Work Text:
When Zuko first wakes up, it’s dark.
And by dark, he doesn’t mean his surroundings are.
It’s his vision that’s dark. As in, he can’t see no matter how much blinking he tries to do.
It’s only when soft huffs of amusement tickle the skin of his cheek, that he soon catches onto the very reason for his sudden blindness.
A smile rises onto his own face, and he rolls over on the bed with a swing of his arm reaching out. His hand feels the slide of smooth skin and he drags Toph towards him, the woman yelling aloud at such rough treatment.
“Hey!”
“Hey yourself.” Zuko mumbles back sleepily, wrapping his arms around her waist and snuggling up against her chest. He can’t quite exactly see where on the bed they were, but it was a big enough bed to fit their tangled mess of limbs and contact.
“You’re horribly clingy this morning.” Toph remarks as her fingers run through the roots of his hair. The sensation of her nails scratching through his scalp sends delightful tingles down his neck, with her hand soon reaching the very cloth that kept him blinded.
She gives it a light tug and Zuko only tightens his grip, clinging onto her even more.
He enjoys the peace of the moment. The two of them in bed, bare to the world just as they had made their own souls bare to each other all those years back. He could feel the fabric of the thin blanket that veiled them from any eyes that would have wandered, should someone even dare to interrupt their isolated bubble in the morning.
No responsibilities are coming to nab at their sanity just yet, and Zuko lets himself soak in such a pleasant thought.
“... Where did this idea come from?” He finally asks after the curiosity grows stronger than his drowsiness.
“What idea?” Toph asks playfully, acting oblivious to his very obvious question.
He nibbles at the skin of her stomach instead, and she squeals.
“Oi, stop that!”
A hand smacks at his face, and he squeezes around her even tighter.
“And let go of me!”
He settles in the resounding laughter of the very woman who chose to blind him on this peaceful evening. She always had the ability to make him blind to everything but herself with her sheer presence, and this moment is no different despite the sash wrapped around his head.
Her laughter rings even clearer to his ears with the darkness that engulfs his vision, and the clarity of her joy makes him finally release his deathly grip around her.
“Finally!” Toph cries out, shoving him off her before the sounds of the bed rustling follow her triumphant sounds. Zuko pats around the mattress where she once was, only to feel an empty space and a dying warmth from her absence. Footsteps tap out against the stone flooring of their room soon after, and he stops in his pointless search.
“... Where are you going?” He calls out, the end of his words reaching just the edge of sulkiness.
“Far away from you.” She teases smoothly, her words alone making his chest spasm with a tinkling sensation. Zuko can’t tell if he is reacting more to the teasing tone in her voice today because of the woman’s amusement at his blindness or the blindness itself.
He isn’t necessarily complaining though.
“Where did you get this anyways?” He asks, sitting up on the bed and lightly touching at the fabric tied around his eyes.
“You can’t tell?” Toph asks from afar, traversing throughout their bed chambers by the sound of her footsteps. Despite the light tone in her voice, Zuko senses the challenge that the woman has laid at his feet.
What kind of partner would he be if he weren’t to take it?
He hears the click of the door, then hush whispering between her and the servant waiting outside to serve them as they did every morning.
Such noises fall dull to his ears however, as he raises his hands to his face to rub the material of the sash between his fingers.
It is definitely familiar, there’s no doubt around it. His fingers slide against the smooth silkiness of the fabric and as he rubs the material between his hands once more, he finds himself reminded of a similar sensation when he and Toph were traversing through the bustling stalls of last year’s Fire Festival.
At a particularly bright stall with numerous kinds of accessories and colours to offer, Zuko remembers running his fingers through every headpiece, necklace and ornament laid out.
Before settling on a simple but quality sash, as red as the festival’s decorations throughout the streets.
He remembers tying it around the waist of the very woman who had left their bed all too soon, and how she had made the effort to adorn that very sash to all of her outfits following that night.
The sight of his red against her green always leaves a warm sensation to settle in his chest.
Except, the red sash isn’t on her at this very moment.
His hands drop to his lap.
“Toph.” He calls out, almost a whine with how he drags out his words. Only the sounds of light rustling respond back, the woman clearly ignoring him to dress herself instead. “You can’t take this off.” He complains loudly, and his purposeful immaturity finally gets her to respond with a casual retort.
“Oh, shut it Sparky. As if you’re wearing it the whole day, you wouldn’t survive a day being blind.” Her words hold little doubt in their tone, spoken candidly as if there was no chance he could spend even a day in a world that she spends her whole life in.
And because of that, Zuko goes still from where he sits on the bed, with another challenge newly laid at his feet.
“Y’know, me saying that wasn’t exactly a challenge.” Toph remarks dryly from where she sits.
With his vision still engulfed in darkness, Zuko is pretty sure she is sitting in front of him on the floor, across the low table he is seated at. Rather than have their meal at the extravagant dining room of the royal palace, the two of them have long since shifted their routines to enjoy breakfast in their chambers instead.
A low table had made itself permanent within the room, making it so that Toph could eat her meal with ease on a floor of stone rather than the woodboards of the dining room.
