Rules of Engagement Chapter 7 "Making Amends"
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Title: Rules of Engagement
Pairing: RoyxEd, RizaxWinry, past MaesxRoy
Rating: R overall
Timeline: AU
Words: 1858
Summary: Roy and Ed attempt to plan the perfect wedding while dealing with their insistent best friends, their very gay rabbits, and an unexpected blast from the past.
AN: The sequel to Blind Date (which I can't link or it tries to send the post into the mod queue).
One more chapter to go.
Rules of Engagement
Chapter 7
“Making Amends”
I won’t be in that kind of relationship at all.
Those ominous words, spoken by Roy before he left, resounded through Ed’s mind, making it impossible for him to concentrate. He had no idea how the hell he was supposed to come up with a list of songs for the reception when all he could think about was the fact that there might not even be a reception if he couldn’t find a way to get over this hurdle with Roy. And while he didn’t want to believe that the man had any intention of calling off the wedding, as evidenced by Ed’s present task, there was no way to know for certain until he and Roy could talk about what happened. Until then, Ed didn’t want to make any assumptions.
He stared blindly at the empty notepad in front of him and tried his best to come up with something, but his mind refused to cooperate. At that moment, Ed didn’t give the first damn about the reception playlist. As long as he got to marry Roy, they could play fucking polka music for all he cared. Or even Debbie Gibson.
Realizing that there was no point in trying to come up with anything right now, Ed tossed the notepad aside and wandered into the rabbits’ room, where two fluffy gay bundles of cuteness were huddled together in the corner of their cage. The teen busied himself by giving them fresh food and water, and he replaced the cage liner even though it didn’t yet need to be changed. It was a mindless chore, but it gave him something to focus on other than his own phenomenal blunder.
By the time he finished and washed his hands, the doorbell sounded. Assuming it was Winry returning to check up on him, and eager for the chance to vent to an understanding party, Ed walked over to the door and opened it…
… and saw that it was not her.
In spite of all his worrying, Ed discovered that he still had some room left over for anger, as well.
“Roy’s not here,” he said, glaring at the man on the other side of the door.
If Maes was put off by Ed’s attitude, he didn’t show it.
“I know,” he replied while pushing up his glasses. “I’m actually here to talk to you.”
*****
After Roy screwed up his fifth attempt at a centerpiece, Riza demoted him to curling ribbons.
“Do you even have one gay bone in your body?” she asked as she proceeded to correct his disastrous effort once again.
“Just one,” Roy replied. “Want to know where it is?”
“No, thank you.”
They glanced at each other across the kitchen table while Winry toiled away at the stove behind them, having been given a pass from the project. The girl could maneuver her way around a car engine with her eyes closed but, much like Roy, the ability to create decorations eluded her.
Riza grabbed the nearby glue gun and checked its readiness. “Well, at least you're not pouting anymore.”
“I wasn’t pouting,” Roy insisted, offended by the accusation. “And thanks for trivializing my relationship issues.”
“Oh, shut up and suck it up.” The woman started gluing the centerpiece in all the right places. “So your partner wanted to know that there was more to you besides your raving whoredom. How dare he?”
Riza’s sarcasm was not lost on Roy. “There are other ways to go about it than stalking,” he pointed out.
“Tell me about it. By the way, I ought to kick his little ass for getting Winry involved in this mess.”
“Come on, Riza.” Winry glanced over her shoulder at her girlfriend. “It’s not like he held a gun to my head.”
Riza wasn’t entirely convinced. Then again, she was always biased where Winry was concerned.
“Did you ever stop to think that some of this is your fault for not telling him anything about your past?” Riza asked Roy as she continued fashioning his mistake into a masterpiece. “I mean, yeah, it wasn’t the smartest thing for him to follow you, but can’t you see why he did it?”
Roy frowned as he rolled the ribbon spool along the tabletop. “I guess,” he mumbled.
“So? What are you going to do?”
“Well, first I’m going to curl this ribbon.” Roy ran the edge of a pair of scissors along the length of the purple ribbon, which remained just as flat as it was before. “...Or maybe not.”
“Good grief,” Riza groaned.
“And then…”
Roy fell silent for a moment. All he could think about was Ed’s expression as he left him earlier, miserable and heartbroken.
“... I don’t know,” he concluded with a shrug.
“Fine. I’ll tell you what you’re going to do.” Riza reached across the table and confiscated the scissors and uncurled ribbon. “You’re going to go home.”
“I thought I was supposed to be helping you.”
“So did I,” Riza muttered. “But all you’re doing is making more work for me.”
Her expression softened, revealing the side of her nature that few were lucky enough to see.
