Chapter Text
It doesn’t take long for Edward to recover from the loss of the baby.
... That’s a lie. It looks like it doesn’t take long for Edward to recover from losing the baby. Even the next day he’s up and bouncing around, chatting Roy’s ear off about some breakthrough he made in the middle of the night on that cheese-related alchemical formula he and Al work on for laughs. He bounces around the kitchen as Roy makes breakfast, being a terror who is in the way no matter where Roy turns, always trying to sneak ingredients into the pan when Roy’s not looking. The morning light that bounces off his still-damp, lightly-curled hair doesn’t even seem to make up for how annoying Ed is that morning, and every morning since.
Roy has spent the last month and a half getting about as intimate with Ed as one is able to be with another person when those two people are not in a relationship or having sex. They cared for a literal infant together; Roy may have had to go to work during the day, but during the mornings, evenings, and late nights he was just as involved as Edward in feeding, changing, tantrums, and playtime. He was there for the latest nights and the earliest mornings, and the scant few times that the former turned into the latter.
(There’s one memory from one such morning that Roy will hold onto for the rest of his life. The baby had fussed all night long, long enough that Roy was forced to call in sick for the first time in his life. Riza had laughed at him over the line for at least two whole minutes, with his team tittering about in the background. It was humiliating.
Or, it would have been, had Edward not been dozing on his shoulder. They were sitting on the floor slumped against the side of the bed, the room was warm and bright, and the child was finally asleep. Edward is slumped against Roy’s left side, his automail arm tucked neatly between them. Edward’s hand twitches against Roy’s thigh as he sleeps, even as he blows warm air against Roy’s neck, and tickles Roy’s collarbone with his hair.
Roy keeps his hands to himself. He has enough self-control to resist rubbing those long locks of gold between his fingertips just to feel their texture. He has enough self control to not lay a hand just under the crook of Edward’s elbow, just to feel the way the mid-morning sun has warmed his automail.
He doesn’t have enough self-control to keep himself from thinking, this isn’t lust, anymore. This isn’t just thinking he’s beautiful. This is so much more.)
The point is, Edward isn’t really over the loss of the baby - dubbed Buyo by her new parents, according to the postcards they send every two weeks without fail - and Roy can tell because Edward hasn’t moved out yet.
Don’t get Roy wrong, he doesn’t want Edward to move out, per se. It’s just that - well - Roy has been a bachelor for a very long time. His whole life, in fact, has been an exploration into the intricacies and routines of bachelor-hood. His days spent living with others were blessedly confined to his days in basic training, and his place as a State Alchemist kept him busy enough that he didn’t particularly have time to pursue anyone that wasn’t Riza or Maes.
(Not that either of them were interested in him at all, but, well. Roy’s own personal heartbreak is rather beside the point.)
So, having Edward in his house in nice. It’s nice to have someone to wake up with and go home with, someone to interrupt his more self-destructive behaviours. It’s dangerous, though. This crush (ugh, how undignified is that, he has a crush like a grade-schooler on a playground) that has developed is slowly making Roy crazy. He’s brusque with his team, daydreams in meetings, looks forward to nothing more than having Edward hover over his shoulder as he makes dinner, and editing Edward’s newest alchemical paper by the fireside.
(That’s how dire the situation has become. They have a nightly routine.)
It’s gotten to the point where Roy is utterly and absolutely confounded. Not unhappy, mind you, just confounded. This entire situation is rather reminiscent of the situation that caused this whole mess, when Edward showed up at his work and demanded a job that Roy never thought he would ever want.
Except this time, Edward showed up in his home and demanded… well, nothing. He just showed up and never left.
(Roy attempted to ask Alphonse about it, once, during their weekly telephone call where Alphonse makes vaguely threatening noises and Roy promises to keep an eye on Edward. Alphonse had just laughed until he wheezed, and then called for Winry. At her behest Roy asked again why Edward had moved into his home with seemingly no intention of leaving, and then she had laughed until she wheezed. Oh my God, is what she managed to say eventually, and Alphonse had responded, I know, right? and hung up.
Needless to say, Roy feels out of the loop. He doesn’t like being out of the loop - usually, he is the loop.)
It says something about just how distressed Roy is about the entire situation that he is thinking about it in his office, at work, while he is pretending to do his job. Well - to be truthful, he’s been thinking about this for the last four days. Or so.
