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North City was dressed in specks of white-gold. There were thousands of lights, spiraling up street lamps and draped over buildings. They casted an electric fog against the dusky north sky, while the cobblestone streets reflected the molten glow. Shoppers filled the streets with bags hanging from their arms. Venues were lined up for blocks, each stand displaying every type of gift a consumer could buy.
Ear-to-ear in smiles, Winry stood before the town in her heels, admiring the Christkindlmarkt. She always wanted to see a real one. Resembool hosted festive markets in December as well, but they didn’t hold a candle to Amestrian markets in the city; particularly in the north, where the tradition started.
It was a pain to convince Ed to go.
“You want to go all that way just for some market?” Ed asked her, dismayed. “Is there an automail event happening or something?”
“No,” Winry answered with a frown. “I know you’ve already seen the markets but me and Theo haven’t!”
Ed flipped a page of his book on transmutation of carbon bonds, returning his eyes to the sentence he left off on. “Sounds like a trap for your wallet.”
Winry pressed her knuckles into her hips. “Come on, Ed, it’s Advent! At least let our son have some fun!”
Inwardly, Ed groaned. He didn’t know why she took it upon herself to treat the holidays like their son’s birthday. They weren’t particularly religious, and in their country, the holidays were all about the theological myth of the death and re-birth of Leto, which coincides with the sun during the winter solstice.
Nonetheless, before he could blink they were on a train to North City. Somehow, Winry caring about Theo’s second Advent rubbed off on him.
Ed let his wife lead the way through the city, which seemed to be taken up entirely by the market and snow.
His son looked like an antenna, carried on top of his shoulders as he pointed to a new attraction every few seconds.
The two-year-old inquired, “What’s that?”
“A nativity scene,” Ed answered.
Theo didn’t know what that meant, but he adjusted his focus onto a new thing anyway. “What’s that?”
“A nutcracker.”
“What’s that?”
“They’re ornaments.”
This kept Ed mildly amused.
In the meantime, Winry was swept away by the festivities. The scents of cinnamon bread and bratwurst wafted past her. Her eyes captured the pops of red from rows of star-shaped flowers. She smiled at an elderly man with plump cheeks and kind eyes, who offered her a flower for her hair.
“Sir!” Another man approached Ed, with a pamphlet in hand. He held out the pamphlet for him to take.
“God bless you,” the man said. “And smile, it’s advent.”
That made Ed feel a tinge of irritation, but as the man walked away and Ed analyzed the pamphlet, his irritation surfaced with a groan.
“Celebrate Leto,” the pamphlet read, along with a cited verse he couldn’t make sense of.
His hand crushed the sturdy folded paper as hard as his hand would have if it were still metal. He stuffed the crumpled ball into his pocket, seething while hunkering his head.
“Oh, Ed.” Winry’s eyes rolled. She was finishing up paying for her flower, tucking away her coin purse, but she still noticed her husband from the corner of her eye.
“Don’t be a Scrooge!” she scolded, giving his shoulder a smack.
Ed flinched. His eyes wandered to loops of pine foliage used as a decoration. As they slowed their pace, he grabbed onto one of the loops, the little green spikes prickling into his palm.
“I’m not, I just don’t get the point of all this,” Ed said to her, gently tugging at the decoration. “These traditions.”
Winry watched Theo mimic his dad’s movements. She looked back to her husband, curiously, though she didn’t know why she would be so curious of something that made so much sense. Not only was a Ed cynical realist at times, but he was also a stubborn poor sport, not wanting to play along with the games of a group. He has been that way since he was knee-high.
She could see her son’s interest change as his amber eyes located a venue of toy trains, both wooden and shiny plastic. He suddenly wanted off Ed’s shoulders.
Winry’s arms elongated as she reached up for him, taking the toddler into her arms.
“But these traditions give families one more reason to spend time together,” Winry said, smiling gently.
Ed gave her a long, inquiring stare. Even as she walked toward the toy stand down the street, his eyes were fixated on her figure, wrapped in the gray wool of her dress coat, and her legs, wrapped in nylon.
Being with Winry always made him question his cynicism.
His subconscious mind dug up the memory of her walking away in Baschool. He had incessantly thought about it since they arrived, and the memory served as one more reminder of the last time they were in the north.
A stand serving glühwein and eierpunsch caught his attention. He needed a drink.
“One glühwein, please,” Ed ordered, resting his elbows on the counter.
The hot mulled wine was poured. Warm alcoholic drinks like these were a great way to stave off the cold.
Compared to then, his life now was so safe, so easy. Being up north, however, stirred up a familiar feeling, like he was fifteen again. Like if he turned around, he was going to see his wife seven years younger, with that orange scarf and sweeping ponytail. Ed turned slightly, watching Winry from afar, and imagined her that way. When he did, he felt a snake’s cold blue eyes looming over her. Paranoia twisted his gut even though he knew Winry was in no real danger. For some reason, he couldn’t shake the notion that Kimblee’s ghost was standing right next to him.
Ed took a drink. The tart liquor warmed his throat. His eyebrows pinched together, the skin between them scrunched. His gold irises were focused on the wall, but they weren’t in the present. They were complacent, lost in the haze of a memory.
“What’s the plan?” Winry uttered under her breath, so low Ed barely caught what she said.
