For RoyEd week Day 2: Similarities/differences or parallels. 
| Day 1 |

It had been Alphonse who’d explained everything to him.

“It’s called selective mutism,” he’d told Roy with a gentleness that was only present when the Elric brothers talked about each other. Alphonse’s smile had been broken back then, and Edward had held him upright with an expression that promised murder to anyone who’d dare to touch his brother in his weakened state. 

Alphonse had given him a smile and turned back to Roy, explaining something about Edward in a few short sentences that had Roy stand up from his chair in one fluid motion. 

“He can’t speak anymore?”

And Alphonse’s smile had been so sad and guilty that Roy sat back down, clinging to the edge of his desk in an attempt to remain calm. 

“No, that’s not it. The gate didn’t take his ability to speak. It’s something that can happen after – after a trauma. He just… he can’t speak.”

They had both adjusted to it, and even after Edward returned from a journey of six years and had changed into something so unfairly gorgeous that Roy forgot how to breathe, things had only worked out more smoothly every day. 

Edward had been the one to ask him out. 

His fingers had talked as quickly as his mouth back then, and Roy hadn’t needed Alphonse to decipher the new words that Edward had once again invented to improve the language of his mute body. Always the scientist, the inventor and creator, Roy thought when he agreed to a first date, and Edward’s smug grin had been the same as six years before that, when he’d started a journey to grow and learn and accept that changes he’d gone through. 

And today, three more years later, Roy could proudly say that things weren’t as bad as they could be. 

When he came home from work and threw himself onto the couch, Edward was usually already there, hunched over a pile of books with two cups of tea steaming in front of him. Roy’s boyfriend somehow had an infallible feeling for when he’d come home, and Roy thanked him with the softest kiss against that warm nape of his neck.

Luckily, Edward had gotten used to working at home these days, at least whenever he wasn’t travelling with Alphonse or polishing his new-found sword skills to perfection (Olivier Armstrong had been a strict, horribly intimidating and excellent teacher. Roy still remembered that one evening he came home and found both of them fighting, all pillows in the house sliced in half and the couch able broken from he-didn’t-want-to-know-what-exercises). 

Tonight was a free evening for both of them. Roy had suggested going out but the soft frown that appeared on Edward’s face made him shrug off the idea. They had decided on just sitting and talking – which basically was Edward gesticulating as wild and beautiful as always, and Roy holding him against his chest, smiling and wondering how he was allowed to be with a man who carried the sun in his eyes. 

People wouldn’t stop shit-talking about Edward. Behind his back, there were countless rumours, the most ridiculous ones saying that his tongue had been cut out (Roy would love to assure them that Edward Elric’s tongue worked perfectly fine, thank you very much, it could bring a man down within seconds), other rumours told that the gate had burnt out his vocal cords. 

Definitely not true. 

‘Bastard.’ Edward’s way of addressing him was charming as always, Roy thought when he received a shove against his shoulder. 

“Yes, sweetheart?” He cooed at Edward, pulling him closer so he could kiss his hair and bury his nose into that spun gold. Edward rolled his eyes and made a short gesture – ‘sappy idiot’ – before curling against Roy’s chest, building a nest out of his boyfriend’s body and the blanket Roy had pulled around them. 

Roy watched him and waited patiently. Edward took a deep breath and exhaled, resting his head in the warm curve of Roy’s neck. His fingers danced across Roy’s chest, and it seemed impossible to Roy how two people as different as them could ever fit together as perfectly as this. 

Edward seemed to be reading his mind, again, because he gently kissed Roy’s neck before lazily raising both hand again. 

‘Stop thinking so much. Just hold me, I’m tired and demand my daily amount of cuddles.’

“Of course, your majesty, granting it right away.” 

And Roy laughed, warm and loud and open-hearted, because Edward always reminded him that they didn’t have to be the same to fit together, that all of their demons and hopes and the warmth in their hearts had found each other through chaos and death and destruction. 

That only two different pieces of a puzzle could fit together, and melt into one.