Work Text:
"Your skin should be darker."
Ed frowned and pulled away from the customer's automail arm, his screwdriver hanging in the air with the statement. He raised an eyebrow at her. "Excuse me?"
"Well, that news article that came out last week said that you were, like... one of these long lost survivors of Xerxes and stuff, right?" she said with a shrug, not even looking up from her book. Ed's frown deepened as she spoke.
"Right..."
"Well, Xerxes was in the middle of the desert," she said, finally flicking her eyes away from the book and up at Ed. Her upper lip curled a little as she looked him up and down. "People in the desert have brown skin. You don't look Xerxian."
Ed snorted and shook his head before turning back to her arm. "Right. I'll just remind my skin to produce more melanin. For your sake."
"I'm just saying," she said with a shrug, turning back to her book again. "You shouldn't look like... Like..."
Ed felt something in him snap, and he pulled away again, putting his screwdriver on the table. He wasn't sure which urge was stronger, to laugh in her face or scream. So he settled for keeping his expression deadpan, staring at her. He'd learned a few things after spending so many years on the road with Al, after all. "I shouldn't look like what, exactly? Like you? I shouldn't look white?"
I should look like someone you can pick out from a crowd? I should look different so you know you're supposed to treat me different? I should look different so it's clear that I know my place and don't end up with privileges like being a State Alchemist?
"White skin just doesn't make sense in the desert," she said with one of those little eyerolls that Ed always hated on a customer. He fought the urge to roll his eyes back, instead standing up and untying the back of his apron.
"Oh, yes, you know so much more than me about how my skin and heritage works," he said with a shrug. "So of course you know all about the history of colonization in Xerxes and how Drachma came and claimed the country as theirs despite how a bunch of people already lived there. And of course you're familiar with how they made the dark-skinned natives into their slaves."
"Well—"
Ed pulled the apron off and over his head, and set to pulling off his gloves. He stared down at his hands, because he was sure that if he looked the woman in the eyes, he would end up losing the little bit of cool he had left. "Now my grandmother, she was one of those Drachman nobles, but she didn't agree with a lot of what her family was doing, and spoke out against keeping slaves. She even ended up falling in love with a slave, my grandfather, and for that, her family cut her off and stripped her away from her own name."
Note to self: Remember to thank Al for tirelessly translating old Xerxian texts to try and figure out our family history.
"And I'm lucky enough to have one of the good stories," Ed finished, finally snapping his eyes up again to fix her with a cold stare. "At least my father was born from a loving, consensual relationship. Plenty of other Xerxian slaves were born with white skin for much worse reasons."
He paused to take in a breath, reminding himself to keep his voice calm, to not yell. He wasn't fifteen anymore. He could be pissed without turning into a tornado of chaos.
"My people had their land, their government, their names and even their skin color stripped away from them because of colonizers, and then you have the audacity to come in here and tell me that they didn't survive in the right way? As if being nearly wiped off the map wasn't enough, now I somehow don't count? And for what? Because I don't look the way you think a Xerxian should look?"
She was looking at him with a confused sneer, her eyes flicking between him and the screwdriver on the table in front of her. "Are you going to fix my arm or not?"
"No," Ed said, jamming his hands in his pockets as he turned towards the door. "I'm going to get you a different mechanic. Someone whose skin is the right color for you."
He ignored her outraged protests as he left the room, rubbing a hand at the back of his neck. He already felt guilty over the whole interaction, like he was overreacting. After all, if wasn't like she had actually said she didn't want him working on her arm. And maybe it was wrong for him to claim this heritage, after all. It wasn't as if he had been raised knowing he even was Xerxian, let alone what it meant to be Xerxian. He didn't even look Xerxian. It wasn't like he had been through a lifetime of people treating him like shit just because he didn't look white enough. Maybe he was just treading in a place he didn't belong. Maybe he wasn't allowed to be upset. After all, being mistaken for white was supposed to mean he was getting the good end of the bargain, right?
"Hey, uh, Win?" he said, gently rapping his knuckles against the door as he pushed it open. He swallowed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm, uh... I'm not going to be able to finish my client. I need you to take over. When you've got a minute."
It was amazing how fast the fight could drain out of him in the right situation. After all, it was one thing to be pissed at a random customer for being rude. But if Winry said he had been overreacting and that it was silly he was upset in the first place... Well, he wasn't entirely sure how he would handle that. But Winry was frowning, immediately putting down her tools and murmuring apologies to her own customer before going over to Ed.
"What's wrong? What happened?" she said in a low tone, reaching out and grabbing his hands. "Ed, you look like... What did she say?"
"Nothing, she just..." Ed shrugged and did his best to laugh, but it came out more like a whimper. "She just said that I don't look Xerxian. That I'm supposed to have brown skin. And I might have snapped at her a little bit."
Winry's lips tightened into a line, and she let go of his hands. "Okay. I'll be back. Can you take care of Hugo quick for me? He just needs an oil change."
"Sure. Easy peasy," Ed said, giving her a weak smile.
