Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Unlike most teenagers, Zuko was a morning person. He liked to wake up, do his stretches, eat a bowl of cereal, and leave the house before either his father or sister were even awake. His school, Sage Conservatory, was an hour-long bike ride away from his house, an hour and a half if he took the scenic route, by the edge of the lake. Although he was already a junior (today being his first day), Zuko did not have a driver’s license, nor did it seem likely that he would get one anytime soon. There were some things he’d accepted he would not experience until after graduating and moving out: like driving a car, inviting friends over, or sleeping in. Home life wasn’t great for Zuko, but then again, was home life that great for anyone living in New Jersey?

The houses and gardens in his suburb all looked the same as he biked to school. If Zuko squinted, it sometimes felt like he wasn’t moving at all.

Zuko arrived just before seven-thirty, when the parking lot was still empty except for a few cars that probably belonged to teachers. He started to chain his bike to the rack outside the main entrance when he heard the sound of a car pulling up behind him. He turned around, mostly out of a habit he had of never having his back to anyone if he could help it. The car was small and grey, and a boy about Zuko’s age was getting out of it. Sage Conservatory was a selective private school with only 400 students total, and Zuko had never met another morning person among them.

“Okay, now give your old man a hug,” the driver said.

“Oh my God,” the boy replied, but he leaned in through the car window and hugged his dad, before the car started pulling away. Zuko suddenly felt very embarrassed, like he shouldn’t be here, outside his school, watching a father and son be easily and openly affectionate with each other. He moved to walk away, and tripped over his own bike tire, falling hard onto the concrete.

“Woah! Are you okay?” Suddenly, the boy rushed over to Zuko with a concerned look on his face. He had dark skin, blue eyes, and a ponytail. Zuko did not recognize him, but he looked too old to be a freshman.

“I’m fine,” Zuko said, while simultaneously wishing the pavement would swallow him into the earth.

“You sure? You fucking ate it, dude,” the boy said.

“I said, I’m fine!” Zuko said, forcefully, standing up and dusting himself off.

“Okay, sorry,” the boy said, sheepishly. “I’m Sokka. I’m new.” That explained why Zuko didn’t recognize him.

“Hi,” Zuko said. It seemed like Sokka was intending on moving past Zuko’s humiliating fall. Thank God. “I’m Zuko.”

“Zuko…” Sokka said. “Where’s that from?”

“I don’t know,” Zuko replied. “My parents are second-generation Japanese, but I’m pretty sure they just made up a name.”

“Cool,” Sokka said. “My family just moved here from Alaska.”

Zuko nodded. He wasn’t used to having conversations for this long, except with his uncle, and he wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep this up. Luckily, it seemed Sokka did not experience this problem.

“Honestly, we moved to New Jersey over the summer because I got into this school, which I don’t think anyone was super expecting me to do, not because they don’t believe in me, but because Sage is pretty selective and almost nobody gets in after freshman year, but you already know that, since you go here too, but anyway it was kind of rushed and I flew in an airplane for the first time, which was super cool, and now we’re here, well, just me, I’m here. My sister Katara is going to the junior high.”

“Ah,” said Zuko.

“I’m super excited to be here though, but I am a little nervous, since my old school was tiny and basically a homeschool, and this is very different, but I’m hoping to join the soccer team because we didn’t have a team at my old school, and—”

“You play soccer?” Zuko interrupted.

“I know, right?! Sokka plays soccer,” Sokka said, sticking his tongue out.

“Oh,” Zuko said, flushing. “I just meant, I mean, I play soccer. I’m the captain of the team.”

“Great!” Sokka exclaimed. “That’s amazing! I’m so glad we met.”

Zuko nodded. Cars were beginning to pull into the parking lot now, as the rest of the school slowly arrived for first period.

“We have practice at four today,” Zuko told Sokka. “You should come. Try out.”

Sokka grinned. His smile was wide and disconcerting. Zuko didn’t know how to respond, so he turned around and entered the school.

After the day’s classes, Zuko went into the single-user bathroom on the first floor to change into his soccer uniform. Some of the other guys on the team gave him shit for never getting changed in the locker room with everyone else, but it was part of his ritual. The noise and the smell of the locker room easily overwhelmed him, and it was easier and more comfortable to change alone. Sometimes Zuko wondered if he was just a person who was meant to be alone, since it was so difficult to be around other people most of the time.

Sokka was already on the field when Zuko came outside. He was talking to the coach, his blue t-shirt standing out against the uniform red of the rest of the team. The coach seemed bemused by Sokka’s animated gestures, but he nodded at Sokka, who then threw up his hands in apparent jubilation. When Zuko walked over, Sokka waved at him, exclaiming: “I’m trying out!” The other guys on the team sniggered. Zuko sighed, then nodded at the coach, who started the practice.

Which went…really well? Sokka was incredible at soccer. Maybe Zuko shouldn’t have been so surprised. Sokka brought his frenetic energy to the field, practically bouncing when he ran, hurtling after the ball. Despite his almost reckless speed, he had a keen awareness of everything else happening on the field—knowing exactly when and where to pass the ball when he was cornered. Zuko had never seen a new player so attuned to the rest of the team. Even as a captain, he often felt lost in the social dynamics of the soccer field.

By the end of practice, the guys were clapping Sokka on the back and chattering excitedly. There was no doubt that he’d made it on the team. Zuko watched, breathing heavily from practice, caught between jealousy and pride. While Sokka and the rest of the team headed to the showers, Zuko just went to his locker to collect his bag and then out to the bike rack in the parking lot. There was no point in showering if he was just going to get gross again on the bike ride home.

“Hey, Zuko!” a voice called from behind him.

He spun around and saw Sokka bounding down the school steps, wet hair glistening in the afternoon sun. He had already changed back into his day clothes. How fast did this kid shower?

“Oh, hey,” Zuko said, holding his U-lock in one hand.

“I just wanted to say thanks for letting me try out today,” Sokka said, a little breathlessly.

“Oh, yeah,” Zuko replied. “No problem. You’re a good player.”

“Thanks, you too!” Sokka said.

They stood there in silence for a moment. Zuko started attaching the U-lock to the frame of his bike.

“Wait, hang on,” Sokka said. He looked nervous, more nervous than he looked when he was trying out for the team or talking to the coach for the first time. Zuko was almost scared to hear what he had to say.

“Can we be friends?” Sokka asked, finally, staring at the ground.

“What?”

“It’s just that my family literally just moved here over the weekend and I don’t know anybody and you’re really the only person who’s talked to me all day except for during practice and, you know, we both play soccer so it feels like maybe we have more things in common—”

“Yes,” Zuko blurted out. “We can be friends.”

Sokka beamed. His smile was so genuine it hurt Zuko a little bit.

“Cool!” Sokka said. He sat down on the school steps. Zuko looked at him.

“Uh, is someone coming to pick you up?”

“My dad,” Sokka replied. “But we’re trying to sort out a carpool situation with two other families, so hopefully I’ll be able to drive myself and three screaming middle-schoolers around soon.”

“Okay,” Zuko said. “I’d offer you a ride, but…” He gestured to his beat-up road bike.

Sokka laughed. The sound surprised and pleased Zuko.

“Don’t worry about it. See you tomorrow?”

“Yes,” Zuko replied. “Tomorrow.”

When Zuko got home, he was in an unusually good mood. His legs ached from practice and biking in a really satisfying way, and he finally had something interesting to write about in his journal.

Zuko’s daily journal was the result of a New Year’s resolution suggested by his uncle, who thought that if Zuko had no friends his own age he should at least have an outlet for some of his emotions. Except his uncle had phrased it more diplomatically: “Zuko, the lake without any rivers holds the most salt.”

“I don’t think that’s true, Uncle Iroh.”

Then Zuko had googled it and discovered that it actually was true. So, he started keeping a journal, writing down the events of each day.

Today, he started the journal:

            August 25^th

            Met Sokka.

Sokka turned out to be a great friend. Not that Zuko was in any position to judge the quality of his friends (or friend, singular). But he always had fun around Sokka. Sokka was funny, sometimes painfully so, and he didn’t mind that Zuko didn’t talk much. He was also crazy good at calculus, which proved to be quite helpful when Zuko got stuck on a problem set. Sokka got along with pretty much everyone, students, teachers, cafeteria workers, you name it, and Zuko started to feel closer to the other guys on the soccer team, as though he was becoming friends with them just by virtue of being Sokka’s friend. Friendship by proxy. Even though Sokka was friendly with the entire school, he always made sure to pay attention to Zuko, his first friend. It made Zuko feel proud. He was Sokka’s first friend.

Zuko’s journal, previously comprising sparse summaries of each day, started to overflow with memories of Sokka.

            At soccer practice, Sokka scored his first goal.

            During history, Sokka passed me a note that was a drawing of the two of us as medieval warriors.

            At lunch, Sokka swapped his apple for my orange without even asking. He knows me so well.

Around mid-October, Sokka invited Zuko over to his house for dinner. It was the first time Zuko had been invited to anyone’s home since birthday parties in the second grade. Sokka also admitted he was nervous, since this was his family’s first time hosting anyone in their new home. Zuko promised to be on his best behavior.

“When do you ever behave badly?” Sokka laughed.

After school, Zuko and Sokka got into Sokka’s family car, attaching Zuko’s bike to the roof so he had a way to get home later. Zuko hadn’t been in a car for a long time. His dad had a car that he drove to work, and Azula carpooled with two other girls from Sage, but Zuko didn’t usually have a reason to travel with his family, unless they were visiting their vacation home in Maine during a school holiday. And even though Zuko was taller and older than Azula, he always had to ride in the backseat.

Sokka turned on the radio to some pop station. He drummed his fingers against the wheel to the beat and pulled out of the parking lot.

Suburban New Jersey felt much more palatable through a car window. All the white houses felt far away, the turns in the road cinematic. Sokka was singing along to the music, his voice squeaking on the high notes. Zuko looked at Sokka, glowing with the evening, and felt filled with light.

Sokka pulled into the junior high parking lot, where a bunch of kids were sitting around on the benches outside. One stood up when she saw Sokka’s car. She tapped two of her friends on the shoulder, and the three of them walked over and piled into the backseat.

“Hi, Sokka!” “Hey, Sokka!” “What’s up, Sokka!”

“Hi, guys,” Sokka greeted.

“Who’s the new meat?” asked one of the kids. Zuko turned around to face the backseat. The girl who’d asked the question was pouting, her eyes completely hidden behind thick, black bangs.

“I’m Zuko,” Zuko said.

“Is this who’s coming over for dinner?” the other girl asked. She looked the most like Sokka, so Zuko figured she must be Katara.

“Yes,” Sokka said, changing gears. “So be nice to him. He’s our guest.”

“I’m Aang,” the final kid said. “Nice to meet you, Zuko.”

Zuko nodded at him. He was already tired from interacting with these noisy thirteen-year-olds. He didn’t know how he was going to survive dinner. He turned back in his seat and leaned his head against the window.

Sokka must have noticed something was off because he said: “We’re going to drop off Toph and Aang, and then head back to our place.”

Zuko nodded again. He felt foolish, like he was another kid that Sokka had to look after.

Once Aang and Toph were delivered to their respective homes, and Sokka had performed a series of increasingly enthusiastic renditions of radio songs, it wasn’t long before he pulled the car into a driveway and turned off the engine.

“Here we are,” Sokka said.

Sokka and Katara’s house was a two-floor detached condo with a small lawn out front. As the kids walked across the grass, Zuko noticed a few planks of wood leaning against the side of the house. He pointed at them and looked at Sokka, who said: “My dad’s building some raised beds for a vegetable garden.” When they reached the front door, Zuko was surprised to see it was a deep blue that looked freshly painted.

“I like your door,” he said.

“Thanks,” Sokka laughed. “My dad got into a whole fight with the HOA about it. I think he ended up preying on their white guilt and saying it was important to our culture to get them to let us have it.”

“And is it important to your culture?” Zuko asked.

Sokka shrugged. “We liked the color.”

He opened the door, and the air inside was warm and smelled rich with onion and thyme.

“Dad?” Sokka called.

“In the kitchen!”

Sokka and Katara took off their shoes and lined them up by the door. Zuko copied them, then followed the siblings through the living room and into the kitchen, where their dad was standing at the stove.

“You must be Zuko!” Sokka’s dad said, holding out his arms and walking toward Zuko. Zuko took an instinctive step backward, bumping into Katara.

“Oh, God,” he muttered. “Sorry, Katara.”

“Not a hugger, hm?” Sokka’s dad said, putting down his arms. “That’s okay. I’m Hakoda.”

“Nice to meet you,” said Zuko, side-stepping around the others until his back was against the wall and he was taking up as little space as possible. He hadn’t been inside Sokka’s house for five minutes and he was already fucking it up.

“Dinner won’t be ready for another twenty minutes,” Hakoda said. “Come back soon to help set the table.”

Sokka gestured at Zuko, who meekly followed him out of Hakoda’s sight and up the stairs. On the second floor, Zuko found himself surprised at how many framed photographs the family already had on the walls, considering they’d just moved into this house. Zuko’s own house didn’t have much of those, and they’d lived there his whole life. As they walked along the corridor, Zuko saw a photograph of Katara smiling in a garden. Another one of Sokka and Katara standing in front of a waterfall. Then, a young Hakoda and a woman holding a toddler and a baby.

“Is that your mom?” Zuko asked, stopping, and pointing at the picture.

Sokka turned around and looked where Zuko was indicating. He smiled softly. “Yeah. That’s her.”

“Where is she now?” Zuko asked, and then immediately regretted his nosiness.

Sokka didn’t seem like he was offended. “She died when I was ten and Katara was seven. Drowned.”

“Oh,” Zuko said. “I’m sorry.” He paused. Then, “I haven’t seen my mom in over three years. I know it’s not the same. I’m not trying to, you know…”

“Where is yours?” Sokka asked.

Zuko hesitated. “She’s at Great Oak.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a psychiatric hospital in Pennsylvania. She’s been there since I was twelve.” He cleared his throat. “It upsets my dad to visit, so we don’t, really, anymore.”

Sokka nodded. Then he cocked his head to one side and looked at Zuko.

“You know I have a car, right?” he said. “I could drive you to Pennsylvania. You know, if you wanted.”

Zuko’s chest felt very tight. “Oh. Thanks.”

“No pressure though,” Sokka said, raising his hands in a gesture of nonchalance. “Just think about it.”

He turned and continued walking down the hallway and into the room at the end, Zuko following. Sokka’s bedroom was small, much smaller than Zuko’s, but unlike Zuko’s, it was filled with things. He had a twin-size bed against one wall, a completely full bookshelf, a desk covered in disassembled electronics and half-empty glasses of water, and posters on all the walls. The posters ranged wildly from a vintage diagram of the anatomy of a whale to some colorful cartoon characters Zuko didn’t recognize.

“You can sit on the bed, if you like,” Sokka told Zuko. “I don’t really have a chair.” Sokka looked down at the clothes and books scattered across every inch of his carpet. “Or a floor.”

Zuko nodded and sat down on the edge of Sokka’s bed. It smelt like Sokka, which was weird to think about. Zuko had never considered that Sokka had a particular smell, but he did, and his room was full of it. It wasn’t a bad smell; in fact, it made Zuko feel calm. Zuko had never told anyone about his mom before, but he wasn’t panicking that Sokka knew. It made sense that Sokka would know. Sokka was Zuko’s friend.

Sokka was still standing, looking at Zuko with nervous energy.

“You can sit down, if you like,” Zuko told him, then winced because it was probably weird to say that to someone in their own room. Sokka laughed and sat down next to Zuko. Together, they looked at the poster on the wall facing them: ocean waves lapping against a beach from above.

“You’ll probably think this is weird,” Sokka said, keeping his eyes on the poster. “But I still really like the ocean.”

Zuko opened his mouth, maybe to attempt say something reassuring, but Sokka kept talking.

“I always feel closer to my mom when I’m by the water. I know that’s kind of morbid, considering, you know... But I feel like she’s still there, somewhere. Like she’s watching over me, through the waves.”

Zuko nodded.

“Zuko,” Sokka said, turning to look at him. “I’m really glad you’re my friend.”

Zuko’s heart pounded. “Me, too.”

Sokka smiled a faint, fragile smile. Zuko felt his cheeks grow warm. Something about Sokka’s overwhelming closeness was making him feel dizzy. His whole body was on edge, like it was mid-flinch. He felt electric and afraid.

“Boys!” Hakoda called from downstairs. Zuko twitched at the sudden noise. “Dinner’s almost ready!”

Sokka jumped up and stretched his arms above his head.

“Let’s eat!” he declared.

Downstairs, Katara had already set the table and was helping Hakoda bring the food out from the kitchen: a bowl of fish stew and a plate of flatbread. Sokka gestured at the chair next to his for Zuko to sit down, before starting to pour water for everyone.

“I wasn’t sure if our new guest could handle spice,” Hakoda said, sitting down at the place across from Zuko. “So I kept the chili flakes separate.”

Sokka laughed. “Dad, I think I’ve literally seen Zuko drink hot sauce.”

Hakoda laughed, too. He and Sokka had similar laughs, except his was deeper and a little bit gruffer. For a second, Zuko imagined having Sokka come over for dinner at his house, noticing similarities between Zuko and his father. The thought made him queasy, so he drank some of his water to wash it down.

“Have you ever had bannock before, Zuko?” Sokka asked.

Zuko shook his head. Sokka tore off a piece of the flatbread and placed it in Zuko’s bowl. Zuko took a bite.

“Hm!” he said, chewing.

“Dip it in the stew,” Sokka advised. “Softens it up.”

Over dinner, Hakoda asked Zuko a series of questions: Where was his family originally from? What did his parents do? What activities in the area would he recommend? To which Zuko replied: Kyoto, law, and drive to New York. Hakoda had laughed at that. During this conversation, Katara was mostly silent, only speaking when Hakoda asked her questions. Her demeanor was almost eerie, and occasionally it felt like she was glaring at Zuko when he wasn’t looking. It was unnerving, but he tried to focus his attention on Sokka and Hakoda, who didn’t seem to sense anything wrong.

When everyone had finished eating, Hakoda went to go read in the living room, leaving the kids to clear the table and wash the dishes. Sokka scrubbed while Zuko dried, and they debated whether garlic could be considered a vegetable. When they finished cleaning up, the windows were growing darker, and Zuko reluctantly decided to go home, while it was still safe to bike.

“It was really nice having you over,” Sokka said at the front door.

“Thank you for having me,” Zuko replied.

“Maybe next time we can have dinner at yours,” Sokka suggested.

Zuko blanched. “Yeah, maybe.”

Zuko turned to reach for the door handle, and suddenly Sokka started speaking again, his words tumbling out in a rush: “Hey, I know you’re not usually a hugging person, but if you ever wanted to hug, I’d be cool with it.”

