WARNING: This chapter deals with the sensitive and controversial topic of biphobia, which I know is a real issue in the LGBT community. I personally am a "gold star" lesbian who has admittedly had her insecurities towards bisexual women in the past, but I disagree with both Azula and Ty Lee's perspectives in this chapter. I was given a prompt about Azula having biphobia included in her trust issues with Ty Lee, and I hope I dealt with the topic sensitively and kept this chapter as light as I could.


#112: Gold Star

Prompted By: turtleducksymphony

Azula steps into her room and her eyes lividly flicker. "What are you doing to your toenails on my bed?"

"Grooming them, princess," replies Ty Lee with a smile. She clips the edge of one off with a snip, snip. Azula wants to snap snap her fiancee's neck when she hears that awful sound.

As Azula starts to change her clothes, she keeps her eyes on Ty Lee.

"If you're going to marry me and be a princess," icily says Azula, "you absolutely cannot clip your toenails on a royal bed. It's a level of uncouth and disgusting I cannot begin to describe."

Ty Lee blinks twice and daringly protests, "It's just, you - you really don't like sharp toenails. 'Cause they scratch you when we sleep."

"We have a staff to do that for you." Azula finishes undressing and sits down beside her fiancee on the plush bed.

Ty Lee sits up and brushes away the small slivers and sets her tool on the bedside table. She rises up onto her knees, leans to the side and softly kisses Azula on the cheekbone.

Azula draws in a slow breath and turns to crush her lips against Ty Lee's.

When the kiss breaks, Ty Lee starts slipping off her silky pink nightshirt, but Azula takes Ty Lee's hands in hers.

"Don't," regally orders Azula as she gently squeezes Ty Lee's soft wrists.

Ty Lee blinks, stunned, heart thundering. She hopes she has done nothing to hurt or anger the princess.

"What's wrong?" asks Ty Lee, furrowing her brow.

It takes Azula some time to formulate an answer that shows little emotion.

"When you came to the Fire Nation, you came for me," says Azula, locking eyes with her future bride. They have faint dark circles under them. "You were still in love with me. Am I wrong?"

Ty Lee stammers, "I… yes. But I tried to convince myself it was a job for Zuko. I did get paid. Still do."

"And, therefore, you have been purely absorbed in me since the moment you set foot on Fire Nation soil? You haven't been with anyone else?"

Ty Lee's heart sinks into the pit of her stomach. She never wanted Azula to ask this. Her jealous fiancee does not need to know about any of Ty Lee's past relationships, and she certainly breezed through several after the war while trying to find herself. Her heart sought a thing she could not name, even on Kyoshi Island. She tried devotion to her work there, she tried falling in love with a thousand different and brilliant people, and she tried traveling.

None of it helped.

Even now, sometimes she thinks Azula was not quite the answer, just something very close to it.

"Why are you asking this?" Ty Lee cautiously inquired, attempting and failing to force a smile.

Azula lies down and, gazing up at the clearly nervous Ty Lee, smoothly replies, "Something… off handed that Mai said about you and a boyfriend."

Ty Lee brazenly lies, "I definitely haven't had a boyfriend since coming here."

"Or a girlfriend?"

"Well, I've had you, princess."

"I…" Azula takes a breath. She still feels like she is right and Ty Lee is lying but Ty Lee shows no signs of dishonesty. "You best not stop loving me because I'm crazy. If you did, I would be forced to murder you or go into exile or something else unsavory. You left me before because I was crazy. More than once."

Ty Lee struggles to smile. She manages a quite bright one that hopefully covers up her doubts and fears. "You've always been crazy. Violent, sadistic, power hungry, controlling, a lot of other words that are ugly even though you're super pretty. But I've always loved you anyway."

Azula slips out of the bed, shoving Ty Lee aside on her way up. "That counts for nothing. You have never been loyal. You refused to act on that love until the last minute. And I am supposed to trust that you won't go chasing after a man?"

A man. A man. A man.

Of course it comes back to this. Somehow, it always does.

"Why do you hate that I've been with men so much," whispers Ty Lee, averting her eyes to show some submission. She does not want to fight.

"I hate it, because I wish you had a shred of self-respect. See, I value myself and my body so the only thing I have ever been with a man is annoyed."

Huffily, Ty Lee dares to protest, "It doesn't matter if it's a man or a woman. I don't want to be with anyone but you. I never do. I never could. No one compares to you, Princess. When you love someone, you never cheat."

