[Fic] Roy/Hughes, Roy/Ed/Riza -- The Right Kind of Burn
Roy's lullabies are soft, haunting melodies. The slow rhythmic thump of the wall, the rat-a-tat-tat of fingers against the window. He falls asleep to the sound of breathy moans in the dark, and when Mamma tells him that it's just the wind, he believes her, because he is young and the pretty young girls that lope around the place are his sisters and he is their brother.
He's almost eight years old when he learns that the moans and groans that rock him to sleep is not the wind, that the tap-tap-tap of the windows is not a tree brushing against glass, but fingers looking for a way in. He walks in on one of the girls, her mouth wide open and some of her pretty red hair caught on the edge of her lip. She lowers herself down over some horrible strangers cock, and he thinks So that's it.
She starts wailing the second she sees him, and the way she screams and rolls off of the man's cock with a slick sound is not very attractive. He thinks that he likes her more when she's smiling, blue eyes all alight with mischief as she sneaks him one of Mamma's cookies. She whines and the man shouts his displeasure, yells about wanting his money back. When Mamma comes into the room, she's holding a gun, her eyes bright with fire and her jowls quivering with rage.
The girl ushers him out of the room and down the hall, forgets her clothes somewhere behind her. The gunshot echoes around the house like a viciously slammed door. The girl is gone by the next day.
~
He's thirteen when he loses his virginity, and when he thinks back on it, he can't believe it took that long.
He is young and inexperienced and when the pretty blond one (his favorite) sucks his cock into her mouth he comes with a yell. He blushes and stammers apologies, but she just smiles at him, leans back so he can get a good view of her own pale fingers pushed up against her clit. She grins at him as she gets herself off and tells him that they'll have to work on that little problem.
By the time he's fifteen the whores consider him one of their own. They don't quite fight over him, but it's close. Instead they share him. Sometimes he has the brunette with the pretty dark skin and the bright smile and other times he has the pretty dark-haired Xingese girl with the clever hands. On nights that are especially lucky, he may get both. He lives like that for months, learning the ins and outs of pleasure. The whore's teach him their trade, teach him all the right ways to pleasuring a woman, how to make each touch feel like something hot and electric curling up the base of her spine. Roy gets cocky, so he doesn't even notice when several of his girl's customers start eying him speculatively, whispering to Madame Christmas about the possibility of perhaps paying for just one night with the pretty young boy under her care. He does, however notice when she whips out her gun and glares them out the door.
When he sends her a questioning look she just smiles and tells him not to worry about it.
~
It's on the eve of his seventeenth birthday that he has his first cock. First real one at any rate. He's known about that kind of pleasure for years, has let his girls tie him up and fuck him until he screams but he's never truly had a man. He's young and he's curious, so when he makes his way into a seedy bar at the edge of town (farthest from home) he doesn't quite know what he's getting into.
The man is older, but attractive in a very rugged kind of way. He smiles when Roy sidles up next to him, cracks a grin when Roy whispers into his ear in the sultriest of voice, Hey handsome, can I buy you a drink?. His eyes glow amber in the firelight and Roy thinks that they're the prettiest shade he's ever seen.
He isn't thinking when the man finally slaps some money onto the counter and ushers him upstairs into one of the rooms. He lets the man push him into cheap, scratchy sheets that smell of dust and sex and thinks that as far as first times go, it could have been worse.
~
He joins the army when he's nineteen with dreams that grow bigger every day. His mother stares at him, and he can't decide if the wet gleam to her eyes is proud or if its disappointed. He chooses not to think about it instead, and hugs her once before marching off to take his Entrance test. He passes with flying colors and has weeks to enjoy the thrill of accomplishing something before the war breaks out. He is transferred to Ishbal with a pretty young man with dark hair and a trusting, disarming smile and somehow, together they make it through the fires, the explosions and the incessant screams.
The man's name is Maes. Maes Hughes, and he is the best thing to have ever happened to Roy. They spend years together, passing the time with the warmth of skin on skin and whispers of upheaval and treason. Maes smiles against the curve of Roy's neck and moans when sparks skitter across his back, the right kind of burn.
For several years, Roy almost believes he's in love. He touches the edge of Maes' smile, muffles laughter into the sharp cut of the other man's jaw and thinks I love you loud enough that he almost convinces himself that Maes can hear it.
And then she comes along, with her lovely green eyes and a smile that's radiance almost matches Maes'. Roy sees the way Maes lights up around her and feels his heart break.
He attends their wedding only because Maes pleads with him with those same eyes that had begged him to fuck him all those years ago. Before her. He is their Best Man and when the camera's flash and wink at him he wraps his arm around Maes, wraps the other around Gracia, smiles and tries to will it to appear real.
He buries his heartache in women, laps at their breasts and remembers his girls. He wraps himself up in work, alcohol, anything to make him forget the taste of his best friend.
He doesn't think he'll ever love someone again, and then on a cold, rainy day he bears witness to the condemning flash of forbidden alchemy. He meets Edward Elric when the boy's eyes are still bright with pain, when the blood has yet to dry on the bandages. He looks at those golden eyes and thinks he's seen eyes that shade of amber before.
He watches the boy grow, grieves for the boy and his brother and wishes he could make things better for them.
When Maes dies, Roy realizes that he's never truly known pain. Edward isn't there for him, and neither are his girls, but when his First Lieutenant clasps his hand as he looks down at cool marble, he thinks that maybe he's overlooked something.
~
Riza's hair is like silk. He buries his nose in it and just breathes her in, smiling when her breathing hitches as he pushes two fingers inside of her, curls them just right. She is like cool rain against his wounds, soothing and so very beautiful. In comparison, Ed is like a raging inferno, sweeping over him and painting him with raw, angry blisters, devouring him until he doesn't know what's quite left of himself. Ed moans against his wrist, licks a cool line up Riza's neck and smirks like the devil when she whimpers against Roy's mouth, pushes her hips down against his hand. He smirks, pulls away from her wetness, and trails those same fingers along the line where tanned flesh meets steel. He thinks about how much he wants to fuck them both, but even more about how much he wants to see the way Ed looks fucking Riza, blond hair hanging damp in his face, long enough that when they move together, it mixes with Riza's own.
He watches Ed smirk, accepts the hot press of Ed's mouth against his own and whimpers a little bit when Riza crawls into his lap and sinks down over his cock.
It's only afterward, when they're lying in a sated, sleepy pile on Riza's bed that he realizes how much he loves them. He watches them both in the early morning light, how the pale light of dawn sends shadows across that damned beautiful tattoo of Riza's and realizes as the sun rises, how much it's rays truly love Edward, playing with the strands of gold until they're gleaming.
Ed wakes up with a scowl on his face and anger creeping over his features like a forest fire. He opens his mouth, ready to start a fight about some ridiculous thing- But in the end, fire is his element. He bends it the way he wants, and if he gets burnt along the way, so be it. He has Riza to soothe away the burns.