Zuko froze, his hand hovering over the door handle. He looked at Sokka, who was twisting the cuffs of his hoodie, waiting for Zuko to respond. The idea of being held terrified Zuko—he hadn’t been hugged since his mom still lived at home—so instead he grabbed Sokka’s hand in his and squeezed it. Like a slow handshake. Sokka looked down at their clasped hands and didn’t say anything. Then, Zuko let go and left, before the pressure in his chest got any worse.

Outside, the evening was cool against his face. He took a few deep breaths, before retrieving his bike from the roof of Sokka’s car. He was just about to get on, when he heard a voice behind him.

“Hey.”

Zuko turned around, expecting to see Sokka, but it was Katara, standing on the lawn with her arms crossed. She must have already been outside when Zuko came out.

“Hi,” Zuko said, cautiously.

“You’re Azula’s brother, aren’t you?”

His stomach sank. This wasn’t the first time someone had asked him this. Azula was notorious, even among Sage seniors. She had once set a girl’s ponytail on fire with a cigarette lighter during her seventh-grade English class. (Their father had pulled some strings and she hadn’t even been suspended.) She was the sort of kid people whispered about in the hallways. They whispered around Zuko too, sometimes.

Zuko nodded.

“I’m watching you, Zuko,” Katara said. Her voice was cold as ice. “If you or your sister hurt my brother, I’ll kill you both.”

Before Zuko could figure out how to respond to this, she opened her front door and darted inside. Then Zuko biked home.

On the way home, Zuko mentally drafted that day’s journal entry. He tried to remember every detail of the evening—what the house looked like, what the food tasted like, everything that was said, including Katara’s ominous warning. He wanted to hold all of it at once in his head so he could write it down perfectly, but the memories were already starting to fade by the time he reached his driveway. Dusk had fallen. Zuko opened the garage with the beeper he had attached to his keys to put his bike away, then entered the house.

“Zuko?” his father called, as Zuko was taking off his shoes. There was a line of light under the kitchen door. Zuko’s stomach clenched, but he obediently walked to the door, opened it.

The brightness of the kitchen meant Zuko’s eyes had to take a moment to readjust. When his vision refocused, Zuko saw his father and Azula sitting at the table, which had sheets of paper scattered across it. Zuko’s father was looking down at the paper and didn’t even react when Zuko entered the room. As Zuko walked toward his family, he caught Azula’s eye, and she smirked at him, which was never a good sign.

He reached the table and looked down at the paper. It was then that he realized they were pages ripped out from his journal. The kitchen suddenly felt too bright again.

“That’s mine,” Zuko said. His voice quivered, like he was thirteen again and his voice was starting to break.

“Who’s Sokka?” his father asked, still not looking at Zuko.

“A friend,” Zuko said.

“He’s a boy at Zuzu’s school who has a ponytail,” Azula added, cheerfully.

Zuko’s father bowed his head. Zuko’s heart was beating, loud and slow, each thump pushing into his throat.

“I don’t understand,” Zuko stammered. “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

His father sighed. “Zuko,” he said. “I don’t want you interacting with this boy anymore.”

Zuko started to feel light-headed.

“I don’t understand,” he said again. “Sokka’s a good friend.”

His father laughed, a harsh, humorless laugh. “Sure, Zuko.” He picked up a journal page from the center of the table and read in a monotonous drawl: “Sokka is so funny he made Mrs. Burnett smile when she was assigning us homework. I’m so lucky to share half my schedule with him.” He picked up another page: “I can’t wait to hang out with Sokka after school tomorrow. He’s so much fun to be around—"

“Stop!” Zuko exclaimed. He felt like he was going to be sick—all his childish words, face up on the table, exposed to the air like a wound. He couldn’t believe how stupid he sounded, fawning over Sokka like that.

“Did your mother make you like this?” Zuko’s father asked. “She always spent so much time with you.”

“Dad, I—”

“I don’t want you near this Sokka boy again.”

Zuko clenched his fists. “Are you mad at me because I have a friend?” he demanded.

“I’m not mad,” his father said, gathering the journal pages into a stack. “I’m disappointed.” He walked over to the stove and threw the pages on a burner. Within seconds, the entire stack was in flames.

Zuko doesn’t remember much of what happened that night. What he does remember is largely pieced together from his cell phone history, Uncle Iroh’s account, and a medical bill. At 11:02pm, Zuko made a call to Uncle Iroh that lasted four minutes. According to his uncle, who drove over just minutes after the call, Zuko was sitting in the driveway with a bag of frozen peas to his face. Iroh got out of the car to lead Zuko to the passenger seat, as Zuko refused to open either of his eyes.

Zuko remembers parts of the car ride, remembers the steady orange pulse of streetlamps from behind his eyelids, remembers the sound of Iroh talking about a new type of tea he’s sourcing for the shop. According to Iroh, they arrived at the hospital just before midnight. The ER was bright, even with Zuko’s eyes closed, and it was filled with people talking. Iroh briefly spoke to a nurse, and then they were able to see a doctor. Zuko remembers sitting on the examination chair, a layer of crinkly paper between his body and the seat, while the doctor and Iroh had a conversation above him.

“We’re going to focus on first treating the burn and preventing infection. Then, we can assess the damage to the eye.”

Pills were placed into Zuko’s palm. He raised them to his mouth and swallowed them dry. Iroh continued talking about his tea. Then he started to talk about his garden. He was thinking about raising chickens, but he was afraid they would get too cold over the winter. Zuko’s left eye kept feeling heavier and heavier. He wanted to fall asleep, but Iroh was holding his hand too tight.

“Zuko, can you open your eyes for me?” a voice far away asked.

Zuko hesitated, then opened. Where Iroh was sitting was a blurry abyss. Zuko panicked and sat up, and Iroh slid across his vision like a ghost. Zuko leaned over the side of his seat, thinking he might be sick, and saw what must have been a hundred frozen peas scattered across the linoleum floor.

Chapter Text

The next day was a Saturday, and Zuko woke up at three in the afternoon. At first, he couldn’t figure out where he was, until he realized he was in his uncle’s bedroom. It was hard to see anything—Zuko’s left eye was covered by some gauze that wrapped around his whole head. On the nightstand were two bottles of pills and a glass of water. He picked up the bottles and brought them close to his face to read: they were both his, to be taken three times a day. He swallowed one of each and drank the whole glass of water. Then he stood up.

It took him two tries to reach for the door handle and open the door.

Iroh’s house was pretty small—he had the modest salary of a small businessman in New Brunswick—but it was well-lived-in. Iroh’s bedroom opened straight into the living room and kitchen area, and all around the walls were weird little paintings either Iroh or one of his friends had made. When Zuko came out of the bedroom, Iroh was stirring a pot on the stove. He turned around when he heard Zuko close the door.

“Zuko,” he said, smiling. “I hope you slept well. I’ve made some chicken okayu if you’re hungry.”

Zuko didn’t know what to say. His head felt fuzzy, like he was dreaming.

“But where did you sleep?” he asked.

“The couch,” Iroh replied, getting bowls and spoons out for the soup.

“But your back—”

“Don’t worry about me, Zuko.”

Iroh didn’t have a dining room table, so he and Zuko sat on the floor around his coffee table to eat. Zuko was feeling a little nauseated, but he tried to eat as much as he could. The okayu was sticky and salty, and it reminded Zuko of his childhood, when Iroh would come over to his house when Zuko’s mom was feeling too sick to cook.

“So, Zuko,” Iroh said, once he’d finished his own bowl and Zuko still had most of his left to eat. “Can I ask what series of events led to my favorite nephew going to the emergency room last night?”

Zuko shrugged, then swallowed another spoonful of soup.

Iroh exhaled a deep breath. “Please tell me what happened, Zuko.”

Zuko scraped his spoon against the edge of his bowl. “I fell.”

After a few moments of silence, he glanced up at his uncle. Across the coffee table, Uncle Iroh looked both close and far away—he looked like a flattened version of himself, a photograph. Zuko squinted, trying to focus his vision, and he was shocked to see a tear rolling down his uncle’s cheek. It made his stomach hurt.

“What are you doing?” he asked. His eyes were hurting too now, and it was so painful he felt his heart begin to race.

“I’m sorry, Zuko,” Iroh said, more tears spilling horribly from his eyes. “I’m sorry I let this happen to you.”

Zuko stood up, blood rushing out of his head and creating floating black spots in the air. “I don’t know why you’re being so weird about this,” he exclaimed. “I fucking fell.”

“Okay, Zuko,” Iroh replied, wiping his eyes on his sleeve. “I believe you. I’m sorry. Please sit down.”

Zuko was tired. He wanted to go back to sleep, but he didn’t want to go to his uncle’s bedroom. He had already been too much of an inconvenience. He sat back down on the floor and held his head in his hands, trying to push the throbbing back into his skull.

“Please excuse an old man’s melodrama,” Uncle Iroh said, finally. “I worry about you, that’s all.”

“You don’t have to,” Zuko muttered into his hands.

“I know. But to make me feel better, will you please stay with me for the next week? I could use the company.”

Once Zuko had eaten as much as he could stomach, he helped Iroh put sheets and pillows on an air mattress in the basement, which was usually used for storage. He spent the rest of the day lying on it, perfectly still to prevent the squeaking, staring at the dark ceiling. His mattress was surrounded by stacks of unmarked cardboard boxes. They felt like walls.

Zuko could hear Iroh humming in the garden outside. He took his second round of pills and fell asleep.

The next day, Zuko left the basement only to eat and go to the bathroom. He kept the lights turned off in any room he entered and avoided looking in mirrors. In the afternoon, Iroh left the house and came back with Zuko’s school backpack and a duffle bag of Zuko’s clothes, which he brought down to the basement.

“You can remove the dressing now, if you’d like to shower,” Iroh told Zuko, who was still lying down. “The doctor said you just have to make sure you dry it well and redress it after. I left some paper towels and gauze in the bathroom.”

Zuko nodded. It had been a few days since he’d showered or even changed his clothes, and he was embarrassed his uncle had to remind him. Iroh went outside to the garden again, and Zuko shuffled upstairs to remove his bandages and take a lukewarm shower. The water felt clean and soft against his skin. When he was done, he dried himself off and put on a clean t-shirt and a pair of flannel pajama pants. He glanced up at the bathroom mirror and froze. For a second, he had the sudden, crazy urge to smash it. Then he turned away and wrapped the left side of his face with gauze.

Zuko didn’t go to school that week. He hadn’t missed school since he’d had strep throat in the sixth grade, and he didn’t even have a good reason this time, just that he was tired, too tired to go to school. He lay on his air mattress in the dark, cool basement, sometimes getting up to wander aimlessly around the house. He didn’t go outside. Iroh left each morning to tend his tea shop and came back each afternoon to make a different type of soup for the two of them to eat.

On Tuesday, Zuko’s phone buzzed and lit up with a text from Sokka. Zuko ignored it. It hurt to look at screens anyway.

On Sunday, Zuko had his first migraine. He pulled the sheets over his head and curled up on the mattress for hours, fighting off the rising nausea, breathing through the pain. That was the worst day.

The next morning, Zuko woke up at six for the first time in over a week. He took the last of his pills and asked Iroh if Iroh could take him to school. His absences were stacking up, and he didn’t need another reason to feel like a failure.

Eventually, he was going to need to go home, too. Zuko had everything he needed to survive at Iroh’s, but he couldn’t live here forever, living in a basement and eating his uncle’s food. For one thing, his father paid his school fees and gave him health insurance. As much as Zuko enjoyed spending time with his uncle, it just wasn’t sustainable to pretend he could keep living here and force his uncle to look after him until he turned 18. He just hoped that by the time Iroh kicked him out, his father would have had enough time to calm down, and they could all forget this had ever happened. He just needed to keep his head down before that, be the kind of son his father could be proud of.

The thing about getting your face broken is no one ever asks you where you’ve been for a week. They all figure it has something to do with the fact you have bandages over half your face.

At school, people stared, people whispered, but no one came up to Zuko and asked him what had happened. Which wasn’t surprising, since he didn’t really speak to anyone at school anyway, except Sokka. He left the classroom after first period and heard a few freshmen gasp as he walked to his locker. Their reactions made Zuko want to rip the gauze off his face, but he knew what was underneath was even worse. He felt like a bad Halloween costume: half-pirate, half-mummy. He felt like a freak.

When he was getting his books out of his locker, he heard a familiar voice behind him exclaim: “Zuko!”

Zuko flinched at the sound, then turned around to see Sokka, beaming and waving.

“Welcome back!” Sokka said. His blue eyes were wide and crinkled at the edges. “What happened to you? I haven’t seen you in, like, a week!”

Zuko swallowed. The crowd in the hallway threatened to drown him. He felt the gauze’s weight, heavy against his left eye.

“I was sick,” he lied.

“Is your face okay?” Sokka asked, frowning in concern.

“It’s fine,” Zuko said. “I’m fine.” He turned back to close his locker. “I have to go.”

“I’ll come with you!” Sokka offered. “It’s calc next, right?”

In his head, Zuko could hear his father say, mockingly: “I’m so lucky to share half my schedule with him.” Zuko wanted to scream. Sokka was still looking at him, head cocked to one side like he was waiting for Zuko to respond. Zuko didn’t respond. He threw himself into the crowd of students and let them pull him away.

He got to the classroom before Sokka and walked over to his usual seat by the window on the right. As he was about to sit down, he realized he couldn’t see the board or the door from this angle anymore. He heard someone enter the room but he couldn’t see them, and his blood ran cold. Zuko scurried back to the other side of the classroom, but all the seats were taken. Heart pounding, he walked over to the guy sitting at the desk in the back-left corner and slung his bag on the desk.

“Hey!” the guy exclaimed.

“I want this seat,” Zuko told him.

“I’m already sitting here,” the guy replied, crossing his arms. “Find another one.”

Zuko had the sudden urge to grab the guy by the throat. The idea shocked him, at the same time that he wished he had the guts to actually do it. More people were coming into the classroom, and Zuko was running out of time.

So, Zuko put his hands on the desk and leaned over, speaking to the guy, quietly. “If you don’t move right now, I’ll slash the tires of your fucking car.” Zuko wasn’t sure where that sentiment came from, or whether he even knew which car belonged to this guy, but it got the desired effect. The guy’s eyes widened, and he stood up and moved to another desk. Zuko sat down, and took a deep breath, terrified by the fact that he had actually gotten what he wanted.

Zuko decided to skip lunch and sit outside during his free period. He couldn’t even think about entering a high school cafeteria, being looked at by so many people. So instead he sat on the edge of the soccer field and watched the trees by the fences sway. The cool air was a relief to his face, which was sweaty from the layers of gauze. Zuko took a deep breath and tried to relax.

“Hey,” said a voice to his right.

Zuko turned his head and saw Sokka standing a few feet away, awkwardly crossing his arms. It hurt to even look at him.

“Can I sit next to you?” Sokka asked.

Zuko didn’t reply, but Sokka sat down anyway, still keeping his distance. Sokka was being uncharacteristically silent. The two boys watched the grass shiver in the wind.

“I realize you have a lot going on,” Sokka said, carefully. “But I gotta ask. Are we cool?”

Zuko glanced at Sokka, then looked back at the field.

“I can’t tell if you’re mad at me, or if I weirded you out when you came over, or… Can you please talk to me?” Sokka’s voice wavered on the question.

Zuko closed his eyes. His left one was beginning to sting again, and the world was getting too bright.

“I don’t think we should spend time together anymore,” Zuko said with gritted teeth.

There was a pause.

Then, “Okay.”

And he heard the rustle of Sokka standing up and leaving. Even when he was alone, Zuko did not open his eyes for several minutes.

After a day of squinting at whiteboards and avoiding Sokka, Zuko talked to his coach to officially quit the soccer team. The coach didn’t even try to negotiate with Zuko—he just took one look at Zuko’s face and nodded. Then Zuko went out to the parking lot to start walking back to Iroh’s. Iroh had offered to leave the tea shop early to drive him, but Zuko had refused. He needed the walk, anyway.

When Zuko passed the school entrance, he saw Mai sitting on the steps—she was a sophomore, and one of the girls Azula carpooled with. She almost always wore black, and she was always on her phone. When Zuko walked past, she didn’t even look up, but asked: “What happened to your face?”

Zuko paused. “I fell.”

“Cool,” said Mai. She continued tapping on her phone. Mai had come over to Zuko’s house a few times when they were really small, as her father and his worked at the same law firm. He remembered getting along well with her back then, when they were young enough to run around in garden sprinklers and throw grass at each other, back when friendship was easy.

He took a deep breath.

“Mai,” he said, uncertainly. “Do you want to go out?”

Mai paused her tapping. “Like, on a date?”

Zuko nodded.

Mai thought about this for a moment.

“Yeah, okay,” she said, finally. “Give me your number.”  

Zuko’s walk to Iroh took longer than it should have, but he hadn’t eaten lunch that day and he was starting to feel dizzy. He kept walking though, refusing to let a little hunger weaken him like this. He was an athlete, and he’d experienced greater physical challenges than this. What was wrong with him? When he got to Iroh’s, he practically flopped onto the couch, where he continued to lie down, waiting for his heart to stop pounding, too tired to get up and go down to the basement. Iroh came home a few hours later, and Zuko pretended to be asleep so he didn’t have to talk. He heard the click of the stove as Iroh started cooking, and curled into the cushions.

When dinner was ready, Iroh called Zuko awake. Zuko hadn’t even realized he’d actually fallen asleep, but he sat up and rubbed his good eye, before lowering himself down to the floor to eat. As Iroh handed him a bowl of golden curry, Iroh asked: “How was your day?”

“Fine.” Zuko knew he was being rude, ungrateful even, but he did not have the energy to fake enthusiasm about his day.

“Anything interesting happen?” Iroh asked.

Zuko ate a spoonful of curry and thought about his long, miserable day of being stared at and talked about, even pointed at. The way people started moving out of his way as he walked through the hallways, as though some invisible force was repelling them. Then he thought about Sokka: Sokka’s genuine smile when he saw Zuko, his excited hand gestures, the way his voice shook when he thought Zuko was mad at him.

Zuko closed his eyes. “I got a girlfriend,” he said.

“Oh!” Iroh sounded surprised, which Zuko found pretty offensive. Did his uncle think Zuko’s fucked-up face had made him too ugly to date? “Congratulations, nephew. What’s she like?”

Zuko considered the question. “She has black hair,” he said.

Iroh chuckled. “She sounds nice.”

Dating Mai was surprisingly easy, probably because she was a sophomore and didn’t have any of the same classes as Zuko, so they didn’t even have to spend that much time together. At lunch, Zuko sat with Mai and her friend Ty Lee, a freshman. Maybe it was weird that his only friends now were two girls younger than him, who were also friends with his sister, but it beat eating lunch alone. In the cafeteria, it was easier to filter out the sounds of the rest of the school when he was able to concentrate on their conversation. Well, on Ty Lee’s conversation. She was pretty talkative.

“Okay, wait, guys, I literally cannot wait for the party on Friday, oh my God, it’s going to be so much fun! I heard Arthur’s family has a pool and he’s planning on filling it with jell-o to make, like, a giant jell-o shot—”

“That won’t work,” Mai said, poking her cafeteria mashed potatoes.

