He ran up to her breathlessly. "Hello, it's good to see you after all these years."

She looked at him puzzled. "H-hi…"

He tilted his head. "You do not remember me?"
"No, I do. It's just, I haven't seen you in so long, and it's odd. What are you doing here?"

"I wanted to see you, and I was around…"

"Ah, I see."

"How have you been?"

"Um, well. I've just been accepted into a clinical psychology Ph.D. program."

"Wow, that's mighty impressive."

"Thank you."

"So, um, did you wanna get a coffee or something?"

"Katara?"

The girl turned to a door where a man was standing half inside a room labeled a research lab.

"So-Oniisan…yeah?"

The man tilted his head at her. "Um, meeting's about to start. Dr. Panna asked about you."

"Right! I'll be right there."

The girl turned to the guy next to her. "Um, I have to go. But, um, coffee sounds great."

"Yeah, sure."

She turned to go, but he grabbed her by the arm. Pulling her close, he pressed his lips to hers. When he released her, she stumbled back and looked at him with tears in her eyes.

"Why?" Before he could explain, she shook her head and walked off towards the man at the door. She walked in under his arm as he held the door open for her, and he patted her back. Turning to the boy in the hallway he said, "If you're who I think you are, that was a mistake. She almost gave you a chance too." The man turned and closed the door, leaving the boy alone in the hallway.

"Goodbye, Tara," Zuko said as he walked down the hallway, through the double doors and down the stairs. Tears were coming down his face as he thought about the girl who wouldn't come back to him, the girl that he'd always loved, even when he was trying so hard not to feel anything. The girl that haunted his dreams and his drunken hallucinations; the girl that he wished he'd never let go. It took him all he had not to run upstairs and pound on the door, begging the girl to come back. And then her sentence echoed in his head. "I've just been accepted into a clinical psychology Ph.D. program." Ph.D., he always knew his girl was smart. He saw her letting herself be held back for him, because she loved him. He wasn't worth it. He was messed up. He kissed her at the wrong times, he left her because he was scared, and he got drunk constantly. And here she was, getting herself accepted to a Ph.D. program. And she was a part of a research lab, for the sign on the door hadn't gone unnoticed. He tried hard to remember her age; she was barely 22, young for someone so successful. No, it was good he'd screwed up and been sent away. Maybe she'll find herself a Ph.D. guy as well. She was worth it.

As he left the building, four floors upstairs, the girl sat there amongst her colleagues and discussed participants. The man she referred to as her older brother sat to her left and tried to make her laugh, for he could still see the tears she was forcing back. Yet she sat there, solid and strong, discussing suspicious participants and cracking jokes. He admired her strength and wondered if she'd ever be free of the guy who rendered her tearful with a single kiss.

As she sat there being as part of the world as she could, she thought about the guy who left her lips pulsating. The power of the kiss rendered her speechless and made her core ache. But she couldn't go back, she wouldn't go back. She had her acceptance email to remind her of that. After the meeting, Sokka asked her if she could stay after to talk for a bit. She smiled and nodded, thinking it had to do with the study. She was blindsided when he asked her who the man in the hallway had been.

"My ex."

"I see. Are you alright?"

"No, and it's amazing how even after all these years, he still has the power of my heart. I always thought one day I'd be free from him, but it looks like I'm only as free as he is far from me. How is that fair?"

"It isn't, but you know something? I think you freed yourself today when you walked away from him."

She shook her head. "No, I didn't. I walked away because I didn't want you to see me with a man down my throat. I walked away because you have a certain view of me, and I intend to keep it that way. I walked away because if I hadn't, I wouldn't have been able to look you in the eye. I walked away for extrinsic motivations, not intrinsic. Freedom is intrinsic, and I'm not that. I'm not that at all."

"Even your very explanation is psychologically based. This is where you need to be, and you know that. Your desires and your goals are intrinsic, and if one intrinsic goal is what keeps you from going back to him, then you are free."

She smiles at him. "You do realize you just influenced my own self-worth?"

"Then why do we consider it 'self'-worth?"

"For the very reason why you consider my extrinsic motivation for staying away from him as intrinsic."

"Because we're psychologists and that's how we roll?"
"Yeah," she smiles again, "Because we're psychologists."

And with that truth, she was able to smile for real, all the way up to her eyes. Sokka felt a sense of possessive pride. She was an amazing surrogate little sister, and when she graduated, he was going to struggle with finding a new undergrad to bond to. Then again, he wasn't sure he wanted to. He didn't even want a first little sister undergrad, but damn her if she didn't find a way to worm herself into his heart. This girl didn't need to be worried after, he knew she was going to be the best in her field; he truly felt she worried over nothing. Until today, when he saw the impact a single man had on her. If Sokka hadn't been a religious man, he would have found a way to end the influence the man had on her life, as it was, he had to make sure she made it to Wisconsin, without the man in the hallway. Because try as he might not to fall for a sisterly undergrad, he had, and she would always be his little undergrad, even when she had a Ph.D. and they demanded each other to refer to them as Dr., just as he would be her older brother, she would be his little sister.