Chapter Text
Toph liked to watch. Which was funny considering her status as the resident blind girl.
Aang had told her his old friend Boomy claimed he’d needed an earthbending teacher who waited and listened to the earth, but Toph had never had her whole existence so easily summarized before. And not just in earthbending either. Waiting and listening for an opportunity for freedom was how she’d survived her parents, it was how she’d joined Aang, and it was how she made jokes.
But sometimes while waiting and listening the joke comes together all on its own. Toph was always willing to add the punchline, but some people were the punchline of their own lives.
That was why Sokka was her favorite. She didn’t have to make fun of him (though she did do a lot of that) the universe did it for him. He’d mock an animal he was hunting only to fall in a hole and spend the whole day naming it. Buy a new shirt only for a bird to immediately poop on it. Describe a guy by his silly ponytail only to realize that same guy can kick his butt six ways from Sunday.
So, naturally, Toph was elated to learn that Zuko was the same way… at first.
Zuko got all the awful customers. Like all of them. A guy who wanted tea without any actual tea in it, check, a lady whose order always seemed to be wrong no matter how many times he filled it, ding ding, obnoxiously loud teenagers who couldn’t figure out what to order, jackpot. Give ‘em all to Sunshine over there.
And, of course, that wasn’t enough, nope. The dunderheads who were mortally offended by the rumors spreading that the Jasmine Dragon was run by firebenders all seemed to show up while Zuko was there. And all of them wanted a fight as though these idiots didn’t realize that being a known firebender in Ba Sing Se attracted a whole lot more trouble than any one of them could dish out.
And there was Aang… Just Aang. Fluttering about like a hummingbird-bee telling him stories asking questions, basically being a nuisance.
It was about two weeks after the Fire Nation’s failed infiltration that she decided Zuko’s misfortunes weren’t as funny as Sokka’s.
It was around the time she discovered, to her absolute delight, that Zuko had a bad habit of sneaking out at night. People being sneaky were the best, because that meant they had something to hide. Even better when they were carrying something suspicious while sneaking around like Zuko was.
She followed him because duh, secrets! He was trying so hard to stay in the shadows, even with the Dai Li disbanded and the city no longer under Long Feng’s thumb there was still a strict curfew in Ba Sing Se. Toph wasn’t bothered, if she got caught all she had to do was play up her blindness and claim she was lost, but an escort home would make it harder to spy on Zuko, so she was careful to stay out of sight.
She almost lost him anyway when he started climbing on rooftops. She could still feel him, but shingles messed with her ‘sight’ but his climbing up the inner wall separating the city from the farmland was loud enough she’d have been able to feel it a mile away. This was clearly a well-planned excursion because he timed it perfectly between the two guard patrols before climbing down the other side with nothing but his bare hands.
The inner wall was hardly smooth, but it was an impressive climb.
Toph just bent a hole in the wall and closed it back up herself, but y’know she was the greatest earthbender in the world and he was just a ninja firebender so she wouldn’t judge him too harshly.
Why he was wondering about the outskirts of the city in the middle of the night, however, she could judge him for because it quickly became clear where he was going and why in the middle of the night.
Because Aang probably didn’t want a firebender who’d chased them around the world visiting his beloved pet bison alone. Especially only two weeks after finding him again, and especially, especially when Aang had only recently discovered Appa’s newfound fear of fire. Toph wasn’t all that worried about it where Zuko was concerned, he was too much of a softy to knowingly hurt an animal.
But what was in the bag?
The barn they’d rented for Appa was big enough for him and not much else. Toph would have to wait outside and peek the door open to hear anything. There wasn’t any way of going inside without Zuko knowing she’d followed him.
Appa roared at him as he approached before hopping the distance between them and knocking Zuko over with licks to the face. Something he normally only did with Aang. Thankfully Zuko was too distracted to notice Toph’s giggle.
“Ah, gross. Get off. Stupid giant— Yes, I’m happy to see you too. Now get off.”
Appa didn’t get off, but Zuko climbed out from under him anyway.
“Gross.”
