The Question
Roy Mustang was pacing his apartment, pulling his hair in anger… at himself. How could he give her the gifts and then just walk away? He was the stupidest man on earth! The most coward! The most undeserving of her!
He felt his hands fisting and the pull to punch something, unfortunately all he had around himself were his books and he wouldn't use the neatly stacked tomes as a punching bag… at least for now…
The look on her face, surprise and… dare he hope, disappointment? He couldn't make up his mind on what she was thinking… It was weird, because he could always read her as an open book and now his emotions were disturbing his judgment…
He remembered the happiness that her note brought him, the careful choice of words to make him feel better, the gift, a simple umbrella to some, but so much more to him… to them…
He wanted to be able of acting on his own accord for the first time in his life, without thinking about the repercussions of his actions over his political future, over their plans to work towards a better country.
It pained him having to put his inner, emotional aspirations under the political and military ones. He was a soldier, a man of action, a killer, a warrior, a dreamer… he was all that, but he was also still a boy, eyeing the blonde girl inside his master's house running around to take care of the domestic chores; the almost man that blushed at seeing the woman that was strong enough to show him her deepest secret, tattooed in her back like a life-long cross; the man that saw the woman he idolized as his queen dying in front of his eyes… He was all that and so much more, all of his faces, all of his doubts, all of his fears surrounded by a part of her, a part of them…
He looked up, into his bedroom mirror and breathing deeply, started rehearsing what he was going to say when the occasion arrived.
It was the first Monday of March, the sun was warm, in a soft way, and the sky was starting to turn a soft blue touched by fluffy clouds. All their comrades were still absent, like it was recurrent during the Monday morning, and Hawkeye was eyeing her commanding officer, surprised at his punctuality, while he signed one of the files requesting his presence in a governmental reunion. He was hopeful it might be the one where they finally, after all those months of dancing around, would choose him as the next Fuhrer. This was the last signal to help him popping the question.
"Do you marry me, Hawkeye?" he said, without looking from his files.
The woman's mouth widen and her eyes blinked repeatedly, afraid her hearing senses or worse, her mental health, were snapping after the latest traumas.
"Wha…?" she started, but the noise behind the door alerted them to the entry of their subordinates, sparing her from an embarrassing answer.
For the rest of the week, Mustang made no comment about his unexpected question and Hawkeye blamed her sleepless night's power over her imagination, relieved she gave no answer to an unreal question, that could spike the curiosity in her chief's mind.
However, next Monday, those damned words were once again released and Riza could no longer blame her hearing, because she saw him moving his lips, his attention directed to her, waiting for an answer. She kept her silence, fidgeting with her papers to hide her blush and the shine in her eyes; he had to be drunk, no way in a normal state he would ask such a thing… However, when Fuery arrived and she asked if he noticed anything weird about their Colonel he shook his head, confused with her question. And apparently, no one of their friends noticed the concealed looks the Colonel would give her when she was distracted or how she would cough when he was too close, to hide her flaming cheeks, because, when in the next Monday they arrived to hear his popping question, they stopped dead in their tracks, their eyes almost bursting from their sockets.
Havoc was the first one to recover and with a loud laugh, slapped Mustang in the back.
"Good joke, chief, you almost got me! You and Hawkeye really put up with this show just for us!" and with Roy's laugh, the rest saw that it was only a joke, with the exception of one blonde lieutenant. She could see how his laugh was hollow, while his eyes shone with disappointment and it was really the first time she let herself imagine giving the answer she really wanted to give, the one she always wanted to give…
Yes, I do…
Poor Roy, but I can't stop laughing imagining Havoc's face if he ever heard something like that!
Please, read and review, I want to hear your opinion and even suggestions if you would like to see a special scene in this collection.