a/n: inspired by an atla rp. rather angsty, but mai-at least, headcanon mai- is like that. so apathetic, but only to protect the fast that she cares so much. but she won't reveal everything and she's cryptic. so that's that.
title: hide me
summary: Wise men are stupid, and you're a horrible hypocrite. But we're all equal now. I see the sun. -Mai, Zuko, Katara.
pairings: maiko. zutara.
rating: M. Mai thinks some pretty gory thoughts. And people do dirty stuff behind others' backs.
word count: 1610
disclaimer: i don't own it, and i probably never will.
hide me.
.
.
.
Sunrise. It's summer. Rise and shine, royalty; rise and shine, scumbags. You're equals now. We're all judged in the morning for the last infinitesimal detail. How does my breath smell, Zuko? Like a hedgehog-cow's gnarled, decaying intestines or wintry pine? Yes, there could be a zealous axe murderer standing outside those obscenely ornate doors they won't let me throw out—but that's okay. Morning says we're all equal now. Don't get dressed in the dark—forwards, backwards—because the midwives might think you're eccentric, and you'll be mobbed faster than you can say "Sozin's Comet" or something equally stupid.
Your robe is stained. I'm the fiancée and all that is entitled to it. Hand it over to be washed. I'm your savior—yada, yada. We're all the same now. I'll hand it to some ugly adulteress to wash in a nearby river. Dress in gold.
.
There's a meeting today—and it's not sunrise anymore. The men come marching down the hill—hurrah, hurrah. The smaller ones scatter to lesser areas; prominents stay with us. And seeing as I'm your better half, Zuko, I get the pleasure of eavesdropping on all the casual discussion of carnage and mayhem, so calmly into words like they're the gentlest stream running uphill. Bizarre, how the palace never floods where we reside in a deep valley full of terrible people.
But don't mind me.
I'm harmless, serving tea to strange men who claim dominion over stranger men like it was divine right for them to decide who should live and who should die. Sacrifice a hundred—and the decision is made in a nanosecond by a man with more medals and armor than real courage.
I don't smile; I don't see the point.
.
It's noon, and this is a time for deceit. Halfway done and I'm counting the seconds to your left, Zuko. I get nowhere fast—but that's life in a cherry-nutshell. You give everything, you break the bank—all to receive absolutely nothing in return but a few halfhearted apologies. I learned early, never giving anything and receiving some charity in return: things like you and Ty Lee, and the driest cockles of world peace that slip through our weak fingers before we can get a good grip on them. I didn't deserve any, but I got them anyway because the kindest people always gone down in the end. Nature takes it course. So it goes. You're opposite—my reciprocal—Zuko. You give more than everything.
"Patience," you say, but you say it to Katara. She's perched on your right and looking smug when everyone wants to buy her love with livestock and gems. And she's beautiful, but you can't take the form of a peasant away. You can smell it in the air—and you reach out and brush her hair accidentally with your elbow. She blushes; you blush; I feel murderous—surrounded by other innocent murderers encased in the wrappers of elderly, supposedly wise skin.
Your crazy uncle sits in a woven chair in the corner. He says nothing this time. He brews more tea.
We pretend everything's right, and a silk-lined elbow strikes dark, lush tresses again. They aren't mine—and I involuntarily find a knife's handle under by own silken sleeve. Faces flush. No one detects the wrong. You're safe for now, Zuko.
I shouldn't be here.
.
I learn about history after the meeting. It's mid-day, and I page through a book about torture. It's a dusty old thing that no one bothered to look with a second thought.
Ever heard of bamboo torture?
I know—just now I've been enlightened, sitting on a comfortable chair in a comfortable place and reading so gruesomely, dissecting every word, making them scream. I can hear every victim.
The plant is malicious; it grows right through a man without thinking twice of it, through every nook and cranny of his protesting body. He screams and cries and begs, but the roots never stop sinking and the branches never stop spreading until his orifices are packed with wood, and splinters poise themselves in his pores and underneath his fingernails. He lives on with this horrible parasite inside of him—pushing, pushing until he falls apart into rags of skin and bone.
When I look up from my book, I find the window. It's been three hours. The sun is lowering to the horizon, casting the last of its rays into the palace's bamboo garden.
