A/N: Hello!

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season :)

Now with you the first chapter of this 2024. As promised, we are in for the longest chapter of this story as well as being one more of those chapters I was eager to post so let's see what Ed and Winry will talk about.


Ed gave a couple of knocks on Winry's bedroom door. "Winry?" He gave it a couple more knocks. "May I come in?"

The silence on the other side of the door was more than enough of an answer but, making use of his stubbornness, Ed tried to turn the doorknob immediately discovering that the lock was on.

"Damn it, Winry, open up please." He kept knocking. "Winry!"

Suddenly the door swung open, freezing Ed's fist in the air.

"I remind you that you're in my apartment, Edward. So you don't have the right to order me around." Winry said in an annoyed tone. Her eyes were slightly puffy but the tears had stopped.

"I just want to talk to you."

"Well, I don't want to talk to you. I'm sick of your cheap excuses."

"They're no excuses, Win. Maybe they look like it, but let me explain."

"Don't worry, Ed. You already told me what you wanted to tell me. The point is, you're going to walk out of my life and I, as usual, have no say in it. It's okay, I understand. I'm used to it by now." She said bitterly.

Ed sighed. "I know I can't correct my past mistakes but at least this time I want to be completely honest with you. I want to tell you everything you want to know and the reasons that are driving me to make this decision."

Winry looked at him defiantly for a few moments before sighing heavily and asking. "Everything?" Ed nodded his head. Winry stared at him for a few moments without saying anything until she decided to speak again. "Will you answer any questions I ask you?" Ed nodded again. "OK, let's do a test... Do you love me?"

"With all my heart." Ed answered without hesitation.

Winry watched his golden orbs intently for a few seconds. The devotion and love she saw in them seemed so real that her own heart raced for a moment.

Winry continued to stare into his eyes for a few more moments before sighing and stepping aside to let Ed pass. "Okay. Come on in."

"Thank you." Ed said before entering the room.

Winry sat down on the bed leaning back against the headboard and stared at Ed with an expectant expression. Noticing that the blond looked a little nervous and unsure about where to sit, Winry rolled her eyes and told him. "Sit on the bed. I'm not going to do anything to you."

Ed scratched the back of his neck before heeding her and sitting on the other side of the bed. He crossed his flesh and blood leg and the temporary prosthetic left it level with the floor. "Okay... where do you want me to start?"

Winry shrugged. "I don't know. After all, I haven't the slightest idea what it is you want to talk to me about."

Ed felt a pang of guilt. "You're right, that's why I want to try to change that a little." He sighed. "Well, then... remember what I told you about the doubles?"

Winry nodded her head.

"What would you do if I told you that I ran into doubles of people I met here? That there's a world in which Maes Hughes is a cop madly in love with a florist named Gracia and that together they're expecting their second child."

Winry's mouth dropped slightly open. When Ed had mentioned to her the existence of "twins" in the other world she had assumed that the young man had once come across the double of someone he had met in Amestris but to hear directly the confirmation from his lips and even more so knowing that this person had been Maes Hughes' double was even more surprising and painful to accept. "Really? With all the years that have passed since what happened to Mr. Hughes..." She gulped at the bad memory. "It sounds like a dream. Something impossible."

"As Greed would say, nothing is impossible."

"Greed... the homunculus that... was in Dante's house?" Winry said not wanting to be so blunt as to remind him of the fate the homunculus had had under his own hands.

Ed was a little surprised. Despite how little he had told Winry she remembered everything he told her very well. He tried hard not to grimace at the grain of guilt adding to his burden before continuing. "Yes, him. Come to think of it, I think you deserve to know what precisely happened with Dante and... the homunculi. Including the one that looked like water."

Winry bit her lower lip before nodding her head. Ever since that foray she and Sheska had made to the Central Command communications room that figure had made its occasional appearances in her mind and nightmares bringing with it the uncertainty of not being able to be completely sure if that being really bore any relation to Trisha Elric just as it had with Wrath and Izumi Curtis' son. Most likely it was but she could never talk about it with either Al or Izumi, preferring to leave Al in blissful ignorance of what happened with that being for as long as possible and not wanting to cause Izumi any more suffering by talking about a subject that was so personal to her.

Ed sighed and began to speak. Unlike the last meeting he had had with Winry in Resembool, this time he told her absolutely everything. From the confirmation that Sloth had been born from the human transmutation he and Al had made, to what her end had been through her own hands and the whole final confrontation with Dante.

Winry put a hand to her mouth letting out an exclamation of surprise. "Ed!" Motivated by fear, she brought a hand to his chest over his heart, as if to convince herself that the young man beside her was real. "But h-how, did you really..." She gulped. "...died?"

Ed took Winry's hand in his flesh-and-blood one and said. "Yes, or at least it felt that way. I have vague memories of standing in front of the Portal of Truth before Al saved me so I think I died but I was left in some sort of limbo before my soul was completely lost, if that makes sense."

Gently Winry pulled Ed's hand away so she could place her hand right at the center of his chest. "Envy... your half-brother stabbed you here." She said and Ed nodded his head. "I can't believe it. Rose told me you'd been hurt but she never gave me details or told me that... that you'd died." A tear escaped her. "And me without even knowing it."

Ed wiped away her tear with a finger. "You had no way of knowing. Neither I told you nor did I make it clear to Rose because she probably has very fuzzy memories because of the trance Dante put her in and I didn't see the point in anguishing her with something that already happened and, amazingly enough, didn't escalate. I mean, somehow I'm alive, right? And Al..." The young man shrugged and a sad smile appeared on his face. "who knows if someday he'll get all his memories back. Although the truth is, I'd rather he stay that way. There are a lot of painful memories that wouldn't do him any good, plus we can build new memories together."

Winry nodded. "Maybe that's for the best." She moved closer to him on the bed and hugged him, obviously shaken by the events he had related to her. Ed reciprocated her embrace by placing his chin on the blonde's head. They remained silent like that for a few minutes until Winry pulled away although this time she was closer to Ed than they had been at first.

She sighed. "I don't know if I want to know the rest anymore."

"Well there's no way around it, there's no going back now. You asked for the truth and you're going to get the truth." Ed said with a slight smile before continuing his tale. This time he told her about what Al did (although of this Winry did have an idea of what had happened), the transmutation circle he had used, and how he had come to a place different from London.

"At first I thought I was in the same place but I've concluded that the truth is a son of a bitch because he sent me to a place with a completely different language, a few years in the future and without any of my automails."

"I agree, he's a son of a bitch."

The spontaneity of Winry's comment made Ed laugh. "I never thought I'd hear you say something like that." He said between guffaws.

"Well, he's earned it. It almost seemed almost like he had something personal against you."

Ed laughed some more until he could control his laughter. "I'd like to say yes but I did earn what happened to me."

"That's not true." Winry said in a firm tone. "You may have made mistakes but no one deserves to go through what you went through, especially considering all you wanted was to make amends for what you did. It's not your fault that unhinged Dante came into the equation."

"But one way or another I ended up choosing the path I took."

Winry snorted. "Yeah, but it's not like you had much of a choice." Winry was quiet mulling over her own words before adding. "At least up to that point, of course."

Ed realized what Winry was referring to. "Maybe..." He sighed.

Winry sighed as well before speaking. "Hey, Ed, so what did you do when you got to the other world? It couldn't have been easy if you didn't even have your automails." Winry said with sincere concern.

"Well... it wasn't exactly easy. I showed up in an alley and stayed there for a while trying to assimilate what had happened. I was probably in some kind of shock. I was surprised to be alive and then it didn't take me long to realize that I had crossed back through the Portal." He sighed. "When I finally got up the courage to get out of there to see what I could do to get a place to stay I got the "wonderful" surprise of not understanding a damn thing anyone else was saying."

"So how did you manage to survive?" Winry said in a trembling voice as she vividly imagined what that experience must have been like for Ed.

"By an unfortunate coincidence. I had to sleep in that alley for a few days while I tried to find someplace where there was a person who spoke the same language as me or just a place where they would let me work to buy something to eat but, even if I couldn't understand them, it was easy to tell that no one was willing to be around an apparent beggar who was missing an arm and hopping around on one leg." He closed his eyes. "Until she showed up."

"Who?" Winry asked in a trembling voice.

"Patrice Alberich." Ed opened his eyes and stared at her. "My mother's doppelganger."

Winry took Ed's hand and held it in hers. "Oh, Ed."

Ed inhaled deeply before continuing. "Discounting my counterpart, she was the first doppelganger I ever met. When I first came to Earth I hadn't really thought about it but that's when I proved Hohenheim's theory correct. Discounting the brown eyes and blonde hair she was an identical copy of my mom because she was even just as good-natured."

