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Branded	By : ibshafer Category: Fullmetal Alchemist > Het - Male/Female Views: 13845 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Full Metal Alchemist, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 6
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Title: Learning Curve – Part 4

Part: 3/7 (Branded – series)

Author: ibshafer

Rating: R

Character/Pairing: EdXWin… or is it WinXEd?…

Disclaimer: I don't own these people, they own themselves and are just nice enough to let me
spin them around the page now and then.

Summary: In which Edward and Winry get some alone time…and in which the course of true
love runs anything but smoothly…

Warnings: sexual situations, but nothing too explicit

Genre: Fullmetal Alchemist; AU

Spoilers: none

Feedback: Yes, please…

[From the previous chapter...]

On the one hand, a fat volume wherein two perfect physical specimens contemplated, talked
about, then had copious amounts of sex.

On the other, a cooler filled with sandwiches and what was beginning to smell like a whole pan
of brownies…

Food?

Sex?

Hmmm…

Food was food was food…

No arguing with that.

And reading about people having sex, no matter how many words were used, was not the same
as actually having sex yourself, so…

Food it was!

With a gleeful little gurgle, Edward (and his triumphant stomach) lunged for the cooler.

~*~*~

Three chicken sandwiches later – there was a fourth, but he was saving it as a reward for cracking
the book’s spine – Ed was just polishing off the 1 lb brownie Winry had packed, when his mouth
ran up against a brick wall. A white brick wall.

A white brick wall that came in the form of a small glass bottle filled with a viscous white liquid
the consistency of bile and the color of … the color of … well, he didn’t want to get into what it
was the color of…

“Gah!” he screeched out loud.

How could she do this to him – and at a time like this? He had a mouth full of brownie, his soft
palate and tongue were getting ready to mutiny, and the last thing he needed was something a
cow made out of chewed up grass and, quite possibly, some of its own poo. Out there in the
fields, happily, brainlessly munching away, did a cow really look where it was chewing? For that
matter, could something that secreted a substance that tasted as foul as milk actually tell the
difference between grass and its own poo?

Yaaach!

Why was it so hard for people to understand that He. Did. Not. Want. To. Drink. Milk. Period?!
(Question mark? Exclamation point!)

Moral debates about the viability of milk as a substance one takes into one’s own body aside, the
more pressing issue was procuring an acceptable substitute.

Immediately.

Before he choked to death.

(The geeks, the ones, that is, that hadn’t already passed out, were stumbling around the command
center, gasping dramatically, holding shaking hands to their throats and generally making a real
spectacle of themselves, not unlike their commander…)

Ignoring the most obvious option (“Edward stormed across the lawn and up the steps, throwing
open the weathered door, making certain he did so with enough force to bounce the thing off the
side of the house, but not so much that it rebounded and smacked him in the face before he could
stomp on through. Once inside, he stomped over to the ice box where he flung the door open,
yanked out the pitcher of fresh lemonade that was sitting there, and drained its contents in one
swallow…”), Edward instead whistled sharply through his fingers, whereby an excited Den
bounded across the lawn, no doubt hoping for something else fun to chew on, only to be met by a
determined looking Edward, who slipped a hastily scribbled note under his collar, pointed him
towards the front porch and with grit teeth and hoarse voice, commanded him to “Find Winry!!!”
after which the dog set off to do just that.

Good dog.

Feeling quite sure liquid rescue was now certain, but still fuming that he’d been put in this
parched position to begin with, Edward leapt to his feet, arms folded across his heaving chest,
mouth open to the cool air in hopes of a passing downpour to bring him relief, and with eyes
glued to the porch, he waited.

~*~*~*~

Oh, goodness. What’s that look for?

Ed was on his feet now, a familiar look of royally-pissed-off molding that beautiful face, a face
she’d had recent opportunity to see flushed and grimacing for another reason...

She’d sent him out to eat lunch and read. What could possibly have inspired such an expression?
And, sheesh, look at the way he was standing and holding his mouth open, like he was in pain
and desperate for relief; like he was…

Oh…

Winry couldn’t help but smirk.

Oopsie…

Well, it was force of habit; if not a packing-Edward-lunch habit, then a packing-someone-a-brownie habit.

How could he even want to eat a brownie without the cool, creaminess of milk to wash it down.
Milk made the brownie worth eating. Without milk, the brownie just turned one’s mouth into a
gummy, disgusting, frustrating…

Now she’d found a giggle to accompany her smirk.

She hadn’t done it on purpose, but there did seem to be an oddly balanced equivalency here, kind
of a frustration-for-frustration karma sort of thing.

Oh, look at him fume…

Just then, she became aware of an excited, black streak, making its way across the lawn towards
the house and she could swear she saw Edward lift his chin towards her, as if punctuating some
sentence that began at the tree and ended at the door.

Just then, Den bounded up onto the porch, barking his arrival. She obliged and let him in; curious
at what his excitement had to do with the state of Edward’s mouth…

As usual, Den was overjoyed to see her and it was only a moment before all that leaping and
barking caused something to drop from the his collar.

Retrieving it from the floor, she saw that it was a piece of paper.

Huffing once and rolling her eyes, risking a quick glance towards the tree where Edward now
appeared triumphant, and, at the same time, somehow even more desperate, she unfolded and
read the note – which took all of one second.

