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The phone jangled at the Curtis Meat Shop and Mason answered the phone cheerfully.
“Hey Ed! How’re- Slow down, I can’t understand you.” There was a short pause. “Hang on, let me get Izumi.”
Izumi, butchering a lamb in the back but aware that Ed was on the line, looked at Sig warily. Mason opened the swinging door, a confused look on his face. “Ed’s on the phone and I just can’t make heads or tails of what he’s trying to say. Sounds spooked about something.”
“That boy,” she grumbled, fully aware he was more man than child now, at least in age and height (at long last). She wiped her hands on her apron and laid her knife on the wooden block she was carving on. “I’ll take it,” she said moving past her assistant.
She took the receiver and listened before she spoke.
“Oh man, oh man, oh man… C’mon pick up!” Ed rambled to himself, sounding scared out of his mind indeed. Izumi’s maternal instincts kicked in.
“Ed? What’s wrong?” she asked calmly.
“Teacher!” Somehow he sounded even more scared than he was a moment ago. “I-I… Um, I asked for Mr. S-Sig, ma’am.”
Izumi’s dark eyes narrowed. “What did you do.” It wasn’t a question; she knew he’d done something bad, now.
“It’s bad! And I don’t want you to kick my ass through the phone!” He sounded like he was going to cry. “I don’t know what to do and it’s just bad… I need to talk to a man this time!”
Izumi wasn’t having any of it. “I’m only one chromosome away from being a man, and besides, Sig’s busy. You know Ostara is a busy time for us.” Ed whimpered and she could see him curling up into a ball like he used to do when he was little and would get scared. In a little gentler tone of voice, she said, “If you’re in trouble, you know I’ll try to help.”
“Swear you won’t yell at me!” he cried.
“You know I can’t do that, especially if you’re in the wrong. But I can try to help you make sense of it all when I’m finished yelling, I always do.” By this time, Sig and Mason stood in front of her trying to make out what was going on.
“It’s… It’s Winry.”
Izumi frowned. “You didn’t cheat on that poor girl, did you?” He answered her so loudly that she had to hold the phone away from her ear as he declared that he most certainly did not cheat on his sweetheart.
“Of course not! I love her to death, I would never do that!”
“Then what? Is she sick? Moving away?”
He groaned on the other end, evidently realizing that he was going to have to let her in on his secret. “She’d been really sick for a couple of days, and then today she told me… Teacher… Winry’s pregnant-”
“Edward!” she exclaimed, her mouth hanging open.
“I don’t know what to do!” he cried. “I just got back from Creta and I don't have a job, I don't have a place of my own, or any way to take care of her and a baby... She deserves so much more than this!”
“You mean to tell me you’re scared!? Imagine how terrified she is! And then for you to just up and leave her when she needs you most-” She heard him yelp fearfully and imagined him holding his hands up to block a blow from her across the miles. Izumi sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Ed, if you ran off after she told you, I swear on your mother’s grave-”
“N-no, I hugged her and told her I’d figure out something and then ran. She’d gone back to bed because she’s been so sick lately.” It sounded like he punched a hole in the phone booth. “I’m so sorry, Teacher. You raised me to be better than this, but I’m scared and worried that I won’t be able to take care of her like a real man. I mean, she’s the one with the career and the professional trade. I’m the travelling bookworm that doesn't seem to have a direction anymore.”
“Alright, listen to me. You’re going to go into town and buy a big bundle of flowers and a big bottle of ginger ale and some gingersnaps. You’re going to go back to that house and assure her you'll be there for her and the baby, no matter what, and you’re going to ask her to forgive you. If she forgives you, you start looking for work and the rest will come on its own, okay?” Sig and Mason’s faces turned to shock at the news of Edward’s bun in Winry’s oven.
“I guess I should ask her to marry me then, if she forgives me, right? Like ask her properly?” he asked nervously.
“Lots of families work just fine without being married. But I know you’d kind of asked her already, so it couldn’t hurt to make sure she knows you’re serious about it.” A little smile grew on her lips. “I always knew you’d put the cart before the horse, Ed. Always so impatient-”
“No teasing when I feel like I’m going to throw up,” he warned.
“Was the sex at least good?”
“SHUT UP!” he yelled as Izumi laughed, pulling the phone away again at his ranting.
“Well, if you won’t answer that one, tell me how far along she is.”
“She said the doctor thinks she's halfway through it already, so she’s due sometime around January. Hard to say, I guess.”
Izumi grinned, nodding sagely. “Uh-huh, and did you forget rubbers existed or did you just get caught up in your passions? .” Her arm was getting a workout with all the phone-jerking-away going on. “Have you told anyone else?”
“No, just you. Too afraid to tell anyone else.”
“Don’t worry. When she starts to show, you won’t have to tell anyone. They’ll figure it out for themselves, lover boy.” Before he could grumble any further, her tone turned serious once more. “If you don’t get anything else, get the ginger things. That will help calm her stomach and should stay down so she can regain her strength. I know you’ll be a good father, Edward. Congratulations.”
“Th-thanks, Teacher. I’m gonna go to the store right now.”
“Call me again in a few days and let me know when the wedding is.”
“Of course. Thank you. Bye,” and the clatter and click let her know he’d hung up the phone.
“Ed’s gonna be somebody’s dad?” Mason asked. “That’s pretty scary…”
“I remember when he was just a boy himself, now he’s going to have a child of his own.” Sig smiled. “Wonder why he wanted to talk to me?”
“Because you were always his buffer, keeping him safe from my wrath when he really screwed up.” Izumi chuckled as she wandered back to the lamb she was cutting up. “But he doesn’t even realize he didn’t screw up. He was just scared. I wouldn’t have been upset at him unless he ran away from her and jumped the next train here. But I think he’s going to be alright now. And looks like we’ll have another blond headed kid in our lives again soon.”
Two weeks later, there was a finely penned envelope in the mail- an invitation to a small wedding in Resembool. She called to RSVP immediately.