(He’s a pathetic excuse for a human being, he is aware, thank you. Riza has been very clear on that.)
Edward is actually doing his job, as far as Roy can tell. Well, it’s not like Roy needs much bodyguarding at the moment, so Edward seems to be doing his other job - being the resident alkahestry genius for Central University. From the state of the alkahestral array sitting on Roy’s desk and the way Edward is eviscerating the end of an innocent pen with his mouth, he’s working hard.
Of course, that’s the exact moment Edward decides to speak.
“Hey, Bastard,” Edward starts, very definitely not looking at Roy.
“Mhm?”
“I’ve been thinking.”
“I hear that’s dangerous for the health.”
“Explains why you don’t think all that much,” Edward mutters, and Roy would be wounded, but this is Edward playing, so he laughs instead.
“It truly, truly does,” he says after a moment, still chuckling. “But you think quite a bit, and you’re quite good at it, so why don’t you tell me what exactly you’ve been thinking about?”
Roy watches carefully out of the corner of his eyes as Edward pulls the pen from his mouth and winds it through his hair, much the same as it was when he was bathing the baby in the kitchen sink. The hair seems to be a procrastination technique, which works - Roy will never cease to be amazing at the way Edward always manages to pile his hair securely on top of his head with mundane objects.
When Edward is done fiddling with his hair he glances quickly at Roy before sighing, and twisting his fingers together roughly.
“I think the team has a problem with me,” he finally announces, the words bursting out of him as if he had to force them out of his mouth. His shoulders are slightly hunched and he’s picking at the joint of his metal forefinger, refusing to look Roy in the eye.
Roy is, honestly, a little taken aback. “What?”
Ed scowls. “You heard me, Bastard. I think they’re… I don’t think they like me anymore, or somethin’. Or maybe they think I’m compromised or somethin’, ‘cause of Buyo? It’s just - they follow me around, but then they fuckin’ scatter whenever I try to talk to them. It’s like they don’t trust me anymore. Well, maybe Hawkeye still does, but even she gets a little squirrely sometimes and I don’t know why.”
“No, no, they trust you. They think the world of you.” Roy scrubs a hand over his face, suddenly tired. “I’m afraid this may be partially my fault,” he murmurs.
“So you don’t trust me,” is Edward’s flat response, and Roy looks up just in time to see the defeated look in Edward’s eyes.
(Roy’s heart breaks then, for the first or the thousandth time, and it’s not his fault that he would burn this entire world to the ground just to never see that look cross Edward’s face again.)
“No, I trust you. I trust you implicitly. I trust you with my life. I trust you with my secrets,” Roy declares, adamant, ignoring the way Edward jerks a little in surprise. “It’s not about - everyone trusts you Edward, I promise. I had to tell them to stay away from you for a while, that’s all.”
“You told them to stay away from me.” Edward’s voice is still flat, but his eyes are starting to get a little bit of that fire back, so Roy figures he’s safe for now.
Well, relatively safe. Roy is fairly certain that the rest of this conversation is going to get him punched one way or another, with the metal hand, but getting punched in the face is infinitely more desirable than any situation that includes Edward looking like someone (Roy) just fundamentally betrayed him.
But he doesn’t say that aloud. What he does say, is: “Yes, I told them to stay away. For everyone’s sake, but especially yours. It’s - how do I say this without sounding like a perverted buffoon -”
“You’re a tease,” Havoc announces from where’s he’s suddenly appeared at Roy’s slightly open office door.
“Havoc,” Roy threatens, fingers twitching and itching to make a spark, and Havoc zooms immediately backwards, one hand up in placation or surrender as the other propels him towards safety.
“Sorry, Boss, we’ll let you do it!” Havoc yells a moment later, from presumably a much safer distance.
“I’m a tease?” Edward repeats, looking at Roy with that little furrow in his brow that says he’s confused in a way that angers him.
Roy lets his face fall into his hands. This is no time for dignity. “I would have phrased it quite differently,” he murmurs, “but that is the gist of it, yes.”
“I don’t understand,” Edward growls, and yes, he’s definitely angry about it.
