Natalie didn’t come out of her room for the rest of the day. She wouldn’t even come out for dinner so Alphonse went up with a tray of food for her.
“Natalie? I know you’re upset but you have to eat something. Please?” Alphonse waited for a minute for her to open the door. When she didn’t he left the tray and went back downstairs.
“I thought you said you apologized to her,” he said to Edward.
“I did but I don’t know as it did any good. Actually judging from the way she’s acting, I know it didn’t.” Edward sighed. “This is what I get for asking her why she’s still here.”
Alphonse looked at Edward a bit confused. He remembered Edward saying it earlier, it’s what started this to begin with, but what he didn’t understand was why it still mattered if he had apologized.
“I bet she’s up there thinking it over just like she said she was going to,” Edward continued then chuckled a bit. “You watch Al, tomorrow morning she’ll come downstairs and everything will be fine.” He then put on that false goofy smile he’d gotten so good at over the years. Alphonse saw through it. He knew that his brother didn’t believe his words any more that he did.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Natalie waited for Alphonse to leave before she opened the door and brought in the tray he’d left for her. She was hungry but she wasn’t ready to face them again. Taking the tray, she sat back on the bed and munched away at the bread while she mulled Edward’s question over more. She did need him to help her practice the alchemy but she knew enough that she could do it on her own if she needed to. But she didn’t really need him for anything else, at least not in the context he’d meant. This was all just getting out of hand. It was time to go home but she couldn’t stand the good-byes. That’s when she formulated her plan to leave; she’d do it that night while they were sleeping. She hated doing it like this but it was actually better this way.
That night, after Edward and Alphonse had gone to sleep Natalie transformed and slipped out of her room. She was just going to go outside but something made her go to Edward’s room instead. She had to say good-bye, even if he wasn’t awake to hear it.
Carefully she slipped into his room making sure not to make a sound. He looked so calm and peaceful while he slept. It was adorable, even though he had fallen asleep in his clothes again. She couldn’t help but to smile as she stood there for a moment just to make sure she remembered how his hair fell over and around his face. She walked around his bed so that she was on the left side, the side he was facing. Kneeling beside the bed, she gently moved his hair off of his forehead and from over his eyes. His hair was a lot softer that she’d expected it to be. Lightly she kissed him on the forehead.
“Good-bye Ed,” she said softly and then stood up. Just as she turned away from him she felt a hand grab her wrist. She turned back quickly to see that Edward was awake and he’d caught her.
“Trying to leave without saying good-bye?” he asked as he sat up.
Natalie closed her eyes and tried to catch the tears that threatened to escape from them. “That was the plan. I thought it would be better that way,” she replied softly. She started to tremble, her knees getting weak. Edward saw it happening and tugged on her arm so she would sit down on the bed and not fall. Once she was sitting though, she pulled her arm from his grasp as she turned so she was sitting to look at him.
His eyes looked so sad when she met them with her own. Why was that look there?
“I figured it out you know.”
“Figured what out?”
“The meaning of what you said to me the other night and why you did everything that you did.”
Natalie’s cheeks flushed so bright red she could feel the warmth of her sudden embarrassment burning in them and with the moonlight streaming into the room, she was sure Edward saw it too. It didn’t matter at this point though.
“I figured it out that night. I couldn’t go to sleep until I had, it bugged me that much. The reason you came here, the reason you sacrificed all of that for me, the reason you’re still here…” He took a deep breath before continuing. “Is it because you love me?”
Natalie bit at her lower lip and looked out the window instead of looking at him.
“I’m right aren’t I?” he asked, putting his hand on hers.
She just nodded.
“And you’d still leave?”
“That’s exactly why I was going to leave, why I have to leave,” she said softly, still not looking at him. “I’ve turned your lives upside down enough and I don’t belong here. I never did. It has to be this way.” She then got up and went over to the window.
Edward got up from the bed and walked up behind her almost close enough to whisper in her ear. “Then… if you have to leave… take me with you…”
Natalie spun around, her eyes wide from shock. “What? Are you out of your mind? I can’t do that!”
He put his finger to her lips. “Shhh, keep it down, you’ll wake up Al.” He then took his finger away and looked into her eyes. “Why can’t you? You brought me to the gate world. Besides, wouldn’t it be better to have someone you care about travelling with you?”
She recognized what he was doing and smacked him across the face for the second time today. “You arrogant, selfish… You know how I feel about you and you’re trying to use it against me! That’s just dirty Edward! You don’t care, you never did.” She pushed him back out of her way and ran out of the room.
“Crap, screwed up,” he said to himself as he pulled on his boots and went after her. At this point he didn’t care if he woke up Alphonse he just needed to get her to stop before she could open a portal and leave. “Natalie stop! That’s not how I meant it!”
She didn’t care anymore; she just had to get out of here. Before she could make it out of the house though, he caught up with her and grabbed a hold of her arm stopping her dead in her tracks. “Wait a minute would ya?”
“Let me go Ed!” she said trying to yank her arm away. This time he wasn’t letting her, he held her just tight enough so that he could keep a hold on her without hurting her.
“No Natalie, I’m NOT going to let you go, not this time. Look, I’m sorry for what I said upstairs. Yes, it was cruel but cut me some slack; this isn’t something I’m good at dealing with alright? I still don’t get it. I don’t understand why you feel this way about me.”