Winry began to rub Ed's hand with her own trying to provide some comfort to Ed as he told his story. She didn't want to push him when the blond was obviously having some difficulty telling that part of his life so she continued with her motion while keeping silent waiting for Ed to decide if he was ready to continue or if he preferred to leave the tale there.

Grateful at Winry's gesture, Ed directed a slight smile at her before continuing after a pause. "Patrice followed me when she saw me hobble into the alley. Unlike all the other people who looked at me with disgust, she approached me and offered her help. Fortunately, she spoke English, although I'm sure even if it was purely in gestures she was going to give me her full support."

Winry continued to listen attentively to Ed's story without letting go of his hand at any time. Ed told her about the great confusion and pain of being face to face with a person who bore the face of his deceased mother. He also told her how Patrice Alberich insisted on taking him to her home (discovering at the time that they were in a city called Frankfurt) to give him a warm meal and a place to sleep for at least one night, although that simple visit led to a period when Ed was living with her and her family: her German-born husband Ulric (Patrice had been born in England but had returned to her father's maternal home in Germany) and their 10-year-old daughter Giselle.

The Alberich family had a small bakery in which Ed had been working, trying to repay them at least in that way for their kindness. On several occasions he tried to get a job so as not to be a burden to them but being a young man two members short and with a basic level of German (Patrice started teaching him German but sometimes it was easier to talk to each other in English, especially when the frustration that filled Ed from time to time at having to learn a complicated language when he had no idea what he could even do to try to get back to Amestris) nobody wanted to hire him, earning him repeated looks of disgust and disapproval in the face of the growing spread of the "superior" Aryan race ideology.

So it went on for a couple of months until Ulric took him with him on a trip to Munich where, as fate would have it, Ed ended up reuniting with Hohenheim. Although it pained him to part with them, Ed agreed to Hohenheim's offer to stay with him since he didn't want to continue to be a burden to the Alberichs, especially considering the inflation that was sapping the resources they had to keep their bakery afloat.

Although the daily coexistence with Patrice had become a duality of warmth and nostalgia, Ed had thought about returning to Frankfurt to say goodbye to her in person but in the end, he decided to just send her a thank you letter with Ulric along with the money that would have been spent on his return ticket, so Ed saw Patrice in person for the last time one cold autumn morning as he left her home not knowing that it would be the last time he would see her, having as a memento of her the recipe for the Königsberger Klopse he had prepared for Winry that night.

During his stay at his father's apartment, Hohenheim spent several months developing the prosthetics with which Ed had returned to Amestris while at the same time talking to his university contacts to get Ed a part-time job as his assistant and enrolling him in an academic program that would give Ed the best possible access to research that might give him some clue as to how to return to his world.

Two years into his new life with Hohenheim, a group of foreign students arrived to study at the University of Munich, among them Alfons Heiderich. Ed didn't talk much about his reactions to meeting the doppelganger of the brother he wasn't sure if he was still alive or not, but Winry could see in his face the glimpses of the emotions that must have overwhelmed him at the time.

Fortunately for Ed, Alfons was interested in the same research as he was so after a few months they decided to share an apartment so that they could devote as much time as possible to their research on space rockets. By then Ed was practically living on his own since Hohenheim had started making constant research trips and spent few days at the apartment.

After a year Ed's hopes of returning to Amestris had dwindled considerably as not even the help of Alfons and his team had given him the slightest clue as to how to get back and it was even having the opposite effect as the more he read and researched the more it seemed that the method he was pouring all his hopes into seemed to be completely useless in achieving his goal.

At that point, Ed told her about the events that ended up leading him back to Amestris. From the encounter with Noah at a fair to Hohenheim's death because of Envy and instigated by the Thule society.

"I'm sorry, Ed."

"Huh?"

"Your father's death. I'm so sorry about that. It must have been very difficult for you."

Ed blinked a couple of times before replying. "Oh... thanks, I guess. Even now I don't know how to feel about it. That Hohenheim was quite a bastard but our time together in Munich... made me realize that he at least had one or two good things hidden inside his idiocy. And without his help... I'm not sure if I'd be here today..." He inhaled deeply to push away the inexplicable moisture that wanted to form in his eyes. "Do you think it's right for me to say that I miss him sometimes?"

Winry pulled him to herself. "Of course I do, Ed. At the end of the day, he was your father and became an important support to you. Maybe that doesn't make up for the years he was away from you but at least he gave his best to help you find a way back home."

Ed nodded his head as he hugged Winry tightly. He didn't shed any tears and, for the moment, didn't attempt to utter another word due to the feeling that if he did he would lose control of his emotions.

A few minutes passed like that until Ed broke away from Winry and gave her a slight smile of thanks.

Ed inhaled deeply before turning serious and continuing. "Well, this part of the story you already know. Eckart succeeded in her task and brought an army to Amestris. The ship you saw me arrive on was given to me by Alfons. Right up to the last moment he went out of his way to support me even though I surely wasn't the best of friends." Ed's look momentarily saddened but Winry preferred not to comment on that. "Thanks to his quick action I was able to completely clear up the big doubt I had all these years. Al was alive and in his original body." He took one of Winry's hands and looked the blonde straight in the eyes. "And it also allowed me to see again the girl I had missed so much and who even across worlds made my heart pound like crazy."

Winry held his gaze as a slight blush came to her cheeks. "Ed..."

Unable to contain himself, Ed leaned over and kissed her forehead before adding. "I managed to see you again and I took advantage of that little time to hurt you." He exhaled heavily. "I got carried away with my impulses and kissed you. Don't get me wrong, I don't regret doing it because it was something I'd been longing to do for years but I made the very big mistake of not talking properly to you, and that I do regret enormously because you didn't deserve to be treated like that."

Winry stared at his face for a few seconds, easily observing the sincerity with which Ed was speaking to her. However, when one of the constant doubts that had been hovering in her mind all these years made its appearance she couldn't help but ask. "Did you decide to return to Earth... for Noah?"

"What? No! How could you even think of that? That wasn't why."

Although Ed's story had given her her answer in a way, Winry let out the breath she hadn't realized she was holding. One of the thoughts that had plagued her so much over the years was finally fading as hearing it from Ed's mouth while looking into his eyes left no doubt that the young man was speaking the truth. However...

"So... why did you leave just like that? Were you really the only one who could close the Portal?"

Ed exhaled heavily. "In my mind, I saw it that way. I was inadvertently a key player in getting the Portal from Earth open so the invasion of Amestris was pretty much my fault. I had to take responsibility for my mistakes."

"Always wanting to take the blame for everything." Winry muttered.

Ed cracked a sad smile. "Sorry, that's just the way I am." He sighed and ducked his head. "That was why I decided to return to Earth. I had to make sure the Portal could never be opened again. So when we finally managed to immobilize Eckart I didn't think much of it and decided to leave because I wasn't sure if there was another army waiting to come through the Portal." He lifted his face and stared at Winry. "Al gave you my message?"

Winry clenched her fists on the sheets. "Yes, he did."

"I can't say I'm glad because that was idiotic of me. You deserved more than that. A proper goodbye."

Winry ducked her head. "All these years I thought the kiss had meant nothing to you since your message was simply a 'Thank you.' Thank you for what? For just being your mechanic? For putting up with the distance you put between us? For indulging your whim to reciprocate your kiss without question?" Winry confessed bitterly.

Ed lifted her face with one hand so she could stare into his eyes. "I'm so sorry, Winry. I'm never going to finish regretting leaving the way I did. There were so many things I wanted to tell you but wasn't able to tell you both because of circumstances and because I was an idiot. When I kissed you a part of me was aware that I had crossed a line and that it changed everything between us. Having kissed you there was no turning back, I could no longer pretend that I didn't feel something for you beyond friendship when all I wanted was to never let you go again. That's why I should have told you at least a part of my true feelings even if Al and Sheska were there but I was a damn coward. And when the climax of the battle came I made an impulsive decision. I didn't think it through that I had to find you and say goodbye to you. Show you how much you mean to me even if I had to leave. However..." He sighed and began to stroke Winry's cheek. "Well you know I'm all an idiot and the best I could think of to tell you was the message I asked Al to tell you. There was so much to tell you but in the end, the thought crossed my mind that perhaps it would be best not to give you false hope because at the time I thought there would be no other way to get back to Amestris. I had no future to promise you and so I decided to leave without talking to you about how I really felt." A tear escaped Winry and Ed wiped it away with his thumb. "Believe me I've been regretting my bad judgment every day since."

Winry closed her eyes for a few seconds focusing on Ed's caress to keep more tears from spilling over. When she felt in control of herself, she opened her eyes and inhaled deeply before speaking. "What did you do when you came back to Earth?"

Ed stroked Winry's cheek once more before continuing his tale. "Regret it, what else could I do?" He sighed. "When the adrenaline of the moment passed, my mind took it upon itself to remind me all at once of what I had lost by my decision. I would no longer see you or Al. I would not see my brother grow up. I would not have the opportunity to pursue your love. I would never see the green grounds of Resembool again. Nothing... I had lost everything." He paused before continuing. "And if that wasn't enough, I also lost my friend, Alfons."

