Cost of a Secret

Review Replies: kikiko, thanks. Yes, Ed is definitely suffering. I'm so cruel to him. mirage, glad you're enjoying the story. I think you will be a little happier about what you said was depressing you this time. radcat, thank you. Too bad Roy and Ed can't hear you out. Baroqueangel, thanks so much. Amethyst-eyed Koneko, yeah, James was a little weasel, wasn't he? You'll find out about Liam here. Promise. As for why no one's told Ed, this is something that they know has to be kept quiet. Sorry to make you cry.

Chapter 5

Liam

After two days on the train, Roy was grateful for the fresh air of East City. He stretched his legs and arms before heading to the vehicle rental area just outside of the train station. He wondered if Ed was still in the house, if the young man had any other options than to stay there. Roy could only imagine how awkward it would be if Ed couldn’t find another place.

Really, Roy knew better, knew that Ed would have another option. He had friends, made them easier, it seemed than Roy had in years. He was also a very attractive man still in his younger years. He had no marks on his face as Roy did, and people were accepting automail better than ever before. Really, there was no reason to doubt that Ed would find himself a place to stay.

If nothing else, Ed had most of Roy’s team on his side. Really, the older man knew why they would side with Ed. All of them, at one point or another, had learned exactly what the man was keeping from his lover, and he couldn’t think of one of them really approving of the fact that he was doing it. But by the time Ed was in a position to learn it the way they had, Liam had learned discretion. Being older probably had a lot to do with it.

Roy headed through the train station, getting his bags checked at a locker there. On the way, he passed a woman who knew Karen, knew of Roy, and disliked what she knew of the man. He did his best to disregard her looks, just as he always did. He did this trip to East City at least six times a year, staying for nearly a week each time. He had grown accustomed to the looks of disappointment and disgust. Admittedly, some of the things in his dealings with Liam earned the looks, but he felt that Karen was the far more deserving candidate.

The man went through the station and out to the vehicle rental area. He knew he had to reserve the car for the entire day, though he really would only need it for a few hours. He knew that it would look suspicious enough that he wasn’t renting one for his usual week. He simply couldn’t risk it getting to Karen why he was really there.

In the interest of time, he did his best not to get caught up in a long conversation with the man who ran the rental place. Morris was a talker, and Roy simply didn’t have time for it. It seemed a shame, because if things went the way he hoped they would, he would be seeing Morris hardly ever again. He didn’t consider the elderly man a friend, per se, but he had enjoyed being around the genial man.

While Roy would miss the people like the man who was currently in the process of finding him a good car for the day, he wouldn’t miss the frowns and looks of disgust at him from people like the women earlier.

Roy sighed and thanked Morris for the car before climbing in and heading to the school where he could speak to Dr. Karlsen. He owed at least that to the woman. She had been good about contacting him and keeping him updated when it seemed that he had no way of knowing. He owed the woman a face to face meeting at the very least.

He started the car and drove down the far more developed streets of the city, glancing at East Headquarters, where he’d once had an office before he became part of Central’s core officers. That was back before he was sure that those in parliament seeking the position of prime minister were planning to make him head of their military department. He’d already been approached, subtly, by more than one aspiring politician.

He continued to drive along the streets that seemed to change more and more with each visit. East City was growing more and more each year it seemed. That was largely due to Ed.

Karen criticized Roy’s lover often enough—until he confirmed otherwise, he couldn’t bring himself to think of Ed as his ex just yet.—but realistically, East City would never have been what it was if it hadn’t been for the young man. Passing by the somewhat exaggerated statue of him in the central hub of the town, it seemed that the town recognized what the woman would not. Ed had done a lot to improve relations with the Ishballans and had even begun a formal relationship with Xing through studies in the country’s alchemy. East City had become a hub for international trade, and it was all thanks to the young man that Karen liked to disparage so often.

Perhaps Karen would have felt differently if she was a native of the eastern border as Roy had been. She had been born nearly as far west as Roy had been born in the east, and it was just one more personality quirk that had explained why they were so often opposed to one another.