“But wouldn’t it be fun if it did?! Oh, and because it’s Halloween, he’s decorating his whole house with, like, spiderwebs and skulls and stuff. You guys are going together, right?”

Zuko and Mai looked at each other.

“I don’t have a costume,” Zuko said.

“Whatever,” Mai replied. “I’m going to be Mr. Orange. You have a suit, right?”

It turned out that Mai was planning to dress up as a character from a movie called Reservoir Dogs; namely, the character who gets shot in the stomach in the second scene of the movie.

“You can be one of the other guys,” she said, showing Zuko a picture of a bunch of white men wearing suits and sunglasses. He’d never seen the movie, but he was grateful for the opportunity to wear sunglasses with a costume. By Friday, he was probably going to have to take the gauze off, and there was no way he was walking around a Halloween party with people seeing his horrible face and thinking it was a costume.

“My suit’s at home and I haven’t been back for a while,” Zuko told Mai.

“That’s okay,” she replied. “I think Azula wanted to get ready at yours, anyway.”

On Friday after school, Zuko joined the girls in their carpool, driven by Ty Lee’s housekeeper. He sat in the backseat next to Mai, who was in the middle next to Ty Lee. He thought about holding Mai’s hand but decided against it. His hands were too sweaty these days anyway. When the car reached the junior high parking lot, Azula jumped in, then turned around with a vicious smile.

“Good afternoon, ladies!”

“Hi, Azula,” Ty Lee replied. “Zuko’s here!”

“I see that,” Azula said, wryly. She grinned at Zuko. “Welcome back, brother.”

Zuko already regretted everything.

The closer the car got to Zuko’s house, the more his stomach started hurting. By the time they pulled up in the driveway, he felt like his insides had become a hundred pounds heavier. He opened the car door and stumbled out. Ty Lee waved to the housekeeper driving away, and Azula ushered everyone into the house. Zuko glimpsed the kitchen door and immediately turned to sprint up the stairs to his bedroom, where he slammed the door shut. He took a minute to breathe, back against his bedroom door, the familiar smell of his bedroom calming him down.

After he’d gotten over his stupid reaction, he went to his wardrobe and took out his suit and black tie, and slowly changed into his costume. When he was finished, he found a pair of sunglasses, which he put in his chest pocket. Zuko still hadn’t taken the gauze off, even though he had been technically supposed to remove it on Wednesday. He left his bedroom, leaving the gauze, and walked along the corridor to Azula’s room, where he could hear the girls talking. He knocked on the door.

“Come in!” Azula sang.

Zuko opened the door and saw the girls, still in their day clothes, taking costumes out of their bags.

“Oh my God, Zuko, you look sizzling hot!” Ty Lee exclaimed.

“Hey, he’s mine,” Mai said, frowning.

“He’d look better without that bandage on his face,” Azula commented, going into her en-suite bathroom with a bag of clothes. “Zuzu, you should take it off.” She closed the door.

“Is he allowed to?” Ty Lee asked.

“He’s been healed for weeks,” Azula replied through the door. “And it looks ridiculous.”

Zuko scowled. Azula had no idea what she was talking about.

“Don’t you agree, Mai?” Azula asked.

Mai shrugged. “It doesn’t matter to me,” she said, sitting on Azula’s bed. Her nonchalance irritated Zuko. She was the reason he was going to this party anyway, and it was like she didn’t even care that he was there. Without even thinking, Zuko felt for the tape holding the gauze together and unpeeled it. He unwrapped the whole bandage from around his head and tossed it in the trashcan next to Azula’s desk. Mai did not look up from her phone, but Ty Lee’s eyes widened when she saw Zuko’s bare face.

Azula exited the bathroom, dressed in a dark-red tunic and chainmail. Joan of Arc, Zuko recognized. She glanced at Zuko but didn’t react. Zuko was simultaneously relieved and annoyed by this. Maybe his scar wasn’t such a big deal. Or maybe Azula was just trying to convince Zuko it wasn’t a big deal so he would go to the party and get mocked by everyone.

“Ty Lee,” Azula said. “Your turn to change.”

Ty Lee’s costume was a flouncy, pink dress that she described as “tulle.”

“It’s from Killing Eve,” she told Zuko as the four of them walked over to the party later that night. “It’s one of the dresses Villanelle wears. She’s a serial killer!”

Mai walked next to Zuko, wearing a black suit and sunglasses like him, but with an excessive amount of fake blood on her shirt. She looked good in a suit, if a little disconcerting. Zuko was glad he’d ended up dating a girl like Mai—he didn’t think he could keep up with a girl like Ty Lee. Mai was weird and standoffish enough that Zuko felt he had some leeway in being weird and standoffish.

They heard the party before they saw it; from a block away, Zuko could feel the thumping music in his chest. When they reached Arthur’s house (Zuko still had no idea who Arthur was), there were a bunch of people standing around outside, and the front door was wide open. Even from just looking through the doorway, Zuko could see the house was dark and packed with people.

“Come on!” Azula said. Not for the first time, Zuko was astounded by how much more comfortable Azula was in high school situations, despite the fact that she wasn’t even in high school yet. Sure, she was an extremely off-putting and even terrifying presence at parties, but at least she was confident. Zuko just stood on the outskirts of everything. He hadn’t even made a friend until this year.

“I’m not going in,” Zuko said.

“What?” Mai demanded. Ty Lee looked confused, and Azula just smirked like she always did when Zuko was uncomfortable.

“I’ll go around the back,” Zuko said, quickly. “I want to see the pool.”

Then, he turned and walked around the outside of the house to the backyard, where there was a modestly sized pool and a bunch of people smoking pot. One of them was Sokka, wearing cat ears and a tail over a surprisingly tight black outfit. He was telling some story to a group of people, waving his arms to mime something ridiculous. The people listening were all laughing. They looked like they were having fun.

Zuko looked around himself, but it seemed like the girls had all gone into the house and he was alone outside. He turned his face away so Sokka wouldn’t recognize him and saw a plastic table set up on the patio, stocked with bottles of alcohol. Zuko walked toward the table, away from Sokka.

Zuko had had wine a few times, and once Iroh had let him try sake, but he felt way out of his depth here, looking at the drinks on the table. He picked up a red solo cup and peered at the label on each one, trying to decipher it through his sunglasses in the dark. Most of the bottles were things he’d heard of but never tried, like vodka or rum. Then his eyes settled on a bottle that made him snort. Fireball. How ironic, he thought, pouring himself a cup.

It didn’t take long for Zuko to feel the fireball hit his system. His stomach felt pleasantly warm, and the fact that everything seemed fuzzy and far away seemed totally normal, comforting even, like this was the way everything was supposed to be. He sat on the grass by the pool, sipping from his cup of spicy alcohol, and watched the underwater lights glimmer.

More people were coming outside now, probably because it got too hot with too many people inside. Sokka was nowhere to be seen though.

“Zuko!” a familiar, high-pitched voice called from somewhere behind him. He turned to look and saw Ty Lee, Azula, and Mai walking over to stand beside him.

“Is this where you’ve been all this time?” Azula asked, crossing her arms.

Zuko nodded. They were all so tall from here.

“Why didn’t you come inside with us?” Mai asked with an irritated expression. She crossed her arms too, which made Ty Lee also cross her arms. They all looked down at Zuko, expectantly.

“I like it better out here,” Zuko replied honestly.

“If you’re going to take a girl to a party, you should actually take her to the party,” Mai said. “Why are you so boring?”

Zuko stood up, swaying as he gained his balance. “I’m not boring,” he exclaimed, indignantly.

“This argument is boring,” Azula declared. “Let’s go back inside and dance.”

Zuko narrowed his eyes at her. Then he knocked back the rest of his cup and swallowed it in one go.

“Yes,” he said. “Let’s.”

Inside was hot, loud, and humid. There were multicolored lights that spun around and made the living room look like a disco. Zuko watched them, fascinated, until Mai pulled him to the spot where people were dancing.

“Dance,” she ordered.

Zuko nodded. He looked around at what everyone else was doing and tried to copy their movements. He closed his eyes and swayed his head, luxuriating in the feeling of the world spinning around him. Now that he was drunk, the weight of his own body did not terrify him, but reassured him. He felt light, yet grounded. He felt amazing. Zuko opened his eyes, and immediately saw the blurry outline of Sokka making out with a girl in a corner of the room.

It was like time stopped, the music, the lights, everything. Zuko felt all of the bad feeling return to his body like a wave returning to the shore. He felt like his body was about to break.

“Zuko, are you okay?” Mai asked.

Zuko ran.

He shoved his way past the other dancers and partygoers and sprinted out into the open air, where the pressure in his chest lessened slightly. He went straight to the drinks table and poured himself another cup of fireball, ears ringing from the noise of the party. He wanted to feel good again. He wanted time to turn back to when he felt good. As he was taking a sip, he heard a voice behind him yell: “What the hell is your problem?”

Zuko put the drink down and turned around.

Mai was standing on the patio, glaring at him. The blood on her shirt looked black in the darkness.

“You can’t keep ditching me,” she said. Her voice was low and furious, but Zuko wasn’t scared. He wasn’t scared of anything anymore. The worst thing that could possibly happen had happened.

“I was just getting a drink,” Zuko replied, rolling his eye.

“You’re a fucking mess,” Mai said.

Zuko laughed. “I’m a mess?” he repeated, incredulously. “Well, at least I’m not a stuck-up bitch who only pays attention to other people to make fun of them before she goes back to not caring about anyone except herself.”

Mai blinked. To Zuko’s surprise, she didn’t reply. The party around them felt quieter. And for a second, Zuko felt bad for her, until he squashed that feeling down with the rest of the terribleness he kept deep inside himself. He took another swallow of his drink.

“Don’t take it personally, Mai,” Azula said suddenly, appearing through the door between the house and the patio with an amused expression, Ty Lee behind her. “He’s just in a bad mood these days because our dad thinks he’s queer.”

Zuko dropped his cup. Fireball splashed all over his shoes and the hem of his pants, but his body was too frozen to react. The ringing in his ears grew louder.

“Azula!” Ty Lee exclaimed. “You can’t say that!”

“Say what?”

“You can’t say that word like it’s an insult,” Ty Lee told her. “It’s homophobic.”

“I’m not saying it like it’s an insult!” Azula said, throwing up her hands. “I don’t care if Zuzu is queer.”

“I’m not,” Zuko said. The words came out small and whispery because it was hard to move. He wasn’t sure if anyone heard him, if anyone was listening anymore. Then, his body released him, and he leaned over to throw up into the grass.

Zuko wasn’t sure how it happened, but Mai ended up walking him home. He walked with his arms wrapped around his stomach, trying to keep the hurt from radiating outwards. He felt totally miserable. He felt sick. Everyone at the party was talking about him now, he knew it. Zuko with the broken face. Zuko who Azula said was…

“Zuko,” Mai said, suddenly. “I’m going to be honest with you. I’m not really feeling this.”

“Do you ever feel anything?” Zuko retorted, his voice hoarse.

Mai sighed. “Hey, I get that you’re going through some shit right now or whatever, but that doesn’t excuse you treating everyone else like shit.”

This made Zuko feel somehow even worse than how he was already feeling. He didn’t have the energy to be angry about it.

“I’m sorry,” he said. He felt like he needed to say something else, but he didn’t know what, so they just walked in silence until they reached his place. He looked up at his house, looming in the darkness, and then back at Mai. Now that they were alone, it was like he was seeing her for the first time. She was almost as tall as Zuko, and her suit gave her body an angular sharpness. She’d taken off her sunglasses, and her face looked pale and clean in the moonlight. Zuko leaned forward.

“Woah, wait, what the fuck,” Mai said, taking a step backward.

Zuko crumpled. “Shit,” he muttered. “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry, I don’t know what I was—”

“I know,” Mai said. “It’s okay, Zuko.”

The street was empty and quiet.

“I’m sorry,” Zuko said again.

“I’ll see you around,” said Mai. Then she left, and Zuko went into his house to sleep in his bed for the first time in weeks.

Chapter Text

Azula woke Zuko up by blowing on his face. Zuko opened his eyes and saw his sister's face two inches away from his, staring directly at him. He yelped and pushed her away, causing her to backward-somersault off his bed, laughing as she hit the floor.

Zuko glanced at his clock and saw that it was already ten. How did he sleep in so late? His body felt gross and sweaty, his head hurt, and his mouth tasted like puke. This day was going to suck.

“Dad got breakfast from the bakery,” Azula said. “He wants you to come down and eat with us.”

Suddenly Zuko’s head started hurting even more.

“He knows I’m here?”

“Of course,” she said. “I told him. We’ve both been awake for a while.”

This was why Zuko was a morning person. Not for the first time, he glanced at his bedroom window and wondered how badly he’d actually get hurt if he jumped out.

“Come down soon,” Azula said, standing up and opening Zuko’s bedroom door. “You don’t want to keep us waiting.” Then she left.

Zuko sat up and looked down. He was still wearing his wrinkled suit from yesterday, including the blazer. No wonder he’d been sweating in his sleep. He didn’t have time to shower though, so he just changed clothes and made sure to put on an ample amount of deodorant. He also brushed his teeth quickly to get rid of that miserable taste in his mouth.

Zuko was so preoccupied with getting rid of evidence of his hangover that he barely registered that he was about to see his father again. That his father was going to see him again, the new Zuko, the ruined Zuko. He made it all the way downstairs to the kitchen door before he realized what was happening, his hand hovering above the handle like it would burn him to touch it. He heard his father on the other side, laughing at something Azula said. Zuko took a deep breath and opened the door.

In the morning light, the kitchen looked different than it had the last time he was here. Zuko kept his head turned away from the stove and moved quickly to the table, where his father and Azula were sitting around a plate of pastries. Zuko sat down in the chair with his back facing the wall, his bad eye to the kitchen area and his good eye to his family.

When Zuko sat down, Azula passed him the flattest croissant on the plate.

“Late night, Zuko?” their father asked, like Zuko hadn’t been gone for weeks and his face wasn’t an unseasoned barbecue.

Zuko flushed at the question, heat prickling the back of his neck. Was his hangover that obvious? His father didn’t seem mad though, only amused, but Zuko couldn’t trust himself to read his father’s emotions at all.

“Yes,” Zuko replied, hoping his response seemed appropriately bashful but not in an effeminate way. All he wanted was to curl up in a dark room, like Iroh’s basement.

Azula scoffed. “Zuzu hardly had a late night,” she told their father. “He and Mai left the party early!”

Their father raised an eyebrow. “You’re spending time with Mai now, Zuko?”

Azula rolled her eyes dramatically. “She’s his girlfriend,” she said. Then she stuck her tongue out in mock disgust. Their father laughed. Zuko managed to respond with a smile. Azula looked his way and grinned.

Zuko took a bite of his croissant. It tasted like dust.

As soon as their father left the kitchen, Zuko ran back upstairs to his room and called Mai. She picked up after three rings.

“Hello?”

“Please don’t tell Azula we broke up.” The words spilled out of Zuko like water.

Mai hummed down the line.

“Okay,” she said, slowly. “So first of all, you should say hello when you start a conversation with someone. Secondly, we didn’t break up because we weren’t ever in a relationship. We saw each other for four days and didn’t even go on one date. And thirdly, I already told her. She asked me about it this morning.”

Zuko fell silent. Azula knew already? God, this morning just kept getting worse.

“Is that it?” Mai prodded.

Zuko put a hand over his face. “I’m sorry,” he said. He wasn’t sure what exactly he was apologizing for, maybe he was apologizing for everything, but he felt he needed to say it.

“Okay.”

“I’m trying to be better,” Zuko said, desperately. “I’m trying… to be better.”

Mai sighed. “Yeah. Well, see you at school.”

Then she hung up. Zuko stared at his phone for a minute. He wished time would hold still for an hour, or a week, or a year. Maybe then he would have enough time to figure out what was happening and why everything always felt like it was getting worse. Maybe then he could figure out how to fix it.

“Are you going back to Iroh’s now?” asked Azula’s voice from behind him. Zuko spun around and saw his sister leaning against the doorway of his bedroom.

“How do you know I’ve been at Iroh’s?”

“You don’t have anywhere else to go,” Azula replied, breezily. “Also, he came by last week to get your stuff. I was the one who let him in.”

“Oh,” Zuko said. “Well, I haven’t decided. When are you going to tell Dad about me and Mai?”

“I haven’t decided.”

Zuko sighed. Go figure.

Azula continued standing in the doorway. Zuko looked at her, expecting her to say something else, maybe blackmail him about his supposed girlfriend.

Instead, Azula just said, “Dad’s out of the house today. You should play Battleship with me.”

Zuko blinked.

“Yeah,” he said. “Okay.”

Ordinarily, Zuko spent his weekends biking around the lake, sometimes reading in the grass, sometimes just staring at the water. Sometimes he would visit Iroh’s tea shop and do work there. He hadn’t ridden his bike since the incident, too afraid of getting hit by a car he couldn’t see. Without a bike or a car, there was nothing to do, nowhere to go.

Zuko and Azula played Battleship in the garden with the plastic travel set they’d had since they were children. Azula won every game, which was a relief because Zuko didn’t know how mad she would have gotten if he’d won any.

“I know you so well,” she crowed after her third consecutive victory. “Even when you have half a face, I can always tell when you’re hiding something from me.”

Zuko’s lip twitched. “It looks bad, doesn’t it?” Even though Azula was an almost pathological liar, he could always trust her to tell the truth if the truth was insulting enough.

To his surprise, Azula was silent for a moment.

“It looks better now than it did when you got it,” she said, finally. “You screamed a lot when it was happening, but after it happened, you just lay there, blank. I thought you were dead.”

The way she said it was so matter-of-fact, like it was something from a book. Not upsetting, or traumatizing, or real. In the garden, with the quiet breeze and the smell of roses, none of it felt real. Zuko felt a strange sense of calm in his miserable, hungover body.

Sometimes he wondered if his sister was the only person in the world who knew how to talk to him without upsetting him, even if she only used this knowledge extremely sparingly. His mind then jumped to Sokka and how careful Sokka always was with Zuko’s sore spots. He shook his head to get the thoughts of Sokka out.

“Would you have liked that?” he asked his sister. “Would you have liked it if I was dead?”

Azula shrugged. “Then I wouldn’t have anybody to beat in Battleship.”

Later that weekend, Iroh took Zuko to the hospital for a check-up appointment where it was confirmed what Zuko already knew: that he was permanently blind in his left eye. The doctor gave Zuko a pamphlet, which he had no intention of reading. In the car, afterward, Iroh waited before turning on the engine.

“Would you like to have dinner with me?” he asked Zuko.

Zuko nodded, but remained silent for the whole ride back.

What he really wanted was to be alone, but there was nowhere in the world he could be. He couldn’t go back to his father’s, he couldn’t be alone at Iroh’s, he couldn’t ride his bike to the lake. He wished he had a car so he could drive it far away, into the Appalachian Mountains, and scream where no one could hear him.