Winry let out a gasp of surprise before asking. "What happened to him?"

"Some fucking Nazi shot him when he found out he'd helped me escape out here." Ed said clenching his hands into fists. "In my disappointment in believing I could never return to Amestris I neglected Alfons when he was always a good friend to me. He listened to all my stories with Al even if he thought I was making them up and he even not only helped me with our research but also helped me improve my German. Thanks to him I was able to get along better at scientific events and in everyday life..." He exhaled heavily trying to push away the stinging that was becoming present in his eyes. "Perhaps towards the end, we had disagreements over his insistence on leaning on the resources the Nazis could provide him if he continued to collaborate with them but first and foremost he was my friend. A friend who helped me not to feel so alone and lost in an unknown world..." He pounded the mattress with a fist. "A friend whom I unconsciously associated with my brother constantly and whom I hurt by not giving him the importance he deserved and recognizing him as a being completely independent of my brother. And who even in his death I couldn't help but feel my heart tear at seeing someone who bore Al's face dead." Concluded Ed ducking his head so that his bangs covered his eyes.

Without a word, Winry closed the distance between them and embraced him, gently pushing Ed's face onto her shoulder. Slowly she began to move so that the two of them rocked gently and soon after she murmured. "It's okay, Ed, let it out. Don't hold it all in. You have every right to grieve the loss of your friend. No matter what differences you came to have, I know he was very fond of you and he left without holding any kind of grudge. So don't torture yourself like this, please."

Ed clutched his hands behind Winry's back and began to cry. It wasn't just Alfons' death that was causing him to cry. It was everything. All the years of uncertainty about his brother's fate. Losing Winry. The constant hopelessness of not being able to return to Amestris. To have seen Hohenheim die, practically his only constant in an unknown world, just when he was finally recognizing him as his father. Living under the same roof as a woman who had the same face as his mother but with no bond or mutual memory to unite them. His loneliness and the almost unbearable regret he had carried since returning after the invasion of Amestris and what he had experienced over the past three years that he had not yet told Winry.

During his crying, Winry did not leave his side and continued to rock him and stroke his head while murmuring a few words of support to help soothe him.

When Ed's crying stopped and turned to the occasional sporadic sob, Winry pulled away from him and began to place soft kisses on his cheeks and forehead until finally the tears had stopped completely.

Winry brought both hands to Ed's face to stroke his cheeks with her thumbs. "I'm sorry, Ed, I shouldn't have forced you to talk."

Ed shook his head. "You didn't force me, Win. It was my decision to tell you everything. Don't try to take my merit, eh." He said cracking a slight smile.

Winry reciprocated his smile.

Ed turned serious. "What's more, I'm sorry it took me all this time to talk to you. There's so much you deserved to know long ago. I had the chance to tell you everything when we were at Rose's house but I refused to do it as usual. It's not that I don't trust you because you're the one I'd trust with my life, it's just that-"

"You didn't feel ready." Winry finished for him. "It's okay, Ed. I think I get it now." She smiled. "Thank you for talking to me, Ed. You don't know how much it means that you're trusting me enough to share all this with me."

"I've always trusted you, Winry. I may not be the best at showing it but you and Al have always been the people I trust the most. Although..." He let out a chuckle. "Don't tell Al because otherwise, he's going to be jealous that I told you and not him."

Winry was surprised. "You didn't tell Al?"

"Just parts of it. Not with all the details like with you." He sighed. "I haven't even dared to tell him that I was living with Mom's doppelganger or with Hohenheim. With Hohenheim I don't know if I should tell him because in the end I'd have to tell him he's dead and I don't know, sometimes I get the impression he's still holding out hope that one day he'll come back."

"He's his father, Ed, he has a right to know. Al is stronger than you think and I'm sure, despite everything, it will make him happy to know that you weren't alone and that you and Hohenheim managed to iron out your rough edges."

Ed was quiet for a few seconds before responding. "You may be right, but that's not a conversation I'm looking forward to."

"You'll have time to prepare from now till Al comes back. You have to tell him in person okay?"

"Yes, madam." Ed said with a slightly teasing tone.

"Good." Winry said with a slight smile.

Ed gently pulled Winry's hands away from his face but not before placing a kiss on the palm of each. He placed them in the middle of each other on the bed without releasing them. "I haven't finished telling you everything yet."

Winry bit her lower lip before replying. "Are you sure you want to go on, Ed? I'd perfectly understand if you'd rather we had this conversation another time."

"No, Winry. I've kept you waiting long enough."

"Are you sure?"

Ed nodded his head.

"Fine, it'll be as you say."

Ed inhaled deeply before resuming his tale. "Destroying the portal as such wasn't difficult, it was simply a matter of stealing some of the explosives left on Eckart's plane and placing them all over the place. The chaos of the moment was good cover for stealing them and placing them, but shortly before activating them Eckart's followers discovered me and tried to catch me." He lifted his shirt to reveal a scar on his right side. "I was shot but luckily it was relatively superficial."

Winry looked at him with a surprised expression before sighing. "Having you here, I won't say any more because we might as well argue about what your definition of 'superficial' is."

Ed cracked a smile. "I admit, it did bleed quite a bit but nothing that couldn't wait to be treated." His expression turned serious again. "Besides at that moment, I felt so disconnected from what was going on around me as I was thinking about what I had let go, that I honestly didn't care what happened to me as long as I managed to destroy the portal and get Alfons' body out of there. He deserved a proper funeral and not to be left in a place where they would end up throwing his body around like trash."

Quietly, Winry took his hand and intertwined her fingers with his, being reciprocated immediately with a light squeeze on his part.

"It wasn't easy but with Noah's help, we made it out of there with Alfons' body. I thought they would follow us but once we were outside they left us alone and fortunately, I haven't heard from the Thule society since. Apparently, the society was dismantled and its resources were completely cut off after the Shamballa fiasco." He closed his eyes momentarily before continuing. "After Alfons' funeral, Noah insisted on staying with me to keep me company." Winry raised an eyebrow. "She apologized to me, treated my wound, and helped me through those early days of adjusting to having to stay on Earth forever although I don't know... I guess a part of me never quite forgave her but..." His tone of voice lowered. "I didn't want to be left alone. I didn't have Hohenheim or Alfons anymore and I'd blown what was apparently my only chance to get back to Amestris... so let's just say I wasn't at my best."

Winry gulped before continuing. "How did you cope?"

"The best way I could think of: with alcohol." He said with a sad smile. "It had only been a month since the invasion when I became a frequent patron of the local tavern. I would spend every night there drinking until I fell unconscious or until Noah came looking for me. Since I saw no possible way to return to Amestris I spent practically all my money on alcohol. It's not like I had a lot of money to support myself with all the recession the country was going through but you'd be surprised how much cheap alcohol you could get. Almost everything tasted like hell but the taste didn't matter, all I wanted was something to help me escape from my reality. And it still wasn't enough... It got to a point where alcohol was no longer helping me deal with my loneliness." He inhaled deeply then gave her a regretful look. "Ever since she started living with me, Noah was constantly hitting on me and had stolen kisses from me even though I always told her that I didn't have feelings for her. But still..." Winry closed her eyes and ducked her head. "I ended up sleeping with her."

"And I have to assume it wasn't a matter of a single drunken night." Winry commented without opening her eyes.

Ed sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "You're right... We did it a couple more times."

Winry inhaled deeply before opening her eyes and lifting her face to stare at Ed. "I see."

"I see?" Ed asked in confusion. "You're not upset? Disappointed?"

"I'm no one to hold you accountable. You were perfectly at liberty to do whatever you wanted. We never had anything."

"But-"

Winry frowned. "What do you want? For me to hit you or something?" She said as she gave his ponytail a hard tug.

"Ouch!" Ed complained as he rubbed his scalp.

"I have no right to say anything to you, it's your life." At Ed's watchful gaze on her, Winry sighed and added. "Ok, do you want me to tell you something? Well yes, it baffles me that you slept with Noah but I'm not one to berate you for it."

Ed raised an eyebrow. "Win? You...?"

Winry ducked her gaze slightly.

Not wanting to pressure her, Ed exhaled heavily and lowered his hand from his head, opting to continue his tale so as not to make Winry uncomfortable by probing into a subject she might not want to talk about. "Those certainly weren't my brightest days. I hope this doesn't sound like an excuse but I told Noah over and over again that I had no feelings for her but she said it didn't matter and was still willing to have sex with me. And I..." He sighed. "Well, at least it helped distract my mind for a while. Afterward, I felt emotionally like shit but that's what there was."

"You're an idiot." Winry muttered.

"I agree with you."