Driving onward, Roy took one final glance at the statue of Ed. It was far too stylized and idealistic, and yet in the same breath, did not do the young man justice. Roy had, perhaps, grown accustomed to the less idealistic, more flawed version of the blond. He had learned to love each outburst, every self-satisfied grin, every scar that this small—though much larger than the real thing—statue would never show.

“Damn it, Roy,” the teen said. “Hands off.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, pulling away. “I just had no idea that there were so many.”

Ed groaned. “Yeah, well, you don’t see me poking underneath of that patch you still insist on wearing. Don’t know who you think you’re fooling.” Roy looked up at him.

“Again, I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me,” Roy said as he tried to sew the tear in Ed’s pants.

The blond huffed. “Don’t you have the sweatpants I wore last time?”

“Can’t find them,” Roy lied. “And I won’t be long.”

“I still want to know where you learned to sew.”

“Being part of the regular military for a while, or at least the academy, you learn some basic things. They want you to be self-sufficient.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ed said, pacing the room in the pair of briefs and long black tanktop. “In other words don’t rely on your C.O. slash friend.”

Roy smiled up at him. The young man looked very good, walking around like that, though he wanted to internally smack himself for that quick little move to touch the long scars at the top of Ed’s thighs.

“You want to tell me why you’re looking at me like you’re a hungry tiger and I’m your next meal?” Ed asked with a smirk.

Roy gaped for a moment. Since when did Ed become perceptive, and smug, of all things? “Perhaps because I’m interested on taking you out somewhere that doesn’t involve the rest of the team.”

“A date?” Ed asked, and Roy expected him to laugh, but the blond turned very serious. “Fine, but on one condition. I want to look at all of your face.” Ed thought a moment. “Two conditions. You pay.”

********

For the second time that day, Ed was repacking his belongings into boxes and suitcases. It was now the third day, including the morning of Roy’s note, and he was still trying to force himself to follow through with his ultimatum. It was just… he didn’t want to.

Ed knew he deserved better. He didn’t have that feeling of unworthiness that drove him absolutely mad with Roy’s ego. He knew that he deserved a relationship with someone who wouldn’t try to change him, someone who understood him, someone who trusted him. And in cases like this, two out of three just wasn’t going to cut it, even if he loved him.

Why did the man have to be so damned difficult? So stubborn? If he had just told Ed… well, maybe they would still be over, but at least there would be the slightest chance. Despite how messed up Roy was when it came to them both, Ed just couldn’t bring himself to believe that Roy really did want it to end like this.

There was a knock to the front door, and Ed immediately rushed downstairs, thinking it must be Al finally back from Risembool. He quickly glanced in the mirror to make sure that he didn’t look like he’d been crying. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately. He had taken two weeks off, including the last few days. Aside from going through the house and dividing up his things, he hadn’t really done anything, but he felt completely exhausted.

He hoped it didn’t show, though he knew that, even if it didn’t, Al would be able to tell like he always could.

The young man opened the front door.

“Where do you want it?” A large man asked.

Ed blinked a few times, seeing another man to match the first was leaning against a large cardboard box. “Want what?” Ed asked, still at a loss.

“The bed,” the man said as though Ed was the biggest idiot in the entire world.

“I didn’t order a bed,” Ed said, still confused. “Do you have the right house?”

“Twin bed ordered under the name Roy Mustang.”

Ed stared up at the man. “The only place for it is the first door on the right upstairs.”

The two men nodded, still looking at Ed as though he was stupid.

Then again, he probably looked the part at the moment, as he was standing with his fists clenched and a look of surprise and anger on his face. Roy had bought a bed? For what?

Did he think Ed would just sleep in that while Roy continued in his place in their bed? It might have been Roy’s first, but Ed felt that it was now as much his as the older man’s.

“Son of a bitch,” Ed muttered to himself.

Roy handed him the oil, and Ed stared at him for a good fifteen, twenty seconds. “You’re serious?”

The man lay there, staring up at Ed. The dark eyes rolled. “Do I look like I am joking?” He gestured to the raging hard-on that he was sporting.

“You’re a bottom?” Ed asked him.

“I like the feeling of prostate stimulation,” Roy said in a voice so sterile, it nearly made the young man laugh himself simple.

