Author's Notes: This is based on the fabulous Switchfoot song of the same title. 'Tis very sad, and I suggest you listen to it, if possible (as I am at the moment). May I also warn you that this involves character death and much sadness/angst, so if you're not in the mood, I suggest leaving it for a later date. I, however, was in the mood for some well-earned tears (bumped my head on the table and didn't even cry, whoah), so I pulled this out of a very dusty folder and attempted to polish it up. And, here we are!

Review, if you would!

Alisa

Just Him and Her

Yesterdays

Sokka was surprised at the number of people that came. Aang and Katara, of course, and Iroh and Zuko too, and Hakoda, after Katara asked him. Suki, the Council of Generals, Bumi, even. The Bei Fongs, understandably, and so many other people. Scores of people, from the Earth Rumble tournaments, from Ba Sing Se, from the remotest corners of the Earth Kingdom, from the Fire Nation, even. People, so many people, all for one person.

Toph.

Sokka couldn't help but notice how pretty she looked today, though especially pale. Especially pale—the thought the laughable. Her face was unadorned, but Sokka liked it better that way—she looked more like Toph. Her hair was in its usual bun, looking especially black. Because it's clean, he thought, and that was almost laughable too. She was wearing her Bending clothes, though Katara had repaired any tears or holes and cleaned them meticulously, in tears the entire time. They looked especially green. Her feet, though, he noted, were still coated with Earth, and if he had had the will, Sokka would have smiled.

But Sokka didn't smile, because no matter how pretty Toph looked, that still didn't stop her from being dead.

Dead.

Sokka hated the word, hated what it meant, hated what it would mean tomorrow and the day after that and the days after that for the rest of his life. He hated what it made him feel and he hated what it made him remember.

He could still see the small look of surprise she had worn when the arrow entered her chest, could still hear the small exhale of air as she fell to the Earth. He could remember the feeling of lead in his legs as he ran to her, could remember cradling her against him as she struggled to take in air. He could remember her breathing his name against his neck, could remember her eyes drifting closed as she exhaled for the last time. He could remember the fighting going on around him as he hugged her and cried. Sokka knew he could never forget.

He felt tears prick at his eyes as he looked at her lifeless form, wanting nothing more than to look away but not being able to. She looked so small, so tiny on the pedestal of rock Aang had created for her—so unlike the Toph he knew, the one with the larger-than-life personality and a larger-than-life ability. This girl, looking so peaceful and calm, she wasn't the Toph that Sokka knew.

A hand touched Sokka's elbow and he jumped. It was Katara. People were beginning to file past the pedestal to pay their last respects to the once-mighty Earthbender. Sokka followed his sister and the Avatar with a sense of growing horror in his heart and numbness in his limbs as the line grew shorter and shorter in front of him.

Sokka could tell that there were tears running down his cheeks, but he didn't need to feel them to know—he could tell by the salty taste in his mouth and the aching in his stomach. It felt as if he was crying every last feeling of joy or hope out of his body, despair and regret drowning him, drowning the very life out of him.

Sokka ran a hand over his face and wiped his tears on the edge of his tunic—they left a damp spot that slowly seeped and spread. It reminded him vaguely of the exhaustion he felt coursing through his body, a weariness that only spread and grew the longer he laid on his cot. Curling the damp cloth in his fingers, Sokka followed Katara and Aang up the small steps to where Toph lay.

He felt his breath hitch as he looked at her. She looked like a little girl, not the fourteen-year-old she was—had been. The fourteen-year-old she had been. He heard a stifled cry next to him and noticed his friends for the first time.

Katara's face was stained pink and two thin trails of tears wound down her cheeks. Her lips were moving, but nothing was coming out. Sokka knew she was apologizing. Next to her Aang was clenching his fists, tears flowing down his cheeks unchecked—he was trying to control the Avatar State, to remain calm, Sokka recognized dimly. They stood very close together, and Katara's fingers were digging into Aang's upper arm in a viselike grip.

Sokka looked away as they said their last goodbyes—he wasn't ready to say goodbye just yet. Aang and Katara walked away, slowly but surely, and then it was just Sokka and Toph. But, he mused, wasn't it always that way? Sokka and Toph—the Dynamic Duo. He smiled—faintly—and repeated the title out loud. It sounded right.

People were shuffling in the line behind him, and he knew he didn't have much time. He leaned over her, his face above hers, a teardrop sliding off of his nose and landing on her cheek, and brought his lips down on her forehead.

Sokka pulled away quickly, startled. She was so cold.

He had kissed her like that once before—a friendly little peck on the forehead, his nose in her hair and her skin comforting under his lips—but she had been warm then, warm and sweet-smelling and protesting and very much alive. Now—now she was just cold.

Biting his cheek, Sokka lowered his lips to her forehead again and inhaled her scent. He could smell the heavy perfumes her body had been washed in, but under that, and more familiar, was the smell of Earth, strong and clean and so very Toph.

He pulled back and brushed away the tears that had fallen on her cheeks. It made her look as if she had been crying, and Sokka hated to see her cry.

Taking her hand in his, Sokka knelt next to her, ignoring the silent parade of people marching on the other side of her. Instead, he focused on a soft fold in her clothing and breathed. His voice came out high and rough when he spoke.

"Toph, I… I'm here to say goodbye. To say goodbye and to say that… I love you. I never told you that, did I? I guess I thought we would have more time together, to actually talk about that sort of thing, but… but just know that I love you. That I'll always love you. And… I miss you already, and I'll always miss you, and I wish you hadn't left, but… it's not your fault. You didn't want to leave either."

