Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Summary: Katara keeps a journal of all the shenanigans that the Gaang run into. 

Authors note: Just a little note to tell any lovely new reader that this fic follows directly on from my Stalking Zuko fic and I will reference occurrences from that story during this one, so I highly recommend reading it first!

Without further ado, let's start not stalking Zuko.

Chapter 1: awkward apologies

So I am starting a new journal about what it's like traveling with the Avatar and fighting the war. It's going to be a brand new, very sensible record of what has happened. I wanted to record what all my friends are like and the crazy shenanigans they get into. This journal will not become full of an obsessive amount of tidbits about Zuko. I am not going to write non-stop about him and his Zuko-ness, because that would be weird and stalkerish and I don't do that anymore.

Today I went down to the market with my brother. We haven't had much time to hang out just the two of us. There are always so many other people around. Sokka wanted to talk about what had really happened on me and Zuko's trip to the Southern Raiders. I'd told him briefly last night but he wanted more detail. Gah! What is it with everyone and more detail! We talked a bit about Mum and how I'd made the right choice with Yon Rha. My brother thinks it's a good thing that I didn't kill him, but he doesn't forgive him either. I asked him why he didn't take my side last night when Aang was going on (and on and on and on)about forgiveness but he just said that Aang had been really worried about me and he didn't want to take sides.

We talked about Zuko and my resolution to stop stalking him. Sokka is the only other person who read my stalker journal (the dirty, sneaky jerk) and knows the sort of things I wrote in there. Sokka was glad to hear that I was leaving my stalking days behind me. He was probably the first one aside from Toph to make real friends with Zuko and has been on at me (for a while now) to give him a chance, stop stalking him etc.

I told him that I was going to buy Zuko some fireflakes as a peace offering. I got Zuko a family size pack of sweet chilli fireflakes (this will not last him very long. Subject's…I mean Zuko's love of fireflakes is well known among our group). Sokka thought I was going a bit overboard on the fireflakes and said 'geez how badly do you want to be friends again?' And I sort of sputtered in response because his comment took me by surprise. I was just being thoughtful. Sokka took my sputtering and blushing as an indication that other things had happened on our Southern Raiders trip. He jumped to the same conclusion as my dad did when he saw Zuko giving me a moon peach.

All the men in my family associate food with love.

For goodness sake! They are just fireflakes not a proposal of marriage.

I mean nothing happened!

Fine! I hugged him and snotty cried all over him, but I had told Sokka that already. There was much embarrassment and bickering between Sokka and I. Sokka seemed to hear naked steamy sex every time I said snotty cry and cuddle in the rain. Ever since Sokka and Suki started doing it, he sees sex everywhere! He's gone all sex maniac.

I know he sexiled Zuko from the boy's room last night. Aang prefers to sleep on Appa so Sokka only needed to get rid of Zuko to have the boy's room all to himself. Suki and Sokka think they are being so subtle. But I am not an idiot. Last night Suki snuck out of the girls room and didn't come back and Zuko was sleeping on the couch in the lounge room.

I know what's going on there!

I told Sokka that me and Zuko were just looking for mum's murderer so nothing happened. Sokka said he liked all his revenge quests with a big side of sex! Zuko had just been helpful. Sokka asked if by helpful I meant sexy. I told him he was being ridiculous and Zuko was just my friend. Sokka looked at the fireflakes and gave himself a slap in the forehead and said the most ridiculous thing ever.

"That's what all the fireflakes are for! You're going to go up to him and say : please take these fireflakes… and my virginity… as a token of my friendship." He put on a really high pitched voice that was supposed to mimic mine. I do not sound like that! I would never say that!

I started whacking him rather spiritedly and quite forcefully with the giant family pack of fireflakes and telling him he was a pervert and an idiot and a sexist and a jerk and…many other names, none of which are too polite. In the face of the Great Fireflake Offensive Sokka covered his head and eventually started to apologize.

When he had reached the requisite number of apologies to calm my wrath, I asked him why he was so sure me and Zuko had sex. He said that we'd been gone for three days together as if that explained everything. I retorted that he and Zuko had gone on holiday to the boiling rock together and been gone for five days and should I just assume that they had super kinky prison sex during these five days.

That shut him up!

I win at arguments forever!

-?-

We made a non-aggression pact because we still had heaps of things to buy. We had to get some new clothes for Suki. She's still wearing her prison outfit, poor girl and she can't go out and about in the town until we get some proper clothes for her. Suki is roughly my size. She's a little bigger in the… err chest area, so I just have to make sure that things feel loose there. I was going to go help Sokka pick out a few things for her.

We have had many arguments.

We have drastically different tastes in regards to what each of us would prefer Suki wear. I, being the girl and being in possession of better taste, won all the arguments.

I win again!

The sales lady was on my side and together we battled Sokka's poor taste! Suki will thank me for the great service I have done her this day. She will be grateful that she can walk about the town and not look like a drunken, blind strumpet who can't co-ordinate an outfit and who is not picky about who buys her drinks. Oh yeah! That was the look that Sokka was going for.

-?-

We carried everything back together and fell into good natured sibling bickering about strumpets and what we would have for lunch, etc, on the way there. Suki was really glad to get some new clothes and really quite pleased with all my choices. I kept giving Sokka these I told you so glances as Suki tried things on and said how much she liked them and how well they fit her etc.

Toph and Zuko and Aang are training. Earthbending is more defensive and firebending is more offensive and they are trying to get him to use both bendings simultaneously. Aang is not allowed to Airbend. Toph and Zuko are in agreement that he is over-reliant on airbending and are trying to increase his confidence with other bendings. He's already pretty confident with waterbending, so I am not needed.

Boo.

However from what I can hear of the training; the array of frustrated comments and swearing (Zuko) and exclamations of Gah! You airbended again twinkletoes! (Toph) I think they are having mixed success.

-?-

They broke for lunch but then got straight back into training as soon as Aang had eaten his last mouthful. Zuko almost had to carry Aang back to the garden by the scruff of his neck-like he was a naughty and playful kitten. I know Zuko is just worried that Aang won't know enough in time for the comet. He's worried about Aang facing his father.

Now that I know how Zuko got his scar, I'm inclined to share his worry. Ozai's not…he's not sentimental about children. He's not going to go easy on Aang just because he's a kid.

Still, sometimes I wish I could just get Zuko to relax. If he were any more rigid I could use him as a surf board. I still haven't had a chance to give him the fireflakes because he's all firebending training -all the time.

-?-

So… um… I have just given Zuko the fireflakes. We have had an awkward moment. We have shaken hands. And nearly hugged. I have agreed to give fireflakes another try.

Gah!

Why did I do this?

So what happened was this. They'd finished training and Zuko was in the kitchen making tea for everybody and I came up to him with the fireflakes behind my back.

Maybe I started off on the wrong foot because I said I needed to talk to him about fireflakes. He sighed deeply and looked imploringly at the ceiling and finally said that he really was trying. I was confused, trying what? He said he knew how much I hated them and that I could spare him the lecture because he really was trying to cut back on his fireflake consumption and had only had them with lunch today and was planning on only sprinkling them sparingly at dinner.

Oh.

Bollocks!

Zuko has never previously listened to me in regards to the many evils of fireflakes. Why did he choose this day, of all days, to cut back on his immense flake consumption? Today when I bought him a family size pack!

Boo!

Why did he decide to cut back? He loves fireflakes!

I think he noticed the expression on my face and asked me what was wrong. I produced the giant bag of fireflakes from behind my back and said that I had gotten them for him. He looked infinitely confused by this turn of events. Like more confused than I have ever seen him. I don't think I could have confused him more if I'd whipped out a dragon egg and told him I'd laid it myself. I said that he probably didn't want them now, if he was planning on cutting back. Zuko made grabby hands for the fireflakes and almost hugged the giant packet and said that he still wanted them really quickly. And then we were just smiling at each other like awkward dorks who are awkward. Zuko makes me act like a dork.

Zuko asked me why I had gotten him a giant family size supply of fireflakes.

And for a few moments all words left my brain. Where did they go? I actually knew the answer! But for some reason my words abandoned me and I became fascinated with the floor. Zuko was still looking supremely confused. Here it was: apology time. I never thought I'd ever have to apologize to Zuko and I wasn't quite sure how to go about it. Should I apologize for every unreasonable/crazy thing individually or just offer a blanket apology? I chose blanket apology.

I mumbled that I wanted to say sorry for being a crazy-lady with him and be friends. However I mumbled this really low and to the floor and Zuko didn't quite hear me. He came a lot closer and told me I'd have to repeat that because the only word he caught was crazy. I mumbled a bit louder. He still didn't catch that and had to get right up in my personal space to hear what I was saying. I was getting a bit frustrated and I ended up saying quite crossly/grumpily I just said I wanted to say sorry and be friends!

Gah! This apology was going all wrong. You're not meant to get cross mid-apology. But it was just so awkward. Zuko said I didn't need to get him a family pack of fireflakes. For him we already were friends. He smiled at me brightly and I smiled back and said that I just felt bad for how I'd been treating him and I wanted to do something to make it up to him. He said he knew what I could do to make it up to him. I think I must have made a worried face because he started nervous babbling like he does when he gets nervous. He said he was not going to ask me to do anything awful. But he thought I should just try fireflakes again, because I might like them and then I could help him eat the family pack.

At first I was a bit sarcastic, because to me- fireflakes are the most awful snack ever created. I made various comments to this effect but eventually relented and agreed to try some.

Why did I do this!

I said I'd do it, if that's what it took for him to accept my apology. And then to cap off this awkward conversation, Zuko made an attempt to hug me at the same time that I stuck out my hand for a handshake. And then we switched. I tried to return the hug and he held out his hand. I was feeling exceptionally dorky at this point so I grabbed his hand and shook it in an exaggerated fashion that was quite comical to me.

We have agreed to be friends.

I have agreed to eat fireflakes in about an hour. So this may be my last entry, as in about an hour I will know the taste of my whole mouth burning and may never recover.

Honestly! The things I do for Zuko.

-?-

Shocking news!

Fireflakes are not repulsive if you just sprinkle the tiniest amount on top of your dinner. They just make it a little zesty.

Everybody was watching me with eyes agog while I crumbled up some flakes (only 3) on my curry. I have had a long standing and well known opposition to the existence of fireflakes, so the others were very surprised that I was trying them again.

Aang asked me what I was doing in a very bemused tone of voice (I may have ranted at length about the evils of fireflakes to Aang back in the western air temple.) I replied that I was just giving them another go. Aang's eyebrows raised his eyebrows so high that they almost climbed off his face and wandered away.

Zuko was watching me expectantly with a glass of milk on hand in case I hated them again. I don't know what it was about the curry, but fireflakes tasted okay with it. When it is just a small amount and they are sprinkled through it- they are okay. So I told Zuko it was not the worst thing I had ever eaten. And he smiled like I had just handed him a million dollars..or his honor… on a silver platter.

Chapter 1 authors note:

Long rambly notes:

Hello lovely readers and welcome to Not Stalking Zuko. I hope you enjoyed what will be the first of many chapters of silliness and shenanigans. I've changed the breaks from -!- to -?- for this new journal because in my imagination at least, Katara is less angry now and more questioning. It is a whole new journal and while she'll probably end up writing predominantly about Zuko, I still wanted all the other characters to be involved and establish good character relationships. Because to me, by the end of their stay on Ember Island, they'll just be six people who love each other a whole bunch. So this fic may have more group dynamic stuff.

Sokka and Katara: I really love their sibling bond. Now wait, I flove it. Sokka is teasing Katara a bit in this chapter because she's being so awkward about Zuko and he's read her stalker journal and has made assumptions. He was the big assumer who assumed things. He's my shipper on deck! Bless his cotton socks. He's also got sex on the brain at the moment.

He's in that first flush of a new relationship and in my experience, when people are in that first flush, they want to set up all their single friends. Is this a global thing or just a thing among my friends? I'm not sure. But I have observed that people who are in that happy new-couple stage want to share the happy-new-couple-stage. He doesn't actually think they've had sex, but he thinks Katara has a crush on Zuko so he's just yanking her chain. Until she explodes Katara wrath all over him.

Suki's clothes: she's in the prison outfit for ages and then new clothes just appear. I thought they deserved some explanation/ acknowledgement.

Sexile: if you are unfamiliar with the word, is a term used when you have a roommate and they have… err company over. Three is definitely a crowd for the activity they have planned and the third wheel gets banished/sexiled until company leaves.

Zuko was going to try to quit fireflakes for her, because nothing makes Katara angrier than fireflakes. But then she surprised him with that family pack and awkwardness ensues. Katara's apology was always going to be an awkward sandwich with embarrassing sauce.

Next up: Katara and Zuko will chat about the gender politics of their respective cultures.

Chapter 2: midnight conversations

My bed once belonged to someone called Kira and she has carved Kira loves Azo all over the bedhead and the side of the bed side table. She's drawn a lot of hearts about the place like some silly lovesick girl. I have been wondering what happened to her and Azo. Did they ever get a chance to be together?

I couldn't sleep. It's not long after the full moon. I am always more awake at night around the full moon. My brain was buzzing with thoughts. I couldn't get it to shut up. I'd be lying there and telling my mind to just be quiet, but it wouldn't settle down. I was thinking about Kira and fireflakes and forgiveness and friendship and what I wanted to have for breakfast tomorrow and so many other things.

This house is so creaky.

If we were going to be staying long term, I wouldn't mind having a go at fixing it up. But I know we won't be staying for long. The boys were tossing round ideas of where we should go next after dinner but couldn't come up with a solution. Toph was asleep just in the bed next to me. I didn't want to wake her with my tossing and turning. Suki's bed across the room was empty again. So I got up and went for a wander about the house. It's a bit spooky, wandering about this house on my own at night. When I got to the living room I found Zuko sprawled on the couch. He'd been sexiled again.

He's a bit too tall for the couch and he couldn't seem to get comfy. He was tossing and turning and his limbs were hanging off at odd angles. His back was to me but I figured he must have been awake, because no one should toss and turn that much in their sleep. I called out his name softly, just to see if he was awake. He gave a shout of fright and fell off the couch.

Good. He was awake then.

I had walked so silently that he'd had no idea that I was there. He was a bit cross at being snuck up on. But I told him that I wasn't sneaking, I just couldn't sleep. Anyway he was the one who taught me how to walk so quietly. He said yeah, that was me, in a very resigned fashion and gave me an odd look and said I have a feeling you're going to make me regret teaching you that. But he said it with a smile. He said he was having trouble drifting off as well and suggested we have a cup of chamomile tea. His Uncle told him that was meant to help people sleep and for Zuko, everything his Uncle said must be absolutely true. He sighed and got up and made a groaning stretching noise.

There was a bit of quiet fussing in the kitchen because we didn't want to wake the others. Zuko made a chamomile tea for me and a jasmine tea for himself. I asked him why he didn't have a chamomile as well if he was having trouble sleeping but he said all the tea in the world would not make the lumpiest couch he had ever come across more comfortable. I said that Sokka was being a berk for sexiling him two nights in a row and Zuko said that he'd put up with actual exile for years and by comparison sexiled for two nights was a breeze.

We sat on the front veranda with our tea cups in hand. There was a nice view of the beach from here. It would make a good moping spot really. I told him about Kira and Azo and how I couldn't stop thinking about them. He said that often couples in the firenation army were allowed to be part of the same division but not the same unit, so at least they would have been near each other. He said that the firenation had many women in its army but they normally didn't serve as foot soldiers and were often trained in different fighting styles and espionage etc, so they rarely fought on the front lines. For all we knew, Kira had lived and just settled down somewhere else. That made me feel a little better about sleeping in her bed.

He spoke about women fighting in the army like it was just normal. I thought about the water tribes and how the northern water tribe didn't think women were worthy of learning how to fight and how hard I'd had to struggle to get master Pakku to respect me. I told Zuko how I'd had to fight Master Pakku just to be taught. I'd won him over in the end but it had been a hard fight and in the end only my grandmother's betrothal necklace had convinced him otherwise. I wonder if he would have taught me if I hadn't been related to Gran Gran.

Zuko thought it was a bit weird to just not train women at all, especially in the northern water tribe because they have a much smaller population. Zuko is firmly of the belief that everybody should learn at least basic self defense because terrible things happen all the time, wherever you are. He said that if people want to learn how to fight they should be taught and started going on about how women were more equal in the fire nation. I pointed out that wasn't entirely true because he'd just said that women didn't often serve on the front lines. Ha!

He said that was more of a brute strength thing than a gender thing. To be a foot soldier you had to be built like a tank to carry around those heavy spears etc all the time. But it was true that more women normally had home army duties, training new recruits, being part of the local law enforcement etc. He said that most of the army got trained by highly competent women and his favourite firebending teacher aside from his Uncle had been a woman called Za Jei. She'd been the one to make him keep training unless he'd been knocked unconscious, not the one who just threw fireballs at him all day.

It was just so different to the water tribes, especially the northern water tribe. It was all healing and cooking and arranged marriages for girls. I told him of Yue, who had no say in who she got advantageously matched with and Yugoda who was one of the smartest women I've ever met and who would never be anything other than a healer. Zuko said being a healer was great and that if it wasn't for my healing capabilities he'd have at least a fractured wrist and three broken ribs at the moment. He said that they had arranged marriages in the fire nation for the nobility. His parents had an arranged marriage, but they hadn't seemed happy. So maybe there wasn't much difference after all. I thought the fact that women were able to lead and fight and teach fighting was a pretty big difference.

Zuko said he didn't know if it was any better in the firenation, because he thought the only reason why women were treated more equally was because of the war and the constant need for soldiers to keep fighting it. Everybody in the fire nation got involved in fighting in the war somehow and as a result everybody had lost someone in their family to the various campaigns over the years. I asked him who he'd lost, and for a second I thought he wasn't going to answer me. It was rather a personal question, I guess.

He looked into his cup a little sadly and swilled it around. Then he told me that his cousin, Lu Ten, had died in the siege of Ba Sing Se when he'd been eleven. He said he thought his Uncle had never really gotten over it. I said I was sorry for his loss, because that's what you're supposed to say right? It just sounds so shallow though. Zuko looked quite sad about it but he said it was okay. He didn't get to see much of Lu Ten as a kid and only really saw him when the family all went on holidays together to Ember Island. It was Lu Ten who had taught Zuko and Azula how to swim.

When Zuko was talking about learning how to swim his eyes widened like he had an idea. He then said I have an idea really excitedly. I made a dubious face. I had a feeling it was going to be a stupid idea but I heard him out. He thought we could go to Ember Island and hide out at the royal residence there, because it was literally the last place on the planet anyone would think to look for us.

See what I mean.

Stupid idea.

Hiding from the firelord at his own summer house? I mean really now. Zuko said that nobody ever went there anymore and it was on a secluded side of Ember Island so it would be easy to hide Appa and there'd be enough rooms for everybody to have their own room so he wouldn't have to be sexiled every night. I said that as tempting as the chance at having my own room was, he still hadn't convinced me. Ember Island sounded a bit too risky to me and the house would be full of creepy Ozai vibes. Zuko replied that his father often hadn't come on the family holidays so there shouldn't be too many creepy Ozai vibes. He made a weird face when he said creepy Ozai vibes. Zuko had him as a dad so he probably couldn't sense Ozai vibes, creepy or otherwise. They'd just be regular vibes to him.

I started going on about how if he was so worried about being sexiled, why didn't he just tell Sokka no and refuse to leave. Zuko said that would be against the bro code. I don't understand the bro code and I told him this. Zuko sighed and said that none of us knew what would happen in the future and that Sokka and Suki should be able to enjoy their time together while they could. He has a point I guess.

Then I said something most ridiculous. I invited Zuko back to my bed. I meant to say bedroom but the room part fell off when I was speaking. Oops. He got the most astonished look on his face. I started doing that babbly talking thing that Zuko does when he's nervous.

By George, it is contagious!

I never babbly-nervous talked before I met Zuko.

I explained that I meant that the girl's room and that he could sleep in Suki's bed, since she obviously wasn't going to be using it at all during our stay and it seemed a bit silly to have him trying to sleep on the lumpy couch when there was a perfectly serviceable bed in our room. Zuko said something about it not being proper and asked if me and Toph would mind. I said proper schmoper (yes, I said that. What is wrong with me?) and I was inviting him, so obviously I didn't mind and Toph wouldn't mind either. He acquiesced in the face of my proper-schmoper argument and came back with me after we finished our tea.

Zuko is a very deep sleeper and fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.

I was still awake and I've gotten up again to make another tea and write this entry. I'm starting to feel tired again now.

Chapter 2 authors note:

Very long and rambly notes follow:

Lovely readers! You have reached the end of midnight conversations. Congratulations! I hope you enjoyed it. In this chapter I just wanted to touch on the different gender dynamics in the firenation and the watertribes and Zuko and Katara's view points. Also, I just wanted to say that I have just seen made in Dagenham and it was fabulous! So if you have a few spare hours and want to see a delightful British movie, give it a go. But all the gender equality in that movie got me thinking about how that would apply to the Avatar world.

If you want to read my rant on gender in ATLA here it is. Otherwise feel free to skip it!

*START RANT*

Water tribes: Katara's been struggling against gender-roles and trying to gain recognition for herself as an equal to the male fighters around her throughout the series. It was her major arc in season 1, to go from that untrained watertribe girl to a water bending master. I think Katara would feel very strongly about women being treated equally because that is something she has really had to fight for.

The water tribes seem the most patriarchal of the four nations. The southern water tribe is apparently a lot less so, but I still get the feeling that there was some ingrained sexism there as well. In the first episode, Sokka is in charge of the southern water tribe by virtue of being the oldest and a boy. And I say this with much love for Sokka as a character, but he's a bit sexist at the start. He does get better quite quickly upon exposure to other tough strong ladies like Suki, which leads me to believe that, in himself, Sokka wasn't that sexist but, he was just reflecting his culture and environment.

The northern tribe: oh baby what was going on here! Arranged marriages seemed like they were common place and not just for the nobility (Pakku and Kanna weren't part of the northern water tribe chief's family were they?) And if a woman wanted out of her arranged marriage, running away was the only option.

Master Pakku refused to teach Aang because he had imparted some of what he learned to Katara. When you actually think about that, it is quite scary. Aang was seen as the one great hope for the future, the one chance to defeat the firelord and Master Pakku was unwilling to train him all over a petty sexist principle that women were not equal and not worthy of learning to fight. Katara does have to fight him and stand up for herself and she does this admirably. But it is only her grandmother's necklace that changes his mind. I was left with the distinct impression that if she hadn't been related to Gran Gran he would not have taught her. I don't want to Pakku bash, because I thought he was an interesting and nuanced character. While eventually he comes to respect and admire Katara, it was such an incredible struggle for both of them.

I have a feeling Katara (being a female master waterbender) is still the exception and not the norm for the water tribes, now that all the other southern water benders, aside from Hama, are gone at least. Things don't change over night and getting gender equality takes time. So to me, it seems natural that when Zuko talks offhandedly about women in the army, she'd be a little curious.

Firenation is a different kettle of fish entirely. I have gathered from my studies that most of the big surges in women's rights came during wars (granted the suffragettes pre-date WWI). To me, it seems that whenever a country is plunged into war, women experience a rise in rights and responsibilities and gain more employment, freedom and movement. Australia during both WWI and WWII employed many women as auxiliary support staff and I think the same thing occurred in Britain/Canada/USA. The fire nation has been at war for 100 years continuously and I think the integration of women into the army/navy/various other roles would have happened fairly naturally. While according to Avatar wiki, more women opt to take home guard/ training positions so they can stay in the firenation, it appears that the women in the fire nation experience much more equality. After 100 years of working alongside men, I feel that, at least among the lower classes, there is a great deal of gender equality in the firenation.

A few caveats: I think there is still a glass ceiling for women in the fire nation, there's no old lady generals are there? And I think for aristocratic women there would still be a little bit of gender inequality. It seems like arranged marriages exist for the aristocracy (and it's never the woman who gets to choose in an arranged marriage) and I think it cannot be overlooked that the only reason for all this gender equality in the fire nation is a war that the country has been waging for 100 years.

Zuko has been raised in an environment where it was normal and occasionally mandatory for women to learn how to fight and the attitudes of the water tribes would be a bit baffling for him. But he's trying to emulate his Uncle and learn from other cultures and put on his non-judgmental pants (bless him). He points out the similarities between the two cultures, but mostly he listens to what she says and responds as best he can.

Naturally YMMV on all of this lovely readers!

*END RANT*

Huge thank you to all my fantastic reviewers! You guys make me smile! Thanks for coming along on a second fic with me! And just a giant thanks so much to everyone who took the time to review and I just want you to know that every review brightens my day !

For the last chapter the lovely Donnacrunch *waves at Donna* mentioned Suki's lack of characterization in the series aside from Sokka's girlfriend/badass. I hope to remedy this in coming chapters and give her a more rounded personality. Donna also mentioned the foolishness of their fooling around (possibilities of getting pregnant etc) which I confess I had not thought much on. But it gave me an exceptionally foolish plot bunny that has now run off into ridiculous land, but that is still a few chapters way!

Next chapter: there will be a few arguments (but not between Katara and Zuko) the Gaang will move to Ember Island and Katara will once again use her healing as an excuse to get handsy with Zuko (for healing purposes of course)

Chapter 3: A different view

This morning there was a mild argument between Toph and Zuko. It is most entertaining to watch the two most intractably stubborn people I know (arguably the two most intractably stubborn people in the entire world) having a polite argument. Me and Sokka bet the last mango on the winner. Toph won, so the mango is mine! (Zuko was always going to give in to Toph.)

Toph and Zuko both feel that Aang needs extensive training in earthbending and firebending respectively. This morning Toph got a bit cross that Aang hardly spent any time earth bending anymore and said that out of the four elements, Aang is the least confident with earth. Zuko started deploring Aang's ability with fire and how he's still not aggressive enough and sucks a bit at it. Toph said he sucked way more at earthbending. While they didn't use these exact words, they did get into a conversation about which element he sucked more at.

In front of Aang.

In fact it turned into a three way conversation with Zuko exclaiming that he hadn't even mastered shooting fire out of his feet yet, Toph lamenting that despite her best efforts, Aang's metal bending was worse than Haru's, and Aang saying seriously guys, I'm right here. Aang got a bit ignored in this conversation.

Zuko and Toph decided to settle it by playing fire, earth, water, air. Toph won the first game and Zuko made them try best out of three. Toph won again. Zuko grumbled but ceded victory to Toph. Toph took Aang to the cliff tops near the beach to practice his earth projectiles.

Go Toph!

Secretly I am very glad that Zuko has taken the morning off training Aang and I think Toph is the only one intractably stubborn enough to accomplish this task.

-?-

Sokka and Zuko decided to spar with their swords.

Boys.

Always needing to whack things with swords. This morning they discovered that they were both trained by master Piandao and spent a large amount of time making no way/yes way faces at each other when they first discovered this.

Suki and I watched their sparring and occasionally called out encouragement/sarcastic comments. We had a lovely chat about Sokka and his poor taste in girl-clothes and what the South Pole was like (Sokka wants to take Suki home after the war and show her how we live) and which of the boys would win if they were fighting for real. I think Zuko, but I would never tell either of them this in a million years. It would lead to over-inflated egos and hurt feelings and shenanigans.

I will say this about Sokka: he's actually gotten really good. He's quick and inventive and not just at sword fighting. It's amazing how far he's come in a year. Sokka, I am almost surprised to say it, is a good leader. I remember how much I teased him when he first tried to lead us and made us walk through the forest (and then we met Jet. I still don't quite know how I feel about that).

Now, for the most part, we all just fall in line with Sokka's ideas and plans. He's our plan guy. Sometimes it's a bit hard for me not to tease him and make fun of some of his more elaborate plans. Because he'll always be my sarcastic big brother with two fish hooks in his thumb to me. But I am proud of him and I probably don't tell him that nearly enough.

-?-

The boys tried an experiment where they swapped weapons. I called out that this was a silly idea. Sokka replied that he thought it was a fabulous idea and they had nothing to lose by diversifying (except their dignity and maybe an eye/limb). Despite my arguments/comments the swap happened.

Sokka was confused about what to do with the second sword despite how much 'helpful' advice Zuko called out. Zuko kept trying to block with his left hand and always realized a little too late that he didn't have a sword in that hand any more. There were shenanigans and it was most entertaining. Until it ended quite dramatically with Zuko bleeding and swearing and Sokka apologizing and saying that it was the sword's fault. What happened was that Zuko tried to block one too many times with his leftie and Sokka made a wild swing with his extra sword and clipped him on his shoulder.

Sword practice is over for the day.

-?-

We were all sitting in the lounge room having tea. Suki made it, she steeped the leaves for a little too long so it was a little bitterer than when Zuko makes it, but all of us were too polite to say so. I was healing Zuko's shoulder. He fussed a little at the start because healing open cuts stings a little but mostly he sat still for me. Zuko has rather nice broad shoulders. I've never noticed before, but they are nice. But he was so friggin tense that it was a bit tricky to heal his shoulder. I started rubbing both his shoulders to help him relax a bit. For healing purposes. This was also nice. He let out a sort of relaxed sigh at one point (when I ran my palm between his shoulder blades). That was most distracting.

Sokka wanted to make plans because Sokka loves plans as much as he loves Suki (but in a very different way.) The four of us left sat down to talk about where to go next. Sokka thinks we stand out too much on this island and Zuko suggested Ember Island again. There were many dubious faces all round.

Zuko was really keen on his Ember Island idea. He whipped out a list he'd written about the benefits of Ember Island from his pocket. What is it with the lists? Really, does he have a list for everything stashed away somewhere? Does he carry all his lists on him? What else does he write lists about?

His list of arguments in support of Ember Island included: The Ember Island house is big (big enough to hide Appa). It's mostly locked up and no one has been there in years. It's on a secluded side of the island but we'll be close to all sorts of services in the main town and because the island is so touristy in summer, a few new people won't stand out as much. There's virtually no military presence and only a small local home guard station. And it is literally the last place on earth anyone would think to look for us. There were a few other items on the list that he didn't read out because he didn't want to embarrass Sokka and Suki. I was still behind him, rubbing …err… healing his shoulders so I could see the list.

Eventually he convinced all of us. Well, he convinced Sokka first and then Sokka got a bit excited about the giant tiled map of the fire nation in the town square of Ember Island and then by their powers combined they managed to convince me and Suki. We decided to leave tomorrow morning, which will give us enough time to pack etc.

-?-

So Toph stomped in crankily and said that she hoped we'd figured out a plan for where to go next because we'd have to move this afternoon. Aang trailed after her and said she was making a big deal over nothing and he'd just helped some people and what was wrong with that. Toph told us that they'd come across some struggling villagers at the cliffs. They'd been rock fishing and there had been a big wave and some of them had been swept out to sea . Aang had got his Avatar on and saved them. And announced his Avatar status to the fisherman. Who had probably run back to their families and told everyone on the island by now.

Oh.

So we'd be leaving way ahead of schedule.

Aang sees nothing wrong in helping people who need it. Toph says she wasn't saying there was anything wrong with saving the fisherman, but he should have done it in a less showy, attention-seeking way and without announcing his Avatar status. Aang said that saving people is selfless and not attention seeking and there's nothing wrong with saving people anyway and their circular argument began anew. This argument has been going on for some time apparently.

We have been trying to keep Aang's identity a secret so we can just blend in and live in hiding but this has really thrown a big spanner in the works. There was much ado and shenanigans and hurried packing. Sokka was making sad panda faces at Aang because Aang has messed with the plan. Sokka hates it when people do that.

-?-

After much ado we got Appa packed with everything. I bended a big misty cloud around us so we could fly without drawing attention. Zuko had remarked that he noticed most of the navy had been deployed when we broke into that messenger hawk tower last week. So there are a few more firenation ships out there for us to avoid. I made the cloud huge so we would be less noticeable. It was hard work maintaining a cloud that size. After a while Aang handed over the reigns to Sokka and helped me. When Aang was standing near Toph, they both continued their argument.