“You are… sinfully attractive, and everything you do seems to amplify it. The uniform, for example,” Roy sighs, resigning himself to his creepy, perverted fate, “and the sleeping, and the hair, and you’re constantly getting wet, and the gun - the gun, Edward -”
“And the baby. Please don’t forget the baby,” Hawkeye adds from her place in the corner of the office, where Roy had forgotten she was standing.
“The baby too. The baby was… the baby was a big part of it,” Roy agreed, before glaring Hawkeye out of the room.
She leaves, but not before twitching her lips in a way that lets Roy know she has his number and isn’t afraid to use it.
“How is this my fault? I’m just existing!” Edward asks, rightfully defensive, and Roy is gesturing placatingly before Edward can even finish his sentence.
“No! No, it’s not your fault at all. My team is a congregation of deviants who are being sent up to Briggs for basic sensitivity training -” Roy raises his voice to be sure his team hears him, and is viciously vindicated when he hears them groan, “- and this is in no way your fault because you, as you say, are just existing. I just need them to stay away from you for a week or so, until they leave for Briggs. Honestly, I’m afraid one of them will snap and beg for your hand in marriage, and at the moment I can’t handle the stress that that amount of paperwork will cause.”
“You’re not going with them to Briggs?” Edward’s brow is still furrowed cutely (cutely! Control yourself, Mustang, you are a General and a war veteran, and this is a sensitive conversation!), and Roy is so distracted by that furrow that he answers without even thinking.
“No, I can control myself. They, on the other hand, have proved they are incapable of being decent human beings -”
“Wait, you can control yourself?” Edward’s eyebrows have flown up near his hairline, and Roy does an impressive impression of a flounder as he realizes his mistake.
“Well, I - that is, I -” he manages, eloquently,
“You can control yourself. You can control yourself, which means you also think I’m a-” Edward hesitates, swallows, and Roy’s eyes do not linger on the way his throat bobs, “-a tease? You’re also attracted to me?”
(“We need to leave, now,” Roy hears Hawkeye demand on the other side of his still-open office door. There are whining and shuffling noises as she herds the team towards the exit, and she shuts Roy’s office door firmly as she escorts everyone away.)
“I am not the one to be concerned about,” Roy deflects, praying to anything that will listen that Edward takes the bait, “It’s the others. They spend too much time together, which has created a large overlap in their taste in partners, which means they have all become captivated - starstruck, if you will - by you. They will be better once they come back from intensive sensitivity training at Briggs under General Armstrong, or so help me-”
“Their tastes overlap,” Edward interrupts, and Roy curses internally. He should have known better - praying never works.
“Yes,” Roy agrees, feeling like he’s been sent to defuse a particularly risky bomb.
“Because they spend so much time together,” Edward clarifies, and Roy just nods. Green wire or blue wire? At this stage, does it even matter?
“But you spend the most time with them, ‘cause you’re their boss. If anything, your position of authority influenced their tastes,” Edward murmurs, pressing his hands flat on Roy’s desk before scratching idly with his metal fingertips at the wooden top, eyes darting about as he thinks. “But I know you used to carry a big ol’ torch for Hawkeye, and I don’t look anything like her - oh,”
Edward inhales sharply, eyes lifting suddenly to stare straight into Roy’s soul.
“I do. I look like Hawkeye. You’re attracted to me.”
“Um,” Roy sits back in his chair using slow, controlled movements. He’s thinking of literally fleeing the building, but most of his higher functions have been replaced with white noise, so he can’t quite figure out how to go about fleeing.
“That’s why you kept leaving when I had the baby at your house,” Edward says, scrambling over Roy’s desk, scattering papers and pages everywhere on his mad quest to land haphazardly in Roy’s lap. His hair is coming loose from its precarious bun, again, and it takes everything Roy has to put his hands in the air and keep them there.
“What are you doing,” Roy asks, deadpan, as Edward straddles Roy in his chair.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” Edward asks back, staring directly into Roy’s eyes as he reaches up and pulls at his hair until all of it is cascading everywhere. A lock of it drifts across Roy’s face, and his hand twitches with the effort it takes to not reach out and touch.
“If you’re not serious,” Roy manages, voice coming out only barely strangled, “if you’re not serious, it’s not funny.”
“I’m as serious as human transmutation,” Edward retorts, resting his hands gently against Roy’s chest, and Roy lets out a strangled noise that was supposed to be a laugh.