Winry sighed. "So, how did your encounters with Noah end?"

"After a few days, I couldn't take it anymore. I always felt terrible about myself after doing it but it only got worse with each occasion so I decided to put a stop to it. Surprisingly enough, Noah complained to me and made quite a fuss when I told her our encounters were over." He frowned. "I don't understand how she was comfortable with our arrangement when I told her countless times that I had no feelings for her and that what we were doing was merely physical."

"Then what happened? How did you manage to convince her that you should stop doing it?"

Ed's gaze darkened slightly. "I was avoiding her as much as I could but a week later she told me she was pregnant."

At that moment Winry looked at him with surprise and some annoyance, pulling away from him slightly. "What?!"

"It's not what you think. She lied to me, she wasn't pregnant. Though of course, at the time I didn't know it was a lie." He sighed heavily before continuing. "When she told me... I was in shock. I always tried to use protection although well I still knew that it could be the case that she would get pregnant plus I was always drunk when we did it so I could have been careless without realizing it. But anyway, the point is that it was not in my plans to become a father. Just the thought of it made me think I'd fuck everything up. So needless to say, the idea terrified me. Pretty much." He bit his lower lip for a few seconds before continuing. "So that night I went and left her there. I didn't know if it was a spur-of-the-moment thing or if I planned to leave for a while or even forever. I just needed to get away."

Noticing how lost Ed's gaze had become, Winry put a hand on his knee in support and asked. "In the end, you didn't leave her alone with her supposed pregnancy, did you?"

Ed smiled slightly for a few moments. "Sometimes I don't understand how you can have faith in me..."

"I know we've been years apart but I still do not doubt in my mind that you're a good person. The look in your eyes gives you away." Winry told him reciprocating his smile.

Ed placed his hand over the one Winry had rested on his knee before saying. "I have my doubts about that because a good person wouldn't just abandon the mother of his child just like that."

"But you came back didn't you?"

"Yes, I did. I don't remember exactly how many days I was gone because I spent most of my time in a bar that was as far away from the apartment as possible. I guess it was about a week when my brain was finally able to properly register what it meant that Noah was 'expecting' my son and that brought me back. I was still dreading the kind of father I would become but at least I had to do something right and be there for both of them. Plus, I don't know, I think a part of me also realized that having a child, as unexpected as his arrival was, would help me to no longer be alone in that world." Ed's tone and look when he said this made Winry feel a pang in her heart as she saw once again the loneliness the young man had experienced on the other side of the Portal. "So I decided that even if I didn't love Noah I would stay with her. Or well..." He sighed. "Truthfully I don't know if I could have endured living with her but I would find a way to be close to my son. To take care of him and be there for him. As much of a jerk as I was being I wouldn't have wanted to make the same mistake Hohenheim made."

"When I came back Noah was a tearful mess and that only made me more miserable with myself for what I almost did." Ed said as he unconsciously clenched his free hand into a fist, resentful at Noah's deceit. "We talked and I agreed to stay with her until my son was born and from there we would see what we would do about us. Noah wanted to get married but I wasn't willing to do it. She made a big fuss about it but I didn't give in and she had no choice but to resign herself although that didn't stop her attempts to want to sleep with me. She became more insistent than ever but I had finally learned not to make the same mistake again." He brought the hand that had been on Winry's to his forehead lightly squeezing the beginning of his scalp. "It was so obvious why she was so desperate for us to have sex again but like the idiot I am I didn't realize her true intentions."

Winry brought a hand to the one Ed had on his forehead squeezing it gently to prompt him to release the pressure he was exerting on his scalp. "You weren't an idiot, Ed - at least not on that occasion." She added in a light teasing tone trying to cheer the blond up, managing to steal a smile from him. "You simply trusted her, even if she didn't deserve it. Trusting people is not a sin. The problem comes when you place that trust in people who don't deserve it and who even go so far as to take advantage of it, but there's no way we can know other people's true intentions. And in this case, Noah took advantage of the vulnerable state you were in." She concluded with a slight frown at the mention of the woman who had toyed with Ed that way.

"But even if I trusted her on her word I left and-"

"I understand yes, you could have made a very serious mistake." Winry interrupted him. "But in the end, you rectified and assumed the role that would have been yours had you had a child with her."

"Ha, what a father I would have been." Ed said, gently pulling his hand away from his forehead and, thus, Winry's.

"Even though you refuse to accept it, I think once you finished digesting the news you would have made a wonderful father."

"I could only have been if you had been the person by my side."

Winry's eyes widened a little more in surprise at Ed's words and the naturalness with which he had said them, implying that the young man had come to visualize her in his future... just as she had him.

Realizing the impact of what he had said, Ed coughed a couple of times before continuing. "Anyway, I don't know if I would have been a good father but at the time I figured the least I could do was provide for the baby's needs and give him a sober father so this time I did take my job seriously, and attended a couple of alcoholic help meetings."

"And you saying you would have been a bad father with all the preparations you were making to properly care for the baby."

Ed shrugged his shoulders. "Well I needed the money and the continued purchase of alcohol is not a good ally in achieving that."

Knowing Ed wouldn't give in easily, Winry decided not to press that point. "So... how was it that you found out Noah wasn't pregnant?"

"When I raised enough money I took Noah to a doctor to verify that the baby was okay, she insisted on going in alone and I let her. When she came out she told me everything was going great and as much as I asked she just gave me very basic details that you can find in any book on human reproduction. So the next day I went to see the doctor to check for myself because she was almost three months "pregnant" and I didn't see any signs that Noah was pregnant and I was really afraid that the baby might have a problem. So the doctor confirmed my suspicions and I left the apartment."

"And Noah probably let you off easy." Winry said sarcastically.

Ed snorted. "Damn right she did. She apologized to me, cried, and begged me but, if I didn't already love her, any trust we might have built up crumbled with her lie."

"And what did you do then?"

"I stayed in the college dorms. I never told them Hohenheim had died because how to explain it to them? There were probably some members of the Thule society at the university but with the fate that befell the society, the remaining members preferred to remain anonymous so they all gave Hohenheim up as missing and I, surprisingly considering my bad habits at the time, was allowed to stay and work there. Certainly, since I returned from Amestris I was no longer a teaching assistant because Hohenheim was no longer at the university but they let me stay on as a librarian. The pay was minimal but in the beginning, it was enough to support my habit and when I left Noah I was performing even better since, with the low enrollment the college was having, they let me stay in the dorm for free as long as I took care of its upkeep myself."

"Don't take this the wrong way but I don't see you as a librarian."

Ed laughed. "Believe me it would never have crossed my mind but that's what there was. The country was going through a severe recession and I had no papers so it's not like I had a lot of options either and..." His gaze darkened slightly. "It's not like I had any ambitions or dreams either."

"So since you returned from Amestris you didn't resume the research you were conducting before the invasion?"

Ed shook his head. "The only thought I had in my mind about resuming my research was 'What for?' I was resigned to my fate since I didn't believe there was any other way to open a portal when I destroyed the one the Thule society had used. At least that was until I had a strong motivation to try one more time."

"What do you mean?"

Ed looked intently into her eyes. "You. I didn't lie to you when I told you that you had been my motivation for returning to Amestris."

The intensity of Ed's gaze made Winry blush slightly. "I don't think I understand you."

"I hope you don't laugh at me when I tell you about it." He sighed. "During my time as a librarian, I interacted with other members of the university. Professors, administrators, and students. One of them was Ludwig Hoffman. He was a young professor just joining the literature and philosophy faculty and for some strange reason he liked me." He shrugged. "He continually went to the library to prepare for his classes and always asked my opinion even though I often didn't quite understand what the hell it was precisely that the philosophy authors he consulted me about wanted to convey."

Winry smiled. "Perhaps your insight struck him as fresh."

Ed shrugged again. "Perhaps he was simply looking for something to distract himself with." He inhaled deeply before continuing. "The point is, he liked me enough to invite me to his wedding. And everything changed when I saw the bride." He took Winry's hand in his left hand. "It was you." He cleared his throat. "Well, you know, your Earth double. The only difference was that Wynona had green eyes but her face and hair color were exactly the same as yours." He exhaled heavily. "Even her smile looked so much like yours..."

"Ed..."

Ed drew Winry's other hand so he could hold both of Winry's hands with his own. "I spent the whole party in a corner drinking while I watched her so happily kissing her husband and dancing with him." He ducked his head as he lifted Winry's hands a few inches below his chin while running his thumbs over the blonde's knuckles. "I couldn't take my eyes off them because every moment it seemed like I was watching you, marrying a man who wasn't me. Smiling, laughing, kissing him, hugging him." He sighed. "Just living the rest of your life by his side." He closed his eyes. "I couldn't stand it. All that time I knew that was the fate that awaited you by not having the chance to even try to earn your forgiveness and love but the thought of it and seeing it materialize through Wynona were completely different things. At that moment, seeing Wynona so happy and hearing your voice through hers, I realized that I couldn't and wouldn't accept that I had definitely lost any chance with you." He confessed quietly as he rested his chin on his intertwined hands.

