Oooof, this Zutara Week challenge thing is already killing me and it's just day two. This one-shot will be shorter, definitely, lol…or at least I hope it ends up being shorter—I never know before I start writing. :(
Zutara Week theme: momentous.
This one is also a modern AU…or something. I don't know, you can figure it out. Also, there's quite a bit of cursing, so apologies in advance for those of you that are bothered.
The black star appeared first in the night, but even then everyone noticed it because it was darker than the empty night.
Science and religion tried to offer explanation, but in the midst of all the worry, someone wished upon it.
Someone wished upon a black star, and they weren't careful with what they desired.
divider
"Shit!" she cursed, even more loudly than she did the last time.
She slammed her hand twice on the steering wheel, and her car honked in return, and as sonorant as it was, it faded into the rest of the cursing and hissing on the highway surrounding her.
Why the hell was there so much traffic on a day like this?
She checked her phone for the time. She was running out of time. This wasn't good. She wasn't sure if she was going to be able to make it to him in time. This wasn't good.
Since her car wasn't going anywhere, she took her hands away from the wheel and thumbed through her phone. Attempting to call his number, she pressed her cell against her cheek and waited anxiously for a dial tone.
None was given: a message flickered on her screen explaining that there was no service available.
Un-fucking-believable.
Throwing her phone down into the passenger seat in frustration, she directed her attention up at the sky, all purple and ebony with angered scarlet and golden ribbons clustering around the half-eaten sun like starved emaciated dragons.
Her eyes squinted towards the bits of sunlight that seeped through the silver clouds.
She was worried that she wouldn't be able to tell him what was left on her lips, though with all honesty, she knew that if she eventually didn't get to see him, that it was actually all her own fault that she hadn't been able to let him know why he was never really able to leave her mind.
All this time she had been lying to herself.
And worse, she had lied to him as well.
…
She smiled, leaning against him as she pieced up more of the bread crumbs and threw them towards the competing pigeons and squirrels.
His arm was around her shoulders, protectively, and keeping her hair out of her face when the autumn wind decided to knock her bangs out of place. His body was warm, and she cradled her cheek up against his sweater, feeling invincible under his grasp.
His deep voice rumbled under his chest, and her neck sprouted goosebumps when the vibrations reached her ear.
"Katara," he started.
She didn't respond but he knew it was an invitation to continue.
"Can you be honest with me?"
Her smile started to fade from her countenance—she predicted this moment to come.
When she didn't answer, his amber eyes turned down at her, his hand fingering her left temple and encouraging her to look up at him. She did, granting her ocean eyes. She could tell in his shallowly creased forehead that the issue was serious, and that he wanted a vocal answer from her.
"Of course," she said, throwing out the last bit of bread towards the sidewalk, not bothering to piece it up. She watched as the larger birds pecked at it, fighting with each other for the biggest piece, while the smaller ones crowded around the crusts to try to pick as much as they could of it.
"Do you love me?"
She faced back into his sweater and frowned to herself. She knew this question was coming.
So why hadn't she been prepared to express what she felt?
"Of course, I love you," she answered briefly.
"I mean, you always say that," he corrected himself. "I meant…have you ever thought about…the two of us together?"
Here, she sighed quietly.
"Zuko, I really like you," she explained. "But I…I don't know what you mean. I…well, have you thought about us?"
He didn't answer, looking off to the distance, but she knew his answer already.
By now, the breadcrumbs were all gone from the sidewalk, and she took inspiration from the empty pavement.
"It's not you," she continued. "I just don't think that I'm ready for a relationship. I…just got out of one with Aang, and you know how that didn't turn out so well. I was being naïve with him, and now my friendship with Aang will never really be the same as it was before." She looked back up at him, and embraced him. "And I don't want that same thing happening to our relationship."
He didn't return the hug.
"I mean, I'm sure you feel the same way about Mai. You guys eventually—"
"Don't talk about Mai like you know her," he retorted harshly.
Not wishing to upset him further, she slid back onto her own side of the bench, removing her arms from him. He retracted his own arm, crossing both of them across his chest.
