Work Text:
She glanced over at him from her desk, suspiciously raking her eyes over his unusually focused stance. He was hunched over his work with his head down—and not resting on the desk, because that would have definitely signified sleep. She pursed her lips, trying to imagine what would be important enough to get him to focus when she herself had such difficulty with the task. She was even beginning to feel an irrational sense of jealousy for whatever it was that had gotten him into line.
She sighed and tried to focus on the black and white print of her report form. She supposed it was human instinct to want to feel needed, but this was verging on melodrama.
She began her work again, scrawling in the familiar descriptions in the blank spaces. The page was nearly halfway done when she heard a thoughtful sigh from his end of the room. She looked up in incredulity. Not only was he paying attention to his work, but he was giving it thoughtful consideration. When anything ever merited that, he would share it with her and ask her opinion.
She berated herself for taking his place as the inefficient worker in the early hours of the morning when the sheer quantity of paperwork they had let pile up demanded complete attention—but she just could not take it.
She slid out of her seat quietly, taking care that the wooden legs of her chair did not screech over the floor. She treaded lightly, making sure the heaviness of her boots did not betray her. She felt a small smile creep over her face at the memory of her doing something similar when they were younger and he had dozed off at her father’s desk.
But things were different now. For one, he was much easier to surprise. He always expected her to pick up any trouble coming from behind. She had prevented the Elric brothers from taping pieces of paper with disparaging messages to his back more times than she could count.
Except on one day that he had forgotten to complete the gas usage paperwork for their car. That day she had let the Elrics tape a piece of paper emblazoned with ‘Cadet Assface’ to his back.
She finally drew up behind him and peered over his shoulder. Another benefit of spending so much time at his back was that the feeling of her there was natural for him. No cause for notice or suspicion.
“Colonel,” she snapped, when she saw the colorful pieces of paper he had spent the last hour examining. These were definitely not military issue work. Nothing here was meant to be colorful.
He leapt up in his seat and she had to jump back to miss the top of his head colliding with her chin.
“Holy shit, Hawkeye! What on earth was that—hey!”
He lunged after her when she snatched the papers off the top of his desk to examine them more closely. She stepped briskly away as he fumbled to get out from behind his chair and reclaim his objects of distraction.
The first card she looked at was vibrant pink, and decorated with a swirling and ruffled-looking dress. At the corner was the black silhouette of a well dressed man, and when she read the curled and gleaming gold script, she was shocked to find that it advertised some kind of gala. She shuffled it behind the others and found the next paper was similar, and that it listed the prices for tickets to a similar event at the end of the month. She flipped through the rest with mounting disbelief, and spun to face him, brandishing her evidence in the air.
“You’re deciding which party you want to go to? While I’m sitting over there picking up your slack?”
He looked surprisingly sheepish and abashed, crossing his arms and muttering something under his breath as he looked intently at anything that was not her. Her brows knit in confusion, waiting for his rebuttal and usual complaints of everything that his job entailed and how sometimes it was just a little much for one man, and he was entitled to his break time.
“What was that,” she asked, stepping a bit closer so she could hear him better. “I’m afraid I didn’t hear that excuse. Is it the same one you always break out?”
He shot her a glare and then clasped his hands to his face, throwing his head back in a display of exaggerated frustration.
“Dammit, Hawkeye, you never let me get anything done the way I want it to be done!”
“Want what to be done,” she asked, bewildered. “Do you mean these are part of some undercover mission or something?”
He scowled at her, and she couldn’t help but be amused by the distinct air of poutiness in his face. It was like he was a boy again, and she had caught him doodling on the sides of her father’s alchemy tomes.
“No,” he snapped defensively. “Not everything I do has to be related to work.”
She blinked at him. “Is this some kind of rebellious phase?”
“No!” He spun away from her on his heel in a huff, bustling over to the coat rack in the corner of the room to snatch his off its hook. He jammed his arms into it messily, giving her another dirty look as he struggled. “And I don’t have to explain it to you!”
