chapter 30

You wake up uncomfortably. Your neck is twisted sideways, as your head is leaning to the left. You would've moved, but there's a weight pressing down on your head. You suddenly realize: it's Ed.

Your automail hand is in his automail hand, and you wonder how that came to be. You remember that you fell asleep with your arm behind your back.

Your neck hurts, but you don't want to wake Ed from his sleep, so you just enjoy the moment instead.

You can feel something expand through your chest and spread warmly through you. Although you can't physically feel through your metal arm, you can still sense little sparks flowing through the automail. You smile a bit.

Above you, Ed takes in a deep breath and stirs. He picks his head off of yours, and you immediately roll your neck, a little pain spreading through your neck, but nevertheless, it felt good.

You look at Ed's sleepy face. His golden eyes are blurred over.

"Finally awake, sleepyhead?" You whisper, tightening your hand around his.

His eyes clear and he looks at you. His gaze slowly falls to your connected hands, and suddenly, he jumps away from you, pulling his hand away and turning a bright shade of red.

"W-What are you doing!? Why were you h-holding my hand..?!"

You shrug. "I should be asking that."

Ed wipes pretend dust off of his metal hand and starts flailing his arms. "You were harassing me!"

You sigh and decide to lie. Just a bit. "You were the one who took my hand first."

"Did not! Why would do that!? That's dumb!"

You show of flash of hurt on your face. "A-Alright then."

You get up. "I'm getting food at the buffet. See ya."

You do your morning honorifics and pull on a coat. It's 8:16 am.

When you step out, you glance to the right, which reminds you of the girl. This is her room.

Slowly, involuntarily, your legs carry you to the front door of the suite. You hesitate, although you don't know why.

You raise your hand and rap swiftly on the door before you can regret anything or change your mind.

There's no reply.

You stand there for at least a minute, quietly. When there's still no sign of the door opening, you knock again. This time, it down take long for the door to creak open. The girl peeks through the crack at you.

Then she opens the door wide. "Hey, Miss (L/N)!"

You smile, confused at her actions. She is a completely different person from yesterday night.

"Hi."

Se stares at you, smiling brightly for a moment, and you her. The silence grows awkward. Then, she scratches her head.

"So....?"

You stare at her. "Um... Do you... Want to have breakfast together...?"

She freezes. "Breakfast!? Me!? You!? Alone!!??!?? AHhhhHhH! Yes!"

You sigh.  "Okay. Let's go, then. I think the breakfast is on the second floor."

~

"Okay, yeah, it's on the second floor."

You slowly back into the elevator as sweaty people on treadmills and holding weights stare at you. You don't know why the elevator leads directly to the gym, it's a bad design, but it does.

The girl follows you and you look through the directory. It's on the third floor. You sigh. "Close enough..."

You click on the button labeled "3" and soon, the elevator dings, announcing its arrival. You step out as the smell of food hits your nose and you're immediately hungry.

There's a warm feeling in the atmosphere, the sound of clinking tableware and talking slowly floating about the air. The entire wall opposite of you is glass, showing a nice view of the street below. There are many tables holding many types of food.

"Room 1901 and 1902." The girl says to the waitress who comes to greet the two of you.

The waitress is smiling, bright white teeth almost sparkling. Her dark hair is tied back into a bun with a pencil, and she's wearing a tight black dress with a black cardigan over. She's holding a black clipboard holding a thin stack of papers.

She marks something on her clipboard and grins at the two of you.

"Enjoy your meal." She points towards the empty tables, indicating you to choose. You choose the table of two next to the windows. You sit down.

"You can go first." You whisper to the girl. "I'll keep the spot."

She nods and takes off.

You set your elbow on the table and stare out the window, resting your face in your palm.

You jump at the deep, scratchy voice and look around, frowning. No one is nearby.

You feel something cold seep up your spine and you shiver, though the room is warm with the aroma of food. A bout of sudden dizziness and nausea suddenly takes over you, and you bend over, breathing in deeply.

You think.

Something sets down on the table, and you look up. "Wow.." You whisper-mutter. "That was fast."

She grins. "I'm hungry."

You stand up and head towards the food. You grab a plate, noticing its warmth, and look around, row by row, table by table. You're not hungry anymore, though, so you grab a (type_of_bread) and (a/some/whatever_describes_it ) (F/F) and a (type_of_drink) and some other stuff you usually get at buffets.

You make your way back to your table to see the girl hasn't started eating yet. You smile and sit down, setting your plate down.

"いただきます~!" You whisper, grinning. You pick up your utensils and stab into (whatever you want to eat first). The girl immediately gobbles down a portion of her food, and so do you.

Soon, you're picking at your remains, full. You sigh, feeling like your stomach would explode. And suddenly, it feels awkward.

You sit there silently.

"Hey." You say, breaking the silence. The girl looks up at you. "Do you... Do you have a name? I mean, of course you do, but what do you want me to call you?"

She stares at you, but you feel like she's looking past you, into her own memories. Then, she shakes her head. "I... No. I don't have a name. Or rather, I don't want anyone to call me by my name."

You give her a weird look. "Who doesn't have a name?"

"I have my reasons."

You fall awkwardly silent. You wonder.

You grit your teeth and push the dark voice away.

"Can I... Ask you something?" You whisper to her.

Her face morphs into a scared one. "I-if it's about yesterday, then... No."

"I.. But why?"

She shakes her head and looks away painfully. "It's something I'd rather not talk about."

It's making you curious, and you can't stand it. But you know you have to respect her privacy. So you fall silent again.

"I..." You look up at her word, feeling eager but trying not to show it.

"I'm from the other side of the gate, too."

********

I watched half of The Sacred Star of Milos and my love for Ed and my motivation to write has been rekindled! Yay!! （≧∇≦）

I'll be fixing up Ed's and Al's character too, I needed reference. Hopefully they didn't become too OOC.

Anyways, if you liked this chapter, be sure to vote, comment, share, and most importantly, ENJOY!!!

~Sky-chan

Word count: 1245 words