Even inches away from her, it was now too dark to see his face properly. She could only see rough details- the outline of his chin, the shadow of his scar. Still flushed and breathing heavily, Jin kissed both, then untangled her body from his and sat up. Through the window, she could see that the sun was almost completely gone, dusk giving way to the blackness of night. Jin leaned over Lee's body to light the candle that sat on her bedside table. She held the blanket over her chest for unneeded modesty, then settled back in next to his bare chest as the glow of the small flame lit up the room.
"My mother will be coming home from her job soon," she murmured into his skin. "You should probably leave before she gets here. Or we should at least get dressed."
Neither attempted to move, though. Jin didn't want to interrupt the quiet stillness, or the memory of what had just happened. She felt Lee wrap an arm around her and pull her closer.
"You're beautiful," he whispered.
Jin felt a chill run through her entire body at not only the words, but also the way his hot breath tickled the back of her neck as he spoke them. She had been with boys before. A girl grew up fast in the Lower Ring. Boys expected things in exchange for them talking sweetly to you. Lee, though. Lee was different than any other boy she had ever met. Even after he had acted so strangely at the end of their first date, Jin had not been able to forget him or their kiss among the lights of the Fire Fountain. She had gone back to the tea shop to use her free tea coupon. Lee had fumbled through an apology as to why he had run off on her before, an apology she could easily tell was half made-up of lies. Still, she went out with him again. And again. And again.
As a boyfriend, Lee was sweet, but he was mysterious. Secretive. Jin knew that there were so many things that he wasn't telling her, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She knew that he was being honest with her about the most important things. Like how he felt about her.
"I didn't come here with an aim of doing this," he said, stroking his fingers absentmindedly up and down her arm. It was feather-light and would have tickled if it didn't feel so good. "I mean, it was, um, it was really nice. And fun. And nice. We just haven't known each other so long and we're still young and I don't want you to think that I expected-"
"I'm sixteen," she interrupted. "You didn't take any sort of advantage of me, if that's what you're thinking. Lots of other girls my age are married with babies and households of their own." She laced her fingers through his and squeezed. "I-I liked doing this. With you. It felt right."
"Is that..." His voice was so nervous, and Jin couldn't help but smile at Lee's awkward stuttering. "Is that something you'd want?"
"Babies? Definitely not," she said. "Not now, at least. I'm too young; I want to do things with my life first."
"Not that," Lee said. "The other thing." Jin knew exactly what he was referring to, but she was going to make him say it. "Marriage."
The idea made Jin's stomach go all knotted in an excited way. They had known each other only a month, but these things always happened quickly in places like the Lower Ring, especially with all the refugees swarming around. There was a war, despite the moratorium on speaking of it that seemed to wordlessly hover over the city, and everyone clung to what they had. People married young and had babies young because there was nothing else. If Jin got married, she could leave her home, the tiny house that she shared with her mother and five brothers and sisters. She and Lee could be their own little family, a small apartment near the tea shop, maybe.
Lee loosened his grip on her waist, and when Jin rolled over, she could see his blushing in the candlelight. "It just, well." He spoke quickly, out of what she assumed to be nerves. "My uncle. He got an offer today, to open his own tea shop. But it would be in the Upper Ring." Jin felt her heart sink a bit, and not just for the loss of her favorite tea. She and most other peasants like her were not allowed outside the Lower Ring. Lee noticed the sudden change in her demeanor, and he reached up to touch her cheek. His hand was so warm against her face. "And I- I don't want to be there without you. Ever since I arrived in Ba Sing Se, you have been the only thing that has made me...happy."
"You make me happy, too, Lee."
Then he smiled, really smiled, a thing Jin had come to learn was rare for him. She leaned in and pressed her lips against that smile. Lee instantly deepened the kiss, tangling his legs with hers as he held tight to the bare skin of her back. Jin let her own hands wander, nails ghosting light over his body until they finally dug into his hair. They would have been ready for a second round if at that moment Jin didn't hear the door open and close downstairs.
"My mother," she said, instantly ripping herself away and making a mad grab for the clothes that had been carelessly tossed on the door. "You need to go. I'll come and find you tomorrow, I promise." They both began to dress in a rush. As he was tying his sash, Lee leaned in for one more kiss, this one delicate, only the slightest pressure on her lips.
Before she could even kiss back, he was out the window. Jin watched him effortlessly jump buildings until he made his way to the ground. Lee was full of mysteries, indeed, but Jin did not care. Soon, maybe, they would be her mysteries, too.