She felt her face fall at his last line. She knew this confrontation was nothing but immaturity and late-night irritation, but she couldn’t help but feel a bit wounded at the jab. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps she was overstepping her bounds.
She turned away from him and made her way back to her desk. She pulled her chair out and fell into it with an air of finality, refusing to look back up at him.
“Right you are, Sir.” She picked up her stack of papers and tried to find the one she had been working on last, despite the heavy weight of his gaze. “Have a good night.”
A long period of silence stretched out, punctuated by the scratch of her pen nib. She could sense that he was standing frozen at the coat rack, not having moved since she sat down. Part of her almost wanted him to leave so she could nurse her wounds in privacy. This was nothing more than a silly spat, and it would be like none of it had happened in the morning. She would take her place at his back, stride behind him through the now-empty halls, and everything would be back to normal.
She pressed her lips together, unsure of her own sudden immature impulse to accuse him of picking and choosing when he decided it was ok to be unprofessional. It was all fine when he was drunk at bars in the early hours of the morning, or when he woke up screaming and she would rush to her phone in the darkness as it rang, knowing that when she picked it up all she would hear would be heavy, panicked panting as he came down from the distorted reality of his nightmares. Of course she was entitled to his life then. Just not now.
She finally heard the soft thud of his footsteps, and she waited for them to stop at the heavy oak door and let himself out. She stiffened when he walked past it, tentative stride bringing him to the front of her desk. She glared with determination at her papers, refusing to let herself look up, even though her eyes had been fixated on the same word for the last several minutes.
“Riza,” he said softly.
She froze at the sound of her name, eyes darting up to his in shock. He had just crossed a line. They were in uncertain territory now, and one of them might say something that the regularity of routine in the morning might not mend.
His face was gentle with cautiousness as he looked down at her. The warmth in his eyes set something thrumming in her veins, and she struggled to force herself back into the realm of rationality.
“You shouldn’t—“
“I’m sorry,” he said, eyes growing serious. “I never mean to hurt you.”
She glanced away, setting her arms on her desk to try and give herself a sense of security. “You didn’t hurt me.” She shot him a self-conscious look out of the corner of her eyes. “Immaturity doesn’t hurt me.”
“Good.” She heard the smile in his voice and looked back at him against her will.
He set the colorful papers on her desk and slid them towards her. They looked gaudy against the harsh and official contrast of her paperwork. She let her fingers drift to the advertisements and touch their edges with what felt like an almost strange reverence.
“Why do you have these,” she asked, voice empty of accusation and incredulity. It was an honest question, a desire to understand.
“Well,” he began, shifting uncomfortably. “You might not like this but, I er—well, lately I’ve been thinking that it might be nice to go to something like this.”
She looked up at him, fingers still resting on the printed pink dress. His face was a little strained, but open. He was not hiding anything from her right now. He gave her a weak smile, a small offering that let her know how hard this was for him. How hard it was for him to strip away the guile and pretense after a day in this office.
She blinked when she realized they were gazing at each other as he waited for her reaction. She let some of the tenderness she kept locked away surface in her eyes. “I understand.” She looked down as she felt the familiar hollow ache that accompanied thinking about could haves and maybe if’s.
“Do you remember all the records that my dad kept? When you two went out on your alchemy field trips I would play them…” She let herself drift back into her memory, hear the soft melody and scratch of the record player as she put on song after song, spinning around in her favorite dresses, stepping over the stacks of research and glass instruments that littered the floor. “You know, he stopped playing them when my mother passed.”
She returned to her senses and straightened in her chair, looking up at him in embarrassment. “I’m just being silly, I was just—“
She broke off when she saw the look in his eyes. She couldn’t describe it as anything other than hunger. An intense longing for the kind of scene she had just returned to, desire to be part of something like it.
And if she was judging correctly, by the soft cast of his eyes, it was something that he wanted to be part of specifically with her.
The thought reminded her of the dangerous direction this—whatever this even was—had started to take. She cleared her throat.
“I suppose what I was trying to say was that I understand.”
