She looks at him over the table laid out with platters upon platters of food where their friends are feasting with abandoned joy at the final desicration of Fire Lord Ozai and along with him the war. He looks back briefly, Mei at his side looking rather like the porcelain doll that she is. They've been talking all night; Aang has been trying to talk to her but she can't make herself listen to him for some reason.

She is confused. Before, the war was a distraction, something to take her mind off of the pressing choice between her feelings for Zuko and her present lack there of for Aang. Aang loved her, Zuko did not as far as she could tell, though if he did, she would have to commend him for his acting skills. Because he makes loving Mei look so convincing.

Her plate is still full, still as full as it was when it was filled for her, though her water glass is nearly empty of it's third fill. Running her fingertip along the rim she watches the way Mei and Zuko smile and chatter, watching them through her bangs so they can't see that she is watching. Why does she feel this way?

At some point in the foggy existance that is the evening, Sokka asks her if she's alright; this calls attention that she doesn't want to her and she is forced to smile and say that she is fine. Of course she's fine, why wouldn't she be fine? But inside, she isn't. She casts Zuko one more look to find he is watching her before pushing back from the table and excusing herself. She can't stay there, it only makes it hurt.

Aang says something to her that she doesn't hear as she passes him, Zuko's eyes never leave her. Not once from the moment she stands and leaves the table to the moment where she is so far past him that he has to turn to look at her. Nothing is said as the others continue their meal.

Once the door to the hall closes behind her, she feels herself wrapped up in the cool darkness, it hides her from the world for a brief shining moment before light from the dining hall cuts through it. Zuko appears and closes the door behind him, the darkness returns.

"What's wrong?", he asks, maybe he thinks that their final battle together gives him some connection to her. But it doesn't, not really, because he chose Mei.

"Nothing", she says softly, her voice sounding much too like the broken and confused mess that she is inside; it is only her skin that is holding her together.

"There is something", he tells her, it's a fact, not a question anymore and it bothers her somehow because she wants to know how he always knows what's going on inside her. He reaches for her but she backs away, staying just out of reach of his fingertips; she knows that if he touches her, it's all over.

"There is nothing", she insists, though it's more for herself now than for him, it's her that needs to hear it, not him. He takes his hand back and maybe it's her imagination but she swears she sees some disappointment in his eyes.

Stepping further away from him, she bows and asks that he excuse her before turning to leave; but he doesn't leave it at that, it's not that simple. He takes her hand in his and holds her in place. She is sure he is watching the broken pieces of her shift under her to make the holes less noticable; if he is he says nothing about it. Instead he just pulls her back, his fingers running along her jaw to lift it up; touches much too light to leave no chips in her visage.

She wants him to kiss her, somehow she needs him to. But then she knows he wont as he looks down at her with those eyes. They knew everything that was inside her, except for this and it was this that she needed him to know the most. So, pushing away from him, she gives him a forced smile, one to glaze over the cracks that are forming (happy that he can't see the tears burning in her eyes in the darkness) and walks away.