“Go home. Straighten things out with Ed.”
She rose to her feet and rounded the table, then swept her friend into a backwards embrace, resting her chin against the top of his head.
“Because if you even think about calling off this wedding, I’m going to kill you.”
*****
“Why do you want to talk to me?” Ed asked Maes. He stood his ground by the door, his automail hand grabbing the knob tightly. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”
“I’m sorry.”
The apology caught Ed off guard. While he wasn’t exactly sure what he was expecting the other man to say to him, that certainly wasn’t it.
“If I had known that you didn’t know about me, I wouldn’t have just come strolling up to your door the way I did,” Maes continued. “I honestly didn’t mean to cause any trouble. That was never my intention.”
While Ed knew full well that he shouldered some… maybe even most of the blame for what happened, and even though he could tell, deep down, that Maes was actually being sincere, he was feeling too sore to be rational.
“What was your intention, then?” He already knew, of course, since Roy had informed him earlier, but he still wanted to hear it directly from Maes himself.
“I wanted to see if he was okay.” Maes shoved his hands into his pockets, his eyes hazed over in contemplation. “After what I did… I just… I just needed to know that he was happy. And now I see that he is. He’s happier with you than he ever was with me.”
Ed couldn’t believe that he was actually feeling somewhat sympathetic towards this man, this fucking guy who just came waltzing back into Roy’s life after breaking his heart.
But the look of regret on his face was obvious. It had only been a few hours and Ed could barely stand the regret of what he had done. He couldn’t begin to imagine dealing with it for years.
“Anyway, I just wanted you to know that I won’t be bothering either of you anymore. When my business is done here, I’ll be going back home and… that’ll be that.” Maes pulled a set of car keys out of his pocket and twirled them around his long fingers. “It really was nice meeting you, Ed. In spite of the circumstances. Good luck with the wedding.”
He turned to leave and then stopped after a few steps. And although he was now facing away from Ed, his voice was still loud and clear. And just a little bit sad.
“... Make sure that he stays happy. Please.”
And with that, he was gone.
*****
After Maes left, and feeling slightly better than before, Ed finally started the song list.
He decided that the best way to determine if a tune was fitting for the reception was to give it a listen. And so he sat down on the floor next to the stereo and started nosing through all of Roy’s old albums and CDs in an effort to pick what he felt were the most appropriate pieces.
He smiled and shook his head when he came across the man's Debbie Gibson collection and begrudgingly decided to give her an honest chance since Roy was so inexplicably obsessed with her music. Although he still preferred Tiffany himself, he also loved Roy too much to make waves by saying so.
Okay, so “Foolish Beat” was way too depressing. “Out of the Blue” was cheesy but kind of cute in an eighties way. “Shake Your Love” was a firm maybe. “Electric Youth”... eh. And Ed didn’t even realize that he was head-bopping to “Only in My Dreams” until the song was over, and he added it to the list with a blush and a swear.
“Lost In Your Eyes” was next. Roy’s favorite Debbie Gibson song. While Ed had already heard it more times than he could count, he now tried to picture dancing with Roy to the slow, sappy beat. And… it wasn’t half bad.
Leaning back against a speaker, Ed closed his eyes and let his imagination take over. He could see it now, the two of them in their tuxes, holding each other tightly and swaying to the music. He could see them surrounded by all things purple, as well as their small circle of loved ones who watched them in admiration. He could see… Roy… standing in the living room and staring down at him-
“What are you doing?”
Ed sat up with a jolt. He was so lost in the music and the vision that he hadn’t even realized that he had opened his eyes.
“Um.. I was… uh…”
He could barely hear himself think over Debbie’s soulful teenage angsting, so he turned off the stereo and tried again.
“I was just trying to decide on some songs,” he explained. “I-I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Obviously.”
Roy smiled and took a seat on the floor beside him. He grabbed the notepad and read over the songs that the young man had listed.
“Do you even know how to do the Electric Slide?” he asked.
“No idea,” Ed admitted. “You?”
“I tried it once,” Roy said. “Riza told me that I looked like I was having a seizure.”
Ed couldn’t help but grin. He had thought the same thing once after he caught Roy “dancing” to a Debbie Gibson song.
Now that the ice was broken, the lovers stared at one another. Roy’s smile slowly faded, and he set down the notepad and let out a heavy sigh.
“I guess we need to talk now,” he said quietly.
Lowering his head, Ed looked down at his hands, taking particular notice of his ring. His beautiful ring that symbolized the promise of infinite love and commitment.
He wanted so desperately to be past this part.
Unfortunately, there was no way around it.
“Yeah,” he replied with a nod. “I guess we do.”
