for zutara month 2017, days five (lord and lady) + nine (tea shop) + eighteen (ba sing se) + twenty-one (matchmaking) + twenty-six (ember island) + twenty-eight (caught in the act)
look, i will never not love the idea of old people in love. especially these two old people. who deserve everything.
my lord, this reminds me of when we were young
"My Lord," she says. Aware of all the eyes on them, she dips into a bow that is not quite deep enough to satisfy protocol. Joints creak as she straightens. If she is not as spry as she used to be, she makes up for it with the mischievous smile that tugs at the corner of her lips.
"My Lady," he replies. Now he dips into a bow just a touch too deep for protocol. Unfairly, his joints do not creak.
Whispers from the surrounding crowd, who are trying very hard to appear as if they are not paying attention, grow in volume. It has been years since Lord Zuko and Lady Katara were seen together. Visits had occurred, of course, but the world had been in such turmoil recently that they had often been on opposite sides of the world. Even the lure of an open bar (a given, when the richest man in the world marries) cannot break the fascination.
"I would say protocol has been satisfied," she says.
A slow smile is the first answer he gives her. Nostalgia hangs between them, almost a third presence, as he gives her the second answer: "I believe it has been."
They're hugging before anyone can think to expect it. Katara wraps her arms around his neck and buries her face in his chest. For the first time in too long her lungs are full with the familiar scent of wood smoke and dragon fire. Zuko's arms are tight around her waist. "I missed you," he whispers into her hair. Keeping the words close. Just between them.
"Toph had the right idea," Katara says. "Going to live in that Swamp."
Republic City has a way of making her feel her age in new and unexpected ways. Things run slower in the Southern Water Tribe. Before, she had assumed that was were the disconnect lay. This visit has been longer. Now she thinks it has to do with how the people in Republic City view her. As a relic of a past era. The wife of Aang, the mother of Tenzin, the sister of Sokka. Katara has been many things in her life and it doesn't sit well to be so diminished.
Zuko lets out a rusty chuckle. "When we last visited her you tried to convince me to set the Swamp on fire."
There's no way to refute this. Katara had gotten irritated with the dreams the Swamp kept pushing and decided Zuko was her best threat against the damned place. It had worked. She should laugh, but instead she's just reminded of how things have changed since that visit. Sighing, she leans back in her chair and watches the sunset over the city.
After so many years of friendship he knows when she is truly discontent. He reaches across the distance between them and pats her hand gently. "I think Uncle had the right idea," he offers. "Buy a tea shop. Play Pai Sho. Dote on local children."
In the distance, the sky turns vibrant orange and purple. Lights flare in building windows. The probending arena lights up. Republic City never sleeps. Katara thinks of her lonely house back in the Southern Water Tribe.
"A tea shop," she says. "Here in Republic City."
"Close to the grandchildren," he agrees.
"Near the Spirit lines?"
"Of course. Makes me feel adventurous."
"We'll name it…"
"Hot Leaf Juice."
"No, Zuko."
A month later, a befuddled agent sells an old commercial building to the former Fire Lord and former Chief of the Southern Water Tribe. They are unconcerned by the encroaching Spirit territory. When he leaves, he sees that they are arguing over a large wooden sign with the name Hot Leaf Juice burned into it in precise kanji.
It happens that Zuko recalls his Uncle's beloved lucky teapot the day before they are meant to open.
The grand opening of Hot Leaf Juice is not, as many had hoped, planned as a state affair. There will be no lavish party. No glittering assemblage of the elite even though most of the elite will arrive anyway. No golden cups or saucers. But the grand open must, apparently, have Uncle Iroh's lucky teapot.
"You already won about the name," Katara says. It is mostly a protest on principle. Beneath her, Druk lets out a snorting noise that might pass for a dragon's laugh.
"We need a teapot," Zuko says. He's trying to sound reasonable. It's his only defense given that Katara is by far the more stubborn.
Rolling her eyes, she says, "We have nine." They had, perhaps, gotten a bit carried away when they went to purchase the necessary supplies for this venture of theirs. Mostly his fault, as it happened, since he actually knew what went into running a tea shop. Zuko knows when to admit defeat and therefore resigns himself to dignified silence as Druk launches into the air.
