Chapter Fifteen: Interstate
On Friday afternoon, "The bitch is real," Ty Lee hisses, glowering at her phone.
She sits in her bright pink bedroom with Mai. They both are on the nail-polish-stained fluffy white carpet, sitting across from each other after a tiring day at school. Their best friend left early since she had two free periods at the end of the day, and now they are fairly lonely.
Mai looks up from her own and says, "You didn't realize that when Azula voluntarily went to stay with her mother for an extra weekend?"
"I'm a hopeful person!" When Mai laughs, Ty Lee makes a sound like an angry cat.
Mai has never seen Ty Lee this angry. She would comfort her if she cared, but instead she just shrugs. "Haru is real too."
Ty Lee flushes bright red, flustered and enraged as she shrieks, "Yeah, well, then I'm gonna break up with him!"
"In hopes that it will make Azula break up with June and marry you and have little babies?" Mai sardonically asks, setting down her iPhone.
"In hopes of the first one," says Ty Lee, startling her best friend. "The other two would just be bonuses."
Mai slowly says, "Haru is the best boyfriend you've ever had, and I don't think you should break up with him. I don't know June but—"
"We should meet her!" Ty Lee exclaims, clapping her hands together. "We can meet her and then show Azula how horrible she is!" Ty Lee grins excitedly at her own idea. "Let's do it!"
Mai makes a mental note to make new friends. "How are you going to get to Portland?"
Ty Lee taps her chin in mock thought. "Uh, Haru can drive and has a car."
And Mai exasperatedly sighs. "So, you're going to take your current boyfriend to help you break up the girlfriend of your crush so that you can break up with him and get together with her?"
Ty Lee does not bat and eyelash as she retorts, "Yup."
All Mai can do is shrug. "I'll get my coat. This sounds hilarious."
"You should pack some stuff too. It's like a sixteen-hour drive."
[X]
Zuko knocking on Azula's door disrupts her Saturday afternoon hiding session. She has been pleasantly concealed in her bedroom, and now he has to ruin it like he always does.
"Your friends are here," Zuko calls through the wood. Azula rolls her gilded eyes.
Azula hisses, "What friends? I only have two friends and—"
Zuko brashly interrupts, "And they're at the door with that football kid Ty Lee took to the dance."
Stunned, Azula stands, opens the door, shoves her brother out of her way, and walks downstairs. Lo and behold, three idiots are waiting for her in the foyer. Ty Lee beams at her, Haru awkwardly waves, and Mai glares.
"You two should come inside," warmly offers Ursa, against Azula's will.
"Thanks, Mrs. Azula's Mom!" Ty Lee says brightly, dropping her pink suitcase on the hardwood floor. Azula glowers from the grand staircase.
Mai walks to the living room, throws her ratty black backpack onto the floor and curls up on the couch. Haru shuffles his feet while Ty Lee hugs Azula tightly.
"Why are you here?" Azula asks, prying Ty Lee off her.
"We wanted to surprise you for your birthday!" lies Ty Lee, and everyone believes her. It is just like her to do something such as that.
"Which is not until Wednesday," Azula says.
"Then we can meet June!" Ty Lee insists, refusing to give in so easily.
Azula cocks an eyebrow. "Did you… drive from LA to Portland to meet June?"
"Yes!" Ty Lee closes her eyes and grins.
Azula glances at her secret crush's companions. "With Haru and Mai?"
"Double—triple date! Triple date!" Ty Lee looks thrilled.
Mai says from the sofa, "This is the quietest she's been in almost twenty-four hours."
"Hi, Mai," Zuko awkwardly says, waving with one sweaty hand.
Mai slowly looks up. "Oh… hey there. How's it going, buddy?"
"N-not bad. Uh… buddy." Zuko averts his eyes.
Ty Lee turns to Ursa. "Okay, so I know she's not being really flattering, but Mai is the best girlfriend for your son. I think they're so cute together which is why I had Azula set Mai on fire last weekend so that Zuko would push her into the pool and I think they're just awkward about that."
"Okay, glossing over Azula setting Mai on fire—" Ursa says.
"So that Zuko would push her into the pool," Ty Lee corrects, unbidden but unknowing.
"Right," Ursa quizzically says, looking around her living room. "I think that you all should probably rest. We have plenty of room."
"I'm in favor of rest," says Mai, standing up.
"You can't stay in with Zuko," says his mother. He glares, but adjusts his bitter expression once she looks away.
"I wasn't planning on it." Pause. "Thank you for tolerating our intrusion, or whatever."
"You're welcome," replies Ursa.
Azula, however, still looks livid.
[X]
"Mrs. Azula's Mom?" Zuko asks Ty Lee as soon as they get upstairs.
Ty Lee pouts at him. "Well, she remarried and I don't know her last name now."
"She married my uncle," flatly says Azula, uncertain how Ty Lee could miss that.
"So?" Ty Lee is befuddled.
Azula says, "She married my paternal uncle."
Ty Lee just squints.
Mai interjects as she opens the guest room door, "She won't get it, Azula."