The servants had just left after setting up their breakfast for the day, giving them a last moment of peace together before Zuko would be hounded by his royal ministers and Toph by her training officers. If any of the servants had noticed the red sash wrapped around his head, none had taken the chance to comment on it. At least not in his presence.
He’s pretty sure there are waves of gossip and rumours already traversing throughout the inner court, but Zuko does not plan to pay them any mind, just as he does now to Toph’s judgement.
“Saying what?” He plays innocently, and an unconvinced hum is returned at his act.
“Alright, suit yourself.” Toph brushes off, and sounds of cutlery being picked up follow. Which ... is something new that he is going to have to navigate around.
Zuko extends his hands out in front of him slowly, grasping at the air before his fingers tap against the side of the table. He begins mapping out the setup on the table in front of him, almost knocking over a cup of tea and possibly sticking his finger in his bowl of rice.
He bites the side of his cheek, tempted to take off the sash for just a moment to see the placement of the dishes and cutlery.
Only sounds of eating come from Toph, clearly holding no empathy for his attempts to eat. With that fact, Zuko takes a deep breath and resolves himself to continue in his awkward patting of the table.
She could at least say something with how hard he is trying.
It takes another minute of struggling on his end for Toph to finally say something.
“Spirits, you’re a mess.” She sighs loudly and Zuko perks up at her words, hearing the fondness in her tone despite the mockery used to mask it. He hears some shuffling approach him, quickly realising that the woman had moved around the table to sit herself closer to him. “Here, ah.”
At her urging, Zuko opens his mouth and food is gently placed inside soon after.
Komodo chicken, yum.
He opens his mouth again soon after, bringing out a noise of amused disbelief from the women beside him. A salted tomato-carrot follows, and he hums happily at the crunch of the vegetable.
This continues quietly with Toph continuing to feed him and herself in parts, while Zuko happily enjoying the spoils of his stubborn decision.
“I like this.” He says aloud, as Toph chews upon her own bite of food.
“Of course you do, you spoiled fire flake.” She remarks with a half-full mouth. Then, her hands grab at his own before he feels the thin shape of chopsticks being put into his grip. “Here, your utensils. Now figure it out.”
Zuko would be staring down at the utensils in his hand if he could.
Rather, with himself blinded right now, he simply sits in place with a pout he hopes is visible to Toph’s seismic sense. He hears the sounds of her cutlery clinking about, as she eats without paying him any mind.
He pouts even further, and she only eats more.
“I don’t like this anymore.” Zuko finally speaks up his displeasure, and it pulls a single laugh from the woman beside him.
“Oh, how sad for you.” Toph drawls back, before she gulps down on her tea. Zuko sits in place expectantly, still waiting for the other woman to continue feeding him. Instead, sounds of shifting follow before he hears her moving throughout the room.
“Where are you going?” He asks curiously, trying to keep his ears out for the noises that travel throughout their chambers.
“I’m still in the room with you, Sparky.” She reassures with little tenderness in her words. Her footsteps travel throughout the space with an ease he could barely replicate in his own gait, despite his residence in this very room outlasting Toph’s time here.
“This is kind of unfair. You still get to see through your bending but I can’t.” Zuko huffs aloud, dropping his utensils on the table. He leans himself to one side, an elbow upon his knee and a hand against his cheek.
“And who made it that way?” She asks from above, just behind him and much closer than he could even notice.
Her hand suddenly grabs at the top of his head to shake him about lightly.
Zuko is barely able to raise his own hand to catch even the tips of her fingers before she vanishes from behind him. A part of him is tempted to call for her back, no matter how much grovelling it would take but fortunately, Toph continues to speak as she steps away.
“Here, how about this?” She suggests much to his unawareness and Zuko’s brow furrows at her words, confused.
Then, a ringing reaches his ears. A very familiar ringing.
It is the same soothing sound that Zuko hears in every step he takes throughout the palace. Such ringing acts as a reminder of who he returns to after a horrible day stuck in council meetings. The peace that he regains from the sound alone is from one small keepsake that he keeps on his person at all times.
A jewel in the colour of seafoam, a pale green that could barely compare to the mischievous gleam of Toph’s eyes.
However, it does well enough to comfort Zuko throughout the day, especially during times when he didn’t have her by his side. It had been bought by the woman herself, from a small artisan store in the quiet corners of Ba Sing Se, during one of their many visits to the Earth Kingdom to check in on his uncle’s tea shop.
And to spend some well-desired time together alone away from the palace, but his uncle didn’t need to hear those details.
The chime of the accessory pulls him out of his reminiscing, as Toph’s footsteps approach.
“A trade for the day.” She hums as she plops down next to him, the ringing of the jewel coming from her person as she shifts in spot. “Or until you give up on this childish act.” Her teasing does little to embarrass him, as he focuses more on the press of her body against his side as she leans towards him. “Now go back to eating, I want to hear you struggling like a baby for the fifth time.”
Zuko lets out an exasperated sigh, one more playful than anything else as he fumbles to grab at his utensils for the hundredth time.
When the ringing of the jewel is accompanied by the chime of her laughter, he finds himself smiling despite his clumsy motions, grateful for the sash around his head.
All for the simple reason of being able to hear the joy in her voice ever so clearer.