Mama's Girl
It wasn't easy growing up the only child. A series of excerpts from the childhood of Lin Beifong. Toph/Sokka, Rated M.
When Aang asked Toph and Sokka to come to Republic City, it was Lin's fourth birthday. She squirmed in her mother's lap as Sokka read the Avatar's message again, his voice slow and clear, his weight shifting between both legs.
Toph didn't know, but Sokka wondered – as he read – if Aang knew that the letter would be read in a room with a child they had parented out of wedlock. The thought made his eyes glisten and he thanked the spirits that Toph was blind. With the threat of a light now – of someone knowing and seeing their lives and their mistake, embodied quite unfairly in a bouncy little girl – Sokka felt ill. Certainly he did not care to share these mistakes with Aang or Katara, but the imminent end of this game was fast approaching, and Sokka's embarrassment suddenly became tangible. It was funny in a pathetic way that he could feel no guilt sleeping with Suki, or taking his son and daughter to the park, or telling them he loved them. But he felt guilty at the thought – even the beginning of the thought – of having Aang and Katara judge him. Aang and Katara, who might as well be the symbols of purity and love and everything else that clicked correctly in the world. Meanwhile, here he was, reading a letter to the blind girl he had entertained while married and the daughter she had given birth to alone.
Toph kept her head steady and listened to him without reacting. When he finished, she stated simply, "I don't want to," and placed an antsy Lin on the floor. Sokka began speaking but she cut him off, surprising him. "I like my apartment here," she continued. "I like working for the school. I'm comfortable. There's no reason to move if they've gotten this far alone."
"Maybe you're right."
"You don't want to go either." Toph faced him, her opaque eyes wide and watery. It occurred to him that it was possible she felt the same way. He knew she was proud of her life and her daughter, and she never admitted to feeling any regret or shame over what had passed on either of them, but she was breaking. Sokka could feel the cracks and fissures, the new tone in her voice, the way she regarded Lin with an alertness that was deliberate and new. He frowned and scooped Lin into his arms, breathing deep for that familiar smell. Lin was each dream he had wanted with Toph, each secret wish they found themselves selfishly revealing after sex or after food, each primal longing embedded in their union. She was what was forbidden: a family, or the bud of a family, a symbol of their lovemaking that would live and breathe and move as any other living thing. She smelled like the sea, salty and muddy, like bread before baking. But she was restless and strong, and he released her from his grip almost as quickly as he had picked her up.
"I don't want to go," he confirmed, controlling the shivers in his throat. "But I think we have to. This isn't an invitation to a party. It's an obligation… We have to. It's a responsibility."
"I know what 'obligation' means," she reported, but cynicism had taken the place of hostility. "They've been away for years. We built our lives without them. And moving to a big city..." She paused, her attention shifting to Lin. "It's not this simple."
He said, with hope, "Maybe it is," and attempted to smile, but his stomach was tight. He threw his arms over his chest and watched Toph stand up, her back to him. She filled a glass with water from the steel pump at the sink and drank slowly.
"I don't want to," she repeated. "Maybe I'll end up going eventually, but you have to go first. We can't go together. Or I go first. I don't know."
Lin said, "Mama, where are you going!" Toph handed her a papaya juice box, one of Sokka's treats from this morning, and picked the girl up. Lin didn't oppose to Toph's grip, and Sokka found himself jealous and simultaneously surprised at his jealousy. When she was younger, Sokka had been the favorite, but now the tide was shifting. He was sure that if he left, Lin would forget him. Toph was careful that Lin called her father 'Sokka' as opposed to 'Baba,' a courtesy that was necessary, but that stung nonetheless.
"Lin-Lin, we aren't going anywhere," Toph explained to the girl. "Sokka is leaving."
Lin looked at Sokka, her lip wavering, before turning to her mother again. She took the straw from her mouth and asked, "Is that true?"
"No, it's not!" her father exclaimed, abruptly animated. He broke out into a goofy smile and reached for her. "It's a joke! Got you! Ha!" He growled and Lin giggled. Toph picked up the juice box from the floor as Sokka spun his daughter in the air. She felt at ease – she always felt at ease hearing his laugh, no, their laughs together – before she remembered she would have to face Katara soon. The suspicions had been there for years, she knew, but there was no doubt that Lin's physical appearance would give something away. Genetics and time were against her, and Katara, already a mother of three, would know right away.
So what? Toph thought to herself. The worst that could happen was a judgment, which, objectively, wasn't all that unfair. She had slept with a married man, had his child, and she was in the wrong. But Aang and Katara couldn't punish her any more than her own parents could. Any disapproval would be a sideways glance that she couldn't see anyway, and then what? Lin would be safe with her, safe with Sokka, and what was important was that Suki was still in the dark. Sokka's family was important to Toph, as much as she disliked the situation now, and if they were smart, they could prevent it all from unfolding like unbaked pastries between their hands. They just had to be smart.
She could control it. She had to. The fact that the chaos would be within her reign and analytic ability gave her peace, and she focused on Lin's laughter now, the way it swung like piano keys. Sokka's laugh was big and clear, a bunch of plates breaking at once, and Toph laughed too, unaware of her own laugh, delicate but strong, a wind blowing through broken chimes.