Note: The title "Somewhere Only We Know" is based off the a song of the same name by Keane.
I would also like to blame my first onscreen major character death on chocolatelova. CHOCOLATELOVA. All caps just to drive that home.
Somewhere Only We Know
Winter
There were places only they knew, places that were theirs. They were secrets, treasures, precious moments bottled up in memories.
In Ba Sing Se, it was the back balcony of the Jasmine Dragon where the views of the sprawling city often brought Katara a sense of both freedom and longing. In the Fire Nation capital, it was the private beach that hid behind the palace. There the ocean was bluest and the sands largely untouched. In Republic City, it was on the top of a hill on Air Temple Island that was surrounded by a forest. Their favorite tree grew there, its thick trunk a perfect place to sit beside as they basked under the shade of the great maple's branches.
The last one was in the Southern Water Tribe, a place Katara now walked to.
The breeze was warm that day, as warm as it could ever be in the middle of a South Pole winter. The snow was powdery under her soft fur-lined boots. She wished she was young and small enough to penguin sled because the terrain was perfect.
But the truth was, she was sixty-seven years old and though she could take on more men in a fight than she could care to count, sledding down a few icy slopes without much control was not something she was particularly ready for.
The light refracted off the white of the snow, and she glanced up to see the sun at the peak of the sky. Midafternoon was a welcome time of day. Bright yellow rays of light ribboned down to the horizon line that appeared before her, their glow limning the cliff edge that she walked up to.
The silhouette of her husband sat cross-legged near the point of the cliff. The bright blue of the sky was a stark contrast to his shadow. The ocean waves below them lapped against the icy shore. It made for a tranquil scene, one where the sun was the highest and the man she loved under the light.
Katara sat next to him. She glanced at him, seeing the open way he gazed upon the sea. He had not been meditating.
"A copper piece for your thoughts?" she asked. She nudged his shoulder with her own.
Aang turned to her, a soft smile forming on his face. His silver eyes sparkled in the daylight in a way that only his could. It was as if all the stars were captured in the way he looked at her.
"Why all this?" Katara started with a tentative voice. "Right now? You're acting like there will be a big change coming soon." She gestured behind them where the expanse of land stretched far away from the capital. "You telling Sokka to build a training compound here, you reminding the White Lotus members of the tribe that their most important duty to the Avatar is to search for and watch over the next one…None of this makes sense."
Aang did not answer. Instead, he placed a hand atop hers.
She moved to get a response out of him again. "Aang—"
He pecked her cheek. "I just…want to make sure that we don't make the same mistake again," he said. "That the Avatar can live a normal life and still be protected without the threat of war."
Katara sighed after a few minutes of silence. "Okay," she said, and nothing else.
The two of them watched over the waves as they crested and crashed. White seafoam rolled onto the floes.
After a time, they made their way back to Sokka's home hand-in-hand. Appa roared at their appearance and stomped his six legs with an agitated grumble. He had been waiting for them for too long, it seemed.
Her brother had been tending to the bison. He held a brush in one of his hands. He waved them over.
"You two ready to go back to Republic City?" he asked. He raised his eyebrows. "It's getting pretty late."
"Yeah, we're ready," replied Aang. Katara nodded in agreement.
Their things were already packed onto Appa's saddle. It was no wonder he was so grumpy. He must have felt weighed down.
Katara embraced her brother, and they said their goodbyes. She started to turn away to board Appa, but not before she caught Sokka and Aang's exchange.
The two men looked at each other for a long moment. Neither of them spoke a word.
It was her brother that broke the silence first. "Take care of yourself, buddy," he finally said. He patted Aang on the shoulder.
Aang smiled. "You too, Sokka," he replied.
When Aang met her in the saddle, he was happy. So was she. Katara did not think much of what had just occurred.
Spring
It was dawn, and so there were hardly any people awake and on the streets of Ba Sing Se. This was a good thing since Katara and Aang had chosen to stay in the apartment above the Jasmine Dragon.
The simple and modest furniture was not new to either of them, as they lived in a similar environment at their home. However, the fact that they were in the Earth Kingdom and were not immediately thrown into the extravagance that the Earth King often insisted on bestowing upon "the Avatar and his friends" was a feat in and of itself.
She stood alone on the balcony that overlooked the city. Her elbows rested on the banister. A cool breeze wafted past her, and she could smell the delicate scent of the blooming cherry blossoms in the courtyards that enveloped them. Their beautiful pink petals were a welcome sight among the buildings of such a sprawling metropolis, and their blooms in the middle of such modernity were like fickle reminders that the past shaped what she now saw.
