Korra came into work feeling good.

She had received an excellent assessment on her final group project, taken Naga out for a long walk around the city, and skyped with her parents for an hour and a half. Not to mention, she also had a nice few days off, going birthday present shopping with Mako, trying out that snazzy little teashop down by the mall with Mako, baking her very first taro cake under the watchful—and irritating as hell—eye of Mako(and making him eat half a sack of flour soon afterward), and hanging out at the park with him and Naga the following morning.

It was the most eventful few days that she had ever had while living in the city, and it was totally awesome.

Korra could finally feel the puzzle pieces settling into their own respective places after months of being so sad and confused. For the first time since Asami left, Korra could actually say that she was happy with her life.

She was doing well in school, she had a job to keep her mind busy and her bank account fed, and she had found a new friend in Mako, who was more loyal than she ever would have thought.

Things were great.

"Korra, honey, how are you feeling today? Your mom tells me that you're looking better."

"I'm feeling better, Uncle," Korra chirped happily.

With Korra's new goal—to move on—at the forefront of her mind, any pain that was formerly associated with her ex-girlfriend couldn't have been any further from her mind. Korra was now willing to accept everything that single life had to offer her; the sky looked a little bluer and the grass a little greener.

Though Korra was a proud girl, she always gave credit where it was due, and she knew she wouldn't have made this breakthrough if it weren't for Mako.

He was her closest friend in the city, and she had never been happier with her decision to work at her uncle's noodles shop. Narook must have known the benefits of having Mako as a friend. After all, he was the one who stayed behind later than everyone else.

"Uncle?"

"Hm?"

Korra strode over to her uncle and engulfed him in a warm embrace. The older man, though confused at his niece's rare display of affection, returned the hug; he rubbed her back soothingly, "What is it, Korra?"

She shook her head; "I just wanted to thank you for bringing me in to work. If you didn't make me come in, I wouldn't have met Mako."

Narook gave a wizened laugh and held his niece tighter, pressing his cheek against her dark tresses, "He's a good guy."

"He's the best," Korra promised softly. She released her hold from Narook and gripped his forearms, smiling widely at her mother's brother. "He's the best guy anybody could ever meet, and it's all thanks to you, Uncle."

She reached on the tips of her toes to peck her uncle's cheek before skipping to the door, "I'm gonna clock in Uncle. See ya."

"Okay!"

Korra gently closed the back door behind her, leaving Narook to his own thoughts. He knew it was a good idea for Korra to make friends with Mako and vice versa. He'd seen his favorite employee just go on day to day without taking any particular interest in anything and it made Narook wonder how he would act if Mako were to be faced with his niece who was indeed a force to be reckoned with.

He touched his cheek where Korra's lips had been moments before, a soft smile curving onto his face. Narook was certain where things would lead at this point.

That smile, which upstaged the sun at any time during the day, looked exactly like his younger sister when she met Korra's father.

Narook was hopeful.

Korra entered the restaurant to the sound of the lunch rush. From the back door, she could hear the noodle chefs hard at work in the kitchen, their pots and pans clattering noisily against one another with the stove going on. Korra heard a fairly color string of curses as she passed the kitchen door, no doubt a result of Tahno burning his finger again.

Amateur.

The main dining hall was packed with college students and working class citizens alike. Opal flitted from table to table, expertly jotting down orders and dancing back and forth between the kitchen and the front, dishing out orders like Narook's wasn't swamped.

"Oh, hey, Korra!" Opal greeted breezily, stopping beside the girl with a tray full of food. "Mako needs your help up front."

"Right. Gotcha."

Korra quickly scuffled to the front, stopping abruptly when she spotted her raven-haired friend. Opal said that Mako needed help, but he looked like his was handling the gorgeous, emerald-eyed dame flirting with him well. Korra raised a brow at the scene unfolding before her very eyes.

An unpleasant twinge began to scratch at her chest, but Korra ignored it in favor of seeing how Mako dealt with the thirsty customer obviously trying to get more than a table for the oblivious idiot. Korra rolled her eyes.

'What does he think he's doing?' she thought, irrationally agitated. The beautiful stranger let out a girlish giggle at something he said; Korra froze when she saw the woman rest a gentle hand on Mako's forearm.

'What the fuck does she thing she's doing?' Korra snarled, rogue fury ringing in her head. Korra stomped the rest of her way to the front, ignoring three other customers requesting an extra glass of water. Mako was still talking to the attractive woman.

"Wow, so you're trying to be a cop?" she gushed, inching closer to the host. Mako clutched the menus against his chest, clearly uncomfortable at her closing distance. He nodded, prompting the woman to bite her bottom lip, giving him very deliberate elevator eyes. "I do love a man in uniform…say, would you like to—"

Korra had heard enough.