And then she was leaving the room, which meant Ed was left to guess at what exactly she was doing as he went through the motions of finishing Hugo's oil change. Was Winry just going off to apologize to the customer and explain that Ed just had a short fuse? We're so sorry about that, he doesn't always know when to stop being rude, of course we'll give you a discount on your service today, deepest apologies, there's no reason for him to be upset.
"Okay, you're all set," Ed said, trying to shake himself out of his thoughts as he tightened the last screw on the front plate of Hugo's leg.
He had managed to take Hugo down to the front room and was writing up a receipt when the sound of yelling exploded from the room Winry and the other customer had been in. He couldn't tell exactly what Winry was saying, but he was pretty sure it wasn't apologies and offers for a discount. Something about that was a little reassuring, even if he felt like he had somehow tricked his wife into being on his side.
"Alright, have a good day," he said, giving Hugo a weak grin as he handed over the paperwork. "Sorry about the chaos today."
And sure enough, just as the front door was closing behind Hugo, the yelling got even louder, and Winry and the woman from earlier burst into the room.
"I can't believe you won't fix my arm," the woman snapped, even as Winry herded her towards the front door. Ed almost laughed a little. That was what you got from kids who had been raised in a sheep town. "You're supposed to be the best shop in town!"
"Oh, we are," Winry said with a sickeningly sweet smile. "And we stay the best because we refuse to work with people who don't align with the type of business we want to run. Which is why you're no longer welcome here. Have a nice day."
"I was just making conversation!"
"I'm sorry, but coming in here and telling my husband his skin is the wrong color isn't really my idea of conversation," Winry said with a tight smile. "And with what you said to me afterward, you should consider yourself lucky that all I'm doing is banning you from the shop for life."
"Well, I want to talk to your manager!"
Ed bit back a laugh, already knowing what was coming as Winry looked the woman over with a glint in her eye. "Bitch, I am the manager. And I say your money is no longer welcome here."
Winry had managed to herd the woman all the way to the front door, and the woman was now facing the fact that the only place left for her to go was out of the shop. Even as she tried to lean around Winry to shout further obscenities at Ed, Winry just leaned and hemmed the woman back into her square foot of space. She seemed to realize there wasn't much of anything left for her to do, and she leveled a dirty glare at Ed.
"And here I thought I would give this place a chance even with your history," she spat at him. "You know, if you're honestly descended from slaves, you think you would have learned how to take orders a little better!"
The words hit Ed like a brick, knocking the air out of his lungs before he could even think of a retort. What kind of person could even say such a thing? Was she basically implying that she thought he deserved to be a slave? Like his dad had been? Fuck, he was only one generation removed from all of that. If his dad hadn't been caught up in the whole homunculus mess, if he had just lived a regular life... Ed had only barely missed inheriting that same life. And instead, he had been allowed to grow up reading books and studying alchemy and going to school.
He was so stunned by the words that he hadn't even noticed Winry practically pushing the woman out the door and coming over to him.
"I cannot believe there are people in the world with thoughts as ugly as that," Winry whispered, looping her arm through his and leaning her head against his shoulder. "Ed, I... I'm so sorry."
"It's not your fault," he said with a weak shrug. "Some people are just... like that."
There was a long pause as they stared at the front door, Winry squeezing his arm. When he finally spoke again, Ed's words were soft, the same sort of quiet muttering he did when he was lost deep in thought and was mostly thinking aloud.
"I sometimes wonder what people like that would think if they knew that at one point, the entire fate of the country rested on the backs of five human sacrifices, and not a single one of us was actually white," he murmured, his eyebrows scrunching on his forehead. "But because we saved the world, they keep trying to say that we were always white. I guess it's fine for the country to rest on the backs of people who aren't white as long as they stay invisible. Once you get visible, once there's a reason for people to respect you, they go scrambling for excuses to say why you're actually one of them."
Ed paused, his frown getting a little deeper. "But maybe I'm not allowed to say I'm not white. I look white. I was raised white. Maybe I'm trying to claim something that isn't mine to claim in the first place."
"Of course you're allowed to claim your own heritage," Winry whispered, squeezing his arm. "That's so sad that you would think you aren't."
"But I look like..." Ed made a face and shrugged. "I look white. I look like the very people that pushed Xerxes down in the first place. I didn't get dirty looks and bullying for my skin color in school. A lot of people don't even think Xerxes was real. It's like I'm just trying to find a way to worm my way into conversations that are meant for people who have actually experienced oppression. You know. Like white people do. Maybe people like her are right. Maybe my skin just isn't... dark enough. And I guess I should be grateful for that."
"Ed..."
"I probably just need a break. I think I'm going to go lay down for a bit," he said, letting out a sigh and giving Winry a weak smile. "Come get me if you need me?"
"Okay, but..."
"Thanks, Win, love ya."
He knew when he woke up and the sky outside the window was dark that Winry had just left him and done all the work in the shop on her own. But on his nightstand was a cold cup of tea and a snickerdoodle, which he knew was her way of saying that she wished she had answers to his questions.
Ed wished he knew the answers too.