“I can’t do this halfway. I won’t do this halfway - if you’re proposing we do this, I need you to know that I am already entirely too in love with you to be casual,” Roy says, and he desperately hopes Edward understands what Roy is actually trying to say, because he won’t be able to resist touching him for much longer.
And then Edward shrugs with one shoulder, smiles that dazzling smile, and says, “I’ve been halfway in love with you since I was fourteen, so I’m pretty sure I know what I’m doing.”
Roy stares for a moment, and lets out a shaky breath.
That answer was… honestly unprecedented.
Slowly - so slowly - he lowers his hands and tangles one in the hair at the back of Edward’s neck, and sets the other on Edward’s lower back.
Edward’s eyes never leave Roy’s.
They’ve barely touched but they’re both breathing hard, and Edward is flushed high up on his cheeks.
Somehow, without noticing, Roy has moved until he’s scant inches away from Edward. and he licks his lips before he can help himself. Edward’s eyes flick down to follow the motion, then flick back up.
“Last chance,” Roy offers. If Edward changes his mind, he doesn’t know what he’ll do.
Edward just smiles again, devious. “I moved into your damn house, and I’m not planning on moving out. I’d say that’s as much of a fuckin’ declaration as you’re gonna get from me.”
“Good enough,” Roy growls, and crashes their lips together. He can feel the smile lingering on Edward’s lips, but he’s more concerned with exploring every inch of Edward’s mouth with his tongue. Edward, to his credit, gives as good as he gets, and every soft graze of teeth over Roy’s bottom lip unravels him just a little bit more.
By the time they break apart - minutes or hours later, Roy can’t really be sure - Edward is making little wanton noises in the back of his throat, and Roy has to duck down to rest his forehead against the hollow of Edward's throat as he breathes very carefully.
“We’re at work,” Roy finally says, voice rough, looking up at Edward.
As always, it’s like looking into the sun.
Roy might feel wrecked, but Edward looks it; Edward’s shirt is crumpled at the collar, his hair is a tousled mess, his lips are swollen, and his face is scandalously flushed. Most importantly, he’s looking at Roy with those wide amber eyes (every eyelash, Roy can count every eyelash) like he can’t quite believe that this is actually happening. It’s an entirely too-familiar feeling, for Roy.
There’s a hickey forming just under where Edward’s shirt will cover, and Roy can’t quite resist pressing a thumb into the mark.
“Stopping just when things were getting good - who’s the tease now, huh?” Edward mocks, still a little breathless, and Roy is helpless to do anything but rest his head against Edward’s chest and laugh.
~
Three months later Edward and Roy are laying low in Havoc's apartment while the rest of the team chases down a particularly stubborn assassin. Edward is poking through Havoc’s drawers because he’s a busy-body who can’t physically help himself, when he finds the envelope.
“Holy shit,” Edward says, which is what alerts Roy to his snooping in the first place.
“Edward, please refrain from invading the privacy of my subordinates -” Roy starts, but Edward interrupts.
“Uh, yeah, he wanted me to do way more than that. He was going to get me the Fuhrer’s car. The Fuhrer’s car. I don’t even drive, but that thing has gold-plated rims. It’s one of a kind.”
Roy attempts to snatch the letter from Edward, but Edward just laughs and dances away. “Sorry Bastard, I think this is it! I’ve gotta go tell Havoc he can get me that car -”
“I’ll show you a car -” Roy growls, chasing Edward around the room.
“Oh, good comeback!” Edward laughs, before he’s looking at the letter again, gasping and exclaiming, “Mustang, Havoc has permanent auditing rights at Central University! That’s it, it’s over, Havoc is my new sugar daddy -”
“You don’t even know what a sugar daddy is,” Roy says, exasperated, as he finally catches up to Edward and hefts him over his shoulder.
(He’s heavier than he looks, with that extra fifty pounds of automail. Roy’s back will never be the same. It’s so worth it.)
But Edward is giggling and squirming as Roy marches them down the hallway towards the bedrooms. “You just can’t compete,” he manages through his laughter.
“I’ll show you how I compete,” Roy says as he drops Edward onto Havoc’s spare bed.
Edward would usually answer with something witty and cutting, but Roy keeps his mouth fairly busy - first with laughing, then sighing, then moaning.
It’s a good way to win arguments, all told.