And so Azula rolls her eyes and says, "Shinohai. Her last name is Shinohai."
"Still?" Ty Lee's eyes widen in shock.
"Yes, because my uncle and my father have the same last name." Azula pointedly rubs her temples. "They're brothers."
Ty Lee blinks several times. "Hm."
[X]
That evening, in the dark of the night, June examines her black fingernails as the kids from California arrive at the bowling alley. They look like she expected. Azula described a football kid, a bubbly girl dressed like a toddler in a tiara, an apathetic goth who is actually a hipster but does not know it, and her brother. Zuko warned her that 'Azula always lies' but this seems true enough.
"I hate bowling," says Mai, again dodging Zuko's attempt to wrap his arm around her. He does not seem to get the hint until she jabs him with her elbow. "I really do."
"So do I," June says, looking the girl up and down. "It's terrible. Do any of us like bowling?"
"I love bowling!" chirps Ty Lee, wrapping herself around Haru.
Azula hosts a brief fantasy of snapping his neck.
[X]
Zuko is good at bowling. Azula is not good at bowling.
Right now, Haru has promised to beat Zuko for Ty Lee, which makes Azula kind of want to grab the lighter from June's jacket pocket and just burn him alive along with her brother.
This is the sole worst and most unfair activity Azula has ever partaken in. And so, she sits down close to June and pretends that her brother and the other three people she thinks she might now hate do not exist.
June kisses her. Azula kisses June. It… makes her forget about her awful brother and awful mother and this awful city and awful bowling alley. In fact, the bliss of it is alien and overwhelming to a girl who never bothered falling in love with someone.
While their lips are locked, Ty Lee jumps up and grabs Mai by the elbow.
"Mai has to go to the bathroom," Ty Lee hastily announces, but no one is listening but Haru.
As soon as Mai and Ty Lee reach the solitude of the bathroom, Ty Lee turns to Mai with abnormal sadness in her eyes.
"They're happy together," Ty Lee whispers, her voice constricted with emotion. "This is the worst thing that's ever happened to me."
Mai does not know how to respond to that.
[X]
After Ty Lee dries her eyes and returns to the triple date, Zuko wins the game; Haru demands a rematch. Azula walks outside and sits down on the back of Haru's truck. It is shiny, black, and fades into the night. While Azula thinks she also vanished, Ty Lee wonders if she glows and glistens, because she is more beautiful than the stars or illuminated city.
Ty Lee walks to Azula and sits down beside her.
"You're probably really good at bowling. You're really good at everything," she says softly as she situates herself beside her best friend.
"I know. I just think it is disgusting in there." Azula sighs. "Did you drive all the way up here to meet June because of that kiss?"
It is the perfect time to confess their feelings for each other.
However, they know the thousand reasons it would be a bad idea—and they still have the sneaking suspicion that it is not mutual, despite all evidence otherwise. Azula may be clever, but she is romantically clueless, and Ty Lee interprets Azula's coldness as indifference. It is like putting your hand too close to the stove; even if you want to touch it, your body won't let you because it does not want to get burned.
"No. That was a… a mistake, you know, and I'm sorry, and you and June look really happy together." Really happy, Ty Lee silently laments behind her smile. "I just came up here because I was jealous about your happy relationship because I'm thinking that maybe Haru is cheating on me. That's why I was being kind of mean to your girlfriend."
"He probably isn't cheating on you. His kindness and loyalty sickens me."
"I hope not. I don't know why you're friends with me. I'm not friends with you material."
"You are friends with me material, because I am very selective."
"Really?"
"Yes. You're special," Azula says, and she watches Ty Lee fall to pretty little pieces.
It is too easy.
Chapter Fifteen: Interstellar
It is Valentine's Day. Azula wakes up, wraps a robe around herself and talks to Ty Lee over coffee. Her fiancée looks brilliantly excited, as she always does today.
"Where do you want to go?" Azula inquires, sipping from her mug.
"Bunny," says Ty Lee, her tongue-twisted from pure thrills.
"That's not a place," says Azula mockingly, "but if you are asking what we will do with our daughter, I am planning on bringing her. We will do a family Valentine's Day."
"That's so romantic." Pause. "As long as it doesn't include your family."
Azula cannot help but agree. "It doesn't, thank God. Now, tell me where you want to go."
"Let's just stay here," Ty Lee dreamily says, fantasizing about a thousand romantic ways to spend the day. They could be such a cute family together, savoring their white picket fence ending.
"Not Paris or Costa Rica or San Francisco? Asia? My father and Mai are in Singapore. On business, but they're not very romantic people. My grandparents are in Venice," says Azula.
"I wanna stay here. New York is super romantic. We can take Bunny to the Alice in Wonderland Monument and we can have a picnic and then go shopping for wedding stuff and then see a movie and make Valentine's Day Oreo pops and then go to Jekyll and Hyde's."
Azula agrees, but those plans are devastated when Bunny coughs, sneezes, and vomits all over the floor of Azula's beautiful penthouse.