Aang just wants to save everyone and help out wherever he can and that is something I love about Aang. He is unashamed of being the Avatar and doesn't want Toph to make him feel like it is something he should hide. He thinks it's time the world knows the Avatar is still fighting and that everybody probably knew he was in the Firenation after the Day of Black Sun anyway and… Toph was a meany-face for not wanting to save people.

Toph is adamant that she is not against saving people, but was saying that next Aang feels the urge, he should try and do so in a way that doesn't announce his Avatar status because we are trying to live inconspicuously. Announcing you are the avatar is pretty friggin conspicuous in the firenation. Unless Aang wants to go back to hanging out in caves, we should all try to keep a low profile. Zuko piped up in support of Toph and said that he wasn't a fan of the living-in-a-cave idea and that it would be better if Aang kept his identity a secret. Aang launched into a rather long and meandering Air-nomad philosophy-I-give-people-hope-and-hope-is-good speech. I piped up in support of hope-giving-but also voiced my opposition to living-in-a-cave. Nobody wants that again.

Suki tried to play mediator, bless her cotton socks. But the argument went round in circles. Sometimes, it was like watching a tennis match between Toph and Aang.

"The Avatar is meant to give people hope! Knowing I'm out there gives people hopeToph." Aang would say.

"Yeah, well I hope we don't run into another barrage of airships! What are you going to do about that hope!" Toph would parry back.

Zuko ended their argument by announcing (in an exceptionally dramatic fashion-there were big hand gestures and everything) the fact that every single soldier in the firenation army has been instructed to kill Aang on sight and every military unit is equipped with a special black ribbon carrying messenger hawk. If Aang is seen/recognized, we will all have to deal with the entirety of the firenation forces and his evil dad way sooner than we'd like to.

That put a dampener on everybody's mood. This is something Zuko excels at. All his dramatic announcements tend to be a little disheartening. So it is a blessing that he doesn't do them that often. Aang has, after Zuko's rather dramatic announcement, agreed to wear a hat in public and try to keep his identity a secret when we are on Ember Island.

-?-

I am exhausted from waterbending that cloud the whole way here, but I will say this. I take back every negative thing I said about Ember Island. This place is awesome. It is so lush. The beaches are long and wide and sandy and there are so many fruit trees and the air is filled with that mango smell. It's just paradise.

We landed in one of the internal courtyards of the royal residence. There was a big fountain on the back wall that Appa started drinking from immediately. And everybody was all excited to explore the house and pick out their new rooms. All the bedrooms were on the second floor and it was going to be a race to get the best one. I asked Zuko quietly which one that was. Zuko whispered that I would probably like the room that was the third door from the left at the top of the stairs.

We had decided that the only fair way to divide up the rooms was a first-in-gets-the-room system. I already knew this would lead to chaos and competition and frantic racing. I made a beeline for the stairs and the third door to the left in the mad rush that ensued as soon as Appa landed. I got up the stairs first. I may have also used my water bending to get ahead of the others, but I don't think it counts as cheating. I just made the floor a little slippery. They'd just have to go a bit more slowly that's all.

But anyway, I opened the door and I was just greeted by the most amazing view. This room is so mine! I have a really large window that looks down to the beach on one wall and a nice little balcony on the other that would be big enough for a few chairs and a table. It has a view of the other side of the beach, the side with the small dock.

I opened up all the windows and the doors to air the place out and threw my waterskin on the bed and claimed the room! I've never had my own room before. It's great. I wonder who had this room before.

The sun was setting and it was just beautiful. I knew I should probably help the others unpack, but bloody hell, I help out all the time, and they could handle it without me for a few moments. I sat on the balcony and draped my legs over the edge and just enjoyed the sight and the smell of the place.

I heard a small polite cough behind me. It was Zuko. I thanked him for the room tip and waved him over and he came and sat next to me. He said he was glad I'd gotten this room because this room was the one least likely to have any evil Ozai vibes and he knew I was worried about that. Our legs were dangling over the balcony and we had a great view down to the sandy beach. There must have been a mango tree nearby because I could smell mango really strongly. I said I could get used to a view like this. Zuko smiled at me then and I smiled back. He asked, really shyly, if I liked the room.

Sometimes he is just so shy.

I gave him a big affectionate shoulder nudge and told him he was an idiot. Of course I liked it! I couldn't think of anyone who wouldn't like it. We watched the sunset together and it was nice.

Then we went down to help the others unpack because Sokka was calling us all sorts of lazy names from the bottom of the stairs.

Chapter 3 authors note:

Lovely readers! You've reached the end of a new view. I hope you enjoyed it. Thank you so much for all your reviews and comments! I really appreciate them all and you guys are awesome for giving me feedback! I do get ideas/inspiration from your comments. Don't worry about Sokka and Suki my lovely readers! I hope to surprise and delight, not irritate and disappoint.

In this chapter: fire,earth,water, air looked like the avatar version of rock, paper, scissors when Aang and Sokka were playing it in that episode in Ba Sing Se.

I floated the memory of Jet (the ghost of crushes past) because I don't think Katara has forgotten about him at all. She just doesn't quite know what to feel. We will deal more with Jet in my chapters around the EIP but I just wanted to illustrate that Katara still thinks about him, even if it is just a passing thought.

I also wanted to acknowledge, or at least have Katara recognize Sokka's leadership role. While there's not really a hierarchy in the Gaang (I see it more as a six person love in), Sokka is the plan guy, the leader guy and I think the one they are all most likely to look to. Even Zuko looks to him for the plan in the boiling rock. I think Sokka is a very collaborative leader and always consults with the Gaang so he's not throwing his weight around like he used to in early season 1 when he was a bit more insecure about his place in the gang. I think Sokka feels quite secure in his plan/sarcasm guy role and he is one of my favourite characters so I just wanted him to get a bit of love.

Avatar Wiki tells me that Zuko and Sokka both trained under Piandao. I assume this would have come up in conversation at some point and they would have made no way/yes way faces at each other. So I wrote it.

It is entirely unnecessary for Katara to give Zuko a shoulder massage, but she does so anyway for… healing purposes – and she will claim that is the real reason to all and sundry. Bless her handsy cotton socks!

One of the bigger themes I wanted to start to develop this chapter was Aang's conflict with his air nomad beliefs and his avatar duties and his personality (which is a little attention seeking- and I say that with a ton of love for Aang) and how this can affect the rest of the group. I also wanted to explore the theme of differing points of view and how the Gaang interact when there is a disagreement, because they would not agree with each other all the time.

One of the things I love in Aang is how genuinely he cares for people and genuinely wants to help. Invariably Aang is a helper. It's what he does. I have a feeling Aang is almost physically or psychologically incapable of turning away from someone who needs him and not getting involved. Aang believes that all life is sacred and it would be abhorrent to him to turn his back of someone in mortal peril. For better or worse, Aang is always getting involved and trying to fix things.

To me, this would logically be a problem in the latter half of season 3. In the first half, before the Day of Black Sun, Aang begrudgingly accepted that he needed to keep his identity a secret and live in hiding. But he felt very strongly about not letting the world down or letting the world think he had died/abandoned them again. Maybe it's a result of hanging around Katara too much, But Aang recognizes the hope he gives people and how important hope is. I think Aang has flashes of feeling intense guilt over disappearing for 100 years. I also think he hasn't properly begun to work through all that entails, but I'll give him a pass on that one because the kid has a heap on his plate. After the Day of Black Sun, everyone knows he's alive and in the firenation. It's not so much of an issue at the Western Air Temple because there are no other people around but in the towns and villages of the firenation where there are people who *gasp* might need saving. I can see Aang realistically saving them and revealing his Avatar status in the process, without properly thinking through the consequences. This would drive other, more prudent, group members Bananas!

The morning with the fisherman-Aang's ego has taken a bit of a blow. I think when he sees fisherman in trouble and he can help with the two bendings he's great at (air and water) he would do so without thinking. But because he's the only bald headed airbending 12 year old in the entire world, he pretty much gives himself away instantly. I think Toph is very practical and quite cluey about these things and she knows the second he shows those fisherman his arrowhead and airbending that they will have to change locations and quick!

Zuko and his dramatic pronouncement. He assumes that Aang realizes the gravity of the situation and how screwed they will all be if he's discovered. When it becomes apparent (on Appa)that Aang doesn't quite grasp the gravity of the situation, he reminds him of it. Dramatically.

YMMV on everything!

In the next chapter: Zuko and Katara will err…let off some steam together.

Til then lovely readers.

Chapter 4: Letting off steam

Everybody is quite tired because it's been a full on/stressful afternoon and the ride on Appa can be quite tiring. We've just dumped out bags in our rooms and left all the camping/communal gear in the lounge room. We will deal with it tomorrow when we've all had some sleep and there is more light. I'm going to just make a simple dinner of pickled fish and veggies and have a sleep because I don't feel like making anything too elaborate. Since I do all the cooking, the others will just have to eat it and like it.

-?-

Very eventful evening.

I made pickle fish and veggies. There were complaints and complaints lead to shenanigans. I think we all might have been a bit grumpy with each other as a result of being a bit tired/room competition/residue ill feeling from the earlier argument on Appa. The others were grumpy with me because of my little waterbending trick when we were all racing for the rooms. There was some bickering regarding rooms. Toph wanted a room on the ground floor, so she can see better and she's chosen what was an office/study/parlour/room of non-descript purposes and she wants the boys to hurry up and move a bed downstairs for her. She Toph-nagged them a bit about this.

Aang got the room two doors down from mine which apparently has a similar view (mine has the best though). All three rooms on that side of the house have a beach view. Aang flew to the balcony in order to claim the room and Sokka thinks this is cheating. Sokka thinks I am a cheater too and he thinks it's unfair that cheaters get the best rooms. Suki was the one who got the third room with a beach view and she asked if Sokka was implying that she was also a sneakier cheater. Frantic backpedalling from Sokka quickly occurred.

Zuko and Sokka have rooms on the other side of the stairs which have a nice view of the jungle. Sokka was complaining about how lame a jungle view was and how small their rooms were in comparison to the beach view rooms. Zuko told him that he was in Azula's old room and it has been good enough for her. I think he was just teasing, but now Sokka doesn't want to enter back into the room because it's been Azula-tainted (tainted with crazy-evil) and wants to swap with Zuko (none us beachsiders would give up our rooms). Zuko said there were other rooms he could pick on the other side of the house, but Sokka would probably get err…lonely on the other side of the house and didn't want to move so far away from us in case something happens and we have to move quickly. I don't get why he's making a big deal, Sokka will probably spend the night in Suki's room anyway. Anyway, there was a bit of room related bickering for a while -until Aang put a stop to it.

Aang piped up that we should all stop bickering and just forgive each other and accept our rooms. Sokka piped up that Aang had one of the best rooms so it was easy for him to accept that. Toph piped up that her room still didn't have a bed in it thanks to Zuko and Sokka's laziness so Sokka should stop complaining. Aang told them to shut it in his Aang way (Aang would never say shut up). He started going on about how he hates it when we fight and he had forgiven Toph from their argument earlier because forgiveness was the best thing to do. He said this with a pointed look in my direction.

I accidentally exploded the water jug.

And there was DRAMA!

I just felt this surge of powerful anger and there was nowhere for it to go. I've been trying not to get angry at Aang because he has so much to worry about as the Avatar and he doesn't need to worry about my anger and my feelings on top of it. But I was so tired and tense. Honestly, if I hear the F word one more time I do believe that my head will explode. It's been ages since I accidentally bended just because I was feeling something really strongly. In that moment I was just so cross! Water just exploded out of that jug and glass chards went everywhere.

Thankfully everybody managed to cover their faces. Aang and Toph were closest to the jug and Aang had luckily covered Toph's face and his own, with his super speed. They were fine but Aang had glass cuts all over his forearm. I rushed over and healed them quickly and started apologizing because I did feel really badly about doing it. Then Aang said he forgave me in that tone of voice and I felt that angry moment again.

Aang, oh Aang. Must you? Really?

My head did not explode and thankfully there was no more water filled glassware in the near vicinity. Suki was thinking clearly. She took Zuko, because he knew where everything was and had gone into the kitchen to get a broom and another jug for me to bend the water off the floor -so it would be easier to sweep up. Suki started to sweep up all the glass. Zuko told Toph not to move because she had bare feet and there was a lot of broken glass on the floor. Toph made a small speech about how she was going to bed because we were all too cranky for her to deal with. Sokka reminded her that he and Zuko still hadn't had a chance to move the bed yet so she couldn't technically go to bed. She declared that she was going to her room anyway. She cajoled Zuko into carrying her to her room with her Toph wiles. As she does.

There was an awkward silence after they left in which me and Aang and Sokka gaped at each other awkwardly.

Suki broke the silence and made a comment about dinner ending with a bang and chuckled to herself. Sokka lame-pun high fived her. There was another awkward silence. More awkward than the previous awkward silence. The old silence would shuffle away from this new silence in public and would feel embarrassed for it. That's how awkward it was.

Aang and Sokka were both looking at me weirdly. Sokka has witnessed the most of my accidental bending and he knew that I hadn't meant to do it. I'd never do anything like that on purpose. He asked me what the hell that was and I just didn't know. I was angry and guilty and embarrassed. So I did the sensible thing and had a small rant (about how I had a long day and it was an accident and I didn't appreciate his tone etc) and stormed off in high dudgeon. If in doubt, storm off-at least that's what I normally do.

-?-

I was sitting on the dock and just thinking. Thinking about why Aang going on about forgiveness annoyed me the way it did. Thinking about how embarrassed I was about accidentally bending. I was feeling really guilty for hurting my friend. I was just a big old mess of emotions. Again! What is wrong with me lately? I just have all these pent up feelings. It surprises me how strong these feelings are. Toph said that yelling at Zuko was my stress release and now I couldn't even do that. Well I could, but I don't want to anymore.

I have a few ways of blowing off steam. Yelling at someone, moping and waterbending. I've yelled, I am moping and I will probably waterbend as well. I hardly get to really use my waterbending combatively at the moment because Aang needs to work of his firebending and earthbending more. Waterbending combatively used to be a great stress reliever for me. Now I just do ordinary household waterbending because Aang doesn't need my training as much. I miss it. Water whips and octopus forms. It just feels natural when I do it.

-?-

I'm making the small streams of water swirl in pretty patterns in the air until I feel better.

-?-

Aang probably wouldn't want to waterbend with me at the moment anyway with all this grumpiness between us. I just want us to be friends again. I don't want to be angry at him at all. I just want him to agree to disagree with me and stop forcing the forgiveness thing.

Because it upsets me.

-?-

Zuko found me a short while later. He'd been delayed because there have been some more shenanigans and room switching back at the house. I can only guess what they were. The others thought I just needed some time to cool off but he just wanted to check that I was okay. I told him I was fine and moved over so he could sit next to me.

We sat in silence for a bit. He got all awkward and asked if I wanted…to…you know…talk about it…or…something. That was all the prompting I needed. I just blaahed out all my various feelings. I just opened my mouth and went blaaah and words came out. I had a rant about feeling guilty and embarrassed and cross and all sorts of other things. Then I ranted about not water bending combatively much and what Toph had said and now I couldn't shout at him for stress relieving purposes.

He said I could shout at him if I wanted. I declined. I didn't feel like it and I didn't have anything to shout at him about. He said he'd eaten three times his recommended daily intake of fireflakes today and I could shout at him about that. Then he gave me a teasing poke. I appreciated the offer. There was a time when such a pronouncement would have left me in a towering rage and there would have been a rant about the many evils of fireflakes and Zuko's idiocy for enjoying them so much, but now I just sort of feel this sort of resigned tolerance for his fireflake addiction.

We sat for a bit and then Zuko said I have an idea in that excited way he does. His idea was that we spar because I haven't sparred with anyone in ages and Zuko thought that was contributing to my various frustrations (mostly because I had gone on (and on and on) about how it was contributing to my various frustrations). Zuko feels the same way about firebending. He says he goes a bit nuts if he can't firebend because he finds firebending a great way to channel and get rid of his anger about various things. He thought that us sparring would be a great way for me to let off some steam. That way I could get all my pent up frustration out with real proper combative water bending at a worthy opponent (meaning himself). I could combine my two stress relievers, fighting him and waterbending and feel frustrated no more.

And much fun would be had by all.

I agreed because it seemed worth a shot.

-?-

Zuko's plan is great in theory. Most of Zuko's ideas are great in theory. Zuko's ideas, when put in to practice, is another matter entirely. Lots of things are great in theory after all. The thing about Zuko's sparring plan was that we both forgot one tiny little detail. We are both super stubborn people who are …er… a little competitive. Neither of us likes to lose, really. We are both fairly evenly matched in terms of skill. So the fight lasted ages and ages.

It was still great fun! I almost forgot how much fun it could be.

There was water and fire going everywhere and it was awesome. I realized that I've watched Zuko firebend so much that I now know most of his signature moves. He knows most of my waterbending moves as well. We just kept deflecting each other's blows and chasing each other up and down the beach and it was brilliant. Brilliant and tiring. There was no way I was going to let Zuko win this one but I just couldn't quite get him to give in.

Gah, just give in already!

He said he never gave up without a fight and I replied that we'd been fighting for ages and he should just cede victory to me because it was getting late. He said I could just cede victory to him if I was feeling tired.

Never!

I had to think creatively if I was going to win.

I remember something he said when we were flying back on Appa from Whaletail Island. About his mum tickling him. Was he still ticklish? It was worth a shot. Nobody can bend when they are being tickled after all. He wouldn't be expecting it. I had the element of surprise of my side.

I dropped my water whip and tackled him to the sand. He was definitely surprised by this and made a noise like ahhergh when I did that. There was a bit of scuffling but I got on top of him and started tickling him. Zuko is officially ticklish everywhere! Wow, like everywhere. But especially on his stomach and under his arms. He struggled against the Great Tickling Offensive and flailed a fair bit but eventually he gave in.

I win again!

It was great. I was relentless. He was doing this really adorable cheeky laugh and trying to swat me away but I was an immovable force of tickling! I was the unstoppable tickle monster of doom! He tried to reason with me between giggles and said that tickling was just plain cheating. You cannot reason with the tickle monster. Then he tried to retaliatory tickle! But I am only ticklish in one place and he does not know where that is and I will never tell him. Ha! I told him he'd have to say that I won and he refused between laughs. I tickled him some more. I tickled him until he did this really weird (but really hilarious) snorty laugh. After we reached snorty laugh stage, he relented and said that I won. I got off him and I did my happy dance.

And the water tribe is victorious over the firenation! Go me!

Zuko said the only reason I won was because I had cheated. Cheating scmeating! He never said I couldn't tickle him. Zuko could not find fault with this logic. He hadn't said tickling was against the rules. I told him to accept defeat with honor and he made a rather sarcastic comment about my underhanded tactics and I tickled him again (only lightly) in retaliation as we walked back to the house. I am quite glad to know this ticklish secret about Zuko.

Next time he annoys me I am just going to tickle him until he does the snorty laugh again.

It was so much fun and I am feeling much better and less frustrated now. He asked me if I wanted to let off steam again tomorrow night and I have agreed. I can think of worse ways to pass an evening. It's weird but Zuko has really cheered me up. Or maybe I'm feeling so good right now because I won.

That always cheers me up!

Chapter 4 authors note:

Hello lovely wonderful readers! You have let off some steam! (high five if you love lame puns.) Congratulations and I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter. I just wanted something a little on the fluffy side and for our dynamic duo to spend some quality time together.

It would have been a stressful afternoon for the Gaang so they are a little bit grumpy with each other at the start of this chapter. This happens at a few points in the series and I think it is quite realistic. It happens all the time. People bicker and over-react and fight and make up and the Gaang is no exception. I thought it was vital that Katara finds another outlet for her stress and anger now that she's not yelling at Zuko a lot. So I have them fighting but in a nice way.

Aang and forgiveness: I'm not trying to hate on Aang (because I love him), but he is single minded about his beliefs and understandably so. He wants all his friends to understand air nomad culture, customs and beliefs because for him that helps keep the air nomad spirit alive. He's living a nomadic life with the Gaang and I think he wants to pass on his knowledge of his culture. He is passionate about what he believes in and that is lovely, however it lacks perspective.

In my imagination, Aang is still worried about Katara as a result of the F-word related shenanigans in the Southern Raiders. He thinks she is his lobster and he wants her to understand his beliefs most of all. He crushes on her and if they are to have a long term future, Katara would have to embrace Air nomad ways a bit more. But she is very resistant, especially to the notion of forgiveness for someone like Yon Rha. Aang is not subtle, he hopes that he can show her by example. He thinks if he forgives and mentions forgiveness a lot, she is going to catch on and agree with him. And in this episode, when she's a bit tired and cranky, she snaps.

I think Katara feels quite maternal towards Aang and would be reluctant to confront him outright about the F-word because she does not want to belittle his beliefs (which are so important to him) while at the same time he's been driving her bananas for a few days now. So she explodes something. I wanted a visual symbol of Katara's anger that couldn't be overlooked by Aang.

For Katara, I think 'accidentally' bending would be embarrassing because she's meant to be at master level and have more control. She used to bend accidentally back at the South Pole when she got angry. She would just have felt this powerful surge of anger and been unable to help herself. I think her bending was a subconscious reaction because she's getting to the end of her tether in regards to the f-word.

Bending in general strikes me as very much linked to the personality and emotions of the bender. I think it probably would have been a great stress reliever. Katara doesn't train much with Aang after the mid-point in season three because he has a more pressing need to learn firebending. In Sozin's comet Aang is still learning firebending and earthbending but feels pretty confident with water. I think Katara would feel the loss of a sparring partner greatly. Water relies on turning your opponent's moves back on themselves, and while she could practice alone, waterbending strikes me as something that is better practiced with a partner. So Zuko volunteers.

I do think Katara and Zuko are pretty evenly matched in terms of skill and I didn't want either of them to beat the other with bending. But they are both exceptionally stubborn people who wouldn't be prone to giving in to each other. I think had their fight continued Katara would have eventually won because its night time and she draws power from the moon but she decides to end it quicker by cheating. Bless her cotton socks. Katara's not opposed to cheating (just a little) if it helps her win. Zuko mentioned being tickled many chapters ago and I wanted to show that Katara is listening to him and remembering the things he says. I also just love the idea of her being a tickle monster and the mental image of the great tickling offensive. I think it has been many years since somebody tickled Zuko so he is taken completely aback by this turn of events (but he kind of enjoys this turn of events). They both thoroughly enjoyed letting off some steam together and I think it's something they both needed.

YMMV on everything!

They will let off some steam in the future, but our next chapter will focus on the Gaang exploring the town and preparations for Katara's birthday.

Til then lovely readers.

Chapter 5: in harmony

Zuko woke up Aang quite early this morning to work on firebending. Sun salutes or whatever. I know because I overheard Aang's rather reluctant progress from bed to going down the stairs. There was much ado and exclamations five more minutes and can't I have a cup of tea first. Zuko said there was something he wanted to show Aang and they had to go now. I don't have to get up and watch them because that would be stalky and I am no longer a stalker. I am planning to just lie in bed most of the morning and sleep.

-?-

Okay, so I know eavesdropping is bad. But I defy anyone to hear their name in conversation and not listen in! This morning I have overheard an interesting conversation between Aang and Zuko. They'd come back from the ruins of this Sun Circle that Zuko wanted to show Aang (For Avatarness! For firebending! For honor! etc). They were in the courtyard drinking tea and taking a break from fireball accuracy practice. I have been going through the house and opening all the windows to air it out. Anyway, I was just in the study behind them. I was just going to open the windows but Aang was talking about me and forgiveness. As soon as I heard my name, I was all set to eavesdrop!

Aang was talking a lot about the monks teachings and how he wants us (especially me) to understand their ancient wisdom and how he's the last of his kind and he has to keep the Air nomad culture alive. Zuko said that he respected Aang was in a tough position. He actually said being the last of your kind, that's rough buddy, which has got to be the understatement of the century. But then he added that Aang should try to understand that I wasn't an air nomad and if Aang kept harping on about forgiveness etc he would only push me away/ annoy me greatly. Aang said that I had always been interested in hearing about air nomad culture before (and I have been previously) and that Zuko was really lucky that Aang was all about forgiveness.

There was a small silence. Zuko didn't seem to know what to say to that.

Eventually he replied that he just thought it would be a good thing if Aang apologized to me/stopped harping on about forgiveness. He asked Aang to think about what he said earlier. I have missed the start of the conversation so I don't know what he said earlier. Aang thanked Zuko for his advice and he sounded sincere. But then he said that he had known me for a lot longer than Zuko and as a result he knew me better. He added that the last time he had followed Zuko's advice it had blown up in his face (rather dramatically) and that I had said Zuko was the worst person in the entire world to give out advice.

Whoops. I did say that, didn't I?

I wished I could go back in time and make a few amendments to my rant. I would say that Zuko will often be the source of bad ideas/advice, but every now and again he will be right about something. These moments are rare and fleeting and surprising. So, if in the future, Aang felt surprised by the amount of sensibleness coming out of Zuko, he should listen to that advice!

There was another small silence and then Aang said something that surprised all three of us. He said I can't believe I'm saying this to you… but can we stop talking about our feelings and maybe learn some firebending now?

This place should not be called Ember island. It should be renamed opposite land. Because everything here is backwards and inside-out. Zuko is giving out good advice and wanting to instigate/continue conversations about feelings. Aang is wanting to really work hard at firebending and not slack off. What is the world coming too?

-?-

I have just realized that it is my birthday the day after tomorrow. It's crept up so quickly! I haven't even noticed the time flying by. I reminded everybody at lunch.

Repeatedly.

Now no one has any excuse to forget my birthday.

Because it is in two days.

But I will remind everybody again this afternoon, just in case.

-?-

Suki and Sokka and Toph and I left Aang and Zuko to firebending practice and went to wander about the market at the centre of town. We had to pick up some supplies, especially cleaning supplies. Zuko says we don't have to worry about it.

Boys.

I am not living in the house where dust bunnies go to die without at least having a stab at cleaning it up. Seriously, there are dust bunnies bigger than Momo everywhere! I can't ignore that.

There is an enormous giant map of the firenation in the town square. Tourists were walking all over it and saying things like hey I can see my house from here. The tiles are raised and decorated intricately and the whole thing looked amazing. Every island in the archipelago was exactly rendered. There was so much detail. The raised orange roofs and green fields made a nice contrast. It almost looks like how things look from the air on Appa. They have added the miniature towns and mountains and even made the beaches sandy. The tiles for the water are a wavy and very glassy smooth and the land is rough and sometimes covered in tiny ceramic trees.

Toph was completely entranced and kept running her hands over where the islands met the sea, the tiny clay towns, the mountains. I guess this is the only sort of map that Toph can see. Sokka thought it was brilliant because now he could see all the terrain properly in a way that you don't get from paper. They were both such keen beans for the giant map that I didn't want to drag them away from it. We still had a bunch of stuff to get and so Suki and I left them there and said we'd pick them up on the way back.

-?-

We wandered around and Suki asked me what I wanted for my birthday. I don't know - a fun day. Not having to cook or wash up and for us all to relax together and enjoy each other's company.

And for everyone to do what I say. No arguments!

Back home, my birthday falls in summer, so it's not a very relaxing day because there is so much that we need to do during the quick polar summer. But for one day everybody has to do what I say and I get my own way with everything and at night we all sat around and I didn't have to cook or do any chores and everybody would tell my favourite stories and sing my favourite songs.

We talked a bit about South Pole songs and stories. Suki wanted to learn some for my birthday. I told Suki that I wouldn't mind hearing more about Kyoshi Island and some more Kyoshi songs. I loved the song she'd sung the night the boys got very drunk on sake. I felt bad to say this, but I don't exactly miss the South Pole. I miss Gran Gran immensely and I miss the village and the feeling of community we had, but I don't miss the monotony and hard work that was life down there.

Suki has promised to sing me many Kyoshi Songs. She also said having mixed feelings about home was normal. I asked her if she missed Kyoshi at all and she said that she mostly missed the other warriors and that they were a real family unit. She'd been a real leader there and had been almost an older sister to all her warriors. Now she wasn't quite sure what to do with herself without them.

I remembered overhearing that conversation between Zuko and Toph (ages ago) about how hard they had found it to integrate into our tightly knit group. Did Suki feel the same? We have mostly seen Suki as Sokka's girlfriend and not as a warrior in her own right. We'd been friendly, Suki and I, but I knew so little about her that I didn't know if we were proper friends yet. Even so, I could tell she was homesick for her tribe of lady warriors. I said she could feel free to be an almost older sister to me. Suki smiled in thanks and threw an arm around my shoulder and gave me a squeeze. Then she told me to be a good younger sister and tell her something that she and Sokka could get me as a birthday present. I told her to surprise me.

We wandered back to the map with our baskets full. Toph and Sokka weren't there. We waited for a little. Just as I was starting to feel a little worried and cross, Toph and Sokka sauntered over looking pleased with themselves. Toph had found another fancy lady day spa and had booked us in at the last minute (using her Bei Fong wiles/money).

The three of us would all go and get a spa treatment on my birthday Toph announced. She said that she knew I had enjoyed the last one immensely and thought a girls day out would be a great present. She said it kind of bashfully. Toph will never admit to liking anything girly (the horror!), but I knew she loved our day spa day back in Ba Sing Se. I gave her a hug and said it was a great idea. After all, I only really wanted us to have a fun day and relax together for my birthday (as well as everyone doing what I say, but that goes without saying) and I couldn't think of a better way to do this than for us all to have a girly, pampery day together. I think it will be awesome. The three of us don't get much of a chance to hang out without the boys.

-?-

After lunch me and Suki and Sokka got started on cleaning the house (the other three were still training). I say Sokka helped, but mostly he 'supervised the library'. We found a library on the ground floor and Sokka was in book love. He has spent most of the day in there exclaiming over titles and dusting them and reading them and 'suggesting' titles he thinks I will like. There is an exceptionally soppy looking novel called 'love amongst the dragons' which Sokka thought would be totally up my street because it's about love and hope and soppy girly stuff. I have whacked him with my mop in retaliation. He protested at the mop whacking and I pointed out that the only reason why I had a mop was because I am actually being productive. Sokka did not take my hint.

I am a bit of a rummager. I know I gave Sokka a hard time at Hama's for going through all her stuff, but this is different. Zuko doesn't seem to mind if we go through the house and there are just so many nooks and crannies and little rooms to explore. This house was just made for rummaging! It's an explorer's delight. We only tried four rooms today and found a veritable treasure trove of entertainment.

Me and Suki cleaned the kitchen and the living room and then had a big explore. One room was locked and one room was Toph's (already in a state of haphazard mess), one room didn't have much in it (aside from Sokka and many books). We hit the jackpot on the fourth room we tried. It was a music room. There is literally an ass-ton of instruments in here. I can't play anything except the drums (it's the only instrument we had back home at the South Pole) but here there were horns and mandolins and flutes and all sorts of other things. There were some instruments I didn't even recognize.

We checked over the instruments and most of them were in pretty good condition -except for the mandolins which were, apparently, woefully out of tune. Or so Suki said. Suki made a face as she strummed her fingers over the strings. Suki can play the mandolin and set to work on tuning one up. She offered to teach me how to play one and I thought that would be a great idea. She said I should look for some sheet music, so she can teach me better. Water tribe drums don't require sheet music and neither Sokka or myself can read it. I started going through the draws on the other side of the room. There were lots of songs that looked ridiculously complicated. I was in search of one that didn't have as many dots and lines.

I found a certificate from the Ember Island Orchestra Summer Program for Zuko. Zuko is apparently an expert tsungi horn player. Who knew? I dusted it off and took it out. I looked about the room and wondered which one was the tsungi horn. I could hazard a guess that it was the giant horn shaped one. I wonder if he'll play for me, if I ask nicely.

