The Other Thing
Summary: She knew where the babies came from. But not about this other thing. Katara and Toph have a chat about womanhood. One Shot.
Author's Note: Prepubescent boys beware—squeamish topics here.
I wrote this just to broaden the sort of sisterly relationship between Katara and Toph. It's not so much about "growing up" as it is about just having friends there to help you.
Plus, Katara needs a little sister! And Toph needs a sibling of any sort, personally.
REALLY EXCITED ABOUT THE FINALE! I will probably keep writing ATLA fanfics anyway, though. I love the characters too much to stop! Hehehe...
This is the brainchild of a sleepless night. Curse you, tasty foreign caffeinated teas!
Remember to review, and happy reading!
It is easy to say that none of Toph's companions considered her a woman…or a young lady…or even a girl. Or so she felt.
Of course, they knew she was, it was just that they never consciously regarded it as something important. Very few women in the Earth Kingdom learned to earthbend; the stances were considered manly, and rather crude. No noble woman wanted her daughter's legs far apart, sending rocks flying here and there, sweating buckets. It was an erotic, sensual, taboo vision to swallow.
This fact, besides the boyish manners the blind earthbender usually displayed, didn't prepare Katara well enough for the first woman-to-woman talk she shared with Toph. And it's not like the younger girl made it any easier. Katara realized with a keen fascination that, even when Toph's most feminine sides showed, she was still just a minuscule tomboy who was perhaps forced to grow up too fast.
But she needed Katara, even though she would never admit it. During their travels some time after Toph turned thirteen, Katara awoke to a good amount of moaning coming from the earthbender's cot.
"Nothing's wrong!" Toph had snapped through clenched teeth, digging herself deeper into the blankets.
"But, Toph—"
"It's just my stomach. I probably ate something bad. I'll be fine."
Yet Katara could trace this course with severe accuracy. So when Toph shook her awake a few nights later, she acted surprised even though she wasn't.
The healer admits silently now, on occasion, that the earthbender's opening lines had been quite comical. It was not so much that they were funny, because they were actually rather morbid. But it was the irony of the whole thing; how could Toph be so strong when she didn't know what was occurring to her?
"I'm dying," she whispered to the healer. Her head was down, curved at an angle. "Katara…" and it killed her to finish the sentence, "I need your help."
Katara didn't mean to laugh, but it escaped anyway: a low, soft chortle. "Toph, I don't think you're dying." She rubbed her eyes slowly and sat up.
Toph's mouth had stretched into a wide, thin frown. "It's the stomach aches," she stated quietly. "They're still here. But now there's…blood." She uttered this as if it were a sin, a deep shade filling her face, about to vomit.
Katara took her outside of the tent they had shared to a clearing on the campsite.
"Blood?" the healer asked casually. "Not too much, right? I'll have to dig out those cloths, and get you some gingerroot. Cinnamon bark works too, I think."
But Toph hadn't moved. She remained paralyzed, wrapped in a thick blanket, sitting on a shabby pile of rocks. Her expression seemed waxy, as if frozen. Emotionless, but somehow, petrified.
Katara realized, without Toph having to say anything, that the earthbender had no idea what was happening to her.
At first it came as a shock to the healer. In the Southern Water Tribe, girls knew all too well what to expect from their bodies at the on set of puberty. Then again, tribal women married young and were expected to have countless children, and to raise them up properly, with the same knowledge. Perhaps the Earth Kingdom is different, Katara thought. Everything there is so precise and hidden, and so sterile.
But she wanted to make sure. "Do you know what's going on?" she asked, and suddenly hated how much she sounded like a nasally teacher.
The question came out in a helpless way, a hallow, ringing note. Toph sounded like a newborn child, afraid of a newly changed world caving in around it. "Am I dying?"
Katara sat next to her, realizing she was about to explain something Toph's mother should have done a long time ago. "No, not dying," she assured, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder. "Just…uh, changing. I guess."
"How's that?" Toph was sleepy, and hoped dearly that the illness was nothing, and that she could go back to her cot soon. With an audible yawn she wrapped the blankets tighter. If she wasn't dying, everything would be fine.
"Well…" Katara blinked. Never had she imagined how uncomfortable a serious conversation with Toph would be. How was the blind bender able to tell there was blood, and that it wasn't just water? Maybe she thinks it is coming from her legs, Katara wondered. Or stomach. That's going to be a cleaning job, she thought. And as these ideas bombarded her, Katara was silent, and thinking.
"Well? How's that?" Ah, the impatience.
