Just Won't Do!

Edward stared long and hard at himself in his bathroom mirror. Slowly a finger came up and plucked at his bottom lip.

“It is not pouty.” The blonde alchemist said to his reflection.

A knock on the door brought Ed out of his sulking “Brother! Hurry up I need to pee.” Yanking the door open Ed looked out sheepishly at his younger brother.

“Sorry Al, it’s all yours.”

The younger Elric knit his brows together giving his older sibling a strange look before moving past him into the bathroom.

Ed looked around their humble abode. The apartment was small, it really only had three rooms, four if you counted the bar counter that separated the living room from the kitchen.

Not for the first time Ed lamented the lack of space. He loved his brother dearly but it was getting harder to share such limited space with him. They had both already managed in there short time back to amass a collection of books that was competing for space.

And Ed found he could just not get enough alone time. It’s not that he couldn’t just go somewhere else if he wanted to get away from Alphonse, but what he needed was some personal alone time.

Like when he needed to deal with how Mustang made him feel when he said things like “you have a beautiful mouth”.

It was silly, and really he shouldn’t have overreacted so badly. Let it affect him so badly, but, when Roy had said that it had made him melt.

And the only way to keep from turning into Jell-O in front of the man was to get angry at him, to twist his words and turn them into and insult.

A large warm hand on his shoulder broke Ed out of his thoughts. “Brother what’s wrong?” The Younger Elric turned his sibling towards him and rested his other hand over the flesh shoulder of his sibling.

“You’ve looked lost in thought ever since you got home and you keep staring at yourself and playing with your lip what happened today?” Concern shown through steely blue eyes as they locked on to golden ones.

“It’s nothing Al, don’t worry about it.” Ed moved to turn away but the hands on his shoulders clamped down harder.

“It’s not nothing, you would be over it by now if it were nothing. Please tell me brother, you know you can tell me anything and since we have been back I’ve had this feeling that you’ve been hiding something from me.”

The worry in his younger brother’s eyes melted any resolve Ed might have had to keep this to himself. He felt the tears begin to well up, threatening to spill over so he quickly buried his face against the taller boy’s chest and held back a sob.

“Brother,” The younger man’s arms came up to wrap around his crying sibling. “It’s all right, let it out, just let it all go.” He rubbed soothing circles on the shorter blondes back.

“It, it’s…I... It’s just so hard!” Ed cried out, sniffling and wiping his nose on the shirt in front of him. Alphonse chose to ignore this disgusting lack of manors, even though it was REALLY gross, and he could see a little snot trail drying on his shirt.

“What is so hard Brother?”

“Being…being near HIM every day. Being so close to him but… but not.”

“Him? Who do you mean Brother?”

“THE BASTARD WHO ELSE WOULD I MEAN?” The smaller of the two howled and pushed away.

“Brother, do you mean General Mustang?’ Why is it so hard to be around hi…Oh.”

Alphonse approached the trembling form of his older sibling, embracing him from behind, pulling the shaking form to his own and resting his blonde head on a cold steel shoulder. For some reason the feel of Ed’s auto-mail was comforting to Alphonse. He supposed it had to do with when his soul had been incased in amour.

“Have you ever just thought of telling him how you feel?”

“And have him laugh in my face, and gloat? Look at that men, I’m so damn amazing even the great FullMetal alchemist has fallen for my charm HAHAHA!”

“You never know Brother; he could very well feel the same way about you.

“Yeah right, Al. The man can have any woman he wants, probably any guy to, why would he want someone like me? I’m…I’m broken.” The smaller blonde hung his head, trying to hold back fresh tears.

A heavy sigh escaped the younger boy’s lips before he could stop it. Sometimes it was tiring trying to convince Ed just what a good person he really was.

“He may reject you Brother and he may not, my point is that you will never be able to move forward unless you get past this. You’ve never let anything stand in your way before.”

“I never stood to have my heart broken before, Al.”

“We all have to go through our first heart break.”

“What is this?! I thought I was the big brother, shouldn’t I be giving you the first broken heart speech?”

“Well, technically I’m the big brother.”

“Holy shit Al,” the older blonde stepped away and turned to face his brother, “did you just make a …short joke?”

“Yep!” A grin split the young mans face from ear to ear.

Twin laughter burst forth, filling the small room. The brothers laughed till tears were pouring from both of there eyes and they had to stop because they could no longer force enough oxygen into their systems.

“Damn Al that was the first time you have ever made a short joke at my expense.”

“Oh come on it can’t have been the first time.”

“No really I think it was.”

“Brother,” Alphonse’s tone turned serious again. “I really do think you should just come clean and tell General Mustang how you feel.”

“I know Al, but…I just…I’m scared.”

“Well, what would make you less afraid?”

“If I didn’t have to do it.”

“Brother! You’re impossible!” Alphonse turned away; ready to leave this conversation where it was till an idea stuck him.

“You know, you could always do it a little at a time, that way it wouldn’t seem so daunting.”

“What do you mean Al?” Ed looked up at his brother as he sat down on their small couch that was really only a love seat, they didn’t have room for anything else in the tiny apartment.

“I mean, talk to Mustang, and get to know him, let him get to know you. He doesn’t have to know right away how you feel.”

“But…won’t he figure it out?”

“A man like Mustang? Probably. But that could work to you advantage.”

“How so?”

“Well, if you take the first step and start “dating” so to speak and he figures it out and you keep dating then you will know he likes you back!”

“I don’t know if it works like that Al, and who said anything about dating?”

“Isn’t that basically what getting to know someone you like is? Just ask him to go to dinner with you, or hey we can go as a group. We used to do that all the time remember?”

“Yeah, but Mustang never went along. He didn’t want to be seen fraternizing.”

The taller Elric let out a large sigh and plopped his bigger frame down next to his brother. The couch gave a loud metal screech and the brothers looked at each other for a moment in trepidation.

Alphonse rubbed his temples for several long moments. “This is getting frustrating.” He thought to himself as he peered of to his side where his brother sat, looking absolutely miserable. “But it’s worth it to see my brother happy again.”

“Brother, just plan on going out Friday night and I’ll worry about the rest.” Alphonse stood and smiled down at his brother noting that golden eyes had widened in surprise, and his mouth moved as if he was about to say something.

Before he even had a chance speak Al cut him to the chase. “You trust me right brother?” Alphonse did his best to look as cute as possible. “Play the old "you trust me card", that’ll get em’ Al.”

Wide golden orbs softened, a small smile creasing the elders lips. “Of course I do, Al. I’ll plan on going out Friday, ok?”

“Great! I set everything up don’t you worry!” The younger Elric hurried of to the bedroom, closing the door behind him in what His older sibling thought was enthusiasm.

Once the door was closed and Alphonse was sure his brother wasn’t going to follow him he let out a loud sigh. He picked his way through the books scattered all over the floor and sat on his bed.

Looking around the room he noticed just what an utter mess it was. The room was small and made even smaller by the two beds that occupied it, one on each side of the room. At the end of each bed was a desk, piled high with more books. On the opposite wall were book shelves, stuffed to the brim with even more books.

“Were getting as bad as Schezka." (1) He thought to himself. A wry smile brightening his features for a moment. He sighed heavily again and rested his blonde head in his hands.

“How am I going to pull this off?”

A/N: (1) I don’t know if I spelled her name right!