Sokka has a car, a terrible voice inside him said.

Even if Zuko wanted to see Sokka again, there was no way Sokka wanted to see Zuko.

At school, Sokka was avoiding Zuko. Zuko was both grateful and hurt about this. Zuko saw Sokka in half of his classes, but they sat separately from each other without even making eye contact. People were scared of Zuko now, which was pretty convenient, if a little lonely. No one even tried to sit in the back-left corner of classrooms anymore and absolutely no one mentioned the Halloween party in his presence.

Although he wasn’t dating Mai anymore, he still spent his lunch periods with her and Ty Lee. At first, it was a little awkward, but eventually it was like Mai and Ty Lee barely even noticed Zuko was there. Which was a relief. He was tired of being noticed.

Unfortunately, just because Zuko could fade into the background during his free periods, he was still painfully visible in class. Sitting in the back row, no students could see him, but he could feel his teacher’s eyes trip over his face as they scanned their classrooms for raised hands—he watched them become frightened of him again.

When Zuko first arrived at Sage as a freshman, teachers would be suspiciously nice toward him, nicer than they were to most other kids, probably because they’d heard horror stories about Zuko’s father. After a few months, they loosened up and began treating Zuko like any other student. But now they seemed unsettled by him again, which in turn unsettled Zuko and made him irritable.

After English Literature on Wednesday, one of Zuko’s more enjoyable classes, his teacher pulled him aside and asked to speak with him. When everyone else had filed out of the room, she leaned against her desk and asked: “Are you doing alright, Zuko?”

Shockingly, this was the first time a teacher had asked him this since the incident.

“Yes, I’m fine, thanks.”

“I’ve noticed your homework hasn’t been up to your usual quality these days,” his teacher continued. “Is everything okay at home?”

Zuko bit the inside of his cheek, then smiled. “Yes, everything’s fine. I’m sorry. I’ll try to do better.”

It was his stupid fucking eyesight. They were reading Moby-Dick and Zuko could barely concentrate on reading a page before his eye started watering and his head hurt. It was so frustrating he sometimes ended up throwing the book across the room. Zuko had been an avid reader and now he was barely literate.

“I believe that you’re trying,” his teacher said. “I know you, Zuko, and you’re a good student. I want you to know that you don’t have to try alone.”

Zuko frowned. “Yes,” he said. “That’s why I’m at school.”

His teacher smiled and shook her head. “I want you to attend a tutoring session.”

Zuko blanched. “I can try harder!” he told her. “I’m sorry.”

“I appreciate that,” his teacher said. “But you either attend a tutoring session or receive a failing grade for your most recent assignment.”

Zuko could not afford to fail a class. He was already on thin ice, catching up on all the work he missed during his week of absences, and he needed to keep his GPA at a firm 3.8 or else he wasn’t going to get accepted to a good college somewhere interesting and very, very far away.

Zuko swallowed and nodded. “Okay,” he said.

Zuko had been staying at Iroh’s all week, mostly because it was slightly closer to school, and Zuko was still not ready to try cycling again. Most mornings, Iroh could drive Zuko to school on his way to the tea shop anyway. It was just more convenient for Zuko to stay away from his father’s house these days.

Instead of walking straight to Iroh’s from school today, Zuko decided to go to the Jasmine Dragon to catch up on some work. The walk to New Brunswick was long, but he was trying to get used to this, the slowness. Everything took him longer now. He was training his patience.

Zuko entered the tea shop, and the bell above the door announced his arrival. Iroh, who was working behind the counter, smiled widely when he saw Zuko. “Nephew!” he greeted, as Zuko walked over. “How kind of you to visit me at work. Isn’t my nephew the sweetest?” He turned to Jin, a college student who worked in the shop part-time. Jin blushed. Zuko tried not to react to this, but his ears were heating up from the attention.

“I just need a place to do homework,” he told Iroh. Then he looked around and saw that every table was occupied with customers. “But I see you’re very busy today. I’ll just go.”

“Nonsense!’ Iroh said. “You came all this way. Let me introduce you to one of my regulars, and you can sit with her.”

Iroh walked around the counter and ushered Zuko over to a table by the window where a young girl was sitting alone. Zuko looked at her closely and realized it was one of the kids Sokka drove to school.

“Toph,” Iroh said. “This is my nephew, Zuko. Is it alright if he sits with you to study?”

Toph took a sip of her tea and smacked her lips. Iroh nodded at Zuko, smiling. Apparently, that was a yes? Zuko sat down across from Toph and took out his battered copy of Moby-Dick, as Iroh walked back behind the counter and started taking customer orders again.

“Zuko, huh?” Toph repeated.

“Yes, I think we—”

“I hear you got your eye busted,” Toph said, grinning.

Zuko blinked. “Um.”

“Sokka said you got a crazy scar,” Toph continued. Then she pouted. “I wish I had a cool scar.”

Zuko couldn’t believe how rude this kid was. Toph took another gulp of tea. “You can still see, right?”

“Well, I—” Zuko began.

“BECAUSE YOU SURE CAN’T SEE LEFT!” Toph roared, slapping the table. She held her stomach and cackled.

Zuko wondered how much trouble he would get in if he threw his book at a twelve-year-old in public. He clenched his fists and looked over at Iroh, who was totally immersed in an interaction with another customer.

“It is the left eye that’s fucked up, right?” Toph asked.

“Have they not taught you left from right at junior high yet?” Zuko retorted.

Toph brought a hand to her face and raised the thick bangs that were covering her eyes. Her eyes were glassy and turned in slightly different directions. She was blind. How had Zuko not noticed this before?

“Oh,” Zuko said. “I didn’t realize.”

“You were quite insensitive,” Toph said, stiffly.

“I’m sorry,” said Zuko, abashed.

Then Toph leaned her head back and cackled again. “I’m just fucking with you! God, you’re easy.” Then, more seriously, she said: “You’re the first blind person I’ve met.”

Her seriousness took Zuko aback. “I’m not very blind,” he said. “But I guess I am, a little bit.” He was nervous saying it out loud, like admitting he was half-blind was going to suddenly cause his other eye to stop working too.

“Have you found your hearing’s improved since?” Toph asked.

Zuko thought about it. “Not really.”

“It might,” she told him. “I was born blind, but I think it made my hearing better. Like, I can usually tell if people are coming up to me, depending on which shoes they’re wearing.”

Zuko nodded. That sounded like a useful skill. Even before the incident, he’d had a lot of anxiety about people sneaking up on him without him noticing.

“Have you been able to get away with shit now?” Toph asked.

Zuko snorted. “I don’t think I’ve ever been able to get away with shit,” he said, thinking about how he always used to get blamed for Azula’s mischief when they were kids.

“That’s not what I’ve heard,” Toph said. “Sokka says you’ve been terrorizing half the junior year.”

“He said that?” Did Sokka think Zuko was a bad person now?

“I know, right?” Toph said. “When I first met you, I thought you were kind of a wimp. It’s cool that you’re a criminal now.”

“Criminal?” Zuko repeated, indignantly. “I threatened, like…” He thought for a moment. “Six crimes. I threatened to commit six crimes. But I’ve never actually done a crime.”

“Would you like to?” Toph asked.

Zuko glanced over at his uncle, who was now talking to Jin.

“Because when you’re blind, no one suspects you of shit,” Toph continued. She knocked back the rest of her tea. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s take a walk.”

Toph had a white cane that she waved in front of her as she walked. It skittered against the pavement and made a cool sound. People moved out of the way when she and Zuko walked along, which, if he’d been alone, would have made Zuko feel offended, like people were grossed out by his face. But when people parted around him and Toph, he felt… powerful.

When they entered the Wal-Mart around the block, the employee at the door greeted them: “Hi! Welcome to Wal-Mart! Please let us know if you need any help.”

“Thank you so much!” Toph replied, her voice a semitone higher than usual. Zuko just smiled and nodded.

“That was uncharacteristically polite,” he commented, once they were out of earshot and walking down an aisle.

“I’m only a dick to people who make a living wage,” she replied.

“But you’re a dick to me!”

“So get a real job, trust fund slut.”

Zuko didn’t know how to respond to a twelve-year-old calling him a slut in the candy aisle of a New Brunswick Wal-Mart, so he didn’t. Toph continued walking, smacking her cane across the aisle and hitting the shelves on either side. As she walked, she ran a hand across the shelves, sometimes flicking a finger to push a candy bar into her sleeve. It was impressively well-coordinated, like she’d been doing this for years. Zuko eyed the discount Halloween candy but felt too nervous to take any.

When they reached the end of the aisle, Toph turned the corner and took Zuko down the makeup aisle. Then they went down the breakfast aisle. When they were done, Toph picked up a bag of M&Ms and brought it to the self-checkout to pay. When she’d swiped the barcode, Zuko grabbed a bag of Reese’s Pieces from the hook behind the machine and placed it on top of the M&Ms without scanning it. Toph didn’t say anything, but she grinned when she heard the rustle of candy.

Then the machine started beeping. “Unknown item in the bagging area,” a female voice said. Fuck.

Zuko immediately started sweating. His heart began to beat faster. God, he was such a fucking idiot. He was going to get arrested. He was going to prison and no one would even know because he didn’t have any phone numbers memorized for his one phone call.

A Wal-Mart employee came over. Zuko held his breath and did not move. The employee swiped her badge on the machine, which immediately stopped beeping. She smiled at Toph and said: “Enjoy the candy, sweetheart.” Then she walked away.

Toph inserted a five-dollar bill into the machine and got back a bunch of coins in change. Zuko and Toph left the Wal-Mart and entered the warm, busy air of the high street. Zuko was holding the stolen candy to his beating heart. He felt dizzy with excitement. He felt cooler than he’d ever felt before.

“Holy shit!” he said to Toph. He’d actually stolen something!

“Let’s move it,” she replied, striding away down the street and back toward the Jasmine Dragon. When they arrived, their table had been taken by another customer and there weren’t any other available seats, so they sat on the curb outside, marveling at their bounty.

In Toph’s lap were: the M&Ms, a granola bar, a small bag of candy corn, two Butterfingers, and a bottle of nail polish. In Zuko’s lap was his one perfect bag of Reese’s Pieces. The orange plastic shone in the sun.

“What would you have done if we’d been caught?” Zuko asked Toph, popping a Reese’s Piece into his mouth. It was the most delicious piece of candy he’d ever had.

Toph shrugged. “Probably said that you were my babysitter and you’d convinced me to do it.”

Zuko choked on his chocolate. Toph laughed.

“You should meet my sister,” Zuko said.

Zuko wasn’t sure what it said about his own maturity level, considering how much older than Toph he was, but spending time with her was much easier than spending time with most other kids. Maybe it was because she couldn’t see his scar, or that his inability to see properly wasn’t an issue for her, or maybe it was because she reminded him of Azula, back when he and Azula got along.

Toph picked up the bottle of nail polish from her lap and held it out to Zuko.

“What color is this?” she asked.

“It’s blue.”

Toph groaned. “I wanted green. You should take it.”

Zuko frowned. “I don’t wear nail polish.”

“Neither do I,” Toph said. “Makes my hands feel weird. You should take it though. Consider it a gift.”

Zuko took the bottle and held it up to the light. It was a vibrant blue, slightly shimmery. It reminded him of Sokka’s front door.

“Thanks,” he said, pocketing the nail polish. He’d keep it at Iroh’s. For decoration.

When Toph’s actual babysitter came to pick her up, Toph gave Zuko her phone number, saying: “If you ever want to go shopping for seeing-eye dogs, hit me up.”

Zuko programmed the number into his phone, strangely satisfied that his contact list had grown by one whole other person.

Zuko’s first tutoring session was after school the next day. His teacher had told him to go to the English classroom at four, and the tutor would meet him there. Zuko arrived before the tutor, which meant he had the daunting prospect of deciding where in the classroom to sit. He settled on a desk nearer the door, moving the chair so he could see anyone who entered. Not a minute later, someone opened the classroom door.

Zuko recognized her. He didn’t have any classes with her, but as the former captain of the soccer team, Zuko had a peripheral knowledge of all the other student athletes at Sage. His new tutor was a nationally ranked varsity taekwondo fighter and also the editor of the school newspaper.

“Zuko, right?” the tutor greeted. “I’m Suki.”

Zuko nodded at her, and she pulled a chair up to sit across from him at the desk.

“So, tell me,” Suki said, removing a dog-eared copy of Moby-Dick from her bag. “Did you read the chapters or not?”

Zuko flushed.

“I’m not here to judge!” Suki promised. “I just need to know how I can best help you with the class.”

In Zuko’s head, he heard his teacher threaten to give him a failing grade again.

“I didn’t,” he admitted, embarrassed.

“Okay, that’s fine. So—"

“It’s not that I didn’t try,” Zuko added, hastily.

Suki smiled diplomatically. “Of course,” she said.

“But it’s been… challenging.”

“Melville is really hard to understand,” Suki replied, sympathetically.

“No, I mean, the text is just too fucking small!” Zuko interrupted. His neck felt hot. He felt immediately embarrassed and guilty for exploding, but Suki hadn’t even twitched at his outburst. Zuko wondered, if he was also one of the most successful young martial artists in the country, he would be able to keep his cool when people raised their voices around him.

“Do you think you might need glasses?” Suki asked.

Zuko snorted. “I don’t think glasses are going to reattach my optical nerve.”

“Yeah, no shit,” Suki replied. “But they might help your other eye cope. There are also large-text versions of the book you can buy if the text in your copy is too small. Have you looked into audiobooks?”

Zuko shook his head.

“I have a blind friend and she uses audiobooks for most of her readings,” Suki continued. “And a Braille-translator, but I don’t know if that would be as helpful for you.”

“Is your friend Toph?”

“You know her?”

“Yeah, yesterday, we—I mean, yeah, she’s cool.”

“Yeah, she is,” Suki said, warmly. “Shall we get started, then?”

For the next two hours, Suki would read a paragraph of text aloud, and then she and Zuko would talk about it. They went through half a chapter just like that. It was kind of fun, once Zuko got over how weird it was that someone else was reading aloud to him. Suki was smart, and clearly had way more knowledge and critical opinions about the book than Zuko, but she still asked Zuko what he thought about the book’s weird form and the characters within it. Zuko had a surprisingly good time with the novel, and he found himself looking forward to going home and downloading an audiobook version so he could keep reading.

Around six, Suki checked her watch and told Zuko the session was over.

“Okay,” Zuko replied, almost disappointed, but relieved that he wouldn’t be receiving a failing grade that week.

“Are you going to the game after this?” Suki asked him, packing up her stuff.

“The what?”

“The soccer game,” Suki said. “First game of the season. Don’t you want to see your old team play?”

Zuko fidgeted in his seat. He was so out of the loop he hadn’t even realized the season had started yet. He didn’t even know who had replaced him as captain. The idea of seeing Sokka again was so painful he wasn’t sure if he could take it.

“Sure,” he told Suki. “I’ll go.”

No one really went to Sage soccer games, mostly because their team had never been very good and there wasn’t really a culture for it. Most students at Sage were concerned with academics over athletics. That being said, there was always a decent crowd of spectators at the first game of the season, maybe about a hundred people, including the competing team’s supporters. Zuko followed Suki up the left-hand side of the bleachers until they reached a spot on the bench a few feet away from everyone else.

“Did you always come to soccer games?” Zuko asked Suki. It wasn’t like he ever paid attention to who was in the bleachers—no one ever came for him, since he’d always refused to tell Iroh when his games were.

Suki shook her head. “I’m here for my friend,” she said. “Sokka—he’s the new captain.”

Zuko’s heart hurt. “He is?”

“Yup,” Suki confirmed. She was looking at Zuko carefully, and Zuko wondered what Sokka had told her about him, if anything.

“That’s great,” Zuko said, keeping his voice as level as possible. “He deserves that. He’s a great player.”

Both teams started trickling onto the field. Zuko spotted Sokka almost immediately—he was one of the only people of color on the team and the only one with long hair, which he had tied up in his typical ponytail. Zuko watched Sokka walk across the field, talking to the rest of the team with large hand gestures. This was the longest Zuko had been able to look at Sokka in a month, and he felt both fortunate and guilty that he was able to do so without Sokka looking back. Beside him, Suki was taking a picture of Sokka on her phone. Zuko looked over her shoulder and watched her text it to a group chat with the caption: “LOOK AT HIM GO!!!”

Look at him go. The game was dynamic and thrilling to watch. Zuko hadn’t actually watched a game of soccer in a long time, and he’d forgotten how enthralling it was to watch his team scramble across the pitch, bouncing the ball between them, getting closer and closer to the goal. At half-time, the players on the field were drenched in sweat, and Zuko looked down to see his hands were also shiny and red from being clenched for the past forty-five minutes. On his right, Suki was grinning and texting again. For a moment, Zuko let himself imagine being a member of their circle and a recipient of pictures of Sokka.

During half-time, he watched Sokka stretch his legs on the grass, touching his toes with long, muscular arms. He watched Sokka lean his head back to drink from his water bottle, the evening light falling across his face. He watched Sokka turn to look at Zuko, make eye contact, smile, wave.

Zuko’s heart stopped. He felt like his arms might float away from his body. He turned to Suki and saw that she was waving back, and he felt all the weight return to his body. Of course, Sokka wasn’t waving at Zuko, but at his friend Suki. Zuko sighed. He would have been mad at Suki if it wasn’t so excruciatingly obvious how much worthier of Sokka’s friendship she was. He bit his lip and tried to be happy for them.

Luckily, half-time ended soon after, which meant Zuko could distract himself by watching the game. The second half was even more exciting than the first, with both teams getting more ruthless and aggressive in their plays. The teams were well-matched (Zuko remembered and respected the Lotuses from last year’s season), and it wasn’t until ten minutes before the end of the game that someone scored. That someone was Sokka. Of course. When the ball hit the back of the net, he threw his arms into the air and yelled to the sky. The Sage supporters in the bleachers all stood up and yelled with him. Suki was losing her shit, waving her arms around and screaming with joy. Zuko stood with her. He raised his arms and let out a tentative yell. Suki looked over and laughed at Zuko’s restraint. She grabbed his hands, got right up into his face, and screamed. Zuko screamed back, first out of shock, and then out of the joy of screaming. Together, they shrieked on the bleachers, celebrating the goal with everyone else in collective euphoria.

When the game was over and Sage had won, Zuko and Suki cheered until their throats were hoarse.

“This was fun,” Suki said to Zuko, as everyone started leaving the bleachers.

“I agree,” Zuko replied. He felt light-headed and relaxed, like he’d screamed out all his anxiety. “We should do this again.”

“There’s another game the week after Thanksgiving!” Suki told him. “It’s an away game, so we’d have to figure out how to get there.”

“I’ll figure it out,” Zuko replied. “I want to go.”

Suki gave him her phone number, which brought Zuko’s list of contacts to a round ten, if he included his own and his dentist’s.