She heard a click-clack of footsteps. She had left the doors wide open after all.
"Oh, hey Twinkle Toes," came Toph's scratchy voice from the inside. She had been eating a breakfast that Aang prepared for them at one of the tables. "The rice porridge is good. You outdid yourself."
Aang laughed. "I don't know about that."
"Well, I think you did," she claimed. "Take the compliment. I don't give those often."
There were more murmurs and jokes that Katara could hear snippets of through the doorway. Then, she heard the creaking of a wooden chair.
"Sorry to cut this short but I gotta go," said Toph. "I need to check up on the metalbending academy that was set up here, and morning lessons are about to start. That idiot Shan has been teaching them the wrong forms."
"Don't want you to miss out on knocking a few heads together."
"You bet," replied Toph with a snort. She paused. "Say hi to Lin for me and don't…upset Sugar Queen too much."
Katara almost stormed inside indignantly, but she stopped when Toph added, "I'll punch you extra hard if you do."
She walked to the center of the balcony where she could peer inside. Toph tossed her a greeting and left through the exit. Aang began clearing the table of the dishes.
Katara watched Toph's back through the windowpane as she disappeared. The clinks from the porcelain were the only distraction to her thoughts.
She went to assist Aang with the tray, but all she could think about was how Toph never showed much affection. This time she had.
Summer
"I don't have much time left."
The words were sudden, heart-stopping. Her bare feet were dipped in the warm waters on the shore already. The sands crept between her toes. She had hoped to wash the stickiness of the humidity and heat off her. Summer in the Fire Nation was just as remarkable as she remembered it to be.
Katara swiveled around. The skirts of her light blue dress flowed around her legs. She saw Aang standing there about to join her in the water. His trousers were rolled up to his knees. The walls of the palace rose behind him in arcs and graceful slopes.
He had wrinkles around his eyes that had deepened recently. His walk slowed.
"I know you know, Katara," he said. He stopped just shy of being within her reach. "It's been something that I couldn't tell you outright, but you know me…and that's how I can tell you know."
She stumbled and he caught her. She grasped for his fingers. She held onto him.
She did know. He was right. For months the truth was a constant inkling at the back of her mind. He left her clues, puzzle pieces that she could slide together when she gathered more of them. No, he could not have told her. She had seen the tremors across his skin, the faltering steps on the stairs, the downward quirk of his mouth when she asked to check over him with her healing abilities.
He could not have told her because he knew her too. He knew her fear. They had feared for each other.
That afternoon she remembered what Aang had told Zuko as they parted ways. Zuko was on his way to a council meeting and Aang was on his way to spend the day with Katara. For once, he had not visited for political reasons.
"Forgive yourself, Zuko," Aang had said. "And then, your people can forgive themselves too."
Zuko's smile had quivered. He bowed low. His hand and fist were propped in the shape of a flame. "I won't ever forget that advice," he had replied.
He took a moment to convince himself to leave.
On the beach, Katara did not let go of Aang. She placed her ear on his chest and listened to his heartbeat.
Fall
They were on their hill. The golden leaves of the forest below shone within the twilight. Red, brown, orange, yellow. Their branches swayed in the winds that whistled in the tors. Air Temple Island never looked more magnificent than it did in the autumn.
"Gyatso told me I was born on the day of the autumnal equinox," Aang said. His head lay on her lap, and she cushioned it with her parka. The shade of the maple tree her back leaned against dappled his face with speckles of dimming sunlight. "It's a spiritual day, especially for the Air Nomads."
Katara hummed. She stroked his arm. "That's today, isn't it?" she asked. Though, she knew the answer. They had celebrated his birthday as a quiet affair every year. Though, he had insisted that the Air Nomads always did this in a communal fashion in which birthday feasts were held at the beginning of each month so that no one was ever singled out for long.
She felt Aang nod.
"Happy birthday, sweetie," she whispered. "Today you're sixty-six. One hundred sixty-six. You're an old man."
Aang chuckled, then shivered. The air was crip and swirled around them. The leaves rustled.
"I want to find you again," Katara said. Her voice shook. She was a silk thread about to snap. She let out a breath she did not know she was holding.
"You don't need to do that, Katara," responded Aang. She felt the tips of his fingers brush against her cheekbone.
She glanced down at him. "Gyatso found you again."
