Sad part about the wait - this chapter was already written. Sorry, guys!

Chapter 15: Green Grass

Playing pretend
I shouldn't hide it
It isn't right
Being a liar
I'm crossing the line
Dancing with fire,
When I'm not fine
Should I deny it?

My feet didn't believe it when they hit solid land after almost six months of being at sea; it meant that I was nine months into my training. My feet could hardly remember stepping foot onto Kyoshi Island or even leaving the Fire Nation. My feet didn't revel for too long because the rest of me was too worried about Iroh.

"Sir, are you sure that you're ready to be back on your feet?" I was practically on the general's heels. It'd been less than a week since he'd almost drowned and he still seemed a little breathless. He wasn't weak by any means—I was just being cautious. Soldiers rushed by us carrying provisions, setting up for two months of land training. The desolate sands of Red Sand Island were quickly turning into a bustling sea-side tent town.

Iroh deftly dodged my feet and worried hands as he walked down the plank. "Huo, I told you, I'm fine! Go do something else for a change. You know what? I'm giving you the day off today and then you can mother me morning 'till dusk tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day...deal?"

I smiled up to the handsome general and was kind of okay with the fact that he thought I was a mother. Maybe he's seeing my feminine side. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing anymore. My one-year contract with Iroh was almost up and I had enough money saved away to start my own life in Republic City. I didn't think that staying another year in the military would be good for me, what with all of the anxiety of being found out.

"Deal," I said with a nod. "In the meantime, what should I do?"

He looked around. The wind whipped his perfect hair around his forehead. He took a deep breath and was alive. That was all I cared about. "Why don't you go meet some of the other younger children? None of them are seconds, like you, so you'll have to remember that. But it'll be good to be around boys and girls your own age."

I wanted to tell him that I technically was hanging out with people my own age but I kept my mouth shut. Another voice filled the silence for me. "Huo!" Sakari's voice shouted out through the forest. I turned to see the woman running towards me. Her tall, muscular body was clad in casual clothes and her hair was pulled up, accentuating her sharp but beautiful features. A few of the men around me chuckled and patted me on the back before nudging me in her direction.

Iroh just smirked, shook his head, and patted me on the back too. "You know," he said as he shook his head, "I always thought she batted for the other team."

I felt a little irate and disgusted that they—especially Iroh—were encouraging a twelve-year-old boy to fool around with an older woman. She had to have been twenty-five, maybe more. Double my supposed age. She knew how old I was in real life but it still bugged me. And what does "batting for the other team" mean?

She knelt down to hug me a little too tightly. "I missed you! Let's go get some lunch, someplace fancy. On me. I've got a change of clothes for you in my tent." Her wink sent a wave of relief through me.

Thank the spirits! It'd been almost six months since I'd last been able to take off my breast bindings. Besides for a few minutes in the shower, at least.

We walked along through the pathways of tents. Behind us, Iroh's dozen ships were lined up along the waterline. Makeshift docks had been made to hold them all. Men were running around like scurrying little pill-ants after a rock had been picked up and they were given light from the sun. The further out we went, though, the less movement, the less men and women there were.

She pulled me along to her rather secluded tent. When we were inside and alone, she laughed and pulled me into the tightest hug I'd ever had. Standing almost a foot taller than me, my feet weren't even touching the ground. "Huo! I'm so glad you've made it this far! Who knew a woman as beautiful as you could pull off passing as an adolescent boy?"

I flushed and cleared my throat as she handed me my clothes. Iroh's words came back to me. You know, I always thought she batted for the other team. She made me feel a little nervous whenever I was around her. Especially when she expected me to change in front of her. She seemed to appreciate me just a little too much. "I, ah, I just learned really well, I guess."

"Hurry up and change so I can introduce you to some of the girls." She must've seen my hesitant look because she said, "Don't worry, none of them will know who you are. And Iroh knows I've taken you for the day. So, are you ready for a girl's night out?"

The grin that showed on my face scared me a little. "Oh, you have no idea."

HHH

We ended up around a campfire sometime later. While it wasn't much different from my normal evenings, this one was full of girlish glee. I felt a little out of place after so long surrounded by men. Everyone was wearing makeup and normal female clothing. I was in a loose kimono that was too long, too wide, and didn't flatter me at all. In a way, I missed the baggy clothes of guys and just sitting and not talking.

Girls liked to talk a lot. I guessed that back in Jang-Hui, I'd never really had to be a girl. I was always working or practicing my breathing and meditation or running away from the terror that was Bujing Gao. Now that I had to deal with it, I realized that I was really out of place. Being with guys all the time tended to make you think a little more like one, too.