"And how," icily demands Azula, crossing her hands over her bosom, "am I supposed to know that you love me?"

"I would do anything for you, anything to prove that," whispers Ty Lee. "I will love you until the day I die."

"Until they day you die? Could you honestly stay true to one person for all of that time?" Azula huffs.

"For you, yeah," says Ty Lee, finally telling the truth. She means that with ever fiber of her being and Azula sees it.

Yet, Azula has the aching suspicion Ty Lee lied about everything else.

So she coolly retorts, "Oh? I am not so sure. Someone who fucks both men and women would fuck anyone or anything."

Ty Lee gives up. She prefers to do that, rather than protesting or arguing with her fiancee. "C-can't you just hope we work out no matter what?"

"Hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have," offhandedly admits Azula.

Ty Lee crawls to the edge of the bed and tries to take Azula's hands in hers. The princess pulls away.

"Well, I hope we do," says Ty Lee despite the silent rejection. "I think we will."

Azula sits back down on the bed.

"This is why people say you are an idiot," the princess cruelly says.

Ty Lee furrows her brow. "I don't know what the… what the problem is?"

"Your problem is that you want to be loved. My brother suffers from the same affliction."

Ty Lee tries to hide the flash of pain inside of her. This whole bisexual versus lesbian thing has only been escalating to the point where Ty Lee is terrified that she will lose the most important thing to her in this world: Princess Azula.

Ty Lee caves, says the words Azula wants.

She will resolve this somehow.

[X]

At sunrise the next day, "Morning," sleepily says Zuko as he raises his steaming cup of tea in greeting.

"Please tell me you didn't hear us fighting," says Ty Lee, grimacing.

"You and Azula were fighting?" Zuko straightens up and furrows his brow. He hopes he will not have to intervene. Azula has been quite tame lately, compared to certain times in the past. Employing Ty Lee certainly helped with that, and if this arrangement breaks apart due to romantic entanglement, Zuko does not know what he will use as Fire Lord to replace it and prove to everyone his baby sister is under control.

Ty Lee sighs and huffs and puffs and sits down across from the Fire Lord.

"We fought all night. I mean, we could've sold tickets," she grumbles.

The Fire Lord is rather startled by Ty Lee's demeanor. No matter her struggles with Azula, she always has remained sickeningly optimistic and positive and bubbly. He thinks that might be what keeps her sane: staying happy even in the darkest times. Therefore, this makes him think perhaps that fight with Azula was something… significant.

"I didn't think she fought with people."

"Huh?" Ty Lee cannot imagine why Zuko would ever believe that nonsense.

He answers her question by saying, "She just destroys people who displease her usually. That's why I hired you."

"Oh, yeah, I know." Ty Lee has felt Azula's ire enough times to know that. But ever since they became so serious in their romance, things have been confusing.

"What happened?" asks Zuko, and Ty Lee launches into a high pitched, rambling story of romantic discontent.

Ty Lee loudly sighs and throws up a melodramatic hand gesture. She pouts and bats her eyelashes, a little more like herself, even if she seems far from bubbly and happy. "… but I don't know. I think she has a problem with me being with boys before and still, y'know, being okay with the idea of ever being with a boy and stuff. Like I'm going to wake up one morning next to the woman I love and think what I need right now is a good old male pounding."

"Please stop telling me this," says Zuko in an uncomfortable monotone.

"You know how lesbians are."

"Uh… not really?"

She ignores him, and continues, "It's not like there's even a point in men. I mean in the pants. No offense."

"None taken."

"And especially after having sex with Azula. It's amazing. I don't think anyone could ever make me feel as totally amazing and bubbly and so hot like her. It's not like any guy is as satisfying as—"

Zuko raises his voice and says in an impressively commanding tone, "As Fire Lord, I am royally commanding you to stop talking about sleeping with my baby sister."

"Yes, I would also appreciate that," purrs a voice from the shadows that makes Ty Lee's blood run cold.

Ty Lee flushes. "Princess, it's so good to see you!"

She beams. Zuko wishes he were anywhere but here, but does not want to leave either. Something about this feels… pivotal, for lack of a better word.

"Do you make it a habit to gossip about me to my brother? Are you still a spy for him?"

"Princess, I never was a spy. I worked for him to keep… keep you in check, but that was a long time ago," breathes Ty Lee, but she knows it is futile. "I'm sorry about talking to him. I'll make it up to you. I promise!"

"Save your breath." Azula crosses her arms over her chest.

