm bells to all of their friends who were sitting ten feet away from them.

Once the bell rang, signaling the end of the exam, Winry bolted out of the room before anyone had even gotten up from their chairs. As Ed passed by Roy and Maes, he purposely ignored their inquiring stares and speed out of the room.

Once they had finished their second exam, Ed was saved the embarrassment of eating alone with Winry along with the uncomfortable idea of staying at school to eat when Roy texted everyone and told them they were going to be having a party in one of the deserted classroom on the third floor, something they did every now and again.

As Ed walked up to the room, he realized that now, when everyone was together and there was a less likely chance of anyone overhearing anything, would be the time to tell everyone else what was up.

"Hey Ed!" Jean exclaimed from his spot on the teacher's desk.

"Hey." Ed responded quietly.

After a quick head count, his stomach doing something resembling a back flip when his eyes passed over Winry, Ed reasoned that he was the last one to arrive and shut the door behind him.

"So what do we have to eat?" Riza asked, sitting on an old school desk that was covered in graffiti that was easily older than any of them.

Roy held up several bags off potato chips up before he motioned to two twelve packs of soda that were sitting on another decrepit desk. Riza let out a small sigh while muttering something along the lines of it not being real food, but accepted a can of soda and some chips all the same.

The group talked and laughed for a good portion of their lunch period. Ed tried to act as if nothing was bothering him and that he had nothing of real importance on his mind, but it must have shown somewhere because half way through their time, Roy pulled him out into the hall.

"So what's up?" Roy asked with his arms folded across his chest with his dark eyes staring sharply at Ed.

"Huh?"

"Okay let's not beat around the bush. I know something's been bothering for a while now and today, neither you nor Winry can look at each other without blushing like a couple of teenagers."

Ed stopped himself from saying to Roy 'well we are teenagers dip-shit' and merely let out a small sigh and turned his focus onto his muddy sneakers and the tiles on the floor.

"Ed," Roy said in a much calmer and mature voice, "if it's something serious, you know you can trust me. I can keep a secret."

"…I know."

"So what's up?"

Ed looked up at him for a moment before he turned and marched back into the room, leaving a confused Roy behind him. Everyone stared at Ed as he went back into the room. Ed took a deep breath before he began to talk.

"So I know that I've been acting kinda weird lately." Ed began.

Out of the corner of his eye, Ed could see Jean open his mouth, probably to say something stupid as usual, but before he could say it, Roy punched him lightly in the side of the head, telling him point blank to shut the Hell up.

"But I do have an excuse for why I've been behaving so weirdly and I know it was wrong to keep this from you for so long but…"

Ed's eye's flicked in Winry's direction and saw, to his amazement and pleasure, that she was looking right at him with a small, encouraging smile on her face. Ed took another deep breath and continued on.

"But Jean, Roy, you guys know how I asked you to take me to the place where my record was and everything? Well, in my file was this extra piece of paper and it said that…"

Spit it out!

"It said that I have a younger brother. His name is Al."

(1) That's what I say about myself

But I hope you loved this chapter even though I know that cliff hanger must be pissing you guys off right now. :P But I'll try and get the next capter posted as soon as possible!

Announcement: I have a new poll on my profile and I'd like it if you guys check it out and if you don't have a profile, you can always say your answer in your review!

-FSK