AN: Depressing things are always fun, well, sometimes only…maybe. The truth is, I always thought that sad things had more meaning, so I actually enjoy writing them. And no, I have no idea where this one came from.

Hatred

Love. What was it? What made it such an unbearable emotion?

True happiness, as I had discovered, was a matter of letting that person you so deeply care for be happy, be joyful, or smile. But the thing is, sometimes you lose yourself in that bliss. What if you could hate that someone?

The worst part of life is quite ironic. Love, although it is supposed to be the best thing you could ever receive in your years, could also be the worst. It gives you the most horrible pain you could ever imagine feeling.

What a sweet, sorrowful thing love can be.

-

Fire. Fire. I felt it everywhere as it seemed to consume me.

I awoke with a gasping breath.

It was the dream again, and I absolutely despised it. I hated myself most of all for even thinking it could happen, that Ba Sing Se would occur again. I sighed to myself, trying to swipe away the tears that threatened to fall in a futile attempt. But most of all I hated myself for dreaming that it was his fault my mother died. How could I? What type of terrible person would I be if I actually believed that? But in fact, I did believe in it, for a while, in my dreams.

My head bowed into my arms as I curled my legs up to my chest on top of the crude bed sheets. Unable to stop myself, I began to sob.

It always happened some nights when I felt that I was to blame for thinking up these completely vengeful dreams, but tonight was especially belligerent, seeing as it was the early hours of the anniversary of my mother's murder.

"Are you up?" I heard a whisper from my back tell me gently. "You shouldn't be."

My sobs only seemed to grow louder and more labored every passing second, but the voice seemed to suddenly understand the situation. A hesitant touch held my shoulder and I was extremely tempted to turn around, but my actions got the best of me and I stayed in my position.

"Katara? Is there anything wrong?" At the sound of the voice, I had to turn around.

There was those eyes again, the ones that I could never ignore. They were a soft, gentle sort of gray, ones that were hardly stormy at all, but more like the dark and silver silks that sometimes were woven in grand tapestries. They took me in like they always do and a calm seemed to overtake my mind even just for a little while. Of course it didn't last long.

"You know you could tell me…if you want."

At first I was hesitant to tell him. After all, it involved him as much as it did our past and my deceased mother. But something inside me said that it was time to do so. I had to even if I was afraid to. No, I needed to do this tonight.

After finally calming myself down from my desperate sobs, I finally murmured, "I had a nightmare. You were in it."

Silence.

I took a deep breath and continued as confidently as I possibly could. "I saw Ba Sing Se again. I saw what happened in the catacombs." There was a light shuffle of a reaction in the background and I knew Aang was beginning to figure out where this one was going.

I went on. "But it was worse this time because I didn't care in my dream. I was angry. I was angry at you."

There was a pause and everything seemed to be at a sudden standstill. I didn't move, he didn't move beside me. The air didn't even seem to shift out through the windows. But the most prominent feature was the ever glowing moonlight the seeped past the wood paneling of the floor. That lone feature was the very thing that made me feel like I was in the spotlight, that everyone from every angle was observing me.

Then: "Why were you angry with me in your dream?"

His low whisper was almost hard to decipher in the beckoning silence. I could tell that he was a little scared to know that answer; as if it was really his entire fault I was even telling him something like this. I knew that wasn't true though.

Instead of saying the direct answer, I answered his question with another question of my own. "Do you know what day it is today?"

I heard him sigh and tap a finger on his knee as if in some deep thought for a while. Then he said, "It's nighttime in the middle of the week and—"

I heard Aang take in a sudden gasp. He had come to a revelation of some sort. I had a feeling that he had concluded correctly.

"Oh," he hesitated shortly, "It's today, isn't it? The anniversary?"

This time I was the one who was silent. I decided not to respond at all and let him take in his surroundings and his predicament for a moment. It wasn't his fault, I reminded myself. I had to keep myself together if I was going to tell Aang my nightmare. I couldn't blow apart to pieces and I also knew that I had brought this up so therefore I had to make sure things came full circle.

"Yeah. It is." I laughed softly and harshly under my breath, enough to hear but in a mocking-myself sort of way. "I just wanted to let you know before I tell you something horrible."

At that point it was hard for me to understand and interpret exactly what I wanted to say. My mind was whirring with all kinds of quotes and phrases I could say, some sort of version of the story that I would find to be the most appropriate to tell. It seemed like a long process but I didn't realize that it only took me a couple of seconds for me to figure out what to say.