"Uh…" Katara started again. "Okay…when…girls kind of…" How had Gran Gran phrased it? It was Katara's grandmother, after all, who had told her of the changes; of babies, and of blood. "It's like this, Toph..." She held out her hands. "When you're still a kid, you can't have kids, right?"
Suddenly Toph could feel a lecture coming on, and knew that this was some sort of secret. Poppy—Toph's mother—had never told her about the female body, nor the female condition. And Toph, being an only child, never knew there was anything much to know. She crossed her arms. "So? What does that—"
"Just listen for a sec," the waterbender tried. "So, when you grow up, you can have kids. It's just a way of life, you see? Girls only—I mean—this would never happen to Aang, even though he's your age. Just girls." She caught herself rambling. "Does that…help?"
"No," the bender blurted, narrowing her eyes. "What does having kids have to do with stomach aches? I know all about 'the talk,' you know," she mused, quoting the air. "You picked a pretty indecent time to talk about sex, Katara."
"It's not about sex!" the healer screeched, losing her patience. There was a low grumble, and then an exasperated sigh, and then a hand to her forehead. "Look, Toph," she stated, smiling pathetically, "the same thing happens to me."
"Happens?" She didn't mean to sound disgusted, but it was the confusion more than the graphicness of the situation. "All the time?"
"Yes, every other month, since I was about your age." Katara twirled a strand of hair around her fingers. She was finally getting somewhere. "Actually, I was a little younger. In our Tribe this happens to girls younger than you. It's genetic, maybe."
Toph grunted in incomprehension.
"The point is," Katara continued, "that it will go away, in about a week."
"Well!" The earthbender stood up in triumph and dusted her hands. "That settles that, then! Good night, Katara—"
"Wait." Katara reached out and grasped her hand. "Toph…it…well, it comes back. It'll keep coming back, until you're older."
Toph stood stilly for a moment, contemplating this new quantity of information. "Like your age older?" she asked, and it sounded distressed, and almost desperate.
"More like Hamma's age older," Katara laughed, sitting Toph down again.
There was a silence, in which Katara could see the inner fibers of Toph's mind working. She had told her the broadest facts, she knew. But Toph was a clever girl, and had already fit the pieces together.
So the question escaped, because it needed to. "What is it, then?"
Katara quoted her grandmother perfectly. "It just means you're a lady now, that's all." The healer cracked her knuckles, rolled her shoulders back. "I mean, you know about sex, Toph. This is adult business here"—she noticed, amused, that Toph's face had become bright red—"If you were to marry, you'd be able to have children." And then, in her nasally tutoring voice, "You could say it…makes pregnancy possible."
"Wonderful." Toph clutched her stomach. She had never felt a pain so persistent, or so new. "This is gross," she observed silently, and then, doubled over, admitted, "I feel gross."
Katara helped her up and led her to the wash basin they had set up beside the tent. "Pretty soon it just becomes a nuisance," the older girl calmed, picking out dry cloths from the basin. "You'll have to put these on. Try not to bend too much—it'll drain you. Oh, and eat red meat whenever you can—it gives you energy. If your stomach still hurts, I can take a healing session at it, and I still need to find you some gingerroot…"
Many of Toph's companions did not see her as a woman…or a lady…or even a girl. But regardless, Toph saw them in perfect clarity through her blindness. Sitting through Katara's explanatory speech was torture, she thought. But giving the speech must have been three times as bad.
So when Katara returned with the ginger, and the clean sheets, and the words of encouragement, Toph didn't object to any help she tried to give. She merely nodded, and finally, after everything had been said and done, grew quiet. "Thank you, Katara," she stated awkwardly, rubbing her arm. It was a quick mention of thanks, but meaningful, and—Toph thought—necessary.
Katara seemed a little shocked. "What for?" she asked with a smile, realizing dimly that the sun would be rising soon.
It was supposed to be a rhetorical question. Something that girls said, in their tribe, to show they were humble. But Toph was an only child from the Earth Kingdom, and everything there is so precise.
"For…being here, I guess." There was a pause. Toph could feel the healer shift her weight. "Just a thanks, Katara. I mean, I knew about babies and junk like that, but…not this other thing." She blushed again, for feeling vulnerable. For opening up to this prissy tribal girl. For feeling girly, even for the slightest moment.
But the healer grabbed her and hugged her tightly, unexpectedly, about the shoulders. "You're welcome," Katara replied, smiling her familiar, clever smile. "Any time you need anything, you let me know, dear. Okay?"
Toph couldn't help but feel as though she had an older sister who had shared some sort of secret wisdom with her. It felt nice. Warm. Safe.
She clutched her stomach again. Most of all, it felt different.