It takes them only a few hours to reach Ba Sing Se and the Jasmine Dragon. By now, no one even bothers to run for cover as a massive dragon lands in front of Ba Sing Se's premiere tea shop. The current manager hands over the lucky teapot without a word of protest. It had been an ornamental centerpiece, but he assures them that he will find something else suitable and wishes them well with remarkable placidity even after hearing the name of their shop.
Outside the Jasmine Dragon, vendors with small carts sell everything from delicate fruit pastries to even more delicate glass cranes. Katara stops to admire the wares. In her old age, she's learned to appreciate these moments. The wars have not touched everything..
"These are lovely," she announces. These are a small arrangement of fire and moon lilies, which must have been imported at great expense given the vibrancy of their petals and the richness of their aroma. It helps that the florist begins to describe exactly which portions of the Fire Nation and Southern Islands these particular blooms came from. For all that the florist focuses upon the expense, the beauty is in the elegance.
Zuko reaches across a sea of flowers to drop ten gold coins into the woman's palm. "Get your flowers," he says. He's trying to sound gruff. It's his only defense given that Katara knows exactly how much of a pushover he is.
During the grand opening of Hot Leaf Juice, Uncle Iroh's lucky teapot holds the place of honor by the counter, filled to the brim with fresh fire and moon lilies.
Hot Leaf Juice offers decent tea and excellent advice. It's a sound business model. One that will allow them to survive if the patronage that comes from people curious to gawk at aged saviors ever dies down.
Their tea shop is where Jinora comes to ask for advice on sneaking out of her room—apparently Kai only ever covered sneaking into his room—and soothing her father's incoherent bluster when he inevitably finds out. It's where Bolin works through one hundred and thirty seven marriage proposals to Opal. It's where Ikki chatters incessantly about her first crush until the servers are forced to put cotton in their ears. It's where people confess undying love, break hearts, and come to the sudden realization that what they've really always wanted wasn't to be a socialite wife but to study koala otters in their natural habitat.
"Maybe," Katara notes, "we missed our true calling."
"As koala otter preservationists?"
The first answer to this is a gentle smack to Zuko's arm. The second is a thoughtful, "As matchmakers."
"Agni forbid," he says.
But two months later Asami comes into their shop just before closing. Normally impeccable, she looks pale and rumpled, green eyes rimmed faintly in red as though she's done a great deal of crying. "Korra," she says. This is the only explanation she can managed until her third cup of tea laced discreetly with brandy.
Most would assume Katara would soothe the young woman's fears and offer insight. Most would be wrong.
Zuko sits beside Asami, pats her shoulder, and says, "I am sorry. You have made the very brave decision to love a woman of the Southern Water Tribe." He pours himself a half a cup of tea. Rather than discreetly dosing, he simply fills the rest of the cup with brandy. Noticing Asami's forlorn gaze, he nudges the bottle of alcohol her way. "Now, what you have to understand is that the vast majority of them are perfectly willing to fight the entire world with their bare hands regardless of—"
"I do not fight the entire world," Katara calls primly from the counter.
Both of her companions give her slightly disbelieving looks. It's an old, somewhat unproven legend that she discovered the Avatar by throwing such an epic fit that she had unwittingly broken several underwater glaciers. The lack of proof means little to anyone who knows her. Even now it looks like she might split the foundations of the earth if she decided it was worth the effort.
Deciding on a tactical retreat, Zuko says, "Katara does not fight the entire world. But only because she conquered it about sixty five years back. And she hasn't given up an inch of ground since."
This gets a laugh out of Katara. She heads back toward the kitchen. Maybe to get more tea. Or alcohol.
Zuko watches her go, then looks to Asami with sympathetic eyes. "You cannot contain a waterbender. Not even to keep her safe. You can only fight at her side, because she will fight." He thinks of the many battles of his lifetime and he cannot regret any of them. "Korra must fight for the world. Don't be afraid to fight for her. If you are lucky—and you are lucky, Asami—you will know what it is to have a force of nature call you her home."