His arms were crossed, sitting as compactly as he could. His brother’s armor had he and Winry sandwiched awkwardly in the backseat. The ride to Baschool was supposed to be thirty minutes, but every minute dragged, seeming as though they would never reach their destination. Ed was nervous, and he couldn’t pin point if it was because he didn’t know if he and Al could get away with fooling Kimblee, or if it was because he was in such close proximity to his female mechanic.
“I’m still brainstorming,” Ed uttered back.
Luckily, for the sake of both of their comfort, Winry was pressed against Ed’s flesh arm. Mentally, however, this was far from comfortable. She was never this close to him, even during automail maintenance, and the more she thought about it, the more it made her heart race. His heat radiated into her—a stark contrast from the Briggs air that casted a chill into the car door on her other side. He was far softer than his brother’s metal, but he wasn’t quite as soft as her. Ed’s body was firm, hers was plush, and the difference had their faces heated.
The silence weighed heavily on everyone in the car. Al was the one who decided to lift that weight, asking the brooding, bearded driver that was almost as large as him, “How much longer until we get to Baschool?”
The man looked into the review mirror and said, “10 minutes, give or take.”
Ed inwardly cursed. 10 minutes to think of what to do with Winry. He couldn’t just leave her accessible to Kimblee while he and Al searched for the Xingese girl. Her last minute decision to tag along really threw a wrench in their original plan.
Winry whispered, cutting into his thoughts, “Kimblee asked you to do it, didn’t he?”
Ed blinked, trying to process what she meant.
She clarified, her voice hinting sadness, “To be a human weapon?”
Then, making eye contact with him, she added, “And he was the one that used me to try to get you to do it.”
Ed didn’t want to say it. She sounded disappointed, and he knew why.
His throat was scratchy as he got out, “Yes.”
Winry’s head turned away from him. The alchemist didn’t take his eyes off her.
Kimblee had emotionally manipulated her. What’s worse, he used a healing wound: her parents. He made her think someone attempted to save them, and gave her closure, telling her that the thought of their little girl got them through the war. He seemed genuine and sympathetic.
Ed tensed up. It was bad enough that he was willing to physically harm Winry. It seems he took pleasure out of messing with her mind as well. He wanted nothing more than to leave that sociopath to rot in a cell.
“You still have family, you know. People that like you a lot,” Ed told her, averting his eyes as she looked back at him.
Somehow, Winry got the hint that he meant himself. She thought about when he had taken her hands into his, prying her fingers from a gun, holding her as she sobbed. She thought about his promise at the train station. She could tell he almost used another L word, and even if he meant it in a familial way, she wished he had said it.
“I know, Ed.”
Winry saw a cluster of buildings in the distance. They were approaching the abandoned town. Something about the way the wind moaned against the vehicle didn’t sit right in her stomach, like it was warning them to go away.
Arms uncrossed, Ed’s gloved hand lie right next to her thigh. His hand was open, so she gave into temptation and squeezed it, shocking Ed with the physical contact. He instinctively wanted to jump out of the car like a frightened cat, but another part of him wanted to squeeze her hand back. He compromised, staying frozen. She could see the fright in his eyes as he turned his head to her, giving her a look but suddenly too stupid for words.
She spoke instead, “I know I can’t stop you from fighting, and I know you and Al are good at it, but please don’t get hurt.”
The wind moaned louder. With her palm pressing into his, Ed’s fingers twitched.
“Yeah.”
The chill stung his side, right where a star-shaped scar left its mark. Ed was starting to feel a head change, either from the alcohol, or the nauseating memory of how he got that scar. He finished the last of his drink, setting it down next to two empty glasses. He turned to make sure his wife and son were still in sight.
It didn’t take long for him to spot them. In perfect timing, Winry looked in his direction. They locked eyes. It was as though they had been thinking about the same thing.
After a long moment of trying to read each other’s eyes, Winry approached him, her little blond man in tow.
Upon reaching the venue where Ed was standing, Winry ordered a nonalcoholic drink. Theo grabbed fistfuls of snow, fascinated by the substance. Winry touched her husband’s back lovingly, and in response, he wrapped his arm around her waist.
“You should eat something,” Ed said softly, setting his hand on her stomach. It barely poked out farther than usual. “You’re building a little person in there.”
“I’m not very hungry.” She rested her head on him. “But I guess you’re right.”
Reflecting on Winry and her parents gave Ed a sense of why the holidays were so important to her after she had Theo. As a parent, you want to give your child everything you didn’t have.
He could take a guess, because he too lost his parents. Since he understood, he swore to himself that he would stop complaining about Advent.
“Do you remember the last time we were here?” Winry asked, leaning her head enough to look up into his eyes.
“Of course I do,” he said, wanting to kiss her with how close their faces became. “How could I forget?”
Winry smiled. “We’ve changed so much since then.”
Ed chuckled. “Yeah.”
“Some things don’t change, though. You’re still an alchemy geek.”
Ed sounded mock offended, “And you’re still a gearhead.”
They continued to talk for a while, bringing up memories of when they were teenagers. The conversation seemed endless, and even though Winry’s feet were sore from standing, she could stand in the cold all day with him.
Finally, Ed paid the bill. Making sure Theo was still preoccupied, he turned to Winry and began to speak with low voice and a mischievous sneer, “After we find a hotel, and we put Theo to sleep, we should celebrate the holidays.”
His eyebrows raised and lowered suggestively.
Winry wore a straight face until what he said finally hit her. She elbowed him, biting back a laugh, “Ed!”
He smirked, shrugging his shoulders playfully. With Ed’s libido, their family would never stop growing.