-?-

Soon Suki had tuned two mandolins and I found a piece of music that didn't seem too complicated. It was called four seasons. She was able to play it skillfully after a few minutes and showed me how to hold the instrument and the chords and how to move my fingers and strum. It was really tricky. My fingers didn't move as deftly as Suki's and it took a long time for me to be able to play the song through once. Together we managed some semblance of the song. Suki started singing the words. It was a pretty song.

Sokka came in, drawn in by the sound of the music and the idea that somewhere silliness and fun was going on without him. Sokka can't be having that. He dusted off a set of drums and joined in! Sokka is a boisterous drummer, so 'four seasons' took on a faster tempo. We were playing it quite loudly which attracted the attention of the others. Aang yelled that he loved this song and grabbed a long flute-like instrument that I didn't recognize and joined in. When we reached a pause Aang said that he was great with woodwinds and Suki made an exceptionally lame pun regarding woodwinds and airbending. And added the bah-boom-cha noise at the end, in case we didn't get that she was joking. Toph patted her rather patronizingly on the head (Suki was sitting) and said she should leave the jokes to her and Sokka.

Toph can play a few instruments herself. It's a side effect of being posh- her parents wanted to make sure she was accomplished. Toph loves big instruments with lots of vibrations, like the giant drums and the big horn, but she can play the other 'more lady-like' instruments as well, like the yueqin and the flute. There was a part for the yueqin, but Toph wanted to be a drummer like Sokka and got another drum for herself and started bashing merrily away.

Zuko claimed we were butchering one of his uncle's favourite songs (in truth what we were playing now had varied wildly from the initial four seasons that Suki and I were practicing). He tried in vain to get the others to return to training. Judging from the gusto with which Toph was whacking the drums and Aang was playing his flute, all attempts to get them to cease and desist their…err…music making would meet with failure.

I told him to stop being such a spoilsport and to play the tsungi horn for us. He looked a bit startled and asked me how I knew he played the tsungi horn and I revealed his old music certificate and waggled it about and said that he couldn't deny his musical talent because apparently he was an expert. Zuko said that they just gave that out to every kid who attended, but he took the certificate and smiled a little and said I can't believe she kept this quietly. I almost couldn't hear him over the din- the sounds that everybody was producing now did not qualify as music. I don't know who the she was that he was referring to but I think it's his mum.

I asked him to play for us (me) and he was a bit resistant because apparently he hadn't played in ages. I told him I'd never played anything but the drums before and I'd picked up four seasons on the mandolin quickly enough and I'd really like to hear what a tsungi horn sounds like. He was a bit surprised that I'd never heard a tsungi horn (because apparently it's the best instrument ever). I told him I didn't even know which instrument it was. I reminded him that it was a firenation instrument anyway. When would I have encountered a tsungi horn before? Zuko said I couldn't go through life never hearing a tsungi horn and picked up the big horn (it was the one I guessed) from where it hung on the far wall. He dusted it off and blew on it once really loudly to get everyone's attention. He told us he would play four season properly for us so we could know what it was supposed to sound like. He said this with a pointed look at Toph and Aang who had been merrily playing their own tune in the corner.

It sounds really beautiful on the tsungi horn. Really melodious. Zuko's actually really good. I wonder why he'd been so reluctant to play for us. I mean I know he can be a bit shy and it can be embarrassing to perform for a bunch of people, but we're his friends and he's really talented with that horn. I could listen to him play four seasons on the tsungi horn all day.

After he'd played it once all the way through, Suki joined in on the mandolin and Sokka on the drums and by the third run through Aang and Toph both joined in and by the fourth time, I had a go on my mandolin. It was a nice afternoon with all of us just playing in harmony together. I want to always remember this. It was just lovely to sit there with the five people I adore and just make music with them. We don't get many afternoons to just relax all together like this

-?-

I was in the kitchen making dinner and Aang came up to me and without any preamble or awkward dithering, he apologized to me. He said he was sorry for forcing the forgiveness thing and making me angry. I dropped the veggies I was peeling in surprise. I mean I wasn't expecting such a direct and blunt apology. I wasn't expecting an apology at all. It had sounded like he didn't think he needed to give me one when he was talking to Zuko this morning. I gave him a hug and said that I accepted his apology and we shouldn't talk about it anymore. I don't want to dwell on jug-smashing unpleasantness after all. He snuggled me back and I rubbed his bald head affectionately. I've never liked being angry at Aang.

I'm glad we're all friends again.

Chapter 5 authors note:

Lovely readers! You've reached the end of another chapter and I hope you have enjoyed in harmony. Sorry it has been a little longer between updates! Real-life has been a little hectic for me (but in a fun and very time consuming way). I thought I'd post this chapter to tide you over until I get to post all of Katara's birthday shenanigans. I'm super sorry to all my lovely reviewers who I haven't got back to! You guys know I love ya and I love your reviews! Thanks for all your comments and encouragement!

In this chapter I wanted all the gaang to get along again (be in harmony- geddit?) and what better way to do that than with an afternoon jam session/sing song. Seriously, joint singing is healing!

Zuko and Aang's conversation: Zuko wants to help in his Zuko way. Aang and Katara are good friends and don't like fighting with each other or having grumpiness between them. He wants the people in his new circle of friends to get along and he wants Katara to be happy. He knows that Aang dropping the forgiveness stuff will make Katara happy. While we don't get to see much of it, because this fic is from Katara's POV, I do think Aang and Zuko have a sort of older brother/kid brother friendship, so I think Zuko would hear Aang out with re: airbender philosophy etc before telling him to ease up on it a little. Aang dismisses Zukos advice at first because the last time he followed Zuko's advice it blew up in his face with the great sea prune debacle. But after the afternoon session he realizes how much he misses just hanging out with Katara in a friendly way and takes the path of least resistance (apologizing and dropping the forgiveness stuff) to get back into her good graces.

In a few chapters we will get the wonderful return of the girl's day out. This time with the added bonus of Suki!

Sokka loves libraries and I can tell you that someone will read love amongst the dragons during this fic, because I have a very silly idea for it.

Instruments: this is a royal family holiday house and I figured that there would have been a room for musical instruments. Being musical is pretty popular in the firenation (all those kids at school could play an instrument) and I imagine the royal family would be no exception. I always got the impression that Ursa was musical. I just did. Zuko's ability on the tsungi horn gets mentioned a fair bit in season 1 and I figured he must have been pretty good at one point, but probably gave it up after his mum disappeared. He's a bit shy and embarrassed to play it in front of everybody because he doesn't think he's that good at it as a result of not playing for so long. But Katara uses her wiles to get him to play for them.

Drums seem like the most common instrument for the Water tribe. Toph lived a fairly posh life before joining the Gaang so I figure she would have had some musical instruction. I imagine Aang would have picked dup how to play a few instruments during his travels with monk gyatso. He doesn't know how to play anything expertly, but he can play chopsticks etc on a few different instruments. Kyoshi seemed to be modeled on Japan and the kyoshi warriors seemed to be a group of communal living lady samurai to me. Samurai had to be scholars and poets/musicians as well as warriors so I figure it's not out of the question that Suki could play an instrument quite well.

Mostly I just wanted them all to chill together and I thought four seasons was a nice, little, easy harmony for them to learn together and the song also emphasizes the harmony between the four seasons/elements.

More rooms will be rummaged through/more secrets will be discovered in the coming chapters, but the next one will focus on the preparations for Katara's birthday – someone will give her a lovely early birthday present.

Til then lovely readers…

Chapter 6: Wishes and Rainbows

Zuko and I were doing the dishes together after dinner, as we always do. I was saying that I was looking forward to a day with no chores. Zuko said I'd probably still 'supervise' and offer 'suggestions' to whoever ended up doing the chores. He said this in a very amused tone with a little smile. There was a small splashing battle. I won. I rubbed the soapy suds in his hair and it was sticking up all at odd angles.

He asked me what I really wanted for my birthday and I said I wanted all my wishes to come true and rainbows everyday and a lionpony named miss fantastic sparklepants. He made a face at me. Really, I don't know if there's anything I want or need, aside from all of us having a fun, relaxing day together. I told him about trying to get Aang to relax before the Day of Black Sun and how hard that had been. Zuko told me that the whole island was volcanic and there were many hot springs and steam pools dotted about the place, so if I wanted to, I could take Aang for another yoga session.

I worry about our stress levels.

I wanted my birthday to be a day of fun and just relaxation. Zuko said that should be easy for me and Toph and Suki because we were going to the day spa. I wanted to help the boys relax too. I asked if they would want to come to the day spa as well. Zuko made the most horrified face when I suggested it. I'll take that as a no then. Zuko is not a day spa kind of boy.

Then I suggested that we all do steamy yoga together as a group bonding exercise. Zuko said he didn't think it would be his thing. I said he was too tense and needed to friggin relax because even his hair was standing to attention (I know this was caused by the soap suds and not tension, but my point still stands). Zuko said he was always tense and I replied that I would make it a birthday command that he would have to relax.

Zuko was a bit confused about birthday commands and I told him that at home everyone does what I say on my birthday. No complaints or arguments! It is my favourite part of my birthday. Zuko said he wasn't surprised that being a birthday commandant was my favourite part of my birthday.

Another splashing battle ensued, but I made sure that I rinsed his hair with water bending this time-so it would stop sticking up ridiculously.

When we were wet faced and grinning at each other and the last of the dishes were clean, he asked me again about what I wanted. I really don't know. Unlike Zuko, I don't have a list in my head for everything. I just wanted small things that would be easy to pack and to carry around with me. I told him to get me nothing bigger than a breadbox. He said I'd have to tell the others because he knew Sokka had already got me something much bigger than a bread box.

Bollocks.

-?-

We let off some steam again after this. It was great. I won again. I cheated…errr used the great tickling offensive again. I think Zuko is trying to figure out where I am ticklish by process of elimination.

He hasn't figured it out yet.

-?-

I have made an announcement at breakfast that I only wish for items smaller than a bread box on my birthday. Sokka face-palmed and said 'now you tell me' but all the others seemed alright with this.

-?-

Aang and Zuko were training in firebending in the courtyard. I decided to watch in a non stalkerish fashion today. Aang's really come a long way in a short amount of time. Zuko was trying to teach him how to do what I think is the firebending equivalent of the octopus form. Aang was able to pick it up pretty quickly and has earned a 'well done' an 'I'm really impressed' and eight smiles for his trouble.

Aang wanted to talk to Zuko 'in private' and gave me a look. It was a look that said please go away while we talk about you! Humph. At first I thought I could just refuse to leave but I realized that would be childish and counter productive. I told them I would be making tea in the kitchen and waited until they'd wandered off. Then I followed them using my sneakiness and some of the stealthy tricks Zuko taught me. They were just sitting on the front deck, so it was quite easy to eavesdrop on them.

Aang wanted to know what was the rarest and the most expensive and the most special things on the island. Zuko said the rarest would be the burning passion firelilies because they only grew on Ember Island and as a result they were quite rare in the firenation and very expensive off the island. Zuko said that a guy would normally get them for a girl when he just wanted to…(there was a long pause)….. Zuko sputtered and then trailed off. He took one look at Aang's hopeful, innocent face and couldn't finish his sentence. What this anonymous flower-giving chap wanted will have to remain a mystery for Aang. I can hazard a guess at what he wanted. I think it's the one thing my dad is always warning me about when he says boys are only after one thing. But that is just a guess.

The most expensive (and tastiest) would be dragon berries. They were really difficult to harvest and had only just come into season. They were a firenation delicacy and a favourite of posh people everywhere. They were so expensive because they were so scarce and had to be picked by hand from the very top of the dragon berry trees.

The most special thing was probably the white crystals but they wouldn't be a suitable present for me because altogether they would be bigger than a breadbox and everybody already had a plan for them. Aang could not get them as a present for because of the plan. Aang agreed and asked if they were still working on the plan this afternoon. Zuko said that Toph and Suki would help them and Sokka had agreed to distract me for the duration of the plan.

This is what happened when I stop stalking! Sneaky people come up with sneaky plans behind my back just to surprise me. I have no idea what this plan is and I am wracked with curiosity.

-?-

What is the plan!

-?-

Everyone has been acting shiftily. They've all disappeared, leaving me with Sokka who is trying to get the proper recipes for five flavour soup and my other favourite foods out of me. I know he was trying to distract me and I wanted to go follow the others and find out what the plan was. I thought there would be nothing Sokka could say/do to successfully distract me from this course of action. Then Sokka mentioned that he might like to add fireflakes to five flavour soup and make it six flavour soup. And I was successfully distracted.

Sokka just knows how to push my buttons.

You can't do that to five flavour soup.

You just can't.

No…just no.

Sokka and Zuko can add their bloody fireflakes afterwards. I can tolerate those bloody flakes in curries, but they will absolutely ruin the delicate flavour of five flavour soup. Sokka was treated to a long lecture about the many evils of fireflakes. I said various things about my birthday culinary wishes and stated that even though I now have a grudging tolerance of his and Zuko's fondness for them, if he dared to add that baked good to five flavour soup he would be making an abomination of water-tribe cuisine, a mockery of my birthday and a cranky person out of me.

-?-

Everyone came back and their general shiftyness continued. All inquiries about what they had been doing and where they had been were met with non committal answers. I bet I could get one of them to break and tell me. I have honed in on Suki. As my honorary older sister figure she should tell me these things after the requisite amount of nagging.

-?-

Suki is like a vault! She is locked down.

-?-

I was going to pester Toph about the plan. She is the most upfront of our group and I think would tell me with the right persuasion. But there has been a horrifying turn of events. She is trying to learn the tsungi horn. I say trying to learn when what I really should write is making the most tremendous, dreadful racket I have ever heard. It's not music. It's just noise! How can an instrument that sounds so lovely when Zuko plays it- sound like this with Toph playing it.

She makes it sound like a fog horn or the distress alarm of a fire navy ship.

Toph has realized that the only instrument that can make a noise louder than the drums in the tsungi horn. Toph likes noise. She likes loud noises even better. She's never come across a tsungi horn in all her posh life. Or at least her parents never let her play one.

I can see why.

Zuko has gotten down the smallest horn for her and it is taller than her. She's earthbended herself a little platform to stand on. Now she can be tall enough to play it. Zuko has got down his own horn and he was showing her how to hold it and how to play a melody. It would sound quite lovely when Zuko played it. Then Toph will just blow her horn loudly and make up a tune of her own. This tune, invariably, did not sound quite as lovely.

Aang has vanished (presumably to escape the dreadful noise) and Suki and Sokka have absconded together (also presumably to escape the noise and canoodle discreetly). I am alone with the tsungi horn twins. I can't seem to stop watching despite the noise. I've never simultaneously seen Zuko be so patient and Toph so be bad at anything. Toph is normally pretty good at everything she tries her hand at. It is unusual to see.

-?-

After a while, Toph got a bit frustrated with her Tsungi horn and said that maybe she was too short for it anyway. It seemed like she wanted to give up on the horn completely. This seemed to alarm Zuko, because he never gives up. He said that he was shorter than Toph when he started to learn and he was pretty terrible at it at the start, but the tsungi horn is an exceptionally difficult instrument and he just needed practice. He thinks Toph is doing great –because she can already (just barely) play the scales on the horn. Toph asked him how he even reached the horn if he was shorter than her and couldn't earthbend a little platform. Zuko said he practiced while standing on the complete compendium of firenation history. This has cheered Toph and now she is back to playing the scales with gusto.

More gusto and noise than I think is strictly necessary, but she seems happy enough.

-?-

Zuko and I left her practicing and went to let off some steam again. Sometimes I think this is my favourite part of the day. It was great, even with the scales playing loudly and badly in the background. I feel like I'm actually improving. With bending, there is always room for improvement I say. I feel I'm getting especially good in fighting fire now. Me and Toph would occasionally spar when we were travelling with Aang and she gave me a good idea of typical earthbender moves. Zuko does the same for firebending. And it's just so much fun! We taunt each other in a friendly manner and chase each other up and down the beach and normally I win by resorting to ...err…sneaky tactics.

I think I'd eventually be able to beat Zuko if we kept bending at each other. My bendings a little stronger than his at night, after all. I prefer to win by tickling. I'd never tell him this, but I just love the sound of his laugh. It's more fun to beat him by tickling than it would be to beat him with bending. And if I beat him by cheating…err tickling, it's not like either of us really lose.

But tonight the most extraordinary thing happened.

We had a stalemate!

A draw!

Or a tie!

However you say it. It was even steven.

I tackled Zuko and was tickling him relentlessly and he was struggling a fair bit. Then he reached around me and grabbed my left foot and started tickling me in retaliation! He's discovered my ticklish spot. My one weakness! The bottoms of my feet!

Oh noes!

And the great tickling battle was on! It was a tickle war of attrition! It was a very inelegant and sandy struggle for dominance! He tickled my feet and I tickled him everywhere I could reach. I thought I had more of an advantage because Zuko is much more ticklish than me, but he is also incredibly stubborn and just would not yield. Not even when he got to the point where he did the snorty laugh. In between laughs, I told him that he should just let me win because it was my birthday tomorrow. He said he'd let me win tomorrow but tonight he was tickling for honour! And in retaliation for being tickled into defeat two nights in a row!

We just messed about tickling each other for ages. It got a bit ridiculous really. It became obvious that neither of us was going to give in easily. I said that we should call a truce or a tie and Zuko agreed and declared that we were equals and we had reached a tickling impasse and further tickling would just be superfluous. I asked him how he knew where I was ticklish. He said he had his ways. I said you asked Sokka-didn't you? And he nodded in confirmation with a cheeky smile.

-?-

When we got back to the house the others were asleep. Toph had left the tsungi horn lying in the living room. I put it back in the music room for her while Zuko made us some tea. We sat on the side balcony and drank our tea together.

I asked him something that had been on my mind since he'd been teaching Toph.

Why the Tsungi horn?

Why, when he had the choice of a room full of instruments did he choose the biggest and the hardest to learn? He said that his Uncle and his cousin could both play it expertly. That was part of the reason, but not the full reason.

I know when he's holding something back.

He told me previously that his Uncle could play most of the instruments in that room expertly, so he could have used that reason for any other instrument. Zuko said he wanted to learn it precisely because it was the most difficult. He wanted to prove to himself that he could do it. He said this with a shrug as if he was already dismissing what he was saying. It was such a Zuko answer. Doing something just because it's difficult and he's stubborn. I didn't quite understand the need to prove something to yourself at the age of nine (that's how old he was when he got the certificate).

He said that his mother wanted him and Azula to have a more rounded education and learn other things, creative things, intellectual things, anything aside from firebending and warrior arts. His dad said Azula was special and she didn't have to worry about learning music and other things. The unspoken message was that Zuko wasn't special. I understood a little better, after he said that.

It made me a little sad to think that it had always been so easy for Ozai to make Zuko feel like he wasn't good enough. That he did it with things that should just be happy, like learning music. I leaned my head on Zuko's shoulder and said that I thought the way he played four seasons yesterday was special. He said thanks -really softly and we sat in silence for a while.

I asked him if he would play it again for me on my birthday. He said with a cheeky smile that he'd have no choice because I would be a birthday dictator and he'd have to what I said. I asked him if he'd play something for me when it wasn't my birthday and he said he would- if I asked nicely.

Then he noticed that technically, it already was my birthday, because it was after midnight. I looked up at the moon and saw that it was at the halfway point in the sky. Zuko was the first to wish me happy birthday. He got up to get my present (a bit excitedly for Zuko, I thought) and I took our mugs into the kitchen. He came back and lit the wall sconces in the kitchen, so we could see each other better. He held out his hands and told me to pick a hand.

I tapped leftie first. He opened it up and there was the intricately woven leather necklace in there. It had three large knots that had been tied into flowers with blue beads in the centre. It was quite pretty, but the first flower was a little wonky. Zuko said it was really hard to get the flowers to sit right and it had taken him ages to make. He explained that they were wishing beads. It's a big superstition in the firenation. The colour of the beads mean something. Blue means hope and Zuko thought it would be perfect for me. I get three wishes (one for each flower) and when it comes true the flower will come undone and the bead will fall off. It's long enough so I can tie it as a bracelet or an anklet or a necklace. I tied it around my ankle and made my wishes.

1 tomorrow will be a fabulous day and I'll not feel sad for a second (My birthday normally makes me a little sad because it is so soon after I lost mum.)

2 We all survive the war (this is more of a wish for everybody and is a bit more weighty than my first wish)

3 we win the war (see above)

I started saying thanks-but Zuko interrupted me and said my present had a second part and waggled his right hand. I tapped that and he flipped it to reveal a clear crystal. It had six long flat sides and a pointed end and a loop of leather holding it at the top. Zuko said it was a prism and would make a rainbow and he knew how much I wanted to see more rainbows (I had a small rant about my mother and rainbows on the way back from the southern raiders). I wasn't sure how a crystal could make a rainbow, so Zuko showed me. He held it near one of the wall sconces and concentrated for a second so the flame burned a bright white. When it was bright, the light went through the crystal and painted a rainbow on the near wall.

Amazing.

Zuko said it looked much better in daylight with the sun and I could hang it on the window in my room and get a rainbow everyday and if the hope beads worked my wishes would come true – the only thing he hadn't been able to get me was a lionpony named miss fantastic sparklepants. He said it with a really shy and bashful smile and I was stunned into silence for a second.

It was a really thoughtful gift. When I said everything I wanted last night, I was being a little sarcastic because I thought he was just asking to be polite. Nobody ever gets me anything I really want anyway. The honest truth is that rainbows and wishes was what I really wanted. Zuko really listens to me when I speak. Who doesn't want all their wishes to come true and a rainbow everyday?

Zuko mistook my silence for a dislike for the gifts and blushed and started going on about how silly it was and…..He was about to start doing that babbly thing he does when he's nervous. I held a finger up to his lips to silence him. I looked him in the eye and told him that I loved the prism and the wishing beads, I was just surprised that he remembered what I said the other night and got them for me. He looked at me and said that he remembers everything I say. Then it was my turn to blush. I said I hoped he doesn't remember everything, because there were a few insults I tossed around earlier that I wouldn't mind taking back. He said some of my insults were pretty memorable. But he said it with a smile.

Then we were just staring at each other and smiling. It was nice. After a long pause Zuko wished me happy birthday again. I realized I hadn't said thank you properly so I gave him a huge hug. He wrapped his arms around me and I may have snuggled against him a little bit. His heart was beating quickly but steadily. I breathed in his Zuko smell and gave him a little squeeze around the middle. He gave me a little squeeze back around my shoulders. I said thanks for my present and he said he was so glad I liked it. It is actually one of the most thoughtful gifts I've ever gotten. Gran Gran and Sokka normally always get me socks and mittens and scarves.

We stood just cuddling for ages. Maybe it's a little weird to have long cuddles with your friends like this. But it was so nice just to hold him and smell him and listen to his heart beat. He wasn't complaining or fidgeting or anything. If Sokka saw us, he'd definitely think we'd been exchanging moon peaches and if Toph saw us she'd laugh and blow the tsungi horn loudly and announce it to everyone and if Suki saw us she'd probably want to get me drunk on saki and have another girls night and ask me all about it. If Aang saw us he'd….. oh bollocks it all. Zuko's a good cuddler and I don't have to make excuses for our cuddling or worry about what the others will think.

It's my birthday, I can cuddle who I want.

Chapter 6 authors note:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of Rainbows and Wishes. This chapter is exceptionally fluffy (pure unadulterated fluff!) and I hope you've enjoyed it! An enormously big thank you to all my fabulous, wonderful reviewers! If I could , I would give you all prisms and wishing beads so that you too can have all your wishes come true and start everyday with a rainbow! Thanks so much for all your comments and reviews! They make me smile!

In this chapter we get to see that Gang getting ready for the auspicious occasion of Katara's birthday. You'll have to wait til the next chapter to see what the plan is all about.

A few things come up in this chapter.

Katara worries about the Ganng and especially Aang and Zuko's stress levels – She's seen what Aang is like when he's stressed and Zuko is just a ball of tension sometimes. Never fear dear readers, she will find a way to help him relax!

I imagine most of the islands in the firenation archipelago would be volcanic and have hot springs/mineral waters etc. I used to live on a volcanic island in Italy and it was fabulous and very fertile and lush. When I imagine Ember island I always seem to think of some sort of hybrid paradise between Ischia and hawaii.

Anyway much fun can be had by all at a hot spring. The Gaang will explore one at some point.

Aang wants to show Katara how he feels and he thinks the best way to do this is through rare/expensive flowers or a rare expensive item. See the fortuneteller episode in season one. Bless Aang's cotton socks, flowers are often a good way of showing that you care but they are also a little bit of a generic gift. Everybody loves flowers after all. Anyway he consults Zuko for all things rare and expensive on Ember island and there is a rare and expensive flower that grows there for no other reason that because there is in my imagination. The burning passion fire lily is a little like red roses. Romatic etc but mostly given when the guy wants some nookie or is apologizing for something.

The lovely and fabulous Kimberley T *waves at Kim*suggest bottoms of the feet for Katara's one ticklish place! This is a fabulous idea! Thanks Kim! Now that Zuko knows Katara's ticklish place, they will be on a more even playing field.

Toph and Zuko- I flove em! I think Toph would have a great fondness for noisy instruments if only because they vibrate much more and I imagine that would be great for a blind person to be able to 'feel' if they are doing it right. The Tsungi horn is enormous and looks like it could make a lot of noise. I just love the mental image of tiny Toph playing a massive horn. And then I loved the mental image of tiny Zuko playing a massive horn. And I put those two mental images together and it was flove! I think Zuko would love to show Toph how to play it properly and would be very patient with her –but I think she'd get a little frustrated with it. She will need lots of practice and may go back to other less deafening instruments during this fic.

I hinted at a few more serious themes regarding Zuko and the tsungi horns. I think this house will stir up a lot of memories for him and not all of them will be pleasant. I think Ozai would have been quite callous in his attitude to Zuko and wouldn't have a problem emphasizing how special and wonderful he thought Azula was in comparison. Zuko would want to prove to himself that even though he wasn't as good a bender as his younger sister he could still be good at other really hard and complicated things.

So he picked the biggest and hardest instrument he knows and tried to master it.

It doesn't hurt that it is Iroh and Luten's instrument either (though I think Iroh can play at least a few instruments- he did a pretty good job on that mandolin in tales of Ba Sing Se). I think his mother would have been really keen for both her children to have a more rounded education- but she was more successful with Zuko. In a chat with the lovely Em Dixon *waves at Em* she said she got the feeling that Azula was 'Ozai's kid' and Zuko was 'Ursa's kid' and I couldn't agree more. I think he would have wanted to make his mother happy however he could and if she wanted him to learn an instrument – he would have been all over that!

So, for Zuko, I think things like the tsungi horn will simultaneously remind him of his father's rejection and his mother's love and his feelings will be a little mixed on the matter. Throughout the final season of Avatar, I felt that one of the bigger changes was Zuko's progression past the point where he needed his father's love and approval and could stand as a person in his own right without needing to look to either Azula or Iroh for guidance.

The gifts:

The wishing beads he gives Katara are similar to Brazilian wish knots and karma beads put together. My friend went to Brazil and said that they have these bracelet/anklets that are tied into quite elaborate knots. The superstition is that you make a wish on each knot as you tie it around your wrist/ankle and when your wish comes true the knot will come undone. My friend swears by them because all her wishes came true. I used to work in a hippy shop (in the days when I smelt of patchouli and lavender and did a lot of yoga) and we sold karma Beads. Similar concept to the wish knots except they came in different colours. I remember that blue was the colour of hope. Pink was love. Green was courage etc.

Anyway I thought blue beads for hope would be perfect for Katara. So I put the two superstitions together and had Zuko make her a gift (it would have taken him ages) because I put a lot more stock in gifts that someone has really thought about and taken time to make/choose. Katara is a little superstitious so she's quite into the wishing beads.

The prism – ah year 8 science – you have been useful to me! Prisms are great! I have one on my window. Zuko knows Katara (at least in this fic) is into rainbows, so he gives her one so she can have a rainbow everyday. She would have had a rant about rainbows and her mother on the way back from the southern raiders and Zuko really is paying attention to everything she says. When she jokes that all she wants is wishes and rainbows, a little part of her is telling the truth and I wanted to show that Zuko takes what she says to heart.

And they cuddle for a good long time.

Don't judge me too harshly lovely readers. I just really like cuddling!

In the next chapter Katara will use her birthday powers and a girl's day out will be had. Someone may have witnessed the tickling and the cuddling and jumped to conclusions.

Til then lovely readers…..

Chapter 7: the Auspicious Occasion: trust

Momo is in my room, vaguely irritating me with his crazy hijinks. He's spent the better part of the last ten minutes trying to catch the rainbow on the far wall. I hung my prism from the window last night like Zuko said. This morning I woke up to all the colours on my far wall and it was amazing. I just watched it moving in the breeze and relaxed.

Until Sokka put Momo in my room.

When he wants me to wake up but doesn't want to suffer my just-woken-up-wrath, he resorts to a Momo alarm.

You can't ignore a Momo-wake-up-call. But oh how I tried! Momo is just a bundle of cuteness and noise. I commanded that Momo leave and let me sleep - as it is my birthday right that everybody do as I say. Momo looked at me with a confused expression. He clearly doesn't understand birthday rules.

There's only so long I can lie in bed pretending to be asleep. I could hear shenanigans going on downstairs without me-so I got up.

-?-

There was an enormous amount of fruit and pastries and other baked goods on the table when I came down. There was a bit of fussing between Suki and Aang over some streamers they were putting around the window. Sokka was already tucking into the pastries and calling out suggestions to them and to Toph and Zuko. Toph was standing on Zuko's shoulders –she was trying to metal bend the light fixture into a curl so they could hang something off it. Sokka kept saying 'a little to your left-no your other left-no the other left.' Zuko made a small noise of frustration and said that he only had the one left. When Toph was satisfied, they got Sokka to hand them the other end of some streamers – so the room was nice and colourful and festive! I made a loud cough and everybody turned to look at me. Then they all cried happy birthday in unison.

We all sat down together and started passing around the various fruit and yogurts and pastries. Me and Sokka had a conversation about his Momo wake up calls. The others were a bit cross that he'd woken me up before they'd finished decorating. Sokka said decorating schmecorating – the food was ready, so he woke me up so they could all get started on the birthday deliciousness!

I birthday commanded that he do ten push ups for waking me up. He grumbled and muttered something about the great birthday dictatorship starting already. But he did the push ups. The others watched open mouthed in astonishment at Sokka's compliance. Sokka said that's what a birthday dictatorship was like and everybody had better do what I say...it was  just easier. I said I was a benign dictator and only used my birthday powers for evil if I had been woken up too early. Sokka grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like 'if you say so' under his breath.

I asked Suki to pass me the moon peaches. Next to mangoes, they are my favourite fruit. Suki brought them over and gave me a deep curtsey as she presented them. I was confused. Suki said that Sokka had insisted that this was how I liked everything to be presented to me on my birthday. Okay – four birthdays ago, I made Sokka bow to me every time he addressed me or presented me with something. Four birthdays ago! And he really deserved it at the time!

Now he's told everyone I'm like some evil birthday dictator with delusions of grandeur.

I have made him do push ups again in retaliation.

We got into a conversation about favourite fruits and how they had all gone together to the most amazing fruit market on the other side of the island that had fresh produce from everywhere. Suki said that they even had sea prunes and she knew how much Sokka and I had liked them. She was quickly and promptly silenced by the others. Do sea prunes have something to do with the plan?

Zuko tried to steer the conversation back to fruit and he and Toph got into a conversation about passionfruit. Was the firenation purple passionfruit superior to the earth kingdom golden passionfruit? Only time and possibly a small sparring session will tell. I told them that I found them both equally delicious.