[X]
Azula scrubs her hands with scented hand-sanitizer for the thousandth time this morning. She sits at work but cannot shake the disgusting germs in her home. Ty Lee scrubbed the mess and tucked Bunny back in bed while Azula slid into the shower and located her box of five Lysol cans.
She sterilized her penthouse and went to the office, but she might get sick.
Sick. She might get sick. Sick.
That is not something she does. Being congested gives her panic attacks and being ill makes her feel wildly out of control. This is the price of being a parent, is it not? Little slimy creatures made of germs and con-artist tendencies.
Azula assumes she will have to stay home today, because Ty Lee needs to take care of her daughter. Of course, Azula does too, but she does not do sick.
Maybe one day that will change.
[X]
Azula lingers at work for as long as she can, but eventually must go home. On the street, as she walks, she sees a young man propose to a young woman. She jumps into his arms and they spin around in circles. The ring drops and rolls away into the sewer.
After staring for a moment or two, Azula makes it home as the sun sets over the city. Bunny is fast asleep while Ty Lee sits on the sofa in a gorgeous short pink kimono.
"Let's watch the Notebook and cry together. The most romantic thing two people can do is cry in each other's arms," Ty Lee airily suggests in a puzzlingly husky voice.
"If you want me to cry with you, you have to choose between Interstellar and Armageddon. They are the only movies that have ever made me shed a tear." They made her bawl like a baby, to tell the truth, but Azula will never admit it.
"Interstellar is on Hulu," Ty Lee chirps, jabbing the remote in the direction of the color television. "You'll cuddle with me, right? Cuddle and cry? It's Valentine's Day, the day of love."
"No," says Azula as Ty Lee starts the movie.
Interstellar is the science fiction tale of how much a father will sacrifice for his youngest daughter and how much he will ignore his elder son to favor her. Therefore, it wounds Azula even more than the sacrifice in Armageddon that always makes her cry. San Andreas makes her tear up too, but the lack of death keeps her emotions under control.
Ty Lee has figured out that the only way to get Azula to sob during a movie is to watch something about a father and a daughter. According to Mai, Ozai is the same way.
"But don't you love me?" Ty Lee asks, her eyes widening like a begging puppy.
Azula sighs and sits down on the sofa. She hears Bunny hacking up a lung in the other room and shudders.
"Oh, well, since you are the only woman I have ever loved… still no," says Azula.
Ty Lee wraps herself around Azula anyway.
[X]
Ty Lee whispers after they have sex, "Why do you get so sad about father sacrifices? Your dad never sacrificed anything for you."
"That is the reason why," Azula says, turning away in bed while she speaks. "I remember every single recital, every play, every dance competition or ballet show. He always had to work. I remember being about fourteen and he was going on this important business trip for the entire summer and he promised me for months ahead that we would go together. Then, we got to the day of, and he told me he had to go alone. I never really got over those wounds."
"You're being so honest. This is the best Valentine's Day gift ever," Ty Lee gushes, wrapping herself around Azula so that her lips hover above her neck.
"He regrets it too. That's why he cries during the same movies as me and at no other fictional times," Azula whispers, and Ty Lee kisses her right under her ear. "I'm calling him. You go to sleep or do whatever you want. Valentine's Day is over now."
Ty Lee still is on Cloud Nine. Azula never has opened up like that before! It seems to be a good sign for their relationship.
Meanwhile, the CEO dials her father's phone number.
Mai answers his phone and groggily asks, "What time is it where you are?"
Azula retorts, "Is my father there? And it's not even remotely late or too early where you are. I checked Singapore time so you cannot give me some criticism about calling you at four in the morning like you so often do."
"Ugh. Why are you calling me?"
"He will not answer, and I called him at least forty times."
"What do you want?"
"I want to talk to my father."
"About what?"
"Does that matter to you?"
"Have you been crying or are you just at last suffering the effects of smoking?"
"Where is my father?"
"He's elsewhere. I'm in the hotel watching Netflix and drinking a liter of Mountain Dew before we go to dinner later. Can I take a message?"
"Whatever." Azula lividly hangs up.
She wipes under her eyes and lies down in bed beside Ty Lee.
[X]
In the morning, feverish and with Zillow open on her phone, "I'm thinking about buying a house in LA," says Azula to her fiancée.
"Is this because of Interstellar?" Ty Lee asks, cocking an eyebrow.
"No," sharply replies Azula, glaring. "It is because of the contagion in my home with Bunny as patient zero. If I had another house, I could go there, and if that house was in LA, my father and Mai could get sick instead of us."
Ty Lee asks, persisting against intelligence, "It's not because you miss your dad?"
"No, it is not because I miss my father," lies Azula, crossing her arms. Ty Lee shrugs. "Do you want to go look for houses with me?"
"Are you going to suggest that I leave Bunny here?"
"Unfortunately, no."
"I—maybe this needs more planning—are we even ready to move across the country?"
"We are not moving. We are purchasing a second home."
"It's not like, exactly an island, but that sounds fun!"
Ty Lee's smile makes Azula smirk.
