Work Text:
Most Amestrian citizens (as was likely, most of the world) despised Mondays. There were a myriad of reasons, ranging from going to school once again to having to leave home for a week of work elsewhere to the prospect of one more week you had to keep living. Whatever the reason was, Roy wasn’t judging. At least, not their hatred. He was, however, severely judging the folder spread in front of him, brows pinched and darker than the gates of hell. The unassuming piece of evil on his desk laid out the paperwork for another city ‘Benefits Plan’, which was essentially a dressed-up load of bullshit that meant, ‘We will be spending the extra money we had left over this year on something military related, or the government will take it from the military.’ These plans usually involved some sort of civilian fitness regime meant to promote general well-being and readiness. What they were readying themselves for, exactly, Roy could never be certain. He tried to abstain from thinking about it, really.
On top of his authorities’ repeated atrocities in logic, for once in her life, Riza was down with sickness, and staying home for the day. He wasn’t so much upset at this, given the number of times he’d threatened her to actually make her go home, but just disgruntled at the wrongness of it all. Riza should be there, keeping watch over his office, whether he was slacking off or working like his life depended on it.
He sighed heavily, chin resting in his hand, looking out the window. It was a bright day, and that only served to darken his mood. It should be dark and rainy and cold, and then the weather would match up with how wrong everything else was.
The only thing that could brighten the rest of his work day was sitting close by, wrapped in wax paper and tantalizingly placed. Perhaps it was to be considered sad that the most uplifting thing about his day so far was a sandwich, but frankly, Roy no longer cared.
Perhaps he shouldn’t say ‘the only thing’. The other thing that could brighten up his day immeasurably was bright as a small sun himself, and there was no telling when Edward would show up.
Seconds ticked into minutes, his appointed lunch hour growing ever closer. In fact, as he began to move his papers out of the way and straighten up his desk, a rattling commotion outside jerked his head up. Havoc yelled something unintelligible, then his own office door was abruptly thrown open and Edward himself came barrelling through.
“Edwar-“
“No time!” The fidgety alchemist flicked his golden eyes around the room, until they landed on his lunch. “Is that a sandwich?”
Something dropped in Roy’s gut and died a painful death. “Yes, but wh-“
He was interrupted, once again, by Ed snatching the sandwich from the table. He took one of the concisely cut halves, stuffing almost half of it into his mouth all at once, then said around it, “I gvobba gef baf do laff, Hafoc’s affer me.”
He opened Roy’s door and prepared to race outside again, presumably fleeing from Jean. Roy glanced down at the injured ruins of his lunch, and in a fit of righteous indignation stood up, picking up his sandwich, and marching to the open area.
“Havoc!” He shouted, causing most of those actually working in the room to start.
Jean appeared in the doorway across from him at the end of the room, his hand around Ed’s jacket collar. Edward looked on the verge of braining him with his metal arm, which, though not absolutely unnecessary, was to be avoided.
Roy sighed, pinching his nose. “What are you doing with Major Elric?”
Havoc looked sheepish, but he didn’t let go. “He tried to steal my lunch. Sir.”
“So you thought, what? You’d just chase him around until he gave up on it?”
Jean’s guilty silence said all that needed to be.
“Major Elric.”
Ed levelled him with a steady golden glare.
“If you would kindly refrain from stealing other people’s hard-earned food and get your own, in the future, it would be much appreciated.”
“It’s not my fault!” Both Ed and Havoc yelled, then glared at each other.
Roy’s patience was wearing thin as his stomach was growling more. He glanced around the entire office, pleased to see that he had more or less unanimous attention. “Your name on it,” here he gestured to the ‘Mus’ in Mustang written on the wax paper, “means it is yours. No one else.” Here he shot a returning glance at Ed. “Furthermore, if your name is not on it, it does not belong to you, by the very basic principles of logic and courtesy.” Here he paused until Havoc released Ed’s collar with a grunt. “Am I understood?”
“Yes, sir,” Havoc grumbled, sulkily.
“Clear as day. Gotta get back to the lab; time-sensitive experiments underway and all that.” Ed waved a hand and shot down the corridor. “Thanks for the sandwich!” He called.