Aang said 'speaking of fruity deliciousness –happy birthday.' At first I didn't quite understand the comment but Aang presented me with a big bowl of spiky berries. He explained that they were dragon berries and they were really rare and expensive in the firenation – he looked to Zuko for confirmation and Zuko nodded and said they were a luxury extravagance. I passed the bowl around so everybody could try a little bit of luxury extravagance. When everybody had a few on their plates, Zuko showed us how to peel them- because he was the only one who had eaten them before. It was a lot of work because the outer shells were so spiky and scaly (that's how they got their name- because their shells look like a dragon hide), but Zuko said it was totally worth it.

It was.

Oh my god -that is the best thing I have ever tasted! It was just like honey and ice cream and all other sweet delicious things at once. Suki was really enjoying her dragon berry on the other side of the table and loudly exclaimed that they were better than sex which caused Sokka to eye the berries mistrustfully. It didn't stop him from eating them and making his own happy-delicious-food-noise. There was a little awkward silence after Suki's pronouncement and she blushed and stuttered that she meant it was better than icecream or some other none-sex related food product.

Toph asked, quite cheekily, what would constitute a sex-related food product and Sokka frantically said that we didn't need to know.

I agree.

Eww.

I used my birthday powers to declare that conversation over.

We all tucked in with gusto and soon all the dragon berries were gone. Toph said that they were totally worth standing around in the woods for an hour while Aang got them. Aang apparently had the others stand look out while he engaged in some petty produce-thievery from the nearest dragon berry orchard. Was this the plan?

No, there had been so much secrecy about the plan that it will be a bit anticlimactic if the plan is just fruit related deliciousness.

Aang said that wasn't his only present and scooted off. Suki called after him that they had agreed to do presents tonight. But too late. Aang scooted back and he'd something behind his back and said that he wanted to be the first to give me a birthday present.

There was a little awkward moment. Zuko and I glanced at each other for a second.

I said that was really sweet, but I didn't mind about the order of presents and when they were given to me and Zuko had already given me his present last night. Aang gave him a look and Zuko blushed a little and said sorry to Aang, but he didn't know that Aang had been so keen on being the first. Toph asked what Zuko had gotten me and I stuck my foot in her lap so she could feel the anklet and told them about the prism. Toph ran her fingers over the anklet and declared it pretty and then Suki came over to have a look and the awkward moment passed. When we had all sat back down Aang came over to me and presented me with a huge bunch of firelilies.

-?-

Oh.

-?-

I took a deep breath and took the flowers and gave him a smile and said thanks. The whole time I was just thinking –they're not the same flowers-they're not the same flowers- I was trying to act normal. Aang was talking about how they were some really rare firelily that only grew on the island etc. When I heard him talking about them with Zuko yesterday – I never thought he'd get me the flowers. It's not Aang's fault. He doesn't know.

Firelilies always remind me a little of Hama.

But the firelilies I saw with her had been the common firelily. Red petals and orange tips. These ones had a deep dark purple centre and dark red petals with pink tips. They were totally different flowers and I should stop being silly.

Zuko offered to go put the flowers in a vase for me and I handed them over gladly and he took them into the kitchen.

Aang was looking at me hopefully and I smiled at him and gave him a quick hug and said thanks. The flowers were lovely-really. Sometimes small white lies are better. He doesn't need to know about Hama and firelilies and it would be impolite to say those flowers give me the jeebies.

Suki and Toph and Sokka went off to get their presents and left me alone with Aang for a second. Aang started asking if I really liked the flowers and I resorted to a small white lie again. Then I said that I probably enjoyed the dragon berries more because they were delicious and started talking about dragon berries with him. He was telling me how hard it had been to get them and began regailing me with the tales of his dragon berry heroics.

Zuko came back in and put the vase on the front window sill and said that firelilies like full sun- so it would be better if they stayed in this room because it got the sun all day. I agreed. Toph bounded back in, present in hand. She asked if she had to bow before giving me a present and I re-iterated that Sokka was only being silly and no bowing was necessary. Sokka and Suki came back in and Sokka was trying to hide something behind Suki's back.

And it looked like present time was upon us!

-?-

Toph said the day spa was her main present but this was just a little something extra. She handed me two long thin bits of metal with little dents at one end and a small loop at the other. She'd run a long piece of leather through the loops.

Was this a necklace?

I guess it must be.

I was a bit confused but said thanks for the necklace. She asked if I had any idea what the metal bits were. I did not. Toph explained that she knew enough of me and Sokka's sneaky ways to know that we both loved to snoop around and these two bits of metal would be able to pick most locks and she could show me how to use them. She'd bended them herself. Sokka thought this was awesome and tried to steal my present thunder. Toph has agreed to show him too. I have protested at being called a sneaky snooper in a backhanded manner. I declared that I wasn't really a snooper.

I have never snooped in my life!

There was a small awkward silence that followed this pronouncement and the others glanced at each other for a quick second.

Someone coughed politely.

Aang said my sneaky ways weren't a bad thing. Toph started recalling all the times I've been sneaky with her/ snooped through her stuff. She said all this in a very affectionate manner and gave me one of her friendly punches on the arm. I can't really be mad at her. She does have a point (she often has a point). And she means so well! And I have snooped through her stuff a fair bit.

Okay... so sometimes I'm a bit sneaky. I admitted it. I thanked Toph and gave her a hug and popped the keys around my neck. Really, it is a great idea. You never know when something like lock picking will come in handy. Then Sokka started going on about my sneaky ways back home and making everybody laugh with sneaky tales and the conversation took an alarming turn.

Sokka has to do push ups again.

Suki said that she was really impressed by how quickly I picked up all of Zuko's stealth tips the other day and that it was amazing that I was able to sneak up on her after only a couple of hours stealth training. She has had years of stealth training. That alone was a strong testament to my sneakiness. But she said this in such a nice and complimentary way that I felt really flattered.

Everybody turned and glanced at Zuko for his comments on my sneakiness. Out of everybody present, I had probably been the sneakiest with Zuko. He smiled and said that I had stalked him quite successfully for a long time and that was an even bigger testament to my sneakiness because he had also years of stealth training. Suki gave him a look and said she'd been stealth training since she was eight. Zuko replied that he'd been stealth training since he was seven. I thought the conversation was going to descend into a stealth-off between the two of them. So I made them shake hands with my birthday powers.

Aang was looking a little perplexed and said that he never knew I had stalked Zuko. I replied that it was back at the Western Air Temple and I had only stalked him a little. Zuko started coughing quite loudly on the moon peach he'd been eating. Sokka gave him some firm pats on the back.

-?-

Suki pulled out a thin long box from her pocket. It had been elegantly wrapped and had a green and gold ribbon around it. I opened it up and gasped. It was a beautiful and ornately carved sandalwood fan. I held it up and smelled it. Ooh I love that smell. Then I opened it up and started fanning myself in what I thought was an elegant manner. Suki said that she wanted to make me an honorary Kyoshi warrior but couldn't find any gold kyoshi fans in the firenation, but then she thought an ordinary fan might be more useful because it was so unrelentingly hot on this island anyway. I gave her a big hug and said I loved it. I really did. It was a useful gift.

-?-

Then it was Sokka's turn. He produced from behind his back a long straight stick. It had been painted in water tribe blue and white and he'd carved a little handle at one end and on the other he'd carved – common sense- and painted it a darker blue.

Was that an actual common sense stick? Sokka replied that he thought I would enjoy having my own righteous stick of common sense.

I do!

I really do!

I squealed in delight and gave him a big hug. My big brother is such an idiot sometimes and I never thought the day would come when I'd be glad that he'd read my stalker journal. It's such a lame, ridiculous present but I can't help but love it. I gave Sokka a light whack with the common sense stick -to test it out and because I was a little embarrassed that he'd bought up my stalker journal in a round-about gift-y fashion.

Sokka explained that it was a water tribe in-joke to everyone else. They were all wearing very confused faces. He said that with the stick I would be able to whack commonsense into people. Zuko face palmed and said that is going to be so bad for me under his breath. I have frequently told him that he is lacking in common sense.

I'm a bit thrilled with all my presents.

-?-

After breakfast was packed away and everybody was ready to face the day I called a birthday silence with the common sense stick. I had thought up some group bonding activities for us to do together. These were activities that would normally meet with some reluctance from certain group members, but on my birthday everyone has to do what I say.

I demanded everyone do trust falls.

Because I could! No arguments!

Just trust falls!

Okay- there were some arguments. Toph said trust falls were lame and if someone tried to trust fall on to her they'd probably smush her and then all trust would be lost. I've paired her with Aang who has promised not to smush her and to make trust falls fun. Toph has raised an eyebrow dubiously at Aang's trust fall enthusiasm. Sokka and Suki wanted to be paired together. I think so they can subtly feel each other up.

I was paired with Zuko which I was a bit thrilled with. Not because I want to subtly feel him up or anything.

...err just because trust has been a really big issue between us and I just think it would be nice if we could do trust falls. And it's good for group bonding and whatever else.

-?-

Zuko was a little reluctant and I told him it was either trust falls or a hundred push ups. He asked me if I would be mad if he chose the push ups. I told him I certainly would be! And then I poked him with the common sense stick.

He was looking really nervous and I got right up in his personal space and asked him what the problem was -really quietly. He looked at me a little shyly and said that he wasn't a very trusting person and found it really hard to just trust people and didn't think he'd be good at trust falls. I told him that I really trusted him and I asked if he trusted me. He looked away for a sec and then looked back at me. He said yes really softly. It made me really happy. That yes.

I told him that I promised I wouldn't let him fall and he promised me the same.

Sokka called out that we should stop whispering to each other already and just get our trust fall on! He and Suki had already done six trust falls and were way ahead of us! Aang said that he didn't know that trust falls was a competition and that he and Toph had already done seven. If it wasn't a competition before, it became one -after Aang said that.

Still the others seemed to be having a good trusting time. Except for Toph who wasn't enjoying it at the start. Toph hates trust falls and has the tendency to shriek as little as she falls back but Aang always catches her in some fancy and unexpected manner. Then when it's her turn to be the catcher, Aang places her arms out and tells her not to move and then just flops on her affectionately. She got the hang of it by the end.

As I predicted, Sokk and Suki got a bit touchy feely with their trust falls.

So did I.

Not in a bad way or anything.

I'm not going to lie. Zuko just has a really nice body. I may have gotten a bit err... handsy with his really nice body when I was the catcher. But he didn't mind and... it was all in a friendly and affectionate manner! Just because he seemed so nervous about the whole trust fall business. I caught him around his middle every time and I'd give him a little squeeze and whisper something like that wasn't so bad -was it? in his ear. He'd smile at me and then we'd switch places. He'd be nice and firm and strong to fall against. He'd catch me carefully every time. He may have been a bit more gentlemanly and less handsy with his catching technique. But he'd give me a little squeeze in return and say that trust falls weren't so bad after all.

He's right. They weren't so bad at all.

Chapter 7 authors note:

Exceptionally long and rambly author's notes follow:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of the first part of Katara's birthday shenanigans! I'm planning to do her birthday in three parts. This part deals with the morning of her birthday. The next part will be more of a girly chapter (just to warn any men-folk out there!) and the third part will be about the plan! I hope you enjoyed reading part 1: trust!

Big thanks for all the wonderful reviews! You guys are just all kinds of fabulous and if I knew you in real life I'd want to do trust falls with you! Anyway reviews help my imagination come up with wacky hijinks! And I love reading all your comments and suggestions!

I have a small note of sad news: my computer is having a tantrum and has eaten my rough draft of the coming chapters.

Oh calamity!

I'll think I'll be able to get them back and all will be well, but for the moment they appear to have disappeared. My lovely fancy-man works in IT and is very computer geeky so hopefully he'll be able to get it back for me. I still had most of what would happen in this chapter in my head and I had a day off today - so I've been able to get this one up. I've written this chapter on his laptop and I am a fail whale at laptops so there maybe a few more typos than usual in this chapter. Sorry about that lovely readers!

Err fail whale is aussie slang for a really epic fail.

Never fear dear readers! We will go onwards! To infinity and beyond!

In this chapter:

Sokka employs the Momo alarm technique to wake up his sister. Waking up with pets is a tradition in my house. When you need someone to get up but you don't wish to deal with morning grumpiness – you let the dog into their room and voila! They are awake! No one can stay asleep in the face on her unrelenting cuteness/noisiness.

Birthday rules: So everybody has to do what she says – no arguments (or maybe just slight arguments.) I think this would be a family tradition! I think Sokka is used to copping it on her birthday and probably make similar retaliatory demands on his own birthday – give me a foot massage – make me stew etc. During this chapter Sokka is ordered to do push ups many times and he does it without fuss because it is just easier! She starts out ordering Sokka around the most because he's her brother and she's used to him and she's never previously had this many people at her birthday command before and she doesn't know how they'll all take it – the more at ease she feels with people – the more likely she is to get a little birthday bossy with them.

Dragon berries made an appearance in my Zuko's adventure with miss smarty-pants bossy boots fic. They are like lychees only more delicious! They are food orgasm inducing. Ooh a food orgasm is when you eat something so incredibly and fabulously delicious that you make that mmmhmhmmhm noise almost involuntarily –because it is that tasty!

Firelilies- I didn't want too much seriousness in this chapter, but I think the Hama experience would have been really traumatic for Katara, even though she's pushed most of her thoughts about it away. That bit with the firelilies in the episode was when I started to get really creeped out by Hama. I think for a long time to come – firelilies will remind Katara of Hama. Aang doesn't know this and he gets them because he wants to give her something romantic. She tries to be gracious about them but Zuko can tell when something is a little off with her and he takes them off her hands.

Sneaky ways- Katara has them and we all know it! I think she was in a bit of sneaky way denial. I just wanted a little group acknowledgement of her sneakiness and I thought Toph would be the one most likely to point it out (bluntly and affectionately). I also realised that everyone in the group except for Aang knew that Katara was stalking Zuko at the western air temple. So I wanted to let him in the loop about that. He has thoughts about that which will become apparent in another chapter.

Sandalwood fans are awesome!

The common sense stick- it just seemed like such a Sokka present. He is the only one who's read her stalker journal and knows how much she wants a common sense stick and he's just having a little joke with her. Katara will become a little too fond of her commonsense stick. Then she may misuse her commonsense stick! Then someone may hide it from her.

Everyone's presents gives an idea about how they see Katara. Zuko sees her as a hopeful optimist. Aang sees her as a romantic prospect. Toph sees her as an affectionate snooper/busybody (mother figure) and Suki sees her as a sister figure/equal and wants to initiate her into Kyoshi sisterhood. Sokka sees her as his little sister - a purveyor of commonsense and ridiculousness simultaneously.

Trust falls- okay they are lame! I know it. but I love them and they are a great vehicle to explore some trust issues. They are a great group bonding exercise and Katara is all about group bonding and being a family. But there are several people in teh group who would be a bit reluctant to do trust falls and I think Katara could only get them all to agree to do them on her birthday. Using her birthday powers.

Something that doesn't get developed much in the series but which I want to explore more is that Zuko has serious trust issues. Understandably so. Poor kid. But even in the crossroads of destiny – he seems a little more open to Katara (he lets her touch his scar and all). I think he is really starting to completely trust and care deeply for her (more than just crush on her) and this is a new and bizarre sensation for him and he's a bit elated/terrified of it. He didn't trust Mai very much when they were dating and felt quite insecure about her feelings. But he's developed something a little deeper with Katara and has come to a place where he will agree to do trust falls with her.

Which gives her an opportunity to get a little handsy/physically demonstrative with him. A handsy Katara is a happy Katara after all.

In the next chapter the girls will hit up a day spa together and there will be shenanigans and lady bonding.

Til then lovely readers...

Chapter 8: the Auspicious occasion: Friendship

After trust falls I announced that we were all going to do relaxing yoga together and a collective groan went up from the group.

Really now!

Yoga isn't that bad!

There were several attempts at arguments from Toph (she already did trust falls, did she  have to do yoga) and Sokka (I'm too manly for yoga) and Aang (Last time you made me do yoga it really freaked me out and did not relax me at all.) They will have to do it- No Arguments! I poked the three of them with the common sense stick quite firmly. It was my birthday and they were ruining it by being anti-yoga jerk-faces.

In fact only Suki and Zuko were not categorically opposed to yoga. Suki said she found it relaxing and Zuko said yoga wouldn't be so bad because it was beneficial for Aang's breathing techniques and breathing is very important for firebending. Aang countered that breathing was very important for life and because Aang was alive, that was proof that he knew how to breathe. Zuko had no counter argument for that.

We needed to find a steamy place to do it because yoga done in a warm environment has more health benefits. I asked Zuko where the nearest steam pool was. He'd told me there were lots on the island. The other exchanged shifty glances. After a few moments, Zuko said there was one about twenty minutes walk from here, but we would have to hike temporarily through the jungle to get there. Another groan went up. Honestly a few days on a tropical island and we've all become lazy bones. I birthday commanded that Zuko lead the way.

Everyone went to put their swimmers on and then we all walked along the beach for a bit and just before we went in the jungle Zuko gave a little speech about all the poisonous and nasty creatures that live in the jungle and how to identify them and the best ways to avoid them.

Wow, the firenation is just full of poisonous creepy crawlies.

I don't do rhino-snakes.

Squirpions- fine! Scorpildillos –I'm cool. Porcu-spiders - sure.

Rhino-snakes – oh hell no!

Zuko's little speech about all things poisonous had a little dispiriting effect on the group. There were a few comments to this effect. He said he didn't want to be a no fun party-pooper, but that there were dangerous things in the jungle and he just wanted us to be safe. He added that all the creepy crawlies were far more scared of people than we were of them and generally avoided the main paths and tracks, so we should be fine if we just stayed on the main path and didn't get distracted and wander off. He said this last part rather pointedly at Aang who had gotten distracted by a butterfly and wandered off before Zuko reached the end of his sentence.

Zuko sighed quite comically.

I pulled Aang back into line and birthday commanded that he stay with the group and we were ready to get our hike on!

-?-

Creepy crawlies aside – the jungle was actually quite beautiful. Very green and lush and filled with bird songs and all different sorts of flowers. The air smelled sweetly floral because of all the star jasmine growing in big wild clumps. There were frangipanis and hibiscus trees everywhere and there were many rare bright moonflowers clinging to the shadowy, shady places on the side of the trees. There were flowers I'd never seen before. One was quite pretty. It was a little like a daisy – Zuko said they were sun poppies – so named because of their happy yellow colour. They were common everywhere in the firenation and had a lot of medicinal properties. I leant over and smelled some and they smelled great. I'd never smelled anything quite like it. It smelled faintly like vanilla and frangipanis had gotten together and made a smell-baby.

Why couldn't Aang have gotten me sun poppies instead of firelilies?

-?-

Eventually the trees opened up and we were in a small clearing at the base of a cliff. There was a large and rocky pool that has steam rising faintly off it. There was a large cave at the other side that hung over the pool. It had star jasmine clinging to the side and its tendrils reached down towards the water's surface, which made almost a flower curtain over the cave. Zuko said the cave opened out at the back and there's room enough for us all to stand back there and it would be nice and steamy, but we'd have to swim through the pool to get there. I birthday commanded that everyone strip down to their swimmers and follow me.

To yoga and beyond!

-?-

Toph was exceptionally reluctant to get in the water and I went over to her and reminded her of my birthday powers. Then she reminded me in a rather petulant voice that she couldn't swim. Oh. Well I feel like a goose. Toph hates the water. Sokka volunteered to carry her to the cave and she acquiesced. Toph loves being carried by Sokka.

The water was deliciously warm. Like a big giant bath. There were a few cold currents eddying around about it was mostly just lovely. The pool got a little deep at the mouth of the cave and Sokka had to put Toph on his back in piggyback style and swim while she was holding onto his neck with a vise-like grip. We all made it to the platform together and it was perfect for steam yoga. There was enough space for all of us and the air was warm but not too hot.

It's yoga time.

-?-

Suki was my best student and stood next to me and performed all the stretches with aplomb. She is my favourite because she gave me no trouble at all. Toph wouldn't copy my movements and moved to her own yoga beat. Aang asked repeatedly am I meant to be relaxed yet? In a similar manner to how Sokka would ask my father are we there yet? when we were kids. I gave Aang a speech about the many health benefits of yoga and he started doing some air nomad yoga instead of copying me, which I guess was an improvement. Sokka and Zuko were the worst! They had clumped together at the back and were making various jokes and comments and laughing quietly and I think, at one point, giving each other noogies. At this point I separated them and made Zuko stand next to me at the front. And…

Oh my.

I have a great…. Err…. Appreciation for the sight of a shirtless Zuko. All sweaty and muscular.

Hhhhmmmm.

I was greatly distracted for a moment. I hadn't got a good look back at the clearing when he took his shirt off and now…. Anyway I greatly enjoyed my current view and I may have ordered everyone to do stretches that would improve my view.

Could I birthday command Zuko stay shirtless the entire day?

Or will the others think that is weird and then tease me forever.

Still it could be worth it.

-?-

I had hoped that by separating the boys they would stop being silly but they did not. Sokka just called out all his comments more loudly. I left the commonsense stick back with the clothes so I couldn't whack him with it. Sokka said something about being too manly for yoga again and Zuko made a sarcastic comment about Sokka's manliness. Sokka said that Zuko was definitely getting a noogie for that one and there was an inelegant struggle at the edge of the water. I birthday commanded them to stop goofing around and get back to yoga….. to no effect. At some point during their inelegant struggle for noogie dominance, Zuko lost his footing/Sokka pushed him in the water and he landed with a big splash. Sokka declared himself victorious.

Zuko didn't resurface.

The Zuko less moment stretched on to half a minute- then a minute- but it felt like a million years. We were all crowded around the water's edge and it was so murky. I couldn't see him anywhere. I started catastrophising in my head.

Maybe he'd hit his head and was unconscious and drowning.

I was just about to jump in and waterbend all the water out of the pool and find him when a pale hand reached up from under the ledge where Sokka was standing. Zuko grabbed him by the ankle and Sokka made a startled noise that sounded like aaeergh. Zuko flipped him into the water in one smooth movement and Sokka landed with another tremendous splash! Because we'd all been standing on the water's edge we all got soaked. Toph let out a squeal of surprise. Aang let out a whoop of joy and declared it was now swimming time! He got a run up and did a giant cannonball into the water and we were all splashed anew. Suki looked at me a little apologetically and gave a slight shrug and dived in gracefully.

Oh well. I wanted everyone to have fun and relax. And judging from the amount of splashing and delighted noises coming from everyone swimming, I had achieved this end. Yoga time was abandoned.

I turned to Toph and asked if she would like me to swim her back to the shallow end. Toph was pursing her lips and putting on a brave face but she nodded slowly. She'd never in a hundred million years admit to being scared of anything. But I knew how much she hated the water. She'd prefer Sokka, but he was otherwise engaged at present. Toph always felt more comfortable with solid earth under her feet and I could get her back to the shallow end easily.

She put her arms around my neck and I swum us carefully around all the water based-shenanigans and splashing of the others. When we were in the shallow end I told her to put her feet down and a wave of relief visibly passed over her face when her feet touched the rocks. Toph had been a really good sport about everything today. I put my arm around her and asked if she'd like me to teach her how to swim. She shrugged noncommittally and said she didn't know if she wanted to learn. She said she knew it was stupid to be scared of the water, but the in the water she felt really blind and she hated that feeling.

Zuko swam over to us grinning and asked if he could join us. I felt a wave of crossness at him. Just five minutes ago he had scared the bejeezus out of me. And accidentally started a pro-swimming/ anti-yoga rebellion.

And now he was here, just smiling and grinning. He had no idea how worried I'd been. He'd nearly given me a heart attack. I'd thought for a second that he was drowning and it had been horrible. There was only one thing for it. I got up and grabbed the common sense stick and started whacking him with it and exclaiming that he should never, ever do something like that again! He was rather perplexed by this turn of events and held his arms up and kept asking what have I done now? I paused in my common sense stick whacking and told him (ranted a little) how worried I'd been and how he'd nearly given me a heart attack with his little trick back there and how dare he worry me like that on my birthday (or any day come to think of it). I whacked him anew with the common sense stick. He said that it had just been a joke and I said he was terrible at jokes and that making me think he was drowning was not very funny at all -next time he made me worry about him dying -he better at least be seriously injured. He apologized for worrying me and gave me an apologetic smile.

Gah! I can't be mad at him when he smiles at me like that. I poked him with the common sense stick instead. Toph, who we'd both forgotten in the common sense stick whacking melee, had been sitting there, cheerfully witnessing the whole scene. She expostulated  aaaww Katara-you really do care quite loudly and affectionately.

I have poked Toph with the common sense stick as well.

-?-

Soon the sun was near the noon point in the sky and it was time to head over to the main town and the day spa. Toph had booked us in for the entire afternoon. We all walked back together along the path. Zuko picked me a sun poppy as a peace offering for his earlier antics and I have put it behind my ear. We left the boys back at the house. They will have to sort out lunch for themselves because I am not cooking anything today. Toph says she got the lunch included package and that Angi's bounty day spa will provide all the snacks and beverages we need.

Go Toph! She is so practical.

When we arrived a super friendly and conciliatory lady showed us to the change room where we could leave our clothes/bags/shoes. She gave me a little vase to put the sun poppy in. She had a nice round face and a gracious manner. She said that she would be looking after us this afternoon and gave us big fluffy towels and dressing gowns and asked what we'd like to drink/eat first and handed us a small menu.

The menu contained 18 different types of fireflakes. Boo.

But also had 23 different types of dumplings. Yay.

She gave the order to a lackey who had appeared from nowhere and then lead us through a series of rooms. There were a few scattered mandolin players who were plucking away a 'relaxing' melody and the whole place smelled like cinnamon and vanilla. Wow this place was even more lush that the fancy lady day spa back in Ba Sing Se. They really go  all out in the firenation over relaxation.

The first treatment was a mineral spa. Toph groaned and said not more water! The gracious lady smiled at her indulgently and said it was only a shallow bath and so there wasn't that much water and the volcanic minerals would be really good for our skin. We all hopped in what appeared to be a giant bath together. It bubbled away in an alarming manner and had steam rising faintly from the surface but the gracious lady said this was normal and it was meant to do that.

The gracious lady bustled off and we all stretched out and Suki gave an especially blissful sigh. The gracious lady returned with our drinks and snacks and said she'd be back when it was time for the next treatment. Suki had ordered a mystery selection of dumplings because she wanted to try new things.

The first bun was ridiculously spicy and Suki made a series of comical faces after she bit into it. Her eyes were watering and she was fanning her mouth. Zuko said milk was good for soothing that spicy –just-licked-the-sun-feeling. I didn't have any milk, but I did have a smoothie. I gave her my mango smoothie to drink and she felt a little better. She made a lame pun regarding the fire nation and hot food and spices. Oh Suki. Lame jokes are her thing. I said the only person who tells lamer jokes was Zuko and that was saying something.

Toph made a sly face and asked exceptionally bluntly "speaking of Zuko- what exactly is going on between you two?"

Suki piped up that she was going to ask me the same thing because she'd seen us cuddling last night when she got up to get a glass of water and she'd been  most curious but wanted to wait until it was just us girls to ask me. Toph was curious about the cuddling and asked if it was kissing and cuddling but Suki said it had only been cuddling when she saw, but she hadn't stayed for the whole time because it looked like we'd been cuddling for ages. I blushed brightly but blamed that on the steam rising for the pool. Steam just makes me red in the face okay.

I told them both very firmly that no kissing had gone on and Toph looked a little disappointed and said that she was sure some kissing should have happened after we rolled around on the sand together. Suki spat out some mango smoothie in surprise. Toph explained how last night when she'd been able to do the scales perfectly, she'd come out to find us because she'd wanted to show Zuko. She had felt us –err rolling about and tickling each other. Toph had assumed we were busy and left. Suki's eyebrows nearly leapt off her face and she turned to me and said "you did what!" I explained that we were just letting off steam together and Suki nodded knowingly and said "if that's what you want to call it" with a smile. She and Toph were making big assumptions like big assumers who just assume things. Like Sokka!

No!

I got a bit ranty and said that it's not that I want to call it that – that's what we were doing. That's ALL we were doing! No kissing of any sort had ever gone on between me and Zuko. Despite my denials and exclamations to the contrary, I couldn't seem to persuade them that me and Zuko were not having a torrid, secret love affair and were just friends. A great deal of assuming was done and and great many teasing comments were made by Suki and Toph and in the end I had to use my birthday powers to end the conversation.

We are not talking about this!

This conversation is over!

Thankfully at this point the gracious lady came to get us for our hot rock massages. Which were done individually. So I had a brief break from all their assuming glances and assuming comments and assuming smiles at each other.

-?-

I just feel I need to write how much I LOVE hot rock massages. That was awesome.

-?-

Toph also loved the hot rock massages. And she talked at great length about what an awesome idea it was and how it reminded her of home. There was brief silence. Toph almost never mentions her home voluntarily. I didn't want to push her in case she shut down. But all three of us were encased in some mud mineral scrub and were meant to stay wrapped up until it had set – so she couldn't really run away from this conversation.

Apparently she'd had a nanny who had been especially kind and this nanny knew a lot about bending and benders and she knew that earthbenders were normally comforted by rocks around them. The nanny had been the first one to notice that Toph had earthbending tendencies and when Toph cried the nanny would give her some smooth river pebbles to play with (all of Toph's other toys had been fancy dolls etc) and would run one of the bigger pebbles over her back in soothing patterns. The hot rocks had reminded her of that a little.

When we had all been rinsed off and were sitting in the mineral spa again, I asked her some more about the nanny. Toph couldn't remember much because she'd been really young, she could just remember the pebbles. One day the nanny had stopped coming to work and that was when Toph ran away for the first time. She went looking for the nanny, but found the badger moles instead. She let her sentence hang in the air. Finding the badger moles was what helped her unlock her earth bending ability.

We were quiet for a second and then Suki piped up that if Toph was meant to see the nanny again, she would. Toph asked her how she could be so sure and Suki just shrugged and said 'because of cheong' as if that explained everything.

Cheong what?

Suki explained that cheong was a Kyoshi Island belief in togetherness and connectedness. We are all connected, but when you have a shared experience with someone, or spend any amount of time together, this connection increases. When someone has an impact upon your life, you will have a bond with them forever. Just passing all those years with the other Kyoshi Warriors meant that she would always be attached to them in some way.

Suki thought that Toph and her nanny would always be connected in some way because she'd had a great impact on Toph's life and if Toph was meant to find her again, Suki was sure that she would. Toph smiled at her in a way I have never seen Toph smile at Suki before. All open-like.

I like the idea of cheong. I said the water tribe had a similar concept, but we didn't have a name for it. Then I told them about that crazy swamp me and Aang and Sokka had visited and how Huu had thought we were all branches of the same tree.

I said that I thought we'd all be connected forever because of the experience of travelling together and fighting with the Avatar. It was like Aang said. Friendship can last a lifetime (or many lifetimes, if you are Aang.) Then faster than you can say cheong Suki reached for me and Toph's hands and we sat in the mineral pool just holding hands. Even though the boys weren't with us, in that one moment I felt connected to them too.

They are the five people in the world who I just can't imagine being without.

I really do think we will always be friends.

Chapter 8 authors note:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of the auspicious occasion of Katara's birthday, part 2: friendship. Congratulations and I hope you enjoyed it! This was a lot of fun to write but I am once again on the bf's laptop, so there may be a few more spelling/grammar errors! I'll try edit them when my normal computer is feeling better. Anyway this chapter was had a bit of a friendship- especially a girly friendship focus and I hope it was a fun read.

Anyway huge giant thanks with cherries on top and hot rock massages for all my wonderful and fabulous reviewers! You guys know I love ya! Really reading your comments just gives me a warm old cheong feeling!

In this chapter:

The firenation, like Australia, has lots of poisonous creatures. I think there seems to be more poisonous animals in temperate to tropical climates and that's the firenation! Zuko knows a bit about how to be safe around poisonous animals and he's a safety first kind of guy when it comes to his friends.