Winry blinked several times to hold back the tears that wanted to form in her eyes. "That must have been so hard." Winry murmured as she thought of the pain she herself had felt at the thought of Ed leaving because he had a woman waiting for him on the other side of the Portal.

"Like you have no idea. That night I got as drunk as I hadn't since my time with Noah, so let's just say that's when I started to forget what I'd learned in the help group. Obviously, the next day I had a hell of a hangover but, as ironic as it sounds, being on Earth I never had a clearer mind than I did in those moments. Maybe it was already a losing battle in case I made it back but I didn't want to be left with the uneasiness of not having tried every last resort to get back to you." Ed said before kissing Winry's hands.

"You made it." Winry said with a slight smile.

"Late though." Ed said with a sad smile.

Winry bit her lower lip before responding, choosing not to delve into what Ed had just said. "So how did you make it back? You only told me something about a Portal and Gluttony but I'm confused. You said that when you got back to the other world you destroyed the Portal."

Ed sighed, somewhat saddened that Winry had ignored his comment. "The short version is that we could say I created a new Portal. I researched for several months in any book that could be of use to me however little, and I infiltrated to take some of the secret files from the old Thule society facilities. When I had the rough calculations of some coordinates I traveled through Austria, Hungary, and Romania, eh Earth countries." He added at last noticing Winry's expression of slight confusion and curiosity. "I wasn't sure but the only option I had was to go on a 'trial and error' basis. In Austria and Hungary, nothing happened, well actually there was something..." He sighed. "I met Noah again."

"Please tell me you didn't make the same mistake."

"No, I learned my lesson." He said with a slight smile. "She wanted to convince me to stay with her but I refused and left as soon as I could. Anyway, when I got to Romania it looked like my calculations had been wrong until I heard about an abandoned town that everyone avoided going to because there was 'a monster' there."

"Gluttony."

"Indeed. Luckily people didn't run into him but they did hear strange noises and could see several mangled corpses of animals in the vicinity. At the time I didn't think it was Gluttony but that town is where the coordinates and calculations I had seemed to converge the most so I went there and the rest is history."

"You spent a few days tracing the circle and verifying it when Gluttony showed up." Winry shuddered slightly as her mind conjured up the image of what Ed must have looked like after his confrontation with the homunculus. Wounds all over his body, broken ribs, and missing the automail from his arm which had been brutally ripped off by Gluttony. "And now you're here." She said cracking a slight smile not wanting to express out loud once again the experience Ed went through in order to get back to Amestris.

"That's right." Ed said reciprocating her smile. "So... I guess that's it. I should have told you everything a long time ago. Not just when I got back but I should have told you about what was happening to Al and me when I was in Resembool." He exhaled heavily. "I thought the less you knew the better it would be for you, so you'd be safer. So you wouldn't be exposed once again to a psychopath like Barry." His gaze briefly darkened at the memory of that extreme experience with Barry but he pushed the thought away as quickly as he could. "There was no need for you to have to be involved in the consequences of my actions-"

"Ok, I understand, maybe there was no reason for me to be with you every step of your journey, but you know I would have been there for both of you... for you." Winry added finally looking him straight in the eye. "First and foremost I am your friend and if there was anything I could have done to spare you all the pain and suffering you went through believe me I would have done it without hesitation."

Ed placed his left hand on one of Winry's hands resting on the bed and gave it a light squeeze. "I know that now. I'm sure I knew all these years but my stubbornness kept me from accepting it and I decided to do things on my own."

Winry placed her other hand over the one Ed had rested on his. "At least now you know you're not alone." She flashed him a smile before pulling her hand away and speaking again. "Hey, Ed, there's something you haven't told me, how did you manage to travel? From what you've told me Germany wasn't going through a good patch and you didn't have the same resources you had here being a state alchemist."

Ed shrugged. "I just saved as much as I could. My job as a librarian didn't leave me much so, since I decided to do everything I could to come back, I convinced the administrators to also give me a position as a teaching assistant to cover some classes when the regular professors were absent. That gave me a little more money but it wasn't enough either so I also got a job as a waiter in the afternoons-evenings at a restaurant."

Winry frowned. "You weren't taking good care of yourself, were you?"

Ed put a hand to the back of his neck. "Well...a lot of the food over there wasn't very good so I wasn't missing much."

Winry smacked him upside the head. "You came back extremely malnourished! You neglected yourself terribly for months! The damage to your body could have been permanent and you might even have been prevented from using your automails!" She said in an annoyed tone.

Ed brought a hand to the sore area. "I wasn't lying when I said I had decided to do whatever it took to get back to you!"

They looked at each other intently until Winry sighed and looked away.

Gently, Ed turned Winry's face toward him before speaking. "Listen, Win, that doesn't matter to me. All I wanted was to be able to see you one more time." He paused slightly before adding. "If there's one thing I regret, it's not coming back sooner and not showing you sooner how much you mean to me."

"Perhaps I should have improved my Edward Elric language and behavior translation skills." Winry said with a slight smile.

Ed reciprocated her smile. "I'm rather amazed at your ability to understand me and, more importantly, put up with me. What's more, you should be giving me lessons in that."

Winry kept her smile for a few more moments before lowering her gaze. She was quiet for a few seconds before she began to fiddle with her hands and ask. "That's your whole story, Ed?"

Ed blinked a couple of times, confused at the nervousness Winry was suddenly displaying. "Yes, I think that's it. If there's anything else you want to know, tell me."

Winry fiddled with her fingers for a few more moments before speaking. "I think it's only fair that I tell you about me. About everything I haven't told you so far."

Noticing her nervousness, Ed said. "You don't have to force yourself to do it. If one of us was indebted to the other it's me."

Winry shook her head. "I want to do it... in fact, I think I need to do it."

"You sure?"

Winry nodded her head before taking Ed's hand, to guide him as they moved on the bed until they were both with their backs leaning back against the headboard.

Winry sighed before she began to speak. "When did you realize that... that you were really in love with me?"

"I don't know if there was an exact moment when I knew. During my travels with Al, I realized that I was feeling something for you but didn't give it the necessary importance since, as I told you before, I thought that later the right time would come to face those feelings and tell you. Although, when I crossed the Portal for the first time I could no longer deny to myself that I was completely and hopelessly in love with you."

"I see... in my case, I realized I was in love with you when I saw you leaving on the train. When you were going with your dyed hair to face the homunculi." She was quiet for a few seconds before smiling and adding. "Although I probably had been for a couple of months before that only there was never a good time to think about it."

"My fault." Ed said with a regretful tone.

Winry shook her head. "I don't blame you, how could I when finding out I had fallen in love with my best friend made me so happy?" She said after turning to look at him with a smile on her face. "I think a part of me had refused to accept it because I couldn't see you as often as I'd like to and sometimes you could be quite the jerk." She said with a chuckle. "But when I finally accepted it, I felt a kind of peace and joy inside. As well as hope... hope that someday I would tell you and you would reciprocate my feelings." She sighed. "Only those emotions were overshadowed by your departure. I felt so worried for you two when you had to leave under the circumstances you did but I clung to my faith that I would see you again soon and that everything would work out. I was so sure that one day I would see you return through the hills of Resembool with your original bodies that when I saw Al return alone with Rose and without any trace of you, I cried and cried. Although I was puzzled by Al's childlike appearance and somewhat saddened by the memories that he did not know he had lost, he had regained his body and that made me very happy but at the same time, I felt my heart begin to break. You were not there and there was not even the slightest trace of you. Al didn't remember anything from the last 4 years and Rose was almost as confused as I was."

Quietly Ed took Winry's hand in his and held it that way as Winry continued to speak.

"Everything pointed to the fact that you had..." She took a shaky breath before continuing. "...That you had died... I couldn't and didn't want to believe it but as the days went by everything seemed to point to that having been your fate. I was trying not to but my hope was crumbling and maybe I would have ended up accepting it if Al hadn't insisted on us so he could go train again with Izumi because he was sure there must be some way to bring you back." She smiled slightly. "His determination rubbed off on me and, even if there was nothing alchemically possible I could do to help him, I could be ready to support him with company or money for his research and I also had to be ready for when you came back because at that moment I set out to become the best automail mechanic in all of Amestris so that you would have an automail that everyone was dying to have."

"Once a gearhead, always a gearhead." Ed joked to lighten the mood.

Winry laughed. "You know that was hardly going to change." She paused before continuing. "With that goal in mind, I decided to go to Rush Valley as Dominic's apprentice. Thanks to Paninya he accepted me and I spent the next few years there as a few months later I was accepted as a mechanic at George's. I moved to Rush Valley and made occasional visits to Dublith to visit Al, Izumi, and Sig..." She bit her lower lip before continuing. "Although I must confess that my visits to Resembool were few and far between." She confessed with obvious guilt in her tone of voice.

