Leave A Scar (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Here We Are

I thought about Ed a lot, the next morning. We shared a room, but when I rose from my sleep, his bed was messy and unoccupied. I checked the time, squinting at the numbers.

9:42am. So we'd missed the 9am and 9:30am trains. Were we staying here for another day?

I slipped out of the sheets, padding to the suitcase open to the both of us. Changing into my regular clothes, I thought about sunsets and unspoken words. Syllabus I kept inside, kept hidden. A chamber full of monsters.

They both greeted me warmly, when I stepped out into the living area.

"Are we staying here for another day?" I asked. My head tilted to one side, my eyes awake and mind exhausted. Luckily supported by hundreds of walls.

Ed nodded, eyes curved in a smile just as big as his lips. "Yep! We'll do another day of research with the books we have and then get on our way!"

"What..." I was looking for something other than the two books between them, when Al reached down to the space beside and below.

A huge stack slammed onto the table, knocking me out for a moment. Waahh...?

Ed snickered, Al laughed in that way of his. I muffled sounds against my lips, and after a sip of the tea waiting for me thanks to Edward, I sat down and opened my first book.

Immediately, small and closely spaced text greeted me. A picture of an hourglass came as well. I stared, having to pull my head back and squint a little. Why do they made the writing on this so tiny?
"Here." Ed took the text, offering me his. "This one is just explaining the salamander's fire." His forefinger rested against the middle margin of the left page. "It picks up there."

My eyes focused, noticing the text was much bigger. I sighed a little. "Thanks."

He nodded, seeming happy to do it, and I felt my insides die a little. A burden. That's all I was.

The morning passed by in pages and unrelenting researching. Nothing about anything more powerful or parallel to the Stone...
Fantastic.

The stacks we had borrowed were finished, by the time the sun disappeared.

"I think I'll go watch the sunset!" Al chirped, one finger up.

Ed and I both nodded, eyes and lips in a smile. When the door clicked shut, it was quiet.

The clock ticked on, and I thought about seconds. Each one passing by like grains of sand inside an hourglass. Just continuing on, leaving us both to wear away.

I thought about the wounds that were healing, on me. The ones inside stayed damaged, scabs that never closed and scars that never healed over.

Ed closed his book, looking up to give a loud yawn. I blinked, eyes heavy, and looked over to the clock. So it was dinner time already.

"I'll grab a menu," Ed stood, two fingers pressing against the text for momentum, and a moment later he was holding a list of food we could order.

I scratched at a band-aid on my face, the one near my lip.

"Stop that." He spoke quietly, gently, as if he really did care.
And I knew the thing he wasn't saying. How he didn't want me to get hurt. And that was a given, every time we went outside and saw one of those things.
My thoughts drifted to him, how he must be feeling with having those creatures after him. He didn't need to be worrying about me, too...
I stopped scratching, trapping my hand in between my crossed thighs, the digit hiding away in an expanse of black created by my skirt.

It was strange, that darkness. I molded it, beginning to create another wall as Ed strolled up to me, still looking at the menu.

He shrugged his arm, hand motioning to what it held. "There's pasta," he remembered, noting my last choice. It had been rich, rich enough to fill me within a few bites. He remembered such a small detail, and it was enough to fill my cheeks with the red of a tomato.