"Sorry the restaurant wasn't that great," Sakari said as she poked the fire with a stick. The other girls around her whose names I'd already forgotten nodded in sentiment. "I forgot how little this town was. They never have enough to feed an entire ship, let alone ten of them! Night's not wasted though." From behind her back she pulled out a few bottles of some kind of hard liquor.

I scrunched my nose up in disgust. Li had tried sneaking me some hard stuff after-hours before and it tasted like I was drinking gasoline! I much preferred the softer wines, especially the dessert ones that came with cakes and sweets in the officer's mess. "I'm not so sure that's a good idea."

"Nonsense!" She popped the cap anyway and held the bottle out to me. "This one tastes like strawberries."

"I do like strawberries..."

The girls and I enjoyed plenty of the delicious drink as we talked about girl things that I hadn't realized I'd missed. The night went on and the fire dimmed (until I bent them up a little too haphazardly a little later in my drunken state) and we just relaxed. My breasts thanked me for every second out of the trap they'd been succumbed to.

"So, Huo, where're you from?" one girl asked.

Everyone looked to me with wide, drunken eyes. I didn't realize how drunk I was until I had to say something rather specific. "Jang-Hui," I said without thinking. I slurred a little, too. How strong is this drink?

Sakari pushed the bottle to me and I took another gulp, feeling warm all over. "Oh, yeah? That's the outskirts of the Fire Nation, right? What was it like?"

A small depression fell over me. The feeling was a lot stronger with the effects of the alcohol added in. I had flashbacks of the day that we were attacked—bodies piled up around the festival square. Bodies piled underneath the platforms under the rivers. Blood, everywhere. Huts burned to the ground. My voice was a little dead when I said, "Poor. Desolate. A group of Equalists killed all of the benders before I left."

One girl, a younger one, looked at me with wide eyes. "But you're a bender! How did you get away?"

I wrapped my arms around my bent legs and sighed. "General Iroh and his men were stationed there. He saved us all. I got away, d—" Disguised myself as a boy, and became Iroh's ship's boy! I covered my own overstep with a yawn. "I got away, joined the fleet, and that's that. I don't want to make this a sob-fest, though. Someone else take a drink." I shoved the bottle off to another girl who happily took another swig. We were on our fourth bottle or so between eight girls—so a lot of alcohol. I didn't know how I'd feel the next morning.

"Who do you serve under?" another girl, this one older, said with narrowed eyes. "I've never seen you before." The other girls offered up nods.

Sakari must have noticed my panicked look. "She works up in communications. Poor girl never gets out of the office." She picked my hand up, entwined our fingers, and kissed my knuckles.

A hot flush ran through my body and straight to my face. "Y-yep," I stuttered, pulling my hand from hers and running it through my hair which was down and around my shoulders. "I'm a work-a-holic, I admit." The alcohol must have done more of a number on me than I'd thought. It seemed like Sakari was flirting with me. Girls didn't flirt with other girls...did they? They also don't kiss other girls knowingly full on the mouth...multiple times. Unless they batted for the other team.

It seemed more commonplace than I'd thought, but the fact that another woman found me attractive was something that I'd never considered. I remembered seeing multiple same-sex couples on my journey...I didn't have a problem with it, it was just different. But I definitely wasn't one of them. Sakari's advances actually made me a little nervous and uncomfortable. Also, fraternization was against the rules.

"So Huo, did you have a man back in Jang-Hui?" The girl who asked this got hit a few times by the women sitting around her, telling her that it was 'rude' and 'unfeeling' to ask a such a question.

I laughed a little into my own hand. "Yeah, right! Jang-Hui was a town full of degenerates. My dad and great-grandfather were trying to marry me off before...it happened. But I was getting ready to run away before they could."

"Life's not like that on the mainland," one woman, obviously a Firebender, said. She stared into the fire intently. "Women have so much more freedom nowadays. It sounds like your town was locked in the days before the One-Hundred Year War."

I picked at my kimono a little. It was plain but beautiful and comfortable to wear. I was starting to miss the pants a little. Just a little. "Yeah, you're right. My great-grandfather used to live on the mainland. He was forced to move away and somehow wound up in our little wasteland of a town. He never changed. He treated me like property. Like I was nothing. Just like he treated the other women in my family. My mom was the only one who stood up to him. I guess I've gained that trait now that I've been out on my own for a while." Not that it matters to Bujing Gao anymore.