Ed gave her hand a light squeeze. "Hey, don't feel bad. I'm sure Granny Pinako was enormously proud that her granddaughter was learning and living in the mecca of automail."

Winry cracked a shaky smile but didn't turn to look at him. "That's what she kept telling me on our calls." She inhaled deeply before continuing. "My grandmother was supportive of my decisions and always had just the right words to encourage me, whether it was advice or a good Pinako Rockbell-style scolding. Furthermore, she not only looked out for me from a distance but also asked me to keep her updated on how Al was doing and any developments there might be about you. She would have loved to see you again."

"Me more so. She always teased me but I miss her so much." Ed said before exhaling heavily. "How I wish I could have told her how much I appreciated everything she did for us."

Now it was Winry who squeezed Ed's hand. "She knew, Ed. Have no doubt about it."

Ed smiled slightly and returned the squeeze.

After a brief pause, Winry continued. "A few weeks after Al called to let me know he had finished his training with Izumi, I went to Dublith and that's when I learned of her death." She said sadly. "I spent a couple of days keeping Sig company before I left. I think Izumi's death scared me and I decided to go see my grandmother because it had been a while since I had visited her. When I arrived I found out that Al was in the house, but from one moment to the next one thing and another happened and when I realized it I was already leaving my grandmother's house to follow Al to Central."

"The day of the invasion."

Winry nodded her head. "You already know this part." She sighed. "For a moment I felt like I was in heaven when you kissed me and in the next, you were gone from my life, seemingly forever and... in that moment it was like my whole world, all my illusions came crashing down." Winry said sadly.

Ed ducked his head.

"You don't know how much it hurt me that you left without saying goodbye. I asked myself a thousand and one questions about why you had kissed me if you would end up leaving like that afterward. And that's when I realized that I didn't mean enough to you to deserve a goodbye from-"

"Of course you mean a lot to me! Too much!" Ed interjected.

Winry turned to look at him with a sad smile on her face. "I had no guarantee of that back then."

Ed sighed heavily. "I guess you have a point."

Winry returned her gaze to the front. "You don't know the million stupid things that went through my head as a result of that moment but it's not like I had that much time to completely sink into my depression either because there was work to be done. Everyone in the military was busy getting civilians out of buildings that had been damaged and the hospitals were overcrowded so I volunteered. It was not my specialty but I did what I could. There were a lot of casualties but fortunately, as far as I could tell, there were only a couple of deaths. It certainly wasn't exactly a pleasant experience because of all the blood and suffering in the first few hours but a few months later I completely forgot that ever happened."

Noticing how Winry's gaze became somewhat lost, Ed began to stroke her hand with his thumb trying to bring her at least some comfort in the midst of her painful memories.

After a few moments, Winry resumed her story. "My grandmother was sick, very sick and I hadn't even realized it." She confessed in a guilt-ridden tone. "When I had returned on the eve of the invasion I noticed her a little thinner and with a persistent cough but you know how she is, she told me it was just a bad cold and behaved with the same energy as always, which made me forget the idea that anything could be happening to her because my mind wasn't really with her at those times." A silent tear ran down her cheek. "When I came back after the invasion, she was still coughing and I decided to stay with her for a while until she got better. She insisted I return to Rush Valley but I didn't budge, so I spent the next few months in Resembool and only made a few quick visits to Rush Valley to see clients, and after a few months..." She inhaled deeply before sighing. "To go on dates."

"With Russell?" Ed asked feigning casualness.

Winry shook her head. "No, with other guys."

In Ed's head the words of 'other guys' became an echo in his mind. "I see..."

Winry sighed. "It's going to sound silly but before the invasion, I hadn't dated anyone because my younger self wanted to be faithful to you even though you weren't here but after you left... I wanted to give myself a chance. It wasn't easy because the first few weeks my heart was broken." She tightened the embrace of her legs. "But one day I snapped out of it and decided it was time to stop crying over a jerk like you."

Ed grimaced slightly but agreed with her words. "Okay, I earned it." He sighed before adding. "Besides you were and are well within your rights to move on with your life."

Winry bit her lower lip before continuing her tale. "So I agreed to go out with the guys who invited me." She sighed. "I dated several guys but in the end, my relationships weren't exactly long-lasting. As much as I wanted your memory would pop up at the most inappropriate times making me drop everything up there or they would do it for me. Even, in a way, that happened with Russell as in the beginning I didn't think we could really properly start a relationship."

Ed sighed. "It's not the subject I'm most passionate about but how did you come to know him?"

"He and Fletcher came to Resembool to carry out a project to restore fields in the east that had been damaged since the Ishval War and where a terrible drought was occurring. They stayed there for about two months, so inevitably we got to know each other. It didn't take long for Russell to ask me out so we went for ice cream from Mr. Johnson. I must confess that I had a very pleasant time with him. He was a bit arrogant at times as someone I know..." She said taking a quick glance at Ed. "But he was also funny and gentlemanly and I must admit he was a very good kisser from then on."

Ed gulped before asking. "So why had you refused to go on any more dates with him?"

Winry shrugged. "Maybe I was self-sabotaging. I'd gotten so used to not lasting long in a relationship that maybe I didn't want to break my tradition."

"And what did Russell do?"

"Insist. He would constantly come to visit me at the house and stay with me telling me all about his projects. I kept him as my friend all that time until the time came when he and Fletcher had to leave to pursue their projects in another city. I figured I wouldn't see him so easily anymore so I agreed to go on another date with him."

Ed inhaled deeply before continuing. "And that's when you started your relationship."

Winry slowly shook her head. "He did ask me but I refused as I didn't feel ready to have a relationship with someone who was going to be traveling back and forth... I thought he would remind me so much of you that I couldn't do it." She sighed. "He said he wasn't going to give up, though. So from time to time, he would call me to say hello and tell me about his adventures. So it was easy to deduce where he was although anyway, Russell didn't take long to give me the address of his apartment in Central in case I dared to leave Resembool to work there since it wasn't like he was a big fan of me working in Rush Valley either. He even offered to put me in touch with his friends in the military to get me a job in some of the offices in Central as a receptionist or assistant to some military guy but you know I've never been much of a fan of the military besides-"

"How could you work at anything that didn't have something to do with automail." Ed finished the sentence for her.

Winry cracked a slight smile. "Exactly."

After a few seconds, Ed felt Winry's hand, which was under his, tighten into a fist so he asked her with concern. "Win?"

Winry closed her eyes and inhaled deeply before opening them and continuing. "A few weeks after Russell and Fletcher's departure, my grandmother became seriously ill. She couldn't get out of bed and it hurt her to breathe. So I took her to the hospital. She was there for a couple of days and that's when I found out what was really going on." After a brief pause, she continued in a cracked voice. "My grandmother had been diagnosed with lung cancer a few months before the invasion."

Ed couldn't help a slight gasp of surprise. Winry had told him it had been age, and now he was discovering that in fact Pinako's cause of death was a completely different one. When Winry had first told him of his grandmother's death she had shied away from his gaze when she told him of the cause, a situation that at the time had seemed somewhat befitting of the painful news she was sharing with him but now, in retrospect, he could tell that the blonde had done so to prevent him from discovering the lie through her gaze. How could he not have realized that at the time? Although... what would he have accomplished by doing so? It would have simply made Winry suffer by bringing out feelings and probable regrets that she wasn't ready to talk about, much less with him, who was just coming back into her life.

Swallowing the lump forming in his throat, Ed asked. "C-cancer?"

Winry nodded her head. "I'm sorry I lied to you, I didn't mean any harm. It's just that what happened with my grandmother... it's something I've had a hard time coming to terms with even to this day." She said in a soft voice. "I was surprised too because I had naively clung to the idea that my grandmother was a strong and almost invincible woman besides when I was in Resembool she tried her best to behave as she had always behaved by devoting herself to automail as much time as possible, but when I finished assimilating my grandmother's health condition, it didn't take long for me to hate myself. I felt so guilty and angry at myself for not realizing it sooner, for not being with her. She had always taken care of me and supported me in all my decisions and I... I left her behind... I got so caught up in myself and my interests that I completely neglected my grandmother, the only member of my family I had left. The woman who raised me and always did her best to make sure I lacked nothing." As she finished a couple of tears escaped Winry, who hurried to wipe them away.

"Win, you don't have to feel guilty. You didn't wish your grandmother any ill will and just went through the cycle of life. Sooner or later you were going to make your own life and I'm absolutely sure Granny parted extremely proud of the granddaughter she raised." Ed said softly while still stroking her hand with his thumb.

