Edward opened his eyes. Where was he? There was soft grass beneath his feet and cool fresh air blowing past his face. The last thing he remembered was that Sebastian guy throwing the knives at Natalie and leaping from his seat to protect her. He looked around and saw a familiar sight, the house that he’d lived in with his mother and Alphonse and the tree with the swing. How was this possible? He and Alphonse had burned that house to the ground when he was twelve, right after he’d passed the State Alchemy exam.
Slowly he walked up to the house. As he approached he noticed that there was someone there in the backyard hanging clothes on the line. He knew that silhouette, he hadn’t seen it since he was small but he knew it well. “Mom…” he said softly as he stepped into the yard.
Trisha Elric turned around when he entered and smiled warmly at him. “Hello my little man,” she said.
“Mom, is it really you?” he asked, his chest starting to feel tight with anxious hope.
She just smiled and nodded. Edward couldn’t help himself, he ran to her like he’d done as a child and hugged her tight. Tears started to roll uncontrollably down his cheeks.
His mother held him close letting him cry everything out of his system. When he’d finally calmed down she led him inside. Edward sat at the kitchen table as his mother prepared tea for them.
“You’ve grown into quite a fine young man Edward,” she said happily. “I’m so proud of you and Alphonse. Through everything, you did just as I asked of you boys, you looked out for each other.”
Edward sighed a bit. It made him happier than she would ever know hearing her say that. That was all he ever wanted, to make his mom proud of him even with the mistakes he and Alphonse had made along the way. There was something wrong with this though. How was this even possible?
With the tea finished, Trisha poured a cup for herself and on for Edward. She set his in front of him and then went with her’s to sit opposite him. She could see the look on her eldest son’s face. It was sad and world worn.
“A boy your age shouldn’t make faces like that,” she said before taking a sip of her tea.
“I’m sorry mom but I just don’t understand. I’ve wanted this, to have you back, for the last ten years. How is it possible now?”
Trisha took another sip of her tea and her own face turned sad. “What’s the best way to explain this?” she thought for a moment. “I suppose you could say this is a world between worlds. Your spirit or soul, however you’d like to think of it, is here but the rest of you is somewhere else.”
Edward thought about this for a moment, when he did there was a twinge of panic. “Am I…”
“Dead? No you’re not, not yet anyway.”
“Yet?”
“Well if you’re here you’re probably in pretty bad shape. I won’t lie to you Edward, you’re old enough and I know you’ve been through enough to understand. Right now you have a choice to make.”
“A choice?” he asked, looking down at the table top and the untouched cup of tea before him.
“Yes, a difficult choice. You can choose to stay here with me but that means your body will die or you can choose to go back and keep living.”
This was cruel, probably one of the cruelest things that had happened to him. He was being forced to choose between his mother and life.
“I don’t know…” he said softly. “What would you do?”
Trisha shook her head. “I can’t tell you that but I will say this, there are people that love you just as much as I do Edward and people you love. How do you think they’d feel if you never came back to them? How did you feel when I died?”
“I was devastated, so was Alphonse. That’s why we tried to bring you back,” he said, rubbing at his automail leg, the reminder he kept of that day.
Trisha nodded to him. “Alphonse would never forgive you if you died but there’s another person that would be completely devastated if you never came back. She’d been by your side this entire time.”
“Natalie…”
“Exactly. You’ve made that poor girl cry so much Edward; she has barely stopped since you put your life at risk to save her. She’s been sitting with you, waiting for you to heal. Waiting for you to wake up and come back to her.”
Edward closed his eyes trying to hold back more tears.
Trisha smiled softly reaching out to put her hand on her son’s. “It’s alright to cry Edward. There’s no shame in it. I know you have a hard time believing that someone would care about you that much but please open your heart to her. I know you’re afraid to completely let her in, especially after what happened with Winry…”
“You know about that?”
She nodded. “I am able to watch over you from here you know. I have been this entire time and I’ll continue to if you go back.”
The tears started to stream down his cheeks. He leaned over, putting his face in his hands. This was just too much, even for him, the one that saved Alphonse from the gate world, beat the crap out of Father, seen so many die just to help him and his brother, been a sacrifice to summon ‘God’. He’d been through so much, he couldn’t give up now.
Trisha looked out the window. “Well it seems we have a visitor.” She got up to have a better look at who was at the gate. “She really a pretty girl Edward,” she said smiling back at her son.
“Natalie’s here?” he asked sounding shocked.
“Seems so, she’s got a pretty strong will if she was able to get her, or maybe more of a strong heart. Come on, let’s go out and meet her.”
Natalie stood at the gate. She didn’t know how she had gotten here or why she was here. She just knew that she had passed out and felt like she was in a dream. The door opened and out walked Trisha and Edward.
Natalie’s eyes got wide and there was a bright smile on her lips. She resisted the urge to run and hug him since his mother was standing right there. Trisha, having a mother’s intuition took a step away from Edward and smiled at Natalie. She took the hit and gave in running up and throwing her arms around him. Trisha chuckled.
“I think you have the answer you needed Edward. Just remember what we talked about alright? Take small steps, but don’t let the important things get away from you.”
Edward let go of Natalie long enough to give his mother a hug. “I love you Mom.”
“I love you too Edward and the next time you see Alphonse make sure you tell him I love him too.”
“I will Mom. Thank you for everything.”
“Anything for my little man.”
They let each other go and then Trisha took Natalie’s hand and put it in Edward’s. “Take care of him please. He can be stubborn and hard headed, but he really is kind hearted.”
“I will Ms. Elric, I promise.”
Trisha smiled. “Alright you two, get out of here.”
They started to walk down the road when the world around them faded away.
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