He nodded, and then surprised her by taking in a deep breath. “I hope you’re not too mad at me, especially since I’ve made a regular ass of myself tonight and I’m probably about to make it even worse, but I was thinking…” He faded off and looked away for a moment, taking in another deep breath and then finishing in a rush, “that you might like to go to one of these with me.”
She stared, taking in the silent question of his face and slowly connecting it with the advertisements that were suddenly burning hot beneath her fingertips.
Her mouth opened and closed as she warred with different sides of herself, struggling to silence the clear, desperate voice in her head clamoring for a yes and gratification.
She closed her eyes and pressed a hot hand to her forehead, trying to slow the pace of everything.
“Roy, you know we can’t—“
“It’s not a military ball!” His eyes were bright with desperation and hope. “We’ll be able to dance with whomever we please, and…” He sighed, voice becoming smaller and more subdued. “I remembered you used to like music.”
A flood of the broken shards of moments that almost were came streaming from the corners of her mind where she had shoved them over all the years. They crashed over her with a painful intensity and she leaned forward on the desk for support, clasping her head and trying to surface from underneath the torrent.
She started to laugh while feeling tired, ashamed, and guilty all at once. Her eyes grew warm and blurry and she swiped at them in impatience, frustrated with her sleep-deprived and over-strung hysteria. Of course she knew what she had to say and what she had to do but God, it was just so hardright now.
“Riza, I’m so sorry,” Roy said, stumbling to his knees in front of her desk to meet her eyes. “I never meant to make this happen and I didn’t want to—“
“No, it’s not you.” She took in a shuddering breath, trying to regain control of herself. She shook her head plainly, letting out one more hiccuping laugh. “I want to, Roy, I really do.”
His face shifted between concern and distress, trying to make sense of her. “Then why can’t we—“
“Because we can’t.”
They stared at each other, her eyes streaming and his flicking through a dizzying series of emotions.
“I don’t understand,” he whispered. “I thought we could just do this one—“
“But it won’t stop, you know it won’t stop.” She resisted the urge to bury her face in her hands. He deserved more than that. She forced herself to look at him with lucid intensity, trying to communicate the unspoken truth they had both spent too much time denying. “You know it won’t just stop here.”
His eyes searched her face, and when he spoke his voice was rough and over-wrought. “Why does it have to?”
She pushed herself up from her seat, clumsily trying to push her chair back into place under her desk. Everything was blurred, but she forced herself to stumble in the general direction of the coat rack. She had to leave, she could not let him do this to himself. There was just too much to lose, and she refused to be his downfall.
“Riza!”
She shook her head, forging ahead. “I can’t, Roy, I won’t do this to you.”
A gentle but insistent grip closed around her arm, tugging her to a gentle halt. She shook her head, bringing her other hand to her face and scrubbing at it. Her shoulders shook with a tired, defeated sob. He was making it so hard, he just couldn’t understand—
He turned her slowly, and she kept her gaze fixed down on the floor when she faced him. A warm hand settled against the wet skin of her chin, softly asking her to look up at him. And damn it all to hell and back, but the rebellious part of her gave one last battle cry and surge, and she looked up at him.
She met his eyes, inches from hers, and felt the last remnants of her resistance wash away. His face was filled with pain at her turmoil, but the hunger was back. The insurmountable longing and desire for what absolutely could not be allowed to exist between them.
“We could go to the masquerade one. We’ll wear masks.” His voice was just above a whisper, wry with tension and hope. “No one will recognize us, it will be fine—“
And it all came tumbling down as she let herself lean forward. Her lips crashed into his and her hands lifted from her sides, searching for the warm skin of his cheeks and his hair as she let herself be free for one damned and ill-fated moment.
He smiled against her in triumph and relief, his hands making their inevitable journey to the nape of her neck, then the clip of her hair, and all the while all she could think was that he was so warm and they fit so well and it all felt so terribly and wonderfully natural.
In the warm and all-consuming rush of elation and freedom, she refused to remember the solemn truth of her earlier words.
You know it won’t stop here.