"But I was selfish! I got so wrapped up in my own goals and my desire to see you again that I left her behind, even though I knew she was already starting to have arthritis problems before I left her! Even when I confronted her and asked her why she hadn't said anything to me she simply told me that she didn't want to be a burden to me. A burden! My grandmother was worried that I would see her as a burden! That's what my selfishness caused!" Winry exclaimed as more tears fell from her eyes.

Unable to resist any longer, Ed walked over to her and pulled her to him with his arm. "Winry, don't be so hard on yourself. You well know what Granny was like. She was an extremely independent woman who preferred to do things her own way and expected you to do the same with your own life. Remember what she always said, Rockbell women are smart, independent, and strong as a bull." He said as he gently rubbed her shoulder trying to reassure her.

"Even so! But why didn't she tell me?! I was an idiot not to figure it out for myself but why didn't she have the confidence to tell me what was really going on with her? She didn't have to have gone through all that on her own!" Winry said between sobs.

"Knowing her, she didn't want to worry you. I'm sure knowing you were carrying the Rockbell name to the top of the automail world and your mere presence in her home in those months were her greatest joy and pride. What's more, you said yourself that she supported you and even told you exactly that, well you know in her own way, when you called her didn't she?"

Winry nodded weakly. "But she was far more important than any achievement I could get in the automail." She said in a tearful voice as her hand clutched at Ed's shirt.

"I know, Win." Ed said then kissed the top of her head. "But she herself wished to support you with all her heart so don't feel guilty about accepting her good intentions okay? Now the best thing you can do for her is to keep doing your best so that no one forgets what a wonderful job the Rockbells are capable of doing."

Winry's shoulders shook until she could contain herself no longer and she clung tighter to Ed's shirt as she buried her face in the crook of Ed's shoulder and neck to cry her heart out. In all this time she had not so openly shared her emotions and regrets concerning her grandmother's death. No one knew the full story of Pinako's actual state of health. Not even Russell or Al. To everyone, Pinako Rockbell had simply died of age peacefully and painlessly.

As Winry cried Ed ran his hand gently over her head giving her occasional kisses on it while whispering soothing words hoping to heal at least some of the blonde's pain.

When Winry's sobs had subsided and her shoulders stopped shaking, Ed said in a teasing tone, hoping to relax the blonde. "Hey, you're gonna have to wash my shirt, huh."

His words had the desired effect as Winry let out a shaky laugh. "It smells like sweat anyway."

"Hey." Ed said as he gently pulled away from Winry a little so he could look into her eyes. "It's cologne, not sweat." He said with a mock frown.

"Well, I think you need to put more on because I don't notice anything." Winry said with a slightly shaky smile.

Seeing her smile, Ed softened his features and ran his thumbs over Winry's cheeks to wipe away her tears.

Winry blushed slightly and wanted to run her hand over her nose to wipe it away but Ed beat her to it by moving even closer to her so he could wipe her face with his shirt.

"You're a mess." Ed said fondly as he wiped her face.

"I think we're actually a mess." Winry said in a soft voice.

Ed cracked a smile. "Probably." He said as he finished wiping her tears and nose.

"I'm definitely going to have to wash your shirt." Winry said somewhat embarrassed as she stared at the visible stain left on the blond's shirt.

Ed shrugged his shoulders. "This is nothing. There's so much I should have done for you." He took one of her hands in his left hand. "I know there's not much I can offer you but if you need to keep on letting off steam or if you need to hit someone to get your emotions out, do it. Do with me what you want."

Winry blinked a couple of times before leaning slightly towards him. She focused her gaze for a moment on his lips before saying. "Anything?"

It didn't go unnoticed by Ed the glance Winry directed at his lips. Feeling his mouth suddenly dry, he could only manage a nod.

At his affirmation, Winry leaned closer until her lips were millimeters from Ed's. At that moment she focused her gaze on Ed's golden eyes and seeing them sparkle and noticing various emotions fluttering in them, she cracked a smile and moved to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you, Ed." She said sincerely. She inhaled deeply before continuing. "There's still something I haven't told you, can I take you at your word and tell you?"

Ed cleared his throat before answering. "As long as you feel ready to talk, I'm all ears."

"Thank you." Winry repeated with a smile that faded a few moments later as she resumed her story, but not before returning to her former position leaning back against the headboard of the bed. "When I spoke to Granny after I learned of her condition, she asked that we keep her illness a secret. In general, she didn't want her acquaintances to make a fuss or look at her with pity, much less did she want to interfere with Al's search for you. Al had just left for Xing and she didn't want him to know because she was sure he'd be back right away as soon as he found out."

Ed felt a pang in his heart as he realized once again how much Granny loved and cared about him and Al.

"She insisted I come back to Rush Valley but obviously I wasn't going to so we spent the next few months alone. Granny always kept her good attitude but it was obvious that her health was declining as she began to miss her poker sessions and it got to a point where she could hardly do automail pieces anymore. We followed the treatment to the letter but... it really didn't seem to be doing anything to her as there were nights when I could hear her complaining about the pain even though she always tried her best to pretend and deny it when I went to see her." She closed her eyes and squeezed them shut momentarily at the memory until she mustered enough will to continue speaking, opening her eyes, bright with tears. "And... a couple of months after I found out about her illness, Granny didn't wake up anymore." Winry said quietly at the end, with a few tears running down her cheeks.

Ed wanted to take her hand again in support but at that moment Winry drew her legs back to her chest so she could hug them.

"Because my grandmother asked me for discretion, only a few neighbors from Resembool were at her funeral. I didn't want to tell anyone else what had happened because it hurt so much and because my guilt made me feel I didn't deserve words of comfort from my friends."

"You really didn't tell anyone? Not even Al, Riza, Sheska, or your Rush Valley friends?... Not even Russell?" Ed asked, puzzled.

Winry shook her head.

"Winry..." Ed said in a slightly reprimanding tone as he began to run his hand over the blonde's head.

"I didn't deserve it... It was something I had to deal with on my own." She wiped away her tears, inhaled deeply, and continued. "So when it was all over I was left alone. Completely alone. Den had died a few days before I found out about my grandmother's diagnosis, you were gone, Al was in Xing and my friends were unaware of what had happened." She closed her eyes and squeezed them tightly shut. "That night, the first night after my grandmother's funeral, was the worst night I've ever had in my life. I felt so abandoned in an empty, silent house that-" Winry couldn't finish her sentence when a sob escaped her.

"Shhh, Win, it's okay, it's all right, shhh." Ed said in a soft voice as he continued to rhythmically run his hand over the blonde's head.

A couple of minutes later, Winry calmed down. Her eyes were still shining from shed tears but her breathing had regularized. Winry looked at Ed with an expression he couldn't quite decipher before the blonde returned her face to her knees.

"The next day..." Winry continued her story in a low voice. "I couldn't take it anymore. I needed someone so I took a train bound for Central. I arrived a little late but I didn't care. I walked and walked until I stumbled upon Russell's apartment."

Ed felt his heart begin to race at Winry's words and the way she began to hide her face in her knees.

"I wasn't sure if he would be there because the last thing he had told me on the last call I had had with him had been that Fletcher had gone south and that he would soon be going north near Riviere... When I knocked on the door I thought no one was there but then I heard noises and shortly after that he was standing in front of me. And I... I rushed towards him. I kissed him over and over again and... I enticed him to sleep with me." Winry confessed in a somewhat quieter voice. "I didn't see him as more than a friend but I was looking for some company. I wanted to feel accompanied for a moment even if it had to be that way. I wanted to feel loved and protected no matter who it was that was with me that night. I just... wanted to feel something, something that would take away my pain at least for one night." She concluded as she pressed her legs together with all her might keeping her face buried in her knees.

Ed was silent for a few moments as he took in Winry's words. Thinking about the great pain and suffering Winry went through when she was left alone, losing the last member of her family and not having by her side those who had once been her best friends, broke his heart because he knew that Winry deserved all the happiness in the world and not to have gone through all that suffering by herself, suffering to which he contributed.

Delicately Ed brought his hands to Winry's face to make her leave her position. Winry refused at first but then gave in although she did so with her eyes closed as Ed drew her into his arms to hold her tightly. Winry ended up reciprocating his embrace just as tightly and so they remained for a few minutes in silence. Soon after, Ed began to deposit delicate kisses on her head and forehead but stopped when he noticed that Winry was beginning to pull away from him a little.

Winry pulled away just enough to look into his eyes. "Ed..." She brought a hand to his cheek. "Why are you crying?" She said as she saw the silent tears spilling from his golden orbs.

Ed was puzzled for a second. He had been so focused on her that he hadn't realized that the sadness he felt at the pain and suffering Winry had gone through had translated into tears.

After inhaling deeply, the blond replied. "For making you suffer like this. For leaving you alone. You didn't deserve to go through all that. You were supposed to have lived happily all this time and I ruined everything. You don't know how sorry I am." He said then wiped away his tears.

