So this is going to be a quick two-shot for Taang week using the prompts from Day 4 and 6. (Shy and Ecstasy) Please let me know what you think of it as this is my first attempt at a Taang fic. Hope you enjoy it!

The italics are thoughts...

Insert disclaimer here

If I Only Could

"Come on Twinkletoes," Toph called impatiently, "It's time for your earthbending lesson."

"Coming," he answered, his voice carrying over the camp.

Finally, after what seemed like a long time to Toph, the energetic airbender danced around Sokka's tent and approached his sifu.

"Hey Toph," he greeted cheerfully, "let's go."

Wordlessly, Toph turned, hiding her smile at her student's perpetually upbeat and positive outlook, and shrugged her shoulder, motioning for him to follow her into the canyon below.

Descending between the two sheer rock races, Aang could not help but be impressed by the grandeur of it. The many layers of rock, compressed over the ages, were arrayed in a rainbow of hues ranging from an almost bright red to a deep, chocolate brown. Approaching the bottom, he noticed a small, bubbling stream running through the middle and descending over the far edge of the canyon.

Despite the magnificent surroundings, Aang's mind soon wandered to the earthbender in front of him. He had known Toph for a while time now and they had grown very close over the years, but it was only recently that he had begun to have feelings other than the normal, friend-to-friend feelings he was used to having. Silently, he admired the sway of her small hips, the soft curves of her body, and her silky, raven hair that she often kept up in a bun. On occasion, when they were training, some of her hair would come loose and fall across her shoulders, and it was in moments like these that Aang realized how truly beautiful Toph was. He longed to hold her tiny hands his, if only for a brief moment.

"Yo, Twinkletoes, anyone home?" Toph called, flicking a pebble across Aang's forehead.

Mentally chastising himself for losing focus—and for calling anything about Toph tiny—Aang smiled, rubbing the spot on his arrow that Toph had hit,

"Yeah," he answered, "I'm here. So what are we doing today?"

"We?" Toph laughed, "We are not doing anything. You're going to go through all your stances and I am going to correct them when you screw them up."

Aang groaned, he hated review days, but Toph insisted they were necessary if he was going to be able to do the more advanced earthbending forms. He still struggled with the basics now and then, so he understood Toph's reasoning, but he still would have preferred to spar or train with his sifu rather than simply going through the many stances he needed to perfect.

"Ok, horse stance," Toph called.

Aang got down into his stance, feet splayed wide, weight on the balls of his feet. Toph circled him, once, twice, and then nodded her approval and motioned for him to continue.

Aang had been going through his stances for almost thirty minutes when he finally hit a snag. Toph had told him to go into the platypus bear stance, but Aang, being hot, tired, and drenched in sweat from exertion and the hot sun was not up to Toph's exacting standards.

"Twinkletoes!" she yelled, "Straighten your back, stick your chest out! I want your arms up by your shoulders, not by your waist! Come on, we've been working on this one for at least two weeks now. You should have mastered this already."

Sighing, Aang dropped his stance and took off his shirt to mop his brow.

"Toph," he began, "Can we take a break soon? I'm tired and fed up with these stances. Can't we work on some more advanced moves?"

"No!" she belted, coming within a hand span of Aang's now bare chest. "We are going to continue doing this until you get it right. Now, back into your stance; we have work to do."

Begrudgingly, Aang took his stance again, hoping to pass Toph's discerning eye. As usual he didn't.

Toph had been circling around Aang's back, feeling his position through his vibrations when she noticed something was off. Coming around to face him, she placed both her hands on her hips and did her best to glare at Aang.

"No Twinkletoes! What did I tell you? Stick your chest out!" she yelled.

As if to emphasize her point, she reached out with her hand and placed it on Aang's now bare stomach. She had meant to push his stomach back to force him to stick his chest out, but had neglected to notice that Aang was now not wearing a shirt. When her hand came into contact with his taut stomach, she stopped in shock, as if an electric current was now passing through her body. Since when did Twinkletoes have abs?She thought, forgetting that she was supposed to be correcting Aang, not admiring his flat stomach. Idly, she began running her hand further down his stomach, approaching Aang's beltline.

When she had gotten a little too close for comfort, Aang finally spoke up,

"Toph?" he began uncertainly, "What are you doing?"

Startled from her revere, Toph pushed Aang's stomach hard, causing him to fall backwards onto the dirt.

"Nothing!" she started defensively, "I was…just…wondering why you were so sweaty. Now go splash around in the river for a bit. I need a break."

"Ok," Aang grinned, happy to be taking a break from training. But still, he couldn't help but notice the disappointment he felt when Toph's hand had left him. It had been like they were connected for the briefest of moments; it was a feeling Aang didn't realize he wanted until he had experienced it for the first time.

Toph, meanwhile, was silently berating herself for her the slip in her previously ironclad composure. How could I be so stupid? She thought. I basically spent five minutes running my hand up and down his stomach. What does her really think of me now? Why didn't he take my hand away?

As all these thoughts ran helter-skelter through Toph's mind, she couldn't help but acknowledge that she had actually liked feeling Aang's smooth skin. A small blush rose to her face as she tried to fight it down. She, Toph Bei Fong, did not like anyone. She was her own woman, and would not allow herself to be tied up by any emotion.

As Aang bended water over his shoulder, ridding his body of its' casing of sweat, he pondered what he had thought about earlier on the walk down. He wanted to spend more time with Toph—just him and her—not with Sokka's annoying jokes or Katara's prying eyes. He wanted to ask her on, well he wasn't sure if he could call it a date, but he figured it was closer to date than anything he had gone on before, and being in this canyon had given him an idea. If her touch and been electrifying, think about what her lips—he stopped the unbidden thought, mentally reprimanding himself. He couldn't let himself continue on that train of thought when he had bigger problems to worry about. Because unfortunately, he had no idea how he was going to do ask her, or if he even had the courage to approach Toph with the suggestion in the first place. But, as he watched his earthbending master pace back and forth, lost in her own thoughts, he couldn't have been more certain that he wanted to. If I only could…