"Hey Mako," she interrupted, reaching out for her friend's forearm. Mako glanced down at Korra, perplexed by her sudden appearance, but Korra didn't really care about that. What she cared about was getting this hag away from him. "Uncle wanted you to go bring some boxes from the back up to the front."

Mako didn't look very convinced; however, he did look relieved to have an excuse to bow out. Wordlessly, he handed a menu to Korra, bowed to the woman, and disappeared in the back. Korra's eyes glinted dangerously at the woman, who had the nerve to shoot Korra the nastiest glare.

"Table for 1?" Korra asked innocently.

"What was that earlier, Korra?"

"What was what?"

"That lady you totally cockblocked earlier. She was going in on Mako and you just cut that off really quick."

Korra and Opal congregated by the front register. The afternoon rush had dulled into a much calmer stream of customers. Most of them were ordering for take-out, so the restaurant was for the most part empty. The door rang again as their most recent visitor exited Narook's. Opal turned to face Korra again, a hand on her hip.

"Korra? Are you going to answer my question."

"I have no idea what you are talking about," Korra lied smoothly, flipping a page of her magazine. Her eyes didn't even register the Future Industries ad that she absentmindedly perused over. Opal scoffed and reached over to snatch the magazine from Korra's grasp.

"Don't play dumb with me," Opal warned, wagging the confiscated magazine front of Korra's face. "I totally saw what happened."

"What happened?" Korra asked, genuinely interested in Opal was going to say. "Because I thought I was saving my friend from receiving unwanted attention."

Korra didn't want to see her friend uncomfortable around some thirsty beggar; was that so difficult to understand? Korra didn't think there was anything that complicated about the matter. She knew how much of a prude Mako was around women and, as his friend, it was her job to protect him from any unworthy suitors.

For all Opal knew, that woman could have been a succubus whose plans were to kill Mako after stealing his virtue!

Korra imagined poor Mako strapped down to the old railroad outside of town, screaming for help as his captor—the woman from earlier—twisted her mustache deviously. There was no way she was going to allow that to happen to him.

"Unwanted attention?" Opal parroted incredulously. "Korra, are you fucking serious right now?"

"What?!" the girl snapped, "Is there something wrong, Opal."

"Oh, spirits, not only are you transparent, but you're blind too!"

"Say what?"

"Korra," Opal said calmly, placing a placating hand on her arm, "you were jealous of that lady and Mako."

"What?!"

Absolutely not.

Opal had been loopy from eating so many noodles on the job; there's no way that she was jealousof Mako and that succubus. Besides, why should she be? It wasn't like they were dating or anything!

The thought of her and Mako dating was simply preposterous.

'Not that there was anything bad about Mako,' she corrected herself hastily. He was a good guy who was dealt a really shitty hand when he was eight years old and made the best of the situation. Mako was the stick in the mud who had helped pull Korra out of the darkest time in her life. He was loyal and selfless and, to be frank, a ginormous dork who wrote a to-do list every evening and knew a kickass taro cake recipe and was surprisingly good with polar bear dogs and had theprettiest brown eyes this city has ever seen—

There was no way that Korra was jealous of any girl approaching Mako.

No.

"That's ridiculous. Absolutely not." Korra denied sharply, crossing her arms and turning away from Opal. "It can't be."

"It sounds an awful lot like you're trying to convince yourself of this revelation," Opal said, "Perhaps you need help finding an answer. Oh wait; I know who can help you. Hey Mako! Korra needs you for somethin'!"

"Opal!" Korra hissed.

"What? Just trying to help a bro out."

"I'm going to throw you in the trash," Korra promised dangerously. Opal scoffed, bopping her friend with the magazine.

"Oh please. Anyway, look not-jealous, Mako's coming!"

"You're so fucking embarrassing."

"Whatever, Madame I-don't-know-when-I-am-so-obviously-jealous, let me know how it goes. See ya."

"Nothing's gonna happen 'coz I don't know what you're talking about!" Korra hollered after Opal's back.

"What's not gonna happen?" Korra yelped and jumped away from Mako, clutching her heart. He raised a brow suspiciously at Korra, who quickly tried to regain composure.

Korra felt weird.

"Oh, hey, Mako."

"Hey, what was Opal going on about?"

"Who knows?" Korra replied, too quickly. Mako shrugged and began to collect the menus scattered on the front counter. A quick surveillance around the restaurant revealed that it was just the two of them in the room.

From the corner of her eye, Korra spotted Opal peeking through the kitchen window, Tahno and Hasook flanking her sides. The three of them gave Korra a thumbs up and winked suggestively at the girl; Korra's face ignited in flames and, in retaliation, she sent the three of them a rude hand gesture. She hid the offending hand behind her back when Mako spun around, eyeing her suspiciously. She grinned a little too widely and her face felt a little too warm.

