That evening, both girls emerged dressed, made up, and with waves from Katara's expert water-bending, and with only the slightest hint of liquor on their breaths. Jet and Sokka were seated together in the visitors' wing sitting area, cracking jokes, which stopped as they stood when they saw the girls.

"Well, hello, my love. May I say that your beauty crashes over me like the waves on the beach, never-ceasing time and time again." Sokka leaned over and kissed Suki's knuckles.

Suki laughed and looked at Katara, "See? Dorky, but I love him." She wound her arms around his shoulders.

"Of course you do, that's why you married me!" he dipped her into a deep kiss.

"I'm sorry, I don't have a smooth line like that prepared, but you do look beautiful, Katara." Jet leaned forward to peck her cheek.

"Oh believe me, it's quite all right." Katara giggled at her brother being, well, her brother, as Suki giggled. The intervening hours where her conversation had turned less serious and much less dignified as their hits from the whiskey bottle grew, had not cleared Katara's mind and seeing how sharp Jet looked in his very nicely tailored suit wasn't helping.

The four moved toward the main ballroom and waited to be announced. She saw Aang and Toph, who had apparently come together, according to Suki, out of awkwardness of not wanting to come alone. Katara waved, but Aang turned away and Toph, of course, couldn't see. She would catch up with them later.

They were introduced and found seats across from Aang and Toph for dinner.

"Well, hello, Sweetness, I thought you would have to be up at the Fire Lord's table and" Toph cut herself off, "That's not Zuko sitting next to you."

"Uh, no, my name is Jet. We met briefly in Ba Sing Se." Jet looked like he was deciding if he should hold out his hand and Katara saved him by pulling his into her lap.

"Right, I remember you, I just thought our Sugar Queen here would have been with Sparky, not you." She leaned back and crossed her arms as the silence spread.

Katara had the distinct feeling that Toph had known she wasn't her with Zuko, but had wanted to create the awkward tension, little chaos breeder that she was.

It was Aang who broke the silence, "Katara, Suki, you both look great tonight. It's good to see you again." After this, the conversation flowed easily. Well, for most of them. At first, Katara thought that Jet wasn't talking much was because he was the outsider with her friends, but even when the floor was open for dancing, and it was just the two of them, the conversation was stilted and awkward.

He went to get them a drink and, as she felt as sense of relief watching him walk away so she could have a few moments alone to collect her thoughts, a voice rasped behind her, "May I have this dance?"

Spinning to find Zuko behind her, holding out his hand, she nodded. "I was beginning to wonder if you were ever going to speak to me again." Katara whispered as she allowed herself to be pulled through the steps of the dance.

"I was jealous and mad, I'm sorry. It just took a couple of days to get past it." He twirled her, "but you're smiling tonight and you look gorgeous and I can't be mad at you for making a choice to be happy." He picked her up and set her back down a few paces later. "We don't have to be awkward and serious about this if you don't want to."

The silence hung for a few more beats and then they both started to laugh. The conversation carried them through two more songs before Katara even thought to wonder where Jet had gone. Missing a step in the dance, it caught Zuko's attention, "What's wrong?"

Stepping back from her dance partner, she looked around the room, "I just realized, I should have remembered sooner, Jet went to get us a drink and then he just never came back." She kept turning, taking in the entire ballroom.

"He's by the door to the gardens, Katara." Zuko nodded to Jet's location and Katara spun on him, angry. "Hey, it's not like I've been watching to see if he was watching us, I just notice things in the room, part of having an uneasy childhood is keeping track of the people who have reason to dislike you."

"He doesn't dislike you, Zuko." She sighed, "And he didn't deserve this."

"You okay?" Zuko set a hand on her shoulder, which she shrugged off as she saw Jet turn and walk out the door.

"Yeah, I just need to go talk to him." She set off across the dance floor and ducked out the door.

"Hey," She sat down on the step next to him and noticed both glasses that he had gone for were empty and sitting next to him.

"Hey," He smiled at her and held out his arm for her to shuffle closer. He smiled down at her, "Why did you agree to have me escort you here tonight, when it's obvious after watching you two for three minutes that you're in love with Zuko?"

She leaned away from him, staring up at him.

"You don't have to apologize, I just am curious. I definitely shouldn't be here, Katara and I'm curious if I was part of a revenge thing because he pissed you off or if you're just as innocent as you always were and you didn't realize that he's just as in love with you." He rubbed a hand absently up and down her arm. "And if it's the revenge one, I'm totally open to taking it a step further if you are."

Setting a hand against his chest and pushing herself away, Katara looked him in the eye, "Jet, it was not a revenge thing." She leaned back into him, "Everyone else seems so sure that he and I would be great together and I guess I didn't realize it might be true until he wasn't talking to me because of this situation and how much I've missed him."

"Well, I guess you've got two choices," Jet ran his hand through her hair, "You can go talk to him and declare your feelings and live happily ever after. Or…" He cupped her cheek and guided her to look at him, his breath ghosting over her lips.

"Or?" She challenged back.

"You can pretend that you don't know he's watching from behind you right now, don't look, just trust me," He shifted his fingers under her chin to keep her focus, "and you can kiss me and it'll buy you time to figure out how you feel."

"Jet," she shifted so that moving close didn't bring their lips closer and gave him a hug, "thank you, for understanding and offering to be so helpful in other ways if I wanted it." She pulled back, "is he still watching?"

"No, he saw you lean forward and went inside. Can I still write to you?" He twirled a strand of hair around his finger.

Extricating his hand from her hair and slowly standing, Katara smoothed her skirt, "maybe let the dust settle for a little while. But I don't want you to be a stranger, Jet. You have a good head on your shoulders now, you're not the boy you used to be and the world needs more people who are willing to learn from their pasts."

He stayed on the ground and watched her walk away, "Bye, Katara."

"Bye, Jet."