That steam pool they hike to is not the closest one. But it gave me a chance to send them on a hike through a lush jungle and see other firenation flowers. I mean it can't all be firelilies can it? They have to have more floral bio-diversity in my opinion. They'd have to have jasmine growing at the very least! So I have introduced a few more flowers.

Birthday obedience is a bit hard on Toph, especially when it comes to the swimming. I am under the impression that she can't swim (this may be remedied later) but she wouldn't want to be a spoilsport and ruin the birthday activities for Katara and so she puts on a brave face and goes along with it. I also realized I hadn't had much Toph-Katara friendship love lately, so I added some.

I very obliquely floated the idea of where I think some of Zuko's recklessness comes from. Zuko can hold his breath for a freakish amount of time in the siege of the north and I think after Sokka pushes him in he gets the idea to play a trick on his bro and swims under the ledge and waits until he can pull Sokka in too. While he's just goofing off with Sokka he doesn't think for a sec how this will drive Katara bananas with worry. I think Zuko is not at all accustomed to people worrying about him and caring about him, save his uncle. And even then, uncle was rarely demonstrative about this (I say this with oodles of love for Uncle Iroh. But it seems like a firenation custom to be a bit more reticent and just more reluctant when it comes to showing affection. Like the lovely brits and their stiff upper lip.)

Knowing that people care about you and will really miss you if anything happens to you can be a huge inhibitor of more reckless behavior and I think previously, Zuko's felt a little unloved in this respect and hasn't felt like he had that much to lose per se when it came to reckless behavior. It's not until Katara goes nuts at him that he realizes that she really does care on a deep level. He'll make an effort to do less dumb stuff that will make her tear her hair out with worry in the future.

He was always going to be the first person Katara really used the common sense stick on.

The day spa – I just think the firenation had a very wealthy upper class and it would make sense that their day spas would be super lush and more volcanic-treatment orientated, so it is a little different from the fancy lady day spa.

The girls have a lot of fun teasing Katara (wouldn't you), but in all honesty they are both wondering what is going on between Katara and Zuko. She may have shut this particular conversation down with her birthday powers – but tomorrow is a new day! I think Katara is not at all sure how she feels at this stage. She is not only the birthday girl, she is also the queen of denial! The Zuko love is just at inception levels and will still have to bust through a whole bunch of dream levels before it becomes something she'll admit to herself.

But never fear-there are many more chapters to come!

Toph's nanny: Toph, though I love her, didn't come into this world as a delightful 12 year old badass. I feel that she had a very coddled over protective childhood. With her parents, I'm surprised that they even figured out she was an earthbender. Of all the elements I reckon earthbending would be the hardest to pick up on in early childhood. And I don't think Toph got allowed outside much as a young kid so she couldn't even be around earth that much. They didn't seem that encouraging of her earth bending in any case. Then I had the idea of a lovely nanny and it made a bit more sense to me. I think it's likely Toph would have had a succession of nannies and one of them knew a fair bit about bending and figured out what Toph was. This nanny would have opened up a whole new world for Toph but when she went missing *cough* got fired *cough* Toph would have missed her. In the episode where she explains how she ran away and met the bagermoles she never explained why she ran away. So I reckon that it is plausible that she was looking for somebody.

We may see this nanny again. In fact we may already know her ;)

When Suki is talking about cheong and Toph finding her nanny again, Toph really warms to her. I think she would have been a little stand offish with Suki as a result of her crush on Sokka. But she has come to terms with the fact that Sokka loves her like a little sister, but not in that other way. She much more astute at reading these situations than other people *cough* Aang *cough*. Now I think she's starting to really warm to Suki as a person and get over her adorable Sokka crush.

Cheong: is not only the name of that nomad guy. It is actually a lovely Korean philosophy of togetherness and connectedness that my friend Hannah explained to me. Sorry Hannah, if I'm not doing it justice. I went to school with Hannah and I ran into her a little while ago and we went for a lovely chat and coffee and a catch up and it was great. Anyway Hannah explained about cheong and how because we'd been to high school together (shared experience of several years) we'd always have a connection. She explained it much more profoundly and I don't know if I'm doing it justice, but anyway I think it's a lovely idea. So I made it a Kyoshi Island philosophy so I could put it in my fic. But I do think strands of it appear through the t.v series (huu and the tree). The Gaang are connected on a quantum level and I just love their friendships and group dynamics.

*In musfasa voice* and so we are all connected in the great circle of life.

In the next chapter we will see what everyone has planned for Katara!

Til then my lovely readers…

Chapter 9: the Auspicious Occasion: hope

After a long afternoon of delicious pampering, we emerged from Angi's bounty day spa looking and feeling fabulous. We were given more tea and dumplings and fussed over at great length by the gracious lady until she pronounced herself satisfied with our appearance. She had overseen a trio of beauticians for each of us, who buffed and scrubbed and did our hair and applied a subtle but lovely layer of make-up. One of them wanted to apply some green to my eyelids but she had tutted dramatically and said that there would be no point in fighting my eye colour in such a barbarous manner. The gracious lady took colours quite seriously. My make-up had been applied in a less noticeable and obvious fashion to the way they had done it in Ba Sing Se. They favoured more subtle shades and softer colours in the fire nation, apparently. A lackey had woven some fresh flowers through my hair, which had been piled in an elaborate fashion. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror on the way out and nearly gasped. I mean I know I'm not ugly or anything, but I just looked ...well, quite pretty.

I looked like some sort of half dazed-mostly fabulous-floral wood nymph.

Toph's hair was as rebellious as the rest of Toph and had broken free, here and there, from its arrangement. Suki's hair had been brushed and heated and blown and combed until it wafted around her face in a gravity defying fashion. Toph said she thought we all looked fabulous and there was much hilarity. But I told her sincerely that she looked really pretty and she beamed at me in response.

We bid farewell to our gracious lady and started walking back home. I almost felt too relaxed to walk anywhere. If the boys had been present I would have demanded one of them carry me. Port Ember, the main town is about half an hour's walk from the house. It doesn't seem so far on the way into town, but the way back felt like it took forever.

When we came near the house we saw the boys having a three way stick-whacking battle on the beach, apparently for funsies. Why is whacking each other with sticks fun? I noted, with some annoyance, that Sokka was wielding the commonsense stick. Aang was flitting about like an agile sparrow and using his air bending to whack the other boys from above, which was something they both protested against.

Boys.

Always needing to whack at things with sticks.

Zuko noticed us first. He looked up and saw me and our eyes met and he gaped a little. His mouth fell open and his eyes widened and he blushed and was just staring at me in a dazed fashion. He was looking at me in a really strange way. Nice strange. I gave him a small wave and he waved back in a rather stunned fashion.

Then Sokka clobbered him over the back of the head with the commonsense stick.

Much ado! (and swearing and head-holding from Zuko)

Sokka, in all fairness, hadn't noticed he was so distracted and was fully expecting Zuko to block his commonsense stick assault. This has not saved him from my  wrath and twenty birthday push ups! After his initial commonsense stick whack he started apologizing and said that he thought Zuko was paying attention and wanted to know what had distracted him etc. Zuko pointed at us with the hand that wasn't holding the back of his head. Then Sokka and Aang looked up and saw us coming down the beach. (I may have been stomping.)

Sokka was entranced by the sight of Suki in all her floral glory (she had also had flowers woven through her hair). It seemed like he forgot all the rest of us were there. He ran over and lifted her up and gave her a sweet twirl and said she looked beautiful. She giggled and whacked him affectionately with one of her flowers. Suki is not one of life's gigglers so this was a very unusual occurrence.

I demanded the commonsense stick back and that he do twenty push ups. Right now. Grumbling, he gave me the stick and started doing the push ups while I poked him with the stick a little.

I have also declared crossly that nobody, and I mean nobody gets to whack Zuko with the commonsense stick but me!

Zuko was perplexed by this and piped up that he would prefer it if nobody whacked him with the common sense stick at all.

Hush Zuko!

I told him the common sense stick was for his own good and went over to him. I fussed over him a little and demanded he show me his head, for healing purposes. He said he was fine and had been whacked in the head before. I put my hand on my hips and made a  face at him. A very persuasive face it turns out, because he complied straight away. I ran my fingers through his hair where he'd been whacked and I could feel an egg coming up there. I tutted and I opened my water skin and healed it. He closed his eyes and sighed with my touch. And then we were just standing close and staring at each other and I was having these…thoughts. Zuko's eyes are a really nice colour.

Anyway, it was a nice moment.

A moment which was interrupted by Aang, who was bouncing up and down next to me rather enthusiastically, claiming that he had also been injured by the commonsense stick at some point during their ill advised-stick battle. This is why we shouldn't leave the boys alone. It's all fun and games until someone gets whack with the common sense stick. I crouched by Aang and scrutinized his arm (which he had proffered for my examination). I couldn't see or feel anything, but I ran some water up and down his arm anyway and this seemed to satisfy him. Sokka had finished with his push ups and had wandered over with Suki and Toph.

Sokka asked if I was ready for my surprise yet. I really was. And we started walking down the beach as a group. I asked if it was far away and Sokka replied that it wasn't very far. Even still, I wasn't walking anymore on my birthday. I demanded that Zuko carry me in a rather regal tone and he complied. Well, he bowed and said yes your majesty in a tone that could be interpreted as joyfully sarcastic. He didn't carry me piggy-back style, but lifted me up with one arm under my knees and the other at my back. I put my arms around his neck. Zuko carried me pretty smoothly, but that didn't stop me from making various demands and advising him in this regard. After this, I overheard Suki as if Sokka would carry her and from the sound of it he complied, but with much ado.

We set off as a group and walked to the other end of the beach and round the rocky outcrop and the headland that separated our beach from twenty mile beach (so named because it was twenty miles long). At the other end of the twenty mile beach was the second biggest town on Ember island, Equinox bay, and I could very faintly see the glow of the town lighting up against the sunset. It looked beautiful. The beach and the sunset and the jungle and the distant town.

There was a cave coming out of the other side of the cliff face that had unlit candles strewn around it. Zuko announced that we had arrived and tried to put me down. But in his attempts to set me down gently he accidentally grabbed my boob. He gasped! I gasped! He dropped me in surprise (thankfully on my feet). He then blushed red furiously and started stuttering an awkward apology and I was blushing and he was blushing and it was an awkward blushing festival of embarrassment. All I was thinking was: Zuko grabbed my boob. Oh la la!

I waved off his apology and told him it was fine before the others started noticing our festival of embarrassment. Aang came over and was bouncing happily and said that I was going to love my surprise. He took my hand and started leading me towards the cave. The others followed and Zuko lit the candles with a pass of his hand.

Oh my.

Good surprise.

They'd laid out some of the blankets from the house and set up a lovely picnic of all my favourite foods. Or at least they had attempted making my favourite foods. The first thing I noticed was small pot of what I assume was a gallant attempt at making stewed sea prunes that had gone a little awry. Half the cutlery and the plates from the house were here in the cave too as well as an instrument for everybody. The instruments lay against the wall in a haphazard fashion, but I still noted the tsungi horn amongst them. There had been a candle stuck into every imaginable crevice, some of which had been artificially made by Toph. At the very back of the cave was a large steam pool that had steam rising softly from it.

We sat down to a delightful picnic and much fun was had by all. Sokka regaled us with the tale of how he and Zuko tried (and failed) to make stewed seaprune this afternoon. Sokka had got us a small amount from the fresh food market they'd visited yesterday. It really is only me and Sokka who enjoy stewed seaprunes, so he only got enough for three (Sokka eats double what a normal person would).

Suki gamely tried some, because she had never had any before. She made the most comical face after her first spoonful and has begged off all other offers of water tribe cuisine since. She has also drunk a gallon of moon peach juice in her attempts to wash away the taste. Zuko got her the moon peach juice and said we warned about the seaprunes under his breath while he handed it to her. She made a face at him.

Sokka and Zuko have had an interesting afternoon 'experimenting' with water tribe cuisine. They tried to prepare stewed seaprunes again, they both got a little confused about the recipe, gave each other several sea prune noogies at some point, and more than a few stewed sea prunes had been dropped by Zuko in fright- look, I just find it really disconcerting when an animal keeps friggin wiggling after you chop off its head- Sokka had the wonderful idea of adding fireflakes to them and Zuko agreed wholeheartedly with this decision. Fireflakes and various other spices had been added to the sauce and the result is ….interesting. It doesn't taste anything like stewed seaprunes should, but it is edible. Sokka is eating his creation with gusto. I am eating his creation politely-because it really is the thought that counts.

Their attempt at five flavour soup went a little better. I had written out the recipe for Sokka EXACTLY but the recipe was lost at some point. For five flavor soup they had the assistance of Aang. (Aang hates the sight and smell of sea prunes so he'd slacked off a bit for the preparing stewed seaprune portion of the afternoon.) Aang is also fond of culinary experiments and by their three powers combined they have made something which I can only adequately describe as eight flavour soup. There are three more flavours than I was originally expecting. Thankfully none of the extra flavours are fireflakes.

Every tale of this afternoon's various culinary adventures only further reminds me  why I do all the cooking for the group.

They have also got me a lovely cake. It is obviously from a bakery – there is no way on earth the boys could have baked something like that without accidentally setting it on fire…or whacking it with a stick…or adding fireflakes to it. The best part of the birthday picnic is the vast assortment of tasty firenation goodies, plump dumplings and zesty salads (I have a suspicion that these were also acquired from a shop).

Zuko is making everyone something called shish kebabs, which is really just meat and veggies on a stick (or just veggies if you are Aang) that he then sets on fire and cooks with his firebending. It is one of the only things he knows how to cook and he is quite proud of his meat and veggies on a stick creation. Sokka finds them delicious and has eaten at least twice the amount that everybody else has. They are not too bad, if I say so myself.

The one great advantage about bringing a firebender on a picnic is that you don't have to worry about anything getting cold. Zuko keeps all the hot dishes warm with his firebending so everything was still toasty and warming long into the night. It had gotten full dark by the time we had all finished eating. The boys piled all the empty plates and dishes in one corner and got my cake ready. Then Zuko and Aang put out all the candles with their firebending and the only light came from all the candles on my cake. Suki held it out in front of me and asked me to make a wish. I'd already made three wishes last night so I was at bit of a loss. I blew out my candles anyway and suddenly the most amazing thing happened.

As soon as the candles went out the whole ceiling lit up in a bright blue colour.

Crystals, just like the ones Aang and I had seen in the cave of two lovers, shone in the darkness. They had been wedged into the top of the cave and arranged to spell out Happy Birthday Katara. I gasped in surprise and delight. How did they even do this? How did they even know?

This was amazing!

I had loved the crystals in that cave. They had given me so much hope at the time. I find that blue light comforting for some reason. Those crystals only shine in the complete darkness. They filled the cave with a soft light and I looked around at everyone and smiled at them with what I think must be the biggest grin I've ever had on my face. They were all looking at me expectantly.

I told them it was the best surprise ever. They told me of the various roles in getting the crystals up there. It was quite a mission. Zuko had come up with the idea originally and everybody had hopped on the band wagon. Aang knew what sort of crystals they were in the cave of two lovers and said that they could probably find them in the fire nation. They used for non-bending families who go camping. Everybody, except Sokka, who's primary role was to distract me for the duration of the afternoon, and Zuko, who's worried about being recognized in the town, (he came here to draw a rough outline on the ceiling) had bought a vast quantity of crystals from the camping store. Aang and Zuko and Suki would hold the crystals in place while Toph earthbended them further into the ceiling. Aang had used his airbending to hold up the ones in the very centre. Suki and Zuko had climbed the walls and held the side ones in place, and stayed up there using only pure stealth and badassery, according to Suki.

And then I did something really embarrassing.

I had a small extremely happy cry.

Gah!

I mean it was just so sweet, but they are all so daft to go to such lengths for me. I mean a huge amount of effort went into this and I just...I mean, I know intellectually, on one level that everybody in this cave cares about me, but it's another thing entirely, for those same people to go ahead and do something that really shows me how much they care.

The others were a bit alarmed about my small cry and many soothing motions were made in my direction. I explained that it was happy cry because I was really happy and I hugged them all individually and told them they were crazy for going to so much effort-just to surprise me like this on my birthday.

Then cake and fun were had by all.

Later still I demanded four seasons on the tsungi horn and Zuko smiled at me and complied. He was joined by Suki and Sokka on the mandolin and the drums. Aang raced over and got a set of drums for Toph, his flute thing and my mandolin and we all played the song together.

After a few rounds of four seasons had finished I asked Zuko if he could play secret tunnel on the tsungi horn. If we have the crystals we may as well have the song too. I love that song! Sokka gave a groan at the mention of the secret tunnel song but still banged out a beat. Secret Tunnel sounds hilarious on the tsungi horn. Suki knew it as well and strummed away on the mandolin and sang the lyrics. She remembered much more of them than the singing nomads did. If we had heard Suki's version of secret tunnel, I don't think any of us would have been that keen on going in. The way she sang 'And DIIIIIIIEEE' was most solemn indeed.

Then Sokka passed round a small flask that he had procured from Chitsang back at the Western Air Temple and our music making increased in enthusiasm but not skill. we all bashed away merrily on our instruments to four seasons again because Four seasons is the only song we all know and can play together. I was full of cake and feeling content and surrounded by the best of friends.

I hope to pass all my birthdays in this manner.

In fact I have decided that will be my cake wish. I hope this time next year, the six of us will be here doing exactly the same thing.

I couldn't hope for anything more.

Chapter 9 authors note:

Thank you my lovely wonderful readers who have made it this far. You have reached the end of Katara's birthday shenanigans and I hope you enjoyed it! Tomorrow she will revert back to her regular state and no longer be able to command her friends to do whatever she says! Alas!

But she will still boss them enthusiastically anyway. I wanted her night time celebrations to give her hope and voila, the Gaang got crystals like in the cave of two lovers. Because I said so and for no other reason than because I thought it would be a sweet gesture.

Huge thank you to my fabulous, wonderful and brilliant reviewers! I think my imagination would have gone splat ages ago, if it hadn't been for your constant encouragement- so thanks a million! Every review puts a smile on my face!

If I ever write this from Zuko's point of view, this section would be entitled kitchen adventures with Sokka. Much ridiculousness would have occurred in that kitchen as they attempted to cook without Katara to supervise them. The only thing they cook with aplomb is barbecued meat products because in my experience most menfolk will beg off cooking, claiming they can't do it, however if there is a barbeque (or firebending), meat and beer involved, they suddenly become jamie oliver. Bless. Most of the really edible and tasty food comes from a shop.

They also hold impromtu stick sword fights for no apparent reason (or at least my male friends do. I don't know if this is an across the board occurrence.) I think the boys would have been waiting for the girls, Sokka would have had the common sense stick and...these things just happen.

Zuko is having a moment where he realises how sexy-fine Katara is. I mean I think he's always found her pretty, but every now and then her fabulousness sneaks up and surprised him. It's not like he loves her all of a sudden- because now she's pretty and that's all you need. Bah! And fie on that trope! I think proper love is a gradual thing. But I do think that in this moment he finds her breathtakingly beautiful and is a little stunned by her hotness. Then Sokka whacks him.

The only person allowed to whack Zuko is Katara, and even then she whacks affectionately.

Aang is a little jealous that Zuko is getting all the attention. Look, Aang is not an idiot in my opinion. He was awfully quick to assume that everything that happened in the play (regarding Katara and Zuko) was going on. That suspicion has to come from somewhere. He keeps seeing these little moments between Katara and Zuko and he does not like it! His injury is his way of saying 'pay attention to me now.' and he keeps trying to get her attention throughout this chapter, in his subtle Aang fashion.

Boob grope added for the lovely moonspirityang! Voila awkardness!

They have a lovely fun night together and play four seasons with great enthusiasm (and slight drunkeness later in the evening). The crystals are a great surprise for Katara. She would have waxed poetic about how much hope they gave her back when she and Zuko were talking about favourite places in the Western Air Temple. While Aang wants Katara to pay attention to him all the time, Zuko just pays attention to Katara because he is really exceptionally interested. He does remember everything she tells him. I think Zuko, who's a bit of a pessimist, loves how optimistic Katara is and wants to give her more hope if he can. So when he's thinking up stuff to do for her birthday he comes up with this idea. He can't do it on his own so the whole gaang get on the band wagon (and some of them try to steal the credit)

YMMV on everything my lovelies!

in the next chapter: we deal with love and other tragedies and what certain people really think about romance. Oh la la

Chapter 10: Love and other Tragedies

I had a huge sleep in this morning. We'd all had a really late night last night, playing music into the wee hours. I may have drunk a little more from the flask than I should have, but it's my birthday! Anyway, I was a little too merry last night to be bothered taking my hair out/washing my face etc. So now my hair is a squashed floral mess that sticks up all over the place, in unlikely peaks and tangles. Boo.

This is the worst bed-hair I have ever had.

I tried but I just can't get any of the flowers out. Especially the ones at the back. I figured that I could find Suki to help me with them and I got up in search of her and her sensible hair de-tangling abilities. I wandered into the kitchen and Zuko was in there, tackling the last of the dishes from last night. He took one look at me, dazed and confused with my hair sticking up at odd angles and nearly burst out laughing. Thankfully he did not, or I would have splashed him with all the dirty water in the sink.

I am a bit grumpy in the morning. In fact I think it would be fair to say that I am not a morning person. I told him to shut it- whatever he was going to say- just ssshhh and he managed to restrain himself. I asked for Suki, but apparently she and Sokka have absconded together, presumably to the hot spring. I bemoaned the state of my hair at length while he finished the dishes. He tried to console me and say it wasn't as bad as I was making out. But he said this in such a sheepish manner, that I was sure that it was worse than I was making out. I complained about the lack of Suki and asked if Zuko would go to the hot springs and get her for me (I was not walking out of the house like this.) Zuko said it wasn't my birthday anymore so he was going to politely decline the Suki fetching mission. Boo. But he did put a cup of something warm and fragrant and soothing in front of me. Yay!

He thought Sokka and Suki would be back soon, but he knew they wanted  'alone time' (ewww) so he thought it would be better to wait. I couldn't wait. I looked ridiculous. The only other people in the house were him and Toph. Aang has buggered off and Zuko couldn't find him anywhere. He'd been looking for ages this morning. I made a joke that he was losing his avatar-finding mojo, which was exceptionally funny to me. Aang would be useless for my predicament anyway. Toph is right out. Hair is not her thing either. I am doomed to look ridiculous for the rest of the day.

-?-

I continued with my small complain about my tragic hair situation while Zuko finished off the dishes. He offered to help me with it diffidently, in a tone that he would normally use for going into battle etc. I considered his offer and accepted it. Then he added the caveat he was absolutely crap at doing hair. This does not surprise me. It also didn't inspire great confidence in his hair fixing services.

Even still, some help was better than no help.

Gah!

Tui and la save me from Zuko's hopeless hair ministrations!

-?-

Zuko wiped his hands dry on the towel and set about the task of getting all the squashed flowers out of my hair with great care. They'd all become so tangled at the back that this was quite tricky. He did his best not to pull my hair and slowly got most of them out. I stayed seated, nursing the cup of tea that Zuko gave me. Sometimes I feel like I'm not really awake until I've had a cup of tea in the morning.

Aah Tea! Work your magic! Wake me up properly.

It was just me and Zuko and sometimes this is really nice. He talks to me more when it is just the two of us. Something very strange has happened and I don't quite know when this occurred or what has prompted this feeling- but I like listening to Zuko. I like his voice, I like knowing what he thinks about things and I like telling him what I think about things.

Weird huh?

Anyway, it was just the two of us and I asked him something that had been on my mind since last night. What had possessed him to tell all the others to wedge the crystals in the ceiling like that. I mean… it was just such a daft idea. Super sweet but daft. He looked a bit worried for a second and asked me if I hadn't liked it after all in a quiet tone of voice.

Now he was just being regular daft.

I told him that I had loved it, but it just seemed like a ridiculous amount of effort. He asked me if I'd had a good birthday and I agreed that I had. I'd had a brilliant birthday actually. It has been the first birthday that I hadn't been plagued with thoughts about my mother. I hadn't felt sad for a second yesterday and on the whole that was a wonderful and surprising thing. Of course, then I felt a little sad when I thought that I hadn't felt sad at all yesterday. But I think I'm starting to move on and that's got to be a good thing, I reckon.

Zuko smiled at me and said that if I'd had a good day then it was  worth it. I grinned at him. I kept pestering him about the crystals. I mean I had told him about the cave of two lovers  ages ago. He said, shyly, that he really does remember everything I say. Apparently back in the Western Air Temple I had gone on (and on and on) about how the crystals gave me hope and were pretty and shiny etc. Zuko had wanted to give me a little more hope, if he could. Oh. I looked at him… and he looked at me …and we were having another one of those moments. Like the moment we were having yesterday.

A moment where we just stare at each other and I feel possibility and indecision in equal measure.

What is this feeling? This smushing, churning in my guts?

Zuko seemed to shake himself out of it first. He said that the story of Oma and Shu is such a well known tragedy. It is apparently a famous folk tale in the firenation. He never thought it was real. Hearing that the secret tunnel actually existed and that they were real people ...that was pretty memorable for Zuko. I corrected him and said it was a love story not a tragedy. But Zuko disagrees with me about this.

He said the story seemed like a basic revenge tragedy. Her boyfriend dies, so she goes nuts and kills a whole bunch of people and then everyone is too scared of her to fight anymore. I said that it wasn't like that at all and because I had been there in the cave, I should know. It was a romantic story about trusting in the power of love and love overcoming all odds.

Zuko snorted derisively in reaction to this statement, which is a most un-Zuko-like thing to do. He said that love hadn't really overcome all odds. Her boyfriend had died and she may have stopped a war but she didn't get him back. I countered that she got to name the city in memorial of their love and now the story of their love was well known and would live forever. And he said that was all well and good, but they didn't get to live their lives together. I got a bit irate because I felt like he was missing the point and belittling the cave and the crystals and the hope etc. I got a bit ranty about this actually.

He said that he wasn't making fun of the cave or anything; he just didn't find stories about a guy dying in war and his girlfriend going nuts with grief especially romantic. He started ranting back at me about his cousin Lu Ten. When his cousin Lu Ten had died, he had a girlfriend back home in the firenation who went... a little strange. She sort of lost the plot and brought shame upon her family etc. I asked how she did that. He smiled ruefully and said that she had started publicly denouncing the war and had been eventually charged with treason over it. (denouncing the war and speaking out against Ozai are both treasonous crimes in the firenation apparently.)

Oh.

I asked what had happened to her. Zuko looked really sad for a second and said that she'd been offered enforced military service instead of jail time, because she had been a talented firebender. She had died in a colonial dispute not long after.

Wow, I didn't know what to say to that.

Zuko seemed embarrassed that he had shared so much. He had blushed a bright scarlet colour. He rarely ever reveals stuff like this. He started doing that nervous babbling thing and talking about how it was stupid for him to think about that sort of thing now …..and how just because his cousin had died and his girlfriend had gone mad...it shouldn't affect my enjoyment of the Oma and Shu legend.

Zuko always does this when he thinks he's revealed too much. He tries to act like what he says doesn't matter. But really, I liked it when he tells me things, even if they are sad things. I didn't know what else to say, so I just thanked him for telling me. He smiled sadly and pulled out the final flower from my hair. It had gotten a bit stuck above my ear. His hand stayed near my cheek and he stroked it, very softly. It was just for a second. It was almost like he was unaware of what he was doing.

I let him.

It was nice.

Then Sokka burst into the room and proclaimed that he and Suki were starving and he hoped one of us had made lunch. Zuko retracted his hand at lightning speed and I glowered at Sokka – the big interrupter- but he remained happily oblivious as he rummaged through the cupboards. He found some birthday leftovers which he started munching on with gusto and began telling us all about his crazy dream, while he piled a plate high, allegedly for Suki. (Suki will not eat that much and most of it is for Sokka.)

I have given him a poke with the common sense stick (I carry it with me everywhere) and stalked off.

-?-

Zuko is still looking for Aang. I can hear him calling out his name repeatedly. Without the flowers, I have been able to brush my hair. Now it no longer looks like birds nest in it. I am snooping about my room now. There are so many cupboards and drawers and they are all locked. I have tried Toph's two little keys, but she hasn't shown me how to use them yet and I have had no luck.

-?-

Aang is back and in a little bit of a funny mood.

He asked me if I wanted to go into the town with him. I needed to pick up some more supplies and something for dinner tonight so I said yes. Sokka also wanted to go shopping and check out the book store – he has been going on (and on and on) at Zuko about all the volumes that his library lacks and has received several gold pieces to remedy this travesty. Sokka lost his atlas and several of his books regarding metal engineering in the Day of Black Sun. Sokka has great enthusiasm for his book shop mission. Suki and Zuko had a quick conversation about the book shop mission. Anyway the end result of this was Sokka and Suki wanted to come along to the shops with us, Suki was to supervise Sokka in the book store. They will most likely make out in the engineering aisle when they think no one is looking.

Still -the more the merrier I say.

Aang did not seem to agree with me and wasn't his usual cheerful self on the walk into town. I didn't understand what had brought on this grumpiness. We walked around the market together and after we'd gotten the supplies and dinner (Sokka wanted something really meaty –obviously) we walked Sokka and Suki to the book store and agreed to meet them back home. I took Aang off for an ice-cream, just the two of us. Aang and I always used to talk. I hoped that I could shake him out of his funny mood. I had some success because he cheered right up after we got the ice-cream. We wandered around town and just had a friendly chat.

Aang was feeling a little miffed because he feels like we rarely hang out, just the two of us, anymore. I reminded him that it had hardly ever been just the two of us because Sokka was always around and always friggin interrupting and making assumptions and doing all the other stuff he does. Aang smiled in agreement over Sokka's interrupting tendencies.

But then he started going about how we always used to waterbend together and now we rarely do that. Only a couple of night ago, I was thinking the same thing. But now I let of steam with Zuko every night, so I've been waterbending plenty. The thing is, Aang already is quite proficient with waterbending and his time is so limited. I know he needs more practice with earthbending and firebending and I feel like he should concentrate on those more.

But at the same time, he's just a 12 year old kid who wants to have fun. He finds water bending with me fun. So I have agreed that we will go waterbending this afternoon.

-?-

When we got back home, Toph and Zuko were messing about on the tsungi horn again. He was teaching her to play a melody that is called brave soldier boy while they waited for Aang. They both had arranged to 'share Aang' this afternoon and teach him for three hours each. But after a speech from Aang about how he needed to improve waterbending as well, and how he found waterbending relaxing etc. they agreed to a three way share. Toph said, fine go splash about until you feel better. I have him for two hours.

We went down to the beach and practiced our octopus forms and then went iceboard surfing together. I love iceboard surfing and if Aang needs more fun, then I can't think of anything better than that liberating feeling I get when I catch a wave. I don't know if I invented this, but I've never seen anyone else do iceboard surfing. I'm the only waterbender I know in the firenation and I reckon you could only iceboard here. The water at the poles would be too cold and all the earth kingdom beaches we visited were quite rocky. Here the beaches are just perfect for it. The sand is soft and the waves crest just perfectly for barreling and the water is warm when you fall in. I'm getting better at doing tricks and so is Aang but Aang does way more aerial stunts than me.

We had a competition about who could get the most air and Aang won (like I knew he would.) Now he is back to his chipper self. Aang would never admit it, but he is competitive and loves winning at this sort of thing. I just think he seemed like he really needed a win today.

-?-

We got back and it was Zuko's turn with Aang. I was pottering around the kitchen. I'd gotten stuff for a slow roasted stew and I was going to put it on so it would have all afternoon to cook. Anyway, there I was -just peeling veggies- and I have overheard the  most ridiculous conversation between Aang and Zuko. I was just innocently eavesdropping this time. I was just minding my own business and they were just there, outside the window, talking.

