Leave A Scar (Fullmetal Alchemist)

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A/N: not exactly a lemon, but a very mild chapter... Small bits and pieces of intimacy. Yee.

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"Take everything you need, take every part of me."

Impossible - Manafest

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Scars were a funny thing. How they can seal a moment in time with a sliver of skin.

I never paid much attention to Ed's scars, when he would reach with his flesh hand. Skin against skin, gently cupping my neck, my face, my waist. Always with clothes on, however minimum we gave the night.

But now... Now I was staring at Ed's back, seeing the pricks and cuts sealed within the skin of his left arm. My sight naturally went to the center of his back, where that insignia would be, if he wore his coat.

But I was greeted with the length of his hair, each braid sealing in a year of travel.

His hand rose, pausing at his mouth before slowly lowering again. And with a heavy, soft breath, his back deflated as well, too.

My eyes traced what the moonlight caught, and for a second, seeing those scars again, a dozen memories shot into me. Walking out of one of the first hotel rooms we shared together, seeing the automail catching light as he swirled his glass. The scar on his inner-shoulder, exposed by a strap slid an inch or two past his shoulder. And then that first night together, watching him watch my lips and seeing the scar on the corner of his neck and shoulder. I wanted to kiss it away, that pain. I didn't want him to hurt anymore.

Just give the weight to me. I can bare it.

Once again, my sight went to something I knew wasn't here. His flamel insignia, on his back. My beacon was gone, for the night.

I lifted my stare, straight up like an elevator. Each braid was a floor, and like he'd told me there were six in total. Six years, over 2,000 days. All reduced to one consecutive line.

A lot of time. I wondered what he thought about those times; what he would say if I asked him. I imagined his voice to be thoughtful, patient with himself as he tried to put it all down in words.

I looked up, slowly tracing the long braid, stopping at the back of his head. I wondered what went through that brain of his, when things were quiet like this. When silences were the loudest and voices the smallest.

Here I am, trying to be poetic again. Blotching the pages with my sorry excuse for ink.

I got on my knees, like always, and with the mattress below me, I placed my hands on his shoulders. Sliding them a little towards his neck, and I was surprised to feel the skin rise, underneath his shirt. He didn't glance back like I thought he would. He just stared down, kept staring down, and I leaned over, peering past his shoulder. Seeing his finger and seeing the blood forced out from a bite.

I wanted him to lean back, give me something I could bare. I wanted that weight, however physical it may come.

I wanted to cure, however little I could.

So my hands went to the tendon along his shoulders, squeezing gently and feeling the tension beneath my fingertips.

He groaned, in response, head rolling back. Telling me in a sound that he needed this. He needed me.

So, with a kiss against the side of his neck where the skin curved into shoulder, I told him to lie back.

"You've never had a massage, have you?"