Title: To Be Loved
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Elricest
Warnings: Ed angsting like a pro.
you'll be loved, you'll be loved just a series of blurs ---
like you never have known
and the memories of me
will seem more like bad dreams
like i never occurred
someday, you will be loved
There came times when reality gave way to fantasy.
Perhaps, he imagined, once it was all over and everything calmed down, Alphonse would be back. He could just picture the sight; Alphonse, thin and lean, stretching and staring up at him with wide golden eyes. Skin marred by scare more than childhood fancies, nothing like his brother's scars and callouses, gleaming white in the post-transmutation light. Faint freckles sprinkled along Alphonse's shoulders, an image stolen from long days of playing in the shimmering lake by their home. Alphonse would blink, adjust to the sudden feel of air dancing along his skin and hair brushing his neck, and then he would smile; the same smile that he had when Mama surprised him with a stuffed kitty for Yule, which made his nose crinkle and the dimple on his right cheek appear.
And all pretending aside, he knew that Alphonse would need medical attention; especially after that agonizing sight within the Gate, suddenly the fantasies forced him to include Alphonse's starvation in the mix. But it was easy to glaze over, to assume that it would all work out in the end, and Alphonse would recover swiftly. It was hard enough to imagine his little brother without his extra pounds of baby fat, much less malnourished and starving, but he had seen the latter with his own two eyes and vowed to gain the former as soon as possible.
Alphonse would adjust, he knew, and soon would be engaging others as easily he did his older brother. Surely, once the impressive (fearsome) armor was gone and everyone saw how not intimidating Alphonse was, it would feel more natural to coddle him as he wished (deserved) to be. Soon, old ladies would pat his head, young girls would form hero-worship crushes, boys would ask him to play pickup games of tag or whatever they played now, and things in the world would be right once again.
Mustang and his group would treat Alphonse the same, but now with a more maternal feel; once Hawkeye saw how dilapidated he was, she would would insist upon him getting the best care, and whatever she couldn't assure, Mustang could. Because Alphonse was hard not to love, and even hard-asses like Mustang would be overcome. Fury would bring in a tiny, starving little kitten that Alphonse would love on sight, and as his older brother, he would be furious but unable to say no to an animal so similar to his own little brother.
It would not take long for Alphonse to recover, and when he did, he would be an energetic as he once was. Everything remembered from childhood, from the soft snores at night to the chewed nails, would resurface with a vigor. It would take adjusting to, certainly; it had taken Alphonse nearly four months to really get how the armor worked, each nuance discovered and analyzed while his older brother fretted and shook and realized that two limbs were missing.
With humanity would come friendship, and he knew that Alphonse would attract friends like flies to honey, once his lifestyle was settled and friends were able to stick easier. They would come and discuss books and gossip, perhaps even the goings-on at the military, of which Alphonse would have the most information and the tightest mouth.
Surely, one of his new friends would be a girl, the girl, with whom Alphonse would strike a fancy. Perhaps she would be tall and willowy, or short and plump, or curvy all around, but she would be there, all prettiness and gentle nature and Alphonse would fall hard. And she would be perfect, no errors to be found even through thorough investigation, and there would be no reason to stop it, this match of two lovely people.
And he would have to quell bitter thoughts at that, but Alphonse's life would be just as beautiful and perfect as this girl, and he would never try to stand in the way of it. Not even for his own different (perverted) feelings would he think to ruin his little brother's life any more.
They would marry in a small, quiet ceremony because Alphonse did not like being the center of attention very much. As Alphonse's older brother, he would be best man for sure, but shortly into the after-party he would skip out to find something harder than cheap champagne to celebrate with, and would celebrate until the reason for it all would vanish with his inhibitions. Luckily, he would be at home, and would simply pass out on the couch until he woke the next morning with a throbbing headache and a twist to his stomach not entirely from the liquor.
Alphonse would worry, but he would brush it all off, insisting that the new husband get to life with the dazzling bride. Soon -- too soon, it would seem, but he would be off working for the military and wouldn't know (care) of the time -- they would have their first child. Then their second, third, fourth, and Alphonse's life would be full of laughter and joy. The children would adore their father as everyone did, and their mother would watch lovingly from the window. Alphonse, unlike his own father, would not leave them.
He would come to visit during his short leaves from the military -- Mustang would offer more, but he would deny them in attempts to not disrupt Alphonse's life yet again --, and the children would squeal, "Uncle Edward! Uncle Edward!" They'd climb all over his lap and play with his golden hair, which would be a good thing, because it would separate him from his own horrible thoughts for a brief time. There would be hardly a free minute with just he and Alphonse alone, but during that one moment, all of his desires would come back in a flash and hit him like a sledgehammer.
And Alphonse, now grown up and with steady, firm muscles and the same gentle grin, would know nothing of it all, musing happily of their teenage days with only the scarcest shadow in his eye. They would be sitting in Alphonse's kitchen, and Alphonse would be doing the dishes after dinner, chatting with his older brother as his wife played a board game with their children.
The dirty, hidden desires would well up again in that one moment, and he would have a chance where he could break it all. The fleeting opportunity to rip Alphonse's golden life to shreds as he did his little brother's body so many years ago, but he would have learned his lesson by then.
