| Author: ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) strandedthought a.k.a causmicfire
Title: Invisible Scars
Theme: From Yesterday
Pairing: Roy x Riza
Spoilers: Ishval Arc
Summary: Post Manga. There are more than a few mishaps as the household gets ready for the night's events, but one they didn't expect, one they hoped not to have to face. </lj> Remnants of the years it took to get to this place in life were scattered throughout the house: pictures, a traveling chess set, empty eyeglasses frames, cards with bullet holes in them, the gauntlet of a piece of armor, and a pair of gloves. Not just any pair of gloves, white ones with a scratchy feel, strange smell, and faded red insignia.
Roy shoved the dull, blue button through the wrong hole in his vest as Riza appeared in the doorway of their room, her lips puckered in anger.
Getting ready for the night had already caused a ruckus throughout the household, and he was certainly going to learn of another hitch in the evening's plans.
“What, now?” he asked, trying to keep the irritation tickling his throat out of his voice.
He was on the final button, and noticed his earlier mistake as his hands searched for the corresponding buttonhole. He was still looking at her while he corrected his mistake, but she didn’t speak.
Riza gathered her purple skirts and made her way into the room, watching as his hand hesitated over the coat hung on the bedpost. For a minute, she could almost forget the invisible scars. The ones on her back, his side, and the one on his hand, the ones healed long ago by retanjutsu. For a moment, he was just the man she loved, and she was ready to let him whisk her away to the party he was hosting at a beautiful mansion. When he adjusted the lapels of the coat, she could see it there for a moment—the scar from battles past etched into his smooth skin—not dissimilar to the sigil on the gloves she held crumpled in her hands.
“I thought they were locked up,” she commented, offering him the wrinkled gloves.
Roy frowned in confusion, and then his eyes widened when they caught a flash of red as the heap of material unfolded itself in her upturned palm.
“They were,” he spluttered, eyes darting from the gloves, to her, and back to the gloves.
“Maes found them,” she informed him, her tone neutral, as if she was filling him in on the latest mission.
Roy muttered a few choice words under his breath and snatched the gloves out of her hand. “Knowing the Elrics should have taught me kids find a way to get what they want with alche—”
“It’s not alchemy,” Riza cut him off.
“Same thing, different name,” he snapped.
Her knitted brows and red cheeks were enough to warn him to take a deep breath—cool down before her tone matched his. “Sorry, I…” His eyes closed in irritation as he pulled his fingers from his gel covered hair.
Riza let out a sigh of exasperation that sent her bangs flying upwards with her breath. “He’s already asking about them…about it,” she admitted. “I don’t know why I thought we wouldn’t have to tell them, thought we could hide it.”
“We can’t pretend it’s nothing, he’ll figure it out, and if he tells Chris about it…” Roy stopped himself from thinking about the consequences of both boys pestering them for answers.
Without realizing it he’d been clenching his gel covered hand, and as he uncurled his fingers it made a sickening squelching noise.
They hadn’t expected this, no more than anyone else, except maybe one grumpy old man.
Not long after the country had settled, and repairs were well into being made, the amount of swollen bellies they saw was phenomenal, and within a short time, the baby boom had even taken over the lives of their closest friends; one of his sisters, Scheska, Rebecca, and even Winry. They’d been asked on more than one occasion if they planned to have “rugrats”, but neither of them had ever considered it.
They had more important things to do, like keeping their country on the right path for the future generations.
Rebecca was already carrying her second child when they found themselves thrown into the beginning stages of parenthood.
When the doctor told them the results of the tests there was relief, then shock. They’d been more than careful. Acceptance washed over them as left Knox’s son’s office.
They discussed it that first night.
That was when he tucked away the title Flame Alchemist, and they decided their child(ren) would not learn the secrets he's had to painstakingly reacquire through retanjutsu.
She had those same eyes when they'd talked about it. Those eyes she'd turned on him at the end of the Ishval war when she'd asked him to burn and crush her back. He couldn't—wouldn't let her give birth to another Flame Alchemist.
Their country would still be delicate as lace for years to come, and he didn't want to see an art mainly used for healing turned against people again in his lifetime, nor did he want his own child to suffer the effects of wielding it the wrong way.
The woman standing before him, in her regal gown of deep reds and purples, was about to crumble behind her angry façade.
Roy laughed when the ex-sniper flinched in surprise as he smoothed her bangs to the side of her face.
"We'll figure it out. We always have," he reassured her(and himself), defeating her scowl with a gentle grin.
She nodded in agreement, and let the knots in her stomach untwist as his arms went around her.
Her head was nearly on his shoulder, when she remembered the hair gel, and shoved him away, the scowl back on her face.
This time it was his brows knit together in concern.
"Go wash your hands, then you'll have to help me untie this," she growled, her hands struggling to get at the ribbon running down the middle of her back.
"Already?" he asked, his voice huskier than it had been moments before, as he looked her up and down lasciviously.
She gave him a sweet smile in response, and sent her hand searching the nearby dresser top as he walked away.
Roy managed a smirk at her before he ducked inside the bathroom just in time to avoid the flying hairbrush.
"A grown man shouldn't be late to his own party," she called after him.
"A grown woman shouldn't be throwing hair brushes at her husband," he replied, his response nearly drown out by a knocking, and then thunder of footsteps racing to the front door.
"Unless he deserves it," she muttered as she left the room .
Riza made it to the door in time to see Elysia take Chris' hand.
"You're still here, Mrs. Mustang?" Elysia inquired with wide eyes. "Mom was practically pushing me out the door, and Mr. Falman passed me while I was walking over."
"We had a few mishaps," Riza explained, then turned her attention to the little fire-fighter.
"Elysia can help you pick out two pieces of candy before bed, then we'll go through it tomorrow," she reminded her son.
"Kay, bye," he called, tugging Elysia out the door.
As she watched them walk down the drive she heard Maes ask Elysia about flame alchemy.
Her lips turned down in a frown as she closed the door, and then her ears perked at the nearly silent steps behind her.
A thumb rubbed the base of her neck, right along the line of invisible ink, and then she felt his hands working at the ribbon of the bodice.
"No one would notice if we're a little late, it's a big house," he pointed out.
"We already are late," she reminded him as she left him standing there with the ribbon from the bodice in his hand.
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"A grown woman shouldn't be throwing hair brushes at her husband," he replied.
Ahaha. I love that X3 Nice job! ;D