Disclaimer: I do not own avatar or any of its characters.

Chapter 10

At school

"I dream of Rain

I dream of gardens in desert sand

I wake in pain

I dream of love as time runs through my hand

I dream of fire—"

Amy hit the alarm clock, silencing Stings 'Desert Rose'.

"Monday…. Ugh…. OW!" She rolled out of bed and hit the floor. She stared up at the ceiling, sighing in frustration, "This is a crime!" She groaned, "I hate school." She stumbled through the door to her parent's room and she knocked on the door.

"Zuko! Get up!" Amy said through the door. There was no answer from the person within the room. She knocked harder, "Get up Zuko! Get ready for school!" But there was still silence.

"Oy Vae!" Amy went in. She saw Zuko sleeping in the bed, fully oblivious to everything around him. She nudged him, "Zuko?" He grunted and turned away from her, still sleeping, "Mhhooheemm!" he murmured/grunted.

"What was that?" But she didn't receive an answer, he was still asleep. She pushed him, "Get up Dammit." But he didn't so much as grunt this time. Amy had an idea; she stepped away from the bed and took a deep breath.

"LOOK! THE AVATAR!"

Zuko's reaction was perfect. He leaped out of the bed, fully awake and his arms posed for fighting, the fists on fire, "WHERE!" He asked.

Amy laughed, "Cool it Jackie Chan. There's no avatar. That was the only way to wake you up. Sorry."

Zuko lowered his fists, the fire going out, "Oh yeah, Schools today…. it's unbelievable that we have to get up this early."

Amy 'pshed' "You'll get used to it. We'll get breakfast on the way. She left him alone to get ready and went to her room and got dressed. She picked out a denim miniskirt with her usual black tank top. It was warm out today, mostly humid from the warm front that was coming through. But Amy bet that there was going to be a cold front right after it, as was common in Florida. Amy did her hair, combing it to one side and putting in two silver hoops in each ear and a silver heart necklace. A little foundation to cover the morning paleness, a touch of eyeliner and a dab of lipstick. She was done and it only took…thirty minutes…

"A new record." Amy said with less then perfect enthusiasm. When she came out of the room, she saw that Zuko was dressed and ready, sitting on the couch and watching MTV Music Wake up. He turned and looked when he heard her enter. His eyes went wide, looking her up and down for a moment.

"What?" Amy asked, looking down at herself, "there something on me?"

Zuko shook his head, looking away, "No, it's just that I haven't seen you wear something like that, only trousers and tunics. I'm not use to it."

Amy shrugged, "Whatever. I need to clean before we leave. It's my daily job before going to school. They had fifteen minutes left before they had to leave for school.

Zuko watched as she swept and vacuumed the carpet and rest of the house. She did it quickly and was done in no time.

"Done!" She exclaimed, putting the vacuum away, "Let's go. Bye Bear, be good pup." Amy told the puppy.

They grabbed their backpacks and left the house. Zuko was glad that he was wearing short sleeves today, it was hot and sticky out. Zuko wore blue jeans that had huge pockets and a black shirt. They got into the car and drove away. The sky was still dark, a very faint trace of the sun shone over the horizon on their right side as it rose gradually into the sky.

"Sleep well?" Amy asked, turning on some music. Natasha Bedingfeilds 'Unwritten' came on through the speakers.

Zuko nodded, "Pretty well I suppose. It was nice though, a better change then from sleeping on the couch."

"Would you rather sleep on the floor?" Amy joked. Zuko cast an annoyed glance at her, but Amy ignored it and they pulled up into McDonalds' drive through.

"What do you want?" Amy asked him. Zuko looked at her blankly…

Amy realized her error, "Okay then. How about some hash browns, a McGriddle, and a fruit parfait?" Zuko nodded but he had no possible idea what she was talking about. Amy ordered the food and went to the window to pick it up. A white male, about eighteen with piercing all over his face gave Amy the food. Amy must've known him because she smiled at the man, "Shaun! How are you?" She asked the man.

Shaun grinned, exposing a tattooed lip, "Hey Amy. I'm doing fine, the band has a new gig at the Grind this Saturday!" He saw Zuko in the passenger seat, he looked at his hair, "Cool do man!" He gave Zuko the thumbs up. Zuko was unsure how to answer, just copy what they do, "Um...Thanks." Zuko said, giving him the thumps up back. Amy had a hard time trying not to laugh, they drove away from the McDonalds. Amy gave Zuko the bag of food.

"Get yourself out a McGriddle and a hash brown." She told him.

Zuko was again puzzled, "What are those?" He held up a flat hash brown and a yellow wrapped McGriddle.

Amy smiled, "You have them in your hands. The brown thing is a hash brown and the yellow thing is a McGriddle, but unwrap it first. Can you hand me a hash brown?"

Zuko did and he watched as she ate it, to see if it was okay to eat. He hesitated then took a bite out of the hash brown. After chewing for a few moments, he concluded that it was delicious. He unwrapped the McGriddle and began eating that too.

"Why did that man, Shaun, have rings and pieces of metal in his skin, everywhere?" Zuko asked after finishing his hash brown.

Amy smiled, "Some people do that for their own reasons, fashion, or it's a symbol for them. You'll see a lot of strange things here; tattoo's, hairdo's, piercings…especially at my school. I even have a piercing that you have never seen before."