She felt him drop the bag on the floor before making an attempt at wiping the slobber out of his clothes. She knew from experience it wouldn’t work. Appa was weirdly interested in him, like the bison’s reactions were still kinda new to her, because half the time she’d been a part of the group Appa was missing. But he was watching the firebender carefully, and Toph could feel a hint of what might be fear in his heartbeat, but at the same time, Appa didn’t shy away or growl at him and had been oddly friendly. The fear made sense if Appa was intelligent enough to recognize the firebender who’d chased them across the world, but it was almost like Appa wanted to trust him and was giving him the benefit of the doubt.
“And now I have to burn this shirt. Cool. You’re lucky you’re cute.” Sunshine said, Appa flopped down on his belly staring intently at the firebender. Zuko sighed and knelt down next to the bag, digging through it probably, but Toph wasn’t quite sure.
“I noticed,” He continued still apparently talking to the bison, “some injuries the other day. I was going to assume Katara would handle it, but I’ve recently discovered you’re family is disgustingly incompetent. So I figured I’d better at least take a look.”
He stood and held out something Toph couldn’t identify but from how excited Appa was to eat it, it was probably fruit of some kind. Toph took advantage of the noise to sit down more comfortably. She couldn’t really tell what Zuko was doing next, but it probably involved looking for said injuries.
“What’s wrong with Appa?”
Sunshine screamed and clutched at his heart his pulse skyrocketing as Toph smirked at him. Appa roared a hello but didn’t bother getting up. He’d been more friendly greeting Zuko. No fair.
“What,” he breathed trying to avoid a heart attack, “are you doing here?”
“I followed you,” she said like it was the easiest thing in the world. “Scaling that wall was pretty impressive, by the way.”
He hesitated, “thanks.”
“So what’s wrong with Appa?”
“Oh… Um.” He shifted his weight and kinda kicked the bag behind him like she couldn’t already feel it there. “I kinda noticed some burns and uh, blood. Y’know… last time.”
“Do you regularly visit our pet in the middle of the night?”
“No. That was when I—Is there a reason you were following me?”
“It was fun.”
“Right.” Sunshine’s heart reached safe levels of speed, finally. “I just wanted to make sure he healed properly.”
“Because he’s cute?” she teased.
“Yeah.”
Appa licked Zuko again.
“Appa thinks you’re cute too.” Toph laughed.
Zuko just groaned. “Great.”
“Well. is he all better?” Toph approached pretending to look over Appa with her eyes. Zuko hadn’t figured out she was blind yet, and she was curious as to how long she could fake it. So far so good.
“Um…”
Toph could feel him doing something next to her, but again couldn’t quite make out what it was. Almost like he was petting Appa, but that wasn’t quite it either.
“Most of it is scar tissue by now, and he doesn’t seem to be in pain.”
As he was looking at Appa, Toph kicked his bag. The vibrations telling her it was mostly more fruit, maybe in case, Appa was less than thrilled to see him? But there was also something metal in there, his swords? Probably, he was out after curfew.
“Someone took care of it before I found him. And I doubt it was the Dai Li.” He muttered and Toph stopped peeking through his stuff.
“You found him?”
His body responded to the lie before he even said it. “Um, no.”
“Where was he? Why didn’t you say anything?” Toph poked him, hard and he whined like a sissy.
“Because we’re not friends…” he said, and Toph was surprised to find that he was lying about that too. Huh.
“Yes, we are. You’re just stupid and don’t know it yet.”
He didn’t reply just turned away from her and picked up his bag emptying it of fruit for Appa, who ate it happily and threw it over his shoulder.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
She gave a frustrated grumble before storming out of the barn herself catching up with him.
“Well, you’re walking me home first.”
“No, I’m not.”
“It’s your fault I’m even out here.” She latched onto his arm and he tried to shake her off, tough luck she was stronger than him because she could hold on like no one else.
“No one asked you to follow me.”
“If you walk me home I’ll earthbend the wall so you don’t have to climb over,” She offered and he stopped trying to shake her.
“You can do that?”
“Sure, easy.”
“Fine,” he said pretending as he’d ever had an option.