Aang wanted to talk about feelings (as Aang is often wont to do) and Zuko was bemoaning the fact that Aang was taking up some of their precious two hours with this 'feelings' talk. Aang said that Zuko had always emphasized how much emotions and having control of them can affect firebending and Zuko reluctantly conceded his point and asked Aang what he wanted to talk about - in a tone of resigned defeat.

Aang wanted to know about love. Zuko made a frustrated noise that I found rather comical. He said what about it? in that same resigned fashion. Aang, very solemnly, wanted to know what made the love you had when you were in a couple special and how could he tell if he loved someone in that way. Zuko was a bit taken aback by Aang's sincerity and said that he probably wasn't the right person to ask. Aang said that he'd been in a relationship with Mai and surely he loved Mai if he'd been in a couple with her. Aang went on to mention Mai at length and how Zuko used to talk about her all the time and now he doesn't. Zuko silenced Aang's flow of words and asked him in a very perplexed tone -what has brought all this -love stuff- on?

Aang replied simply that just wants to know what it is like to be in a couple. There was a short silence and a frustrated sigh from Zuko. Zuko asked if Aang wanted to talk about any other feelings. Aang did not. Zuko sighed again. Eventually he said that being in a couple was nice, in a most unconvincing and uncertain fashion. Aang pointed this out. Zuko sighed again and said nothing's perfect Aang.

Aang asked if Zuko loved Mai. I dropped all pretense with the veggies and laid them quietly in the sink and I listened more closely. In fact my ear was pressed right against the wood paneling in order to hear him better.

Did he? I'd have never been able to ask so boldly.

Now, it wasn't just Aang who really wanted Zuko to answer the question. Zuko seemed acutely uncomfortable in this conversation. He actually said, look I'm a bit uncomfortable with the conversation, do you have any other feelings, really any other feelings at all that you want to discuss. Aang did not. Aang was quite insistent that Zuko answer the question and eventually Zuko snapped back that he didn't think he really did.

Love Mai that is.

Yay!

He said that the sort of love Aang was talking about, means loving the other person exactly as they are. He had always wanted Mai to change and be more emotional and talk to him more, but you can't change people. He finished his little rant by saying that Aang really wanted to know about being in a lovey-dovey couple he should go ask Sokka or Suki.

I couldn't see Aang but I could guess that he was making that sad face he does whenever he gets snapped at. This was confirmed by the fact that Zuko quickly started apologizing and saying that he was sorry for being snappy at Aang, but Aang was just asking some really personal questions and he didn't feel like discussing it. Aang replied that the monks had never taught him anything about this sort of love (they'd been more about universal compassionate love for all beings, not about romantic love for one being in particular). He just wanted to understand better. He'd asked Zuko's Uncle about love back in Ba Sing Se and his Uncle had been helpful and he thought Zuko could help too. Zuko sighed loudly and dramatically. The mention of his Uncle's helpfulness and Ba Sing Se seemed to have shamed him into being more forthcoming. He said Bollocks it all. Do you really want to know what I think about love and all that? Aang did. Zuko spoke a bit emphatically - from his frustration with the whole conversation. I have written it down word for word.

It's just that sort of love...it just makes you so vulnerable. You can get  really hurt loving someone like that...do you know what I'm saying to you. (Here he paused for a few moments, possibly to look pointedly at Aang). That person could mean everything to you, but they might not love you back…. or they might leave you, or they could die and... I've always been too scared of that Aang, so I'm not the best person to ask about this sort of thing.

There were a few moments of silence and then Aang said that he hadn't thought Zuko was scared of anything. Zuko sniffed and sighed and said now Aang knew and could they please, for the love of all that is under Agni, get back to firebending practice.

Aang agreed and fireballs were thrown ferociously for the next hour.

-?-

I am thinking a lot about their conversation.

-?-

I should stop thinking so much about their conversations

-?-

I came up to my room to have a nap and I have overheard another conversation. An unintentionally hilarious conversation. Aang, it appears, has taken Zuko's advice. After he finished practicing with Toph he went and found Sokka and said that he needed to talk to him. Sokka was deep in the fine art of metalwork but he laid it aside and followed Aang outside. They ended up sitting right under my balcony and their words carried up. Aang asked Sokka about romantic love and how it was different from friendly love. Sokka said the main difference was touching and…then he completely got the wrong end of the stick. It quickly became apparent that he thought Aang was asking about sex. He has now treated Aang to the most awkward explanation of the birds and the bees that I have ever heard.

Wow!

I have overheard the tale of the penguin and the igloo and the fable of the badgermole and the cave and the legend of the flower garden and the big hose needed to water it. (or a small hose- Sokka didn't want to make judgments on hose size).I worry that, as a direct result of this conversation, Aang will now have an unhealthy obsession with flowers.

Ooh Sokka!

When Sokka has children, I vote that Suki explains the facts of life to them.

Then the conversation took a dramatic turn and Sokka started telling Aang about the things boys do when they are on their own and it's okay and it's normal and Uncle Sokka wouldn't judge him. If Aang has been going penguin sledding a lot recently- that is perfectly normal for a kid his age. It's good for a penguin to be -sled-every once in a while. But girls often get grossed out by penguin sledding-so Aang should only sled in private. Aang was exceptionally baffled by this and said that I had gone penguin sledding with him the first time we met and I hadn't been grossed out. I had actually really enjoyed it.

Sokka said you did what with my baby sister? with the most comical and perplexed look on his face. Aang explained that he thought was in a conversation about actually penguin sledding with… ya know actual penguins, not the penguins that Sokka was referring to. He didn't seem to know the other meaning that Sokka was getting at when he was talking about  penguin sledding. There was much confusion! And embarrassment! Sokka excused himself politely and said he was just going to talk to Zuko.

-?-

So I'm having a day of eavesdropping. Whatever. It is hilarious. Sokka found Zuko playing the tsungi horn with Toph. He told Toph that he just needed to speak to Zuko for a sec and dragged him over by the stairs. They were standing right under my door again. How can I  not eavesdrop! Zuko and Sokka's conversation went like this:

Sokka: You need to explain penguin sledding to Aang.

Zuko: What's penguin sledding

Sokka: You know (I imagine he gestured here because Zuko instantly clicked about what Sokka meant by penguin sledding)

Zuko: Oh hell no! You tell him!

Sokka: I tried, but I don't think he knew what I was getting at.

Zuko: Um no, I have already had one mortifying conversation with Aang today. There is only so much humiliation I can take in a day.

Sokka: And here I was thinking you would have gotten used to humiliation by now.

They then proceeded to have a noogie off. The loser would have to attempt to have 'the talk' with Aang. It was a noogie-off for dignity, something they are both fond of. Suki came across them, locked in their joint noogie giving struggle. She asked them what they were doing and had the situation explained to her. She muttered boys under her breath and has gone looking for Aang.

-?-

Aang appears somewhat scarred from his conversation with Sokka and hadn't moved from the tree under my window. Suki came over and asked if he wanted to talk about something. Aang shrugged and said that he'd asked Sokka about love and then Sokka had gone on (and on and on) about penguins and now Aang was confused. What did penguins have to do with love?

Suki asked, just for clarification, if Aang had been asking Sokka about love or making love. Aang said he'd just asked what the difference between friendly love and romantic love was. He wasn't quite sure about what Suki meant by making love. Suki sighed and looked away, and when she looked back it was with a look of pure determination. She was going to do this!

'Well Aang when a man and a woman really love each other and they want to celebrate that love and maybe…. when they are much older and ready … they might want to make a baby and…."

Aang cut her off and asked if she was talking about sex and Suki gaped at him in surprise. Aang said quite emphatically that he knew what sex was! Why didn't everybody just call it sex if they were talking about sex. Suki was looking at Aang in open relief. She said 'well- that's good then' in a business-like tone and got up to go. Aang piped up that he didn't see what sex had to do with love and he'd been asking about love. Suki sighed and sat back down. There was no such easy escape from an awkward conversation with Aang.

Suki said that sex was something that couples did together and friends did not. It was something that occurred when a couple wanted to affirm their love. Aang said that air-nomads didn't do sex like that.

Huh?

Is there more than one way?

Suki seemed to be in a similar state of bafflement. She gaped at Aang and asked how else could you do it in a hushed whisper. Aang explained about all the male monks going to the eastern air temple and meeting up with the lady monks and then there would be a festival and they would do sex (he said do sex with a slight shudder) and then nine months later new babies would turn up at the southern air temple. That was doing sex meant to Aang. Aang didn't want to know about sex, he wanted to know about love.

Suki (bless her cotton socks for sticking this conversation out like a trooper) explained that for other cultures, sex normally only happened just between two people who loved each other romantically. That was why the two (sex and love) were all bound up together and sometimes confused with each other. Aang asked if that's all there was to romantic love –just sex and Suki hastily backtracked and said there were many things involved. Aang asked what exactly and Suki sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose and thought for a sec.

She said she thought love would vary from couple to couple and person to person. Aang asked what is was like for her and there was a few moments silence. Suki played with the hem of her skirt and then said that love was a tricky thing to define. She felt that it was such a mix of feelings. For Suki- love was not solace or joy or comfort but a combination of all of those feelings. She patted Aang on the arm and got up to go. She said that she didn't know the feeling was love until she felt it for herself. Aang would know real love when he felt it.

Chapter 10 authors note:

Lovely fabulous readers! You have reached the end of love and other tragedies. Congratulations! I hope you enjoyed it! Once again enormous thank you to my brilliant, beautiful wonderful reviewers! You guys are just the best! In this chapter I wanted to have a bit of a closer look at how certain members of the gang feel about love and sex and the awkwardness that abounds in these conversations.

So at the start of this chapter Katara is having a hair disaster very similar to the hair disaster I had yesterday. long story short- I went to a pirate party (and imbibed a bit too much rum- alas). For my costume I had plaited feathers in my hair and it had looked awesome – but ye be warned dear reader, if you don't take it out and just fall into bed – disaster awaits! Anyway I had already written Katara getting flowers plaited in her hair and I figured that she might also face a similar problem the next day. And it gave me an opportunity to have a nice, tender, hair-assisting moment between Katara and Zuko. Zuko is finishing off doing the dishes because I think the sight of a guy doing the dishes is just oh la la! Also the dishes are his and Katara's thing and he doesn't want her to have to clean up after her own party.

I think there would be a real growing attraction between the two of them that they would be a bit nervous to act on. But it is there and getting stronger. Katara doesn't notice it, but she is unconsciously seeking Zuko out all the time and she does love just chatting with him and she loves exchanging ideas with him. Notice that Zuko points out the fact that he and Mai had poor communication skills as a big problem in their relationship, but he and Katara communicate quite well.

I think one of several problems for me with Maiko is that they both are clearly hoping the other person will change for them. Zuko wants Mai to talk and express herself and show emotions etc. Whereas Mai who is much more reticent and composed, looks on in askance at all of Zuko's various Zuko tantrums. She doesn't actually say 'get a hold of yourself man!' but I can tell she's thinking it.

Oma and Shu – Am I going out on a limb here? Is this an unpopular opinion? I know their story is meant to be epic and super romantic etc, but I just find it super sad. All those tragic love stories when the guy dies in war and the girl will remember him and love him forever, (sometimes she is barefoot and pregnant but then she will have his baby and remember him and love him forever). Bah. And fie upon that trope! A life of mourning! Boo! They are depressing. I just think those stories are not really about love and living together (because invariably one party is dead).They are more about the idea of love than the reality of it.

So I have Zuko say that he doesn't find the story of Oma and Shu romantic at all. I hope his reasons aren't too out of left field. The way I see it, Lu Ten would have been almost a mini Iroh, he would have been a smoothie, a bit of a flirt etc. I think he would have been old enough to have a girlfriend in the firenation. I think if I were Lu Ten's girlfriend and I lost a mini-version of Iroh, I'd go a little nuts and be a little anti-war myself. I think Iroh would have been a bit beside himself with grief/out of the country and returning home, when all the shenanigans with Lu Ten's lady friend happen, so he couldn't protect her from her traitorous fate. Lu Ten and his lady friend loved each other and then he died and she went nuts. For Zuko he would have learned that even when love works out and the relationship is great and the other person loves you back, it can still end in tragedy. When Zuko is talking about how vulnerable love makes you – he mentions how the other person can die on you. I think he's been thinking about Lu Ten for a while after his conversation with Katara and that has further reinforced for him that loving someone totally is an enormous and giant risk.

Zuko is exceptionally uncomfortable in his conversation with Aang. I don't mean for Aang to come off as rude. He is just extremely inquisitive and persistent. I notice in the series that Aang just has this wonderful confidence. He will just ask stuff without worrying about feeling awkward. Zuko has probably had a few awkward conversations with Aang by this point and he realizes that it is better just to answer the kid's questions because Aang's not the sort to let things go. If he wants to know something he will just keep asking and asking and asking.

I think Zuko would feel reluctant talking about this sort of thing with Aang. He's much more guarded in his feelings whereas Aang is just so open about everything. Also I think he would probably feel better talking about these sort of soppy things with Katara – she's his go-to girl for soppy conversations and I think he finds himself sharing things with her more easily that he does with the rest of the gang. I also think Zuko also has an inkling about who they are talking about and regardless of whatever has popped up between Katara and himself, it's pretty obvious to him that Katara isn't returning Aang's crush, so he does his best to gently dissuade Aang by saying the other person might not love you back.

Aang, I think is curious and inquisitive about romantic love. It is completely outside his scope of experience and I imagine this is something that the monks did not have any handy go-to teachings on. Air nomads strike me as more Buddhist in their philosophy than anything else. As far as I know, Buddhism emphasizes love for all things – a sort of detached but universal love- but they do not encourage the intense personal attachment that occurs with romantic love.

On her birthday, Zuko is not the only one who noticed how sexyfine she is (yes that is a reference to the abridged series ;) Aang saw her hotness as well and his crush has intensified. That was what his mysterious disappearing mope was about in the morning. He is crushing on her hardcore. He is also under the impression that the reason why the crystals in the cave of two lovers mean so much to Katara is because that is where they almost kissed. So he thinks he's got a shot! But he is a bit sad that they never do anything just the two of them. He mopes his way into an icecream/surfing/waterbending. Katara thinks she is just being a good friend, but he thinks it's almost a date. So Aang, with his deepening crush on Katara is a bit confused about where things go from here. He's not certain if he just feels intense friendship or if it is real romantic love. So he seeks out advice/validation of his feelings from others.

First he asks Zuko because he and Zuko used to talk about Mai a little bit (back during the great sea prune debacle) and Zuko is one of only three people he knows who has had a relationship. Also Aang has noticed a few moments between Katara and Zuko and wants to subtly remind Zuko of Mai. It is Aang's way of saying you know that girl who is not Katara,-remember her-yeah, good – so stop mooning over my girl!

His conversation with Sokka is a bit more disastrous. I think Sokka is still in that happy first flush of a relationship and he does have a bit of sex on the brain and when Aang asks what the primary difference between friendly love and romantic love, he immediately jumps to the conclusion that Aang is asking about sex and to be fair he does valiantly attempt to have 'the talk' with Aang, but only succeeds in confusing Aang a great deal. Sokka and Zuko are perfect happy to let Suki take the awkward conversation ball. Explaining the facts of life to Aang is something that neither of them wants to do. Ever. Also Sokka's comments about sex being like are garden are inspired by the brilliant movie 'now and then.'

Suki just strikes me as the practical, down to earth sort. I think that if anyone had to explain that sort of thing to Aang, Suki, with her calm competence and experience would be a good choice. She has been leader of a teenage band of girl fighters and I reckon she's the veteran of a few supremely awkward conversations. Anyway I love Suki, and I wanted to incorporate her more into the story.

Also their conversation allowed me to highlight what I think would be Aang's attitude to sex. He doesn't see how sex and love go together. Part of the problem for me with Kataang is just that Katara seems miles ahead of him in the sexual maturity department. Aang is just so young, bless his cotton socks. So sex is a bit icky for him. He probably just innocently crushes on Katara. He fantasizes about holding her hand and chastely kissing her.

But also I think in airnomad culture, sex and love and romance did not go together at all. They were a gender segregated society and Aang was brought up by all male monks. I think sex for them would have been a means to an end- a way of procreating the air nomad race rather than a way of couples to express love. The fantastic Kimberly T *waves at Kim* explains this so much better in her 'promises to keep' fic that all of you should go read! It's brilliant! Anyway in 'promises to keep' the airnomads have a festival where they all meet up and get their nasty on (power to ya airnomads) and then nine months later the next batch of babies are born and then these babies are divided up between the temples. So air nomads don't have a father and a mother per se, instead the entire airnomad race is one big family and the monks raise the babies together as a whole group. Sort of like it takes a village to raise a child philosophy.

But anyway the point of the matter is that the monks would have explained sex to Aang in these terms – it is a way of procreating the race, rather than giving him the when a man and a woman love each other very much speech. So Aang thinks a little differently about sex etc. he doesn't quite associate sex and sexual attraction with romantic love. He is completely lost when Sokka is talking about penguins (penguin sledding is Sokka's extremely euphemistic way of saying 'playing with ya willy'). It is only when Suki mentions babies that he realizes that they are talking about sex.

Next chapter: There will be more misunderstandings about what a man and woman who love each other are getting up to. Zuko will worry. Suki and Katara will have a perplexing conversation. Sokka will owe Suki five silver pieces.

Til then lovely readers…

Chapter 11: Misunderstandings involving penguins

After dinner, Zuko and I went down to the beach to let off steam again. We always make time to do this, no matter how weird/wacky/tiring the day has been. Normally we call it a draw after a while but tonight we ended up in a eerr ….compromising position. We were rolling about on the sand and somehow, I don't even know how, Zuko ended up on top, straddling me. How did he do that?

He is so wily.

Anyway he was on top of me and we were just looking at each other and our faces were really close and instead of thinking get off me now my brain was just whirring and going this is the hottest thing ever! And my stomach was doing this weird smushing thing. It's a weird feeling. I don't know how to describe it.

Anyway we stayed like that for a moment and I have a horrible suspicion that I had  the dopiest smile on my face. Zuko smiled back at me and then seemed to realise the..eerr compromising nature of our position. His eyes widened and he blushed scarlet and got off me really quickly. He reached out a hand to help me up and we brushed the sand off each other and walked back to the house.

-?-

Zuko made us some tea and we drank it together on the verandah. Zuko asked me how Aang had seemed to me today. Hmmm... Aang seemed, I wasn't really really sure. He's definitely in a funny mood. Zuko asked if Aang had asked me heaps of really personal questions during training. In all honesty, he had not. Zuko said he hadn't asked Toph any either. I said that I guessed it was just him who had the joys of answering Aang's personal questions about love. And he said lucky me quite sarcastically and then looked startled and said wait, did you hear what he was asking me? with some alarm. I tried to act nonchalant and said I hadn't really been listening (just a little white lie) and that I had just assumed that's what Aang would be asking about-because he'd asked Sokka and Suki about love all afternoon. And that Sokka had answered him by talking at length about penguins.

Zuko smiled and said from what he overheard of Sokka and Aang's conversation, Sokka has an unhealthy obsession with penguins.

He asked me how waterbending training had gone and I told him about the iceboard surfing. He said that he and Toph had been talking. They both thought that Aang was getting too tense and frustrated with their respective bendings. They agreed that it might do him some good to practice another bending that he was really good at. Being good at something was always a confidence boost. Zuko is of the opinion that airbending and waterbending both came quite easily to Aang. He thought a large part of the reason why Aang got really frustrated with earth and fire was because they did not come naturally to him at all.

They had created a schedule with Sokka, (Sokka loves schedules) and he thought it would be better if there was more waterbending on it. He was wondering if I would be willing to waterbend with Aang three times a week (Well initially he thought only twice a week would be sufficient but we have had a bit of negotiations regarding this. Twice a week is not enough for any improvement! But more than three times will eat into precious firebending time.) I have agreed. We got out the schedule and made a few changes to it and Zuko left a little note to Sokka that apologised for messing with the schedule.

Sokka hates it when people do that.

-?-

Sokka has had a weird dream. Which he told us (Me and Zuko) about this morning over breakfast.

At length.

He dreamed that Suki turned into a penguin while they were making out and Suki was just this penguin with red hair. Zuko looked a little aghast at this conversation and just said a penguin? You big pervert! Sokka got a bit defensive and said it's not like he enjoyed the Suki/penguin dream. Because I felt like teasing him I said there was a lot of truth in dreams. Then it was Sokka's turn to look aghast. He asked if I was implying that he fantasised about penguins and I grinned and said yes, deep deep down. He said the penguin-ness was not the point of the dream, because he was a penguin too. But that the Suki/penguin had given him a bag of fireflakes to look after. Sokka, in penguin form, had sat on it and then the Suki/penguin had swanned off with me (I am also a penguin in Sokka's dream) and he'd been left alone sitting on this bag of fireflakes.

Zuko said that he worried about Sokka in a very condescending tone and I chipped in that penguin fantasies are not exactly normal and I'd certainly never dreamed about snogging penguins. Sokka replied that I had been the one who dreamed about grand master Pakku dressed up like a Ba Sing Se show girl and doing a naughty dance for the whole northern water tribe.

Okay that was me.

But I had too much ice cream just before bed. That's the only reason why I would dream something so ridiculous. It was a dairy overdose. I now regret telling Sokka about the dream and I ranted about how it was only caused by ice cream and at least I hadn't snogged bird life in it ….and that the dress had quite suited Pakku so it wasn't too weird. Zuko was looking at me with that frowny face he does when he is trying really hard not to smile.

I have poked them both with the common sense stick.

-?-

Suki has started reading Love Amongst the Dragons and has gotten quite engrossed in it. I cannot engage her in conversation until she reaches the end of the next chapter.

-?-

Sokka has found Zuko's amendments to the schedule. He is displeased. He has drawn up a new schedule so it will look 'neater' and gently scolded Zuko for making a mess of the first schedule. Zuko was feeling a bit cheeky and made a remark about penguins and sitting on fireflakes. This caused Sokka to chase him around with the common sense stick (which he snatched off me). I proceeded to chase Sokka to get my common sense stick back. And there were shenanigans.

Suki called up that if she had to put down Love Amongst the Dragons and get off the couch to sort us out -she was going to be pissed off.

Toph and Aang returned from training and were perplexed by the shenanigans going on. I cheekily recounted Sokka's dream (much to his embarrassment). Toph laughed her arse off but Aang thought about it seriously for a second. At first I thought he was humouring Sokka, but then he said that the daddy penguin normally sits on the eggs and if penguin/Suki had given him a packet of fireflakes to sit on- maybe Sokka's dream was telling him that Suki had the magical ability to make fireflakes, or that he had to take better care of our supply or fireflakes, or maybe he should eat more fireflakes.

Suki sighed, put aside Love Amongst the Dragons and announced that she was not a magical fireflake producing penguin – there is a sentence I bet Suki thought she'd never have to say.

-?-

So me and Zuko were in the kitchen making tea. We have had an awkward conversation. About penguins.

What is it with penguins today?

I blame Sokka.

Well it started off about penguins and Sokka's penguin dream. Zuko was worried that the penguin dream would come true. I gaped at him in a most incredulous fashion and explained that there was no way in the entire universe that Suki was going to turn into a red headed penguin. That wasn't what Zuko meant. Zuko meant...here he just gestured hopelessly and looked supremely embarrassed. If I knew what he was getting at I would have been able to help him out, but I was at a loss. He fluffed off for a second and made a  compose yourself gesture at the door and came back for a second try at this ridiculous conversation. I was sure that whatever he was about to say would be really ridiculous to warrant this much awkwardness.

He came back and fussed about unnecessarily with the tea for a second. He started going on about how we all knew that Suki and Sokka were being intimate but the penguin dream had made Zuko worry that they weren't being careful at the same time that they were being intimate.

This worries Zuko because he is a big worrywart.

At first I thought he was worried about accidentally walking in on them. I thought he was going on about the locking the door sort of careful not the other careful. I told him not to worry, they have been discreet about it so far. This prompted a worried rant from Zuko about how you can't be discreet about a baby. If Suki got pregnant, pregnancy usually led to an infant and what would we all do with an infant. He asked if I was ready to be Auntie Katara?

I felt a thrill of cold horror go down my back.

No. No I am not ready to be an auntie just yet. I hadn't ever worried about that  before Zuko mentioned it and now I can't stop worrying about it. Zuko thought that I should have a quiet word with Suki, because I was a healer and a girl and I knew about babies and lady bits etc.

I countered that he should have a quiet word with Sokka too and he looked  horrified. Apparently boys don't talk about this sort of thing together. Why not? I pointed out the blatant double standard present. Zuko said that if a boy needed to talk about something touchy feely he would go find a girl because girls were just better at that sort of thing. I pointed out that he had touchy feely conversations with Aang and his uncle and they were both boys. He said that was different and that he normally looked for me if he wanted to talk about something touchy-feely.

Aww, I'm like really flattered...in a really strange way. Anyway he got a bit embarrassed after this statement, so I could get no further touchy feely comments from him. I have agreed to have a quiet word to Suki about the different ways of being careful etc. This has reassured him somewhat.

In truth, now I am worried about it as well. I think a quiet conversation between me and Suki is the best way of putting everyone's mind at ease. Afterall, I have miles more tact that both Sokka and Zuko put together. If the two of them tried to have this conversation...

Okay, now my brain just got this mental image of Sokka going on (and on and on) about penguins and Zuko whacking him with the common sense stick.

Yeah, it's best for everyone concerned if I just talk to Suki.

-?-

I had to wait for Suki to get to the next chapter in Love Amongst the Dragons which gave me a bit of time to figure out what I wanted to say. She sighed happily and folded her page down and we were ready to go. We walked into town together because I didn't want anyone overhearing our conversation. Suki was giving me a slightly bemused expression but agreed to have tea with me in a nice little tea house overlooking the harbour.

We had a nice view of the boats. After we had ordered and our tea and dumplings had arrived, I knew I could no longer avoid this conversation. I chickened out at the last minute and started talking about my friend, who had just started being intimate with this guy. I said this with an exceptionally pointed look at Suki so she would know that she was the friend I was referring to. She did. She gushed a little about how great it was for my friend that she had found a guy that she clicked with and how she thought my friend and this guy were both really compatible.

I agreed that they were. Sokka and Suki do go quite well together really and I wanted to reassure her that I did support their relationship and I wasn't judging them for being intimate with each other or anything. I talked a little bit about how my friend was the sensible one in the relationship and Suki whole heartedly agreed with me. I told Suki that her sensibleness was why I had sought her out because I wanted to ask her something private. Suki told me to ask away. I started going on about how being intimate was a really big deal. And Suki interrupted me to ask when the intimacy had started -which struck me as a little odd. I mean surely she had been there at the time!

I wasn't quite sure about the date or anything. It's not like I've been keeping track of them. So I just said it had started ages ago. Suki seemed really surprised by this and I was surprised by her surprise. She kept pestering me about the date. Was it before we came to Ember Island? Yeah, I knew they started ages before we got here and said as much. Suki then said something most strange. She said Damnit! I owe Sokka five silver pieces. I was confused. I mean I've never had a boyfriend before unless you count Jet or Haru, which I don't. But surely you don't exchange funds after a certain amount of time. Maybe this was a Kyoshi Island tradition.

There was a slight pause in conversation before Suki asked me what I wanted to talk about. I replied that I wanted to talk about the various ways of being careful when you are being intimate with a guy. Suki appeared a little alarmed by this and asked suddenly if  my friend and this guy had been intimate without using contraception. I didn't know-that's why I'd brought her down here in the first place. All I managed to say was that I'm not sure and then Suki came over and gave me a hug and said I should have come to her sooner.

I mean all hugs are good, but this was a weird hug. Something was askew in this conversation and I couldn't quite put my finger on it.

Suki was acting quite strangely. She gave my hand a little squeeze and said she was a little surprised and disappointed but that we would figure it out. Then Suki started going on at length about the various forms of contraception. She even got some ink, a brush and some paper from the front desk and started drawing diagrams. She got quite into her explanations of the various forms of contraception and how it was important to find one that was right for  my friend.

I kept trying to interrupt her politely and eventually I had to click in front of her face to distract her from her rant about sponges vs these tablets they have on Kyoshi Island that you take once a day. When I had gotten her attention I explained that while I appreciated her (long) lecture about contraception, it wasn't necessary. I already knew all about contraception. I was a healer after all. Aside from all the various herb compounds and sponges and tablets, there are a few handy waterbending tricks that Yugoda taught me just in case. Suki was quite confused and asked me why I was asking her about it then. I told her that I was just hoping to impress upon my friend the importance of using contraception. We are in the middle of a war after all and if she got pregnant it would be a big problem.

There was a really long pause.

Suki gaped at me in shock for a few seconds and then cleared her throat. She asked, in a very dignified voice, if she was the friend we had been talking about. I told her that of course she was. Who else did she think we were talking about? She shrugged delicately and just said that she had assumed that Zuko and I had finally got it together and I had wanted to tell someone.

What?

I may have said something rather rude in my shock and surprise. Me and Zuko? Where did she get that idea from. She said that the two of us are always talking and whispering and cuddling and messing about with each other and she just figured it was only a matter of time.

I went on a little bit of a rant about how me and Zuko were just friends and I hadn't bought her down here to talk about my friendship with Zuko. I had brought her down here to make sure she didn't end up up the duff and I didn't have to become Aunty Katara at 15. Suki laughed at our weird and crazy misunderstanding and reassured me that all my worry was for nothing.

There was a brief lull in conversation. I was feeling supremely awkward. This awkwardness was not helped by the fact that Suki really wanted to talk about me and Zuko and ascertain the status of our friendship. She asked if we had ever...and then she made a rather rude gesture. I said no with a bit of indignation. And she smiled and said she knew we wouldn't have yet. And then grinned and said that Sokka owed her five silver pieces

Okay, what was with the five silver pieces!

Suki told me that she and Sokka had a small innocent bet (for funsies). Sokka is convinced that me and Zuko got our nasty on back at the rendezvous island. I asked (a bit grumpily) why Sokka didn't just ask Zuko instead of making childish bets. Suki gave a small laugh and said that boys didn't talk about this sort of thing easily. Then she said Can you imagine; Sokka would probably just mention penguins a great deal and whack Zuko with the common sense stick a bit.

I had to concede her point.

After a brief pause, Suki coughed delicately and said just for clarification, both of us at this table know about the importance of - and different methods of -contraception. I agreed that she was correct in this summation. She said Well that's good then in the same tone that she used dealing with Aang yesterday.

-?-

While we were walking back, I asked Suki what she had meant by  yet. Back in the tea shop she said that she knew me and Zuko would not have been intimate yet? Did that  yet mean that she thought we were going to do it eventually. Or did she just mean that we hadn't done it and probably would not in the future. Suki shrugged and said she just meant that she thought we would get around to it eventually, when we were both ready.

I protested at this. I had another small rant. We are just friends. Can't a girl be friends with a guy and cuddle him and let off steam with him and want to talk to him. It doesn't have to mean anything more than friendship. And there is a war on. I don't have time to think about boys  in that way in the middle of a war. Can't me and Zuko just be friends without bloody assumers making big assumptions and bets at our expense.

Besides Zuko drives me crazy most of the time.

Suki smiled knowingly and said that when two people drove each other crazy the way that me and Zuko drove each other crazy, it meant something.

I told her that it only meant that Zuko needed to be poked with the common sense stick more often.

Suki smiled and said if you say so honey in a rather condescending tone.

Chapter 11 authors note:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of 'various misunderstandings involving penguins'. Congratulations and I hope you enjoyed reading it! Big thank you to all my brilliant splendid reviewers! You guys are brilliant! I know I've up-ed the awkwardness in these last two chapters, but I think anything involving sex is bound to be a little awkward at that age! I felt there were a few more misunderstandings and awkward conversations regarding sex to be had!

But naturally YMMV on everything!

In this chapter: Zuko suggests that Katara and Aang spend more time bending together. Don't be cross! There are reasons! Aang is a principle member of the group and I still want him and Katara to interact and have conversations etc. even though this is a Zutara fic, I still adore Aang and want him to have a role. I also do think that Zuko primarily wants what is best for Aang regardless of if it conflicts with his own desires/needs etc.

