Zuko sits quietly out by the small pond with his back against a tree, watching a pair of turtleducks paddling around the edge. He sighs softly as he watches the lovers chatter happily to each other. For him, love hadn't been so easy. There were all those years of his banishment coupled with chasing the Avatar, not to mention the years he spent as a refugee… the latter of which weren't so bad, upon reflection. Jin was a nice girl, and maybe he should have learned more about her…. Ah, but then he did the most shameful thing of all and returned to the fire nation.

His head hangs in shame of the memory. He should have known Azula and his father would pull a stunt like that, but he just wanted so badly to be accepted…. He sighs softly to himself. It's just too bad I never realized Uncle had accepted me all along.

Then again… he realizes now that he had to go back. If he hadn't, Aang wouldn't have learned firebending, and the world wouldn't have been left to save after the comet arrived. His stomach flips with the familiar fear: If you don't defeat the Fire Lord before the comet comes, there won't be a world to save anymore.

Zuko shakes his head to clear out the competing memories, needing to remind himself every once in a while that the battle is long over. The Fire Nation (and the entire world, for that matter) has long since entered an era of peace.

"Peace is nice." Zuko muses aloud.

"You can say that again." A voice from behind him startles Zuko, hunk of bread falling to the ground as he bashes the back of his head against the tree.

"Ow!" Zuko holds the back of his head as he whips around to see who managed to sneak up on him. "What the… is that you, [name]?"

"Wow, I'm surprised you remembered my name, Zuzu." [name] smirks as she comes out from behind the tree. "It's been so long since we've seen each other, after all."

"Yeah… I haven't seen you since…"

"Before your banishment?"

"… Yeah. That sounds right."

"I missed you, you know." She slides down the tree to sit beside him, reaching between his legs with a smirk. Zuko tenses up, eyes shooting wide open, only to flush and look in the other direction when she simply retrieves the abandoned hunk of stale bread. "You've sure gotten jumpy."

"And you've sure gotten sneaky," Zuko pouts just a little, showing [name] a glimmer of his old self but… in a somehow different way… a sweeter way… a not nearly so hostile way.

"But of course. You'd be terribly disappointed otherwise," [name] winks at him, sassy as ever. Zuko looks back at her with a light smile, getting lost in his memories once more.

This girl was always the typical sassy classic beauty, and she practically radiated "fire nation." Her [h/c] hair and [e/c] eyes went so well with that confidence [name] just seems to radiate. And yet, Zuko knows perfectly well that, most of the time, the confidence is all an act. He knows deep down that [name] is a sweet, shy girl who only wants to be accepted. Not unlike himself.

"Hello? Earth kingdom to Zuko? Anyone home?" [name] waves her hand in front of his face.

"Huh?" Zuko shakes his head and looks at her, liquid topaz eyes filled with confusion until he realizes he must not have been paying attention to her. "Oh, sorry [name]. What were you saying?"

She laughs softly. "Oh nothing much, I was only asking if you missed me, too."

"Of course I did." Zuko smiles. "I mean, I didn't have that many friends to begin with… and you were the one I made for myself."

"Oh so I do matter?" [name] giggles and flushes softly. "I was just making sure. I was lonely without you and was hoping… maybe you'd want to do something fun together again."

Zuko smiles warmly at her. "That'd be great. What did you have in mind?"

"Oh a little of this, a little of that." She laughs and winks at him.

[name] grins recklessly as she tugs Zuko up a hill on the outskirts of the island as the sun sets, teasing him endlessly. "You're getting slow in your old age, Zuko!"

"I'm not that old!" Zuko grumbles at her as he follows her up. "What are we doing here anyway?"

"Silly, don't you remember what's up this hill?"

"[name], I haven't been on this side of the island for several years. Where are you taking me?" His voice is filled with confusion, and she realizes he really doesn't remember. Soon enough she laughs as she reaches the top of the hill ahead of him, although Zuko isn't far behind at all. The young male hears his friend giggling madly to herself, growing more curious as he makes his way up. When his head finally appears above the top of the stone, his eyes widen. "Hey… this is where we used to play together."

"You mean sneak out in the middle of the night to see each other." The beautiful girl laughs, the sound wonderfully melodic. She looks over her shoulder and gives him a coy smile. "And share secret kisses under the moon."

Zuko's face turns a shade of crimson of which even his father would have been proud.

"Relax, Zuko! I don't expect you to kiss me again, you silly man." [name]'s cheeks tint pink as she turns her head away again, getting into her bag and pulling out a quilt to lay over the grass. Zuko smiles and moves forward to take it from her.

"Allow me, [name]." He takes hold and begins to shake out the quilted fabric, easily snapping the ends out and laying it flat. "So, what are we doing here, exactly?"

[name] laughs and pulls out dinner for the two of them, as well as a couple of bottles with wine and water. "We are celebrating!"

"What exactly is it we're celebrating?" Zuko regards the girl with open curiosity, she just grinning brightly in return with a faint flush tinting her cheeks.

"Your return, of course! Your position as Fire Lord! The Jasmine Dragon's immense success upon the re-conquering of Ba Sing Se! Anything! Everything!" [name]'s eyes glow with excitement. "It can be simply because I broke you out of the Fire Palace and away from those annoyingly persistent bodyguards! Whatever the reason! Tonight, we celebrate!"

Zuko laughs softly at her enthusiasm. "Oh, that's right. You use any excuse to celebrate."

"Oh Zuko, you remember me so well." The handsome scarred male grins at her.

"Indeed, I do. I remember the LAST time you decided we should celebrate." His golden eyes flare with amusement. "You were angry with Azula for tricking me into kissing Mae and pulled a prank on her."

"Yes, and her perfect hair was perfectly orange for a week!" She can't help but laugh at the memory.

"Not to mention she knew it was you!"

"Only because YOU pointed out my orange hands!"

"How was I supposed to know it was because you did it?"

"Because I told you I was going to do something awful to her!"

"How is dying her hair orange awful?"

"I don't know!" [name] wipes her eyes, which have teared up from laughter. "But whatever the reason, she thought it was the worst thing in the world!"

"Yeah," he laughs softly. "It's a good thing it washed right out again, though. I don't know what she would have done if the dye had been permanent."

"I'm sure my punishment would have been something much worse than her unimaginative blue dye in MY shampoo." The grin Zuko receives from [name] is crooked and amused. "The dye she used was permanent, but I thought it suited me."

"So did I," he replies as he sits down on the blanket and stretches out. [name] sinks down to sit beside him, also stretching out as she smiles up at the fading sun.

"The sunsets here are always so pretty," she murmurs, [e/c] eyes watching the pinks, oranges, yellows, and reds tangle together with the lazily drifting clouds over the horizon of water. Zuko smiles at her comment and murmurs his agreement before she speaks again. "You know what the best sunset of all has been?"

He shifts his gaze from the waving clouds to the girl next to him. "Which one is that?"

"This one," she smiles then looks at him, "because I'm getting to share it with you."

Zuko's smile widens as he glances across the blanket to the pretty girl beside him. "Then let's celebrate that."

"Celebrate what?" She lifts her head and looks at him curiously, and her peachy skin flushes as his lips brush against her cheek.

"Let's celebrate seeing this sunset… together."