There was the quietest choked sob from above him, and Sokka jerked his head up to find Lady Bei Fong looking down upon him, two thin hands (Toph's hands) pressed against her mouth. Wide, tearful eyes peeked from above her fingers and Sokka knew she had heard every word he had spoken to her dead daughter. But he didn't care; Toph wasn't here and it didn't matter anymore, what Lady Bei Fong thought or Lord Bei Fong thought or anyone thought. Right now, it was all about what Toph thought, and she wasn't in a very talkative mood.

Sokka slipped his hand from hers, heat lingering on her skin from his own body, and let his fingers trail listlessly over her white lips. Lady Bei Fong was weeping openly now, he could hear, and she fell to her knees, her hands tight around Toph's arm as if letting go would make Toph's death real.

Knowing this was the last time he would ever be near Toph, ever see her, ever touch her, ever smell her, he leaned in, his lips brushing against her dark hair as he whispered thinly in her ear, "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. Just… I love you. Wait for me."

His pressed cold lips against colder skin for the last time, and stood up abruptly. Lady Bei Fong was now being ushered to her feet by her husband, who was whispering calmly in her ear as he led her away, and Sokka followed them from the platform. Katara slipped her arm in his when he stood next to her, and Aang wiped at the tears still streaming from his eyes with the heels of his hands.

The line passing Toph dwindled, slowly, and then died. Now everyone was standing in the sharp winter air, shuffling, whispering, crying, waiting for the burial to finish. Aang moved forward now, his face hard and set as he approached his Earthbending master and friend, and it wasn't until he was slipping into his horse stance did Sokka realize what the Avatar was doing.

"Wait!"

His own voice startled him, just like the fact that his legs were carrying him forward. He didn't regain control of his body until he was leaning over Toph, one hand shoved deep into his pocket, eyes fogged and misty, throat tight and painful. He pulled the necklace out of his pocket, and he didn't need to see to tell that the entire assembly was watching him with baited breath. But he didn't care.

His slipped the necklace around her neck with a small, choked laugh that he himself did not understand. It looked nice, he decided, pale jade against pale skin. It would have matched perfectly with her eyes.

"I made this for you," he informed her, touching the round stone gently. A tear spilled from each eye as he blinked. "I was going to give it to you later, once the war was over and once I finished the carving, but… I want you to have it now. You do want it, don't you?"

He waited, breathless, before a painful dart in his heart reminded him that she wasn't going to be replying to anything he would say to her for a long time. It was strange that he thought she would, and he wanted, faintly, to laugh at that, too.

But instead, he returned to his place next to Katara. Aang turned and looked at him for one long, painful moment with a look of raw regret, sorrow, remorse (everything that made him remember he wasn't the only one suffering), then turned back to the pedestal he had raised Toph on. It took two swift movements to encase her in a tomb of stone, and another to sink the tomb deep within the Earth, right were she would have wanted to be, never mind that he would have preferred her in his arms where she really belonged.

Dust settled, and the ground was smooth and bare. It was strange, the idea that Toph was now residing under his feet, and Sokka didn't like it in the least bit. Then the crunch of stone filled the air, and where the tomb had rested was a slab of stone, strong and secure and just a little rough around the edges, like Toph (had been). Katara's fingernails dug into Sokka's skin through his shirt as Aang fell to his knees in front of the stone and began etching into it with a finger. Sokka didn't want to know what he was writing.

And then, like that, it was over. People were moving about, finding family members, leaving the grave. Back to their lives, their friends, their everyday problems. No war to fight, no friends to comfort, no regrets to cry over every day for the rest of your life. Sokka wished it was that easy (they were the lucky ones), but it wasn't.

Aang walked over to them, steps heavy, shoulders stooped, and Katara tucked the hand that had been cutting through Sokka's arm into Aang's hand, tears pooling again. Sokka hated seeing her cry—it always made him want to cry, too.

One foot in front of the other, toes dragging in the dirt, and Sokka found himself standing over the stone that marked the once-great Earthbender. The inscription, bold and simple and probably perfect for Toph, blurred around the edges until Sokka couldn't discern one symbol from another. Hands shoved deep within his pockets, he blinked his eyes hard and sighed, and for the first time in three days, his breath came out a steady, strong stream of air. Tears which were undoubtedly soon to return had, for the moment, been quelled, and Sokka stood in this personal victory. For the moment he was numb, and he was slowly finding he preferred it this way.

And yet, like a bruise he couldn't help but touch, the sore feeling in his heart remained, flexing with every beat of his heart. Every day, he knew, every day for the rest of his life, he would regret not telling her. Even holding her dying in his arms, he hadn't done it, and now it was too late. He never told her he loved her, never got the chance to hold her in his arms, never had the opportunity to press hot lips together, never did anything brave like she did, and now he would live the rest of his life wondering what would have happened if he had.

Holding her in his arms, crimson blood seeping through her clothing, arrow shaft creating the strangest sight plunged into her chest… what would have happened if he had said something the day before? What if he had kissed her after they had eaten the handful of berries he had picked? What if she had loved him like he loved her? What would have happened if she had lived?

Sokka didn't know. All he knew was that she was gone. All he knew was that he would remember her like he remembered yesterday.

After all, all he had left of the girl he loved was yesterdays.