It was times like that that I wondered where human souls went when the mortal body died. Was my mother watching over me from Agni's temple? Was my great-grandfather watching from Koh's den? Was my father stuck in some limbo in the middle? I liked to think that human souls found their own way in the spirit world. It was too depressing to think otherwise.

The conversation finally turned away from me after that. I could feel myself getting drowsy and sleepy. I leaned against Sakari after a while and noticed her lay her head against mine. She laid a small kiss on my forehead and that woke me up almost instantly. Woke up and sober up were two different things, I realized later, because I definitely wasn't sober.

I shot to my feet and said, "I should probably be going. Iroh'll wonder where I've been." My feet stumbled a little and I hadn't realized what I'd said until every girl's eyes were on me. Sakari groaned and facepalmed, leaving a big red mark on her forehead.

"Why's Iroh going to be waiting for you?" the same distrustful soldier asked. The other girls put up their declarations of surprise and confusion, blinding my ears for just a second before I caught my balance.

The blush on my face burned hotter than our fire. "Well, I, uh..."

One girl giggled. "Are you his girl for the night?"

My drunk brain took a second to catch up to her insinuation. My whole body was an inferno. "What? No!" Then, my brain made me shout, "Iroh has nightly girls?!"

"It's just a rumor," a different girl, one I'd never heard speak, say with a mischievous smile. "But he takes a girl at every port. Usually the same one, if he can help it. He is such a gentleman, though. Treats them to dinner, ravishes them completely, and sends them off with a fire lily and a kiss." Everyone sighed in content. "What I wouldn't give to see what that man hides behind doors!"

As Iroh's ship's boy, I had never seen him take another woman into his quarters. I realized that I wasn't always there, but I figured that I would know if Iroh was sleeping with a woman! It made me mad to even think about it. I didn't know why, though. Iroh didn't belong to me—Koh, he didn't even know I was a woman! Still, I liked him. There was no doubting that I was attracted to the full-of-honor Prince of the Fire Nation with his schooled knowledge, his dashing good looks, and his strange, wealthy ways that I still couldn't seem to understand.

I know what's behind those doors, I thought as I excused myself from the ladies to walk off to...I didn't know, actually. And it's wonderful. Sakari called after me but my drunken, confused brain ignored her. As I wandered the woods, I thought on how handsome and kind he was. How powerful and strict he was when he had to be. How caring and loving he was to the ship's boy he thought of as a brother.

The thought of being loved as a brother to Iroh brought on a wave of nausea. Either that or the alcohol running through my system. I sat down on some stump in the middle of nowhere and took a few deep breaths to calm my rolling stomach. I reminded myself that my attraction to Iroh was wrong and that I would never be able to do anything about it.

I was just a peasant pretending to be someone I wasn't. If Iroh ever found out...well, I figured that he would be crushed. He wasn't the kind of man who would allow himself to be lied to.

"Oh, hello." I looked up and my heart stopped as I recognized the voice and eyes of the man in front of me. "Who're you?"

Genji. Oh, no! A few other officers were behind him. I must've been on the correct path to the ship, but I hadn't realized that I was still in my women's garb and not my boy's disguise. "Oh, hello! I'm sorry, I was just taking a rest." I stood up quickly and let my hair cover my face. That was a bad move, though. I stumbled and he caught me, somehow appearing right there, his arms around me.

"You don't look okay, Miss." I looked up to see his bright green, almost olive eyes staring at me with concern and a little bit of recognition. His hands guided me back down to my sitting position and he just stared at me for a minute. Genji, never one to show much emotion, only widened his eyes when something clicked in his brain. I cursed under my breath and that seemed to steel him. He looked back to the soldiers behind him and said, "You men go on back. Remember, duty starts at eight a.m., no matter your state in the mornings."

Some of them groaned. At least one made a lewd comment. I just pretended I didn't hear them even though my ears were on fire. "Thanks." He knelt down next to me and stared at me again in a way that made me sigh in defeat. He just waited. I looked at my feet for a short while and kicked the dirt a little with the toe of my sandal. The silence dragged on. "What do you want me to say?"

"Who are you?" he asked the second my last word was out of my mouth. His words were harsh and biting. He pushed on my shoulder and tilted my chin up, simply looking at me. "Shit, Huo...if that's your real name. You're gonna be in a lot of hot water if you get found out."

I stared at my good friend and put my hands on the side of his face, trying to keep it from blurring into more than one hims. "I'm a little intoxicated at the moment. But what I'm gathering is that you aren't going to tell anyone?"