Roy sighed again, hand tightening around his food, shot a glare directed at anyone who chanced to see it, and went back into his office.
O
The end of the day was a grudging relief to Roy’s tired mind, promising food that would not be stolen and a bed he could sleep in from the moment he got home, if he so chose.
Well.
Unless Ed would be there.
If Ed was there, his food would definitely be stolen. If Edward was there, he wouldn’t be going to sleep, but perhaps to bed, at some point earlier in the evening.
If Ed was there-
Roy closed his eyes, a gentle breath escaping his lips. Somehow the entire day and its flaws, including Edward’s robbery of his sandwich, seemed trifling and meagre.
He strode forward again, a new spring in his step, a tired smile barely restrained.
O
He opened the door to his house, taking off his boots and coat, and scanned the house for signs of Edward.
“Roy? ‘S that you?” The familiar voice called from the kitchen, and Roy’s very fingers tingled.
“Thankfully so,” he commented, making his way into the clean eating area.
Ed was sitting in his normal chair, the table spread with alchemy notes, his notebook, and several pencils. He got up when Roy came into the kitchen, letting Roy wrap him in his arms and bury his face in his neck. It really wasn’t fair that after working around dangerous chemicals all day long Ed still managed to smell so good. Perhaps it was just higher genetics, or a gift only Edward seemed to have.
“Fucking starving,” Ed announced, as soon as he had slid out of Roy’s arms again and back into his seat. His arms were resting on the table, head bent towards his notes.
Roy smiled. “How is stir-fry?”
“Pretty good, I think.” Ed grinned up at him. “An’ if you’re suggesting you make that, I’m all ears.”
“Or all mouth,” Roy said smoothly, moving past him to start the stove.
“You weren’t complaining about my mouth last night,” Ed observed, utterly un-self-conscious, still leaning over his work.
Roy smiled, halfway in the refrigerator. “And I’m not doing so now.”
They worked in silence for several minutes, each paying attention to his own task. Roy added the vegetables, then the chicken, and finally almost half a bottle of the stir-fry sauce he’d bought. Ed seemed to like it, even if it did make one thirsty.
He heard Edward get up behind him, probably for a glass of water, and pointed at his drawer. “Could you hand me the spatula, love?”
Ed slid the drawer open and rummaged around, brow furrowed in concentration until he found the aforementioned object. Leaning across the other two (off) burners on Roy’s stove, he handed him the cooking utensil.
For a moment, though, Roy didn’t take it from him. The clock resting on the kitchen wall seemed to momentarily still, or maybe its ticking was just no longer registering in Roy’s brain. It couldn’t have been more than a few moments, but it seemed like a small eternity that Ed’s arm was stretched over the space, the alarmingly neat letters spelled out in black ink.
R O Y
Roy took the spatula slowly, then Ed’s arm snaked back, he was moving back to the kitchen table, and the kitchen was quiet again. The faint tick tick tick of the clock could be heard once again, and he glanced down at the food still frying innocently in his pan. He stirred it thoughtlessly to keep it from burning, dark eyes tipped downwards while he thought.
His entire face felt warm, and not from the heat of the pan. The letters themselves, as well as their neatness, told him a great deal that he didn’t need to ask. The image of Ed leaning over his lab table, mouth pinched in concentration and golden eyes blazing with their customary intensity, writing out those simple three letters made something in his chest stutter. Stroke after stroke of dark ink, each one making Ed’s intentions and Roy’s words from that afternoon clearer and clearer.
And people liked to think that Ed didn’t care about gestures of romance.
He smiled to himself, reaching up into the cabinet to grab two plates. Setting them out on the counter, he piled stir-fry on top and turned the heat off so that it wouldn’t burn the pan.
Ed saw him coming before Roy had even taken a step in his direction, and in the space of a few seconds alchemy notebook and scratch paper were cleared off. He tried to rearrange the napkins and glasses the way they had been before, then waited for Roy to set his plate down.
“Why don’t you bring more of this stuff to work?” He inquired, promptly shovelling a forkful into his mouth.
Roy rolled his eyes, taking his place across from him. “It’s not very appetizing cold.”