As Zuko was leaving the field to walk back to Iroh’s, he heard someone run up through the grass behind him. He turned around, expecting to maybe see Suki again, but instead he found himself face to face with Sokka’s younger sister, Katara. She must have been here watching her brother play, but Zuko couldn’t see Sokka nearby. Katara was glaring at Zuko, her blue eyes almost glowing in the late evening.

“I told you not to hurt him,” she said.

Wouldn’t it be funny if Zuko survived everything that had happened this autumn just to get murdered by a kid from the junior high? Then he took a closer look at Katara and was horrified to notice the hurt in her expression, underlying her anger. He felt awful.

“I know,” he told her, seriously. “I’m sorry.” Sometimes it felt like Zuko was never going to stop needing to apologize.

“If you’re sorry you should tell him yourself,” Katara replied, still glowering.

“Okay,” Zuko said, already knowing that he wouldn’t, hating himself for it. He wasn’t ever speaking to Sokka again. This was going to be just another promise he’d have to break.

Katara nodded, but she still looked like she had something else to say. She was almost vibrating with it. Finally, she asked: “Also, like are you okay?”

“Uh.” That was not what Zuko was expecting she’d say.

“Azula’s been acting weird at school,” Katara continued.

Zuko’s blood ran cold. “She hasn’t hurt anyone, has she?” he asked.

Katara shook her head, her hair loops swinging against her face. “No, she’s just been quieter than usual.”

Zuko nodded. He was glad no one was hurt, but this still wasn’t good news. Zuko had never known his sister to be quiet.

“I’ll check on her,” he told Katara.

There was a pause. Katara looked like she was going to leave, which made Zuko panic. He knew he wasn’t going to get this chance again.

“Is Sokka okay?” he said, suddenly.

Katara frowned. “What do you mean?”

Zuko took a deep breath. “Like is he okay? Is he doing okay? Is he enjoying school and the area? Is he enjoying being captain? Is he happy? Is he okay?” His heart was shuddering in his chest.

Katara looked at Zuko with an unreadable expression. Zuko knew he sounded desperate, crazy even, but he couldn’t bring himself to regret asking this. Not yet.

“Yeah,” Katara said, finally. “He’s going to be okay.”

Which wasn’t the answer Zuko wanted, but he realized he wasn’t going to get the answer he wanted. Not from Katara, anyway. So he let out the breath he’d been holding, thanked Katara, and walked away, heading into the darkness to walk back to Iroh’s alone.

Chapter Text

When Zuko got back to Iroh’s after the soccer game, he felt like he should text Azula, but he didn’t know what he would say. They didn’t really have the kind of sibling relationship that involved texting, unless it involved blackmail. So instead he called her from Iroh’s garden where there was better signal.

It took six rings before Azula picked up and asked: “Why are you calling me?”

Over the phone, she couldn’t hide behind make-up or unsettling facial expressions. She sounded so much younger.

“I just wanted to see how you’re doing,” Zuko replied, then cringed at how awkward he sounded. How did normal brothers talk to their sisters?

“I see,” Azula said, mirth lacing her voice.

“I haven’t been home in a while,” Zuko continued.

“Oh, I know,” Azula said.

“So I thought—"

“What, did you think I would miss you?” Azula asked, incredulously.

Zuko clenched his phone in irritation. “No, I mean—”

Azula started laughing: a high, mean, fourteen-year-old laugh. And she did not stop laughing until Zuko hung up.

Well, he thought. Nothing unusual there.

That week, Zuko started waking up at dawn again to walk to school. On Suki’s recommendation, he listened to audiobooks on his walks, which was something he could never do on his bike rides. It calmed him to begin each school day like this, alone and outside with a book to distract him from his thoughts.

Although Zuko had only been required to take one tutoring session with Suki, he was surprised to find out that she was interested in hanging out with him as a friend. They ended up seeing each other at weird times, tacitly avoiding lunch breaks and after school because that was when Sokka and Suki hung out. But when Sokka had soccer practice, Zuko and Suki took walks around the neighborhood, sharing a bag of Flaming Hot Funyuns and talking about books. Zuko could never bond with anybody about movies or music (his family never really used their television and he’d inherited his music taste from his mother—1980s city pop wasn’t a super popular genre at Sage), but he knew books.

“You know, the school paper is looking for a new arts editor,” Suki told Zuko, holding out her hand to take back the Funyuns. “You should apply.”

“Oh,” Zuko said, a little taken aback, handing her the bag. “Sure. I don’t know anything about art though.”

“Art is just anything from books to music to theater,” Suki said. “It might be fun to try. Also, I’m graduating early, so I’m gonna need a strong team to take over the paper when I’m gone.”

“You are?”

“Yeah, I’m applying to a bunch of colleges now,” Suki replied. “My dream would be studying journalism in New York.”

Of course Suki was graduating early. She was smart and cool and knew all sorts of weird skills like carpentry and cutting hair. She was going to kill it in New York.

Zuko couldn’t help but feel a little abandoned, knowing that his friend was probably going to leave at the end of the year, but he tried not to let it upset him. He relaxed his jaw and flexed the tension out of his hands. It really felt like he spent about 80% of his energy trying not to be upset by things, and 20% of his energy trying not to bump into objects he couldn’t see.

He considered Suki’s proposal. Joining the paper was an interesting idea, now that he didn’t have soccer practice to fill his time, but he still was finding it hard to look at screens or written text for any extended amount of time. Maybe he’d apply later, once things had settled.

The next day was a Friday, which meant Suki and Sokka were hanging out after school and Zuko was at the Jasmine Dragon, trying to study. Toph was here, which was fine, since she usually just sat at the table and let Zuko do his own thing, but today she had a friend with her.

“Hi!” the kid said, grinning and holding out his hand, when Zuko sat down. “I’m Aang.”

“I know,” Zuko replied, shaking Aang’s hand. “We’ve met.”

“No, we didn’t,” Aang said.

Zuko frowned. “Okay.”

“This is Zuko,” Toph told Aang, as though they hadn’t all met together in Sokka’s car last month. “He’s going to help me commit acts of treason.”

“I am?” Zuko asked, at the same time that Aang said: “You know, if you’re actually planning an act of treason, maybe you should talk about that in private.”

“Well, we’re not,” Zuko said, scowling.

Toph pouted. “We never do anything fun together.”

Zuko took out his math textbook and ignored her. Toph turned to Aang and the two of them proceeded to have the most incoherent conversation Zuko had ever witnessed.

Toph: “While crows are chaotic and I respect them, I do not think they can be counted as criminals as they don’t follow human standards of behavior.”

Aang: “I don’t want to talk about gangsters.”

Toph: “What about crimes against animals?”

Aang: “You are making this very difficult.”

Zuko was trying very hard to focus on differential equations, but he found himself getting drawn into their conversation. He put down his pen and looked up at the two kids. “What the hell are you guys talking about?”

“We have to give a presentation for English class,” Aang explained. “We can choose any topic, but we have to talk about it together for ten minutes for a public speaking grade.”

“Twinkle Toes here wants to talk about nature, and I want to talk about crime,” Toph said.

Zuko hummed. “What about ecoterrorism?” he suggested.

Aang cocked his head to one side. “What’s that?”

“It’s, like, a type of environmental activism that uses violence or property damage. Like, destroying a fracking site.”

“You can do that?” Toph asked in an uncharacteristically hushed voice. Her face was widening into a ghoulish grin. Perhaps this was a mistake.

“Well, you shouldn’t,” Zuko said. Then he reconsidered his stance. “I mean, you shouldn’t.”

“Oh, I won’t,” Toph said, still smiling.

Zuko prayed he wouldn’t be asked to recount this conversation during a future criminal trial.

Aang and Toph both seemed pretty enthused by Zuko’s suggestion, and the two kids spent the rest of the afternoon Googling various incidents of ecoterrorism on Aang’s phone and making voice memos in Toph’s. Zuko managed to finish his problem set earlier than he’d expected, so he left the kids in the tea shop and started to walk back to Iroh’s.

When Zuko was midway in his journey, his audiobook paused and he heard a ping through his headphones. Zuko took his phone out of his pocket, expecting to see a text from Iroh or maybe Suki. To his shock, a text from Azula lit up his lock screen.

Azula: You should come home.

Zuko didn’t even hesitate. He started running.

He reached his house about thirty minutes later, chest heaving, the taste of blood in his mouth. He wrenched open the front door and didn’t even take his shoes off. His whole body felt like a coiled fist.

“Azula?” Zuko called. His voice echoed in the hallway.

“I’m here,” Azula called back from the first-floor bathroom. Zuko kept walking until he reached the open door of the bathroom, where Azula was standing, alone, facing the doorway.

The first thing Zuko noticed was that Azula had cut her hair—what had previously been her typical shoulder-length haircut was now a choppy mess. It looked like she’d attempted to give herself bangs and a trim but had done it too hastily. The second thing Zuko noticed was the broken glass all over the floor.

“Thank God you’re here,” Azula said, but she didn’t sound relieved. She was looking directly at Zuko, unblinking. In her hands were a pair of scissors.

“What’s going on?” Zuko asked, his heart still hammering in his chest from the run. He took a step forward, and his sneakers crunched on the glass that surrounded Azula. It was then that he realized they were mirror shards, and the mirror above the sink had been completely smashed.

“Dad will be home any second,” Azula said. She looked down at the broken shards around her bare feet. “He’s going to be disappointed again.”

Zuko swallowed. “That’s okay,” he said. “I’ll help you clean this up.”

“No.” Azula raised her arm, pointing the scissors directly at Zuko. “You don’t get to do that.”

“Do what?” Zuko asked. He’d never seen Azula like this. She looked afraid.

“You can’t fix it,” Azula said, her voice high and strained. “You’re the one who ruins things.”

“I don’t ruin things,” Zuko replied.

Azula blinked. “Do you think it’s easy being perfect all the time?” she demanded. Her hand holding the scissors started shaking.

Zuko felt like his heart might break his ribs.

“I’m—”

“Just tell Dad it was you,” Azula said, suddenly.

“What?”

“What’s the worst that could happen?” Azula laughed. “You’re already a disappointment.”

Zuko grimaced. “I’m not doing that.”

“Just tell Dad you broke the fucking mirror,” Azula said, her voice rising in desperation.

Zuko flinched, but he kept eye contact with his sister. “No.”

Azula scoffed. The blade of the scissors shone in the light. “You’re so fucking selfish, Zuzu.”

Azula lunged, and it was like time slowed down. Without even thinking, Zuko dodged around her. Azula kept falling forward, pair of scissors in her outstretched hand, and Zuko grabbed her from behind to stop her fall. The scissors clattered to the floor. Azula started thrashing and screaming, but Zuko was hugging her tightly, pinning her arms to her sides. She kicked his shins, hard enough to bruise, but he didn’t let go, just sank to the floor with her. Eventually, she went limp, and her shrieks broke into sobs.

Zuko didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know how to let go.

After some time, he had no idea how long, he heard the familiar sound of his dad’s car coming up the driveway. Zuko felt like his chest might implode. He looked down at Azula, who wasn’t moving, just staring into space.

“Azula,” he whispered. “We have to go.”

She didn’t reply. She didn’t even look like she’d heard him.

Zuko heard the garage door creak open. It sounded like knuckles cracking.

For what felt like the first time ever, Zuko knew what to do.

Azula barely reacted when he picked her up, holding her out in front of him like an offering. She was lighter than he’d expected, and terrifyingly fragile. Zuko walked down the hallway to the French doors leading into the backyard, then into the neighbors’ yard. He carried his sister as far down the road as he could before his arms started shaking. He gently placed her onto the lawn of a neighbor’s backyard and, with trembling hands, took out his phone to call Iroh.

Iroh arrived ten minutes later. He helped Zuko move Azula to the front seat of his car. She was as silent as a doll. When Zuko was closing the car door, he noticed the soles of her feet were stained with blood.

At Iroh’s, Zuko carried Azula to the couch, while Iroh attended to the pork he’d been roasting in the oven.

“Uncle, her feet,” Zuko said. His voice felt hoarse.

Iroh turned away from the kitchen area and walked over to Azula. He inspected her feet and tsked.

“Can you take care of dinner,” Iroh requested. Zuko nodded.

As Iroh went to the bathroom to retrieve the first aid kit, Zuko moved to the oven. This was the first time since the incident that Zuko had even gone near a stove, but he refused to let himself think about that. He focused on the individual tasks ahead of him: spooning rice from the rice cooker into individual bowls, using a tea towel to take the pork out of the oven, turning the oven off. Iroh was finishing wrapping Azula’s feet when Zuko brought dinner to the table. He glanced at his sister, who was sitting on the couch with glassy eyes, tears sliding down her mascara-stained face.

He had been scared of his sister for most of his childhood, but this was the most scared he’d ever been.

While Zuko and Iroh sat down and started eating, Azula picked up a spoon, slowly. She raised it to her face and looked at her reflection in the convex side.

“I’m ugly,” she said, breaking the silence.

“No, you’re not,” Zuko replied, forcefully.

“Wrong again, Zuzu,” Azula said. Her voice was distant and unaffected. “I’ve made myself ugly.”

Then she shoved her spoon into her bowl of rice and started to eat.

After dinner, when Iroh was clearing the table, Azula kept her spoon, continuing to look into it with a small frown. Zuko felt harshly reminded of himself when he first came to Iroh’s after the incident, when he oscillated between avoiding mirrors and forcing himself to look at them, punishing himself with his own reflection. There was no denying that vanity ran in the family. But while there was nothing anyone could do to fix Zuko’s face, he could do something to help Azula.

He left his sister and uncle in the house and walked out into the garden. He took out his phone, scrolled through his contact list, and pressed dial.

“Zuko?” a surprised voice said through his phone.

“Hi, Suki,” Zuko greeted. “Do you do house calls? I have an emergency.”

Suki arrived a few minutes later in a familiar grey car. Zuko’s heart stopped when he watched it pull up to Iroh’s driveway. Suki got out quickly, a satchel over her shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” she told Zuko. “This was the fastest way I could get here.”

Zuko nodded, his face feeling warm despite the cool evening air. In the driver’s seat, Sokka was sitting with his hands still gripping the steering wheel. He looked up at Zuko through the windshield with a stoic expression, like he was waiting for Zuko to tell him to leave.

 Zuko blinked.

“Why don’t you both come inside,” he said.

When the three teenagers entered the house, Iroh was doing the dishes and Azula was still sitting on the couch, staring at her reflection in her spoon. She put the spoon down on the coffee table when she saw them, eyeing Suki and Sokka suspiciously.

“Who are they?” she demanded.

Zuko bit his lip. He was definitely taking a risk here, and he wasn’t sure if it was going to pay off.

“This is Suki and Sokka,” he told Azula. “They’re my friends.” He felt a little bad about saying Sokka was his friend, considering he’d been avoiding Sokka for a month, but it seemed like a bad idea to get into that right now.

Azula glared at Zuko.

“Since when do you have friends?”

Suki and Sokka shifted uncomfortably at that, but Zuko had never felt more relieved to hear his sister insult him.

“I’ve been cutting my friends’ hair for two years,” Suki said, gesturing to her satchel, which presumably held her hair cutting supplies. “Zuko said you—”

“I’m not your friend,” Azula interrupted, crossing her arms.

Suki crossed her arms, too. “Not with that attitude,” she responded, absolutely unfazed by Azula’s rudeness.

Zuko held his breath, watching Azula’s face carefully for a reaction. Azula only blinked. Then, miraculously, she made a noise that was half-way between a scoff and a snort.

“Okay,” Azula said, standing up and facing Suki down. “Fine. Are you gonna give me a makeover, or what?”

After Suki and Azula went into the bathroom to fix Azula’s hair, Zuko and Sokka stood awkwardly in the middle of the living room. Iroh had finished doing the dishes and was now wiping the counters.

Zuko looked at Sokka, who was fiddling with the sleeves of his hoodie.

“Let’s go outside,” Zuko said.

The whole garden was blue with the evening light. Zuko led Sokka away from the windows, to Iroh’s herb garden. He had no idea what he was doing or what he was planning on saying, but like always, Sokka seemed to have a plan.

“I’ve missed you,” Sokka said, suddenly. It was a confession without fanfare or emotion. Just a bare truth.

Zuko faltered. He wanted to say it back. Sokka deserved him saying it back. He opened his mouth and found himself saying: “My dad thought we were dating.”

Sokka’s blue eyes widened. “What.”

“That’s why I didn’t want to see you,” Zuko said. He looked down at the ground to avoid looking at Sokka. “He thought we were dating and he… he told me to stop seeing you.”

There was a moment of silence. Zuko glanced back at Sokka, whose mouth was slightly agape. His front teeth were resting softly on his bottom lip.

“Why did he think that?” Sokka asked, finally.

Zuko nervously licked his lips. “He read my diary and found it… complimentary.”

“Complimentary?” Sokka repeated, and Zuko was both horrified and pleased to see that Sokka was smiling now.

“Alright, shut up.” Zuko was smiling, too, now.

“But we weren’t dating,” Sokka said. He sounded frustrated.

“Right!”

“We’re just two dudes who love to grapple in the mud and sweat of the soccer field at dusk,” Sokka continued.

Zuko laughed, hoping it was too dark for Sokka to see his face heat up at the joke. “Right.”

“Not that there’s anything funny about guys dating!” Sokka said, waving his hands. “Like, I’m not homophobic. But that wasn’t what we were doing.”

“Right,” Zuko said, again.

“I’m not homophobic!” Sokka insisted, which was strange because Zuko hadn’t really thought that Sokka would be. “I’m actually… a guy who dates guys.”

Zuko’s brain blue-screened. The shiso fidgeted in the wind.

“You are?” The words came out as a whisper.

“Well, not yet, not really. I mean, like, one day, maybe.” Sokka was wringing his hands uncomfortably. “I haven’t dated a guy yet, so who knows, you know?”

“Uh-huh,” Zuko said.

“Is that… okay?”

“Yes!” Zuko replied, far too loudly. Flushing, he added: “You know, I’m not homophobic either. It was just my father.”

“Of course,” Sokka responded, nodding. “We’re just two non-homophobic dudes who love to have emotional conversations in gardens at night.”

Zuko laughed. It felt like it was bursting from his chest. “Exactly!”

Sokka laughed, too, then looked down at his hands, biting his lip again.

“You know,” he said, slowly. “When you were leaving my house and you held my hand, I kind of thought you were coming on to me.”

Zuko swallowed. “Really?”

“Yeah.” Sokka kept looking at his hands and didn’t say anything else.

“I guess it was kind of a weird thing to do,” Zuko said, self-deprecatingly.

Sokka shrugged. “I guess.” He was still looking down at his hands. Zuko wanted to hold them so badly, and the force of his desire was almost overwhelming, but he knew he had more to say first.

“I’m sorry,” Zuko said. “For everything, for all of it. I’m sorry I was terrible to you for so long.”

Sokka finally looked up and smiled at Zuko, tenderly. He was as beautiful as the sun. “You’re almost as dramatic as your sister,” he said. “Don’t sweat it. Let’s just keep looking forward.”

Around them, the herbs rustled in the evening breeze.

