AN: My apologies for the tardiness of this update. Other tasks distracted me. But thank you to everyone who reviewed, favourited, alerted, etc. Since there weren't enough reviews for me to call a clear majority, I haven't decided on the format just yet. I have, however, aligned this chapter to the left to make a comparison between the two easier. So if you're following this story, PLEASE tell me which you would favour, even if you just drop a quick anonymous review to tell me your preference. I don't want to drag this problem out any longer than necessary. So tell me, centred, or left aligned?

Anyway… Now that the more "introductory" chapters are out of the way, the story should make some headway. I mentioned some bonding at the end of the last chapter, didn't I? Did I, or did I not follow through with that? Only one way you're going to find out, isn't there?

"That will be all for now," Master Hawkeye told him, and gestured at a thick book sitting on the end of his desk. "Review this, and report back to me tonight."

"Yes, Master," Roy replied obediently. He took the volume the man had indicated and made to leave, though he paused at the door to look back at his Master. He was flipping through the book open on the desk in front of him, frowning in concentration as he looked it over. He had probably already forgotten that Roy had just been in the room. Roy closed the door behind him and sighed. Though he greatly respected his Master and his knowledge of Alchemy, he couldn't deny that the man seemed to care more about his personal research than anything else. He often wondered exactly what it was his Master was working on that required so much of his time and attention. Not that Roy felt he needed more of his Master's attention; it just concerned him that the man never seemed to leave the house. It surely couldn't be good for his health, being shut up in his study all the time. A man had to get out and breathe in the fresh air every once in a while, right? Though it wasn't as if he was here all the time, so perhaps Master left the house sometime when he wasn't around… But he doubted it. He had a hard time picturing his Master anywhere but his study.

Descending the stairs, Roy made his way into the living room, setting down his book on the table. He didn't see Riza anywhere, and he didn't really expect to; she never lingered when he was in the house. He often felt that she was outright avoiding him, but he didn't know why she would do that. He had never said or done anything to make her dislike him at all, that he was aware of. It bothered him more than he would care to admit. He often thought of himself as a likable person, so it was an enormous blow to his confidence. He wasn't used to not being liked. It normally didn't take him long to gain anyone's attention - females admittedly more so nowadays than males - though he managed to garner a lot of respect from members of his own sex. Well, older males at least. Boys his own age and younger, who were a lot less driven than he was, often didn't understand why he was so serious about his studies, or were afraid that his attractive appearance would catch the attention of the girl they liked. But still, even if they initially thought of him as a rival, he would end up winning them over eventually.

Yet, it seemed that he couldn't win Riza over at all. He didn't get much time outside his studies, so he didn't see her much, but when did, and if he found her downstairs, he would always try to talk with her. In part, it was because he didn't want to appear ungrateful to the person who fed him while he was here, but it was mostly because he was a sociable person. He was accustomed to having a lot of people around him, and there would always be someone who would be happy to speak with him. In this house, there wasn't. Master Hawkeye spoke to him, but only about his studies. Riza, he couldn't engage at all! He would say something to her, and she would reply, usually without looking at him, and then walk off and leave him alone again. A year he had been here; a year, and the girl couldn't even stay in the same room or speak with him for more than a few minutes! Why? What had he done to make her want to ignore him?

He shook his head violently to clear it. That was enough! He shouldn't be dwelling on stupid things like his personal charm failing to sway his Master's daughter. That wasn't important. What was important was the text his Master had told him to study. He sat down on the couch and picked the book up, lounging back comfortably to read. Though the silence in the house had bothered him when he first arrived, he had discovered it was much easier to focus here than it was at home. In this house, there were no distractions to pull him from his studies.

A loud shattering sound broke his concentration, and he started as a rock landed beside his foot, as though purposely mocking his thoughts. Shards of glass littered the carpet in front of the living room window, broken off from their source when the stone had made its entry. Knowing full well that rocks couldn't fly through windows of their own accord, Roy leapt to his feet to investigate, his hands fisting in anger as he surveyed the scene outside. Three boys stood just outside the iron fence. A brunette boy stood marginally closer to the house than the other two. He was flanked by two redheads, who were egging him on as he poised to throw another rock, a bold smirk plastered across his face.

