"Why are we here again?" asked Katara. She stopped, crossing her arms, demanding an answer. Her brother, Sokka, turned back around in confusion.
"It's my day off, and it's a nice day too. Now come on, we're wasting time." He dragged her by the hand down to the lake's edge, and slung his backpack into a small rowboat.
"Oh no," Katara said, backing away hurriedly, but it felt wrong somehow. She knew in her bones that the water wanted to pull her closer, and she found it as hard to resist as an undertow. And that scared her more than her brother's antics. "I'm not getting in that thing. Do you even know how to work a boat?"
"Yeah, of course I do," Sokka said. He stepped into the boat and adjusted one of the oars, which popped out of its rest and splashed into the water. Katara laughed, but when another person's voice joined in, she yelped and spun around.
An old man was sitting on a park bench set further back from the shore. He grinned at her, and she couldn't help but smile back. As Sokka fiddled with the boat, she watched as the old man broke up a loaf of bread and fed the ducks. He felt her watching, and looked up. "Nice day, isn't it?" he asked. When she didn't answer, he waved his left hand, which was holding the bread. "I'm Grandfather Aang," he said.
"Who's grandfather?" she asked.
"Hmm…I never thought about that…" he said. "It just has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"
Katara laughed. "I'm Katara," she said. "And that's my brother Sokka." Grandfather Aang nodded, then studied her face.
"You look very familiar," he said. "Have we met before?"
"No, sir," she replied. "I'd have remembered."
A flock of ducks flew overhead, calling to each other as they flapped to greater heights. Grandfather Aang tilted his head back to watch them. Katara couldn't help but feel sorry for him. He was very old, over a hundred by the looks of it, but there was something…
"I wonder what it would be like to fly," Grandfather Aang said, still watching the retreating ducks. "Not in a plane, everyone's done that. But to really fly! That would be something, wouldn't it?" He smiled at her, but it didn't reach his eyes.
Katara's breath caught in her chest, but Sokka spoiled the moment by coming up. "Katara! Leave the guy alone, all right?" He dragged her away, and muttered under his breath, "Crazy as a loon, that one."
Katara yanked her hand away. "He is not!" she hissed.
"Are you coming or not?" asked Sokka, walking backward as he waited for her decision.
The next thing he knew, he tripped into something soft, something that yelled out a "Hey!" as he fell on top of it.
Katara went over to help the two parents untangle their child from Sokka, and they were shouting at him to be more careful, but when the girl, for that's who Sokka had fallen on, snapped, "Can't you watch where you're going, since I can't!" they both fell silent, glaring at Sokka instead.
Sokka did a double-take as he put a hand under the girl's left elbow to help her up. "You're blind?" he asked.
"Yes." She shook him off. "But I don't needyour help!" And she stood up by herself. She brushed the dirt off her clothes, or tried to, and scowled at Sokka's left ear. "I can take care of myself!" She turned and took a step, but there was a rock in her way, so she tripped, and would have fallen, but Sokka caught her, and set her back on her feet.
"Just stay out of my way," she said, but she didn't put as much bite into it.
Her parents instantly swooped down on her and led her down the path and out of sight.
Katara frowned at her brother. "Way to go, Sokka," she said, but he wasn't paying attention. He slowly made his way back to the boat, but she turned to look at Grandfather Aang. He was smiling at the blind girl.
When he noticed Katara watching him, he said to her, "That girl's got a lot of spunk."
"Yeah, she does," she agreed. She wanted to ask him a question, but it didn't make sense, and she'd only known him a few minutes. Oh, why not…
"Katara!" Sokka called. "Come on!"
"Bye," she told Grandfather Aang. "It was nice to meet you." She walked quickly down to her brother, but she took one last glance over her shoulder. He was bowing to her.
She bumped into someone. "Sorry," they both said as they corrected their paths, but they held gazes a second too long. He was a few years older than her, and very handsome except for a scar on the left side of his face.
She looked away, blushing slightly, and finally made it to the boat. She jumped in without a second's thought, and Sokka pushed off from the shore. It would be a silent trip to the center of the lake.
The young man with the scar shook his head slightly, then noticed Grandfather Aang watching. He scowled, jammed his hands into his pockets, and set off down his original path.
Only Grandfather Aang was left. He felt very strange, as if tiny pieces of his soul were being carried away by everyone he had just met. The young Katara was carrying away a large part of it, but Sokka, the blind girl, and even this scarred man each had a tiny piece too. He closed his eyes against the warmth of the sun. He could still see Katara laughing. She really did remind him of someone.
Ah well. It didn't matter.
He fed the rest of the ducks, then set off, gripping his cane with careless ease, as the wind seemed to push him westward in the direction the flock had flown.