He spoke after a long painful amount of silence.
"It wasn't the same as it was with you and Aang," he said simply. "Mai and I were perfectly happy together."
"So then what happened?" she asked, and she regretted that it ended up sounding more like a mockery than just a question.
He didn't reply.
"Zuko?"
Finally, he responded, "She loved me, and she knew I loved her, but she thought that I loved someone else more."
"She thought you were cheating on her?" Katara asked, surprised, because she had never heard this. "Cheating on her with who?"
His golden eyes met her cerulean eyes.
…
God, she had never realized until now how much of a façade she had made herself.
She looked at the time again and noted that her car had barely moved 50 feet in the past few minutes.
She could run faster than whatever pace her car was trucking along at.
Quickly considering all her choices and then looking up once again at the sky, she flung her car door open and started to walk. The wheels weren't going to get her where she wanted in time, and she could see the exit she needed to get out of just a quarter of a mile away.
Some drivers gave her a hard stare when they saw her walking by, but she didn't give a shit. In fact, her car could go to hell—she just needed to tell him one thing, and that was all that was left in the world for her to do.
Her strides started slow but her footsteps widened and she found herself beginning to run, not caring that her ankles were shattering in her heels.
…
She cackled, calling out to her companion. "Zuko….come here and dance with me."
Looking over at her, he stepped away from the group of friends he was socializing with and scooped her up in his strong arms. She loosened to jelly and let herself mold against his body, her heels tripping all over his feet.
She heaved, flinging her arms around his neck and swaying them back and forth.
"Katara, you really should just sit down."
"Don't tell me what the…fuck to do," she replied, and his nose crinkled upon catching the stench of alcohol on her tongue. "Just dance." One of her arms took his arm and wrapped it around her waist. Not debating against her wishes, he did the same with his other arm and let her hold him tight against her, dress right up against his shirt.
She saw his eyes wander to check their surroundings, and this pissed her off.
"You know what I hate about you?"
His eyes snapped back to her.
"Is that you…are never…true to yourself," she slurred. "Always so worried about everyone else and what everyone…thinks."
He didn't reply, continuing to waltz her along the rhythm of the music, though her body really was just sliding along the glass floor and she was barely doing any work.
"You have to get…guts," she continued.
"You know, next time I will not drive you to a club when you ask me to, even if you beg me," he answered instead.
"Don't get…off topic," Katara hissed. "You're such a…wuss."
She could tell his eyes wanted to narrow, but he smiled, hiding Katara's drunkenness from the couple dancing next to them before carrying the two of them to a more isolated part of the floor.
"Like…I know that you want to…fuck…me."
"What are you saying?" he snarled, and she laughed because she had always thought it so cute whenever he got angry at her.
"I mean, everyone knows…that…you want to marry me," she explained.
"I'm taking you back home," he interrupted, taking his hands off her waist and attempting to pull her hands off his neck.
"Listen to me for once, you…idiot!"
"I'll listen to you back in your apartment," he declared, starting to pull her towards the door.
She dug her heels into the floor and crouched to prevent herself from moving. "I'm going to…scream," she said, in a growl. "Stay here and listen."
He returned to her side. "Okay, tell me." They moved back into a dance formation and she placed her hands around his face, pushing her lips up to the shell of his ear.
"Even Mai knew," she said, continuing from where she left off. "Remember…back…last year? You told me…she…broke up with you because…"She didn't finish the sentence, losing her track of words.
She felt his jaw tense.
"You…asked me if you wanted to…if I wanted to…be together," she added. "Why…didn't you answer your own question? Why didn't you just…tell me…that you want to be with me—everyone already…knows."
"Being together," he replied, almost bitterly, "means that both people want to."
She didn't pick this line up, per cause of the alcohol.
"Why don't you just…kiss?" and her lips grazed the corner of his mouth before he reared his head back away from her.
"Katara, I'm taking you home. I don't give a fuck about what you say," he insisted, and then suddenly he was carrying her bridal style.
