Clean Hands from Shattered Glass, for shindkrow

[alice_pike]

Title: Clean Hands from Shattered Glass
Author: alice_pike
Series: First anime/CoS
Characters/Pairings: Ed/counterpart!Trisha, Ed/Hei, implied Ed/Al (before and after CoS), talk of Trisha/Hohenheim
Word Count: 4,156
Rating: NC-17
Warnings/Enticements: daddy!kink, incest of almost every possible immediate-family variety, ANGST (possibly some melodrama-I lost any objective scale I had on the matter about 1.5k words in), Ed's terribly dirty mouth, and a not-exactly-happy-but-not-totally-depressing ending.
A/N: I went with your most wanted pairing (well, sort of) and your most preferred canon, and this is what came out. The ending isn't quite as happy/fluffy as I think either of us wanted, but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless! And huge apologies for the delay in posting.

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It's not long after Ed moves in with Alfons that his past catches up with him.

At first it's just Hughes, and that's fine. It's nice to see a familiar face, to have some semblance of normalcy in a world where everything he knows is different. If this Hughes isn't as happily insane as the Hughes he knew, well, it's not too big of a deal.

And anyway, Ed never got to say his goodbyes. This way, it's like he'd never had to.

Hughes introduces him to Gracia, and that's less fine. She is as warm and as kind as ever, and Ed thinks that maybe that's the problem, because all he can remember are the shadows that lined the other Gracia's face after the death of her husband and the way she tried, unsuccessfully, to hide them for Elicia's sake.

This Gracia has never known the happiness that Hughes could give her, and yet she's as happy as Ed ever knew her to be. It doesn't fit.

None of this fits, and that gets him thinking. He thinks of what Hohenheim told him about counterparts and how they are connected to the people they parallel. Among other things, Ed knows that counterparts should love the same people on both sides of the Gate.

So he thinks of Hughes and Gracia. It's early, but there's a good chance that will happen. Of course, Ed thinks bitterly, there's also a good chance that Hughes and Gracia are going to get pulled apart by a war, possibly abetted by the fact that Ed is incapable of tying up loose ends and let some Amestrian weapons find their way into Europe.

More importantly, he thinks of him and Alfons.

(Or more like, he doesn't think of him and Alfons, because been there, done that. He and Al got over this particular flavor of fucked-up years ago; Alfons doesn't quite understand the implications of their relationship the way Ed does; Ed sees no reason to stir up old issues.

Besides, that's not even the issue here, anyway.)

Because if Ed puts it all together, Alfons should love Ed's counterpart, not him. But thanks to him, Ed's counterpart is dead, and Ed is as much a replacement for him as Alfons is for Al. (Which is to say, not much of one at all).

Bottom line, Alfons loves the wrong person, and in their own ways, both he and Ed know it.

It's just that only Ed knows what it means.

So what this thinking ultimately accomplishes is Ed getting angry at Hohenheim for telling him all of this to begin with, and Ed getting angry at himself for dwelling on it.

Months pass, and he can't stop thinking about how he's fucked everything up, how he's changed the lives of these people that he never even should have met. It was bad enough in Amestris-bad enough with Mom and Al without dragging everyone he knows in Europe down with him, too.

Edward Elric: Ruining lives one world at a time.

Nothing fits the way it should and as far as he can tell, he's pretty much to blame for all of it. He wishes there was something he could do, but he's been wishing there was something he could have done for most of his life, so the feeling is familiar, if unbearable at times.

His past isn't about to cut him any slack for his penitence, though.

Maybe he shouldn't have been surprised when Trisha accidentally bumps into him as she passes him on his way from the university, but he was.

Maybe he should have expected the small smile she gives him over her shoulder, and the way it suggests something it shouldn't. Maybe he should have expected this to fit as well as everything else he's encountered in this world.

Maybe he should have, but he didn't.

Alfons is there when Ed gets home. He's hunched over a stack of papers and half-hidden behind piles of books, but he manages a half-wave and a mumbled "How was the lecture?" when Ed comes in.

"Good," Ed replies automatically, and he's glad that Alfons is too distracted to even look up. He still feels shell-shocked, confused, and right now he just needs to be alone for a while. He thinks that he doesn't take a proper breath until he's fled to the bedroom and shut the door firmly behind him.

Maes and Gracia were one thing. Hell, even Al was something he could deal with. But Trisha? His mother? His dead mother? There was not enough time and space behind him to make this okay.

He realizes that he must have been sitting there for longer than he thought when he hears Alfons's voice at the door.

"Ed, you okay?" Alfons asks him, clearly concerned.

"Yeah," Ed answers immediately, startled. "I'm fine, Alfons," he lies, trying his damndest to sound it.

Alfons's silence is heavy with incredulity, but he knows Ed well enough to let it go. When Ed does finally emerge from the bedroom, he says nothing about it, and Alfons doesn't bother to ask again, knowing he still won't get an answer.