“Kill the mood, why don’t you?” Ed asked. “You know, there are a million other ways of putting it. You could say that you enjoy the feeling of another man inside of you.” He leaned down and nipped at Roy’s neck. “Or that you are an attention hog who likes to be taken care of?” He kissed Roy’s cheek. “Or that you just like being pounded into a mattress?”

“I wonder if a runt like you could actually pound me into anything,” Roy said.

With a near-feral growl, Ed chose to prove him wrong.

“Brother?” a voice said, waking Ed from his memories. “Brother? Are you okay?” Ed looked up at saw Al, standing at the doorway. “The door was standing wide open.”

“Oh… Delivery men,” Ed said, trying to dismiss the problem that the men’s presence had started. He shook his head lightly, walking over to Al’s side. “So… Al, how are you?”

“The train ride went fine,” Al said. “Brother, what’s wrong?”

Ed shook his head and put on a smile. “Nothing’s wrong, Al.” He moved closer to his little—well, not literally—brother and suddenly felt awkward. Considering their history, he wasn’t sure if he should shake his hand or hug him… if he should do anything at all. He was still quite amazed that his little brother would actually talk to him again, and finding him standing before him had Ed more than at a loss.

“You’re not telling the truth,” Al said. Though it was obviously an accusation, there was none of the meanness or bitterness in his voice that Ed would have expected, that Ed would have certainly had in his own if their roles had been reversed. There were loud thumps upstairs and Al’s eyes were diverted toward the source of the sound. “Brother?”

The sheer concern in the large brown eyes was eating at Ed. Despite himself, he said his thoughts aloud. “How can you act so normal?”

Al looked as surprised by Ed’s little outburst as the blond, himself, was. Ed nearly smacked himself as Al’s expressive eyes—no surprise he’d be so easy to read now, as he had been even in his armor—flashed so many different emotions that Ed knew he couldn’t begin to catalogue them all. The surprise was definitely there, but there was also hurt, anger, frustration, pity…

Ed could only manage shame.

“I… Ed,” Al started. “You’re my brother. You look like you haven’t slept in days.” He put his suitcase down. “No matter what, I’m going to worry about you. What is it?”

There were dozens of things that could have come out of Ed’s mouth, ranging from the lack of trust to suspicious behavior of the older man. What came out, however, was “Bastard bought me a bed.”

Al’s light brown brows met and he looked at Ed as though he’d grown a third head. With a sigh, Ed began to explain, only pausing when the other men made trips for the mattress, box springs, and finally to leave.

********

“Liam’s behavior has been subdued lately. And that has us concerned,” the gray-haired woman said, after having listed off a number of worries about Roy’s main priority in coming to East City. “And he has been frightening other students with the stories he has been telling.”

“Truth be told,” the mousy man to Dr. Karlsen’s left said, “he has been scaring some of the teachers too.”

“If this were a case of a young, active imagination,” she continued as though the teacher had not spoken, “we may have just dealt with this on our own, but it’s not just Liam who has changed.”

Roy nodded. “Karen has been combative at best since I was forced to cut her research budget.” He looked the older woman in the eye. “I can’t really explain the reason, but there was no option, and as I’ve been put in charge of the state alchemists… well, it fell to me to do.”

The woman nodded. She was the principal of a school. Of course she understood difficult decisions as a person of authority.

“Well, Major General,” the woman said, standing and holding out her hand, “good luck with them both, and please, keep us updated.”

Roy nodded and shook her hand. “Thank you, and I will.”

Saying his goodbyes to the woman and to the teacher, he headed toward Karen’s home. He knew from Liam’s letters that the woman would be her personal lab by this time of day. Still, he quietly drove the car up to the front of the house. Thankfully, his presence wasn’t so unheard of that the neighbors would immediately contact Karen to notify her he was there.

He glanced up just in time to see a head of dark black hair disappear from a window. In just a few moments, he watched as the back door was opened.

Roy stepped from the car and watched as the little boy with his shaggy black hair and almond-shaped brown eyes came running through the back yard. He was much too thin, in Roy’s opinion and looked far too relieved to see him. The older man preferred when Liam looked happy to greet him. This look on his face clearly said that the boy considered Roy his savior.

“Daddy!” he yelled out before throwing his arms around the military man.