Dear, Mako
Are you tripping on cactus juice again? I thought you learned your lesson the first time, and told Bolin to stay away from that stuff.
No, but seriously. Like for monkey feathers' sake.
What are you thinking, man? You took the greatest thing that ever happened to you, the one person who made your life amazing for six months and...
Now Asami?
Again? :0
Don't get me wrong, I love Asami. She's amazing, but dude. What is your problem, flameo?
I am now going to write an angsty chapter about you and my broken feels inflicting justified pain of your stupidly gorgeous body that Asami/Korra/Asami/me have been in.
You got off easy.
You will soon see my fingers typing away to manifest your regrets into this chapter.
Prepare yourself and blame it all on Varrick, Mako.
Flameo, Hotman, flameo.
Yours truly,
A very hurt fangirl by the name of Bolinlover123.
May the Spirits (the Light ones) bless you and all your illegitimate children.
I'm lucky you're so good at breaking girls' hearts. Korra better watch out.
...
Damn it.
He's screwed.
He's so screwed, he thinks, as his stupid-mustached coworkers drag him out their (no, not just his anymore, because damn it, what is happening to his relationships?) apartment.
"It's Varick! This is all Varick! He set me up!" He called to Asami as he was pushed away, and he thinks, maybe this is what he deserves for being a jerk to the few people his life has managed to be built around.
Lu shoves a hand to his back again with a chuckle, and he stumbles a bit before straightening up with a grimace and squaring his shoulders.
Please, as if they thought that was going to do anything. He can't count the number of times he's been arrested in his youth, and, neither him nor Beifong would ever bring it up, but if he remembers correctly, he's pretty sure she was the one who interrogated him when he was twelve after getting caught during an opium bust on the west side, as was held for a night.
Once a Triad, always a Triad.
Well, he'd say he's going to miss being a cop, but quite frankly, he's not so sure.
"Stop lagging, May-co. Pick up the pace, street rat." Lu pushes him again, and oh, Agni, what he's give to burn that smug mustached grin off his face.
But, of course, what else would you expect from a thug like him? Because obviously, this was his plan all along and his only future will be behind bars. Blah, blah, blah.
Look's like you should put more 'try' in Triad.
In his head, Varick laughs at him as he dangles his limbs from a red thread. He feels Bolin's resentment coming off him in waves as he packs his suitcase and declares he is leaving, with no such discussion about it. Asami's tears and familiar, yet, stranger lips sting his skin, with Traids scoffing at him with curses, and- her face.
It's always her face that brings him back. Her face that is crumbled up in his uniform pocket on the couch. Not like he needs either of those things anymore.
He job is gone, his reputation ruined. He's putty in the hands of a mastermind, he's pretty sure his brother hates him, his ex(ex?) girlfriend is about to lose her company, family name, and honor to said mastermind, and heart to him ( once again), and she-
She probably wants nothing more to do with him. And he can't say he blames her.
He's got nothing left, and who wants nothing when it smells like betrayal and broken promises? Burnt lilacs, and burnt-out flames and, a little boy who just couldn't do it. A street rat who thought he could ride his way to the top, only to crash down again because, yeah, I guess I am.
Yeah, I guess I am.
Yeah, I guess I am.
Yeah
I guess
I
am
Oh, how that scene had played like a broken record in his dreams every night.
Oh, how he wishes sometimes that he could do back to living on the street, because blocking everything out and burning away every emotion and desire was so much easier than feeling.
Than feeling all this...this...this...gahhh!
"Hey, Fire Cracker," Gang remarks, twisting his stash with his fingers, "Get in the car. Don't make us use excessive force."
Excessive force, his ass, his life's been excessive force since he was eight. They wanna give him a shiner for their pride? He'd like to see them try.
Lin gives him a pointed glare, and he feels his hands heating up, and maybe if he can melt the medal off his writs...
He shakes his head. What would it matter?
He is eight/ten/twelve/ sixteen/ as he gets into the police car once again, knowing by now that by bending his elbows and resting them against his knees, will slide the cuffs down and not make them hurt so much.
He's closing his eyes, trying to dip his head down out of view from the window, when a tap sounds on the glass. He hardens his jaw and rolls his down.
"Hey, kid," Gang remarks.
"What."
"When you get to jail...tell em' Lu and Gang sent ya'!" and they start hooting and hollering like a couple of spider-monkeys.
He glowers, and rolls up the window with a pitch in his stomach.
When you get to jail, tell em' Mako sent ya'!
Ooh, I like that one.
Okay, I'll use that next time.
What is wrong with him? His stomach flutters and he swallows back a bitter taste.
Shame? Heartbreak? Regret?
Something like burnt chocolate and the salty tears on his face that he is too far gone to care to whipe away, mixed with crimson because he thinks he's bitten his lip so hard that it is bleeding, and when he moans, Lin's eyes dart to him, asking him what's the matter and he mumbles, nothing.
As if you really care.
But he thinks what he's really trying to say is 'nothing matters anymore'. Because he's managed to push them all away, especially her. And now he's a nothing.
If I could remember how to tell myself the truth, would you say the first time we met was when I confessed my love to you; love at first sight?
Maybe then I would feel able to be loved in return. (1)
Nothing except an idiot.
Because once they arrive at the station, there her face is, printed on the front cover of a newspaper, disregarded on someone's desk just like eight years ago, and he flashes back to ten-years old; the first day he saw her face, crumbled on a desk just like this in the Triple Threat's HQ, the corner if an igloo smudged with coffee.
Only now, her black and white face is not in a chubby, confident pout that says she can take on anything and anyone.
It is in a faint little smile, eyes hiding a unknown truth, unknown heartbreak, and unknown future for the world. She is different...a difference that he cannot explain; maturity? Confidence? Identity? But inside, those eyes hold a pain. A pain that he knows he caused.
Beside her is Tenzin and the kids; the background showing some ancient looking scenery with the same symbols as the gates at the Island, and he thinks she must be out there doing 'Avatar Stuff' and that is way more important than him, so he should be happy. The print states that she is learning more about the Spirits and the Spirit World, and something called 'Energy Bending', and he is happy for her. He really is.
The crappy world is most diffenitly more important than crappy him, but he just wishes she could see how much he needs her back.
"Well," Lu chuckles, bringing him back, "Looks like the Avatar's doing mighty fine without you, Mister Heartbreaker."
He just swallows and nods, because yes, yes, he gets it now. He really does. He's always needed her, but so has the world, and his world is so small, and her's is so big, and it's not fair for him to fight for his own spot. Because she is the Avatar, and everyone needs her, so really, he is nothing more than anyone; he really isn't. He's just a street rat; always has been, always will be.
Gang snorts, "I know, right? Jeez, kid, who do you think you are?"
"An idiot." he replies faintly, as her eyes shine back at him through the print.
"An Idiot who fell in love with the Avatar."