Not Upset
Her mother kept telling her to light lamps and candles. To smile. To forget him, to let go of an exile and a traitor and find someone good and noble and a real gentleman. Mai put out fires and kept her lips a thin line; she shut her windows and swore never to see the sun again.
Everyone thought it was so easy to forget each other.
She really didn't care, but that didn't mean she could just forget.
-
Mai was in her room, glaring at the rolled up note and hitting a target across the room, when Ty Lee knocked on her door – teased the wood was more fitting, really. "Mai? …Oh, Mai!" she sang. "I'm coming in!" She paused, then added softly, "Azula's not with me."
Mai slipped a knife into her sleeve just as the door opened. Ty Lee flipped over and hugged her, lingering a moment longer than usual. "Hey," Mai calmly said, nudging Ty Lee away and turning her head to the side.
"It's so dark in here," Ty Lee chided gently, opening the curtains. "It does match your aura pretty well, though," she teased, grinning back at Mai. When Mai didn't react, Ty Lee wilted and walked over, sitting neatly on the table. "Mai," she murmured, "just forget about him. I mean, he's only a boy," she tried, smiling. "Not to mention a boy who left you as easily as he left his country. Totally uncool."
"If this is all you wanted," Mai started, but Ty Lee cut across her.
"It's not all, I'm sorry." She brushed her fingers against the back of Mai's hand and offered a small smile. "Let's go out. What do you say?"
Mai sighed. "Fine."
-
There was a boy with honey-colored eyes with a quick smile and small, delicate hands.
She let him kiss her. He was decidedly unimpressive, and that night, Zuko stalked through her dreams.
-
Her mother brought her dresses and flowers and young men; when Mai asked for a fruit tart, she clucked her tongue and rolled her eyes and didn't understand why Mai spent the rest of the day sulking in her room.
The dresses were all right, she could stand the flowers (barely), but it was all she could do to not shut the door in the suitors' faces.
She tried to stay bored by everything (tried!) and always failed neutrality when he drifted back to her mind.
-
She found herself missing Omashu, because at least then she knew it wasn't his fault and that they were that they were bound to meet again.
-
Visiting with Azula was always the worst.
"Yes, I'm sure it's painful without my fool of a brother around," Azula consoled her, her lips almost curled in a smile, "but really, Mai, what did you expect? Someone like Zuzu was bound to move onto smaller and pitiable things. Get over him already."
Mai held her tongue and rolled her eyes. "You're right, Azula," she said dully. "I don't know what I was thinking."
-
Mai was excellent at refusing to cry.
-
The characters started to fade, turning her fingers black.
-
It was her mother who finally encouraged sense into her, after supper one night, when they were both on a balcony, the sun setting, swathed in ugly colors on the horizon.
"It's going to be impossible to forget one firebender when you're surrounded on all sides by it." She sighed and readjusted her chair. "Why don't you do something productive, instead of attempting to ignore the color red?"
Mother was always the sensible one, so Mai started training again. After all, she wasn't fool enough to think any one person could attain perfection, and improving herself was more interesting than staring at parchment and thinking about traitors.
-
Mai never really realized how empty her room was.
-
It was a hair tie that did what so many sleepless nights and quiet days couldn't.
She was looking under a chair for a dropped calligraphy brush when she found it. At first she didn't know what it was, but the moment it was in the light, she recognized the tiny embroidery; she clenched her fist, struggling to soothe the pain in her chest and throat.
"Idiot," she mumbled. She tried not to blink, glaring at the inconspicuous piece of cloth. "Idiot," she repeated, her hand shaking, a few tears dropping off her eyelashes.
Then it passed, and she was cool inside again.
She wasn't sure she wanted to burn it or throw it away, so she settled for pocketing it and moving on.
Something about it steeled her resolve. She just didn't know what she'd resolved to do.
Maybe it was just to finally stop being as crazy as the rest of them.
-
"I'm not upset," Mai corrected Ty Lee over tea, leaning a cheek against her palm. "I'm annoyed," she decided. Close enough, she supposed.
"Oh, Mai," Ty Lee said, touching her arm. "I don't know if I'm jealous of you or not."
Mai hesitated, scrutinizing her friend's face. "She'll come around," she said softly, the shadow of guilt touching her chest. She laid a hand over Ty Lee's and tried to smile, wondering when she'd become so selfish.
"Sure," Ty Lee said with a little laugh. Neither of them were really convinced.
-
Mai couldn't hide the letter from her Uncle from Azula, and she found she really didn't care.
Azula could get her to the Boiling Rock faster, anyway.