Winter settles into Republic City. Bitterly cold, this year, with drifts of snow that come up to Zuko's hip. "I did not move away from the Southern Water Tribe," Katara announces as yet another snowstorm begins, "to be cold."
"Oh thank the Spirits," Zuko says. Cold makes his joints stiff, snow makes him irritable, and he's been holding his complaints back through sheer stubborn pride. Now that Katara—the waterbender born to a world of snow and ice—has complained, he can say what he's been wanting to say for over a month, which is: "Ember Island is lovely this time of year."
They leave the shop in the entirely capable hands of an Air Acolyte. "How long will you be gone, again?" the man asks. He's eyeing the couple in the corner of the shop who appear to be in the middle of a breakup, the tour group outside the windows who wave frantically at the former Fire Lord and Chief of the Southern Water Tribe, and the stack of teacups just through the kitchen doors that are in desperate need of washing.
"A bit," Katara says. Consolingly. With a motherly pat to the Air Acolyte's hand. "Just a bit. You'll be fine."
Ember Island is very lovely this time of year. Warm, sunny, with a breeze that always smells like saltwater and flowers. The sand is white gold and the sea is turquoise. Only locals remain, and they're kind to the 'sweet old couple staying out by Coral Point'.
Katara spends long hours knee deep in the shallows. "I like the water here," she says, "It's kind." When she moves her hands in the gentle patterns of her bending, as she often does, the sea rises to her biding. In her smile, there are echoes of the young girl she once was.
Zuko smiles, and says, "I like the sun here. It's gentle."
Perhaps the best thing about advanced age is that one ceases to feel shame for the small pleasures.
Katara enjoys sassing important political figures who come through the shop. She enjoys watching Zuko carefully brew tea. She enjoys teaching young waterbenders the fundamentals of combat. She enjoys learning Pai Sho with Zuko. She enjoys seeing her family, both found and blood, on a properly regular basis. She enjoys watching Zuko's morning bending practice beneath the dawn sky. She enjoys talking to spirits that answer her with songs or lights or interpretive dance.
She adores kissing Zuko.
Kissing Zuko is a hundred small pleasures. A thousand. It's the way he puts one hand at the small of her back in a move equal parts sweet and possessive. It's how he always goes back for one more kiss, soft and chaste, like he's needs something to carry with him. It's the way his neatly trimmed beard tickles. It how his eyes are warm gold. It's this: feeling young and giggly and loved as he presses a scorching line of kisses along her neck while saying she's more beautiful than ever.
"Mother!" Tenzin hasn't sounded this strangled since the birth of his first child. "What are— What is— How—"
Very slowly, Zuko pulls away from Katara. "Should I pretend I fell on you?" he asks. As if she does not have whisker burn on her cheeks and his hand is not dangerously close to her arse. "I could claim it was my bad hip." Mischief sparks in his golden eyes and she has to contain a laugh.
"I can hear you," Tenzin says.
"And you don't have a bad hip, Grandfather." Oh, that would be Iroh. The United Forces must be back in Republic City after their escort mission to the Northern Water Tribe.
They disentangle themselves slowly and turn to face Tenzin, Iroh, and Korra. All of whom look shocked. Then Asami enters, putting her car keys into her pocket likely after driving the group. She pauses, looks between the two groups in stand off, and nods consideringly. "They just realized, didn't they?"
"Yes," Katara says.
"Have you mentioned…?" What a blessedly discreet creature she is, to trail off so. Asami has always been Katara's favorite of Korra's friends.
"Not exactly," Zuko says. He puts his hand at the small of Katara's back again. When she glances up at him, she sees the same mischief from earlier has not left his eyes. Thus far they have assumed that everyone will catch on as Asami did. As Bolin and Jinora and a half dozen others did. It appears that is no longer strictly viable.
Looking back to the lineup of a handful of her favorite people in the world, Katara clasps her hands together and gives them all a beatific smile. "We live together. We own a shop together. And we happen to be married."
Asami lifts a hand to her mouth to hide a laugh.