He held her gaze as if searching for something. "Then, if you find me, can you teach me again?" he asked. He grinned.
He could have been asking her for anything. There were times when he asked to make a dozen fruit pies with Bumi and Kya just so they could use them for a good prank on the Air Acolytes. There were times when he asked to use those same pies in an airbending lesson with Tenzin. "It's an ancient Air Nomad tradition, Katara," he would explain with a teasing smile. Though she disapproved, she had always somehow agreed.
And though their children were now grown, Aang could have asked her for any other ridiculous thing. A mango yogurt drink on the pier, if he could bake rolled purple yam cake for dinner, if he could take her out onto a boat to dance under the stars on a random weekday.
She realized that he asked her for permission to make her happy. Because even now, Katara was not familiar with childhood.
"I'll find you," she spoke. She struggled to keep the tears at bay. "I'll find you and I'll teach you to be a better waterbender than me. But I want you to promise me something too."
His smile widened.
"Don't leave me forever."
Something told her to hold both his hands and she did so while never looking away from the life in his eyes.
"I love you, Katara," he said. The words were a trembling whisper on his lips. "Don't forget that I love you."
The world was a quiet specter. And so, when he left her, he was quiet too. His breath was a lament on the breeze. His every last moment was fixated upon her. He did not look away from her either, as if he were drinking her in. He shuddered once, stiffening, then stilling. He slouched in her lap. His hands slipped away and fell on his chest, on his side.
For a second, his eyes and tattoos glowed.
At long last, Aang was Aang, not the Avatar. He was a human without a spirit. To many that would seem unremarkable, but not to her.
He left on a sigh.
Katara bent forward. Her breath hitched. She pressed her warm lips to his cooling forehead, his cheek, his own lips. With shaking fingers, she closed his eyes.
He could have been sleeping, and that was what struck her as the most unfair. He could have been sleeping.
She did not know what happened next. She thought she could vaguely recall Tenzin meeting them at the crest of the hill, asking if either of them wanted dinner soon. Eddies of color blurred her vision, and someone was wailing.
Katara realized too late that it was her.
The day was cold on the tundra of the Southern Water Tribe. Even for Katara who had grown up in frigid temperatures and harsh winters, it was the kind of cold that sank into her old bones.
She needed to escape for a while and leave the capital behind. Too many people kept asking her questions and for help. She just wanted to rest. She was tired. She felt the years begin to catch up with her.
She hummed the tune of one of Iroh's favorite songs. "Winter, spring, summer, and fall," she sang under her breath. The seasons came and went.
She trudged up the hill that led to where she wanted to be. Relief settled upon her when she knew she was close. She just wanted to be alone for a while. Then, she would return to Kya's over-worrying and the White Lotus's pestering.
She stopped in her tracks. She tilted her head when she spotted something unusual up ahead.
A tiny shadow interrupted the white of the ice.
As if on cue, the shadow spun around. It was a little girl that did not yet reach her hip. Her dark hair was tied high in a ponytail and bunches of it were bound at the sides of her face. Her parka was a little lopsided and her boots seemed too big for her feet.
"Lady, this is my secret spot!" shouted the girl. Her hands were on her hips.
"I…never expected to meet someone here," Katara replied, stunned. No one had come to the cliffside before. She was not sure if people knew it existed.
"How did you find me?" the girl demanded.
"I wasn't looking for you. I don't even know your name."
She puffed out her chest. "Korra," she said with pride She stuck out one of her hands and held up all her fingers. "I'm five!"
Korra seemed to come around quickly and had gone from mistrust to trust in mere seconds. The situation was so absurd that Katara could not help it, she burst out laughing. It was difficult not to when the antics of a young child were so admirable.
Korra pouted and rolled her bright blue eyes. She placed her hands on her hips. "I think you were looking for someone," she said importantly. "Like a student?"
Katara stopped at the sudden assertion. Her eyes widened. "What would make you think—"
"You're a waterbender," Korra interrupted. She looked earnest. "Can you teach me?"
Katara stared at the little girl. She had not waterbended at all since she met her.
"But—"
"You can't break a promise!"
Katara smiled a genuine smile for the first time in years. "I guess not," she said. She fell into step beside Korra. "You don't seem like you break promises either."
Note:
-The mango yogurt drink is based on mango lassi, which is an Indian yogurt drink.
-The purple yam cake is based on ube cake, which is a cake made of purple yam from the Philippines.
-The rice porridge Toph eats is based on Chinese congee.