She didn’t need him to walk her home, of course. She was more than capable, but the way he’d denied their friendship while clearly wanting to be friends struck something in her. Toph wasn’t sure what, but she got the feeling she wasn’t the only one who’d grown up lonely.
Plus his uncle was super nice and cared about him a lot and that was really sweet so someone had to protect the squishy prince ninja.
It was just after they crossed the wall that she realized just how much the universe hated Zuko. Because there was no other explanation for them running into one of the previously mentioned firebender hating dunderheads with a group of slightly drunk friends. They were in the upper ring after curfew! What even were the chances?
Zuko wasn’t even surprised.
“Back off.” Sunshine actually stepped in front of Toph. He didn’t even know she was blind yet, and he still thought he needed to protect her.
“Well well well, if it isn’t the little ashmaker. What are you
Attempt #2
Zuko didn't know Toph was blind.
Sunshine's reactions were easy to figure out. Like he was as transparent as Aang. Aang talked so much that there wasn't any guessing involved in reading him, Zuko talked too, just not with his mouth.
And she knew that, despite Sokka's claims to the contrary, he had a sense of humor. It wasn't a well-developed sense of humor since he never actively practiced it, but it was there. She could feel the tell-tale signs of a repressed laugh in his lungs or hear the dry sarcasm that Aang always missed.
And for some reason, he hated it when he didn't get the joke.
That's how she figured out he didn't know. She made a blind joke to Katara when he was taking their order and his insides did that weird flip-flop between irritation and embarrassment that told Toph he didn't get it.
There was a novelty.
Toph had always thought she could pass for a sighted person if she wanted to but anyone she’d ever hung out with had known she was blind before she even met them. Her parents seemed to think they needed to warn everyone they let her come in contact with and even her friends had heard her stage name before she got the chance to test out her theory.
“Your eyes make it kinda obvious,” Katara told her when Toph brought it up on their way back from the teashop. They’d felt it best to leave when Aang accidentally knocked over Uncle’s pai sho table in the middle of a game. Even Uncle was started to get frustrated with him by then.
And no one wanted to witness an angry Uncle.
“But then, your bangs are always covering them, so I guess I can see how he missed it. He’s a lot taller than you.”
“I wanna see how long it takes for him to figure it out.”
“I don’t know Toph. Maybe we should just tell him. I don’t think he’ll think it’s very funny.” Katara led them down into the middle ring probably to do some shopping.
“Don’t you dare. It’ll be hilarious.”
“For you maybe.”
“What color is his hair?”
“Toph I’m not going to help you make fun of Zuko.”
“Ugh, you’re no fun. I’ll ask Sokka. He’ll help me.”
“I’m plenty fun,” Katara yelled after her as Toph ran off towards the palace to find Sokka.
Sokka was all for it. She learned that Zuko’s hair was super dark brown, almost black. Black being the only color she could identify helped a little. His eyes were gold, which was the color of money… apparently, and he wore green while in the city which was the color of plants.
Colors were weird.
Sokka also told her his hair was overgrown, kinda like her bangs, and he was really pale. She already knew he had a scar over his eye and his relative body structure.
So essentially she knew more about what Sunshine looked like than her own mom.
She’d have to try harder to look at him while talking to him but that wasn’t that hard. Her feet could see his height and location and she’d gotten this far without looking him dead in the eye.
She could totally fake it.
She had to threaten Aang to keep him from spilling the beans. He didn’t want to lie to his new sifu. Toph didn’t have to remind him that Zuko wasn’t actually his teacher yet, but she did anyway.
The next day she told him he looked nice and it was incredible how fast he got suspicious over one complement.
“What was that for?” he asked and his weight shifted as he crossed his arms. She made sure to look in his direction. Not at his face, that would be weird since she hadn’t bothered yesterday. Didn’t want to make it obvious something had changed.
“Nothing, I just thought you should know. Did you do something with your hair?”
“No.”
“Huh, maybe it’s just the light.”
Why was he even more suspicious now? Seriously, it was just a compliment. Toph figured it was safest to just order and not risk him looking too closely. Just because color was so important to people who could see she ordered green tea.
He gave her her tea and then avoided her the rest of the time she was there.