Jaylene finally woke later that week, looking healthy but extremely hungry. The doctors and nurses hurried to remedy her appetite with filling foods and drinks, fully intending for her to gain more weight. While her health proceeds to improve, her mental health slowly declines as she's filled with nightmares of her captures and memories.
And with each nightmare, she'll startle her body awake and scream for help, waking the rest of the hospital. So in order to prevent such nightmares from continuing her unrest, Mustang and the Elric brother's make it their jobs to oversee Jaylene's rest while still recovering. They ensure that she remains asleep and calm during the night, taking turns each night.
On one such night, Ed was quietly reading his book next to her bed when Jaylene started to whimper and toss in her sleep. And like every night, Ed would reach over with his normal hand take her normal hand within his, not even blinking an eye at the contact. But instead of her relaxing and returning to sleep, she startles awake with a soft gasp and looks down at the intertwined hands.
She then follows the arm back up to Ed, he studying quietly, unaware that she woke. Afraid to go back to sleep, she turns onto her side to be a little more comfortable, studying his face. She blushes lightly as her eyes trace over his relaxed face, to his keen eyes and down to his lips. She notices that he mumbles the words quietly to himself while he reads. `Probably doesn't even know he does it....' Jaylene thinks quietly to herself.
Suddenly, Ed's face scrunches up as he yawns wide, setting the book down to rub his eyes tiredly. Taking a deep breath, he looks down at her, becoming aware she's looking at him.
``Oh, hey. I didn't mean to wake you,'' Ed flustered softly as he tries to pull his hand away. But Jaylene just tightens the hold on his hand, keeping it close.
``You didn't wake me. Just my nightmare. But it was nice waking up like this....'' she whispers quietly, looking up at him. Ed flushes up at her admission and smiles gently. He leans down and pulls up a basket he brought with him, full of books, snacks and drinks.
``Here, can I have my hand back? I wanna get you something to eat and drink while you're awake,'' Ed requests softly. Jaylene reluctantly releases his hand, having liked the feel of his big, warm hand encasing her smaller one. As Ed starts to cut up an apple for Jaylene, she sits up fully and glances at the book he was reading.
Her own curiosity gets the better of her, Jaylene leaning over and grabbing the book off of Ed's lap and starts to read what's inside.
``Don't loose my spot please,'' Ed says with a laugh as he watches the curious girl read with eager intrigue. She continues to read, having the same attention span as himself. He chuckles and continues to cut up some fruit for her.
Soon, Jaylene tugs him over onto her bed, a look of confusion on her face. ``Can you explain this to me Ed?''
The alchemist looks at the passage she was reading and chuckles softly at the passage about chimera's. Doing his best, he explains in detail on what it was saying about chimera's, Jaylene's attention completely entrapped by his words. Without meaning to, Ed roused the other sleeping female in the room, making her groan quietly. Her groan went unnoticed from the attracting couple, making her scowl.
Kia sat up a bit, hefting up her extra pillow and chucked it square in Ed's face. ``Will you two love birds keep it down? Some people are trying to sleep,'' she groused angrily before flopping over and tries to go back to sleep.
``Hey! That was rude!! I was just answering a question!'' Ed growled angrily.
Jaylene whimpered softly for having angered her room mate, leaning into Ed unconsciously. The young Alchemist flushes hard at how close she is to him, swallowing thickly.
``Yeah, yeah. Get your head out of the gutter fullmetal and put her back to bed. She needs her sleep, not for you to teach her more alchemy, especially when her brother doesn't want her doing anything that reminds her of her time in that lab. Chimera's are getting a little too close, don'cha think?'' Kia said with an exhausted scowl.
That made Ed flush in embarrassment for having forgotten that and looked down weakly at Jaylene. ``Hey.....I'm sor-'' he tried to say before Jay put her hand over his mouth.
``Don't be. I asked you to explain it. And with that knowledge, I can probably sleep better,'' Jay said confidently as she smiled up at him. Ed's eyes widen at how cute she is, making his heart hammer. He yelps and falls back, scrambling off and away from her bed. Jay gave him a confused look as Kia looks over and snorts at his flushed face.
``Are you ok, Ed?'' Jay said softly, leaning over the side to look at him.
``F-FINE! Totally fine! J-just eat your fruit and get some more rest!!'' Ed exclaimed a little to quickly, sitting up and pushing the plate closer to her and quickly gets up, turning around to hide his increasing blush. Still looking his way, Jaylene slowly begins to eat the fruit. The alchemist went to great lengths to stop his throbbing heart as he takes deep breaths. When he manages to calm down enough, he turns back to see Jaylene laying back down, her eyes dozing close for a minute.
Smiling gently, he helps her settle into the bed, tucking her in and gently stroke her hair, finding it soft and silky to the touch. Blushing harder, he pulls back and sits down, watching her doze off into a blissful sleep, her nightmare long forgotten.