When Zuko and Sokka reentered the house, Azula and Suki were still in the bathroom. Iroh started brewing a pot of tea, and his puttering movements filled the silence while Zuko and Sokka waited for the girls to be done. Iroh was just finishing pouring the tea, when the girls emerged from the bathroom.

Azula’s hair was now a pixie cut, her black hair curling around her face and behind her ears. The style made her face look rounder, softer. Zuko couldn’t help but smile when he saw his sister. She somehow looked both older and younger than he’d ever seen her.

“What do you think?” he asked her, careful not to offer his own opinion before he’d heard hers.

Azula shrugged, but she smiled twitchily back at Zuko.

Iroh handed Azula a cup of tea. “I think she looks like a princess,” he declared.

Once Zuko had thanked Suki profusely for her services, she and Sokka drove away. That night, Zuko slept on the couch, while Azula slept on the air mattress downstairs.

The next day, Iroh insisted that Azula went to see a psychologist. Zuko expected Azula to throw a tantrum over this, but she was uncharacteristically yielding to Iroh’s suggestion. Iroh had found a therapist that took emergency appointments, and he drove Azula and Zuko to the clinic, where Zuko sat with Azula in the waiting room until it was time for her to be seen.

They were the only people in the waiting room, just sitting side-by-side and watching the clock on the wall as it ticked its way to the appointment time.

“I don’t want to end up like Mom,” Azula said, quietly. Zuko turned to look at her, but she was still staring directly at the clock, her eyes twitching every time the second-hand moved.

Zuko’s eye started stinging. He thought carefully before speaking.

“Our mother is the kindest, most loving person I know,” he told his sister, blinking away the tear welling in his right eye. “If you grow up to be anything like her, I’d be so proud.”

Azula’s jaw quivered.

“That’s the gayest shit I’ve ever heard you say,” she said.

Zuko snorted, which caused Azula’s face to break into a reluctant smile. He started laughing first, and soon she was laughing too, and they were two siblings laughing in a therapist’s office, feeling closer than they had in years.

When Azula had been called in for her appointment, Zuko walked back to Iroh’s car. The moment he’d sat down in the passenger seat and closed the door, he said, “I don’t want to live with my father anymore.”

Iroh didn’t even hesitate to reply. “You are welcome to live with me.”

Zuko’s heart thudded. “Are you sure?” he asked, looking over at his uncle.

Iroh smiled at Zuko. “Absolutely.”

“But…” Zuko floundered. “I eat.”

“So do I.”

“And I’m on my dad’s health insurance and my tuition—"

“I will figure it out,” Iroh interrupted.

“But—"

“I will figure it out,” Iroh repeated, sternly. Then, he cocked his head. “But if you’re worried about the money, you could help me out at the Jasmine Dragon a few days a week. Jin got a research job at her university, and I’ll need the extra help.”

Zuko couldn’t believe how generous his uncle’s offer was. “Yes, I will,” Zuko said, nodding vigorously.

“And you are not allowed to start until your academics are in order,” Iroh added.

“Okay, yes,” Zuko replied, still nodding. “I won’t disappoint you.”

“No,” Iroh said, smiling gently. “You won’t.”

When Zuko and Iroh got home later that day, Iroh decided to start sorting through the boxes in the basement and give their contents away to charity. Zuko offered to help. He removed the lid on the first box and found it was filled with clothes.

“Are these…”

“Lu Ten’s? Yes.”

Lu Ten had been Zuko’s cousin and Iroh’s son. He’d died when he was a sophomore in college and Zuko had been twelve.

“Are you sure you want to give these away?” Zuko asked.

Iroh opened another box. “Memories live in the heart, not in cardboard boxes,” he told Zuko. “It is better for these things to be used by someone who needs them.”

Once they’d finished going through each box’s contents, Zuko helped Iroh load the boxes into the car. They left one behind—a box of Lu Ten’s school notes and assignments, which Iroh moved into his own bedroom.

“Maybe you can cheat off him again,” Iroh joked.

“That was one time!”

Once the boxes were cleared out, the basement looked large and a little barren. Iroh promised Zuko a proper shikibuton soon, as long as Zuko dealt with the decorations. Zuko had never decorated his bedroom before, but he was excited to try. Maybe Sokka would have ideas.

For now, he was exhausted from moving boxes and the emotions of the last two days. He lay on his air mattress in his dark basement bedroom and fell asleep.

At school on Monday, Zuko arrived early, like he generally did, and spent the entire morning before class in front of Sokka’s locker. While he was waiting, a bunch of people gave him weird looks, like they thought he was trying to steal something. Zuko tried to alleviate their suspicions by smiling at them, but that just made people look even more freaked out.

When he finally spotted Sokka, he waved, then self-consciously put his hand down. Sokka walked over, a confused frown on his face.

“Thanks for coming over on Friday,” Zuko said.

Sokka nodded. “Suki needed a ride. Is Azula alright?”

“She will be,” Zuko replied, pleased to find that he didn’t feel like he was lying.

“That’s good.” Sokka opened his locker and started taking out his books.

Zuko watched him do this for a few moments, before the words he’d been planning to say tumbled out of his mouth: “Can we be friends again, please?”

Sokka froze. “But your dad—”

“He doesn’t matter anymore,” Zuko said, quickly.

He watched Sokka swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I don’t want you to get hurt,” Sokka said, finally.

“Hang out with me after school and I won’t be,” Zuko retorted.

Sokka huffed a small laugh. “Okay,” he said.

“Okay?”

“Yes, Zuko,” Sokka laughed. “Okay.”

The moment Sokka and Zuko started spending time together, they spent a lot of time together. It was like they were catching up on the lost weeks when they weren’t friends. After school, they would get in the car, pick up and drop off the kids, and then hang out for hours. On days when Sokka had soccer practice, Zuko would study with Suki or Toph at the Jasmine Dragon. Azula still was spending most nights at their father’s, except on therapy days, when she had dinner with Zuko and Iroh. Zuko made sure to be home early on those days.

He didn’t like that Azula still wanted to keep living at their father’s, considering how afraid she’d been of him and what Zuko knew he was capable of. But trying to get Azula to do anything was only going to ensure she did the exact opposite.

“The sun can’t force the tree to grow,” Iroh told Zuko. “All it can do is provide the light.”

Zuko didn’t feel like a sun. Most days he felt like a deep pit in the ground. All he knew was that if his father laid a finger on Azula, Zuko would go back and kill him himself. And he’d get away with it, too, because Katara would help him bury the body.

Surprisingly, Zuko was finding himself warming up to Katara. Despite the impression he got from their first few interactions, Katara was a forgiving person. She was just a person with a lot of anger. Like Zuko. The first time Zuko returned to Sokka’s house, he was expecting it to be strained, even confrontational. But Hakoda had just greeted Zuko: “Long time, no see,” and Katara had nodded at Zuko.

But even with Zuko’s newly filled social calendar of study sessions with Suki and Toph and dinner with his uncle and sister, he was always most excited to spend time with Sokka. They did homework together, watched movies together, ate meals together, smoked pot in the car in the woods with the windows down, together.

The first time Sokka drove them both out to the woods to do this, Zuko’s hands were shaking too hard to light the pipe. Zuko managed to click the lighter on for a moment, but instantly dropped it when he saw the flame.

“Shit, sorry,” he muttered, rooting around the car seat in the dark for the dropped lighter.

“Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” Sokka said, nervously.

“No, wait,” Zuko replied. “Just.” He sighed. “Can you do it?”

Zuko handed the lighter to Sokka, who took it with a brush of his fingers against Zuko’s. Zuko held the pipe to his mouth, thumb over the carb, and waited. Sokka leaned in, held the lighter to the pipe, and lit.

The click, the flicker of light, and the warmth so close to his face made Zuko twitch, but he inhaled as slowly and calmly as he could. Sokka was watching Zuko closely, like Zuko himself was a flame Sokka was afraid would go out.

They passed the pipe back and forth, the embers glowing in the dying light of the evening.

“Do you think we’re alone in the universe?” Zuko asked Sokka when they’d finished the bowl.

Sokka laughed. The sound was bright and joyful in the darkness. Zuko wanted to touch it. “I knew you were gonna be the kind of person who gets high and starts talking about aliens!” he accused.

“I’m not talking about aliens,” Zuko said, wrinkling his nose. “I’m asking you if you think anything’s out there.”

Sokka stuck out his tongue. “Well, there are stars, asteroids, black holes, planets—"

“Forget it,” Zuko interrupted, laughing. “Forget I said anything.”

Sokka leaned back in his seat, looking up at the stars through the skylight. He was silent for a moment, before saying: “For what it’s worth, I don’t feel alone.”

Zuko looked at Sokka. “No,” he agreed. “Me neither.”

The shadows of the trees were speckling Sokka’s face, glittering whenever Sokka moved. Zuko watched Sokka shift position in his seat and thought, Oh. I get it now. This is what people talk about. This is what it feels like. Sokka looked back at Zuko, smiling curiously, but Zuko didn’t say anything for fear of ruining the moment. He wanted to feel this forever, the evening, the wanting, everything.

That night, when Zuko got home, Iroh was sitting at the coffee table drinking tea. He raised an eyebrow at Zuko when Zuko walked in. Perhaps Zuko should have felt embarrassed, or even guilty, for entering his uncle’s house in this condition, but he was feeling so good he didn’t think there was any room in his body for anything else.

“Uncle,” he said. “I think I’m in love.” The words surprised him but they did not terrify him. They merely hung in the air like stars.

“That’s wonderful,” Iroh said.

It is, Zuko thought, dizzyingly. It is.

Chapter Text

“Okay,” Sokka said. “This one is widely regarded as the best film of the franchise. It has swamps and puppets and robots and a culture-shattering plot twist, so you better pay attention because there will be a pop quiz at the end.”

“Hmhm,” Zuko replied, stifling a yawn.

It was eleven at night and he and Sokka were sitting at the head of Sokka’s bed, their backs against the wall, legs lying side by side. Sokka’s laptop was open on Sokka’s lap, and it was playing the opening sequence to the second Star Wars movie of the night. Zuko had never seen any of the Star Wars movies, which had resulted in Sokka insisting on spending Saturday night watching the original trilogy together. It was late, completely dark outside, and Zuko knew he was going to have to go back to Iroh’s at some point, but he was putting it off. He’d been feeling a little awkward around his uncle ever since last weekend when he got stoned and accidentally admitted he was in love with his best friend.

Not that Iroh was being weird about it. Zuko was definitely the one acting weird in this situation. Iroh had very politely not brought up Zuko’s confession at all, but he had raised his eyebrows when Zuko mentioned doing homework with Sokka after school, which had made Zuko’s entire digestive system wither with embarrassment.

It wasn’t that Zuko felt that Iroh might be upset by Zuko’s terrible and humiliating love for his male best friend. On the contrary, Zuko was concerned that Iroh was far too excited about the whole affair.

Now that Iroh knew (and Zuko had admitted), the question that seemed to naturally follow was: Now what? So, you’ve realized you’re in love with your best friend. So, you spend every moment with him thinking about the proximity of your bodies. What are you going to do about it?

Nothing. Zuko was going to do absolutely nothing.

God knows what sort of facial expression Iroh would make when Zuko went home later tonight. No, it was better to put off that encounter for as long as possible. Maybe Iroh would even be asleep when Zuko got home.

Sleep. Wouldn’t that be nice? The feeling of Sokka’s thigh resting next to his was so warm and pleasant. Sokka was grinning at the screen, enthralled by the action, his face lit up in the darkness. Surely he wouldn’t notice if Zuko dozed off a little. Then he could drive Zuko home when the movie was finished, just like they’d planned.

Zuko woke up with a sore neck. He opened his eyes and realized, with a jolt of panic, that the sun was up and he was still sitting upright in Sokka’s bed. He looked down and saw Sokka curled up on the sheets next to him, face just inches away from Zuko’s thigh, his long hair loose and spread out on the pillow like a fan.

Zuko imagined lying down next to Sokka. He imagined falling back asleep with their faces close enough to feel each other breathing.

Then he heard footsteps downstairs. Someone else was awake, maybe Katara or maybe Hakoda. Zuko felt his hands begin to sweat. He wasn’t supposed to be here. What an idiot he was for falling asleep. He gingerly slid himself out of bed, careful not to bump into Sokka, and looked out the window.

Yeah, there was no way he’d survive climbing out.

Maybe he could creep downstairs and sneak out the front door before anyone noticed. Whoever was awake was probably in the kitchen or the living room—not waiting by the front door. And if it was Katara, maybe Zuko could reason with her or at least make a deal. He’d had a lot of experience with blackmail from young teenaged girls; he could survive that. If it was Hakoda… Well, Zuko didn’t really want to think about that.

Zuko took one last look of his sleeping friend, before he slowly opened the bedroom door and crept out into the hallway. He moved quickly and quietly down the stairs, listening for either of Sokka’s family members who might be lurking nearby. He made it to the front door, reached out for the handle, and—

“Good morning, Zuko,” Hakoda’s voice greeted from somewhere behind Zuko.

Zuko flinched. His hand was still holding the door handle. He could still open it. He could still run.

“It’s okay,” Hakoda’s voice said. Zuko heard him come closer. “I’m not upset.”

Zuko’s hand tightened around the handle.

“I was actually just about to start making waffles. Do you mind helping me?”

It was over. Zuko had missed his chance to leave. He let go of the door handle and turned around. Hakoda was standing in the hallway, wearing a white tshirt and flannel pajama pants. Zuko felt embarrassed to see him in his sleep clothes—he hadn’t seen his own father wearing pajamas in years. But Hakoda didn’t look mad that Zuko was still here, intruding on his Sunday morning. He looked calm, like he was just waiting for Zuko to reply.

“Oh, yes, sure,” Zuko replied, clumsily. “I’ll help.”

He followed Hakoda into the kitchen.

Zuko’s father didn’t cook. After their mom left, the family had basically survived on delivery services, Ichiban ramen, and cereal. Zuko remembered a few nights when their mom had just left and their father was staying late at the office, and Zuko and Azula had eaten the ramen noodles dry because Zuko couldn’t figure out how to turn on the stove. Since living with Iroh, Zuko thought he might learn to cook soon, but it hadn’t happened yet. He was still too fidgety around open flames.

In the kitchen, Hakoda had opened a recipe book and was assembling ingredients from the cabinets and fridge. Zuko stood awkwardly in the doorway, watching.

“Can you crack three eggs for me, Zuko?” Hakoda asked, passing a carton of eggs and a metal bowl to Zuko. Zuko nodded, then set the items on a counter. He took out an egg from the carton and felt its cool, round exterior in his hand. Then, trying to recall how Iroh always did this, he cracked it against the edge of the bowl.

Raw egg splattered across the bowl, the yolk falling and breaking onto the counter. Zuko stared in horror at the destroyed yolk. He felt cold egg whites drip down his fingers.

Behind him, Hakoda laughed, then passed him a paper towel, which Zuko used to hurriedly wipe up his mistake.

“Maybe try cracking it gently next time,” Hakoda advised.

Zuko nodded, flushing.

After he’d cleaned up the counter and his hands, Zuko tried again. He took an egg and hesitantly tapped it against the bowl. Nothing. Feeling more confident, he continued tapping the egg, slightly more aggressively each time, until it cracked. He dug his thumb into the crack and opened the egg into the bowl.

Hakoda leaned over and looked in the bowl.

“No shell,” he remarked. “Good job.”

Zuko nodded again, still embarrassed but feeling some of his dignity return to him.

Zuko watched Hakoda measure out cups of milk and oil into the bowl. Then, when Hakoda instructed him to do so, he began to stir the ingredients together. Hakoda was finishing measuring the dry ingredients and pouring them into Zuko’s bowl, when Sokka appeared in the kitchen doorway, rubbing his eyes. He’d changed into a new set of clothes, but his hair was still down, falling around his face.

“What are you guys…Oh!” Sokka seemed to notice Zuko was still here. Zuko kept guiltily stirring the waffle batter. He felt like a criminal who had just broken into a family’s house and started cooking breakfast. He didn’t belong here.

“Good morning, Sokka,” Hakoda greeted.

“Morning, Dad,” Sokka replied, darting over to Zuko and leaning over his shoulder to peer into the bowl. Zuko felt Sokka’s loose hair tickle his cheek. He held his breath.

“Sokka,” Hakoda said. “Can you please let me know ahead of time the next time you have a friend stay overnight?”

Zuko blanched. He skirted away from Sokka, turning to face Hakoda with his back to the wall.

“It wasn’t Sokka’s fault,” he said, the words coming out of him fast. “I stayed late and I accidentally fell asleep. It was my fault and it won’t happen again. I’m sorry.”

Hakoda looked at Zuko with an indiscernible expression, his eyebrows furrowed in an almost-frown. Zuko glanced at Sokka, who wasn’t looking at Hakoda, but at Zuko. He looked upset.

“It’s not a big deal, Zuko,” Hakoda said, carefully. “I just like to know when we have guests in the house.”

“I’m sorry, Dad,” Sokka said, still looking at Zuko.

“What’s Sokka sorry for?” Katara appeared in the doorway, grinning. She was wearing pajamas, like Hakoda. “Oh! Zuko’s still here. Hi, Zuko.”

“Zuko is helping me with breakfast,” Hakoda said. “He’s doing a great job.”

“I broke an egg,” Zuko reminded him.

“Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do with eggs?” Katara joked. Hakoda chuckled, taking a large contraption out of a cabinet and placing it on the counter.

“Oh fuck, you’re making waffles?” Sokka exclaimed when he saw the machine.

“Sokka, please don’t swear before eleven a.m.,” Hakoda chided, plugging it in.

“Sorry, Dad.”

Hakoda turned to Zuko and explained how the waffle-maker worked. Zuko nodded, then carefully poured a ladle of batter into the machine and closed it. He watched it very closely, while Sokka’s family chattered around him. The moment the little light turned from red to green, Zuko opened the machine and saw a golden-brown waffle. He felt like a diver who’d opened a clam to discover a pearl.

“Look!” he exclaimed, pointing at his creation.

“Good job, chef,” Sokka said, coming over and squeezing Zuko shoulder with his hand, a pleasant surprise.

Zuko didn’t even care if Sokka was being sarcastic. He’d made a waffle, as perfect and round as the moon.

After a boisterous and delicious breakfast, Sokka offered to drive Zuko home. Zuko thanked Hakoda and Katara for breakfast, apologized once again for overstaying his welcome, and left with Sokka. Sokka was unusually quiet in the car, turning off the radio when it started playing music. When they had been driving for a few minutes in silence, Sokka spoke in a casual tone: “So, I noticed you were kind of… jumpy, this morning.”

Zuko twitched. “Jumpy? Me?”

Sokka rolled his eyes, before continuing.

“You know, my dad’s not, like, mean, right?” he said. “Like, he gets weird about me and Katara getting good grades, and one time he yelled at me because I almost electrocuted myself by trying to rewire the toaster, but he’s not a bad guy. Like, he’s cool with me being bi and stuff.”

