Chapter 3 - Shopping Spree

Ch.3, Shopping Spree.


Six days of house life later found Edward prying through a fridge with the gusto of a hobo on the street.
"It's empty!" Edward bellowed loudly, pushing the fridge door closed with an octave 'SLAM'!

"Are you trying to break the thing?" Alphonse said to him from the kitchen table, a newspaper in hand.

"How?" Ed whined, going to the table and collapsing to a chair, his head flat against the oak wood in defeat. "I don't even have the energy to break a sweat..."

As if to prove this, his stomach spoke up in his favor.

"That's only because we haven't gone grocery shopping yet" Alphonse reminded him. "I hate grocery shopping, that's Winry's job!" Edward argued. Alphonse tossed the paper to the table. "Well you don't have much of a choice, she hasn't come back from Risembool with Den yet."

"Why don't you go grocery shopping?" Edward snapped, a glare fixed at his young tall brother.

"Even if I did Ed you'd still have to go with me, you know I could never tell right from rancid if I went on my own."

This was an excuse of course, Alphonse could easily ask a person working behind a grocery booth what anything he picked up smelled like, except He figured since his brother could use some brushing up on his housing skills he might as well let his older brother learn a lesson or two.

That and Edward was being a royal dink anyway, why shouldn't he suffer for it?

Edward, desperate for an escape from having to cave in to such a hated chore, hastily reminded Alphonse how Winry was suppose to show up today. "I don't need to go anywhere with you, she'll show up soon, then I can give her the damn grocery list I wrote while she was gone."

Alphonse sighed, said list was about from the kitchen table to the front door, a good twenty feet in length. No doubt any display of such verocity would result in wrench welts. Except Edward wasn't really heeding this scenario, quite possibly because close starvation was effecting his brain in some warped way.

"Apples, cookies, shepard pie..."

His reverie was interupted by ringing from the living room.

With a huff Edward dropped his behemoth list and raced to the living room for the phone. "Hello?"

"Hey, Ed!"

"Where the hell are you?!" Edward yelled over the phone. "You were suppose to be back hours ago!"

"Nice greeting... glad to know youv'e missed your future wife so much."

"Quit playing around, Winry! There's no food here!" He shouted.
Winry sighed audibly. "Didn't you go grocery shopping for the stuff on the list I left you guys?"

Edward looked ready to dead-pan on the spot. What list?

He voiced his question to Winry, who sounded mortified on the other line. "The one I left on the kitchen table before I went to go get Den, geeze; weren't you listening to me when I said I put it there?!"

Edward thought back two days ago, vaguely remembering a hearty spill of grape juice on the counter, in which he hastily tried to clean the mess with the nearest paper towel. Unfortunately one wasn't to be seen so he transmuted a peice of paper which was conveniently right there on the table into a clothy napkin to use.

"Umm, no?"

"Well, there was." She said exasperated. "Listen, your going to have to do it yourselves."

Did she just say something taboo here?! That like fell on the lines of performing human transmutation or something?!

Go grocery shopping?!

"Winry you can't do this!!!" Edward yelled before Winry could explain her situation. "That's YOUR job!"

"Sorry I don't know what to tell you," Winry said with a tone of indifference. "The train I was on broke down, so now I have to wait for a buggy to come pick me and Den up. I should be back tomorrow evening, so don't worry about it."

Don't worry? Ed could have cared less about that; his deteriorating stomach was more important damnit! "Please tell me this is a joke!" He begged rather immaturely.

"I gotta go, buggy's here. See you tomorrow!" She hung up on the other end.

Ed stared at the echoing ring tone phone for a few minutes before dropping it, trying to figure out whether or not he'd finally died and went to hell. A quick self pinch to his left forearm followed by pain proved otherwise.

Damnit...

-.-.-.-.-

"I could put you in the cart..."

Edward glowered, teeth bared as if he considered biting if Alphonse went anywhere near him. "don't even think about it!"

"Then quit scuffling, you wouldn't even move when there were people behind us in the road." Alphonse sighed. Edward was making it painstakingly obvious he didn't want to be at the road side market, face directed to the ground and mumbling incoherently as they walked.

"Not to mention you walked into about five people while we've been here, you could at least look up."

Not a chance!

Edward grunted, persistantly burning a hole in the trodden soil like he found the theory to 'All You Need to know About Human Alchemy from A to Z' in the brown microscopic pebbles. Stopping the cart, Alphonse turned on his older brother, breathing in non-existing air to scold him.

And from nowhere a cart flew from beside him and slammed into the Bullheaded Alchemist.

"Yo, Chief! How's it going?" Jean Havoc said waving to Edward as if the poor boy weren't clutching his stomach in pain. Havoc turned to Alphonse. "Hey there, Big Guy."

"Hello, Lieutenant Havoc." Alphonse said, the scold in him dying as he worryingly watched his older brother mutter threats of death as he glared at the lanky man in front of him.

"What the hell do you want?" Edward snapped.

"There's alot of rumors going around," Havoc said as he pulled the cart back to keep Edward from turning it over on him. "Frankly all of what I heard around HQ is a bit scattered so I figured I'd get my info from the horses mouth."

The man leaned forward to look Edward in the eye with seriousness echoing in his features.

"Is that mechanic girl really going to have twins?"

Edward fell to the ground almost as fast as Alphonse ghasped. Just what the hell kind of rumors have been flying around Headquarters?!

Havoc shook a hand. "I didn't believe it either; some where saying that was the reason you two were getting hitched, earlier it was just because you got her pregnant last time you left for the countryside and suddenly twins got brought up. Then later it was..." Edward's face had been growing pale with each word Havoc had been saying, where the hell was this coming from?! "But seriously..." Havoc cut off his rant, whispering closely. "You don't come off as the type of guy to just jump and marry a girl over an accident from a one night stand."

Edward's demand to harvest information from Havoc about who it was that started such a ridiculous rumor bottomed out. Remembering to try keeping a straight face in the mention of his engagement he got up from the ground and breathed out deeply before saying...with inner demand.

"No; That's not true. W-we haven't even gotten into talking about... about kids yet."

If walls could talk, they'd be whispering about the strange young man who almost nearly rivaled the color of his own coat for decades.

Havoc chuckled and pulled out a tiny box from the vest of his coat pocket. "Level headed, I like that. But..." Havoc walked around his cart and tossed the object in front of Edward, forcing the young alchemist to catch it in the air.

"Keep that in handy if you ever change your mind." he whispered with a wink. that said, Havoc went back to his cart and left with a quick salute.

Alphonse waved goodbye to the second lieutenant before observing the thing that Edward held in his hands. "What did he give you?" He asked as Edward removed whatever it was that lie inside the tiny box.

Edward barely pulled the object out and made a small noise of shock before quickly stuffing it back in the box and dropping it to the ground. "Brother?" Alphonse questioned as Edward continued on, suddenly taking a turn with his dislike for grocery shopping and turning it into a complete fascination.

Alphonse picked up the object while his older brother wasn't looking and stuck it inside his pouch he usually kept chalk hidden in. Just because it was something from Havoc was no reason to toss it away like trash, it was a gift. Like the one the Major had given him... only smaller. There had to be a good reson Havoc gave this to his brother.

What that was Alphonse figured he'd wait till Edward cooled down enough to tell him. How bad could it be?


TBC.

You are not authorized to comment here. Your must be registered and logged in to comment