Ed shrugged, tapping the fork prongs against his teeth. “You’re supposed to be the flame alchemist, right? Why can’t you just, I dunno, heat it up?”
“Perhaps I should have tried that earlier today,” Roy conceded, after swallowing a bite of food. He really had outdone himself this time. “But it wouldn’t be wise to try it on a regular basis. I doubt Riza would allow it, and I myself try to not use alchemy in the office unless absolutely necessary.”
“’Absolutely necessary’ meaning, ‘If I drop my brandy glass on the floor accidentally and it breaks’?” Ed grinned across the table at him, wolfish.
Roy waved a hand, fighting a smile. “Something like that. All very necessary in these trying times.”
Ed sat back a little in his chair, and Roy took a moment to admire the sheer grace of him, sprawled across his seat. What had once been a ruthless teenage energy and limbs he hadn’t known what to do with had, for Ed, morphed over time into something more poised. An energy held back, but not stifled.
God, what are you doing with me?
Nothing less than something careful, I hope.
“What counts as trying times for you?” Edward demanded, scraping his fork around to collect the last of his stir-fry. “An’ d’you have more of this?”
“Honestly, you practically just answered your own question,” Roy responded, getting up to refill Ed’s alarmingly clean plate. Ed watched him go with slitted golden eyes, the ink on his arm almost glowing against the light from Roy’s ceiling.
“What’s that supposed to mean, bastard?” His tones were suspicious enough to let Roy know that he probably knew what was being referenced.
He sighed, fishing around for the rest of the leftover meat in the pan. “Well, it’s always very trying to me when I can’t get through the afternoon without my lunch being stolen. Please believe me: even signing paperwork becomes questionable when your stomach is growling.”
Ed raised his eyebrows. “I was hungry, and the sandwich was just there. You had to have known that I would eat it if I found it without its owner. ‘Sides.” His grin sharpened again. “It was your fault for keepin’ me upstairs this morning so I didn’t have time to eat breakfast.”
“I saw you eating a banana!” Roy returned to the table, setting Ed’s plate down. His eyes were still fixed on Edward’s arm.
Now it was Ed’s turn to wave a hand. “That wasn’t a real breakfast. I can’t survive off of a few grams of potassium for the entire morning.”
Roy was quiet, chewing his last forkful of dinner slowly. He would honestly love to impress upon Ed all the reasons why that still didn’t make stealing a superior officer’s lunch an ethical option. But he had bigger questions on his mind.
Such as, “Why did you do that?”
Ed blinked at him for a moment, then his cheeks flushed slightly and he turned his arm so that the written portion was resting on the table and invisible. “Was bored in lab,” he said, voice almost defensive.
“I see. Why was it my name?” Roy would fish as long as necessary, and it might be a long time.
Ed’s face was growing even deeper red by the minute. “You know why. It doesn’t matter. It was just a stupid-“
“It’s not stupid.” Roy reached across the table, turning Ed’s arm over. He traced the letters of his own name with a finger, smiling slightly. When he looked up, Edward was looking at him, breathing slowly through his opened lips.
Roy smiled at him even wider. The table was really too wide to practically lean across it and kiss him like he wanted to. And oh, he wanted to, he wanted to. A kiss for every stroke of that pen that had created his name in such careful print.
Ed looked down slightly, voice almost a mutter when he spoke. “Heard what you said today, when you were bein’ a shit and getting pissy at the office.”
Roy swallowed before asking the question that had really been on his mind. “You know I still love you, even if there’s no public reminder of it, right?” His fingers brushed the letters again, and Ed shivered. Their eyes met across the table; Ed pretty and pink, Roy somehow unable to stop that tiny smile in the corner of his mouth.
“’Course I know that, bastard.” He grumbled, but didn’t pull back from Roy’s hold.
“So, you just...”
“Wanted to be able to. See it.” Ed spoke haltingly; how was it that such a genius could be stumbling around a few words? Roy was constantly surprised, intrigued, dazzled by how deep and intricately Edward’s mind ran. A network of tunnels filled with the most blinding sunlight you could imagine.
