Chapter 2

Mai and Zuko sat on the bed together, sharing a bottle of rice wine

"I'm sorry," Zuko said. "We made an agreement, that I would stay away from him, and I broke it."

Mai swirled her drink in her cup and sighed. "You should have talked to me first. It wasn't my intention to prevent you from having any contact with your family at all, but it does bother me you went back on your word," she said. "But, I guess that's an argument we will need to have at a different time. You must have a lot on your mind."

"No, you're right. I shouldn't have gone to see him," Zuko said. "I didn't want to know this. I wish... It would have been easier if he had just died and I had just... found out about it after the fact. Because then I wouldn't have so many decisions to make."

"What sort of decisions?" Mai said. "He doesn't have any earthly possessions that need to change hands. The prison usually makes its own arrangements for burials."

"No," Zuko said. "Things I can only decide to do before hand. Am I going to keep visiting him? Am I going to let him meet Izumi? Am I going to try to... I don't know... let him leave on good terms?"

Mai wrinkled her eyebrows. "Wait... you want to bring our daughter to..."

"She does have a right to know about her family, who she is and where she comes from, the good, the bad, and the ugly. It would be her only chance," Zuko said. "And also, he did ask."

"He... asked... and because he asked..." Mai sighed. "See, this is what I was worried about. This is why I told you not to go and see him!"

"The visit went perfectly fine, Mai. I don't think I've hurt anyone by it."

"No..." She huffed. "Because he's... intoxicating. Because every time you see him, you start... I don't know... you get pulled in. You start forgetting all the awful things he did. You start to feel sorry for him, being locked up and lonely. You start trying to... fix it."

"I fixed it years ago. He's locked up. The war is over. He can't hurt anyone ever again."

"You fixed the physical, immediate problems. But you can't fix the aftermath. The reason I don't think you should see him is because every time you do, you start thinking you can fix it. It eats you up. It makes you miserable. And then you start blaming yourself. And that causes you to try to live up to him and his expectations, and..."

"Mai, that's the last thing I am trying to do. The last thing I want to do in the whole world is be something he would be proud of. You're not making any sense."

"But you are, Zuko. It's like... It's like you're trying to hunt the Avatar all over again." She took a deep breath. "All this talk of 'making things right' and 'letting him leave on good terms.' It's a fantasy, Zuko. It's not real. It's not possible. Not with someone like him. You tried all your life as a child to do that. What makes you think you can do it now?"

"I'm the one with the power now," Zuko said.

"When you give in to those fantasies, he feeds off of that. That's what he did your entire growing-up, to control you and your sister, nurturing those fantasies of one day getting love and attention. And it worked."

"But what's the alternative, Mai?" he said. "The alternative is to just hate him. I can't do that. I mean... I sort of do," Zuko said. "No. I actually do hate him. A lot... but I know it's wrong. It's wrong to let myself get overwhelmed with hate. It's wrong to hold onto wrongs and never forgive. It's not what's going to make me a better person."

"Why not?" Mai said. "Why is it wrong? I hate him."

"But you're not his kid."

"Zuko. I hate him every single day. Every time I look at your face and see what he did to you. Every time I see how he destroyed Azula's spirit, forcing her to have to live in that mental institution, I hate him. Every time I look around this country, and see how divided it is and how hard it's been to bring in and era of peace, I hate him. Maybe not in the sense I wish evil upon him, but in the sense I can look at evil for what it is. I don't get it confused. It's okay to be angry at him. It's healthy, in fact."

"Mai, but what about your dad? He did some less than honorable things. And you still visit with him, and talk to him. What if it were your dad who was dying in that cell?"

"My dad was good to me Zuko."

"All the time?"

"No, but he never crossed the line into cruelty. He took care of me."

Zuko sighed. "Mai, my dad took care of me too." He took another deep breath. "I can't ever just sit down and let myself hate him, as easy as you make it sound. Because, while there is a lot of stuff that happened that should make me hate him, there was a lot of stuff that happened growing up that..." Zuko almost smiled. "That actually was kind of cool. Like... he would take Azula and me out onto the lawn and teach us fire bending tricks. It made my mother furious because of course we would practice them indoors and something would get burned or broken. Or... when we went to see the plays on Ember Island. You came with us to a couple of those I think. Whenever the acting was bad or the story had a plot hole, he would lean into our ears to crack jokes. He had you laughing just as hard. He wasn't angry all the time. Hell, I don't think anyone would have the energy to be angry all the time."

"A few good memories don't excuse him from all the bad ones he also gave you."

"No," Zuko said. He took a sip of the rice wine and closed his eyes. "It just made the bad memories worse. Because we knew... we knew that the good times could come back... maybe if we just knew what buttons to push and which levers to pull, or maybe if we just made him happy enough... or maybe if we just did exactly what we were told all the time... then maybe we could bring that good side of him back."

Mai looked down. "Azula always talked like that," she said. "When it was her and me and Ty Lee... she always talked about your father like that. She always complained when he was in a bad mood, which was almost all the time but she always had these elaborate schemes to cheer him up. And Ty Lee and I could never understand why she worked so hard. I was young at the time, and I thought it was because she was a good, obedient child and I wasn't. But it drove her..." She raised her eyebrows. "It drove her literally insane."

"And that's why this is so hard for me," Zuko said. "I thought my father's death would be easier than my uncles, because I would miss my father less. But what's making it hard is that... I'm not feeling the way I expected to feel. I expected to feel relieved, and on one hand I am. But I'm also... I'm actually worried about missing him. Not because he deserves it, but because of... that one stupid time when I was a kid he taught me a fire bending trick. That's who I see some times when I go and visit him in prison. Not the tyrant bastard I grew to seem him as when I became an adult, but as the dad I worshiped when I was little."

"Look, Zuko," Mai said. "Yeah. I get it. It makes sense. I guess I can't tell you what will make you feel better. You're right. This might be your last chance to make some sort of peace, or get some kind of closure. But..." She put his hand on his cheek and turned his head to look him in the eye. "Don't get your hopes too high. You're father nearly destroyed you because of all the impossible expectations he put on you. If you go to him with impossible expectations of your own, guess what... that's not going to hurt him, it will hurt you too. If you need to visit him, then do that. If you need to stay away, then do that. But please, take care of yourself first, okay?"

"I promise," he said.

"And remember, you don't have to deal with this alone." She leaned forward and kissed her husband tenderly. The two of them put their glasses on the table, snuffed out the lamp, and finally relaxed together in the dark.