And no words would escape his lips.
Years would pass as they had before, and Alphonse's children would grow older, just like their parents. They would go to school and perform spectacularly, for they would just just as brilliant as Alphonse himself was. Every so often, during Yule and perhaps on birthdays, one would ask, "Papa, why doesn't Uncle Edward come around anymore? I miss him!"
And Alphonse would reply, with a weight brought upon by many arguments, "He's very busy, honey, but I'm sure he'll be around soon enough. You know how the military is."
He would return, of course, when it was too painful and too difficult to avoid his brother anymore. But their reunions would be short and scarce, and soon enough, Alphonse would be too busy with his own life to try and coax his older brother out of his shell. Soon, their paths would separate further; the children would grow older, the city would change, and all that once tied the two brothers together so fiercely would fade.
Perhaps he thought that healing would come with time and he would get over this (dirty) love for his brother, but healing never came and so he stayed away.
And when he died, of old age and perhaps a broken heart (but no one would know of that), Alphonse would come to his grave in tears, wondering where their old bond had vanished to. He would bring tulips because his wife insisted, but would deposit them at another grave and give his brother's a kiss instead.
But Alphonse would still be alive and would have to leave, leaving behind a tombstone with "Beloved Brother" etched deep into the marble.
These were his fantasies.
Edward thought they were fairly fitting.
---
It seemed impossible to have reached that day, but Edward stared into the whirling golden storm with tear-filled eyes. The array reacted around him, but he kept his eyes focused on the center, waiting and worrying for his little brother, whose soul was caught up within it. Like any storm, the frightening moments were tempered by eerie stillness, but it soon settled.
And seated in the middle was Alphonse, just as Edward had ever imagined, smile and all.
With Alphonse's recovery came that which was no longer a fantasy, and Edward braced himself for the pain he knew would come. It was harder than he thought it would be, to watch Alphonse laugh and smile and talk; he wanted to reach over to his brother and kiss him madly, clinging to his newfound body and sobbing into the kiss with relief. He wanted to undress him and touch every part that he could, kissing soft lips and running his hands through golden hair. He wanted to know Alphonse as intimately as anyone could, together as they always should be.
But he had already ruined his brother's life once. Edward was not that selfish.
Two months after the transmutation, Edward was up before dawn, shaken by dreams and far away from rest. He saw Alphonse on the porch of Winry's house.
"Brother," Alphonse called. He looked exquisite in the morning light, though he was still too thin and weak from his time within the Gate, and Edward forcefully quelled another pang of longing within his chest.
"Yeah?" he asked.
"It's so beautiful out here," Alphonse said as Edward came to stand beside him, gazing out onto the green of their hometown. His smile, which seemed almost permanently etched on his face, grew wistful, and he said, "Remember how every year we went to Central, and Mama would wake us up before dawn to catch the early train so we'd sleep on the ride?"
"Ha, yeah," Edward replied, remembering the mornings of whining and clinging to Alphonse to try and stay awake. They would curl up together on the train with a blanket, Edward pressed against their mother and Alphonse pressed against Edward. It was a gentle enough ride that he could fall asleep easily, clinging to Alphonse like a favored stuff animal that just happened to breathe.
"Brother," Alphonse murmured after a moment of listening to the morning birds. He looked conflicted about something, and for all of Edward's resistance, he looked up at his brother and itched to kiss him, hold him, or do something. Reality was, he stayed leaning against the porch gate, head turned to stare at his younger brother.
Finally, Alphonse continued, "I love you, you know."
It hurt, like the first of many cuts to come, but Edward replied, "Yeah, I know."
"You don't have to force it, Brother," Alphonse said, leaning on the railing next to Edward and dipping his face close. "You think you're toughing it out, keeping it all from me, but I've been here all your life and I'm not going anywhere."
Edward couldn't respond, too shaken by the implication, so he simply stared at his little brother, who was watching him with a nervous tint to his expression.
"I know, Brother," Alphonse said. Edward felt his expression freeze, defensively, trying not to let his flesh arm quake in terror. Before he could say anything, anything at all, Alphonse touched his hand gently, adding, "I know you better than anyone in the entire world. You can't hide from me unless I let you, you know."
"Al--" Edward began, not sure what to say but certain that he had to say something, anything to stop this moment from happening; Alphonse could never find out.
"Weren't you listening?" Alphonse asked, leaning closer, his face no more than a foot from Edward's. "I told you I love you. I love you. You can stop trying to hide from me."
"You," Edward began, hardly able to function with such a declaration normally, much less with Alphonse pressed against him, feathery hair and soft lips inches from his face. He choked out, sounding disbelieving to his own ears, "You love me?"
Alphonse answered with a kiss, closing the distance and clutching his older brother's shirt tightly, as though desperate to hold him forever. Edward found himself responding as soon as the shock wore off, arms wrapping around his younger brother with all the pain of a thousand fake memories fueling his strength.
Edward could feel tears in his eyes as his fantasies shattered, tiny specks of self-hate breaking on the ground, and couldn't be happier.