Livid, Roy dashed over to the door and yanked it open. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" he yelled furiously.

The boy yelped in surprise and stumbled back, colliding with his two friends behind him and sending them all tumbling to the ground. As Roy advanced angrily, they scrambled to their feet and fled, sprinting back down the road as fast as their legs would carry them. Roy paused at the gate as he watched their retreat. He wanted to give chase, but they had the advantage in turf. In the time that he had been visiting here, he had only ever come to visit Master Hawkeye, so he had never bothered to explore the town before. If he tried to chase them down, he'd just get himself lost, most likely. But how he wanted to catch them! Their vandalism of his Master's house infuriated him. He wanted to run those boys down and make them pay for what they had done. He would catch them and beat them senseless until they learned that doing things to upset someone who had never done a thing to hurt them was wrong. But common sense out-ruled his desire for justice. It was ridiculous to begin a pursuit that wouldn't be successful in the end anyway, when he could always search out the boys and pay them back later. Yeah… That was a solid plan. He had gotten a good enough look at them to describe their features. Surely there would be someone who could tell him where they lived.

Turning back to the house, he walked over to the broken window and examined it. He could fix it using Alchemy without any trouble. Master Hawkeye would never have to know it had been damaged. He would have to do it from the inside, since most of the glass had landed in the house. A few shards, however, had landed outside, so he picked them up. The transmutation would work better if he had as much of the original material as possible.

"Bunch of damn kids…" he muttered to himself distractedly, jiggling the broken glass in his hand.

There was a grating creak behind him and Roy jerked in surprise. As he did, a sudden flash of pain in his hand made him gasp. Blood started to dribble from his clenched fist. Looking down at his hand, he opened it tentatively, to find glass cutting into his skin. Of course. In his surprise, his hand had tightened around the shards, digging them into his flesh. He stared dumbly at the wound for a moment, before it finally clicked that he should react in some way.

"Shit!" He grabbed his wrist, grimacing as his hand throbbed in pain. Before he could even attempt to stop the bleeding, he would have to remove the glass; wrapping a tourniquet around his hand to stem the blood flow would drive it in deeper.

Hearing a soft gasp, Roy remembered what had surprised him in the first place, and whirled around. Riza was standing in the gateway, clutching a paper bag full of groceries in her arms. Her eyes widened as they fixed on his bloody hand.

"Riza…?"

She snapped out of her trance when he spoke her name, and hurried past him into the house.

What was that about? he thought to himself. Is she afraid of blood or something? He had certainly seen it before at home; a few of the women who worked for his aunt didn't like blood at all, growing queasy or fainting at the mere sight of it. Roy shook his head and went into the house himself, pausing in the hallway as he realised; he didn't even know where he could find anything to help him. No… He didn't even know if there were any first-aid materials in the house! Lingering aimlessly in the hall, he nearly tripped over the paper bag that Riza had seemingly left sitting on the floor. He stumbled, grabbing the staircase rail behind him with his good hand to keep his balance.

"It's just not my day today…" he muttered to himself.

Hurried footsteps sounded from the kitchen and he looked over as Riza emerged, holding a small tin container by the handle. He flinched in surprise and pain as she grabbed his hand and examined it in a businesslike manner.

"This doesn't look good, Mr Mustang. You should really be more careful with broken glass." He hissed in pain as she pulled carefully at one of the shards and she winced in sympathy. "Sorry."

Roy was confused. What had changed exactly, to make her suddenly want to help him? He could think of nothing at all. She had been just as distant to him as she usually was of late. She had never treated him differently like this before. Why had she suddenly started caring now? Or… was it that she had not actually disliked him in the first place? That she was actually a compassionate person at heart, helping him out because he needed it, and her behaviour to date was just the fault of… shyness? He cursed himself for not realising it sooner.