"I wanted to thank you for this afternoon," Mako said, breaking the awkward silence that had settled in between them. "I know it looks like I don't know when someone is making a pass at me—"

"You don't," Korra deadpanned. Mako's lips twitched and he threw a dishrag at her to silence her before continuing.

"—but when I do, I get uncomfortable quickly. So, thanks for cutting in today."

Mako looked absolutely mortified sharing this information with Korra, and that made him look like an even bigger dork in her eyes. She beamed fondly at him and reached over to tweak his cheek affectionately.

"Anything to protect widdle Mako from those predators."

"Oh, shut up Korra. Hey, d'you wanna come with me to get some tea after work? Bo woke up with some bug that's been going around and wanted tea from that place we went to."

Her answer was immediate.

"Thanks for coming with me, Korra," Mako said outside of the Jasmine Dragon, "It was fun. I'll see you at school tomorrow?"

"If you don't catch that sickness yourself," Korra replied, "Take care of yourself, nerd. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Bye, Korra!"

She clutched her box of leftover teacakes and rushed in the direction opposite of Mako.

Korra ended another day with Mako, something that she couldn't complain for. Both had gotten off of work early and stopped by the Jasmine Dragon for rice crackers and green tea. A good end to an overall decent day.

With her mind filled to the brim with thoughts of Mako, the walk home wasn't very long at all. From where Korra faced, she could see the central business district of the city finally winding down after a long winter day. The last of the sun's setting beams just touched the magnificence of Future Industries.

Korra watched as the rays slowly began to sink, receding away from the impressive skyscraper and back into the shadows. In the distance, Korra could make out a long line of satomobiles, rumbling impatiently in bumper-to-bumper traffic along Kyoshi Bridge. Yue Bay's waters rippled softly against the shores of Republic City, silently awaiting the rise of the full moon.

The street Korra was currently on had no working streetlights, so if she were to look hard enough, she could see the North Star off to the east, dimly twinkling against the noisy canvas the city sky had painted. Korra concentrated harder to get a better look at the star, as it wasn't something that was easily seen in these parts of the world.

Mako's face entered her mind, unbidden.

She could hear his annoyance, as she remembered a conversation they had not too long ago.

'Korra, we're in the city. It's too bright for that, and what kind of idiot just stands there stargazingin the middle of the city? You're asking to get mugged.'

Giggles erupted from Korra's lips at the memory. It was rather silly to go looking for stars in the middle of a dark road, wasn't it? Silently reprimanding herself for her carelessness, Korra pulled her scarf up over her face and rushed back to her apartment.

Naga was quietly waiting on her bed when Korra pushed open the door.

"Naga! How was your day girl?"

The polar bear dog wagged her tail happily, hopping off her cushion to go greet her master. She wet the side of Korra's face with a swipe of her tongue; Korra laughed and rubbed the back of her best friend's ears.

"I had a good day too. I went to work and, like, there was this girl who was all over Mako, but whatever, I saved him," she rolled her eyes at the memory before continuing, "and then we went to go get tea after work. How's your day been? Have you been bored holding down the fort?"

Naga didn't answer, but it's not like Korra really expected her to.

Having grown up with only a giant polar bear dog as your best friend made Korra accustomed to filling any sort of silence with her own voice, much like she was doing right now.

Bzzt! Bzzt!

The vibration of Korra's cell phone in her pocket took her attention away from Naga. She dug deep into the pockets of her parka before producing her phone. She froze upon reading the name of the caller.

'What? Why now?' Korra thought, feeling her heart thud in her chest at a dangerous rate. Naga tilted her head at her owner, noticing Korra's sudden change in demeanor.

'Should I even answer it?' she thought to herself.

Panicked blue eyes flew over in the direction of her kitchen table, where she had unceremoniously dropped her box of teacakes from earlier. She bit her lip, her thoughts taken back to the park the day before. Korra was reminded of how understanding Mako was, smiling kindly down at her in the morning light. She didn't want to acknowledge it then, but even as she was promising to move forward with her life, she could feel a tugging sensation in her chest. It pulled harder and harder, only bearable when she was finally in Mako's arms. Heat rose up in the back of her neck as she recalled the hard muscles of his body melting against hers and the warmth of his breath against her ears.

The throbbing in her chest made her long to see him again.

She wanted to see Mako again. She wanted to see Mako now.

Naga barked, bringing Korra's attention back to her ringing phone. A new determination glittered in her eyes as she hit 'accept.'

"Asami?"

"Hey, Korra."