Ed says nothing about it because Ed has never told Alfons what happened to his mother. Ed has never said anything about his family, and he has no intention of starting now. Alfons already accepts more about him than Ed would've ever imagined someone could, and he isn't about to ask for anything more. He knows that seeing mirror images of people he knew and loved in his own world (his own world, for Christ's sake) isn't normal-even for him-and Ed decides that this is one thing about his life that Alfons doesn't need to know.

Ed has told Alfons nothing about his mother, so he doesn't tell him about Trisha, either.

He sees her everywhere, now that he's seen her once.

She smiles at him as they pass on the city streets, before she sits down at the opposite end of the lecture hall at the university, when she's three people in front of him at the brewery. And every time, it's there-that suggestion that shouldn't be. Every time, Ed is jarred by it, but he can't help himself reacting.

He can't help the small smile he gives her in return, or the way his stomach drops every time he sees her, like he's falling. He can't make sense of it, because his emotions have been one big, tangled mess ever since he arrived here and if he can't separate love from longing from desire from desperation, well, there's not really much he can do. Because this is just one more thing that's off, just one more thing that he's managed to fuck up.

Because if there is a Trisha in this world, she shouldn't be interested in Ed like that. If there is a Trisha in this world, Ed shouldn't want her in the way he does, shouldn't need her in the way he does.

But he thinks back to Resembool and his childhood and the lack of his bastard father and he wants so badly, no matter how he can have it: This is what he worked so hard to get and this is what he gave up so much to have back, and if it's not quite what he wanted then it's fucking close enough-it's more than he'll ever have anywhere else and he can't quite bring himself to say no, no matter how wrong or fucked up it is.

Ed will take it, because it's the closest he's going to get.

That is how it starts, at least.

"You're doing it again," Trisha tells him gently. She reaches out and caresses Ed's cheek, her fingers feather-soft on his skin. "Who am I to you?" she asks him.

And there it is again, that thing about her that always gives him pause. Gracia asks who she reminds Ed of, like she and that other woman are two separate entities; Trisha has never doubted that she is a replacement, that she and that other woman are the exact same thing.

Trisha asks him the impossible questions, the ones that he could never answer-because how can he say that she is his mother? How can he say that she is what he gave his and his brother's entire lives to get back? How can he say that she is where everything starts, and ends?

He can't, and so he doesn't say anything at all.

After several moments of silence, she smiles at him, like she'd never expected an answer in the first place.

And Ed will never forget what it's like to be so easily forgiven, to be excused unconditionally; and Trisha is so much like his mother in this moment that Ed can barely breathe through the tightening in his chest. He fumbles and reaches out to her blindly, and she catches him-she catches him-and he collapses into her arms, just letting himself be held.

"Mom," he wants to whisper, but doesn't.

"Trisha," he says instead, and it's almost enough.

She pulls him back up the length of her body and Ed settles himself between her legs. She leans up and kisses him right beneath the eye, her lips soft on the ridge of his cheekbone, but it is too tender a display of affection for Ed and he turns away, eyes snapping shut in some attempt to block out his thoughts.

He can tell from her silence that she knows she's upset him, and that makes him feel even worse: How can she possibly blame herself for loving him? He snaps his head back to look at her and kisses her fiercely before she has time to react. A small sound catches in her throat as Ed takes her head in his hands, deepening the kiss, and he rolls his hips against hers instinctively, all at once needing more.

"Ed," she whispers, when he finally breaks the kiss to suck in a desperate breath. She wraps her legs around him, opening herself for him. "I need…"

Anything, he thinks.

Trisha is both everything he remembers about his mother and everything he never knew about the woman herself. She is kind, and intelligent, and has a way of reading people that allows her to empathize with everyone, and to see something in them worth loving.

But she is also beautiful, and poised, and not at all afraid of what she wants.

Ed begins to understand what his father saw in her, why she was the one he loved enough to stop his endless wandering. He sees why she was someone worth staying with, even if only for a handful of years.

When Ed is with her, this side of the Gate doesn't feel so much like a punishment. She reminds Ed of his life in Amestris perhaps more than anyone else he's met in Europe-Alfons included-because she reminds him of the life that he lost even there, even before he knew the Truth. That's not to say it's easy-far from it, really. It still makes him sick, sometimes, when Trisha can be so much his mother and yet he can still turn around and smile at her with intent that is far from innocent. It feels wrong, it doesn't fit-but not enough to stop him doing it.

Ed burned down his house when he was twelve years old; with Trisha, some of that comfort and security can be his again, and with her, he remembers what it's like to have a home.

What Ed doesn't understand is how his father could have left her, and why he didn't come back when she needed him the most.

He doesn't understand why she loved him, even until the day she died.

