A/N: Alright, so I went out on a limb here and wrote something that didn't have to do with Zuko and Katara...mostly just Zuko and Mai...I know, what is happening to me! It's all angsty all over the place, sorry about that. Definantly listen to the song Death Is The Road To Awe while reading this, it so works. It's awesome. Alright, well enjoy!

The Diary of Change/Death is the Road to Awe (Clint Mansell from The Fountain)

Zuko sat at the edge of the bed. The morning light shattered across the floor in a greenish gold glow and tinted the red walls into an unfamiliar brown hue. Questions flooded his mind, one after another but the only answer that came was the steady tick of the clock and his own ragged breath. He spent day after day, night after night, sitting at the edge of this bed waiting. Yet it was always in vain. The room was always empty and he was always alone. His breath caught in his throat as he squeezed the small book in his hands. He'd flipped through its pages countless times, reading it over and over again as though somehow the words would change. Salty tears formed at the corner of his eyes. It was a long goodbye letter of sorts. Zuko turned the page as the tears broke free and rolled down his cheeks without restraint. This was no ordinary book though, this was a diary. It was Mai's dairy. She wrote everything in it. He wasn't sure when she first started keeping one, but it seemed as though she wrote frequently in it. There was everything from what she did that day to the feelings she kept locked inside. Every word described her thoughts, the way she changed from the day he came into her life. Zuko cringed as he read the next page. Somehow the words started to morph from joys and thrills to sadness and misery over the course she kept the journal. He took a deep breath and paused in reading. The entire palace seemed empty. There wasn't a hall he could walk down where he didn't hear her name echoing on the walls, or a room where his mind wasn't filled with the sound of her voice. Zuko shut his stinging eyes. Even this room held the slightest lingering of her perfume. He shut the book on the long red ribbon that marked his place. He put the book at his side, but his hand remained locked around the bound papers. It never left his hand, not for a moment. The hot tears streamed down his cheeks, fiercer than before. Not a single day was easier. The pain racked is body in a miserable whimper. Every day they spent together, she documented. Every change he never saw, that he never notice, never knew, was written on these pages. Zuko sucked in a rickety breath and brought the book back to his lap. He opened to the bookmarked page and let the ribbon fall to the floor. The papers were beginning to change hue and his fingers were becoming brittle from turning the pages time and time again. His eyes scanned the page once more. Time faded away. He didn't know how long it'd been since she said goodbye and left him without a second glance. She walked out the door, never to return. His world crumbled and time stopped. His reddened eyes burned as he restrained his endless urge to weep. Zuko turned the page. The last page of the journal, it was a simple summary of every page. Her diary was a story, beautiful and unparalleled. It told the story of their life, how they were together, the way they lived, the way the loved. Most of all, however, it was a diary of how she changed, how the Mai he once loved died away. Zuko shut the book and set it down. The tears dried and he took a deep breath. His hand left the cover and he stood up. He walked to the desk and retrieved a pen. Zuko opened the book to the final page and scribed the end to the story Mai started. It was how he cried that night, every night since she said goodbye to him and the pain of his broken heart and the torment of the open book she left behind. He hesitated for a moment and for the first time in the longest time a smile unfolded on his tear stained features as he scribed the last words: After death, there is life.

For after death, real or perceived, we live again.

A nice short one shot.
Nothing else to say. leave a comment.

Peace-Love,

Amy.