He was silent for a long time, just looking at me. One hand gently came up to brush a strand of hair behind my ear. I felt myself blush because Genji wasn't a bad looking guy. He was fit and intelligent and he treated me with respect. "No. I'm just wondering how you passed as a scrawny twelve-year-old boy for so long. You're actually kind of pretty, Huo."

"Gee, thanks," I deadpanned.

"No, I mean..." Genji groaned and pushed his perfectly-kept hair back. "Look, your secret's safe with me. I always knew that there was something weird about you. Now everything just makes sense. Let's get you out of those clothes, though, before someone comes by and—"

"Lieutenant," came the one voice I did not want to hear at that point. I was sobering up a lot faster with all of the scares of my being found out. Iroh was standing between two young saplings in some casual clothes but he still held an aura of command around him. "Is everything alright? Your patrol came back without you."

"Yes, sir," he said simply, his gloved hand coming to grasp mine. His was large compared to mine, but no so much as Iroh's had been. "I was just escorting this young lady home. She was lost in the woods and I volunteered to help personally. As an officer should."

The man I'd come to know smiled widely at his Lieutenant. "Of course. I've trained you well, Lieutenant. It won't be long until you've been promoted." Then Iroh turned from a beaming Genji to look at me. I blushed and tried not to meet his eyes. "I hope you return home safely, my lady. Lieutenant Genji as a loyal and trustworthy man. You'll be safe with him."

When I didn't say anything, Genji elbowed me a little in the side. "Y-yes, General. Thank you."

He about said something but stopped, instead staring at me intently. Genji saluted his general and turned to give me a kiss on the forehead which surprised me. "Let's get you home, little one."

"Wait, Lieutenant." We both stopped and half-turned to Iroh who was staring at us seriously. "We've gotten a missive from Republic City. The Avatar has requested our help in fighting the Equalists. Round up any men you can find. And if you see Huo, I need to brief him on the situation. The ship will leave at eight a.m. sharp. Anyone not there will be left behind."

I almost followed Genji's salute but stopped just in time. "Yes, sir!" Then he grabbed me and said "Let's go!" under his breath and pushed me into the underbrush.

Yes, please! I practically tripped over myself trying to get away from Iroh. If Genji had figured out who I was, Iroh definitely would have in a second. We walked quietly through the forest in a round-a-bout route toward the ship. "Thank you, Genji. I can't tell you enough how much this means to me."

My friend nodded and gripped my hand tighter, that of which he'd never let go of. "Well, I'd expect you to do the same for me, too. How old are you really, anyway?"

"Nineteen."

"You're older than me?" he asked with a scrunched up nose. "Ugh. I guess that explains everything, then. You being all high-and-mighty, I mean."

I used my hip to bump him from his path a little. He didn't stumble near as much as I did. "You're awful cocky for a guy who's been fooled by a girl for almost a year!"

He readied to playfully punch me like he normally did but then he pulled back. He looked conflicted. "Huo...why? Why would you want to be a man? I mean, just thinking of you in the showers with us and the head..." He looked a little green around the gills at that thought, actually.

"I never saw anything, I promise!" I squeaked. I had to clear my voice to stop it from cracking again. "I just...guys get everything. Like just now, you, the brave, strong man had to help me walk back to my fake home which doesn't exist because I'm a woman. If I were Huo the boy right now, you'd just slap me on the back and tell me to walk it off before I went back to the ship!"

"You could have just joined as a woman," he said, still sounding hurt. "You didn't have to lie to everyone."

I stopped us both and put my hands on his taller shoulders. He may have been younger than me by a year or two, but he was still larger. He was a man and I was a woman—just another difference between us. "Look, Genji. I'm sorry, okay? I ran away for my own safety. Not telling anyone was just keeping me safer. I'm running from the Equalists...and, well, to them as well, I guess."

Suddenly I was pulled against him. He was sturdy and well-built, if not a little skinny, but this was normal for an Earthbender. He laid a soft cheek against my head. "Those stories, then. The ones I've been hearing about your family being killed? It was the Equalists?"

I pushed him away and couldn't help but glare. I wasn't a different person just because I was a girl. "Don't treat me differently, Genji! I'm still Huo. Don't give me any pity, either. I chose my fate. Now I'm training to help rid the world of those scum. So don't you dare treat me like I'm some delicate flower. You don't get to do that. You hear me?"

He stared at me for a few moments in a way that made me feel a little bad about my rant. Finally he relented and slapped me on the back a little harder than necessary. "You're scary as a woman."

I just let out a nervous laugh and shoved him away from me. "Yeah, well, I have to be to get some respect around here. Now go get me some clothes."

"Yes ma'am."

"I'm gonna pretend you didn't just say that."