Ed never forgets who his mother was, but Trisha reminds him of her more sometimes than others.

She'll look at him in a certain way, or touch him surprisingly gently, or say something just so, and he could be a five-year-old kid in Resembool again with scraped knees and a messy room and a love so unconditional he didn't even know he could survive without it.

She'll search his face for something, or run her fingers along his skin with unexpected intensity, or stay silent when he needs her to speak, and he'll remember the love that held his mother together and how counterparts love on both sides of the Gate.

But they are both his mother, and Trisha is the same.

He wonders, sometimes, if maybe he reminds her of someone she'll never be able to find, or to keep.

He doesn't want to be rough with her but she encourages it, arching under his touch when he presses too hard, goes too deep, leaves bruises light blue under her skin. She keens under him, begging him for more.

He knows he'll never be enough.

He is not the man that she wants, no more than she is the mother he lost.

Some days are worse than others.

Some days, Ed can barely stand living in Europe. He misses Al and Winry and, hell, even Mustang, but he misses alchemy the most. Without his alchemy, a part of him is gone, and he's never gotten used to it, even now. To add insult to injury, this world, he thinks, is severely lacking in proper academic material and even its finest libraries have nothing on the branches in Central (he's been to enough of them in both worlds to know).

These are the days when Trisha will make a pot of coffee and sit with him over her kitchen table, chatting to him about nothing in particular, trying to soften the scowl on his face.

Some days, the guilt of his past overwhelms him so much he can barely breathe. Trisha doesn't know exactly what happened to Ed's brother (or to the rest of his family, for that matter) but Ed has said enough that she doesn't ask him outright about it (even when it doesn't entirely make sense).

These are the days when Trisha will keep him close: She will hold him when he needs comfort and wipe the tears from his face when he cries; she will touch him to remind him that he's not alone and she will assure him that he is loved-by her, and many others besides.

Her legs are crossed behind Ed's back where she's straddling his lap, rocking with him. One of his arms is slung casually across her back while he supports himself with the prosthetic, matching her rhythm.

Trisha leans towards Ed and rests her forehead against the side of his temple, her breath hot on the shell of his ear as they both get closer to climax. Her hands find their way from his shoulders to the nape of his neck, and he nearly hisses with pleasure when her nails scrape the back of his skull as she comes, muttering in his ear, the syllables uncharacteristically harsh-

Trisha's fingers are gentle where they cradle the sheep Ed has transmuted for her from the stone wall around the front of the house. She smiles down at the figure in her hands fondly, if a little wistfully, before directing that smile at her oldest son.

"Did you make this with alchemy?" she asks him, and Ed thinks that maybe she is mad at him, but then she is cupping his chin in her palm and leaning down to kiss his hair.

"It's beautiful, Edward," she tells him with a smile. "Thank you."

-and when she tells Ed to follow her, to come for her, he does.

He goes to her after Alfons is killed and just cries; he cries like he hasn't done since his mother died, since Alphonse was first bound to the armor. He clings to her, desperately, because although he has Al back now, he's still lost so much, and she is still gone.

Except here. Except now.

Trisha holds him, tightly, and doesn't ask questions.

Trisha runs her fingers through Ed's hair and he can't help but wonder if his mother did that to him, if Hohenheim melted under her touch like Ed is now, if he wanted her like this, if he-

He buries his face into the curve of her shoulder as he pounds into her, dropping kisses along her neck and breathing in her scent.

She pants Ed's name in sync with his own breaths, her fingernails scratching down his back, failing to find purchase on his sweaty skin. She rocks with him, forcing him deeper-

"Don't worry, my darling," Trisha tells him, tucking him up on her lap. "You'll be good as new in a few days." She turns to smile down at Alphonse. "Won't he, sweetie?"

Al smiles and nods emphatically; Ed can't help but remain skeptical while the small gash on his leg still hurts this much, freshly bandaged or not.

"You'll see," she promises, kissing the top of head. "You'll see."

-and he bites his lip, hard, as he comes.

Not for the first time, Ed considers telling Al. He feels guilty as hell keeping it a secret, and Al's a smart kid-Ed knows it's not going to be long before he realizes something's wrong and figures it out on his own. Al has a right to know; he deserves to know, and Ed has no business keeping it from him.

Ed brushes it off, though, and tells himself he'll deal with it another day. He thinks, hating himself, that it's hardly the first time he's done wrong by his brother.

But Al's always been the better of the two of them; forgiveness and acceptance have always come naturally to him. He wouldn't need the same way that Ed does. These are Ed's issues and this is Ed's problem, and just because he's this fucked up doesn't mean that Al is, too.

"You have someone else," she says, matter-of-fact.

Ed freezes where he stands, but Trisha doesn't sound upset or judgmental. If anything, she sounds concerned. For him. She sounds like she's known about this for years.

Ed can't look at her, but he can't lie to her, either.