In Edward’s unmistakable chicken scratch was a single, somewhat innocuous word, one that
usually fell more on the innocent side of the vocabulary war and one that was certainly not
accustomed to being uttered, or chicken scratched, in the heat of what was looking to be, if not a
battle, then at least a spirited skirmish…

This normally tepid three-syllable word was followed by some rather emphatic, almost
accusatory punctuation. (Hence the transformation of said word from a mild-mannered collection
of letters, into something intended to be more the verbal equivalent of a slap in the face…)

“LEMONADE!!!” the note said, somehow managing to sound commanding, despite the chicken
scratch – and a fair amount of Den’s stray dog hairs.

What Edward had failed to realize was that this was not Winry’s first day on the Edward Job.

He’d been issuing her orders for as long as she could remember – even as a soft-bellied five-year
old, Edward could be a stern little demon when provoked – but Winry had always been a girl
possessed of her own spine: she rarely complied and she never stepped to and the only thing
keeping Edward from realizing this was his own inability, or was it his reluctance?, to accept that
she had no intention of complying or stepping to.

The more vehemently he insisted, the more emphatically she resisted. All this insisting and
resisting was usually accompanied by the requisite amount of arm-waving and name-calling,
none of which either paid heed to, but circle they did all the same.

It was an age-old dance, not as romantic as a waltz or a tango, but one that had defined their
relationship for as long as either of them could remember.

And so Winry Rockbell was not about to be ordered around, especially by someone who used to
piddle in her wading pool, someone who always, always stole the strawberries from her plate
when he thought she wasn’t looking; someone who, not too terribly long ago, had been reduced
to a puddle of goo by the tip of her tongue placed against the back of his ear…

This last thought, and the memory of his helpless moaning, almost softened her resolve, almost
made her want to give in to him…

Almost, but not quite.

Edward, you do not know what you are missing…

While she was resolving this and that, she also resolved to make the lactose-adverse Edward, and
the large-looming specter of milk, her very next project…

Milk is not only good for you, Edward; it makes so many things worth eating!

Resolve now firmly back in place, she just shook her head, watching the beautiful, red-faced
young man she adored do that thing he did so well; Edward was working himself up into quite
the Mad.

Winry bit her lip to keep from laughing; at this distance, Edward’s tantrum was pretty funny.

Striding confidently onto the porch, she folded her arms across her chest and very vehemently,
very emphatically, shook her head: NO!!

Edward’s response was more agitated wind-milling after which he paused, crimson faced, to
sputter in place and fix her with a pointed glare, as if the wind-milling and sputtering ought to
have changed her mind.

Which they did not.

Winry raised a single graceful finger and pointed it pointedly at the basket; the basket that
contained the original, offending liquid. Then she punctuated her finger pointing with a single
emphatic chin-point.

The message was not lost on Edward. He stared at her, utterly aghast, and then, in a real reversal,
he huffed once and seemed to give in, bending to rummage through the basket.

A moment later, he had the milk bottle in his hand. But instead of giving in and drinking it, he
spun to face her and with an evil look on his face, making certain he had her full attention, he
poured the liquid rather dramatically out onto the grass.

His face showed a moment of triumphant satisfaction that quickly faded as he no doubt realized
that he was still, in point of very parched fact, quite thirsty.

She regarded him with cool indifference.

Much as she adored him, it had been his choice to pour out his only source of relief.

Seeing she had no intention of complying with his eloquent request…

…Edward stormed across the lawn and up the steps, throwing open the weathered door, making
certain he did so with enough force to bounce the thing off the side of the house, but not so much
that it rebounded and smacked him in the face before he could stomp on through. Once inside, he
stomped over to the ice box where he flung the door open, yanked out the pitcher of fresh
lemonade that was sitting there, and drained its contents in one swallow…

From her post on the front porch where she’d moved not a muscle since his abrupt return, she
could hear him making all sorts of noises in the kitchen – gasping and huffing in dramatic relief.

Still panting, wiping his mouth and chin with the front of his already lemonade-soaked black
tank, Edward stomped back out onto the porch and had just begun his somewhat theatrical
descent down the stairs when he froze on the step, cheeks suddenly flushing, golden eyes wide,
as though he’d just remembered something of extreme importance.

Before she had a chance to ask him what was wrong now, he’d spun around on the stairs and
come back onto the porch. While he resolutely avoided looking her in the eye, there was no
mistaking the intensity of his expression.

A second later, he pulled her roughly into his arms, slipped one hand into her hair, and kissed her
hard.

She had a moment to wonder at the unexpected gesture, so abrupt in the face of his most recent
temper tantrum, as well as to revel in his obviously burgeoning skills – for a moment her knees
went weak – before he just as abruptly pulled away, still without comment, stomping back down
the stairs and across the lawn to the tree.

She touched her lip in awe.

He-he wanted me to know he hasn’t forgotten…

…how we started the day…

Winry shivered.

She’d seen it before, but never in this particular context. Their morning had been fueled by a not-unappealing mix of excited energy and wide-eyed inexperience, but she had yet to see, or feel,
this.

Edward’s passion…

He’s gone back to read the book. What will happen when he finally “gets it?”

She touched her lip again, then steadied herself with a hand to the railing.

Oh, god…

~*~*~*~
- 6
- 7
- 8
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