"Mom, I'm scared."
My last words to her. My. Last. Words.
You made it that way. You made it so that the very last thing I ever said to my mother was a pathetic whimper. Your eyes glinted colder than the snow, and I crumpled beneath you. I couldn't be brave. I couldn't be strong. I was so scared.
You took her from me.
Words won't make it okay. Words can't describe this. There's no way to explain what it was like to come home with Dad and find blood splattered across the snow. There's no way to explain the way the image is burned within my mind. There aren't words for how I cried, and Dad cried, and even Sokka couldn't stop himself. The blood washed away. The seasons passed and we didn't cry anymore.
But inside the tears have always been raging. They fall constantly, and fell as I rose up. I had to take care of Sokka. Take care of the funeral. Take care of my world, or rather what was left of it when you were done. I didn't have time to cry openly. I couldn't. It would've unnerved Sokka. So I bottled it up inside. For the whole of my life, I've been crying inside.
The rain isn't even close to the volume of my tears, but when I stop them, you get a glimpse of what I feel.
She protected me. She loved me. She loved the world and never put herself before anyone in this life. She was a better person than you could ever be if your life depended on it. She taught me everything I remember.
And because of you, my last words to her were weak.
I was ready to cry. I whimpered. My voice whined. My eyes were wide. You did this to me. You made me so that I couldn't even speak properly in the last thing my mother ever heard out of my mouth before she died. You made me a coward.
I could kill you. I could kill you in so many different ways. I could kill you with water, the element you mocked. I could have Zuko kill you with fire, your own element. I could rip through you with ice to make new stained snow for a grieving family to cry over. I want to. I need to. I can't stop thinking about it. You deserve it.
But the truth is, if I did that, I'd only be doing it because I'm scared. Scared to look weak. Scared I'll never stop crying inside. Scared I'm just too weak to make my mother proud, except when I look into your cowering eyes, I realize something.
This wouldn't make her proud.
I leave you broken and crumpled, not like you left me. You broke me. I didn't break you because you were too fargone to be helped to begin with. I don't care how the world sees this. How I see it. My mother would not ever be okay with me killing you. And as Zuko and I leave you, I look to the skies and think a small prayer.
Rest in peace, Mom.
I'm not scared anymore.