The walk back to the small apartment Zuko shared with his Uncle Iroh was quiet. People were settled into their homes for evening meals; the streets that were so chaotic by day were now mostly abandoned.
Zuko hoped that his uncle did not ask him how the date had gone. He didn't think he would be able to control the redness of his face, even if he tried to lie. It had been the first time that Zuko had gone that far with a girl, and even if neither of them had planned it, he was...very glad that it had happened. He had told her the truth back there, in bed. He had been incredibly miserable and sullen when he came to Ba Sing Se. Still so wrapped up in what he had seen as his singular goal- to capture the Avatar and regain his honor. Every day he spent with Jin, however, made Ba Sing Se seem a little better. She made everything else seem farther away. She made him realize that perhaps he could be happy in this life, as this new person. He imagined coming home to a small, two-roomed apartment with her, eating together, laughing together, falling asleep with her wrapped up in his arms...little pleasures had never meant to Zuko what they had begun to mean now.
There was a single dark cloud over all of this. The lies he was telling to Jin. He had everything but asked for her hand, yet she did not even know his true name. Multiple times he had come close to telling her something, that he was Fire Nation at least. He had always managed to pull back. If they lived together as husband and wife, however, Zuko didn't know how he would keep the secret. He knew that he would have to tell Jin eventually, but he didn't know when. Would it be so wrong to marry her without revealing his true identity beforehand?
He reached the building that he could still not bring himself to call home, climbing the stairs with this issue still heavy on his heart. He would ask his uncle, Zuko decided. No matter how much embarrassment he would have to sit through to get to that conversation, he knew that what he really need was his uncle's advice. Preferably with as few tea metaphors as possible.
Jin combed through her hair with her fingers as she descended the stairs, trying to make it look as neat as possible. Her mother was in the kitchen, putting a kettle on to boil as her younger siblings Wen and Ping sat at the table, peeling vegetables. She smiled as she saw her eldest daughter approaching.
"So nice of you to join us," she said. "How was your day?"
Before Jin could open her mouth to answer, Ping couldn't help but blab for her.
"Jin had a boy upstairs!"
Jin sent her sister a killer glare, but the words had already left the child's mouth. She watched her mother heave a heavy sigh. "Oh, Jin."
"It's not like that, mother," Jin said, wanting to explain the situation clearly. She knew that her mother always jumped to the worst conclusions when it came to boys, especially boys that wanted to date her. And, well, in the past she had turned out right more often than not, so Jin knew that she had to choose her words carefully if she wanted her mother to understand. "Lee is not the same as most of the guys around here, Mother. You would like him, you really would. You will like him. He's sweet, and he wants-" Jin felt her stomach turning as she confessed all. "And he wants to marry me."
"Boys always say that they want to marry pretty girls like you, Jin. I should know. I was one."
She didn't even know Lee and she was already so poisoned against him. It wasn't fair. "You're always so cynical!"
"I've seen a lot more than you have, Jin," her mother said quietly. "Afford me my cynicism."
The kettle had begun to boil, and her mother crossed the room to take it off the stovetop. She was wrong, Jin knew. Her mother may have known how most of the boys in Ba Sing Se were, but Lee wasn't like any of them. For all of his secrets, when he held her close and spoke of marriage, Jin knew that he was being honest.
"So," her mother said, placing a cup of tea in front of her. "Are you pregnant?"
"What? No!" Jin wanted to be mad at her mother for the assumption, but she knew that it wasn't the furthest leap to be made. After all, she herself had been sixteen when Jin's older brother was born. Jin took her cup and sipped. Jasmine. It instantly made her think of the tea shop and, by extension, Lee. She couldn't stop the goofy smile that floated to her face. "It's not like that, I told you. I just...love him."
"Strong words for a boy that I haven't even met yet." Her mother's voice was warmer now, though. "When will I be meeting him?"
Jin's smile spread into a wide grin. "I told him I'd come see him tomorrow while he's working. I could ask him to come over for dinner tomorrow night. If that is all right with you." As much as she hated to admit it, her mother's approval did mean a lot to her. They were not always close, but she just wanted her entire family to like Lee as much as she did.
Her mother didn't respond vocally, she just nodded her head and turned to the vegetables Wen and Ping had finished with. Knowing that was as good of an answer as she was going to get, Jin left the table and ran back upstairs, secure in her assumptions that things were going to turn out just right this time.
End of the first chapter. I will try to get the next part in shortly. I will try to incorporate canon events as well as I can, but obviously, they will change due to the AU nature of this story.