She didn't like this and started kicking. "You…spineless…fuck! Why don't you just…kiss me!"
He ignored her demand, kicking the door open with his foot before going out into the night and forcing her into the car seat.
"I'm not going to do anything that you'll regret in the morning," he explained, closing the passenger door securely.
…
The dress that she had worn to work was not giving her the best gait right now, and she had almost tripped over herself twice before even coming close to the exit where she was running down the freeway.
Geez, the traffic was so bad; it was even clogging up the local roads.
She looked down at her tight dress, and then hitched it up above her knees for a few strides. Finding that more uncomfortable however, she bent down and just ripped the hem of her dress.
She didn't give a fuck anymore.
She hadn't given a fuck for a long time, since she realized that the only person she had left was him.
And now, she couldn't reach him.
Katara reached into her purse to get her cell phone, but then remembered that her phone was still on the passenger seat of her car all the way back. She cursed herself and then turned her attention back to her feet, which were not enjoying the high-heeled run.
She stopped, almost slipping on the gravel at the side of the road. She reached down and threw off her heels. The asphalt was cold under her skin.
Alarmed at the temperature of the ground, she looked back at the sky, noting that the sun had slivered away drastically since the last time that she had seen it.
Here, she realized why nothing was working.
"The lights are out?" she whispered under her tired breath, slowing her pace to rest from the run. "The traffic lights weren't working?"
Looking toward the intersection, she found an opportunity to cross and ran across the five-lane road, small sharp pebbles from the damaged road piercing her feet through her thin stockings, feeling her heart pounding as she crossed the wide road without knowing if the cars next to her would suddenly accelerate from a step too early on the gas pedal.
…
There was just something about holding his hand that she liked.
Childishly, when he wasn't noticing, she swung their joined hands back and forth like they were elementary students on a date.
She knew that when others on the street saw them pass by, they thought they were together.
And she found tricking the rest of the world so oddly fun—a secret that just the two of them shared: they actually were not together, no matter what it seemed like.
He looked up from his smartphone. "The café is across the street from here. We're on the wrong side of the road, sorry about that."
She didn't mind. "Okay."
He placed his phone back into his pocket, looking back at her with a small smile across his lips before leading them towards the nearest crosswalk. She felt him give her hand a tight squeeze before they set their feet off the crosswalk.
A blare of horns as the driver of the car about to collide into them realized that he had set his foot down on the brake pedal too late. Her eyes widened, like that of a deer in headlights and her world stopped for the moment before a strong pull to the right tripped her into his arms.
"Are you okay?" he practically shouted at her, his nervous free hand tucking her hair behind her ear and then cradled her cheek. "That was too fucking close—the damn bastard!"
"I'm totally fine; it's okay," she assured him, noting that her fingers were still fastened into his, the joints aching at how strongly he had gripped her.
And she realized then why she loved to keep her hand entwined between his fingers.
Because no matter what, he'd never let her go.
…
To her dismay, she fell, her knee hitting hard against the curb of the next sidewalk.
Recovering without minding to see if her body ended up with some sort of injury, she continued on, a dull numbness settling in her left knee that she turned to ignore.
But her pace was slowing, and she began to worry again. The shadows flickering on the sidewalk began to elongate in front of her eyes and she panicked, looking back at the sky where the sun began to look like a smile, its familiar yellow turning into a bloody red.
She still wasn't sure if she was going to make it in time.
She was getting desperate and was beginning to feel the first bursts of despair, a symptom that she recognized overtaking the rest of her coworkers the week before when the black star confused their religious sects and made them question what they knew about themselves and the world.
When paranoia bloomed, she was actually one of the last people to react irrationally—everyone else before her had succumbed to madness with the arrival of the black star.
And while that might have seemed like a good thing in the midst of all the chaos, she knew that it would have been better if she was one of the first that became superstitious about the star.
Beginning to recognize some of the closed down buildings that she passed, she found a bit of hope left in her heart to squeeze out to run the remaining few blocks, tasting iron on her tongue and feeling the sting of her open wound on her left knee, the sting of the hollow wind against her braised skin.