She stopped struggling and just resigned herself to the fact that he wasn’t going to let her go. “Ed, you’re trying to look at something logically that has no logic to it to begin with,” she said softly.
“Alphonse said something like that to me too. It just doesn’t make sense.”
“Edward, there are some things that only make sense once you realize they don’t and resign yourself to just letting it be and nothing else. Love is one of those things. You wish for it, you look for it; you do everything to hold it in your hands and control it. It’s only once you’ve given up and given in to it that it appears in those very same hands.”
At her words, Edward let her go. He went over and sat down on the couch. He knew that he’d just given her an open invitation to just walk away, to do exactly as she had planned. He was hoping that she wouldn’t. It finally started to click how was it was possible. He still wasn’t sure if he believed in the idea of love at first sight and he wasn’t even sure if he actually loved her but he did know that he cared about her and that had happened in the three days she had been here. He couldn’t just dismiss it, not anymore anyway. He couldn’t hold her here against her will either. He may be a jerk sometimes but he wasn’t a monster.
Natalie thought about it for a moment and for that moment she really was going to just run out the door and run away but she changed her mind. She went over and sat next to him on the couch.
“Answer me one question, why did you really say you wanted to go with me?”
Resting his elbows on his knees, he rested his chin in his hands thankful that she had decided to at least wait a little longer. “What else do I have left here? Alphonse told me we needed a new purpose and he found one. He wants to go to Xing and research alchehestry with May but he won’t go unless he knows I’m going to be alright. I don’t want to hold him back; I’ve done enough of that. We finally got our lives back; I just want him to be able to do what he wants with his and not have to worry about me.” Edward shook his head. “Listen to me, and here I thought I was supposed to be the older brother.”
Natalie put her hand on his back. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting the best for your brother Ed. Why not go with him to Xing?”
Edward laughed a bit. “As much as I want to know about alchehestry myself, I think I would just be in the way if you catch my drift.”
Natalie smiled and laughed. “Yeah I know exactly what you mean but then why not go west? Maybe there’s something there.”
He looked at her. “The last time I went searching blindly for something, it almost got both Al and I killed. Plus, as much as I hate to admit it, I really don’t want to go alone. Half the fun of the old days was travelling with Al but it’s time for us to make our own lives.”
“But how does going with me make you have your own life?”
“There are so many different worlds out there and I want to see them too. Who knows what I could learn and bring back here. Between what Al learns in Xing and what I might find if I go with you, we might be able to make better lives for people here.”
Natalie’s heart was breaking listening to him. The more he said the more she wanted to bring him with her, the more she wished she could. It wasn’t for any selfish reason either, she agreed with him. She knew herself that there were things in her world alone that would help them here.
“I wish I could bring you with me,” she said softly. She wasn’t even sure if he could hear her.
“Why can’t you? Like I said before, you brought me to the gate world, why can’t I go now?”
Natalie sighed heavily, so he had heard her after all. “I’m not allowed to take people from their own world Ed. The gate world exists within this world so I didn’t technically take you away. If I take you with me when I leave here, there’s a price to pay and the only thing I know about it is that it’s something that’s precious to me. There are a few things that I hold precious to me and I don’t want to lose any of them.”She paused for a moment and looked at him, putting her hand on his cheek. “That includes you too you know.”
Edward couldn’t help but to blush and there was no missing it. Natalie noticed but left it alone. The last thing she wanted to do was give him a reason to press the issue of coming with her.
She got up and started heading to the door. “I think it’s time I go now Ed…” she said softly, not looking back at him. “The sooner I leave; the sooner things will get back to normal for you and Alphonse…” Reaching the door, she opened it and walked out.
Edward sat there, stone silent, not knowing what to do. He wanted to go after her but how could he after what she’d just said to him? He didn’t want to cost her anything more than he already had.
Alphonse had heard the commotion and had been sitting at the top of the stairs listening pretty much the entire time. He held his brother’s jacket in his hands, the one he’d worn pretty much through their entire journey in the old days.
“What are you waiting for Brother? Don’t let her just leave! I’ll be fine! Follow your heart instead of your stubborn head for once!”
“Al…” he said softly looking up to his brother standing on the stairs. “I…”
“I told you Brother, I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me. You’re so worried about holding me back; don’t let me be the one that holds you back. You’ve got two perfectly good legs Brother! Get up and use them!” As he said this last part he threw Edward’s jacket down to him.
That snapped Edward out of the stupor he was in. “Thanks Al!” he said as he jumped up from the couch, grabbing the jacket just before it hit the floor and ran out the door. He knew he had to take the chance, if not for this then for what?
Alphonse smiled as he watched his brother leave. He knew he probably wouldn’t see him again for a very long time after this but that was alright. It was good to know that Edward was finally back to the brother he knew and loved and that maybe he could finally be happy.
Edward ran down the road as fast as his legs would carry him, his jacket flapping in the wind behind him. He couldn’t see her but he saw a light coming from behind the tree that she had hidden behind when she got here. He didn’t have much time.
He reached her just as she was going to step through the portal. “Wait!” he yelled as he lunged to reach her.
“What the…?” she said as she paused for a moment and turned just in time to see him crash into her, his arms wrapping around her. When he did, it made them both fall through the portal.
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