Zuko could feel where this conversation was heading, and he wanted to delay its destination for as long as possible. “Huh,” he said.

“Yeah, I mean...” Sokka wrinkled his nose. “When I came out, it was like, Sokka, let me introduce you to my friend’s sister’s coworker’s son. Sokka, have you met so-and-so from the reservation? Sokka, did you know Callan’s younger brother just came out as gay?”

“Huh,” Zuko said again, trying not to feel heart-wrenchingly jealous of three strangers who might have just been invented by Sokka in the moment for an anecdote. Then, when Sokka didn’t say anything else, he looked down at his hands and said: “My father wasn’t like that at all.”

Sokka snorted quietly. “Yeah, we kind of figured.”

“We?” Zuko looked up at Sokka.

Sokka grimaced. “Ah, okay,” he said. “Don’t be mad, but Katara and I talked about you the other day.”

Zuko blinked. “You talked about me?” He wasn’t mad. He was actually quite pleased. Sokka talked about him with his sister? Sokka thought about him enough to talk about him?

“Yeah,” Sokka said, drawing out the vowel. “Just about your whole… family situation. I know you live with your uncle now, and he seems cool.”

Zuko laughed. “He’s not,” he said. Then, feeling bad, he added: “I mean, he’s cool, but he’s not cool. you know?”

“Yeah, no, I get it,” Sokka replied. “I’m just… I don’t want you to come over and like feel like my dad’s going to act like your dad, you know?”

There was a moment of silence. Then—

“I should fucking hope not,” Zuko said, his mouth twitching into a self-deprecating smirk. “I only have one eye left.”

The moment the words left his mouth, Zuko regretted it. It was like the air went cold. Sokka’s whole body seemed to tense up behind the wheel, his knuckles whitening. The car was stopped at an empty intersection, but Sokka didn’t give any indication that he was going to take his foot off the brake. Zuko mentally kicked himself, wishing he could take back what he said.

“Holy shit, dude,” Sokka said, finally.

Zuko swallowed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It was a joke.”

“Yeah, I get that it was a joke,” Sokka replied. His voice was bitter and quiet. “But holy shit, dude.”

“I’m sorry,” Zuko said.

Sokka sighed in annoyance. “No,” he said. “It’s okay. Don’t be sorry—it’s not your fault, I’m just… It’s just so fucked up. Like, it’s just so incredibly fucked up. I mean, like, fuck 12, but your dad should be in jail. Like, we should abolish the prison industrial complex for everyone except your dad. Like, what the fuck!”

“I’m sorry,” Zuko said again. He felt lost.

“Okay, it’s okay, can you just... Give me a second.”

Sokka turned the car engine off and pulled his feet up onto the seat. He crossed his arms over the steering wheel and buried his face against his forearms. Zuko didn’t really know what to do, so he just let Sokka sit there and breathe for a few minutes without saying anything. While he was waiting, he watched the side mirror to make sure no other cars came up behind them. None did.

After a while, Sokka sighed and raised his head from his arms. The rims of his eyes were pink and shiny. “Just tell me the truth,” he said, his voice hollow. “Did he… Did he do that to you because of me? Because he thought we were…” He trailed off.

Zuko had never seen Sokka like this.

“It wasn’t… He didn’t do it because of you,” he told Sokka. He needed Sokka to hear this, to understand this. “He did it because he’s fucked up and mean and he’s been like that since me and Azula were kids, since before I knew you. This had nothing to do with you, you just… happened to be there.”

Sokka bit his lip. “Okay,” he said. “Well, I’m sorry anyway.”

“Well, I’m not sorry!” Zuko exclaimed, the force of his voice surprising both Sokka and himself. He was angry. He couldn’t believe that he had gone through hell to get to where he was right now, and his father was still ruining things. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair to Sokka. “I’m not fucking sorry, not about anything. I’m glad it happened—” And that was an absolutely blatant lie, but it felt good to say anyway, to pretend it was true, to make it true by saying it. “I’m glad because it got me out of there. And now I’m here and I’m fine and you’re fine and we’re fine and everything is… good.”

“Okay,” Sokka said, again. Zuko could tell Sokka didn’t totally believe him, but that was okay. At least his eyes had stopped shining.

“And anyway,” Zuko continued. “Guys dig battle scars, right?”

Sokka smiled gently, then turned the car engine back on. “You’re right,” he said. “They do.”

That Friday was the last day of school before winter break. At lunch, Zuko sat down in the cafeteria next to Ty Lee and Mai, intending to get music recommendations from them. To apply to the school paper, he was going to have to write his own review of a recently released music album, and he felt totally out of his depth. Ty Lee was a dancer and Mai had headphones in half the time, so he figured they would be able to help.

When Sokka and Suki came and sat down next to them, he felt a little awkward, since Suki was going to be one of the people on the school paper reading his application, but he was determined to solicit advice.

“How do you listen to music?” he asked Ty Lee.

Ty Lee cocked her head. “Like, on Spotify?”

Zuko shook his head. “No, I mean, like how do you know what to listen to?”

He watched everyone at the table exchange bemused glances with each other and felt his face heat up.

“I’m trying to listen to a recently released album,” he added, with gritted teeth. Suki nodded in recognition. Sokka just looked like he was trying not to laugh.

“Oh!” Ty Lee laughed. “Why didn’t you say so? I’m texting you a link right now.”

“Oh,” Zuko said. “Thanks.”

“It’s from a new Korean girl group. They came out with an EP earlier this year, but this is their debut album, and it’s so good! Like, imagine Twice meets Carly Rae meets Charli XCX.”

Zuko nodded. “I don’t know what those words mean.”

“They sound like what bubble gum tastes like,” Mai replied.

“Oh, you listen to them?” he asked.

Mai’s pale cheeks colored. She pierced a pea with her fork.

“I’m familiar,” she said.

Sensing some kind of tension, Suki changed the subject: “What are everyone’s plans for winter break?”

“I’m going snowboarding with my family in Vermont!” Ty Lee said, still texting.

“Visiting grandparents,” Mai said.

“Probably just kicking my sister’s ass in snowball fights,” Sokka said.

Zuko usually spent his winter breaks at his family’s vacation home in Maine, but since that definitely wasn’t happening this year, he didn’t really have plans.

“Working at my uncle’s tea shop?” Zuko said. “And turning seventeen, I guess.”

 “Oh my God!” Ty Lee exclaimed. “When’s your birthday?”

“Tuesday.”

“That’s before my family leaves to Vermont,” she said, her eyes gleaming.

“Okay,” said Zuko.

“You should throw a party!”

“Oh,” Zuko said, remembering the last party he attended and trying not to melt into his seat.

“My family doesn’t leave until next Thursday,” Mai said. “I could come.”

And that settled it. Zuko resigned himself to asking Iroh if he could invite a group of guests over on Tuesday night. He secretly hoped Iroh would say no, but knowing Iroh, he would insist on cooking an elaborate meal for everyone and meeting each of Zuko’s alleged friends.

When school finished for the day, Sokka and Zuko walked out to the parking lot together and stood in front of Sokka’s car, talking, before going their separate ways.

“Okay, so as my birthday present to you—” Sokka began.

“You don’t have to get me anything,” Zuko interrupted.

“OKAY,” Sokka repeated, louder. “SO AS MY BIRTHDAY PRESENT TO YOU, I am going to gift you with…” He tapped the roof of his car with both hands in a makeshift drum roll. “A road trip!”

“A road trip?”

“Yeah! Wherever you want to go, whatever you want to do, I’ll drive! As long as we can get there and back within a day.”

Zuko didn’t hesitate.

“Can you drive me to Great Oak, Pennsylvania?” he asked.

“Sure thing!” said Sokka, before he seemed to realize what Zuko had asked and his face became serious. He nodded. “How’s Sunday?”

When Zuko got home, he looked up the visiting hours for Great Oak and called ahead to make sure he would be allowed to visit his mom on such a short notice. The attendant on the other end was very helpful, confirming that he’d be able to see her on Sunday, before asking if he wanted to speak with her over the phone.

“No, that’s okay,” Zuko said. “But can you let her know I’m coming?”

He hung up, feeling like a coward, but he needed time to prepare before he spoke with her. He hadn’t seen his mom in years. The weight of that guilt felt like it was going to crush him.

Saturday was the day of Zuko’s trial shift at the Jasmine Dragon. He wasn’t officially an employee yet, but Iroh thought it was a good idea to have Zuko come in and informally learn how to take orders and use the cash register over the course of a few days, before he had the pressure of actually having to do it alone. The worst part was making eye contact with customers when listening to their orders, which Iroh kept gently reminding Zuko to do, knowing full well that Zuko wasn’t trying at all. How was he supposed to concentrate on making eye contact and committing an order to memory at the same time?

Despite the fact it was a Saturday, there weren’t too many customers at the tea shop in the afternoon, which meant Zuko didn’t have to stress too badly about keeping track of several orders at once.

In fact, there wasn’t even a line when Katara appeared in the tea shop, the bell above the door ringing her arrival.

Zuko looked up from the cups he was stacking and blinked, surprised to see her here, alone. Toph and Aang weren’t here, and Zuko had never seen Sokka at the shop before. Katara smiled politely when she saw Zuko and walked up to the counter.

“What can I get you?” Zuko asked.

“Can we talk?” she replied.

That was never a comforting thing to hear. “Is Sokka okay?”

“Yeah, he’s fine. I just wanted to talk.”

Zuko glanced at Iroh, who had been measuring tea leaves for a special order, but who was now watching Katara and Zuko’s interaction. Iroh nodded, saying: “You can take a break in the employee room.”

Zuko beckoned Katara to follow him around the counter and through the back door marked “Employees Only.” They entered the small room where there were a few plastic chairs and a small table for employees on break. Katara sat down on a chair and Zuko followed suit.

She cut straight to the chase.

“I know we got off on the wrong foot,” she said.

“Sorry about that,” Zuko said, sheepishly.

“I was quick to judge you.”

“Well, you were right.”

“Yes,” Katara said. “I was. But I don’t want there to be hard feelings between us.”

Zuko raised his hands defensively. “No hard feelings here! I feel very… softly.” He cringed.

“That’s what I wanted to talk about,” Katara replied, ignoring Zuko’s pained facial expression.

“Feeling softly?”

“Sokka. He seems tough, and he fools around, and he acts like nothing affects him, but he’s actually pretty sensitive.”

Zuko thought back to the conversation he and Sokka had had in the car last week. Did he do that to you because of me?

“Yeah,” Zuko sighed. “I’ve noticed that.”

“Good,” Katara said, nodding. “I want you to internalize it. I think there’s nothing I will say that will make you stay away from my brother, nor is there any punishment painful enough if you fuck this up, so I have to trust that you’re going to be a good person and you aren’t going to fuck this up.”

“I’m trying very hard to be good,” Zuko said, his cheeks heating up.

“Sokka says he’s taking you to see your mom tomorrow.”

Zuko nodded.

“When our mom died, our dad didn’t leave the house for weeks. Did you know that?”

Zuko shook his head. Sokka hadn’t really talked about his mom since their conversation months ago when Zuko first found out that she’d died.

Katara continued. “Some of the elders from our village brought us food and helped us cook and clean, but we were on our own for a while. And Sokka… Sokka was a mess. He barely ate, he slept all the time, I had to beg him to take showers.”

Zuko frowned. “You were only seven, right?”

“Nobody else was doing it,” Katara said. There was a ferocity in her voice. “Nobody else was looking after him.”

“You shouldn’t have had to do that. You were a kid.”

“I know,” Katara replied. “But that’s not why I’m telling you this.”

“Then why?”

“Because for a lot of our childhood, I had to step up and be the adult, and Sokka is… painfully aware of that fact. I mean, you’ve seen him driving me and my friends to school and buying me snacks and helping me with math homework. He feels like he owes me.”

Zuko had noticed Sokka and Katara were close, but he’d assumed that was normal behavior for other siblings. “And does he?” Zuko asked. “Owe you?”

Katara shook her head so forcefully her hair loops smacked against her cheeks. “No,” she said. “I don’t hold any of this against him. But he doesn’t get that. He still thinks he needs to make up for the fact that I kept him alive all those years ago.”

Zuko frowned, thinking. “And, so wait,” he said. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because now he’s looking after you.”

“No, he’s not,” Zuko replied, automatically.

Katara raised her eyebrows. Zuko’s ears pinked.

“Fine,” he said, embarrassed. “But, what should I do?”

Katara looked at him like he was an idiot, which he was.

“Look after him, too.”

It was just over three hours by car to Great Oak from Uncle Iroh’s. When Zuko told Iroh where he was going on Sunday, Iroh promised to make him and Sokka two thermoses of jasmine green tea for their journey. Zuko held these thermoses in his hands while waiting for Sokka to arrive on Sunday morning.

The neighborhood had experienced its first snowfall a week ago, but last night was the first night the snow seemed to stick. There was about an inch of snow covering Iroh’s garden, and Zuko felt bad (as he always did) walking across the perfect white shell of the earth, breaking it with his footprints.

Sokka rolled up to Iroh’s driveway at eight-thirty, punctual as always. Zuko handed him one of the thermoses as he got into the passenger seat. Sokka pointed at the thermos of coffee he already had in the cup holder.

“I’m going to be so fucking hydrated!” he declared.

“Sorry,” Zuko said. “Or, you’re welcome, actually.”

“Oh, you’re going to be sorry when we have to take fifteen bathroom breaks during this three-hour journey.”

Zuko laughed and took a sip of his own tea as Sokka pulled out of the driveway.

The car ride was beautiful and tense. Sokka soon seemed to realize Zuko was too anxious to talk, so he alternated between monologuing and singing loudly along to whatever was on the radio. Zuko didn’t know any of the songs, but after the second rendition of the chorus, he sometimes felt confident enough to hum along to the tune, which caused Sokka to grin and sing louder, until they were both just garbling noisily at each other, while the scenery spun past, green and white and silent.

Great Oak was exactly how Zuko remembered it: a large red-brick building surrounded by acres of land. There were flower beds surrounding the building that presumably housed flowers in the summer but were now filled with snow.

Sokka drove up to the front entrance and put the car in park. He turned to Zuko, who was clutching his thermos and staring at the car’s GPS that confirmed that, yes, they had arrived at their destination.

“Do you need a minute, or?” Sokka asked.

Zuko swallowed. He glanced at Sokka, who still had his hand on the gear stick and was looking at Zuko with patience expectation, like they were waiting outside a convenience store and not Zuko’s mother’s psychiatric hospital after years of estrangement.

“I’m good,” Zuko said, his voice stiff. He started to unbuckle his seatbelt and ended up spilling cold tea on his trousers. “Oh shit.”

“Hang on,” Sokka said, reaching across Zuko to open the glove compartment and pull out a packet of tissues. As Sokka’s elbow brushed Zuko’s chest, Zuko felt infinitely more stressed, the tea cooling stickily through his chinos. Thank God he was wearing black. Sokka passed Zuko the packet of tissues, which he accepted gratefully, patting himself as dry as he could, before crumpling up the tissue and shoving it in his coat pocket.

“Thanks,” Zuko said. “I’m gonna, uh, go now.”

He placed his thermos in a cup holder and practically clambered out of the car, eager to get out of one humiliating situation into another.

He waved a stilted goodbye to Sokka, before entering the hospital’s glass double doors. The lobby was pretty spacious. There were a few armchairs, several pot plants, and a desk, behind which a receptionist was sitting.

“Hi, welcome to Great Oak!” the receptionist greeted. “How can I help you?”

“Hi,” Zuko said. “I’m here to see my mom.”

After signing a few forms and placing his phone and wallet into a locker, Zuko was led by a nurse through an electronically locked door down a corridor and into a large lounge area. There were a few patients sitting on sofas and at tables, mostly elderly people wearing sweatpants or pajamas. None of them were Zuko’s mother.

“Wait here for a moment,” the nurse told him. “I’ll go get her.”

Zuko nodded, placing his hands into his pockets. He wasn’t sure whether he should sit down or not. One of the patients eyed him suspiciously—maybe they didn’t get a lot of visitors. That made Zuko feel ill.

Then, out of a doorway on the other side of the lounge, he saw her. She was smaller than he remembered and she looked older, but she was unmistakably his mother. He felt his breath catch in his throat as she walked over, the nurse guiding her to Zuko until they were face to face.

His mom looked at the nurse, frowning in confusion. Her expression was exactly like Azula’s when Azula was uncertain about something, and Zuko felt his right eye sting with emotion.

“Mom?” he said, his voice curling upward in pitch. His mom turned to look at him, blinking. “It’s me. It’s…”

“Zuko?”

Before Zuko could even nod in reply, her face crumpled and she started to cry, tears spilling down her cheeks, shoulders shaking, her mouth open.

“Mom, I—”

Arms were flung around Zuko’s neck and he flinched in surprise, until he realized that she was hugging him, his mom was hugging him, he was being hugged by his mom, and she was crying into his shoulder and whispering words in Japanese that he couldn’t make out or understand and he felt his legs shake with the weight of it.

“I’m so sorry,” he murmured, the words getting tangled in her hair. “I’m so sorry I didn’t come sooner.”

Somewhere behind him, someone cleared their throat.

“I’m sorry,” said the voice of the nurse. “But you’re not technically allowed to touch.”

Zuko’s mom looked up and glared at the nurse.

“This is my son,” she said, her eyes dark. “This is my beautiful son.”

The nurse looked sheepish. He glanced around the room furtively, then said: “You can hold hands.”

Zuko nodded and extricated himself from his mother’s hold, taking her hand in his. He squeezed it and smiled at her. She smiled back and Zuko was overwhelmed by how familiar her smile was, even after all this time.

They sat down together on the closest couch, still holding hands.

“You’ve grown,” Zuko’s mom said, in English. “You’re so tall!”

Zuko laughed out loud at that. At 5’5”, he was one of the shortest guys at school, but he was now half a foot taller than his mom. How the hell did that happen?

“Thanks,” he said.

“What happened to your face?”

Even though Zuko knew this was coming, he still felt a twinge of pain at the question. “Dad,” he said. He didn’t elaborate, but it also seemed like he didn’t have to. The moment he mentioned his father, his mom’s face went stony and she sat up a little straighter.

“I don’t live with him anymore,” Zuko added, squeezing his mom’s hand, urging her back into the present. “I’m actually staying with Iroh these days.”

“Who?”

“Uncle Iroh, Dad’s brother.”

“Oh, yes,” his mom said, smiling again. “How is he?”

And they sat on the couch together, talking about Iroh, about school, about the Jasmine Dragon. Zuko was surprised at how much he had to say and how comforting it was to have his mom hear about these aspects of his life that hadn’t existed three years ago, or even a few months ago.

“You’re so grown up now,” she said, eyes sparkling. “I’m so proud of you.”

“Thank you,” Zuko said, and he found he didn’t feel embarrassed at her praise or attention. “I’m sorry I didn’t visit until now, but I promise I’ll visit more in the future.”

“How did you get here? Can you drive now?”

Zuko shook his head. “My friend drove me.”