"It doesn't appear to have penetrated too deeply. Just hold still, and I'll–" Looking back up at his face, her eyes widened, and she dropped his hand as though it had unexpectedly burned her. "I-I'm sorry! I didn't mean to – I'll just–" She turned abruptly to leave.

Realising she mistook the reason for his shock, he grabbed her arm with his uninjured hand before she could escape, and offered her a friendly smile. "No, it's alright. I would appreciate the help. It will be a bit difficult for me to tend to it by myself. Please?"

She looked up at him searchingly for a moment, before glancing away and bobbing her head in compliance. "All right… But it will be easier if you would sit down Mr Mustang."

"The living room then?" he asked, and she nodded in reply.

He walked into the room and sat down on the couch, and she followed, sitting the container she had been carrying down on the table and opening it. Inside were various items that usually made up such a kit; antiseptic, bandages, scissors, tweezers and the like. She removed the latter and looked over at him expectantly. He offered his hand to her and she took it, readying the tweezers to perform their task. He winced as she pulled out the first shard of glass and sat it on the table beside them, looking away to take his mind off of it. It didn't really hurt - he was already in enough pain; it couldn't get any worse - it was just unsettling to watch. He caught sight of the broken window once more. In the fuss over his injury, he had all but forgotten what had caused it in the first place.

"Does it happen often?" She looked up at him questioningly and he gestured at the broken window. "That. A brunette boy and two red-haired boys did it. They threw a rock in your window. Do you get that all the time?"

She glanced over at the damaged window for a moment, before returning her attention to his hand. "No. I'd say the Harmon boys have their cousin from the West visiting. They like to show off in front of him. They would never dare to do something like that if it were just the two of them."

Her blatant indifference bothered him. "How can you say that?" he demanded angrily. "You don't care that they just vandalised your house?"

She flinched and shrank away from him and he mentally swore at himself for letting his frustration get the better of him and frightening her. It would just make her more apprehensive about talking to him.

"I'm sorry," he apologised. "I didn't mean to yell. I just don't understand why it doesn't upset you that they would do something like that in the first place."

She looked at him sceptically before returning to the task at hand, lapsing into silence for such a long moment that he was briefly paranoid she was ignoring him. "Children are very immature, Mr Mustang," she finally said softly. "They hear of my father, and how he rarely leaves the house, and they think of him as a crazy man. They think it will be fun, daring even, to try to provoke the mad alchemist who lives in the rundown house down the street. It's… a game to them."

After hearing her speak, he felt uneasy. That kind of outlook wasn't something he expected from a girl her age. He knew from experience that most children were inherently selfish, putting their own wants and needs above all else; he had been the same just a few years ago. Part of growing up was learning to consider and accept the actions and feelings of others. It was creepy to hear such tolerance from a kid.

"…You speak of children as though you aren't one yourself," he said finally.

"I suppose I am a bit different," she replied in a sheepish tone that brought an amused smile to his face.

"Well, you might be forgiving, but I'm not," he told her. "You know those guys right? Tell me where they live, and I'll make sure they don't do anything like this again."

"Please don't." Her voice was firm and serious.

"Huh?"

"Mr Mustang, please don't think such a thing. Just leave it alone."

"What? You're telling me I should just forget this happened? What if they decide to do it again? If I confront them about it now, there's no way they'll do it again!"

"And then what happens, Mr Mustang?" she asked him seriously. "When you go home for the week, what do you think those boys will do? I go to school with them. Do you think they won't consider that maybe I was the one who sent you over to visit them?"

"If they bother you, I'll just–"

"I'm asking you to leave those boys alone," she cut him off. "Besides, it was just an isolated occurrence; it's never happened before, and I'm sure it won't happen again. No good ever comes from stirring things up. So please… don't."

"Fine," he huffed finally. "But if they do something like this again, you have to tell me, all right?"

"All right," she agreed, but he wasn't convinced. She fell silent once more as she dabbed his now glass-free hand with the antiseptic.

"Do they bug you at all?" he questioned. "At school, I mean?"

She shook her head. "No, they would never dare. The teacher makes sure that nothing like that happens on her watch."

