Work Text:
Katara
Sometimes, I wish my waterbending allowed me to tell the rain when and when not to fall. For example, not fall when I’m out at Ember Island’s market and I have to completely hide my waterbending. That way me, Zuko – (he was accompanying me to the market today) – and our groceries wouldn’t get soaked. But, then again, some things you can only wish…
“Urgh!” I groan in frustration, doing my best to squirm closer to Zuko while he uses his cape for covering the two of us from the heavy raindrops.
“A waterbender that doesn’t like the rain?” he comments with a small grin, watching me glare at all the drops individually. “Now that’s ironic.”
“I’ll let you know that I love the rain,” I counter, returning his smirk. “It’s just a little… troublesome when I can’t make it stop by myself.”
“Yeah, that is difficult when you are undercover inside the Fire Nation.”
“You and Sokka would make a great detective agency together.”
Now it’s his turn to glare at me. “Funny,” he deadpans.
My smirk grows pronounced.
So does the rain.
“We should wait until this passes for returning to the house,” Zuko suggests.
We walk over to the side of a building; me, trying to not get my sandals and the edges of my skirt wet by stepping on the ponds – which is a whole lot difficult when the water has taken over the entire ground. The building’s rooftop is large enough to provide a shadowy, dry space for us. Too bad is not also a warm one, because I’m freezing!
And the worst part is that I can’t embrace myself because I’m carrying the groceries!
Prrrrrrrr!
“You are going to catch bronchitis like that,” Zuko says, already taking off his cape and putting it over my shoulders.
The tremble that was shaking me eases upon the comfort and heat of the fabric. Although is a little bit too hot for mere cloth. Must be the lasting impression of Zuko’s body heat.
“Shouldn’t you keep your hood on, too?” I ask, standing stock-still staring at his face while he ties a knot around my neck for securing the cape. “Since we are undercover and all.”
“Don’t worry about that,” he answers, “There is nobody on the street now anyway.”
“Won’t you be cold?”
His chest heaves with a deep breath, his mouth exhales a soft flame that fades easily with the cold wind. “I don’t think I will.”
One of my eyebrows arches. “That’s pretty cool.”
“You should have come with Sokka and me to the Boiling Rock, I had to use fire breathe a lot there. Um… you want to carry the groceries for you?”
I hesitate for a moment. (He is already being so nice; I don’t want it to feel like I’m taking advantage.)
“No, it’s okay,” I say. “I can.”
He only nods. A raindrop slides from his hair, down the outline of his nose, and towards his mouth. It is still honestly amazing to see him like this compared to how he was before, it’s like all the changes he went through on the inside reflected on the outside. His hair is not only longer, his skin is also fresher, more glowing; his factions look better defined and more elegant without his former everlasting scowl. Yet, he is skinnier and paler than he was before as well.
Not all changes – even good ones – come from the best circumstances. I have learned that, the changes I have had to endure this year mostly came because of my own feelings of anger and pain.
It makes me wonder… maybe I could have related to Zuko earlier, maybe I could have tried to reach out to him then.
I didn’t.
Remembering everything properly, I think we were still too different at the start.
But I like this new person that he is now.
I am a new person myself. The two of us are working through our respective new selves. Maybe that’s why we get each other so much better now, why we are always so close. Because it’s difficult to confront the world around you when you’re still deciphering who you are in it and whether that is the person you want to be. Zuko and I know how that feeling, we share it.
We feel together.
Another raindrop falls from his hair to land on his lips. It’s hard to not stare at them like that.
“What?” he asks.
I shrug. “Nothing.”
It is nothing. Nothing visible, nothing tangible what is pulling me closer to him.
Yet I still feel that pull, and I follow.
The echo of the rain booms when my mouth finds his. The raindrops keep on drumming against the earth while we kiss; his hands come to cradle my face while I drink the rainwater from his mouth. His palms are hot and soft. All of him is.