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“Can I play with your hair?”
It was an innocent question, but never one Ed expected to hear from Winry. Whenever she touched him before, it was always with a command, like “Let me see your arm,” or just plain grabbing him. But now she was asking to touch hishair?
Unsure what else to do, he said, “Uh, sure, I guess,” and she plopped down next to him, turning his head with the same casual roughness she always had. But the gentleness with which she pulled out his hair tie surprised him. And the run of her fingers in his hair felt good. His neck was twisted at a weird angle for him to read his book now, but he didn’t care, so long as she kept her hands where they were. She twisted sections of his hair then stroked them free, braided and unbraided others. He closed his eyes, enjoying the sensation.
“What are you doing?” Ed knew before he opened his eyes that Al was wearingthat grin. The one he wore whenever Ed or Winry so much as breathed in the other’s direction, like he expected them to … whatever, jump each other on the spot or something. Ed hated that grin.
So it pleased him when Winry told Al in a very warning tone, “Ed’s reading a book.”
“Uh, right.” Al sounded unconvinced, but he knew better than to mess with Winry when she got that tone. And that tone had come out of nowhere, too. Was she really getting defensive of playing with Ed’s hair?
Ed turned to look at her. “Do you want me to stop?” she asked him, almost like she would be sad if he told her he did.
Ed did hate to see her sad. He shook his head no, almost like a reflex, and her answering smile was so knowing that it made his cheeks heat up a little. Why did he feel so found out? Lots of people liked having their hair played with. And no one had touched his since … oh.
Winry had been the last person to brush his hair besides him. On the day he’d decided to become a state alchemist, he hadn’t wanted to wake up at all, let alone get out of bed. But she’d helped him out of his nightclothes and into a wheelchair, brushed away his bedhead. It was a small detail, but it was hard to forget your own listless stare in the mirror, much as you wanted to. After Mustang had left, Ed had insisted on doing everything he could for himself, including brushing his hair one-handed.
Had that hurt Winry’s feelings or something? Did she think she’d hurt his? How could he have known her so long and still have no idea how her mind worked?
Winry reached for his unbound hair, and instead of sitting in a slightly uncomfortable position Ed lay down, his legs hanging over the arm of the couch they were sitting on and his hair spilling over her lap. His book fell to the floor. Al had left the room, so he couldn’t comment on how Ed obviously was no longer reading it.
Ed asked Winry, “Do you mind doing this?”
Winry shook her head, her fingers sinking into Ed’s hair again. “I haven’t touched your hair since you grew it out,” she said. “I was worried that if Al teased you about it, you’d get all grumpy.”
“So?”
“So it’d ruin it. You’d never let me touch your hair again – at least where anyone could see. And it’s stupid. It’s just your hair.”
Except that Winry was touching it. And she’d kissed him a few times. And he’d kissed her back a few times. And Ed was pretty crazy about her. But she was right, it was just his hair. Touching it didn’t have to be a romantic thing.
“You could have asked me earlier, you know,” he told her.
“Yeah,” she agreed. “I guess I was scared to. You were so touchy about doing things for yourself.”
Ed wasn’t sure what to say to that. He hadn’t known that his issues with independence had been worrying her for that long. He wanted to go back and clock his younger self in the face. He should’ve known better than to shut her out. “I’m sorry,” he said to Winry.
She undid the braid she’d been working on and touched his cheek. “I know,” she said, and her tone let him know that she understood.
She went back to stroking his hair. Ed wanted to kiss her, but felt awkward about it. They had just established that what they were doing wasn’t necessarily romantic. And just because Al had left the room didn’t mean he or the old hag wasn’t still sniffing around. Instead Ed reached up and touched the top of Winry’s head. She smiled down on him, and her hand moved to his scalp in a similar gesture.
Maybe playing with his hair didn’t mean anything romantically, but in other ways it was very intimate. Ed wasn’t all too concerned about the details, as long as he got to stay beside her.