"Alright… But what about after school?"

"I come straight home after school."

"What about on the way–"

She gave him an irritated look and he bit his tongue.

"Sorry. I guess I'm prying, aren't I?"

She didn't respond, distracted by wrapping a bandage around his hand tightly. "Done."

He examined his bandaged hand and smiled at her. "Thank you."

She returned the gesture tentatively and looked down at the pile of glass she had picked from his hand. "I'll have to throw this out."

"No! Don't throw the glass out! I'm going to use it to fix the window!"

"…Okay. But I think it would probably be wise to wash the blood off first." She started to pack the tools back into the kit, glancing over at him for a brief moment. "…And you should probably change your shirt… It has blood on it too."

"What?" He asked, confused. She pointed and he followed her indicating finger to his sleeve cuff, which was soaked with it. "Aww man… My aunt is going to kill me! This is one of my favourite shirts too…" His aunt disliked doing laundry any more than was necessary, and she had warned him from an early age that if he stained his clothes there would be torturous consequences. Taking his bloody shirt home would surely be a trip fraught with uncertain terrors. It would be safer to burn the shirt than take it home even; she would rather buy him a new one than attempt to get the bloodstains out of this one!

The fear must have shown up on his face, because Riza said, hesitantly, "If you would like, Mr Mustang, I could wash it for you before you leave."

"Y–You would do that? Because that would be great! …Are you sure it won't be too much trouble?"

"It's really not a big deal, Mr Mustang. I need to do the laundry anyway… It won't take me much longer to do your shirt as well."

"Thank you!" He made to undo his shirt buttons, and paused. It probably wasn't a good idea to strip off his shirt in front of his Master's daughter. "I'll go change upstairs. Where would you like me to put the shirt?"

"Just leave it in your room," she replied as she closed the lid to the first-aid kit, "and I'll pick it up when I clean up there."

"You… clean my room?"

"…Well, it certainly doesn't clean itself, Mr Mustang."

"You're right, that was stupid. I'm sorry." It wouldn't be too hard to figure out that the only person who made sure the house was tidy was Riza, but he had never really put much thought into it before, since he had never actually seen her doing it. "When will you do it?"

"Sometime later today."

"When I'm upstairs with your father," he said bluntly. She didn't respond. "You know, you can just come in any time. I really don't mind."

"I don't want to disturb your studies, Mr Mustang…" she replied.

"What makes you think that you would?"

She looked away and shrugged. "The last thing you need while you're studying is someone bumping around the room."

"You won't disturb me. Really. I'm used to more noisy girls at home. Compared to them, you're like a mouse. Quieter than one, actually." She stared at him. "…It's a compliment."

"Thank you, I think…" She stood and picked up the first-aid kit. "I'll go put this away."

She left, and Roy went upstairs to change. He took off his bloody shirt and put on a clean one, leaving the stained shirt on the end of the bed as Riza had instructed.

He saw now that his opinion of her behaviour had been egotistical. He had thought she had been avoiding him because of something he had done. He had never considered that the problem had merely been shyness and uncertainty on her part. But now that he knew that for certain, he could deal with it. There were ways to combat shyness, and he would take the most direct method; ignoring it. It would merely require a bit more effort on his part. And perhaps if he could make friends with Riza, he wouldn't feel quite so lonely when he came here in the future.

Roy went back down the stairs and paused. The groceries still sat in the hallway, abandoned where Riza had left them to tend to him. He picked up a couple of apples that had rolled away, wincing as his injured hand pulled, and put them back in the bag. Now seemed like as good a time as any to start. He lifted the bag awkwardly in his arms and carried it into the kitchen.

"Riza? Where would you like this?"

Reviews make me happy! They give the encouragement I need to keep writing. What will happen in the next chapter? You'll find out that much faster if you click that 'Review Story' option. And PLEASE, I want the formatting problem sorted out. Don't assume that someone else will tell me what you want, tell me yourself! And constructive criticism is welcome. DON'T FORGET TO REVIEW.