Zuko knows what it is like to fail and feel like you are not good at anything and what a good confidence boost it can be to realise that despite struggling with somethings, there are other things you are good at. Zuko struggled with his own firebending as a kid and I think he would have take solace in things like dao swords and ninja skills because those were things he was really good at. Aang is really good and water and airbending. I think he sees Aang struggling with firebending and he wants to make it a bit easier for the kid.

Sokka's penguin dream and Katara's showgirl Pakku dream are just ridiculous bits of fluff. Sokka over shares with his dream because it was quite vivid and really weird. The dad penguins do sit on the eggs and babysit – but Sokka wouldn't have gotten that from being told to sit on the packet of fireflakes – at the kitchen table he is just wondering if the other guys think he is a big weirdo for dreaming about penguins. Yes Sokka, they do. But I still love ya! It's only when Aang mentions daddy penguins that Zuko's worrying tendencies go into overdrive. I think Zuko is a bit of a worrier at heart.

Zuko knows that he's not too good at touchy feely conversations. Katara is his go-to girl for touchy feelyness and when he starts to worry about a possible penguin baby- she's the first person he tells. He hopes she can fix it. Katara didn't worry about a possible pregnancy for Suki and Sokka until Zuko mentioned it. But she is a worrywart as well and after he brought it up, she would have been consumed with worry.

Suki is reading Love Amongst the Dragons because all the Gang will have a go at reading Love Amongst the Dragons.

So ages ago, I wrote that I had gotten an idea regarding Suki being pregnant and I think I worried a few of my lovely readers. Don't worry, this idea was as silly as the rest of my ideas. This fic isn't going to go an turn into one of those fics on ya! My idea was just that Suki and Katara would have an awkward sandwich of a conversation regarding contraception.

So Suki and Katara have a big giant misunderstanding of conversation. Suki is sure that Katara has brought her out to the tea shop to spill her guts about getting her nasty on with Zuko and is using the term 'My friend' because she feels a little shy. Katara thinks that Suki knows that she is the friend and that Suki is just playing along with the code name. They both get the wrong end of the stick when they are talking about their friend It's only when Suki thinks that Katara and Zuko are doing it without protection that she gets really worried and the my friend ruse falls apart.

***** a short rant about contraception follows*************

I know everyone's MMV wildly on this, but in my imagination, there is contraception in the Avatar world. I just think that it is important thing to acknowledge. Being intimate with someone is a Really Big Deal with contraception and it is an Impossibly Big Deal without it. I'm very much of the mindset that whatever happens between two consenting adults is their business, but that safety is of the utmost importance. I think sex is a crucial part of romantic love and shouldn't been seen as something shameful. It is a huge expression of trust and affection. However, unless the people involved are well ready to have a kid then contraception should absolutely be used.

So in my imagination Katara and Suki both sensible girls. They both know about contraception and they are both the sort of girls who would be 'safety first' when it came to sex and wouldn't just throw themselves around. When Suki first thinks that Katara would engage in sexual activity without contraception she is surprised and disappointed (and a little appalled). She proceeds to give her a long lecture about contraception. In my imagination they even have options for contraception in the avatar world! because I want to look after the lovely ladies and give them options. (That Kyoshi Island Tablet that you take one a day – is the pill. Because I say so and for no other reason.)

**********end rant***********

Suki is also a bit of a shipper on deck – possibly a consequence of hanging out with Sokka too much. I've given Suki a bigger role in the last two chapters, but there hasn't been much of the fabulous Toph. I love Toph and I seek to remedy this instantly. The next chapter will deal with what happens when Hawky returns with a response from Toph's parents.

That thread was just left hanging in the show!

Til then lovely readers...

Chapter 12: Letters from Home

Toph and I were in my room. She was showing me how to use the keys she gave me. We were practicing on the dresser drawers and had gotten most of them opened. You have to be patient when picking a lock and wait until you feel the click. Toph said I had picked it up really quickly.

Go me.

Sokka burst in, super excited because Hawky had returned! Sokka didn't even know how Hawky had found us but he was quite pleased to have his hawky back. Hawky was perched on his shoulders and he kept stroking the bird and cooing at it and saying all sorts of nonsense like who's such a clever boy then. It was all a bit sweet.

Anyway Hawky had brought a response from Toph's parents and Sokka handed it to her. It was on shiny, expensive paper and it had the Bei Fong wax seal emblazoned on it. Toph ran her fingers over it and then put the whole message in her pocket. Sokka was looking at her expectantly and said 'don't you want to know what it says?' to which she shrugged and said maybe later. We both offered to read it to her, but she declined and said she'd get one of us to read it to her in her own time.

She didn't want to talk about it and was quite emphatic about this. The three of us got back to unlocking the drawers.

Sokka also wanted to be shown how to do it.

He was a most enthusiastic student.

We both caught each other's eyes whenever Toph touched the message in her pocket lightly. I wanted to say something, but she was in such a funny mood about it. Miraculously both me and Sokka managed to hold our tongues and not harp on about it or nag her about it.

But I was very sorely tempted.

-?-

After a while I got up to start preparing lunch. There were a few locked cabinets in the library that Sokka and Toph went to tackle. Suki was sprawled on the couch completely engrossed in Love Amongst the Dragons and Aang and Zuko were in the courtyard practising fire kicks. It was a most peaceful little domestic scene... until Hawky flew down in search of Sokka and saw Momo.

Hawky and Momo are archenemies.

A loud and boisterous battle immediately interrupted in the courtyard and there was much ado. Aang was trying to pull Momo out of the fray and got terribly clawed by Hawky for his trouble. Zuko shouted a command sternly at the bird. Whatever he said would make hawky go still for a few seconds. However, invariably Hawky would see Momo out of the corner of his eye and their battle would begin anew.

Appa let out a loud roar and both animals relented.

Aang picked up Momo and cuddled him. Zuko picked up Hawky, holding the bird gently, but in such a manner that prevented Hawky from flying away. He took him over to Sokka, who had emerged from the library with Toph, to check out the commotion. Sokka made a great fuss over Hawky.

I healed Aang and then set lunch on the table. Aang and Sokka tried to get Hawky and Momo to be friends. This involved holding on to both animals and putting their faces near each other while both animals struggled to get away and fight anew.

-?-

I have been quite stern about a new rule I made up just now.

Today there will be no animals at the table. Both Hawky and Momo have been separated and banished to different corners of the room. Hawky is making a plaintive noise squawk in Sokka's direction, but is otherwise obeying.

Sokka cannot believe that Hawky found us again (I am beginning to wish he had not.) Zuko explained that all messenger hawks have a bond with whoever they consider their master (sadly for Hawky- this is Sokka). The birds apparently feel a bit lonely at the communal Hawkeries and communal birds are less reliable than birds with owners. They are loyal and intelligent birds with a unique tracking ability. Hawky will always find his way back to Sokka eventually. Sokka is overjoyed to hear this and has been, well, rather cute with Hawky since. Sokka called Hawky over from his banished corner – breaking my no animals at the table rule and incurring my wrath and several whacks with the common sense stick- He has used what I call his 'Hawky voice' and said variations on 'Who's a loyal Hawky then' while Hawky nuzzled him affectionately.

Sokka thought for a second and piped up that Hawky was a bit like boomerang because he always came back and Zuko gave him a funny look and said  that not everything was like boomerang.

Sokka turned to Hawky and asked the bird if it would like to be renamed boomerang. Hawky shook his head and screeched indignantly in response.

Zuko is right.

Messenger hawks are intelligent birds.

-?-

After lunch, Toph came and pulled me aside and asked if I could read her the letter in private. I agreed readily. Her first letter had explained that she was safe and fine and that we were taking good care of her, but that she intended to stay with us and teach Aang earthbending. She made sure that I added a few tales of our adventures which highlighted Toph's competence with earthbending.

She had sounded quite un-Toph-like when she was dictating the letter to me and she used quite formal language. I had commented on this at the time, and she had explained that she and her parents always spoke to each other that way. She wanted to make it as easy as possible for them to understand why she was doing everything. Toph said she'd been a bit reluctant to read the letter this morning. Getting a response had just come as a surprise to her and had thrown her. She was worried that they wouldn't understand. But now she felt ready.

I opened the letter and skimmed it. I think I might have inhaled sharply in surprise. Toph rarely talked about her parents, but if she did say anything about them, she would usually comment that they hadn't understood her. I struggled a bit with this. What is so hard to understand about Toph? Toph is one of the most straight forward and direct people I know. She is normally pretty up front about what she is thinking and feeling. I had a hard time imagining how her parents didn't understand her, but just skim reading the letter made it clear.

Wow, her mother didn't understand her at all. This was bad.

Toph wasn't going to like this at all. I half contemplated just reading out something kind and reassuring, because this letter was really going to upset her. Toph could tell I had this inclination straight away and she said firmly You don't need to lie to me Katara. Just tell me what it says. I took a deep breath and started reading and I did my best to keep my voice even. It's a horrible job, reading a letter like this to a person like Toph.

-?-

the letter said:

Dearest Toph

This is mother. I hope one of those wild friends of yours that you seem so unusually fond of will read you this letter accurately because what I have to say is of great import.

Firstly, I must admit that your letter has distressed me somewhat. I was quite unable to formulate a reply for several days. I am sorry if it seems like I have been remiss in my attentions to you, my only daughter. I hope this letter reaches you promptly and that you are in good health and spirits and in a more reasonable mood than the obtuse one you must have been in when you wrote me that first missive.

Secondly, but most importantly: COME HOME IMMEDIATELY!

Toph dearest, what on earth do you think you are doing? You claimed such outlandish things in your letter. Teaching the Avatar earthbending? Racing round the world? Fighting bad guys? Don't be so fanciful dear one. I am surprised that you should think to fight anyone in  your condition. I am sure you are much more a hindrance than a help to your friends. It sounds like they care for you and would not wish to tell you directly, but it cannot be easy travelling with someone of your condition. It would be better for them and better for you -if you returned to us. Tell me where you are and I will be there as fast as humanly possible. I would like to take you home and care for you my dearest daughter.

I worry for you greatly, not just because of  your condition. Please tell me you are not exerting yourself too greatly. You know that you have a weak heart my darling. (I would never, until that very moment, have thought of Toph as having a weak heart) It is simply not able to withstand the trials and tribulations that would come from travelling with the avatar. I know you found life here a little confining, but I knew that this life was best for you. You need to be kept safe!

The avatar does not need your help. He has saved the world in previous incarnations single handedly. To use the avatar requiring you services as an excuse for your deplorable behaviour is unacceptable. I'm sure he could not require the help of someone with all your limitations.

I have done my best to bring you up to be a fine earth kingdom lady. It sounds to me as though you have thrown all the lessons I have bestowed upon you in this regard completely by the wayside. It was my dearest hope that you would find a kind and wealthy gentleman who would be willing to overlook your deficiency, and make you a good match. A good marriage for you will be impossible if you continue gallivanting about the countryside like some wild child. Your reputation will be ruined! if your friends have any sense they will see that it is in your best interest to come home immediately.

Thirdly, I miss you so very much. You can have no idea how precious you are to me, my fragile baby girl. I am the only one who knows what is best for you. Please come home to me so that I can keep you safe.

Love always,

Mother.

There was a long pause when I finished reading. Toph had a heartbreaking look of wide-eyed hurt that I have never seen on her face before. I searched for the right thing to say. So many things about Toph became clearer now; her fierce independence, her reluctance to let anyone help her, her determination to never be thought of as incapable or helpless. She was right, her parents really didn't understand her. Her mother obviously loved her, that much was evident. But she didn't know her at all.

I crouched in front of Toph and I reached out and gave her shoulder a squeeze. She recoiled from my touch angrily and said that she was fine and that she didn't need me to comfort her or mother her. She practically spat the words "Don't mother me" out with a great deal of vitriol.

Then she ran away.

-?-

I have searched high and low but I can not find Toph anywhere. She's been gone for hours now. She was meant to start training Aang in earthbending but she didn't come back for that. I had half hoped she would. The others were quite worried and I ended up telling them what had happened.

We all decided to split up and look for her. Me and Suki were given the house to search.

-?-

There are some boulders that sit on the cliff face to the north. I had a hunch that she might have gone there and after I had searched every room in the house, I started up the hill. I was just sure that Toph would be there. I was right.

But Zuko beat me to it.

I heard his low, raspy voice making occasional agreements while Toph ranted about the ridiculousness of her parents and various other things. She complained at length about their expectations and fine manners and not being helpless and having to waste time in manners lessons and learning the flute and being obedient - just to make her parents happy.

I waited a little further down the hill for them. Toph hadn't seemed to want to speak to me after I read the letter to her. I didn't want to intrude on their conversation. At least she was talking to Zuko rather than just being angry and running away. So I waited and their words carried down to me.

Zuko voiced his agreement about the general uselessness of etiquette lessons and regaled Toph with some of the more ridiculous firenation customs he had to learn (apparently there are 32 different pieces of cutlery at a formal banquet and Zuko knows the correct use for all of them). This seemed to cheer Toph up somewhat and she countered that she used to have three servants to dress her and it would take three hours to get everything pinned and zipped just so and heaven forfend if she ever got her dress dirty. Her parents would never let her run barefoot outside – can you imagine anything more unladylike.

She said running away with us was the best thing to ever happen to her and she didn't miss her home at all.

Then Toph made a small noise that just made me want to cuddle her and just protect her from all the world. She'd never let me do that. In fact she'd be furious with me for trying, but still the urge was there.

She said in an entirely different voice that she knew her mother missed her, when Toph was declared too old for a governess, it was her mother who took over her education. They'd spent every day together. Toph wasn't allowed to go to school and never had any friends before she met us. All because her mother was convinced that she was blind and helpless and had a weak heart. Toph was convinced they'd never see her as anything else. Zuko asked why and Toph explained that she'd been born premature and it had been a traumatic birth for her mother. Because she was born so early, she'd been blind and the doctors thought she would always be a weak and sickly child. They said that she had a weak heart and should be kept from the stress of the outside world as much as possible.

There was a small silence and then Zuko said that she wasn't the only one with a weak heart. He said weak heart with this bitter, sarcastic tone that I haven't heard from him in ages. Zuko confessed that he'd been born early as well. He had been a sickly baby and his dad always used to comment that he was lucky to be born, whereas Azula was born lucky. What was worse than being born early was being born in the middle of winter which is considered exceptionally unlucky in the firenation. Winter babies are not supposed to be able to firebend, or if they do, it's only ever weak firebending, so Zuko had put up with comments about his weak heart and weak lungs and weak firebending for a long time during his childhood.

Zuko's point was that he knew how Toph felt like she had something to prove, but she didn't need to prove anything to us. We all knew she was brilliant. She was an incredible earthbender and a general bad ass and he was sure that one day her parents would recognise that about her. Toph said that they might recognise that about her, but that wouldn't change anything. She said they'll still want me to come home and be a lady and make a good match. When this war is over …they'll just want me back there living some useless fancy lady's life.

Zuko said that whatever happened, she would not have to go back to Gaoling after the war, not if she didn't want to. There was a small pause and then Zuko added much more quietly and shyly that she was his friend and she'd always have a place with him. If we win, I'll have a palace …and you can have your own suite... and I'd never boss you around …..and there would be lots of bad people for you to beat up. He said all this really uncertainly-almost like he was sure Toph would say no. But she chuckled and said You'd let a blind twelve year old girl beat people up for you. Zuko replied that he would let the best and toughest earthbender on the planet beat people up for him. There was the sound of a light punch and a whispered Thanks Zuko.

Then Toph said that they should be getting back because she knew I was waiting at the bottom of the hill and I was just itching to fuss over them. Bollocks. I'd forgotten about how far Toph's ability to sense me stretches. She explained that I had been eavesdropping this whole time, then she added well not the whole time, but most of the time. Zuko gave a soft laugh and said Yeah...she does that.

-?-

Toph let me cuddle her and fuss over her a little bit. I tried to restrain myself and not fuss too much or be too motherly. I know how she hates that. I repeated Zuko's offer that we would look after her . She could come back with me and Sokka to the South Pole if she wanted. Toph made a sardonic face at me and said that she would take a firenation palace over the South Pole, but thanks for the offer -in her usual sarcastic Toph tone of voice.

I am glad that she is sounding like her usual self.

-?-

When we got back to the house, everyone was called back from the search using Hawky. There was much rejoicing and fussing over Toph, which annoyed her greatly. She told us all to cut it out and stop being ridiculous. Aang was most enthusiastic about seeing her and praising her and showing off how good he'd gotten at earthbending as a result of her teachings so she shouldn't be sad. This seemed to mollify Toph somewhat, but she said their earthbending lesson was cancelled for the day. Because she had a letter to write. She asked if I would help her with it. Sokka also wanted to help, but I kicked him out. He is in the lounge room now, bothering Suki with Hawky. He keeps sending her little love notes while she attempts to finish 'Love Amongst the Dragons'. She cannot read three pages without getting a little missive.

This is annoying her greatly.

-?-

This letter was a little less polite and formal than the previous letter. She re-iterated that she intended to stay with us and that she was strong and tough and independent, not fragile and helpless. She concluded by saying that she loved her parents, she really did, but she would not be coming home in the near future, thank you very much.

When I'd finished writing, and we were waiting for the ink to dry, I sat next to her and asked if I could just check something quickly. She agreed curiously and I explained that I just wanted to check her heart and she nodded reluctantly. All this talk about weak hearts had me a little worried and I just wanted to make sure that she was okay. I put one hand on her chest and one on her back and felt her heart. It beat strong and steady. There was nothing weak about it and I told her so. She smiled and said she's always thought so too.

I folded up the letter and attached it to Hawky. We have sent him back to Gaoling. Sokka waved goodbye to Hawky for a long time. Sokka is quite sad to see Hawky go, but I have reminded him that Hawky will always come back.

I think Sokka will miss Hawky much more than Suki will.

-?-

Me and Zuko were having tea in the kitchen after letting off steam. I had let him win, which was most unlike me. He had called me on it. He knew when I was going easy on him and this had annoyed him. I brought up what I had overheard him say about being born early and having a weak heart etc. He got a bit grumpy and said that it was just a standard diagnosis in the firenation for premature winter born babies. He said that he had never had a problem or anything but that it was just a label that they put on winter born kids. I asked if he would let me check, just to be on the safe side. He agreed, a little nervously.

I placed one hand on his chest and one hand on his back, just like I'd done earlier with Toph. But this was way different. This felt really..what's the word...intimate I guess. I felt his heart beat out a quick but steady rhythm. I may have held him 'just checking' for ...err... a little longer than necessary, but he doesn't need to know that. I moved a little closer and his pulse quickened. He looked down and asked me if Sokka and I were really planning on going back to the South Pole after the war. I shrugged and said that we hadn't really discussed it, but that I wasn't certain we'd go back.

I told him to take some deep calming breaths and his pulse slowed a little. We just stood together for ages. I might have drifted off into a bit of a daydream. He looked down at me and smiled a little nervously and asked if he was okay - heart wise – because I'd been 'checking' for ages. Whoops! Ah yes! I was not just feeling him up. I was feeling him up for a purpose. A legitimate medical purpose.

I told him that his heart is fine.

In fact it has one of the strongest beats I've ever felt.

Chapter 12 authors note:

Love wonderful readers, you have reached the end of 'letters from home' congratulations and I hope you enjoyed it! Big thanks to all those fabulous wonderful people who review! Seriously guys thanks! I'm not going to lie, I love reading that you guys are enjoying this story. Praise makes me a happy panda! It also makes me write faster! All my reviewers! You guys know I lave ya!

This chapter puts a bit of a spotlight on Toph's relationship with her parents. This never really gets resolved in the series and it's something that always puzzled me. So I guess I wanted to put a few ideas here. I think Toph's relationship with her parents is very complex and will probably pop up again in future chapters. It really has shaped some of Toph's more defining characteristics. Her resentment of authority and being babied, her determination etc.

Firstly I don't think Toph's parents are bad people at all. They are misguided yes, and they don't know Toph very well, but they do love her. That much is clear in the blind bandit. They are immensely and crazily worried about her and they see her as this tiny, blind, helpless girl. This view will not change easily. Even after seeing how bad ass she is at earthbending in the ring, and having her earthbending teacher say she is the best he's ever seen, all her dad can do is try and impose more limitations on her – to keep her safe-.

Toph has always been kept secret from the outside world which was something I found a little puzzling. Surely being blind is not that shameful. I had the idea that she might have been born premature (being a premie can be a cause of blindness from birth). This would have had a myriad of health problems that her parents would have been worried about, they would have been told about her delicate constitution and her weak heart etc. and so they kept her as safe and coddled as they could.

Premature babies can still thrive and be healthy and I think Toph is perfectly healthy, the only consequences of being born premature being that she is very short and petite for her age and is blind. But I think her parents always saw her as this rare and delicate flower who had to be protected. I got the feeling that the Bei Fong's are a very traditional family with the male as the head of the household (this is why Toph's appeal at the end of the blind bandit is addressed to her father – because he is the ultimate decision maker in their household). However I think Toph was closest to her mother, based on her excitement over getting a letter from her mother back in Ba Sing Se and how she either talks about her parents as a unit or her mother as a person in her own right.

I think her mother would worry about what would happen to her poor, blind baby girl when she was gone. To her mother, it would be impossible for Toph to make her own way in the world and so the most suitable solution would be a good marriage. She would want to groom her to be a proper young lady and that is why Toph knows so much about fancy manners and fancy ways despite never being allowed into the outside world or allowed to mingle with society.

I got the impression that Toph for the most part, played along with her parents idea of her. She had a charade as the helpless blind girl by day – incredible fighter by night – down pat. She was leading a double life because she thought her parents would not accept Toph who was an impolite street fighter the same way they adored Toph the helpless blind girl. Mr Bei Fong's biggest reaction in Toph's fight scene is actually when she spits (how unladylike). After she is outed by Aang she offers a very heartfelt plea for them to accept her as she is – which is rejected by her father (oh my heart broke for her then) but we never got to see her mother's opinion.

I think her mother would have lead a very similar, sheltered and coddled life to the one that she was trying to bring Toph into. I also have this mad theory that she suffers from 'nerves' in a similar manner to Mrs Bennett in pride and prejudice. Her letter is not to make her out to be a horrible person, she is just a person of limited experience. Travelling and fighting with the Avatar is too alien and too scary and Toph's first letter would have really thrown her for a loop. Toph would almost seem like a stranger to her and she only wants her sweet helpless baby girl home so that she can take care of her. Toph and her mother's relationship is full of misguided love and protection, strict confining rules and smothering underestimation.

I think Toph's relationship with her mother occasionally spills over onto her relationship with Katara. Toph hates being mothered (as she associates that with been sheltered and thought incapable amongst other things). That's why I have her react so viscerally when Katara tries to comfort her and 'act motherly'. But at the same time I think that Toph has come to see Katara as a sort of positive motherly force. She's a mother figure who tries to understand Toph and who really cares about her and accept her as she is. So she still turns to Katara to read and write her letters and she does like (some) of the motherly attention Katara gives her.

I actually thought that Toph would be a nice foil for Zuko in this chapter, both of them were undervalued and unappreciated and thought of as incapable/inferior as children (Toph was in a more loving way). Both have really fought to prove themselves. I was always a bit puzzled by Zuko's comment that his dad used to say that Azula had been born lucky, but he'd been lucky to be born. So I have thrown it in here. I guess I interpret it that Zuko had a complicated birth and was born a few weeks early and at an unlucky time. Being labeled as weaker or lesser since birth is another thing that I think he and Toph have in common. I thought Zuko would be best placed to understand the myriad of feelings that Toph's mother's letter would stir up in her.

One of Toph's unspoken fears is that she will have to go back home and that everything will go back to the way it was. She has run away previously before Aang, but had no place to go and invariably ended up back home again. Her mother's letter confirms for her that her parents would prefer it if everything went back to the way it was. But now Toph has experienced the outside world and freedom and having friends and she doesn't want to go back. She loves her parents but she doesn't want to have to play the role of the helpless blind girl for them anymore.

I think Zuko is perceptive enough to pick up on this and offers her a solution. She wont have to go home if she doesn't want to, he can take care of her and offer her a place to stay instead. He doesn't want to promise her something he can't deliver, so he adds the caveat If we win, But he is sincere in his offer. I think Toph was his first proper friend of his own and they have a lovely platonic friendship. He doesn't want her to have to go back to a life that would make her unhappy. But he's also very afraid of rejection so he adds many more compelling arguments, her own room, people to beat up etc. Toph would have been happy to accept even without the people to beat up.

And because I am a sucker for the mush , I have Katara check their heart function and get a little handsy with Zuko. Seriously though, they've both brought up being born premature and been diagnosed as having weak hearts and I think Katara is a good friend and would just want to check to be very sure and to see if there was anything she could do. Thankfully, they are both completely healthy.

In the next chapter Katara will go through the drawers and cabinets that she and Toph opened at the start of this chapter. She will get her rummage on and discover who's room she is staying in and a few other surprising things.

Til then lovely readers...

Chapter 13: the personal effects of Lu Ten

Both Sokka and Suki are out of sorts this morning.

Sokka was despondent over the loss of his beloved hawky. Aang has lent Sokka Momo for a week to cheer him up. Momo has taken up residence on Sokka's shoulder at the moment and is chirruping contently. Suki was in tears over a particularly tragic chapter of l ove amongst the dragons. At first when I came down and found her crying on the couch I was quite concerned, but she is fine. I asked her what had happened, but she didn't want to spoil it for me in case I read it. I pestered her anyway and she burst forth anew about  long lost twins and how it was so sad.

-?-

Toph and I have taken to watching the fire bending practice when Zuko and Aang are in the courtyard. Well Toph feels the practice I guess. Ostensibly, we do this because we want to see where Aang is at with firebending. We are all trying to blend our three teaching styles a little better so that Aang can use all four elements at once. Or at least that's what me and Toph claim we are doing. I actually think this is the real reason why Toph is watching or feeling. I may have ….another reason which I hope Toph cannot sense. She is so wily. Look, the thing is - it is so hot now that they train with their shirts off everyday. I have a... great appreciation for the sight of a shirtless Zuko.

How am I supposed to not look?

I look but I don't touch. Okay. Well sometimes I touch, but either in a nice friendly way, or when I have a legitimate medical reason. No other touching is going on. Not that I am thinking about other touching. But even if I was -it would not be happening. Because we have stuff to do that I need to focus on. We have an Avatar to train and a firelord to fight and evil to defeat and lots of other stuff to do. So I should focus on that!

And not on other things.

-?-

Aang has perfected blasting fire out of his feet. This has made Zuko very happy because he has been trying to get Aang to do this for a very long time now. He did this really dorky little happy jump when Aang perfected it which I found a little hilarious. Aang is very joyful and he and Zuko have high fived and hugged and it is all very sweet.

Aang wants to take Appa on a celebratory fly around the island, because Appa needs to get some exercise and is going a bit stir crazy. There was a bit of reluctance from Zuko towards this idea because Appa is really recognizable, but eventually, in the face of Aang's sad panda expression, he relented on one condition: Aang promises to fly only around our house (because we are far away from the main town) and to fly very low.

Aang has agreed, yippeed and taken off on Appa.

-?-

Aang still not back! He is meant to be earthbending with Toph. This has thrown off Sokka's schedule and has made Toph a bit cranky. She has commented that he never slacks off and disappears for firebending or waterbending training. Zuko replied that the only reason he doesn't disappear on him is because Zuko has the morning slot and has taken to waking Aang up exceptionally early so that Aang cannot escape his lessons!

They both looked at me and I shrugged. I've never had a problem getting Aang to come waterbending with me, but this may be because I favour the gentle encouragement approach instead of the stern disciplinarian approach (Zuko's) or the random and terrifying approach (Toph's).

-?-

The magical Momo effect is wearing off and Sokka is still a little down about Hawky. Zuko suggested that they could set up some giant hammocks because giant hammocks are always fun. He then tried to tell a joke of his Uncle's about hammocks. He mangled it. Badly. Wow, it was so bad that none of us could even laugh politely. Sokka put an arm around his shoulder and said what have I told you about the jokes? Zuko has agreed that he shouldn't try to be funny.

Anyway there's this big dusty storeroom that Suki and I haven't gotten around to cleaning yet and the boys went and got out a giant dusty hammock and got Toph to earthbend the dirt out of it. They have been trying for the last half an hour to set it up. It is complicated. There is much frustration and ado and commotion coming from team hammock.

But Sokka is occupied and not feeling sad about Hawky so this is an improvement.

-?-

Aang returned a little bit later and we all had lunch. Still no luck on the hammock front. There are even instructions. The boys were arguing over them quite comically. It said to insert hook A onto slot B – well which was slot B huh plan guy? It's not my fault that nothing is labeled! Hey it's your hammock.

Sokka also scolded Aang for ignoring the schedule. Sokka is very fond of the schedule and doesn't like it to feel ignored.

After lunch, Toph went off to throw boulders at Aang, team hammock returned to whatever they were doing and Suki and I took to freshening up the house again. We opened up all the windows and doors and got rid of all the dust the other day. Today Suki went to go pick some nice fragrant flowers so the place would smell nice while I mopped all the floors with my waterbending. It's all terracotta tiles on the ground floor -so that was easy. The upstairs is all polished wood so that was also done in a flash.

I decided to sort out my room, now that me and Toph had unlocked all the cupboards and drawers and unpack all my stuff (which had previously been tossed about the room a little haphazardly.) I may have gotten my rummage on a little. There was some really cool stuff all locked away in the cupboard. An incredible number of useless nick knacks and souvenirs and keepsakes from places all over the firenation (judging from the the different place names carved into the various sundries), and incredibly large bundle of letters that had been kept in an elegant box, eight different pai sho sets, twelve different fine tea sets, a vast number of different weapons and training tools and some really beautiful artistic scrolls that had been rolled up. Mostly landscapes in vibrant colours. I opened a few and hung them on the walls. So now my room feels a little brighter.

The rainbow from my prism moves across the walls through the day- according to where the sun is in the sky. I just noticed. The anklet Zuko gave me is missing a flower as well. I guess the wishing beads really do work because my birthday wish came true. I have tightened it so that I won't lose it.

I started going through the dresser and there were many books hiding in the drawers. Book of proverbs and quotes, books on strategy (I have put those aside to give to Sokka) and many books on tea and botany. I flicked through one that looked well thumbed and a picture fell out. It was a family portrait. At first I thought no one looked familiar, but when I looked again at the dad's face (he had such a dad face – is that a weird thing to write. Anyway he had a face that looked like it was made to give advice and stick up for people.) I realized I knew him. This was Zuko's uncle as a younger man- this picture was of Zuko's Uncle's family. His Son and his wife. He looked happy in the picture. Everybody did. I popped it up against the mirror in case Zuko wanted it.

I was in Uncle's room. No wonder Zuko had said it would have the least Ozai vibes in it.

I wonder what Uncle's name is. Zuko just refers to him as Uncle but surely that is not his actual name. Surely no one would name a child Uncle. But who knows, the firenation is a weird place. I have met him several times but never really been introduced. I guess it's hard to exchange names and pleasantries in the middle of a battlefield.

I found a box next, a neat wooden box with a label – the personal effects of Lu Ten, deceased with Honors. It was weird to think that this was the stuff of that kid in the picture. Anyway I felt this insatiable curiosity. Sometimes I can't help myself. I knew it was bordering from rummaging into snooping, but I opened the box anyway. In it was a dagger, a few more trinkets and other useless objects, some clothes and several letters. There was a letter to Zuko, which I got out and put with the picture.