To be concluded.
Title: Rules of Engagement
Pairing: RoyxEd, RizaxWinry, past MaesxRoy
Rating: R overall
Timeline: AU
Words: 1858
Summary: Roy and Ed attempt to plan the perfect wedding while dealing with their insistent best friends, their very gay rabbits, and an unexpected blast from the past.
AN: The sequel to Blind Date (which I can't link or it tries to send the post into the mod queue).
One more chapter to go.
Rules of Engagement
Chapter 7
“Making Amends”
I won’t be in that kind of relationship at all.
Those ominous words, spoken by Roy before he left, resounded through Ed’s mind, making it impossible for him to concentrate. He had no idea how the hell he was supposed to come up with a list of songs for the reception when all he could think about was the fact that there might not even be a reception if he couldn’t find a way to get over this hurdle with Roy. And while he didn’t want to believe that the man had any intention of calling off the wedding, as evidenced by Ed’s present task, there was no way to know for certain until he and Roy could talk about what happened. Until then, Ed didn’t want to make any assumptions.
He stared blindly at the empty notepad in front of him and tried his best to come up with something, but his mind refused to cooperate. At that moment, Ed didn’t give the first damn about the reception playlist. As long as he got to marry Roy, they could play fucking polka music for all he cared. Or even Debbie Gibson.
Realizing that there was no point in trying to come up with anything right now, Ed tossed the notepad aside and wandered into the rabbits’ room, where two fluffy gay bundles of cuteness were huddled together in the corner of their cage. The teen busied himself by giving them fresh food and water, and he replaced the cage liner even though it didn’t yet need to be changed. It was a mindless chore, but it gave him something to focus on other than his own phenomenal blunder.
By the time he finished and washed his hands, the doorbell sounded. Assuming it was Winry returning to check up on him, and eager for the chance to vent to an understanding party, Ed walked over to the door and opened it…
… and saw that it was not her.
In spite of all his worrying, Ed discovered that he still had some room left over for anger, as well.
“Roy’s not here,” he said, glaring at the man on the other side of the door.
If Maes was put off by Ed’s attitude, he didn’t show it.
“I know,” he replied while pushing up his glasses. “I’m actually here to talk to you.”
*****
After Roy screwed up his fifth attempt at a centerpiece, Riza demoted him to curling ribbons.
“Do you even have one gay bone in your body?” she asked as she proceeded to correct his disastrous effort once again.
“Just one,” Roy replied. “Want to know where it is?”
“No, thank you.”
They glanced at each other across the kitchen table while Winry toiled away at the stove behind them, having been given a pass from the project. The girl could maneuver her way around a car engine with her eyes closed but, much like Roy, the ability to create decorations eluded her.
Riza grabbed the nearby glue gun and checked its readiness. “Well, at least you're not pouting anymore.”
“I wasn’t pouting,” Roy insisted, offended by the accusation. “And thanks for trivializing my relationship issues.”
“Oh, shut up and suck it up.” The woman started gluing the centerpiece in all the right places. “So your partner wanted to know that there was more to you besides your raving whoredom. How dare he?”
Riza’s sarcasm was not lost on Roy. “There are other ways to go about it than stalking,” he pointed out.
“Tell me about it. By the way, I ought to kick his little ass for getting Winry involved in this mess.”
“Come on, Riza.” Winry glanced over her shoulder at her girlfriend. “It’s not like he held a gun to my head.”
Riza wasn’t entirely convinced. Then again, she was always biased where Winry was concerned.
“Did you ever stop to think that some of this is your fault for not telling him anything about your past?” Riza asked Roy as she continued fashioning his mistake into a masterpiece. “I mean, yeah, it wasn’t the smartest thing for him to follow you, but can’t you see why he did it?”
Roy frowned as he rolled the ribbon spool along the tabletop. “I guess,” he mumbled.
“So? What are you going to do?”
“Well, first I’m going to curl this ribbon.” Roy ran the edge of a pair of scissors along the length of the purple ribbon, which remained just as flat as it was before. “...Or maybe not.”
“Good grief,” Riza groaned.
“And then…”
Roy fell silent for a moment. All he could think about was Ed’s expression as he left him earlier, miserable and heartbroken.
“... I don’t know,” he concluded with a shrug.
“Fine. I’ll tell you what you’re going to do.” Riza reached across the table and confiscated the scissors and uncurled ribbon. “You’re going to go home.”
“I thought I was supposed to be helping you.”
“So did I,” Riza muttered. “But all you’re doing is making more work for me.”
Her expression softened, revealing the side of her nature that few were lucky enough to see.
“Go home. Straighten things out with Ed.”