I remember Crazy Uncle telling me bamboo harbors stories of prosperity and youth and timeliness. But I don't think he's right, so I shut the book and return it to its neglected shelf and leave it there never to be opened again. That is my prediction.
.
There's a pain I get so often right in the pit of my stomach. It's ominous. It pulses, and I can't sense the pulsing boom through the palace walls and deep down in my ear canals.
"Precious," they say. "Keep him precious."
It's all rhythm and none of the rhyme—the same way our palace boasts all the glitz and none of the glamour.
The doctor says it could be a whole host of things: pregnancy, cancer, anxiety, common stomach flu, or nothing at all.
"It could be serious," he warns. I ignore the severity of his face and the lost serenity of his voice. I shut myself in our room and weave threads together. When I have a full row, I pull them apart and start over.
The pain continues.
It could be serious.
.
Zuko, you come in carrying a lantern. Your hair is disheveled. Katara scurried by a few minutes earlier, looking humiliated. Don't think I don't take in my surroundings.
"Mai?" you ask, and I nod.
"Mai, are you okay?" Another nod. A blank stare.
"I heard you saw the doctor…"
It's not a question, so I don't care.
You want a child, Zuko. I don't. You can't get pregnant if your will to live will not support another. I have predicted infertility—and science proved it shortly thereafter. But you still desire a child, and you'll do anything.
"Is there anything you need to tell me?" You look so anxious—like the world is hanging unsteadily, standing on uneven stilts, and a slight tremor will knock it flat on its face (And this might be entirely true for your reality. Not mine.)
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
You make the mistake of never asking open-ended questions. Our conversation never had a fighting chance. I wait for questions like "Are we still in love?" or "Do you hate me?" to pop up, but they never do. Those would be the only exceptions.
.
Don't make a scene, Zuko. I can draw conclusions. A girl can be smart, a girl can be a warrior or a soldier or an ally. A girl can hide in the shadows.
A girl can be me.
"I did something bad," you say.
And I reply, "I know."
"How?"
We're in bed. I roll over away from you and descend from the mattress, pattering barefoot across a wooden floor. I don't have to be told that it's all bamboo—every last piece of this room. I feel like I'm suffocating, suddenly, and I don't understand why. I stand with back turned, fists clenched, throat closed.
You start," Katara—"
"I know."
After a pause, "Mai, I'm so, so sorry. Please. Will you forgive me? The public can't know. I can't humiliate you or Katara. This is my fault—"
I say, "Obviously," before you can go on. I don't want a monologue.
"I'll make it up to you."
"No."
That's all it takes. You smell like a peasant—it's stuck to your skin and it won't ever come off, and its pungent stench permeates my nostrils to where they'll never be the same again.
I leave in my nightgown. I don't want to look back.
.
Crazy Uncle sees me. The sun has yet to rise again. Katara—filthy peasant—hides behind a tree. She had been pursuing guidance, and Iroh oozes it the way wound ooze pus.
He offers me delectable food for thought: "Forgiveness is a virtue, Fire Lady."
"I'm not the Fire Lady." Not anymore. I glare at Katara's tree, but she's fled. She's long gone. Maybe she can find purchase in your betraying arms.
He repeats, "Forgiveness is a virtue."
"It isn't. Some things aren't forgiven or forgotten. Goodbye."
"Hiding helps nothing."
Hypocrite. Katara did the same exact thing and no eyebrows are raised. But pointing fingers is rude—mother told me so. Mother is a hypocrite too. She pointed fingers at father and me. And you, Zuko, you pointed fingers at your sister, mercilessly. At your father. At everyone who wronged you when you were banished and especially the Avatar. You pointed so many fingers we couldn't tell who was to blame.
"There is nothing left to help." And that's the end of it. The whole place reeks of bamboo and peasant and rotting wisdom and death and broken promises and old, stupid men.
.
You never say, "Do you love me?" I would've answered yes from behind my crown.
It didn't matter, and it doesn't now either. I'm sure the peasant has a body like a fountain.
Pain warns of rain. I'm treading in mud, Zuko, and my make-up stains my cheeks with grim stripes of kohl. My knuckles turn white on the blade of a Shuriken knife. The sun inches above the horizon. I assume we'll all be equal soon—maybe in the eyes of Someone better.