"It's not all your fault, Ed. Yes, you hurt me by leaving the way you did but I made bad choices too."

"But I left you alone."

"And I contributed by isolating myself even more." Winry said with a sad smile.

Ed sighed. "I guess we're more alike than we thought, aren't we?"

"Maybe."

Winry nodded and Ed looked thoughtful. In their own way, they had each isolated themselves and sunk into their depression going so far as to seek physical pleasure to forget their loneliness. Now he understood why he hadn't received the scolding or disappointed look he had expected Winry to give him when he told him what happened with Noah.

Winry broke the silence. "Then you already know. That's how Russell and I started dating. After we had sex he thought we were already a couple and I never dared to tell him that I had only sought him out for the comfort and pleasure he could give me so I played along and, like the coward I am, became his girlfriend without telling him the truth about why I had come to his house that night. Also, since a few days later he had to leave for North City, he didn't learn of my grandmother's death until months later and is unaware of the exact date of her passing so to this day he doesn't know the reasons that brought me to his door that night."

Ed bit his lower lip for a few seconds undecided whether or not to ask his question but curiosity got the better of him. "Win... so how come you agreed to marry him?" He gulped before adding. "Did you fall in love with him?"

Winry was quiet for a moment, staring into his eyes, then sighed and answered. "The truth? I think I accepted so I wouldn't miss the chance to have someone by my side and thus avoid being alone. After all, my previous relationships were always something fleeting, so I think a part of me feared that I wouldn't get another chance like that in my life." She confessed. "Russell is a good man. He's hardworking, responsible, and funny and he and Fletcher are doing a lot of projects that are helping hundreds of people. I have no doubt that he loves me and I... I care for him very much, but..." She clenched one of her hands into a fist. "I don't think I've come to love him. I care about him and I really do appreciate him but as hard as I've tried he hasn't stirred the same emotions that you so easily provoke in me."

"And in the end the one who is going to marry you is him." Ed said wryly with a sad smile on his lips.

"When I agreed to marry him I did it out of my selfishness of not wanting to be left alone but in reality, Russell doesn't deserve to have me do that to him. As I told you, he's a good person, obviously, he has his flaws here and there but that doesn't take away from the good heart he has. So I told myself that I would strive to learn to love him properly. It's the least I could do after all my mistakes and the fact that I used him in the past. But..." She paused to move the hand she had previously clenched into a fist and place it over Ed's flesh-and-blood hand. "Ever since you came back my resolve has been wavering. That's why I kissed you as I did on the Gala night. It wasn't for game or revenge I simply couldn't hold back any longer and let myself be carried away by the feelings you arouse in me. But... then the regret came to me and the memory of how upset, disappointed, and lonely I had felt after your departure and that's why I acted the way I did. I'm so sorry, Ed, I didn't mean to hurt you with my attitude."

"Don't apologize, I earned it." Said Ed now that he had a cool head and knew the whole story behind what happened compared to that night when anger and jealousy kicked in. "Besides, I can't say I didn't quite enjoy the first part of that night." He said with a slight smile.

Winry blushed and laughed. "I could tell."

Ed reciprocated the smile. "Win, thank you for talking to me. For telling me everything. For letting me be a part of your story." He told her sincerely as he moved his hand so that he could now intertwine his fingers with the blonde's.

"And you for finally letting me be a part of yours. I think we both needed this." She said lightly tightening her grip on her fingers with Ed's. Turning serious she continued. "Ed, were you serious about what you said to me at the end of dinner?"

Ed's smile faded. He sighed and said. "I think it's for the best."

"Even after everything I told you?" She leaned slightly toward him. "Even after I told you I love you?"

Unconsciously, Ed replicated Winry's movement, the two of them remaining within a short distance of each other. "You said it yourself. Russell is a good man and can make you happy. I don't want to interfere with your happiness and..." He gulped as his eyes strayed momentarily to the blonde's lips. "Now you know why I don't feel able to see you married to another man. Seeing Wynona get married broke my heart even though I knew it wasn't you, so... seeing you married to another man I think is something I can never be fully prepared for, especially since this time I have nothing else to hold on to. Back then I was able to get over the pain and resignation of seeing Wynona get married because, firstly, at the end of the day she wasn't you and, secondly, because I had you as my motivation. I know I didn't even have the right to fight for your love but I allowed myself to delude myself with the illusion that maybe if I made it back and tried hard enough to make up for my mistakes, one day we could be together but now I am convinced that we can never be and that, because of what an idiot I am, I will do you more good if I walk away than if I stay close to you as a nuisance that maybe I will never finish assimilating the idea that you are going to marry another man. I can't pretend I'll be completely fine when Russell marries you, not after realizing how little control I have when I'm around you. If I kissed you knowing you were engaged who's to assure you I'll be able to restrain myself when you're already married?" He sighed. "I don't want to be the cause of your unhappiness. That's why I think it's best to put distance between us because I'm afraid of doing something foolish that will ruin your happiness... It's for the best." He repeated although this time he sounded more to himself than to her. "I've already made you suffer and I don't want to do it anymore."

"Then don't hurt me anymore, Ed. Don't go... I understand what you went through and to some extent now I can understand your reasons but also..." She bit her lower lip before continuing. "I know it may be selfish of me to ask you to stay by my side under these circumstances but... I'm not ready to let you go. I don't want to be separated from you anymore." Winry said in a soft voice that gradually became a whisper. "Don't leave me again."

"Win..." Ed murmured as he brought his automail hand to her face. "I..."

"Please, Ed..."

Ed stared at her before continuing. "I don't know... I don't..." He inhaled deeply before continuing in a soft voice. "No... I won't leave..." With that said he closed the distance between them with his lips.

Unlike their previous kisses on the Gala night and the kiss Winry had initiated a few hours ago, this one was softer and gentler. This time there was not the unbridled frenzy caused by the imperious need to be in direct contact with each other but this time it was about conveying the tenderness, affection, and love that united them. They wanted to transmit all these feelings while at the same time forgiving the other and apologizing for the mistakes they had made. In that moment they wanted to forget everything, their current circumstances, their regrets, and their past pain to finally accept and enjoy the simple fact of being together, closer together than they had been before because they had both revealed their fears and mistakes, showing themselves as they were and bringing their souls closer than they had ever been before.

After a couple of soft kisses, they parted and Ed placed his forehead on Winry's, closing his eyes in the process.

Winry opened her eyes and a slight smile tugged at her lips as she noticed how Ed's expression seemed calmer and also at the simple closeness they now enjoyed. She delicately brought her hand to the blond's chin to stroke it gently, causing the blond to open his golden orbs.

"Stay with me, Ed." Winry murmured.

Ed nodded and kissed her forehead then drew her into his arms and placed his chin on the blonde's head. He really had been willing to walk away from her but now... he couldn't do it. He hadn't wanted to do it from the start but now more than ever he wanted to forget everything and just run away with Winry by his side. He had never wanted anything more strongly than he now wanted to be with Winry forever. A part of his mind still wasn't convinced if he was doing the right thing but at least for that night, he wanted to focus solely on the young woman in his arms. She was everything his heart longed for.


A/N2: I know this was a long chapter so I'll try not to go on too long.

Perhaps I could have omitted the first part where Ed tells Winry about the events of 03 but I liked the idea of Ed telling her absolutely everything about what he had been through to further show how much he would have liked things to have been different so he could have lived his life by Winry's side, or well, really allowed her to be a part of his life as she so wanted.

I also think it's important for Winry to get that information directly from him both because of the bond between them and because of her own involvement in certain events. Rose could have told her some things about what happened in that final confrontation with Dante but there are certain things that no matter how much she wanted to she could not have told her, such as whether Sloth was the homunculus created as a result of Ed and Al's transmutation (since she did not know Trisha) and Ed's death (although in this case, I think she does have the memory of it but preferred not to divulge it). Besides, as I said before, no matter how many doubts she had, I don't think Winry insisted on checking 100% her Sloth hypothesis since her only source is Izumi and Izumi already had a lot to deal with with Wrath and everything that happened with the Elrics.

I also feel that this point in the story is important because, although Ed and Winry have not yet decided what they are going to do with their lives, the two finally allowed each other to talk properly. After all, their insecurities and their desire to keep certain things to themselves had formed a barrier between them that finally broke down allowing them to talk freely because a key element that was affecting their interactions was the poor communication they had been having and now they are both trusting each other to talk about what they have experienced in the years that they were apart.

Anyway, as a final point, I tried not to leave out any of the moments I had in mind for this story from both Ed and Winry. I tried to leave a hint or two about some of them, so I hope that at the end things have been well connected and if I forgot something, let me know and I'll include it in the notes or, if possible, I'll integrate it in later chapters.

Now, after thousands of words hehe, that's all for now.

Thank you very much for reading!

Golden