“I did get bored in lab,” Ed continued, regaining some of his fortitude. “Had a slow period where all I could do was fuckin’ wait. An’ I thought about what you said. Didn’t really realise I’d done it until I had, actually.” He smiled, and Roy’s heart contracted.
“I see,” he said again. Ed’s nose wrinkled.
“Why’re you smiling like that?”
Because I love the things you do, even if you steal my sandwiches.
Because you have a beautiful face, and I’m probably unhinged, so I like smiling at you.
Because I am so hopelessly in love with you, Edward.
He said none of those things. He wasn’t sure, even with his smooth tongue and ease with words, that there were enough sentences in the world to string together what he felt. And what he felt was what he wanted to say.
“Because the people who think that this relationship is one-sided are idiots.”
Edward scowled, parsing through his words as if looking for a joke, or a catch. He seemed to find none, because the next sentence out of his mouth was, “Well, and I got your sandwich. Equivalent exchange, right?”
“I’m not sure that’s quite how it works,” Roy murmured, reluctantly releasing Ed’s arm and standing up. “But if you truly believe that you are in my debt, you can serve your time by helping me clean up this kitchen.”
“Much rather eat the food in it,” was Ed’s comment, but he carried his plate to the sink and began to wash it obligingly enough.
“I know, and I thank whatever deity is watching over us that I still have food in my pantry when I come home at night.” Roy paused in wiping the table to look at him.
Ed smirked, then abruptly cursed. “Name’s washing off,” he said, so casually that most people would assume he didn’t care how long it stayed.
Roy was not most people. “Let me do the dishes,” he offered, offering Edward the cloth in his hands. “We can fix it after I put them away.”
“Who said I wanted it fixed, you greedy piece of possessive sh-“
Roy pulled their lips together, hands slinking down to twine with Ed’s still wet ones. He absently ran his thumb over the place where he knew the fading lines of his name were written.
His name on Ed’s arm, his mouth on Ed’s mouth, Edward Elric in his house. No, Roy wasn’t naturally a very possessive person. He did, however, have the alarming ability to latch on to something and hold on until he was forced to let go. A habit he’d tried to keep under the radar from all partners, but the only one who seemed to have seen right through it was Ed.
Perhaps it is my name, but it will always come back to you.
“Getting your pants wet,” Ed mumbled against his mouth, and Roy tilted their foreheads together.
“You seem to have a talent in doing that to my pants in a myriad of situations,” he said (smirked), and Ed punched him in the arm.
“Finish drying those fuckin’ dishes, Roy,” he ordered. If the glint in his eyes said anything, Roy guessed there was a reason for Ed wanting him to be quick about it. Still smirking, he finished with the plates and dried his hands.
Ed had left the cloth on the table and wandered somewhere into the living room. Upon closer inspection, Roy discovered him sprawled out on the couch, alchemy notebook over his face. Suppressing a smile, Roy went to his office to find a marker, and padded back into the room quietly.
Ed flicked his eyes towards him when Roy bent down, an outstretched hand silently asking for his arm. He huffed a breath, but allowed Roy to uncap his marker and slowly, carefully fix the faded lettering. On impulse he leaned down, kissing the creamy expanse of arm. Ed tasted like soap and ink; a truly malevolent combination. The things he did for love.
The room was quiet for a few moments as Roy drew, tongue sticking out of his mouth in concentration. When he’d finished and the ink looked (mostly) dry, he capped the marker and set it on the table beside Edward’s head. When he reached over, Ed dropped his notebook and curled his arms around Roy’s neck, pulling him into a kiss.
“Love you,” he breathed, in the safety of Roy’s ear; nestled in the safest space he knew of, and the safest person he knew. “’Nd you know ‘m yours.”
Oh, he loved the sound of that so very much. Ed might have declared himself Roy’s, but the sense of ownership went both ways. Roy cupped his cheeks and kissed him again, smiling against the heart beating wildly in his chest. Perhaps if he leaned in a little closer, if Ed moved just a little over, their hearts could just syncopate and he could listen to Edward’s pulse, his own beating to a slightly different mantra in agreement with his brain.
Yours, yours, yours, yours.