Zuko looked at her ears, there were two holes in each and a silver loop through both of them, "I've seen piercing like that."

Amy lifted up the bottom of her tank top, showing him her belly button ring, "Anything like this?"

Zuko stared, "That…is…um…different." He said, not sure what to say. The ring was a jeweled sun with little black sunglasses.

"You'll see a lot of those too on women. Just don't stare, K?" Zuko nodded.

"How did you know that man? Will he be at this school we are going too?"
Amy shook her head, "Shaun? No, he's a drop out. We use to go to school together though. He works at McDonalds now so he can help raise his girlfriend and baby girl. Asia is almost one year old now. She's adorable."

Zuko sat back in the seat and they drove on.

:Time Gappy:

They pulled up ta the school, Zuko stared at all the people that were walking around, talking in groups or just playing around with each other. There were people of all ages, most of them were his age or slightly older he could see. They got out of the car, Amy locked up and they headed for Amy's normal hang-out spot. Zuko received many looks and whispers, but he acted like Amy and ignored it all.

"Who's the hottie?" He heard one girl say to her friends. They shrugged, not knowing. 'Hottie?' Did that refer to firebending? Zuko did not know, there were so many strange words in this world.

Amy sat down on a cement wall in the middle of the courtyard. Zuko sat beside her, surveying the people around him. Zuko saw a few people younger and older then him, a lot of them.

"Amy? Do people different ages stay in the same classes together?" He asked her.

Amy shrugged, "Depends on how smart you are. There are four levels of people mostly depending on ages. There are Freshman, Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors. We are Sophomores. Freshies can take classes like Geometry with the upper classmen if they are smart enough. People in higher classes sometimes have to take classes with the younger levels. Freshmen are twelve year olds to maybe fifteen and it goes up from there. You'll understand more as we go along. So what do you think of the school so far?"

Zuko grimaced, "Overwhelming." He admitted, "I heard a girl say that I am a 'hottie'….what is that?"

Amy grinned, "It means you're good looking. Hot is what we call it."

Zuko was surprised by this, he had never viewed himself as good looking, only scarred.

"But my scar…"

"Don't worry about it. Some people will probably bring it up. Don't get mad, say that you were in a fire when you were young and you don't like to talk about it."

Amy looked off back to the crowd and her eyes went wide and a slow smile spread across her face. Zuko looked and saw what she was so happy about. There was the jerk he had fought with on Saturday night. Matt was with the same guys he had seen him with that night. Zuko could see the black eye he had left, big and purple, it stood out on Matt's pale face. Zuko felt instant gratification to know that it was too big to be hidden. They had not seen him yet, but one boy, an African American with a black dew-rag on saw Zuko. He told Matt, Matt turned and looked at Zuko. Their eyes met and Zuko could feel his hatred in his gaze, also worry and a bit of fear. Matt turned and walked away. The other boys called after him, asking why he was leaving. Then they saw Zuko and they left quickly, following their leader.

Amy smiled, "I guess he's gonna stay outta your way for now on." She said, "everyone will know that you knocked out Matt! You are already getting a bad boy reputation."

"Bad-boy? Is that good?" Zuko asked.

"It is if you don't want people to mess with you. Get you angry…plus, a lot of girls like bad boys, think they're hot." Amy laughed. Zuko decided to change the subject, "What is our first class?"

Amy pointed to building 5, Veterinary Medicine.

"Ms. Bonnie's class, with the cats. Bell will ring in…." She checked her cell clock, " In seven minutes. Sydnee, Liz and the others should be here soon, they arrive together most of the time." Zuko and Amy waited, they talked about school and the Vet Med class, what Zuko should say when the teacher asks him a question and so on from there.

All of a sudden, Amy let out a "YIPE!" A black girl appeared from behind her, grinning cheekily.

"TERIIKA!" Amy shouted. Zuko looked at Teriika who was laughing along with Amy. Teriika had short black/brown hair with big brown eyes and whit, straight teeth that gleamed when she smiled. She poked Amy in the stomach, "Whatcha ben doin' Bitch?" She asked. Amy smacked her playfully, "Nothing whore. How are you and Tristen?"

Teriika shrugged, she saw Zuko, "Amy? Who's this?"

"I'm Zuko." Zuko answered for himself.

"cool name, sounds familiar. Haven't I heard Sydnee talk about a person named Zuko at the lunch table before?" She asked Amy.

"Um…yeah." Amy murmured, "But it's not the same Zuko.." Amy lied. Everyone showed up, Courtney, Garret, Liz, Sydnee, Sarah, Stephanie and Brianna.

"Cool dude! You're here!" Sydnee said excitedly. Everyone said hello and they all started talking about school.

Amy told them what happened with Matt, they cheered for Zuko.

Sarah broke in , "You know he will want revenge." Amy knew, Matt didn't take a defeat sitting down. He's gonna try every possible thing to humiliate Zuko for punching him, for defeating him on Saturday. 'I'll just have to keep an eye on him' Amy made a mental note.

BEEEEEEEEEP! The bell rang, time for school!


I hoped you all like. I wrote like, five more composition pages since last night. Thank you all for the reviews and the idea's! I love you all. The writers bloke is starting to fade thankfully! I love Desert Rose by Sting. I was listeningto it over and over the whole time I was typing this up. That and 'Thousand Years' (sigh)

Leave a review!–Amy!