"In my dream it was that same scene. First, Azula was shooting you down and then I was watching, but the difference was that I didn't bother to catch you. I felt like you were my enemy and I didn't move. I didn't care if you survived or not because I thought—and I really did—that you were the reason my mother was gone."

"I blamed you for everything…and I—I even hated you. I hate myself for even thinking it! How could I?"

He whispered harshly in reply, "Was it because I disappeared, you know, for one hundred years and the war started? Was it because the Avatar wasn't there?"

"N-no. I—"

Aang whispered again so that I could just barely hear him. "You can't lie to me, Katara."

"Then yes," I murmured guiltily. "Yes."

At that very moment I felt that I hated myself even more than I ever have in the twenty-five years of my life. I felt so stupid, horrified, and useless. I was my own worst enemy.

"So in your dream you blamed me for not coming on time, and in that happening you blamed me for what happened to your mother." I heard him sigh. He seemed distressed, with whom I wasn't so sure. Could it be himself, or was it me? "I still think about that time."

Curiosity struck me by surprise. "About what?" I said aloud, speaking not only in my words but also in my very thoughts.

"The war. I always think that disappearing was one of my greatest mistakes, but what if I was there? Like you told me years ago, I probably would've been killed and they would just keep killing that Avatars after that, and then where would we be?" He paused, and his sparkling gray eyes bored into mine. I felt like I was in a daze, a wonderful, graceful dance of the dreams.

"But one thing is for certain," he continued, "I wish all those people hadn't died because of me, and I'm sorry." He bowed his head and looked so ashamed that I almost wanted to come closer to his form and embrace him ever so tightly. "I'm so sorry I let that happen, Katara."

Here he was, trying to convince me all over again that it was his fault for everything. Years ago, during that typhoon, I already realized that I wanted that type of self-deprivation to stop. But the thing that bothered my wandering mind the most was the fact that I thought that some part of me did actually believe that it was all Aang's fault that my mother had to die for the sake of saving my life.

Dreams were part of our inner-most minds, were they not? If so, then some part, deep, deep, within me had secretly blamed the Avatar for every terrible event that happened. Some malicious piece of my soul, then, had to hate, but the problem was, I had to hate myself too.

How could I hate Aang? I cared for him with everything I had! I'd married him three years ago, did I not? He was a part of me.

"Why do I feel like some piece of me hates you?" I hoarsely murmured at an undertone. "But I don't hate you, and I know you shouldn't be sorry because it's not your fault!" Tears prickled at my eyes, and I think he saw them, for his expression became all the more soft. "It's not."

I felt a hand gently brush my shoulder and I generously welcomed the touch.

"I know," he said gently, "You told me during that storm, remember? I'll never forget."

Suddenly, I started to remember what I had said to him…

"You're being too hard on yourself. Even if you did run away, I think it was meant to be. If you had stayed you would have been killed along with all the other airbenders."

He had protested and retorted that I didn't know that for a fact. But I didn't want to hear it. I was so sure.

"I know it's meant to be this way. The world needs you now. You give people hope."

-

I was now desperately trying to blink back my tears. Without my noticing, I had fallen into that embrace with him that I had longed for only minutes ago. My cheeks were wet with tears, and I finally realized I was crying silently.

"You give people hope."

At that time I didn't know how powerful my phrase was, but I had forgotten it until now. But I was right back then; Aang did give people hope and that would always include me. I had figured the situation out not on my own, even though it seemed that way, but because Aang had reminded me of the past.

"Aang," I said shakily after extended moments of silence, "I think I understand now, and you helped me to find out."

"You give me hope still, and that's why I thought I hated you in my dream. I couldn't see that you were always there, even before my mother died. You were always hope, and I know that my mother believed it too. She hoped that she could save me from being killed. I hoped the war would end so my mother could rest in peace. It's hope, like Iroh usually says, that we have to give to ourselves."

I smiled into that fabric of the clothes. "You were always there, so there was never any reason to hate you."

"No," I heard him say very quietly, "That's why I never hated you."

Dreams are enactments of your mind's reality. Sometimes they become nightmares that place forth the over exaggeration of happenings that you are afraid will occur, and the facts that you don't want to come to be true.

One thing was for sure after the darkness passed: Love and Hatred were polar opposites, but somehow they always seemed to come in one package. But in the end, it was evident which would always prevail, and Hatred would constantly be purified by light.

After that night, the nightmares began to stop and the dreams began again.