She rose to her feet and rounded the table, then swept her friend into a backwards embrace, resting her chin against the top of his head.
“Because if you even think about calling off this wedding, I’m going to kill you.”
*****
“Why do you want to talk to me?” Ed asked Maes. He stood his ground by the door, his automail hand grabbing the knob tightly. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”
“I’m sorry.”
The apology caught Ed off guard. While he wasn’t exactly sure what he was expecting the other man to say to him, that certainly wasn’t it.
“If I had known that you didn’t know about me, I wouldn’t have just come strolling up to your door the way I did,” Maes continued. “I honestly didn’t mean to cause any trouble. That was never my intention.”
While Ed knew full well that he shouldered some… maybe even most of the blame for what happened, and even though he could tell, deep down, that Maes was actually being sincere, he was feeling too sore to be rational.
“What was your intention, then?” He already knew, of course, since Roy had informed him earlier, but he still wanted to hear it directly from Maes himself.
“I wanted to see if he was okay.” Maes shoved his hands into his pockets, his eyes hazed over in contemplation. “After what I did… I just… I just needed to know that he was happy. And now I see that he is. He’s happier with you than he ever was with me.”
Ed couldn’t believe that he was actually feeling somewhat sympathetic towards this man, this fucking guy who just came waltzing back into Roy’s life after breaking his heart.
But the look of regret on his face was obvious. It had only been a few hours and Ed could barely stand the regret of what he had done. He couldn’t begin to imagine dealing with it for years.
“Anyway, I just wanted you to know that I won’t be bothering either of you anymore. When my business is done here, I’ll be going back home and… that’ll be that.” Maes pulled a set of car keys out of his pocket and twirled them around his long fingers. “It really was nice meeting you, Ed. In spite of the circumstances. Good luck with the wedding.”
He turned to leave and then stopped after a few steps. And although he was now facing away from Ed, his voice was still loud and clear. And just a little bit sad.
“... Make sure that he stays happy. Please.”
And with that, he was gone.
*****
After Maes left, and feeling slightly better than before, Ed finally started the song list.
He decided that the best way to determine if a tune was fitting for the reception was to give it a listen. And so he sat down on the floor next to the stereo and started nosing through all of Roy’s old albums and CDs in an effort to pick what he felt were the most appropriate pieces.
He smiled and shook his head when he came across the man's Debbie Gibson collection and begrudgingly decided to give her an honest chance since Roy was so inexplicably obsessed with her music. Although he still preferred Tiffany himself, he also loved Roy too much to make waves by saying so.
Okay, so “Foolish Beat” was way too depressing. “Out of the Blue” was cheesy but kind of cute in an eighties way. “Shake Your Love” was a firm maybe. “Electric Youth”... eh. And Ed didn’t even realize that he was head-bopping to “Only in My Dreams” until the song was over, and he added it to the list with a blush and a swear.
“Lost In Your Eyes” was next. Roy’s favorite Debbie Gibson song. While Ed had already heard it more times than he could count, he now tried to picture dancing with Roy to the slow, sappy beat. And… it wasn’t half bad.
Leaning back against a speaker, Ed closed his eyes and let his imagination take over. He could see it now, the two of them in their tuxes, holding each other tightly and swaying to the music. He could see them surrounded by all things purple, as well as their small circle of loved ones who watched them in admiration. He could see… Roy… standing in the living room and staring down at him-
“What are you doing?”
Ed sat up with a jolt. He was so lost in the music and the vision that he hadn’t even realized that he had opened his eyes.
“Um.. I was… uh…”
He could barely hear himself think over Debbie’s soulful teenage angsting, so he turned off the stereo and tried again.
“I was just trying to decide on some songs,” he explained. “I-I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Obviously.”
Roy smiled and took a seat on the floor beside him. He grabbed the notepad and read over the songs that the young man had listed.
“Do you even know how to do the Electric Slide?” he asked.
“No idea,” Ed admitted. “You?”
“I tried it once,” Roy said. “Riza told me that I looked like I was having a seizure.”
Ed couldn’t help but grin. He had thought the same thing once after he caught Roy “dancing” to a Debbie Gibson song.
Now that the ice was broken, the lovers stared at one another. Roy’s smile slowly faded, and he set down the notepad and let out a heavy sigh.
“I guess we need to talk now,” he said quietly.
Lowering his head, Ed looked down at his hands, taking particular notice of his ring. His beautiful ring that symbolized the promise of infinite love and commitment.
He wanted so desperately to be past this part.
Unfortunately, there was no way around it.
“Yeah,” he replied with a nod. “I guess we do.”
To be concluded.