“Oh! How kind!”

“Yeah,” Zuko said. “He’s… great.” Flustered, Zuko tried to change the subject. “So, you’ve been here a while.”

“Yes,” she said, simply.

Zuko bit his lip. “Are you happy?” he asked, hesitantly.

“Zuko,” she replied. “I am the happiest I’ve ever been.”

The nurse let Zuko take his mom for a walk outside. It took the attendants a minute to find her coat and shoes, but eventually she and Zuko were able to leave the building and walk out into the cold alone. She already had a path she wanted to take Zuko on, and he was thrilled to let her lead the way, as she occasionally pointed out her favorite trees or sitting spots.

A few times on their walk, she would stop for a moment and ask him who he was, and every time, he held her hand tightly and reminded her, and then she would cry all over again. Maybe he should have found their repeated reunions upsetting or tiresome, but he didn’t. They were oddly comforting. They reminded him of when he and Azula were very small and, instead of reading them bedside stories, their mom would recite her lines for whichever play she was acting in at the time. She would say the same sentences over and over, and the scene would repeat itself like a magic lantern, where people kept falling in love for the first time and endlessly surprising each other and the jokes would land, perfectly, every time, like waves to a shore.

He wasn’t afraid that his mother wouldn’t love him anymore because they played through the same scene so many times, and every time she still loved Zuko and told him so and Zuko believed it. It was the best kind of memory, one that never ended.

When it was his mother’s lunchtime, he brought her back to the building where the attendants and other patients were. He promised to give his number to the front desk and told her she could call him at any time.

“Maybe I can get Azula to come with me next time,” he suggested.

“Oh,” his mother said, smiling and breathless, her cheeks still pink from the cold. “That would be wonderful.”

It only took ten minutes in between Zuko texting Sokka and Sokka rolling up to the main entrance. Zuko practically bounced into the car, more energetic than he’d felt in years.

“How was it?” Sokka asked, once Zuko had closed the car door.

“It went really well,” Zuko said, beaming. “Really, really well.”

Sokka nodded and smiled, but Zuko could tell it was more subdued than his typical Sokka grin.

“What did you get up to?” he asked Sokka.

“Well,” Sokka replied, pulling out of park and driving down the street. “First, I filled up on gas. After that, I visited the town center and found some truly godawful shirts at a Goodwill that I’m hoping to surprise Katara with. Then, I checked out their historical society and, man, did this town get up to some bullshit during the Civil War. And then I took some pictures of a weird-looking fountain for Instagram, and now I’m here.”

Zuko smiled. “Sounds productive,” he said.

“You know me,” Sokka replied. “I put the action in tourist attractions.”

He seemed to have perked up during the conversation, which was good. Zuko thought about what Katara had said to him the day before. Look after him, too.

“Have you eaten?” he asked Sokka.

“No,” Sokka replied, merging onto the highway.

Zuko frowned. “It’s been a while since breakfast,” he said. “You should eat.”

“You should eat,” Sokka retorted.

“Yes,” Zuko said, agreeably. “Now, here’s a crazy thought. What if we ate… together?”

Sokka stroked his chin in mock contemplation. “Fine,” he said. “Since you insist on being the voice of reason for once.”

At the next exit, he drove off the highway, while Zuko peered out the window for restaurant options.

“Aha!” Sokka exclaimed, as Zuko pointed at the neon sign of a diner down the road. The Hot Rock Diner, in flickering purple letters. They pulled into the empty parking lot, got out of the car, and entered the restaurant.

Zuko had never been in a diner before. His experience with restaurants was limited to reservations at Michelin star restaurants and a few hole-in-the-wall Japanese places his mom enjoyed and would take him and Azula to when their dad was on business trips. He’d never been to an honest-to-God diner, and he was surprised at how similar this one looked to pictures he’d seen from the fifties.

Sokka also seemed like he hadn’t much experience with diners, considering how excited he was by the red leather booths and the jukebox in the corner.

They took a table by the window, and a waitress came by with laminated menus and plastic cups of water.

“Oh man,” Sokka said, when the waitress left. “I was hoping they’d be wearing rollerblades.”

Zuko snorted. “I think they reserve that kind of spectacle for the dinner guests, not the cheapskates who only come for lunch.”

Sokka clucked his tongue. “No respect for the lunch crowd,” he said.

The waitress came back almost immediately, probably because there were no other customers, notepad in hand.

“Ready, hons?”

“Yes!” Sokka exclaimed, with a winning, confident smile. “I’ll have the guacamole, bacon, and blue cheese burger, medium rare, and a pumpkin pie milkshake, please.”

Zuko stared at him.

“And for you?” the waitress prompted, looking at Zuko.

Zuko looked down at his glossy menu, overwhelmed by the colors and pictures and sheer number of options.

“Uh…” His eye caught on a picture. He panicked. “Can I get the chocolate chip pancakes?”

“Sure thing!” the waitress chirped, taking their menus. “I’ll be back with your milkshake in a sec.” Then she left.

“Pancakes for lunch,” Sokka commented. “Bold choice. I respect that.”

Zuko shrugged. “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” he said. “Best to have it twice.”

What followed was one of the best meals Zuko had ever had. Realizing there weren’t any adults to disapprove, Zuko drowned his pancakes in syrup, while Sokka laughed at Zuko’s shamelessness.

“That’s just depraved,” Sokka said, as Zuko took the first bite of his sugar-drenched pancake.

“Says you,” Zuko said, his mouth still full. He pointed at Sokka’s hamburger, which was so full it was slowly opening and dripping onto the plate. “Look at the abomination you ordered.”

“Oh, you haven’t seen nothing yet,” Sokka said, darkly. He removed the top bun of his burger, grabbed a bottle of hot sauce from the table condiments, and squirted a healthy amount onto the inside of the bun. He closed the burger and took an impressively large bite.

“Hm!” Sokka said, closing his eyes with exaggerated elation.

Zuko narrowed his eyes. He knew a challenge when he saw one. He picked up the bottle of hot sauce and squirted some onto his own plate. When Sokka opened his eyes and saw what Zuko was doing, he paused his chewing to watch Zuko take a bite of spicy chocolate chip pancake. Which was shockingly delicious.

“I’m never eating anything else again,” Zuko said, in awe of his creation.

Sokka hummed in agreement, taking another bite of his monstrous-sized burger.

Zuko watched pink hamburger juice dribble down Sokka’s fingers, mesmerized and grossed-out at the same time. He couldn’t stop staring. Sokka’s messiness, his recklessness, his boyishness—it was all so totally and incomprehensibly appealing to Zuko that he almost felt sick with it. When they had both finished eating, he watched Sokka wipe his mouth and hands with a napkin and thought, I will never feel this way about anyone else. I will never watch someone devour a guacamole and blue cheese burger and want them so incredibly badly.

Zuko paid the check. Sokka put up a bit of a fight, but Zuko refused to hear it. On Iroh’s suggestion, when Zuko moved out of his father’s, he’d taken out all the money from his bank account. He was supposed to open a new account, but he hadn’t gotten around to it yet, which meant there was just a Ziploc bag of cash in his chest of drawers at home and forty dollars in his wallet. It was Zuko’s idea to have lunch, anyway.

When they left the diner, it was snowing again, gently. The cold air clung to Zuko’s face and neck. He felt like the cold made his senses sharper, his vision clearer. It urged him awake. He watched Sokka stroll across the parking lot to the car, leaving perfect dark footprints in the snow, his light-blue kuspuk shimmering against the white sky. When Sokka walked around the car to the driver’s side, Zuko followed him.

“Uh,” Sokka said, leaning against the car door and smiling. “The passenger seat is on the other side.”

“Oh yeah,” Zuko said. He didn’t move.

“Are you—”

“I really appreciate you driving me to see my mom,” Zuko said. He was close enough to see Sokka’s breath condense in the air.

Sokka shrugged. “Oh, yeah, no worries,” he said. “It was your birthday present.”

“I think you’re great,” Zuko said, his heart thumping. “I think you’re amazing.”

Sokka smiled, but he was looking at Zuko with a sort of bemused expression. “I think you’re amazing, too, Zuko,” he said.

Zuko shook his head. “No, shut up, that’s not what I’m—”

Sokka started laughing. “Did you just tell me to shut up?” he asked, his blue eyes bright with glee.

Zuko felt his face heat up. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m sorry. I’m just trying to say something.”

“Okay.” Sokka leaned back against the car, raising his chin defiantly, like a challenge. “Then say it.”

Zuko faltered. I’m in love with you, he thought, desperately. I think about you all the time. You make me feel afraid and brave at the same time. I feel so fucking queer around you. You make me feel so fucking queer.

A snowflake landed on Sokka’s eyelashes. He didn’t blink. It just stayed there, quivering.

Zuko cleared his throat. “Can I kiss you?”

Sokka blinked, and the snowflake on his eyelashes dissolved, disappeared.

“Yeah,” he said, quietly. “Okay.”

Zuko took a tentative step forward. He didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he placed one on the roof of the car behind Sokka and the other on Sokka’s waist. He could almost swear he could feel Sokka’s pulse, even through the layers of clothing, but maybe it was Zuko’s own heartbeat—he was too close to tell. Sokka was still looking at Zuko, watching him patiently. Zuko didn’t breathe. He leaned forward, felt his too-long bangs brush against Sokka’s forehead, and kissed him.

And even as he was kissing Sokka, he was thinking, Oh God, why do I still want him? He’s right here, I have him, how can I still keep wanting him? How can I ever stop?

After a few moments, Sokka pulled away. His lips were shiny and pink.

“We should, uh…”

“Yeah,” Zuko said.

Then they both got back in the car and drove back to New Jersey.

The kiss changed nothing. The kiss changed everything.

On the car ride home, they talked about whether rocks were alive and why ghosts had such a negative reputation. When they arrived at Iroh’s, Sokka leaned over and kissed Zuko on the cheek.

“See you on Tuesday,” Sokka said.

“Yeah,” Zuko said, the spot on his cheek where Sokka kissed him burning. “Tuesday.”

Zuko woke up on his seventeenth birthday at dawn.

He got up, did his stretches, then walked upstairs and saw Iroh already sitting in the living room with a teapot and two teacups.

“Happy birthday, nephew,” Iroh said, pouring Zuko a cup of steaming tea.

“Thanks, uncle.”

“When are your guests arriving this evening?” Iroh asked.

“Six, I think,” Zuko replied, taking a sip of the hot tea.

“Wonderful. I will go pick up the fish this afternoon.”

“Thank you,” said Zuko, nodding his head.

“Is there anything you want to do today?” Iroh asked.

“I was planning on taking a walk.”

After tea and breakfast, Zuko took a warm shower. He dried his hair, put on his favorite red sweater, and went outside.

It had been a few months since he’d been to the lake, since he hadn’t ridden his bike in a while, but he had the time to walk there today. When he reached the water, his hair slightly crispy from being damp in the cold, he was pleased to see that it hadn’t frozen over yet. It was still a deep green. He stood at the edge of the bank and looked into the water.

For so long, all he wanted was to be alone and older. And now he was alone and seventeen and in his favorite place to be alone and all he could think about was how nice it was going to be to see his friends tonight.

Maybe he’d bring Sokka here next time.

Zuko arrived home before Iroh did, who was presumably at the fishmonger’s, so he took the opportunity to take a short nap on the couch. He woke up again, an hour later, to the sound of Iroh turning on the tap in the kitchen. Zuko sat up, then walked over to his uncle at the kitchen sink.

“How can I help?”

Azula, Ty Lee, and Mai were the first party guests to arrive, fifteen minutes early.

“So you’re a Sagittarius,” Ty Lee said, the moment Zuko opened the door.

“Uh, I think so,” he said, a little taken aback.

“He’s a Gemini moon, too,” Azula said.

“I am?”

Azula rolled her eyes. Zuko opened the door wider and beckoned them in.

Iroh was still cutting fish at the kitchen counter, but he waved at the girls as they entered.

“Welcome,” he said. “Make yourselves at home.”

The girls sat down on the couch. Azula collected their coats and handed them to Zuko, who didn’t know what to do with them. He just placed them on the floor in the corner of the room.

“Happy birthday, Zuko,” Mai said.

“Thanks, Mai.”

The second wave of guests arrived twenty minutes later, after Ty Lee had gone through every aspect of Zuko’s birth chart and explained why the opposition between the moon and Saturn at the time of his birth accounted for his strained relationship with his father. When the doorbell rang, Zuko gratefully left the conversation on the couch to open the door. Sokka, Suki, Katara, Toph, and Aang were all standing on the doorstep with big grins.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” they yelled in one cacophonous voice.

“Thanks,” Zuko said, reeling from the noise. “Come on in.”

The gaggle of teens and kids came into the house, kicking off their shoes and throwing their coats onto the pile in the corner.

“I hear you got a real job working at the Jasmine Dragon,” Toph said to Zuko. “Nice one.”

Zuko grinned at her. “Who’s the trust fund slut now?”

There was a moment of silence, during which everyone else in the room stared at Zuko in confusion and horror, before Toph started laughing.

“Zuko,” Aang said, once Toph’s laughter had died down. “The ecoterrorism project went great, thanks to you!”

“I’m glad,” Zuko said.

“What on earth are you doing to these children, Zuzu?” Azula asked, from the other side of the room.

“Yeah, what are you doing to us, Zuzu?” Sokka repeated, with a terrible grin.

“Oh, shut up,” Zuko said, flushing.

“Is this everyone, Zuko?” Iroh called from the kitchen.

Zuko nodded. He walked over to his uncle and helped him carry trays and bowls of food to the coffee table, while everyone else sat down on the couch and on the floor around the coffee table.

“What’s for dinner?” Suki asked, peering at the bowls of rice, raw fish, and vegetables.

“It’s temaki,” Iroh explained. He picked up a sheet of seaweed and demonstrated how to place the fillings and roll each seaweed sheet into an edible cone. For the next few minutes, the room was silent, as Zuko’s friends screwed up their faces and concentrated on rolling their temaki without them overflowing or breaking. Azula was by far the neatest and most efficient. Sokka was a mess—his looked like a misshapen lump of sushi.

“Sokka, why does yours look inside-out?” Katara asked, laughing.

“It’s deconstructed,” Sokka replied, sticking his tongue out at her.

Toph just grabbed handfuls of fish and stuffed them in her mouth.

After dinner, Iroh insisted on doing the tidying up alone, so Ty Lee suggested a visit to Zuko’s newly decorated room. While everyone else went downstairs, Zuko watched Sokka run over to the pile of coats and fish out a football-sized object that had been hidden there, wrapped in newspaper.

Zuko frowned. “What’s—"

“Shh!” Sokka said, putting a finger to his lips.

Zuko’s bedroom looked both larger and smaller with people in it. When Zuko and Sokka entered, Azula was sprawled across his shikibuton, Katara and Aang were looking at the framed old photograph of Iroh, Zuko, and Lu Ten hanging on the wall, while the others were sitting around on the floor and talking.

Ty Lee looked up and noticed the object in Sokka’s hands.

“I thought Zuko said no presents,” she said, narrowing her eyes.

“I did,” Zuko said.

“Yeah, but I thought that was more of a ‘wink wink nudge nudge’ reverse psychology request,” Sokka said, sitting down on the floor with the object in his lap.

Zuko sat down next to him. “But you already got me a present.”

“Yeah,” Sokka said. “But that was before…” He looked around the room and cleared his throat. “Before your actual birthday,” he finished, awkwardly.

Toph cocked her head. “Why is Sokka acting weird?” she asked.

“Because gay people don’t know how to act in public,” Mai said, in a dry voice.

Ty Lee nodded thoughtfully.

Ignoring them, Sokka handed Zuko the present. Zuko ripped open the newspaper wrapping and saw… himself. He blinked. In his hands was a small, slightly concave mirror attached to a round clamp by a rod.

“What is it?” he asked, looking up at Sokka.

“I made it for your bike,” Sokka explained. “You attach it to the handle on the right side and tilt it so the mirror shows what’s happening on the left-hand side of you without you having to turn your head.”

Zuko looked back down at the object.

“I haven’t super tried it out, so I don’t know if it’ll actually be useful,” Sokka continued, rambling. “And it’s a little too icy to be riding bikes right now, but, like, I thought maybe you might be getting sick of me driving you everywhere, not that I’m not okay driving you, I’m super happy to drive you wherever, whenever…”

“Sokka, shut up,” Azula interrupted.

Surprisingly, Katara laughed. “Thanks for intervening.”

“I love it,” Zuko said, his throat sore. “It’s amazing.”

He looked at Sokka and Sokka looked back. He felt warm and wonderful.

From the other side of the room, Aang’s voice asked, “Hey, Zuko, do you wear nail polish?”

Zuko tore his eyes away from Sokka and looked over at Aang, who was standing by Zuko’s chest of drawers. “No?”

“Then, what’s this?” Aang asked, holding a bottle of shimmery blue nail polish.

“Oh,” Zuko said, blinking. “Toph gave that to me.”

“That’s your birthday present, by the way,” Toph added. “Now that we’re giving gifts.”

“It’s such a nice color!” Katara commented.

“You can have it if you want,” Zuko told her.

“No, no, no,” Toph said. “You are not regifting your birthday present!”

“It’s not regifting,” Sokka said, standing up and walking over to Aang. “It’s redistributing the wealth. I want some.”

And that was how Zuko spent his seventeenth birthday watching Katara paint her own nails, then Sokka’s, then Aang’s, then Zuko’s. Toph refused to have her hands painted, but she let Katara paint her toenails. Once everyone else had blue nails, Ty Lee also wanted to join in, which meant Mai also agreed, as long as Ty Lee was the one to paint hers. Finally, Azula sighed and stuck out her hands for Ty Lee to paint.

“Does this make us soul-bonded now?” she asked, inspecting her newly blue fingernails.

“No, silly,” Ty Lee said, giggling. “We’d have to do a blood sacrifice for that.”

“Please, no blood sacrifices on my new rug,” Zuko said.

Sokka chuckled. Zuko felt unbearably proud, like he always did whenever he managed to make Sokka laugh.

Once the nail painting was over, Suki, Mai, and Ty Lee started talking about taekwondo, while Katara and Azula discussed their school’s biology club, and Aang and Toph babbled about the physics of flying creatures. Zuko and Sokka sat on the shikibuton together, their backs against the wall, watching them. Despite his nap earlier, Zuko was feeling sleepy again, and he felt his head drooping a little.

“If you want, you can rest your head on my shoulder,” Sokka mumbled.

“Yes,” Zuko said, nonsensically. “I can.”

He shuffled closer and tilted his head so it was leaning against Sokka’s shoulder. He closed his eyes, relaxing in the warmth of the basement, then opened them again to intertwine his hand in Sokka’s. Out of the corner of his vision, he saw Azula glance their way, but she didn’t say anything, just turned back to continue her conversation with Katara. He guessed he and Sokka had been pretty obvious about this for a while now.

Zuko looked down at his and Sokka’s hands, their fingers laced together, nails shiny and blue. The world kept turning.