Further along the street, she noticed the first glimpse of his apartment building, and a sigh was elicited from her relief that she had at least made it this far. Noticing the odd shade of lighting that was cast upon the bricks though, she knew that she was nowhere close to where she wanted to be.
She needed to be at his side, now.
…
"I just need a place to stay for the time being," she explained, making herself comfortable on his sofa as he walked over to his window and looked over the skyscrapers in the horizon.
He caught her motive quickly. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Well…" she said, picking at her nails. "I was hoping that maybe you'd let me stay at your place."
"Your brother or any of your friends aren't going to help you do that?"
She looked up at him. "If your real question is why I'm asking you, I'm asking you because I trust you more than anyone else I know."
He turned his slim figure towards her, and she secretly admired the way the sunset threw shadows over his face and tight-fitted shirt, further defining his sharp edges.
"And you just assumed that I'd say yes," he finished her thought for her, crossing his arms.
Her lip twisted. "If you want to put it that way…"
Passing her and stepping into his room, "You already know that I can't say no to you," he muttered under his breath.
She laughed when she said this. "God, you make me sound like I treat you like a slave."
He took a step back from his room, a wry smile decorating his countenance. "Worse—you treat me like a friend."
Taking offense, she reached over to playfully slap him on the arm, but he gracefully slipped past the damage. She heard him open his closet and shuffle through some of his clothes, and having observed him for so long now, she knew that he was getting ready for a shower.
"So is that a yes?" she called out, lying down on the sofa.
"Yeah, but you'll have to sleep on the couch," his voice wafted from the other room.
She wrinkled her nose. "What? Why can't you take the couch?"
The closet door closed and he appeared in front of her, a stack of clothes in one hand. "Because it's my fucking apartment."
"I thought you couldn't say no to me," she insisted, sticking her tongue out.
"Every rule has an exception," he replied briefly, turning towards the bathroom.
She wasn't surprised when he later opened the door shortly after finishing his shower and dressing, still rubbing his hair dry with his towel.
"Well," he said, in reconsideration. "How long are you going to be here?"
…
Producing a key from her purse—she still had the keys to his apartment, and actually used them quite often whenever she decided to visit (barge in expected, really) him—she flicked her wrist and opened the apartment building's main door.
The lobby was a mess—letters and ads were strewn all over the place by the mailbox and the trash hadn't seemed to be emptied in a long while. She could have sworn she smelled the fragrance of strong incense burning somewhere.
Her feet blessed her for stepping onto some nice tile floor, having been roughed against sidewalk for the past…whatever amount of time—she didn't even know how long, and she didn't really care.
Hurriedly, she pressed the elevator button, only to be dismayed that the damn thing seemed to be stuck on the fourth floor after a long five minutes of waiting.
From inside here, she couldn't see the sky, but she could tell that the sun was turning into a sliver the size of the moon on its night before it became new.
She couldn't wait much longer. She had already gone this far, sacrificed this much to reach here.
He lived on the sixth floor. Just six flights could be done in a few minutes.
After three flights, she found herself exhausted, but she got angry with herself. Three flights was nothing—she had definitely had to climb higher before. And she didn't care if she had just run more than a mile trying to get here on foot in a dress without shoes—she should be able to push herself because she was so damn close.
Her time was coming to an end—she had to make it to his arms before it was too late.
…
"Ah damn," she whined. "Why did the elevator have to be out of operation the day that I decide to move into your place with all my heavy suitcases?"
"You shouldn't have brought so much shit," he said.
"That's my entire house right there!" she retorted, pointing at the three suitcases and few boxes.
He shrugged, before rolling his eyes and saying, "Women."
Pursing her lips, she decided that she might as well take the heavy suitcase for herself. "Then I'll take my own stuff on my own! Don't even bother helping me if you're just going to complain."
Scoffing, he decided not to argue with her rather hypocritical logic.