Zuko takes half of a protective step in front of Ty Lee.

"I'm not going to stand for this in my palace."

Azula snarls, eyes flashing at her brother, "Then sit down."

Zuko steps forward, fully in front of Ty Lee now. "I know how lesbians are but-"

Azula cocks an eyebrow, momentarily startled out of her glacial rage. She laughs. "What?"

Ty Lee gently pushes Zuko aside. "You're… you're scared I'm going to sleep with a boy. I've been with enough girls to know how some of them feel about that."

"You probably slept with half of Kyoshi Island before you became my fiancée, but that does not make you an expert on every woman. Do not pretend to know me, because you don't."

Ty Lee takes a breath. She wants to defend herself, but Zuko jumps in again, the noble and overbold man. Azula has often said that honor will be the death of him one day, and Ty Lee has often agreed with her on the matter.

"She knows you better than anybody else. That's why I hired her. That's why you're in love with her. And so that isn't a fair argument."

Azula hisses through bared teeth, "Zuko, stay out of this."

He takes a step back, and then another, and then leans against the table. Azula might be a bitch, but she is right that this is between her and Ty Lee. And maybe he can trust them to handle it without violence.

"Please just call me an idiot and be done with it."

Azula scowls and replies, "You're an idiot," and Ty Lee briefly looks wounded. "But love has a way of making us all look like idiots. All I want is for you to tell me the truth about what I asked you."

Ty Lee now knows Azula saw through her. Or maybe the princess is just as paranoid as ever. Either way, Ty Lee knows honesty is the best decision. "I did… half lie last night."

Azula does not lash out in violence, or scream, or break anything. She simply says in a tone as cold as the South Pole, "Confess," Azula orders, eyes molten gold. Ty Lee tries not to look at them, even though she loves them to her very core.

"Well, uh, if I'm starting at the beginning, I moved in here because my mom kicked me out of our house after I got the job working for Zuko and moved back in. It wasn't to try to win your heart."

"Why did your mom kick you out?"

"A normal reason."

"A normal reason?"

"It's like when you tell your mom you're going for a walk at the pier with your boyfriend and you come home with your lips swollen and your hair messy and your makeup ruined and she asks what you were doing and you say you were just at the pier and she says that's my boyfriend and you need to stay away you stupid whore and I sass her for the first time and tell her that maybe she should style her hair for once."

"That was a subtle way of confessing you were sleeping with men upon moving to the Fire Nation to work as an… extinguisher."

"Yeah… but after I slept with you, I no longer ever want to sleep with any man or woman other than you ever again."

"You aren't properly confessing. You are telling me you have always had options even here. That is worse. You think I don't have options? I have countless options. I could seduce anyone I wanted to. I could make someone fall in love with me when I don't feel a thing. I've done it before."

"Uh…" Ty Lee now looks truly terrified.

So Zuko interjects, with a brusque laugh, "Azula, you couldn't seduce a prostitute after handing her eighty gold pieces. If you don't stop treating the only person crazy and stupid and desperate enough to agree to marry you, you're going to die alone and unloved."

Azula snaps, "I've been alone and unloved all my life. What does it matter?"

But Ty Lee is the only person in this world who can tell whether or not she's lying. "You want to be loved."

Azula's eyes violently flash.

"Do not accuse me of such a thing," she snarls.

Zuko twitches to intervene but restrains himself.

Ty Lee trembles slightly as she whispers, "You wouldn't be worried about me cheating on you or leaving you, if you didn't want to be loved. And I love you. I love you more than I ever thought was possible. I've loved you since we were little kids and no matter who I dated, I compared them all to you, because you're the only person I've ever loved and ever will love."

Before Azula even speaks, Ty Lee flinches slightly as if something were thrown at her.

But in fact, Azula does not speak at all. The thing is, sometimes in life when the weasels close in and life gets complicated and arguments become stale, the only thing you can do is stop fighting the tidal wave and grab your fiancee by the shoulders and pull her into a messy, twisted, blue hot, biting kiss.

Ty Lee presses herself against Azula as the princess sets the palm of her hand on the small of the acrobat's back. Azula digs her nails in and Ty Lee sucks on the princess's soft rouge lower lip. Azula knots her fingers in Ty Lee's hair as they weave backwards against the wall.

Ty Lee touches her hand to Azula's face and presses her thigh between Azula's legs as the kisses deepen.

A mortified Zuko croaks out, "Please get a room. Any room. Any room that is not this room."

They ignore him.