"Yes," he admits. "But it's…it's not what you'd think."

Trisha laughs, but not unkindly. "Edward," she says softly, "I've long since stopped assuming anything about you." She scoots over and pats the bed beside her. He sits, and her unspoken invitation hangs in the air between them.

After a few moments, Ed speaks.

"I love him," he begins, because it's a solid enough place to start, but he doesn't know how to continue. Because he does love Al, of course he does, but he doesn't know how to explain to Trisha what she is to him, how she can offer him something that's pretty damn close to what he destroyed his life to get back.

How even if it's not perfect-even if it's a little fucked up-it's still something he could never allow himself to lose again.

Trisha reaches out and cups the side of Ed's face in her palm. Ed leans into the touch, his eyes falling closed on a sigh.

"He just can't be everything," Ed explains in the end.

Ed can't help but let her take control. He feels like he hasn't had a proper grasp on anything in his life since he wound up in England on his first trip through the Gate, but this is one thing he wants to surrender. If he's given her nothing else, at least he can give her this, and he can make her happy in one of the last ways he is able.

She pulls him to her bedroom by his ponytail and he laughs, open and honest, at the playful smirk that she wears. He is happy like he has rarely been since Alfons died getting him home, since Al gave up any second chance at a life in Amestris to be by his side once more. He feels loved, in these moments with Trisha, and the sacrifices of those he loved in return don't feel so much like a burden when he is with her.

She kisses him once on the mouth as she loosens the buttons of his vest, then proceeds to drag her lips across every inch of skin she uncovers while undressing him. She doesn't hesitate over the synthetic skin of his prosthetic limbs, nor does she flinch when, barefooted, she kicks his ankles apart with a dull thunk, closing the distance between them.

He lets himself be pushed onto her bed, waits willingly for her to crawl up his body and lower herself onto him. She guides his hands to her hips and settles into a rhythm, their fingers interlacing over her skin.

He and Al don't really talk about alchemy anymore. They spoke of it freely during their first years in Europe, when Al was still excited to learn what this world could teach him and Ed still believed they could find something new. They spoke of it often, before the loss of it began weighing on them in many and indecipherable ways.

Ed knows that Al probably thinks the lack of alchemy in this world is for the best. Maybe it was the war, which for having no alchemists still had its horrors. Maybe it was the growing number of counterparts they met in their travels, reminding them of what they'd lost at its hands. Ed thinks back to everything that has happened because of alchemy, to everything that has gone wrong (there is a catalogue inside his head, his own experiences and others', one that he has run through more times than he count) and wishes that he agreed.

Even when they do find themselves reliving the past, Al never mentions their mother. Maybe he's unsure of how Ed would react. Maybe he just doesn't want to think about it himself. Either way, Al is reluctant to bring up the past because all he can remember are its mistakes.

Ed thinks about their mother anyway, even if Al doesn't say it, and he wants to agree that they're better off without alchemy because without it, they wouldn't be here. Without it, they never would have done what they did and Al never would have lost his body and Ed never would have destroyed their lives. But he can't-alchemy is still too big a part of him and the loss of it is still too devastating, and under all of that, there's still a part of him that thinks: If they'd only known more.

Ed thinks about their mother and all the ways he couldn't save her-all the ways he wasn't good enough to fix his mistakes or have proper judgment or give his brother the life he deserved, in this world or their own.

His thinks of all the ways he's failed her.

"I'm sorry," he sobs. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. The litany courses through his veins like blood, as steady and as sure as his heartbeat. It overwhelms him, just how sorry he really is, and he knows that nothing he does will ever make up for his failures. His mother's faith in him was wildly misplaced and surely he deserves whatever hell this world is, because nothing else is even close to equivalent for his sins.

His mother is a memory everywhere but here, because he let her die and he couldn't bring her back and it's all his fucking fault.

Ed's clinging to her again, like he often does, and he can take only rattling gasps of breath against the violent waves of self-loathing that are crashing through him. Trisha's fingers are tight where they grip his shoulders, and she whispers to him soothingly, trying to calm him.

"Breathe with me," she says, touching their foreheads together, mingling their air, until Ed can match her every inhale, exhale, and there could be one set of lungs between them.

Ed doesn't open his eyes, but he can feel hers on him, watching him intently. Only when he is about to move away does she speak.

"She'd forgive you, Edward, for whatever it is you've done."

Ed tenses, taken aback, because he never thought he'd hear those words and especially not from her; but then he curses himself for hoping, for even considering it possible, because forgiveness is the last thing he deserves for his transgressions.

"You've earned it," she tells him, like it could all really be that simple, like his debts could have been so easily paid.

But then he thinks of all the people he's lost and of the way a part of him seems to die when they do, and he wonders what else he's losing.

A soul for a soul has never been enough.

Maybe it is, after all.