Following after her up the stairs to the next flight, he took two boxes in his arms and slowly climbed the steps as she took each step one at a time, rolling her heavy suitcase up slowly by the handle.
Right before she reached the next flight, she tugged a bit harder to finish up her run up the stairs, but unfortunately found herself tripping backwards—the strength that she had put into pulling her luggage up had not been enough. He hadn't expected this either, and fell forward in the same manner, cursing but shifting the boxes he had in his arms up onto the next platform in one last effort.
"Well, at least you made it up to the next flight," she commented, her lips just a hand span away from his face.
He laughed soundlessly through his nose once and she felt his wind blow against her sweat-matted forehead, as he adjusted his wrists to push up off her and the stairs.
"Let me do the rest, okay?" he suggested.
Her cerulean eyes caught his amber orbs for a moment though, and he hung there above her for a bit, the tips of his dark hair about to tickle her skin. Hesitantly, or rather, slowly, she lifted her delicate fingers up to his face.
When her cool touch smoothed over his skin, his eyelids fluttered a bit and he caught himself falling towards her lips with her gentle pull down towards her.
Her own eyes closed in anticipation, but she felt a drag of cool air lift from her and when she recovered her senses and looked up, she saw that he had gotten up and was already handling her dropped suitcase.
He felt her eyes on him and he didn't look up at her, explaining, "I don't want this coming between us."
She didn't know what he meant, but she was vaguely sure that this had something to do with a lie that she had told him back when she found inspiration from an empty sidewalk that was clean of bread pieces.
And she suddenly wished that those stale crumb trails back to the past didn't exist anymore.
…
Clicking the locks open, she threw his door open, flying in at the same speed as she had started running down the freeway.
He turned, taking his golden eyes off the window, surprised to see her. "Katara?"
"Zuko!" she cried, running up towards him and immediately pulling him into a tight embrace.
He seemed surprised, not able to return her hug for a moment.
"What are you doing?" she asked him quickly, but then she noticed the half glass of water in his hand, an open and empty aspirin bottle on the windowsill, and the lack of an overdose of pills in his other hand—his lips were wet from a recent drink.
Her eyes widened and she tucked her face into his chest, tears spilling from her helpless eyes.
"I love you, Zuko—and I was never able to admit that I just wanted to be with you forever!" she exclaimed, sobbing. Her hands reached up towards his face and she pulled him down for a kiss.
And it was a kiss that she hadn't realized she had needed for the longest time.
When she released his lips, she still lingered centimeters from his face, sure that he could see the tears caught on her eyelashes.
She heard him place the glass of water onto the windowsill as his hands followed her example and held her face in his hands.
"God, Katara," he said softly, his breath tickling her lips, as the last rays of the dying sun dissolved into an eternity of night.
"Why couldn't you tell me before the end of the world?"
fin
I'll tell you what the end of the world will be like.
It will be a final moment, both terrible and heartbreaking. Absolute chaos. People running as fast as they ever have, cars filling every road and freeway, phone lines backed up trying to process millions of calls, fingers flying over keyboards, thumbs texting like rapid fire, long lines of people trying to cram themselves into subways and airplanes. All of them trying to tell someone else,
"I love you."
It's not the end of the world yet, but don't wait until then to tell them. The worst thing isn't the end of the world. It's what you didn't finish-what you didn't say when you had the chance.
o.O, well I did not expect this story to turn out the dark ways it did—writing takes you on quite an adventure through the depths of your mind…the whole thing kinda created itself…you guys can make sense of this story with your own interpretations.
And I feel like I had some random Hansel and Gretel reference when Katara was flashbacking about trails of bread crumbs or some shit like that…ugh, my mind is just so strange.
In fact, I don't know where this whole idea came from. I must have been listening to Celldweller or something. It hits the theme vaguely though right? A momentous moment: the apocalypse?
I didn't write the last section btws—that came from some random post somewhere online that I saw, so credit to the person that wrote those beautiful lines.
It's a bittersweet Zutara, lol. You guys can fill in what happens next—I have another one-shot to get to. Reviews for the hungry writer?
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