It was like I summoned him with my brain. There was a faint tap on the door and I heard him say that he and Sokka had gotten the hammocks up if I wanted to...he trailed off as he looked at the chaos with some surprise (I may have scattered some of my more interesting finds all over the room.) I felt like I'd been caught doing something naughty so I sputtered an explanation about how I was just sorting through the drawers. (Sorting, not snooping.) I said that I had figured out that I was in his Uncle's room which was really just stating the obvious. Zuko smiled and shrugged and said that his Uncle was always able to wangle the best rooms and this one was best room in the house. I asked what his Uncle's name was and he seemed a little surprised that I didn't know. Uncle's name is Iroh.

I told him I'd found a letter for him from Lu Ten and his eyes nearly popped out of his head and he asked me what? in a really shocked fashion. I told him about finding the box of personal effects and the family portrait and I handed him the letter  He brushed the letter with his fingers and still seemed a little dazed. He said that they normally made soldiers write letters to loved ones before a big campaign, just in case, but he'd never known that LuTen had written to him. He said 'why didn't he ever give this to me?' really softly. I think he was just asking metaphorically, but I answered anyway and said that it looked like the box hadn't been opened in a very long time. There was a small silence. Zuko said his Uncle had gone a  little strange for a while there, after Lu Ten had died. He said that most likely his Uncle had put the box of Lu Ten's effects here and then forgot about it, almost like he was trying to convince himself.

I pestered him about opening the letter. I'll admit it. I was a keen bean to see what the letter would say, and it wasn't even my long dead cousin writing to me from beyond the grave. He popped the seal and read the first few lines (I was trying to peer over his shoulder but I couldn't make anything out). After about a minute he put his hand over his mouth in what I can only describe as sad surprise. He got up abruptly and said excuse me politely and has scarpered off. I find it strangely endearing that even in really tense situations, he tries to be polite.

-?-

Where the bloody hell is Zuko? I have searched high and low. This is the second time in two days that someone has disappeared after getting a letter. It is driving me to distraction. I gave him a few minutes after he'd left my room so abruptly, because he had seemed like he needed to have himself a moment. But I had assumed that I would be able to find him again pretty quickly.

I assumed wrong.

I have been looking for at least two hours now!

Gah!

This house is great, but the biggest drawback is that now I don't know any of his moping places off by heart. If we were back in the Western Air Temple I would have found him by now. But I was stalking him there and then made it easier. Maybe I should just start  lightly stalking him again? Nice stalking, just so I'll know where he goes if he absconds in the future.

No! No stalking!

Because that would be weird.

-?-

Maybe I can ask him to write me a list of all his usual moping places.

Zuko likes lists.

-?-

really now!

This is just getting ridiculous!

This is a really elaborate and messed up game of hide and seek!

Three hours of searching!

-?-

I didn't want to have to ask the others to help in finding him. I mean I just think this is the sort of the thing Zuko would like to keep to himself and that's why he's buggered off. But I have been looking for ages and I am feeling frustrated!

When I found them ,all thoughts of finding Zuko were pushed from my mind, because Sokka gave me a light scolding. I had been meant to be training Aang for the last two hours according to Sokka's schedule. Oops. Sokka was complaining that I had thrown the schedule way off. It's easy for Sokka to criticize. He has scheduled himself nothing to do but lie in a hammock and chill out all day.

-?-

Aang had been waiting most expectantly and impatiently for waterbending training. We went down to the beach and practiced our giant waves and iceslides. I have accidentally stepped on a sharp shell and it hurt like the blazes (there may have been a great deal of swearing when I first did it). I was just about to heal it, when I realized that I have never taught Aang to heal. Terrible oversight by me.

I called him over and tried to demonstrate for him. His first few tries were unsuccessful and stung quite a bit but eventually he got it. I have decided that Aang must learn healing, because the more healers the better. What if he gets injured and I'm not nearby? Next time somebody gets injured I will make Aang heal it. Unless he's being really crap at it and then I'll gently take over.

I was telling Aang about my plan to teach him healing. Most other forms of waterbending come quite easily to him. Aang seemed excited to learn healing and was glad that this would be impromptu waterbending (that would arise if and when somebody injured themselves) rather than scheduled waterbending. Aang hates Sokka's schedule. Aang's not really a schedule kinda kid anyway. He sees the schedule as more of a guideline. I said that was a good thing because the schedule had been a bit disregarded today and I would be surprised if the schedule ever got followed exactly.

Aang asked me where I was for two hours and I felt a bit on the spot. I wracked my brain for something that legitimately could have taken me two hours, but in the end I settled on the truth. I just said that Zuko had buggered off and I had been looking for him and Aang made  a face first and asked me why quite sincerely.

I said I don't know, but really I do know. I want to find him because I just like to know where everyone is. Because I'm worried that he's feeling sad and having a mope. Because I'm really nosy and I want to know what the letter says. Because I want to make him feel better if I can. Aang said I probably wouldn't find Zuko if he didn't want to be found and I protested at this. I am really good at finding him when he doesn't want to be found.

Aang asked me about why I was so intent on stalking Zuko and I got a bit ranty. Okay, so I got a bit stalky in the Western Air Temple and now everybody knows (and they occasionally tease me about it). But that was ages ago and it was stalking with a purpose. I was stalking to ensure Aang's safety. But this afternoon wasn't stalky – it was friendly concern! Aang brightened and asked if I really was stalking because of him. I said yes. And that is the truth. Or at least it was at the start.

I definitely started stalking to ensure Aang's safety.

-?-

We got back to the house and Aang went off to play with Appa again. Apparently Suki is cooking this evening to give me a night off. Cheers Suki! I could hear her banging away in the kitchen and for a brief moment I wondered if I should go in to help her...but I got distracted. I could admire the boy's hammock handiwork for the first time (I was a bit too preoccupied earlier to inspect the hammocks.) They'd set up two enormous hammocks on the back deck. They will get lovely dappled sunlight all day there. Each hammock looks big enough for at least three people to lie in comfortably. Toph and Sokka were in one, lying top to tail and just chilling out and chatting about metal bending.

Zuko was in the other.

This was what distracted me.

He was sprawled out and re-reading the letter for what could be the billionth time for all I know. I went and stood grumpily over him and made a little ahem noise. He looked up and folded the letter away and said hi, trying for an innocent and normal tone. That did not fool me. I folded my arms in front of me and I said that I had been looking for him all afternoon. He had the decency to look a little sheepish and said that he knew. Apparently I had walked under him a couple of times in my search.

He'd been in the big mango tree behind the house. I will look there first next time.

I was a little cross that he hadn't let me know where he was and he apologized and said he just wanted a little time to himself. I hopped in the hammock with him and he scooted over to make room for me, even though it was a bit unnecessary.

You always end up smushed together in a hammock anyway.

I wanted to speak to him alone and I needed to be close enough to speak quietly to him so that the others wouldn't overhear. I asked him softly if he wanted to talk about it. He said not really and that's was the whole point of having time to himself this afternoon was about. We lay together for a little while and eventually I asked if he would let me read it. I am so curious about that letter. It's such a mystery. It's almost like getting a message in a bottle. He said  no really quickly to my letter reading request. I made a face at him and the  no changed to a maybe later.

I'll take maybe later as a yes!

He gave me a little grin and said that I was impossible under his breath. I protested at this mildly, but really I was glad that he was smiling. I leaned my head on his shoulder and he said thanks for finding it really softly, because he never would have found it otherwise. I said he may have and he countered that he didn't make a habit of going though other people's stuff. I have tickled him for this comment in retaliation. I don't make a habit of it! I just very occasionally do it. He has relented and taken his comment back after much ado.

I started talking about my new plan to teach Aang healing which Zuko thinks is a good idea, but he hopes that he is not the one we have to test out Aang's healing abilities on. And we just lay smushed together in a hammock talking about waterbending and healing and how it works. Zuko is mystified by waterbending healing and I was explaining some of the finer points of it to him. Then I heard some loud bangs from the kitchen and Suki's voice plaintively calling out for me. I got up to help her, with a little big of difficulty- hammocks are easy to get into by really hard to get out of. When I looked back Zuko had that letter out and was reading it again.

What does it say?

Chapter 13 authors note:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of 'The personal effects of Lu Ten'. Thank you and I hope you have enjoyed it! Thanks a million to all my brilliant reviewers! Seriously guys you are all awesome!

In the EIP Toph and Katara are watching the firebending practice. This is when that starts. Toph is actually watching for legitimate reasons, katara has cottoned on to her legitimate reason and may be using it as an excuse to be a little pervy. Bless her cotton socks. I don't blame her. That much shirtlessness to look at, everyday! I think she has started to develop a pretty big attraction for Zuko but she is trying to ignore it. Katara is queen of denial in my imagination. But in all honesty, she does want to concentrate on the war and preparing Aang and doesn't feel like she should be focusing so much on crushes etc when there are so many monumental and important things happening.

All that being said, she is also fascinated by Zuko and suffers a slight stalky relapse – which she gets defensive over when Aang calls her on it. I also think that Katara should have taught Aang to heal at some stage because that is a really crucial skill.

The giant hammocks would be from IKEA if they had IKEA in avatar land. The instructions would be difficult to understand/in swedish and the boys would have gotten a bit frustrated. I think this is something that a servant would have previously set up for Zuko so he's never had a bash at hammock setting up for himself. But Sokka is quite logical and eventually Team Hammock prevails!Seriously though they are on a tropical island and I think Hammocks are mandatory on tropical islands.

Now people can snuggle in giant hammocks. Yay!

The wishing beads work! Double yay!

Is Katara introduced to Iroh properly at this point? Toph knows him and Aang and Sokka got to know him in Ba Sing Se, but I think Katara knows him from the all the time he spent chasing them with Zuko, the Seige of the north (crazy battle) and when he got shot by lightning. They actually haven't exchanged that much dialogue at this point, and Zuko only refers to him as Uncle so I think she knows who he is but not much else about him etc.

I think Iroh was grieving something fierce after losing Lu Ten. To me I think he would have come back to ember Island at one point, as this was a place he and his son were really happy together. I think he would have wanted to just shut himself away from the world of firenation politics and back stabbing for a time and just grieve and I think Ember Island would have been a good place for that. I think that he took the box of Lu Ten's effects their and didn't want to open it/disturb it's contents. Sort of like how some people leave a loved one's room as it was after they have passed. He didn't not give Zuko the letter on purpose, I think he just forgot/never got around to it.

Zuko needed to have himself a moment after getting the letter. I think he adored Lu Ten as a kid (in my imagination Lu Ten is almost like a loveable mini Iroh) and getting a letter from him all these years later has really thrown him for a loop. He wants to read it in private and mope about it in private and process it in private. I think it would be dishonest to his character to have him be willing to open up and share every little detail about what he's feeling. I think Zuko is very much of the keep calm and carry on/stiff up lip school of thought. Before Katara I don't think he was prone to big long talks about his feelings (just big long sulks about his feelings) and so he's still not comfortable sharing everything. Katara still instigates most of their touchy-feely conversations after all and almost has to prie/bribe/tickle some pieces of information out of him still. I also didn't want to have Katara read it because I think her snooping has limits. She reads Toph's mother's letter because Toph asked her too and I think she'd only read Zuko's if he let her. I also didn't want to have two 'letter based chapters' close together. You will read the letter dear readers, but a little later.

And I have a question: what do you guys think is the cheesiest, soapiest plot devices out there. Any bad fanfic peeves? I'm talking lost twins, sudden magical powers, big melodramatic scenes! Any fiction/t.v pet peeves! Let me know! Trust me, it's relevant!

In the next chapter, Sokka will read love amongst the dragons, Aang will be oppressed by the firenation (but only a little) and much fun will be had by all.

Til then lovely readers...

Chapter 14: the Winds of Change

So Suki is quite good at many things. Cooking is not one of them. I'm grateful that she tried to give me a night off but I think it's just for the best if I cook in the future. I don't even know where her mad urge to cook had come from. The land of bad ideas? I asked her and she said that she had felt like trying it out. Umm, okay. We need a new hobby for Suki. Was that an inedible giant hunk of wood? No, it was a roast, apparently. I have to say the meat had a rather remarkable crispy factor that you don't often get with a roast. I decided the only thing for it would be to chop it up into tiny pieces and make a stew.

She'd also made a sauce that looked and tasted like congealed sadness and boredom with chunks of berries in it. This was meant to be a Kyoshi island dessert, not a sauce. She'd been trying to copy this Kyoshi Island recipe that her Aunt used to make and it had taken her hours and she really wanted everyone to like it. I had a small taste, schooled my features and made a quick trip outside and told everybody to eat what Suki was about to serve them and pretend to like it.

No matter what!

Toph said it wasn't my birthday and she didn't have to do what I said. I said if she did not -she would hurt Suki's feelings and nobody wanted to do that. Zuko, who has had to eat many unpleasant things in the name of politeness (and honour!) told her the trick was just to get a small piece and just try to swallow it whole so you didn't have to chew/taste it. Toph thought this sounded a bit gross. Sokka said that he was sure that whatever Suki had made would be delicious.

Oh Sokka. He has no idea.

I went and found Aang with Appa and delivered him the message and he said it was okay because he would just eat the vegetables and you can't ruin those. Oh no. Aang was not getting out of this one so easily. Aang had to eat the dessert as well. There was no meat in the dessert so his 'I'm a vegetarian' excuse wasn't going to fly this time! Aang gulped.

I went back and added the finishing touches to the stew. And Suki thanked me for helping her out. She was worried that she'd ruined dinner. She confessed to me that cooking wasn't her strong point and I pretended to be surprised by this news and said that I was sure it would be delicious (just a little white lie).

The best part of dinner was the expression of everyone's face when they had their first mouthful. In truth Suki had burned the meat until it was a shadow of its former self. It was crunchy in a way that meat is not supposed to be. But she'd put in so much effort and I didn't want everybody to complain and make a fuss and hurt her feelings, so I gave everyone a little warning glare at the start. Sokka's face was the funniest! But after he had chewed for a very long time he exclaimed that it was absolutely delicious and tucked in with feigned gusto. Everybody looked at him a little strangely except for Suki who blushed happily and said if he liked it so much, she could make it for him everyday. Hardy ha ha! Sucks to be you Sokka!

-?-

Me and Zuko were sitting on the veranda after letting off steam. Another tickling draw- Zuko has made me promise that I won't ever just let him win after last time. We had tea and a bit of a laugh over Sokka's predicament regarding his future dinners. Still if I learned anything from this dinner, I know it is definitely true love as far as Sokka is concerned. And I said, in all seriousness, that it was nice that Sokka and Suki have found each other. Zuko agreed with me and said they were really, really ridiculously lucky. There was a funny tone in his voice and I was a bit perplexed by it. It's not that unusual is it? To find someone you really click with? Zuko smiled a little sadly and said he thought it was more difficult than they make it seem.

We were silent for a bit and then he asked if he could ask me a question. I said he already had, just to be cheeky and he made a face at me. Normally when someone asks if they can ask you a question – it's a pretty important question and they want to give you a bit of a head up that a Really Important Question is coming your way. He was quiet again so I poked him and told him to ask away. He cleared his throat and asked me if I thought people could really change.

Um, wow. Not the question I was expecting. I had been expecting something about...anyway.

But I guess it is an important question nonetheless. It seemed really important to Zuko,at least. I had a think for a moment. I didn't just want to answer flippantly.

I asked if maybe was an acceptable answer. Because, really, I think it would depend entirely on the person. I'm not sure if people can easily change themselves. I think most drastic changes in character occur after something terrible has happened. People get changed by things that happen to them. I know that my mother's death changed the way I looked at the world. But some people just stay the way they are regardless of whatever terrible things happen to them. Aang has stayed pretty constant. He is still the joyful, happy-go-lucky-kid me and Sokka found in an iceberg -despite everything. Even finding out that everyone he knew was dead, and that he was the last of his kind hadn't dampened his positivity. Sometimes it amazes me how Aang can be so cheerful, but I hope he never changes. So I guess I think that some people change and some people don't and I don't know why it is that way. I asked why he wanted to know and he just shrugged and said something my cousin wrote.

What is in that letter?

He asked if there was also a dagger in the box of personal effects. I said yes and then he asked me really quietly if he could have it. I told him not to be silly, of course he could have it. And we went up to my room and I got out the box and handed him the dagger. It was plain and of good quality steel. He smiled when I gave it to him and said that his Uncle told him it was always good to have a dagger on you -because you never know. I stifled a small giggle and he looked really perplexed and asked if I was laughing at him. I said that wasn't it at all. It was just that my mother used to always tell me to have my parka nearby-because you never know – in that exact same tone of voice. It just struck me as funny, that's all.

Did Zuko's Uncle chase him, dagger in hand, saying you never know every time he left the house without it? My mother would always chase after me if I left the igloo without my parka. Zuko smiled as said when he was a kid he probably would have run away from anyone who was chasing him with a dagger. I commended this wise hypothetical decision.

-?-

Observed fire bending training after breakfast! May I say that watching firebending and eating mango and passionfruit smushed together is the best way to start the day.

-?-

The three of us have scheduled a three way training session. Aang is in the center and he has to deflect all of our combined attacks. This was our first time trying it. Mixed success. Aang did very well for about 20 minutes but then one of Toph's earthbended rocks went a little rogue and knocked Sokka from his hammock (he was relaxing and reading Love Amongst the Dragons on Suki's recommendation). He landed in a big heap and there was much ado and complaining from Sokka. Toph was apologizing in her Toph way and I helped Sokka up when I noticed he had some gravel rash on his elbow from his rough landing. I declared that I had been waiting for this happily, and Sokka made an unhappy face at me and asked if I had been waiting eagerly for him to get injured.

Never mind that, it was healing training time.

-?-

Sokka was a most impatient patient. He squirmed, he protested, he didn't see why he had to be the one we experimented on. I told him to shush and just let Aang get on with the healing. Aang took a deep breath and splashed water on Sokka in an unhealing manner. He tried again, but was unsuccessful. He tried again and again and again and started to get a little frustrated. I spoke encouragingly to him and outlined the basic healing procedure many times and told him to just be patient with himself. Sokka piped up that his patience had run out and he would just live with his gravel rash forever! He didn't need healing anymore! He didn't need his elbow! He just needed lunch.

Also he wanted to get back to Love Amongst the Dragons because apparently Zali had just discovered she was part dragon and had dragon powers and could fly and firebend at the same time. Love Amongst the Dragons sounds a little stupid if you ask me. Long lost identical twins? Dragon powers? I healed his gravel rash quickly, gave him a few pokes with the commonsense stick because he was so difficult and sent him on his way. I fussed about the kitchen for a while and went about preparing lunch.

Aang sat on the counter while I diced veggies and we had a chat about healing. He just could not seem to do it. He said he felt like there was something blocking him. I pointed out that he had done it yesterday after a while and he looked a little sheepish and said that it was actually my constant 'demonstrations' that had healed my foot. Apparently I had healed it over , but I had been so into my explanation about healing that I hadn't seemed to notice. He hadn't wanted to disappoint me by telling me yesterday because I'd seemed so happy when I'd noticed my healed foot and thought he had done it.

I gave him a few pokes with the commonsense stick for not telling me yesterday.

We brainstormed different ideas about how I could teach him better. Maybe I should get one of those chi mannequins like Yugoda had. That way I could demonstrate healing without having to have an actual live (and complaining/squirming) patient. Aang thinks this is a good idea. I might see if Toph can make me one after lunch. Aang said there might not be time after lunch because he had an announcement.

-?-

Well ...lunch was eventful.

Aang announced that he wanted to celebrate the North Wind and there was much ado (and an especially lame joke from Suki about wind and the especially beany dish I had served for lunch- Sokka high-fived her.) Anyway, Aang wants to take a week off training and celebrate the North Wind in proper Air nomad style. Zuko was exceptionally unimpressed with this announcement and made an announcement of his own. There was no way under angi that Aang was going to get out of a week of training.

Aang said that the North Wind hadn't been celebrated properly in a hundred years because some nation had wiped out all of his people. Zuko was silenced. You can't argue with somebody who brings up the Airnomad genocide without looking like a dickhead. Aang explained that the Air nomads had a celebration for each of the four winds. We hadn't been able to celebrate any of the other winds because we'd always been on the move or had heaps of other adventures/shenanigans going on. But now we were just doing nothing and chilling around the house and had time to properly celebrate. Zuko got a bit beside himself at the allegation that we were doing nothing because he was certainly working really hard at training Aang. Aang hand-waved this comment and continued with his announcement.

The North Wind was the migration wind. It was the wind of transition and turbulence. It was celebrated in the week of the dark of the moon in the last month of summer – meaning from tomorrow. The Airnomads would celebrate by a week of games and activities that were meant to develop the qualities an Airnomad needed to soar through a changing and inclement wind. There was a day of logic, a day of patience, a day of bravery, a day of creativity, a day of preparation, a day of co-operation, and a final day of celebration. Aang considers us all his family and wanted us all to celebrate in proper Air nomad style, hence taking a week off.

There was a bit of resistance – mostly from Zuko, but also a little bit from Toph and myself. Toph said that she still had so much to teach Aang and that while she wouldn't mind celebrating Airnomad style, she didn't think they should just slack off for a week. This was my point too. Zuko said he was touched to be considered family etc but he loudly exclaimed that Sozin's comet wasn't that far away and Aang should be training all his waking hours because he was nowhere near ready to face the fatherlord. Sometimes Zuko slips up and refers to Ozai as the fatherlord, but I don't know if he is aware he does this.

Aang expostulated quite loudly that he was being oppressed by the firenation in response to this comment. Zuko protested and said that he wasn't oppressing him and he just wanted to train him and they got into a small argument about Zuko's disciplined training style vs Aang's lack of initiative re: firebending etc. Aang would preface all his responses to Zuko's further comments with a very cheeky don't you oppress me! This annoyed Zuko greatly.

Sokka put forward the idea that we compromise and still celebrated Air Nomad Style, but we could just play one air nomad game a day rather than filling up the whole day with games. That would still be celebrating but leave plenty of time for training (oppressively or otherwise). We have all agreed to this. Sokka has made a new schedule that will allow for Aang's games but allows time for lots of training. Aang has been given the afternoon off to set things up and has joyfully scampered off with great enthusiasm.

After he left we all had a quick chat and decided to just go with Aang's week of fun. Whatever Aang came up with, we would roll with. Suki piped up that she thought Aang deserves a break from all the training and intensity because she'd never train her Kyoshi Warriors this hard without allowing them some time for fun. I said that if Aang wants to honour his people's memory then we'd be the biggest jerks on the planet if we didn't allow him this festival. So we have all agreed and are bracing ourselves for Aang's week of Airnomad fun.

Sometimes I think the Airnomads must have had a different sense of fun to normal people. Aang finds hurling down the mail system of Omashu fun. I (a normal person) did not get quite the same thrill from nearly hurtling to my death. But that is just me.

-?-

Dinner was also eventful.

Aang is bursting with excitement about his week of fun and says that we are all going to love it. The Airnomads always competed in teams and they tried to match up people so that each team was equal in skill so that the games would be fair. Aang had paired us into three teams. He had decided that the teams should be boy/girl and bender/non-bender. The teams for Aang's week of fun are:

Me and Aang

Toph and Sokka

Suki and Zuko.

Suki and Zuko were not especially pleased with this arrangement. Suki glanced at Zuko and asked if she could go with Sokka instead. Aang answered no because that would mean that Toph and Zuko were together and they were two benders and that would give them an unfair advantage. There was a small eruption of protest from the others regarding this statement because me and Aang are two benders and we were on a team together and Aang was the avatar – didn't that give our team a giant unfair advantage.

Suki said if it was about advantage then the easiest thing would be for her (a non-bender) to go with Aang and for me to be in a team with Zuko. Zuko expressed approval for this arrangement but they got shot down by Aang. Aang said that would be the same problem as before, there would be two benders together. It wasn't a problem for me to go with Aang precisely because he was the avatar. As the avatar and keeper of peace and balance in the universe etc, he could be relied upon to be fair and not cheat. Also it was his festival- so they both had to suck it. (He didn't actually say they both had to suck it- but that was the general gist of Aang's I'm the avatar speech.)

Suki grumbled about being paired with the grumpiest and least fun person in the entire firenation and Zuko shot back that being on a team with her wasn't his ideal arrangement either. Sokka sat between them and told them to make nice – like he would if he were dealing with Hawky and Momo. Zuko and Suki have shaken hands in a disgruntled fashion upon Sokka's request.

-?-

Zuko was a bit cranky at being called the most grumpy and least fun person in the entire firenation. He complained about it (at length) while we did the dishes together. He was complaining about being called grumpy in such a grumpy fashion and the irony was not lost on me. He said he wished that we could be on a team together for Aang's week of fun. I said it would have been nice, but it was Aang's week and we'd all agreed to let him celebrate his people properly, so we all had to go along with his team allocations. I told him that he'd have to be nicer to Suki if they were going to be on a team together for the week of fun. He grumbled that he hated this week of fun already. I pointed out that perhaps his (admitted) hatred for the week of fun was why Suki had called him the least fun person in the fire nation. He ask me if he really was no fun. He was a bit worried that he was becoming the unfun one.

I teasingly said that he wasn't becoming the unfun one, he already was! He is the most serious person I have ever met in my life. Secretly I am very glad of this, before Zuko joined us, I was the unfun one. But Zuko makes me look like I'm an extraordinary comedian. Still, I remembered how it felt when the others were teasing me for hating fun. It hurt a little. I nudged Zuko affectionately and said that I found him a lot of fun to be around. He smiled at me tentatively and asked if I really meant that. I assured him I did and that he was fun in his own special Zuko way

Chapter 14 authors note:

Lovely wonderful readers! You have reached the end of Winds of Change. Congratulations and I hope you enjoyed it. Huge thanks you to my brilliant fabulous wonderful reviewers! You guys are definitely a lot of fun!

Change is a big theme in this chapter with a few characters trying on new things or experiencing changes. Suki is trying new things. She is trying to cook, which I think would be a new thing for Suki. She is exploring new roles in the group and the chef is a role that Katara normally fills but Suki just thought she'd have a go. She is experimenting with more than just cooking. She's experimenting with her place in the group and she's trying on the traditional feminine domestic role.

I think Suki would at some point feel a bit insecure about her place in the team. She was a leader, but now that role is mostly Sokka's and she is still quite new to the group and is reluctant to boss them around. She is highly trained and very stealthy, but so is Zuko (this may be a source of conflict for them). I think, like Sokka, she would have a moment to herself where she thinks "I am just an ordinary person surrounded by all these amazing benders." Sokka got a whole episode dedicated to him finding his place and I want Suki to have the same experience. In the show she gets treated like 'Sokka's girlfriend' rather than a person in her own right.

I put her with Zuko partly because I think they still have some issues to work out, they hardly ever interact in the show and because I think they would have some hilarious arguments over who is stealthier/more of a badass. And I think Zuko would be the person she would most likely have open clashes with. Zuko is Sokka's bestie and she's the girlfriend and they are both a bit feisty and I think a bit of mild bickering would naturally happen. She's not trying to be a bitch when she calls him the grumpiest person in the fire nation because a)he is, b) she's quite disappointed about not being on a team with Sokka.

One of my lovely reviewers wrote ages ago that it would be reasonable for Zuko to be a little jealous of Suki and Sokka's easy relationship, because in his experience relationships/marriages were more for political expedience rather than love and seeing a really loving couple would be a bit jarring. He would never have expected to be as lucky in love himself (I think there is a little bit of political expedience in his relationship with Mai – but that is for another chapter). He would feel a bit like a bad and disloyal friend for feeling this way, but would feel it none the less. You are brilliant whoever you are! I love the idea and think it is spot on and I think shades of this would come through when he is referring to how really ridiculously lucky Sokka and Suki are when he is talking to Katara.

Zuko is a bit preoccupied with change because Lu Ten has written something in his letter about Zuko's ability to change and it is weighing on his mind. But that's all I'll say about that. You will have to wait lovely reader. One day in Aang's week of fun is a day of patience and patience is a virtue! I think Zuko lost his never give up without a fight Dagger in Ba Sing Se. I think the Dai Li would have taken it from him before throwing him in prison. So he needed a new one for my fic and now he has Lu Ten's.

The lovely Donnacrunch * waves at Donna * said that Aang wouldn't be able to heal because it is only available to a select few waterbenders. I always thought Aang would be well pretty terrible at healing because I think Katara had never really struggled to teach Aang anything. Waterbending has always come quiet naturally to Aang and I wanted her to experience the other side of the master's fence that Toph and Zuko are on.

However I don't know if there are only a small number of waterbenders with healing ability. Is it only women who have this ability? I got the impression for the episodes in the northern water tribe that it was something that all water benders could do but they deigned it to be a "Woman's job" so only women got trained in healing. So men might have picked up bits and pieces but it was mostly a woman's role. To Jeong Jeong, he might have seen a smattering of waterbending healers, but not understood the cultural background of healing = woman's role. I would bet my last dollar that the northern water tribe would be reluctant to let their women folk near a battlefield. So to Jeong Jeong it looks like very few waterbenders can actually heal. I think Aang has the ability to heal but he will find it exceptionally difficult to master and may not acquire the skill for a very long time.

Sokka hates being the test dummy because Aang is a bit crap at healing and he is in a really good bit of Love Amongst the Dragons. Dragon powers= dual bending! And both twins can do it! And they will both fall in love at first sight with the same man! Oh yeah! It's that kind of story.

This chapter introduces an Airnomad festival that I just made up and Aang's desire to celebrate his people's traditions, especially now that they are settled at Ember Island for the time being. I actually think this would be a good thing for Aang on a few levels. It will help him honour/remember his people and make him feel more of an affinity with them and their teachings. I think feeling close to them and remembering them will attribute to his 'I'm not killing anyone' schmoozle in Sozin's comet, much like Katara remembering her mother contributed to her anger at Zuko in the lead up to the southern raiders- in my head canon at least.

Also this will help me have an entire week of shenanigans which I hope you all will enjoy. I think the air nomads would have celebrated the winds and the changing of the winds. I learned from Ma jong/ the joy luck club- that the east wind is the where things begin and is the wind of possibility/ I gathered from the movie Chocolat that the north wind is the wind of change and turbulence. If you are interested I even assigned festivals to the other winds in my imagination. I think it would go in a cycle beginning with the east wind and ending with the south wind, therefore the south wind would mark the ending of a cycle and the continuous and circular nature of the Avatar universe. That leaves the west wind to be the wind of freedom and higher Airnomad ideals of detachment. Voila! Airnomand wind festivals in my imagination. I think there is one festival approaching the end of every season.

The others (especially Zuko) are reluctant to let Aang have an entire week off, but at the same time they recognize that the wind festival would be important to him. So a compromise is reached. Aang has also learned that he can get is way pretty quickly with Zuko if he mentions the Airnomad genocide. It's like when someone brings up the holocaust- you can't argue with that.

Of course Aang puts himself on a team with Katara and then makes 'rules' for the others. He wants to spend time with her and thinks they are very much a team already so it is just logical that he would make the teams in such a fashion. However I think he does want the teams to be even and as fair as possible. There was an episode where all the air nomad kids decided that Aang couldn't play with them anymore because he was the Avatar and that would give whichever team he was on an unfair advantage. Oh Aang, let me hug you. So I think Aang does care about fairness (personal desire to be on a team/spend time with Katara aside) and would be conscious of the fact that Sokka and Suki would want to go together and as two non-benders they would be at a disadvantage. But when Suki suggests that she goes on a team with Aang (for Fairness!) leaving Zuko and Katara together, Aang Does Not Want! and gets a bit high and mighty.

The lovely Irako of the Desert * waves at Irako * has directed me to the TvTropes site! Wow! thanks! That site had eaten my brain! The sites has introduced me to the concept of the unfunny or unfun one. It says they are a character who ostensibly has a serious, composed personality, but is funny because he or she is put into funny situations. Apparently this is Katara according to TvTropes, however I think it is equally applicable to Zuko. Zuko is the most serious member of the Gaang but Katara still finds him fun in his own special Zuko way.

Next chapter we will deal with the start of Aang's week of fun and the various ramifications of that.

Til then lovely readers...