Toph knows it's all her fault.
And that's the thing that cuts to the quick, as she tries to loosen her all too tight dress. It was Katara who went to the dressmaker and who took her measurements - "because water never forgets a shape" she said blithely, linking arms with Aang. But Waterbending is one of the most fickle of arts, right along with Airbending and Twinkletoes.
And as she tries to loosen it, it's like trying to push away a mother of sorts. Katara.
And she thinks about how Katara has always judged her, every single day, and how she always tries to make her more ladylike, more appropriate. And maybe it's just because Katara wanted another girl in the group, or perhaps its because she wanted a friend. And Toph knows that Katara, who was always conscious of what her hair looked like, or how coiffed she was, is her mother.
And its not because of the differences between her biological one and Katara. She's fought side by side with her. Pulled hair away from her prying brush, and picked toe jam just to see her squirm. Warts and all, Katara accepted her, where he mother tried to mold her.
But Toph is rock - and under the wrong companionships rock doesn't mold. It breaks, and cuts off in slabs, and Toph has never thanked her lucky stars she left before that happened to her and she ended up like Bumi.
And as she sees how the dress is too short, for her liking, even though its all the way to her knee's and beyond, she tries to tug it down a bit more, because she doesn't like being reminded she's a woman. Or a girl.
Just like she'd told Twinkletoes. "You're more in touch with your feminine side," she'd once laughingly mentioned, just to see him color up and blush because even then it was so obvious, between him and Katara that it made her laugh inside to see.
And then she hears Appa's grunt outside and she waves her hand, not all loose-fingered, and oh-la-la but fingers together, palm out, a boyish dismissal. "Shut your yappin', Appa." He growls, a deep-throated grumble, before standing up.
And she swallows deep. There's a catch in her throat, as she tries to smooth her hair back, her fingers grasping for things that she knows isn't there, as her hair's up, again.
The comb that holds her hair together snaps against her pressing fingers and she feels her hair fall to her shoulders. It's longer than she thought it'd be, and she remembers how she's never really had it down. Properly down. Swung into a ponytail before she goes to bed, and even then, her hair brushes her shoulders for only a few moments.
She's on Appa before she realizes she's moved. It's glacial, her progress, and Appa is half-asleep. "Yip, yip." She gives a bad impression of Twinkletoes but bison or not, he understands.
She doesn't want to go where Appa is flying, and she hopes Appa slows down, admires the scenery, maybe takes a couple loop-de-loops.
Because she doesn't want to her him say the 'I do'.
Especially to Suki.
And not her.