Toph listened on, pretending to nap as her daughters, four year-old Suyin and ten year-old Lin, were talking to each other. Hearing them talk without screaming or shrieking at each other was a welcome relief for their mother – the two girls hardly went through a day without fighting over something as petty as a soap dish.
"Yin-yin," Suyin lisped, "I 'ave a joke!"
Toph heard her elder daughter giggling. Lin was exactly like her mother – abrasive and stubborn – but she was also quite serious and brooding, preferring to spend her time reading or training earthbending all alone. She watches over her sister, as her mother told her to, but when all three of them are at home, Lin preferred to lock herself up in her room and be quiet as a ghost. Right now, however, she was obviously enjoying her time with her younger sister.
"Okay," Lin laughed. "What's your joke?"
"What is a pig with a fork?"
"What?"
Suyin clapped. "A poo poo!"
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"I 'ave another joke, Yin-yin!"
Lin was trying to steady herself – her sister had just started school, and already she was cracking jokes so bad they were funny. She wondered where Suyin got them – as far as Lin knew, the only guy to crack corny jokes in their family was Tenzin's Uncle Sokka. "Go ahead, Su – tell me!"
"A guy was at a shop he brought some lobsters and said to the man: aaaaaah! It's a crab," Suyin leaned towards her sister, then whispered: "And the other man said, 'that's not a crab, it's a orange pencil."
"What?" Lin giggled as she helped her little sister up. "Come now, you have to get your afternoon nap."
Suyin pouted. "But Mommy said – "
"Mom's napping too, Su," she interrupted. "So you gotta get your afternoon nap and then Mom said we could go to Aunt Katara's and play."
"Okay – but I 'ave another joke," Suyin smiled.
"Fire away."
"Yin-yin, do you like ice cream?" she asked.
Lin failed to see the joke, but she humored her little sister nonetheless. "Yeah, of course."
"If you like it so much, why don't you marry it?"
Both girls were startled as they heard their mother heartily laughing from her room.
Suyin looked at her sister. "Mom is acting funny."
"I know."